First time druid seeks advice

[Blackhawk748]

now i have never played a druid before but i have seen them played and i am aware that its almost impossible to screw up im just looking for general advice here.

Right now im a lvl 1 lizardfolk druid who has a swindlespitter as his companion and i am quite durable and capable of fighting in the front lines.

[FleshrakerAbuse]

Any reason for lizardfolk? It's better not to have LA. Buy it off if you can later.

Use druids not as melee at low levels. You use be dumping str and dex, but maxing wis and con. Focus on having your swindlespitter ranged damage with you, so you can do battlefield control and debuff. This means entangle, obscuring mist for escapes, and using produce flame if needed. Later, get things like frost breath, saltray, and blinding spittle. Summon animals to use as tanks to help rogues flank and stuff.
Basically:
Entangle to open, have animal acid.
Switch to summoning. Wolves are good for tripping.
Finally, ranged damage.

Melee starts at 5th. Before then, be a caster.

[Blackhawk748]

he still has an 18 Wis, but his Str is 16 and his Dex is 15 so hes still pretty good

I should probably mention i rolled his stats

[eggynack]

Swindlespitters are pretty good. Just toss an entangle out there, and have the thing punch them in the face, and most things aren't going to be able to take it. You should probably dump strength and dex in favor of con. When you get to level 5, you get wildshape, and you can replace your strength and dex with the animal you become's strength and dex. Your con bonus to hp stays the same though. Before that, you shouldn't really punch things that much. Your animal companion is already a more proficient melee guy than most things at that level, and you're not really helping that much. As long as you have good wis and con, and take natural spell at 6th, druid builds are indeed pretty impossible to screw up. They don't have the worst chassis for punching things, but it's a really low priority compared to the other stuff you can do.

[Blackhawk748]

i switched his Str and Con around his stats are as follows

Str 14

Dex 15

Con 16

Int 14

Wis 18

Cha 10

EDIT: this is after racial modifiers

[eggynack]

That looks about fine. Your stats are crazy high though. You could probably punch things reasonably with them, even as they are now, though shooting entangle at stuff is probably a better course of action, because that spell is crazy buns. Produce flame is also nice, especially when you need to deal damage.

edit: Though you should consider switching lizardfolk out for human or something. You're taking 2 rhd and +1 LA for limited benefit. You'd be better off by a longshot just playing a 4th level druid. You're barely losing anything, and you get better spells, and access to wildshape faster.

[Urpriest]

i switched his Str and Con around his stats are as follows


One thing I want to be clear on: is this a character that you're already playing at the table, or a character you're still making? If the former, how much is your DM allowing you to change? If the latter, how much do you feel it's important not to change?

[Blackhawk748]

i havent played him yet, and we are playing with lvl adj buyoff and hes not making me take the RHD, also he took Ashbound as his 1st lvl feat

Edit: things id rather not change, his race, as we are playing as leaders of kingdoms and i like leading lizardfolk, and thats about it

[Urpriest]

i havent played him yet, and we are playing with lvl adj buyoff and hes not making me take the RHD, also he took Ashbound as his 1st lvl feat

Level Adjustment buyoff will be nice later, but as-is you're still saddled with LA +1 since you can't buy it off till 3rd level. Are you guys starting at ECL 1 or ECL 2?

For all that everyone is saying on the subject, at this level you're not actually terrible at melee. Your spells will be better, but on low priority combats where you don't want to waste spells feel free to walk in and flank with your animal companion. Your stats are good enough that you can afford to. Just be aware that in a few levels you won't be keeping up.

Keep in mind that once you do get wildshape AC is tricky. You'll want some idea of how you're going to be boosting your AC in wildshape, either via barding or Wild armor or spells like Luminous Armor. Druids can get a very high AC, but you do need to work for it, and without effort you're very easy to hit for primary melee.

[eggynack]

Even without RHD, it's still quite a bit more mediocre than just a regular old druid level. Buyoff is probably a good idea at some point, as has been noted. It's not cripplingly bad though. Ashbound is a neat feat too, because it makes early summoning actually worthwhile to some extent. Greenbound is probably better, but if you don't want to be cheese filled, ashbound is likely what you should stick with.

[Blackhawk748]

good to know, does anyone know i Lord of the Tides is any good? it looks kinda fun

[eggynack]

It looks pretty meh. You're losing a level of casting, wildshape progression, animal companion progression and there's a feat tax. In return you're getting is some flavorish desert abilities and a decent elemental summoning power eventually. By the time you can summon a large elemental once a day though, you'd already have 6th level spells (Skills mean you can't enter till 6th, so you're at level 11 when you get the power). You can just summon huge elementals, except they can be of any type. It just seems kinda mediocre.

[GenericMook]

It looks cool, but doesn't really add much to you doing your druid shtick. You get additional elemental summons, and some things that aren't too great. The capstone seems really lackluster, too. I'd say it's not worth it, overall.