Too good to be true Druid Build

[Grams]

I was tasked to build a fourth level character for a 3.5 UnderMt campaign. After a few hours of hatching away at the character sheet, he seems to be absurdly overpowered.(especially the companion) I feel like I'm missing something important or perhaps not and maybe suggestions on what to hamper.

Overview/idea: He's a Goliath Druid with an Ape companion. They both wield huge darkwood morningstars (2hands) and both take advantage of long range companion Share Spell with Shillelagh/Brambles spells.

Here's the stats.

4th level Goliath Druid Variant
Str 18 (+2 race)
Dex 14 (-2 race)
Con 18 (+2 race)
Int 15
Wis 18 (+1 level 4)
Cha 13
---
HP: 38
AC: 18
F:8 - R:2 - W:8
---
Feats: 1 Natural bond (offset ape -3), 3 Companion Spellbound (30ft buffs)
---
Weapon: Huge Morningstar (2hands) mw
+8hit / 3d6+6
--- --- --- --- --- --- ---
Animal Companion: Ape (6 HD)
Str 23
Dex 16
Con 14
---
AC 23
---
Feats: 1 Light Armor Proficiency, 3 Simple weapon Proficiency, 6 Imp Toughness
---
Weapon: Huge Morningstar (2hands) mw
+11 hit / 3d6+9
Armor: Dragonhide Chainshirt
--- --- --- --- --- --- ---


Just at face value, my ape is a better fighter than the fighter PC we have by a large margin by #'s alone. And vastly better than myself at melee aswell, though not too shabby. AC is a tad low...

The **** really hits the fan when I Share Spell either/both Shillelagh and Brambles, as my ape wields a huge morningstar as well.

The weapon damage we can dish out buffed with both spells @ level 4 is:
(Flanking)
Me: +12 hit / 6d6+11
Ape: +15 hit / 6d6+14

Total: 12d6+25 - I've ran this through a die roller and the average is in the low 100's. Every round. Just one combo hit would be enough to kill any CR creature in our party levels level range.


I know it's not a pun-pun or other stupid powerful optimize builds, but this still seems a bit absurd. Especially since I'm only accounting just raw damage. Not other spells/wildshape/nature spell/powerful wildshape grappling/magic items, ect.

Seeing as how I like this character for RP reasons, that I did not go into, I'd hate to see him get Greater Teleported into orbit after the first encounter.

I'm defiantly not the most versed player... and this is my first druid. However, I have been playing d&d every week for two years. And I have built my fair share of characters and check every bit of math via books/erratas. The only thing that seems to be a bit hazy are the animal companion feats. The PH says they gain feats per HD just like a player would though...


Anyway, I know druids are Tier 1. Is this just overwhelming on paper? Have I screwed up somethings on my synergies? I just don't want to be leagues above the other PC's and/or focus fired by my DM. Will the +1 LA from Goliath level me out later?

*edit* The other characters include a buffer cleric, a straight fighter... and warlock. I'm pretty fluent with ToB and trying to sway the fighter to take warblade instead.

[cakellene]

I thought Powerful Build would only allow you to use a weapon one size larger, not two.

[Grams]

you can wield a 1 handed weapon 1 size larger with two hands

[cakellene]

you can wield a 1 handed weapon 1 size larger with two hands

Is there an attack roll penaalty for doing so?

[eggynack]

The thing you're missing, or maybe not missing, is that druids are absurd. You know they're tier one, but what you may or may not know is that unlike wizards, or even clerics to some extent, they have that position while completely outclassing low tier classes in their own specialty. Other tier one classes just generally do things that are better than beat sticking, while druids do that, but also beat stick. You don't even seem to be optimizing all that hard, using a +1 LA race, and quarterstaff fighting optimization, which are good but not great. I haven't checked the numbers on your build yet, but I wouldn't be surprised if they were completely accurate. Also, animal companions do in fact get feats.

Edit: Actually, your projected damage/round is off by quite a bit. 12d6+25 will come out to 67 damage on average, and that's after wasting a bunch of spells and actions on buffing.

[Spuddles]

Morningstars are not wooden weapons, so are ineligible for brambles. The are not a club or quarterstaff, so are ineligible for shillelagh. Brambles only lasts 4rounds. By the time you make an attack with it, you have three rounds left. Except of course companion spellbound breaks the action economy all to hell.

Your ape is not proficient with weapons- how did you give him proficiency? I'm guessing via bonus HD?

It's definitely very strong, though I dont think the LA would be worth it for me on a druid, esp cause goliath does nothing for a druid past level 5.

[Grams]

Is there an attack roll penaalty for doing so?

You incur the -4 to hit penalty if you use a large one handed weapon only if you choose not to use both hands.

A large longsword in two hands has the exact same stats as a medium greatsword.

[eggynack]

It's definitely very strong, though I dont think the LA would be worth it for me on a druid, esp cause goliath does nothing for a druid past level 5.
Well, it does give you goliath druid substitution levels (RoS, 151), but I think those are kinda a downgrade in general, so your point stands. The 6th level trade is a non-trade, but it doesn't do anything that I would use. However, I think that powerful build stacks into wild shape, so that could help. Not much, but maybe a little.

[Grams]

Morningstars are not wooden weapons, so are ineligible for brambles. The are not a club or quarterstaff, so are ineligible for shillelagh. Brambles only lasts 4rounds. By the time you make an attack with it, you have three rounds left. Except of course companion spellbound breaks the action economy all to hell.

Your ape is not proficient with weapons- how did you give him proficiency? I'm guessing via bonus HD?

The morningstars are made of darkwood via SRD. But I did overlook that clause on Shillelagh. I guess I just read it's prereq as brambles. That helps cull the damage quite a bit.

And yes the ape has 3 feats via 6HD.

[superjudas]

Ok assuming 3.5 since I do not know pathfinder.
Shillelag can be cast on a nonmagical oak club or quarterstaff, not on a morningstar.
Brambles can be cast on a wooden weapon, not morningstar.

Your ape does not have 6hd but 4. When you choose ape your druid level is at -3 because the ape is stronger than those you can choose at level 1. I do not think natural bond works here, but I am not 100% certain.

Your ape can not use huge weapons without penalty because he has not powerfull build. He can use a large weapon.

I think you can only choose extra feats from the bonus hd, not the starting feats at hd 1 and 3. But when he get to hd 6 you should be able to choose a reasonoble feat (what the dm permits)

Finally if you come to a fight, casts two spells, then flanks somebody and then dish out your calculated damage in the low 100 ( actually 12d6+25 is on average 67 damage, I would not count that as low 100:) )
You are looking at two rounds of casting, and then maybe one round to set up a flank. And the you can hit. That is not overwhelming since combats tend to not last many rounds.
But that being said, druids are great, animal companions are awsome even without any optimizing other than choose the right companion.
We do not know if you are overpowered until you have told us about the other characters you are going to play with

Edit: way to slow hen writing on the ipad:smalleek:

[Know(Nothing)]

Even without miscalculations, straight druid will be leagues above most anything for the first 12 levels or so, unless people in your group are making a concerted effort to optimize. Fighters probably won't ever catch up.

A good way to contribute as a druid without walking away with the game is to play a controller role. Use your animal companion and summons to flank with the fighter or rogue, use your other spells to slow and control enemies but not obliterate them. You can hang back with the wiz/sorc/other currently-squishy-caster and play bodyguard if need be. If your animal companion is out-shining the fighter too much, have it hang with the caster instead.

A druid is an army. To keep your fighter relevant, find yourself relevant things to do besides fighter-ing.

[eggynack]

Considering it further, I would say that this druid is decent, but not nearly to the levels of borkedness it could be hitting. As spuddles notes, you're sacrificing a hell of a lot to pull this trick off, and you're not getting much out of it. You'd be far (far far) better off being a 5th level character of a normal race, taking these same feats, and applying them to your fleshraker animal companion, before casting venomfire on it, as well as you, because you're also a fleshraker. That's pretty basic super damage optimization. I'm not really a fan of using druids for insane damage optimization, preferring a plan based on careful spell use, but it is what it is.

Edit:

Your ape does not have 6hd but 4. When you choose ape your druid level is at -3 because the ape is stronger than those you can choose at level 1. I do not think natural bond works here, but I am not 100% certain.
It does, in fact, work in that manner. Your other comments seem accurate though.

[Grams]

Ok assuming 3.5 since I do not know pathfinder.
Shillelag can be cast on a nonmagical oak club or quarterstaff, not on a morningstar.
Brambles can be cast on a wooden weapon, not morningstar.

Your ape does not have 6hd but 4. When you choose ape your druid level is at -3 because the ape is stronger than those you can choose at level 1. I do not think natural bond works here, but I am not 100% certain.

Your ape can not use huge weapons without penalty because he has not powerfull build. He can use a large weapon.

I think you can only choose extra feats from the bonus hd, not the starting feats at hd 1 and 3. But when he get to hd 6 you should be able to choose a reasonoble feat (what the dm permits)

Finally if you come to a fight, casts two spells, then flanks somebody and then dish out your calculated damage in the low 100 ( actually 12d6+25 is on average 67 damage, I would not count that as low 100:) )
You are looking at two rounds of casting, and then maybe one round to set up a flank. And the you can hit. That is not overwhelming since combats tend to not last many rounds.
But that being said, druids are great, animal companions are awsome even without any optimizing other than choose the right companion.
We do not know if you are overpowered until you have told us about the other characters you are going to play with

Edit

The morningstars are made of darkwood as per the SRD. But you're right about Shillelagh.

I agree with you on feats only applying to the bonus HD.

And the Ape can wield a Huge one handed weapon in both hands at no penalty.


The other characters include a buffer cleric, a straight fighter... and warlock. I'm pretty fluent with ToB and trying to sway the fighter to take warblade instead.

[Spuddles]

Dont go venomfire fleshraker- that's just abusive. Fleshraker with natural bond is pretty strong cheese. I mean, just for the sake of everyone at the table.

A barded (that's armor for animals) ape companion two handing a club with spikes/bramble and shillelagh on it is pretty good optimization. Almost unfair to the fighter, but remember your ape only has 2 int.

[Treme]

You incur the -4 to hit penalty if you use a large one handed weapon only if you choose not to use both hands.

A large longsword in two hands has the exact same stats as a medium greatsword.

This rule has come up at our table a few times and I'm never sure how it turns out! Posting here to see if someone can respond definitevely as all I can see from the SRD is

A creature can’t make optimum use of a weapon that isn’t properly sized for it. A cumulative -2 penalty applies on attack rolls for each size category of difference between the size of its intended wielder and the size of its actual wielder. If the creature isn’t proficient with the weapon a -4 nonproficiency penalty also applies.

[Spuddles]

Darkwood only affects the parts of weapons made of wood- the head of a morningstar is steel and unaffected by darkwood.

You want something like bronzewood, from eberron. Unfortunately, for weapons, it costs like 500gp/lb, which makes it enormously expensive for huge weapons.

Finally, druids are not proficient with morningstars. They are proficient with a very small list of weapons, actually.

[Grams]

Darkwood only affects the parts of weapons made of wood- the head of a morningstar is steel and unaffected by darkwood.

You want something like bronzewood, from eberron. Unfortunately, for weapons, it costs like 500gp/lb, which makes it enormously expensive for huge weapons.

Finally, druids are not proficient with morningstars. They are proficient with a very small list of weapons, actually.

I'm glad I posted here. I screwed up quite a few things...

I changed over to huge wooden clubs to allow for both of those spells and proficiency. At a loss of a couple d6 damage.

[superjudas]

The morningstars are made of darkwood as per the SRD. But you're right about Shillelagh.

I agree with you on feats only applying to the bonus HD.

And the Ape can wield a Huge one handed weapon in both hands at no penalty.


The other characters include a buffer cleric, a straight fighter... and warlock. I'm pretty fluent with ToB and trying to sway the fighter to take warblade instead.

The srd tells us that morningstars can not be made out of darkwood. Only wooden or mostly wooden weapons can be made out of darkwood. And I do not think it replaces the iron when you are making darkwood spear, you only replace the wooden part of the weapon with darkwood.
Does anybody disagree?

[Spuddles]

Dont feel bad OP- I worked on a few extremely similar builds for years. Literally years. I spent a lot of time book diving.

Brambles/Spikes are awesome spells, esp. because my group uses the 3.0 version of spikes. It lasts hours, not rounds.

[eggynack]

Dont go venomfire fleshraker- that's just abusive. Fleshraker with natural bond is pretty strong cheese. I mean, just for the sake of everyone at the table.
Oh definitely. That's the kinda power you only pull out at certain tables. I just like using venomfire fleshraker as a theoretical high point on druid damage builds. In this case, it was meant to indicate what a truly "too good to be true druid build" would look like.

[Crake]

You incur the -4 to hit penalty if you use a large one handed weapon only if you choose not to use both hands.

A large longsword in two hands has the exact same stats as a medium greatsword.

Thats... not how it works. A large one handed weapon is a two handed weapon for a medium creature, you can't just "choose" to wield it with one hand. And even if you wield a large one handed weapon in 2 hands, you still incur a -2 penalty for wielding a weapon that's too big for you.

[Chronos]

Yeah, if you're trying to wield an oversized one-handed weapon as a one-handed weapon, the "penalty" is "you can't do that at all". You have to use two hands just to make it possible.

You can probably use appropriately-sized (Large for both of you) greatclubs, though, if your DM rules that Shillelagh works on them.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

An animal companion begins as a typical creature of its kind, so an Ape will still have Alertness and Toughness. You can pick one more feat to give it, so either simple weapon proficiency or armor proficiency, but not both because it has to have the printed feats for its 1st and 3rd HD. Note that it can wear masterwork studded leather with no drawback as there's no armor check penalty for it.

Put Unguent of Timelessness (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/wondrousItems.htm#unguentofTimelessness) on the weapons, their passage of time will be slowed by 365 times. When you cast your 4-round Brambles on those clubs, it will take 365 actual rounds for a single round to go by for them, so the spell should last 146 minutes at your current level. Shillelagh will last 24 hours and 20 minutes at your current level, so you'll only need to cast it once each day as long as you both stay within 30 ft. of each other.

[derninus]

Here's the stats.

4th level Goliath Druid Variant
Str 18 (+2 race)
Dex 14 (-2 race)
Con 18 (+2 race)
Int 15
Wis 18 (+1 level 4)
Cha 13


how many stats do you start with???
i count 51

isnt normal 28 or something?

[ericgrau]

I'm not sure unintelligent animals can gain weapon proficiencies. The animal type (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/typesSubtypes.htm#animalType) says "proficient with natural weapons only", and "proficient with no armor unless trained for war". Implying that animals don't learn to use weapons. And RAI is that they're too dumb and have too much difficulty communicating to be taught true proficiency. They could only wave it around randomly, meaning a -4 to hit. Plus isn't there another -2 penalty to hit for wielding an oversized weapon?

I dunno where you'd find a shop that has dragonscale shirts custom shaped for large apes. And normally expensive armor takes months to make, if not over a year. And if you say you've been doing such and such for a year, man o man all my characters could get such crazy gear with a year of crafting, or at level 1 even a year of profession, or etc. But actually if you were to play it through from level 1, none of these things are nearly as profitable as adventuring and you'd give up on them. Really your WBL should go down drastically if you try to pull such shennanigans, and in fact it's unlikely that a level 5 character has even been adventuring for more than a few months. Not to mention the difficulty of finding an ape for reference for the armorsmith when you don't even have one until the end of those months.

Natural bond can never make your effective druid level exceed your character level. I don't think LA counts, but HD does.

Buffs that take 2 rounds to setup are pretty irrelevant. By then most of the important part of the fight is already over. You are actually decreasing your damage-per-combat. As pointed out they don't apply anyway. And darkwood doesn't apply to metal weapons either. And shillelagh only applies to clubs and quarterstaffs regardless.

And others are noticing all kinds of things I missed. Like the feat selection.

Trying fixing that huge mess and reposting your stats so we can see how it looks. Making a couple errors or some fudging on what "RAW" says is pretty common, but wow this takes the cake.

[Asteron]

how many stats do you start with???
i count 51

isnt normal 28 or something?

Some groups roll their stats and use different ways to roll to avoid bad rolls. This is entirely dependent on the group and the monsters/obstacles may be stronger to reflect the higher stats.

Honestly, though, it doesn't matter. It doesn't change a single thing about the build if he is lying and his DM will certainly make sure that he is playing by the rules. If he isn't lying, it still doesn't matter. The build remains the same.

[Urpriest]

I'm not sure unintelligent animals can gain weapon proficiencies. The animal type (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/typesSubtypes.htm#animalType) says "proficient with natural weapons only", and "proficient with no armor unless trained for war". Implying that animals don't learn to use weapons. And RAI is that they're too dumb and have too much difficulty communicating to be taught true proficiency. They could only wave it around randomly, meaning a -4 to hit. Plus isn't there another -2 penalty to hit for wielding an oversized weapon?

Look at literally any other type. They all say something like that, even the humanoid ones. That's just the proficiencies given by type.



I dunno where you'd find a shop that has dragonscale shirts custom shaped for large apes. And normally expensive armor takes months to make, if not over a year. And if you say you've been doing such and such for a year, man o man all my characters could get such crazy gear with a year of crafting, or at level 1 even a year of profession, or etc. But actually if you were to play it through from level 1, none of these things are nearly as profitable as adventuring and you'd give up on them. Really your WBL should go down drastically if you try to pull such shennanigans, and in fact it's unlikely that a level 5 character has even been adventuring for more than a few months. Not to mention the difficulty of finding an ape for reference for the armorsmith when you don't even have one until the end of those months.

Or you could be from the land of the battle-apes, or a Fabricate-based economy, or...essentially, if this was supposed to be harder to get, the rules would have made it more expensive, or put in rules for exotic items being harder to find.



Natural bond can never make your effective druid level exceed your character level. I don't think LA counts, but HD does.

There's an extensive argument about whether it can offset the penalty for a higher level companion...I personally hold that it can't, but others disagree.

As for the feats, I would typically allow an animal companion to start with non-typical feats, but that's not RAW. Consider having enough money to pay for a Psychic Reformation.

[eggynack]

Natural bond can never make your effective druid level exceed your character level. I don't think LA counts, but HD does.

It's not making the effective druid level higher than character level. The effective druid level for the ape is four, and the druid's character level is four.

[Pluto!]

"Effective Druid Level" isn't a defined term, so this is going to be one of those spots where we go forty pages of people talking past one another.

Since the OP is counting the advanced companion penalty in his calculations, we can pretty reasonably assume that in the game in question (the OP's), the less conservative implementation is in play.

And yeah, the animal companion starts tough enough to keep a lot of melee dudes sweating over their niche; giving it more HD means that martial characters might have to actually work, just to keep up.

[Coidzor]

You want something like bronzewood, from eberron. Unfortunately, for weapons, it costs like 500gp/lb, which makes it enormously expensive for huge weapons.

Finally, druids are not proficient with morningstars. They are proficient with a very small list of weapons, actually.

Isn't there another wood that's basically identical to bronzewood which isn't a product of the Ironwood spell?

Always found that kind of curious myself. At a guess I'd say it's largely to keep crossbows out of their hands.

[eggynack]

"Effective Druid Level" isn't a defined term, so this is going to be one of those spots where we go forty pages of people talking past one another.
I don't see how it's not defined within this context. The animal companion discusses, "applying the indicated adjustment to the druid’s level (in parentheses) for purposes of determining the companion’s characteristics and special abilities," and natural bond says, "druid level for the purpose of determining the bonus Hit Dice, extra tricks, special abilities, and other bonuses that your animal companion receives." There seems to be a pretty congruent definition of terms here. I can't imagine another way it would be defined.

[Gavinfoxx]

Don't use Darkwood.

Use Coldwood. Or Bronzewood. Or bluewood.

But not Darkwood.

[Coidzor]

Don't use Darkwood.

Use Coldwood. Or Bronzewood. Or bluewood.

But not Darkwood.

Ah, Bluewood, that's what I was thinking of.

Can't recall Coldwood for the life of me though.

Bluewood is from Unapproachable East, right? Where's Coldwood from?

Edit: Come to think of it, isn't there some kind of index for this sort of materials question?

Edit2: What I can find here (http://community.wizards.com/forum/previous-editions-general/threads/1776531)suggests that Duskwood from MoF(Magic of Faerun?) may be of interest/use here.

[Gavinfoxx]

Duskwood would work too, but I am not sure if it can be shaped as much as the other stuff...