Planar Shepherd of Lamannia

[Vash9177]

I'm currently putting together a druid / Planar Shepherd of Lamannia - The Twilight Forest and wanted to try and put a list together of good wild shape forms for the plane.

I'm looking for forms with good utility and good combat ability for both Wild shape (magical beast) and Wild shape (elemental or outsider).

We are going to start at level 5 and I will be able to go into Planar Shepherd at level 6, so I can use magical beast forms at 8th and elementals / outsiders at 14th.

So far the elemental weirds from MMII and Frostburn seem really strong but I'm not sure what to use before I get to that point.

[Vash9177]

So after some more searching around it would seem the Celestial Creature would let me morph into any animal or vermin as this would make them a magical beast.

Also using the woodling template, MMIII pg 198, I could get a +7 increase in natural armor and if I used the spell Enhance Wild Shape I could gain it's ex abilites of Damage Reduction 5/slashing, Low-Light Vision, Hide skill bonus +4, and a downside of Vulnerability to Fire. Seems like a decent buff overall.

However could you shape into a Celestial woodling creature? Would not add much other than smite evil but I think that would allow me to use woodling vermin as well.

[Vash9177]

Also looking for good equipment and feats, so far I've found

Ring of the Beast
Mantle of the Beast
Armor of the Beast
Bead of Karma
Ankh of Ascension
Periapt of wisdom

For Feats I have
Greensinger Initiate
Greenbound Summoning
Natural Spell
Rashemi Elemental Summoning
Dragon Wild Shape

Frozen wild shape is out, DM had a bad experience with a hydra in a previous game.

[sambouchah]

Also looking for good equipment and feats, so far I've found

Ring of the Beast
Mantle of the Beast
Armor of the Beast
Bead of Karma
Ankh of Ascension
Periapt of wisdom

For Feats I have
Greensinger Initiate
Greenbound Summoning
Natural Spell
Rashemi Elemental Summoning
Dragon Wild Shape

Frozen wild shape is out, DM had a bad experience with a hydra in a previous game.

Ashbound Summoning is a strong choice. As for equipment I'd grab some Druid's Vestments(for the +1 Wild Shape per day, if you need it anyway), and any equipment that wouldn't normally give you benefits in Wild Shape pop a Wilding Clasp on so it will.

[jaydubs]

There's a planar shepherd handbook that lists a lot of wild shape forms for Lamannia. http://community.wizards.com/forum/previous-editions-character-optimization/threads/1081076

If you want to take it easy on your DM, think about dropping greenbound summoning. It's a great feat, but that wall of thorns 1/day that greenbound creatures get will absolutely wreck at level 5. Spell focus (conjuration) -> augment summoning, or ashbound are both nice SNA boosters that don't quite break the game as much. Though ashbound and planar shepherds don't mix too well fluff-wise.

[Vash9177]

@sambouchah Wilding clasps will definatley be helpful. Speaking of wich would craft wonderous Item be worth a feat? Being able to make the clasp and a few other pieces of equipment for half the price seems helpful.

Druid's Vestments would be worth it for sure since the Wild Shape (elemental or outsider) takes two uses per change. Thanks

@jaydubs Thanks for pointing out the handbook, the list for the plane with some of the main features for each form should save a lot of time.

Also for greenbound summoning I agree it's an insane feat but the DM was who suggested it to me. Ashbound seems really strong to and I'll talk to my DM about the fluff next time I get the chance, we are playing in a custom campaign setting he is creating and might just refluff it.

After going through the list some the nightmare seems really strong, having Astral Projection and Etherealness at will.

Also as a side note if I use Enhance Wild Shape to gain EX abilities from a Woodling creature I shape into do I get the plant traits from it? I ask because they don't have the plant type they gain plant traits.

[Vash9177]

Is rapid spell worth it for summoning? If i understand it correctly with Ring of the Beast + rapid spell I could spontaneously cast a Summon Natures Ally of my highest level avaliable spell slot and it would take a full-round action instead of 1 round.

Also I saw the druid handbook mention Ocular Spell however I'm unsure on what spells to use it with to make it worth it overall. Any suggestions?

[Ketiara]

Wild shape amulet (+4 hd max lvl 20) is always good!!

[Vash9177]

Wow that amulet seems pretty strong. I'd have to run it by my dm but how I'm reading is +4 to druid level for wildshape so druid 10 / planar shepard 10 would give me
Wild shape plant
And a cap of 24 HD, 25HD with the trappings of the beast set.

Does that sound right?

[Ketiara]

Wow that amulet seems pretty strong. I'd have to run it by my dm but how I'm reading is +4 to druid level for wildshape so druid 10 / planar shepard 10 would give me
Wild shape plant
And a cap of 24 HD, 25HD with the trappings of the beast set.

Does that sound right?

IMO no. Ive heard that you can cheese it so you can get past 20Hd, but as I read it you can't use it to improve a Druids wildshape ability past lvl 20.

[sleepyphoenixx]

Is rapid spell worth it for summoning? If i understand it correctly with Ring of the Beast + rapid spell I could spontaneously cast a Summon Natures Ally of my highest level avaliable spell slot and it would take a full-round action instead of 1 round.

Also I saw the druid handbook mention Ocular Spell however I'm unsure on what spells to use it with to make it worth it overall. Any suggestions?

Rapid Spell is certainly nice to have. I'd only take it if you want to focus on summoning though since it doesn't really have many other applications and there's a lot of cool feats for druids and not many feat slots.

I'm not a fan of Ocular Spell on druids. You just don't have all that many touch spells and your usually tough enough to just use them the normal way.

While the Wild Shape Amulet is nice it's also seriously expensive (40000gp). Only worth the cost if you focus on wild shaping in combat and have a specific form in mind that gives you a serious boost.
In most cases there are probably better things to do with your money.

[eggynack]

While the Wild Shape Amulet is nice it's also seriously expensive (40000gp). Only worth the cost if you focus on wild shaping in combat and have a specific form in mind that gives you a serious boost.
In most cases there are probably better things to do with your money.
On a normal druid, I'd call it worthwhile at somewhere in the 11-14 range. That's where you get huge wild shape, and with it, dire tortoise form. Dire tortoise is utterly ridiculous on just about every level, so getting it fast may be worth that price. I'm not sure what the breakdown looks like on a planar shepherd though, as I'm not that familiar with the specifics of that class. I'm seriously considering just writing, "This is broken. Here's a handbook," next to the whole thing.

Edit: As for pushing past 20, you very explicitly cannot, and for rapid spell, at high levels you're probably better off just packing some golden desert honey (CM, 136), and at low levels you're definitely better off getting a chronocharm of the uncaring archmage (MIC, 86). At mid-level, I'm actually pretty plan-less. Maybe just being far away when you cast the spell is enough at those levels, unlike low and high levels where being at a distance is tricky as hell (at low levels, you lack movement options, and at high levels, your movement options don't matter).

[sleepyphoenixx]

A Planar Shepherd usually gets Outsider WS at level 14. Depending on the plane that gives you access to Planetars and all kinds of Devae with their ridiculous SLAs, Regeneration/evil, tons of immunities and good physical stats (and cleric casting depending on interpretation).
Also guardinals, eladrin and all that other high-power celestial stuff.

There's kind of a lull in good outsider options there with the next big thing being the solar. That's 22HD though so that amulet won't to anything for you. Not that you'd need the boost.

Demons are an option too but they are usually weaker and have worse abilities and SLAs.
There's also some cheese options to get early access to wish as an SLA but the planes that have them are usually lacking in decent combat forms and their HD are relatively low so you don't need the WS-level boost.

Edit: When Golden Desert honey becomes a trivial expense you can just shuffle/retrain Rapid Spell. On the mid levels it's seriously helpful though if you're a dedicated summoner. I'd personally take Rapid Spell and Ashbound and drop SF:Conjuration and Augment Summoning. Add Greenbound and/or Rashemi Elemental Summoning and you're pretty much set.

Building a Planar Shepherd as a summoner is kind of a waste though since it doesn't really add anything to summoning. If you're going there you should focus on your strengths. You can use summons for utility just fine without feats.
For a dedicated summoner Moonspeaker is a lot better.

[Vash9177]

@Ketiara fair enough it would be a bit crazy to go over like that but it still sounds worth it for for later in the game.

@sleepyphoenixx I'd like to focus more on wild shape than summoning, but the summoning seemed like a nice back up option. Not sure which feats to take for wild shape other than dragon wild shape. Exalted wild shape seems powerful but having Lamannia as my home plane lets me shape into any animal or vermin and apply the celestial template to them.

@eggynack I think it would be worth it at the same time. Only things I lose from normal druid progression are wild shape plant and elemental wild shape, I still get Huge and tiny. I gain wild shape into magical beast from the plane at level 8, includes creatures whose type changes to magical beast as the result of applying a template. The templates in Lamannia are Celestial, Fiendish, and Woodling (MMIII 198). Then at 14 I get elemental / outsider wild shape which gives me, Air elemental (all), Earth Elemental (all), Water Elemental (All), Nightmare, Avoral, Leanol, Djinni, a long list of Mephits, and Dao with a house rule of no limited wish. Most of those I can shape into once I get to level 14 since most of their HD are lower than that.

The desert honey seems awesome and I'm sure I could work with using the chroncharm until I can afford to have a good stock of it.

[sleepyphoenixx]

Well there's a few nice utility SLAs and some at will blasting in there but not much for combat forms.
You can use the standard druid animals (with celestial/fiendish template added) but straight druid with plant shape gets better options for straight combat.
Your Planar Bubble gives you... automatic extend on druid spells.
That's a pretty underwhelming plane. :smallwink:

If you want to focus on WS you should find a form with as many natural attacks as possible, get Multiattack and stack on melee feats.
Tigers are usually good for 3 attacks, pounce & rake. Bears trade pounce & rake for Improved Grab. Fleshrakers (MM3) are as good as a WS form as they are as a companion.
For utility look to your outsiders. Djinni get a Major Creation SLA that has a permanent duration for plant matter. That's huge.
The Leonal and Avoral should have at least one blasting SLA at will and a few utility things.

Power Attack isn't quite as good with natural weapons as it is with a two-hander but you can make that up with quantity. You can also get it free with the Bite of the WereX line of spells (SpC).
Rapidstrike may be an option too depending on your preferred combat form (and if your DM allows you to qualify with a WS form).

Get an Amulet of Mighty Fists (DMG) with a Wilding Clasp (MIC)and ask your DM if you can enchant it with special abilities and not just straight enhancement bonus.
If he doesn't allow that try to get your hands on a Mantle of the Beast (CC) or a Sickle of the Talon (A&E) so your natural attacks at least count as magic without having to cast a spell on every single one.

[Vash9177]

What plant forms are worth it for combat? I should still be able to wild shape plant with Enhance Wild Shape.

I'm allowed the mighty Fleshraker so that form should be fun for a while :smallbiggrin:

He might let me use Amulet of Mighty Fists that way since we have used the necklace of natural weapons that way before but he did say he would let me get Mantle of the Beast for sure.

[sleepyphoenixx]

Most of the really nasty ones are in Fiend Folio.
The Ironmaw gets 4 natural attacks with a 60ft reach, 1d6 con damage and wounding.
The Kelp Angler is an aquatic plant with 4 attacks, blindsight, regeneration and immunity to cold and bludgeoning.
The Octopus Tree gets 8 tentacle attacks + bite, Frightful Presence, Swallow Whole, regeneration 10 and acid immunity.
The Yellow Musk Creeper has 6 attacks with a 15ft reach and regeneration but it's main selling point is it's ability to create plant zombies that are loyal to you. It's an (ex) ability so you can get it with Enhance Wildshape.

Sandstorm has the Ironthorn which has a nasty paralysis poison in addition to its 15ft range.

Most plant forms get high natural AC boni (15-25).

[Vash9177]

I think the ironmaw is my favorite, 60ft reach is crazy and wounding 3 + con damage on each is nasty.

Octopus Tree getting 9 attacks is pretty crazy to, in addition to it's other abilities.

The yellow musk creeper makes me somewhat sad I'm playing NG and I don't think making zombies would let me keep that alignment.

Thanks that list is really helpful and I have a new found respect for plants.