Highlights of Druidry

[Jade_Tarem]

Recently had an argument with a fellow DnD player about druids. He seems to think they're grossly underpowered, especially as compared to clerics, or just about anything else. I argued against this but he's unconvinced, can anyone here provide a breakdown of the Druid's pros and cons, please? I don't have anymore brainpower to spend on it....

[The_Snark]

Have you pointed out to him that while the Cleric might be a Divine Powered/Favored Righteous Might-using tank, the druid is a wildshaped legendary ape wielding a Shiellagh'ed, Brambled quarterstaff fighting with a bear alongside?

Druid pros:
-Wild shape. Versatile shapeshifting, and it doesn't even take up spell slots. Good if you need to fly, good over long distances, good if you find yourself underwater. You don't have to look very far for good shapes; there are several nice ones for various levels in the PHB, such as the dire bear and dire lion.
-Full spellcasting, from a pretty reasonable list; it's not as good as the sorcerer/wizard list or even the cleric list, but it isn't half bad, with a good selection of buffs and some battlefield control.
-Animal companion. At low levels, when you don't have wild shape, this makes up for it. It's usually about as good as the fighter at low levels.
-Decent skills. Better than the cleric, at least.

Cons:
-Annoying armor restrictions hurt at low level.
-Gear problems; you don't get most gear benefits in wild shape, though you can mitigate that with wild armor.
-Spell list, as pointed out above, is not quite as good as that of some other full spellcasters.

[Jarl]

In, surprisingly, before Natural Spell.

-Can't wait.

[axraelshelm]

And if your dm doesn't allow you to egt natural spell because it's too powerful still spell would cover it atleast a portion of the way. Just make sure you would need those spells in your wild form. Heal, buff, and maybe one fire storm for those moments when you want to clear a room or area.

[Thomas]

In after Natural Spell.

Druids aren't as grossly, game-breakingly overpowered as they used to be in 3.0 (shapechange and harm!), but they're still very, very good. At low middle levels, a bear animal companion destroys opponents, and usually briefly out-performs the party fighter. Then the druid becomes a killing machine with wild shape, still able to perform as a full spellcaster. (Honestly, a druid without Natural Spell is pretty pointless.) A druid's effectiveness is all about how well you choose and employ spells, so people who haven't seen them played by a competent "druid player" probably will think them underpowered. The character that literally ruled our 3.0 campaign was a druid - the player picked every spell with care, knowing exactly what he'd use it for, and destroyed all encounters. Even at epic levels, he still employed low-level spells to clever and devastating effect.

[Bears With Lasers]

Compare a Druid wildshaped into a Treant at 12th with Bite of the Werebear up with a Divine Power/Quickened Divine Favor cleric.
Mmm, tasty 49 strength.

Then factor in the animal companion (something like a Brown Bear with +2 STR/DEX, +4 bonus HD, and +4 NA), maybe with Animal Growth cast on it.

[Person_Man]

Ah, where to begin.

Wild Shape and Polymorph remove one of the primary balance features of D&D: Attributes. You take on the Str, Dex, and Con of your new form. It's pretty easy to gain huge bonuses that that would normally take multiple buff spells or very expensive magic items to attain. Plus they can cast multiple buff spells on top of their current form.

Furthermore, a good DM tries to balance combat encounters to challenge some players while allowing other players to shine. If you do this well, everyone will have a chance to save the day, and everyone will come close to death (or die), everyone will feel useful, but no one will feel indestructable. But because the Druid can Wildshape, they can just change into whatever form best suits the encounter, making it very difficult for the DM to challenge a Druid without screwing all the other players.

A Druid also steps on multiple player niches. They're excellent scouts, Meat Shields, buff casters, healers, and battlefield controlers. If they have a high Int (they should, as most Druids dumpstat physical stats) and take the right feats, they can be excellent Skill Monkeys. If they own enough supplements, they can be blaster casters as well.

And on top of everything, as Bears mentioned, they get an animal companion. Which is sometimes more powerful then some PC's.

In short, Druid is by far the most powerful class. A Cleric or other full casters can keep up if they're smart. But mechanically, I wish WotC had written Druids like Spirit Shamens instead.

[Dragonmuncher]

What does everyone think of the PHB2 variant that exchanges wildshaping for shapeshifting? I tend to think it makes things more balanced, and has a pretty cool flavor.

[Bears With Lasers]

The PHB2 druid variant is vastly better balanced, yes.

[Fax Celestis]

What does everyone think of the PHB2 variant that exchanges wildshaping for shapeshifting? I tend to think it makes things more balanced, and has a pretty cool flavor.

Shapeshift is far more balanced, since it removes two of the gamebreaking abilities of the Druid: Wild Shape and Animal Companion.

[Bears With Lasers]

It also has Shapeshifting availible from level 1, not just from level 5 on, making the druid more consistent.

[Person_Man]

What does everyone think of the PHB2 variant that exchanges wildshaping for shapeshifting? I tend to think it makes things more balanced, and has a pretty cool flavor.

I like it as well. But hard to convince most PCs to use a PHBII Druid, since the core Druid is so much more powerful, and they're core.

[headwarpage]

I like the PHBII Druid, myself. There's a lot less research, for one thing. Being able to switch back and forth helps too, since I prefer not to walk around as a bear all the time. It's obviously less powerful than core, but it's a lot of fun, and fairly versatile. My only complaint is that you don't get bonuses to things like Hide when you're in animal form, or any useful animal abilities like Scent.

[The_Snark]

PHBII druid is fun, and it prevents the dumping of physical abilities- something I always hated when druids do it. It doesn't make any sense; what did they do before they could wild shape?

Lack of options like a swim speed, scent and such is a drawback, though; there should be feats available for PHBII druids for that sort of thing.

[Nevermore]

i play druids. I play Druids alot. Atm I play a lvl 17 Lizard Folk Druid. His two lowest stats at starting were Intelligence and Charisma. Strength (14) Dex (11) Con (14) Int (10) Wisdom (15) Charisma (10). I thought it was rather balanced. i used my stat bonuses to up my wisdom to 19. I tend to use Wild shape for scouting and travel (Golden Eagle and Eagle Owl respectively) while relying on magic items, buffs, and spells in combat. My Druid wears leather, uses a wooden shield, carries a scimitar. He has quick draw so i can still cast spells, openning up a free hand.

[Druid]

My brethren and I don't even need to wild shape to be pretty powerful. A druid with the augmented summoning feat with spell selection focused on battle field control and buffing/ debuffing still makes an excellent addition to any party. Really, if you want to make a combat summoner it's stupid to not go with a druid.

[The_Werebear]

I am playing the druid in the Core class battle.

I think my strategy will go quite smoothly.

Feel free to look in once we get it going. I wasn't optimizing particularly hard, but then again, it's not hard to put a druid into stupid good territory.

[Turcano]

A druid with the augmented summoning feat with spell selection focused on battle field control and buffing/ debuffing still makes an excellent addition to any party.

Actually, I've found that a lack of good high-level debuff spells is the main weakness of the druid spell list (well, that and an over-reliance on fire/cold energy damage, at least in core). That's not a real damper on the druid's power, but you still need another caster in the party.