Wizard//Druid Gestalt

[Gwazi Magnum]

Basically how valid/powerful would such a combination be?
How would one make a build to have it work?
How much more powerful would it be if they both used the same casting stat?

Please no "X//Caster" are better statements.
I know there's stronger combinations out there.
I'm just curious about this combination specifically.

[Troacctid]

Pretty powerful. You've got a solid medium chassis (medium BAB, two good saves, 4+Int skill points, d8 hit die), an animal companion and a familiar to improve your action economy, full casting off two of the best lists, and wild shape.

Casting off of two different stats shouldn't hurt you too much. Try and consolidate your spells that allow saving throws so that they're all on one side, and you should be fine. It's not a big deal to have fewer bonus spells when you've already doubled your spells per day.

[eggynack]

It's a pretty good combination. Druid makes for a strong secondary side, using some of those long term buffs and naturally fast spells to not eat up combat actions, the animal companion and wild shape as always on support, and if you're going all out, then aberration wild shape for nilshai form grants an extra standard action to really push out spells. Druids don't have a massive amount of active casting based stuff that wizards lack, but they do have some, including spells like control winds, entangle, and blizzard. The wizard side is definitely active, making use of that crazy list, bolstered by that secondary druid stuff.

[sideswipe]

i would use lost tradition on the druid to get int casting.

you can probably completely dump dex (normally a secondary on wizard) as you can wild shape into a dex thing.
natural spell applies to your wizard casting as well.

the way you could work is to accent one casting with the other. you could try metamagic reduction on the wizard side to persist spells (incantatrix) and then use your druid side for casting mostly and combat.

[Gwazi Magnum]

So basically it'd be either Druid giving support to the Wizard, or the Wizard giving bonus feats to the Druid?

[Rebel7284]

It's certainly an improvement.
Wizard's only real weakness is the crappy chasis.
Druid's only weakness is the slightly weaker spell list (at least at higher levels).

However, the two classes are already SO powerful and have so many ways of covering their weaknesses, that the combination doesn't really have a large effect on overall effectiveness.

As far as making it better, taking good prestige classes on the wizard "side" would help. =P
The usual advice about dipping to pick up some passive abilities still applies, just chose a side you're ok with delaying.

[eggynack]

So basically it'd be either Druid giving support to the Wizard, or the Wizard giving bonus feats to the Druid?
The first thing, definitely. Probably not the second thing. The wizard's main contribution is absolutely the list, because the list is everything. The druid's main contribution would ordinarily be the list, because it's a great list, but it's not the wizard list, so the druid's contribution is everything else. You do want something to do with those slots though, so as I mentioned, you'd do well to seek out stuff that doesn't eat actions much, like the heart of X line, the primal line, instant of power, and so on. And, of course, druid style summoning is substantially different enough from wizard style summoning that it's definitely value added. Not the absolute best combination, but it can be very good if you do it well.

[FocusWolf413]

It's so good it's broken. If you want, you can dump most of your druid spells into buffs and healing, leaving the wizard spells for debuffs and battlefield control.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

It's incredibly solid. I would keep Druid single-classed and pick up either Incantatrix or Spelldancer and then Abjurant Champion to progress Wizard casting.

It's still a good idea to specialize, especially for the ACFs you'll qualify for, such as Abrupt Jaunt for Conjuration. Take Obtain Familiar in CA and trade that for Rapid Summoning (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/specialistWizardVariants.htm#conjurerVariants) if it can work for SNA instead of/in addition to Summon Monster. Enhanced Summoning is all the more worthwhile in this case, but see if you can forego the 5th level ability for the domain power ACF in CC for Planning to get Extend Spell. The Fighter feat variant (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/variantCharacterClasses.htm#wizard) would also be a superb choice if not going the summoning route, get Improved Initiative or Combat Reflexes or similar instead of Scribe Scroll, and you can still trade the 5th level feat for the Planning domain power for Extend Spell.

Natural Spell will benefit your Wizard casting, as will Magic of the Land in RotW, which can be extremely beneficial for party buffs such as Haste. You can make your character a Killoren from that same book and use the Aspect of the Ancient to always succeed at using Magic of the Land. You can describe the Druid abilities as inborn and say he learned the Wizard spells and abilities.

I would go Druid 20// Wizard 5/ Incantatrix 3/ Abjurant Champion 5/ Incantatrix 7. Get two flaws (Love of Nature and Bestial Instinct (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?258440-The-quot-Best-quot-Flaws#30)), say you visited or plan to visit the Otyugh Hole in CS for Iron Will, get Combat Casting, Natural Bond, Greenbound Summoning, Item Familiar and/or Obtain Familiar, and Natural Spell by 6th level. You'll have Extend Spell and one of Augment Summoning or Improved Initiative or Combat Reflexes from Wizard, and get Persistent Spell from Incantatrix 1. If creating a character at a level higher than 1st, your flaws can be used to get feats at any of your starting levels rather than just 1st level feats, since flaws are only limited to during character creation. Get a 'level -3' companion such as a Fleshraker dinosaur and Natural Bond will allow you to count your full Druid level toward its benefits. Use Metamagic Effect and Cooperative Metamagic to add Persistent Spell to your buffs, Cooperative Metamagic can be used on your own spells outside of combat since the action economy system only exists during initiative. Item Familiar (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/magic/itemFamiliars.htm) is mostly for Invest Skill Ranks to put a huge bonus toward Spellcraft for reliably using your Incantatrix abilities. Other good metamagic feats to take include Invisible Spell, Quicken Spell, Imbued Summoning, and Split Ray.

[Troacctid]

Take Obtain Familiar in CA and trade that for Rapid Summoning (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/specialistWizardVariants.htm#conjurerVariants) if it can work for SNA instead of/in addition to Summon Monster.
You can't get a class ability from a feat and then trade it for an ACF. Alternate class features don't work that way.

[atemu1234]

i would use lost tradition on the druid to get int casting.

you can probably completely dump dex (normally a secondary on wizard) as you can wild shape into a dex thing.
natural spell applies to your wizard casting as well.

the way you could work is to accent one casting with the other. you could try metamagic reduction on the wizard side to persist spells (incantatrix) and then use your druid side for casting mostly and combat.

Source on Lost Tradition, please.

[Snowbluff]

It's so good it's broken. If you want, you can dump most of your druid spells into buffs and healing, leaving the wizard spells for debuffs and battlefield control.

Or vice versa.

Bifu has it right. You want to persist the Bite-of spells and Wraithstrike.

[Eloel]

You can't get a class ability from a feat and then trade it for an ACF. Alternate class features don't work that way.

Eh, trade first, get Obtain Familiar later.

[eggynack]

Eh, trade first, get Obtain Familiar later.
Doesn't really work in this case. He's using the familiar for two separate ACF's here, instead of using the familiar on its own merits.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

You can't get a class ability from a feat and then trade it for an ACF. Alternate class features don't work that way.


Doesn't really work in this case. He's using the familiar for two separate ACF's here, instead of using the familiar on its own merits.

If you have a familiar, you can trade a familiar for Abrupt Jaunt as long as you're a specialist Conjurer. If you have a familiar, you can trade a familiar for Rapid Summoning as long as you're a specialist Conjurer. There's nothing about Rapid Summoning that indicates you can only choose to take it at Wizard 1.

[Troacctid]

If you have a familiar, you can trade a familiar for Abrupt Jaunt as long as you're a specialist Conjurer. If you have a familiar, you can trade a familiar for Rapid Summoning as long as you're a specialist Conjurer. There's nothing about Rapid Summoning that indicates you can only choose to take it at Wizard 1.

The Unearthed Arcana specialist wizard variants all specifically give up their summon familiar class ability from their specialist class.


Because magic plays such an important role in the game, the wizard class offers great opportunities for change when designing a campaign or a character. The following variants present different versions of the standard specialist wizards. Each variant specialist class gives up one of the standard specialists class abilities in exchange for a new ability unique to the variant specialist. Each specialist class has three variants: one that replaces the specialist's summon familiar ability, one that replaces the specialist's bonus feats, and one that replaces the specialist's bonus spell per day from the specialty school.

You cannot give up the ability if it comes from some other source. Anyway, Obtain Familiar isn't even the same ability--it works differently.

As for immediate magic, it a. must be taken at 1st level and b. only replaces the class feature gained from the actual class.


Alternative class features replace class features found in the original class description.

Also, familiars are great! Totally worth keeping. You even have an animal companion too, so you're just getting all the actions.

[Ellowryn]

Source on Lost Tradition, please.

The 3rd party book Bastards and Bloodlines so probably wont fly in most games, but then again if you allowing someone to gestalt druid/wizard then maybe it wont be too overboard.

As for Abjurant Jaunt, mini-Celerity at Int mod times per day is probably more than worth the loss of a familiar especially since you can spend a feat to get one thats almost as good.

[Kraken]

Familiars are indeed pretty awesome, they're so much more than a skill bonus. With some doing depending on the particular item, you can use them to fire off magic items, as they have actions in combat separate to their master. They're also a great way to cheaply have a second contingency, as you can cast contingency on your familiar separately from yourself, due to the wording of the share spells ability (your animal companion allows a third contingency!). Just as a general statement, share spells and buffing can make you and your familiar an incredible brute fighting team, once you get polymorph. But in your case you'll be sharing spells with both an animal companion and your familiar. What's scarier for your foe than seeing you polymorph into a hydra? Seeing you, your familiar, and animal companion polymorph into hydras. :smallbiggrin: And if you want to go out of core there's way scarier stuff than hydras.

[sleepyphoenixx]

i would use lost tradition on the druid to get int casting.

you can probably completely dump dex (normally a secondary on wizard) as you can wild shape into a dex thing.
natural spell applies to your wizard casting as well.

the way you could work is to accent one casting with the other. you could try metamagic reduction on the wizard side to persist spells (incantatrix) and then use your druid side for casting mostly and combat.

I wouldn't do that. Switching druid casting to int means giving up at least +5 to spell DCs (from Owl's Insight). Unless you really need those skill points you're much better off switching your wizard casting to wisdom, imo. Because with a few CL boosts that's easily a +8-10 to spell DCs.

[Lerondiel]

If the idea of persisted buffs on an animal companion & familiar is your style, consider something as simple as:

Wizard15/Spelldancer5
Ranger4/Druid6/Beastmaster10

Yup, 6 animal companions (without Natural Bond) of Druid Level: 21, 21, 21, 18, 15, 12....with a Wizard's full list of buffs 24/7

[sleepyphoenixx]

Yup, 6 animal companions (without Natural Bond) of Druid Level: 21, 21, 21, 18, 15, 12....with a Wizard's full list of buffs 24/7

Beastmaster is a trap. The additional companions don't stack with anything. They don't progress at all after Beastmaster 10. The only use you get is +3 to your primary companion at BM 1, and that's not worth losing casting and wild shape progression.

Similar for the Ranger levels. You don't get a second companion from that. It just stacks at Ranger level -3, meaning you actually lose companion progression over straight druid (in addition to casting and WS). Familiar and Animal Companion progression always stacks unless it's explicitly stated otherwise.

The only way i'm aware of to get multiple decent "companions" is the Extra Familiar feat from Dragon Magazine and the Wild Cohort web feat (which doesn't get Share Spells).
Could be worth it if your DM allows it to apply to the Urban Companion ACF, because having multiple normal familiars is just an invitation to get XP drained and lose your feat for a year.

[Rowan Wolf]

The wild reaper variant druid (dragon magazine 311) might be worth looking into as it obtains turn undead, fast heal and ability damage healing.

[Khedrac]

Look up any Arcane Hierophant guides - they are essentially this without Gestalt.
(The AH has the advantage of merging the familiar and animal companion.)

Although people look at the lists and go "wizard combat, druids buffs" the wizard buffs can become very powerful when put on a wildshape form.
Consider:
Greater Mage Armor +6 Armor
Shield +4 Shield
Barkskin +5 enhancement to Natural Armor Class
Heart or Air/Earth/Fire/Stone - movement speed boost, temporary hit points, nice sacrifice spell abilities*
etc.

I played an Sorc/Druid AH (for orb spell spamming for combat damage) and I ended up with an insane armor class and movement spell (and really really bad reflex/fort saves).
The answer is decide which spells you want each day and what the most efficient way of casting them in - and then you know what remaining spell slots are free to play with.

Read the Heart of Earth carefully, nowhere does it say that the spell ends when the temporary hit points run out, this means that the component-less stoneskin can be activated after the temporary hit points have been used...

[Snowbluff]

Greater Mage Armor +6 Armor


Greater Luminous Armor. +8 and is enhanced by abjurant champion.

[Rebel7284]

Dip suggestions on the druid side:
Holt Warden 1: Domain spell slots are nice. Rebuke plants is thematic too.
Sacred Exorcist 1: Turn Undead!
Contemplative 1: Extra domain.

[Lerondiel]

Beastmaster is a trap. The additional companions don't stack with anything. They don't progress at all after Beastmaster 10. The only use you get is +3 to your primary companion at BM 1, and that's not worth losing casting and wild shape progression.

Similar for the Ranger levels. You don't get a second companion from that. It just stacks at Ranger level -3, meaning you actually lose companion progression over straight druid (in addition to casting and WS). Familiar and Animal Companion progression always stacks unless it's explicitly stated otherwise.

The only way i'm aware of to get multiple decent "companions" is the Extra Familiar feat from Dragon Magazine and the Wild Cohort web feat (which doesn't get Share Spells).
Could be worth it if your DM allows it to apply to the Urban Companion ACF, because having multiple normal familiars is just an invitation to get XP drained and lose your feat for a year.

Interesting...where do you interpret ranger and druid companions stacking from?

[Kennisiou]

Honestly, it's not the most impressive Gestalt. Wizard//Factotum tends to do a lot better, or Wizard//Psion, since both opposite sides manage to offer action economy manipulation that can be used alongside wizard's or is better than wizard's. Druid doesn't add much to Wizard except base attack bonus, health, and the ability to sometimes be a bear. All of those things are nice, but not as nice as taking more actions. And if you're just looking for a better chassis for your wizard, just go Wizard//Warblade.

[Snowbluff]

Honestly, it's not the most impressive Gestalt. Wizard//Factotum tends to do a lot better, or Wizard//Psion, since both opposite sides manage to offer action economy manipulation that can be used alongside wizard's or is better than wizard's. Druid doesn't add much to Wizard except base attack bonus, health, and the ability to sometimes be a bear. All of those things are nice, but not as nice as taking more actions. And if you're just looking for a better chassis for your wizard, just go Wizard//Warblade.

Wizard can mess with enough of the action economy alone, justifying a double caster build. Without nailing the nasty tricks, they have enough swift action spells to qualify as a meaningful accessory to a druid build.

[sleepyphoenixx]

Or you could go Wizard/Swiftblade for all the extra actions (along with a truckload of extra goodies) - without spending all your feats on Font of Inspiration and still getting 9th level wizard spells.
Or go right for the Psion, because that's where the real action economy abuse is at. Synchronicity, Linked Power, Anticipatory Strike, Sense Danger, Temporal Acceleration, Schism...

And the "sometimes be a bear" thing may be often repeated, but that's hardly the form you want. How about Dragon Wild Shape. Tome Dragon for free metamagic or other forms for various immunities, senses, movement modes and special abilities that last all day and don't cost spell slots?

Aberration Wild Shape brings its own action economy abuse with the Nilshai, in addition to tons of forms with other (often unique) abilities that are hard to get otherwise.
Even without spending feats there's quite a few very tough plant forms that are certainly preferable to being a squishy wizard.

Regeneration of all flavors, immunity to blunt weapons, tiny high-dex forms for defense and touch attacks... the options are all there if you look through the books.

Compared to that, even with the advantage of only needing Int Factotum hasn't really that much to offer for a wizard gestalt except skills.


Interesting...where do you interpret ranger and druid companions stacking from?

Animal Companion Basics

Class Level

The character’s druid level. The druid’s class levels stack with levels of any other classes that are entitled to an animal companion for the purpose of determining the companion’s abilities and the alternative lists available to the character.

[Khedrac]

Greater Luminous Armor. +8 and is enhanced by abjurant champion.
Yes I forget the Sacred spells because they are not usually in play in my group:(

As for Abjurant Champion, as a class that advances two options at once (combat and casting) it's probably not allowed by the default Gestalt rules...
(My AH didn't cast her own mage armor, she got the party's Argent Savant to do them...)

[Snowbluff]

As for Abjurant Champion, as a class that advances two options at once (combat and casting) it's probably not allowed by the default Gestalt rules... Oh, I'd like to see you defend that in court.

[Kennisiou]

Oh, I'd like to see you defend that in court.

I see the whole "gish prestige classes aren't allowed by gestalt default rules because they progress casting and combat" thing a lot and I don't get it at all. Full base attack bonus progression is not progression of class features. Like, under that logic, is Hexblade banned? Your base attack bonus is full and your casting progresses.

[Snowbluff]

I see the whole "gish prestige classes aren't allowed by gestalt default rules because they progress casting and combat" thing a lot and I don't get it at all. Full base attack bonus progression is not progression of class features. Like, under that logic, is Hexblade banned? Your base attack bonus is full and your casting progresses.


Prestige classes that are essentially class combinations-such as the arcane trickster, mystic theurge, and eldritch knight-should be prohibited if you’re using gestalt classes, because they unduly complicate the game balance of what’s already a high-powered variant. It only restricts PrCs. HOWEVER, Abjurant Champion cannot be considered a class combination, as it only draws class features from one set of classes, the Arcane caster. Furthemore, it's a "should" not a "must." It's not assumed unless the DM says so.

[Kennisiou]

It only restricts PrCs. HOWEVER, Abjurant Champion cannot be considered a class combination, as it only draws class features from one set of classes, the Arcane caster. Furthemore, it's a "should" not a "must." It's not assumed unless the DM says so.

Now that I see it again, I notice that Eldritch Knight is explicitly mentioned... What's the line here? Is it that Eldritch Knight has a fighter bonus feat, so it's coming from two classes? I dunno. The anti-theurge rule is kind of dumb anyways, and only a suggestion, like you said.

[sideswipe]

Now that I see it again, I notice that Eldritch Knight is explicitly mentioned... What's the line here? Is it that Eldritch Knight has a fighter bonus feat, so it's coming from two classes? I dunno. The anti-theurge rule is kind of dumb anyways, and only a suggestion, like you said.

i would personally only restrict it to casting (and casting like things before people say oh ill just combine psionics and initiating).
honestly a class that gives multiple things like bonus feats, progresses smiting, sneak attack, raging or something like that probably wont even come close to a single classed caster even if used in gestalt.

[Kraken]

Theurges really aren't all that powerful in the scheme of things, I don't really think they should be excluded any more than an eldritch knight. You're really just trading away great class features from non-theurge prestige classes for more and different spells per day on the slower overall progression theurges have. It's not a terrible trade, but in practice it doesn't end up being as wild as people expect.

[sleepyphoenixx]

Theurges really aren't all that powerful in the scheme of things, I don't really think they should be excluded any more than an eldritch knight. You're really just trading away great class features from non-theurge prestige classes for more and different spells per day on the slower overall progression theurges have. It's not a terrible trade, but in practice it doesn't end up being as wild as people expect.

True enough. Having triple 9ths may look really impressive on paper, but you'll still only have 1 set of actions per round. Unless you're abusing psionics, but that's hardly a problem with theurge classes.
The spell access is pretty easily doable without theurging for most primary casters, so the only difference will be class features (which aren't that hot on most theurge classes) and staying power (which shouldn't come into play that often).

[sideswipe]

the only good thing about triple 9's is the versatility. most will say you get the same versatility on the most part due to limited wish, wish and miracle, but the point is that instead of having to cast a high cost spell like wish you can just cast the other spell, lowing the cost for the most part.

you also have A LOT more spell slots usually, so rather then possibly running out of 9's in a day you can be much more liberal with your spells.

[Kraken]

This reminds me of an argument someone was making once (Pickford, I think? Good times :smallbiggrin: ) that wizards weren't really all that good because they can't actually afford the time/gold to acquire all the spells in the game, but the simple reality is that you don't need them all, a little bit goes a long way. As long as you're making good choices, sure extra spells over and above your essentials are fine and dandy, but are they more useful than class features? Theurgy for those extra spells is certainly not a weak option, but we're talking about making the most impact on your turn throughout an adventuring day, you don't want to be a theurge. In terms of power, druid20//wizard5/prestige classes15 is going to beat out theurge builds. The larger spell access and additional daily spells are helpful, but the diminishing returns on being able to fulfill those extra niches just isn't going to beat out the class abilities you're sacrificing from initiate of the sevenfold veil, incantatrix, and in this situation, even just plain old druid (unless planar shepherd shenanigans are afoot). Arcane disciple and planar touchstone are a good way to poach cleric spells that you just can't live without. Further, theurges take a long time to hit their stride, whereas druid20/wizard5/prestige classes15 is good right from level 1, more or less without any speed bumps, compared to theurges.

[AnonymousPepper]

My immediate first thought was that PrCing the Druid into Planar Shepherd for time/action economy shenanigans as a class feature, given the Wizard's much more powerful list offensively-speaking (for the most part, anyway), would be hilarious. Broken as all get-out, as anything involving PShep is, but hilarious.