Building a Druid

[OrlockDelesian]

Greetings.

During our last session, on his downtime, one of my players investigated the destruction of his village a few years back. He discovered that the attack was ordered by a high priestess of Zeboim (A druid).

Now I was expecting him to wait a few months and then face her along with the rest of the Party.

In a true player fashion that destroys all of your plans, he took the barbarian with him, and decided to attack him. With brilliant planning and deception they have managed to send 9/10s of his cronies on a fools erand and are now ready to face him in his grove.

Now I have already warned them that surprising him is out of the question since he is so deeply connected with the land and animals that he will be aware of trespasers in his forest.

Problem is, I have never played a druid, nor have I use one as an opponent. I was planning to read up but, the battle will begin before I have time to prepare accordingly.

Now, I was thinking of maybe placing a few lair action -since he is in his grove- but I have no Idea how he will fight.

The Attackers are an 8th Lvl Shadow Monk and a 5th lvl Totem (Eagle) barbarian/3rd Ranger (Hunter)

For the Npc I was thinking something among the lines of 14th lvl moon druid.

I know that by sheer numbers alone he could wipe the floor with them, but for the life of me, I cannot get HOW.
I don't want to cheat, nor do I want the battle to seem easy. I made it clear that if they die, they die and since they are far away from the other party members and no one knows where they are, they will not be ressurected either.

So.

How should the Druid, deal with them?

[hymer]

The obvious solution is to use earth elemental form. Between its ability to travel inside the ground and having 10' reach, the PCs can be in real trouble. The form emerges, attacks, and retreats back underground. Cast Longstrider and Freedom of Movement and perhaps have the Mobile feat. For Concentration, you could pick Conjure X, if you like for another earth elemental. A large batch of wolves may be more annoying, though. 24 for a seventh level slot if you really want to. With no AoE damage, going through 24 wolves could be extremely frustrating, especially while getting houdini'd by an earth elemental at the same time - the elemental can attack over the wolves due to its reach.
Even if pressed, it's almost impossible to prevent the druid from retreating into the ground.

That's without the cheese of pixie conjuring.

[R.Shackleford]

The obvious solution is to use earth elemental form. Between its ability to travel inside the ground and having 10' reach, the PCs can be in real trouble. The form emerges, attacks, and retreats back underground. Cast Longstrider and Freedom of Movement and perhaps have the Mobile feat. For Concentration, you could pick Conjure X, if you like for another earth elemental. A large batch of wolves may be more annoying, though. 24 for a seventh level slot if you really want to. With no AoE damage, going through 24 wolves could be extremely frustrating, especially while getting houdini'd by an earth elemental at the same time - the elemental can attack over the wolves due to its reach.
Even if pressed, it's almost impossible to prevent the druid from retreating into the ground.

That's without the cheese of pixie conjuring.

Ready/Delay actions (or whatever they. Call it now) will take care of the druid.

When I see an earth elemental rise up I will shoot it/cantrip it.

The earth elemental druid won't be able to see that the party is waiting for it to pop up so it gets hit the first round the party holds and has to guess if the party continues to wait for it. If the druid doesn't take a turn to pop up and attack then some can focus on any other c re atures whip one focuses on playing whack-an-elemental.

[hymer]

Ready/Delay actions (or whatever they. Call it now) will take care of the druid.

When I see an earth elemental rise up I will shoot it/cantrip it.

Between the monk and the barbarian, they seem to be melee. While I'm sure they have some sort of ranged attack, it won't be their best. And it won't benefit from Extra Attack. Adding to that is problems of cover (if you shoot the moment you see the elemental, it gets cover) and shooting while threatened in melee (a threat for at least one of them).


The earth elemental druid won't be able to see that the party is waiting for it to pop up so it gets hit the first round the party holds and has to guess if the party continues to wait for it. If the druid doesn't take a turn to pop up and attack then some can focus on any other c re atures whip one focuses on playing whack-an-elemental.

That's what so great about tremorsense. It allows you to 'see' straight through stuff, such as earth. The druid will know exactly where the PCs are unless they jump in water or fly.

[R.Shackleford]

Between the monk and the barbarian, they seem to be melee. While I'm sure they have some sort of ranged attack, it won't be their best. And it won't benefit from Extra Attack. Adding to that is problems of cover (if you shoot the moment you see the elemental, it gets cover) and shooting while threatened in melee (a threat for at least one of them).



That's what so great about tremorsense. It allows you to 'see' straight through stuff, such as earth. The druid will know exactly where the PCs are unless they jump in water or fly.

Extra Attack does work with delay/ready as that is your action. Delay (or whatever it's called) allows you to take an action at a later time as a reaction, this reaction isn't an OA.

Monks and Barbarians can still throw stuff. The monk may be able to stun with a thrown monk weapon (will need to check).

Tremorsense doesn't let a creature "see" that the enemies are waiting for them. Just because you are waiting for an enemy doesn't mean you are standing still, you are moving around your 5' square or moving around. You can move on your turn and then delay/ready.

You may know where they are but you don't see what they are doing. You are vastly overpowering this druid on bad rulings.

[hymer]

Extra Attack does work with delay/ready as that is your action. Delay (or whatever it's called) allows you to take an action at a later time as a reaction, this reaction isn't an OA.

While the DM may rule it otherwise, you get Extra Attack when you take the Attack Action. You're talking about the Ready Action.


Monks and Barbarians can still throw stuff. The monk may be able to stun with a thrown monk weapon (will need to check).

Stunning works only with melee weapon attacks. As for throwing, they'll be doing so with disadvantage or cover or both, and odds are they'll be using nonmagical attacks (unlike their melee), which the elemental has resistance to.


Tremorsense doesn't let a creature "see" that the enemies are waiting for them. Just because you are waiting for an enemy doesn't mean you are standing still, you are moving around your 5' square or moving around. You can move on your turn and then delay/ready.

DM call on whether people can see what action others take. But I never claimed the druid wouldn't surface in those cases. That'll be up to the DM. The PCs will be seriously disadvantaged whether they use Ready Actions or not.

[Misterwhisper]

A few things.

1. A high priest of Zeboim, should be a Tempest Cleric not a druid, but that is not that much of a deal anyway.

2. There is nothing wrong with just beating them senseless, with multiple attacks, bonus action healing spells, hit and run tactics, and resistances and also forcing them to read actions to attack thus reducing their effectiveness.

3. The issue will be the monk's stunning strike, that can cause you issues. That pretty much is a death sentence.

4. Keep in mind that if the barbarian has no target for a round they lose rage, that can really hurt a barbarian.

5. The spell, Antilife Shell is amazing, no save, 1 hour concentration of lost attacks unless the weapon has really long reach or they throw things.

6. Set up Antilife shell, then cast spells until you are out of the big ones killing the monk, or both with aoe's, after the monk drops shape shift into earth/fire elemental and proceed to beating on them with bonus action healing and resistances.

7. If nothing else just remember the golden rule of D&d, he is a caster and they are not, it would take a miracle for you to not at least get away.

[tieren]

As a lair action I might let the druid cast entangle (or generate an entangle like effect) 3x a day without the need for concentration.

For this particular character maybe an electric version of flaming sphere to protect the grove as well would be cool.

Or maybe get them in the grove then wall spell around it to prevent the PCs escape and use plant growth or spike growth to make the area difficult or painful for the PCs to function in.

[OrlockDelesian]

A few things.

1. A high priest of Zeboim, should be a Tempest Cleric not a druid, but that is not that much of a deal anyway.




According to the Dragonlance lore, Druids are those that specialize in nature. They are priests and priestesses that serve Habbakuk, Chislev, or Zeboim, all gods of nature. A druid must choose one of the three gods, and does not receive a Medallion of Faith from their chosen god.

I know that Tempest Cleric would probably be a better fit but these the days of the War of the Lance and I wanted to show them different ways of worshiping the old gods that are returning.
(Well kind of. They Never left after all)

[R.Shackleford]

While the DM may rule it otherwise, you get Extra Attack when you take the Attack Action. You're talking about the Ready Action.

You take the ready action to use the Attack Action as a reaction to a trigger. You get all of your extra attacks you would normally get because you can take any action you want as a reaction.

You can even cast a spell such as Magic Missile. Though using the Ready Action takes your concentration until you cast the spell.

[Hudsonian]

Are you trying to kill them or challenge them while still having a totally manageable fight? I feel like you can use the moon druid and change the difficulty level like the AI in video games. Just know that once you go earth elemental and start kiting, there is no going back without showing your hand.

It also seems to me that from the story telling aspect, it could be more interesting to fight an army of woodland creatures than play whack-a-mole for 45 minutes of a game session. Are you wanting it to be a RAW PC character? It seems like a sweet piece of fluff would be to put the additional lightning damage a cleric gets on the druid'so wildshape.

How embarrassing would it be if both of the characters lost to a bunch of wolves and an owl using flyby and what is essentially shocking grasp without the reaction clause.

[hymer]

You take the ready action to use the Attack Action as a reaction to a trigger. You get all of your extra attacks you would normally get because you can take any action you want as a reaction.

The Sage disagrees with you (http://www.sageadvice.eu/2015/01/24/extra-attack-ready/) for what it's worth. In the end, it'll be up to the DM.

Edit: I see your point now. But I also see what the Sage is referring to. I was right, but for the wrong reason. It's the language of Extra Attack that prohibits multiple attacks as a Ready Action, not the language of Ready Action.

[rhouck]

You take the ready action to use the Attack Action as a reaction to a trigger. You get all of your extra attacks you would normally get because you can take any action you want as a reaction.

No, you do not.

PHB p.192-193 list the available "Actions in Combat". One of them is "Attack". Another is "Cast a Spell". And another is "Ready".

Ready states:

Sometimes you want to get the jump on a foe or wait for
a particular circumstance before you act. To do so, you
can take the Ready action on your turn so that you can
act later in the round using your reaction

First, you decide what perceivable circumstance
will trigger your reaction. Then, you choose the action
you will take in response to that trigger, or you choose
to move up to your speed in response to it.

When the trigger occurs, you can either take your
reaction right after the trigger finishes or ignore
the trigger. Remember that you can take only one
reaction per round.

So in your example, you take the "Ready" action on your turn, and choose to take the "Attack" action whenever X event happens on a later turn.

Why did I emphasize "your" and "later"? Because Extra Attack states:

you can attack twice, instead of
once, whenever you take the Attack action on your turn.

Thus Extra Attack only applies when you take the "Attack" action on your turn. When you take the "Ready" action, you are, by definition, not taking the "Attack" action on your turn -- you are taking the "Ready" action and taking the "Attack" action later on someone else's turn using your reaction. Thus Extra Attack does not apply.

FWIW, I know many DMs that house rule it otherwise (i.e., that you can take Extra Attack), but RAW you cannot take Extra Attack when attacking via reaction.

[Hudsonian]

Guys, remember, this thread is about helping the op build a druid that will be fun and engaging while not totally destroying the PCs.

What race, level, stats, and spells should he have? What "grove" actions should he have?

[R.Shackleford]

The Sage disagrees with you (http://www.sageadvice.eu/2015/01/24/extra-attack-ready/) for what it's worth. In the end, it'll be up to the DM.

Edit: I see your point now. But I also see what the Sage is referring to. I was right, but for the wrong reason. It's the language of Extra Attack that prohibits multiple attacks as a Ready Action, not the language of Ready Action.

I typically take sage advice with a big bucket of salt. WotC has a long track record of making a good core rules and then flubbing the ancillary rules and aditional things. They are doing better in this edition but I think that social media and the fans are more or less forcing them to if they want to stay in the top spot.

Also, for what it's worth I typically play by the RoC and RoNFT (rule of cool and rule of not f.... troublesome).

I recall the Crossbow Expert feat issue just got comply fed due to sage advice. It isn't broken if you duel wield crossbows but they sage adviced/errata it out. Linkle, at least mechanically, is downright awesome and I would love a way to play that sort of charactet at a low level instead of waiting 6, 12, or 18 levels to get magical guns when I can just as easily explain it via no magic.

[rhouck]

That's without the cheese of pixie conjuring.

While Conjure Animals at a higher slot (as you mention) would generally be my go to, using Pixies might be fun in a less abusive way (i.e., not the typical cheese) where they only use Polymorph against the PCs to turn them into nonharmful enemies (e.g., sheep). The PCs then can figure out that it might be worth attacking their allies to reduce them to 0 hp (and have them change back), which is more fun and interesting than just slogging through the Giant Ape's hit points for the 8th time in a row.

Given that Pixies are good and Zeboim's druid is (presumably) evil, I might even allow the PCs to try and convince the Pixies to subvert their orders (i.e., if druid just generically orders "Polymorph all of them!") then they could cast Polymorph as a BUFF rather than turn them into sheep, etc.

[Renvir]

You could give the druid two lair actions: 1) the druid is aware of everything within a certain distance and therefore cannot be surprised 2) the druid can summon creatures anywhere within X distance.

This lets the druid conjure fey, animals, elementals, etc. right on top of the two PC's as they make their way to him. Do this in waves for added tension. If the PC's don't run away then the druid could throw out call lightning when they are close enough and then wild shape into an elemental to finish them off. Anything beyond this could be done on the fly because I find it hard to believe two level 8 PC's will survive after being softened up like this. If they do run away then it will enforce the idea that they need their allies help and they can game plan for the challenges they know they will face.

[OrlockDelesian]

Even so, they still have ways to get surprise. If they Τeleport next to her (they have an one use Item that I have given them for Campain Reasons, but the monk decided to use it for his own reasons -that will bite them in the ass when they find themselves in a ship attacked by dragons but this is another story), and the monk stun-locks her, the Duel is pretty much over.

Now, I Always build NPCs the way I would play them if someone told me "hey! build this" and I never cheat on rolls, in order to give my players the feeling that every NpC is a unique creature in this world as much as they are.

Her base stats (rolled) where 14, 14 ,11, 15 ,14, 8. One of those 14s and the 15 became 16 due to a wood elves increase in dex and wisdom.

So her stats

s 8
d 16
c 14
i 11
w 16
c 14

Now on her Fourth Lvl, she upped her Wisdom to 18. On her 8th she Grabbed the War Caster feat for the advantage on concetration saves. The point is. Do I put Alert on her or not? If I do, the player is gonna feel cheated, because let's face it, a druid will increase his wisdom to 20 before taking this feat. I also thought to give her a weapon of warning, but the "you cheated" feeling is gonna stay the same.

So, is there a way, to counter the stun-lock, if the monk surprises her? A spell she could have cast before?

[hymer]

Even so, they still have ways to get surprise. If they Τeleport next to her (they have an one use Item that I have given them for Campain Reasons, but the monk decided to use it for his own reasons -that will bite them in the ass when they find themselves in a ship attacked by dragons but this is another story), and the monk stun-locks her, the Duel is pretty much over.

Teleporting is only half the battle (and the spell at least is notoriously unreliable, by the way). You have to know where she is to teleport to her location.


Do I put Alert on her or not? If I do, the player is gonna feel cheated, because let's face it, a druid will increase his wisdom to 20 before taking this feat.

Moon druids are a lot less dependent on their wisdom stat than land druids. Even if you don't take Alert, taking Resilient (con) is absolutely recommendable. It'll help reduce the danger of the monk's stunning, but she probably took it for those all-important Concentration saves.


So, is there a way, to counter the stun-lock, if the monk surprises her? A spell she could have cast before?

Depends on how paranoid she's being at any given time. She's got 7 hours of elemental wild shapes per short rest, or 14 hours of beast shapes. She might spend a lot of that on the wing as an air elemental. Enhance Ability could give her advantage on Initiative. Meld into Stone would probably confuse the players to no end if she just wasn't there. Antilife Shell mentioned above defeats monk stunning.

[rhouck]

Now on her Fourth Lvl, she upped her Wisdom to 18. On her 8th she Grabbed the War Caster feat for the advantage on concetration saves. The point is. Do I put Alert on her or not? If I do, the player is gonna feel cheated, because let's face it, a druid will increase his wisdom to 20 before taking this feat.

Not necessarily. I play a Moon Druid (currently level 9) and have not increased my Wisdom at all (started at 16). I took Resilient: Con and War Caster instead so that I have +7 (with 16 Con) and Advantage on concentration checks. Given how important maintaining concentration is for a Moon Druid (especially when wild shaped, since you can't recast if you lose it), I have found it pays off.

And as I level up, I still don't plan on bumping Wisdom. Neither getting an extra 1-2 spells per day nor increasing my DC 1-2 make a big enough difference for the way I play the character versus taking more feats! There are so many great Moon Druid feats and it's one of the few classes that does not need to bump stats.

I'm actually Variant Human and have the Mobile feat as well. For a single BBEG, that's another one to consider as it helps keep them from getting locked down (or incurring OAs). Note that Thorn Whip is a melee spell attack, if she gets stuck up close in caster form. And if she introduces difficult terrain in her lair, that's an added bonus (as she can kite the party while letting her conjured minions attack).

tl;dr take as many feats as you want, without worrying about "cheating"

[MintyNinja]

Lair Action: 2 Actions, Call Lightning at 5th Level, no Concentration.

This gives the Beast Shaped Moon Druid a "Ranged Attack" that admittedly attacks the PC's strong save (+Danger Sense for Barb), but half damage from 5d10 could add up nicely. Or increase the power if you want to put the fear of god into these two.

[Misterwhisper]

I think the main issues is going to be how do you NOT kill them.

In every game I have ever played in, 2 almost exclusively melee classes go try to take out a caster 6 ish levels ahead of them just ends up with the 2 players making new characters.

As soon as they get anywhere within range cast Call lightning out of 7th level slot, he is the high priest of Zeboim so it really should be stormy all the time, that is a 7D10 or 8D10 lightning blast every turn, bonus action shift into an air element and fly out of their range and blast them to death, or earth elemental and just never come up in range of melee to summon your bolt.

Costs 1 spell and shape shift, if by some random chance they lice through the spell or get out of the area just land on a tree, go back to wood elf form and cast it again out of 6th level spell, and play keep away.

If you wanted to keep it simple, shift into a Giant Crocodile and beat on them, using a bonus action every turn to blow a spell and heal, then if they knock him out of shape shift, do it again.

Or

Cast Antilife shell, and give them the finger as you ignore their melee abilities, and spell them to death.\

Or if you are feeling like teaching them a lesson.

As soon as they are in sight ready an action to cast a spell when they get within arms reach.

Then cast Plane Shift.

There is no way that a Monk or a Barbarian are going to have a great save on Charisma and the save should be about DC 19 or 20 by then, sense 20's do not auto make a spell save anymore one of them has a nice one way trip to the plane of negative energy, plane of fire, or where ever you want their corpse to be.

Then you just beat the other one to death with the tactics above.


Seriously, if you do not kill them you have done something wrong.