Robe for a Druid

[Hiro Quester]

My 15th level druid PC is wearing a few magic items, but not a robe.

Don't want to wear armor because I took one Monk level (for AC bonus, Improved Unarmed Strike --kung fu Tiger-- and Improved Grapple).

We don't have wilding clasps in our game (DM's attempt to stop my druid from overpowering other less-than-optimized PCs in our party; also a reason for the monk level).

My druid spends a lot of his time in Tiger wildshape, especially if there is trouble brewing.

The only half way decent robes I have found are these:

Robe of Thunder (MIC; raiment of the storm walker, functions in wildshape): take half damage from from sonic attacks, std action activation 3/day for 5 rounds it deals 2d6 sonic damage to those who hit you in melee.

But at 36,000gp it's expensive and protects against a rare attack, and the standard activation for a meh effect; I'd usually have better uses for a standard action. Not sure it's worth it.

Robe of the Vagabond (CC): +1 luck bonus to AC and all saves. For only 6000 that might be useful, even if it does not function in wildshape.

What other options are worth considering?

[Troacctid]

Vestments of Vermin Shape: 20,000 gp to gain the ability to wild shape into monstrous vermin. DMG II.

Robes with activated abilities that you won't need in wild shape, such as a Robe of Useful Items, could also be a good choice.

Or you could leave the slot empty. No rule says you have to wear robes.

[eggynack]

Or you could leave the slot empty. No rule says you have to wear robes.
This one has a good chance of being correct. Never quite understood the whole, "I need all the slots filled exactly once," thing. Alternatively, lots of folks interpret wild armor to, because it melds into your form, work fine with monk abilities. So, maybe that, or because you're high level, armor of the beast. Not my favorite pair of items, but you're working with a pretty small pool of availability here.

[Hiro Quester]

Yeah... thanks. I have left that slot open because I have never found anything particularly useful there.

It's just that we finally have some gold and are in a major city, about to visit the magic store, after a long time wandering in the wilderness, and I'm looking at empty slots thinking about useful items that might fill them.

And for the life of me I can't see any robe that seems particularly useful, and worried that I'm missing something useful and obvious.

The armor of the beast is kinda useful, but +1 wildshape/day is not worth the 26000 gp, and the lost AC when not in wildshape. Luminous armor spell and monk AC bonus is way better.

[eggynack]

]
The armor of the beast is kinda useful, but +1 wildshape/day is not worth the 26000 gp, and the lost AC when not in wildshape. Luminous armor spell and monk AC bonus is way better.

Well, I was assuming that you already had the ring and mantle, so you'd also get some other marginal bonuses. Not sure why you'd care about the robe slot if you don't have those items yet. I'm well aware it sucks in general. It's just that you seem to not have much to do with your cash. Wild armor is one of the better things you can do with the slot if you're just overflowing with cash. I'd probably just do more ring stuff though. Druids have good rings.

[Deophaun]

We don't have wilding clasps in our game (DM's attempt to stop my druid from overpowering other less-than-optimized PCs in our party; also a reason for the monk level).

My druid spends a lot of his time in Tiger wildshape, especially if there is trouble brewing.
It should be noted: there is nothing that prevents you from putting on a magic item after you have wild shaped to gain the benefit of it. Since you seem to have a preferred form for combat, just get whatever "robe" you want (doesn't have to be an actual robe: just something to fit on a tiger's torso) and only put it on when you're the tiger.

[Hiro Quester]

I do gave the Mantle, Eggynack. And our DM is using the ring as an adventure hook to get us to go to a place he wants us to go. (Previous owner of my mantle may have had one.)

And I do wear a few items in wildshape (mostly +3 amulet of mighty fists with wisdom enhancement, and rings). But trying to keep that item dependency to a minimum, since I often have to wildshape in a hurry. Swift action wildshape get is the point of the mantle, after all.

Plus DM has ruled (again to mitigate my optimizing tendencies) that many items I wear in my regular small gnome-sized shape can't instantly resize to wear in large Tiger shape.

I'll probably just use my gold for an orange ioun stone and a 6th level pearl of power. Thanks all.

[Crake]

Robe is the same slot as armor, right?

Wild chitin full plate to go along with my monk's belt and wilding clasp, easy peasy

[Hiro Quester]

Robe is the same slot as armor, right?

Wild chitin full plate to go along with my monk's belt and wilding clasp, easy peasy

That would work. Except no wilding clasps, and I don't want to wear armor (monk level and greater luminous armor)

[StreamOfTheSky]

I essentially asked about this a few months ago (from the perspective of a monk, which your full question also is): http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?483507-Good-robes-for-Monks

The conclusion seems to be...there's really not much to pick from. Robes of the Vagabond and maybe Kimono of Storing, that's about it. Perhaps you'd like the Ghost Shroud (MIC; ~5500 gp for deflection +1 AC and all melee attacks are ghost touch) that I had planned to use the slot for, until I discovered the Shadow Cloak (Drow of the Underdark) exists.

And to answer the question of "why do you care?" -- efficiency! Magic items go up in cost exponentially, and adding properties to an existing item usually will cost 50% extra. As you get higher in level and have the other slots taken up already, you're cheating yourself to leave one unused.

[Hiro Quester]

Thanks, StreamOfTheSky. That was a useful discussion for my purpose.

The ghost shroud does sound useful (esp because I already have a good shoulder item--Mantle of the Beast). and fairly reasonably priced.

It would be even better if I still used a ring of blinking --seems like it could be interpreted to enable me when ethereal to still attack the material plane and disable the 20% miss chance of one's own attacks, too. But I traded that to our party rogue, because the DM was getting frustrated that I was so hard to challenge in melee without killing other party members.

But now I know I'm not missing anything too special, I think I'm just going to save my money for other items I need more than filling a robe slot (Pearls of Power, orange ion stone, etc.).

[StreamOfTheSky]

I'll have blink soon via Invisible Fist alternate class feature (trades evasion and imp. evasion for an immediate action invisibility and an immediate action blink, respectively) and was looking at ghost touch to get around this miss chance, but by RAW it doesn't seem to work.

And yeah, it's unfortunate. WotC seemed to think only casters wear robes. Which is especially ironic since there's a million ways for an arcanist to wear armor and not suffer spell failure %, but absolutely zero ways for a monk to wear armor and not lose class features. Way to cater to the less needy audience....
If you could get a Soul chakra bind (Incarnum) via Open Chakra type feat, that'd be an option, but I guess you can't.

[eggynack]

And to answer the question of "why do you care?" -- efficiency! Magic items go up in cost exponentially, and adding properties to an existing item usually will cost 50% extra. As you get higher in level and have the other slots taken up already, you're cheating yourself to leave one unused.
50% is meaningful, but it's not insanely so. You kinda need to be glomming items together on a druid anyway, in this context, given that there's such a small number of items that work in a wild shape, and because you're getting a lot of your items through attaching items to those items. In a more standard context, wilding clasps reduce that cost from 50%, And, beyond that, they mean that you're going to usually want somewhat more expensive items over the smaller stuff.

Yes, theoretically, assuming all slots are equal, in that you have roughly equal options for all of them, you do indeed want to fill all slots instead of doubling down in a slot, or upping a bonus. But all slots aren't equal, or even close. If you're saving money by sticking your cash in an item you wouldn't even want if not for the discount, then you're not saving money at all. Getting a crap item for an unused slot isn't efficiency. It's just bad itemization.

[sleepyphoenixx]

The only thing like that i've found worth it is the body slot equivalent of Bracers of Armor from LEoF, and then only for the Soulfire enhancement.
But that generally requires Wilding Clasps.

You can do the same with the Robe of Thunder, but the bracers from the same set are cheaper, also function in WS and you don't have to use a setting-specific book to add Bracers of Armor functionality to it.