Can someone sell me on a moon druid?

[Dankus Memakus]

Okay, so ive never been into moon druids because of their shapeshifting aspect. However now i really wanna build an AL legal melee druid and moon seems like my only effective option so can anyone sell me on cool builds on a moon druid? (Bonus points for a dwarf build)

Edit: i really want to know how you handle rp for a moon druid too

[sambojin]

Virtually unmatched versatility on how to handle a situation. Massive powerspike at lvl2 that stays pretty competitive until around lvl10 (by which time you're a pretty good caster anyway). SAD, so plenty of opportunities for multiclassing. Good low level spells that can alter encounters at even high levels. Your resources last ages, so whether it's a short-rest sparse campaign, or one with heaps of them, you'll be fine. Ability to slap conditions on enemies that would usually take a spell slot/resource for anyone else to do, but for you it's an attack action. Stacks of handy summons. Can be played and built as either a melee combatant, or as a caster with a decent durability, but still be ok at the other if you didn't feat/stat for it regardless. Plenty of nice races that work well and synergistically with the class.

They take a little more knowledge than some other characters (a few good wildshape forms for different situations, and just what certain conditions do to enemies), but they're one of the easiest melee combatants to run while ending up as good casters pretty early on.

Handle RP however you want. Bestial, fiery vengeance, one-with-nature, everything-is-nature, making balance by your hand, I'm a disney princess, nature eats people and so do I, whatever. If anything, you're less constrained than many other classes, because of the all-pervading source of your power, but still being a bit of a brute or a wise-master in melee as well.

[sambojin]

Favourite builds probably are V.Human with Alert or Sentinel, then going +2 Wis, Resilient (Con), and then more Wis. Can chip in a monk level or a barb level if you really want more combat power/endurance.

Or a Firbolg, going +2 Wis, Resilient (Con), more Wis. Drop in a level of cleric if you want to up-shift your prepared spells (you'll have a boatload of options, regardless of domain choice). Great for any campaign with a bit of a social or subtertuge aspect to it, with your invis popping to up your defense occaisionally to dodge big hits you think are incoming.

I've wanted to try out a Ghostwise halfling, just for telepathy in wildshape, but have never gotten around to it.

[AchuakScale]

I had a Hill Dwarf Druid, lost most of his memories to Mind Flayers. He was a Shepard Druid, almost pure caster, but there was another Moon Druid in the party. The two of us would end major boss encounters by swamping the Boss in question with dinosaurs. Druids are the b-b-bomb diggety.

[sophontteks]

If you weren't into moon druids because they shapeshift, why do you want to build one now?
Shepherd druids are pretty amazing if you don't want to shapeshift in combat.

[Odessa333]

Oddly enough, I was logging on here to ask this same question lol. I've played numerous versions of every other class, and tend to avoid druids. I'm starting up a new game and trying to fix that, see if I can find a way to make druids seem fun, but they seem off to me. They've never held my interest, and I want to give them a fair chance. Weird timing, eh?

[Lolzyking]

Al dinosaurs and the hearts of jungle rot expanded dinosaurs list is al legal

Zealoraptor/trodon Are good wild shape options

Also barb/monk dips are nice, savage attacker and tough are good feats.

Magic item wise, insignia of claws, bracers of defense, amulet of health, giant belts, staff of the Woodlands are good choices.

[MasterCat]

I'm playing a Moon Druid 9 with Barbarian dip right now. Because Wild Shape is a short rest resource and a Druid's best combat spells are concentration, you go spell->WS->move on your first turn and then tank until damage pops your beast form. I find that even "deadly" encounters are won by the time I get popped a second time.
At Druid 2, do control with Entangle or help your party with Faerie Fire. One level later, Entangle can be replaced with Spike Growth for the beginning of an encounter, and Flaming Sphere is potent. At Druid 5, the most potent thing you can be concentrating on is Conjure Animals (always 8x CR 1/4 animals). Druid 6 changes your tanking for the first time by opening up options like the Giant Constrictor Snake, and then Druid 7 lets you use your concentration on Conjure 8 Pixies (unless your DM denies them to you). That's an insane force multiplier, because it lets you turn a party of 4 into 4 157-HP tanks.
Just before Druid 7, you have 10 spell slots and you can really only use 2 in even the longest, hardest combat encounters. So try to get your party to think in terms of short resting after every encounter, or every other if you only had to Wild Shape once. As long as your friends can find ways around the DM denying you short rests, you can tank 5-10 encounters a day for them while doing battlefield control, minionmancy or some other help every time. It feels great. :D

[Dankus Memakus]

Oddly enough, I was logging on here to ask this same question lol. I've played numerous versions of every other class, and tend to avoid druids. I'm starting up a new game and trying to fix that, see if I can find a way to make druids seem fun, but they seem off to me. They've never held my interest, and I want to give them a fair chance. Weird timing, eh?

Yeah i totally get that. The shapeshifting just really feels strange to me. I also avoid druids. However the idea of turning into a raging bear slowly sounds better and better to me. I really wanna give it a shot. Nobody in my group plays druids and i wanna change that.

Edit: hey Mastercat why are pixies so great?

[Asmotherion]

A cool build? Literaly just roll one and you can't go wrong.

Shapeshift into big HP beasts. Have ongoing Healing Spirit wile Shifted. if you ever need to Rince-Repeat.

The bonus comes from healing allies as well as yourself wile doing some respectable melee damage and tanking.

And goodberies. Never start an encounter with lower than half your or your allies HP again. There's some Diping Life Domain Cleric 1 Tric for Max Effectiveness but regular Goodbery is amazing alone as well.

As for RP think generic hippy. Perhaps a bit less anti war and violance viewing them as a necessity.

[Zuras]

If you are building for actual AL play, Moon druids are amazing in that environment thanks to their flexibility. If your table composition varies wildly, the Druid can easily adjust, since you pick spells daily from the full list and can tank in wild shape if needed.

The main drawback of Moon Druid is that it requires a lot of system mastery and you have to maintain a list of creature forms and their abilities to be most effective.

[sambojin]

@Dankus Memecats
Pixies can cast polymorph. They're CR1/4. You can have 8 pixies from one cast of Conjure Woodland Beings. You now got 8x 4th lvl spells, and some others, from one slot.

You'll be at 7th level when you can initially cast this. So most of your party will be too. You can now change 8 of them (or do it 8 times to one, or twice to 4) into a CR7 (or whatever their level is) creature. That's a lot of free HP, stats and size.

Pixies are also invisible. So you can wait for the appropriate moment to command them to cast it. They follow your commands. And are summoned for an hour.

Very few DMs allow this other than as a "this is essentially your divine intervention, I, the DM, allowed it to happen", or you won't ever be able to do it more than once or twice if they didn't know how amazing it is. Remember, by RAW, the DM chooses which sort of creature, at or below the CR you have chosen, to appear when you cast Conjure *anything*. Pray for pixies. But don't expect them.

As you all level up, the polymorph beast forms available get bigger. It's the pixies' concentration, not yours, being used. It's the person it's cast on that determines max CR (form chosen by you, because you commanded the pixies to polymorph them into *foo*. It's really horribly great.

It is not a small list of spells they have either:
At will: druidcraft

1/day each: confusion, dancing lights, detect evil and good, detect thoughts, dispel magic, entangle, fly, phantasmal force, polymorph, sleep

Yep. 8x that for one lvl4 spell slot. Just about any situation you could encounter, sorted. Nice huh?


((Druids are weird. Do we get Find Familiar? No. But at lvl9, 5th level spell, we can cast Awaken, so we spend a day or two of downtime flying around as a giant eagle or queztlcoatlus, to find the most broken beast that's huge or smaller. And feed it goodberries and healing magic, and be nice to it. It can now talk, has Int10, and puts plenty of other summons to shame. Is this a "class skill" spell? Kind of. And you can have a few of them. But it's pretty late, it costs heaps of gold, and you're expected to actually look after your permanent summons. But it's a thing Druids do.
But so is summoning things that can cast spells. Being a spell battery summoner is apparently inherent in the design of Druids. If it wasn't, there wouldn't be so many summons that can cast spells, that only you are good at summoning, fairly early on. Remind your DM of that. Pixies aren't nice, but many fey creatures or elementals are friggen mental on the slot used=>slots gained outcome. It is intended, to a certain degree.))

[djreynolds]

A druid has a great spell list, IMO, it's strong and has flavor. And you are a full caster.

A moon druid can excel as both caster and melee combatant. Just not at the same time,

Exploration makes great use of wildshape

And after maxing out wisdom, you have 3 years to play around with.

[sambojin]

I guess I'll start again on the "selling you a Moon Druid" thing.

You are a full caster, but you are hard to kill. You shouldn't die before lvl5 unless it's a TPK. And by lvl5, you're a good caster.

You start with "Polymorph into a CR1 or less beast" as a 2/short rest "spell". It lasts for 1hr+.

Very few DMs ever flesh out druidic circles, sects of, etc. It's kind of assumed that either you are the only druid alive until you ask to seek out other druids, or that you all kind of get along (maybe with some kind of challenge, but Moon Druids are the best at random challenges, at any given level). So you have essentially a world-wide nature church, with no god stuff. Go and meet some druids, possibly in a circle, and buy some spell scrolls. ASAP. You don't need them to learn spells, you've just got nothing to spend your money on anyway, and you do *heaps of spell slots* the best of nearly anyone.

You are a force multiplier due to conditions placed on enemies, your good (changeable) spells prepared, your summons, and your spell battery summons. You look at Bards and laugh, even while singing alongside them. How many off list spells can you access? Oh, that many, and you can melee and move/spiderclimb/then fly by default? With people riding aboard, thus saving precious non-Bard/every-druid-can-do-cool-stuff-eventually secrets? Tralalalala....

You think things that Sorcerers do is amateurish. You have 1x4, 1x8, 1x16 concentration eventually. Twin spell? Hahahahahaha. Extend? You do at least a minute of something amazing, or ten minutes of something useful, or an hour of something terrifying, just by default. You scale spells to slot or summon, the duration or multi-target/AoE is always there. Nature is pre-meta'd. Heavily so.

Fighter's AS, BM's superiority die? Even a Wizard's spell regen? You can break the action economy with summons, prone/restrain/paralyze/blind (not just prone), and have exactly the same sort of BS available to you at early/mid campaign (lvls 2-11) that wizards can pull, but you were never squishy. Not combat limited, but can fight a bit, but for the party. Not magic hopeless, actually pretty good at some stuff, but can pseudo-cast almost resourcelessly compared to most "really full casters", with a FULL SPELL LIST AVAILABLE on level-up, regardless of DM or campaign (mostly). Never spend a cent on magic weapons, spell scrolls, books, or BS. You get yours free.

Warlock gimmicks? Oh dear, do you have some gimmicks as a Druid. Naturally. Available in a plethora of forms and spell lists, and vision/skill types. But hey, you pick your gimmick, on any given day or time. And you answer to no-one but yourself and your world, and maybe better gimmick masters that speak druidish.

Clerical faith is a wonderful thing. But you have nearly everything they have, though more and often better. Healing? Check. CC or save targeting damage? Check. Resilience? Check. SAD builds? Check. And while you do as much damage as them, to put the dead condition on things, you're so much better at everything else it's a wonder that there's not more nature gods saying "Look, just be a moon druid. It's how I intended you to kick arse anyway".

Rogues? Well, you can Pass without Trace, Enhance Ability, Hold Person, Entangle, Guidance or simply go into a fast or sneaky or strong or stompy form better than most expertise, SA, super-auto-crit, or dash moves could ever give you. And you can tank. And you can walk up walls. And you can fly. And many other things a rogue simply can never dream of.


Anyway. Moon Druids are great. It takes a bit of thinking and knowledge. But the power is there, certainly. You won't be as good as an optimized "whatever" class at the thing they do (unless you optimize to do that thing, probably with multiclassing as well, in which case you may be about as good "at that", but can also do heaps of other stuff). But think of yourself like the old 3.5 Chameleon prestige class. There's very little you can't do on any given day, if that's what you've decided to do. And you can do it well. All day. Or just a bit of anything you want. All day.

But remember, the beauty of being a Moon Druid is that you make other people do stuff better too. You fit into any party. You fit into any campaign. You fit into any DM style, wealth expectations, world scope, player beginning and end level for a campaign. Your own party can make you uber powerful as well, you are not just a support. You are highly supportable, with buffs on you, debuffs on enemies, good team tactics, and them filling in a bit so you use less resources doing "everything", so you can do a few things well. But you can change that thing, and that focus, from short rest to short rest, and from day to day. What goes around comes around. You can take the lead, but also drag people along. You can push others forward, so you all leap ahead. They're good to play as, and to play alongside. But there's a lot to learn to really understand how powerful a Moon Druid can be. Fortunately, they're also pretty good if you just want to play a Fighter Champion Bear with some magic and healing as well.

[Dankus Memakus]

I guess I'll start again on the "selling you a Moon Druid" thing.

You are a full caster, but you are hard to kill. You shouldn't die before lvl5 unless it's a TPK. And by lvl5, you're a good caster.

You start with "Polymorph into a CR1 or less beast" as a 2/short rest "spell". It lasts for 1hr+.

Very few DMs ever flesh out druidic circles, sects of, etc. It's kind of assumed that either you are the only druid alive until you ask to seek out other druids, or that you all kind of get along (maybe with some kind of challenge, but Moon Druids are the best at random challenges, at any given level). So you have essentially a world-wide nature church, with no god stuff. Go and meet some druids, possibly in a circle, and buy some spell scrolls. ASAP. You don't need them to learn spells, you've just got nothing to spend your money on anyway, and you do *heaps of spell slots* the best of nearly anyone.

You are a force multiplier due to conditions placed on enemies, your good (changeable) spells prepared, your summons, and your spell battery summons. You look at Bards and laugh, even while singing alongside them. How many off list spells can you access? Oh, that many, and you can melee and move/spiderclimb/then fly by default? With people riding aboard, thus saving precious non-Bard/every-druid-can-do-cool-stuff-eventually secrets? Tralalalala....

You think things that Sorcerers do is amateurish. You have 1x4, 1x8, 1x16 concentration eventually. Twin spell? Hahahahahaha. Extend? You do at least a minute of something amazing, or ten minutes of something useful, or an hour of something terrifying, just by default. You scale spells to slot or summon, the duration or multi-target/AoE is always there. Nature is pre-meta'd. Heavily so.

Fighter's AS, BM's superiority die? Even a Wizard's spell regen? You can break the action economy with summons, prone/restrain/paralyze/blind (not just prone), and have exactly the same sort of BS available to you at early/mid campaign (lvls 2-11) that wizards can pull, but you were never squishy. Not combat limited, but can fight a bit, but for the party. Not magic hopeless, actually pretty good at some stuff, but can pseudo-cast almost resourcelessly compared to most "really full casters", with a FULL SPELL LIST AVAILABLE on level-up, regardless of DM or campaign (mostly). Never spend a cent on magic weapons, spell scrolls, books, or BS. You get yours free.

Warlock gimmicks? Oh dear, do you have some gimmicks as a Druid. Naturally. Available in a plethora of forms and spell lists, and vision/skill types. But hey, you pick your gimmick, on any given day or time. And you answer to no-one but yourself and your world, and maybe better gimmick masters that speak druidish.

Clerical faith is a wonderful thing. But you have nearly everything they have, though more and often better. Healing? Check. CC or save targeting damage? Check. Resilience? Check. SAD builds? Check. And while you do as much damage as them, to put the dead condition on things, you're so much better at everything else it's a wonder that there's not more nature gods saying "Look, just be a moon druid. It's how I intended you to kick arse anyway".

Rogues? Well, you can Pass without Trace, Enhance Ability, Hold Person, Entangle, Guidance or simply go into a fast or sneaky or strong or stompy form better than most expertise, SA, super-auto-crit, or dash moves could ever give you. And you can tank. And you can walk up walls. And you can fly. And many other things a rogue simply can never dream of.


Anyway. Moon Druids are great. It takes a bit of thinking and knowledge. But the power is there, certainly. You won't be as good as an optimized "whatever" class at the thing they do (unless you optimize to do that thing, probably with multiclassing as well, in which case you may be about as good "at that", but can also do heaps of other stuff). But think of yourself like the old 3.5 Chameleon prestige class. There's very little you can't do on any given day, if that's what you've decided to do. And you can do it well. All day. Or just a bit of anything you want. All day.

But remember, the beauty of being a Moon Druid is that you make other people do stuff better too. You fit into any party. You fit into any campaign. You fit into any DM style, wealth expectations, world scope, player beginning and end level for a campaign. Your own party can make you uber powerful as well, you are not just a support. You are highly supportable, with buffs on you, debuffs on enemies, good team tactics, and them filling in a bit so you use less resources doing "everything", so you can do a few things well. But you can change that thing, and that focus, from short rest to short rest, and from day to day. What goes around comes around. You can take the lead, but also drag people along. You can push others forward, so you all leap ahead. They're good to play as, and to play alongside. But there's a lot to learn to really understand how powerful a Moon Druid can be. Fortunately, they're also pretty good if you just want to play a Fighter Champion Bear with some magic and healing as well.

1st off i had no idea that druids had such an amazing versatility. I honestly thought it was a bit of an exaggeration

2nd, are you suggesting i multiclass my champion fighter into moon druid because i demand to know more on this topic

[Zuras]

Druids have amazing versatility in their spell list. They are not best at anything besides summoning, but they have adequate spells for damage, crowd control, healing and exploration.

In a party with multiple other casters, they might feel a little weak, since they can’t blast like a Wizard/Sorcerer, Heal like a Life Cleric, or bamboozle like a Bard, but in a party with only one full caster they are amazing, and probably stronger than any alternative full caster.

[sithlordnergal]

So, you wan a play a Dwaf Moon Druid in AL. Well, there are a few things you should know about playing them:

1) you'll have to mark down any special beasts you've seen on your log sheets, particularly dinosaurs.

2) You really don't want to multiclass. AL is one of the few ways to consistently get a character to level 20, and a level 20 Moon Druid is insane

3) Find yourself a Staff of the Woodlands as soon as possible. There are a few modules you can play that reward them, and they are amazing in the hands of any Druid.

With that out of the way, here's why you should play a Moon Druid. As a Moon Druid, you are going to be a master of battlefield control, and you'll be the best tank in the party. The extra hp granted by your two Wild Shapes is amazing. Now, wild shape does drop off a little of levels 7 through 9, but by then you have spells like Conjure Animals and Polymorph, which more then make up for it. In fact, depending on your DM, Conjure Animals could be the deadliest spell in your arsenal

At level 10 you gain Elemental Wildshape, which pretty much instantly boosts you back up, and will even increase your DPS. Fire and Earth Elementals are, personally, my two favorite forms to use. Fire Elementals deal a lot more damage then you might expect at first, while Earth Elementals give you a lot of cheesy strategies.

The biggest thing about Moon Druids, and Druids in general, is that they aren't good at burst damage. Instead their spells focus on dealing consistent damage over several rounds, controlling the battlefield's terrain, assisting allies, and tanking everything.

[MasterCat]

At level 10 you gain Elemental Wildshape, which pretty much instantly boosts you back up, and will even increase your DPS. Fire and Earth Elementals are, personally, my two favorite forms to use. Fire Elementals deal a lot more damage then you might expect at first, while Earth Elementals give you a lot of cheesy strategies.

Earth Elemental shenanigans: cast concentration spell->Wild Shape->use move action to get your body completely underground. On subsequent turns, move under enemies and uppercut them twice. I'm not sure how this cashes out RAW, but best case scenario is that you uppercut and retract your arm in a fraction of a second, leaving it vulnerable only to readied actions.
Let's not forget Air Elemental shenanigans: cast Spike Growth->WS->standard action grapple on your next turn->move enemy 45 feet through spikes for 18d4 piercing damage.

[sithlordnergal]

Earth Elemental shenanigans: cast concentration spell->Wild Shape->use move action to get your body completely underground. On subsequent turns, move under enemies and uppercut them twice. I'm not sure how this cashes out RAW, but best case scenario is that you uppercut and retract your arm in a fraction of a second, leaving it vulnerable only to readied actions.
Let's not forget Air Elemental shenanigans: cast Spike Growth->WS->standard action grapple on your next turn->move enemy 45 feet through spikes for 18d4 piercing damage.

Why even bother coming back up? Cast a high level Moon Beam, turn into an Earth Elemental, sink into the ground, and wait. Use your actions to move the Moonbeam where ever you want. DMs can't even use the "You're underground so you technically can't see" counter because Moonbeam does not require you to see anything. Just move around underground till you see something with Tremorsense, and move the moonbeam to it.

[MasterCat]

sithlordnergal: Yeah, that's good too. However you do have a party to help, so the DPR of using your concentration on Conjure CR 1/4 Animals and doing 2 uppercuts a turn over hiding and using your action on Moon Beam should not be overlooked.