Land Druid Circles. why not Urban?

[Edgerunner]

Running Mad Mage with a Land Druid /Grasslands circle. Good spells all and all.

My character is from Waterdeep and has never spent any time away from the city except for Undermountain. He is a member of the Grey Hands faction.
Essentially I have been playing him as a Wizard that taps into the Life Force around him to power his spells. The DM has never asked me if I have a Deity and to be honest I don't want him to have one. I chose Grasslands because it's pretty awesome TBH.

How would you go about creating a Spell List for an Urban Druid circle?

[nickl_2000]

Spells that may work (by Druid Level):

3rd: Animal Messenger, Beast Sense, Continual Flame
5th: Create Food/Water, Daylight, Sending, Stinking Cloud
7th: Blight, Fabricate, Freedom of Movement
9th: Contagion, Dominate Person, Geas, Mislead

Just tossing some out there that may make sense. Since it's just spell selection, I would be pretty open as long as you weren't cherry picking out the best spells.


You could also look to find spells that specifically focus on humanoids, since as an urban druid the "animals" you focus on the most are humans

[NaughtyTiger]

Spells that may work (by Druid Level):

3rd: Animal Messenger, Beast Sense, Continual Flame
5th: Create Food/Water, Daylight, Sending, Stinking Cloud
7th: Blight, Fabricate, Freedom of Movement
9th: Contagion, Dominate Person, Geas, Mislead



stinking cloud made me laugh... perfect spell.

tongues
wall of stone - extending existing buildings.
etherealness - walk through buildings
dominate person, geas

[Vogie]

In most cases, I'd just apply whatever land type the city used to be before it was a city. The area that is now Waterdeep, for example, could be easily Mountain, Grasslands or Coast, and maybe even Underdark for the "undermountain" region

[Man_Over_Game]

It's important to remember that every Land Druid step has at least one spell that's usable in combat.

My recommended list:

3rd: Heat Metal, Detect Thoughts
5th: Gaseous Form, Stinking Cloud
7th: Stone Shape, Confusion
9th: Wall of Stone, Legend Lore

[NaughtyTiger]

snip

i like this a lot.

[noob]

Would animate objects or animate city be cool extra spells?
Or the equivalent of treewalking but with towns(you enter a town and get in another town)

[NaughtyTiger]

Would animate objects or animate city be cool extra spells?
Or the equivalent of treewalking but with towns(you enter a town and get in another town)

animate objects would work, but as a DM, I hate animate objects...

[KorvinStarmast]

How would you go about creating a Spell List for an Urban Druid circle? Druid, which would appear to be pretty much not urban. Interesting mind stretching exercise you are doing here. Let us know how it goes in play.

[noob]

Druid, which would appear to be pretty much not urban. Interesting mind stretching exercise you are doing here. Let us know how it goes in play.

druidism is not a very well known religion and dnd druids have barely anything to do with real life druidism so saying "druids have to be themed around stuff that is not man made" is quite weird.
Also you can check the 3.5 urban druid and apply the appropriate changes for making it a 5E class

[Naanomi]

Looking at the list of terrain types in general, Underwater and a variety of Planar environments are also untouched

I feel like they should be allowable Ranger terrains at the very least

[nickl_2000]

stinking cloud made me laugh... perfect spell.


Thanks, it seemed perfect after reading about "the great stink of Paris" recently.

[Tanarii]

My character is from Waterdeep and has never spent any time away from the city except for Undermountain. He is a member of the Grey Hands faction.Not to put down on the idea of an Urban Land Druid, but it sounds like of the PhB options, Coast, Mountain or Underdark would have made more sense in terms of aligning with your background.

[Willie the Duck]

druidism is not a very well known religion and dnd druids have barely anything to do with real life druidism so saying "druids have to be themed around stuff that is not man made" is quite weird.

Then so would be assuming he was talking about real world druids. You're right, D&D druids aren't particularly tied to them at all. The oD&D druid as monster/opponent entry was a fairly good representation of druids as Cicero or Tiberius might have seen them -- a thing to be feared (with whatever witchery either of them believed in) resisting Roman occupation in Gaul, etc.


Also you can check the 3.5 urban druid and apply the appropriate changes for making it a 5E class

Yes, that is the distinction (and, also yes, a good place to start for a homebrew 5e version). 5e has not done much with 'un-classes' outside of paladins (where 'you don't have to play these guys Lawful Good this time' seems to be a deliberate emphasis-decision). There aren't urban druids/rangers, we haven't seen an ur-priest (or Planescape Athar), no specific 'it takes a thief to catch a thief'-style rogue archetype, nor any specific 'un-musician' bards. These are all things I think we would have seen if 5e had gone with the lots-of-splatbooks business model, or there were still a Dragon Magazine in need of articles.


Looking at the list of terrain types in general, Underwater and a variety of Planar environments are also untouched

Both of those options I get why they weren't put in the PHB, but do wish that we'd gotten at least more extensive UAs for dealing with Underwater and Planar Travel campaigns. Perhaps Horizon Walker is meant to capture this character type.