Sword staff druid

[gamerdad24]

Playing a gestalt campaign with a druid/barbarian, feral template, aristrakh homebrew race. Looking for tips on aggressive build, contemplating a sword a staff combo, maybe monkey grip on the feats. looking to balance enhancement while also trying to figure out a viable combo for combat with animal companion, trying to also figure what animal to choose. Starting lvl in campaign is lvl 14

[ExLibrisMortis]

An aggressive build? As in, melee damage? Shock Trooper, Leap Attack, Wild Shape into something with hands and a ton of strength? If you want a melee druid, I wouldn't suggest adding barbarian. Instead, add totemist (which is a lot like the barbarian, fluff-wise), or split the difference and go barbarian/totemist/totem rager.

Sword and staff isn't particularly useful, not with Monkey Grip, and not without it--two-handing generally beats TWF (for the same feat investment), and quarterstaves are already double weapons, so there's no point adding an off-hand, normally. If you specifically want to use a staff, you could go with Eilservs School, which is a nice damage boost to both ends of the staff.

[gamerdad24]

An aggressive build? As in, melee damage? Shock Trooper, Leap Attack, Wild Shape into something with hands and a ton of strength? If you want a melee druid, I wouldn't suggest adding barbarian. Instead, add totemist (which is a lot like the barbarian, fluff-wise), or split the difference and go barbarian/totemist/totem rager.

Sword and staff isn't particularly useful, not with Monkey Grip, and not without it--two-handing generally beats TWF (for the same feat investment), and quarterstaves are already double weapons, so there's no point adding an off-hand, normally. If you specifically want to use a staff, you could go with Eilservs School, which is a nice damage boost to both ends of the staff.

Ok setting aside the staff, was hoping then to do something along the line of both me and my companion going at the enemy in a dual rage fashion enhancments and such. Was tinkering with the thoughts of weapons which is why the staff came to mind. Should i try for mainly nat weapon attacks that come with my claws on the feral template and wild shape

[Darrin]

Looking for tips on aggressive build, contemplating a sword a staff combo, maybe monkey grip on the feats.

I'm not exactly sure what you mean by a sword staff combo... but I think you may be misunderstanding how Monkey Grip works... which is actually exceedingly common for that feat. It does not allow you to wield a two-handed weapon with one hand. It allows you to wield a larger-sized weapon without increasing the handed-ness. You still have to eat the -2 wrong size attack penalty. (I suspect many groups house-rule Monkey Grip to work the way most people think it does, rather than how it's actually written.)

Or maybe the aristrakh race has multiple arms?

[liquidformat]

So for gestalt melee druid my hands down favorite build is druid/ Bear Totem Barbarian 3/Ranger3/Fist of the Forest 3/Primeval alternatively you could also go druid/ Bear Totem Barbarian 3/Overwhelming Attack Monk 2/Fist of the Forest 3/Primeval if you are allowed to get rid of the alignment restriction on monk/barbarian. The first build requires you to take power attack, unarmed strike and self-sufficient and the second self sufficient and endurance; either way you will also want nature spell of course. I like taking dire puma for my primal form due to the high ability scores, climb speed, and attack modes (punce, improved grab, rake); though dire wolverine is of note purely for ability scores while raging and dire ape for having hands and being able to wield weapons and such.

Either way if you are looking for a melee power house, going with primeval backed up by druid spells is very powerful and the above build allows you to have Con, Dex, and Wis all go to AC in all forms so you can comfortably tank. I would suggest going with Fleshraker animal companion, superior unarmed strike and snap kick are great choices, this build does quite well with vow of poverty which is how I normally play it though can work just fine with wilding clasps too.

[Particle_Man]

Can druids use swords?

[Mr Adventurer]

They can use whatever weapons they like.

[liquidformat]

Can druids use swords?

They are all proficient with scimitars by default, beyond that if they gain proficiency with any others they can use them without penalties.