More moon druid options

[ragnorack1]

Hi all new to these forums and relatively new to D&D (played a few taster sessions over the years) but my work pattern has changed to a point where I can hopefully return to my home town more often and join a group of old school friends who regularly play.

Got a couple of ideas of characters I've been throwing about one being a strength based monk/barbarian who's character is based around a fantasy version of a WWE wrestler and an actual priest who wrestled for a orphanage Fray Tormenta (not making this s guy up, honest).

The other idea is a more traditional green Knight character that I want to base around an oath of the ancients paladin and a moon druid. Why have the moon druid aspect? Surely the oath of the ancients fills that role alone? Yes but I'd like a bit more variety, and most importantly I like the mental image of morphing into an armoured bear like Iorek Byrnison :P

To make the decision I need a to gain some knowledge and opinions on a few matters so figured I'd post some ideas here for feed back:
Firstly, beast forms seem a bit limited at higher levels and the higher level forms don't quite fit the bill of "protector of the forests", I'd quite like to be able to carry on using bear forms effectively at higher levels. Just wondering if there are any guides or rules of thumb for scaling creatures up to higher CRs?

Secondly, is I'd like to armour my bear. Thinking along these lines a long term goal for my character would be to obtain/craft some ironwood plate armour and barding and through some means make it into a magical item that can transform between human and some beast forms. Any ideas at what level range/cost this would be suitable or would it be too imbalanced?

Finally if the above homebrew was acceptable to the DM would CR4 creatures still be useful at higher level play if the campaign went on this long, I doubt it will but committing to a choice between paladin2/druidx split or paladin8/druidx would be made fairly early on in the characters life. I'm tending towards paladin 8 for better party buffs and an extra attack out of wild form but not at the expense of making wild forms completely useless, and the paladin 2 builds not so bad if it did make it to level 20 as atleast then I can have a bear that shoots lightning.


Thanks for any advice you can give, obviously this will require some chat and agreement with friends when I next see them. But I just wanted some opinions so I can go armed with options and don't suggest anything too daft :D

[Man_Over_Game]

For a good list of beasts to use, I'd check out this link: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showt...n-and-Shepherd

As to armor for your beast form, there are official rules for that: "Barding is armor designed to protect an animal’s head, neck, chest, and body. Any type of armor shown on the Armor table in this chapter can be purchased as barding. The cost is four times the equivalent armor made for humanoids, and it weighs twice as much."-p.155 of the Player's Handbook.

As to what level a magical piece of armor that would shift between forms....not sure. It'd inevitably would be up to your DM, but I'd probably say....level 7-8 seems fair.

[Merudo]

For a good list of beasts to use, I'd check out this link: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showt...n-and-Shepherd

I've also made such a list; you can check it up here.

I find my list more convenient because I color coded each beast (Sky Blue: Amazing, Blue: Good, etc.)

[Dalebert]

A magic item I created for my game:

Mimic hide armor (very rare, requires attunement by a druid). Made from the hide of a mimic, this +2 hide armor grants you advantage on checks to grapple a creature in all forms. When you wildshape, it merges and shifts with you but stops acting as armor instead granting benefits similar to a barkskin spell. While wildshaped, if your AC would be lower than 16, it becomes 16.

Quite beneficial for a lot of forms with crappy AC but saves you having to extract stats and do math for each form.

[Man_Over_Game]

I've also made such a list; you can check it up here.

I find my list more convenient because I color coded each beast (Sky Blue: Amazing, Blue: Good, etc.)

I do like yours a lot better.

I do wish I could find a list that goes into more detail, though. Sometimes, it's relevant to know how many attacks the creature makes, or to know what proficiencies it has.

[MagneticKitty]

For barding see if your dm will allow ring of arming from 3.5e (upgraded to fit 5e) to store you bearbarding in. Meaning you might need an entire turn to setup for wildshape and getting armor, but not bad.

Or reflavor barkskin spell to look like barding.
get a ring of spell storing and charge it with barkskins / mage armor. You don't need components to cast from the ring since those are used when spell is put into the ring originally. Magic rings can resize to fit the attuned wearer. Can also throw shield or absorb elements in the ring

Or dip barb. Bears have high con, have unarmored defense, plus resistance to b/p/s.

I would say you can have higher offense (paladin dip) or higher defense (barb dip) or better bears (less other levels more druid). Choose 2. Lol

[ragnorack1]

Cheers for the feedback, some nice ideas in regards to increasing the AC.

As an aside are there any guides out there for home brewing monsters? The higher cr creatures don't really feel right for the character to morph into being mostly dinosaurs/mammoths and him a defender of the woodland, would like to hash out some ideas for "sacred" forms of woodland creatures but if there's advice out there to assist in stating them out with out them becoming imbalanced.

[MagneticKitty]

I'd reflavor the dinosaurs as large animals. Using the same stats so you don't have to worry about balance.
Mammoth - giant or "sacred" elephant
brotosaurus - giant or "sacred" giraffe
Saber tooth - giant or "sacred" tiger
Raptor - giant or "sacred" panther
ect

[nickl_2000]

I'd reflavor the dinosaurs as large animals. Using the same stats so you don't have to worry about balance.
Mammoth - giant elephant
brotosaurus - giant giraffe
Saber tooth - giant tiger
Raptor - giant panther
ect

Where is the Dire Wiener Dog in D&D? It would be 1 foot tall, 4 feet wide, and 25 feet long!


Also, if you want more close to official options, check out the Kobold Press Tome of Beasts and Creature Codex. I really, love some of the entries in there

[KyleG]

In looking for jungle animals around cr1 and cr2