Nerf the Druid!

[Maxus]

I'm staring at the class. And, wow, it's just amazing that Wizards just let this by.

The major issue, of course, is Wild Shape. They can become any animal that fits the size requirements. For an hour/class level.

Granted, most of the animals can't compete with monsters, but....

That's just ridiculous.

And, of course, optimizing a Druid consists of "Take Natural Spell at level 6," so they can be a head-biting Dire Bear *and* cast spells why doing it.

And their range of random bonuses and abilities are second only to the Monk's. The one that really gets on my nerves is A Thousand Faces. That one should really be for a Doppelganger racial class, or something. It's the ultimate disguise ability, and if I'm reading the rules right, I could just go, "I change into myself, but with wings and a 120-foot fly speed" or "Whatever has gills and the max swim speed". I guess the guy who wrote this thought, "Hey, I've given them the ability to turn into any animal. That looks week. I know! I'll let them turn into any person, too!"

So I break out the nerf bat and apply it to these things:

1) Wild Shape. You should be forced to have a selection of forms, and it shouldn't be total stat replacement, instead of just saying, 'Here, be anything'. Oh, and I'd make changing form provoke an AoO, on the basis that it's a good idea to stab someone while he's sorting his arms and legs out, and probably very easy to do.

2) GET RID OF NATURAL SPELL. It's just dumb to force people to choose between caster and non-caster (read: usually stabs people in combat), and then give feat which allows a class to both bite off heads and cast spells, too.

3) Get rid of that damn A Thousand Faces ability.

[Fwib]

Congratulations. 4e will be out soon and your problems (some of them) will go away, maybe. Of course, WotC have been tweaking over the years since 3e came out and not managed to do anything much, so don't take it as read that they won't just port the uberness of the druid right into 4e.

[Surgo]

If you take a look at the errata, A Thousand Faces is now the same thing as a 1800 gp magical item. It's really not even an issue.

[Voss]

Easy fix.
Animal companions contract a wasting disease and die automatically.

Druid gets split into two classes-
Shapeshifter gets wild shape
Druids get the spell casting.

Done. Now he's down with everybody else.

[Maxus]

If you take a look at the errata, A Thousand Faces is now the same thing as a 1800 gp magical item. It's really not even an issue.

Agreed, but it's also annoying. It's one of those cases where it's just *stupid* to have it like that. Why would a Druid need to impersonate other people? So they can play pranks on each other, or something?

I could see if it were a class based on deception and Disguise, but that's just a case of "Huh? Why?"

[RandomCasualty]

1198282774[/unixtime]]



Agreed, but it's also annoying. It's one of those cases where it's just *stupid* to have it like that. Why would a Druid need to impersonate other people? So they can play pranks on each other, or something?

I could see if it were a class based on deception and Disguise, but that's just a case of "Huh? Why?"

I wonder the same thing.

[angelfromanotherpin]

Why would a Druid need to impersonate other people? So they can play pranks on each other, or something?

Not so much on each other as on other people. Druids in Celtic myth are shapechangers, and they totally do all kinds of Odin-style disguise-trickery to mess with people.

[JonSetanta]

1198281329[/unixtime]]
Druid gets split into two classes-
Shapeshifter gets wild shape
Druids get the spell casting.

Done. Now he's down with everybody else.

That, and the Shapeshifter gets the disguise either as a low level spell (long-duration Alter Self, sans ability score/monster trait cherry picking) or class ability such as Change Shape.

There could be some crossover, but much in the same way that Divine and Arcane casters have their goon squad of Mystic Theurge wannabes lined up for CharOp delight.

[Crissa]

The problem comes when you find out that there's no actual skills or mechanics that synergize with shapeshifting other than spellcasting.

But that's mostly because of the way that Fighters and Monks suck, which is just annoying.

-Crissa

[Surgo]

Agreed, but it's also annoying. It's one of those cases where it's just *stupid* to have it like that. Why would a Druid need to impersonate other people? So they can play pranks on each other, or something?

Who cares? It's level 13. You can get a Hat of Disguise for nothing. It's just a filler ability for an otherwise ability-less level. You could give it away to any class and nobody would care. I thought this thread was about balance, not the class having the flavor you think it should have.

[Talisman]

The shapeshifter variant in PHB2 is quite good. You can shapeshift at level 1...as a swift action...an unlimited number of times,

BUT...

You CANNOT cast spells while shapeshifted.
You lose your mind-controlled tank...I mean, "Animal Companion"
You're limited to a few specific forms when shapeshifting
The forms, while offering decent bennies, aren't overpowered for their levels.
You gain stat enhancements, not stat replacements. No longer is Strength the automatic druid dump stat.
You CANNOT cast spells while shapeshifted (I know I already said it, but it's worth repeating).

[Voss]

Aside from the animal companion, however, its still very good. shifting is a free action, and you're still a full spellcaster. So you can buff or flip between front line and fire support at will. Do it right, and you still make melee classes cry.

If you sit down and work it out, you can still out melee a barbarian and have a boatload of spells to throw at people.

[Bigode]

Voss, I thought making meleers cry was par for the course; the question's whether it makes the cleric and wizard feel bad; do you think it does?

[Talisman]

1199133226[/unixtime]]Aside from the animal companion, however, its still very good. shifting is a free action, and you're still a full spellcaster. So you can buff or flip between front line and fire support at will. Do it right, and you still make melee classes cry.

If you sit down and work it out, you can still out melee a barbarian and have a boatload of spells to throw at people.

Probably true (I've never played a shapeshifter druid...campaign imploded before I could). However, it's certainly better than the core druid.

[Voss]

Only in the sense of being shot in the foot is better than being shot in the hand. Some fucker still shot you.

Bigode- eh. Probably. You're buffing yourself with giant enhancement bonuses for free.
I look at it this way. As a free action (or swift, I forget off hand, but essentially, not an actual action), you get: an enhancement bonus to Strength, natural armor, attack rolls, damage rolls, and a pile of miscellaneous bonuses, ranging from crappy DR to pounce. At the very least, you're getting a very enhanced bulls strength, barkskin (which may stack with actual barkskin) and greater magic weapon, simultaneously, for free. A cleric is going to have to spend spell slots, essentially every encounter, (or invest in magic items) to do the same thing. He's also going to have to spend actions to do it.

Now, the druid loses item bonuses in shapeshift form, but he can stock up on spellcasting equipment instead.

There are a lot of absurd things you can do with a built in fly speed and the ability to shift to either a full spellcaster or a huge melee brute as a a free action.

You have to worry about touch attacks in shapeshift form, but really, you can just stand back and cast spells at those targets. Or summon a bunch of crap. Gods know the fucking druid has a shitload of force effects (and creatures) in the goddamn spell compendium.