D&D 5E Adjusting Wildshape

[Hawk Diesel]

So I've had a problem with Wildshape ever since 3.5. My issues with it are as follows:

1) I don't like players (myself included) having to flip through the Monster Manual to figure out your stats and determine if its the best option. In addition, technically you need to have seen the animal before. I like this limit, but it also seems artificial.

2) It is very hard to balance or standardize beasts against one another, even of the same CR. Some are are able to do massive damage with poison or have other abilities (multiattack for the Giant Badger, which even a non-Moon Druid could use at level 2) that make them clear favorites.

3) Keeping track of your potential forms is a headache in itself.

So I am proposing a change to the current 5e wildshape feature. non-Circle of the Moon druids get access to two forms. These are an exploration form, and a Burden/Swift form. Each form gets its own associated stats as follows:

Burden/Swift Form
Size: Medium or Large
HP: 16 + Druid Level
Speed: 50ft
Strength: 15
Dexterity: 11
Constitution: 13
Natural Attack deals 1d6 damage (Your choice of claw/slashing, bite/piercing, or slam/bludgeoning. You can change this each time you wildshape)
Darkvision 60ft

Each time you use this wildshape, you can choose either the Sure-Footed or Beast of Burden ability.

Beast of Burden. You are considered to be one size larger for the purpose of determining its carrying capacity.

Sure-Footed. The goat has advantage on Strength and Dexterity saving throws made against effects that would knock it prone.

Exploration Form
Size: Tiny or Small
HP: 4 + Druid Level
Speed: 20ft
Strength: 5
Dexterity 16
Constitution 10
Natural Attack 1 damage (Your choice of claw/slashing, bite/piercing, or slam/bludgeoning. You can change this each time you wildshape)
Darkvision 60ft

Each time you use this wildshape, you can choose one of the following additional movement types from Climb, Swim, or Burrow. Your speed in these movements is equal to your walking speed. If you choose a swim speed, you are also considered amphibious.

Whenever you gain an ASI from your druid level, you can improve your Wildshape Form's abilities. You may apply a +2 to one Wildshape ability score, +1 to two Wildshape ability scores. You cannot improve your Wildshape ability score higher than 20. You can apply this improvement to each form available, and you can choose a different stat to improve for each form.

In addition, each time you improve your Wildshape ability scores, you can choose 2 abilities from the following list. Each ability can only be taken once. You must meet the minimum level listed for each ability. Each ability chosen can be used in any form you have available.

Level 4 – Keen Senses (Advantage of Perception Checks), Stealth (Advantage of Stealth Checks), Standing Leap, Illumination, Swift (+10ft all movement speeds)

Level 8 – Fly, Blindsight 60ft, Spider Climb, Tough (+2 HP per Druid Level), Natural Armor (+2 AC), Improve Attack Damage (Improve by one die)

Level 12 – Pack Tactics, Charge, Relentless, Constrict, Flyby, Poison, Grapple, Swallow

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For the Circle of the Moon Druid, you gain one additional form called a Combat Form. Your Combat Form has the following stats:

Combat Form
Size: Medium or Large
HP: 30 + (Druid Level x 4)
Speed 40ft
Strength 16
Dexterity 14
Constitution 14
Natural Attack 1d8
Darkvision 60ft

In addition, when you gain a combat form, you can choose one of the following abilities for your combat form: Pack Tactics, Charge, Relentless, Constrict, Poison, Grapple, Swallow, Pounce, Running Leap, Rampage

As a Circle of the Moon Druid, you also gain access to Wildshape abilities faster than normal Druids. You do not need to meet the normal level requirement associated with Wildshape ability improvements.


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For any form (Exploration, Burden/Swift, Combat) you may describe how the form looks so long as it is appropriate based on the forms statistics. This provides the benefit that you can look like whatever creature you want within limits of the forms capabilities. Your explorer form could be a cat, mini-dragon, or bigger than normal insect. Your Burden/Swift form could be an ox, cow, dinosaur, whatever. Your combat form could be a polar bear, Worg, or even a hybrid form similar to a were-creature.

 

[Bardbarian]

This may be good at low levels but it doesnt really scale well. I suggest just having the player have the stat blocks of monsters they might want to use available before the game pre printed out I do this with my druid and its very fast. If I need a very specific animal i can look it up but sometimes its fine to just skip optimal for speed of play. Recently i polymorphed an ally into a giant shark on dry land because i didn't have a better option ready on my turn. it was ine and we got a laugh out of the druid who wasnt prepared. Sub optimal can be fun.

 

[Nailen]

Maybe encourage your players to spend some time looking through the MM between game sessions to decide what forms they are interested in..?

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[Rya.Reisender]

I'm using the Unearthed Arcana rules where it's fairly hard to learn new forms, limiting the possible forms to a small amount that you can easily keep overview on. For tracking which forms have been learned I ask my Druid to write the forms he learned onto his character sheet.

 

[Nailen]

I forgot about the limitation of what they've seen.
The druid in my game goes for bear. The player wants to try tiger or lion, but I'm pretty sure that the character won't have seen one. Dire wolf is more likely.

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[Li Shenron]

Maybe encourage your players to spend some time looking through the MM between game sessions to decide what forms they are interested in..?

I think this is a better idea than trying to create new rules.

Just disallow using the MM book during the game, and tell your players that they can only use stats they have at hand. So if they want to wildshape into a specific animal or summon a specific monster, they must have the stats on paper ready to use. Maybe bring one yourself for the first time.

Anyway, in most cases the stats matter only in combat. Wildshape usage in combat is mostly supposed to be the niche of Moon Druids, while other Druids can be suggested to use Wildshape for scouting or hiding purposes only, which already means that the exact stats are mostly pointless.

A Moon Druid player is actually supposed to use Wildshape in combat, and so she should instead be encouraged to prepare herself with a chosen animal form that works well in combat. I am sure that many gamers have already figured out which animal is the best choice at various levels, so this info can probably be found on the web. Then print out / photocopy the stats of that creature, and avoid using other creatures.

 

[Aldarc]

I would prefer that an implementation of Wild Shape that was more similar to the OP's approach, to be honest. One of the biggest complaints I have received from druid players is that the rules incentivize finding the optimal animal form to shapeshift into and discarding mechanically obsolete forms rather than using preferred forms due to aesthetics or character concept. For example, a player may want to shapeshift into a panther as part of their character concept, but then find themselves being encouraged to shapeshift into bigger, tougher, harder-hitting things at latter levels rather than having that panther form scale with their druid level. Switching to a scalable utility-focused form of wild shape would also help reduce the book-keeping of all the different animal types that can make the druid less new user-friendly.

 

[Sacrosanct]

*Edit nevermind. That wasn't worded like I wanted, and I'm not sure how to articulate it. So...not important!

 

[Hawk Diesel]

So most people seem to have suggested just having the stats ready from the MM. That would be fine if that was the only problem I have. But like I said, there are also issues of balance, difficulty standardizing the power between forms, and the fact that Wildshape is now vastly different mechanically than any other ability except perhaps the Beast Master Ranger's animal companion ability (which I also strongly dislike). Plus, when creating animal stat blocks are designers always keeping in mind that a druid could potentially wildshape into them? Based on how vastly different various beast can be in terms of power or ability, even at the same CR, I would argue no.

Plus, this gives the player more power to customize their animal forms and have greater understanding/memory of each form, since they are in essence in charge of building it.

As for what was previously said about mechanics not mattering for non- Moon druids, I completely disagree. When you take that form, it is usually because you are trying to act as a scout or stealthing (exploration) or need a boost to strength and speed for some task (swift/burden). While mechanics may be less important, or differently important, they still matter.

Also, it really sucks to put something up for critique, and rather than have people break down what I've developed to better understand limitations or potential abuse, say that it's not really needed. Clearly I've outlined the issues I have with wildshape and feel it's problematic enough to develop something new (which I do often because tinkering with rules is fun for me). It's nice that others maybe don't see the same issue, but this this isn't really about that. I would find it much more valuable to dissect my homebrew than discuss whether or not it's needed.

 

[Mephista]

I like this limit, but it also seems artificial.

Well, it is artificial, mostly because it gives the DM leverage to say that, say, dinosaurs don't exist in their setting, so no, you cannot turn into one. Its not really meant to ban turning into a grizzly bear when you play in the Sword Coast, though it is banned if you play in a Dark Suns setting (I would guess that bears don't exist there?).

So I am proposing a change to the current 5e wildshape feature. non-Circle of the Moon druids get access to two forms. These are an exploration form, and a Burden/Swift form. Each form gets its own associated stats as follows:

Now, I'm a fan of allowing just a single form that grows with time. Or just leaving the usual 1/8th or whatever level CR most druids can change into and adopting one "advanced" form that you can shift into with growing stats. The reason is because I like the idea of a spider-focused drow druid, or a were(-wolf, -panther, -cow, -fox) shifter, and so on. Single animal form you embrace. I really do like the idea of a single war-form

But you are making things way over complicated here. Most of the time, a druid turning into a bird or frog or whatever don't really depend on stats. AS you mention elsewhere, its mostly as an exploratory thing. So, why not just make notes for said exploration bits and go from there?

For the Circle of the Moon Druid, you gain one additional form called a Combat Form. Your Combat Form has the following stats:

Combat Form
Size: Medium or Large
HP: 30 + (Druid Level x 4)
Speed 40ft
Strength 16
Dexterity 14
Constitution 14
Natural Attack 1d8
Darkvision 60ft

In addition, when you gain a combat form, you can choose one of the following abilities for your combat form: Pack Tactics, Charge, Relentless, Constrict, Poison, Grapple, Swallow, Pounce, Running Leap, Rampage

As a Circle of the Moon Druid, you also gain access to Wildshape abilities faster than normal Druids. You do not need to meet the normal level requirement associated with Wildshape ability improvements.
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Hmm... HP seems to be following 4e's philosophy. Most of the tankiness is supposed to come from sacrificing spell slots. You're standardizing speed and, well, almost everything. That's kind of boring. Part of the interesting things about picking your form is being the large lumbering bear versus the agile snake, versus stalking tiger. Sure, there's the abilities, but having it reflected in the stats is good too. You're better off with either giving a second standard array for the Moon druid to track, or start off with a base animal stat and letting it grow with level in some way.

As it is? You're lacking any real growth. Hells, there's not even any multiple attacks at level 5+. This means that you'll always be attackign with just 1d8+3 damage. That's not good.

Plus, you're not really looking at the Moon Druid's level 6~14 subclass levels. just the apprentice levels. While level 6's primal strike really doesn't need adjustments (maybe put in Multi-Attack here), level 10 and 14 are basically completely and utterly unrealistic to leave alone.

As for what was previously said about mechanics not mattering for non-Moon druids, I completely disagree. When you take that form, it is usually because you are trying to act as a scout or stealthing (exploration) or need a boost to strength and speed for some task (swift/burden). While mechanics may be less important, or differently important, they still matter.

Curious minds inquiring. How much have they mattered in your games? I've never seen dice rolls really come up in my game related to animal shapes.