Druids?
Impeesa
Explorer
I played an epic druid for a short while... I have never played such a powerhouse combat monster before or since, and I say this as a person who has built a character for the express purpose of breaking the dragon disciple wide open. Here are some key points for when you top 20th:
1) Your first three epic feats should be gargantuan wildshape, colossal wildshape, and improved elemental wildshape. You can now wildshape into primal elementals (cr 35) starting at about 24th level. You gain like +48 natural armor, big SR, DR, nice feats, all sorts of cool stuff. Fringe benefit: You can also wildshape into the various elemental weirds and fill the party in on the entire adventure before it happens.
2) The single monk level adds a nice AC boost, but where it really comes down is epic buff spells. These will increase your combat capability in primal elemental form beyond all rational expectations for your level. You can get decent AC and SR boosts, and a little reverse engineering makes it fairly easy to deduce a greater magic fang seed to give +15 or so to your natural weapons/attacks. Those can easily be made permanent with the 100-day casting time option, leaving your daily allotment for ability score boosters (since your items won't function while wildshaped).
3) Don't underestimate A Thousand Faces (alter self at will). Take the Hover feat (MM2), and even your primal earth elemental form is now air combat capable.
4) Improved spell capacity, persistant spell. You're no cleric... but with MotW, you can turn your animal companions into some mean fighting machines. You haven't lived until you've seen a pair of legendary bears with persistant animal growth, nature's favor, nature's avatar, regenerate critical wounds, and uber magic fang (epic spell of fairly obvious purpose) in action.
5) If your DM is feeling generous, you may be able to con him into allowing the OA "shapeshifter's" armor enchantment to be applied to other items, allowing the bonuses to continue to function while wildshaped. It's a reasonable request - at roughly equal cost to a wilding clasp, it can't be moved from item to item. It's really just icing on the cake though, and the four points above are all above the table and perfectly sufficient to turn you into an absolute combat monster.
Hope that helps.
--Impeesa--
1) Your first three epic feats should be gargantuan wildshape, colossal wildshape, and improved elemental wildshape. You can now wildshape into primal elementals (cr 35) starting at about 24th level. You gain like +48 natural armor, big SR, DR, nice feats, all sorts of cool stuff. Fringe benefit: You can also wildshape into the various elemental weirds and fill the party in on the entire adventure before it happens.
2) The single monk level adds a nice AC boost, but where it really comes down is epic buff spells. These will increase your combat capability in primal elemental form beyond all rational expectations for your level. You can get decent AC and SR boosts, and a little reverse engineering makes it fairly easy to deduce a greater magic fang seed to give +15 or so to your natural weapons/attacks. Those can easily be made permanent with the 100-day casting time option, leaving your daily allotment for ability score boosters (since your items won't function while wildshaped).
3) Don't underestimate A Thousand Faces (alter self at will). Take the Hover feat (MM2), and even your primal earth elemental form is now air combat capable.
4) Improved spell capacity, persistant spell. You're no cleric... but with MotW, you can turn your animal companions into some mean fighting machines. You haven't lived until you've seen a pair of legendary bears with persistant animal growth, nature's favor, nature's avatar, regenerate critical wounds, and uber magic fang (epic spell of fairly obvious purpose) in action.
5) If your DM is feeling generous, you may be able to con him into allowing the OA "shapeshifter's" armor enchantment to be applied to other items, allowing the bonuses to continue to function while wildshaped. It's a reasonable request - at roughly equal cost to a wilding clasp, it can't be moved from item to item. It's really just icing on the cake though, and the four points above are all above the table and perfectly sufficient to turn you into an absolute combat monster.
Hope that helps.
--Impeesa--
Ah the power of druids!!! A lot of people will talk about the druid's powerful wildshape, but there are plenty of druid only spells that are just bad ass in themselves. Here's a sample:
2nd Level:
Produce Flame: For 13 rounds you can hurl fire that does 1d4 + 6 points of damage up to 120 as a ranged TOUCH attack. You get two attacks per round at 13th level druid, so that's 2d4 +12. Not bad for a second level spell.
Barkskin: +5 to Natural armor for 2 hours.
Soften Mud and Stone: This is a great trap spell. Use some create water to wetten the earth, then when the bad guys come use it. If they fail their reflex saves, there basically dazed- and it affect 13 10 foot squares!!!
Speak with Animals: There's a catch to this spell that a lot of people overlook. A friendly animal can be convinced to do favors for you. With good animal empathy, you can make an animal friendly, then use this to get a temporary animal companion if your dm is flexible.
Tree Shape- A great hiding spell, and can be useful in combat. Best thing about it is that its a free action to turn back, so you can use it for protection until that's no longer an option, and then instantly change back.
3rd level:
Poison- This one is damn powerful. 1d10 con can screw up even the hardest characters, and assuming an 18 wis, its a fort save of 20 for a 3rd level spell!
Speak with Plants: Who suspects the plants? That crazy wizard kills every living thing he sees, and casts more antiscrying spells then a wizard academy. And he was brought down by key info from his pet ficus.
4th level:
Flame Strike: Need I say more?
Giant Vermin: Not too hard to collect a few ants or so in a jar, and at 13th level your creating huge creatures- and you can ride the flying ones.
Quench: Often overlooked, but nothing better against fire creatures. It does 13d6, with NO save. And it has a huge area, and won't effect your own party. Also, it PERMANTELY removes fire magic from items.
Rusting Grasp: What iron door? Where's that iron golem?
5th level:
Animal Growth: Turn your animal companions into power houses.
Awaken: You basically make your own permanent friends. They are always friendly to you, can actually gain character levels, and are teh perfect way to have eyes and ears in an area. 250 xp ain't too much, so druid with time on his hands could create a sentient network in a hurry.
Control Winds: At your level, you can create hurricane force winds from still winds. If the winds are strong, you can create a tornado. Gee that castle you were about to assaut doesn't seem so bad when there's a tornado tearing through it.
Wall of Thorns: Has a huge area, and does a lot of damage unless you are armored up. Even using magic to burn through it takes 10 minutes, so its a great way to stop someone from coming.
6th level:
Antilife Shell: Those poor fighters always trying to get into melee with me, tisk tisk.
Fire Seeds: These are fantastic. The bombs can do 13d6 damage as a ranged attack, and a direct hit means NO save. Or use them as booby traps.
IronWood: This one is an easy one.
7th Level:
Change Staff: You get a huge treant for 13 hours!! And if you create more of those special staffs, you can have an army of them.
Control Weather: You can make a blizzard or a tornado in a 3 mile radius!! And it last from 1 to 4 days!! Talk about softening up an enemy.
Creeping Doom: By a strict interpretation of the rules, this ones an instakill for practically a creature in existence without damage reduction-period.
Fire Storm- Oh yeah.
Sunbeam: This is the ultimate undead weedwacker. I mean 13d6 in a line 230 ft long is greeeeat.
Transmute Metal to Wood: That iron fortress just doesn't have its luster anymore does it? Not so hot against metal magic weapons because the SR is nasty, but against common metal its gets the job done.
Summoning Spells: Elementals can make great summons for their abilities. An earth elemental can move through stone, meaning they can get into castles and fortifications easily. Air elementals can fly and whirlwind.
Those are some of my favorite druid spells, as you can see druids don't have all the stuff clerics have- but they have some very unique stuff all to themselves.
2nd Level:
Produce Flame: For 13 rounds you can hurl fire that does 1d4 + 6 points of damage up to 120 as a ranged TOUCH attack. You get two attacks per round at 13th level druid, so that's 2d4 +12. Not bad for a second level spell.
Barkskin: +5 to Natural armor for 2 hours.
Soften Mud and Stone: This is a great trap spell. Use some create water to wetten the earth, then when the bad guys come use it. If they fail their reflex saves, there basically dazed- and it affect 13 10 foot squares!!!
Speak with Animals: There's a catch to this spell that a lot of people overlook. A friendly animal can be convinced to do favors for you. With good animal empathy, you can make an animal friendly, then use this to get a temporary animal companion if your dm is flexible.
Tree Shape- A great hiding spell, and can be useful in combat. Best thing about it is that its a free action to turn back, so you can use it for protection until that's no longer an option, and then instantly change back.
3rd level:
Poison- This one is damn powerful. 1d10 con can screw up even the hardest characters, and assuming an 18 wis, its a fort save of 20 for a 3rd level spell!
Speak with Plants: Who suspects the plants? That crazy wizard kills every living thing he sees, and casts more antiscrying spells then a wizard academy. And he was brought down by key info from his pet ficus.
4th level:
Flame Strike: Need I say more?
Giant Vermin: Not too hard to collect a few ants or so in a jar, and at 13th level your creating huge creatures- and you can ride the flying ones.
Quench: Often overlooked, but nothing better against fire creatures. It does 13d6, with NO save. And it has a huge area, and won't effect your own party. Also, it PERMANTELY removes fire magic from items.
Rusting Grasp: What iron door? Where's that iron golem?
5th level:
Animal Growth: Turn your animal companions into power houses.
Awaken: You basically make your own permanent friends. They are always friendly to you, can actually gain character levels, and are teh perfect way to have eyes and ears in an area. 250 xp ain't too much, so druid with time on his hands could create a sentient network in a hurry.
Control Winds: At your level, you can create hurricane force winds from still winds. If the winds are strong, you can create a tornado. Gee that castle you were about to assaut doesn't seem so bad when there's a tornado tearing through it.
Wall of Thorns: Has a huge area, and does a lot of damage unless you are armored up. Even using magic to burn through it takes 10 minutes, so its a great way to stop someone from coming.
6th level:
Antilife Shell: Those poor fighters always trying to get into melee with me, tisk tisk.
Fire Seeds: These are fantastic. The bombs can do 13d6 damage as a ranged attack, and a direct hit means NO save. Or use them as booby traps.
IronWood: This one is an easy one.
7th Level:
Change Staff: You get a huge treant for 13 hours!! And if you create more of those special staffs, you can have an army of them.
Control Weather: You can make a blizzard or a tornado in a 3 mile radius!! And it last from 1 to 4 days!! Talk about softening up an enemy.
Creeping Doom: By a strict interpretation of the rules, this ones an instakill for practically a creature in existence without damage reduction-period.
Fire Storm- Oh yeah.
Sunbeam: This is the ultimate undead weedwacker. I mean 13d6 in a line 230 ft long is greeeeat.
Transmute Metal to Wood: That iron fortress just doesn't have its luster anymore does it? Not so hot against metal magic weapons because the SR is nasty, but against common metal its gets the job done.
Summoning Spells: Elementals can make great summons for their abilities. An earth elemental can move through stone, meaning they can get into castles and fortifications easily. Air elementals can fly and whirlwind.
Those are some of my favorite druid spells, as you can see druids don't have all the stuff clerics have- but they have some very unique stuff all to themselves.
Glad to see other input! I was not aware of some of those spells.
By the way, the Miasma spell from MotW is another absolutely insane spell.
The spell fills the lungs of the target. The victim gets no save, but can hold their breath for Con * 2 rounds. Sounds reasonable? Not when the spell lasts 5 * level rounds. Want to shut up that spellcaster? Done! It's got medium range - so no touch attack. You've instantly silenced the spellcaster.
And if he dispels it, well cast it again - it's only a level 4 spell!
zyzzyr
By the way, the Miasma spell from MotW is another absolutely insane spell.
The spell fills the lungs of the target. The victim gets no save, but can hold their breath for Con * 2 rounds. Sounds reasonable? Not when the spell lasts 5 * level rounds. Want to shut up that spellcaster? Done! It's got medium range - so no touch attack. You've instantly silenced the spellcaster.
And if he dispels it, well cast it again - it's only a level 4 spell!
zyzzyr
isoChron
First Post
zyzzyr said:
That's why most DM do not allow this spell in their game or give it at least a save ... There are many threats full of "Miasma is broken".
Errr, I don't have my books here at the moment but wasn't Iron Wood errated ? I think they changed the Focus (object to be enchanted) to Material Component (object to be enchanted).
That would mean you have to produce (craft) a new armor every time the spell runs out (which is 15 days for a 15th level druid).
Am I wrong ? Does my mind play tricks on me ?
Someone here knowing the answer ?
Bye
Kestrel
Explorer
Thoqquas. They are the best creature. period. for summoning.
I call these guys my fiery torpedoes of doom. They can burrow through anything, considering they are hot enough to melt rock. Need to get through the castle gate? Send two or three of these little buggers to melt it down. Even better, take out the wall by having them burrow though the bedrock below.
I call these guys my fiery torpedoes of doom. They can burrow through anything, considering they are hot enough to melt rock. Need to get through the castle gate? Send two or three of these little buggers to melt it down. Even better, take out the wall by having them burrow though the bedrock below.
(Psi)SeveredHead
Adventurer
Please tell me how you broke the DD. I have a PC who desperately wants the class, and I want to know what to look out for.
Can you do both? OMG!
I thought you couldn't make Touch spells persistent.
Or you could Wildshape... they don't stack. This spell doesn't even work well with animal companions. Underpowered, IMO.
Coolness! I think Poison is EVIL (in a good way!) and the scaling DC ... and then Maximize Spell ... OMG!
I've found this spell to be pretty weak, but I do have more experience casting it at 7th level than at 13th level.
I'm a huge fan of Antilife Shell! So is a cleric I DM for ... it didn't save him from an Inevitable, however.
Dimwhit
Explorer
My advice, for what it's worth, is to not multiclass. Just go straight Druid. They are plenty powerful enough on their own. Take wildshaping feats, like Natural Spell and maybe Multiattack. Greater Magic fang a few times (2 claws and a bite), and you've got a nasty fighter. My Druid enjoys the Bear form, and he's great.
drnuncheon
Explorer
Dr. Zoom said:
For that matter, hit points (unlike skill ranks) change immediately when your Con changes - so even if he did get the extra hp from being in a giant form, he would lose them as soon as he left that form and lost the heightened Con.
J
Malin Genie
First Post
Summon Nature's Ally IX can be used to get 1d4+1 dire tigers (16HD)
Then Animal Growth them (and your own animal companion(s) while you're at it) and throw a chained greater magic fang.
You now have 1d4+1 32 HD creatures, attacking at +37/+37/+32 for 2d6+17/2d6+17/2d8+11 (and penetrating DR with their +5 natural weapons.) Their grapple checks (with Improved Grab) are at +48. And they have 304 hp.
Add a nature's avatar and a nature's favour (at 18th level) and the attacks go up to +56/+56/+51 for 2d6+36/2d6+36/2d8+30.
There is little that is more scary than a high level druid's animal buddies.
Then Animal Growth them (and your own animal companion(s) while you're at it) and throw a chained greater magic fang.
You now have 1d4+1 32 HD creatures, attacking at +37/+37/+32 for 2d6+17/2d6+17/2d8+11 (and penetrating DR with their +5 natural weapons.) Their grapple checks (with Improved Grab) are at +48. And they have 304 hp.
Add a nature's avatar and a nature's favour (at 18th level) and the attacks go up to +56/+56/+51 for 2d6+36/2d6+36/2d8+30.
There is little that is more scary than a high level druid's animal buddies.
