First Druid follow-up

[Paul Smart]

Good afternoon everyone.

This is a follow-up to my First Druid thread. After almost 40 years of RP, I have decided to make my first Druid. I would like some advice on how to proceed.

My rolled stats are 18, 15, 14, 12, 10, 10. We will be starting at level 1 and going to level 12 or so. The world is wide open, just about anything is possible given enough time.

My questions:

Race:

I have narrowed the race down to, elf, half-elf, or variant human. Lizardfolk is no longer available. Which would you choose and why?

Circle:

Originally I said I had no interest in the Circle of the Moon. Looking at it further I am intrigued by it. Is Circle of the Moon any good?

Spells:

If I go circle of the moon what sort of spells should I focus on?

1) Elemental Master - focus on fire, lightning etc.
2) Beast Master - focus on summoning, befriending, talking to beasts.
3) Earth Warden - focus on control spells like entangle, thorn whip, fog cloud etc.
4) Something completely different. If so what?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

 

[TwoSix]

I'll try and go into more detail later, but basically: If you're planning on spending the bulk of the game leveling through Tier 1 and Tier 2, moon druid is an awesome choice. The only downside is that those impressive stats you rolled mostly go to waste, as moon druid especially doesn't need really good stats.

 

[tommybahama]

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Variant Human with quarterstaff, shield and Pole Arm Master.

Everything else is fluff.

 

[RogueJK]

Yes, Circle of the Moon is good. However, it's a different playstyle than your typical caster Druid. If you're wanting to be a dedicated Summoner, or dedicated Elemental blaster, or a dedicated Controller, you don't want to be a Moon Druid. There are other Druid subtypes that will be better at those (like Shepherd for Summoning, Land for Controlling, or Wildfire for Blasting).

Instead, think of Moon Druids as frontline melee Tanks like a Fighter or Barbarian, but one that also happens to have the ability to have a single buff, control, or damage spell running while they do so, and that has a bunch of utility, exploration, and healing spells for outside of combat.

You can't cast spells while Wild Shaped, but you can Concentrate on one. So the typical combat pattern for a Moon Druid is to start combat by using their 1st round Action to cast a Concentration spell, either a buff/debuff like Faerie Fire, or a control spell like Entangle, or one of the specialized Bonus Action Damage spells like Moonbeam or Flaming Sphere. They then use their 1st round Bonus Action to Wild Shape into the biggest and meanest Combat Wild Shape form available to them at that particular level, and their Movement to close with the enemy and start tanking hits. From there, they use their Actions on the 2nd and subsequent rounds to Attack using their Wild Shape form's melee attacks, while using their Bonus Actions as needed to control their Concentration spell or burn spell slots to heal themselves, and soaking up damage from enemy attacks throughout the rounds.

The cool part about a Moon Druid is that they retain their three mental stats in Wild Shape form, but adopt the three physical stats of the animal form. So you can worry less about STR/DEX/CON and focus more on WIS. Most Wild Shape forms have fairly good STR and CON and adequate DEX.

So for a Moon Druid, I'd do something like:
Wood Elf Moon Druid
STR 10
DEX 14+2
CON 15
INT 12
WIS 18+1
CHA 10

Skill proficiencies: Perception (Racial), Survival and Nature (Druid), Insight and either Athletics or Acrobatics (Background)

At Level 4, take the Resilient CON feat, to gain +1 CON and proficiency with CON saves (including Concentration checks when you take damage while concentrating on a spell). This is absolutely essential, because you will be getting hit. A lot. And constantly losing Concentration is frustrating, and a waste of spell slots.

At Level 8, take the Observant feat for +1 WIS and a nice bonus to your already high passive Perception.


Or, if you want to be an even more of a utility caster outside of combat, go with:
Variant Human Moon Druid
STR 10
DEX 14+1
CON 15
INT 12
WIS 18+1
CHA 10

Skill proficiencies: Perception (Racial), Survival and Nature (Druid), Insight and either Athletics or Acrobatics (Background)

Take Ritual Caster: Wizard at Level 1, which gets you the ability to scribe and cast any Wizard Ritual spell you find. (I'd start with Find Familiar and Detect Magic as your two starting options, and then add any others that you can find as you come across them in your travels.)

Then take Resilient CON at Level 4, and +1 WIS +1 DEX at Level 8


A great option for a Moon Druid is to dip 1 level into Monk, to gain the Monk's Unarmed Defense ability, which allows them to calculate their AC as DEX+WIS when not wearing armor. This still functions when Wild Shaped, allowing you to use the animal's DEX + your WIS (+4 or +5), instead of the animal's DEX + their Natural Armor, which is usually only +1 to +3. So for a 1 level dip, you get a nice boost to the otherwise rather low ACs of most Wild Shape forms (with a few notable exceptions like the Earth Elemental, whose Natural Armor is higher than +5).

The combination of this dip, along with the Resilient CON feat, greatly increases your chances of keeping Concentration while tanking in Wild Shape form, because more attacks will miss due to your higher AC, and when you do get hit, you get to add your proficiency bonus to your Concentration check which means you're more likely to succeed.

 

[ClockworkNinja]

Race: I have narrowed the race down to, elf, half-elf, or variant human. Lizardfolk is no longer available. Which would you choose and why?

The feat from variant human can be very nice (lucky or magic initiate to get a familiar for example) but there is nothing you truly need. The +2 CHA on half elf is mostly wasted but they have so many features it hardly matters. Of the three I might do wood Elf purely for roleplay reasons but I advise you to go with your gut, there is really no bad choice here.

Circle: Originally I said I had no interest in the Circle of the Moon. Looking at it further I am intrigued by it. Is Circle of the Moon any good?

Circle of the moon is an absolute beast in combat (pun intended), especially in the earlier levels it can give even Fighters and Barbarians a real run for their gp. And if you do get beaten down, you are reduced to being a "mere" armored full spellcaster.

Spells: If I go circle of the moon what sort of spells should I focus on?

If you go Circle of the moon, you won't be casting much in combat, so I recommend you focus on utility spells that a more dedicated combat caster might not have space for.

 

[Leatherhead]

I'm going to go slightly against the grain here.

Go Half-Elf with wood elf heritage to get Mask of the Wild. So you can hide using nature (which a druid can summon, maybe even with Druidcraft)

Then as a half elf, pick up Elven Accuracy (for +1 Wis and Super-Advantage) at level 4, and Prodigy (for expertise in stealth) with your next ASI.

The goal here is to make a druidic "assassin". The spell list should be things that help you do that, mostly utility. And Faerie Fire is great for getting advantage. But the true virtue of the druid spell list is that you can swap it out to suit your situation better. Moon druid would be useful here, because you can go anywhere unarmed and then just turn into a bear.