The druid is a true powerhouse of a class due to the sheer versatility and power of its three main class features: wild shaping, spells, and animal companions. Able to function as a tank (or 2 tanks with wild shape and animal companion), summoner, battlefield controller, damage-dealer, scout (both with wildshape and with divinations), and healer, the druid is extremely flexible. -Akalsaris
Cons: - Most prestige classes are traps for the druid, as very few advance the things a druid cares about. Nature's Warrior, Master of Many Forms, and Blighter are all far weaker than straight druid. Planar Shephard is the only PrC that possibly surpasses straight druid, while Moonspeaker and Contemplative both give some things and take away some things.
- Very feat-tight. A druid gets 0 bonus feats and must take Natural Spell at 6th (don't argue this one), so every feat it takes must do a hell of a lot for the build, especially on a non-human. A summoner's feats are practically locked into Spell Focus (Conj), Ashbound/Greenbound, Augment Summoning, Natural Spell, Rapid Spell, and Elemental Summoning, for example.
- Spells are alignment-limited and the druid must have a neutral component to her alignment, which can limit the spell list sometimes, especially for summoning. Neutral (True Neutral) is easily the safest alignment in this regard, completely sidestepping the restrictions.
- Very few worthwhile alternative class features, unlike the wizard or cleric. The Shapeshift Druid is alright, but trades 2 good class features for one mediocre class feature. -Akalsaris
Pros: - The chassis: Druids have medium-high hitpoints, medium BAB, medium skills/level, medium-low armor and weapon proficiencies, and high fort/will saves. All decent, but not particularly strong, though the saves are quite nice.
- Spells: the most powerful tool in a druid's arsenal. First level starts off strong with Entangle, a very long-range battlefield control spell, and only gets better from there on. With a fast spell progression and wisdom based casting, the druid also has dozens of supplements' worth of spells to cherry-pick from, as she can cast any spell on her list with preparation. The ability to spontaneously cast Nature's Ally spells is another strong ability for summoning-focused druids, and can be helpful even to other kinds. Druid spells are typically either utility, battlefield control, or damaging, with a large sprinkling of divinations, healing, and buff spells. The Spell Compendium is notable for nerfing a lot of former druid staples, but introducing a ton of other excellent spells, especially self-buffs.
- Wild Shape: The next most powerful tool a druid has, at its best, wild shape allows a druid to cherry-pick through a dozen sourcebooks for animal forms that are the best answer to any given situation. Even if only limited to the Monster Manual, wild shape gives tremendous flexibility and allows druids of 8th level or higher to completely ignore Str and Dex in character creation, freeing up points for other stats. It also makes the druid's weak armor and weapon proficiencies a non-issue.
- Animal Companion: The linchpin to the druid's power, the animal companion is like having .5 more party members. At low levels it can function as a support tank, and at higher levels it can either be used to provide the party's less awesome members with flight, or it can become a tank in of itself. Dinosaurs especially are good at almost all levels. With 1 or 2 buffs such as a shared Bite of the Wereboar or an Animal Growth spell, the animal companion can easily match the party's fighter in tanking and damage output.
- Other class features: To top it off, the other druid abilities are pretty solid as well. Nature Sense is effectively a +2/+2 skills feat, while Wild Empathy is like a free, albeit limited, Diplomacy score. Venom Immunity is useful for evil druids who want to use poisons, while Timeless Body means that a druid starting at high levels can begin with +3 to all mental stats without the physical drawbacks. -Akalsaris
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More cons for druids: doesn't (easily) get access to time stop and wish. At this tier it's a consideration. If you're playing gamebreaking characters, not having access to a couple of gamebreaking techniques is significant especially when a lowly sorcerer CAN get those tricks. -Rebel7284
