How to make a capable druid?

[Halivar]

Vow of Poverty

Under normal circumstances I would agree; but this is a monty haul campaign so it's likely he will receive magic items far in excess of any bonuses VoP could give him. I expect him to be sporting two or more +6 stat items by campaign's end, and VoP can't give you that.

 

[NuSair]

Under normal circumstances I would agree; but this is a monty haul campaign so it's likely he will receive magic items far in excess of any bonuses VoP could give him. I expect him to be sporting two or more +6 stat items by campaign's end, and VoP can't give you that.

True, if he can get that clasp that let's you use your magic items in wild shape form, I agree.

 

[MarkB]

One thing to look into if you're going to spend most of your time wild-shaped is communication. Technically, any time you're in animal form you cannot take any verbal part in conversations with fellow party members.

So look out for either options that let you vocalise whilst transformed, or options for other party members that will allow them to understand you - otherwise the DM will be free to veto any contribution you make to in-character conversation whilst transformed.

 

[Dark Dragon]

IMHO, for feats, assuming human baseline (applying a template won't affect this):

Human bonus feat: Natural Spell
Level 1: Weapon focus (scimitar)
Level 3: Two-weapon fighting
Level 6: Improved critical (scimitar)

At this point, you're making a primary attack at -2, off hand at -4. Based on the point-buy your DM is allowing, this will not be a problem AT ALL, I assure you! The +4 Str from the half-celestial template will offset the main hand penalty nicely. Both attacks crit on 15-20 (if that would hit). At level 9 you can take Improved Two-Weapon Fighting to give you a total of 4 attacks a round.

If you take a template like Half-Celestial, then qualifying for the Wis and Dex prerequisites of the above feats should be a cinch.

Again, I say use your feats to bolster your non-wild-shape fighting because wild-shaped you're good enough.

If you follow this path, make sure that your scimitars are enchantend with the powers of "sizeable" (may increase the weapon size) and "opposable" (let's you use the weapon even in animal form). And get these scimitars made of adamantine (good vs. constructs, stoneskin).

 

[Halivar]

If you follow this path, make sure that your scimitars are enchantend with the powers of "sizeable" (may increase the weapon size) and "opposable" (let's you use the weapon even in animal form). And get these scimitars made of adamantine (good vs. constructs, stoneskin).

My word, that is truly broken. Good advice.

 

[Jackinthegreen]

Note that the Sizing enhancement is from MiC, while the Opposable is from Masters of the Wild. Opposable will only work for certain wild shape forms though since it requires being able to stand without using the limbs wielding the weapons, plus it requires having some sort of capable limb or appendage to use in the first place. Hydras don't seem to have that ability.

However, there is a weapon enhancement from Lords of Madness called Mouthpick that allows wielding a weapon in the mouth of any creature with a bite attack and even gain iterative attacks with it unlike how bites normally go. If you decide to go nuts with a hydra form on that, be prepared for a book to the head.

Now I'm imagining a druid/kensai build which does exactly that and only has to pay XP to enhance all his weapons. lol

 

[Marflarius]

Wow that's a lot to soak in. . .

I did a little bit of surfing around other websites to try and make this character and was gonna try for dragonwrought kobold, but my gut is telling me that I can't add that template to a kobold. In that case Should I just stick with human and go half celestial or is there another race/template that may interact well with it?

I am only starting off at level 6 and was planning on going somewhere around 5 Druid 1 Planar Shepherd and haven't really gotten any good ideas as far as native planes go right now, any hints?

Unfortunately we're only starting off with 10k gold and basic adventuring gear, the campaign itself isn't flowing with magic items, but character capabilities seem to be way over the top, and the majority of our party, after LA's, is around 10/11th level, have ability scores that range in the 30s, and are all monstrous humanoids, or in one characters case (our level 13, go figure) is a fallen angel of some sort, whatever the template of an la +7 is. He possesses stuff and teleports away and gets party members killed fairly often, so far his kill count is at 5.

I kinda like the idea of dragonwrought kobold but if there's better options out there, then by all means I'm very susceptible to feedback, right now my feats are natural bond natural spell dragonwrought greensinger initiate and improved natural attack claw (was planning on wildshaping into fleshraker but I doubt I'd be of much use at my current level, considering the other melee types in the party, and I don't want to make something that's not going to be able to contribute to the party).

Edit: Also we have access to a total of two flaws from unearthed arcana, just thought I should mention that!

 

[Marflarius]

IMHO, for feats, assuming human baseline (applying a template won't affect this):

Human bonus feat: Natural Spell
Level 1: Weapon focus (scimitar)
Level 3: Two-weapon fighting
Level 6: Improved critical (scimitar)

At this point, you're making a primary attack at -2, off hand at -4. Based on the point-buy your DM is allowing, this will not be a problem AT ALL, I assure you! The +4 Str from the half-celestial template will offset the main hand penalty nicely. Both attacks crit on 15-20 (if that would hit). At level 9 you can take Improved Two-Weapon Fighting to give you a total of 4 attacks a round.

If you take a template like Half-Celestial, then qualifying for the Wis and Dex prerequisites of the above feats should be a cinch.

Again, I say use your feats to bolster your non-wild-shape fighting because wild-shaped you're good enough.

It's not an actual point buy based system, there's just a lot of bonuses, like we get to pick a region for skills/spell likes/feats and some other bonuses, and then we have access to an intermediate bloodline (of the following):

Celestial
Demon
Devil
Dragon, black
Dragon, blue
Dragon, brass
Dragon, bronze
Dragon, copper
Dragon, gold
Dragon, green
Dragon, red
Dragon, silver
Dragon, white
Elemental, air
Elemental, earth
Elemental, fire
Elemental, water
Fey
Genie, djinni
Genie, efreeti
Giant, cloud
Giant, fire
Giant, frost
Giant, stone
Giant, storm
Ogre
Slaad
Titan
Troll
Vampire
Yuan-ti

We also get bonus spell like abilities per day, depending on what we pick from a certain list, a lot of it isn't really that great because of our current level, but it will get better over time.

 

[Halivar]

If you have a concept you would like to try, then you can safely throw min-maxing out the window and go for it. With what your DM is handing you, you will still be quite powerful.

 

[Marflarius]

I think that's my problem right now is I don't really have an idea of what I'm looking to play, I have more experience as a caster type but with the way the campaign seems to be heading, it looks like casters will outweigh fighters by the time we're done with the tower, so I guess I just have to figure out what I would be best suited with for the moment and then decide later on if I want to pursue a caster or melee route.Does anybody know of any good sources where I can find suitable templates of an la +4 and lower? I did confirm that I can't use vdk in conjunction with half celestial since his type would be dragon rather than humanoid, but if I decided to go with regular kobold then I could do it with the template, and HC seems to be the best template for now unless I can find something else that would fit in with the vdk route as a template.