D&D 5E Moon Circle Druid Play Report

[Authweight]

haha Paul, it's funny you mention speaking, because that came up no less than a dozen times yesterday, where not being able to speak became a problem. Surprised at just how often that comes up.. That, and opposable thumbs...

also, I certainly don't think I was railroading players because the druid had to change back early to cross a rope bridge, or so he could cast spells to help the rest of the party. Those were all party choices.

in my very humble opinion, theorycrafting shouldn't be anything other than a fun exercise, and not to be taken too seriously since actual play is so much different than a white room

I'm really not theorycrafting here, I was running a session last night and this came up for the first time and blew it all to smithereens. I'm not just judging based on the numbers or anything, I'm saying that it was so obviously strong that the moon Druid player, during the session, just started laughing and saying, "I cannot believe they printed this."

 

[SilverfireSage]

I agree, but honestly I think that just makes the Druid MORE powerful, not less.

Wildshape lets you:

1) Have more strength than most 2nd less characters
2) Climb any surface without fail
3) Have blindsight
4) Gain a 60 foot speed.

And I'm sure there is more. What we are highlighting is not only does wildshape provide you wonderful versatility, it also provides the equivalent combat power of other classes...and more frequently recharges than some of those classes.

All of those are only gained by a certain individual wildshape. No creature has all of them, or even a couple of those. Flying around as a hawk to scout and your friends are attacked? Have to burn another wild shape in order to help. Climbing up a wall as a spider and get knocked off? Have to change into a hawk to survive. Suddenly in all of these situations you've burned up all of your wild shape abilities, and require an hour long rest to gain them back. As you've stated, the wild shaped druid is just about as effective as a barbarian in wild shape, but what happens after that combat? What happens when they don't have a wild shape ability left and are forced to fight as themselves? A lot of people seem to look at these classes and say "holy crap look at how much damage they can do in x rounds if they use all their abilities!" while neglecting to take into account that a lot of adventures have more than a few encounters per day. A barbarian is really powerful even without using the rage. They can go all day doing crazy amounts of damage, and are only enhanced when they go into their range. Once a druid is out of wildshape, they're down to spells, none of which will be that powerful in combat.

 

[SilverfireSage]

I have trouble imagining it being a common occurrence that you are required to go back to human form but you do not have an hour to sit back and get your stuff back. If you don't have that hour, then you would be justified in and out of character to just stay in wild form. To keep putting the party in situations that force the Druid to revert without also getting an hour rest seems to me like it would require a great deal of DM railroading.

There's one really simple way to get a druid out of his wildshape, that I can imagine happening quite often: force him to cast a spell. Seriously, that's it, there's dozens of times when a spell would be more useful than a wildshape. Is it really that much of DM railroading when another player goes "Hey, I need barkskin quick!" or "Get out of that bear form, we need some healing here!"? Or how about the party wants the druid to go scout in his hawk form? That immediately burns a use of wild shape they could have used in combat later. In regards to encounters per day, I'm guessing (Yes guessing, but basing it off of the adventures currently printed as well as various tweets and printed rules) that there will be an average of 3-5 encounters a day with 1 short rest in between. That means that if you do nothing but combat all day long you'll have at least one encounter where you won't have wild shape. I tend to think that the various other parts of D&D will burn that up faster.

 

[Stalker0]

All of those are only gained by a certain individual wildshape. No creature has all of them, or even a couple of those. Flying around as a hawk to scout and your friends are attacked? Have to burn another wild shape in order to help. Climbing up a wall as a spider and get knocked off? Have to change into a hawk to survive. Suddenly in all of these situations you've burned up all of your wild shape abilities, and require an hour long rest to gain them back. As you've stated, the wild shaped druid is just about as effective as a barbarian in wild shape, but what happens after that combat? What happens when they don't have a wild shape ability left and are forced to fight as themselves?

So I'm flying around as a hawk, and I'm able to use an ability that lets me quickly get to my friend to help...where no one else would probably be able to get there in time? That sounds amazing.

I fell off a wall...and instead of landing into a ravine and dying...I get to spend an ability I recover every short rest and live. Sign me up.

We could say the same things about the barb. What if X happens and he has to rage to again? But if he gets into a combat and didn't get an hour to heal all that damage he took in the last fight? (of which the druid ultimately took none do to his "extra hp"). What if the barb gets stunned for a round and loses his rage for the fight?


If a druid doesn't have wildshape....they are still a full spellcaster. But you asked for a comparison between barbarian and druid when they are both berefth of such resources. That is a fair request, I will see what I can do. Obviously comparing spellcasting to melee is a much harder comparison than a direct combat comparison between melee warriors, but I'll give it a shot.

 

[Sacrosanct]

yay, I see we've officially moved into the spellcaster fallacy. I.e., if a PC can do x or y or z, it's being presented as if the PC can do x and y and z

 

[SilverfireSage]

So I'm flying around as a hawk, and I'm able to use an ability that lets me quickly get to my friend to help...where no one else would probably be able to get there in time? That sounds amazing.

I fell off a wall...and instead of landing into a ravine and dying...I get to spend an ability I recover every short rest and live. Sign me up.

We could say the same things about the barb. What if X happens and he has to rage to again? But if he gets into a combat and didn't get an hour to heal all that damage he took in the last fight? (of which the druid ultimately took none do to his "extra hp"). What if the barb gets stunned for a round and loses his rage for the fight?

I never said those abilities weren't good, but the aren't overpowered. The point is, I can see a druid losing his wildshape pretty quickly if he isn't careful, and it comes back to all of the classes: all of their abilities have some sort of drawback that balances them. Remember also that druids don't get to cast spells (which could also have been used to slow their fall or fly over to a friend and help) in wildshape, don't get to take advantage of their spells already cast, don't get to take advantage of any magic items, can't talk, and can't take part in anything that requires hands. Yeah they're a full caster too, but they have an extremely limited spell list compared to others.

I suppose I should get right to the point: all of the things I've been saying have been taken from experience DMing for a lvl 10 Circle of the Moon druid. In no case has he seemed to out power any of the other classes significantly, and he's still had a lot of fun with it.

 

[Authweight]

yay, I see we've officially moved into the spellcaster fallacy. I.e., if a PC can do x or y or z, it's being presented as if the PC can do x and y and z

It's more that a fighter can do x, while a Druid can do x+, y, or z, where x+ is basically what the fighter does except a little better.

The fact that the Druid can use wild shape for other things besides fighting doesn't make wild shape worse, it makes it better. The Druid can always just choose to not use wild shape and have it for a fight, so a rational Druid will always come out ahead.

Our models are actually downplaying the strength of wildshape by ignoring all the utility it brings to the table.

The biggest thing that makes a difference is how often the Druid will have to revert to their regular form. The fact Druids can wild shape twice every short rest is, IMO, very generous on this point. However, this is very much a playstyle thing. In some campaigns, the need to be in human form will be very high, and the penalties for not doing so will be severe enough, that everything will somewhat balance out.

For a lot of campaigns, including mine, that is just not going to be the case. As long as you can take on about two encounters each bear form, you come out way ahead of everyone else. That will happen quite often the way I run my games. I feel like it's poor design for a single level 2 ability to be so good that a DM has to change their entire playstyle to accommodate it.

I also really don't feel like my playstyle is so uncommon. If I ran into such immediate, obvious issues with it at my table, it seems likely it will happen that way for others as well. Hence, some sort of errata or at least a community fix seems like it would be helpful for many tables.

 

[Authweight]

I suppose I should get right to the point: all of the things I've been saying have been taken from experience DMing for a lvl 10 Circle of the Moon druid. In no case has he seemed to out power any of the other classes significantly, and he's still had a lot of fun with it.

I think that by level 10 the moon Druid is probably just fine. There is a much bigger opportunity cost to being an animal at that point, and everyone has more powerful abilities. Even by level 5, the moon Druid is much more balanced. I'm talking specifically at level 2 though.

 

[Stalker0]

The point is, I can see a druid losing his wildshape pretty quickly if he isn't careful, and it comes back to all of the classes: all of their abilities have some sort of drawback that balances them. Remember also that druids don't get to cast spells (which could also have been used to slow their fall or fly over to a friend and help) in wildshape, don't get to take advantage of their spells already cast, don't get to take advantage of any magic items

I posted that barb vs druid comparison that you asked for. Again, its a rough shot, but the druid was able to hold their own with their spells vs a rageless barb.

While true that the Druid can lose their wildshape pretty quickly, I think that's fair to say of any class. Most classes are going to want to rest if given the chance. The druid for wildshapes, the barb to recover his health.

One error in your statement above, Druids can benefit from spells cast on them before wildshaping. The book even mentions that you can keep using call lightning while in beast form.

Over what levels have you been dming that druid? From what I'm gathering, the issue is strictly in the 2-6ish range. So far, everything I have heard past that point says its much more balanced.

 

[Sacrosanct]

no Authweight, you are objectively incorrect. If a class can do something without any limitations, and another class can do that same thing with a bonus, but is limited by a lot of other factors, that second class is not objectively better. It's only situational. You simply cannot make that conclusion with any sort of credibility when you're ignoring or not accounting for all of the in-game factors that implement said limitations.

that's what we keep trying to say, and why white room theory crafting is a horrible tool to use in analysis in an RPG.