doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
The more Magic worlds we get, the more I wish 5e had a Dryad race. Anyone have a favorite 3pp Dryad or a favorite homebrew take?
D&D 5E Any good 3PP Dryads for 5e?
- Thread starter doctorbadwolf
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CleverNickName
Limit Break Dancing
My wife allowed me to play a dryad sorcerer for her Feywild D&D campaign earlier this year. She started with the Eladrin (elf subrace) and made the following changes:
- The dryad's Magic Resistance ability replaced the elf's Fey Ancestry ability.
- The elf's Keen Senses and Trance abilities were removed.
- The elf's Languages were reworded: "Dryads speak Elvish and Sylvan. In addition, dryads can communicate with beasts and plants as if they shared a language."
- The dryad's Tree Stride ability replaced the eladrin's Fey Step ability.
- The spells on the dryad's Innate Spellcasting list were reworded, to be more in line with other elf subraces: "You know the druidcraft and shillelagh cantrips. When you reach 3rd Level, you can cast the entangle spell and the goodberry spell once (each) with this trait and regain the ability to do so when you finish a Long Rest. When you reach 5th Level, you can cast the barkskin spell and the pass without trace spell once (each) with this trait and regain the ability to do so when you finish a Long Rest. Wisdom is your Spellcasting Ability for these Spells, and casting them requires no material components."
- The dryad's Fey Charm ability was restricted to once per long rest.
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There's a nymph race with dryad as a subrace in the player's guide to Odyssey of the Dragonlords. It's free:
www.drivethrurpg.com
Odyssey of the Dragonlords: Player's Guide - Modiphius | Free Products | RPG Quickstarts | Odyssey of the Dragonlords | DriveThruRPG.com
Odyssey of the Dragonlords: Player's Guide - Odyssey of the Dragonlords is an epic fantasy campaign for the fifth edition of the world’s greatest roleplaying game.
dave2008
Legend
And it is free!There's a nymph race with dryad as a subrace in the player's guide to Odyssey of the Dragonlords. It's free:
Odyssey of the Dragonlords: Player's Guide - Modiphius | Free Products | RPG Quickstarts | Odyssey of the Dragonlords | DriveThruRPG.com
Odyssey of the Dragonlords: Player's Guide - Odyssey of the Dragonlords is an epic fantasy campaign for the fifth edition of the world’s greatest roleplaying game.
doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
That’s really cool! I’ll take a look at soemthing similar. Might model it more after a dragonmarked elf subrace, but that is definitely a rad starting point.
doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
Working on a Dryad based on the elf. Got most of the elf's stuff switched over.
Looking closer, maybe I should use the satyr isntead? It's Fey, has advantage against spells rather than fey ancestry (which I hate being applied to all fey PC races. It's an elf thing.), etc. IDK.
Couple ideas I have for the dryad, that I'd love feedback on.
Tree form, tree home, tree stride. Obviously they can ignore difficult terrain from roots and such. Sleep in tree form has both drawbacks and benefits? If they die, they can reform over the course of 1 year and 1 day in their tree? At level X they can do this with only 1 month? Spend a short rest in tree form to gain extra benefits?
Speak with plants and animals fully?
The spell speak with plants or plant growth 1/day at level 5? Or 1/day Tree Stride teleportation?
Ability to increase AC temporarily? The barkskin spell sucks, so I don't wanna just use that.
Looking closer, maybe I should use the satyr isntead? It's Fey, has advantage against spells rather than fey ancestry (which I hate being applied to all fey PC races. It's an elf thing.), etc. IDK.
Couple ideas I have for the dryad, that I'd love feedback on.
Tree form, tree home, tree stride. Obviously they can ignore difficult terrain from roots and such. Sleep in tree form has both drawbacks and benefits? If they die, they can reform over the course of 1 year and 1 day in their tree? At level X they can do this with only 1 month? Spend a short rest in tree form to gain extra benefits?
Speak with plants and animals fully?
The spell speak with plants or plant growth 1/day at level 5? Or 1/day Tree Stride teleportation?
Ability to increase AC temporarily? The barkskin spell sucks, so I don't wanna just use that.
CleverNickName
Limit Break Dancing
I wouldn't make the AC increase temporary; I'd make it permanent ala the Warforged or the Dragonborn. If the character wants/needs to temporarily increase their AC, they should use class features (instead of racial) to handle that. Otherwise you are going to have a problem with bounded accuracy.
The year-and-a-day regeneration for dryads in their tree is great for storytelling and would be great for NPCs, but it might be a bit too slow to be useful for players. Also, death becomes less likely at higher levels thanks to access to resurrection magic, so shortening that reform period as level increases won't really help. I'd probably just drop this, or maybe borrow from the Revenant in UA.
For any spellcasting abilities, I'd use the High Elf or the Drow as a template. "You know the X cantrip. At 3rd level, you can cast Y once per day. At 5th level, you can cast Z once per day." Anything more than that pushes the limits of game balance...a character's race isn't intended to replace their class, and vice versa.
Anyhoo, that's my advice. I'm not a game designer, so take it with a grain of salt.
The year-and-a-day regeneration for dryads in their tree is great for storytelling and would be great for NPCs, but it might be a bit too slow to be useful for players. Also, death becomes less likely at higher levels thanks to access to resurrection magic, so shortening that reform period as level increases won't really help. I'd probably just drop this, or maybe borrow from the Revenant in UA.
For any spellcasting abilities, I'd use the High Elf or the Drow as a template. "You know the X cantrip. At 3rd level, you can cast Y once per day. At 5th level, you can cast Z once per day." Anything more than that pushes the limits of game balance...a character's race isn't intended to replace their class, and vice versa.
Anyhoo, that's my advice. I'm not a game designer, so take it with a grain of salt.
doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
yeah could give them 13+Dex natural armor or something.
I definitely don’t see it as necessary that such an ability be super useful. It wouldn’t be a huge part of the power equation. Not a ribbon, but not a major ability.
I’m not sure they need a cantrip, the balance template is definitely that progression. Druidcraft is cool and all, but if ditching it allows them to have treestride and plant growth and the ability to speak fully with plants and animals, it may be worth it.
It’s appreciated!Anyhoo, that's my advice. I'm not a game designer, so take it with a grain of salt.
doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
I mean...kinda. It’s a good take. I might settle for it, but if I gotta input all the data into ddb anyway, why not work out a version that does exactly what I want?
Voadam
Legend
Children of the Fey from DM's Guild has a dryad race among their many fey race options including other arboreal fey races.
Voadam
Legend
Ancient Adventures has Nymph racial options including forest nymph for dryads.
Soooo much Barkskin as a racial ability in a lot of these. One of the versions I have that's the carrot at 5/6th level - Barkskin once per day. Blargh. I think it would be easier to brew one up that has more interesting features. Tree Stride is a way cooler ability. Pass Without Trace in Forests would also be on-point. Simple divination using tree spirits would also be neat - like, you ask the bog oak in the claering - have orcs passed this way recently? and you get a yes or no answer.
Chaosmancer
Legend
Years ago I swiped these pages from the internet for a half-dryad (because being tied to their tree, Dryads can't adventure much) I have never gotten anyone to play it, but it always looked solid
Can't really credit these, I don't even remember where I got them from
Can't really credit these, I don't even remember where I got them from
doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
Yeah I don’t like bark skin as a free spell because it’s just a bad spell, but otherwise a lot of these look good.
I think I’d go with the AC calculation, but I honestly prefer it as a thing you activate, so I gotta think on that.
I think I’d go with the AC calculation, but I honestly prefer it as a thing you activate, so I gotta think on that.
Chaosmancer
Legend
Honestly?
I think it is just time to homebrew Barkskin into being a decent spell. I saw this had barkskin as a free spell after I posted it and I realized that it sucked. I'm going to start googling homebrew solutions to it soon. Because, why not just fix the problem for all three or four areas instead of just for the Dryad
Chaosmancer
Legend
So, in terms of Barkskin, I've found a solution I think I might like.
Remove Concentration from it.
Your AC from wearing armor cannot be lower than 16, shields still add +2 to your AC.
It essentially makes it like Mage Armor only with a big boost to AC and a shorter time limit, and would give the Druid an equivalent to an 18 AC. Which they could get anyways if they have a decent dex score, so it isn't too powerful by a long shot
Remove Concentration from it.
Your AC from wearing armor cannot be lower than 16, shields still add +2 to your AC.
It essentially makes it like Mage Armor only with a big boost to AC and a shorter time limit, and would give the Druid an equivalent to an 18 AC. Which they could get anyways if they have a decent dex score, so it isn't too powerful by a long shot
doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
Could work.
CleverNickName
Limit Break Dancing
Or just remove Barkskin from the druid list of spells, and replace it with Mage Armor?
doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
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