Druid Wild Shape

[Akaiku]

Cept when you are shifted, you loose access to the vast majority, if not ALL the actions you used to be able to take.

 

[DracoSuave]

Cept when you are shifted, you loose access to the vast majority, if not ALL the actions you used to be able to take.

If I'm an orb wizard, I don't have a lot of immediate/opportunity actions to take. So this cost of losing actions I'm not taking is so negligable that it just might be worth taking a feat so I can shift every other turn, and in the -off- chance I need to make an OA, it can be a -useful- power that aids my control, rather than a punch that does nothing.


Edit:
Come to think of it, if you're a staff-wizard, you can use your implement with that druid power you got, AND you still get your +1 AC bonus, AND you can still use your Staff of Defense power, as class features are not turned off and it's not a power anyways.

Not -every- character cares about their off-turn. If you're not built around off-turn powers/OAs, then the cost of shifting is nothing compared to the gains you garner from it.

 

[Danceofmasks]

So just keep your savage rend for that one OA you need to do per combat, and you're golden.

But ... 18/18 deva that wild shapes every round is ... just weird.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

There are 2 flaws with that. One is you can't use a staff as wizard except with wizard powers, period. This is true for all classes. Even if the implement is the same type of implement, the only thing that gives you a right to use an implement at all is that you have a class feature, and that feature always restricts you to using it with your own classes powers. OK, I see that Initiate of The Old Faith does get you past that one...

Secondly, you have NO effective melee attack when MC into Druid, except a once-per-encounter use of a druid at-will. You can OA (sort of, technically not, but the difference is unimportant really) once per encounter, or you can make an attack, once per encounter. Once you burn that use, you have NO melee ability at all.

Now, that doesn't negate your ability to leverage Wild Shape into an extra minor action shift every other round, but it is at the cost of a minor EVERY round, which does put a bit of a crimp in it. IMHO you are not doing badly, the MC Druid has a bit of utility, but it is a pretty small benefit for the cost of a feat overall. I would think there are better ways for a wizard to use a feat slot in general. There would seem to me to be superior MC options as well, generally. If it fits with your character concept, then it isn't too bad and you get to have fun with it. Other than that I'd call it not THAT great.

 

[dragon23ca]

I think everyone is missing the Power-Swap Feats and Paragon Multiclassing. A lot of the multiclass feats really don't look good till you start power-swapping.

 

[Akaiku]

True, but if you paragon multiclass, you have one at will useable outside of beast form and one useable inside of it. If you, say, ignore that beast form exists, you can take all the non-beast powers, many of which are rather good, and pretend that the -powers form doesn't exist. It just is less... cool.

I am kinda noticing this with my shaman multi'd to druid. Druid beast form attacks are always worse then druid ranged attacks or shaman attacks in the same slot. The wild shape power turns into a situational stacking skill buff and rp fluf...

 

[DracoSuave]

There are 2 flaws with that. One is you can't use a staff as wizard except with wizard powers, period. This is true for all classes. Even if the implement is the same type of implement, the only thing that gives you a right to use an implement at all is that you have a class feature, and that feature always restricts you to using it with your own classes powers. OK, I see that Initiate of The Old Faith does get you past that one...

So yeah, that's not a problem. Droods use stick, wizards use stick. And you still get Staff of Defense in Rawr-mode.

Secondly, you have NO effective melee attack when MC into Druid, except a once-per-encounter use of a druid at-will.

Don't matter. You're a wizard. You're not doing this for the melee. You're doing this for the shifting to get -out- of melee. If your OA is 'Do damage and shift them one away from you' then that is a -fantastic- OA, and probably better than any melee attack you'd be doing otherwise. Well -worth- a feat to get as an -encounter- power for a wizard.

You can OA (sort of, technically not, but the difference is unimportant really) once per encounter, or you can make an attack, once per encounter. Once you burn that use, you have NO melee ability at all.

Again, doesn't matter. Savage Rend is probably the best one for you to take;
it'll help -get you out of melee- which is the point.

Now, that doesn't negate your ability to leverage Wild Shape into an extra minor action shift every other round, but it is at the cost of a minor EVERY round, which does put a bit of a crimp in it. IMHO you are not doing badly, the MC Druid has a bit of utility, but it is a pretty small benefit for the cost of a feat overall.

The thing is, if you're planning to use one of your daily utilities, you're either in a shift-to-beast form round, in which case, you hold it off until next round. And if you're in a shift-from-beast form round, you actually don't lose anything.

I would think there are better ways for a wizard to use a feat slot in general. There would seem to me to be superior MC options as well, generally. If it fits with your character concept, then it isn't too bad and you get to have fun with it. Other than that I'd call it not THAT great.

It depends on your build, but if you're not deep into minor actions, wizards aren't spending them on DCs, Curses, Quarries, or all sorts of other things that classes do all the time. So it's not as much of a cost for them.

The thing to remember is a Druid uses them to use their Beast Form abilities, which involve high mobility and really decent single-target control and damage. That does not mean a wizard doesn't use it for something else, which is to make them less sticky and harder to hit.

Think if it the same way as a Fey Warlock who MCs into Paladin to get the Divine Challenge. In a Paladin's hands, it's a way to attract the enemy's damage. In a Fey-Lock's hands, it's a debuff to their attacks that adds to their damage.

 

[Shadowsong666]

Curious, what is the Melee Basic Attack of a Druid in wild shape? I ask because if you multiclass in to Druid, and have only one at-will power that can be used 1/encounter, then what do you do otherwise? Do you just have the MBA, and what would it be?

You don't have any attack. But well, you could trick your way around that with a magic armor.

Dragon Magazine 369 - Feral Armor
It gives you a claw attack with a +3 prof. light blade weapon. Bonus to damage and attack equal the bonus of the armor itself. It also counts as a basic melee attack.

While you can't use any attack, utility or feat power lacking the beast form keyword you still can use class features. So a cleric could use healing word while in beast form or a ranger could still set his hunter's quarry or a rogue could apply his sneak attack bonus.

Feral armor is the only way i see around the problem, as it is no weapon (you would drop it because you only hold implements in wild shape) but an armor which bestows upon you a claw attack.

But in terms of "optimizing" i just don't see a point in wild shape at all. Its just not that good.

But well, if you would come to the point that you think that a Dragonborn Bard (mc druid, cleric, warlord) with a vampire heritage, taking the racial Paragon Path Scion of Arkhosia (you need that, because you get a natural fly speed at level 16 and so you can wild shape into a large bat and fly away) would be cool, wild shape makes sense. Just give him a hat of disguise, a magician's ring and some Hedge Wizard's Gloves to round the things up. Now let him create a magic item to summon a illusionary, ghostly church organ (think of something like [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=olfxxNsubwI&feature=related[/ame]) and i think you could have some cool character which may not be great, but with his intimidate, diplomacy and bluff check could be a real crazy face character of the group.

Not that i would ever have such an idea... never ever. i swear - i do.

 

[malcolm_n]

I think it's great that they held to the spirit of the 3.5 druid so well and multiclassing into/out of the druid is a pain and a half.

Sarcasm aside, I have to side with the fact that shifting out of combat every other round is really, really good. We have a kobold in one of our games and he uses shifty all the time to broken ends. Even cutting him down to every other round would barely keep him within reason.