Druids too powerful?

[Majere]

Base - 10
Plate+5 - 13 -27k
Shield +5 - 6 -25k
Expertise(5) - 5 -0
Ring +4 - 4 -32k
Natural armor- 4 -32k
Boots Speed - 4 -12k
Dodge - 1
Dex - 1

Total - 48

Admittedly this is streaching the money a little fine, but at 13th level you could get barkskin from the druid, and magic vestments on the plate to cut down costs. Haste removes the need for Boots of Speed. Note you only lose one point of Ac for moving up hasted for a full attack on the AoO you provoke (-5 Expertise +4 Mobility Feat).
Also note that at very high levels the main use of Ac it to protect you from iterative attacks, because usualyl the main attacks will hit on a 5 or a 6.

A druid only doensn't need people when he is ouside, stick a druid in a 10 or 5' corridor and see how effective he is. All the classess need other people: mages need fighters to meat shield for them, all the classess need rogues, rogues need mages and fighters, clerics and druids are teh closest to stand alone classess, but are best employed buffing the fighters and mages.

 

[Majere]

I read that as level 13, a level 17 has much more money !!
Ok, make the ring and armour bracers +5
(increasing cost to 50k each)
Cloak of diplacement major (50k)
Defending +5 sword (72k before anything else you add)

You now have an ac of 55 and every attack has a 50% misschance
and have spent Appx 236k Leaving about 100k for stat items.
(lets assume you stated with 18str add 4str from levels and spend 72k on a +6 str item for 28 St for the bulk of it)

This is just the obvious stuff, Im sure someone from Smack productions Inc can do a better job, but you know.. he doesnt look too easy for you to hit does he ? And he has 4 attacks at some beefy +s and. With a mere 50ac vs the bears +28 attack He does d8+19 crits on a 17-20 and you have money to add some energy damage dice/ get a +con item or othewise round out the Fighter.
Good buy would be cloak of resistance +5 (25k)

His grapple check is +17+9+4 (improved grapple feat) so the bear isnt too far ahead
Of course 50gp buys a potion of enlarge person, so now he has an ac of 49/54, but has a grapple check of
17+10+4 (feat) +4(size) and actually is ahead of the bear (scary thought eh?)

So far of the fighters 14/15 feats we have used
Weapons Spec, Greater Weapon Spec
WEapon focus, Greater weapn Focus
Dodge Mobility
Improve unarmed strike, Improved grapple
Combat expertise

Leaving 7 feats
The three saving throw feats, Seem to be a good choice, and Im sure you can find uses for the other 4

 

[DM2]

Base -10
Plate+5 -13 -27k
Shield +5 -6 -25k
Expertise(5) -5 -0
Ring +4 -4 -32k
Natural armor-4 -32k
Boots Speed -4 -12k
Dodge -1
Dex -1

Total -48

Admittedly this is streaching the money a little fine, but at 13th level you could get barkskin from the druid, and magic vestmens on the plate to cut down costs. Haste removes need for boots of Speed. Note you only lose one point of ac for moving up hasted for a full attack on the AoO you provoke (-5 Expertise +4 Mobility Feat).
Also not that at very high levels the main use of Ac it to protect you from iterative attacks, because usualyl the main attacks will hit on a 5 or a 6.

A druid only doensnt need people when he is ouside, stick a druid in a 10 or 5' corridor and see how effective he is. All the classess need other people: mages need fighters to meat shield for them, all the classess need rogues, rogues need mages and fighters, clerics and druids are teh closest to stand alone classess, but are best employed buffing the fighters and mages.

Wow...I know I haven't finished my morning cup of coffee because it took me a couple of minutes of staring to figure out why you were calculating some massive negative number...

...then I realized you were just using the dash to separate the numbers from the labels, and were calculating an armor class.

duh.

 

[Majere]

Oops My bad,
We used power attack too, so with saving throw feats that is 13 feats, but you still have room for two more feats

 

[Pielorinho]

Oops My bad,
We used power attack too, so with saving throw feats that is 13 feats, but you still have room for two more feats

Majere, I'm not denying that a fighter focusing on defense above everything else can get a high defense. That's far from typical for high-level fighters, however: usually in addition to the defense stuff, they've got offensive stuff, mobility-enhancing items (e.g., wings, etc.), cool ranged attacks, potions for healing and buffing, and so on.

That does raise a point, a major weakness of the druid: they're not nearly as good at ranged combat as a fighter who specializes in such. But if a druid is facing a fighter in a situation where flight (literal flight) isn't an option, chances are good that the average druid can kick the average fighter's butt.

Anyone have their books handy, can look up the AC of the average 17th-level fighter?

Daniel

 

[Majere]

Actually that is a very typical fighter from our parties
But that is a matter of taste. Our parties fighters are quite clear, the really big advantage of fighter is heavy armor and a shield, so fighters take those items. If you are going to fight with two weapons or in light armor there are good arguments for barbarian and ranger, but honestly, fighters make bloody good tin cans. If you want to go witht he two weapon path you are giving up 7Ac from your shield which you can partially offset with Two weapon defence, with iproved and greater two weapon fighting (Which you have the feats for if you remove the suggested saving throw feats) You now have 4 attacks at d6+19 and 3 at d6+14. Lets have him power attack for.. 5 points, and givent the bears ac the fighter will pretty much be garunteed to hit with all his attacks.
He does 7d6 +153 damage and the statistacal odds are that he will score 1 or 2 crits, (another d6+19/24). You can tell me if the bear is Still alive. (An augmented Dire bear has 12d8+75 hp.. doesnt look good for the bear).
Infact, you probably dont need to power attack the sucker.

 

[Majere]

The Guy has a +5 sword !
Its just for the purpose of the example I reduced the +s for Ac
DMG 3.) lists ac of an npc 17th level fighter at a pathetic 31. But if you build your characters like Npcs you arent thinking about it enough.

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

Here's a thought - in the typical D&D world, surely this conunundrum has been noted many times. What tactics can a fighter use to counter the natural advantage a druid would have in this situation? Because it's quite likely that those tactics would become almost as ubiquitous as setting spears against a charge.

If I'm a fighter, and I know I'm facing a druid who can wild-shape (or a summoned dire bear), I might ready an attack to full-on power attack and then step 5' back. That could defuse the initial charge by the bear, and possibly inflict major damage on a foe who likely has a pretty poor AC.

Of course, it depends on accurately defining one's circumstances.

It isn't necessary to always defuse an advantage through rules, if it can be defused through sensible play. Setting spears against a charge is a sensible tactic that is very effective - but it's effectiveness is backed up by reality. It's not so easy to adjudicate reality when you're dealing with a bear the size of a house because that doesn't exist in real life. If it did, however, I think the only sensible tactic would be RUN! Or at the very least, concentrate all available firepower to take down that one very visible threat.

 

[Pielorinho]

Actually that is a very typical fighter from our parties

I may be way off. Try taking one of your typical fighters and placing him against a reasonably-buffed 17th-level druid who does the tactic mentioned above (summons dire bears, animal growths them all). Reasonable buffs=barkskin, greater magic fang, and one or more of the stat-buffs, stoneskin, produce flame, true seeing, and/or repel metal). Give the druid equipment equal in value to the fighter -- reasonable equipment might include gloves of rusting grasp, stat-buffing items, wild armor, etc. Lemme know who wins.

Daniel

 

[kigmatzomat]

Sure, for the whole party it was easy to hack that golem into bits. My problem is: the druid could have done it alone as well.

Remember, a single 17th level character is equivalent to a group of 13th level characters. In theory then, the CR13 golem ought to be defeatable by any given party member.

Golems are immune to most spells, so the two wizards (and the cleric) couldn't harm it.

Horse pucky. The casters couldn't cast spells on it directly. Use the environment; rock to mud, stoneshapes, Walls of Iron/Stone, collapsing the ceiling on it or just flying/teleporting/ wraithforming past it. Challenge defeated. Or they could use the same tactic as the druid and Summon something big to deal with it. I'm fond of Telekinesis based attacks and using Shrink Item-ed Walls of Iron dropped from altitude. DR doesn't matter much if you inflict 30D6 kinetic damage and then bury the beasty under five tons of iron.

It has DR 15/adamantine, the cleric and the paladin have no adamantine weapons (the cleric has a +3 bastard sword and adds +12 damage per hit, attack bonus is 24/19/14; the paladin wields a holy avenger longsword, dealing 1d8+12 against a neutral creature, attack is 28/23/18), their damage done was almost nothing.

Both these guys have plenty of buffs available if they're determined to mix it up with an animated tank. Where's the Divine Sacrifice, (Lesser)Aspect of the Diety, Divine Favor, Righteous Might and the like? And if your attacks do diddly, throw caution to the wind and powerattack for 10+ points. Flank the golem and the paladin has at least a 50/50 shot with his first attack. It might take 10 rounds, but they could do it.

All in all, I'd say the other players simply screwed around waiting for someone else to bother getting rid of the nuisance.