Help me nerf the druid

[Gorbacz]

Man, I just love this kind of Rhetoric! Such insightful and intellectually stimulating debates these are!

/sarcasm

Dude, if you're going to make a wild, unsupported claim loaded with hyperbole, at least have the common decency to get basic facts straight. Dire Bear is 12 HD, a level 8 Druid couldn't turn into one.

And go ahead and turn into a dire bear and lose all your gear for a nice str check, size large (if only there were level 1 potions that let my fighter do THAT!), and some natural armor (to go along with your pathetic touch AC). My Fighter will do just fine with his gear, feats, and full BAB. Not as fine as he'd do if he were a Warblade or whatever, but fine enough...

Yeah, I forgot about the HD thing. So, Polar Bear – kosher, right ? I’ve got my Polar Bear with his speed, improved grab and 3 attacks, you have your Fighter 8 with his 2 attacks and feats.

And to be honest – you will outdamage me. Not by an overwhelming deal, but you will be ahead of me in damage.

But that’s not the point. The point is that a druid can compete with you, and he happens to be full caster with 4th lvl spells at that point, apart from his melee capability he can bring stuff like scry, fom and reincarnate to the table. And the fighter, apart from his damage dealing can bring … ?

Of course, all this is irrelevant because a 3.5 core Cleric walks by, casts the holy trifecta and looks at both of us with a confused stare and asks “what are you two arguing about ?” at which point the Fighter can go back home and the Druid can start quickly looking for things which he can do and the Cleric can’t.

Pathfinder fixed it by making sure that while Fighter remains one-dimensional, he at least is a king of the hill in that one dimension. Nobody gets close to his damage-dealing capability. The days of full casters replacing full BAB classes in their intended role are gone.

 

[Kaisoku]

Did PF change the definition of what it means to be an "animal"?

Yes, they did. I mean this in all politeness, but it'd be a good idea to reread the class if you are going to make judgments on it.

Pathfinder also lets you decide what skills and feats it gets (which it didn't seem to in 3.5e, at least not to the degree of versatility we have now).

This is all basically to say that the Animal Companion is not a toss away ability it might have once been considered.

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Regarding "battle" casters...

Honestly, wildshape now simply gives the Druid a similar buff to combat abilities that a Cleric can buff. There are some differences (more utility, longer lasting, but not quite as much of a boost to attack and damage, etc).

In 3.5e, a druid could literally tank their physical scores in favour of wildshaping into a holy terror with 30+ Str and 20+ Con, etc.
There was no way to limit this without breaking some verisimilitude. I'm glad Druids can still turn into the creature they want (for at least utility and roleplay, if not for the gobs of combat stats it once could).

 

[BryonD]

So on 6th level you can mimic a 2nd level spell... weee. Ok, it's better than that, but still a bit underwhelming even for a mere buff.

It is a lot better than that. When the wizard is still casting L3 spells, an effect that can buff STR, and CON, plus give natural armor, plus give stealth advantages, plus give natural attacks, plus give enhanced mobility, among other things. This is still an awesome ability for 6th level. To call it underwhelming is boggling.

It's just as ridiculous for any human to turn into a Bear (which can be medium sized btw). But this is fantasy, and shape-changing is a staple of D&D. I don't see any reason why a weak PC couldn't become a relatively strong animal.

Black bear str mod is +8... it's alot and shouldn't be available at low levels, but mid level? Sure. After all being in such a form means you have the disadvantages of not being able to speak, cast spells, or use items. And a tough fighter will still be able to beat a 6th level druid in bear form.

Now if you remove any of those limitations: allow animals with magic armor, talking parrots and spell-casting pussycats, then thats when it becomes broken.

A tough fighter SHOULD be able to kick the ass of an equivalent druid in melee combat. If not, what is the point of the fighter?

How else do you propose getting a +8 to STR at L4 (when medium wildshape is available)? Forget the list of other perks already provided, just give me an example of a +8 to STR at level 4.

 

[BryonD]

See, from my point of view, that's the wrong direction. That's the 4e direction in which the values for defenses and attacks are pretty much completely contrived and gamist. I'd prefer whipping up an animal to make it the most appropriate fit for D&D concepts rather than an appropriate fit for a certain level of adventurer.

I agree 100% with this mindset. But, you then need to step back and consider at what point should a druid gain this power.

As I mentioned in passing before, another approach would be to limit the amount of ability increase a druid can create. And then limit the druid to forms his base STR + his increase cap can meet.

So if you are 6th level and can get a +4 to STR, only a druid with a normal form strength of 14+ is capable of turning into a bear. A druid with less base STR just can't take the form of a bear. Maybe his ability to channel the nature of a bear isn't sufficiently supported by his own nature. Whatever, flavor basis you want.

I do agree completely that turning into a bear should be turning into a bear. But, that doesn't mean that a L6 STR8 halfling should be able to turn into a STR21 bear, with claws and teeth and tougher skin, while the L6 STR 8 halfling wizard can get +4 STR.

I'd strongly encourage a halfling druid to not consider bear as a valid option.

Making it feel right is absolutely the #1 priority.
But determining when in the scheme of things that correct feel is reasonably balanced is not far back down the list of priorities.

 

[BryonD]

Dude, if you're going to make a wild, unsupported claim loaded with hyperbole, at least have the common decency to get basic facts straight. Dire Bear is 12 HD, a level 8 Druid couldn't turn into one.

Does the HD restriction still exist? I'm pretty sure it doesn't. But maybe I missed it.

 

[Friend of the Dork]

It is a lot better than that. When the wizard is still casting L3 spells, an effect that can buff STR, and CON, plus give natural armor, plus give stealth advantages, plus give natural attacks, plus give enhanced mobility, among other things. This is still an awesome ability for 6th level. To call it underwhelming is boggling.

A tough fighter SHOULD be able to kick the ass of an equivalent druid in melee combat. If not, what is the point of the fighter?

How else do you propose getting a +8 to STR at L4 (when medium wildshape is available)? Forget the list of other perks already provided, just give me an example of a +8 to STR at level 4.

Well maybe Wild Shape was never intended to be gained at level 4? But even at 5th level, it was pretty unique - then again there were other weaknesses attached, such as AC, inability to talk, cast spells etc. (3.0). And a fighter with decent feats can still out-perform you.

BryonD:

If you use PF rules whenever advantageous, and 3.5 or 3.0 rules when those are advantageous, then of course it will be unbalanced. It is evident that if you allow 3.5 polymorph rules you use all of them, including the HD limitation. It probably also a good idea to delay when the druid actually gets wild shape, to level 5 at least.

Why couldn't halflings turn into bears? This is even a medium sized one we're talking about. I can understand a limitation in the size alteration you can perform, but a black bear could be appropriate for a halfling while a brown bear could be for a human.

I'm skeptical to have str requirements in order to turn into animals, doesn't fit with my idea of druid. Much better then to delay certain very strong animals to a higher level and not just based on size as it is.

 

[billd91]

I agree 100% with this mindset. But, you then need to step back and consider at what point should a druid gain this power.

As I mentioned in passing before, another approach would be to limit the amount of ability increase a druid can create. And then limit the druid to forms his base STR + his increase cap can meet.

I don't think I would like that approach much either. Even without gaining the full stats of the typical bear/dire bear/whatever, the PF druid still has a pretty ass-kicking disguise. So he's weak for a bear, still looks like one though. That's always been one of the best aspects of wildshape, in my book. So I'm pretty content with PF wildshaping.

 

[BryonD]

If I made you think I'm mixing 3X with PF, I've misspoken. I'm talking about PF only.

Why couldn't halflings turn into bears?

I'm not saying a halfling "can't" turn into a bear. only that it may be much easier for s STR18 human to turn into a bear than it is for a STR 8 Hlafling to turn into a bear.

I'm skeptical to have str requirements in order to turn into animals, doesn't fit with my idea of druid. Much better then to delay certain very strong animals to a higher level and not just based on size as it is.

And that could be fine as well.

But again, there needs to be both correct flavor AND some degree of balance.

Letting the hulking human druid turn into bears earlier than the tiny halfling, while the tiny halfling can become an agile, fast, stealthy owl much more easily than the hulking human. To me there is some cool flavor in that trade off. And there is less issue with OP druids.

Ultimately, what I REALLY think is the best idea is to use the rules as written in PF. I think they strike a good meeting of both flavor and balance.

Then expect a good DM and a good player to work together to understand what the character can do with those abilities. It may be perfectly reasonable to agre that the halfling is going to be limited to a STR of 12, so any animal with a STR much higher than that isn't allowed for the character. In effect a house rule by mutal consent.

Or, you can agree that wildshape is just that, a shape. The halfling can take the *appearance* of a bear, but not truly become a bear. He is bulky and big, and maybe scary looking. But, almost like a shadow conjuration, the forms bear muscles are not really all muscle like in a real bear.

I completely buy the idea that wildshape is a well established cool staple of the druid. And messing with it is touchy.
But the druid is well established as being way more powerful that other classes (and I am referencing 3X,not PF here). I think this change in PF brings that back in line. I'm honestly not certain if it goes too far, or not far enough because no one has run a druid in my game so far. But I see it as an improvement. I think the flavor can still be maintained wiht the rules as is, the expectations just need to be adjusted to more equitable levels.

 

[BryonD]

I don't think I would like that approach much either. Even without gaining the full stats of the typical bear/dire bear/whatever, the PF druid still has a pretty ass-kicking disguise. So he's weak for a bear, still looks like one though. That's always been one of the best aspects of wildshape, in my book. So I'm pretty content with PF wildshaping.

I'm sorry, I think I must have misunderstood your point somehwere along the way.

But if we both like the PF approach, then I think we are good.

 

[ruemere]

[...]

Just a few weeks ago, our party fought a very powerful sorcerer who clearly was higher level than us. He had buffed his AC to something like 30, which...is hard to hit at level 6 to say the least. He twice put up the Mirror Image spell to make things even more annoying for us. We first thought, "no big deal, either we swing at him or we wipe out an image, since they're easy to hit." Silly us and our rational 3E mindsets where low level figments are easy targets. Check out the 3.5 and Pathfinder versions of that spell. As if higher AC on the images (ven a 25 was very hard for us to manage), notice PF also was nice enough to remove this text: "While moving, you can merge with and split off from figments so that enemies who have learned which image is real are again confounded." See, in a civilized (ie, 3E) game, there are some common sense rules to help deal with the spell. Such as, "you can't move the images until your turn comes up" so that should you get lucky and discover the real target, your party can take advantage of that for a round at least. PF has no such text, so thanks to the ambiguity, it was up to the DM. He figured if they took it out from 3E, then the intent was clear. Who'd have thought that in their "balancing" of things, Paizo would actually boost Mirror Image, which I don't recall ever being considered a "bad" spell in 3.5...
Just one example of the little stuff you don't notice at first until it comes up in game, and then you realize how much worse PF rules are than 3E. And yes, that encounter still pisses me off.[...]

When fighting opposition of higher level, expect difficulties.

Also, in this particular case: close your eyes and grapple.
So yes, he'll get AoO on you (or maybe not, he was a sorcerer).

50% miss chance and your CMB vs his CMD:
CMD = 10 + Base attack bonus + Strength modifier + Dexterity modifier + special size modifier

This is the way our party Barbarian does most of opponents under multiple buffs.


Regards,
Ruemere

PS. Blind-Fight + Rage = CMB ownage.