D&D (2024) New Wild Shape

[dave2008]

Okay, synthesizing a few different ideas here. Some of this may be unbalanced but wanted a good starting point.

Level 1 - Wild Shape
Choose between a Critter or an Animal when you use this feature.

Critter - AC 10, Speed 20 (walk, climb, fly), Keen Senses, Dark Vision, Cannot attack or cast magic, any damage ends the wildshape

Animal - As per the playtest doc, but remove Senses, Keen Senses and notes about 5th level upgrades. Instead
Pick 2 of the following traits when you assume this form.
Darkvision 60'
Keen Senses
Stealthy (adv on Stealth Checks)
5xPB Temp Hit Points
Climb Speed 30
Walking Speed 50


Level 5 - You can now pick 4 traits when you assume Animal form, and you also gain access to the following choices
Pack Tactics
Multi Attack
Poison (condition on failed save)
Don't provoke Opportunity attacks
Swim/Water Breathe
Tough (AC 15 + Wis)

Level 9 - You can now pick 6 traits when you assume Animal form, and you also gain access to the following choices
Fly
Attacks count as Magical
Regenerate (PB HP per turn)

Moon Druids
Level 3 - As per Playtest doc
Level 6 - As per playtest doc, plus pick 2 more traits when you assume Animal Form
Level 10 - As per playtest doc, plus gain 5xPB Temp Hit Points
Level 14 - As per playtest doc, plus can assume the shape of a Huge creature in Animal Form

That seems like a good approach. I might allow one wildshape trait starting at level 1 and increase from there. I feel 6 is a bit much though.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

And it's not as if the druid is lacking in overall power. It's a nine level spellcaster that comes out of the gate far faster than any other spellcaster while ending up with ninth level spells.

Nah.

If it had the Divine spell list, even, you might have a case. If it had the Arcane one, you definitely would.

But it has the Primal one. And we've seen the updated Primal list. It's easily the weakest of three lists, by a fairly huge margin too. I would go as far as to say it's on a half tier or even a whole tier down from the other two lists, which are closer to on-par.

But the game is better with the immersion and tension ruining temp hit points gone.

I'm not arguing it's not.

I'm argue that whilst change might be fine, the accompanying bizarre unnecessary changes just absolutely trash the Druid for no reason.

I didn't find them "immersion or tension ruining", and I've had Druids in the party and played Druids (on and off) for most of 5E. I do think they're boring, and that's a reasonable critique.

Do I think they need something more? Yes.

Indeed. And this is bizarre because there so many unnecessary nerfs - the tiny form thing just speaks to the designer not having any clue how D&D is actually played. I've seen countless Druids (including me) try to leverage that - and you can - but you absolutely cannot replace the Rogue (though you can help the Rogue and sorta fill-in if the party doesn't have one - I mean somebody has to!). It's not some overpowered abilities needing strict limits, not unless they change things drastically and give it like, Advantage on all Stealth checks, free Stealth proficiency and so on. But as someone who has dealt with (for example) mice in the house, I can assure you mice should not automatically get stealth, not with their little clicky clacky claws!

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Okay, synthesizing a few different ideas here. Some of this may be unbalanced but wanted a good starting point.

Level 1 - Wild Shape
Choose between a Critter or an Animal when you use this feature.

Critter - AC 10, Speed 20 (walk, climb, fly), Keen Senses, Dark Vision, Cannot attack or cast magic, any damage ends the wildshape

Animal - As per the playtest doc, but remove Senses, Keen Senses and notes about 5th level upgrades. Instead
Pick 2 of the following traits when you assume this form.
Darkvision 60'
Keen Senses
Stealthy (adv on Stealth Checks)
5xPB Temp Hit Points
Climb Speed 30
Walking Speed 50


Level 5 - You can now pick 4 traits when you assume Animal form, and you also gain access to the following choices
Pack Tactics
Multi Attack
Poison (condition on failed save)
Don't provoke Opportunity attacks
Swim/Water Breathe
Tough (AC 15 + Wis)

Level 9 - You can now pick 6 traits when you assume Animal form, and you also gain access to the following choices
Fly
Attacks count as Magical
Regenerate (PB HP per turn)

Moon Druids
Level 3 - As per Playtest doc
Level 6 - As per playtest doc, plus pick 2 more traits when you assume Animal Form
Level 10 - As per playtest doc, plus gain 5xPB Temp Hit Points
Level 14 - As per playtest doc, plus can assume the shape of a Huge creature in Animal Form

Congratulations you're already a better design than people being actively paid to design stuff by WotC!

But yeah that's much better.

 

[Neonchameleon]

Their spells are objectively inferior to a Cleric or Wizard. By design.

Their spells significant overlap with a cleric and more than a little overlap with wizard battlefield control while having arguably the best summonings. By Design. And they have standouts, starting with Goodberry, Thunderwave, Pass Without Trace, Flaming Sphere, and Spike Growth.

If that changed, which it hasn't, you could make that argument.

The biggest OP Cleric combo (Spiritual Weapons/Spirit Guardians) has been brought into line.

But as of right now, we've seen the Primal list, and it's still terrible compared to the Arcane and Divine lists. Don't pretend things are equal that aren't, I would suggest.

I really can't agree with you here. There are a lot of spells on the Primal list I'd want as a Cleric, and they have a shared core. Don't pretend that the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence when the core overlaps and there's a whole lot of utility on both.

 

[billd91]

This has absolutely happened in my own games. The druid is far better at this than the rogue.

I'd be hard pressed to think of this as a problem, exactly. The contexts in which they infiltrate are substantially different with one not necessarily being always better than the other. Plus, druids and rogues being excellent infiltrators gives the players choices in party makeup. That's the problem with excessive niche protection. There should be multiple character types capable of filling any single niche, just in different ways.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I really can't agree with you here. There are a lot of spells on the Primal list I'd want as a Cleric, and they have a shared core. Don't pretend that the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence when the core overlaps and there's a whole lot of utility on both.

I'm not. I'm speaking from extremely long experience of playing both Druids and Clerics. The idea that the grass is greener is hilarious - I own both houses (hell, several times in the last three years I played both in the same week!). The Cleric list is far better when it comes to actual game impact, and not due to that one combo.

Their spells significant overlap with a cleric and more than a little overlap with wizard battlefield control while having arguably the best summonings. By Design. And they have standouts, starting with Goodberry, Thunderwave, Pass Without Trace, Flaming Sphere, and Spike Growth.

Pretty much all these spells are either mediocre and commonly available (Thunderwave, Flaming Sphere), have been nerfed severely already in 1E (Goodberry - it is no longer a "standout"), or will undoubtedly be nerfed - there's no way the actually-good (and I agree they are good) summons Druids have in 5E survive into 1E. Absolutely none. And I think you know that. Those spells are either gone entirely, or nerfed into the ground.

Which leaves us with Pass Without Trace, which is a good spell, but niche and rarely actually useful (not never!), and Spike Growth, which is just a great spell, but I give it 50/50 odds of being severely nerfed.

Have we seen even a single Arcane spell so far nerfed? I don't think we have. And I don't think we will do. OP junk like Fireball will probably remain OP.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

I'd be hard pressed to think of this as a problem, exactly. The contexts in which they infiltrate are substantially different with one not necessarily being always better than the other. Plus, druids and rogues being excellent infiltrators gives the players choices in party makeup. That's the problem with excessive niche protection. There should be multiple character types capable of filling any single niche, just in different ways.

Sure, when rogues can swap out their areas of focus daily I'd agree. Or if the druid had to pick between tiny form, combat form, etc. As is, it is a bit too much utility slapped as an additional perk on a 9 level caster. The moon druid does basically everything, and does everything probably a bit too well. Requiring investment in the form of spells or feats to achieve B+ in an area seems fair.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I'm really interested in how they are determining the STR and DEX of the wild shape forms -- you keep your stats on CON which makes sense, since you are also keeping your own hit points), and

they use wis as your attack stat... it's weird that without useing it to bufffer hp it seems so weak now

 

[Clint_L]

My issue with the drastic changes to Wildshape, especially for Moon Druids, is that they make druid into a fundamentally different class. I don't think that is fair to people who currently play the class. Quite a few folks (most?) play druid as a primary tank, secondary caster. You can make a case that this was bad design to begin with, but that horse is already out of the barn. What do you do with a player who has been playing their druid for years?

I suppose what you do is just give them the option to keep using the 2014 version. But unlike what we've seen with other classes, this is a radical change in class design. I'll be interested to see what the feedback is from druid players.

 

[Benjamin Olson]

I mean, you can't turn into animals anymore. You can turn into a standard statblock with the appearance of some animal. Way simpler to play and adjudicate, and a Druid player no longer has to consult the monster manual and online guides to figure out what they should be turning into. But I just don't feel any draw to it; there's no particular appeal. And I'm not lamenting it no longer giving a bunch of extra hit points, that was what made wildshape gobble up the whole Druid class and I'm glad to see it go. I'm lamenting that it feels like the simplification you do for a D&D videogame. Much of why I prefer tabletop to videogames, enough to go to all the trouble of scheduling time with people to play a game with a bunch of complicated rules rather than just boot up a computer, is that there is so much more room for open ended creativity.

In my own 5e clone game the solution for balance and simplification I arrived at with the "Coven of Skinwalkers Witch", the only wildshaping character option so far, was that they start with a few specific, basic animal options, but then at a low level they gain at will Speak with Animals and the ability to use it to try to persuade any animal to spend an hour teaching them its form. Animal forms effectively become a form of treasure, that the DM has some ability to restrict by what they include in their game, and players can feel like an effective wildshaper simply by learning the animal forms they get the chance to learn rather than needing to research stat blocks.

I do really like having alternative uses for the "Channel Nature" ability, so that druids aren't so defined by Wildshape.