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Message: <blockquote data-quote="billd91" data-source="post: 1706649" data-attributes="member: 3400">I think your problem is you've fixated on a particular set of druid stereotypes and never got beyond that. A druid is a fun class to play and always has been, without making any modifications to fit the campaign. So let's look point by point:1. True Neutral from 1st/2nd edition Druids. This isn't a weird alignment at all nor is it necessarily apathetic. It may very well be highly pragmatic and non-prejudicial. Neutral characters aren't necessarily predisposed to favor one extreme over another and can side with which ever one makes the best case. It may also mean that the character thinks extreme philosophies are irrelevant to his own personal life (just as they are to animals living in the wild). It's an alignment with a great deal of freedom because the character wouldn't feel bound by any constraint beyond doing what is pragmatic, even if some other people would be squeemish about it. So why join the paladin's group? Because that is the best means, pragmatically, of accomplishing the druid's goals... whatever they are. Joining orcs to accomplish anything contructive? Not too pragmatic.2. Tied to the land? Never have been tied to any particular location that I can think of outside of Dark Sun. At least not until they establish a base of some sort but that's no different from any other class that establishes a stronghold. There may be practical reason to visit a home base periodically, but that's true of anyone who needs to resupply or story their junk.3. Motivation. Anything as long as it isn't antithetical to the druid's main responsibility: defending/conserving nature and serving as an interface between society and the natural world. Can more money help accomplish that? Sure. Or go out and spread the good word about the divine that can be found in nature. Really, finding a motivation for a druid to adventure is no harder than finding a motivation for a cleric to do the same thing.4. Why these jokers? Any number of reasons. Maybe you actually like them on a personal level even if you don't hold to all of the same goals. Ever been friends and hang out with someone you don't see eye to eye with on a number of important topics but you still liked to do things with them? Same thing. Or maybe it's more of a purely practical thing and you know you can get more accomplished by working with people who are good at what they do even if you don't mesh with them that well.5. Why am I in a town, etc? Because that's where things happen, where you can get things  you might need, and so on. Just because they aren't "natural" (and by this reasoning, is an ant hill natural, or the nest of a bird?) doesn't mean they aren't useful or worthwhile places to go. In the Village of Hommett, there's a druid who ministers to the townsfolk who follow the "old" religion. Perfectly good reason for a druid to live in a town. This model looks at druids as if they were like priests of an older pagan-style religion and as such they tend a flock of worshippers and not just the wilderness. Perfectly good way to look at a druid if you so choose.6. Proficiencies bizarre. Hey, at least they can use spears, a primary hunting weapon if there ever was one (same with the sling). The weapon list is a bit odd but much of it is hold-over from earlier editions that tried to make the druid a bit more distinct from the cleric with a set of more exotic (and bloodletting) weapons. I don't think adding a bow to every druid would break the game by any stretch of the imagination.7. Fanatical member of Greenpeace. Some people play druids this way (I played one a bit more like an Earth Firster, quite frankly, as an alternative and it was fun) but it's not a requirement. Druids probably should defend the wilderness from base exploitation because doing so is good for the natural order of things and the resilience of nature. But that doesn't mean that they have to be fanatical about it or that they can't see it as their duty to help people use nature's resources responsibly rather than wastefully running roughshod over it.</blockquote>

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