D&D General Wild Shape: Inefficient or Useless?

[Staffan]

Yeah, wildshape was not great with the 2014 rules and is now substantially worse. Thanks to other properties, notably World of Warcraft and other RPGs, not to mention (checks notes) the official D&D move, Honour Among Thieves, the expectation of most younger players is that druids will be these awesome, kickass shapeshifters. It is inexplicable to me that WotC has been unable to deliver a compelling druid class.

Note that in WoW, in order to be a kickass shapeshifter, you need to spec into Guardian (for bear/tank) or Feral (for cat/melee DPS). I haven't kept up with WoW enough to know if bear/cat form are locked behind those specs these days or if it's just that you need to take the specs in order to get your numbers up to the right point, but either way a Balance druid (ranged DPS) won't do much good in either of these forms. There's also a few Travel forms that all druids have: stag for land travel, seal for swimming, and eventually bird for flying.

To be honest, one of the main reasons I wanted to play the Druid was because I love the idea of shapeshifting. It's just that the way it's written (or the campaign we're in) seems to make it where my doing it is basically the worst option to choose in most of the situations. I can only think of once that I was able to use it in a way that actively helped the group.

We have a couple of skilled scouters, but 99% of the time they find some sort of trouble that would require my caster abilities rather than my sneak ones.

If shapeshifting is your jam, you should see about getting your DM to let you change your subclass into Circle of the Moon. That's the subclass that's all about the shapeshifting and makes it a combat-relevant ability.

That said, it does sound like your DM has decided that this adventure has to be solved this particular way and taken steps to shut down any alternate way of doing it. That's generally considered poor form.

 

[Indagare Nogitsune]

Yeah, actually having a non-dungeon setting vastly helps the Druid character (and the Ranger).

Sounds like the DM has put you into an area that punishes creative play and specifically the Wildshape's strength - is this maze for the entire campaign or just one portion?

It's only one portion. We need to get through the maze to get to a tower to rescue someone helping us against cultists (they have an artifact which would significantly impede the cultists plans, but we need to get it and the person to safety first).

To be honest, I'm freaking out a bit because the party got split. We wanted to test communication and teleportation across the maze and found it shut it down completely. Worse, they ended up in an area we had gone before (containing a dao) and defeated only to find it had reset, which suggests every single monster encounter we will face will also reset and there's no real good indication of how the maze is actually set up. The sundial keeps having more shadows, none of which align with the sun but which don't seem to really indicate direction either.

Basically, I'm worried there isn't a logical way out of the maze--that it'd be a matter of getting the correct random d6 roll on one of the 8 paths available and, worse, by the time we get to the tower we'll have no resources left to actually face the cultists.

-For those of you who might wonder about us sneaking in and out, remember it only takes a single bad die roll to make things go from "you get yourselves and the person out safely" to "all the cultists are now aware of you and actively attacking you".

 

[Indagare Nogitsune]

Note that in WoW, in order to be a kickass shapeshifter, you need to spec into Guardian (for bear/tank) or Feral (for cat/melee DPS). I haven't kept up with WoW enough to know if bear/cat form are locked behind those specs these days or if it's just that you need to take the specs in order to get your numbers up to the right point, but either way a Balance druid (ranged DPS) won't do much good in either of these forms. There's also a few Travel forms that all druids have: stag for land travel, seal for swimming, and eventually bird for flying.


If shapeshifting is your jam, you should see about getting your DM to let you change your subclass into Circle of the Moon. That's the subclass that's all about the shapeshifting and makes it a combat-relevant ability.

That said, it does sound like your DM has decided that this adventure has to be solved this particular way and taken steps to shut down any alternate way of doing it. That's generally considered poor form.

I chose Circle of the Shepard because I generally prefer support characters, especially if there's really no designated healer. Plus the ability to talk with animals (more or less) seemed like a good idea at the time.

I think it's more that the campaign has the maze be a certain way. I already asked our DM and he said he wouldn't put us in a situation we couldn't figure our way out of. That said, there's a lot of difference between Player Knowledge and Character Knowledge and the maze, so far, has been far more frustrating than fun for me.

 

[Tessarael]

Wild shaping is one of the much trickier set of choices to make a character work well. It very much depends on what forms your DM lets you use, and whether the setting is suitable for making good use of it (outdoors is better, vs. tight dungeon spaces which may restrict you to a medium or small size non-flying form). It is certainly possible to make it work well in a dungeon, but it is an alternative in addition to spellcasting, not just the only thing you will focus on.

 

[mellored]

3) the maze removes all attempts to mark any part of it

Have you tried casting Skywriting?
Possibly the only time that the spell would be useful, but they specifically stay in place.

Remember Druids can swap spells after a long rest. So your not stuck with it.

one of the 8 paths available

Or if your 5th level, 2014 Conjure Animals can summon 8 beasts that can each go a different direction. Shepard druid can talk to them.

Possibly Conjure Animals + Animal Messenger.
Or Animal Messenger + Beast Sense.
There's also Locate Object and Locate Plants and Animals.

Using Wild Shape to summon a familiar was added as an option for 2014, but I don't recall which book.

Also, wild shape Badger for burrow speed and try going under the maze. I assume the DM will say no burrowing, but could be worth a shot.
Otherwise be a horse and run around faster.

 

[Indagare Nogitsune]

Have you tried casting Skywriting?
Possibly the only time that the spell would be useful, but they specifically stay in place.

Remember Druids can swap spells after a long rest. So your not stuck with it.

Or if your 5th level, 2014 Conjure Animals can summon 8 beasts that can each go a different direction. Shepard druid can talk to them.

Possibly Conjure Animals + Animal Messenger.
Or Animal Messenger + Beast Sense.
There's also Locate Object and Locate Plants and Animals.

Using Wild Shape to summon a familiar was added as an option for 2014, but I don't recall which book.

Also, wild shape Badger for burrow speed and try going under the maze. I assume the DM will say no burrowing, but could be worth a shot.
Otherwise be a horse and run around faster.

The thing to keep in mind is besides the maze we have dragon-riding cultists to deal with, so even if the maze allowed that spell we'd likely be immediately attacked with dragons.

Also, the person we're trying to rescue is trapped in the tower with the cultists. I very much doubt he'll be able to hide out for the entirety of a long rest. Indeed, one of my worries is that if we take too long in this maze he'll be captured and tortured then killed.

In theory I could but the maze makes it where we need a specific gem, guarded by or within a given monster (we faced two gorgons and one of them had the diamond we needed to exit that part of the maze). Only if we go back there the gorgons will have respawned so we'll have to fight them for the gem all over again. None of the animals would be able to return.

I suppose I can try, but given what happened when I tried being a squirrel I'd rather not risk it. Going faster won't help because the maze is a warp maze so all I'd do is end up separated from the party facing some monster all by myself.

 

[DrJawaPhD]

I chose Circle of the Shepard because I generally prefer support characters, especially if there's really no designated healer. Plus the ability to talk with animals (more or less) seemed like a good idea at the time.

Circle of the Shepherd is suuuuuper strong in 2014 rules with Conjure Animals spell, just completely bonkers overpowered, to the point that many DMs ban it. It would make sense though to almost never use Wild Shape as a 2014 Shepherd Druid so you're probably not doing anything wrong.

 

[Horwath]

Circle of the Shepherd is suuuuuper strong in 2014 rules with Conjure Animals spell, just completely bonkers overpowered, to the point that many DMs ban it. It would make sense though to almost never use Wild Shape as a 2014 Shepherd Druid so you're probably not doing anything wrong.

or just a simple fix,
you can only summon one animal with 3rd level slot, 2 with 5th level, 3 with 7th level and 4 with 9th level.

 

[Stormonu]

Oh, I think I know what adventure you're in, it sounds very familiar ... best of luck.

 

[GrimCo]

Yea, this isn't about druid wildshape being bad or useless. It's about wild shape being useless in this particular scenario which obviously has only one solution and DM that shuts down all creative workarounds. And to be honest, i get your frustration.