With the changes to Druid, that now require the Improved Share spell in order to cover your animal companion with a shared barkskin or resistance, it is now means that eventually for someone with the the animal companion, wild shape combo, you must get this feat.

Ok, enough rambling.

The dilemma; another feat on the must have list for Druids is the Quicken Spell feat in order to get a Summon Nature's Ally off in a reasonable period of time (less than 1 round) on an as needed basis.

So the question for you guys, is advice:

which of these two feats (Quicken Spell or Improved Share Spell) would you pick up first in the mid-level range of your Druids advance?

Thanks
Robyn

Improved Share Spell. Keeping my companion alive is better than bringing in typically weaker creatures.

To be honest, I have never felt the need to taken Quicken Spell as a Druid. But that's just me.

Ditto. Quicken Spell is something I would probably take at 11th or 13th level rather than 9th -- you don't have enough level 5+ spell slots at 9th or 10th level to really use quickened spells.

Quickened summoned creatures seldom live long enough to be very useful; they're rarely enough of a threat that the enemy will even worry about them. (I suppose a temporary roadblock might be handy, but you have better spells for that, or a flanking buddy for your animal companion -- but that's only +2, better to cast a quickened buff spell on him).

Thanks for the repsonses guys.

They fit my perception also.

Isn't the 5ft limit too limiting to be really useful in melee? (no more strategic positioning, flanking large+ enemies, etc) The only time i see it useful is for bodyguards/mounts

Improved Share Spells

You can share spells with those you have a magical connection with.
Prerequisites: Spellcraft 10 ranks, ability to acquire an animal companion, eidolon, familiar, or special mount.
Benefit: Any non-instantaneous spell (but not any spell-like ability) you cast on yourself can also affect a creature bonded to you (such as an animal companion, eidolon, familiar, or special mount). The creature must be within 5 feet of you at the time of casting to receive the benefit. The spell’s duration is halved between you and your bonded creature (for example, a spell with a duration of 1 hour has a duration of 30 minutes for both you and your bonded creature).
If the spell or effect has a duration other than instantaneous, it stops affecting the creature if it moves farther than 5 feet away from you. It does not affect the creature again if it returns before the duration expires.
You may share spells in this fashion even if the spells normally do not affect creatures of that type.
This feat only applies to animal companions, eidolons, familiars, or special mounts gained through a class feature.

Emphasis mine. It's contradictory.

Off post: can I use Banishment to banish a Improved Familiar: Imp? If yes, which would be the consequences? Effectively dead familiar? Can call it back with another spell? Maybe Gate...

The dilemma; another feat on the must have list for Druids is the Quicken Spell feat in order to get a Summon Nature's Ally off in a reasonable period of time (less than 1 round) on an as needed basis

While Quicken Spell is a very good feat, you can't cast Summon Nature's Ally quickend:

Casting a quickened spell is a swift action. You can perform another action, even casting another spell, in the same round as you cast a quickened spell. A spell whose casting time is more than 1 full-round action cannot be quickened.

One round is more than a full-round action.

can I use Banishment to banish a Improved Familiar: Imp?

By RAW, yes, that should work. Though I probably would rule against it in my game because of the Link between the Wizard and his Familiar.

Come to think of it: How do you get a hold of an Imp to make your familiar anyway? Do you need to summon it or is it summoned as part of the ritual to replace your old familiar?

miniaturepeddler wrote:

The dilemma; another feat on the must have list for Druids is the Quicken Spell feat in order to get a Summon Nature's Ally off in a reasonable period of time (less than 1 round) on an as needed basis

While Quicken Spell is a very good feat, you can't cast Summon Nature's Ally quickend:

Ahem:

A spell that takes 1 round to cast is a full-round action. It comes into effect just before the beginning of your turn in the round after you began casting the spell. You then act normally after the spell is completed.

So a spell with a casting time of 1 round takes a full-round action to cast which is of course equal to a full-round action and therefore is not more than a full-round action making it a valid target for quicken spell.

Now that's interesting. The rules for metamagic used by bards and sorcerers say

If the spell's normal casting time is a standard action, casting a metamagic version is a full-round action for a sorcerer or bard. (This isn't the same as a 1-round casting time.)

So, now I'm totally confused. Here's how I understood this up till now:

- Full-round action casts (such as a metamagic spell used by a spontaneous caster) is just like a fighter making a full round attack - you don't get your move action but the effect starts in the same round at the end of your turn.
- A casting time of 1 round means the spell won't come into effect until the start of your next round, risking interruption by any damage you take during that time.

So is spontaneous metamagic the exception to the rule or are the rules simply not fitting together for some reason?

If you have a metamagic rod of Quicken Spell that's great. The stuff you can summon off a list 4 levels below your best probably won't even make a decent flanker though. If you really want quicker summons with a Druid take one of the animal totem archetypes. They let you summon your totem animal as a standard action.

Lion Totem seems especially nice since you can get pounce and rake in wildshape at 6th level. The worst problem with a Lion Totem druid is probably that if you, your big cat companion, and a summoned cat all charge that's 15 attacks to resolve on your turn.

Improved Share Spell seems like it would work best for a druid who intends to use his animal companion as a mount. Unless I had a mounted character concept in mind I'd probably skip this feat. A real "must have" feat for wildshaping druids is Natural Spell.

Now that's interesting. The rules for metamagic used by bards and sorcerers say

Quote:

If the spell's normal casting time is a standard action, casting a metamagic version is a full-round action for a sorcerer or bard. (This isn't the same as a 1-round casting time.)

So, now I'm totally confused. Here's how I understood this up till now:

- Full-round action casts (such as a metamagic spell used by a spontaneous caster) is just like a fighter making a full round attack - you don't get your move action but the effect starts in the same round at the end of your turn.
- A casting time of 1 round means the spell won't come into effect until the start of your next round, risking interruption by any damage you take during that time.

So is spontaneous metamagic the exception to the rule or are the rules simply not fitting together for some reason?

The rule I quoted came from the casting time rules, as such I would honestly go with it more often than a casual reference in the sorcerer/bards spontaneous rules.

However a thought on how this is "fixed" and doesn't contridict each other:

The casting time rules state that casting the spell is a full round action and that the effect happens at the start of your next turn.

So even if you quicken cast summon nature's ally the allies don't arrive until the start of your next turn.

If a sorcerer casts elemental (cold) fireball however it takes him the same full round action to cast it -- but the spell goes off this round (at the end of his full round action) instead of at the start of his next turn.

Quicken Spell is almost certainly more useful for, say, Storm or Tempest Druids who can spontaneously cast domain spells (instead of summons)... right?

Two Years.

Two Years.

Is there something about the thread that has invalidated it in that time? Would you rather I create an entirely new thread to ask opinions about Quicken and spontaneous domains?

Is there some reason that threads in a forum should be kept around indefinitely if they are never supposed to be used after they drop off the first page?

Worth noting that the requirement to have 10 ranks in spellcraft for improved share spell is basically saying the earliest a Druid could take it is character level 11. (First feat a Druid would get after having 10 levels to put into spellcraft. )

Make new thread
Response: Use SEARCH!

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Response: Necromancer!

Reach Spell is a favourite spellcasting feat of mine.