Is the Treesinger Druid Any Good?

[Brom the Obnoxiously Awesome]

I love having a companion, and druids do that for a living really. So I looked into the Treesinger Druid, an Archetype available to Elves. Looking at the different abilities, they seemed pretty weak, which confused me. There has to be a good side to the bad points of the class.
So I ask of the community; is the Treesing Druid any good? Or should I just play a normal druid?

[Brom the Obnoxiously Awesome]

Oh, and this is for PFS, though I doubt that changes anything.

[Arachnofiend]

Yeah, looks pretty terrible to me. The Treant looks at least passable for a companion, but it's not going to be as good as the standard picks and Plant Shape is just straight up inferior to Beast Shape.

[Brom the Obnoxiously Awesome]

Yeah... it's a shame that so many of the race-only archetypes were so bad. They should have made them really good because only some races can play them.
I probably won't play it, but it's a shame, 'cause I like the idea of a plant companion.

[Imbicatus]

Bestiary 4 has some decent plant forms, but over all, it's not that great. On the other hand, you are still a full caster, so you are more powerful than most just from that.

[Brom the Obnoxiously Awesome]

Good point, but all I have is Bestiary 1, so that's not that useful for me. Definitely going to go normal Druid.

[Mighty Squash]

Remember that the plant type itself gives plant companions a reasonable haul of defensive abilities over animals.
It may not be a huge thing, but it can make a significant difference.

[Eltacolibre]

It's actually pretty nice. Since it's an animal companion, the treant get to share all the spells that wouldn't affect it normally, like Enlarge Animals, Magic fangs, Aspect of the Bear, even better nowadays with the feat Animal Soul , you can both buff yourself up from level 1. You will be able to keep casting these spells with wild shape into plants.

[Brom the Obnoxiously Awesome]

Eltacolibre wrote:

It's actually pretty nice. Since it's an animal companion, the treant get to share all the spells that wouldn't affect it normally, like Enlarge Animals, Magic fangs, Aspect of the Bear, even better nowadays with the feat Animal Soul , you can both buff yourself up from level 1. You will be able to keep casting these spells with wild shape into plants.

Wow. That sounds cool. I'm going to quickly google what kinds of plants I could turn into other than Assassin Vines and Shambling Mounds.

[Eltacolibre]

it is, also Treants are roughly humanoid, you can equip him with some leather armor. (Not more than that because of the armor check penalties, but still yeah some extra cheap ac).

[Brom the Obnoxiously Awesome]

Hmmmm... I was hoping someone would come along and say "No wait, this is actually good!" because this is a really neat archetype.
It seems as though there are some cool options for the plant subtype and animal-affecting spells that affect my companion. I'm going to look a little deeper and see what I can figure out.
Also, Vegepygmy are plants not magical humanoids, so that's pretty cool.

[Imbicatus]

If this is for PFS, animal soul is not legal.

[Brom the Obnoxiously Awesome]

Imbicatus wrote:

If this is for PFS, animal soul is not legal.

Wow, seriously? I guess that makes sense, but they ban all the fun stuff.

[Brom the Obnoxiously Awesome]

Okay, so I see. Plants don't have to sleep, and I don't have to worry about the herbivore thing. Not to mention that many of the plant options also get a climb or fly speed, but then again, so do a lot of animals.
I don't know, a normal druid seems better.

[Imbicatus]

I think it's so you can't be raise by raise companion,a lough having access to being affected by heal mount or sky steed is a concern. And what would happen if you were affected by carry companion?

[DrSwordopolis]

Imbicatus wrote:

And what would happen if you were affected by carry companion?

Hilarity. Hilarity would happen.

[Brom the Obnoxiously Awesome]

DrSwordopolis wrote:

Imbicatus wrote:

And what would happen if you were affected by carry companion?

Hilarity. Hilarity would happen.

Oh man. I can just picture it...

[voideternal]

I feel like the treesinger is a nice fluff alternative to standard druid. Plant focus and all.

But mechanically? I dunno. If you just want a strong druid, I wouldn't go treesinger. The lack of pounce is sad for druid offense.

That said, plant traits are a good layer of defense for your companion. And Grab+Constrict is an okay alternative when you can't full attack.

I feel that, at the end of the day, you're making a druid. Assuming you don't do silly things with it, like pumping charisma or taking two-weapon fighting, it's gonna rock. Treesinger or not. I mean, at the very least you can augment summon nature's ally. And that's kinda all you really need, right?*

*I actually have no PFS experience. But it seems to me Treesingers (or any druid) would be fine in the APs I've played.

[Brom the Obnoxiously Awesome]

Very awesome point voideternal.
Funnily enough, I was originally gonna do this, but I managed to get a boon trade going with wellsmv (thank you!!!), so I probably won't be an elf anyway. Which isn't huge, because I proably wouldn't have done a Treesinger after seeing what people have said. I'm not a min/maxer, but honestly, it just doesn't seem strong enough.

[Bob Bob Bob]

The Treesinger druid is just a more flavorful downgrade from the normal druid. The plant companion is a different (not better or worse) option than the animal, the domains are strictly less choices (druid gets all of them), the wild empathy is actually an upgrade (nothing else does it for plants, and it lets you do animals too at -4), and the wild shape is pure downgrade. It gets you Plant Shape I at level 4 (better) but you get the others at exactly the same time. Six levels later.

It's a nice flavorful archetype that doesn't get you anything mechanically unless you really need to diplomancer some plant creatures. And never plan on using wild shape much.

[EvilPaladin]

There is a dark secret about the Treesinger's companion:You can't teach them tricks. They get the bonus ones just fine, but Handle Animal can't be used on them to teach them tricks. This can be pretty painful[without tricks, it can't guard/attack/attack unnatural things/etc].

[voideternal]

EvilPaladin wrote:

without tricks, it can't guard/attack/attack unnatural things/etc

Waitaminute... if the companion is a plant, can a druid even handle her own companion to use a trick it knows? The skill is called handle "animal" right?

On the other hand, do plants have any hesitation attacking unnatural things? Handle animal only says what "animals" will not attack.

Were these questions already answered elsewhere on the forums?

[K177Y C47]

Oh, and one other thing about the treesinger...

If you are playing a caster focused druid, the layers of defensive abilities gained from plants is actually very nice, since things like Pounce mean a lot less to caster druids...

[Brom the Obnoxiously Awesome]

I wouldn't wanna be a caster-focused druid. I have a cavalier who uses his mount as something of a flanking budddy, and druids can do that even better, so I figured I'd build one.

[Captain K.]

Not for PFS, and I'm not normally a houserule person, but I'd allow Ghoran (the Triffid race) to take it too. They are plants, they like plants etc. Their Cha bonus won't be much use, but it's thematic.

For similar reasons I allow Oreads to take Stonelord Paladin too.

[Captain K.]

Brom the Obnoxiously Awesome wrote:

I wouldn't wanna be a caster-focused druid. I have a cavalier who uses his mount as something of a flanking budddy, and druids can do that even better, so I figured I'd build one.

I like caster druids. I'm not too keen on having too many stat sheets to plough through and druids are strong enough anyway. It gives a thematic option to an already strong class. For example, Storm Druid is my favourite archetype. It may not be quite as mathematically powerful, but it's barely noticeable. And it is easier and very cool.

[Brom the Obnoxiously Awesome]

Captain K. wrote:

Brom the Obnoxiously Awesome wrote:

I wouldn't wanna be a caster-focused druid. I have a cavalier who uses his mount as something of a flanking budddy, and druids can do that even better, so I figured I'd build one.

I like caster druids. I'm not too keen on having too many stat sheets to plough through and druids are strong enough anyway. It gives a thematic option to an already strong class. For example, Storm Druid is my favourite archetype. It may not be quite as mathematically powerful, but it's barely noticeable. And it is easier and very cool.

Interesting. At this point I'm debating a Hunter and a Druid, for combat potential, but I might wanna give caster druid a second look, because they do have a wide spell list to work with and wild shape, which makes me very excited. As a grippli, combat will be a little tougher, because we get a strength penalty, but a caster with a companion could be fun.

[Shifty]

They aren't good, they are down right amaze-balls.

Makes a nice change from the one or two other min/max builds and is an enjoyable 'something different'