Hello everyone! I am building a druid, and I would love a second set of eyes to ensure I am building this correctly. This was set off by my recent interest in Druidic Herbalism, and I’ve always been fascinated by the Naga Aspirant racial archetype, so I thought I would combine them. Then I realized the potential craziness that this combination can create. However, I am at a bit of a disadvantage, having never played an Alchemist, and some of the Druidic Herbalism features function as Alchemist Extracts.
Naga Aspirant:
Class Features:
Aspirant’s Bond (Ex)
A naga aspirant gains a spiritual connection to the serpentine deities worshiped by the nagas. At 1st level, and each time she gains a druid level, she may add one of the following spells to her druid spell list.
0th—acid splash, bleed, daze, mage hand, open/close, ray of frost;
1st—charm person, divine favor, expeditious retreat, mage armor, magic missile, ray of enfeeblement, shield, shield of faith, silent image, true strike;
2nd—acid arrow, detect thoughts, invisibility, mirror image, scorching ray, see invisibility;
3rd—dispel magic, displacement, fireball, lightning bolt, suggestion;
4th—divine power, greater invisibility.
This ability replaces spontaneous casting.
Aspirant’s Enlightenment (Ex)
At 4th level, a naga aspirant gains a +4 bonus on saving throws against the spell-like abilities, supernatural abilities, and poison of nagas.
This ability replaces resist nature’s lure.
Naga Shape (Su)
At 6th level, the naga aspirant can use her wild shape ability (gained at 4th level, as normal) to assume the form of a true naga. This effect functions in a similar manner to a shapechange spell with the following exception. The druid’s true naga form is unique, representing her personal evolution. When taking naga form, the nagaji’s body transforms into that of a large serpent, though she keeps her own head. The naga aspirant loses her limbs and her size increases by one category, granting her a +4 size bonus to Strength and Constitution, a –2 penalty to Dexterity, and a +2 enhancement bonus to her natural armor bonus. She gains a +10 enhancement bonus to land speed and a bite attack that deals 1d6 points of damage. She can cast verbal spells in this form, but cannot cast spells with other components without metamagic or feats such as Natural Spell.
This ability otherwise works like and replaces wild shape.
Augmented Form (Su)
At 9th level and every four levels thereafter, a naga aspirant can choose one of the following abilities to enhance her naga form. Once chosen, this augmentation cannot be changed and always applies to her naga form. The caster level for these abilities is equal to her druid level, and unless otherwise stated, the DC is equal to 10 + 1/2 the druid’s class level + the druid’s Charisma bonus.
Charming Gaze (Sp): The druid gains a gaze attack that affects creatures within 30 feet as a charm person spell.
Darkvision (Su): The druid gains darkvision with a range of 60 feet.
Detect Thoughts (Su): The druid can use detect thoughts at will.
Guarded Thoughts (Ex): The druid gains a +2 racial bonus on saves against charm effects and immunity to any form of mind reading (such as detect thoughts).
Poison Immunity (Ex): The druid gains immunity to all poisons. The druid’s naga form must have at least one poison-based natural attack in order to select this ability.
Poisonous Sting (Ex): The druid’s stinger becomes venomous. The naga form must have a tail stinger to take this ability. Sting—injury; save Fort DC 10 + 1/2 the druid’s class level + the druid’s Constitution modifier; frequency 1 round; effect sleep for 2d4 minutes; cure 1 save.
Spit Venom (Ex): The naga form can spit her venom up to 30 feet as a standard action. This is a ranged touch attack with no range increment. Any opponent hit by this attack must make a successful save (see above) to avoid the effect. The naga form must have a venomous bite to take this ability.
Sting (Ex): The naga form grows a stinger on the end of her tail, granting her a sting natural attack that deals 1d6 points of piercing damage.
Swim (Ex): The naga form gains a swim speed equal to her base speed.
Tough Scales (Ex): The druid’s enhancement bonus to her natural armor increases by +2. The druid may select this ability more than once. Its effects stack.
Venomous Bite (Ex): The naga form’s bite attack becomes poisonous. Bite—injury; save Fortitude DC 10 + 1/2 the druid’s class level + the druid’s Constitution modifier; frequency 1/round for 6 rounds; effect 1 Constitution damage, cure 1 save.
This ability replaces venom immunity, a thousand faces, and timeless body.
True Naga (Su)
At 20th level, a naga aspirant metamorphoses into a unique naga. Her wild shape form becomes her natural form, though she can transform into her original nagaji shape at will. Her creature type permanently changes to aberration.
This ability replaces wildshape (at will).
Druidic Herbalism:
Druidic herbalism is a nature bond option that can be taken by any druid at 1st level except those with archetypes or alternate class features that alter or replace nature bond or mandate a specific nature bond choice.
Instead of granting access to a domain or an animal companion, a druid’s bond with nature can take a third form: access to druidic herbalism.
A druid who chooses to learn druidic herbalism can use combinations of nuts, berries, dried herbs, and other natural ingredients along with appropriate containers to create herbal concoctions or magic consumables that function like potions. This acts like the Brew Potion feat, but only for spells on the druid spell list. Herbal concoctions are typically thick and sludgy, and their creation time, caster level, spell duplication capabilities, and all other variables and properties are identical to those of potions created using Brew Potion. Herbal concoctions created with herbs that cause special effects when ingested retain those effects as well as the appropriate spell effect.
A druid can create a number of free herbal concoctions per day equal to her Wisdom modifier. Additional concoctions cost the same as creating an equivalent potion using Brew Potion. Druids can sell their herbal concoctions just as if they were potions (though NPCs unfamiliar with druidic herbalism may need some convincing before purchasing these wares).
At 4th level, a druid’s increasing skill with herbalism means that she can disguise the effects of her herbal concoctions. When a creature attempts a Perception or Spellcraft check to identify one of the druid’s concoctions, the concoction appears to be a different herbal concoction of the druid’s choice unless the creature exceeds the identification DC by 5 or more. The druid must designate this false result when creating the concoction. If a creature exceeds the identification DC by 5 or more, it correctly identifies the concoction, though not that the druid tried to fool it.
Additionally, at 4th level, when the druid creates additional concoctions, she need pay only half the normal cost to create them. It takes her only half the normal time to create her concoctions, and she can create concoctions of spells from any spell list, as long as she can cast the spell.
At 7th level, when the druid creates concoctions with potential false identification results, a creature attempting to identify the concoction must exceed the identification DC by 10 or more to determine the concoction’s true identity.
Additionally, at 7th level, a druid can create any herbal concoction in 1 minute. She can also create a special concoction of any spell higher than 3rd level that she can cast, but to do so, she must expend a spell slot of the same level. These special concoctions do not cost her anything to create and function like extracts created by an alchemist with the infusion discovery.
So.
Can I use Druidic Herbalism to create extracts of the newly-added Naga Aspirant spells?
Can I use Druidic Herbalism to make extracts I can hand out of Personal-Range spells, like the afore-mentioned Divine Favor?
I would also love your thoughts on this combination, and anything it inspires to be added to the character!
Question 1:
Herbalism says "acts like the Brew Potion feat, but only for spells on the druid spell list". However, Naga Aspirant says "add one of the following spells to her druid spell list".
You're adding spells, you're fine.
Question 2:
It still acts like the Brew Potion feat, which means you are limited to spells of 3rd level or lower, and to spells that target one or more creatures or objects, and to spells that don't have a range of personal. At 7th level, you can start making the special concoctions, which work for spells of higher than 3rd level. It's worth noting that it's only these special concoctions that are treated like alchemists' extracts; all the ones of spells of 3rd level or lower are still treated as potions.
So you cannot make a potion of Divine Favor. However, you might be able to make a special concoction of Divine Favor, if you use metamagic feats to increase its spell level to higher than 3rd.
That's a great point, Saethori. Heighten Spell and/or Extend spell would be useful for bumping things up a bunch, and probably even one with a larger adjustment to get those 1st level spells up to 4th.
*Scribbles in notes*
Thank you! I appreciate you chiming in. I really think this could be a terrific character!