Druid Class Preview

Monday, July 23, 2018

Druids are practitioners of primal magic, which blends vital essence (the essence of life, instinct, and faith) with material essence (the essence of matter and the natural world). Thus, primal traditions are rooted in an instinctual connection with and faith in the surrounding world: the cycle of day and night, the turning of the seasons, and the natural selection of predator and prey. Druids are the iconic primal spellcasters; they call upon the power of nature for magic through their deep faith, as opposed to primal sorcerers, who harness the power of fey or other natural creatures that flows through their blood to access the same sorts of primal energies.

Since this is the last class, before we go deeper into the druid's mechanics, I want to show you some extra pieces each class has that you might not know about. Every class entry starts with some bullet points to help you get a feel for what playing the class might be like.

Playing a Druid

Players of druid characters might approach gameplay in the following ways:

  • During combat, you call upon the forces of nature to defeat your enemies and protect your allies. You can cast spells drawing upon primal magic to summon deadly animals to fight at your side, grant resilience to you and your friends, or heal their wounds. Depending on your bond to nature, you might also call upon powerful elemental magic or even change shape into a terrifying beast to fight with tooth and claw.
  • During social encounters, you represent balance and a reasoned approach to problems, looking for solutions that not only are best for the natural world, but also allow the creatures within it to live in harmony and peace. You often propose compromises that allow both sides to gain what they truly need, even if they can't have all that they desire.
  • In exploration mode, your skills in nature are invaluable. You can track down enemies, navigate through the wilderness, or use your spells to detect any magical auras around you. You might even ask wild animals to assist your group in your travels with their extraordinary senses and scouting abilities.
  • In downtime mode, you might craft magic items or potions. Alternatively, your tie to nature might lead you to tend to an area of the wild, befriending its beasts and healing the wounds caused by civilization. You might even attempt to teach people sustainable techniques that allow them to subsist off the land without harming the natural balance.

Roleplaying a Druid

Druids are the living embodiment of nature, acting as its agent; you protect the wild places from harm and speak for their interests in more civilized lands.

If You're a Druid, You Likely...

  • Have a deep and meaningful respect for the power of nature.
  • Are in constant awe of the natural world, eager to share it with others but cautious of their influence.
  • Treat plants and animals as allies in your quest, working with them toward your goals.

Others Probably...

  • View you as a representative of nature, and might even assume you can control it.
  • Assume you're a recluse who avoids society and cities, preferring to live in the wild.
  • Treat you as a mystic, similar to a priest, but answering only to the forces of nature.

Illustration by Wayne Reynolds

Spellcasting

Druids are full prepared spellcasters, able to cast the same number of spells per day as the cleric and bard, rather than gaining extra spells through bloodlines or schools as the sorcerer and wizard do. However, just as the cleric has channel energy and the bard has compositions, the druid has more than enough tricks up her sleeve to make her a primal powerhouse. And figuring those out starts with...

Orders

As the druid's initial architect, Jason pulled the concept of orders from the sidelines of lore directly into the spotlight, making your choice of order a major part of your druid. As with the bard's muse, you can choose abilities that belong to another order, but unlike for the bard, you gain extra benefits from feats and abilities that belong to your own order, incentivizing you to check out your own order's feats first. An order member gains a new skill and an order power that druids of other orders can't gain, and each order adds its own component to the basic druid anathema forbidding actions like despoiling nature. The four orders presented in the playtest are animal, leaf, storm, and wild, though more orders are all but certain to arise.

Animal

An animal druid (known by names like druid of the claw or druid of the wing depending on her preferred animal) has a strong connection to animals. She is trained in Athletics, which is a signature skill for her. She also gains the heal animal order power (exclusive to that members of order) and the Animal Companion feat. Committing wanton cruelty to animals or killing them unnecessarily is anathema to her. (This doesn't prevent her from defending herself against animals or killing them cleanly for food.)

This is the order that's all about having the coolest animal companion. Other druids can easily get an animal companion (and they're a solid choice for all druids) and take the same upgrade feats, but with each feat, the animal order druid will get something cool or extra for the animal. As an example, an animal druid's companion can have multiple specializations, which are like animal companion archetypes, if the animal druid commits more to this path.

Leaf

A druid of the leaf reveres plants and the bounty of nature, acting as a caretaker and warden for the wilderness, teaching sustainable techniques, and helping areas regrow after disasters or negligent humanoid expansion. She is trained in Diplomacy, which is a signature skill for her. She also gains the Leshy Familiar druid feat and the goodberry order power (exclusive to that members of order). Committing wanton cruelty to plants or killing plants unnecessarily is anathema to her. (This doesn't prevent her from defending herself against plants or harvesting them if necessary for survival.)

This style of druid is all about plants, with options including Verdant Metamorphosis, where you flat-out become a plant, and the druid of the leaf's leshy familiar, which has more powers than a typical familiar. Let's check out Verdant Metamorphosis to see a special benefit only druids of the leaf receive:

Verdant Metamorphosis Feat 18

Druid

Leaf Order

You transform into a plant version of yourself. You gain the plant trait and lose any trait that's inappropriate for your new form (typically humanoid). You can change from a form that looks mostly like your old self into a tree or any other non-creature plant as an action (this action has the concentrate trait). Perception checks don't reveal your true form, but a creature can attempt a Nature or Survival check against your class DC to determine that the plant is new to the surrounding area. While in this form, you can observe everything around you, but you can't act other than to spend an action (this action has the concentrate trait) to change back, which ends your turn. In this form, your AC is 30, your TAC is 20, only conditional bonuses, conditional penalties, and circumstance bonuses and penalties can affect you, and you treat all successes and critical successes on Reflex saves as failures.

Special If you are a druid of the leaf order, if you transform into a non-creature plant and take your daily rest during daylight hours, the rest restores you to maximum Hit Points and removes all non-permanent drained, enfeebled, sluggish, and stupefied conditions.

Storm

A druid of the storm carries nature's fury within her, channeling it to terrifying effect and riding the winds and storms. She is trained in Acrobatics, which is a signature skill for her. She also gains the Storm Born druid feat and the tempest surge order power (exclusive to that members of order). Creating unnatural weather patterns that could be damaging to the local environment (such as by using a 9th-level control weather ritual) is anathema to her.

In addition to healing magic, the primal list contains powerful energy blasts, including fireball and other spells newly available to druids. Armed with this magic, druids of the storm are elemental dynamos who focus on the power of the tempest, flying around in storms and ignoring penalties from weather. Notably, their tempest surge order power is an extremely good blast for a 1 Spell Point power, particularly after if they take a feat that ups the d10s to d12s. Let's take a look, since you'll be slinging it around a bunch of times each day.

Tempest Surge Power 1

Air

Electricity

Evocation

Casting [[A]] Somatic Casting, [[A]] Verbal Casting

Range 30 feet; Targets one creature


You surround a foe in a swirling storm of violent winds, roiling clouds, and crackling lightning. The storm deals 1d10 electricity damage to the target, depending on their Reflex saving throw.

Success Half damage.

Critical Success No damage.

Failure Full damage, and the target is sluggish 1 for 1 round.

Critical Failure Double damage, and the target is sluggish 2 for 1 round.

Heightened (+1) The damage increases by 1d10.

After increasing the damage to d12s, the damage scales at the same rate as lightning bolt. But it doesn't just deal damage! The sluggish condition penalizes AC, attack rolls, and Reflex saves, so taking double damage on the critical failure is just the beginning of the horrible pain. When we were playtesting, every creature that critically failed against tempest surge was in for a very bad round.

Wild

The savage, uncontrollable call of the natural world infuses a druid of the wild, granting her the ability to change her shape into the ferocious form of a wild creature. She is trained in Intimidation, which becomes a signature skill for her. She also gains the Wild Shape druid feat and the wild claws order power (exclusive to that members of order). Becoming fully domesticated by the temptations of civilization is anathema to her. (This doesn't prevent her from buying and using processed goods or staying in a city for an adventure, but she can never come to rely on these conveniences or truly call such a place her permanent home.)

Notice the wild order druid starts with Wild Shape? Any druid with Wild Shape feats gets a free extra casting of certain polymorph spells, heightened to her highest possible level, eventually rising up to two free castings if the druid takes enough Wild Shape feats. But the thing that makes a wild order druid particularly different is that, in addition to these, she gains a number of additional bonus castings of these spells equal to her Strength modifier (if it's more than 1). That means a druid of the wild tends towards higher Strength than a typical member of other orders.

Druid Features

Aside from an order, you gain spellcasting and primal spell proficiency at the same levels as all the other spellcasters, new spell levels at every odd level save 19th, expert proficiency in primal spells at 12th level, master proficiency at 16th level, and legendary proficiency at 19th level. You also get the secret Druidic language (don't teach it to nondruids—that's anathema!) and wild empathy, which lets you use Diplomacy to Make a Request of animals, and possibly of plants if you're a leaf order aficionado.

Druid Feats

I covered many feats that connect to orders, but many feats aren't affiliated, like this powerhouse:

[[F]] Leyline Conduit Feat 20

Druid

Metamagic

Frequency once per minute

Trigger You start to cast a spell of 5th level or lower that has no duration and a maximum of 2 spellcasting actions.


You add a Somatic Casting action to the casting of the triggering spell, and you don't expend the prepared spell as you cast it.

This means every minute, you can cast a 5th level or lower spell without expending it. That's really useful! There are some interesting effects of how Jason designed this feat, though, that make it more than just a simple repetition, particularly the fact that you can use Leyline Conduit only if you were already able to cast the spell, meaning you had to prepare it and then avoid using it up by casting it without Leyline Conduit. So the feat gives you somewhat limitless uses of the spell, but if you really need to cast it again before the minute is up, while Leyline Conduit is unavailable, you'll expend the spell for real (at least for the rest of the day).

Animal Companions

Before I go, let's talk about animal companions. While Jason was deep in preliminary design of the druid, he bestowed upon me a strange primal chart of flowing options, almost in Druidic itself, and explained it to me. This chart combined all the best aspects of the 4th- and 7th-level animal companion advancements with animal companion archetypes and new unique features for each different animal, all while moving away from having to make tons of basic feat selections for the companion. What I built from that chart was the first draft of the animal companion system in the playtest. Let's show off the companion most often overlooked in Pathfinder First Edition, the noble bear. The bear has generated a plethora of threads dedicated to how neglected it is, so let's see how the playtest handles it.

Bear

Your companion is a grizzly, panda, polar bear, or other type of bear.

Size Small

[[A]] UnarmedStrikes jaws, Damage 1d8 piercing;

claw (agile), Damage 1d6 slashing

Abilities Str, Con

Hit Points 8

Skill Intimidation

Senses scent

Speed 35 feet

Work Together Benefit Your bear mauls your enemies when you create an opening. Until your next turn, all your weapon Strikes against a creature your bear threatens deal 1d8 additional slashing damage. If your bear has a specialization, the additional slashing damage increases to 2d8.

Advanced Maneuver Bear Hug

[[A]]Bear Hug

Requirements Your last action was a successful claw Strike.


Make another claw Strike against the same target. If your Strike hits, the target is also grabbed, as if you had succeeded at the Grapple action.

The bear starts out Small. Don't worry—when it grows up, it can eventually become a Large bear (in the first book, too; there's no need to wait). The bear's boost in Strength and d8 damage die for its jaws make it the most directly damaging companion, tied with the snake, which it edges out in terms of Constitution, Hit Points, and land Speed. (The snake, for its part, has better AC and lots of special Speeds.) The Work Together benefit is something you can have the bear do instead of attack, and it again deals the most direct damage, adding 1d8 (later 2d8) to the damage of your weapon Strikes. The bear is a great companion for someone who plans, much like the bear itself, to wade into the thick of the fight. Finally, the bear can eventually learn the Bear Hug advanced maneuver. This maneuver essentially means that if the bear hits twice in a row, it gets a free automatic grapple. Handy for keeping foes in place!

So that about wraps up the druid. If you were a druid, which of the four orders would you be?

Mark Seifter
Designer

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Tags: Druids Lini Pathfinder Playtest Wayne Reynolds
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Dark Archive

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Druid looks great looking forward to playing

Liberty's Edge

Presumably the leaf druid's more of a traditional caster druid, probably focusing on crowd control (entangle) and utility. My guess is it's "Leshy Warden, but as a core option".

Designer

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Tholomyes wrote:

It's a shame that the wild order's anathema flies in the face of what I was planning on doing with my druid character for one of the playtest adventures (i.e. a druid spymaster, who uses wild shape, speak with animals, ect to gather info), but at least wild shape is able to be taken by any druid. Hopefully the wild shape feats will be mostly universal, not just limited to wild order druids.

Other than that, this looks neat.

There are no feats that are purely limited to a single order. The wild order druid gets an advantage with them, though (she gets extra uses of Wild Shape depending on her Strength).


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The Rot Grub wrote:
I don't know if this is the right place to raise this, but is there an advantage to referring to "Exploration Mode" and "Downtime Mode" using that terminology? Seems unnecessarily technical to me.

Having specific delineations of "when to use these rules" is super-useful to the GM since it underlines, for example, that it's inappropriate to use a round-by-round structure when people are, say, searching a library.

So we don't have to say, for example, that you're going square by square searching for traps (since no one wants to play that way) you just move around via largely freeform movement and state "I am searching (for traps, hidden doors, etc.)"


Somewhat interesting.


WRT the whole 1 action to get 2 thing, it seems like an understandable balance thing? Because the whole problem with ACs/eidolons/etc before was essentially doubling your action economy.

That said, it'd also be cool to have higher-level abilities that increase the granted actions and/or remove the action cost (maybe just for specific actions?), to represent you bonding more closely with your companion.

Silver Crusade Contributor

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But can the bear drive?

It comes up more often than you'd think...


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Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

Wild Druids in an Urban campaign are probably a rough fit, but the city could just be where things need to be done, they live and sleep in the Wilds and meet up with people behind the walls.

An Urban Druid archetype that alters Anethema slightly seems like a natural thing to come in the future, as does a Savage Druid for evil Druids who are evil even to their own charges.

Liberty's Edge

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Pretty much as expected from the PaizoCon stuff. I mostly quite like it.

I'm not entirely sold on the Wild Druid Anathema either, depending on wording. Could I play a feral, homeless, Wild Order Druid with a thing for rats who turns into giant vermin via Wild Shape, or does something like that not work?

Because it sure sounds like it should.


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For purposes of fantasy biology is a mushroom a plant? So if I wanted to do a fungus druid, would I pick leaf or wait for that option later?

(IRL a fungus is about as genetically close to a plant as it is an animal, but nobody is here for cladograms.)


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
Deadmanwalking wrote:

Pretty much as expected from the PaizoCon stuff. I mostly quite like it.

I'm not entirely sold on the Wild Druid Anathema either, depending on wording. Could I play a feral, homeless, Wild Order Druid with a thing for rats who turns into giant vermin via Wild Shape, or does something like that not work?

Because it sure sounds like it should.

Sounds like not being domesticated by the temptations of civilization to me!

Designer

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PossibleCabbage wrote:

For purposes of fantasy biology is a mushroom a plant? So if I wanted to do a fungus druid, would I pick leaf or wait for that option later?

(IRL a fungus is about as genetically close to a plant as it is an animal, but nobody is here for cladograms.)

Fungi are considered to be different than plants this time around because of the reasons you said. Effects vary as to whether they handle fungi and plants or just plants.


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worldhopper wrote:

WRT the whole 1 action to get 2 thing, it seems like an understandable balance thing? Because the whole problem with ACs/eidolons/etc before was essentially doubling your action economy.

That always seemed like a weak argument when it came to animal companions (less so eidolons). Animal companions are very limited in terms of what they can actually do (fight, run, carry, etc, but not cast spells, use items, or most other things that allow for action economy abuse).

I can see why they did it, and as a balancing action its a particular effective debuff, but it does end up looking kind of silly, and I think animal companions in general will have to be pretty impressive for this to be worth it for most druids. Or animal companions will just end up being glorified baggage trains, but that's not particularly unusual anyway.


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What's the in-setting justification for animal companions having altered action economy? I don't think it makes a ton of sense for my animal companion, Clawthrax the Destroyer, dire bear manifested to protect nature, to sit around being a passive observer while his home is assaulted unless I'm prodding him to keep participating.


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Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber
Quote:
Work Together Benefit Your bear mauls your enemies when you create an opening. Until your next turn, all your weapon Strikes against a creature your bear threatens deal 1d8 additional slashing damage. If your bear has a specialization, the additional slashing damage increases to 2d8.

Why is this not listed as an [[A]]? I had no idea what this meant until explained later that it's used in place of an attack -- so does this mean I first command the bear to [[A]] Attack, but then replace the attack with the "Work Together Benefit"?

What if it was:

Quote:

[[A]] Companion Command: Until your next turn, all your weapon Strikes against a creature your bear threatens deal 1d8 additional slashing damage. If your bear has a specialization, the additional slashing damage becomes 2d8.

Your bear mauls your enemies when you create an opening.


Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

My guess would be:

Action: Command companion to attack.

Smurf continues to attack until you tell it to stop.


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Mark Seifter wrote:
PossibleCabbage wrote:

For purposes of fantasy biology is a mushroom a plant? So if I wanted to do a fungus druid, would I pick leaf or wait for that option later?

(IRL a fungus is about as genetically close to a plant as it is an animal, but nobody is here for cladograms.)

Fungi are considered to be different than plants this time around because of the reasons you said. Effects vary as to whether they handle fungi and plants or just plants.

After so long of whining about things like fungi in pokemon being grass type, I am not sure what to do with this information.

I should probably go and make a cordyceps spell or something, to go along with the "stomach bugs" adaptation of phantasmal killer I made.
You know, so scary druids.


Is The Leshy Familiar an option for Leaf Druids or a requirement?


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PossibleCabbage wrote:
The Rot Grub wrote:
I don't know if this is the right place to raise this, but is there an advantage to referring to "Exploration Mode" and "Downtime Mode" using that terminology? Seems unnecessarily technical to me.

Having specific delineations of "when to use these rules" is super-useful to the GM since it underlines, for example, that it's inappropriate to use a round-by-round structure when people are, say, searching a library.

So we don't have to say, for example, that you're going square by square searching for traps (since no one wants to play that way) you just move around via largely freeform movement and state "I am searching (for traps, hidden doors, etc.)"

Yes, I suspect that was the intention. But couldn't they just say "when exploring" and "when in downtime"? I can't imagine a case where this causes a big problem. It seems like this gets into the issue with everything being referred to as an "action." Unless there is rules text that refers to "modes" in general, such as "Choose a Mode. Your character has X ability during the Mode you have chosen."

It's a bit jarring for me to see this language used outside the "crunch" text of the class.

Designer

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kpulv wrote:
Quote:
Work Together Benefit Your bear mauls your enemies when you create an opening. Until your next turn, all your weapon Strikes against a creature your bear threatens deal 1d8 additional slashing damage. If your bear has a specialization, the additional slashing damage increases to 2d8.

Why is this not listed as an [[A]]? I had no idea what this meant until explained later that it's used in place of an attack -- so does this mean I first command the bear to [[A]] Attack, but then replace the attack with the "Work Together Benefit"?

What if it was:

Quote:

[[A]] Companion Command: Until your next turn, all your weapon Strikes against a creature your bear threatens deal 1d8 additional slashing damage. If your bear has a specialization, the additional slashing damage becomes 2d8.

Your bear mauls your enemies when you create an opening.

There is a Work Together action in the same section, and it says it has a varying benefit based on your animal. Then each animal lists the "Work Together Benefit." I think this is more a case of not having the whole text in front of you yet!


nightpanda2810 wrote:

My guess would be:

Action: Command companion to attack.

Smurf continues to attack until you tell it to stop.

That, I'd be fine with. Mark just hasn't gotten around to that question yet.

Edit: Well, I'm not sure why my avatar suddenly became a grumpy smurf, but it seems appropriate.

Sczarni RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

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I like the orders, but the Anathemas seem overly restrictive to me. I tend to GM more than I play, so my first thought when reading the Animal anathema was, "You mean I can't make an evil druid who dominates the animals around him and beats up his animal companion?"

I get that it's not something a good PC should be doing, and I even see how it makes sense from a class design and flavor standpoint. But I also really like the villain concept of an evil druid who blights the land and the PCs need to go stop him. Making these "out of balance" things into anathemas seems to nix those concepts. Unless we get an "anti-druid" class/archetype/whatever down the road, I suppose.

Designer

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ChrisLKimball wrote:
Is The Leshy Familiar an option for Leaf Druids or a requirement?

Druids of the leaf start with one. Other druids have the option of gaining one.


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Judging by the Dino Shape spell shown at paizocon, your attributes (physical or otherwise) don't seem to affect the effectiveness of polymorph spells at all.

So making a wild druid's wild shaping dependent on his strength, which he probably doesn't even want to use (because he wants to fight in animal form), seems odd.

What's the reasoning behind this?


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Blave wrote:

Judging by the Dino Shape spell shown at paizocon, your attributes (physical or otherwise) don't seem to affect the effectiveness of polymorph spells at all.

So making a wild druid's wild shaping dependent on his strength, which he probably doesn't even want to use (because he wants to fight in animal form), seems odd.

What's the reasoning behind this?

I second this, i don't like the idea of having an additional secondary attribute

Grand Lodge

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Favorite preview yet!

Very flavorful implementation.
Each druid order feels very different and all look fun to play.

Was hoping they got rid of prepared casting so there was a wisdom based spontaneous caster but hey no class is perfect :)


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I guess I'm not a fan of the veiled alignment call-back reference in the social encounters section (was never a fan of the one-neutral thing), and I'm not a huge fan of some of the anathema (leaf is alright but just a rewording of animal, wild is fine conceptually but sort of makes going feral something you can't come back from (though I guess that works alright), the druidic language thing is a little iffy IMO but I suppose it's tradition). I think verdant metamorphosis should probably set some size constants. I'm curious what span means.

Wild empathy is fairly cool.

The strength thing is strange as opposed to say, con. But I guess con is a strong stat to put as a priority, and str is probably needed for the claw power.

The baby bears are cute.


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Blave wrote:
What's the reasoning behind this?

Preventing them from dump-statting it without penalty? Thereby getting undue benefit from his wild-shape.

Alternatively mayhaps muscular strength (being a truely primal force) enhances the ability of wild druids to withstand the primal forces involved in polymorphing. In other words polymorphing yourself that way induces muscle fatigue that stronger druids more easily resist.

Dark Archive

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Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Tamago wrote:

I like the orders, but the Anathemas seem overly restrictive to me. I tend to GM more than I play, so my first thought when reading the Animal anathema was, "You mean I can't make an evil druid who dominates the animals around him and beats up his animal companion?"

I get that it's not something a good PC should be doing, and I even see how it makes sense from a class design and flavor standpoint. But I also really like the villain concept of an evil druid who blights the land and the PCs need to go stop him. Making these "out of balance" things into anathemas seems to nix those concepts. Unless we get an "anti-druid" class/archetype/whatever down the road, I suppose.

In that case you would create non-animal order druid with animal companion. I mean, no matter how you put it, it doesn't really make sense to create character that has deep respect for animals and abuses them <_<


Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber
wizzardman wrote:
nightpanda2810 wrote:

My guess would be:

Action: Command companion to attack.

Smurf continues to attack until you tell it to stop.

That, I'd be fine with. Mark just hasn't gotten around to that question yet.

Edit: Well, I'm not sure why my avatar suddenly became a grumpy smurf, but it seems appropriate.

It's because you had smurf in your post. S morph works too apparently.

Mission: accomplished.


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Blave wrote:

Judging by the Dino Shape spell shown at paizocon, your attributes (physical or otherwise) don't seem to affect the effectiveness of polymorph spells at all.

So making a wild druid's wild shaping dependent on his strength, which he probably doesn't even want to use (because he wants to fight in animal form), seems odd.

What's the reasoning behind this?

So that you don't dump physical attributes if you're going to be fighting in a form that doesn't use them. Dumping physical stats was a big 3.5 druid problem and a PF1 Synthesis Summoner problem.

There may also be a Wild order benefit that lets you use your strength in some way to boost your combat ability when polymorphed.

Designer

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Blave wrote:

Judging by the Dino Shape spell shown at paizocon, your attributes (physical or otherwise) don't seem to affect the effectiveness of polymorph spells at all.

So making a wild druid's wild shaping dependent on his strength, which he probably doesn't even want to use (because he wants to fight in animal form), seems odd.

What's the reasoning behind this?

Magic-pseudo-explanationwise, the more you've trained up your muscles, the more they can handle shifting into these more taxing forms.

Conceptually for the character, it's good to have a strong incentive for the specialist in beating things up who gains powerful claw options and is otherwise a scrapper when in their wild form to not be a weakling when in natural form, especially so you don't wind up playing a character that has to wait around for several levels until it gets a nasty battle form before it kicks in (you can still do that and play the scrawny weakling who becomes a powerful animal if that's your concept, but the added benefits for putting in some Strength make it an actual question of what you'll want to do).

EDIT: Cantriped is pretty insightful and faster than me!


Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
wizzardman wrote:
Edit: Well, I'm not sure why my avatar suddenly became a grumpy smurf, but it seems appropriate.

You should be careful what you quote. :)

Edit: smurf'd (in the ninja'd way; i was expecting to get smurf'd the other way)


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to be honest was more hoping for multiclass info but this is nice too

Designer

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CorvusMask wrote:
Tamago wrote:

I like the orders, but the Anathemas seem overly restrictive to me. I tend to GM more than I play, so my first thought when reading the Animal anathema was, "You mean I can't make an evil druid who dominates the animals around him and beats up his animal companion?"

I get that it's not something a good PC should be doing, and I even see how it makes sense from a class design and flavor standpoint. But I also really like the villain concept of an evil druid who blights the land and the PCs need to go stop him. Making these "out of balance" things into anathemas seems to nix those concepts. Unless we get an "anti-druid" class/archetype/whatever down the road, I suppose.

In that case you would create non-animal order druid with animal companion. I mean, no matter how you put it, it doesn't really make sense to create character that has deep respect for animals and abuses them <_<

I could easily see a wild order druid that has a feral predator inside and is absolutely vicious to animals she dominates, including her own companion.


Mark Seifter wrote:
Blave wrote:

Judging by the Dino Shape spell shown at paizocon, your attributes (physical or otherwise) don't seem to affect the effectiveness of polymorph spells at all.

So making a wild druid's wild shaping dependent on his strength, which he probably doesn't even want to use (because he wants to fight in animal form), seems odd.

What's the reasoning behind this?

Magic-pseudo-explanationwise, the more you've trained up your muscles, the more they can handle shifting into these more taxing forms.

Conceptually for the character, it's good to have a strong incentive for the specialist in beating things up who gains powerful claw options and is otherwise a scrapper when in their wild form to not be a weakling when in natural form, especially so you don't wind up playing a character that has to wait around for several levels until it gets a nasty battle form before it kicks in (you can still do that and play the scrawny weakling who becomes a powerful animal if that's your concept, but the added benefits for putting in some Strength make it an actual question of what you'll want to do).

So the wild druid is designed to be somewhat of a frontliner even when not in wild shape. Makes having decent to high strength more valuable and more likely.

Thanks for the explanation! :)


Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber
First World Bard wrote:
wizzardman wrote:
Edit: Well, I'm not sure why my avatar suddenly became a grumpy smurf, but it seems appropriate.

You should be careful what you quote. :)

Edit: smurf'd (in the ninja'd way; i was expecting to get smurf'd the other way)

I think my job here is done :)


Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber
Tamago wrote:

I like the orders, but the Anathemas seem overly restrictive to me. I tend to GM more than I play, so my first thought when reading the Animal anathema was, "You mean I can't make an evil druid who dominates the animals around him and beats up his animal companion?"

I get that it's not something a good PC should be doing, and I even see how it makes sense from a class design and flavor standpoint. But I also really like the villain concept of an evil druid who blights the land and the PCs need to go stop him. Making these "out of balance" things into anathemas seems to nix those concepts. Unless we get an "anti-druid" class/archetype/whatever down the road, I suppose.

Keep in mind that for Paladin, they stuck with only Lawful Good in the playtest. It could be they are just leaving some Evil options out of the playtest due to time/space.


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Elleth wrote:
I'm curious what span means.

In context, I'm pretty sure it means "Mark messed up his HTML a tad, so that what should have been </span> (markup), invisible to the viewers, came out as /span> (text) instead."


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Jesus, are shapeshifters getting shafted AGAIN?

Guys, it's okay for people to have fun.

Dark Archive

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I agree with the sentiment that goodberry is too iconic of a druid thing to lock into one specialization.


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Kalindlara wrote:

But can the bear drive?

It comes up more often than you'd think...

Never mind that, I want the right to arm bears!

Paizo Blog wrote:
During social encounters, you represent balance and a reasoned approach to problems, looking for solutions that not only are best for the natural world, but also allow the creatures within it to live in harmony and peace. You often propose compromises that allow both sides to gain what they truly need, even if they can't have all that they desire.

OMG, for reals? I thought this had died a (richly-deserved!) death with AD&D >.<


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Well, Druid's here, and I've been conditioned to try to break its restrictions over the course of PF1:

I think we've found the new paladin thread if that class gets opened up: you stepped on a bug, you fall.

The leaf order is similar enough to the one above that the same line of thought applies. Given the spellcasting at your disposal (which presumably includes various ways of dissuading plants/animals), this could turn into a complete straightjacket

The Storm anathema is about the weather, and only the weather. There is nothing stopping one from opening a magma vein and, ahem, letting nature take its course. Heck, you could manually torch the forest if you felt like it.

And then there's the Wild Order. As if getting a bunch of powers to be your modus operandi in agreement to serveisn't as much a civilization as buying a house.


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DFAnton wrote:

Jesus, are shapeshifters getting shafted AGAIN?

Guys, it's okay for people to have fun.

Seems ok to me, but I'll probably need to reserve judgement until we see what polymorph spells are out there.


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nightpanda2810 wrote:
First World Bard wrote:
wizzardman wrote:
Edit: Well, I'm not sure why my avatar suddenly became a grumpy smurf, but it seems appropriate.

You should be careful what you quote. :)

Edit: smurf'd (in the ninja'd way; i was expecting to get smurf'd the other way)
I think my job here is done :)

What the smurf is going on here?

Anyway, As others have stated, I really like that the orders provide a different vibe for druids starting right at level 1. My immediate thought after reading each one is that I want to play each one. I was worried that I'd get bored of PF2 for a while after its initial release because of it naturally being limited to the core book for character options in the beginning. I don't think that will be the case, however.

Designer

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Slamron wrote:
nightpanda2810 wrote:
First World Bard wrote:
wizzardman wrote:
Edit: Well, I'm not sure why my avatar suddenly became a grumpy smurf, but it seems appropriate.

You should be careful what you quote. :)

Edit: smurf'd (in the ninja'd way; i was expecting to get smurf'd the other way)
I think my job here is done :)

What the smurf is going on here?

Anyway, As others have stated, I really like that the orders provide a different vibe for druids starting right at level 1. My immediate thought after reading each one is that I want to play each one. I was worried that I'd get bored of PF2 for a while after its initial release because of it naturally being limited to the core book for character options in the beginning. I don't think that will be the case, however.

One of our goals for each order, muse, etc was to provide different enough playstyles that people who love that class might be eager to try out several or all of them, so glad to hear it! I'm sure someone in the playtest will do something like play all 4 druid orders or the like. I know Linda's playtest barbarian kept changing totems every game for a while there (I let them change things to playtest different features; she seems to have stuck with dragon totem in the end though).

Designer

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Wandering Wastrel wrote:
Kalindlara wrote:

But can the bear drive?

It comes up more often than you'd think...

Never mind that, I want the right to arm bears!

Paizo Blog wrote:
During social encounters, you represent balance and a reasoned approach to problems, looking for solutions that not only are best for the natural world, but also allow the creatures within it to live in harmony and peace. You often propose compromises that allow both sides to gain what they truly need, even if they can't have all that they desire.
OMG, for reals? I thought this had died a (richly-deserved!) death with AD&D >.<

These are some ideas of how you might play a druid, or what people might think of you, just a kickstart Jason (in this case) or whoever was working on the class chassis wrote up to get your creative juices flowing.


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Pathfinder PF Special Edition Subscriber
Mark Seifter wrote:
One of our goals for each order, muse, etc was to provide different enough playstyles that people who love that class might be eager to try out several or all of them, so glad to hear it! I'm sure someone in the playtest will do something like play all 4 druid orders or the like. I know Linda's playtest barbarian kept changing totems every game for a while there (I let them change things to playtest different features; she seems to have stuck with dragon totem in the end though).

Then you completely succeeded with me as far as the druid is concerned: Now I want to try all four, and it will be hard to decide which one is first!

(Much more so than the bard, by the way. The bard in general is cool, but the various muses didn't feel appealing. I think it's because there were so few details about them, compared to this blog here. Also, I found the term "muse" a bit off-putting).

Can't wait for the playtest to drop...


Fuzzy-Wuzzy wrote:
Elleth wrote:
I'm curious what span means.
In context, I'm pretty sure it means "Mark messed up his HTML a tad, so that what should have been </span> (markup), invisible to the viewers, came out as /span> (text) instead."

OK, that makes sense. Thanks.


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Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

Well, I successfully Smurf'd Mark, I'm content. :)

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