Druid Wildshape Nerf

[Dr. Johnny Fever]

I have showstopper-level problems with the current Pathfinder implementation of wildshape:

1. If my melee/wildshape spec'd druid already has a belt of strength +6 and a nice magic weapon, what value is there in wildshaping into a creature that might very well give a smaller enhancement bonus and whose natural weapons aren't really impressive by comparison? Change the stat bonus' to size mods or racial mods so they stack with enhancement items.

2. What happens to magic gear when you wildshape? The Beastshape spells and Polymorph descriptions in the beta rules softcover don't appear to mention anything about this. Also, besides attribute mods and special abilities, what else do I get? Damage dice and number of attacks? Is the info there and I'm just not seeing it? This is a big deal for druids....

Give me something as a player to get me excited and make me want to roll up a druid. I don't need to be a better melee'er than the party fighter (not possible now anyway because of the many new fighter class abilities) but I at least need to see some potential where I'll sit down and run some numbers and can come up with some promising wildshape combat combos. Right now I'm depressed when I think about the endgame for a wildshape spec'd druid. Let's fix this now while it's in beta.

I do believe that wildshape and polymorph were too powerful in 3.5. Leaving them unchanged in Pathfinder would be a mistake. However, it is just as wrong to lessen these abilities to the point where few people will use them, all so that we can sit back comfortable in the knowledge that 'hey, at least now its not overpowered'. Personally, as a DM, I'd rather rein in a slightly too-powerful ability as opposed to watching some poor schlep get discouraged and frustrated with a wildshaping druid after x levels of trying to realize the potential of a build that the rules make impossible.

Good gaming to all

[The Wraith]

Netherdrake007 wrote:

I’ve got a new one.

At 8th lvl Druids (Beastshape 3)gain the ability to change into magical beasts. Now that you are limited to only gaining “burrow 30 feet, climb 90 feet, fly 90 feet (good maneuverability), swim 90 feet, blindsense 30 feet, darkvision 60 feet, low-light vision, scent, constrict, ferocity, improved grab, jet, poison, pounce, rake, trample, trip, and web” what is the point of taking the form of a magical beast? Seems kind of lame.

Actually, a Druid never gains the ability to take the form of a Magical Beast.

page 26:
"At 8th level, a druid can use wild shape to change into a Huge or Diminutive animal, a Medium elemental, or a Small or Medium plant creature. When taking the form of animals, a druid’s wild shape now functions as beast shape III."

So, basically the Wild Shape of a Druid functions as Beast Shape III (for the purpose of the maximum size allowed and the special abilities that can be taken if the form possesses it), but it allows to take the form of a creature only of the Animal type.
Of course, the Druid can also take the form of a Plant creature (and for this purpose, Wild Shape functions as Plant Shape I) and of an Elemental creature (and Wild Shape functions as Elemental Body II).

[hogarth]

Dr. Johnny Fever wrote:

I have showstopper-level problems with the current Pathfinder implementation of wildshape:

1. If my melee/wildshape spec'd druid already has a belt of strength +6 and a nice magic weapon, what value is there in wildshaping into a creature that might very well give a smaller enhancement bonus and whose natural weapons aren't really impressive by comparison? Change the stat bonus' to size mods or racial mods so they stack with enhancement items.

I guess it depends how nice your nice magic weapon is. Druid A spends 36K gp on a Belt of Str +6 and 18K gp on a magic weapon (a +1 Holy scythe, say). Druid B spends 45K gp on an Amulet of Mighty Fists (let's say a +0 Holy Merciful amulet of mighty fists) and turns into an elephant. Those sound roughly equal to me; it's just two different ways of doing the same thing.

Dr. Johnny Fever wrote:

2. What happens to magic gear when you wildshape? The Beastshape spells and Polymorph descriptions in the beta rules softcover don't appear to mention anything about this.

The Polymorph subschool description explains this:

http://alpha3.wikidot.com/spells-and-magic#polymorph

"When you cast a polymorph spell that changes you into
a creature of the animal, dragon, elemental, magical beast,
plant, or vermin type, all of your gear melds into your body.
Items that provide constant bonuses and do not need to be
activated continue to function while melded in this way (with
the exception of armor bonuses which cease to function).
Items that require activation cannot be used while you
maintain that form."

[Sueki Suezo]

Dr. Johnny Fever wrote:

I have showstopper-level problems with the current Pathfinder implementation of wildshape:

1. If my melee/wildshape spec'd druid already has a belt of strength +6 and a nice magic weapon, what value is there in wildshaping into a creature that might very well give a smaller enhancement bonus and whose natural weapons aren't really impressive by comparison? Change the stat bonus' to size mods or racial mods so they stack with enhancement items.

You're primarily Wild Shaping for the Attack Routine, Special Attacks and Abilities granted by the new form. You'd take the larger of the two Enhancement Bonuses and apply it to your ability scores.

Dr. Johnny Fever wrote:

2. What happens to magic gear when you wildshape? The Beastshape spells and Polymorph descriptions in the beta rules softcover don't appear to mention anything about this. Also, besides attribute mods and special abilities, what else do I get? Damage dice and number of attacks? Is the info there and I'm just not seeing it? This is a big deal for druids....

Your gear merges with you now, but remains operational.

Dr. Johnny Fever wrote:

Give me something as a player to get me excited and make me want to roll up a druid.

There's plenty of reasons to still play a Druid. You just can't play "God Mode Druid" anymore. Hopefully we'll rein in the Wizard and the Cleric before the Beta ends.

[Dr. Johnny Fever]

Dr. Johnny Fever wrote:

Give me something as a player to get me excited and make me want to roll up a druid.

There's plenty of reasons to still play a Druid. You just can't play "God Mode Druid" anymore. Hopefully we'll rein in the Wizard and the Cleric before the Beta ends.

In the years that I played 3.5, with all the splat books, the cleric, druid, and wizard were FAR from God mode. In fact they were struggling by the endgame (lvls 15+). High NPC saving throws, damaging spells that didn't scale with the potential damage from a well spec'd melee toon, numerous magics available to resist elemental damage or outright neuter whole schools of magic (mind blank and death ward, I'm looking at you), the (much needed) nerf to the persistent spell feat, anti-magic and, in the case of the wizzy and sorc, horrible base saves (strong will only) and d4 hit points combined to leave these 3 classes usually wishing they had played a melee toon.

Ok, enough threadjacking from the OP. Back to wildshape. First, thanks to the above posters for filling me in on the merging of magic items. Thankfully they continue to function while the druid is wildshaped.

However, I still feel that a melee wildshape spec'd druid will not compare to an equivalent level fighter, barbarian, paladin, etc. in terms sheer melee damage output and survivability. Now if you believe that that's how it should be, then let's remove the need to have them sacrifice points into their physical stats since they are only ever going to be 2nd rate melee combatants using wildshape as it is currently implemented.

In other words, you can't (or shouldn't) have your wildshape nerf both ways. Either the druid sacrifices attributes and spellcasting ability (because they aren't focusing on wisdom and spellcasting feats) in order to gain melee wildshaping potential equivalent to traditional tanks or dps classes, or leave wildshaping's melee potential less than the tanks but don't require them to allocate points and items towards their physical stats. Choose one or the other. It's not balanced to end up with a solution whereby a druid does everything they can to maximize their melee wildshaping potential, at the cost of their spellcasting potential, only to still end up less than their tank or dps class counterparts.

Mechanically, the problem is greatly reduced if the stat bonus' while wildshaped change from enhancement to untyped, racial, or size.

I do still believe that wildshape and polymorph were overpowered in 3.5. I simply also believe that it is possible to address those aspects that were being exploited without gelding one whole class build (the melee wildshaping druid).

[Phasics]

Ok here's a nice meta combo for anyone b!#@&ing about druids

Call Lightning plus Large Air Elemental Wildshape using Whirlwind , as Large air elemental whirlwind you can do dmg simply moving into occupied squares you still get std action to call lightning strikes and such strikes do 3d10 instead of 3d6 because of the whirlwind effect so you can imobilse and strike targets with lightning,

5d10 with call lightning storm

[Texicutioner]

two words
Strom giant

[Dragonborn3]

Netherdrake007 wrote:

Pathfinder, give me a reason to want to be a Druid who can change into animal forms – something the other classes can’t do just by casting a few spells.

Druid in bat form fling produce flame. I got to the point I had +20 ranged touch with that spell. Then there was flame blade...

[Abraham spalding]

reasons to wildshape?

Pounce, Damage Reduction, hour long changes, spells in alternate forms, Improved Grapple, Better Attacks (Natural attacks using your top BAB instead of weak secondary attacks), better than magic items ability enhancments, natural armor, flight (all of which can save your magic item slots for better things, or save spell slots)

The ability to do what the fighter cannot: Change your combat abilities to best take advantage of the situation.

Do what another spellchucker cannot: Take a form that allows you to have better use of your spells without expending a bunch of spell slots doing so.