Woodland stride is for nonmagical difficult terrain caused by plants..
Feather step does not have that restriction, but the save must still be made to avoid being entangled, because that is separate from the entangle area being difficult terrain.
Entangle is a magical effect. Woodland Stride does nothing for it.
So what is the use of packing Feather Step at all? If Woodland Stride takes care of the difficult terrain aspect and Feather Step doesn't get you past the save, does it not then become an absolutely useless spell? Anything it can do, Woodland Stride covers and anything Woodland Stride doesn't cover, it can't do. Or?
Woodland Stride = Is the (ex) class ability that all druid get for themselfs.
Feather Step = Is the spell, that the druid cast on the other PC, so they can do the same thing the druid gets to do free.
Orfamay: That's exactly my point. Even with Feather Step, you still have to make the save with an Entangle Spell (going by wraithstrike's words here), so what is the sense of having it?
Um.... this may come as a surprise, but the idea behind Entangle is that you cast it on other people,, not yourself. It trumps Feather Step as well as Woodland Stride, but if you're not a total fool, you use it to achieve a better tactical position for yourself and your allies and then stay the hell out of the area of effect.
It's an awesome spell if you have a party that, for example, has heard of crossbows. Your wizard can spam Acid Splash at the trapped creatures all day long and they can't do much about it.
As for Feather Step, it's great for dealing with difficult terrain in general. Or for helping other people deal with difficult terrain.
As for Woodland Stride,... not all entangling undergrowth is magical. In "Forest" terrain, anywhere from 50% to 70% of the squares are ordinarily movement-hindering just from the plants you see there,... except for Druids. Bogs are about 40% movement-hindering, and farmland is typically about 40% "undergrowth."
So if you're out in anything other than the Ross Ice Shelf or the Sahara desert, there's a good chance that there's a lot of difficult squares out there that will hamper the paladin, but not you.
Basically, you're not thinking like a druid, you're thinking like a fighter. You don't need to go in and skirmish with them. If you can't kill them with sling bullets, just summon a Dire Hamster and have it tear them apart.
So what is the use of packing Feather Step at all? If Woodland Stride takes care of the difficult terrain aspect and Feather Step doesn't get you past the save, does it not then become an absolutely useless spell? Anything it can do, Woodland Stride covers and anything Woodland Stride doesn't cover, it can't do. Or?
The entangle spell does two things..
1. It forces you to save or become entangled.
2. It creates difficult terrain.
The save and the difficult terrain are two different features of the spell.
Also Woodland Stride only helps you with nonmagial difficult terrain caused by plantlife. Featherstep bypasses it even if it is magical. That is why its better.
Neither of them stop you from gaining status affects such as entanglement created by magic, which is what the spell does.
The idea of the spell is to hold the enemy back while you lay into them with ranged attacks, or just hold them off if you are out numbered. I am sure there are other creative uses.
There is way to make it work, but it requires 2 Feats:
Nimble Moves (pre-req DEX 13), which allows you to ignore 5' of ANY difficult terrain each round (not just non-magical vegetation),
and Mystic Stride (Ultimate Magic, pre-req DEX 15), which allows you to move at full speed thru magical vegetation effects like Entangle/Wall of Thorns.
Although you can move freely, you would still need to make the Save, or suffer the other effects of Entangled Condition:
If both you and the enemies are Entangled (failed the Save), the attack penalty is countered by the AC penalty resulting from the DEX penalty.
(unless using DEX to-hit, e.g. Weapon Finesse or Ranged Attacks)
Probably the most disappointing thing about the ability is that there simply isn't that many qualifying spells that do this, between Entangle at low level and Wall of Thorns at higher levels, although you keep the DC up or otherwise improve Entangle with Metamagic*. And regardless of the Save, the effect always works as difficult terrain which can be a worthwhile use of a 1st level slot.
* HOUSERULE: All casters get Heighten Metamagic for free, if you're blowing a higher level slot the least you can get is an appropriate DC for it.
Hey guys,
I'm not buying the Druids should never melee themselves concept being floated above. Not saying they are good as your melee classes but then again the melee classes do not get spells immediately either. :)
The desired situation is this.
Druid/Sorcerer 2/3 casts Mage Armor/Shield Entangle (Feather Step if he needs to) and then Shillelagh and then goes to beat up someone. Now granted there are smarter ways to go about attacking an enemy, ways that are more druidy perhaps.
But tbh, doing things the way you are 'supposed' to, does get boring after a while.
Is there a way to make this work?
OH
Druids are good in melee so I don't think anyone said that. I did see someone say you should not enter the entangle spell to melee. That is something entirely differently than not meleeing at all. If you can get access to Freedom of Movement you should be ok, but that is at a higher level. I think clerics get it at level 7. I don't know if druids get it at all.
I'm not buying the Druids should never melee themselves concept being floated above.
No one said that. But just like you don't Fireball your mates, you don't Entangle them (or yourself) either.
Entangle is for stuff you don't want to melee.