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When a friend convinced me to run a Kingmaker game, I gathered up a couple of other players, and due to their busy real life schedules and the short-term notice, I ended up making characters for them (although they did the RP work in terms of fitting a background to the character's stats, and as they're both seasoned roleplayers, they've done a good job making the characters come to life). The initial friend made his own character.
The problem is that I may have slightly over-optimized the characters I made - one is an angel-kin aasimar paladin, and the other is a tiefling diviner (foresight). Without boring you with the stat blocks, they're both excellent specialist characters - the tiefling controls the battlefield well and the paladin does reliable, significant single-target damage.
The other character (the player who initially asked me to run this game) is playing a dwarven druid. There's nothing wrong with the character, but it's not built to the same levels of optimization as the other two, and I get the impression that the player feels somewhat left out in combat. I've been doing what I can to make it clear that the party would have serious problems without the druid (for instance, survival rolls for getting lost, hunting and weather, and the actual map-making, since only the druid has knowledge geography). They haven't made it to the ruined temple of Erastil yet, but the dwarf is a follower of Erastil, so that combat should be a chance for him to shine.
The player has been talking about taking a level or two of monk (sensei) and feral combat training to have a good melee character in wild shape, but I honestly don't think that's the best choice mechanically, and it only going to exacerbate the problem.
Is there anything else I can do, in terms of suggesting character advancement choices to my druid player, or in terms of tweaking the actual AP, to make combat more enjoyable for my druid player? I hope that once they hit level 7 or so, the druid will catch up in power, as a full caster. I just want to make sure the player has fun until then.
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What is your group's play style? How hostile are the encounters?
IMC, players don't always leap to combat immediately. Instead, my group's druid has gotten a lot of mileage out of negotiating with and/or taming potentially hostile animals with wild empathy.
Generally, the players are most interested in figuring out plot details, interacting with NPCs, and trying to keep everyone they can alive. (Even with a few random encounters, the only killing they've done was the mites.) There hasn't been any wild empathy used (mostly because they all see animals far enough away to avoid them), but I'll definitely look into what I can do to make that aspect of druids come through.
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Also, what all does he do aside from wild shape? Does he have an animal companion? Did he take a domain? Is he taking advantage of spontaneous Summon Natures' Ally?
I'm still thinking about my group's druid. He's gotten a lot of mileage out of Obscuring Mist, summoned animals, and his storm burst ability.
My PCs are still 3rd level, so everything he does, he does out of wildshape at the moment. (Honestly, I'm hoping that once he has access to wildshape, he'll be happier with the character.) Most of his exploits in combat have been due to casting entangle or throwing acid darts. He's taken a domain instead of a companion. Normally, this player plays much more martially-oriented characters.
Basically, I think the player would be happier playing a druid with limited or no spellcasting ability, no animal companion, and more powerful (and earlier) wildshape. (I even looked around for something like that, but couldn't find anything.)
As I talk through this, I realize the problem may be that he doesn't actually want to play "a druid" and more want to play "a nature-themed dwarven shape-changer", and so we may need to discuss his character more fundamentally.
...although I have almost no idea how to approach that problem either, since the mechanics I'm aware of don't support that kind of character.
Let him retrain to take an animal companion: this gives him his druid, but still lets him play a combat character (pouncing cat, high armor boar, etc.)?
Sounds like the easiest solution: two "characters" are better than one, no?
Maybe a reskinned barbarian, where the rages are kind of wildshape effect? Or the barbarian/sorcerer hybrid class from the Advanced Class Playtest, if you wanted some spellcasting.
Indeed, it would be easy to add a fluff element to the barbarian's rages to make it shapeshifting-like. A lot of rage powers can reinforce this (beast totem, animal fury, raging climber/swimmer/leaper, scent, sprint...)
IMO the druid will start shine from level 4 with wildshape, but if you don't want to wait for it, have him retrain as a barbarian as suggested or a Ranger with the Shapeshifter archetype and the Skirmisher or the Trapper archetype too (to replace spellcasting)
Get a wand of Shilleleigh, a masterwork quarterstaff and the 2 weapon fighting feat allowing for decent attacks with both sides of the Q.Staff. You get 2 attacks a round as a 2 weapon fighter with the spell damage added in. My Druid did that and was often one of the best fighters in play at lower levels.
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These are useful suggestions; thanks all! I can't believe I hadn't thought of suggesting shillelagh in wand form. I was also thinking of suggesting retraining for an animal companion, so it's good to know other people think that might be a good idea.
At the very least, I think if the player is adamant about taking levels in another class, I'll suggest barbarian (or Bloodrager) instead of monk. The flavor fits better and I think it will more closely approach what the player wants to do.
If the player decides to completely rework the character, I'll have him take a look at the ranger archetype, but as it is I think dipping barbarian is the best bet.
Helping the player optimize harder isn't going to make for a better experience.
Considering the player's complaint is "I feel like I'm not helping at all in combat", I think you're pretty wrong in this.
As it pertains to feeling "useful in combat", I hope that this is a direct request from the player. Otherwise, it might not need fixing. I have had many players and many characters that were not as "useful in combat" as other players.
Keep in mind that there are many ways that a player can find a game rewarding. Combat prowess, monetary gains, side-arcs, relative importance to the local world, out of combat contribution to the furthering of the plot, etc. are just some examples.
Perhaps the Tiger-lord barbarians are a tribe of dwarven barbarians that trace their roots to a more peaceful druidic life. If they were once devoted to Erastil and fell out of favor with their god when the original incarnation of Armag took control of the tribe.
However, if he genuinely feels that his character is a bit underpowered compared to other characters, it's probably because he is. At low levels a base race simply doesn't compare to either a tiefling or an aasimar. Those two races are just more powerful at lower levels. luckily the benefits eventually decrease as characters gain levels. If you want to give him a cool fix before the benefits decrease, I would use a plot device to encourage some roleplaying and as a sub quest.
As just an idea: What if the White Stage came to the dwarf (either in a dream or spirit) in order to draw the group towards the temple. Perhaps hint at "The test of the White Stag". After the test give the dwarf a divine reward from Erastil in the form of a lower level SLA similar to that of the Tiefling and Aasimar. This should immediately bring a bit more power to a base race while potentially furthering the plot of the campaign.
Sticking with it: animal companion! :-D