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Can a multiclassed Shifter benefit from the Shaping Focus feat?
Shaping Focus feat says you need to be a multiclassed druid for it to do anything.
Shifter says, "A shifters can take feats and other abilities that require wild shape; for the purpose of qualifying for prerequisites, her effective druid level is equal to her shifter level."
Does that work? Is that good enough, so long as the Shifter is multiclassed?
I feel like Shifter SHOULD be able to take Shaping Focus, but I'm not sure if it actually works.
They can meet the requirements, but it's like you said, it doesn't do anything for them. Not because they aren't a multiclassed Druid, but because the feat has a "can't exceed character level" clause.
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They can meet the requirements, but it's like you said, it doesn't do anything for them. Not because they aren't a multiclassed Druid, but because the feat has a "can't exceed character level" clause.
The character level limit bit is irrelevant.
A Shifter 4/Fighter 4, for example, would have an effective druid level of 4. Shaping Focus, if that works, would bump that up to 8.
The whole question at hand is whether being a multiclassed Shifter counts as being a multiclassed Druid for the purposes of Shaping Focus.
I think we all agree that this feat would not benefit a single-classed Shifter -- but Wayne did specify a multi-classed Shifter.
The main problem is that the Shifter has an effective druid level equal to her Shifter level "for the purpose of qualifying for prerequisites", not for applying the effects of a feat. There don't seem to be too many feats yet that have both Wild Shape and a druid level as prerequisites.
RAW, it doesn't.
RAI, the feat was made well before Shifter was a thing, so the feat wasn't written with the assumption that it was there.
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Pretty much what David and Darksol said are my thoughts on it.
Like I said above, I feel like it SHOULD work, but I'm pretty sure it doesn't.
I was really hoping this feat was going to be reprinted in Ultimate Wilderness with a fix for this exact issue. Otherwise, as it stands now, in order to make use of Shaping Focus a Shifter would need to dip a level of Druid.
I'd greatly appreciate some hits on that FAQ button so that we can hopefully get this cleared up. One of those situations where I'm hoping the intention is that it's supposed to work and it was just overlooked, so an FAQ could fix the problem.
I think it's been pretty clearly answer that it doesn't do anything for them.
*Casts Raise Thread*
So everyone agrees that RAW the shapshifter 4/fighter 4 gains nothing from this feat, but what about shapshifter 4/fighter 3/druid 1? It seems to me this would result in level 8 wild shape.
Thoughts?
I think the intention is you wouldn't even need the druid level.
Sure, but that doesn't help everyone. At home your GM can rule anyway they want, but in PFS they can't.
Everyone else on this thread seems to think the feat doesn't work as you suggest, because the special line isn't a prerequisite, and therefore the shifter/fighter doesn't count as a multiclass druid.
Whatever the status of shifter/fighters with this feat, shifter/fighter/druid should work, yes.
The next sentence after what I wrote may help you though. Gotta keep reading. It's a direct quote.
A shifters can take feats and other abilities that require wild shape; for the purpose of qualifying for prerequisites, her effective druid level is equal to her shifter level.
I don't think the class can make it any simpler. It's written into the class.
You qualify as a druid for the feats. Your level is your druid level.
Even the throwaway sentence of "must be a druid"... you would be.
No one is arguing that they can't take the feat. The feats text says if you are a multiclassed druid. Not if you have wild shape, which would have worked better. As it is written (not that I would run it that way) it doesn't apply to Shifters, Avenging Beast, Feral Champion, or Feral Hunter.
And it doesn't seem that its come up in the PFS forums at all as a question and nothing in campaign clarifications.