I haven't finished putting final touches on my character yet. Storm Druid, human, 7th level and we'll play till about 12th or so. All Pathfinder published allowed (except for crazy cheese stuff like Leadership and Sacred Geometry feats, but mostly everything). Three others in the party, one of whom will be front line fighter. I haven't committed to equipment or feats yet.
The upcoming campaign has my GM warning of constructs and other creatures immune to nearly all spells in their homebrew setting. Besides buffing the melee fighters and healing(yuck?) what's a caster-focused Storm Druid to do? I'm looking for spells I've overlooked, items I can buy, and even feats that'd help.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Summons can work fairly well. Storm druids lose the ability to spontaneously summon, but they can still memorize summon natures ally spells.
By default, constructs are not immune to magic. If you are talking about golems, they are immune to anything that allows spell resistance. If this is the case, look for spells that ignore spell resistance. Spell resistance almost always works on evocation spells, but there are a lot of conjuration spells that it does not work against.
Some of the Domain powers are Supernatural, and not subjet to Spell Resistance. Storm Druids are generally throwing around a lot of electricity damage, so you will probably want a way to properly identify Constructs with Know:Arcana... some are healed by electricity damage, whilst others are vulnerable to it. Things like the Storm subdomain's Gale Aura would still create difficult terrain around you that most Constructs will not be able to 5-foot step into. The Wind subdomain's Wind Blast would still be able to Bullrush them.
Constructs are still subject to magical effects like pits/walls and other spells that obscure movement or vision. A lot of battlefield control stuffs will still be relatively effective. Being able to make those Know:Arcana checks would come in handy here, but a lot of generic $#!+ works just fine against Constructs in the sense that they are inconvenienced by the effects of a lot of standard battlefield control spells.
Too bad you can't get Control Construct via Dreamed Secrets until level 15. Sad face.
I'd have a long talk with your GM. While he has warned you ahead of time, a good GM should not build scenarios which constantly shut down certain classes. By telling you that his creatures will be immune to almost all spells, the GM has effectively told you that you won't be able to play certain characters, which is in my opinion, a bad GM.
That being said, your best bet is Buffing, summoning, and transforming.
the last druid I played spent most of the campaign as a huge earth elemental just smashing stuff.... plus I would summon a few more to fight with me.
Yeah, if he is stacking the deck against you, it's going to be rough regardless of how well you plan/prepare. However, most Constructs lack any special vision or Perception... magical darkness/fog/mist still works against their Darkvision. Most Constructs lack special movement speeds, and very few that I have found have special abilities to ignore difficult terrain. A lot of Constructs lack flight, so take Nature Spell and Wild Shape into something that flies... cast your spells from complete safety. Get the Stealth skill with a trait, as most Constructs have crappy Perception/Wisdom and are easy to hide from. Constructs literally have no good saves, so anything that affects the environment around the Construct and requires a save or they fall prone or are entangled or whatever should still be relatively effective against most of them.
Thanks, all, for the input. Good ideas for me to use.
Assuming immune to magic means they are like golems and are immune to anything that allows spell resistance there is a still a lot a caster druid can do. The druid is a prepared divine caster so that mean he gets access to his entire spell list. If all books are allowed the druid has an enormous spell list. It is not that difficult to find a few spells that do not allow spell resistance. Spells that do not allow spell resistance tend to be those that do not affect the target directly. The one thing a druid excels at is manipulating the environment. Of all spell casters the druid is probably has one of the best spell lists for dealing with creature that are immune to magic.
One thing to keep in mind about constructs is that they have NO good save. That means that once you deal with the spell resistance, they are actually pretty easy to affect with magic. As constructs they are immune to mind affecting and pretty much ignore spells that require a fortitude save, but spells that require a reflex save easily affect them. Most constructs don’t have a good DEX, so that means those spells will actually be quite effective. Even low-level spells will often be effective.
A first level druid with an 18 WIS has a 60% chance of effecting a stone golem with entangle. The stone golem will be able to break free fairly easily, but since the area is considered difficult terrain it cuts is already slow movement even further. This means it will need to continue making saves to get out of the area. So, your first level caster focused druid can neutralize a CR 11 golem for at least 2 rounds with a first level spell. How many other classes can do that?
The caster focused druid is not being disallowed or penalized by the GM choosing to use a lot of constructs. He even gave the player a warning so he can build the character appropriately. As long as he is not focused on evocation spells he should do fine.
If we are talking about golems, you cannot overcome their spell resistance no matter how high your caster level. They are flat out immune to any magical effect that allows spell resistance. You could have a caster level of 5,000 and if the spell allows spell resistance they are not affected.
Storm Druids have to take a domain so don’t have an animal companion.
The Samsaran ability to use spells from another divine list is not going to be all that helpful in this situation. Other than buffs and spells targeting undead and outsides the cleric list does not have good combat spells. Those combat spells the cleric gets tend to allow spell resistance. I don’t think the shaman has a lot of combat spells that will be useful vs constructs either.
Look for conjuration and transmutation spells instead of evocation. For example, Rusting Grasp is a 4th level druid spell and does not allow spells resistance and has no save. When used against a construct it does 3d6+1 per caster level (maximum of +15) and you can make 1 attack per round up and last 1 round per caster level.