Author Topic: The Druid Handbook  (Read 598823 times)

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DocWarlock

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #280 on: March 08, 2011, 04:39:01 AM »
Dragon wild Shape out of Draconomicon is nice, but only allows for a Small or Medium dragon shape. This seems to be a waste of a feat given a Medium Gold is a wyrmling before becoming large. Largely I was less than impressed with this feat UNLESS it in fact scales with a druids ability to take on larger forms, for example a 15th level Druid's ability to be a huge creature. Could I in fact be a Mature Adult Gold? How about a Very Old Silver? An Ancient White? Lol, just kidding, every one knows White dragons are lame.

cru

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #281 on: March 08, 2011, 08:54:45 AM »
Dragon wild shape from Draconomicon is indeed limited to small and medium dragons. Size does not scale with level (only HD). This means, dragons suck as melee attackers. However, they shine as mobile defensive spell casting platforms. Read more e.g. here: http://coboard.wikia.com/wiki/Druid#Dragon_Wild_Shape

DocWarlock

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #282 on: March 08, 2011, 05:37:39 PM »
Another problem that I have with Dragon Wild Shape is that the PH 3.5 clearly says that a Druid can only assume a form she is familiar with, that said, a 12th level druid that has never seen a dragon before ever cannot take the shape. Same goes for Any wild shape. Frozen Wild Shape is awesome, but if you've never fought a Hydra before... The Fleshraker wild shape is awesome, but if you've never seen a Fleshraker before... The Dire Tortoise is awesome, you see where I'm going with this.

Shiki

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #283 on: March 08, 2011, 05:43:19 PM »
What the fuck is Knowledge (nature) meant for, do you think? As far as regular Wild Shape goes.
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wotmaniac

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #284 on: March 08, 2011, 05:54:18 PM »
What the fuck is Knowledge (nature) meant for, do you think? As far as regular Wild Shape goes.
oh, there you go -- trying to bring in logic and reasoning, and wanting to actually use your skill checks .... :nonono
...
 :P

[spoiler]
If you stop ignoring 289 pages telling what the intent is to stretch "more power" in your own god complexion of your interpretation trumps all to cover ability adjustments from aging then I will ignore a quarter page of rules that exist within a sidebar.
I think in this case the grammar is less important than whether the Str and Dex bonus provided to your created undead scales.

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DocWarlock

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #285 on: March 08, 2011, 06:12:09 PM »
What the fuck is Knowledge (nature) meant for, do you think? As far as regular Wild Shape goes.

I've seen Michael Cera movies, but I'm not familiar with Michael Cera. I'm familiar with his acting, I'm familiar with a verb. Essentially a Druid is like an Animorph, they can only take the shape of animals they have seen.

Shiki

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #286 on: March 08, 2011, 08:33:37 PM »
^You may limit yourself to that if you like it, but it surely is not the only concept potential the ability can give you. And really, fluff hardly matters when talking about class potential anyway.

What the fuck is Knowledge (nature) meant for, do you think? As far as regular Wild Shape goes.
oh, there you go -- trying to bring in logic and reasoning, and wanting to actually use your skill checks .... :nonono
...
 :P

 :(
"An ally of truth."

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wotmaniac

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #287 on: March 08, 2011, 08:34:28 PM »
^You may limit yourself to that if you like it, but it surely is not the only concept potential the ability can give you. And really, fluff hardly matters when talking about class potential anyway.

What the fuck is Knowledge (nature) meant for, do you think? As far as regular Wild Shape goes.
oh, there you go -- trying to bring in logic and reasoning, and wanting to actually use your skill checks .... :nonono
...
 :P
:(

 :lol

[spoiler]
If you stop ignoring 289 pages telling what the intent is to stretch "more power" in your own god complexion of your interpretation trumps all to cover ability adjustments from aging then I will ignore a quarter page of rules that exist within a sidebar.
I think in this case the grammar is less important than whether the Str and Dex bonus provided to your created undead scales.

Greenbound Summoning RAI
Expanded Gestalt
More Savage Progressions[/spoiler]
Report any wrongs I have done here.

Shiki

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #288 on: March 08, 2011, 08:37:30 PM »
^
"An ally of truth."

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DocWarlock

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #289 on: March 08, 2011, 11:15:52 PM »
^You may limit yourself to that if you like it, but it surely is not the only concept potential the ability can give you. And really, fluff hardly matters when talking about class potential anyway.

"The form chosen must be that of an animal the druid is familiar with. For example, a druid who has never been outside a temperate forest could not become a polar bear."~PH3.5 Page 37

I'm not "limiting myself to that if I like it" It's literally how the class works.

Now what we could do is discuss ways to work around this annoying little limitation instead of arguing about the truth of the matter because without such a discussion the entire Wild Shape section of this guide is as if to say "An Epic level Periapt of Wisdom +10 would be great for a level 3 druid, but you're never gonna see one."

SNA 1-9 offer a great selection of animals the druid can use to gain familiarity. But as far as a hydra or a dragon, I dunno.
« Last Edit: March 08, 2011, 11:29:43 PM by DocWarlock »

Shiki

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #290 on: March 09, 2011, 01:01:44 AM »
What about a druid who went everywhere?

edit: I'm not arguing about Dragon or Frozen Wild Shape here, since technically speaking a Druid doesn't have Knowledge (arcana), but one could get it anyway.
« Last Edit: March 09, 2011, 01:10:21 AM by Shiki »
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DocWarlock

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #291 on: March 09, 2011, 03:31:49 AM »
What about a druid who went everywhere?

edit: I'm not arguing about Dragon or Frozen Wild Shape here, since technically speaking a Druid doesn't have Knowledge (arcana), but one could get it anyway.

Alright, since you still wanna fight me on this we're about to get specific. Let's take into account the Savage Tides adventure path that takes place in southern tropical Greyhawk. Nowhere on ANY of the random encounter tables from adventures 1-12 which take players from 1-20th level is there a wolf. A simple wolf. So a player goes from 1-20th level never having seen a fucking wolf without summoning one. Not even a bear. So we have a druid that has never seen a wolf or a bear in the fur. That automatically rules out the possibility of having one of those or their Dire forms as an animal companion or a wild shape form.

Point: An adventure that starts at higher levels could have a druid that has a background story of a "world traveler" but a low level campaign you're out of luck.

The_Mad_Linguist

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #292 on: March 09, 2011, 03:56:54 AM »
What about a druid who went everywhere?

edit: I'm not arguing about Dragon or Frozen Wild Shape here, since technically speaking a Druid doesn't have Knowledge (arcana), but one could get it anyway.

Alright, since you still wanna fight me on this we're about to get specific. Let's take into account the Savage Tides adventure path that takes place in southern tropical Greyhawk. Nowhere on ANY of the random encounter tables from adventures 1-12 which take players from 1-20th level is there a wolf. A simple wolf. So a player goes from 1-20th level never having seen a fucking wolf without summoning one. Not even a bear. So we have a druid that has never seen a wolf or a bear in the fur. That automatically rules out the possibility of having one of those or their Dire forms as an animal companion or a wild shape form.

Point: An adventure that starts at higher levels could have a druid that has a background story of a "world traveler" but a low level campaign you're out of luck.
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/summonNaturesAllyIII.htm
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DocWarlock

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #293 on: March 09, 2011, 04:42:51 AM »
What about a druid who went everywhere?

edit: I'm not arguing about Dragon or Frozen Wild Shape here, since technically speaking a Druid doesn't have Knowledge (arcana), but one could get it anyway.

Alright, since you still wanna fight me on this we're about to get specific. Let's take into account the Savage Tides adventure path that takes place in southern tropical Greyhawk. Nowhere on ANY of the random encounter tables from adventures 1-12 which take players from 1-20th level is there a wolf. A simple wolf. So a player goes from 1-20th level never having seen a fucking wolf without summoning one. Not even a bear. So we have a druid that has never seen a wolf or a bear in the fur. That automatically rules out the possibility of having one of those or their Dire forms as an animal companion or a wild shape form.

Point: An adventure that starts at higher levels could have a druid that has a background story of a "world traveler" but a low level campaign you're out of luck.
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/summonNaturesAllyIII.htm

Are you trying to say that the druid could use that spell to gain familiarity with a bear or wolf? Cause if you are thanks for agreeing with the point I made 4 posts above this one.

Dictum Mortuum

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #294 on: March 09, 2011, 05:18:19 AM »
Dragon wild Shape out of Draconomicon is nice, but only allows for a Small or Medium dragon shape. This seems to be a waste of a feat given a Medium Gold is a wyrmling before becoming large. Largely I was less than impressed with this feat UNLESS it in fact scales with a druids ability to take on larger forms, for example a 15th level Druid's ability to be a huge creature. Could I in fact be a Mature Adult Gold? How about a Very Old Silver? An Ancient White? Lol, just kidding, every one knows White dragons are lame.

I'm using shadow dragon. A lot. +16 natural armor, energy drain immunity and total concealment almost 24/7. Plus a breath weapon that deals negative levels.

Oceanus dragon is good underwater. Ethereal dragon has an awesome breath weapon and battle dragon has high stats/decent breath weapon.
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McPoyo

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #295 on: March 09, 2011, 09:25:34 AM »
You could also use knowledge checks, Doc. The DC to know everything about a creature is relatively low, all things considered.
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wotmaniac

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #296 on: March 09, 2011, 10:25:03 AM »
You could also use knowledge checks, Doc. The DC to know everything about a creature is relatively low, all things considered.
right -- this was mentioned already.
I think the point is this: how much of a break with reality are you willing to make.  My knowledge check could be over 9000, but if I had never encountered a creature, if I have literally never had the opportunity to even be made aware of such a creatures existence, then how does it make sense that I would know to take its form?

really though, it's all just a matter of the flavor of game you want ....

[spoiler]
If you stop ignoring 289 pages telling what the intent is to stretch "more power" in your own god complexion of your interpretation trumps all to cover ability adjustments from aging then I will ignore a quarter page of rules that exist within a sidebar.
I think in this case the grammar is less important than whether the Str and Dex bonus provided to your created undead scales.

Greenbound Summoning RAI
Expanded Gestalt
More Savage Progressions[/spoiler]
Report any wrongs I have done here.

The_Mad_Linguist

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #297 on: March 09, 2011, 04:44:32 PM »
You could also use knowledge checks, Doc. The DC to know everything about a creature is relatively low, all things considered.
right -- this was mentioned already.
I think the point is this: how much of a break with reality are you willing to make.  My knowledge check could be over 9000, but if I had never encountered a creature, if I have literally never had the opportunity to even be made aware of such a creatures existence, then how does it make sense that I would know to take its form?

really though, it's all just a matter of the flavor of game you want ....
I've done intensive study upon the physiology of sea sponges.

I have never been scuba diving.
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DocWarlock

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #298 on: March 09, 2011, 05:04:21 PM »
^Do I have to quote the PH again?

You could also use knowledge checks, Doc. The DC to know everything about a creature is relatively low, all things considered.

That goes for you too, buddy.

The_Mad_Linguist

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Re: The Druid Handbook
« Reply #299 on: March 09, 2011, 05:12:50 PM »
^Do I have to quote the PH again?

You could also use knowledge checks, Doc. The DC to know everything about a creature is relatively low, all things considered.

That goes for you too, buddy.
I am very familiar with the physiology of the sponge.  Much more familiar than a guy who just goes diving every weekend and say "ooh, look at the pretty sponges"
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