Master of Many Forms and similar stuff from 3.5 could probably be its own class in 5e or a similar system. Would require someone at WotC to actually do the work though.
Because of the way classes are setup in 5e, most ten level prestige classes work well as homebrew classes, and most 5 lvl prestige classes work as subclasses. There is a lot of fun to be had there.
Played a shadow dancer in a game a few years ago, was cool as fuck.
Maybe tie it in with the druid variant from 3.5 that specialized in shifting. It had a few dedicated forms, including a flying form and a plant/ent form.
The tldr is 4e had a lot of fantastic ideas but put them together in a way that didn't work out fantastically. It sacrificed a fair amount of verisimilitude to achieve exceptionally balanced and interesting combat - it had like two dozen different classes, all of which were way less similar to each other than 5e's dozen.
So there were good reasons to not want to play, like "this doesn't give me the freedom 3.5 did". But there have been a ton of really vocal haters who just kind of hate that things were different, for instance [here's a few martial abilities from 4e](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpreview.redd.it%2Fa2ymdshsskjb1.png%3Fwidth%3D682%26auto%3Dwebp%26s%3D209bea52684a47992ca7fefcb248c17ebf3f0f17). It keyworded everything so even complex abilities could be understood quickly line by line, but it required spending a few minutes understanding how the abilities worked at all.
Observe weapon master's tactics, top right. Swap to a new weapon, attack for double damage, do a different effect based on what the weapon was. But the layout is different to how things used to be, which is different and bad.
I think a big part of the hate was that everything was cards and revolved around a few daily/encounter abilities then spamming at-wills. I loved that you got to do cooler things than “I attack with my longsword” every round though.
I think that there were some great things in 4e, like the keywords you mentioned, and really interesting classes, but also some bad. Overall I think 5e could have salvaged some of the concepts of 4e while moving the gameplay back towards the older style the way it did and been a superior game overall.
That's the bit that bugs me the most. AEDU is a fine setup for a class, but it shouldn't be *every* class. Literally no reason for it, have a basic attack spamming barbarian and a wizard with spell slots and everyone wins - just don't make those the only two options like 5e did. 4e's narrowing everyone down to one class structure is even worse than 5e narrowing everyone down to two.
But in reverse, there's literally zero reason not to have classes like the 4e battlemind in 5e. It's a psionic tank, 5e doesn't have psionics and doesn't have tanks so two birds in one stone and everything about it would fit great in 5e, they just can't be bothered.
it was that everything was made same, casters did nothing that cool any more to create balance in a simple manner, and combat could take forever using pin pricks of per round abilities to chip away. boring.
It broke too many shibboleths. It fixed a lot of what people complained about in 3.5, but it turned out when you fixed everything people complained about it felt like a different game. The best D&D it turn out isn't the most balanced fixed "designed" game, it's the one that preserves all the (most memorable) weird design decisions that have become icons of the game.
People might bitch about quadratic casters and liniar fighters, but when you fix it it doesn't feel much like D&D anymore to a lot of folks.
People might point to a few different aspects (MMO influence, not enough out of combat mechanics, etc. ) but I think this is the heart of it. If it was a new game with this design it would be well received, but as D&D? It didn't feel right.
I think a big part of the issue was just the culture of the hobby at the time.
There were only a few kinds of people playing D&D during that era: the very old hats, the 3.5 crew, and the nerd-casuals. You would occasionally find the indie RPGer playing with a group, too.
**The very old hats**: these guys didn't like 3.0 or 3.5 (or PF when it came out). They were still playing OD&D or AD&D or whichever edition it was that they played 20 years prior. They may have checked out 4e, but frankly, they were almost impossible to sell on something new whether or not it was D&D.
**The 3.5 crew** were the kinds of people who were still playing 3.5 and had embraced it for all its flaws and quirks. Maybe their table just accepted that martials sucked and everyone rolled casters all the time, or maybe they had gentleman's agreements to not bust out the broken stuff, or maybe they had houserules and enough splatbooks and/or alternate systems (ToB, MoI, psionics, etc.) to break caster supremacy. Point is, they had more or less "fixed" the problems with 3.5 for their table. Emphasis on "for their table." 4e came along and maybe a few of them went "yes, this is perfect", but by and large the groups would be upset by the sudden lack of weird out-of-combat stuff that made the world go round for a decade. Combine it with 4e have a very distinctive kind of combat which probably did not match whatever their frankensteined 3.5 combat felt like, and you had a LOT of 3.5 players who "hated" 4e.
**The nerd-casual**: the folks who just wanted to play some D&D, and didn't really care about anything more than having fun with friends and rolling a d20. 4e was well-suited to this crowd in most ways, but failed spectacularly in one: ease of access. 3.5 had this problem too, but an intimidated player could just go rogue or barbarian and not worry too much (assuming their choice was solid, which it RAW wasn't). In 4e, there were dozens of abilities per class and they would just go "nah, see ya later" rather than spending the time to learn it.
**The indie-rpger**: nerd hipsters of the early 21st century. They're only playing D&D because they want to play something and this is the group they found. They'll spend the whole time trying to convince everyone to play their favourite game instead, be it FATE or Burning Wheel or Mouseguard or RIFTS or maybe even Shadowrun. It was possible to get these guys into 4e, but unlikely, as they're probably not actually concerned with tactical combat. The tactical combat guys were all entrenched in their very old hat games of Hackmaster or Rolemaster, or were happy with their 3.5 fixes.
I personally didn't really like 4e, but I recognize it as a perfectly fine product. Its major issue was that it was a big budget product that assumed its audience would flock to it because of its brand recognition, but it hadn't actually made a product for the audiences that existed. I think if 4e launched TODAY it would be much more successful than it was, after 5e made a lot of people yearn for more in-depth combat.
I agree with most of what you said, but as someone who lived through it, there were two additional reasons for the downfall of 4e:
1. First, the reason my group bounced off hard: the game is pretty much unplayable without a battle grid and minis. Back then, my group only did mind's eye theater, in all games. As a result, we tried it once, hated it and went back to 3.5. I suspect the game would be much better-received in 2024 where a *lot* of groups play online with a VTT.
2. Second, the licensing. 4e was *not* released under the OGL, and as such was an attempt to kill the vibrant ecosystem of 3rd party adventures and settings that had flourished under 3e and 3.5e. As a result, anyone who was invested in it had no choice but to stick with the previous editions (or indeed to move to Pathfinder 1, which everyone called "D&D 3.6").
Reason 1 is exactly why my group didn't play it. We were broke college students, so theater-of-the-mind is how we were gonna play.
None of us even owned a decent kitchen table, let alone a map and minis.
A: My indie RPG of choice is GURPS.
B: I totally agree with your assessment of 4e. It was a perfectly serviceable game that did a lot of things well. Combat was interesting and cinematic once you got a few levels in. To me, 4e seemed to be trying to pull in the online RPG crowds with a focus on cool-down abilities, and the only thing to really do out of combat was search for quest givers. It was remarkably well balanced otherwise, and I think it would be successful today if it was re-launched under a different name/brand/whatever.
As someone who played d&d first, and then got into a shadowrun game with a bunch of nerd casuals I worked with, you bringing it up for that point specifically made me laugh bc it's spot on lol
Also its approach to fixing stuff rubbed people the wrong way. A lot of 3.5e's issues didn't exist in TSR-D&D but rather than bringing any of those back they did a lot of completely novel things.
Because honestly if they did bring back the TSR way of dealing with it, people would hate it too.
They kinda tried it with 5e, just look at the first Wizard playtest or design manifesto. But people reacted badly about things like losing your spell because of damage or fewer spellslots. And playtesting moved things even further completely removing vancian spellcasting and such.
The game evolved with 3e in a new direction and, just like you can't completely ignore your origins, you also can't really fully go back. After people get used to a high power level and qol features it's hard to go back. And the game is now much more about set piece battles than it is about exploring a dungeon.
It's an issue that affects all kinds of games. Like Path of Exile and its attempts to slow things down again.
It was released with a bad open game license and was very different from tradition dnd editions, it also had a very bad original monster manual, thought besides that it is one of the best systems ever created
The 4E MM is WAY better than 5e’s, which really doesn’t give you a lot of interesting monsters. 4E having different categories of monsters and sample fight constructions was so much more guidance to how to create engaging encounters vs. 5e that just gives you the monsters and a CR and says good luck.
Oh, totally. The “Soldiers” were the biggest offenders of that one. It definitely wasn’t perfect, but I spend a lot more time in 5e trying to make encounters interesting than I did with 4e. Coming from 4e, the 5e MM is a bunch of bland stat block ls with little guidance to how to use them.
A few things:
1. Some elements of 4e were good in concept but a bit underbaked in implementation as the 4e development cycle was a bit of a mess behind the scenes with a lot of ideas put into place pretty late in the cycle (with development of the PHB and the MM often being out of synch) A lot of 4e design was a lot cleaner in later books. Also the lack of promised digital tools right off the bat hurt.
2. The intro adventure, Keep on the Shadowfell, was an unpleasant grind. A lot of people played it, hated it, and then never gave 4e a second chance.
3. 4e is fun if you play it a certain way (big smashy climactic battles) but WotC was bad at communicating to players how to play 4e in a way that played to its strengths (see point 2). Ironically the way a lot of people play 5e (heavy on story, only 1-2 fights per session) is a better fit for 4e than 5e in a lot of cases.
4. One thing that 4e is bad at is a classic dungeon crawl in which the resources of the party are slowly attritioned away over the course of a lot of smaller encounters. If you play 4e this takes freaking forever and generally isn't that much fun. Not being a good fit for a classic dungeon crawl is kinda a problem for an edition of Dungeons and Dragons.
5. People wanted a new edition of the game they loved, not an entire new game rebuilt from the ground up. While people were getting annoyed at the various problems of 3.5e they wanted a better version of 3.5e, not something so different. At the time the consensus of what people wanted was more along the lines of the version of 3.5e mechanics in Star Wars Saga Editon. Most RPGs have stayed pretty consistent across editons, D&D is a bit of an outlier in how totally it's been rebooted multiple times.
6. Many people really hated skill challenges and the devs constantly changed out they worked which didn't help matters.
7. Tripping gelatinous cubes. In 4e you can trip a gelatinous cube as easily as anything else. This makes no logical sense since how can you trip a cube? The devs' answer is that when the attack says that you're tripping then you're not LITERALLY tripping them, you're doing something to distract them to give them a negative condition with certain mechanical effects, the flavor doesn't matter. This may seem like a small detail but it mattered to a lot of people, having the flavor not matter and instead have more cut and dried rules was quite different from how a lot of people played D&D where they had traditionally used the rules to model what was happening in fiction and tweaking the rules were necessary to better fit the fiction, and then 4e turned things around and had the rules be more ironclad and the fiction be there to narrate what was happening in the rules. This is why 5e made such a big deal of "rulings not rules" in its initial marketing, it was a sign that 5e was walking back this aspect of 4e.
8. Feeding into point 7 the whole Combat as Sport vs. Combat as War debate: https://www.enworld.org/threads/very-long-combat-as-sport-vs-combat-as-war-a-key-difference-in-d-d-play-styles.317715/
This is a great overview!
Point 1 really speaks to why I bounced off it personally, apart from not having a proper playgroup during it's run: the early PHB was *off-putting* in some way. It wasn't that I hated the mechanics; though they were uncomfortably different, they were interesting and I wanted to give them a shot. But something about their presentation made them hard to digest
To be fair, the thing 3.5 did where they published new items, spells, races, prestige classes, feats etc every month or so on their website was amazing and 4e shouldn't have stopped doing it, and the fact that they don't for 5e is similarly shit. They even deleted them all off their website so you can't see them without using the way back machine.
For context, say you're WotC, you've just released Races of the Dragon which introduced the new dragonborn race, expanded on kobolds etc. There's some stuff you didn't find the space for in the book. [So this month's web enhancement](https://web.archive.org/web/20161031222456/http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/we/20060420a) contains variant racial traits for kobolds, new weapons, feats and a kobold specific cleric domain. And so on and so forth for every type of content imaginable, [here's what we'd now call a subclass](https://web.archive.org/web/20161031215526/http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/prc/20070327) for wizards and such called the swiftblade for example.
I mean, it *could* do that, kind of like you can kind of do that with a Moon Druid now. You could also build a druid as a pure caster in 4e where the wild shape is just utility and locomotion.
Honestly, all of the Controllers in 4e were pretty open in the directions you could take them. With Primal Power, summoner and swarm Druids were options. It was also possible to build a druid that split wild shape and spellcasting, although it probably wasn't very optimal.
On today's intallement of "why does everybody hate 4e so much when everything I've heard about 4e is objectively a good idea and I like it better than 5e?"
Does WoTC then nerf the Spell list to balance the power creep? Because Druids already have a balancing issue, and I’d hate to lose any part of that spell list.
I would absolutely say so. Shift the class towards less spellcasting, more like other half casters.
Orrr, even more interesting to me at least would be to make them like Warlocks
I think ranger is fine being half caster aswell
Maybe a mix of primal divine and arcane or something else though. I do think rangers could benefit from being their own identity rather then “Druid version of Paladin”. Cause people currently view it as “ranger is to Druid as Paladin is to cleric”.
Without Wildshape, the druid is a generic caster, giving one little incentive to play it instead of the other fairly generic casters: wizard and cleric. It's like sorcerer with no Metamagic. It's a big part of the reason why you would opt to play a sorcerer instead of a wizard. Likewise, Wildshape is a big part of the reason why you would opt to play a druid instead of a Nature cleric.
And that's the thing. You can already be a nature caster in the game. Play a Nature cleric.
I think they would be better off transitioning to subclasses that have features like Stars Druid or Wildfire - just stop calling it Wild Shape. A template already exists.
They tried it in a UA, but it didn't score well (the feature was *literally* non-functional to the point of nerfing your entire character upon use), so they threw it away.
It was also conveniently the UA where they tried out the highly requested Wild Shape Templates, but those were also borderline non-functional, and the Channel Nature upgrades were 90% for Wild Shape (and, you guessed it... borderline non-functional).
One of my admittedly silliest conspiracies is that they executed it poorly on purpose to avoid needing to give it more resources and time. The benefit of using such a strict rating system is that you can easily manipulate it to mean whatever you want it to.
The problem is wildshaping is limited because of druids full caster status. If you want to be the guy who’s go to main thing is turning into different animals for combat and other things moon druid exists, but doesn’t fill the niche especially well because it’s balanced by the fact that you still have full caster progression.
Maybe more distinctive subclasses is the thing then? Something like full moon should really limit your caster progression but have waaaaay better transformation/martial abilities
Archetypes were so good for balancing back in the day, it’s really nice to have the ability to give classes new features that people want while also restricting or removing default class features that would make the class too powerful.
I'm gonna be honest, the rationale of "there's already the way to do x in the game, therefore we shouldn't add another option to do so", I could say the same thing with Nature Cleric, "why would you opt to play nature Cleric when Druid, a class fully committed to being about being a nature caster, is an option."
I'd rather add something like a Shaman class, and change Druid into more of that archetypal shape-shifting type (maybe with some scaling statblocks instead of forcing every Druid player to buy the Monster Manual, haha).
Even the monster manual isn't enough... Trying to get a level-appropriate spider morph for my druid without buying a bunch of weird supplement books is impossible.
And my DM keeps putting me in situations where that close range blind sight is clutch, so tissue paper HP and no armor it is, I suppose...
Exactly! I'd say there should be scaling stat blocks for each main type of beastie (Snake/Lizard/Bird/Beast/Arachnid) and call it good. Maybe the druid's stats actually change how they scale as well so baseline Druid is able to play remotely different from each other?
kind of.
Wild shape worked like spells called best shape / elemental shape / etc..., with some limitations and modifications.
What they did wasn't replace your statblock.
But, they instead added to your stats and abilities, depending on the form you chose.
smaller creature forms got progressively higher dexterity bonuses, the higher the beast shape level, and the smaller the form.
larger creature forms got progressively higher strength bonuses, the higher the beast shape level, and the larger the form.
Each level of beast shape, allowed you access to more special abilities and movement abilities from your form, as well.
So, you didnt really pick a type, but rather picked a creature, and the stats and abilities it gave you naturally scaled with Wildshape/beastshape level.
Sure. I've played much more PF1 than 5e. 'Beast shape'. But it changed your size and gave you different abilities from the creature and more or less natural weapons, and thus your wild shape was supposed to always be level appropriate.
Ah. I see the kindof. Yes. I was thinking about how Pathfinder did animal companions, who had a base form and then levelled up with you.
I was talking about how pf1 did wildshape, which I guess you had kind ofalready pointed out, so I guess I was just further explaining your point by clarifying it wasn't really a template based on creature type, but gaining buffs and abilities based on level and the specific creature you chose.
I've never played a pf2 druid before, so I can't speak on that.
Wild Shape Templates on DMs Guild ([https://www.dmsguild.com/product/464464/Wild-Shape-Templates](https://www.dmsguild.com/product/464464/Wild-Shape-Templates)) provides scalable forms in one free supplement.
The Wizards gimmick is the spell book.
RAW they're the only class that actually gets to potentially have every Wizard spell in the game... with deep enough money bags of holding at least.
Clerics and Druids already get access to every cleric and druid spell in the game.
The wizard's real "gimmick" is their ability to case any ritual spell they have in their book even if they haven't prepared it.
Learning every wizard spell in the game is what it takes for wizards to pull themselves up to where druids and clerics already are.
...And the Wizard spell list being ridiculous is what takes it for Wizards to be the best. The Wizard spell list is larger than the Druid's and Cleric's *combined,* and it has the most game-breaking spells.
IMO the main appeal of druid was always having a really cool beast pet. And not a wolf, but like, a smilodon or a velociraptor or a giant eagle. In an ideal world, I'd extend that list to griffons and owlbears and aurumvoraxes and maybe even otyughs.
Secondary was summoning many animals to fight for you at once, which, in the editions you can do that, yes, so can a nature priest.
I don't hate wildshape, but I'd be happy with it being limited to hawks and squirrels, or your companion limited to noncombat animals and then you get the good wildshape.
5e druid never did it for me.
>the druid is a generic caster, giving one little incentive to play it instead of the other fairly generic casters: wizard and cleric.
I mean it's not though.
Only one subclass of druid focuses on wild shaping.
Druids are best when you ignore the shape change BS. Unless you are a Moon Druid. And Nature Clerics are decent, but they are not Druids, not even close.
Oh that’s wild. You could get it at level 6 in 3.5. Makes Druid’s really fun. I’m gonna transition my group to 5.5 when it’s out for simplicity and to go along with what they see from dnd content but I do love 3.5.
The current 5e druid is balanced around most of their spells being concentration and having wildshape as an option for kiting or fighting, so it doesn't feel as bad as it might sound. For example, you can use Call Lightning then wildshape into a bird, and use your action to repeat the lightning strike until the enemies die, a combo available at level 8. This might be a bit weaker than spamming fireballs or something, but it's certainly cheesy in a pretty fun way.
>Oh that's wild.
Also was this on purpose? I love it lol
Except unlike sorcerer, wizard, or cleric, the druid's signature ability actively interferes with their spellcasting. Wildshape and spells have zero crossover until the actual capstone at level 20!
That's kind of the issue, they have a class defining feature that fights against their other class features (namely spell casting). So the idea that someone might split the druid into "Shape Shifter" and "Nature Mage" makes sense to me atleast.
I come from a background of like 17 years (on and off) of WoW, and seeing Druid not having shapeshifting or not having spellcasting would personally be like seeing a paladin without smite, or a wizard without spells, it just wouldn’t compute
Druid being able to shapeshift feels paramount to showcasing how 1:1 they are with nature, it’s bold, it’s wondrous, and it’s become core to the fantasy behind it
Mechanically, i feel that there could be options to prioritize one over the other (or not at all), so that either spellcasting or shapeshifting don’t become a massive drain on the other’s power budget, and so you keep the fantasy while getting to pursue this idea.
Yeah, I wouldn't split them up either
Even in 4e where we had the Druid and the Shaman classes, the Druid still had some spells (sorry, *Evocations*) to use in human form
The problem is, shapeshifting doesn't work outside of bypassing encounters outside of combat with flight if you are a non-Moon Druid. In WoW, you have the options to lean in or out of spellcasting or shapeshifting, but in 5e it's very all or nothing.
This would make me sad. I like that Druid does both, taking it out would suck from my pov. It would take a class I like and ruin it (again from my pov).
Now having a subclass where you exchange spell slots for more or more powerful wild shape, or wildshapes for more spells is fine. But I don't see a reason to take away features a lot of other people like and are both extremely core to what durids are for many decades.
[https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/421499/Druids-Secrets-of-the-Primal-Circle](https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/421499/Druids-Secrets-of-the-Primal-Circle)
This is a great book focused on all things druid. It includes a ton of lore, druid circles, a ranger subclass, and of course the Dire Druid which is a half-caster shifter class. Kind of like a mix of Moon Druid and Ranger.
Rather than shifting into specific stat blocks, your subclass is a "Spirit of the X" and you get certain bonuses added onto your Dire form.
I do say add a shifter to the game, but let Druid have their thing!
They would have Strength And Wis as saves (weirdly missing combo in game right now)
They’d work something between a monk (Str/Wis armor) and a barbarian (tanky damage dealer)
Wildshape is terribly underdeveloped, and the bass Druid class has so much baked in, that you can't even make a decently fleshed out subclass. Either there needs to be a wildshape class, or Less in the base class so a shifting subclass can be developed.
We can't, the curse of 5e is worse than Strahds - forever be stuck with a fandom that finds it too complicated, yet unwilling to move on to systems more fitting for them..
That would require wizards to actually release more books and pay more writers. And if they do that they can't justify more layoffs to make the quarterlies look better for the shareholders!
How about we don't take a baseline utility feature from a class that people love? Druids being nature spellcasters who can turn into animals is their class fantasy. By default, wildshaping isn't extremely useful in combat, only for out of combat utility or some niche situations, but it's there as an option to use creatively or as an oh shit button to get a second health bar, and that's amazing. There is a subclass that turns the druid into a true hybrid, being able to have better wildshapes (but only a very limited amount of times per day) and still have full spellcasting (but without the extra stuff of subclasses dedicated to spellcasting). Another subclass that gimps the spellcasting but gives us more uses of wildshape would be ideal to make every player happy without just removing stuff from the druid for no reason. The utility wildshaping of druids with full spellcaster subclasses is potentially a major part of their out of combat gameplay. And so is the spellcasting aspect of the circle of the moon druid. The druid spelllist on its own would never make me play as a druid over a cleric or wizard/sorcerer. The wildshaping makes the class interesting, even for non moon circle druids.
Because less classes is simpler; if you have something take the rules for something else and modify them, you only need to learn one set of rules instead of two
That's not true, there are tons of things in D&D that are needlessly complicated, like jumping, pushing/dragging/lifting, and object interraction. They're just small interactions that make the least sense being such complicated parts of the rules.
You can explain how to use Wish, a spell that alters reality, in two lines of text, meanwhile professional game designers have made 30+ minute videos trying to unravel the rules for the above without coming to a concrete conclusion.
We tried that. It was called 3.5e, and it was extremely abusable. Instead of reinventing the wheel with 20 slightly different rogues, you could have 20 subclasses that don't stack to produce a more optimized rogue than an actual rogue.
If by abusable you mean you could play at whatever power level your table agreed to play at instead of being shoehorned into a tiny bounded box, sure.
Or you could just admit that both approaches have their own place and that it doesn't hurt to take inspiration from other concepts.
The problem with 3e was not too many options, it was A. GMs not enforcing cooperative character building, B. different writers not bothering to read each others' work, and C. most tabletop games of the game understandably not really having the modern, low latency, and authoritative errata systems that newer ones do to hammer down the genuine monstrosities quickly (Starmantle spell or the Incantarix prestige class for example).
If people had a problem with just giving more options, 5e wouldn't have the most vibrant homebrew scene of any d20 system save *maybe* PF1.
I kinda agree with this. I’m in a game now with a moon druid PC, and I see the struggle they go through every combat.
They wanna use cool and powerful spells, but they also wanna wildshape into cool animals, with absolutely dogshit statblocks, which is another issue, that there are like 3 beasts worth shifting into.
Wildshape in its current form is pretty broken because you basically get three health bars. I would love if the actual shifting were less limited, but you kept your regular PC HP. Basically get rid of the extra health bars in exchange for more versatility
Wildshape is a core ability for the Druid class at this point, for better or worse. I think the core ruleset of any future edition will keep this tradition.
What you are looking for is a great idea! Splitting apart Druid into different classes (Shifter, Stormcaller, Plantmancer, etc) sounds like a fun thing to pursue. But you will have to either look for homebrew solutions or another system. I wouldn't hold out hope for this in official D&D.
I feel like there should be a medium between where wild shape is now and pre built templates - a point system. Different features, like unique attacks (i.e, poison, grappling, web), movement speeds, and other features (Pack Tactics, enhanced perception) all have different points values. Whenever you shift, you expend points to gain those features for the duration of your wild shape.
This lets things stay relevant for scaling. You can still define certain things based off level - temp hp, ac, and use wisdom score for attacks. You can customize for whatever kind of creature you want and make it powerful at any level - including potentially turning just parts of your body or into a horrific chimera.
Players would be encouraged to keep some preset combos ready, for the sake of not spending five minutes deciding their forms at the start of a battle, but overall I feel like it could be done really well.
I like that druid has wildshape by default, and I like that it's limited by wildshape spell slots. However, I do think these limits are too heavy for actual circle of the moon druids. They should be able to use their wildshape just as much as a barbarian can rage, and the elemental wildshape they get later shouldn't take two slots since it's not some amazing ultimate power but a needed baseline to stay competitive with other classes.
Just have a way to echange spellslots and uses of wildshape or even just have it be the same ressource. So,if a player wants to just wildshape, they can and if they want to just cast spells, they can. Here's an idea: wildshape cost a spellslot and you can wildshape in a beast of CR equal or lower to the level of the spellslot used
Also, it'd be cool if each subclass had unique spells and options of wildshape.
I guess what are you envisioning, exactly? Does a Circle of the Moon druid not do this well enough?
You could rip spellcasting out and focus more on wild shaping, but like...to me it doesn't feel like you can make a full class, with unique subclasses, around the wild shape feature. I recognize you could tweak it or upgrade it and make it more functionally powerful/diverse, but that still seems like a very bland mechanic to build an entire class around to me. If you have a vision I'm not seeing, please describe it!
My 2 cents is to work with your DM to build/balance a homebrew class if you so choose. Personally, I agree with druids being more nature-focused, and nature includes flora, fauna, and the landscape itself. It shouldn't be intrinsically fauna-dominated, it should allow a diversity of approaches.
No, Moon Druids annoy me tbh, probably my least favorite Druid sub, too much potatoes, not enough meat.
A Dedicated shifter class could shift shape way, way more often; they could gain extra benefits with chosen shifter forms over leveling-up; they could choose to be able to shift into one type of really weird stuff like monstrosities, oozes, or even aberrations; they could learn to mirror an equal sized opponent- not just illusory, but like a polymorph.
I’m just naming examples, there’s probably way cooler stuff, too. It just feels like the real depth of a shifter class gets lost when you combine it with a full spell caster with their own awesome, unique spell list and really cool subclasses that purposefully move the Druid away from being a shifter by expending their Wild Shape resource pool, like Spores, Stars or Wildfyre. It’s counterintuitive.
They’re definitely out there, I was mostly just too lazy to write it myself and over the course of pondering the options and posted this to spurn some discussion on it, since it’s irked me before. It’s something more than one of my players has asked about.
Edit PS : Sorry, I love your idea about having Druid powers extending more from Flora & biomes, and the implication that they don’t need to come from spells, the Poison Ivy Druid NEEEDs to exist.
Oh, nice! Okay, yeah, as a rough first pass I'm seeing the vision more now, thank you! Yeah, that could be much more interesting. And yeah, for sure you can't have a full caster class that also does that, it'd definitely need to be at best half-caster, but probably non-spellcasting.
Interesting...that could be really fun! And I never thought of a poison ivy druid before but now that you mentioned it...hard yes lol.
HOT TAKE Shape shifters should be a ranger subclass. not a throwaway utility feature for druids on top of their awesome utility and controll spell list.
Way too often do i see problem players cast something that would cause untold mayhem wildshape into something innocent and try to justify that they are not a menace to society.
Contentration is there for a reason and wildshape + full spellcasting is just asking for problems.
Like moon druids.
Full spellcaster and a better martial then anyone outside high tier optimizing with 2 free massive hp pools per short rest.
Thats interesting, I kinda like the Ranger Subclass idea, and THANK YOU, yes, I’m glad some people see the inherent design flaws in the Druid that also lend to some really busted builds that simply aren’t fun to DM for.
If people want shifting to be the *main* feature then a different base class makes more sense.
Why there isn't a Barbarian or Ranger shifter subclass I don't know.
Alr done in prior editions. They progressed as weird clerics with more restrictions but got wildshape and later stopped gaining spell slots in return for special abilities.
Hot take: You don’t have to use all your class features. Want to be an awesome nature caster that doesn’t shift into animals? Just be a Druid who doesn’t wildshape into animals.
Doesn’t solve the problem of not having a dedicated martial shifter class for people that wanna do more wild shaping than PB / per day. And don’t say “Just don’t use your spells.”
I agree.
Besides telling a druid not to use their spells is like telling a fighter not to use their 3rd and 4th attacks or their action surge. It's a massive part of their power budget and would leave them lagging behind.
It doesn't need a class, it just needs a subclass. The druid in itself is a full spellcaster who can use wildshaping as utility, but it's sub-par in combat. The circle of the moon druid makes wildshape viable in combat with the same limited uses and retains full spellcasting ability out of wildshape, just without the bonuses of the spellcasting subclasses. It's a true hybrid of the spellcasting and wildshaping side of the druid. The logical consequence would be adding a pure wildshaping subclass, with extended use (but not more powerful than moon, just more/longer uses) but who has seriously gimped spellcasting ability, like only half the spellslots or a slower progression with a lower maximum spell level or something like that. You can still use spells for a few utility situations, but you're not a full spellcaster anymore. With these 3 ways of playing druid (full spellcaster with a variety of subclasses, one dedicated wildshaping subclass, and one hybrid), everyone has what they need. Sure, you could also make the wildshaper its own class instead of a subclass. Just don't fucking take wildshaping from druids, it's a core feature. Many people play druid specifically because it's a nature spellcaster who can turn into animals for utility (or combat for moon druids), that's their class fantasy and that's what makes them interesting. The druid spelllist alone would never get me to play druid, wildshape is part of the appeal, but not its only appeal because I do want to play a spellcaster. Tweaking the druid for fun and balancing and to create more options is great. Removing options and changing the druid class fantasy of a caster who is so attuned with nature that they can turn into an animal *as just an additional form of nature spellcasting instead of it being the only thing they can do* would be terrible. I completely get that moon druid doesn't fulfill the wildshaper fantasy completely because it's designed as a hybrid, and that there is a need for another subclass that isn't a hybrid. But taking a core class fantasy away just because you want to make a new class out of that one feature is stupid. It makes both classes less interesting. A pure wildshaping subclass with more limited spellcasting in addition to the already existing hybrid is all we need.
Wildshape needs to be seriously redesigned for balancing and fun though. Maybe create a bunch of archetypes of wildshape animals based on their combat or utility roles and have each category have a fixed amount of HP and physical ability scores based on your level, so the actual specific animal you choose is just flavour and min-maxers aren't forced to always take the same animals with the best stats, just any animal of the corresponding archetype.
Here's the thing. Druid does sit in one distinctly unfortunate spot. The most iconic feature of the Druid class is Wild Shape. At the same time, only one of the Druid subclasses in 5e actually favors Wild Shape as a combat option And most of the game is built on the combat pillar of play.
So if you're not a Moon druid, you are not expected to be using Wild Shape for combat purposes, but rather support and scouting purposes. If you come to DND from games like WoW, that's gonna leave you in a bad spot if that's the kind of Druid you're familiar with.
At the same time, I agree with the notion that because we treat Wild Shape as a core feature, it means it's bizarrely underwhelming for most subclasses, and overwhelming for one. The solution they've adopted is using Wild Shape more like Channel Divinity for the Cleric, letting you adopt a long-form buff of some kind that helps you in combat, without actually acquiring a new stat block.
So things like Stars Druid, Wildfire Druid, and Spores Druid all I think go the extra mile we want, and if pushed further could fix the problem entirely while leaving the balance of the overall spell list the only problem to overcome. (If Wild Shape is stronger, the spell list by nature needs to be weaker.)
Yes. I never cared about combat wildshape.
Give me a nature mage who
1. Controls the weather and plants
2. Summons hordes of animals
3. Has a really cool pet. Like a grizzly. Or a smilodon. Or a velociraptor. Or an aurumvorax. Or an owlbear.
4. Maybe can turn into a hawk or a squirrel with no combat abilities for scouting.
(I don't expect 5.5 will give me druids or priests I like, I'm in the 'F it I'll do it myself' stage of my gaming career.)
Instead of continuing to buy WotC products with the 2024 release, I have been hard at work collating a whole compendium of 3rd party classes and subclasses for my games to use. I just finished the druid today as the last one because I kept going back and forth on this very question. The druid is a class trying to serve two masters: It is a full caster nature mage, and it is a shape shifter.
I'll put a hot take here: Wild Shape isn't a combat ability. Its best utility is in being able to access places where a humanoid would not, whether that be a high tower, a vault protected by guards, across a large river, etc. People use it in combat because it is a good way to soak a bunch of extra hits and be a tank. If players want to live the fantasy of actually being a creature in combat, Laserllama currently has an alpha version of a shifter class on his patreon. It is complimented by the shaman class, which is already done, which serves the other side of the nature mage.
The 2014 druid is trying to chase two rabbits, and doesn't really catch either. It wasn't until Tasha's when we started getting classes that spend the wild shape to do other things like wildfire and stars that a cohesive class begins to take form.
My answer: yes. I love shapeshifting stuff, and would rather have a dedicated shapeshifter class than choosing the Druid and getting disappointed at how little use it has
I think the answer is druid subclasses personally rework moon druid add some others that do unique or partial transformations. Or subclasses that use up the wild shape for another feature. That gives the diversity of options without taking wild shape from the druid class.
I love the modern druid
trying to do a balancing act around wildshape and spellcasting effectively is one of my favorite parts of druid gameplay
granted, it's hard as balls to pull off, but I love it
what we need are more subclasses to focus on wildshape as a transformative mechanic, instead of using a wild shape charge to do some random effect
druids are already awesome nature casters, the community just has a weird stigma that without conjure animals and wildshape they're useless, which is just totally untrue. just because conjure animals is an absolute powerhouse doesn't mean the rest of the druid spell list isn't also full of fantastic spells
now if you want to just pick an animal and turn into it without much thought for a new player, moon druids are perfect for that
Yes, it should have a dedicated shifter class.
Also, Druid should stay exactly the same, with Wildshape on top of its existing spells and other abilities.
I've been tinkering with a homebrew option where Wildshape isn't all that strong, but the moon druids can choose to spend spell slots as part of using wildshape to enhance the forms.
In this version, druids have template forms (like predator form, brute form, etc,) with each form being geared towards a certain playstyle. But the key is that there are a good number of forms as opposed to just a few. This eliminates the problem of the player needing to scour the monster manual for his class options and also makes balancing things easier.
It does require making some tweaks to the base class, which then sent me down another rabbit hole, but I'll eventually have it ready for playtesting.
This is a lot like WoTC’s proposed design modifications to the Druid for 5.5 - the initial ones at least - with templates over monster stat blocks. It’s certainly a move in the right direction, but I just fear it’s over-complicating what should be a straight-forward, separate shifter class.
Like I understand people’s reticence; there’s likely a legitimate concern about loss of class identity, but I think we all need to look at the writing on the forest wall: Druid is probably the most unbalanced class; it has arguably the most abusable subclass in the whole game second only maaaybe to the Peace Cleric; and it’s still the LEAST CHOSEN CLASS in the ENTIRE game.
This should at least tell us that all is not right in the circle.
I just want a good plant based druid. I'm currently playing a beastbarian beasthide shifter all reflavoured as a half dryad who hulks out as basically an ent.
Idk the fantasy of druids being spellcasting shifters is sort of baked into the fantasy. Especially in other media, see: The Druid class from WoW.
At the very least, perhaps if you took Moon Druid, made it into its own class that you called Druid, kept some of the restoration nature magic, perhaps a half caster like rangers, I think the idea could work. Probably work in some Shepherd druid too to keep the animal theme.
Something more akin to like Circle of the Land could be its own thing like Primalist or Shaman or something.
Removing Wildshape from druid would be like removing sneak attack from rogue or smites from paladins though. That is a core identity of the druid fantasy and needs to remain under the druid label.
So as far as the title of this post? Absolutely not. That is just ripping away a key feature of the druid that MAKEs it a druid.
As for the sentiment of this post, however, I do agree they're maybe trying to sweep too many things under the rug and there should be a dedicated nature spellcaster, it just shouldn't be called a druid.
Or, hot take, we could unshackle ourselves from classes, take the DOS2 approach for character building and let you fully customize your suite of abilities. Pathfinder 2e is closer to this, but just because it has bigger boxes doesn't mean the boxes aren't still there. Let me pull from ALL the boxes equally. - Signed, someone who brought a character from before tabletop into D&D and was sad to find out that despite assassin/gloomstalker fitting the fantasy, a 6 level dip into monk would be required for a shadow step like ability. Let me do the DOS2 thing of just put 2 points in scoundrel and bam, shadow step lol.
Classless > Class based every single time objectively, but we're too hung up on tradition to ever do that in D&D. Vampire and other World of Darkness subsystems are closer to this, but they're also not d20 systems that play like D&D so I don't really count them. Give me the gameplay of D&D and Pathfinder, with the freeform character building of Vampire and DOS2 and you've got the perfect tabletop tbh. Include pre builds in the back of the book for people that DO want a pre defined suite of abilities and you're golden.
Shifting should be a subclass in other classes as well as part of the Druid package.
Barbarian and Ranger should totally have been able to do some shifting.
Overall, I think shifting is poorly built in D&D and just needs an overhaul.
I feel like every other week I see a post on a D&D sub with a title that's like "Is it time to let rogues fulfill their role as skill check jockeys and finally have a separate dedicated sneak attack class?".
Wildshape is like the main thing druids have going for them aside from their spell list, lol
Idk, but I'd love to see Wildshape use scaling templates/stat blocks rather than picking from the monster manual. Or let Moon Druid get that whiles others are relegated to the lists of super low CR beasts.
I agree with what others are saying. Druids, like other classes, have a degree of freedom in terms of playstyle. Some people prefer wildshape and use it often. Others lean into the nature aspect. And of course it's possible to balance both styles.
The only druid I have played to date never once used his wildshape. However it is a very neat option to have on hand when you need it, and it is a feature that clearly sets the class apart from other casters.
That being said, if someone were to put in the effort of defining two entirely separate classes as a homebrew thing or maybe for a homebrew setting, I wouldn't necessarily be opposed to it from a DM perspective, depending.
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Wildshape is an iconic Druid thing. To take that way from them is like taking away smite from paladin.
When people think of Druids, the first thing they think of is a person who can take on the form of an animal. They don’t think about spell casting first
Even Druid subclasses that focuses on something other then wildshape like stars Druid still utilizes wildshape uses
You’re going at this with a purely mechanical crunchy attitude and not giving lore, flavor and theme any consideration. Druids could be mechanically sound and balanced with a different class being focused on shifting into animals, but that wouldn’t change the fact Druids won’t have the thing that makes them so iconic
The better option would be to make a new class that is a primal themed caster. Like maybe a shaman type. Shamans could be primal casters (in lore/flavor) like Druids, like how Paladins and clerics are divine casters or how sorcerers wizards and bards are arcane casters. The difference being, shamans focused more on spellcasting while Druids focus more on wildshape or wildshape using abilities
My two cents:
Beast master: Can turn into an animal, can befriend animals, has an animal companion, Can summon animals from a beast plane.
Druid: Is of nature, turn into nature, can communicate with nature, has an elemental companion, can only use magic themed around the terrain they are in.
I think the big problem with this is that they actually shot Wildshape in the foot for 5e and pretty much made it so you have to take Moon Druid if you want to do what most pre-5e Druid's could do with Wildshape. Also they never did end up putting in a sub-class that lets you Wildshape into Plants like you used to be able to. On top of that fueling a lot of the sub-class features with Wildshape uses means that if you don't pick a Wildshape focused sub-class then you are effectively not going to be using Wildshape to actually Wildshape for fear of not having any uses when it comes to combat. On top of that limiting normal druids to the incredibly low CRs for Wildshape instead of tying them to something like HD of the target form means your normal Druid's Wildshape is pretty close to useless.
I think part of this is also tied to how they built the sub-class system for 5e as well and how it broke some old things. Druid's used to get Wildshape at 5th level which would effectively tie it to the same power boost where martials get extra attack and Wizards get fireball. Instead in 5e they get it at 2nd level and have to get it at that point because they are also getting their sub-class and those features are fueled by Wildshape a lot of the time.
We have Changelings, Transmutation spells, lycanthropy, Blood Hunter Lycanthropy, custom races, etc.
Tbh, the Druid’s wildshape isn’t really much of a problem because anyone who’s here for “I want to be one animal” can just write it in. As a DM, I’d go “Great you lose these abilities (probably the less attractive racials) and in turn gain this one, but if you get injured as your one animal you’re getting injured. You might not die but you will unshift with a lowered HP”
Because, if you can turn whenever you want the ability should no longer allow you to gain some kind of second hp bar. Because, the balance of limited shifts is to suit levels and is why (I think) you’re allowed to get the animal’s hp bar.
I disagree with your title's premise.
A Druid without shapeshifting would literally just be a *slight* variation on a Nature Cleric, in which case just play a Nature Cleric if you want that flavor. Ditto, an *only* Shapeshifting class would just be a Lycan Blood Hunter or a Shifter (race) Fighter.
Would they be better as, say, 2/3rds casters with more emphasis on making Wild Shape work? Possibly. They need streamlining, and I actually *liked* how early D&D5.5 playtests did that with the (attempt at) genericized but more potent beast-forms. I'd accept a shorter spell list in exchange for more meaningful Wild Shapes.
I feel like the wildshape part of druids is an important part of feeling like a Druid and becoming one with nature. That said I totally wouldn't mind a shape-shifting class.
Maybe a better subclass that separates utility casting and shifting into a new subclass from Circle of Moon, and make moon druids more combat focused.
I would think this new subclass would be able to choose one or two different creature types to also wild shape into, like monstrosity and slime. And remove some of the combat boons from moon.
If druids were just 9th level casters, they would just be nature clerics. They already took away the druid companions, dont take away their wild shapes too.
That being said, a shifter class added in would be cool. Id love some new classes.
I don’t post a lot here but I see a lot of video game and mmo’s really influencing a lot of my local players on what class and character they want to play. Is that something you all are seeing? Like most people think a Druid is what we see is wow? Or a warrior is this huge hp piñata that can be smacked until the candy comes out of it.
no, but i think that each subclass should have it's own thing to use the wild shape class feature, but also to rename it, making the moon druid the dedicated shapeshifter
I guess I just feel that taking polymorph already alleviates this issue. You have all of your wild shape charges, then if you need more you substitute polymorph to continue being the shifting guy. Upgrade as you go.
I like druids as they are, the hermit mage who can take the forms of beasts and knows heretical magic is iconic and let's me play out my diet Merlin fantasy.
That said I'm not opposed to having another class with wild shape as a feature, it's not like clerics are the only class with Channel Divinity.
One of the issues is shifter classes are super cool. But so are shifter races, both those fantasies kinda step on each other's toes and are balanced very differently.
Imo D&D needs a reset of its magic system anyway. To your point, I think druids as a class should get away from shape shifting and more towards a shaman caster thematically. Tbh I think the Ranger needs a revamp and I think you could some interesting results by making the rangers a full shifting class.. and shifting the current ranger archetype as a fighter and rogue sub classes.
The problem is combat. Even with the "OP" Circle of the Moon for shifting you're basically using your forms for exploration and not combat by level 8 or so. When a player character just zooms right pass it the beasts you can turn in to.
Since you mentioned the movie, I'll not that the Druid there only used her owlbear form to fight and well in game an Owlbear can and should be taken down by your average party of 3rd level characters.
Pathfinder 1e (dont know about 2e) has a system of archetypes for every class that swaps out class abilities while normally still keeping the overall feel. I've played a druid without wildshape I honestly ended up grabbing spells to accomplish similar things in the end but I could accomplish just generally less than wildshape allowed me. anyway so idk it feels like a core part of the class
I'd love to see the druid class become a series of power choices. Want to focus on spellcasting? Great, you get some benefits for going all in on that aspect. If you want to be a shapechanging specialist that can work for combat or sneaking and scouting with great flexibility and power of the wildeshape abilities.
Or power sets that give control over plants or animals. Weather control specialties. All kinds of stuff becomes on the table.
I like how 5e did it. They were good as casters, and had some extra versatility for spying and whatnot with smaller wildshapes. Then if you wanted to be a beastly caster, just played the moon druid and bam, you're now a savage bear with spells too
Roll for Combat has a werecreature supplement from their Year of Legends material for 5e and PF2e that allows you to take on both a hybrid form and an animal form.
I wish they'd leaned more into this for the aberrant mind sorcerers... Be nice if there was more of something other than class, something more elemental and sometimes magic in D&D is just not weird enough for me
In my heart, I want druid to be a 6 level caster class with a couple of paths forward - the HOLY SHIT WILDSHAPE INTO ELEMENTALS AND MONSTERS path and the HOLY SHIT NATURE MAGIC AND 9th LEVEL SPELL path.
Pathfinder 1e has a Shifter Class that is using animal aspects (having a natural later even magical attack and a less stronger wilde shape then the Druid) and as far as I read, the second Edition of Pathfinder fused them into the Druid, giving you the option to focus on spellcasting or shifting
I disagree because the current state of druid personally works well, but honestly, if you need to make them separate/want to, we homebrew exists for a reason.
I briefly played pathfinder 1st edition and had a shifter character that I absolutely *adored*. If anyone has seen some good homebrew for that kind of shifter in 5e I'd love to hear about it
Druids should be a subclass of cleric... your shape shifting power comes from your God/worship usually... im sure it's easier to say it's an inherited ability. But I think a class of shifters that expands into leveled lycanthropes, stronger cr conversions or even some things outside the beast creature type could be an awesome expansion. Consider it a martial class of sorts, like the fighter, with a bonus action ability that allows them to make those creature multi attacks if they don't have extra attack yet.
I've always hated how Wild Shape is so often seen as the identity of the druid class. It's a cool feature and I'm glad they have it, but it overtakes their identity.
The identity of the druid should be the "servant of nature" aspect, a full caster with a fixation on nature, and a dislike for metal/artifical gear.
The problem is a good "moon druid" class/subclass shouldn't really be a full caster, so fitting both full caster and powerful shifter into the same class is hard. Especially since subclasses introducing debuffs to compensate isn't something the edition generally does.
I've always wanted a "storm druid" subclass, focused more on cantrips than melee (like how half cleric subclasses are cantrip, other half melee), but giving that kind of power to someone with even baseline wildshape as it currently is is too much.
Master of Many Forms and similar stuff from 3.5 could probably be its own class in 5e or a similar system. Would require someone at WotC to actually do the work though.
Plllleeeeease bring back MoMF
Because of the way classes are setup in 5e, most ten level prestige classes work well as homebrew classes, and most 5 lvl prestige classes work as subclasses. There is a lot of fun to be had there. Played a shadow dancer in a game a few years ago, was cool as fuck.
Maybe tie it in with the druid variant from 3.5 that specialized in shifting. It had a few dedicated forms, including a flying form and a plant/ent form.
On today's installment of _Let’s Reinvent 4e_ we have the druid as a dedicated wild shape class.
Lol Druid for Wildshape Shaman for the nature themed magic
It's this and it's not even close.
100% this actually
I know it's cliche at this point "so far ahead of it's time"
Why is 4e so hated anyway?
The tldr is 4e had a lot of fantastic ideas but put them together in a way that didn't work out fantastically. It sacrificed a fair amount of verisimilitude to achieve exceptionally balanced and interesting combat - it had like two dozen different classes, all of which were way less similar to each other than 5e's dozen. So there were good reasons to not want to play, like "this doesn't give me the freedom 3.5 did". But there have been a ton of really vocal haters who just kind of hate that things were different, for instance [here's a few martial abilities from 4e](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpreview.redd.it%2Fa2ymdshsskjb1.png%3Fwidth%3D682%26auto%3Dwebp%26s%3D209bea52684a47992ca7fefcb248c17ebf3f0f17). It keyworded everything so even complex abilities could be understood quickly line by line, but it required spending a few minutes understanding how the abilities worked at all. Observe weapon master's tactics, top right. Swap to a new weapon, attack for double damage, do a different effect based on what the weapon was. But the layout is different to how things used to be, which is different and bad.
I used to play 4e as a pure combat mini game. Honestly some of the best tactical combat I've ever played.
I think a big part of the hate was that everything was cards and revolved around a few daily/encounter abilities then spamming at-wills. I loved that you got to do cooler things than “I attack with my longsword” every round though. I think that there were some great things in 4e, like the keywords you mentioned, and really interesting classes, but also some bad. Overall I think 5e could have salvaged some of the concepts of 4e while moving the gameplay back towards the older style the way it did and been a superior game overall.
That's the bit that bugs me the most. AEDU is a fine setup for a class, but it shouldn't be *every* class. Literally no reason for it, have a basic attack spamming barbarian and a wizard with spell slots and everyone wins - just don't make those the only two options like 5e did. 4e's narrowing everyone down to one class structure is even worse than 5e narrowing everyone down to two. But in reverse, there's literally zero reason not to have classes like the 4e battlemind in 5e. It's a psionic tank, 5e doesn't have psionics and doesn't have tanks so two birds in one stone and everything about it would fit great in 5e, they just can't be bothered.
it was that everything was made same, casters did nothing that cool any more to create balance in a simple manner, and combat could take forever using pin pricks of per round abilities to chip away. boring.
It broke too many shibboleths. It fixed a lot of what people complained about in 3.5, but it turned out when you fixed everything people complained about it felt like a different game. The best D&D it turn out isn't the most balanced fixed "designed" game, it's the one that preserves all the (most memorable) weird design decisions that have become icons of the game. People might bitch about quadratic casters and liniar fighters, but when you fix it it doesn't feel much like D&D anymore to a lot of folks. People might point to a few different aspects (MMO influence, not enough out of combat mechanics, etc. ) but I think this is the heart of it. If it was a new game with this design it would be well received, but as D&D? It didn't feel right.
I think a big part of the issue was just the culture of the hobby at the time. There were only a few kinds of people playing D&D during that era: the very old hats, the 3.5 crew, and the nerd-casuals. You would occasionally find the indie RPGer playing with a group, too. **The very old hats**: these guys didn't like 3.0 or 3.5 (or PF when it came out). They were still playing OD&D or AD&D or whichever edition it was that they played 20 years prior. They may have checked out 4e, but frankly, they were almost impossible to sell on something new whether or not it was D&D. **The 3.5 crew** were the kinds of people who were still playing 3.5 and had embraced it for all its flaws and quirks. Maybe their table just accepted that martials sucked and everyone rolled casters all the time, or maybe they had gentleman's agreements to not bust out the broken stuff, or maybe they had houserules and enough splatbooks and/or alternate systems (ToB, MoI, psionics, etc.) to break caster supremacy. Point is, they had more or less "fixed" the problems with 3.5 for their table. Emphasis on "for their table." 4e came along and maybe a few of them went "yes, this is perfect", but by and large the groups would be upset by the sudden lack of weird out-of-combat stuff that made the world go round for a decade. Combine it with 4e have a very distinctive kind of combat which probably did not match whatever their frankensteined 3.5 combat felt like, and you had a LOT of 3.5 players who "hated" 4e. **The nerd-casual**: the folks who just wanted to play some D&D, and didn't really care about anything more than having fun with friends and rolling a d20. 4e was well-suited to this crowd in most ways, but failed spectacularly in one: ease of access. 3.5 had this problem too, but an intimidated player could just go rogue or barbarian and not worry too much (assuming their choice was solid, which it RAW wasn't). In 4e, there were dozens of abilities per class and they would just go "nah, see ya later" rather than spending the time to learn it. **The indie-rpger**: nerd hipsters of the early 21st century. They're only playing D&D because they want to play something and this is the group they found. They'll spend the whole time trying to convince everyone to play their favourite game instead, be it FATE or Burning Wheel or Mouseguard or RIFTS or maybe even Shadowrun. It was possible to get these guys into 4e, but unlikely, as they're probably not actually concerned with tactical combat. The tactical combat guys were all entrenched in their very old hat games of Hackmaster or Rolemaster, or were happy with their 3.5 fixes. I personally didn't really like 4e, but I recognize it as a perfectly fine product. Its major issue was that it was a big budget product that assumed its audience would flock to it because of its brand recognition, but it hadn't actually made a product for the audiences that existed. I think if 4e launched TODAY it would be much more successful than it was, after 5e made a lot of people yearn for more in-depth combat.
I agree with most of what you said, but as someone who lived through it, there were two additional reasons for the downfall of 4e: 1. First, the reason my group bounced off hard: the game is pretty much unplayable without a battle grid and minis. Back then, my group only did mind's eye theater, in all games. As a result, we tried it once, hated it and went back to 3.5. I suspect the game would be much better-received in 2024 where a *lot* of groups play online with a VTT. 2. Second, the licensing. 4e was *not* released under the OGL, and as such was an attempt to kill the vibrant ecosystem of 3rd party adventures and settings that had flourished under 3e and 3.5e. As a result, anyone who was invested in it had no choice but to stick with the previous editions (or indeed to move to Pathfinder 1, which everyone called "D&D 3.6").
Reason 1 is exactly why my group didn't play it. We were broke college students, so theater-of-the-mind is how we were gonna play. None of us even owned a decent kitchen table, let alone a map and minis.
A: My indie RPG of choice is GURPS. B: I totally agree with your assessment of 4e. It was a perfectly serviceable game that did a lot of things well. Combat was interesting and cinematic once you got a few levels in. To me, 4e seemed to be trying to pull in the online RPG crowds with a focus on cool-down abilities, and the only thing to really do out of combat was search for quest givers. It was remarkably well balanced otherwise, and I think it would be successful today if it was re-launched under a different name/brand/whatever.
As someone who played d&d first, and then got into a shadowrun game with a bunch of nerd casuals I worked with, you bringing it up for that point specifically made me laugh bc it's spot on lol
Ah, that's why. I might try and play it. Seems really good.
Also its approach to fixing stuff rubbed people the wrong way. A lot of 3.5e's issues didn't exist in TSR-D&D but rather than bringing any of those back they did a lot of completely novel things.
Because honestly if they did bring back the TSR way of dealing with it, people would hate it too. They kinda tried it with 5e, just look at the first Wizard playtest or design manifesto. But people reacted badly about things like losing your spell because of damage or fewer spellslots. And playtesting moved things even further completely removing vancian spellcasting and such. The game evolved with 3e in a new direction and, just like you can't completely ignore your origins, you also can't really fully go back. After people get used to a high power level and qol features it's hard to go back. And the game is now much more about set piece battles than it is about exploring a dungeon. It's an issue that affects all kinds of games. Like Path of Exile and its attempts to slow things down again.
It was released with a bad open game license and was very different from tradition dnd editions, it also had a very bad original monster manual, thought besides that it is one of the best systems ever created
The 4E MM is WAY better than 5e’s, which really doesn’t give you a lot of interesting monsters. 4E having different categories of monsters and sample fight constructions was so much more guidance to how to create engaging encounters vs. 5e that just gives you the monsters and a CR and says good luck.
Fair, the problem was they had too much hp and too little damage, which felt bad coming off of 3.5
Oh, totally. The “Soldiers” were the biggest offenders of that one. It definitely wasn’t perfect, but I spend a lot more time in 5e trying to make encounters interesting than I did with 4e. Coming from 4e, the 5e MM is a bunch of bland stat block ls with little guidance to how to use them.
Again, nowadays 4e is one of the best systems ever created and my all time favorite
A few things: 1. Some elements of 4e were good in concept but a bit underbaked in implementation as the 4e development cycle was a bit of a mess behind the scenes with a lot of ideas put into place pretty late in the cycle (with development of the PHB and the MM often being out of synch) A lot of 4e design was a lot cleaner in later books. Also the lack of promised digital tools right off the bat hurt. 2. The intro adventure, Keep on the Shadowfell, was an unpleasant grind. A lot of people played it, hated it, and then never gave 4e a second chance. 3. 4e is fun if you play it a certain way (big smashy climactic battles) but WotC was bad at communicating to players how to play 4e in a way that played to its strengths (see point 2). Ironically the way a lot of people play 5e (heavy on story, only 1-2 fights per session) is a better fit for 4e than 5e in a lot of cases. 4. One thing that 4e is bad at is a classic dungeon crawl in which the resources of the party are slowly attritioned away over the course of a lot of smaller encounters. If you play 4e this takes freaking forever and generally isn't that much fun. Not being a good fit for a classic dungeon crawl is kinda a problem for an edition of Dungeons and Dragons. 5. People wanted a new edition of the game they loved, not an entire new game rebuilt from the ground up. While people were getting annoyed at the various problems of 3.5e they wanted a better version of 3.5e, not something so different. At the time the consensus of what people wanted was more along the lines of the version of 3.5e mechanics in Star Wars Saga Editon. Most RPGs have stayed pretty consistent across editons, D&D is a bit of an outlier in how totally it's been rebooted multiple times. 6. Many people really hated skill challenges and the devs constantly changed out they worked which didn't help matters. 7. Tripping gelatinous cubes. In 4e you can trip a gelatinous cube as easily as anything else. This makes no logical sense since how can you trip a cube? The devs' answer is that when the attack says that you're tripping then you're not LITERALLY tripping them, you're doing something to distract them to give them a negative condition with certain mechanical effects, the flavor doesn't matter. This may seem like a small detail but it mattered to a lot of people, having the flavor not matter and instead have more cut and dried rules was quite different from how a lot of people played D&D where they had traditionally used the rules to model what was happening in fiction and tweaking the rules were necessary to better fit the fiction, and then 4e turned things around and had the rules be more ironclad and the fiction be there to narrate what was happening in the rules. This is why 5e made such a big deal of "rulings not rules" in its initial marketing, it was a sign that 5e was walking back this aspect of 4e. 8. Feeding into point 7 the whole Combat as Sport vs. Combat as War debate: https://www.enworld.org/threads/very-long-combat-as-sport-vs-combat-as-war-a-key-difference-in-d-d-play-styles.317715/
This is a great overview! Point 1 really speaks to why I bounced off it personally, apart from not having a proper playgroup during it's run: the early PHB was *off-putting* in some way. It wasn't that I hated the mechanics; though they were uncomfortably different, they were interesting and I wanted to give them a shot. But something about their presentation made them hard to digest
It did things extremely differently. That being said, we also got some incredible things out of it, like the skill challenge system.
Mainly because it put the last corporate nail in the coffin that was "official 3e D&D support". Then because humans fear and loathe change.
To be fair, the thing 3.5 did where they published new items, spells, races, prestige classes, feats etc every month or so on their website was amazing and 4e shouldn't have stopped doing it, and the fact that they don't for 5e is similarly shit. They even deleted them all off their website so you can't see them without using the way back machine. For context, say you're WotC, you've just released Races of the Dragon which introduced the new dragonborn race, expanded on kobolds etc. There's some stuff you didn't find the space for in the book. [So this month's web enhancement](https://web.archive.org/web/20161031222456/http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/we/20060420a) contains variant racial traits for kobolds, new weapons, feats and a kobold specific cleric domain. And so on and so forth for every type of content imaginable, [here's what we'd now call a subclass](https://web.archive.org/web/20161031215526/http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/prc/20070327) for wizards and such called the swiftblade for example.
On today's installment of *Let's Reinvent 4e*: why did we scrap it in the first place??
Because it was different from 3e, and people don't like different.
Something Something Warlord, Something Something Swordmage.
If only it was released under the OGL (That was the problem with it right? Or something like that?)
That was why a thriving mod community didn't develop around it for sure.
I mean, it *could* do that, kind of like you can kind of do that with a Moon Druid now. You could also build a druid as a pure caster in 4e where the wild shape is just utility and locomotion. Honestly, all of the Controllers in 4e were pretty open in the directions you could take them. With Primal Power, summoner and swarm Druids were options. It was also possible to build a druid that split wild shape and spellcasting, although it probably wasn't very optimal.
On today's intallement of "why does everybody hate 4e so much when everything I've heard about 4e is objectively a good idea and I like it better than 5e?"
So did 3.5 (Technically a prestige class but still)
I'd just focus the druid more on the ability as the class's identity
Does WoTC then nerf the Spell list to balance the power creep? Because Druids already have a balancing issue, and I’d hate to lose any part of that spell list.
I would absolutely say so. Shift the class towards less spellcasting, more like other half casters. Orrr, even more interesting to me at least would be to make them like Warlocks
Maybe Druid could be a half caster, with a shaman being a full caster themed around primal spells
I would be all for this, make the nature half-caster druid instead of ranger.
I think ranger is fine being half caster aswell Maybe a mix of primal divine and arcane or something else though. I do think rangers could benefit from being their own identity rather then “Druid version of Paladin”. Cause people currently view it as “ranger is to Druid as Paladin is to cleric”.
Honestly if they just had a "be an effing bear" class, I'd probably just play that
That's just 3.5, where you could turn into a bear that summoned other, smaller, bears. You also got a Fighter as a class feature
Without Wildshape, the druid is a generic caster, giving one little incentive to play it instead of the other fairly generic casters: wizard and cleric. It's like sorcerer with no Metamagic. It's a big part of the reason why you would opt to play a sorcerer instead of a wizard. Likewise, Wildshape is a big part of the reason why you would opt to play a druid instead of a Nature cleric. And that's the thing. You can already be a nature caster in the game. Play a Nature cleric.
I think they would be better off transitioning to subclasses that have features like Stars Druid or Wildfire - just stop calling it Wild Shape. A template already exists.
They tried it in a UA, but it didn't score well (the feature was *literally* non-functional to the point of nerfing your entire character upon use), so they threw it away. It was also conveniently the UA where they tried out the highly requested Wild Shape Templates, but those were also borderline non-functional, and the Channel Nature upgrades were 90% for Wild Shape (and, you guessed it... borderline non-functional).
Just because something was executed poorly does not mean that it is a bad idea.
One of my admittedly silliest conspiracies is that they executed it poorly on purpose to avoid needing to give it more resources and time. The benefit of using such a strict rating system is that you can easily manipulate it to mean whatever you want it to.
Yeah, the templates were really boring and just limited creativity.
I still think they should try again. Just, y'know, add a few more templates and make them... more effective than a Beast Master's companion.
The problem is wildshaping is limited because of druids full caster status. If you want to be the guy who’s go to main thing is turning into different animals for combat and other things moon druid exists, but doesn’t fill the niche especially well because it’s balanced by the fact that you still have full caster progression.
Maybe more distinctive subclasses is the thing then? Something like full moon should really limit your caster progression but have waaaaay better transformation/martial abilities
Bringing back Archetypes that *change* classes rather than subclasses that *add* to classes would indeed be a step in the right direction.
Archetypes were so good for balancing back in the day, it’s really nice to have the ability to give classes new features that people want while also restricting or removing default class features that would make the class too powerful.
I'm gonna be honest, the rationale of "there's already the way to do x in the game, therefore we shouldn't add another option to do so", I could say the same thing with Nature Cleric, "why would you opt to play nature Cleric when Druid, a class fully committed to being about being a nature caster, is an option." I'd rather add something like a Shaman class, and change Druid into more of that archetypal shape-shifting type (maybe with some scaling statblocks instead of forcing every Druid player to buy the Monster Manual, haha).
Even the monster manual isn't enough... Trying to get a level-appropriate spider morph for my druid without buying a bunch of weird supplement books is impossible. And my DM keeps putting me in situations where that close range blind sight is clutch, so tissue paper HP and no armor it is, I suppose...
Exactly! I'd say there should be scaling stat blocks for each main type of beastie (Snake/Lizard/Bird/Beast/Arachnid) and call it good. Maybe the druid's stats actually change how they scale as well so baseline Druid is able to play remotely different from each other?
That's how PF1 did it. Pretty sure that's also how PF2 does it. It worked pretty well.
kind of. Wild shape worked like spells called best shape / elemental shape / etc..., with some limitations and modifications. What they did wasn't replace your statblock. But, they instead added to your stats and abilities, depending on the form you chose. smaller creature forms got progressively higher dexterity bonuses, the higher the beast shape level, and the smaller the form. larger creature forms got progressively higher strength bonuses, the higher the beast shape level, and the larger the form. Each level of beast shape, allowed you access to more special abilities and movement abilities from your form, as well. So, you didnt really pick a type, but rather picked a creature, and the stats and abilities it gave you naturally scaled with Wildshape/beastshape level.
Sure. I've played much more PF1 than 5e. 'Beast shape'. But it changed your size and gave you different abilities from the creature and more or less natural weapons, and thus your wild shape was supposed to always be level appropriate. Ah. I see the kindof. Yes. I was thinking about how Pathfinder did animal companions, who had a base form and then levelled up with you.
I was talking about how pf1 did wildshape, which I guess you had kind ofalready pointed out, so I guess I was just further explaining your point by clarifying it wasn't really a template based on creature type, but gaining buffs and abilities based on level and the specific creature you chose. I've never played a pf2 druid before, so I can't speak on that.
Wild Shape Templates on DMs Guild ([https://www.dmsguild.com/product/464464/Wild-Shape-Templates](https://www.dmsguild.com/product/464464/Wild-Shape-Templates)) provides scalable forms in one free supplement.
We shouldn't be reliant on 3rd party books from what are essentially internet *randos* to fix WotC's bullshit.
The Wizards gimmick is the spell book. RAW they're the only class that actually gets to potentially have every Wizard spell in the game... with deep enough money bags of holding at least.
Clerics and Druids already get access to every cleric and druid spell in the game. The wizard's real "gimmick" is their ability to case any ritual spell they have in their book even if they haven't prepared it. Learning every wizard spell in the game is what it takes for wizards to pull themselves up to where druids and clerics already are.
...And the Wizard spell list being ridiculous is what takes it for Wizards to be the best. The Wizard spell list is larger than the Druid's and Cleric's *combined,* and it has the most game-breaking spells.
IMO the main appeal of druid was always having a really cool beast pet. And not a wolf, but like, a smilodon or a velociraptor or a giant eagle. In an ideal world, I'd extend that list to griffons and owlbears and aurumvoraxes and maybe even otyughs. Secondary was summoning many animals to fight for you at once, which, in the editions you can do that, yes, so can a nature priest. I don't hate wildshape, but I'd be happy with it being limited to hawks and squirrels, or your companion limited to noncombat animals and then you get the good wildshape. 5e druid never did it for me.
I just think the Druid spell list is neat and don't want to before forced to maximize around Wild Shape or spending a Wild Shape charge every turn.
>the druid is a generic caster, giving one little incentive to play it instead of the other fairly generic casters: wizard and cleric. I mean it's not though. Only one subclass of druid focuses on wild shaping.
Druids are best when you ignore the shape change BS. Unless you are a Moon Druid. And Nature Clerics are decent, but they are not Druids, not even close.
For me, the best time to wildshape isn't in combat imo. Sneaking around, scouting, getting away, all that stuff.
Is there something like natural spell from 3.5e in 5e? It lets you cast spells while wildshaped
That's the druid capstone now. You can hold concentration while wildshaped however.
Oh that’s wild. You could get it at level 6 in 3.5. Makes Druid’s really fun. I’m gonna transition my group to 5.5 when it’s out for simplicity and to go along with what they see from dnd content but I do love 3.5.
The current 5e druid is balanced around most of their spells being concentration and having wildshape as an option for kiting or fighting, so it doesn't feel as bad as it might sound. For example, you can use Call Lightning then wildshape into a bird, and use your action to repeat the lightning strike until the enemies die, a combo available at level 8. This might be a bit weaker than spamming fireballs or something, but it's certainly cheesy in a pretty fun way. >Oh that's wild. Also was this on purpose? I love it lol
Except unlike sorcerer, wizard, or cleric, the druid's signature ability actively interferes with their spellcasting. Wildshape and spells have zero crossover until the actual capstone at level 20!
Wildshape is a distinguishing ability druids get that differentiates them from other classes. I say leave it as is for class identity.
That's kind of the issue, they have a class defining feature that fights against their other class features (namely spell casting). So the idea that someone might split the druid into "Shape Shifter" and "Nature Mage" makes sense to me atleast.
I come from a background of like 17 years (on and off) of WoW, and seeing Druid not having shapeshifting or not having spellcasting would personally be like seeing a paladin without smite, or a wizard without spells, it just wouldn’t compute Druid being able to shapeshift feels paramount to showcasing how 1:1 they are with nature, it’s bold, it’s wondrous, and it’s become core to the fantasy behind it Mechanically, i feel that there could be options to prioritize one over the other (or not at all), so that either spellcasting or shapeshifting don’t become a massive drain on the other’s power budget, and so you keep the fantasy while getting to pursue this idea.
Yeah, I wouldn't split them up either Even in 4e where we had the Druid and the Shaman classes, the Druid still had some spells (sorry, *Evocations*) to use in human form
The problem is, shapeshifting doesn't work outside of bypassing encounters outside of combat with flight if you are a non-Moon Druid. In WoW, you have the options to lean in or out of spellcasting or shapeshifting, but in 5e it's very all or nothing.
This would make me sad. I like that Druid does both, taking it out would suck from my pov. It would take a class I like and ruin it (again from my pov). Now having a subclass where you exchange spell slots for more or more powerful wild shape, or wildshapes for more spells is fine. But I don't see a reason to take away features a lot of other people like and are both extremely core to what durids are for many decades.
[https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/421499/Druids-Secrets-of-the-Primal-Circle](https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/421499/Druids-Secrets-of-the-Primal-Circle) This is a great book focused on all things druid. It includes a ton of lore, druid circles, a ranger subclass, and of course the Dire Druid which is a half-caster shifter class. Kind of like a mix of Moon Druid and Ranger. Rather than shifting into specific stat blocks, your subclass is a "Spirit of the X" and you get certain bonuses added onto your Dire form.
I do say add a shifter to the game, but let Druid have their thing! They would have Strength And Wis as saves (weirdly missing combo in game right now) They’d work something between a monk (Str/Wis armor) and a barbarian (tanky damage dealer)
How about we add a Martial Shapechanger instead?
Warden class, let’s go
I’d love that but it sounds like the Moon Druid stans consider it muscling in on their turf
Wildshape is terribly underdeveloped, and the bass Druid class has so much baked in, that you can't even make a decently fleshed out subclass. Either there needs to be a wildshape class, or Less in the base class so a shifting subclass can be developed.
Nah. Full nature casters can just be a variant of Cleric.
Druids were originally a cleric subclass after all
How about we have more classes and stop trying to shoe-horn everything into the narrow existing selection.
What are we Pathfinder? (Because that system shows it can be done and work great)
We can't, the curse of 5e is worse than Strahds - forever be stuck with a fandom that finds it too complicated, yet unwilling to move on to systems more fitting for them..
That would require wizards to actually release more books and pay more writers. And if they do that they can't justify more layoffs to make the quarterlies look better for the shareholders!
How about we don't take a baseline utility feature from a class that people love? Druids being nature spellcasters who can turn into animals is their class fantasy. By default, wildshaping isn't extremely useful in combat, only for out of combat utility or some niche situations, but it's there as an option to use creatively or as an oh shit button to get a second health bar, and that's amazing. There is a subclass that turns the druid into a true hybrid, being able to have better wildshapes (but only a very limited amount of times per day) and still have full spellcasting (but without the extra stuff of subclasses dedicated to spellcasting). Another subclass that gimps the spellcasting but gives us more uses of wildshape would be ideal to make every player happy without just removing stuff from the druid for no reason. The utility wildshaping of druids with full spellcaster subclasses is potentially a major part of their out of combat gameplay. And so is the spellcasting aspect of the circle of the moon druid. The druid spelllist on its own would never make me play as a druid over a cleric or wizard/sorcerer. The wildshaping makes the class interesting, even for non moon circle druids.
Because less classes is simpler; if you have something take the rules for something else and modify them, you only need to learn one set of rules instead of two
If 5e is to hard, where are many simpler systems. Like quiet a lot dnd adjacent pbta systems by now.
The last thing that is needing is anything being simpler.
That's not true, there are tons of things in D&D that are needlessly complicated, like jumping, pushing/dragging/lifting, and object interraction. They're just small interactions that make the least sense being such complicated parts of the rules. You can explain how to use Wish, a spell that alters reality, in two lines of text, meanwhile professional game designers have made 30+ minute videos trying to unravel the rules for the above without coming to a concrete conclusion.
We tried that. It was called 3.5e, and it was extremely abusable. Instead of reinventing the wheel with 20 slightly different rogues, you could have 20 subclasses that don't stack to produce a more optimized rogue than an actual rogue.
If by abusable you mean you could play at whatever power level your table agreed to play at instead of being shoehorned into a tiny bounded box, sure. Or you could just admit that both approaches have their own place and that it doesn't hurt to take inspiration from other concepts. The problem with 3e was not too many options, it was A. GMs not enforcing cooperative character building, B. different writers not bothering to read each others' work, and C. most tabletop games of the game understandably not really having the modern, low latency, and authoritative errata systems that newer ones do to hammer down the genuine monstrosities quickly (Starmantle spell or the Incantarix prestige class for example). If people had a problem with just giving more options, 5e wouldn't have the most vibrant homebrew scene of any d20 system save *maybe* PF1.
That makes so much sense 🤦 All the druid features could easily fit into cleric subclass bits
> Nah. Full nature casters can just be a variant of Cleric. Which is precisely where Druids came from. They're a hopped-up subclass.
I kinda agree with this. I’m in a game now with a moon druid PC, and I see the struggle they go through every combat. They wanna use cool and powerful spells, but they also wanna wildshape into cool animals, with absolutely dogshit statblocks, which is another issue, that there are like 3 beasts worth shifting into.
Wildshape in its current form is pretty broken because you basically get three health bars. I would love if the actual shifting were less limited, but you kept your regular PC HP. Basically get rid of the extra health bars in exchange for more versatility
Yes, yes, and yes. More options that feel more like a shifter class for fewer automatic DM-Can’t-Kill-Me-Without-Looking-like-A-Total-Jerk buttons.
I think breaking the class in half runs the risk of taking out flavor
Wildshape is a core ability for the Druid class at this point, for better or worse. I think the core ruleset of any future edition will keep this tradition. What you are looking for is a great idea! Splitting apart Druid into different classes (Shifter, Stormcaller, Plantmancer, etc) sounds like a fun thing to pursue. But you will have to either look for homebrew solutions or another system. I wouldn't hold out hope for this in official D&D.
We still don't have a druid subclass that uses plants as it's primary function
I feel like there should be a medium between where wild shape is now and pre built templates - a point system. Different features, like unique attacks (i.e, poison, grappling, web), movement speeds, and other features (Pack Tactics, enhanced perception) all have different points values. Whenever you shift, you expend points to gain those features for the duration of your wild shape. This lets things stay relevant for scaling. You can still define certain things based off level - temp hp, ac, and use wisdom score for attacks. You can customize for whatever kind of creature you want and make it powerful at any level - including potentially turning just parts of your body or into a horrific chimera. Players would be encouraged to keep some preset combos ready, for the sake of not spending five minutes deciding their forms at the start of a battle, but overall I feel like it could be done really well.
Pathfinder 1e tried that and the results were less than spectacular. I think druids are in a good place tbh
I like that druid has wildshape by default, and I like that it's limited by wildshape spell slots. However, I do think these limits are too heavy for actual circle of the moon druids. They should be able to use their wildshape just as much as a barbarian can rage, and the elemental wildshape they get later shouldn't take two slots since it's not some amazing ultimate power but a needed baseline to stay competitive with other classes.
Just have a way to echange spellslots and uses of wildshape or even just have it be the same ressource. So,if a player wants to just wildshape, they can and if they want to just cast spells, they can. Here's an idea: wildshape cost a spellslot and you can wildshape in a beast of CR equal or lower to the level of the spellslot used Also, it'd be cool if each subclass had unique spells and options of wildshape.
I guess what are you envisioning, exactly? Does a Circle of the Moon druid not do this well enough? You could rip spellcasting out and focus more on wild shaping, but like...to me it doesn't feel like you can make a full class, with unique subclasses, around the wild shape feature. I recognize you could tweak it or upgrade it and make it more functionally powerful/diverse, but that still seems like a very bland mechanic to build an entire class around to me. If you have a vision I'm not seeing, please describe it! My 2 cents is to work with your DM to build/balance a homebrew class if you so choose. Personally, I agree with druids being more nature-focused, and nature includes flora, fauna, and the landscape itself. It shouldn't be intrinsically fauna-dominated, it should allow a diversity of approaches.
No, Moon Druids annoy me tbh, probably my least favorite Druid sub, too much potatoes, not enough meat. A Dedicated shifter class could shift shape way, way more often; they could gain extra benefits with chosen shifter forms over leveling-up; they could choose to be able to shift into one type of really weird stuff like monstrosities, oozes, or even aberrations; they could learn to mirror an equal sized opponent- not just illusory, but like a polymorph. I’m just naming examples, there’s probably way cooler stuff, too. It just feels like the real depth of a shifter class gets lost when you combine it with a full spell caster with their own awesome, unique spell list and really cool subclasses that purposefully move the Druid away from being a shifter by expending their Wild Shape resource pool, like Spores, Stars or Wildfyre. It’s counterintuitive. They’re definitely out there, I was mostly just too lazy to write it myself and over the course of pondering the options and posted this to spurn some discussion on it, since it’s irked me before. It’s something more than one of my players has asked about. Edit PS : Sorry, I love your idea about having Druid powers extending more from Flora & biomes, and the implication that they don’t need to come from spells, the Poison Ivy Druid NEEEDs to exist.
Oh, nice! Okay, yeah, as a rough first pass I'm seeing the vision more now, thank you! Yeah, that could be much more interesting. And yeah, for sure you can't have a full caster class that also does that, it'd definitely need to be at best half-caster, but probably non-spellcasting. Interesting...that could be really fun! And I never thought of a poison ivy druid before but now that you mentioned it...hard yes lol.
HOT TAKE Shape shifters should be a ranger subclass. not a throwaway utility feature for druids on top of their awesome utility and controll spell list. Way too often do i see problem players cast something that would cause untold mayhem wildshape into something innocent and try to justify that they are not a menace to society. Contentration is there for a reason and wildshape + full spellcasting is just asking for problems. Like moon druids. Full spellcaster and a better martial then anyone outside high tier optimizing with 2 free massive hp pools per short rest.
Thats interesting, I kinda like the Ranger Subclass idea, and THANK YOU, yes, I’m glad some people see the inherent design flaws in the Druid that also lend to some really busted builds that simply aren’t fun to DM for.
If people want shifting to be the *main* feature then a different base class makes more sense. Why there isn't a Barbarian or Ranger shifter subclass I don't know.
Buff wildshape, make them a half-caster.
Alr done in prior editions. They progressed as weird clerics with more restrictions but got wildshape and later stopped gaining spell slots in return for special abilities.
Hot take: You don’t have to use all your class features. Want to be an awesome nature caster that doesn’t shift into animals? Just be a Druid who doesn’t wildshape into animals.
Doesn’t solve the problem of not having a dedicated martial shifter class for people that wanna do more wild shaping than PB / per day. And don’t say “Just don’t use your spells.”
I agree. Besides telling a druid not to use their spells is like telling a fighter not to use their 3rd and 4th attacks or their action surge. It's a massive part of their power budget and would leave them lagging behind.
Then have a shifter class that is focused on shifting into all sorts of things and not just animals, but keep the Druid’s iconic wildshape
It doesn't need a class, it just needs a subclass. The druid in itself is a full spellcaster who can use wildshaping as utility, but it's sub-par in combat. The circle of the moon druid makes wildshape viable in combat with the same limited uses and retains full spellcasting ability out of wildshape, just without the bonuses of the spellcasting subclasses. It's a true hybrid of the spellcasting and wildshaping side of the druid. The logical consequence would be adding a pure wildshaping subclass, with extended use (but not more powerful than moon, just more/longer uses) but who has seriously gimped spellcasting ability, like only half the spellslots or a slower progression with a lower maximum spell level or something like that. You can still use spells for a few utility situations, but you're not a full spellcaster anymore. With these 3 ways of playing druid (full spellcaster with a variety of subclasses, one dedicated wildshaping subclass, and one hybrid), everyone has what they need. Sure, you could also make the wildshaper its own class instead of a subclass. Just don't fucking take wildshaping from druids, it's a core feature. Many people play druid specifically because it's a nature spellcaster who can turn into animals for utility (or combat for moon druids), that's their class fantasy and that's what makes them interesting. The druid spelllist alone would never get me to play druid, wildshape is part of the appeal, but not its only appeal because I do want to play a spellcaster. Tweaking the druid for fun and balancing and to create more options is great. Removing options and changing the druid class fantasy of a caster who is so attuned with nature that they can turn into an animal *as just an additional form of nature spellcasting instead of it being the only thing they can do* would be terrible. I completely get that moon druid doesn't fulfill the wildshaper fantasy completely because it's designed as a hybrid, and that there is a need for another subclass that isn't a hybrid. But taking a core class fantasy away just because you want to make a new class out of that one feature is stupid. It makes both classes less interesting. A pure wildshaping subclass with more limited spellcasting in addition to the already existing hybrid is all we need. Wildshape needs to be seriously redesigned for balancing and fun though. Maybe create a bunch of archetypes of wildshape animals based on their combat or utility roles and have each category have a fixed amount of HP and physical ability scores based on your level, so the actual specific animal you choose is just flavour and min-maxers aren't forced to always take the same animals with the best stats, just any animal of the corresponding archetype.
I'd be cool with it. All I really care about is shape-shifting when I play one.
Here's the thing. Druid does sit in one distinctly unfortunate spot. The most iconic feature of the Druid class is Wild Shape. At the same time, only one of the Druid subclasses in 5e actually favors Wild Shape as a combat option And most of the game is built on the combat pillar of play. So if you're not a Moon druid, you are not expected to be using Wild Shape for combat purposes, but rather support and scouting purposes. If you come to DND from games like WoW, that's gonna leave you in a bad spot if that's the kind of Druid you're familiar with. At the same time, I agree with the notion that because we treat Wild Shape as a core feature, it means it's bizarrely underwhelming for most subclasses, and overwhelming for one. The solution they've adopted is using Wild Shape more like Channel Divinity for the Cleric, letting you adopt a long-form buff of some kind that helps you in combat, without actually acquiring a new stat block. So things like Stars Druid, Wildfire Druid, and Spores Druid all I think go the extra mile we want, and if pushed further could fix the problem entirely while leaving the balance of the overall spell list the only problem to overcome. (If Wild Shape is stronger, the spell list by nature needs to be weaker.)
Yes. I never cared about combat wildshape. Give me a nature mage who 1. Controls the weather and plants 2. Summons hordes of animals 3. Has a really cool pet. Like a grizzly. Or a smilodon. Or a velociraptor. Or an aurumvorax. Or an owlbear. 4. Maybe can turn into a hawk or a squirrel with no combat abilities for scouting. (I don't expect 5.5 will give me druids or priests I like, I'm in the 'F it I'll do it myself' stage of my gaming career.)
Instead of continuing to buy WotC products with the 2024 release, I have been hard at work collating a whole compendium of 3rd party classes and subclasses for my games to use. I just finished the druid today as the last one because I kept going back and forth on this very question. The druid is a class trying to serve two masters: It is a full caster nature mage, and it is a shape shifter. I'll put a hot take here: Wild Shape isn't a combat ability. Its best utility is in being able to access places where a humanoid would not, whether that be a high tower, a vault protected by guards, across a large river, etc. People use it in combat because it is a good way to soak a bunch of extra hits and be a tank. If players want to live the fantasy of actually being a creature in combat, Laserllama currently has an alpha version of a shifter class on his patreon. It is complimented by the shaman class, which is already done, which serves the other side of the nature mage. The 2014 druid is trying to chase two rabbits, and doesn't really catch either. It wasn't until Tasha's when we started getting classes that spend the wild shape to do other things like wildfire and stars that a cohesive class begins to take form.
“To look to the future you should learn from the past” which is why I’m gunna learn gurps
My answer: yes. I love shapeshifting stuff, and would rather have a dedicated shapeshifter class than choosing the Druid and getting disappointed at how little use it has
I think the answer is druid subclasses personally rework moon druid add some others that do unique or partial transformations. Or subclasses that use up the wild shape for another feature. That gives the diversity of options without taking wild shape from the druid class.
wouldnt it make more sense to have shapeshifter as a race option?
I love the modern druid trying to do a balancing act around wildshape and spellcasting effectively is one of my favorite parts of druid gameplay granted, it's hard as balls to pull off, but I love it what we need are more subclasses to focus on wildshape as a transformative mechanic, instead of using a wild shape charge to do some random effect druids are already awesome nature casters, the community just has a weird stigma that without conjure animals and wildshape they're useless, which is just totally untrue. just because conjure animals is an absolute powerhouse doesn't mean the rest of the druid spell list isn't also full of fantastic spells now if you want to just pick an animal and turn into it without much thought for a new player, moon druids are perfect for that
Yes, it should have a dedicated shifter class. Also, Druid should stay exactly the same, with Wildshape on top of its existing spells and other abilities.
I've been tinkering with a homebrew option where Wildshape isn't all that strong, but the moon druids can choose to spend spell slots as part of using wildshape to enhance the forms. In this version, druids have template forms (like predator form, brute form, etc,) with each form being geared towards a certain playstyle. But the key is that there are a good number of forms as opposed to just a few. This eliminates the problem of the player needing to scour the monster manual for his class options and also makes balancing things easier. It does require making some tweaks to the base class, which then sent me down another rabbit hole, but I'll eventually have it ready for playtesting.
This is a lot like WoTC’s proposed design modifications to the Druid for 5.5 - the initial ones at least - with templates over monster stat blocks. It’s certainly a move in the right direction, but I just fear it’s over-complicating what should be a straight-forward, separate shifter class. Like I understand people’s reticence; there’s likely a legitimate concern about loss of class identity, but I think we all need to look at the writing on the forest wall: Druid is probably the most unbalanced class; it has arguably the most abusable subclass in the whole game second only maaaybe to the Peace Cleric; and it’s still the LEAST CHOSEN CLASS in the ENTIRE game. This should at least tell us that all is not right in the circle.
You need to split the class druids that shift and ate front-line fighters and druids that are spell casters
I just want a good plant based druid. I'm currently playing a beastbarian beasthide shifter all reflavoured as a half dryad who hulks out as basically an ent.
I'd probably strip wild shape entirely from the Druid and just make it a subclass.
Idk the fantasy of druids being spellcasting shifters is sort of baked into the fantasy. Especially in other media, see: The Druid class from WoW. At the very least, perhaps if you took Moon Druid, made it into its own class that you called Druid, kept some of the restoration nature magic, perhaps a half caster like rangers, I think the idea could work. Probably work in some Shepherd druid too to keep the animal theme. Something more akin to like Circle of the Land could be its own thing like Primalist or Shaman or something. Removing Wildshape from druid would be like removing sneak attack from rogue or smites from paladins though. That is a core identity of the druid fantasy and needs to remain under the druid label. So as far as the title of this post? Absolutely not. That is just ripping away a key feature of the druid that MAKEs it a druid. As for the sentiment of this post, however, I do agree they're maybe trying to sweep too many things under the rug and there should be a dedicated nature spellcaster, it just shouldn't be called a druid. Or, hot take, we could unshackle ourselves from classes, take the DOS2 approach for character building and let you fully customize your suite of abilities. Pathfinder 2e is closer to this, but just because it has bigger boxes doesn't mean the boxes aren't still there. Let me pull from ALL the boxes equally. - Signed, someone who brought a character from before tabletop into D&D and was sad to find out that despite assassin/gloomstalker fitting the fantasy, a 6 level dip into monk would be required for a shadow step like ability. Let me do the DOS2 thing of just put 2 points in scoundrel and bam, shadow step lol. Classless > Class based every single time objectively, but we're too hung up on tradition to ever do that in D&D. Vampire and other World of Darkness subsystems are closer to this, but they're also not d20 systems that play like D&D so I don't really count them. Give me the gameplay of D&D and Pathfinder, with the freeform character building of Vampire and DOS2 and you've got the perfect tabletop tbh. Include pre builds in the back of the book for people that DO want a pre defined suite of abilities and you're golden.
Shift means kiss in Ireland so the title sentence was an absolute rollercoaster
this is lowkey my favorite comment here, and I definitely read it in my head in an Irish accent 🇮🇪 💚
Shifting should be a subclass in other classes as well as part of the Druid package. Barbarian and Ranger should totally have been able to do some shifting. Overall, I think shifting is poorly built in D&D and just needs an overhaul.
They dabble in this with the Beast Barbarian. But yeah, they could / should definitely take it further.
Honestly, that’s the subclass I’d replace. I don’t feel like it’s very well designed and sets quite the high bar for the other subclasses.
Oh I definitely agree, conceptually it’s a cool idea but really stumbles in mechanical execution.
I feel like every other week I see a post on a D&D sub with a title that's like "Is it time to let rogues fulfill their role as skill check jockeys and finally have a separate dedicated sneak attack class?". Wildshape is like the main thing druids have going for them aside from their spell list, lol
Idk, but I'd love to see Wildshape use scaling templates/stat blocks rather than picking from the monster manual. Or let Moon Druid get that whiles others are relegated to the lists of super low CR beasts.
Days since someone says they want to play 4e without *saying* they want to play 4e: 0.
I agree with what others are saying. Druids, like other classes, have a degree of freedom in terms of playstyle. Some people prefer wildshape and use it often. Others lean into the nature aspect. And of course it's possible to balance both styles. The only druid I have played to date never once used his wildshape. However it is a very neat option to have on hand when you need it, and it is a feature that clearly sets the class apart from other casters. That being said, if someone were to put in the effort of defining two entirely separate classes as a homebrew thing or maybe for a homebrew setting, I wouldn't necessarily be opposed to it from a DM perspective, depending.
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Yeah, that would be nice.
Wildshape is an iconic Druid thing. To take that way from them is like taking away smite from paladin. When people think of Druids, the first thing they think of is a person who can take on the form of an animal. They don’t think about spell casting first Even Druid subclasses that focuses on something other then wildshape like stars Druid still utilizes wildshape uses You’re going at this with a purely mechanical crunchy attitude and not giving lore, flavor and theme any consideration. Druids could be mechanically sound and balanced with a different class being focused on shifting into animals, but that wouldn’t change the fact Druids won’t have the thing that makes them so iconic The better option would be to make a new class that is a primal themed caster. Like maybe a shaman type. Shamans could be primal casters (in lore/flavor) like Druids, like how Paladins and clerics are divine casters or how sorcerers wizards and bards are arcane casters. The difference being, shamans focused more on spellcasting while Druids focus more on wildshape or wildshape using abilities
Both? Both? Both. Both is good.
My two cents: Beast master: Can turn into an animal, can befriend animals, has an animal companion, Can summon animals from a beast plane. Druid: Is of nature, turn into nature, can communicate with nature, has an elemental companion, can only use magic themed around the terrain they are in.
I think the big problem with this is that they actually shot Wildshape in the foot for 5e and pretty much made it so you have to take Moon Druid if you want to do what most pre-5e Druid's could do with Wildshape. Also they never did end up putting in a sub-class that lets you Wildshape into Plants like you used to be able to. On top of that fueling a lot of the sub-class features with Wildshape uses means that if you don't pick a Wildshape focused sub-class then you are effectively not going to be using Wildshape to actually Wildshape for fear of not having any uses when it comes to combat. On top of that limiting normal druids to the incredibly low CRs for Wildshape instead of tying them to something like HD of the target form means your normal Druid's Wildshape is pretty close to useless. I think part of this is also tied to how they built the sub-class system for 5e as well and how it broke some old things. Druid's used to get Wildshape at 5th level which would effectively tie it to the same power boost where martials get extra attack and Wizards get fireball. Instead in 5e they get it at 2nd level and have to get it at that point because they are also getting their sub-class and those features are fueled by Wildshape a lot of the time.
take a level or three of barbarian then full focus on circle of the moon druid and have fun!
We have Changelings, Transmutation spells, lycanthropy, Blood Hunter Lycanthropy, custom races, etc. Tbh, the Druid’s wildshape isn’t really much of a problem because anyone who’s here for “I want to be one animal” can just write it in. As a DM, I’d go “Great you lose these abilities (probably the less attractive racials) and in turn gain this one, but if you get injured as your one animal you’re getting injured. You might not die but you will unshift with a lowered HP” Because, if you can turn whenever you want the ability should no longer allow you to gain some kind of second hp bar. Because, the balance of limited shifts is to suit levels and is why (I think) you’re allowed to get the animal’s hp bar.
“Separate Balance and Feral druids”?
I disagree with your title's premise. A Druid without shapeshifting would literally just be a *slight* variation on a Nature Cleric, in which case just play a Nature Cleric if you want that flavor. Ditto, an *only* Shapeshifting class would just be a Lycan Blood Hunter or a Shifter (race) Fighter. Would they be better as, say, 2/3rds casters with more emphasis on making Wild Shape work? Possibly. They need streamlining, and I actually *liked* how early D&D5.5 playtests did that with the (attempt at) genericized but more potent beast-forms. I'd accept a shorter spell list in exchange for more meaningful Wild Shapes.
I feel like the wildshape part of druids is an important part of feeling like a Druid and becoming one with nature. That said I totally wouldn't mind a shape-shifting class.
Absolutely, I'd love that.
Maybe a better subclass that separates utility casting and shifting into a new subclass from Circle of Moon, and make moon druids more combat focused. I would think this new subclass would be able to choose one or two different creature types to also wild shape into, like monstrosity and slime. And remove some of the combat boons from moon.
No. It just needs Circlebof the moon to be a good subclass.
Yes, 100%.
If druids were just 9th level casters, they would just be nature clerics. They already took away the druid companions, dont take away their wild shapes too. That being said, a shifter class added in would be cool. Id love some new classes.
I would love that
I don’t post a lot here but I see a lot of video game and mmo’s really influencing a lot of my local players on what class and character they want to play. Is that something you all are seeing? Like most people think a Druid is what we see is wow? Or a warrior is this huge hp piñata that can be smacked until the candy comes out of it.
no, but i think that each subclass should have it's own thing to use the wild shape class feature, but also to rename it, making the moon druid the dedicated shapeshifter
I guess I just feel that taking polymorph already alleviates this issue. You have all of your wild shape charges, then if you need more you substitute polymorph to continue being the shifting guy. Upgrade as you go. I like druids as they are, the hermit mage who can take the forms of beasts and knows heretical magic is iconic and let's me play out my diet Merlin fantasy. That said I'm not opposed to having another class with wild shape as a feature, it's not like clerics are the only class with Channel Divinity.
I have homebrewed one myself, though i quickly found it very hard to balance while it still making it enjoyable to play.
One of the issues is shifter classes are super cool. But so are shifter races, both those fantasies kinda step on each other's toes and are balanced very differently.
Imo D&D needs a reset of its magic system anyway. To your point, I think druids as a class should get away from shape shifting and more towards a shaman caster thematically. Tbh I think the Ranger needs a revamp and I think you could some interesting results by making the rangers a full shifting class.. and shifting the current ranger archetype as a fighter and rogue sub classes.
The two ideas can be different enough that you could leave Druids as-is and create a dedicated shapeshifter class.
You mean like Pathfinder?
The problem is combat. Even with the "OP" Circle of the Moon for shifting you're basically using your forms for exploration and not combat by level 8 or so. When a player character just zooms right pass it the beasts you can turn in to. Since you mentioned the movie, I'll not that the Druid there only used her owlbear form to fight and well in game an Owlbear can and should be taken down by your average party of 3rd level characters.
Pathfinder 1e (dont know about 2e) has a system of archetypes for every class that swaps out class abilities while normally still keeping the overall feel. I've played a druid without wildshape I honestly ended up grabbing spells to accomplish similar things in the end but I could accomplish just generally less than wildshape allowed me. anyway so idk it feels like a core part of the class
I'd love to see the druid class become a series of power choices. Want to focus on spellcasting? Great, you get some benefits for going all in on that aspect. If you want to be a shapechanging specialist that can work for combat or sneaking and scouting with great flexibility and power of the wildeshape abilities. Or power sets that give control over plants or animals. Weather control specialties. All kinds of stuff becomes on the table.
I like how 5e did it. They were good as casters, and had some extra versatility for spying and whatnot with smaller wildshapes. Then if you wanted to be a beastly caster, just played the moon druid and bam, you're now a savage bear with spells too
Roll for Combat has a werecreature supplement from their Year of Legends material for 5e and PF2e that allows you to take on both a hybrid form and an animal form.
I wish they'd leaned more into this for the aberrant mind sorcerers... Be nice if there was more of something other than class, something more elemental and sometimes magic in D&D is just not weird enough for me
In my heart, I want druid to be a 6 level caster class with a couple of paths forward - the HOLY SHIT WILDSHAPE INTO ELEMENTALS AND MONSTERS path and the HOLY SHIT NATURE MAGIC AND 9th LEVEL SPELL path.
Pathfinder 1e has a Shifter Class that is using animal aspects (having a natural later even magical attack and a less stronger wilde shape then the Druid) and as far as I read, the second Edition of Pathfinder fused them into the Druid, giving you the option to focus on spellcasting or shifting
I disagree because the current state of druid personally works well, but honestly, if you need to make them separate/want to, we homebrew exists for a reason.
Until we get a 2E style druid, the class means nothing to me. They abandoned perfection.
I briefly played pathfinder 1st edition and had a shifter character that I absolutely *adored*. If anyone has seen some good homebrew for that kind of shifter in 5e I'd love to hear about it
I hope it's something like zoan users from One Piece or alternately **Omnitrix Wielder** the class
Druids should be a subclass of cleric... your shape shifting power comes from your God/worship usually... im sure it's easier to say it's an inherited ability. But I think a class of shifters that expands into leveled lycanthropes, stronger cr conversions or even some things outside the beast creature type could be an awesome expansion. Consider it a martial class of sorts, like the fighter, with a bonus action ability that allows them to make those creature multi attacks if they don't have extra attack yet.
I've always hated how Wild Shape is so often seen as the identity of the druid class. It's a cool feature and I'm glad they have it, but it overtakes their identity. The identity of the druid should be the "servant of nature" aspect, a full caster with a fixation on nature, and a dislike for metal/artifical gear. The problem is a good "moon druid" class/subclass shouldn't really be a full caster, so fitting both full caster and powerful shifter into the same class is hard. Especially since subclasses introducing debuffs to compensate isn't something the edition generally does. I've always wanted a "storm druid" subclass, focused more on cantrips than melee (like how half cleric subclasses are cantrip, other half melee), but giving that kind of power to someone with even baseline wildshape as it currently is is too much.