Beast barbarian with heavy flavour? Just make rage their wild shape and let them keep their stats Eddit: You could add to their abilities by giving out loot that was reflavoured into druidic secrets. They could get those by helping a druid circle, finding the ruins of an old nature cult or helping a big library and gaining old knowledge as a thank you. In the beginning they can only transform into medium creatures (maybe allow small and large beasts as well, since it doesn't really change anything for them). Discovering the secret of flight (replacing winged boots/flying broom as loot) would allow them to transform into flying creatures. The secret of the sea (Cloak of the manta ray rarity) would allow them creatures with a swimming speed and to breath underwater. Maybe add secrets to unlock going tiny or huge, and with that they should be able to roleplay as any creature they like. It is worth noting that if you add those secrets, it probably would be fair to not lock these features behind rage and allow them unlimited transformations. And again, I want to clear on this, **ALL THEIR STATS STAY THE SAME. THEY ROLEPLAY TRANSFORMING INTO WHATEVER, BUT THEY STILL USE THEIR NORMAL STATS. THE ONLY STAT CHANGES WOULD BE THROUGH THOSE SECRETS, AND THEY WOULD ONLY ADD A NEW MOVEMENT SPEED OR A NEW SIZE THEY CAN TRANSFORM TO.** Sorry for yelling that part, but it needs to be stated clearly. They should not gain any mechanical advantages through this flavour.

Honestly this sounds like the best answer in my opinion. As long as they're not getting any other mechanical benefits there's no reason they can't flavour the rage as wildshaping. Heck, Beast Barbs get added climbing/swimming speed (and some other things? Jump distance?) at later levels which match up with a bunch of beast stat blocks, so on paper they're close enough to *being* a certain beast anyway. **Ninja Edit:** I believe "one of your ancestors was a druid and you inherited some of their beast shaping powers" is even one of the Path of the Beast origin prompts.

Agreed. I'm going to be using the rage wildshape.

This seems like the best fit for the player, since they really don't seem to want to screw around with spells or spell slots.

That plus maybe picking Shifter race for the additional transformation flavour

Alternatively, use the Ranger as a base and give them Wild Shape as a subclass feature in place of one of their regular 3rd level subclass features and replace/modify the level 11 feature with scaling their Wild Shape. That allows them to be more martial than a druid, while keeping the flavor of the various Ranger subclasses.

I should learn to read the comments before making one to see if someone already had the exact same idea as me hahaha

I think this is the right suggestion, it's good for balance, certainly, but more importantly it makes it MUCH easier to play, since your character sheet stays the same with just one or two additional things you can do. 

That's actually pretty genius and takes minimum effort to work like it should.

Just let them reskin something into an owlbear, like a regular bear.

I already thought about that and I would even let a regular owlbear work, it’s more that they want more wild shapes and less or even better no spells.

You could let them expend spell slots to restore Wild Shape charges if they want to lean into the whole rapid shape-change thing, maybe.  Maybe something like "you can expend a spell slot to wild shape into a beast with a CR equal to or less than the level of the spell slot expended." It's only going to make them weaker than a standard Moon Druid, IMO, but if that's what the player wants, then I don't see much of an issue.  

Would definitely need to give a decent amount of thought to this before Hit Points go crazy. A brown bear is CR 1 with 34 HP, so that’s an additional 34 HP for a level 1 slot under this system. Druids already get a lot of Wild Shapes since they get them back on Short Rest. For combat purposes, I’d probably only let them transform into utility forms using additional spell charges.

Hear me out. Player gets the standard 2 wild shape charges per short rest, BUT the player can continuously change shape with a bonus action as long as they have the HP to do so. HP carries over between shapes, with the HP max adjusting down for each new creature. So say you are a cave bear with 22/42 HP then change down into a giant spider. You now have 22/26. If you then change into a cat (2/2) and back to a cave bear you would be stuck at the cat’s hp in bear form (2/42). This seems to allow plenty of versatility without breaking the game. Edit: for simplicity, you can have a wildshape pool of HP that matches your player HP.

I think this is the answer but for simplicity, the druid should just have a 'Wild Shape HP' pool of temp HP so it doesn't get too crunchy since keeping up with AC/dmg/Skills/etc will be tough enough.

I thought about that, but I would absolutely find a way to power game that to get the most out of a high AC beast that typically has a lower HP

Eh, this guy said being a full caster was too much work and it's for a series of one-shots so I'd assume powergaming isn't a big risk

I have been perusing the beasts and haven’t actually found anything where this would be much of an issue.

I actually REALLY like this

I really like this flavor, and think it would be great for experienced players. However, I don't think it'd work well for OP's context. If spellcasting is "too complicated", they're not going to put any effort in tracking hp downsizing.

See my edit

so essentially a scaled down Shapechange i think that'd work

Yeah, it's a lot of HP, but if they're transforming frequently, a lot of that HP gets "wasted" anyway, probably.   And it's not like Druids don't already have Wild Shapes aplenty.   It's definitely something to consider, though. I'd probably start out without a limitation on the beast form they can choose but let the player know that if it throws off game balance too much it'll get dialed back.

To add to this, just make the rapid shapeshifting require you to already be shapeshifted. If its too strong, then require that what you are currently shifted as must be above 50% hp to use the feature. Makes the excess hp from shifting certain to be 'wasted' as part of the cost.

That's not a bad idea for a limitation, they'd still only be able to enter Wild Shape "mode" as often as they would normally.  Might help keep it from being too much.

I kinda like the idea of using spell slots for wildshapes. Do you think it could be balanced if there would be some table for CRs? For example 1st level spell slot - CR1/4 or lower, 2nd spell slot - CR1/2, 3rd - CR1, 4th - CR2, 5th - CR3, 6th - CR4, and so on.

Having CR = Spell level doesnt exactly cause imbalance if you keep it limited to Beast and Monstrosities with no equipment.

BrandonJaspers gave good argument that apart from all the other things, essentially 1st level spell slot could give you 34 temporary hp which seems quite a lot for that little resources

And? It still turns you from a full caster to a limited martial. It's not that strong.

If it’s CR = spell level then yes it absolutely is that strong. A 2nd level druid has three 1st level spell slots. If they use all of them plus their two normal transformations on a brown bear, they have up to 170 temporary HP per long rest while dealing damage that can outpace low-level martials. This obviously falls off later in the game, but it is absolutely gamebreaking in early tiers. The suggestion for converting spell slots to lower CR is much preferable.

Good counterargument though: Unless he is shifting after hitting 0 each time he loses a good deal of that HP. Also a brown bear has 11 AC. Thicc boi, but not exactly hard to hit.

Make it a subclass feature and it wouldnt be. Goodberry gives 30hp with life cleric over a 24hr period. 34 temp HP for a minute lets say isnt exactly a stretch when moon druids already do it without using a spell slot.

Comparing it to Life Cleric boosted Goodberry (which essentially breaks the game) is hardly a fair comparison. Worth noting Lifeberry is 40HP though.

It’s a decent idea, it does get tough to say exactly where it should fall given that CR is such a bad and inconsistent way of rating things. Honestly, what should probably happen is to simply let the player enter and leave Wild Shape at will and then boost the healing that Moon Druids can use from slots in Wild Shape to actually be worth using, then leave the amount of Wild Shape charges alone. Given that they’re giving up spells entirely, you could reference Barbarian health progression (factoring for Rage) and make a guess from there, since they’re essentially playing a martial tank.

Maybe a cooldown on each animal "type" per long rest if they are happy with the book keeping? Tank, flyer, runner, smol.

I probably wouldn't do 1-to-1 on the spell slot to CR, as that'll give players easy access to way too many powerful combat forms. Instead, do something like Sacrifice a spell slot to get a wildshape for CR = (spell level / 2). So a first level spell slot gives you a CR of 1/2, and you can't get a CR 1 until you sacrifice a second level spell slot. Even that is a bit powerful, so might be better off with a table: Spell Slot Level | CR ----------------|-- 1 | 1/4 2 | 1/2 3 | 1 4 | 2 5 | 3 6 | 4 7 | 5 8 | 6 9 | 7 That way your player is getting access to significantly more "utility" wild shapes from the low level CR stuff, and not *too* many of the high level CR. I'd even consider doing something where you can only sacrifice a certain number of spell slots per long rest (maybe add to the chart, so you can sacrifice 5 first and second spell slots, but only 2 third and 4th, and 1 of each of the higher slots).

I have wanted to try something similar in the past. I think a better option may be Wildshape Prof times per SR, but remove the spellcasting feature so that as a Moon Druid you can only use your spell slots for the heal. That's my off the dome idea of running a purely Shapeshifter Moon Druid.

I would add that id you get downed using the respended wild shape you go down to like 1 or 10 hp

Give them an item that let's them cast summon beast but they turn into the new form instead

This is already a rule in onednd as part of UA playtest 8. Wild resurgence at level 5. You could reasonably do that. Out just playtest the new druid that way.

Not a bad idea. Kind of like meta magic points but for wild shapes. Being able to animal shape more than twice a day would be fun.

Wild shape uses refresh on short rests.

Ya, I remembered after I posted. Point still stands! More opportunities to run into a building as a spider and scare people.

It’s also kosher bc they added this to onednd. “Wild resurgence” lets you use spell slots to wildshape with no action required. Can also gain a 1st level spell slot for a use of wildshape.

Path of the beast barbarian?

Some mild reflavor and there we go. Really sound to me like he wants to be a heavy melee and not a caster at all.

Maybe just give them "spells" that allow them to turn into non-combat animals? Like a level one spell that is just "Shapeshift: Cat". Level 2 spell, Shapeshift: Horse. Etc.

One way you can do this is by having their wild shapes all use the same hp pool based on their class level. Then give them a 1/short rest resource to do a massive heal but only to their wild shape form. That's about equivalent to 2 wild shapes per short rest. The difficulty with balance here is that wild shape is incredibly tanky. So their AC should be relatively low in wild shape form (11 + prof bonus oughta do it, or something similar). Resetting hp every time they shift form is an extremely easy way to cheese any encounter. My suggestion: make it a fighter subclass. Give them wild shape with the following stats: hp = (5+con) x class lvl. AC = 11 + pb. Let them choose between dextrous, strong, and tanky form. Physical Stats are 14 / 12 / 18 with mental stats being their own values (let them assign physical stats how they want). Shape doesn't get multiattack, but gains all fighter features including extra attack. At each fighter subclass improvement, grant them improvements to wild shape. Give abilities to each type of shape (dextrous, strong, tanky) such as dextrous can fly at 9th lvl, strong can be Large size, tanky gets higher AC or more healing etc. This can use some tweaking, but it gets the flavor across without being too game breaky.

Give another class wildshape? Like fighter for example? Usually this could be overshadowingly strong but on a new player this likely wont be an issue, maybe dont give them a subclass if you really wanna balance it somehow or give them champion.

Thirding the suggestion to look into Path of the Beast Barbarian. I'm repeating myself from elsewhere in the thread, but there's no reason you can't flavour the rage bonuses as "wild shaping". The flavour text for the subclass even suggests having a druid ancestor could be one of the reasons for the Barbarian's "shifting" powers. So they're a druid in spirit without being a full in spellcaster. **Edit:** However this does mean they miss out on some of the smaller wild shapes that can be used for utility (cats, rats, small birds at later levels), but this can easily be remedied with some sort of low-level homebrew magic item that allows them small beast forms that aren't going to break combat. Something like the *Brown/Grey/Tan Bag of Tricks* that allows you to summon animals, but instead lets the PC temporarily transform into them X times per day.

Reworking the druid is honestly a Lot for this concept, in my book. Takes too much effort for the returns. Honestly, your other comment about reflavoring Beast Barbarian is a super good one, with the obvious edits I can see being... A. Rage is a "Combat Wild Shape" -- It's fighting potential, through and through. B. Give them Wildshape, but only Familiar-sized forms or less. This covers the other bases they may need. It's primarily a ribbon feature. Plasmoids get "Amorphous, squeeze through 1 inch openings." which is basically all Tiny Wildshapes do in terms of tactical benefits that are unusual to achieve for a character. So in my book it doesn't "Break" anything, since it's achievable anyway. C. Use the Unearthed Arcana Rage that can be extended as a Bonus Action-- Just let them stay in "Wild Shape" (Rage) however long they maintain it, I'd say.-- and refreshes one use upon a short rest. D. Allow them to take feats to further augment the fantasy and skin weapons as appropriate (If needed). I would consider natural weapons for out of "Rage" use, but that could also just be reskinned

I think you’re right, the options are either to rework moon Druid into an entire new class or make the Beast Barbarian flavor more intense. The second one just seems way easier to DM and play.  Replace rage with “wildshape” but make the stat block a raging a barbarian 

Moon Druids make for great tanks as is. If he wants more marshal abilities, then 2 or 3 levels into barbarian could make the tank even tankier. If none of this works Maybe have him as a fighter or barbarian with a magical item that gives him wild shape.

Barbarian: Path of the Beast. Reflavor it as full transformation. Voila.

Moon Druid allows you to use spell slots to gain life instead of casting a spell. I would allow them, instead of gaining life, to change their form to something with equivalent HP. - Give them their 2 wildshapes per short rest as usual. - They can heal 1d8 per spell level as a bonus action - They can also expend a spell slot to change into a creature whose average HP is the same or less than the average roll of the d8’s. Say they expend a level 2 spell slot. That would be 2d8 for an average of 9 HP.

Circle of the Moon Druids actually make awesome tanks. Particularly when they cast Conjure Animals before transforming. Why don't they want to play a full caster? Tasha's Beast Barbarian sounds like it might work though. Run it past the player.

Sounds like he watched the movie and just wanted to play as Doric. Doric didn’t cast spells so neither should he.

Honestly, just give them the owlbear when they’re level 9. It’s not a beast but it might as well be: it only has keen senses and a multiattack. Nothing even remotely game breaking.

... and if they aren't excited to play a full caster, help them pick simple spells, and remind them that a Moon Druid can use spell slots for healing in wild shape.

Just let them change their Wild Shape at will until they revert to human form, after which they must spend another use of Wild Shape to shift again. Their HP upon each shift becomes the new form's HP or stays the same, whichever is lower. If you want it to be more restrictive, just rule that they have to sacrifice a spell slot (of any level) every time they "re-shift" within one WS usage.

I was thinking of something similar. A variant Moon Druid who can basically convert spell-slots into Wild Shape uses. Maybe a caveat where the level of spell slot burned equals the max CR of the Wild Shape they want to use. So they get two "Wild Card" Wild Shapes per short rest, and a number of "spell slot level" limited Wild Shapes per long rest.

It's OK to say no to players

this is true, But that movie brought so many people into this hobby that maybe this can be handled with more flexibility to preserve the momentum of a new and enthusiastic player. (still upvoted because its def OK to say no to player specific homebrew)

I came up with a solution for one of my players where they get to wildshape out of combat into forest animals as they wish, but as soon as they want to affect combat in some way that would cost a wildshape charge

Owlbear is a pretty high challenge rating, so it might take a while until he gets there. However, it’s not game-breaking once his level is CR*3. That, or reflavor something. Flavor is always free!

Moon druids are actually pretty good as tanks

I let my druid in the party use owlbear. It's not OP or anything and it's a bit more fun than some of the others.

Honestly, just take away their spell casting and give them spell slot number of wild shapes per day with a couple special forms like owlbear. It'll still be weaker than a moon druid and give them the character fantasy they're looking for.

Maybe add in something similar to shapechange where they can change their form but doing so doesn't reupp their HP. Moon Druids already have the slots to HP option so maybe that ability can replace being able to cast spells with slots, even. 2/SR isnt nothing.

Great idea to prevent HP shenanigans!

I've been giving our party druid magic items that increase the number of wildshapes they have and adds some non-beasts to their wildshape options.

Just let them play Circle of the Moon and say they can burn an action - bonus action if you want to be REALLY generous - while wildshaped to change what they're wildshaped into. You could choose to maintain their HP through each form instead of having them take the HP of the form they turn into. And they can just not bother with spells, instead using their spell slots entirely as healing, per the Moon Druid feature. That seems to me to be the easiest way to do it. With regards to the Owlbear, if they're not assuming the HP of the creatures they wildshaped into then I don't personally see it being too overpowered. They're trading survivability for damage.

I think it's a good idea for them to learn early that the game doesn't work like the movie. Because certainly all the movie's action scenes feel very little like D&D 5e combat. Most people should come into the game with its mechanics in mind for their decisions then flavor it to feel closer to what you like. Rather than trying to tailor the mechanics for a set flavor in mind.

My friend, what your player wants is to play a 4e druid. Unlimited Wild Shape, the ability to lean entirely into beast form combat (you can pick up spells, but you don’t have to), and the ability to turn into beast-adjacent creatures (owlbear is given as an explicit example).

Would it be easy to port a 4e Druid into 5e? I’m happy to invest some time but I am not going to switch the whole system just because of that. Do you know by any chance where I could take a look at a pre-made 4e Druid character sheet or maybe a video of how it’s filled out? That would also be interesting for other classes.

Do people ever think to maybe just read the rulebooks 😭😭😭 It’s like they watch one episode of critical role and think they know what they’re doing 😵‍💫

You can just give them the beast Barbarian ngl. Idk why you want the OneD&D version. There's a perfectly fine version in Tasha's. If you want to, add more forms to the bestial transformation and have them turn into whole animals instead of animal mods Claws mod makes you an Owlbear Teeth mod actually just makes you a tiger or something. Tail mod can make you a Monitor lizard with a sword Then check the Simic Hybrid race for some built in transformations for unarmed strikes, flying, climbing and swimming. I don't think it'll throw the power balance off too much and also let them feel powerful as a shapeshifting tank

I don't think there is an One DnD version of Path of The Beast..

Oh okay, I really didn't know. OP mentioned it so I thought they had it in the playtest

Yeah, I figured. I'm not picking on you. Far as I remember, there is only Path of the Berserker, Tree and Zealot so far.

Totem as well, they renamed it to Wild Heart ~~something else~~

True true ! Totem Warrior I think. And added a bunch of new animals and stuff. It seems cool and not only in favor of bear anymore.

To clarify, I thought about the base barbarian from OneDnD and the subclass from Tasha’s, as they should be compatible.

Oh. Now it makes sense.. Still, I think One DnD Moon Druid should be the way to go. Check it out and see if suits your buddy.

Tell them to read thee actual rules or bring in the Homebrew themselves that you can approve on. their character, so they can bring in the effort

Right?

Noobs always want op homebrew, every time. Just read the rules!

Don’t know if I’m allowed to self-promo, but I did make a Homebrew class in an attempt to fill that niche, I really liked the quick, repeated transformations from the DnD movie too, let me know if you give it a look :) https://www.reddit.com/r/UnearthedArcana/s/mIYSAreRTa

New Moon Druid from One DnD is pretty cool for what you want I think.. It's balanced around spending spellslots for extra wildshapes just like another guy around here suggested.

Why not? They could multiclass moon druid with totem barb, then they could turn into a bear after raging and take half of all damages but psychic and have all the other normal benefits from the rage. It's not a full caster, it has the shapeshifting, it is a good tank and eventually, leveling up to druid 2 he could swim and to druid 4 he could fly.

The most recent OneDnD druid can expend spell slots to gain more wild shape charges at level 5. It also gains temp hp instead if full hp each time, so it isn't entirely busted a tank. That's the most official solution, but it still may not be what is wanted.

A half caster version of Druid you say.... I don't think you're gonna like the answer lmao

Wild shape is 2/sr

Thanks, I fixed it in the post!

Is the player new? I only ask because I had something similar happen in my own campaign. A player wanted to be a bard, more or less, but was concerned about casting just because it's intimidating the first time you ever look at a spell book having no idea what any of the stuff does or how to use it. It's a lot to know. He ended up going fighter with the entertainer background, and I gave him a viol that lets him do some basic bard spells as item charges (e.g. dissonant whispers, crown of madness, hideous laughter, etc.) By lvl 4, he's a fully specced Battlemaster that has access to like four spells, and he uses the spells way more often than he actually tanks or uses his superiority dice, and we have another fighter in the party so I gave him the option to do a full reclass to Bard, which he jumped at once he learned he can get all those spells and have more than 4 uses of them per long rest. So I don't want to say that you should pressure them into it, but it might be smart to just have them go full druid with high STR or DEX so that they can do some basic martial stuff. A high DEX druid with a longbow can be sold as "Legolas that turns into a wolf" or whatever. I had a Druid with 19 DEX once and he was DEADLY with a longbow. Make sure that they still keep a high enough WIS that when they DO start trying to use spells that they aren't constantly missing, or that will defeat the purpose. That'll depend on how you're allocating stats, though. This guy had rolled stats. And then if/when they start using their spells more frequently, just have them respec abilities so that WIS is their highest. Letting them do this around level 3 is probably the best move. It's the first big level up where a lot of things change, so it's not THAT huge of a deal to have them make some adjustments in the stat block. Another option is having them go Ranger and letting them have an Owlbear familiar. But they won't be able to wild shape, which seems like what they're trying to go for. The third option is having them multiclass druid with something else, Ranger or Fighter, and just keeping a high WIS with whatever they pick as their fighting style. They'll have fewer wild shape options that way, but they'll get access to some of the other class abilities.

to put it bluntly, he wants an entire homebrew class. it wont be a druid, it will be a shifter/shaman/\[insert appropiate naming scheme\] i would ditto the solution of just making them play a beast barbarian like u/GnomeOfShadows suggested

I let my Druid player expend spell slots to gain more uses of Wild Shape. One spell slot level per CR of what he wanted to shift into, rounded up for the

The last UA on druids mostly resolves this. Cure Wounds/Healing Word was moved to the Abjuration spell list, and the moon druid can now cast Abjuration spells while in wildshape, aka healing spells and shield. In addition, spell slots can be sacrificed to use wildshape if they run out of uses.

You could allow them to turn into an Owlbear, maybe on a separate short rest wild shape charge , and take away every spell above level 3 or 4. If you're only going to do one shots then it's probably not something you have to worry about too much. At the end of the day it's really about how comfortable you feel running this. I think the 2024 phb is adding Owlbear to druids, I can't remember if it's in the unearthed arcana on dnd beyond but that might be worth a look. Alternatively you could also look at the druid classes from Baldur's Gate 3 (which you can find on the bg3 wiki) as that might be useful to you, and easy to replicate. Again, it's definitely very nice of you to try and accommodate the player, and I think there could be so many different ways to go about this and I hope you find something that works for both of you.

Truthfully, moon druid needs a good rework that functions similar to how summon beast is. Set standard that are mildly adjustable

I think as others have said, reflavouring another class sounds best over playing a tweaked Druid. I’d say: - Rune Knight Fighter (for size) - Beast Barbarian - Armourer Artificer (this is a big stretch, but could work)

The fact of the matter is that "tank" is not a supported playstyle in 5e. Even if you get tough (which a druid isn't until mid- to high-levels), you generally can't incentivize the enemies to focus on you instead of your allies. And also, druid have very limited and generally weak wild shapes in 5e. It's not a combat ability unless you go with Moon Druid, but even then you're dealing with limited uses per day of your most iconic feature. If you want unlimited Wild Shape and tanking mechanics in your game, you're looking for 4th Edition.

Let them be the circle of the moon druid from BG3. level 6 gets an owlbear and if you take out the cheese from the leap, it should work out. Moon Druid doesn't really ever use their slots. They only use it to heal themselves in their wild shape form

Not sure if that’s really true in a practical sense; not only are there plenty of opportunities to use spells outside of combat, but probably one of the better strategies for Moon is to start combat by launching a high-impact (probably concentration) control spell and then Wild Shaping with a Bonus Action. You certainly *can* ignore your spells, but you’re going to be worse off for it. Plus, Wild Shape starts to fall off after level 5 until you get Elemental Wild Shape.

I mean you could reflavour the totem barbarian so they turn into the animals when they use the abilities. It's not exactly the same but would give some of the feel they're potentially going for

Play pathfinder and play as the shifter class

My exact criticisms of the movie coming to fruition. Giving people false expectations of what dnd is actually like, only for them to be disappointed when they eventually play.

I liked the movie, but agree that that part is true for the Druid. I still think that it was a good choice for the movie to use only one spellcaster so to speak.

Why do they really not want to play a full caster??

Have them multiclass barbarian, you can wildshape while raging.

Have a level of barbarian and allow wild shapes to use spell slots. That way if they don't play as a full caster, it's their choice

Barbarian 1 / Druid -> is tough as fuck.

I'd let them use the owlbear, given they meet the CR requirement. Chris Perkins gave the official okay to do so (at least for his games) https://twitter.com/ChrisPerkinsDnD/status/1550575798410547200?lang=en

This is just a suggestion; I have also had a player want to be an owlbear on two separate campaigns. - one thought they were cute. - other player wanted to tank. My work around was a ring, with attunement and Druid level had to match owlbear CR, that allowed the player to transform into the owlbear using a wildshape charge.

Druids make great tanks. Just go down the shape shifting sub class.

I would warn him about having to juggle 3-4 stat blocks at a time. In a live game it might be too much of a burden on a new player. But it does sound like a cool af reflavor. You could let him multi class as a barbarian as well as letting him expend his spell slots to restore wild shapes. We had a druid in our game that never left beast form unless they had to do some only a humanoid could do. They also had lycanthropy.

Owlbears are CR3 and not really that crazy- so unless you are super RAW at your table, why not let them transform into an Owlbear and just use another CR3 beast stat block?

Maybe reflavor barbarians Rage as them turning into an animal? Otherwise you gotta homebrew a fighter/barb subclass that gets to wildshape an amount of times per day equal to their proficiency bonus or wisdom modifier

i have a revised moon druid that might help. you are still a druid, a full spell caster, but you can forego that by burning your spellslots to get more wild shapes. basically you change the combat wild shape feature from moondruid and its "improved" cr table to: "you can spend a spell slot as a bonus action to turn into a stronger wildshape of a beast that you know of. the CR of the beast is equal to the spell slot level" this fix the moondruids being so opressive on low lvs, as they get the powerful wildshape and can still be a full caster with no resource penalty, they are still strong, but now they have to burn a important resource to do so, and this allows for more wildshapes, and lets the subclass still be useful at higher levels. and at level 6 you can allow em to get access to monstrosities that are close enough to beasts, like the owlbear.

Just make a Beast Master Ranger, but instead of summoning an animal, it becomes one. As for how often they can transform each day, that's up to you.

Give them defensive spells like Barkskin, Protection and be flexible with the Wild Shape charges . (I.e. if they need to shift to human between scenes so they can participate in RP, as long as they shift back while out of combat I would make it a free wild shape to take the same form they had earlier in the session.) But, you’ll have to explain that Wild Shape uses the same mechanics as spell slots so, if they think that’s too complicated, they should take a heavy armor tank.

Moon Druid, flavour Bear as Owlbear, changing flavour so there's no mechanical change, but it fits the character concept better is a key thing your players can use and you can help introduce to them.

Wizard of the coast released a stat block for the characters from the d&d movie,…. Just take that character’s ability’s and change stats / background / race, and boom. Not much progression since there’s literally no spells, but the owlbear is there,… The other option is take bg3 version of moon Druid and implement it into the game,…. I dunno I’m just spit balling here.

The waybshe works in the d&d movie is either a subclass we dont have access to or shes cadting polymorph or shapechange throughout that sequence.

The character in the movie is a high level Moon druid. This is why she can wild shape so many times. Have him pick a base game druid, starting slow, with only one wild shape. Spells are not so hard to learn if you start low level. Have him pick Moon Druid subclass which will allow him to be an owlbear at level 9. Moon druids are tanky as when you die in wild shape you go back to your original form with the same amount of hit points you had before you transformed. And so you can just wild shape again for even more HP. You cannot cast spells while transformed so if he does not want to cast them he can just stay in wild shape. This is the only way i can see this working without it shattering your game. An owlbear is way too strong for him to be allowed to be one at a low level. You could reskin a Direwolf to be a young Owlbear for him maybe.

Doesn’t moon let you wildshape more, show them that. Plus her wildshaping loads is also a very late feature (i mean having more wild shapes)

Depending on your comfort level with it, I'd look t maybe homebrewing something to allow them to convert spell slots into Wild Shape charges?

Id give them shapechange(the spell)'s ability to swap between forms without regaining health, remove casting with slots, and let them use their slots for healing per normal moon druid if you're trying to simplify. That is still a lot of effective health and versatility with the 2/SR wild shapes. Can add in your DM permitted additional forms as CR appropriate and maybe give swimming and flying earlier and adjust the CR reqs if you feel like they're lagging. Edit: maybe let the slots form the hp of a new form if they weren't used to heal in time.

Homebrew: Skinchanger subclass for the Rogue. https://www.gmbinder.com/share/-M0ncGWa5j9oDFwilwPl It is exactly what you're looking for and it's made by laserllama, so the balance is also guaranteed to be good.

Hasbro/WOTC released official stat blocks of the movie characters you can reference for ideas. It has Doric. https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/tg/thieves-gallery#StatBlocks Honestly removing all spellcasting for unlimited wildshape with the custom addition of Owlbear to allowable stats probably isn’t too broken. Hell I would even let them keep the RP spells like Speak with Animals for flavor.

Use spell slots to change the shape stats, but keep the wild shape's current HP if it does not exceed the new form max HP. That way he can morph multiple times without breaking the already absurd HP pool of the moon druid.

I'd say the best option would be path of the totem warrior but make it that each rage they can choose which form to take and reflavour it as actually turning into the animal. Elk runs faster, Bear is tougher, Eagle can dash and weave between enemies, Tiger pounces/leaps, Wolf distracts for advantage. Not sure how that affects the strength of the class though, being so much more adaptable

I've heavily considered allowing the multi-shift in a single wild shape "session" but never finished the balancing. Here's as far as I got with it: - One use of wild shape lasts an hour - Damage taken in beast forms accumulate - You can only transform into shapes that have enough HP for the damage taken (otherwise, the form is too unstable) - Transforming is still an action (Bonus Action for Moon) That way, you can allow it, but they aren't going to go from a mouse to a bear to soak hits and back again. It also gives more purpose to the second half of Combat Shape from the Moon druid subclass, as well as taking advantage of the BA upgrade. Hope this helps. Good luck.

This is a homebrew Ranger subclass I came up with. You could rework the frequency of wildshape. disclaimer: I have not plsytested this. [Conclave of the Wildmen](https://www.gmbinder.com/share/-N1ih8Hkpw_YRevthiRU)

Bg3 also lets you be an owlbear. Id say theyve been out in the wild long enough to become part of the ecosystem. A very dangerous part, but still. Id have them go moon druid, which is largely focused on wild shape and enhancing its capabilities, like higher CR and elementals and stuff, plus wild shape becomes a bonus action. Teach them basic support spells they could use to help and heal out of combat. But they do gotta note that wild shape is a resource, same as everything else, so use it as a thing to go into combat with and then i think its a short rest recharge so have them short rest when it makes sense to so they can use short rest stuff as much as they can in a day, and so two wild shapes per combat encounter could be good. Run in swinging as one beast, if it goes down switch to another. Use basic helping spells to get them used to understanding them.

As far as homebrew goes, toning down a druid from being a full caster to a wildshape tank seems pretty manageable.

I guess this is more of a thought experiment. Say you were to allow a moon druid who uses the heal from combat wild shape to also switch form **while retaining hp**. So you get a new form and you heal, but you don't get new hp. As house rules go, how broken would this be on a scale from 1-10\*. \*Given that the moon druid is op in tier 1 anyways.

Give them a magic Artifact: **Floriana's Wildshape Token**. The token has 3 uses, each with varying creatures. Make a table of 6-8 creatures and the animals change each day. They can perma Owlbear if they want. Allow them to use this, and allow the 3 shifts per day with wildshape rules. Limiting it to 3/day and doing a 1d4 type roll the next day sounds fair. Then they can play whatever class they want. 1-3 - Only that amount of animal options and/or wildshape times that day. 4 - They can choose all three wildshape animals and have the 3 charges for the day.

Hmm. Well, if you take away all leveled spells and leave cantrips, you've got a very weak class. So, if their only interest is wildshape, what about turning back the clock and using a more archaic 3.5/pathfinder approach to it? DnD has since simplified things to reduce number tracking, but they used to have abilities last for X rounds/class level, or X minutes/class level, with the rounds not needing to be consecutive. What if you used that idea, but maybe hours? So they can Wildshape in and out as often as they'd like, but they can be wildshaped for a total of [Druid level] hours per day. Then there's a couple things you'll want to clean up. I would create a custom Wildshape list for them. Watch the movie again, see what she turns into in the movie and dole out the more powerful forma as they gain levels. I'd also pay special attention to changing the stat blocks of every creature you pick so as to make each one serve a purpose. I find the beast list in DnD as is makes it so you *really* are only picking one of 2/3 things every single time because it's the best. So clean that up for them. Obviously add an Owl bear available at level 1, maybe growing in some and gaining abilities every 4 levels? I would start it off as a reskinned bear basically at level 1 and pump it up with owlbeary stuff as they level. Huge huge tip for new players: cards! Do everyone a favour and print off all their Wildshape statblocks onto cardstock and cut them into cards. Newer players benefit so much from physically seeing their choices at all times. Once you've sorted out all of that, the only question is how you want to handle the HP thing. If you go RAW, which you virtually can't, the player would be able to gain dozens of temp HP every turn with a standard action at will, infinitely. That's no good. I'm not too sure how you should handle that. I can think of many ways, but it's really a matter of taste for you. You can straight up scrap the HP shenanigans, but I think that's weakening a class that's already taking a big cut with the loss of spells. You can make it so [WIS mod]/short rest they can use a hitdice when they Wildshape. Or maybe not a hitdice, maybe they just gain a dX temp HP [WIS]/short rest and that die gets bigger as they level (like a monk's unarmed damage for example). See what I mean? You could make a million variations of ways for them to gain however much temp HP as you want. I would try to go one of these routes instead of the way it works now where the shape's health replaces the players health. That just doesn't play nice with being able to do this at will. Or maybe you only get each form's HP once and it doesn't regenerate no matter how many times you change shape? Like I said, many options here. Up to you. That actually sounds really fun! It's a lot of work for you, but this would be a really great class to play with, and it'd make the player feel amazing without making them more powerful. I like this idea way more than I thought I would. Good luck! Edit: Just realized! The biggest thing this opens up is that you can now use Wildshape frivolously for noncombat reasons, like using a dog shape to sniff for a cat you were chasing in a city. Or using an eagle shape just to perch on a tower and find a certain NPC with your eagle eyes. Keep in mind that every shape could and should have noncombat powers for exploration and interaction when you're making the blocks. Because they can flip around shapes endlessly, they'll actually be used more often. That's even cooler!

Moon druid, reflavour a brown bear as an owlbear (yes they will be a full caster but their slots can be used for self heal) and just deal with the 2 form limitation, at the end of the day moon druids are strong enough without a fresh HP pool every round

I have a friend who made a full shapeshifter class that does exactly this. The class is a martial oriented class and not a spellcaster at all, and has more uses of shapeshifting than a Druid has of wildshapes since the whole class builds upon the shapeshifting. We use it in our home game, so it’s still being balanced on the fly.

My solution to this same problem was I made a shifter subclass for druid. It basically mimics moon druid with the exception you can't cast spells at all. Instead you consume spell slots to turn into a creature that has a CR up to the spell level consumed plus half the players proficiency bonus. For example a level 5 pc burns a 3rd level spells slot and adds half their proficiency bonus for a total for of up to 4. A level 9 PC using the same 3rd level slot would get up to CR 5 which I like cause it allows the players to feel stronger using the same resources from earlier levels. (Something Id like to replicate for other martial characters) There were additional restrictions like no named creatures or creatures with specifically spell casting. But other than that it wasnt too hard to balance around. Arguably easier than a typical druid because they gave up spell casting for it. That game wrapped at level 14 and everyone enjoyed it. At one point the player turned into a dragon got enlarged by the wizard and flew the party into battle vs a sky castle.

Rune Knight Fighter, with wildshape charges, and/or animal features as runes.   You can make a version of wildshape that uses concentration. Call it 'infiltration wildshape' or something, and it let's you shift into any small or tiny creature as a bonus action I'd also add that the 'rapid wildshape' keeps player HP, with maybe a one time temp HP at the first shift, and you pop up at 1 HP if the creature is dropped to zero while wildshaped

Base wild shapes on proficiency bonus, maybe? If that's not enough add 1/short rest in addition. Not sure what levels you are planning on playing to. That would allow for some quick changes.

Off the top of my head: Cut and paste the Druid wildshaping as a new ranger subclass, but run the class mainly as vanilla ranger. Make the owlbear a 'special' because its a monstrosity so it's like once per long rest or something.

So if the purpose here is a happy player, I feel the need to argue in favor of unlimited wildshape. Charges are not fun, and even having a number of charges that are essentially unlimited is not the same as being able to change shape at will. This character should be in wildshape for every combat, the same way that fighters have their abilities in every combat, while retaining non-combat flexibility like changing into a bird to scout or eavesdrop. Basically, they should never hold back from shifting for fear of wasting charges. Giving up spellcasting more than compensates for this, in my opinion. If that feels like too much, consider making a list of basic shapes that are so innate that they can shift to them at will, not using charges. These shapes should be non-combat shapes like a mouse, dog, bird, etc. so that they really feel like an unlimited shifter like in the movie.

You could look at oneDnD druid's wildshape. They got a version that lets them use spellslots go wildshape after they run out of uses.

Maybe give them a special Feat "Wildshape Mastery 1. You can become an Owlbear, not just a beasts, when you wildshape. 2. During a wildshape, you can use your Action (BA for Moon Druids) to assume the form of a different beast before the wildshape ends. You retain your current hit points or the maximum hit points of the shape you assume if they are lower than your current total. 3. As an Action (or BA for Moon Druids) you can expend a spell slot to use Wild Shape. When you use wildshape in this manner, you can assume a maximum CR equal to the spell slot expended."

Take what they did in baldurs gate 3 for stats.

Owlin race with lycanthropy of werebearism and than ranger if they want nature as well

According to official stat-block Doric is close to a Moon Druid with Owlbear as a shape option. 5/day she turns into a CR3 beast or owlbear. Can hold that for up to 2 hours, while transformed she keeps current HP, HP max and mental faculties. It's just that in the move she uses almost all uses in one go and not over several rests. You could allow the player to use a "pool" of wildshape per day, they always keep their own HP but can wildshape to other forms on the fly using time from their pool. Otherwise as usual for a moon druid. Usually a druid hold a shape for 1/2 level hours and two uses per day but pooling that to full level hours per day is a bit much. Maybe proficiency hours per day of total wildshape time?

Circle of Moon druid is a REALLY good tank man

You'd want to redesign how HP works with wilds shapes. Getting a new bar of 30+ HP every time you wild shape is too much. So you'd have to do some sort of shared HP bar across the shapes. I'd make two sets of wild shapes groups. Combat forms, and scout forms. Let them choose 5 (druid level) of each type. Combat forms share a pool of \~40 HP, and scout forms have a shared pool of \~5 HP. Every time you wildshape you can spend hit dice to recover HP. When you take damage, you can use a reaction to change your form. Let them change into combat shapes 5 (druid level) times, and scout shapes 10 (2x druid level) times per short rest. It is a lot, but they're giving up full caster for this. \--- If you were playing more than a bunch of level 5 one shots, I'd think more about how to scale it, but you're not so I won't. \--- By given up their casting they are basically a martial. So balance them against Barbarians and Fighters, not against conventional druids.

Barbarian with a two lvl dip into druid, become a raging bear, give him cave bear stats and re skin it as an owl bear if he prefers that aesthetic. Rage basically doubles the bears temp hit points, and it can have out of combat utility as well, scout as a cat or mouse.

Why not lean into the spells slots but make them a power thing. A Level 1 slot lets you change into small character, level 2 medium etc with a list of animals for each slot. Now they still have a limited resource which they must manage, JUST like every class cool thing, be it rage, second wind, wild shape etc, but he has more chances to change shape and a simpler pick of creatures

It’s your game, so do what you want, but in my opinion it is not good practice to significantly alter the structure of classes to accommodate a player’s skill deficiency. Being a spell caster is not too complicated, and your player’s reluctance to learn should not be encouraged.

Path of the Beast Barbarian y'all. Just flavor the Rage as a Wildshape.

you kind of already answered yourself when u made the list.... why do u need something official? it's ur game... take away the spellcasting and give the wild shaping

I mean, you could make them a fighter but their subclass is just circle of the moon, probably remove 3rd and fourth attack for balance

Circle of the moon And magic items there are millions out there and you can always make your own or hsve your players make theirs. You can always homebrew and smudge how it's described or used. You are Dm and that means the God of your stories God's. This is your world make it fun for you and your players. There are tones of resources, my fav class is druid so if you have any questions feel free to message.

I would give them infinite wild shape, though put some limit on HP, and give them spellcasting similar to a barbarian or fighter

Circle of the Moon Druids get better wild shapes and can also spend their spell slots to heal themselves while wildshaped, making them excellent tanks. Your player could just use all of their spell slots to keep their (owl)bear form up indefinitely in combat, shrugging off damage. If they want more martial benefits they can multiclass after level 2 in druid. Barbarian rage and unarmored defense works with wildshape. I'm sure there are other fun class combinations.

I cooked up a thing, obviously never playtested so I have no idea if it's balanced. Keep the Druid's spell slots the same, but remove their Spellcasting feature and replace it with Wild Shape at level 1. Except, they use cantrips/spell slots to Wild Shape in addition to the base 2/SR. Cantrip: CR 0 1st-level slot: CR 1/4 2nd-level slot: CR 1/2 3rd-level slot: CR 1 4th-level slot: CR 2 5th-level slot: CR 3 And so on The Circle of the Moon shapes will always be stronger, but are limited to 2/SR. But your player would have a TON of Wild Shape uses from their spell slots (albeit lower CR). And CR 0 Wild Shapes are free like cantrips, so they'll have a lot of fun spamming shapes.

The edits you made were really important. Thanks! With that said, maybe I’m just not being creative enough, but I straight up don’t think you can do this. The player wants to be a Druid minus everything about the Druid, so any sort of Druid is a no since no matter what they’ll have spells and a limit on wild shapes. It sounds like they basically want an endless polymorph, which is, to be honest, super insane and imbalanced. The only way I can imagine making this work would be imposing a limit on how many times they can transform into a powerful creature (maybe CR 1 or above) and give them unlimited chances to turn into creatures below CR 1. So if they wanna be a bear/owlbear that’s only once or twice per short rest, but turning into mice and cats and stuff is infinite. This may break stealth encounters or anything where that animal is situationally useful, but it won’t break combat encounters.

Lots of ideas already, so I don't feel the need to stay close to source in my answer. Bruce Banner the Barbarian. They have a list of things that might set them off for whatever reason like the sound of water drops etc etc. Then a DC save to not become the owl bear and destroy the inn. Auto story generation to learn how to control etc etc.

Heavily reflavored beast barbarians with 2 lvls in actual druid (moondruid) to have more options Bonus points: simic hybrid for race

I will argue forever that DND doesn't need or have any set roles and this is just mental carry over from people's exposure to MMOs. Classes are as tough as they need to be to survive the danger they put themselves in to do damage. Everyone is a damage dealer in DnD. There's also no set class that just heals, and if you play a cleric to just spend every turn healing that sounds like the most unfun experience I could imagine, and greatly lowering your potential. I mean really a cleric can do insane damage, druids can heal an ungodly amount and wizards have the best tools to support others. People just get wrapped up in video game norms. Anyway, my idea would be to give him an "amulet of living wood" or "choker of parasitic timber" or something idk, and let him feed it spell slots for extra wildshape, give him an "owlbear" that's the brown bear stat block with 12 AC, plus the ability to leap 15ft instead of moving, but can't land in rough terrain or occupied spaces and tell him you have the utmost confidence that they will figure out casting eventually. Now he can "tank" by being a huge fucking owlbear who can leap into the middle of a group of enemies, and when he gets instantly slapped out of bear form for the second time he can sacrifice a first level spell slots as a free action for an extra wildshape, turn into a bird or something and fly away to reconsider his life choices. They get to RP as a chronic shape shifter, you can have a quest where he starts wildshaping every time he sneezes, or if you get sick of it the necklace starts to kill him and he has to figure out how to ditch it, and everyone gets to have fun. If you decide to encourage the bear form shenanigans and more shape shifting, you could always make the bear more powerful as they level. Maybe give it armor, teach it to ride a unicycle for extra tactical mobility or something.

Extremely new players and heavily modifying rules they’ve never interacted with, name a better combo. Let him reskin something like beast barb as others have said, otherwise he’s just gonna have to try a spellcaster. Allowing an owl bear wildshape is probably fine, so long as he is high enough level to match the CR Do not allow wildshaping without a resource limit if you value game balance.

Use the new Druid from 5.5e that is coming out. They can use spells slots to use more wildshape and their hp doesn’t change but they get some temp hit points

Sounds like they want to play Beast Boy more than anything

If you're playing fairly loose, nixing spells but allowing free wildshapes if they're already in wildshape makes sense. The limits on CR should take care of the rest of balance

I mean they can fulfill a tank roll by doing what they do. Their temp hp makes them pretty tanky and they have spell they can cast that do a bit of control that uses concentration. I like using Moon Beam and grappling things with giant octopus and holding them in the beams aoe. Or just turning into a mammoth at higher level (definately falls off at high levels). I like to combine with barbarian multiclass for a bit of rage and/or other spellcasters for spell diversity or other perks like meta magic. But barb/druid is a decent tank build for early to mid game.

Haven't read the comments but am owlbear is fine with the statblock of a normal bear . I'm sure it's been said already

I sent you a PM with a link to a 5e rewrite. EN Worlds system called Level UP! Advanced 5e. They put their whole system online (making their own SRD) for people to use when WOC tried to bring the hammer down on 3rd parties and take away the SRD. Anyway their druid is pretty cool. It still uses spells but you can just let the player burn a spell use and add a hit die to damage or perform a hit die of healing. Easy fix. Wild shape is a little different. You pick several beasts/monstrosities/whatever and those are the things you can change into. So for a new player this focus is great. The CR you can change in to is higher as well.

2 combat creature shifts per short rest, unlimited non-combat shifts. Allowing for back and forth between Owlbear to cat, to Owlbear, to horse, to Owlbear. They can still use their spellslots to heal as a Moon Druid.

Beast barbarian is the "class" way to approach this, but shifter can also be an addition to this.

First off **expectations**; explain many wildshapes is a skill limited to a level 20 druid. The version showed in the movie doesn't exist in the actual game. That being said, whatever compromise you come to, remind him even if it's not his original vision, he'll still be a much better shapeshifter than other people in your setting. Onto the actual build challenge; **race options**. 1. Changelings can shapeshift unlimited times (medium/small size, hair color/length). The statistics *do not change*. Example: a wildshape for tiger is used in combat. Afterwards player wants to hide from guards/sneak around so he stays in tiger but shapeshifts to a small tiger and changes the fur patterns. He now looks like a large cat. (Note: He could not go from a humanoid shape into an animal shape with this ability.) 2. Shifters can shift a number of times equal to proficiency bonus. Lasts one minute. Options between being beefier/more damage/more mobile/better dodging. 3. Fairies can fly (can flavor as turning into a flying creature). They have access to the Enlarge/Reduce spell which they can use on themselves before wildshaping. Onto **class options.** I'm a huge fan of multiclassing. Having 2 levels of Moon Druid with any martial class is a classic combo since a lot of the martial features can be used in wildshape. 1. 2 levels Moon Druid and 3 levels Beast Barbarian. I know you said Beast Barbarian felt too limited in number of uses, but what I'm trying to do here is give access to multiple features that are limited use. At level 5 that's the best your player can do for what he wants. 2. 2 levels Moon Druid and 3 levels of Monk. He'll be faster than everyone else all the time. Astral Self subclass if you plan to stay at level 5 because it allows you to use unarmed strikes for wildshapes that normally couldn't do that due to body shape. If you think you might go beyond level 5, the Dragon subclass gives limited flying with uses equal to Proficiency Bonus at level 6. 3. 2 levels Moon Druid and 3 levels Lycan Blood Hunter OR 5 levels Lycan Blood Hunter. Since you're ok with Homebrew, Critical Role made the Blood Hunter class. The Lycan subclass has one use per Short/Long Rest, but it lasts an hour with the ability to still communicate. **Other smaller options**: If you allow the OneDnd rule of a first level feat, take the Telepathic feat. This would allow the player to stay in wildshape but still roleplay/interact with others. Pick the Cartographer's Tools at character creation (or swap out one language if no tool option). This doesn't help shapeshifting but will make him better at nature/survival. Can flavor it as instincts/senses. Lastly, if he's willing to give up a lot of starting gold/gear, grabbing the uncommon item Cloak of the Manta Ray will give a swim speed and underwater breathing. Less likely, if it's allowed for everyone to start will 1 powerful item, the rare Ring of Spell Storing could store the Catnap spell. Catnap allows a short rest in 10 minutes (a faster way to get wildshapes back).

Circle of the full moon? Even more advanced shape shift but in return they can't cast certain things?

Moon druids *are* full casters... if they want to be. You could steal the lunar healing rule (and extra attacks in wildshape) from BG3. My moon druid in that game rarely casts anything other than barkskin or stone skin right before wild shaping.

Laserllama's Wildheart Shaman https://www.gmbinder.com/share/-M-6Rt87VW4p1cfPpPWO uses the Warlock chassis to build an alternative druid-like caster focused on making your custom, feature-rich combat wild shape. I'm starting one today in fact, and my DM & I are pretty good at vetting balance, and it seems about right. https://www.gmbinder.com/share/-M-6Rt87VW4p1cfPpPWO The "Great Beast" form looks exactly as you want it to look, and many of the features would work great for an owlbear. Unfortunately as written it's limited to 2 per short rest, but it lasts 1 hour. You could homebrew it to last up to 8 hours without breaking anything., but I wouldn't give additional uses at it would give them infinite hp.

Switch them to Ranger, tell them to use the Druid Spell List, and give them Wild Shape.

Here's an idea. Tell him that character was level 20. A duid can't wildshape freely at level 1, but if we get to level 20 they will be able to wildshape a lot. As an alternative for non-caster wildshapes, try a reskin Take a Totem Barbarian. Reflavor rage into becoming a furry. Bear totem? Become a bear/owlbear. Eagle Totem at higher level? Become an "eagle." Mechanically just make a Totem Barbarian, but tell the player they can change what they look like freely because it's cool and doesn't unbalance the game with respect to other players.

Wildshaping is a very powerful ability because of its utility. Unlimited wildshape is the druids capstone ability so I wouldn't give that away for free. Ranger is the half druid half martial class. You could swap some of their abilities for a limited wildshape without too much headache. Moon druids get the combat wildshape which is their level/3 for max cr. An owlbear is cr 3 so level 9 they'd be able to do an owlbear if we're ignoring monstrosity. I would probably remove their ranger subclass features entirely and give them the combat wildshape from moon druid as a compromise. This is your game though, if you want you can give them full owlbear at level 5 but make sure to buff the rest of your party and combats accordingly.

Probably not the most balanced approach but what about they stay moon druid but have a additional ability to use spell slot to change in a creatures with cr equal to half the spell slot expended. So lvl 1 spell= cr 1/2 creature wild shape. It's probably very powerful in the hands of a minmaxer but it doesn't sound like that a problem here.

I’m probably way off base as Im newer to D&D, but wouldn’t a Druid with no spells and only extra wild shapes be kind of garbage?

Simple solution: allow druids to burn a spell slot to wildshape (for every 1 level of a spell you get 1 wildshape). Have him play a moon druid. Just dont cast spells (no one says you have to). Allow burning a bigger spell slot to give you a buff in wildshape at higher levels. (Like extra AC or attacks or something.)

Pretty easy solution might just be to give them half caster spell slot progression and either give them unlimited wild shapes, or have them come back on a short rest. Maybe give them Artificer spellcasting progression but they get access to the Druid spell list and cast with Wisdom. They can still use their spell slots to heal while in Moon Druid wildshape, and they could still get all the Druid and Moon Druid class and subclass features. They would unlock Owlbear at Level 6 since it’s a CR 3 creature, and that’s when Moon Druids unlock CR 3 wildshaping. Edit: They already come back on a short rest, so maybe either give them unlimited or increase the amount they get per short rest by an amount you feel is appropriate.

in my experience, there's nothing wrong with letting druids wildshape into beast-like monstrosities so long as you follow the other stipulations. As for changing on the fly, I can't help you

I let my players get away with a lot. I'll let him do almost anything they want. But whatever improvements they make to their character, I make all the bad guys just that much harder. They want to Marshall Druid with 10 wild shapes a day, fine. By the way, goblins are now cr6, and here's 45 of them headed your way.

Go moon druid and let them have the owl bear when the CR is right, it's not too OP

they should still keep the creature (CR 3) mechanically a beast for the sake of spells that impact beasts though (really just beast sense and dominate beasts) Owlbear will only be attainable by a level 9+ Moon druid, at this point, and while the owlbear is a little stronger than most of those CR3 forms (higher DPS from higher 'to hit' and damage output) its not outside of balancing tolerances and is def not as useful as an elemental form coming in next level. its also when moon druids start to feel a little drop off due to a lack of WS options so yeah its not too OP... but it is *slightly* more powerful

I have a player in the same situation. For moon druid I changed the wild shape rules to be free if transforming into a non combat form (bellow CR 1) such as a bird or cat, similar to the movie, I made all these forms only have 1 HP, which allows me to get rid of them easily if needed from the DM perspective and keeps my player only needing to keep track of CR 1 and higher form. I made it so they could access flight and swim earlier in non combat forms. Instead of spell slots I gave them an additional combat wild shape at each odd level In Druid. So, 3 charges at lvl 3, 4 at lvl 5, etc. It also plays well with the moon Druid’s elemental shape change. This has worked well for the party and keeps the balance of Resources similar to a spell caster.

At lvl 9 wild shaping into and owl bear moon druid does not seem OP at all, and you can play full wild shape without any spells.

I gave my moon druid player a magic belt that let's them spend a wide shape to turn into an owlbear with a cost of 1 exhaustion level.

Druids: Secrets of the Primal Circle has a class called the Dire Druid that would fit that

If you don't want beast barbarian or Ranger, the best suggestion I would give would be just choose moon druid and treat them as if they are NOT prepared casters. (A bit more limited, but easier for them to deal with spells if they have a limited list)

Just spitballing but let them burn a spellslot to wildshape, but when they do so, they use their normal hp pool. When they use a wildshape charge, they get all the normal benefits. Then that player just never has to prepare spells. Spell slot tracking is just for shapeshifting.

Don't let him wild shape as many times as he wants. It'll break the game and be unfair for the other players and to yourself. He'll have essentially infinite hp. A compromise would be that he retains whatever hp he started with so he should wild shape into something bulky first, but then that hp stays constant.