Making Druid OP

[...]

Let's count the ways that we can make Druid OP! I'll start:

1. Wild Shape Aberration and Large size CR 25 Elder Brain in the same book.

[enderlord99]

2. Play a druid. Congratulations!

[Nilehus]

2. Play a druid. Congratulations!

Sonuva... Stole my post.

3. Take the Natural Spell feat.

[Hazrond]

4. abuse the feat that lets you use spell like and supernatural abilities of your wildshapes

[eggynack]

Apart from the thoon elder brain, I don't think there's much in the way of elder brain forms that are overpowered. My preference along the aberration wild shape front is nilshai form from unapproachable east for double spells every round. In any case, as was noted, you don't really have to make druids OP. They just start out that way. That being said, you can pull off some crazy junk.

Edit:

4. abuse the feat that lets you use spell like and supernatural abilities of your wildshapes

Feh. You can accomplish more than enough with just enhance wild shape combined with aberration wild shape.

[...]

5. Abuse RAW and call some fake creatures "animals," and some real creatures "beasts."

[White Blade]

Apart from the thoon elder brain, I don't think there's much in the way of elder brain forms that are overpowered. My preference along the aberration wild shape front is nilshai form from unapproachable east for double spells every round. In any case, as was noted, you don't really have to make druids OP. They just start out that way. That being said, you can pull off some crazy junk.

Edit:
Feh. You can accomplish more than enough with just enhance wild shape combined with aberration wild shape.

The exalted deeds one lets you grab Blink Dog capabilities at level 5. There's nothing like being a horrible, selfish monster of a player playing an exalted druid.

[eggynack]

The exalted deeds one lets you grab Blink Dog capabilities at level 5. There's nothing like being a horrible, selfish monster of a player playing an exalted druid.

Level eight or nine, actually, depending on whether you're running VoP. It's a pretty sweet feat, though probably behind dragon wild shape, and definitely behind aberration.

[...]

Apart from the thoon elder brain, I don't think there's much in the way of elder brain forms that are overpowered. My preference along the aberration wild shape front is nilshai form from unapproachable east for double spells every round. In any case, as was noted, you don't really have to make druids OP. They just start out that way. That being said, you can pull off some crazy junk.

Edit:
Feh. You can accomplish more than enough with just enhance wild shape combined with aberration wild shape.

It's not that the Elder Brain is OP, it's that you can turn into a CR 25 creature at level 8.

[eggynack]

It's not that the Elder Brain is OP, it's that you can turn into a CR 25 creature at level 8.

No, you can't. Too many HD. Nothing in the feat bypasses that limit.

[...]

No, you can't. Too many HD. Nothing in the feat bypasses that limit.

Really? I never knew that. Curse you, d8 hit dice!

[Vhaidara]

Really? I never knew that. Curse you, d8 hit dice!

...The problem is number of HD, not size.

[...]

...The problem is number of HD, not size.

I meant for aberrations. Smaller hit dice size equals more hit dice for same hit points.

[Vhaidara]

Not sure why hit points are relevant, especially since aberration and druid have the same hit die (d8)

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Aberration Wild Shape feat (LoM) + Assume Supernatural Ability feat (SS) for 'eye rays' + Wild Shape: Beholder or any of the Beholderkin in various books, mostly LoM. Those creatures only have a single Eye Rays (Su) ability, under which each individual eyestalk's special ability is included, so just gaining 'eye rays' gets you all of those attached abilities.

[heavyfuel]

Nobody said this yet?

6. Take the Greenbound Summoning feat.

[ArqArturo]

7.- Augment Summoning Shenanigans.

8.- Arcane Heirophant. Congratulations, you're now Batman with a green thumb.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

I meant for aberrations. Smaller hit dice size equals more hit dice for same hit points.

The post-errata Wild Shape is based on Alternate Form:
"The creature retains its hit points and save bonuses, although its save modifiers may change due to a change in ability scores."

You keep your own HP total whenever you Wild Shape. Even if you take the form of a creature with a higher Con score, your HP doesn't change. The assumed form's actual hit points are absolutely irrelevant for purposes of wild shaping, only how many hit dice the creature has. You cannot wild shape into a creature with more hit dice (the number before the letter d) than your Druid level. Taking an example from your original post, and Elder Brain has 26 HD (Hit Dice: 26d8+364 plus 3), so even with Aberration Wild Shape you would have to be a level 26 Druid to Wild Shape into that. You don't get any of the form's hit points, you always keep your own hit point total.

[Vhaidara]

9. Planar Shepard.
9b. Planar Shepard using Dal Quor

Yes, those are separate.

[...]

Not sure why hit points are relevant, especially since aberration and druid have the same hit die (d8)

I meant that if you wild shape into an aberration with 80 hp maximum, they have 10 HD. If you wild shape into a magical beast with 80 hp maximum, they have 8 HD.

[ArqArturo]

9. Planar Shepard.
9b. Planar Shepard using Dal Quor

Yes, those are separate.

I think that's not OP, I think it's "Let's see how long it takes for the DM to break into a pile of tears and broken dreams" kind of a deal.

[eggynack]

I meant that if you wild shape into an aberration with 80 hp maximum, they have 10 HD. If you wild shape into a magical beast with 80 hp maximum, they have 8 HD.

Probably irrelevant. It is the rare epic monster that can serve any druid purpose.

[Vhaidara]

..., the hit point total is completely irrelevant...

I think that's not OP, I think it's "Let's see how long it takes for the DM to break into a pile of tears and broken dreams" kind of a deal.

Wait, the DM has dreams? That means you can summon the DM from Dal Quor, doesn't it?

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

I think that's not OP, I think it's "Let's see how long it takes for the DM to break into a pile of tears and broken dreams" kind of a deal.

More like, how long before rocks fall....

[Coidzor]

Not sure why hit points are relevant, especially since aberration and druid have the same hit die (d8)

I believe they mean that Aberrations tend to have more HD for an equivalent amount of badassness than Magical Beasts or Animals in a way similar to how Undead have massively inflated HD for their CR when taken as a group, partially(IIRC) due to their lack of Constitution Score.

Whether this is correct, I cannot recall.

[FabulousFizban]

elevate your caster level for the call animals spell, use animal empathy to befriend said animals, then train them to fight for you. Congratulations, you now have a bunch of creatures to fight for you that are 3-4 levels higher than the rest of the party.

Alternatively, just make tornadoes

[eggynack]

Well, there's always that one cool trick, where you use fey ring for a siabrie. That explodes the game pretty good.

[Vhaidara]

Eggy, shouldn't you be able to get this thread to item 50 all on your own?

[ArqArturo]

So basically a druid is a Vitamancer?.

[eggynack]

Eggy, shouldn't you be able to get this thread to item 50 all on your own?

Eh, depends on how much I space stuff out, and how you define OP. If I were to just wedge my handbook into as small a space as possible, then I'm working with 489887 characters of druid stuff, and I think that posts are limited to either 30 or 50 k characters, so there'd be between 9 and 16 posts, approximately. Probably not a whole thread, in other words, especially as a lot of the word count is crap like explaining why bear's endurance is overrated.