General Fantasy: Why is the druid so rarely picked or offered?

[Zardnaar]

My memory was a little fuzzy, but I'm right that fighter was top, followed by cleric, with druid in the bottom: See here.

There was another survey where they gave the exact numbers.

It was during the D&D Next. Your survey is for 5E classes.

5E Paladin is really good.

[Nifft]

There was another survey where they gave the exact numbers.

It was during the D&D Next. Your survey is for 5E classes.

5E Paladin is really good.

Paladin has been one of my favorite classes across all editions, based almost entirely on RP reasons. 5e made Paladins strong enough that I don't feel dumb for playing one, but it's not like I wasn't already playing one.

I've been able to make fun Druids, too, but they require a lot more intellectual effort, to design a niche that is both fun and flavorful and fits a party.

[Max_Killjoy]

This isn't too far off -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Druid

A druid (Welsh: derwydd; Old Irish: druí) was a member of the high-ranking professional class in ancient Celtic cultures. While perhaps best remembered as religious leaders, they were also legal authorities, adjudicators, lorekeepers, medical professionals and political advisors. While the druids are reported to have been literate, they are believed to have been prevented by doctrine from recording their knowledge in written form, thus they left no written accounts of themselves. They are however attested in some detail by their contemporaries from other cultures, such as the Romans.

The earliest known references to the druids date to the fourth century BCE and the oldest detailed description comes from Julius Caesar's Commentarii de Bello Gallico (50s BCE). Later Greco-Roman writers also described the druids, including Cicero,^[2] Tacitus^[3] and Pliny the Elder.^[4] Following the Roman invasion of Gaul, the druid orders were suppressed by the Roman government under the 1st century CE emperors Tiberius and Claudius, and had disappeared from the written record by the 2nd century.

In about 750 CE the word druid appears in a poem by Blathmac, who wrote about Jesus, saying that he was "... better than a prophet, more knowledgeable than every druid, a king who was a bishop and a complete sage."^[5] The druids then also appear in some of the medieval tales from Christianized Ireland like the "Táin Bó Cúailnge", where they are largely portrayed as sorcerers who opposed the coming of Christianity.^[6] In the wake of the Celtic revival during the 18th and 19th centuries, fraternal and neopagan groups were founded based on ideas about the ancient druids, a movement known as Neo-Druidism. Many popular notions about druids are based on the misconceptions of 18th century scholars. These have been largely superseded by more recent study.^[7]

[Temperjoke]

One thing to consider is druids are usually considered/seen as preferring wilderness, being less civilized, more animalistic, etc. They don't have to be, but that's what a lot of tropes regarding them are. And a lot of people don't want to play that sort of character. They also aren't seen as fitting in, after all, why would a rugged uncivilized druid be in the middle of a bustling urban metropolis?

EDIT: Another thing problem too is, when you're taking shapeshifting into account, there's extra work involved in managing the stats for the animal shapes, you need to know what your DM wants to make available to you, you or the DM needs the information. There's also the problem that a lot of people use digital playing systems that may not handle shapeshifting characters that well.

[NovenFromTheSun]

It seems a bit redundant: is it really any more "nature-y" when a Druid shoots lightning than when a wizard or priest does it?

[Anonymouswizard]

It seems a bit redundant: is it really any more "nature-y" when a Druid shoots lightning than when a wizard or priest does it?

Depends on if I've given the other classes the Call Lightning spell.

In all honesty, I prefer the 2e treatment, where druids were explicitly a variety of priest. Generally weaker than the 2e Cleric*, as specialty priests were supposed to be (although I understand that wasn't always true), and pretty much a nature priest. They were included (in theory) as an example of how a specialty priest might look.

* The 2e cleric was versatile and strong, but mainly suffered from not having a lot of powers. It's not exactly over or underpowered, but it's supposed to be the all-rounder of the priest classes.

[Cluedrew]

Many popular notions about druids are based on the misconceptions of 18th century scholars. These have been largely superseded by more recent study.

Many popular notions about everything are based on misconceptions from somewhere.

Personally, any nature-linked mystic could be descripted as a druid, when you have something close enough in fiction using an approximately accurate word gives a good starting point. Unless you are doing historical I don't see the need to stick to history. And I see no reason at all to stick to D&D's definition either.

[Starshade]

I personally, think there is possibly more old 18. Century scholar theories in D&D druids than we believe. the Ancient Order of Druids (those guys at Stonehenge in the summer months), descends from Ancient Archaeological Order of Druids, who as the name implies, is based on old Archaeology work and theories, now often quite romantic and outdated research. I think, there is some parallell thoughts in D&D and the druid revival movement.

As a student of Cultural history (archaeology), I suggest the D&D druid is quite dependent on the Druid revival movement, and the historical and archaeological works the guys doing solstice ceremonies in later years at Stonehenge used to build their religion. D&D simply used the same thoughts the "New druids" picked up.
They did, though, cherry pick what they wanted (the neo druids don't have tribes to govern). In fantasy we might go back to the sources, and add the lorekeeper, judge and political parts of the tales. The Celtic Druids must have had great political powers, maybe able to pass judgement, unite tribes in war, etc.