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  1. - Top - End - #271
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    RogueGuy

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    Default Re: Being Everything: Eggynack's Comprehensive Druid Handbook

    I'm not sure if you were aware of these spells: http://archive.wizards.com/default.a...d/mb/20040721a

    Also, there is an ACF? or regional eberroni druid that confers the following spells/benefits: the Horse Watchers of the Tairnadal elves, which are found in Valenar and Aerenal
    Quote Originally Posted by The Siyal Marrain (Horse Watchers)
    The Siyal Marrain (Horse Watchers)
    Druids of the Siyal Marrain cannot take any of the sect feats (Ashbound, Child of Winter, Gatekeeper Initiate, Greensinger Initiate, or Warden Initiate) presented in the Eberron Campaign Setting. However, a Siyal druid does gain access to three additional spells, which are added to the druid spell list at the indicated level: 1st-level -- mount; 3rd-level -- phantom steed; 4th-level -- spirit steed. The druid loses access to these spells if she abandons the traditions of her people.

  2. - Top - End - #272
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    Default Re: Being Everything: Eggynack's Comprehensive Druid Handbook

    Quote Originally Posted by daremetoidareyo View Post
    I'm not sure if you were aware of these spells: http://archive.wizards.com/default.a...d/mb/20040721a.
    Yeah, already got bone talisman in there.
    Also, there is an ACF? or regional eberroni druid that confers the following spells/benefits: the Horse Watchers of the Tairnadal elves, which are found in Valenar and Aerenal
    Hadn't seen that one though. Really weird. I guess it's a trade? The spells are alright.

  3. - Top - End - #273
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    Default Re: Being Everything: Eggynack's Comprehensive Druid Handbook

    If keeping the tradition means taking a horse as your animal companion, it's probably not worth it.

  4. - Top - End - #274
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    Quote Originally Posted by Troacctid View Post
    If keeping the tradition means taking a horse as your animal companion, it's probably not worth it.
    True. The text seems pretty loose on that though. Only thing I can find on that page says, "A way to strengthen their bond with their mounts. The typical Valenar ranger possesses a horse as her animal companion." I figure that, if rangers only usually have horses, then druids are likely similarly unbounded. Another downside, though, is that it looks like you have to be an elf, which is also probably not worth it. I'ma make note of the definitely elf and probably horse thing. Not sure if those notes are worth a drop to red though. I figure I'll just say something like, "If you weren't already planning to be an elf, or if you consider taking on a horse animal companion or doing generally horse related things mandatory, then the spells you're getting aren't worth it and this drops to red."

    Edit: And done. Also moved the entry to the right place alphabetically. There's just something about these really marginal abilities that seems to demand tons of text. They have this tendency to be so fiddly.
    Last edited by eggynack; 2017-01-25 at 06:33 PM.

  5. - Top - End - #275
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    Quote Originally Posted by eggynack View Post
    True. The text seems pretty loose on that though. Only thing I can find on that page says, "A way to strengthen their bond with their mounts. The typical Valenar ranger possesses a horse as her animal companion." I figure that, if rangers only usually have horses, then druids are likely similarly unbounded. Another downside, though, is that it looks like you have to be an elf, which is also probably not worth it. I'ma make note of the definitely elf and probably horse thing. Not sure if those notes are worth a drop to red though. I figure I'll just say something like, "If you weren't already planning to be an elf, or if you consider taking on a horse animal companion or doing generally horse related things mandatory, then the spells you're getting aren't worth it and this drops to red."

    Edit: And done. Also moved the entry to the right place alphabetically. There's just something about these really marginal abilities that seems to demand tons of text. They have this tendency to be so fiddly.
    No precocious apprentice duskblade 2/druid (Deadly hunter Lion totem druidic avenger)//3 prestiging into geomancer 3/knight phantom 10?

    Wis to AC, Favored enemy, fast speed as monk, rage, spell channeling, photosynthetic ghost horse guy. It's almost as good as a core only monk, plus delayed druid casting and two whole spells from the duskblade spell list. Maybe strongarm your DM in allowing valenar trample allow your phantom steed make an attack, and if so, take the mounted fury feat and some rage enhancers to beef that stallion up.

    Actually that build is terrible.

  6. - Top - End - #276
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    Using mounted combat tactics has to be less costly than that. I just don't know exactly why you'd care. Dunno what a druid gets out of it. Traditionally you're getting some mobility, and maybe some extra damage with a lance, but you already have mobility, your main mode of combat should be natural attacks, and you probably want to be mostly using magic anyway. Maybe you get some weird advantage in the first four or five levels, but even then you should probably just have your animal companion handle the combat and keep on with the magics. And, y'know, if I'm running the weird mounted druid, it's probably gonna be halfling style. Their substitution levels aren't exactly good, but they're at least fitting.

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    I just added the corrupt 9th putrefaction. Really amazing chunk of spellcraft there. Unless I'm missing something important, it lets you, with practically no defenses or recourse, kill a target and have it come back as your permanent ghost slave. It's a bit more complicated than that, and the combination of one round casting time and touch range hurts, but that's some insanity right there. I'm currently mentally labeling it, "The other druid 9th." Foresight's obviously still there, being good, but we're talking about something close to a singularity spell here, like an ice assassin that's harder to use. I'm a fan.

    Edit: Oh, yeah, and I have camel as a first level companion now. Nearly strictly better heavy horse.
    Last edited by eggynack; 2017-02-03 at 03:01 AM.

  8. - Top - End - #278
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    Default Re: Being Everything: Eggynack's Comprehensive Druid Handbook

    Are standing stones (masters of the wild pg. 30) worth it?
    Last edited by thethird; 2017-02-05 at 05:00 PM.
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    Quote Originally Posted by thethird View Post
    Are standing stones (masters of the wild pg. 30) worth it?
    It's interesting. Extend is obviously solid, but it alone can't possibly justify the cost, especially with the rod right there. Enlarge seems mostly bad, especially if you also need to get value out of extend or maximize for it to be worth it, and you do. Technically blizzard would get value out of both extend and enlarge, but the fact that we're necessarily bound to this immobile stone reduces the utility of that kinda plan. Way I figure it, you really need to have a spell that gets utility from extend and maximize simultaneously. And it has to be a pretty long term buff, because the standing stone is locked in place. I can't really think of a spell that fits all of these criteria. The few effects that'd get some benefit out of maximize, like awaken and reincarnate, don't get anything out of being extended. I think I remember some weather control spell with variable effects, but the thing I don't remember is where it is. That could be interesting. I guess there's theoretical utility if we're working with a bunch of druids, but keep in mind that the replacement is a metamagic rod which is covering three castings, so you need to cover more than that many druids a day to get value.

    If there's something standing stones do that's good, I'm not currently aware of it. It's an effect with potential, certainly, so I could be missing something. One annoying thing is that the druid spell specification means that this can't reach out onto other lists through domains and such. That'd open up some possibilities that probably wouldn't pan out. I'ma go with a tentative no to whether this is worth it.

  10. - Top - End - #280
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    I think it might be passable in fimbulwinter but yes they are pretty bad.

    What about infusions from the same book? At first I thought they were just a refluffing of scrolls with easier activation, but the rules on crop yields got me thinking that you've got no way of distinguishing infusion levels per the plants you use and that maybe growing ones own's plants allows "free" access to some up to level spells in scroll infusion form.
    Thanks a lot Gengy for the awesome... just a sec... avatar. :)

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    Default Re: Being Everything: Eggynack's Comprehensive Druid Handbook

    Quote Originally Posted by eggynack View Post
    If there's something standing stones do that's good, I'm not currently aware of it. It's an effect with potential, certainly, so I could be missing something.
    The biggest advantage over the various rods are the standing stone has no daily limit. The biggest drawback is the physical contact thing. Acorn of far travel doesn't really help with that. Ring gates would be ideal, but they are not cheap. Dvati druid is probably the best way to take advantage of this. As far as cost goes, presumably these stone circles are already built, so you just have to find an existing one that does what you want, get your dvati twin there, and then they can move around and touch whatever stone you need. At the very least... would make for an extremely annoying villain.

    We may want to look at shrink item... ok, so let's assume we're dealing with a block of granite. 1 cubic foot of granite weighs 168 lbs, so 8000 lbs is 47 cubic feet. Caster level 24 shrink item is doable pre-epic with a bit of CL shenanigans. If we want to bring down the CL, the rules don't specify what the stone is made out of, so we can choose something heavier, such as galena (lead ore): 468 lbs per cubic foot, which brings the CL down to 9. Once it's shrunk, it weighs 2 lbs, or enough to hold in your hand.

    But let's say we don't want to be bothered with shrinking it, we just want it floating nearby. Suspension (Shining South) offers some interesting possibilities. As with shrink item, it's a 4th level wizard-only spell, but has some advantages: we only need 8 CL, we can move the stone up to 45' with a move action, and a nice long duration: 1d4 days + 1 day/CL. UMDing a scroll or wand might work well here. Dismissing the spell also gives us 20d6 falling object damage if we find something that isn't quite flat enough for our tastes.

    Why stop at floating, though, when we can make it fly? Call it a colossal sling stone, let's say. We can add the Flying property (+1 enhancement, Magic of Faerun) for a 30' fly speed. Or we can break out the SBG, take the Landlord feat, carve/shape the stone into a bathtub (0.5 stronghold spaces), and give it an "Incredible" locomotion for 12,500 GP. This gives us a 10' x 20' platform with a 300' fly speed (240 miles per day is 10x human walking speed). Make each 5' x 5' square a different stone, and we've got 8 different spells we can add metamagic to just by walking onto a new square. Call yourself a Stone Temple Pilot.

    Quote Originally Posted by eggynack View Post
    One annoying thing is that the druid spell specification means that this can't reach out onto other lists through domains and such. That'd open up some possibilities that probably wouldn't pan out. I'ma go with a tentative no to whether this is worth it.
    Geomancer might help there, although I'm not quite sure "make this a druid spell" is one of the qualities you can add to a spell.

  12. - Top - End - #282
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    Quote Originally Posted by thethird View Post
    I think it might be passable in fimbulwinter but yes they are pretty bad.
    That might be the spell I was thinking of. Extend doesn't do much, because the duration is already so ridiculous. You're saving like 100 XP every half-year. I don't think enlarge does anything at all, because the area is well defined as suiting the original radius. You're obviously getting only one casting out of this every half year, because the whole plan would be enshrouding a particular area in actually permanent super-winter. So, what we're getting here is a cost savings on empowering this one spell of about 23k GP compared to a rod, and losing a ton of other utility in the process.

    Here's my thinking on the ideal spell. Take blizzard, with its obvious gains from duration increases, weird disconnect between area and range, and additional utility from repeating casting, and toss in a variable numeric effect like the one from fimbulwinter, and you have something that could make for a real impact from standing stones. Not necessarily super powerful, because we're still spending a ton of cash to cover a region in incredibly ridiculously deep snow, but it has utility. I dunno what spell looks like that though. I guess the actual ideal spell would be an hours/level buff with variable numeric effects. That sounds pretty good, at least if you're running a few separate druids.

    What about infusions from the same book? At first I thought they were just a refluffing of scrolls with easier activation, but the rules on crop yields got me thinking that you've got no way of distinguishing infusion levels per the plants you use and that maybe growing ones own's plants allows "free" access to some up to level spells in scroll infusion form.
    That you seem to need wilderness lore to make use of the relevant variant rules seems like a real problem. Also, the rules here seem really similar to the craft rules, to the point where you might actually not gain much ground over just using those, especially when you consider the fact that the lack of material cost is made up for by the presence of that whole herb finding subsystem.

    Quote Originally Posted by Darrin View Post
    The biggest advantage over the various rods are the standing stone has no daily limit. The biggest drawback is the physical contact thing. Acorn of far travel doesn't really help with that. Ring gates would be ideal, but they are not cheap. Dvati druid is probably the best way to take advantage of this. As far as cost goes, presumably these stone circles are already built, so you just have to find an existing one that does what you want, get your dvati twin there, and then they can move around and touch whatever stone you need. At the very least... would make for an extremely annoying villain.
    If you just kinda arbitrarily find these things, that'd obviously be some utility. Not sure the degree to which we can assume that. I mean, that's the main advantage of the daily limit, right? That people can build these things for themselves and not object to you using them. I don't think you get that much out of the daily limit thing if you're making the thing, unless you just happen to have a team of druids or something.

    Crazy magic stone carpet plan snip
    I don't think the shrink item thing works, cause the stone is magic. I'd assume you can't shrink the stone and then make it a standing stone, because you presumably need the rock to be big to put standing stone magic on it. The various flying stone plans seem a lot better/less questionable. Dunno how much utility you're actually getting from these standing stones, but if it's gonna happen, then this would probably be key to getting it in non-static form. I mean, at this point I almost want to make an entry out of just this stuff, about the ridiculous druid army atop a floating construct that aids with their casting, but it's all rather dubious until we establish what casting is being aided.
    Geomancer might help there, although I'm not quite sure "make this a druid spell" is one of the qualities you can add to a spell.
    Yeah, this is really my biggest problem with the whole thing, or rather the spells you'd use are the problem. A lot of my analysis was assuming that the stone being stuck in place wasn't that big of an issue, in that I was just thinking of what spells you'd want to empower, enlarge, and extend. I'm not really sure what spell you'd want to do that to. Spells that want to be extended rarely want to be empowered, and vice versa, and spells rarely want to be enlarged in general. And you really need to get at least two out of three here. Maybe you could justify this with something you'd empower that's of 7th, 8th, or 9th level, because that's where rods are least cost efficient, but a big problem is that I dunno that people really wanted a greater rod of empower spell in the first place, let alone one that you need to finagle into mobility or that only works with one spell.

    The demands on the spell are so specific here. I dunno that there's anything that works. If you happen to come across a standing stone that's of some arbitrary hours/level buff spell, go ahead and use it. Especially if you can wrench it out of the ground and into the air or whatever. It's probably well worth sacrificing a cow. But that's such a weird context to consider magic items in, and at some point we're talking about something that eats into WBL anyway, such that you should maybe avoid places with standing stones lest you fill your WBL with crap. Or something.

  13. - Top - End - #283
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    Default Re: Being Everything: Eggynack's Comprehensive Druid Handbook

    Quote Originally Posted by eggynack View Post
    If you just kinda arbitrarily find these things, that'd obviously be some utility. Not sure the degree to which we can assume that. I mean, that's the main advantage of the daily limit, right? That people can build these things for themselves and not object to you using them. I don't think you get that much out of the daily limit thing if you're making the thing, unless you just happen to have a team of druids or something.
    Finding an existing stone circle that does what you want should be like finding any other magic item: set a DC, make the appropriate Knowledge check. I'd probably start with Knowledge (Arcana), but Knowledge (Nature), Knowledge (Geography), Knowledge (Local), or Knowledge (History) could work just as well. I might even be persuaded that Knowledge (Architecture and Engineering) could apply. You could also treat it as a magical location, so I think that's an Arcana check. These stone circles have likely been around for thousands of years.

    There's undoubtedly a few Spinal Tap jokes here:

    Stonehenge! 'Tis a magic place
    Where the moon doth rise with a dragon's face
    Stonehenge! Where the virgins lie
    And the prayers of devils fill the midnight sky


    Quote Originally Posted by eggynack View Post
    I don't think the shrink item thing works, cause the stone is magic.
    Dispel magic renders it nonmagical for 1d4 rounds, long enough to shrink it. After the dispel magic wears off, the shrink item lasts 1 day/CL or you can add permanency.

    Quote Originally Posted by eggynack View Post
    I mean, at this point I almost want to make an entry out of just this stuff, about the ridiculous druid army atop a floating construct that aids with their casting, but it's all rather dubious until we establish what casting is being aided.
    Well, the first thing that sprung to my mind was creeping cold, since extending that is just stone cold pure nasty. Enlarge doubles the range to 50' + 5'/CL, and Empower adds +1.75 damage per d6.

    The druid's signature spell is call lightning, and that fares pretty well here: 20 rounds/CL, +50% damage, and range is now 200' + 20'/CL.

    Any "damage over time" spell would at least hit Extend/Empower. I should think the druid list has a few of those outside of creeping cold, but I'm not sure I want to look them up right now.

    Quote Originally Posted by eggynack View Post
    Spells that want to be extended rarely want to be empowered, and vice versa, and spells rarely want to be enlarged in general. And you really need to get at least two out of three here.
    I'm not sure I agree. If I've got a spell that I always want to Extend every time I cast it (presumably more than 3/day or 6/day or whatnot), then I don't really care if Empowering or Enlarging is thrown in there to no discernible effect.

    Hmm. Let's look at creeping cold first:

    Price Material/Service
    6,300 GP Cost to create 2nd level Standing Stone
    330 GP shrink object from 11th level arcane caster
    8,050 GP permanency from 11th level arcane caster
    14,680 GP Total

    The shrink object and permanency are fixed costs, while a standing stone for call lightning would look like:

    Price Material/Service
    7,875 GP Cost to create 3rd level Standing Stone
    330 GP shrink object from 11th level arcane caster
    8,050 GP permanency from 11th level arcane caster
    16,255 GP Total

    Hmm. Let's look at this by spell level:

    Spell Level Standing Stone Metamagic Rod
    1st 13,805 GP 1,500 GP
    2nd 14,680 GP 1,500 GP
    3rd 16,255 GP 1,500 GP
    4th 18,530 GP 5,500 GP
    5th 21,505 GP 5,500 GP
    6th 25,180 GP 5,500 GP
    7th 29,555 GP 12,250 GP
    8th 33,230 GP 12,250 GP
    9th 37,255 GP 12,250 GP

    In most cases, you'll have to cast that spell more than 9 times to make it worth carrying 3x metamagic rods. Ok, so, shrink item/permanency is probably not the way to go here, unless you've got money to burn.

  14. - Top - End - #284
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    Quote Originally Posted by Darrin View Post
    Finding an existing stone circle that does what you want should be like finding any other magic item: set a DC, make the appropriate Knowledge check. I'd probably start with Knowledge (Arcana), but Knowledge (Nature), Knowledge (Geography), Knowledge (Local), or Knowledge (History) could work just as well. I might even be persuaded that Knowledge (Architecture and Engineering) could apply. You could also treat it as a magical location, so I think that's an Arcana check. These stone circles have likely been around for thousands of years.
    As I note elsewhere though, I'm not sure how that gets priced. Like, you go out and find this standing stone. Do you now count as owning a standing stone? How much does that eat into WBL? If we're just trying to find some magic item, and that's the context we're considering it in, then it's going to act a lot like actually buying/making the thing. Money in D&D is weird.
    Dispel magic renders it nonmagical for 1d4 rounds, long enough to shrink it. After the dispel magic wears off, the shrink item lasts 1 day/CL or you can add permanency.
    Fair enough.


    Well, the first thing that sprung to my mind was creeping cold, since extending that is just stone cold pure nasty. Enlarge doubles the range to 50' + 5'/CL, and Empower adds +1.75 damage per d6.

    Any "damage over time" spell would at least hit Extend/Empower. I should think the druid list has a few of those outside of creeping cold, but I'm not sure I want to look them up right now.
    Yeah, that's not bad utility. Hadn't considered creeping cold, and it definitely uses every part of the standing stone buffalo. It feels like that's probably the top end of utility. Which, I dunno, maybe? It's a lot of money and effort to get some more juice out of creeping cold. It doesn't help that low level spells have a bad price point in the rod comparison. You can get four lesser metamagic rods of extend spell for the price of one standing stone associated with creeping cold, and swapping to call lightning makes it worse. So, you're really in it for empower and enlarge, and that whole setup doesn't strike me as all that good. Especially after you consider the costs of making the stone usable on the go. The comparison gets somewhat better if you're crafting, but that's more of a universal truth for items. You're more likely to have craft wondrous than craft rod, but my tendency has been not considering that facet of item comparisons.

    I'm not sure I agree. If I've got a spell that I always want to Extend every time I cast it (presumably more than 3/day or 6/day or whatnot), then I don't really care if Empowering or Enlarging is thrown in there to no discernible effect.
    But most of the spells I'm really interested in extending are long enough in duration that getting six uses isn't great. Creeping cold is an exception, and might be the top of the curve here, but am I really going to cast bite of the wereX enough times in a day that picking up this item to make that last awhile is worth it?
    In most cases, you'll have to cast that spell more than 9 times to make it worth carrying 3x metamagic rods. Ok, so, shrink item/permanency is probably not the way to go here, unless you've got money to burn.
    A lot of it is intrinsic to the standing stone cost too, as I note above. If we stop assuming the stone is crafted, the actual cost of the stone becomes more important than the cost of shrink item/permanency. The creeping cold idea is interesting, but it seems like the value add from standing stones compared to other options is insufficient. Also, rods are all versatile and such. That you can use them on creeping cold is good, but that you can use them on creeping cold and also use them on a ton of other things is what makes them great.

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    Default Re: Being Everything: Eggynack's Comprehensive Druid Handbook

    Why not animate it and use it as a mount instead of shrinking it.

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    Quote Originally Posted by daremetoidareyo View Post
    Why not animate it and use it as a mount instead of shrinking it.
    With what, animate objects? Seems even more expensive on a couple of fronts, though it could work I suppose. I think that's kinda what Darrin was angling for with the whole flying stones plan.

    Edit: That you technically only have the capacity to order the animated objects to attack strikes me as problematic for this particular expression of the plan. Also, not sure how the whole, "An animated object can be of any nonmagical material," thing comes into play. It's a restriction on result, rather than target, after all.
    Last edited by eggynack; 2017-02-06 at 04:34 PM.

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    Default Re: Being Everything: Eggynack's Comprehensive Druid Handbook

    Just added heir of siberys to the gestalt section. That took way way way too long. Mighta left some stuff out, but I think I hit the highlights. I mean, the goal here was always a pretty surface level analysis, because such is the nature of spending time writing about classes that are very much not druid, but I've got the SLA's, and the two feats, and the three spells, and a couple of items. Decided against mentioning the reservoir thing that adds an SLA use, cause the siberys one seems overpriced, and the primary goal is neat longer term utility.

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    Default Re: Being Everything: Eggynack's Comprehensive Druid Handbook

    Regarding Standing Stones, the Druid I'm playing has already created a druid grove that consists of a circle of standing stones surrounded by a circle of 6 different trees (move earth, stone tell, speak with plants, and liveoak spells were involved).

    This area, also hallowed with a "speak with animals" spell, has become his home (when not off adventuring).

    And that was before he knew about Standing Stones or the "Druid Grove" spell.

    Making a few standing stones attuned to a regular buff spell cast every morning (for automatic extend/widen/maximize) would possibly be useful if this was one's home.

    One could even double up and cast druid grove to store in a tree next to a stone a spell that would then always come off empowered, extended and widened.

    e.g. a healing spell like vigorous circle covering more widely spread creatures and lasting twice as long. Storing that in a tree next to a standing stone might be a good use of Druid Grove.

    Or a defensive/offensive spell one is likely to cast when the area is attacked. Consider frostfell cast here being extended, widened, and empowered would not be a bad idea. It lasts twice as long, covers double the area (more space in which cold spells are +1 CL), and does 50% more damage to those who don't turn to popsicles.
    Last edited by Hiro Quester; 2017-02-14 at 12:05 AM.
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    Default Re: Being Everything: Eggynack's Comprehensive Druid Handbook

    The primary question for standing stones is not whether you can use it enough. That's an important consideration, but I think it's the second question that should be asked. The first question is what you're actually putting on the thing. Like, you bring up frostfell, but that spell doesn't get that much out of these things. The second effect is actually enlarge, and bumping it up to medium doesn't do that much, empower is alright but not that relevant if you're just trying to make a frostfell environment, and extend is alright but this is already lasting most of the day. For vigorous circle, I don't think enlarge actually does anything, and I'm pretty definite empower does nothing, so it's all down to extend, which, again, you can just rod. The big issue with standing stones is that they're really expensive, and the metamagic effects rarely come together to do something truly interesting. This item demands a lot, and I don't think there's anything that truly delivers. Which kinda sucks, cause the item is cool. Something that I'd really like to extend, empower, and enlarge, something that gets true value add from those effects, and preferably something that works well tied to an area, would be great, but it doesn't look like a thing that is.

    Separately, am I the only person super into putrefaction? I feel like I was only barely hyperbolic with my super hyperbolic sounding claims. Granted, 9th's tend to be good and such, but it's always made me unhappy that the druid more or less completely fails to compete at level 17 if you drop shapechange. Now the druid kinda has two ways to access the singularity.

    Edit: Is the answer to, "What buff spell has long duration and variable numeric effects?" venomfire? Is that the answer to the question that is standing stones? I don't know that druids really need an item to make venomfire better. Especially sucks cause I think, without checking, that 3rd level spells are really inefficient to stone relative to rods.
    Last edited by eggynack; 2017-02-14 at 12:23 AM.

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    Default Re: Being Everything: Eggynack's Comprehensive Druid Handbook

    Looking at 9th levels druid spells There aren't that many good ones. Once you cast Foresight, and your DM bans Shapechange as too overpowered, there are few good options.

    Wondering what you think of Cast in Stone (not mentioned in the guide).

    As I see it, it has some good potential; a rounds/level no-action-required on your turn save-or-die, with partial or total concealment as a side-benefit.

    For rounds/level, any creature within 30 ft that meets your gaze makes a fort save or is permanently turned to stone (as Flesh to Stone; no SR).

    And this affects all creatures within 30 ft of you, at the beginning of their turn. It requires no effort on your part if used this way.

    If they avoid having to save against being turned to stone, by averting their eyes, then you and nearby allies get concealment against them. And they still have a 50% chance of having to save

    They can close their eyes but then you (and other allies) have total concealment against them.

    As a standard action on your turn, you can actively try to gaze and force a save of a creature not already closing its eyes or averting its gaze. But you could just let them have to make a save on their turn, and spend your turn doing other useful things.

    And you can speak a command word at any time to free any ally who accidentally looks in your direction and gets turned to stone.

    I imagine using this in air elemental form. Flyby attack with 100 ft perfect maneuverability means you can swoop across the battlefield, buffing allies or blasting foes in the middle of a move action, ending up in a position within 30 ft of several (ideally low-fort-save) enemies away from allies, making lots of annoying noise to make those around you look at you, forcing a save vs. turning to stone of all those enemies on their turn. Lather, rinse, repeat.
    Last edited by Hiro Quester; 2017-02-14 at 12:35 AM.
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    Default Re: Being Everything: Eggynack's Comprehensive Druid Handbook

    Quote Originally Posted by Hiro Quester View Post
    Looking at 9th levels druid spells There aren't that many good ones. Once you cast Foresight, and your DM bans Shapechange as too overpowered, there are few good options.
    Except fo' this one. Apparently. It's like ice assassin or something. Surprised it's not mentioned more. Or not, cause it's an obscure old dragon mag corrupt spell.

    Wondering what you think of Cast in Stone (not mentioned in the guide).

    As I see it, it has some good potential; a rounds/level no-action-required on your turn save-or-die, with partial or total concealment as a side-benefit.
    It seems reasonable. Might include it. I'm not a big fan of the fact that the concealment thing is basically strict downside to what was otherwise a solid mass SoD effect. It's like, you can kill stuff, or just blind them unless they have a fancy alternate vision mode which they probably do. They get to choose, y'know? It reads similarly to unearthly beauty, but with better defined murder capacity, and a spell level higher. I probably have worse 9th's listed already.

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    Quote Originally Posted by eggynack View Post
    Like, you bring up frostfell, but that spell doesn't get that much out of these things. The second effect is actually enlarge, and bumping it up to medium doesn't do that much, empower is alright but not that relevant if you're just trying to make a frostfell environment, and extend is alright but this is already lasting most of the day.
    Oh. Right. I always get enlarge and widen infused. I was thinking of widen. Still, extending the range isn't a bad thing (hit enemies while they are still far way). Empower is relevant on the CL d6s in frostburn damage suffered by those who make their save. And yeah, extend is alright for the +1CL on cold spells effect, but it's already hour/level.

    One of the effects that these stones seem have in their favor is the ability to affects spells without increasing their spell level. Ordinarily a druid could not apply these metamagics (esp. empower) to higher-level spells.

    Getting all 3 effects (even if few spells could benefit from all 3) without increasing the spell level has to be useful for something. Im also having trouble seeing what that could be, though.

    E.g. if you regularly cast Shambler to protect your grove-with-standing-stones, then you can use a stone to extend and empower that 9th level spell (get more shambling mounds for longer). That's not something you could usually do.

    But you could just use a greater rod of extend spell. It is half the price. Cast it twice as often for more shambling mounds. And you still have the versatility of using the greater rod of extend spell for other spells.

    Even venomfire doesn't benefit from the enlarge (enlarge doesn't affect touch spells). But empowering and extending the extra d6/CL acid damage is pretty huge.


    Edit: Tsunami could benefit from all 3 effects. Extend (greater range), empower the d6/CL bludgeoning damage done to those caught up in the wave, and extend (you can concentrate on it for 2 rounds/level).

    But Tsunami is not a spell you would usually want to use from the same location many times. Unless you are regularly defending your small island from invading fleets of ships?


    Further edit: planting such an tsunami-empowering obelisk on the deck of a ship, though, would make your ship a lot more well-defended.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Hiro Quester View Post
    One of the effects that these stones seem have in their favor is the ability to affects spells without increasing their spell level. Ordinarily a druid could not apply these metamagics (esp. empower) to higher-level spells.
    The obvious comparison point is metamagic rods. You generally need to be getting empower plus one of the other two to beat the cost of just picking up a pair of rods. The stones let you get two metamagics onto one spell, but you still need to get real value from the doubling or triping down to make it worthwhile. If one is enough, the rod is nearly always better. Unless you really need to grant a lot of druids the ability to empower a particular spell, anyway.

    Edit: Tsunami could benefit from all 3 effects. Extend (greater range), empower the d6/CL bludgeoning damage done to those caught up in the wave, and extend (you can concentrate on it for 2 rounds/level).

    But Tsunami is not a spell you would usually want to use from the same location many times. Unless you are regularly defending your small island from invading fleets of ships?
    Not a bad setup, I suppose. Real problem might be the material component. The item demands that you cast this a lot, and 5k GP is a lot to ask repeatedly. Actually, real problem is it's a 9th. Generally hard to argue for reasonable efficiency upgrades when you're running 9th's. I do like the idea of setting up a weird tsunami defense system for a town or whatever, but it's kinda hard to imagine the threat that's totally equipped to bypass the 17th level druid or druids hanging out in this town on a permanent basis, which can't also handle a tsunami.

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    Just added the elder viper tree from expedition to the demonweb pits. I really like that broken branch thing. It seems a whole lot like you can generate as many very damaging and poisonous branch minions as you want, I suppose limited by your initial number of branches (which looks high, based on the picture), as well as by their one hour duration.

    Separately, any opinions on summon wurm from dragon 296 page 82? I've been going back and forth on whether I should include them, cause they have this weird DM dependence issue. But, like, it lets you summon cool druid dragons. And that's pretty good. Also been going back and forth on whether I should include them as wild shape forms. Their breath weapons are rather unique, so they could be worth putting in, but again, this is a thing that required DM permission before the turning of the editions. Basically, were I to include this, it would likely be the most "core distant" thing currently in the handbook

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    I don't know if this has been addressed before, but I see no mention of the Verdant Lord in the PrC section. I know it's not been reprinted in 3.5e, but the conversion booklet covers the command/control plants dilemma as well as the changes to the skill prerequisites and I've always seen it as a nice iconical Druid PrC, although the last one may just be my opinion.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Uncle Pine View Post
    I don't know if this has been addressed before, but I see no mention of the Verdant Lord in the PrC section. I know it's not been reprinted in 3.5e, but the conversion booklet covers the command/control plants dilemma as well as the changes to the skill prerequisites and I've always seen it as a nice iconical Druid PrC, although the last one may just be my opinion.
    Not sure where the conversion booklet for this is at the moment. However, my big problem is that it costs a lot and doesn't seem to do overmuch. You pay two feats, and then I'm not sure what you're getting out of it. It's mostly these feats that aren't worth feats, and abilities that don't do too much. Even if you were getting enough to compensate for the feat loss, you're also paying in a loss of druid stuff progression, which is maybe fine short term but can be rather deleterious in the longer term.

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    Default Re: Being Everything: Eggynack's Comprehensive Druid Handbook

    How about Wild Shaping in Horrid animals? It is not mentioned in the handbook. Is it because it is somehow illegal? Or because it is simply not worth it?
    It seems to me that taking a Horrid bat form is somehow competitive with a Desmodu Hunting bat given the justifications in the handbook. The Horrid bat has a shorter Blindsense range, flight speed and does not have Scent, but gains an extra 5 AC, an immunity to Acid, 1 more point of Dex bonus and 8 more points of Con bonus.

    And maybe for offensive forms things get better, since the Druid has better HDs than the original animals and benefits better from the extra 1d6/ 4HD acid damage per primary attack than they do. How about that, am I missing something?
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    Quote Originally Posted by remetagross View Post
    How about Wild Shaping in Horrid animals? It is not mentioned in the handbook. Is it because it is somehow illegal? Or because it is simply not worth it?
    Horrid is a template, and thus not allowed with wild shape because of the rules of alternate form.

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    Default Re: Being Everything: Eggynack's Comprehensive Druid Handbook

    Ahhh, fair point. Too bad :)
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    Default Re: Being Everything: Eggynack's Comprehensive Druid Handbook

    Eggy, would you mind adding a section for non-Druid Wild Shapers and tips for such builds?
    _

    Monk has a Wild Shape Variant, as does Ranger.

    Wild Monk (Dragon Magazine #324, page 97) has slightly delayed Wild Shape progression compared to a Druid at the expense of its 3 bonus feats and Slow Fall (and of course it has no casting).
    Wild Shape Ranger (Unearthed Arcana, page 58) gets Fast Movement and normal Wild Shape progression, but for small/medium animals only (never gets large or elemental forms) in exchange for its combat style.
    _

    I think the Monk would be pretty straightforward- shift into one of the animal forms you mentioned as being good for Druids who are just going to hit stuff, losing out on the Druid's buffing spells.

    I guess Ranger would be similar, though it would have its own unique spells for buffing. You can take Improved Unarmed Strike and Ascetic Hunter to be able to punch harder, something that wins you a small advantage over a regular Druid.

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