Druid nerfs

[mr420247]

I here there finally nerfing druids aka fixing them

Why or what they are one step above fvs barely this for real

[Amundir]

Instead of "hearing" things, "read" things.

https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/493875-Druid-Update-Preview

[J-mann]

I here there finally nerfing druids aka fixing them

Why or what they are one step above fvs barely this for real

Fixes are long overdue. That being said, unless they change some things in their current build, melee druids will be pretty mediocre.

[Cantor]

Fixes are long overdue. That being said, unless they change some things in their current build, melee druids will be pretty mediocre.

The trees look OK. I feel it depends entirely on natural fighting. Natural fighting is absurdly weak compared to any thf, swf, and twf. If they intend to take away twf they have to do something big with NF.

[PsychoBlonde]

The trees look OK. I feel it depends entirely on natural fighting. Natural fighting is absurdly weak compared to any thf, swf, and twf. If they intend to take away twf they have to do something big with NF.

Right--and not just increase the doublestrike %, because even with the current ds amount, people can easily get to 100% and there's no wrap.

Just being able to get the increased +[w] and crit from using an actual weapon will go a long way, of course. Really need to see what it looks like on Lamma.

[Cantor]

Right--and not just increase the doublestrike %, because even with the current ds amount, people can easily get to 100% and there's no wrap.

Just being able to get the increased +[w] and crit from using an actual weapon will go a long way, of course. Really need to see what it looks like on Lamma.

Yup. I think they know that +w and better crit profiles will make a difference and that's why they are holding out on changes.
I understand why they are doing it but... My favorite thing about wolf was not worrying about what type of weapon, just the effects. I feel the change to using weapon profile kills all the flavor just making animal form more or less cosmetic. I would have preferred +w scaling with levels or newer forms at higher levels something to fix the problem without making it just like everything else.

[PsychoBlonde]

Everything being on pretty much the same system makes it a lot easier to keep it curated and avoid bugs and exploits, tho.

It's easy to have preferences when we're only going by how we wish things could work instead of the actual problems of implementation.

I kind of look it as . . . we're finally getting to the point where I have no real reason to say "the prospect of doing another life in that class makes me want to ralph"

[goodspeed]

I here there finally nerfing druids aka fixing them

Why or what they are one step above fvs barely this for real

lol id say they're nerfing wolves. Bears and "druids" suck already. Unless you have an hour to chill out and wait for stuff to die in a 5 spell earthquake storm.

[Kriogen]

Fixes are long overdue. That being said, unless they change some things in their current build, melee druids will be pretty mediocre.
Vistani tree is not so bad. Ah, you mean "wolf" ... He's dead, Jim.

Its like Cleric/FvS and War Priest or Wizard/Sorcerer and EK. It will always be mediocre at best. If it would be good, other classes would not be required.

Personaly im neutral when it comes to wolf, bear, melee. What bothers me is that a class that can cast 9th level spells(the highest) gets 2 melee oriented enhancements trees and only 1 caster tree. Odd.

[guardiankaiser]

Personaly im neutral when it comes to wolf, bear, melee. What bothers me is that a class that can cast 9th level spells(the highest) gets 2 melee oriented enhancements trees and only 1 caster tree. Odd.

Well I don't expect that big of a change at this point, and Protector has some nice low hanging defensive perks that will help casters, I really would have expected more along the lines of the following

Animal Path: 1 tree for both forms, most of the perks being dual sided, offense for wolf (stealth skills, sneak attack, aggro reduction, attack speed (like twf)), defense for bear (Intimidate, PRR, massive threat boost, cleaving attacks (like two handed) neither of these paths should be stronger then true melee characters as they should make use of spells in these forms for added healing, damage for building more threat, and some light CC abilities. To that end while slower cooldowns would be important in these forms a method of insuring they can functions as casters as well as melee needs to exist such as using wisdom for hit and damage (possibly with a restriction of needing that buff to come from an updated Shillelagh spell, using quarterstaff, dual club, or club and shield combos, seeing as such weapons often already show up with mage stats on them, also scaling animal abilities off spell power and not melee would help) Allowing animal form flexibility between attack/defense in wolf/bear forms without having the mastery of it that other classes have. Evidence they should be merge even in the current design is there non-stacking animal form cooldown reduction core ability effects

Elemental Path: A form that uses Summer/Winter aspect of fire and water elemental forms, largely the cast path already fills this role, with some more refining. A spellcasting offensive path.

Nature Path This new tree should include many support abilities, Healing, Summoning, Debuffs/CC effects, pet enhancements, a few new spells might need to be added as there are only a handful of plant, growth, and poisoning effects.

I know a lot of people want an Air/Earth elemental form, but I would rather not the spell pool be further divided between a Spring/Autumn, while the Nature path could embody them, there doesn't seem to be a need to create a conflict between them.

That all said as long as a good number of the caster issues are fixed, tweaked, and balanced, I will be fine with just the 1 path for casters, my suggestion would most likely require all paths to be reworked and that would require some massive effort. I look forward to returning to a Druid (TR'ed them to a warlock for the time being).

[Tom116]

I here there finally nerfing druids aka fixing them

Why or what they are one step above fvs barely this for real

Casters are getting buffed, Bears are getting a big boost to (hopefully) make them actually playable, Wolves are getting buffed as played the way they intended but the 2WF/SWF exploit is being fixed which does nerf any builds that built around taking advantage of said bug lol.

[Chacka_DDO]

I think most of the announced changes in the early preview look good.
And maybe some of the changes mean that they remove something we are used to.
But only because something was there for a long time, it means not that it is right.
e.g. that Single Weapon Fighting worked on wolfs and bears is just no logically in my opinion.
Even less that you can use Single Weapon Fighting + Shield Mastery + Two-weapon Fighting if you have 2 Ranger level and 3 bard level.
Only one fighting style at the same time makes sense in my opinion as they do it now.
The balance between fighting styles is another question, of course, all of them should have their advantages and all of them should be attractive.