The Official Druid Enhancements Discussion Thread!

[nayozz]

suggestion for druid:

what about making an enhancements that recite:

you pet get +3 levels and +1 maximum level ?

for example a level 20 druid gets a lvl 21 wolf
and a level 6druid level 6 fighter gets a lvl 9 wolf

what do you think ?

[Claver]

Springs Resurgence should be redesigned if it requires mana cost


- On live, Springs Resurgence has zero spell cost to activate
- On Lamannia, it now cost 8/6/4 spell points as a Tier 4 ability

Springs Resurgence gives melee druids just that little bit of a push with survivability. It helps make Season's Herald attractive as a melee option for Fire Elemental and Water Elemental forms as an alternative to wolf/bear melee builds in Nature's Warrior. Adding mana cost is not the end of the world but Druids have a very shallow mana pool, and Springs Resurgence becomes less of a top shelf selling point for the Tree given (a) the effects are conditional and only trigger at 50% health (b) the ability has to be refreshed after it 5 minute duration expires and (c) the healing doesn't scale to be that useful in Epic content, especially for an 8 point mana cost.

If Springs Resurgence must have a mana cost I suggest the following design changes:

Option I: Greatly extend the 5 minute duration, ~ say 30 minutes. In its present form, I would no longer buff every member of the party with a spell that might do nothing for 8 points a head that's likely to run out before they need it.

Option II: Increase spell cost to 25 and make it a mass buff centered on the druid. Every ally, pet, charmed creature in a 15 ft radius of the druid, including the druid, receives Springs Resurgence

[Claver]

Druids with shield and weapons equipped while in animal form get the benefits from those items added to their wolf form and bear form attacks.

The shield mastery and improved shield mastery feats grant bonuses to double strike when a shield is equipped while in animal form.

It would appear the mechanics for shape change encourage and support the use of sword and board

On lamannia, a druid stalwart defender with shield and weapon equipped who enters wolf form drops out of the Shield Defensive Stance and can not renter it even though a shield is equipped.

This is inconsistent with how sword and board is being handled in other aspects of druid wolf and bear form.

Please revise Stalwart Defender to provide full benefits of Stalwart Defense to wolves and bears that have a shield and weapon equipped in animal form.

This will also provide another tool to help compensate for the weakness of melee based wolf and bear druids builds

[dlsidhe]

A few things:

1) As a caster druid player, thank you for the SLAs. All of them. Seriously, I have a hotbar of SLAs now. It really helps with the low-mana issues that druids have. I'm 90% sure, though, that the cooldown timer on the Produce Flame SLA isn't right - with it at rank 3, and call lightning at rank 3, if I cast Produce Flame, then Call Lightning, I can cast another lightning before Produce Flame is off cooldown.

2) Not sure if I like Spring's Resurgence having an SP cost. Mind you, when you get the ability it's pretty OP - if you're quick with hitting it, you can be effectively immortal - but it doesn't scale. If it's going to have an SP cost, it should also scale to some degree, even if it's just the current dice on the healing + caster level. Alternately, remove the timer - cast it once, and it stays on the target until rest.

[Andu_Indorin]

Every time I experiment with the new enhancements, I get terribly discouraged and somewhat depressed at the difficulty (impossibility?) of building a viable, animal-form Druid. I totally agree with Tilomere's evaluation:

I just finished my 2nd druid life to 20.

My feedback after looking at the trees is that animal form is no longer viable. You will no longer be able to pick out the healing spell power you need, even as a pure druid, and multiclassing a few monk levels makes your heals bad to start with.

Wolf form, the most popular form, requires ice + healing spell power enhancements on live which are no longer possible to get at the same time as wolf abilities.

Bear form, the least popular form, requires healing + universal spell power, and doesn't self heal or stay alive well already due to a lack of mana procs.

Lacking spell power to self heal and stay alive, both forms are useless, and everyone will remain in caster form.

Druids also won't be able to take racial abilities, like elf AA + elf abilities, or dwarf tankyness + bear + healing, because they wouldn't be able to heal at the same time due to a lack of spell power.

A low dps healing hybrid class is becoming a low dps non-healing class, or a pure caster non-hybrid class. ...

TLDR: Animal form needs spell power for healing and animal form spells, at the least. ...

I'm ready to TR my Druid; and I want to return with the Winter Wolf build. It was the reason why I purchased the class in the first place. If the animal-form Druid becomes mainly unviable, will TR'ing as a Druid be a waste of time -- and money?

[hermespan]

Every time I experiment with the new enhancements, I get terribly discouraged and somewhat depressed at the difficulty (impossibility?) of building a viable, animal-form Druid. I totally agree with Tilomere's evaluation:



I'm ready to TR my Druid; and I want to return with the Winter Wolf build. It was the reason why I purchased the class in the first place. If the animal-form Druid becomes mainly unviable, will TR'ing as a Druid be a waste of time -- and money?

I couldn't disagree more.

What it sounds like you are saying to me is you want a good character but you want it without focusing the build. If you are taking spell power enhancements on a wolf druid, you are doing it wrong.

[Andu_Indorin]

I couldn't disagree more.

What it sounds like you are saying to me is you want a good character but you want it without focusing the build. If you are taking spell power enhancements on a wolf druid, you are doing it wrong.

How then to make the Cold Breath stronger (for example)? Or to improve the Cure Critical Wounds? Under thee new system, you have "waste" a lot of action points on Season's Herald to ramp up cold and devotion. If you cannot make a Winter Wolf's "trademark" Cold Breath attack do damage commensurate with the opponents one is up against, why even bother adopting the form?

[Kithyx]

Things i feel lacking in the enhancement tree as a melee wolf druid:
+0.5/1/1.5 [W] damage to attacks (tier 3 'fight' skill should be like this)
Skill that effects DCs of trip, jaws of winter, snowslide (and howl but it has spell pen check for some reason)
Fortification bypass.
Some physical resistance rating since its needed for higher level content.
Healing amp, but not spellpower.



Underwhelming or easily made obsolete skills:
Bestial Nature (3 ranks)
1AP
Cooldown 1 second
[+1/+2/+3] Insight bonus to Fortitude and Reflex saves with a [-1/-2/-3] penalty to Will Saves.

Problem is it's an insight bonus, which doesn't stack with superior parrying, which also gives +4 AC, +4 all saves and doesn't give a penalty to will save. Simply change it from an insight bonus to a primal bonus.



Fatal Harrier (3 ranks)
1AP
Beast Stance: Killing an enemy gives a +5% attack speed increase for 8 seconds. This stacks [1/3/5] times.

Doesn't stack with haste, extremely low duration, impossible to keep maxed especially so in groups or raids. Suggestion: Gives +0.5W Per stack duration increased by 5 seconds per tier. 8 base, 13/18/23



Improved Dodge (3 Ranks)
1AP. requires Dodge feat
+[1/?/?] dodge in wolf or bear forms.

Just not good enough if its 1/2/3. Nowhere near worth the AP cost nevermind the feat slot. Suggest changing it to a primal bonus to PRR 3/7/12 with toughness requirement instead of dodge.



Athletic (3 ranks)
[+1/+2/+3] balance, Jump, Swim, Tumble.
[ 0/0/ +1] Wild Empathy Use

I don't even... we get knockdown immunity later in the tree. and we can buff jump and swim. This could easily be deleted and very few would miss it. Suggestion: Change it to the wolf DC boosting skill needs to scale with level since our higher level wolf abilities don't have item boosts like takedown with vertigo +10 or stunning fist with stunning +10.


I'm also not impressed by the +1 hp per level but don't know what to replace it with, There's also issues with natural fighting being poor (but that's a feat issue) and bear form attack animation but this is enhancement/wolf related post.

[Carpone]

2 minute cooldown for the Sunburst SLA is too long. It needs to be shortened to 20 seconds.

Storm of Vengeance as an SLA is really nice. The 2 minute is cooldown annoying even on a 20 Druid in Primal Avatar (75 sec duration).

[Claver]

Hide of the Crocodile has the following:

8 second Duration
5 Minute Cool Down

8 seconds is too short too be useful in Boss Fight
5 Minute cool down is too long for this ability to be useful versus trash.

The Enhancement pass is an opportunity to redesign this to be more useful, provide more value in the Nature Warrior tree, and potentially provide wolf/bear form modest support.

DESIGN SUGGESTION:

Druid Hide of the Crocodile I/II/III: Your skin thickens and hardens, and the cold confidence of the crocodile fills you. Activating this ability reduces the damage you take from physical and acid attacks by 40%/50%60% for 8 seconds. If you are in wolf or bear form when activating this ability the duration lasts 60 seconds instead(5 minute cooldown)

[Hajutze]

Does Beguile work with glancing blows ?

[Silverleafeon]

2 minute cooldown for the Sunburst SLA is too long. It needs to be shortened to 20 seconds.

Storm of Vengeance as an SLA is really nice. The 2 minute is cooldown annoying even on a 20 Druid in Primal Avatar (75 sec duration).

+1

Please no super long cooldowns, we only have so much hot bar room.

[Claver]

I find the Natures Warrior tree to be highly undesirable compared to trees from classes other than druids.

Here's why:

(1) Tree highly dependent on playing in wolf/bear form [this would be cool if wolf or bear form viable/ better supported]

(2) Wolves/Bears make poor melee options in Epic and Elite content [attack animation too slow, damage die does not increase, many powerful Epic Destiny activated ability attacks are unavailable while in Animal Form (Legendary Dreadnaught for example)]

(3) The core abilities of Natures Warrior are not powerful enough to make playing in Wolf or Bear form a compelling option and therefore Natures Warrior is an unattractive tree (see item 2.)

(4) The core abilities of Natures Warrior are less powerful and less interesting than core abilities from other trees.

Pale Master allows players to turn into zombies/vampires/wraiths and liches. Kensei gives a +8 bonus to strength at level 12. Radiant Servant provides healing burst at level 6. Assassin provides vorpal attacks from stealth at level 18. By comparison, Natures Warrior provides uninteresting and very modest bonuses to sneak attack damage for wolves and PRR to bears.

(5) The power of the Natures Warrior Tree dilutes itself with benefits that can not be taken simultaneously. Four Legs Are Good/ Reaving Roar are Stances that can't be taken simultaneously. Celerity and Shrike are only available to Wolves. Turtle only helps you as a bear. If I build a druid to be a tank that fights in bear form Celerity/Shrike do nothing for me. My wolf rogue build is not interested in Essence of the Turtle. And I can't occupy two beast stances at once. And yet I may have to spend AP on these enhancements to qualify for the top Tier Abilities. Compare this to the Ravager barbarian tree where nearly ALL of the enhancements are useful all the time to the barbarian.

Given that there is a smaller subset of enhancements/stances that can be used by a wolf or bear those particular enhancements need to be exceptional in power to make spending AP points to access higher Tiers of the tree worthwhile.

(6) There are not enough quality enhancements to support designing a character who plays primarily in wolf form. The enhancements as presented do not adequately offset the inherit weakness of playing in wolf form.

(7) There are not enough quality enhancements to support designing a character who plays primarily in bear form. The enhancements as presented do not adequately offset the inherit weakness of playing in bear form.

(8) The Tier 5 enhancements in Natures Warrior are less powerful and less interesting than the Tier 5 enhancements from other trees. There is less draw to commit to Natures Warrior as the primary tree versus the competition.

By comparison, at Tier 5. Shintao have Ranged Stun and Rise from the Dead, Radiant Servant has Positive Energy Aura and Reactive Heal, Tempest has Improved Evasion, Kensei has +1 Crit Range, Assassins gain Assassinate, Knight of the Chalice gains Censure Demons, Immunity to Energy Drain, Healing Amplification and a Smite Attack that can destroy undead. What does Nature's Warrior get - an extra 3d6 activated attack versus the ubiquitous plants and animals, a 5% chance for 10 temporary hit points upon being hit and a 15 second duration buff to double strike while in wolf form.


****Bottom Line: Natures Warrior Tree and Wolf/Bear form need a big boost in power*******

(A) Redesign the core abilities

(B) Add better Tier 5 enhancements

(C) Improve existing enhancements


Here are my suggestions

(A) CORE ENHANCEMENTS

Core 1 = Gain 1 hit point for each point spent in this tree. Gain + 0.5 [W] to attacks made in wolf and bear form for every 2 Natures Warrior Core Abilities you posses. For example, Druid 3rd level attacks at 1.5[W]/ Druid 12th level attacks at 2[W]/ and Druid 20th level attacks at 2.5 [W] while in wolf or bear form. So at 20th level capstone, a Natures Warrior would do 2.5[1d12] in Dire Bear form and 2.5[1d10] in Winter Wolf form.

Core 2 (Druid 3rd) = Wolves gain +1d6 sneak attack damage, Bears gain + 5 PRR

Core 3 (Druid 6th) = Natural Affinity: Gain 10% Healing Amplification while in Wolf or Bear form

Core 4 (Druid 12th) = Bears gain Tremor effect (DC equivalent to spell @ total character level) on a vorpal. Bears gain + 15 PRR

Core 5 (Druid 18th) = Wolves gain manslayer on a vorpal. Wolves gain + 2d6 of sneak attack damage

Core 6 (Druid 20th) = Cool Down of spells while in animal from 2.5x to 1.5x. Natural Affinity: Gain 20% Healing Amplification while in Wolf or Bear form. Primal Fury: Once per rest gain +30% damage to physical attacks made in wolf or bear form (Duration 90 seconds)

(B) ADD BETTER TIER 5 ENHANCEMENTS

GO FOR THE THROAT: Your wolf pet gains a stacking primal bonus (%) to weapon alacrity equal to your total level (level 14 = +14% weapon alacrity). While you are in wolf form you also gain this bonus to weapon alacrity.

HONEYCOMB FORAGER: While in bear form, gain a stacking primal bonus to physical resistance rating equal to total level (level 28 = + 28 PRR). If you are poisoned while in bear form gain a +4 primal bonus to STR and CON for 60 seconds (yes, I know Druids gain Venom Immunity at level 9)


(C) Improve existing enhancements per various suggestions in this thread

[Hajutze]

The funny part is that if a melee character splashes a druid for some reason, the best melee boosting enhancement is in the Season's Herald ...

[Diyon]

How then to make the Cold Breath stronger (for example)? Or to improve the Cure Critical Wounds? Under thee new system, you have "waste" a lot of action points on Season's Herald to ramp up cold and devotion. If you cannot make a Winter Wolf's "trademark" Cold Breath attack do damage commensurate with the opponents one is up against, why even bother adopting the form?

Cold breath sucks. I don't even keep it loaded on my wolf druid on live. If I can keep my positive spell power pretty close to what I have on live I'll be mostly happy with the warrior tree, as on live it can hold it's own in EEs. Alpha strike looks like fun (my wolf druid would love some aoe melee attacking, no room for cleave feats), but if use is limited by empathy then that sucks. I suggest removing that, or making wild empathy regenerate over time like paladin smites. Really looking forward to adding that 30% doublestrike boost to my doublestrike arsenal (45% standing on live).

[culdraug]

First impressions are good. Most of what I have on live is there with some things even better. My biggest concern was loosing what I currently have.

I do have a couple of gripes.

What is the replacement for Energy of the Locus? SLA's? I dont really like that as a replacement. Cool downs are way too long and I will keep the spell anyway. Thats just another slot on my bar. Would rather have the spell points to just cast the spell.

The other is the forced season switching. I hate it on live and dont take either PrE. While the bonus to spell power would be nice, having to keep up with what season I am in is to much of a hassle. Could we not have another tree that does not have a PrE?

[decease]

no epic 2w for wild form...

alpha strike cost one charge of wild empathy?? you kidding me??

p.s. we need epic druid form...

[Gljosh]

I played around a little bit while porting my in-progress 3rd life TR Druid. I really did love the way my caster felt with the enhancement. Level 8 with 3 SLAs feels great, but I am not a fan the SP cost for Spring Resurgence. It already takes a pretty large AP cost, now if the additional points increased the d6s I would really love it.

[~rex_havok]

(...evasion..)

first a over sight, the primal lack a sword and board feat...offered two handed, two weapon and ?unarmed but the bear is a medium armour sword and board..druids can and do use shields. guess bears are unarmed but really should say natural attack.


Alright, hope this sounds ok don't normal say to much but as one of the few if only pure bear druids i have seen at cap I feel I should say something. Currently my heavy built with raid gear intima-bear as a AC 122 reflex 35 PPR of 87 no evasion, (primal my ac drops to 70 prr 31 and bad evasion. ac will be a little higher when i get my 2nd set of white armour- leather for the evasion option..not sure if it is worth doing thou.) about 800 hit points and a meager 1500 spell points. all these have a little room to move but will work as a test frame for a fully built gear equipped model. as you can see it is not the ultimate tank but he does tank all the raids. I get a few heads turns when we do fall of truth and the bear tanks the dragon but it's a lot of fun altho the spell points are only half of what he needs he can be a viable medium lv tank, the other problem is hate gen is difficult, the bear hits like a little kid but self healing and spell damage is very nice and different to other popular tank builds.

unfortunately can't connect yet to get exact details of my bear on lam. but I believe it was fairly similar and i liked the spell hate option. and unfortunately that is the problem. to make this work better they will need more then is currently offered, I believe Druids (bear) need bonus feats like the monk line has. It would also be nice to see a higher tier of animal form ie. great direbear or direbear spiteform. (again i only know the bear so....) the defense tank bear is the lest popular build due to lack of support. they need a lot of feats, enhancements (shield, armour etc) and spells (there is no lv 9 bear spell for example) ....also as a personal note, I am older with a damaged hand so please be easy with the new..clicky short duration everything....lastly the racial chart ... ...should it be our base race or or druid form or a combo? I think u may need an extra tab for classes that have an alternative 'race' druids and necromancers. the skills for spell power...can we have a few extra skill points to go with that plz

I believe what is truly needed for the druid animal forms is EVASION and perhaps improved evasion the druids are out in the wilds, avoiding pit falls and the elements so can justify them having ----evasion and inherent elemental resistance----. have only played the bear so can't speak for the other forms but I feel the druids need there own place. instead of completing with the character classes they need something else. maybe survivability.

The bear doesn't hit hard enough or quick enough I can actually hit faster and harder in human form then bear..think this needs to be looked at ..the lv 20 plus weapons and the special ones like the dwarf axe is a d12 times 3 19-20 base the bear is suppost to be big...3d6 full step at lv 20 and 1/2 per 2lvs? so lv 20 3d6x2 lv 22 3d6x2.5 lv24 3d6x3, lv 26 3d6 x3.5 and the big bear 3d6x4 at lv 28. this is to keep up with the base damage from weapons that the bear (monks and dog would be here too) form replaces. the attack speed is slow so either quicker animation or a big jump in double strike to compensate (bears do have teeth and two paws ;P). to help out with this issue example..my strength based bear does about 35-40 damage base per (has about mid 40's stength)...OK stop laughing i use hate gen to compensate.
the primal avatat ED needs some TLC. but that is for a different post. but what i would like to see is the tree form 5 times faster. that is painful to watch. AND>>>> the Experience points that are lose when in a capped destiny to spill into ...something...i would like to use my capped destines but always farming other destines can we have a xps spill into other destines or a pool or something so we don't lose exps while in our capped destines?

I feel that granting druids evasion and elemental resistance would make them more attractive as a unique class.
as far as elemental resistance my proposal would be elemental absorption. druids lack spell points and are attuned to nature and elements perhaps they could absorb elemental damage and convert small amount to regaining spell points. plz make this scale...i laugh when i do the bard spell point song and the +3000k spell caster is getting 2 points back. perhaps 5pts per lv on proc or 10% of damage? The Bear form would benefit from a real capstone as would most classes the capstones are ....weak compared to the advantage of two lv splash of something the 1.5 casting speed is very need but this should? be included with the 2nd? tier animal form and the capstone could be stronger...true beast form -spirit claws and spirit form -take on the true nature of the animal form and gain..insert advantages...possible .. gain dr breaking attack, increased attack speed, higher double strike, ghostly, improved evasion, increase spell absorption, ghostly shield and armour (have armour and shield but doesn't effect/cap your ability to dodge, use evasion or monk ED line u are considered unarmed, unarmoured) improved ppr,
.again note this is from the standpoint of the intimabear melee druid option....

last big point is the druid companion and summons did not see a enhancement pass for the companions. altho it doesn't matter much can't take them or the summons in raids and in many quest anyhow. they do odd things and draw agro in funny, unwanted ways. this is a HUGE feature of this class and largely has to be ignored plz fix. unless the companions and summons are specifically stated and designed as agro tank type then they should NEVER effect agro this is a terrible thing for for an active tank. if someone has used intim then the summons and companions should NEVER... EVER..pull agro form that toon. deception is also a terrible (?unattended) feature of the mobs losing agro for a tank..again if intim has ever been used deception should not break focus, not sure on bluff, no one uses it, likely for fear that it will do the same thing of confused agro instead of reduced threat.

to recap what i would like to see some though on the race tree, are druids still 'human'? evasion and maybe improved, elemental absorption, additional bonus druid feats, bonus skill points? not sure i have seen anyone mention where all the caster types are going to find 1,2 or 3 extra skill points for the new spell skills. enhanced animal forms at or near cap, scaling base animal melee damage. and can i PLZ sit while using a rest shrine, my paws are sore. like the 4 good legs and many of the new enhancments, it will be a big learning curve but looks exciting. at the moment with no changes i will likely drop my pure bear druid, tr into the popular monk, monk splash tanks or perhaps try 2-5 lvs of monk on the druid to make this work better, pity the bear is neat but at last it is still just a flavour build at the moment.
I also feel that shields have been ignored it this pass. they tried to get sword and board back in play but what i really think shields need is innate dr flat number or % off all physical (i know prr from shields covers physical, I guess) AND magical attacks. the old image of someone ignoring dragon breath behind a shield(active) or just less damage form direct and indirect spells would go a long ways, say 15/30/45 % of all incoming spell damage for a shield? and double in block? that is right the full plate tower shield fighter could block 90% off the fire breath.
or in this case the druid sword and board bear could block (active blocking...is it working in animal form? no animation) have a chance of evasion, block 30% and absorb ?30% more. WOW nice damage reduction great tank material.
primal avatar could use a big bump! perhaps in survivability? tank option to complete with unyeilding. it could be the light armoured version. monks get high ac perks can bears (and dogs...i guess) get some too? currently i have to use unyielding to do bear sword and board tanking.

I believe I am one of the few (only?) active bear druids playing that should say something about how much change is needed to make people consider playing this style and class. this class needs more then a face lift it needs ...a lot. others have written better on it's short coming them me so i will leave it at that.


hope this makes sense
The Bear

[Charononus]

Biggest problem is that if you want devotion to self heal as a wolf, your best option seems to be shintao.