Regarding past life: Druid

[darchow_the_raven]

The passive past life druid feat is as follows:

You were a Druid in a past life. You occasionally find yourself gazing at the stars and get sentimental around mistletoe. Each time you acquire this feat your summoned creatures, charmed minions, and hirelings gain +2 to all ability scores. This feat can be stacked up to three times.

Granting +2 and eventually +6 to all ability scores for charmed minions will harm one's ability to keep enemies under the influence of charm type spells by increasing the monsters saves. While initial save success won't be affected, the periodic save to maintain control will be easier for the enemy to make. I'm now reticent to TR into the Druid class.

This drawback of past life: druid could be remedied by causing the feat to no longer affect charmed/dominated etc. minions, while still affecting hirelings and summons.

Better yet, the minion's saves against the augmenter's spells could be made to not increase, or for the fortitude and will save of charmed minions to decrease in tandem with the saves granted by the stat increases.


Apologies if I have misunderstood how augmented summon feats work and that in fact the minion's saves against the augmenter's spells do not increase. If this is the case I would request that this be noted in the feats' descriptions. Judging by recent forum posts and ddowiki it's not just me who assumes (there's every reason to from the description!) that these feats increase the chance for enemies to break free from charm-type spells.

[droid327]

I seem to remember someone pointing this out a long time ago and the response was that monster saves vs your spells are specifically exempt from any minion boosts (Druid PL, Augment Summons, etc.)

[darchow_the_raven]

I seem to remember someone pointing this out a long time ago and the response was that monster saves vs your spells are specifically exempt from any minion boosts (Druid PL, Augment Summons, etc.)

Was this someone from Turbine? I haven't seen any posts claiming this, all were either to the contrary or saying they didn't know (obviously I wouldn't be able to see the ancient one you refer to).

Ddowiki claims the following;

"Charmed or Dominated minions with Augment Summoning will also receive a bonus to saves from the ability score increase to escape the effect, but will lose bonuses from Augment Summoning once they do and can be re-Charmed or re-Dominated."

If you're right droid then I change my suggestion to a request for clearer descriptions for these feats. The confusion caused for me and others could be eliminated with an added sentence stating "This will not increase the likelihood of minions breaking free of your charm type spells."

[Lonnbeimnech]

Something I found out 2 days ago.

http://ddowiki.com/page/Suggestion,_Mass

It's duration is set, with no recurring saves.

[Enoach]

While I agree that they will have a better chance of saving I think we need to look at the spells, maximum duration and how often they get a chance to break free

Charm Animal - Duration: 60 seconds +6 seconds per caster level - saves every 15 to 30 Seconds
Charm Monster - Duration: 60 seconds +6 seconds per caster level - saves every 3d6+12 seconds
Charm Person - Duration: 60 seconds +6 seconds per caster level - saves every 3d6+12 seconds
Control Undead -Duration: 60 seconds +6 seconds per caster level - saves every 2 minutes
Ooze Puppet - Duration: 1 minute plus 6 seconds per caster level (No maximum) - saves every 60 seconds
Suggestion (spell) - Duration: 30+2 seconds per caster level (No maximum) - No additional saves
Suggestion, Mass - Duration: 30+2 seconds per caster level (No maximum) - No additional saves

As you can see Charm Spells seem to allow for the save bonus to help them release earlier. Suggestion Spells don't have the early release program, but are shorter in time then their counterparts. However in all cases you will have at least 15 seconds where they will fight for you, or at least not attack you.

[darchow_the_raven]

Yeah suggestion/mass suggestion rock, though they have other differences to charm monster such as which level spell slot used and the enemy having to understand one language. I usually try to have both suggestions and charms when playing bard or enchantment wizard. Dominate person/monster is a more poignant example for charm being harmed by increased saves as it also has a 15-30sec periodic save.

My point is that a past life feat, especially one that is acquired free, shouldn't really have any negative drawbacks. I love everything else about the past life druid feat, it just would decrease my effectiveness in a spell type I enjoy using.