Druid pass suggestions

[AzB]

There should be no penalty for casting in animal form. It should simply be obvious that you choose to build towards caster or melee and you cannot do both well. But you should be able to be a caster or a melee and still choose an animal form. I'd also love to see a few more animal forms, preferably different size creatures like squirrels and frogs, on up to the dire bear (as the largest) size. There could be some slight bonuses to hiding, dodge or ac for being really small.

I like the pet. With a great deal of investment, he should be able to survive at least in elite. The biggest gap in power is gear. You can only fit so many bonuses on two pieces of gear. What we need is pet specific gear that allows many more bonuses. At least dodge, prr, mrr, ac, hp, and maybe a displacement guard when hit. These are all defensive bonuses and wouldn't affect balance at all, simply allow the pet to have a chance at surviving more difficult challenges. Also, the AI could be tweaked so when the pet gets down to 20% health he stops trying to attack and returns to your side. Basic self preservation mode.

Too many of the high level druid spells are unuseable once you're locking into a role. If you're a caster, none of the animal spells are useful at all, and vice versa. There simply aren't enough spells that don't rely on an elemental or animal shape. And speaking of elemental shapes, we really need air and earth. Lightning is an iconic part of the Druid class and the fact that it becomes useless after level 16 or so is extremely frustrating.

Lastly, it should not cost spell points to change shape. It's not a spell, it's a natural ability.

[AzB]

One other thing I forgot to mention: run speed. Wolves can run almost 40 mph for long periods of time, and even the largest of bears can hit 40 for short sprints. Why there is no run speed modifier when in animal form, I've never understood. A druid in animal form is for intents and purposes, that animal. Not a magical transformation.

If not innate, at least put something in the enhancement tree. It's inconceivable that various monks and barbarians can run far faster than a wolf. How fast is Usain Bolt? Maybe 28mph? And nobody has ever outrun a bear.

[Maquist]

A few considerations from PnP... Wild shape is a class ability that does not eat away at your casting ability. But you are limited to the number of times per day you can wildshape, and the duration for which it lasts. At least in DDO, you could wildshape once and remain in that form indefinitely. Personally, I wouldn't mind seeing it as a no-SP-cost class granted ability (which would probably have to be done via a collection of feats) that has a cooldown until you could shift again. But I assume that they would have to code up a new feat for a each choice/set of choices in the wildshape repertoire.

In PnP, it takes an additional feat to be able to cast while wildshaped. Natural Spell allows you to use motions and sounds that would be native to your chosen form as somatic and verbal components. I'm guessing that limiting the casting ability in DDO as much as it would be limited in PnP was decided to be far too prohibitive, given the nature of the game. So I can understand their choice to make spell cooldowns longer. I could see adding the Natural Spell feat to DDO to bring the cooldowns back to what they would be in the normal form, though. That way if someone is inclined to be a shifter/caster, they can do so without as much penalty.

As for the pet, I would like to see a couple more equipment slots added. The ones that specifically come to my mind are necklace and belt. It is very easy for me to imagine those slots being something that an animal companion could use, especially since you are able to put collars and armor (barding?) on them. I think boots, rings, helmets, cloaks, and bracers are a bit of a reach, though I could also see arguments being made for the trinket slot. These would allow more power customizations for the animals, and maybe make them a little less squishy. But since I don't know how these critters are coded, I don't know how much work it would entail to make these changes, and whether that would be worth it overall in the broad scope of the game. To druid players, yes... To the rest of the game, I don't know.

[AzB]

It can't be too hard to code a pet specific collar with 4 slots. We already have gear with 4 slots, so surely that wouldn't be a big deal. And that would be a good start. Maybe something in slavers that would give us some customization.

But if they're doing a druid pass, they could clean up the wolf enhacement tree. There's a bunch of stuff on there that doesn't work at all, or is really not relevant. Some of the defense issues could be added there. It's sad that my pet has higher attributes than my character but has abyssmal saves, almost no prr, no dps, etc, even with massive investment into the pet.

[Maquist]

It can't be too hard to code a pet specific collar with 4 slots. We already have gear with 4 slots, so surely that wouldn't be a big deal. And that would be a good start. Maybe something in slavers that would give us some customization.

I had meant giving the pet additional item slots into which they could equip items, not just an item with four slots on it. So basically, the wolf pet would have slots to equip a collar, an armor, a necklace, and a belt.

[AzB]

I had meant giving the pet additional item slots into which they could equip items, not just an item with four slots on it. So basically, the wolf pet would have slots to equip a collar, an armor, a necklace, and a belt.

I understand, and agree. I'm just saying that having 2 items with 4 (or more) slots should be a relatively simple thing to give us and would be a step in the right direction.

[Maquist]

I understand, and agree. I'm just saying that having 2 items with 4 (or more) slots should be a relatively simple thing to give us and would be a step in the right direction.

Ok, I see what you're saying. At this point, anything to help out would be a good start.

[burlicconi]

I think that power of druid pet can me raised with new, 3rd enhancement tree which should improve summoning and healing skills.
For example, at druid 6th level you can add ring to your pet, at 12th necklace, on 18th another ring or so, maybe a shield.

Also, enhancements for animal form doesn't have to be exclusive, wolf or bear, you should have both within same AP investment.

And definitively MUST improve druid spells for animal form, they are joke now even on hard, on elite and reaper are just waste of SP and time.

[psykopeta]

I think that power of druid pet can me raised with new, 3rd enhancement tree which should improve summoning and healing skills.
For example, at druid 6th level you can add ring to your pet, at 12th necklace, on 18th another ring or so, maybe a shield.

Also, enhancements for animal form doesn't have to be exclusive, wolf or bear, you should have both within same AP investment.

And definitively MUST improve druid spells for animal form, they are joke now even on hard, on elite and reaper are just waste of SP and time.

Something in the line of increasing % values instead of raw values would be better, for example 20% stats increasr in pets, or 20% damage increase, etc

Adding things like 1,2,4 or 10 won't make pets, summons or hires, suddenly useful

But yup, i love the healing pets druid, so one tree focused in that would be awesome