Because DG is running out of classes to code!! Druids!!

[edge2054]

Very much a work in progress but here's what I'm thinking so far.

Three shapeshifting trees organized by form. Each form will have unique abilities and attack forms and give the player a different playstyle. The forms I'm considering are Cougar (stealthy, all offense in combat), Wolf (good senses and balanced combat), and Bear (stuns and good defenses).

At least three casting trees. Not sure if these should be divided by use or effect. But water, storms, and plants all sound like good ideas. Maybe a utility earth tree too. More specific spell ideas I'm thinking about are earthquakes, swarms, weather effecting, some sort of tidal wave that's not tidal wave >.>, some plant based pins, poisons, treants, earth or tree walking.

The call of the wild generic tree (this will be a Wilder).

A Primal Combat generic tree (for some combat bonuses that apply to all forms like hit, defense, stuff like that. It'll be a Combat Training tree but follow the more typical four talent form).

An advanced Primal Combat tree that's not generic. Damage bonuses, active abilities that you can use while shape shifted. Probably call it Savage Combat to separate it from Primal Combat.

A meta-like tree for casting. Obviously it won't be meta but it'll be a tree that improves upon the druids spellcasting.

Cunning and Willpower as primary stats but I'd like to shoot for a ranged/melee hybrid playstyle and I'd like to avoid the 'caster-form' thing WoW did. Maybe there's a way to encourage the player to shift from one form to the other without making it mandatory. I'll think on that.

Anyway here's the document I'll be updating as we go along.

Any thoughts, criticisms, or additions, I'd be happy as always to hear.

[Zaive]

Let's see if I can think of anything...

Going by the bear form skill, the first talent gives an active ability as well, right? The hydra's first thing could be a poison breath. For the stat bonuses, considering the highest stat the summon hydra has is willpower, I'd say... willpower. It would make the hydra better for determination, but would never surpass the bear and wolf thanks to their damage masteries.

The wolf could increase dex, probably. Furious charge sounds like a rush... but maybe it could stun or disarm, or pin or something. Great howl sounds like it'll confuse or something, or if possible, make enemies run away? That could be fun - scatter the enemies with a howl, then chase down and pin one using furious charge.
Throat rip.... that could range from a simple critical hit to an instant kill or maybe make the enemy lose air incredibly fast.

For some spell casting ideas.. A vine AoE that focuses on pinning rather than dealing damage, and an AoE that deals very low poision damage for several turns (Noxious cloud?) that will stack to something impressive.
How about a spell that creates a crack in the earth - an x panel wide bottomless pit that can't be walked over but can see, and shoot enemies across it. how this works in a dungeon with several floors I have no idea. Maybe they have REALLY long stairs to the point where falling that far would kill or something.
An earthquake (Again an AoE) that deals damage, possibly knocks back in random directions and dazes. I wouldn't mess with the dungeon layout through.
Poison bolt! 'nuff said. Or perhaps a replica of that poison trap in the forests.
Swamp AoE (lots of AoEs >.>) that causes slow
Grow trees? like a replacement whatever the 4th earth magic skill is called. stone wall?
Maybe have something similar to strike... A stone spike that shoots out of the ground and impales (causes bleed) an enemy?
TORNADO!
Also, though it probably isn't very druid-ish: I want to see a meteor. xD

Just throwing some random ideas out there.

Also, earth's eyes is more like vision than sense.

[darkgod]

I like your AOE ideas, feels .. druidy

[edge2054]

I got distracted playing with a sun paladin last night and didn't complete my edits. >.>

Yes, the forms will have a base attack built into the initial talent.

Hydras will be + Willpower and have a Poison Breath Base. Hydra's will also have a move speed penalty (what you want ranged elemental attacks that cost stamina for free?!?) Hydra's will have higher determination but their attack forms won't use strength or dex for scaling. Their breathes will basically be spells that cost stamina (scaling off Willpower).

Wolves will be +Cunning and have a move speed bonus. They'll also start out with a bite attack that will have a special effect on crit. I may have the wolves bite attack cause bleed and change the bear claw to something else, not sure what though.

Throat Rip is a high damage attack with a chance to insta-kill on crit.

Furious Charge is Rush that stuns on crit.

Great Howl is a self buff + enemy debuff. That debuff could be fear though. The fear charge combo sounds like fun.

Good spell ideas. I moved the ones I had working into another document so I didn't have to scroll past them to get to the stuff I was working on. A lot of similar stuff but hey, it's a druid, it's nature stuff.

Grow Trees I had thought would be cool as individual trees. More talent points increases the number you can place. You could block yourself off completely like stone prison at a high enough talent level.

Also, permanent trees But a way to remove them one talent level later, animate them and send them at your enemies

I'll post an updated document once I get that far.

[edge2054]

Also, the biggest issue I think I'm having is tree layout for the spells. I initially thought it'd just be Animal, Plant, Elemental, Weather, etc. etc. but that feels really boring to me and to mageish.

What do you guys think of organizing the spells by terrain type?

Like Swamp could have all your poisons and insect swarms. Mountain could have your earth spells. Forest your tree spells and some forest animal stuff. Sky could have your tornados, lightning bolts, and fog clouds.

Feel more druidy?

[Zaive]

Terrain types sound good.
Strike, Thunderstorm and tidal wave all seem like good druid spells, which is a shame since they're already mage spells.

As for the bear attack... I'd like to see something disarm.

Could you provide a link to the spells, too?

[edge2054]

Yeah, I was going to modify those spells.

Call Lightning will be a radius nuke, you're literally calling a single bolt from the sky.

Tidal Wave I wanted to do as a slow moving bolt 3 tiles wide that wouldn't do much damage unless it knocked you back, in which case the target could take repeated damage each round (like the old school tidal wave). Rushing Wave was the name I came up with for that one but a different name would be good too.

Here's the whole folder. I apologize in advance for it being a mess.

https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0B2BrcM ... YTUz&hl=en

[edge2054]

As for the bear attack... I'd like to see something disarm.

Doesn't the bear creature type disarm? Seems like I've been disarmed a few times by them.

[Feanor.81]

What do you guys think of organizing the spells by terrain type?

Like Swamp could have all your poisons and insect swarms. Mountain could have your earth spells. Forest your tree spells and some forest animal stuff. Sky could have your tornados, lightning bolts, and fog clouds.

Feel more druidy?

Actually, feels more MTG, but I like it

My contribution: I feel a druidic class would just missing something if it had no "charm"-like spells: druid's ability to communicate with creatures (at least natural ones, eg. wolves, snakes, insects, bears, trees...) is one of the most distinguishing. Also, I experimented a little with charm spells on my own, and found it's quite easy to make other creatures friendly, and even make them fight on your side (basically, you treat them as summons once succesfully charmed).

It could be placed in the Harmony tree, which could contain also a sense-like spell (the ability of the druid to connect with small insect and animal minds in a radius and perceive reality through their senses).

[edge2054]

I was actually going for more of a shadowrun spirit domains vibe but I see the MTG symmetry too

As to charms I'd like to put a few in but I think they'll need to be handled carefully.

Take a straight charm animal for instance. Almost game breaking for the first part of the game and then pretty much useless. Most experienced players would probably view it as a waste of talent points and if that's the case it probably should be left out.

On the other hand... I had an idea for a spell that would buff canines (player in wolf form included) and create a charm aura that affected canines only (Pack Alpha). If the player could summon his own wolves this would be a spell that would be useful even when it's charm effect wasn't taken into account. In other words, the charm is a nice bonus but the spell's main function goes beyond that.

I'm not sure Pack Alpha still fits. If it sticks around I could see it going in an advanced heart of the wolf tree but something along a similar vein would be a good way to do charms.

[Zaive]

you could have some sort of permanent ally, similar to the Alchy's golem but more natural.

Some animal companion or nature spirit or animal spirit or nature companion... or something. That could fit for the "Communicate with nature" part.

[edge2054]

Maybe a nature spirit summon or companion that has charm as one of it's abilities?

Considering the class is already going to be hotkey heavy I think a companion as fleshed out as the golem might be to much. But a summon that sticks around until it dies and has charm animal as a spell that it uses on its own when it finds an appropriate target would be pretty cool.

Each tree could have it's own spirit type, again this is very Shadowrun

For instance...

Domain/Mountain
-Call Mountain Spirit: You call a mountain spirit to your aid. The mountain spirit has blah blah blah and can cast blah blah blah. You may only have one spirit active at a time.

Domain/Forest
-Call Forest Spirit: You call a forest spirit to your aid. The forest spirit has blah blah blah and can cast charm animals, blah, and blah. You may only have one spirit active at a time.

[edge2054]

Something I forgot to mention, after some discussion with DG this will be a cunning/willpower based class, not magic/will. Hence a lot of the X on crit effects.

[edge2054]

Many updates to the spell document.

[Zaive]

Let's see, here...
Will/Cunning. Okay, but no weapon uses those stats. Okay for summoners, but... maybe there should be another weapon type that uses cunning or willpower?
Awaken: It should have a duration, otherwise it would be too easy to have an army of ents following you around.
Poison vine: I was thinking of having a vine lash at them on the spot but creating a trap works too.
Brush fire: this stays for several turns, right? otherwise it's very similar to blistering sun.
Murder of Crows: Cool.
Tornado: perhaps have a PULLback in a slightly larger ring around it? dunno if that's possible, but...
Mountain Spirit: Armor Bonus? maybe uses strike occasionally... Sky or prairie could give a defense bonus.
Noxious cloud: I know I'm the one that suggested it but... noxious cloud was the name of the air spell in the old tome 2, wasn't it? That's what I was aiming for.
Swamp Spirit: Allies deal poison damage, or perhaps slime (!) when struck.
Windgust: uh..... knockback?
Tundra Spirit: Cold damage and possible freeze when struck or added to melee attacks, or just give it an ice storm style aura.

I like the crit effects. Makes it so the wolf can be a decent spell caster as well, and also makes staves of might a lot more useful (Though they require the magic stat....)

So far, it seems to me Prairie isn't as good as the other class trees, and forest is a lot better than the other generic trees. That's just looking at the descriptions though. Now that I think about it, fog and rushing wave could be really useful.