|
Post by phalthallus on Nov 8, 2006 19:56:34 GMT
So you think Dragon was a bad choice on your build? I'm in the process of starting a druid, and from the rest of the thread, people thought it was a decent feat to take. So I'm just curious as to why you think it was a waste. Please don't think I'm criticizing; I'm just asking for my own benefit and that of others reading the thread.
|
|
|
Post by cathedralmaster on Nov 8, 2006 19:58:42 GMT
I will mem empowered Call lightning and Flame Strikes but overall I think it was a bad feat choice. Not unlike my Dragon Shape that I just had to take "Cause its cool to be a Dragon!" I dumped dragon shape from my next druid too as I haven't found it's uses to be worth the annoyance. To expand on that, the big problem with it beyond the spell book (and the re-equipment of gear issue) is that though the breath weapon sounds nice, it's very difficult to hit more than one or two if your surrounded by an active mob, and then your not doing a whole ton of dmg anyway. It's good if you have nothing else left and you need some quick defense (ie. it leaves you with something to do rather than stand around) but beyond that, it's not something you want to use. As Mish stated, it's a last resort option. In my experience, if you have a good number of spell slots, you really shouldn't need it to fall back on any more than a good wizard or sorc really needs a last resort option.
|
|
|
Post by Ironfang on Nov 8, 2006 20:28:27 GMT
So you think Dragon was a bad choice on your build? I'm in the process of starting a druid, and from the rest of the thread, people thought it was a decent feat to take. So I'm just curious as to why you think it was a waste. Please don't think I'm criticizing; I'm just asking for my own benefit and that of others reading the thread. I just found I hadn't used it. I only read the rest of this thread after reading your comment above and Yue makes some good arguments on where it would be useful. Redoing my spellbook everytime I use it is just not something I like doing, I have used it when logging in with no spells and needing to kill something. In regards to Heavy Armor proficiency remember you can use a Cloak of Worldliness for this and this is why you will often see my Druid log in naked, yet I find this much less annoying than the Dragon shape as its only on login.
|
|
|
Post by Yomi on Nov 8, 2006 20:36:27 GMT
I'm still in the process of levelling my druid. Similar to Cath's stats above except I dropped CON to 14 and bumped CHA to 14 (16), which means up to 60 fewer hp, but +2 to reflex and will and +1 to fort saves from the paladin level. I took combat casting, but am still debating the wisdom of that. I will likely go ahead and take improved combat casting. I pumped evocation and conjuration skill focuses early, as they are very useful for causing more damage and keeping things immobile in your stonehold or storm of vengeance. Necromancy I left for later, as I don't cast Necro spells (FoD is the only one that even comes to mind not counting harm that doesn't have a save), and and only getting necro for the epic. Basically reversing the places of Necromancy and Conjuration in Cath's build. I found getting silent early was nice to get as many call lightnings as possible, and put off greater spell penetration to a bit higher as I never fought anything in the pre-30s that had enough spell resistance to matter. It looks like I'll have Great Wis 7 and dragon shape, but only 4 epics including the book. I may toss out dragon shape for either maximize for quillfires, LL conjuration to get 2 higher DC's on bombards, or epic reflexes. My worry on that will be if the Hells turns out to be a place dragon shape will be a survival feat. Or keep dragon shape but drop great wis down to 5 (for a final wisdom of 60 before using an artifact, vs. 62 with GW7). With a 16 CHA, this should give me +9 to saves with maxed equipment. Final saves using +20 gear and maxed con/dex/wisdom (I'm being optimistic but no saving throw feats would seem to be: fort: 12+10+5+8+20+9 = 64 reflex: 6+10+5+5+20+9 = 55 will: 12+10+5+26+20+9 = 82 Which seems to give some leeway for lesser equipment, and is swaying me to not take epic reflexes -- the paladin level really does come in handy. Epic reflexes was a big help for my cleric, but she'll finish off with a reflex of 50 including the feat.
|
|
|
Post by tyranlthixis on Nov 9, 2006 1:28:50 GMT
The dragon shape with the build posted has an Achilles heel. Once you gain 30 or more druid levels your druid regains the shifter bug. Good news is you will no longer lose your equipment driven spells slots when you die. The bad news is if your druid dies in dragon form you end up with like 8 ac until you transform and untransform. Which means you will die and die and die some more.
If you are interested in dragon form (and there are many reasons to want to use it), I suggest the following build
29 druid/10 shifter/1 monk
This build
1.) avoids the shifter bug 2.) get a dragon with a final ac 140-150 depending on gear 3.) massive damage reduction/free 100% immune in 3 elements 4.) full dc in basilisk form 5.) access to epic shifter forms 6.) with focus off of spell penetration you are free to take more epic druid focuses 7.) full dragon breath dc (10 shifter levels avoids dc penalty) 8.) cannot be disarmed or disrobed while in form 9.) uber saves 10.) combination of massive hp, damage reduction, elemental immunes, and ac makes your character one of the best tanks in the game 11.) have access to the full range of druid spells (earthquake, barkskin etc) and empathy summons
Negatives 1.) low ab, so relies heavily on dragon breath for damage 2.) ring rest hog in tight fitting areas 3.) res'ing dead party members eats through your 3 dragon forms fast 4.) spells that rely on dc and spells levels are nerfed (such as finger of death)
With druids you can't have your cake and eat it too. So, you have to make tough choices. Either you make a dragon druid or you make a caster druid.
Tyran
|
|
|
Post by lusitania on Nov 12, 2006 0:32:15 GMT
I will admit that I haven't gone to dragon shape in a very long time now that I'm 60 and fairly well equipped. The last time was on the bridge at ssyis doing a 3 person run, when the arcane caster rested and all the archers on the other side of the bridge suddenly got unhanded, and I was out of epics. It probably did save me there, though. I probably wouldn't take it if I rebuilt, but I'm sure not going to rebuild because of it. My stats while self-buffed dragon, if anyone is interested, are 138 AC, 64/60/72 fort/reflex/will, and 1402/1302 HP. On empower vs. silent: empower will let you do a little bit extra damage to bosses between rests (I'm thinking 2 or 3 person DB runs here, where you might be running low on rests by the time you get to the boss). You can still memorize lots of harms, it's just a difference between replacing bombardments or earthquakes. Being able to have more bombardments vs. earthquakes would make a difference in a small part of the pyramid, but not a very large one. I've never been a big fan of FoD on a druid. I can't think of a situation where the difference between one and the other is really significant. Do other people have specific, late game instances where the difference is large? Overall, I'd say that the difference between empowered vs. silent and dragon form vs. epic reflexes or something is pretty small. Dwarfed by different equipment choices or gameplay skill. I do favor improved combat casting, though. I spend a large amount of my time casting in the middle of a map full of guys, I wouldn't want to get attcked 10 extra times every time I cast.
|
|
|
Post by shadowspawn on Nov 15, 2006 21:14:35 GMT
I noticed in this build and the variations listed (except for whodat's) that the splash classes are taken at the end. With respect to saves, would it not be better to take them pre-epic. You get +2 to primary saving throws for each class you add.
What I'm considering is 37 Druid/2 Monk/1 Paladin, taking a monk and paladin pre-epic and a monk at the end to max tumble and discipline. Would this be better? and why or why not?
Also, whodat, what is the significance of taking paladin @ 5th level? Can it be taken at other pre-epic levels as effectively?
thanks in advance ss
|
|
|
Post by whodat1 on Nov 16, 2006 2:02:29 GMT
The more druid levels I took off the more nervous I got, so I did 38 druid. However I don't think 37 will break the build.I don't think there was significance with the 5th level specifically.
FYI, I decided not to take dragonshape - I concluded that if your shifting to dragon as a druid, its because something went wrong. Not saying that its not useful, but its not something I wanted my build to focus on.
|
|
|
Post by jillybean on Nov 16, 2006 2:23:53 GMT
Also, whodat, what is the significance of taking paladin @ 5th level? Can it be taken at other pre-epic levels as effectively? thanks in advance ss I think to max your AB for this build, you would need to take paladin on either level 1 or 5 or 9 or 13 or 17. "Maxed" AB helps casters with their touch attack spells.
|
|
|
Post by cathedralmaster on Nov 16, 2006 5:45:19 GMT
Your probably better off taking the paladin lvl around 5 so that you can wear heavy armor earlier on.
|
|
|
Post by cathedralmaster on Nov 16, 2006 22:05:10 GMT
I noticed in this build and the variations listed (except for whodat's) that the splash classes are taken at the end. With respect to saves, would it not be better to take them pre-epic. You get +2 to primary saving throws for each class you add. Ok, I decided to take about 45 minutes or so in the testing chamber and assuming the character sheet is correct (which is a massively huge assumption): The ab for pure lvl 21 druid, a 20 druid/1 pally, a 1 druid/1 pally /19 druid, and a 4 druid/1 pally/16 druid is +15/+10/+5 for each of them. The saves for 21 pure druid are 15, 5, 21. The saves for 20 druid/1 pally are 16, 6, 22. The saves for 1 druid/1 pally/20 druid and 4 druid/1 pally/ 16 druid are 17, 6, 21. So it would seem by taking the paladin level pre-epic, you get +1 to fort and -1 to will. I didn't double check this myself so one of you may want to just in case I made an error, which I wouldn't rule out.
|
|
|
Post by Yomi on Nov 17, 2006 1:31:42 GMT
Using the CBC280 spreadsheet, testing out a druid build (FA with final stats of 8 str/dex, 10 int, 14 con, 16 cha, 23 wis), maxing wiz abilities, taking no other feats that effect things.
Any paladin level will add CHA mod to saves. All at level 21. Saves are fort, will, reflex.
D21. Bab of 16, 210hp, saves 14/21/5
D1/P1/D19. Bab of 16, 212hp, saves 18/23/8.
D4/P1/D16. Bab of 16, 212hp, saves 18/23/8.
D4/P1/M1/D15. Bab of 15, 212hp, saves 20/25/10.
D20/P1. Bab of 16, 212hp, saves 17/24/8.
Pretty much the same findings as Cath. According to the spreadsheet, the attack bonus doesn't change no matter where you take your one paladin level -- it will go up if you take 4 pre-epic paladin levels, but now you're a battle druid or somesuch, not a caster druid. Taking the pally level pre-epic gives you one more fort save at the cost of will. Since you're going to have a huge will save at the end, this seems like a good way to go (changing 73 to 72 will save is unlikely to matter as much as fort gong from 53 to 54).
Taking the paladin level early is also good since you get to wear heavy armor early, and while this may require you to wear some +str gear early on, at the early levels full plate is really nice. The CHA bonus to saves, especially with a FA build with points put into charisma, is also helpful. So I'd recommend taking the paladin level early (5 works as well as anything else).
The monk level early, as shadowspawn points out, does seem to raise all your saves by 2, which is not trivial. It does lower your attack by one as I'd expect. It also means one less druid level overall since you'll still need to take another monk level at 40 to max tumble and discipline. It's one less spell penetration and caster level, which makes your offense suffer some (all of my casters really hate losing caster levels). The attack bonus might hurt for touch attacks as it looks like the ab really isn't stellar and you don't have all the buffing spells clerics get to make theirs land. Alternately you could figure you aren't going to hit much anyway and live with it. Personally I think the build's saves are high enough that the +2 isn't worth the caster level tradeoff (and I know that as soon as I think about 2 monk levels I'll wheedle myself into 3 for the increased movement esp. since you can cast your own freedom of movement spell). With the paladin level, figure out a way to get points into CHA since each modifier is +1 to all saves.
|
|
|
Post by shadowspawn on Nov 25, 2006 4:01:15 GMT
So what is the consensus on the Epic spells?
I see a lot of builds taking Evo, and maybe I need to change my mindset, but I've always thought that the point of building up spell focii was to get the Epics. At first glance, Immutable Force does not seem all that good. I get that you want to up your spell pen., and some of the better spells are Evo based, but does that outweigh passing up an Epic like Shunt?
I'm curious what people feel the best Epic spells are (eg. is the sander any good?) and what schools NEED the better focus for effective casting.
ss
|
|
|
Post by thedomicron on Nov 25, 2006 11:02:39 GMT
evo, necro, and conjuration are all important schools for spells (eq, fods,/harm, bombard) and then you should probably pick one more. some people will tell you 5, but i think a good balance is with 4 epics
|
|
|
Post by Yomi on Nov 25, 2006 11:44:56 GMT
Haven't played mine far into LL's, so take this with a bit of skepticism. Conjuration is very important for spells (bombard among others). Evocation is useful for earthquakes. If you really are into FoD as a killing tool and not damage, then Necro may interest you -- unlike mages you don't get anything like wail, and harm doesn't have a save so the focus is irrelevent for it. I'm not seeing any other schools that have any great reason to focus on them; maybe transmutation for things like quillfire, drown, nature's balance, etc. For epics, you really need to get Shunt (transmutation) unless you have a pressing reason not to get it. Not getting it would be like a sorc who didn't take meteor swarm. Due to their importance in spells, you'll probably get immutable force (evocation) and shroud of nature (conjuration). Both look pretty nice. Dust to dust (necromancy) would be my 4th pick, as this is a quite useful tactical spell. On the other hand, Nature's Frailty (abjuration) also looks attractive. Those would be my 5 choices -- my druid is only choosing 4, and I debated betwen the last two (decided on dust to dust). I've not heard good things about the massive sander, but couldn't tell you for certain. The illusion epic looks weak vs. the others -- it is long lasting +4 or 5 to your AC, but compare that to giving your whole party 38-60% concealment, or 53-75% elemental immunity. Now if it was more like the cleric girding and gave your whole party the bonus it'd be of some interest. Primal Cataclysm seems like a mashup of Hellball and Starfire. I really don't want yet another massive lootbreaking spell. At first glance, Immutable Force does not seem all that good. Indeed -- only 5 rounds. However, it does seem pretty useful in practice. For instance, things in the room that blow up when destroyed? Invul and blast away. Monsters that do kickback damage? Mass them, invul, and blast away. Laser lights that cause bunch of damage when someone runs through them? Invul and run through. Big boss is on final legs and people need tag? Invul and kill it quick (ok, that one's problematic, but it can help). Little hard to target buggers that tend to cause death? Invul and blast them. It's perhaps not as useful in desert and Ssithrak, but has important uses in Pyramid, Illithids, and DB. Edited to reflect Shroud is 1% per caster level, not 20% plus 1%/CL.
|
|