Druids

[Yinao]

Actually there is a way to get -1 full ac point in shifted forms and it is quite easy if you ask me. Granite i am a Tard Cl/Dr class and i have been able to do it and if your druid prime the prime quest eq (I dont know if it has ac attached to it or not) but assuming that it would should be easy to get a full -1 ac point off of a shifted form. I will show you what i wear shifted in order to get the full -1 ac point off.

You are using:
<used as light> a magical will-o-the-wisp

<worn on finger> a wiedzmin ring..It has a soft glowing aura!

<worn on finger> a wiedzmin ring..It has a soft glowing aura!

<worn around neck> a twisted thorn necklace..It has a soft glowing aura! (with a broken thorn attached to it)

<worn around neck> a twisted thorn necklace..It has a soft glowing aura! (with a broken thorn attached to it)

<worn on feet> a pair of dolphin skin boots

<worn about body> ancient sensate cloak..It has a soft glowing aura! (with a maple-leaf brooch attached to it)

<worn about waist> a wolf-hide belt

<worn around wrist> a band of ether

<worn around wrist> a band of ether

<held> a runed taffeta pouch..It has a soft glowing aura!

Add it up if you please but i am sure that that will get you a full point off of your ac.

[Yinao]

Yep i screwed up this was an old thread and didnt realize it but ya i would say that those a decent stats that you could work with. This is what i currently work with. Str: 17 / 0, Int: 16, Wis: 18, Dex: 18, Con: 10 naked but str spell IS up.

[Autolycos]

[quote="Yinao":1tj6dvsk] Granite i am a Tard [/quote:1tj6dvsk]

we all knew you were a tard yinao... but a stone one?


granted young one.. not granite

[Rynquald]

Personally I like the current arrangement where shift forms get high natural ac, but very little shiftable eq, it makes little sense that a dragon would be wearing a full set of armor, or even need it.

On the subject of useless forms, there's plenty of useless spells/skills in every classo.

The two real "solo" classes imo are druid and necro, druid has a lesser solo than necro (as it should be), but imho it should still have a better solo than most other classes. After all, druids don't get much of any use unshifted besides mana regen.

Oh and Hottie...try using 60 mana to get ready for solo (after lites etc), and then spending 40 mana a shot for simple blasting before you suggest making shifting cost more mana.

[12345]

Psst... Ryn.

Hottie's post was more than 2.5 years ago.

[Rynquald]

Sigh...that's what I get for trying to read and reply to 2 days worth of posts in 2 minutes, thought the whole thread was posted while my phone lines were screwed.

Sorry Hottie

[jezer]

Yeah old thread... I know... but really? What has changed? So I thought I'd give the thread a bump.

Most people have made some really good points... And since this thread is quite old... I'm a little disappointed they haven't really been addressed. I'm just gonna add a few of my thoughts here now that I play prime druid.

1) Regen rocks... and it's a great idea.
2) Playing druid before hitting lvl 38 is flaming hard work if your 4 times caster... and I don't recommend you do it.
3) I find it strange druid has all these weird spells... but can't cast them while shifted... it's just seems silly. Let a druid, cast druid spells shifted.
4) I don't care much for druid eq, at lvl 38, I wear a few +hit items just to help things go along faster.
5) There are too many useless forms below lvl 38. I only ever used asp and ferret on vk. Once you get off vk, you tend to hit prime 40 quickly... so most of those interim forms are silly... sure you use them every blue moon but...
6) Druids use to much mana, at lvl 38 and shifting to wurm, I can kill 4 murkwood mobs before I need a regen... which is about 3-5 mins... That just really sucks. I use 420 mana to make 1.2mill xp taking about 10mins.

I think the druid class is cool, because it's a little bit of everything... it's a bit of tanking... a bit of casting etc etc. But I do think it's unbalanced...

The person who made the comment about God's wrath opening up at lvl 38 couldn't have been more right...

Level < 38 - Suck Suck Suck Suck - compared to everyone else.
Level 38 - equal or better than some other classes. In one level...

I've seen Tremble, doing his thing in a group with his multiple vicious attacks... I sure hope the avatar forms are as good as that. I'm having the thoughts that a -11 flurrying, fastened, triple attacking 1300hp tank deals more than druid forms? yes? no?

Don't play druid without a warrior, monk or thief class... big mistake...

I know one day as an avatar I think my classo with be insanely powerful for hitting a single mob... but it really does suck for solo xp... and when your not in clan... and live on the otherside of the world when other people are sleeping... it's will be hard work. No need to get your violin out :p

If I can put a few suggestions forward... I'm not entirely serious about all of them... just wanting change, and people to think about it.

1) Don't make the shifted animal use (much) mana, unless it is fighting... or make it use less or something while it is not fighting. It takes less energy for me to stand still, than to play sport... so why can't the same thing apply to shifted forms.
2) Let us cast druid spells shifted... not to much we have is offensive anyways.
3) Improve the lowbie forms.
4) It's more mana efficent not to cast wurm spells and to stay shifted longer using the attacks, than to cast wurm spells to kill a mob. I'm not sure that should be the case.
5) Have druid eq that allows us to cast a spell while shifted?

I'm not to bothered by shift eq and lags... it's the constant regening for xp runs that is killing me.

Lot of good points made in this thread... it's easy to tell those who actually play druid, and those who don't... and think it's overpowered. Any changes to balance out the class would be welcome by me, particularly at the lower levels.

[Widow]

I know I'm a necro prime, but I'm druid second and I often shift into a form to fight a larger mob.

That being said - I experienced the same joys of getting the wurm/naga/dragon forms that every druid feels when getting those levels. Those shifts allowed me to finally take down some bigger mobs I'd been meaning to hit. As for the spellcasting side - I think it's great that I can still use breath weapons/spec attacks in no-magic rooms (it's not a spell) so there's a huge advantage to druids over all spell casters.

If anything were to be looked at in regards to the shifted forms, it would be to adjust equanimity at least slightly. As it stands now, you get this too late to be effective for your lower level forms and it's completely ineffective for the higher forms.

I understand there's a time and place for everything, some spells you grow out of or are used for very special occassions and the like. But this one doesn't appear to fall into that category because it's supposed to affect you shifted, so why have it only affect smaller shifts?

[Krok]

Stop crying and L2Multiclass.

[Rynquald]

[quote:3f9cd9rr]2) Playing druid before hitting lvl 38 is flaming hard work if your 4 times caster... and I don't recommend you do it. [/quote:3f9cd9rr]

Right, the <40 druid forms could do with a bit of a push, atm druid mainly serves as a class you take for later on, even as prime (imo it's easy to forget what it feels like to have a <40 prime as your only char, 3x40+ seems pretty far away).

[quote:3f9cd9rr]3) I find it strange druid has all these weird spells... but can't cast them while shifted... it's just seems silly. Let a druid, cast druid spells shifted. [/quote:3f9cd9rr]

I always figured the reasoning for this was that we give up our magical and (most) of our mental ability to shift, it's a trade off.

[quote:3f9cd9rr]4) I don't care much for druid eq, at lvl 38, I wear a few +hit items just to help things go along faster. [/quote:3f9cd9rr]

Naked shift forms already have equivalent (mostly better) stats than the fully clothed unshifted version of the char, any eq you wear shifted is just an extra.

[quote:3f9cd9rr]5) There are too many useless forms below lvl 38. I only ever used asp and ferret on vk. Once you get off vk, you tend to hit prime 40 quickly... so most of those interim forms are silly... sure you use them every blue moon but... [/quote:3f9cd9rr]

There are a ton of spells/skills in every class that no one uses.

[quote:3f9cd9rr]6) Druids use to much mana, at lvl 38 and shifting to wurm, I can kill 4 murkwood mobs before I need a regen... which is about 3-5 mins... That just really sucks. I use 420 mana to make 1.2mill xp taking about 10mins. [/quote:3f9cd9rr]

Thinking of shifting as a sustained cast throws this into different light, how long can you blast/heal out? I'll agree that shifting is a poor way to run xp, but it has other strengths.

[quote:3f9cd9rr]I've seen Tremble, doing his thing in a group with his multiple vicious attacks... I sure hope the avatar forms are as good as that. I'm having the thoughts that a -11 flurrying, fastened, triple attacking 1300hp tank deals more than druid forms? yes? no? [/quote:3f9cd9rr]

5x40 tank vs. 5x40 druid is pretty comparable, piasa gets 7 brutals at -12 with 2100hp (of course warriors get all that without sustained mana drain).

[quote:3f9cd9rr]1) Don't make the shifted animal use (much) mana, unless it is fighting... or make it use less or something while it is not fighting. It takes less energy for me to stand still, than to play sport... so why can't the same thing apply to shifted forms. [/quote:3f9cd9rr]

Mana usage doesn't represent the physical energy that your form consumes to fight, it's the magical drain a druid encounters for keeping their body out of form.

As for shifted casting, casting druid spells shifted would be pretty much useless, and casting all spells shifted would be way overpowered.

And whether to blast or not works exactly the same as unshifted, is the mob hitting you hard enough that you're willing to kill it in a less efficient manner in order to kill it faster?

I don't mean to seem negative on all your points, but seriously, shifting is already very strong when played to its strengths.

Of course that's all just my opinion.

[jezer]

Nah, that's a good post Ryn, and I guess the counter arguments seem to balance out the arguments for, and hence nothing much seems to happen.

Most of my ideas/criticism stem from not being to effectively do xp runs solo... and I guess I knew that might be the case as a 4x caster... but once I got into it... it really does start to hurt. heh.

I don't consider knocking around ideas whining... and if my idea's are proved foolish by reason, well that's all good.

Maybe a better question is... how do casters run xp solo?

[Rynquald]

Using your mage blasting to play like a thief is often a good bet. Farlorne/Kozakura/DWeb are good SS areas for it, along with all the lyme stab/blast stuff (if your 4xcaster's 3x40).

Survivability is a likely problem without mirrors or an aerial servant to soak up the obscene stab mob damage, a rabbit helps though.

Which brings me to my next point. Finding a thief or monk to run with is the best xp for most casters, if there's any around with comparable levels at the times you play.

Someone else might be able to clue you in on necro xp runs, but I have no idea how it works.

[Rynquald]

Since the forum doesn't want to let me edit my last post:

Mansion is a good casterish solo area too, not bad coins either.

[jezer]

I feel a bit red faced...

I have been Level 39 druid for about a week, and I have been leveling other classes... shifted as wurm. I haven't wanted to level to prime 40, and then risk loosing all the xp and gold in a death... as that happened to me recently.

But last night I got 40mill quickly in a two man, and I wanted to try out the shambling mounds for helping me solo... so I thought what the heck level it...

It made an incredible amount of difference... It seems the cost of staying shifted was nicely reduced in that one level... I was actually killing about 7-8 mobs in murkwood before I needed a mana regen. I found I also hit more from that one level... and regened faster. There was a house of spring on at times last night... but honestly I had no idea how much improvement that last level made to being shifted.

Now that things are the way they are... in the context of fairness and balance, I personally will be waiting longer to make any more calls about changes to druids... things are how I guess I expected they should be... I had in my mind how I thought I should be running, as I used to run the area as a monk, and the druid was performing at about half of what I expected. I still can't believe what a difference that last level made...!

Is it because once I got that level, my 30 secondary cleric levels kicked in on top? That last level made probably twice the difference I expected.

[Rynquald]

A lot of classes gain innate bonuses at 40, a higher stab multiplier for thieves jumps to mind. Not sure if that happens with shift form stats and mana usage, but I wouldn't be surprised.

A higher outdoor mana regen bonus at 40 seems likely, especially if you're regenning faster (of course all caster classes get more normal regen with levels too).

I'm glad it worked out for you