The best Wild Shape forms for your Moon Druid: D&D 5e

[@MeZimm]

No mention of Dire Wolf? Sadface. That was my default combat form for most of my Moon Druid's time in Tier 1. Speedy, stealthy, solid AC, pack tactics, and a decently powerful attack which knocks things prone. It was even useful for tracking. And unlike Deinonychus, it's probable that your druid will run into one - for my party, a small pack of them was the boss monster of our level 1 session.

[@PsyrenXY]

Did you miss the comment from your last wild shape video? Xanathars solves the "beasts you have seen before" issue by giving a fairly balanced list of starting beasts for the biome(s) your druid grew up in or came from.

[@TreantmonksTemple]

I missed that one, but these videos are done weeks ahead so usually when you see these videos the next few are already done and published for patrons. Looking through it, there's a pretty wide range of CR 1 forms available by environment, anywhere from 1 to 6 options.

[@PsyrenXY]

@Treantmonk's Temple What our DM does is let druid players access any animals from the PHB (304-311, so every druid gets the basic stuff like cat and wolf and brown bear etc) and then pick two biomes from that list. So while my aquatic druid might have trained by the coast and also learned underwater forms, someone else's might have trained in a mountainous forest, or a hilly desert.

[@МаратГабдуллин-б5ф]

Also very fun CR2 form is Quetzalcoatlus. And if you want to optimize it- take Skill Expert feat for Athletics expertise, cast Longstrider and Enhance Ability or Enlarge (or/and dip 2 levels into Rogue). So you can grab enemy with advantage and expertise, fly 90ft up in the sky and drop it for 9d6 damage. With rogue levels you can do bonus action dash and do it every round.

[@Karagianis]

Also has flyby, so you're a nightmare for any foe that doesn't have ranged attacks. You could technically kill a Tarrasque with a druid in Quetzalcoatlus form dive bombing it from above (although it'd take a while). Because the Tarrasque has no way to hit it, and primal strike makes the druid's attacks count as magical!

[@Tespri]

@@Karagianis *Tarrasque prepares an action)* Quetzalcoatlus tries to use flyby gimic, Tarrasque uses Swallow.

[@iglerflexrex1276]

My favorite CR 1 Beast is the giant octopus. Good hit points, 15ft reach and a restrain effect on a hit with a very high escape DC. Downsides are the poor Ac and land movement, but with longstrider and the 15ft reach it isn't that much of a problem.

[@TreantmonksTemple]

Really nice HP as well.

[@TheBaconWizard]

Take longstrider and cast it prior to wildshape if possible, really helps.

[@susannahammond2033]

The only problem with Octopus is the swim speed which doesn't allow you to use it until lvl 4. Still pretty good though.

[@TheBaconWizard]

@@susannahammond2033 Yes. It also limits you to an hour long after you would normally be able to WS for 2 hrs at a time, because it can't hold it's breath out of water for longer. Then again, good argument for not getting hit with cloudkill and other stuffs....

[@iglerflexrex1276]

@@TheBaconWizard I haven't thought of the Swim Speed and the hold breath time. It also can grapple only one creature at a time, which is also limiting. That are three more downsides. But I still love it. You can hold the opponent 15ft away from you, so he can't attack with melee. That makes it easy to hold concentration on Spells. Also the restrained condition exceeds the damage of martials fairly high, especially if they took Power Attack Feats at Level 4. You can also drag creatures trough Aoe like Spike Growth and they use the action and need a fix 16 to escape from your grapple. With 15ft reach you can block entire rooms with Oa and protect the backline casters very efficiently.

[@macacones]

I remember to read some of your guides and builds for Pathfinder 1E, its so nice to see that your love for table top rpgs its still burning. I just want to thank you for keeping up with a high quality content and sharing so much information! Big hug from a brazilian fan.

[@TreantmonksTemple]

Hey, thanks!

[@michaelmuirhead910]

I expect that you’ll have a segment about combat feats that can be used while in wildshape. Slasher, charger, mobile, etc… I love the druid class, and your deep diving (to steal a phrase from Colby at D4) into druid mechanics and optimization is fantastic. Well done sir!

[@TreantmonksTemple]

I will indeed. Feats and wild shape coming up!

[@nyanbrox5418]

I am pretty sure something like resilient constitution is sort of a must have, The problem with slasher/ the weapon type feats in tasha's is you have different kinds of damage, bears do both slashing and piercing, snek's do bludgeoning and poison, fire elementals do fire! also, I wonder if something like the tough feat would work to add hp to the creature form an equal amount that they have hit dice x 2, that would be kinda sweet, charger is interesting as an idea but it takes your bonus action, which is usually being used to enter wild shape, though I suppose you could do that turn 1 instead... which would be super interesting because you can shove a creature prone, for bear and elemental and snek and giant spider this is sort of insanely good but *also*, races? I mean what if you are a dragonborn and replace the bear's bite with a breath attack, that would be really cool, or what if you had the dragonborn ability to manifest spectral wings? or an aasimars ability to deal extra radiant damage, or maybe fly too, the extra damage from these would massively help achieve that baseline damage even if a spell concentration went down, what if you played a kobold and turned the "draconic cry" into a bestial cry, which would be actually completely badonkadonks... I mean all attacks at advantage multiple times per combat for the whole party? if you wanted you could technically also combine this with conjure animals for some... well... it would certainly be a strategy... but you might get people wondering why they are still even friends with you after you pull off something like that, but if you cast something cool like the summon beast spell instead I don't see any complaints, then you could play with two large animals, though getting over non-magic resistance later is a pain for your summon if you're not a shepherd... Hmmm... one interesting idea is going dragonborn, and then picking up dragon hide feat later at level 16, though maybe it's a little bit late, it does give stuff like air elemental form a +3 AC as your "scales harden", but because I don't know how wildshape works still I don't really know if that feat works in your wildshape... like at all, as a DM I would rule that sure, now all your wild shape forms have scales, why the heck not... other than maybe fighter initiate for a trip attack, I really can't see much synergy with feats other than the abysmal savage attacker or the generically good lucky feat

[@x0Vinny0x]

Those are neat choices! My favorite feat is Sentinel.

[@purplejacket348]

Great video as always, Chris! One thing I'd add as a major point to Earth Elementals is they have a Con score of 20, higher than all the others, which allows you to concentrate on whatever spell you cast before wild shaping with much greater effectiveness. If you have resilient (con) or warcaster, it'll be difficult for enemies to make you drop concentration. And although it doesn't happen terribly often, if you are fighting in a place with natural stone (natural caves, a mountain range, etc), with earth glide you can always end your turn inside rock, and on your turn you can appear, attack, and then earth glide again, all while still knowing where your enemies are due to tremorsense.

[@ElManReborn616]

It's funny: you keep your wisdom which you want to increase anyway and you get the dexterity of a beast. On paper, one would think this is the one case in which a monk dip would work. Then you look at the beasts and notice nothing goes higher than 16 Dex, so you're better off scaling faster And since you're not taking the attack action if you're using multiattack, you can't even use martial arts, albeit that can be useful with certain forms

[@macattack5863]

Arguably you can still take the attack action and get all the same effects.

[@MagicScientist]

This is another point in favor of the air elemental, since it has a 20 dex, so you can have a 20 AC, higher even than the earth elemental

[@jcdenton2187]

Monk multiclass can let you have a +5 AC to all your wildshapes since you're keeping your Wisdom. The Barbarian's AC is a lot less reliable since you're dependent on the form's Dexterity and Constitution modifier. I'd definitely encourage any DMs to let martial arts work in wildshape despite the multiattack not technically counting as taking the attack action, cause letting them do 1d4 + whatever damage each turn as a bonus action is far from broken. I'd still take Barbarian for the multiclass though because it mechanically lets me do a *little* more in wildshape, I can at least choose whether to Reckless attack and Rage.

[@MagicScientist]

@@jcdenton2187 Not all wildshapes benefit from monk unarmored defense - since you use the wild shape's dex, and can't stack with natural armor, sometimes just using the natural armor is better The earth elemental is a good example of this - 17 natural armor ac or 14 ac with monk unarmored defense

[@brettmajeske3525]

Monk dips still help with AC most of the time.

[@Unknown-yt2hb]

I love updates on my favourite classes!

[@whysegaming1548]

Great video as always! I recently started playing a stars Druid for my friend’s campaign and even though this is only for moon Druid, I’m hoping to use the same strategies used here to help pick which beasts I’ll use when I’m not using starry form. Keep up the great work!

[@carlmeade1667]

Great video for moon druids but given 5ne tips are focused on combat abilities and it starts ar CR1 which you won't get until level 8 I am not sure how much the advice crosses over to a stars druid. For you when not using starry form (or find familiar) wildshape is all about utility, If you want to travel by cart but are worried at the first combat the horse will bolt of get killed turn into a horse yourself, hide in plain sight as a mouse or stray dog to find out what the bad guys are planning, need to bury a body quickly? Turn into a giant badger. Maybe Chris cando a video on wildshape for utility at some point

[@UninterestingPedant]

24:51 I played a high level Tortle moon druid for a short campaign and found that the improved wildshape forms shine defensively and utility-wise at higher levels once the DPR of the forms’ attacks starts petering off. I was rarely really worried about losing concentration because of all the various mobility options I had to get and stay out of range of enemy attacks; creatures with flyby like the Quetzalcoatl or Owl, creatures with burrowing speeds like the giant badger and earth elemental, creatures with high speeds that I could use to just keep my distance from foes, etc. On top of that, since I didn’t need to worry about pumping my own STR or DEX at all, I had plenty of ASIs to pump into CON and take feats like Resilient CON and War Caster after capping WIS. On the uncommon occasion I was hit, I was making a save with advantage and adding +12 to the result (had +1 from a cloak of protection); anything doing less than 27 damage on a hit would still save even if rolling double natural 1s, which was still higher than a good number of creatures’ average damage on the individual attacks of a multiattack. Flying out of melee range dropping bolts of upcasted Call Lightning while also being able to cast healing word as needed starting round 2 makes for a very fun and powerful combo. Druids are great.

[@alanmaxwell9105]

Thank you Treantmonk, I love the direct comparisons. There are so many options that it really helps to have a general top list to choose from at the table depending on what you need. For your eventual build, I think the Telepathic feat from Tasha’s is fantastic. Being able to stay wildshaped for the full duration and still communicate with your party could prevent you having to end early. And Detect Thoughts fits nicely on a Druid looking to get under a door as a spider to spy on folks. Great Video as always, keep it up.

[@Marc.Google]

Loving your Moon Druid series. Thanks Chris!

[@TreantmonksTemple]

Glad you like them!

[@inversenexarus9152]

I was a Goblin Moon Druid in a Curse of Strahd campaign. Hands down my most powerful wildshape was the Air Elemental. 144 HP, AC 22. Resistant to Acid, Cold, Lightning, Fire and non-magical Bludgeoning, Percing and Slashing damage. Immune to Poison. And a bunch of condition immunities. Base module, in the Swamps of Berez there is a circle of Standing Stones that specifically allows a Druid PC to max out a wild shape hit dice. Which is how I got the 144 HP. The ridiculous AC is because I took a single level dip into Monk for Unarmored Defense. Animals and Elementals do indeed fight without armor. Air Elemental has 20 dexterity and wildshape lets you keep your wisdom which was 22. In the Amber Temple there is a manual of wisdom that my character studied. Then the Beacon over Argonvostholt gives player characters who are against strahd a +1 to their AC and saves. So 10+5+6+1= 22 AC. The DM who was running the campaign was using the Dragnacarta suppliment that has the Three Fanes. At the same circle of standing stones in Berez that gives Druids a maximum increase to their health. A ritual is performed and the character to complete the ritual becomes champion of the Swamp Fane, gaining resistance to Acid, Cold, Fire and Lightning damage. Funnily enough, my Druid and the Warlock died in the final fight. I was chasing Strahd up and down that Castle trying to Grapple him so that the Paladin could get hits in.

[@Bernardonogmo]

Great video as always! Dear Treantmonk, I have a very important request to make and hope you see this, I know it can be a lot of work but here we go... Since 5th edition is mostly "finished", if it's even possible to say something like that, I think it's a great time to go back to your Treantmonk Variant, revisit and extend it to some of the content released outside of the Players Handbook, I find your input so simple and elegant on this topic and therefore think It'd be such a major contribution to our community a final version of this, so please?

[@TreantmonksTemple]

I appreciate that, but there are so many similar projects right now (the big ones are of course One D&D, Black Flag Project and Level up), that the timing would be poor for the time investment. I think I'll wait and see how these projects turn out.

[@Bernardonogmo]

@@TreantmonksTemple Nice! I'm grateful for your reply anyway

[@TheBaconWizard]

I particularly enjoy Giant Octopus for its automatic restrain of enemies on a hit, and its 15ft reach. Downside is 10ft movement on land, so take longstrider and cast it before combat if you can.

[@darkmage1975]

I'm lvl7 Moon Druid but my DM at lvl1 said: "in your past life you only saw bear and wolf as wild animals, you'll see other ones in the campaign" Never saw anyone else. So I'm not using wild shape anymore...

[@phecto]

Giant octopus was a great option for my moon druid and having just made level 9 I see myself using killer whale quite a lot. We spend a lot of time in the water so aquatic forms get an advantage. The 120' blindsight when DM really loves to try and surprise us with sneaky enemies or restricted vision is perfect. Also no mention of flying forms, which are great when combined with things like call lightning, and with a moon druid having access to larger flying forms and the right party you can even do things like carry the halfling to let them also bombard the enemy from out of range.

[@Staff7]

awesome video Chris . I love druids, monk is my favorite in terms of flavor but druid is second and it feels good that they actually have some power lol.

[@comfortablegrey]

I know this is specialized on the combat forms, but at level 2 there are a few forms that give bonuses to different skills. Advantage on wisdom for smell, or hearing, or sight for instance.

[@dungeondr]

Great list for cr1, however I've gotta mention why I think dire wolf is a missed opportunity: great speed, no need to charge for the knock prone effect and pack tactics for reliable advantage which mitigates scaling of attack bonus. In isolation it might not be as good as brown bear for damage, but in a party I'd argue it's stronger as it sets up other melee attackers. And the big advantage: if you're multiclassing and able to pick up extra attack you can stack dire wolf's attack with it, unlike brown bears multiattack which gains no benefit. Dire wolf would therefore in a multiclass gain two attacks, likely with advantage, and both with the chance of a knock prone effect.

[@purplejacket348]

I'd argue that multiclassing 5 levels to get extra attack in order to improve Dire Wolf's abilities in combat is not a super-great tactic, since by then the dire wolf statblock has very low HP and if you had solo-classed druid you'd have better spells and CR2 forms.

[@dungeondr]

@@purplejacket348 Depends on the multiclass, but monk, barbarian and fighter all bring a lot of great enhancements in addition to extra attack. I did a build with long death monk on my channel that managed to get a lot out of just the dire wolf form well into mid tiers of play.

[@TreantmonksTemple]

Dire wolf was on my CR 1 list - though that list was quite long so I edited it down with the intention to provide some examples of good CR 1 forms along with the assurance there were other strong options in that window.

[@dungeondr]

@@TreantmonksTemple That's fair! I may be somewhat biased towards the dire wolf as it's always been a solid go to for my players and myself, but I was impressed by the multiclassing options when I tried optimizing moon druid.

[@jand.4737]

3:25 Xanathar's Guide to Everything has a table that sorts beasts by biome for the purposes of wildshape. The idea is "determine where you are from. These creatures likely have shown up in that region and thus you can use them for wildshape.

[@kylethomas9130]

11:18 when we rolled initiative for the final boss battle, we started a long ways off from the castle walls. I was hoping to use an Elemental for my Wild Shape, but figured it would be more team player to pick a beast to move my allies closer to the battle. Turns out, those who took me up on the ride, didn't even go all the way to the walls. So I resorted to Giant Scorpion, since I could no longer do an elemental, and proceeded to hit nothing with my attacks.

[@ArticleNoun]

I’m so pumped for this series. Thank you

[@jackattackhissnack]

As someone who loves stats, I love this review. Covers the math perfectly.

[@FluffyAkuma]

Earth Elemental in unworked earth areas is probably the most broken if concentrating on some form of damaging spells. Wrath of Nature can really buff its damage and utility while being entirely safe depending on the ground availability, draconic transformation is one of my go to wildshape concentrations for outright damage/utility, summon spells in general while underground give safe options; and reach means you can go up and slap something, command your summons with sight, do bonus action damages where applicable, then go back down to safety. Fire is my go to swarm form and again with draconic transformation gives a bonus action damage boost as well as a fly speed. Wind becomes more so a middle ground safe option that fills the general situation. In a worked area with fire resistant or single strong targets or quick hit and run tactics? Wind wins outright. Water I honestly quite enjoy but whelm is underwhelming (😉) in its actual effectiveness but when it works it feels great and the above concentration spells supplement the damage issue with a decent control.

[@shredder6637]

My best advice (from personal experience) for optimizing wild shape is being the biggest nuisance on the battlefield so the vengeance paladin in your party can do whatever they want :)

[@Godzillawolf1]

I think one important consideration with a Moon Druid build would be trying to get Mage Armor. That doesn't help all Wild Shapes, as dex varies and some like the Mammoth have an absurdly low one, but it'd be a sizable buff to an Air Elemental, whose AC goes from 15 to 18. In fact, the Earth Elemental is the only Elemental that wouldn't benefit (as its dex is low and its AC is high), but as a level 1 spell, it's easy enough to just dispell it if you know you're going to go Earth Elemental, then recast it when you turn back. Giant Hyena goes from 12 to 14. Same with the Constrictor Snake. Deinonychus goes from 13 to 15. Trade off is not being able to wear armor in your Druid form, but given good armor is something Druids don't really get due to their 'no metal armor' limitation, Mage Armor might actually be an objective improvement over wearing the armors available to Druids, and as an eight hour, level 1 spell that requires no concentration, it's as easy to get as Magic Intiate or a few other feats. Or heck, just have the Party Wizard cast it on you every dawn if you have one. Mage Armor is a decent buff for any Druid due to their armor restriction, but I think it's an even better one for Moon Druids depending on your wild shape of choice.

[@g3neralrevan27]

Do you need to end your turn in a creature's space for the Fire Elemental's damage? "The first time it enters a creature's space on a turn, that creature takes 5 (1d10) fire damage and catches fire; until someone takes an action to douse the fire, the creature takes 5 (1d10) fire damage at the start of each of its turns." You could dash and ignite every enemy, and now they have to burn an action to remove the flames. For no save, 100ft dash speed, that's pretty good control. Even with 50ft movement and attacking, fire does a lot of damage (even though it's reliant on fire and it gets better the more enemies are clumped together).

[@notoriousthief]

Constrictor snakes are one of those where I allow them to squeeze through smaller areas. It doesn't make sense for them not to be able to go through a 5ft corridor despite their size.

[@saltypork101]

Great video. I'm looking forward to the next frankenbuilds video.

[@gunhead7159]

Something I *highly* recommend for anyone that's going to play a moon druid: talk to your DM and ask if y'all can work together and upgrade your animal forms at CR increases! I'm currently playing a beastformer-esk warforged druid and this is what we do with my character. I still have the ability to learn new creatures, but it's so much more fun and a lot more personal for your character to start out with their *main* forms (could even be weaker versions of stronger creatures to balance for CR) and have their forms evolve with the character. Kind of like their own signature.

[@warmwaterpenguin]

Loving this, can't wait for the rest of the series!

[@dominicl5862]

I've heard/read about and first hand seen Moon Druids un-optimized and fall off in Martial Combat past lvl 4. And many optimizers have said the same. But its the spells. A few feats as well go a long way. Resilient Con, Warcaster, and then a pure martial feat like sentinel and then boom, +wis , +wis. Vuman isnt even needed (just speeds everything up). Spam spells like goodberry, longstrider, flaming sphere, moon beam, conjure animals, conjure fey. Once you get to Lvl 7 and beyond you can keep up in melee if you gear yourself towards it. Treantmonk sneak peaked a cave bear with GoN. You start stacking spells at this point (lvl 9), don't scoff at a giant scorpion with Longstrider, Flame Shield, GoN. And all of this translates to the elementals. The problem becomes, you can do it only so many times IMO. I rely akin Moon Druid and Spore Druid to Bladesingers. FULL casters who have the potential to super sayian up and join the melee. Otherwise play as a full caster with great support, dmg, summon. Multiple Spike growths, Conjure animals, summon Fey, Flaming Sphere, Summon Beast to support with cantrip firepower. Druid is extremely potent and underrated.

[@dominicl5862]

Also I have a theory and a small playtest of a Full spore druid, polearm master, mobile, warcaster. Same spell philosophy applies, cast summons and controls while in mage mode, sit back and all. When you have time to prep for a fight then Spore Mode, Longstrider, Flame Shield, Elemental weapon maybe or Guardian of nature.

[@derekzoetewey6547]

I really hope in the next edition, they make wildshape work more similar to some of the new summon spells where you pick from a number of forms and it scales and improves more evenly across levels.

[@Ricardo-zo1ti]

I was waiting for this video! Thanks

[@DaBurgerKing93]

Giant Octopus is a pretty strong wildshape creature after you unlock swim speeds. Theyre really slow which sucks, but can be helped a lot by longstrider. 52 HP and an attack that restrains.

[@troyg5439]

my warforge druid used = giant spider(ferrying the party up walls/openings or across ravines ect) the most followed by earth elemental (mainly for combat) in our last campaign.

[@Hyde_Hill]

Thing is with flaming sphere and other spells this is calculating in a set up round. So then if you assume 4 rounds you have to remove around 25 percent (minus first round spell damage) for the base damage.

[@MeZimm]

Grapple builds on Moon Druids are how you dish out massive amounts of damage. There's the old-fashioned Spike Growth "Cheese Grater", but also spells like Moonbeam and Wall of Fire which deal damage to creatures that stay in the area or enter the area for the first time on a turn. With the "triple dip" exploit, this can get out of hand very quickly: grappling the target forces them to stay in the area on their turn (forcing damage), then on your turn you can use your movement to drag them out and then back in (forcing damage again), then ready your action to drag them out and back in YET AGAIN on someone else's turn (forcing damage a THIRD time). Using this exploit, a base-level Wall of Fire would thereby deal 5d8*3 = 22.5*3 = 67.5 damage per round with a 4th level slot, +13.5 DPR every level you upcast it. All you need is: a form with high strength plus arms or a trunk; Skill Expertise in Athletics; and a way to safeguard your concentration. (DO talk to your DM about this first; it should work RAW - depending on how they interpret some rather ambiguous rules on grappling - but they might still deem it too cheesy. You can still do pretty decent damage by only "double dipping" and then using your action to Multiattack instead of Ready.) EDIT: Also not as cheesy but still reliant on grappling: if you can grapple a target and then shove and hold them prone, your Conjured Animals or Woodland Beings (I suggest Quicklings) get advantage on all their melee attacks, as do you and the rest of your party, making this also an excellent source of DPR. Since Druids don't get Extra Attack, the main drawback here is the action economy required to set this up, or to take 5-6 levels in another class.

[@Karagianis]

One thing I'm going to raise here, the fire elemental says it does fire damage the first time it ENTERS a creatrues space, not when it ends its turn there. So technically if it has enough movement you could do this to MULTIPLE creatures on your turn. Meaning it has the potential to do a lot more damage than any other elemental in the event of there being multiple targets close together, because it could dash through a bunch of them and set 4-5 maybe even more cratures on fire in a single turn. Doing 1D10 fire damage to each of them, plus another 1D10 at the start of their next turn and each turn after that if they don't waste an action putting themselves out. And this can't miss, it just happens if it moves through something. Oh, and oportunity attacks? Great that makes them take even MORE fire damage cos they're attacking you in melee!

[@micahiwaasa9304]

I was in a campaign that ended at level 14. I was really looking forward to playing with the giant crocodile form at level 15 as a provider of advantage for my conjured minions to bombard. (Most frighteningly, giant owls.)

[@samuelbroad11]

you'll probably sort this in the ancestry selection, but communicating in wildshape form is pretty important. the party carried a few sacks of sand for the druid to scratch in when needed, and the table agreed the giant spider could write with the web. Of course there is usually heaps of blood of enemies around for scrawling, but in scout mode it was an issue.

[@none-of-your-busi-ness]

A favorite of mine is the CR2 dinosaur Allosaurus while it lacks multiattack, it has good hp at 51, is very fast, at 60ft, and has a pounce ability, meaning you can charge in, make a claw attack, and then bite as a bonus action if they're knocked prone. Combines very well with the mobile feat to allow you to cycle charge in and out! powerful and great fun. Worth noting, that my gm ruled it that my characters proficiency overrides the dinosaurs for anything that uses it. IE, its attacks, and the saving throw of its pounce, this I think is not a common ruling, but I think its correct, and a very good idea.

[@davidecolucci6260]

10 levels in moon druid and enough in monk for unarmored defense and unarmored movement for a lightning fast air elemental. Also at 18 level, losing concentration is less of a problem due to beast spells

[@inversenexarus9152]

It is indeed, I know from experience.

[@PeacefulOz]

I use spike growth and run a grapple build with my wildshape. Dragging along them for big damage especially after my wizard casts haste. Lots of damage and good control

[@undrhil]

By the time you are level 18, you should be able to afford full plate boarding for your mammoth form even if it costs more because of the size. There should be no reason that you as a mammoth should have a CAC of 13 peryou will be in mammoth form for at least 9 hours unless you take damage and drop out early or have to chum out early anyway. So turn into your wild shape in the morning get your allies to armor you up and then wait in the battle with AC18 or more Depending on what you can get for armor.

[@Melorific]

I think earth elemental's earth glide is a bit of an unsung hero here, especially on the topic of maintaining concentration in wild shape. Since you don't disturb the ground you move through, most creatures won't have ways to reliably hit you if you end your turn underground. This means you can cast your spell, wildshape and then go underground. On next turns you can come up, hit something and just go underground again. On the topic of concentration. I think in your elemental comparison the CON scores of the elementals should've been addressed. Since you'll be using your wild shape's con score. An air elemental has the lowest CON (+2) out of any elemental. The earth elemental is +5. Between earth glide, +5 con and the highest AC, earth elemental is the form that has the least issues maintaining concentration by a pretty wide margin.

[@Vonsen]

You mentioned this briefly, but I was wondering if you could go into more detail about your assumptions of target AC by level for your DPR calculation? How do you select your target AC? Is it based on the average AC of all monsters of that level's CR? It seems like an interesting (and non-trivial) problem!

[@MrThedowd]

Nice video as always! I'm playing a moon druid in a Strahd campaign and really enjoy it. But I'm constantly struggling with what concentration spell to cast before wild shaping. And I also like fire shield for concentration free damage but then it's suddenly two rounds of setup before doing anything.

[@nevertoonate]

This video has extra spice with the context of the new ODnD playtest haha

[@Mr_Ne0]

Can't wait for the next ones on this subject! 😆

[@Marc.Google]

Also, Dire Wolf has been a solid early game pick in my games. It has Pack Tactics which is fairly consist, especially along side a Summon spell. Seems more reliable then Brown Bear IMHO.

[@ryancparker]

Why no dire wolf? It gives you solid hit points, armor class, movement, stealth, pack tactics, and trip attack. Why aren’t you casting conjure animals before wild-shaping at level 5 and higher? One dire wolf becomes a pack of three for example.

[@dhaas4698]

Personally, I tend to default to Fire Elemental. I mean the slam attack is okay, but you just have so many ways to stack up that fire damage. Enemies take damage when hitting you. They take damage when you move through their space. So usually I move through an enemy, (d10), keep moving to grant an AoA, (d10), then slam ×2 for whatever the damage the slam attack is. Not to mention you can get really creative with the style of play by using armor of agythis upcasted (Mark of Warding Dwarf), and fire shield so the enemy is just taking boat loads of damage on their turn.....oh and they'll start their turns taking d10.

[@vinspad3]

Giant Toad and Giant Octopus at level 4 when you get a swim speed are as viable for levels 4 and 5 as the Brown Bear option if not more so. The Toad is a great Tanking option.

[@vinspad3]

You've shown that a Moon Druid isn't a primary damage dealer. They should concentrate on tank / support, not damage. Even your higher damage numbers have to assume that the enemy is prone for all attacks. How is that happening? The elementals barely do baseline damage for their level. You're better off making a character focused on tank/support options, and Beasts like Spiders, Toads, Snakes, etc have abilities that are better or different than what your average PC can do. A Barbarian Moon Druid Giant Toad can swallow orcs to its hearts content while raging. There is no save against the swallow. There is no way to escape the swallow unless you kill the Toad. Druid 6 Barb 2 Fighter 2 (For Action Surge to swallow in the same turn) then Druid the rest of the way. You could Barb 3 if you really wanted to go Ancestral and up the tanky support or Bear for the extra resist, but the Moon Druid isn't a damage dealer in either case. It's an HP soak. You could potentially make a nova build with a Paladin and forgo all the spells if you really wanted to do a damage build. You only need str / wis / cha 13. I'm not sure how well that would work. Might be worth a shot. 2 level dip and jump back into Druid? The problem is any mukticlassing slows down your forms. But you nova max smites at level 8 so who cares?

[@johngillan4475]

Very interesting video. Hopefully you have some good strategy going forward. Thank you

[@UnbornHeretic]

Earth also has tremor sense, which is useful in various vision limiting situations

[@kenmcclain1499]

Thank you for this video.

[@larstollefsen1236]

Mammoth concentration is trivial, Resilient (Con) will give a +11, you're Lv18 using Mammoth's con stat, to your roll. With a minimum roll of 12 you should be able to automatically pass most of the time. It would only get dicy if you took something like 40+ in a single hit.

[@rexbosworth2869]

So the Fire Elemental's Fire Form reads that "... The first time it enters a hostile creature's space on a turn..." it takes damage and catches fire, not if it ends its turn there, which is what it sounded like was being said in the video. I don't interpret "In addition, the elemental can enter a hostile creature's space and stop there" as that on entering the space you MUST stop in a creature's space if you enter it, just that you can. This allows you to increase your damage output by allowing you to move across the battlefield with 50 feet of movement and enter multiple creatures' spaces in one turn, though doing so also provokes opportunity attacks, which if successful (and if the creature doesn't have reach) would also damage the creature further with a separate clause in Fire Form. Your survivability does go down this way, but your damage does go up.

[@dirkmagilicuddy5136]

Cantrips do two dice of damage at 5th level, so the brown bear damage is right about on par with a cantrip.

[@jonathanhaynes9914]

Thanks Chris.

[@aimerw]

Problem with a lot of the enhancing spells is that the you can't both attack and cast a spell, and most (if not all?) of these spells are short duration so difficult to pre-combat cast. Hence, while on later turns the DPR may be as mentioned, on the first you lose most of your damage. Depending on how many rounds occur, this can drop the average DPR a fair amount, and the first round is also one of the most important (which is why Initiative matters) - so essentially losing it is not trivial.

[@TreantmonksTemple]

Yes, there are a number of factors you need to look at with spell selection.

[@woodsman105]

I suppose this makes the radiant soul aasimar a lot more attractive. Wild shape into a mammoth and sprout wings from your back.

[@irakhlin]

Perhaps I missed it, but part of your discussion of the Mammoth problem is that once they drop concentration, they cannot cast spells. Doesn't the druid gain the ability to cast in wild shape at level 18 as well through beast spells feature provided the spell does not have a material component? It's not perfect but it is worth mentioning.

[@wolfchanel2879]

Druid really feels like it needs to be split into two classes, the skinchanger and the shaman or something like that. One is focused on shifting and the other is focused on spells

[@marcusholtzheimer9316]

Finally got the level 10 on my moondruid last session. Exited to summon an element and wild shape into one having 2 elementals Ora Ora the baddies

[@Name_InProgress]

At level 9 , The Giant Snapping turtle is also a good consideration

[@RecklessFables]

Hey, the Pathfinder and gaming news channel is doing DnD builds? 🤪

[@Droogie128]

We're playing with a house rule that allows me to scale up lower forms to the appropriate CR for my level, and CR 0 forms don't require uses

[@ethans9379]

"Druid spells actually are pretty good!" Louder for the people in the back!

[@PiiskaJesusFreak]

Would Berseker barbarian work well wit wildshape? Frenzy giving a bonus action attack would be a boon to many forms, unarmored defense remedies the AC of beasts a bit, and once you get elemental forms, you can frenzy without worrying about exhaustion. The downside of not being able to concentrate on spells really hurts, but it would be an option to pull out if you lose concentration... Not sure at what levels this would be good though...

[@deanofett]

All this effort into wild shape when Tashas gave druids the option to turn wild shape into temporary familiars. I can't wait to see if there are any reasons to do anything else

[@bukharagunboat8466]

Are you kidding?! Wild Shape is one of the best abilities in the game. I agree the Companion makes a good scout (within 100'), and it can take the Help Action. I don't like Moon Druids, or others that use the Wild Shape as part of their Circle abilities, because that detracts from its utility. At low levels you can use a small animal form for scouting and infiltration; getting through small gaps and hiding in plain sight. You can also use a form that runs very fast to cover distances (about 30 miles in your hour for an ostrich). At higher levels swimming, climbing and burrowing are valuable. Flying is incredible, both for scouting and for long-distance travel (a pigeon can fly over 60 miles in your hour). Then you have perception, possibly including sonar, and a few special attacks (like skunk spray).

[@deanofett]

@@bukharagunboat8466 those are some good reasons. But a lot of them can be done as easily with a familiar or higher level spell that affects multiple creatures, and since this is a team game, I will go for those and have a nice pocket familiar when needed. The advantage on perception is nice tho.

[@SpiderWaffle]

9:10 The Cave Bear is one of many creatures that doesn't follow normal proficiency bonus rules compared to its hit dice. It's a shame.

[@bukharagunboat8466]

The Giant Wolverine used to be hard to beat for the stink attack. I can't find 5E stats for either that or the Giant Skunk.

[@archmagemc3561]

Don't doubt the RP power of the giant constrictor snake either. My druid used enlarge reduce on themselves, then turned into one to crush a house in a village. Made the entire village run away since I basically looked like their village god. Saved them from a raid a day later. lol

[@CosyPigeon]

Feels like you may not have given the fire elemental a proper read. You don't need to end your turn in a the creatures space to do the fire damage, it happens "The first time it enters a creature's space on a turn" Which means a fire elemental can deal damage just by walking through enemy spaces. Opportunity attack? if they hit it's another 1d10 fire damage, and on top of that, because they're on fire now, they have to waste an action to put out the flames or continue to take burning damage. Against larger groups of enemies the fire elemental dramatically out damages the other forms. If there's ten enemies on the board and you use your action to dash through all of them you've done 10d10 fire damage without having to hit with a single attack, and set them on fire for more damage in future rounds.

[@thas2689]

Alright, sir. I have a complaint. I've been playing DnD since the late 70s, mostly as a forever DM. One of my players recently started a game (as in 1st session was yesterday) with me, my kid and his two kids. In all those years, I have never played a druid. I made a moon druid and I've watched all your druids spell analysis videos, wildshape video, considered the barbearian. Here's my beef... I need these other videos you mention in the beginning like now, before next Friday, especially the spellcasting to enhance wildshape video. Clocks ticking! (I hope this is obviously in jest and I love the channel and the current druid content!)

[@TreantmonksTemple]

Sounds like you need to join my Patreon!

[@susannahammond2033]

It came out!

[@Graxil]

Great video as usual! One question though: did you include the Fire Elemental's ignite damage in the DPR calculation? On hit its a guaranteed 1d10 since it does damage at the start of that creature's turn and takes an action to douse from any creature. Although splitting damage isn't usually ideal, you can hit up to two creatures with the Touch attack to ignite them both

[@jinxtheunluckypony]

Earth Elemental is my favorite Wild Shape by a landslide. The ability to phase into the ground where enemies can’t reach you is absolutely silly and it opens the door for all kinds of weird combos. I’ll grant that the Air Elemental is stronger more often since it doesn’t rely on specific terrain to use its best features, but when Earth Glide come up there’s nothing like it.

[@GrimViridian]

Heh, landslide

[@daloypolizei]

I always assumed earth elemental was the best due to the higher hp and ac-- and boy was i surprised to see it rank last among the elementals

[@dilsoncamacho4100]

Wh no mention of the giant elk for cr 2? IMO that's a clear contestant for best form for that CR, it's only issue is needing your party to help with getting enemies prone, other than that it's 4d6+4 damage on charge+ram and 4d8+4 if the enemy is prone and you can stomp them, legit great form in terms of damage. Plus it combos well with 1 level dip on monk and maybe getting haste.

[@apoclaydon]

level 18 moon druids do get beast spells so they can cast some spells at level 18

[@mattdahm4289]

Thank you!

[@TheRosgath]

So there's really just one thing I want to point out about the elemental forms that DRAMATICALLY brings them down in comparison to Beast forms. The Primal Strike feature EXPRESSLY states that your attacks in *beast* form overcome Resistance and immunity to non-magical attacks. It says nothing about attacks in an Elemental form. It doesn't say anything about being in a form granted by your Wildshape even. This means that, while it's really spiffy that the Air elemental can 'deal the most damage', most of that damage at level 10+ is going to be resisted because it's non-magical. This really brings down that option. Water and Earth are in the same boat really, with fire being the only form that will overcome that non-magical Bludgeoning/Piercing/Slashing resistance, but also subject to one of the most commonly resisted damage types, fire. This means that, in most cases, your Elemental forms provide a lot of status immunities, alternate mobility, and damage resistances at the cost of damage output.

[@TreantmonksTemple]

There is definitely iffy wording, but at least according to JC, it's supposed to work: twitter.com/jeremyecrawford/status/739168325129756672?lang=en

[@TheScreamingMime]

By time you are able to be a mammoth you're able to cast spells while wild shaped

[@SirEliteGrunt]

If you are thinking of playing a moon Druid, please choose wild shapes for rp reasons and not just because they are op. I ran what was supposed to be a fun one shot a few months ago. Set everyone to level 3 to just have simple combat and to teach some new players how to play. The power gamer in our group wasn’t going to be there so I thought it was perfect. He showed up the day of the one shot so I put a limitation of phb only instead of telling him he couldn’t play. He made a level 2 moon Druid with 1 level in monk, wild shaped into the raptor and the huge spider in the two combats we had. Every one else was attacking once and felt super lackluster. I’m just glad the new player played assassin rouge because he was having lots of high damage. I have not played with this other player again and don’t think I will ever dm for them again. Btw it was my second time being a DM… I have another group that is much more into rp but if they didn’t exist I don’t think I wouldn’t want to dm ever again.

[@aimerw]

It is not which form per say at level 2 (or 3), it is that CR1 forms are generically overpowered. A standard Brown Bear, which is very roleplaying friendly, is ridiculous at level 2. The problem was being a Moon Druid at level 3 (the one Monk level slightly optimises it for this specific level, but is quite slight). What you should have done is just ask them not to play anything that would be overpowered at that level. So, no Variant Human Crossbow Expert/Polearm Master Fighter, no Peace/Twilight Cleric, no Moon Druid, etc. Even if you don't know what is overpowered, if they are truly a power gamer, they do. So, put the onus on them.

[@SirEliteGrunt]

@@aimerw yeah. I was a newer dm so I didn’t feel comfortable “stifling creativity”. I also didn’t know what was overpowered at the time. If someone wants to play the moon did there will be times when they are very strong but in order to pick the best creatures at every cr, rp is not the priority in my opinion. I made a moon Druid that was a lizard folk who could only turn into things with scales. It was so fun! Instead of always being a bear, I had to be more squishy at lower levels. Everyone likes different things but imo rp is the most fun factor of the game.

[@minorbflat4358]

It’s good to see you get back to D&D 5E contents. You bring a unique perspective to it.

[@VALUST17]

My moon Druid has a saying, “The fog is thick and full of spiders!” (She prefers to cast fog cloud and turn into a giant spider.)

[@matthewlenard8346]

A level 20 Arch Moon druid can turn into a CR6 Columbian Mammoth, if you're a DM that believes in giving your players optimized god-like powers and you have a moon Druid in your party, build encounters within the Primal Planes, this is not a must, it just makes it far easier to explain how it's possible. Your Moon Druids want to turn into dinosaurs.

[@JuckiCZ]

What about Longtooth Shifter and its ability to attack with BA? This can be awesome!

[@NegatveSpace]

I wonder if there is an argument to be made for a character to retain their hit points when they transform. Maybe flavor-wise the characters is more of physically transforming instead of being given a temporary magic body which I sort of see wildshape as. Weapons and items can still disappear as normal. I wonder if this would somehow make it easier to balance the class or make one less decision point on choosing a type of animal to transform into. Or I wonder what other explanations of why or how a character wild shapes yet that could explain their hit points changing or not changing?

[@pdubb9754]

I was really hoping my DM would let my moon druid dream of 0and transform into) dinosaurs. More for flavor, actually.

[@Ryan-ek5tt]

It seems odd to leave out the DPR from a Summon a Fey or a Conjure Animals spell cast right before you wild shape, since you can do both on your first turn of combat. This drastically changes the DPR calculations unless I'm missing something.

[@MrGold-qz4zw]

You can wild shape the same turn you cast a spell, but not attack with your wild shape

[@trinityhydra2687]

I think you underestimated how good fire elemental is, and maybe misinterpreted how their fire form feature works. The creature doesn't take damage when the fire elemental ends it's turn on their space, the creature takes it as soon as the fire elemental moves into it's space. Additionally they are set on fire, and they or someone else has to use their action to douse it, or keep taking 1d10 fire damage every round. A really good strategy you can use is disengage, or even dash, on your first turn and set everything in the room on fire. Now everything is taking continual damage or have to give up their actions to remove it. After that you can use your multiattack to mop up the remaining enemies. Of course this would be completely undone if the enemy is resistant or immune to fire damage, in that case one of the other elementals would be better. Still I feel like fire elemental is underrated in your ratings.

[@PapaSmerf008]

After this series of Wildshape videos, I really hope they overhaul wildshape to use a beast few templates (where you get mechanics and flavor your shape into whatever animal form you choose). The system as is is pretty complicated, not well balanced at most levels, and I really don't like that it refers players to monster books (which they shouldn't be using in my opinion).

[@PeacefulOz]

And for earth elemental I think you underestimate the power of a burrow speed and tremor sense. You can’t be attacked if you are underground. Air is still sweet though. Those are my favorite two

[@linguinibros.productions]

"I don't want to save the world, I want to turn into a dinosaur!"