Treantmonk is really good at responding to feedback. He doesn't let ego get in the way of suggestions and constructive criticism, and his content just keeps on improving.
I am colorblind and I do have trouble telling a couple of the colors he uses apart (red/orange and purple/blue) but that’s not what I have the most trouble with. A color ranking system isn’t intuitive. A system using a number of something (like his stars) is actually intuitive. I’d rather the color system be done away with completely. I only listen to the videos so I don’t even see the stars unless I go grab my phone to check because I really am not interested in memorizing which color is better than which.
@@jonahsalyers5979 color systems are obviously intuitive, and he does it because it's widely used. Red = bad/stop, green = good/go. Bronze, silver, gold is another obvious one. Or Black and white symbolizing evil/unknown and good/pure/truth. The stars and colors together are redundant, but that's no big deal.
@@shane9287 A complete straw man argument since you’re not actually addressing his color system, isn’t it? There’s nothing intuitive about orange being slightly better than red and purple being a bit better than that. Oh, we get green next so we know it’s good because it means go! And then blue must be at the top because SkY bE uP hIgH aNd HiGh MeAnS tOp ScOrE! Is that how the intuitive part works?
The bonus damage from absorb elements is on melee attack, not on melee weapon attack, so you can get it on melee spell attacks like thorn whip or flame blade.
Still a pretty marginal damage boost, however ... especially when you consider the "creatures that do elemental damage tend to be resistant or immune" drawback ... but yeah, nice catch.
One thing to note, about Absorb Elements that does actually make the Additional damage somewhat useful, even if it s a measilly 1d6, is that the key word is just Melee Attack Roll. It does not specify weapon… so you can technically use this with Melee Spell attacks like Thorn Whip.
Pretty solid. I will add that in my experience, the Druid first level spells hold value longer than some other casters. When I play a Druid, I will never get to a point where I consider those first level spells irrelevant. Especially now that Druids can have a familiar, those touch spells get a second look.
Any caster that thinks that first level spells get irrelevant at any point is doing something wrong. There is no down casting, so why leave the first level spells on the table? And between Spells like Shield, absorb elements, bless, healing word and goodberry, every caster has an excelent first level spell, or two, at their disposal.
Just a quick note for Animal Friendship: the most common social check you should be called on for a low intelligence animal is Animal Handling, which uses Wisdom, not Charisma. That makes it a bit more useful than you are indicating, but it's still pretty marginal.
Charisma is for training, and for making them do things for you. Charisma animal handling roll, for coaxing a cat to come to you, or a dog to chew a rope.
@@WexMajor82 Sage Advice explicitly suggests Wisdom is the stat used for taming, although taming a wild animal is non-trivial. More holistically, Animal Handling is already a pretty weak skill. Making it worse by trying to key it off a different stat that the classes with it won’t have makes no sense.
Animal handling is a general skill usable by any character, druid or not. If you can actually speak with the animal, then it would only make sense to use charisma based skills.
@@burningwp It is a generally usable skill in the same way that anyone can technically go mountain climbing; you know full well that the most likely classes to take it use WIS. Anyways, Animal Friendship, the spell in question, does not give you the ability to speak to animals.
@@MrAmbitione I wasn't specifically responding to your comment, just adding to the discussion, especially relevant because of the existence of Speak with Animals, shepherd druids, and Firbolgs. I could manipulate a kid into putting down the toilet seat by giving them a cookie every time they did it (i.e. animal handling), but that is a much different interaction than if I went up to that kid and said, "please make sure to put the toilet seat down" (i.e. persuasion).
Would you consider making a chart at the end to see all the rankings at once? It’d be a huge help to consolidate everything you just said. Also, I’m seeing a lot a about the web spell, but unless I’m confused, only underdark druids get access to web as a circle spell.
Entangle literally just helped me catch a running enemy earlier today. It's a very good spell I enjoy a lot, and I can't wait for web which is a favorite of a ranger player I get.
Let me tell you about the time I literally derailed the campaign with entangle. Our party were prisoners and were being delivered via train, so I had my spore druid use entangle on the rails and the added plants lift the cart off the rails and we crashed in the tunnel sides. Marvelous use of the spell, and one the DM didnt expect at all.
Great advice, as always. Just thought I'd mention that I personally prefer hearing about the spells in order of descending rank, rather than alphabetically, as in your Wizard guide. Not a big deal either way, and I could be in the minority.
One of my favorite uses of Fog Cloud was when our party was up against a troop of crossbow wielding Duergar. There wasn't a way to get to them without being seen (Smooth stone cavern, lit with dim light) and a lot of ground to cover, like 300ft. So I upcast to level 2, which makes a surprisingly massive Cloud, 80ft across, and set it 10-20ft in front of them. They went on alert, and when I stepped out of the cloud every held action went right at me. I was an Eldritch Knight. At best 1 or 2 bolts actually landed, and my party was able to charge out of the cloud and mow them down safely.
I love these. I like to pretend that the creators of D&D listen to them following along going “well crap he has a point there. That spell is absolutely useless. “ I would love a D&D 5.5 where they just watched all these videos and acquired a more discerning eye for play balance.
At my table I rule that if the Ice Knife hits, the targets has disadvantage on the Dex save. It just seems it would be harder to dodge the cold damage if one is already taking the piercing.
Ice Knife is the coolest idea for a spell that actually ends up sucking most of the time unfortunately. Snare is even worse than you think, it eats .5gp worth of rope every time you use it, even if it never ends up doing anything, and I think that's trash. There's almost certainly a dozen more useful things you could use a rope for, especially when Entangle does everything better.
Snare is an NPC spell. It lasts until dispelled or triggered, which makes it a useful and very cheap (compared to, say, Glyph of Warding) home defense trap.
I see he's still putting off the most anticipated subclass ranking video yet... Edit: Here's hoping Way of Mercy can obtain the coveted Rank "D"... (well, coveted by all the other monk subclasses)
@@godminnette2 I feel like it should. I ran some numbers and Mercy pumps out quite a bit of healing and cleansing. At third level you can pay a ki point for a Hands of Healing whenever you would use your bonus action to attack that turn (which you normally do for free as a monk). Hands of healing at this level is 1d4 + WIS, same as a Healing Word, without using any additional actions from the monk (since again the bonus action it’s attached to already gets its value from the “offhand attack”, the only cost is the ki point. That means you’re getting 3 healing words’ worth of healing per short rest. That’s three 1st level spell slot regenerating on a short rest, that’s not bad at all for a martial to be able to provide. 1d4 + WIS is probably 5.5 on average, times 3 uses is about 16.5 healing total; that’s more than a paladin’s Healing Hands, and you don’t need to stop attacking to use it, *and* yours recovers on a short rest instead of a long rest. This is really good for improving a low level party’s longevity. Speaking of Paladin, at the same level the Mercy monk gets “smite” for 1d4 + WIS to add to an attack. That’s again 5.5 on average, quite a bit less than the Paladin’s 2d8 = 9 additional damage (which all doubles on a crit). Also, the monk’s healing and “smite” draw from the same pool while the Paladin has two separate pools. However, the paladin only has three spell slots per long rest again, so with only one short rest the mercy monk can provide slightly more healing and about 60% of the smite damage. With two short rests, the monk is providing more healing and more smite damage on average. At fifth level, the Paladin has doubled their available spell slots and increased their healing hands pool to 25, while the monk has increased their damage and healing to 1d6 + WIS (good argument for boosting WIS before DEX, but it could go either way) and increased their pool per short rest by 66%. So the Paladin is scaling a little faster in these level ranges but that’s because spell slots jump a lot for half casters between levels 3 and 5. Furthermore, at level 6 Mercy Monks get to add a 2nd level spell effect onto their 1st level spell effect, for the same single ki cost. They’re basically using cure wounds now without an action cost, and also attaching a Lesser Restoration to it. That’s great value, far better than what the Paladin can provide with healing hands and their limited spell slots, and they can do it without stopping their attacks. The Paladin still has 4 x 2d8 + 2 x 3d8 = 4x9 + 2x13.5 = 63 extra points of damage available from their smites, which would take a 1d6 + 3 = 6.5 damage Hands of Harm about 10 activations to match (that’s a full set of ki from the start of the day plus the first long rest spent on Hands of Harm, meaning if you want to mathematically match the extra damage from smites AND the healing from Healing Hands you need a second short rest, though there’s no accounting for the fact that the monk included cleanses in their heals here). Buuuut you don’t need to fully match the damage of normal smites anymore because your “smites” now poison with no saving throw! That makes them more akin to, say, a Wrathful Smite (in terms of providing disadvantage on attacks) which only deals 1d6 damage as a 1st level spell, plus requiring concentration and a bonus action. So now, comparing apples to apples, we should be comparing the damage to an additional 1d6 + in which case the Mercy monk’s 1d6 + WIS + is the clear winner, and that’s before taking into account that the Mercy monk has more of these points than the Paladin has first level slots, and they come back on a short rest, and the condition doesn’t require a saving throw! (Of course the Paladin got their Aura at this level, none of this is meant to suggest that Mercy makes the monk top tier. The point is that it gives them a lot of good tools, tools that are comparable to tools that other martial professions get. They still have many of the disadvantages of being a monk: lower AC and HP, no good feat support for damage, less damage per hit. But I think that Mercy gets enough that they can easily be a useful addition to your party without too much difficulty, and that means that when those niche situations come about where a monk’s unique utility like wall running, arrow catching, slow falling, water walking, or just plain speeding up to a caster and stun-locking them finally come up, you can have that character that shines in that moment without thinking that you’re useless the other 95% of the time).
@@Skyhigh91100 One comment here being you are including the Subclass features. It isn't likely to change much since Channel Divinity is once per rest, but some of the oaths bring a lot to the table.
It’s worth remembering that scrolls of these 1st-level circumstantial spells, especially the ones without save DCs, are really cheap for their value. Having a fire extinguisher, poison detector, blanket of fog, or beast speech translator in your pocket for a mere 25 gp a pop can help you be prepared for many more situations without eating up all your slots.
@@jrg305 there are rules in Xanathar’s, if your GM allows them. If you have Arcana proficiency, you can make a scroll of any 1st-level spell you know for 25gp and 1 day of downtime (and any expensive material components, if the spell requires them). Higher-level scrolls get pricey and time-consuming very fast, but 1st-level scrolls are very much worth the time, IMO.
One more thing to say about Fog Cloud: it can be used to shut down certain creature abilities that rely on sight. One example is the Intellect Devourer who can do very little if it can't see its target. Another use of Fog Cloud is to allow players to Hide at any time which may be situationally useful depending on party composition.
I played a low level moon druid recently. The other party members were a kensai monk and valor bard. I ended up being the tank,healer and top damage dealer. I routinely had to drop wildshape and cast healing word on the bard to get him back up.The monk did decent damage but was so squishy that I had to occasionally cast healing word on him also. This campaign was very frustrating,I felt like the bard wasn't even trying. The point of my rambling story is I couldn't cast any spells but healing word the entire campaign or players were going to die
Moon druid under level 5 is overpowered. I've played one. You will carry the party. You gotta learn to make them hit you instead of party members because you have like +80 hp from each short rest even if you do no damage or cast no spells.
@Professor Thinker what about standing next to them and grappling them with bear strength? Punishing them with opportunity attacks if they attack others? Concentrating on something dangerous for them will make them want to hit you. You can "create aggro" that way but obviously if the DM doesnt role play properly or is metagaming vs a particular player, yeah, there is no taunt or anything I agree.
I'm definitely late for the party, but I still wanted to defend the Jump spell a little bit. Jump is generally a bad spell, but on a druid, I think it can be circumstantially pretty useful, because of wild shape allowing you to turn into beasts that can take more advantage from Jump's benefits, with much higher movement speeds and strength scores than your humanoid form would have(druids don't also get a lot of ways to fly, so jumping is the next best choice for the time being). The best example of this is the giant frog, with the standing leap trait: which would allow you - with Jump and dash action - to make a 60ft long jump, or a 30ft high jump without a running start, and you could even bring a small size party member on your back with you!
Earth tremor should probably be orange. Situationally it can be used to knock down foes near you - large is OK because it's Dex and not Strength - and put 20 feet of difficult terrain between you and your nearest foe. In constrained areas it could be used to effectively stall or blunt an advance. Not good in any real way, but orange.
Holy Shit!!! THIS is the BEST ANALYSIS OF LOW LEVEL DRUID SPELLS I'VE COME ACROSS. THANK YOU SO MUCH!!! Yes-- that was ALL shouting, lol!!! But I absolutely LOVE the way you analyzed low level DRUID spells, BUT ALSO talked about WHICH ONES GET BETTER and WHICH ONES LOSE IMPACT as you level up!! I just listened on a long walk, but going to listen again with my notebook out. Will THIS video necessarily be the #1 "clickbait monetizer" out of ALL the D&D vids on UA-cam? Maybe, maybe not. But as a first time player with a Druid PC, I APPRECIATE this SO MUCH. Thanks again, and bless you, friend!!😘💖💖💖💖💖
I should probably try Entangle on my Druid soon. That seems solid! Thanks for getting into the Druid spell list. It is interesting to hear your thoughts.
Speak with animals is an underrated spell, something to take into account is that most animals, even big scary predators are no particularly moved to fight you in the first place. Most of them are moved by hunger or fear, easy to persuade with the right bribery.
A notable thing about druid (and cleric & paladin) spells is that you really want to be familiar with the orange [**] spells, because you can prepare them whenever their situational use is likely. Casters with fixed/limited lists of spells have more leeway to skim and forget.
animal friendship will potentially also stop the animal from attacking your allies if you carry around goodberries. i keep goodberries wrapped in jerky to toss to charmed predators when traveling around places i expect dangerous beast. no beast is gonna feel the need to eat your allies if its stomach is full and you leave it alone
@@TreantmonksTemple So excited! That spell is crazy good, being able to choose which squares grow and which don't is just silly, and the range is huge.
If you are attending a big social event, like a banquett or ball in a D&D game: Bring Detect poison and disease, and absolutely bring Purify food and drink. Because, come on! Of course there is going to be a poisoning attempt!
I was considering a Druid build a few weeks ago and didn’t like any of the online recommendations, so I made my own list using your system. So happy you are doing this list now - very curious how close my rankings are to yours.
I was surprised to see faerie fire as green, and entangle as blue. Due to faerie fire causing objects to glow as well I've seen it used in a party without much darkvision to illuminate a treacherous cave, while also getting advantage against some of the enemies inside. However, I did not consider how strong entangle stays even at higher levels, and for that I thank you for another great video!
Charm spells started pretty powerful in original dnd (where were encountered mostly in dungeons. So a very restricted context) and only got nerfed with time. It is interesting to read the past iterations of the spell, that are usually more detailed/specific. It gives great insight on how they should be today, because even in past editions, there were already a lot of restrictions. Also, contrasting the explicit text with a much more modest description of its powers, indicate that they don't include the powers it had in the past, or it would be stated clearly. For example, past editions said the caster was regarded as its best friend and will try to defend the caster against any threat (real or imagined). All in all, I don't think they know what they want this spell to do or why it is there. It is an iconic spell, but they don't really want to keep it or take it away. So they nerf it endless, put a lot of caveats, etc.. so the player finally says: "ok, it is not worth the hassle" and the DM exhales relieved. The biggest nerf in my view is that the person knows it was charmed. No ifs and buts. That takes a lot away from it's possible use for manipulation, specially since it only last a few minutes (it used to last days or even months).
Absorb Elements is worth upcasting when you're out of first level slots, but only if the reduction in damage taken is worth the second level slot. The added damage is just a little bonus that you can use if you have good melee attacks. Also as someone has already pointed out, it could be a melee spell attack, as "weapon" is not specified in the spell.
I feel like it is more important on casters with limited known spells or spell slots (sorc or warlock). Or hybrid casters. Prepared casters have it easy. I've played all three.
@@jrg305 absolutelty, but I'm curious to see how certain spells are rated differently based on the type of spellcasting feature that other classes offer, for example hold person is a situational good spell when cast by a warlock, not so much if a wizard uses it instead, at least in my opinion
I feel like Beast Bond is underrated because you didn't consider Elephants in the mount section of the PHB. They have an Int of 3, and deal 3d8+6 on a Gore, and 3d10+6 on the Stomp if the enemy faisl their Str Save. Sure, 200g is a bit pricey low-level, but if the fighter can make due with chainmail for a bit longer the druid can give the party a living siege weapon.
I think spell scrolls can make some of these more viable, since making them can allow you to prepare a spell that's good under exact circumstances, but not a common enough one to keep prepared without wasting a prepared spell on it.
Is purify food and drink better on a lizzardfolk? Could use it to remove poison or disease from an ally/potential snack :p "perhaps the real rations are the freinds we make along the way"
Cure Wounds is good on a Shepherd Druid, because you can place your unicorn spirit as a bonus action for extra healing and then cast Cure Wounds with your action.
I'd argue that Detect Poison and Disease is the very definition of an "orange" spell - it doesn't really get any more circumstantial. Many campaigns don't have a default encounter that can cause disease in a PC, and if you're poisoned chances are you're going to have a good idea what it does based upon the damage you're taking and/or your ability score reduction; not to mention that you're likely going to try and cure it as soon as you can anyway, whether it's been identified or not.
@@NemisCassander Only if there are both hidden and poisonous creatures to detect in the first place, which will not be the case in most combat encounters. Hence me not saying it's bad, just situational
Protection from good an evil became the best spell ever in Curse of Strahd the other week. Strahd tried to charm my character in one of his shake downs and he gave me time to cast it when he wasn't looking. 😀
Earth tremor is potentially awesome for a wildfire Druid. Being able to create a 10ft radius of concentration free difficult terrain and teleport out of the area of effect with a potential damage and knocked prone effect is theoretically pretty powerful for a 1st level spell.
Entangle does have two advantages over Web that you didn't mention. One is that sometimes you don't want anyone who moves into that space afterwards to have to make a save, if it's your own party members. That is situational, but I do find it's a situation that does come up. The other big advantage is the spell doesn't give any way to destroy it, unlike web. Now obviously DM's may rule it can be destroyed with fire or attacks or something, but without that, it is a pretty big advantage, especially against anything that uses fire.
Note that earth tremor doesn't need to be cast in combat. A no concentration 10 foor radius of difficult terrain that stays untill cleared has it's uses For example my party had to defend a tower while a mage did research and we knew we were going to get attacked by hobgoblins. Our druid spent a couple of 1st level spells slots and we were able to defend that building with ease for days. They all got destroyed at range
So, I just realized something looking back on this video: Absorb Elements effects Melee Attacks, not specifically melee attacks. That means Thorn Whip, a melee attack, can use Absorb Elements' additional damage. So a Druid could use Absorb Elements and then use Thorn Whip to return it to sender at a decent range.
The social interaction checks for dealing with beasts could easily be ruled as animal handling checks and you will have a better time with animal friendship as a druid.
I wish I had read the description of create or destroy water more carefully before. I've had to prepare it all campaign long because of Circumstances. There have been a couple of occasions where destroying fog would have been pretty valuable.
14:00 Ah but that's different than the charmed condition too. The charmed condition does not state that the creature knows its been charmed unlike this spell so other charmed conditions can be used to build a sphere of influence unlike this spell. So charm person makes someone think you are a aquintance but other charmed conditions let you create permanent acquitances.
Goodberry: get Magic Initiate and pick it as your free daily 1st level. Ferrie Fire is a favorite along with healing words being in almost all my lists. I love druids because I keep wanting to change Spells all the time. Entangle is also a favorite.v😊
This isn't the sword/knife I wanna die on, but one silver lining of ice knife is that there are no verbal components. Cast silence and re-flavor your ice knife as cold shuriken and be that ninja your party never expected
I think the weirdest effect of going full RAW on Fog Cloud is that you can have a gnomish rogue spend 72 hours straight setting up a moronic 360 no scope max range arcing volley blindfolded behind-the-back trickshot while wearing plate mail using a longbow against a prone, dodging, blurred target, and as long as you dump a fog cloud on them, they're rolling straight-up.
Faerie Fire is a blue spell if ever there was one. If a creature fails its save, it *will* die unless your concentration is disrupted or it can teleport away.
I'm a little surprised healing word is only green, taking20 (Another DND youtuber) rated it as one of the most broken spells in the game and made an entire video ranting about it. I don't think it is quite as good as he says it is, since you need still to keep one or two 1st level spell slots on reserve to get the value out of saving someone and you aren't using those spell slots pro-actively if your doing so, but the value of being able to bring an ally up from a safe distance and still have your main action is clutch when it comes up.
Unless you're at very low level, effective battlefield control, damage focus and defensive features will make characters going down a rarity. So Healing Word is only powerful in situations where things are going bad.
The main thing that people tend to overlook is that saving your main action, while not useless, tends to have disappointing value for full spellcasters since they can't use that action to do what they're best at; casting (non-cantrip) spells. It still holds value for casting cantrips or taking the Dodge action if nothing else, but it's not quite as potent as your action might normally be. The range of Healing Word is a great advantage at lower levels though.
@@fadeleaf845 our party just hit level 5 and we have 1 or 2 players going down every encounter. at level 2 or 3 we had a PC death purely because i chose to prepare cure wounds instead of healing word and the action economy/range of the fight made it so if i ever used an action and my movement to get to them for cure wounds i would have died. however our DM is also balancing each encounter very aggressively into the "deadly" rating. Every single encounter feels like we are on the edge of a TPK. My Spore druids main damage is already either a shillelagh or Chill touch and i literally dont have any other bonus actions so i am using healing word almost every turn along with a damage action and concentration spell like entangle active.
My players turned am otyugh from a dynamic encounter with a creature with multiple attacks and a disease half-hidden in sewage, to a piñata snooze fest.
Healing Word is not overrated. I believe that the cost of a bonus action(especially to bring back a fallen ally) is extremely powerful in this action economy game.
Based on Crawford's ruling do you think goodberry would work with the Moon sickle? At first glance the wording is different. The Life domain feature saying "Whenever you use a spell of 1st level or higher to restore hit points to a creature" and the sickle reads "When you cast a spell that restores hit points...". So my thought is no it doesn't work because goodberry just makes berries but doesn't restore hp. However the life feature works tenuously suggesting it does restore hp and each berry could heal an additional d4 damage rolled at the casting of the spell. If it works the spell starts looking even better since it is just an uncommon item.
I had to read the spell description for Earth Tremor several times and then go back and read the PHB section on spell ranges and areas of effect. It's still not 100% clear but I think Chris has it correct here. So here's (what I *think* is) the *incorrect* interpretation; does it make Earth Tremor more valuable and would you allow it at your table? The range is 10 feet, so the center of the area of effect can be 10 feet away from you. The area of effect is a 10-foot radius square (so, the same as Entangle or Faerie Fire).
absorb elements does not say melee weapon attack . it says melee attacks which i do believes counts for melee spell attacks doesnt it? so using thorn whip on the next turn would qualify. this spell is perfect for druid.
Even if Goodberry is allowed to be used to bring back a downed opponent, how is this a better way to do so than Healing Word ? I understand that the berries can be spread around to all party members so anyone could do it, but it still requires moving over to the unconscious character and using your action to bring them up with 1HP, disrupting the current combat flow and wasting an entire turn for that character. Healing Word allows the Druid to stay put, raise a character and throw in a cantrip or, let's say..strike down a lightning from an active Call lightning Spell. Additionally, even if it can be combined with the Life cleric Disciple of Life, it usually won't, so it will still "only" heal 10HP (and more likely out of combat), which is good, but IMO Healing Word is still a go-to spell and the best at raising characters up.
I might take Longstrider at first or second level if I was playing, or the party included, a dwarf, gnome or halfling ... particularly one whose specialty is mixing it up in melee (Hello, Circle of the Moon druid!). Also, one other (highly circumstantial) instance in which Purify Food and Drink could be useful: Court Intrigue or Espionage campaigns in which you're meant to either survive a feast with a notorious poisoner (think Livia from "I, Claudius") or protect someone politically important from poisoning. *STILL* super-circumstantial. but *I* might consider creating such a scenario specifically so a druid in the party could feel important in a social situation. ;) Finally, one of my Moon druid buddies used to *LOVE* Thunderwave at second and third (character) level because he could cast the spell, drive at least a couple of creatures back to create an escape route, use his Bonus Action to Wild Shape into a wolf, and then use the wolf's 40' movement to go hide behind the fighters and heavily-armored clerics. Nice tactic for softening the enemy up for said fighters and clerics, though it certainly didn't last past character level 4 or so ...
What if we want to clean a polluted lake, so we just drop the druid in the middle and have them ritual cast purify food and water for a week. Maybe give them a stir every now and then
Great video as always, however I'm not sure Earth Tremor should be red. I've never used it and it certainly seems red but if its combined with Slow it could really stall enemy movement. Just happened to be looking at spells that affect movement and was literally reading Earth tremor when it came up on the list. Definitely wouldn't give it any better than orange but I think it could be useful.
Rule #1: If you can get Absorb elements as a caster, get Absorb Elements. The amount of times this spell saved my bacon is immeasurable. But maybe this is just my character wich seems to be draw "face-aggro" in every encounter. :o
If the Life Cleric ruling is allowed, Goodberry becomes even more crazy with a Moon Sickle, which is only uncommon so not that difficult to get. Making each berry heal for d4+4hps is crazy for a level 1 spell.
I don't think jump is a combat spell. Sure, circumstantially. But I think it was used as an utility spell. You cast it to make one jump. Like jumping from one roof to another to lose pursuers or bypass an obstacle while dungeon crawling, and being able to clear the way to the rest of the party.
Your experience with Entangle must be different than mine. I've casted it three times and everytime all creatures made their Saving throws and it restrained no one. For me, Entangled is the spell I keep casting and nothing happens.
The Wizard spell guide is still the most helpful as it works for Wizards, Sorcerers, and even Warlocks and somewhat for bards. Clerics have the smallest spell list but it's pretty much a completely separate list from the Wizard.
@@guardian_of_the_rune he did a written guide where he talked about it, though it's slightly outdated and also focused on a melee cleric build for Chult. So SW/SG was the staple anyways. Nowadays, most recommend using BA for telekinesis over spiritual weapon the vast majority of the time. Really, clerics are super fun, but not very diverse a lot of the time. Bless, Healing Word, Aid, Spiritual Weapon, and Spirit Guardians are the classic hits again and again
Like you say the campaign dictates whether protection from evil is good or bad. If you're heavy into intellect devourer's, ghosts, or other creatures with power to possess a character, it could be blue.
I'm looking at the color coding of choice here like the quiz that tells you to identify the color of the words but you have words like "blue" colored purple and so on so it fries your brain just trying to process that. Decades of gaming have taught me that quality 1 is white, 2 is green, 3 is blue, 4 is purple, and 5 is orange....usually classified from common to legendary where the best of the best is orange, purple is epic, blue is mid, green is just better than the worst, and white is lowest of the low. The color coding of choice here just turns all that on its head.
I'm purchasing the "official" D&D Druid Spell cards to make play easier & faster. I was going to get the Xanathar's Guide cards for the missing spells, but would Tasha's cards be a better spell supplement? Thanks to anyone who responds!!😘💖😘💖😘
I know Goodberry is already being rated as good, but you didn't touch on the food factor of Goodberry. In some campaigns, DMs just don't care about food, but some do. Even if they don't, especially early on, when a party has very few assets and, from a storytelling and campaign construction perspective, are dealing with problems much more close to personal level, Goodberry is an incredible social tool as well. A full day's nutrition, likely two, is a great bargaining tool that costs the party only one point of healing that they may not even need anyways. On the flip side, a particularly sinister DM, or one extremely miffed about their survival mechanics being circumvented may also make goodberry abuse have dire implications for a character's waistline.
I have a question regarding good berry. When I read “the berry provides enough nourishment to sustain a creature for one day” to me, that includes water. Am I wrong in thinking that?
I mostly play some kind of gish. I don't think I've ever used the extra damage from Absorb Elements because I was either doing something else on my turn, or never hit an enemy who didn't have immunity. Now funny story with it. I was playing a low level game and forgot the DM basically homebrew all his monsters. "The goblin shaman casts fireball on your guys. Make a dex save." "I cast Absorb Elements. Even if I make the save, I still could use the damage reduced by 7." A Few Moments Later "its a 2d6 fireball?!!!???"
My druid have a hawk as my best friend and traveling companion so with my master I chose the spell Besat Bond so that I can use the hawk to acquire information, in this situation it is considered a good use of the spell or is it worth using another spell?
I love how thoroughly you thought out the legibility of your ranking system. I’m not color blind myself but I appreciate the consideration.
Treantmonk is really good at responding to feedback. He doesn't let ego get in the way of suggestions and constructive criticism, and his content just keeps on improving.
Thank you!
I am colorblind and I do have trouble telling a couple of the colors he uses apart (red/orange and purple/blue) but that’s not what I have the most trouble with. A color ranking system isn’t intuitive. A system using a number of something (like his stars) is actually intuitive. I’d rather the color system be done away with completely. I only listen to the videos so I don’t even see the stars unless I go grab my phone to check because I really am not interested in memorizing which color is better than which.
@@jonahsalyers5979 color systems are obviously intuitive, and he does it because it's widely used.
Red = bad/stop, green = good/go.
Bronze, silver, gold is another obvious one.
Or Black and white symbolizing evil/unknown and good/pure/truth.
The stars and colors together are redundant, but that's no big deal.
@@shane9287 A complete straw man argument since you’re not actually addressing his color system, isn’t it? There’s nothing intuitive about orange being slightly better than red and purple being a bit better than that. Oh, we get green next so we know it’s good because it means go! And then blue must be at the top because SkY bE uP hIgH aNd HiGh MeAnS tOp ScOrE! Is that how the intuitive part works?
The bonus damage from absorb elements is on melee attack, not on melee weapon attack, so you can get it on melee spell attacks like thorn whip or flame blade.
Wow, good catch!
Absorb elements and Thorn whip are a 1-2 combo. (And it is range)
Or even Primal Savagery
@@mcullennz primal savagery is not a range melee attack
Still a pretty marginal damage boost, however ... especially when you consider the "creatures that do elemental damage tend to be resistant or immune" drawback ... but yeah, nice catch.
That’s how you timestamp a multi subject video.
Very well done.
I try
@@TreantmonksTemple you succeed
One thing to note, about Absorb Elements that does actually make the Additional damage somewhat useful, even if it s a measilly 1d6, is that the key word is just Melee Attack Roll. It does not specify weapon… so you can technically use this with Melee Spell attacks like Thorn Whip.
Pretty solid. I will add that in my experience, the Druid first level spells hold value longer than some other casters. When I play a Druid, I will never get to a point where I consider those first level spells irrelevant. Especially now that Druids can have a familiar, those touch spells get a second look.
Any caster that thinks that first level spells get irrelevant at any point is doing something wrong. There is no down casting, so why leave the first level spells on the table?
And between Spells like Shield, absorb elements, bless, healing word and goodberry, every caster has an excelent first level spell, or two, at their disposal.
Just a quick note for Animal Friendship: the most common social check you should be called on for a low intelligence animal is Animal Handling, which uses Wisdom, not Charisma. That makes it a bit more useful than you are indicating, but it's still pretty marginal.
Charisma is for training, and for making them do things for you.
Charisma animal handling roll, for coaxing a cat to come to you, or a dog to chew a rope.
@@WexMajor82 Sage Advice explicitly suggests Wisdom is the stat used for taming, although taming a wild animal is non-trivial. More holistically, Animal Handling is already a pretty weak skill. Making it worse by trying to key it off a different stat that the classes with it won’t have makes no sense.
Animal handling is a general skill usable by any character, druid or not. If you can actually speak with the animal, then it would only make sense to use charisma based skills.
@@burningwp It is a generally usable skill in the same way that anyone can technically go mountain climbing; you know full well that the most likely classes to take it use WIS. Anyways, Animal Friendship, the spell in question, does not give you the ability to speak to animals.
@@MrAmbitione I wasn't specifically responding to your comment, just adding to the discussion, especially relevant because of the existence of Speak with Animals, shepherd druids, and Firbolgs. I could manipulate a kid into putting down the toilet seat by giving them a cookie every time they did it (i.e. animal handling), but that is a much different interaction than if I went up to that kid and said, "please make sure to put the toilet seat down" (i.e. persuasion).
Would you consider making a chart at the end to see all the rankings at once? It’d be a huge help to consolidate everything you just said.
Also, I’m seeing a lot a about the web spell, but unless I’m confused, only underdark druids get access to web as a circle spell.
Entangle literally just helped me catch a running enemy earlier today. It's a very good spell I enjoy a lot, and I can't wait for web which is a favorite of a ranger player I get.
I love these videos. I've never been big on minmaxing or optimization, but you put out a lot of info that helps me make cool characters anyway.
Let me tell you about the time I literally derailed the campaign with entangle. Our party were prisoners and were being delivered via train, so I had my spore druid use entangle on the rails and the added plants lift the cart off the rails and we crashed in the tunnel sides. Marvelous use of the spell, and one the DM didnt expect at all.
Guess thats to be expected when you get railroaded....I'll se myself out now XD
@@ArchangelLion rule of cool 😎
Great advice, as always. Just thought I'd mention that I personally prefer hearing about the spells in order of descending rank, rather than alphabetically, as in your Wizard guide. Not a big deal either way, and I could be in the minority.
I think I’m in the same boat here
Or, just do the ordering in the description with the timestamps. I've seen that be effective in other teir lists!
One of my favorite uses of Fog Cloud was when our party was up against a troop of crossbow wielding Duergar. There wasn't a way to get to them without being seen (Smooth stone cavern, lit with dim light) and a lot of ground to cover, like 300ft. So I upcast to level 2, which makes a surprisingly massive Cloud, 80ft across, and set it 10-20ft in front of them. They went on alert, and when I stepped out of the cloud every held action went right at me.
I was an Eldritch Knight. At best 1 or 2 bolts actually landed, and my party was able to charge out of the cloud and mow them down safely.
I love these. I like to pretend that the creators of D&D listen to them following along going “well crap he has a point there. That spell is absolutely useless. “
I would love a D&D 5.5 where they just watched all these videos and acquired a more discerning eye for play balance.
At my table I rule that if the Ice Knife hits, the targets has disadvantage on the Dex save. It just seems it would be harder to dodge the cold damage if one is already taking the piercing.
Ice Knife is the coolest idea for a spell that actually ends up sucking most of the time unfortunately. Snare is even worse than you think, it eats .5gp worth of rope every time you use it, even if it never ends up doing anything, and I think that's trash. There's almost certainly a dozen more useful things you could use a rope for, especially when Entangle does everything better.
@@sharkforce8147 it’s still really bad tho. I think it would benefit from being a ritual
Ice Knife at least does not have a Verbal component. Can be useful for that.
Snare seems to be redundant for the druid anyway since they have entangle in their spell list.
Snare is an NPC spell. It lasts until dispelled or triggered, which makes it a useful and very cheap (compared to, say, Glyph of Warding) home defense trap.
I see he's still putting off the most anticipated subclass ranking video yet...
Edit: Here's hoping Way of Mercy can obtain the coveted Rank "D"... (well, coveted by all the other monk subclasses)
I wonder if Mercy might squeak into low C.
@@godminnette2 I feel like it should. I ran some numbers and Mercy pumps out quite a bit of healing and cleansing. At third level you can pay a ki point for a Hands of Healing whenever you would use your bonus action to attack that turn (which you normally do for free as a monk). Hands of healing at this level is 1d4 + WIS, same as a Healing Word, without using any additional actions from the monk (since again the bonus action it’s attached to already gets its value from the “offhand attack”, the only cost is the ki point. That means you’re getting 3 healing words’ worth of healing per short rest. That’s three 1st level spell slot regenerating on a short rest, that’s not bad at all for a martial to be able to provide. 1d4 + WIS is probably 5.5 on average, times 3 uses is about 16.5 healing total; that’s more than a paladin’s Healing Hands, and you don’t need to stop attacking to use it, *and* yours recovers on a short rest instead of a long rest. This is really good for improving a low level party’s longevity.
Speaking of Paladin, at the same level the Mercy monk gets “smite” for 1d4 + WIS to add to an attack. That’s again 5.5 on average, quite a bit less than the Paladin’s 2d8 = 9 additional damage (which all doubles on a crit). Also, the monk’s healing and “smite” draw from the same pool while the Paladin has two separate pools. However, the paladin only has three spell slots per long rest again, so with only one short rest the mercy monk can provide slightly more healing and about 60% of the smite damage. With two short rests, the monk is providing more healing and more smite damage on average.
At fifth level, the Paladin has doubled their available spell slots and increased their healing hands pool to 25, while the monk has increased their damage and healing to 1d6 + WIS (good argument for boosting WIS before DEX, but it could go either way) and increased their pool per short rest by 66%. So the Paladin is scaling a little faster in these level ranges but that’s because spell slots jump a lot for half casters between levels 3 and 5.
Furthermore, at level 6 Mercy Monks get to add a 2nd level spell effect onto their 1st level spell effect, for the same single ki cost. They’re basically using cure wounds now without an action cost, and also attaching a Lesser Restoration to it. That’s great value, far better than what the Paladin can provide with healing hands and their limited spell slots, and they can do it without stopping their attacks.
The Paladin still has 4 x 2d8 + 2 x 3d8 = 4x9 + 2x13.5 = 63 extra points of damage available from their smites, which would take a 1d6 + 3 = 6.5 damage Hands of Harm about 10 activations to match (that’s a full set of ki from the start of the day plus the first long rest spent on Hands of Harm, meaning if you want to mathematically match the extra damage from smites AND the healing from Healing Hands you need a second short rest, though there’s no accounting for the fact that the monk included cleanses in their heals here). Buuuut you don’t need to fully match the damage of normal smites anymore because your “smites” now poison with no saving throw! That makes them more akin to, say, a Wrathful Smite (in terms of providing disadvantage on attacks) which only deals 1d6 damage as a 1st level spell, plus requiring concentration and a bonus action. So now, comparing apples to apples, we should be comparing the damage to an additional 1d6 + in which case the Mercy monk’s 1d6 + WIS + is the clear winner, and that’s before taking into account that the Mercy monk has more of these points than the Paladin has first level slots, and they come back on a short rest, and the condition doesn’t require a saving throw!
(Of course the Paladin got their Aura at this level, none of this is meant to suggest that Mercy makes the monk top tier. The point is that it gives them a lot of good tools, tools that are comparable to tools that other martial professions get. They still have many of the disadvantages of being a monk: lower AC and HP, no good feat support for damage, less damage per hit. But I think that Mercy gets enough that they can easily be a useful addition to your party without too much difficulty, and that means that when those niche situations come about where a monk’s unique utility like wall running, arrow catching, slow falling, water walking, or just plain speeding up to a caster and stun-locking them finally come up, you can have that character that shines in that moment without thinking that you’re useless the other 95% of the time).
@@Skyhigh91100 One comment here being you are including the Subclass features. It isn't likely to change much since Channel Divinity is once per rest, but some of the oaths bring a lot to the table.
Thunderwave has the dm smile when used the 300 ft audible boom it makes
Create and destroy water is a must have spell for a Grung 🤣
It’s worth remembering that scrolls of these 1st-level circumstantial spells, especially the ones without save DCs, are really cheap for their value. Having a fire extinguisher, poison detector, blanket of fog, or beast speech translator in your pocket for a mere 25 gp a pop can help you be prepared for many more situations without eating up all your slots.
I've never made a scroll. Is this a common practice? How do u do that?
@@jrg305 there are rules in Xanathar’s, if your GM allows them. If you have Arcana proficiency, you can make a scroll of any 1st-level spell you know for 25gp and 1 day of downtime (and any expensive material components, if the spell requires them). Higher-level scrolls get pricey and time-consuming very fast, but 1st-level scrolls are very much worth the time, IMO.
Casting Fog Cloud and then moving in and wild shape as a Giant Spider with a bonus action for a Moon Druid is great in some situations.
One more thing to say about Fog Cloud: it can be used to shut down certain creature abilities that rely on sight. One example is the Intellect Devourer who can do very little if it can't see its target. Another use of Fog Cloud is to allow players to Hide at any time which may be situationally useful depending on party composition.
Fog Cloud also shuts down attacks of opportunity.
So happy to see you doing druid spells. I am starting my first 5e druid in 2 weeks and these guides will be handy!
How was it playing the druid?
I played a low level moon druid recently. The other party members were a kensai monk and valor bard. I ended up being the tank,healer and top damage dealer. I routinely had to drop wildshape and cast healing word on the bard to get him back up.The monk did decent damage but was so squishy that I had to occasionally cast healing word on him also. This campaign was very frustrating,I felt like the bard wasn't even trying. The point of my rambling story is I couldn't cast any spells but healing word the entire campaign or players were going to die
Sometimes that's a sign that characters need to die. Let em. :)
to make it worse, bonus action to change back from wildshape, so have to use cure wounds not healing word!
It was such a problem the DM let me exchange my action for a bonus action.
Moon druid under level 5 is overpowered. I've played one. You will carry the party. You gotta learn to make them hit you instead of party members because you have like +80 hp from each short rest even if you do no damage or cast no spells.
@Professor Thinker what about standing next to them and grappling them with bear strength? Punishing them with opportunity attacks if they attack others? Concentrating on something dangerous for them will make them want to hit you. You can "create aggro" that way but obviously if the DM doesnt role play properly or is metagaming vs a particular player, yeah, there is no taunt or anything I agree.
I'm definitely late for the party, but I still wanted to defend the Jump spell a little bit. Jump is generally a bad spell, but on a druid, I think it can be circumstantially pretty useful, because of wild shape allowing you to turn into beasts that can take more advantage from Jump's benefits, with much higher movement speeds and strength scores than your humanoid form would have(druids don't also get a lot of ways to fly, so jumping is the next best choice for the time being).
The best example of this is the giant frog, with the standing leap trait: which would allow you - with Jump and dash action - to make a 60ft long jump, or a 30ft high jump without a running start, and you could even bring a small size party member on your back with you!
Earth tremor should probably be orange. Situationally it can be used to knock down foes near you - large is OK because it's Dex and not Strength - and put 20 feet of difficult terrain between you and your nearest foe. In constrained areas it could be used to effectively stall or blunt an advance. Not good in any real way, but orange.
This was so freaking helpful! Subscribed
Both thoughtful and illuminating, great work once again, Chris!
Holy Shit!!! THIS is the BEST ANALYSIS OF LOW LEVEL DRUID SPELLS I'VE COME ACROSS. THANK YOU SO MUCH!!! Yes-- that was ALL shouting, lol!!! But I absolutely LOVE the way you analyzed low level DRUID spells, BUT ALSO talked about WHICH ONES GET BETTER and WHICH ONES LOSE IMPACT as you level up!! I just listened on a long walk, but going to listen again with my notebook out. Will THIS video necessarily be the #1 "clickbait monetizer" out of ALL the D&D vids on UA-cam? Maybe, maybe not. But as a first time player with a Druid PC, I APPRECIATE this SO MUCH. Thanks again, and bless you, friend!!😘💖💖💖💖💖
Oh man. I'm so waiting for you to get to warlocks and sorcerer's for your subclass ranking videos!
I should probably try Entangle on my Druid soon. That seems solid! Thanks for getting into the Druid spell list. It is interesting to hear your thoughts.
I like this, it’s good. It’s also a great video to delay the monk ranking one too. Double bonus
I love the explanations, and completely agree with all of the decisions made.
*looking at my Druid who has Earth Tremor and Jump prepared*
... mostly.
Speak with animals is an underrated spell, something to take into account is that most animals, even big scary predators are no particularly moved to fight you in the first place. Most of them are moved by hunger or fear, easy to persuade with the right bribery.
A notable thing about druid (and cleric & paladin) spells is that you really want to be familiar with the orange [**] spells, because you can prepare them whenever their situational use is likely. Casters with fixed/limited lists of spells have more leeway to skim and forget.
Druids have a great list. It doesn’t have the raw damage of wizard or sorcerer, but it grows well for battlefield control and the environment
animal friendship will potentially also stop the animal from attacking your allies if you carry around goodberries. i keep goodberries wrapped in jerky to toss to charmed predators when traveling around places i expect dangerous beast. no beast is gonna feel the need to eat your allies if its stomach is full and you leave it alone
Great video as always Chris! I'm very excited to hear what you say about plant growth.
I will have a map simulation for plant growth in that video (coming in 2 weeks)
@@TreantmonksTemple So excited! That spell is crazy good, being able to choose which squares grow and which don't is just silly, and the range is huge.
"Hey I'm hungry, gimme some nuts!!" - Squirrel
Loved this.
If you are attending a big social event, like a banquett or ball in a D&D game: Bring Detect poison and disease, and absolutely bring Purify food and drink. Because, come on! Of course there is going to be a poisoning attempt!
I was considering a Druid build a few weeks ago and didn’t like any of the online recommendations, so I made my own list using your system. So happy you are doing this list now - very curious how close my rankings are to yours.
Love the spell guides. Very helpful.
I was surprised to see faerie fire as green, and entangle as blue. Due to faerie fire causing objects to glow as well I've seen it used in a party without much darkvision to illuminate a treacherous cave, while also getting advantage against some of the enemies inside. However, I did not consider how strong entangle stays even at higher levels, and for that I thank you for another great video!
Charm spells started pretty powerful in original dnd (where were encountered mostly in dungeons. So a very restricted context) and only got nerfed with time. It is interesting to read the past iterations of the spell, that are usually more detailed/specific. It gives great insight on how they should be today, because even in past editions, there were already a lot of restrictions.
Also, contrasting the explicit text with a much more modest description of its powers, indicate that they don't include the powers it had in the past, or it would be stated clearly. For example, past editions said the caster was regarded as its best friend and will try to defend the caster against any threat (real or imagined).
All in all, I don't think they know what they want this spell to do or why it is there. It is an iconic spell, but they don't really want to keep it or take it away. So they nerf it endless, put a lot of caveats, etc.. so the player finally says: "ok, it is not worth the hassle" and the DM exhales relieved.
The biggest nerf in my view is that the person knows it was charmed. No ifs and buts. That takes a lot away from it's possible use for manipulation, specially since it only last a few minutes (it used to last days or even months).
Absorb Elements is worth upcasting when you're out of first level slots, but only if the reduction in damage taken is worth the second level slot. The added damage is just a little bonus that you can use if you have good melee attacks. Also as someone has already pointed out, it could be a melee spell attack, as "weapon" is not specified in the spell.
For Create Or Destroy Water, I would argue that the ocean is an open container. Just... a very, very large one.
Jump seems like a good NPC spell that goes into crafting enchanted boots, but not for actual use as a spell.
Purify Food And Drink is an amazing spell if you wanna cook with poisonous mushrooms and not die.
For a Divine Soul Sorcerer, protection from evil and good is green in my opinion because it can be twinned…especially when you have War Caster.
I can hope for videos with the ranking of the other spellcasters spell lists?
Possibly in the future.
I feel like it is more important on casters with limited known spells or spell slots (sorc or warlock). Or hybrid casters. Prepared casters have it easy. I've played all three.
@@jrg305 absolutelty, but I'm curious to see how certain spells are rated differently based on the type of spellcasting feature that other classes offer, for example hold person is a situational good spell when cast by a warlock, not so much if a wizard uses it instead, at least in my opinion
I feel like Beast Bond is underrated because you didn't consider Elephants in the mount section of the PHB. They have an Int of 3, and deal 3d8+6 on a Gore, and 3d10+6 on the Stomp if the enemy faisl their Str Save. Sure, 200g is a bit pricey low-level, but if the fighter can make due with chainmail for a bit longer the druid can give the party a living siege weapon.
I think spell scrolls can make some of these more viable, since making them can allow you to prepare a spell that's good under exact circumstances, but not a common enough one to keep prepared without wasting a prepared spell on it.
Is purify food and drink better on a lizzardfolk? Could use it to remove poison or disease from an ally/potential snack :p
"perhaps the real rations are the freinds we make along the way"
Lizardfolk at a funeral pointing at the casket, "You done with that?"
Cure Wounds is good on a Shepherd Druid, because you can place your unicorn spirit as a bonus action for extra healing and then cast Cure Wounds with your action.
Star druid for double healing
I'd argue that Detect Poison and Disease is the very definition of an "orange" spell - it doesn't really get any more circumstantial. Many campaigns don't have a default encounter that can cause disease in a PC, and if you're poisoned chances are you're going to have a good idea what it does based upon the damage you're taking and/or your ability score reduction; not to mention that you're likely going to try and cure it as soon as you can anyway, whether it's been identified or not.
@@NemisCassander Only if there are both hidden and poisonous creatures to detect in the first place, which will not be the case in most combat encounters. Hence me not saying it's bad, just situational
Protection from good an evil became the best spell ever in Curse of Strahd the other week.
Strahd tried to charm my character in one of his shake downs and he gave me time to cast it when he wasn't looking. 😀
Earth tremor is potentially awesome for a wildfire Druid. Being able to create a 10ft radius of concentration free difficult terrain and teleport out of the area of effect with a potential damage and knocked prone effect is theoretically pretty powerful for a 1st level spell.
And at lvl 6 you can just cast it from your spirit.
Entangle does have two advantages over Web that you didn't mention. One is that sometimes you don't want anyone who moves into that space afterwards to have to make a save, if it's your own party members. That is situational, but I do find it's a situation that does come up. The other big advantage is the spell doesn't give any way to destroy it, unlike web. Now obviously DM's may rule it can be destroyed with fire or attacks or something, but without that, it is a pretty big advantage, especially against anything that uses fire.
With animal friendship you could argue that you could use animal handling and wisdom for that type of social interaction
@35:30 jump + spring heel ? would allow a thirty foot jump?
Note that earth tremor doesn't need to be cast in combat.
A no concentration 10 foor radius of difficult terrain that stays untill cleared has it's uses
For example my party had to defend a tower while a mage did research and we knew we were going to get attacked by hobgoblins. Our druid spent a couple of 1st level spells slots and we were able to defend that building with ease for days. They all got destroyed at range
So, I just realized something looking back on this video:
Absorb Elements effects Melee Attacks, not specifically melee attacks.
That means Thorn Whip, a melee attack, can use Absorb Elements' additional damage. So a Druid could use Absorb Elements and then use Thorn Whip to return it to sender at a decent range.
The social interaction checks for dealing with beasts could easily be ruled as animal handling checks and you will have a better time with animal friendship as a druid.
I wish I had read the description of create or destroy water more carefully before. I've had to prepare it all campaign long because of Circumstances. There have been a couple of occasions where destroying fog would have been pretty valuable.
20:30 Interactions with Animals are usually made with Animal Handling.
Once again a curse to my insomnia.
14:00 Ah but that's different than the charmed condition too. The charmed condition does not state that the creature knows its been charmed unlike this spell so other charmed conditions can be used to build a sphere of influence unlike this spell. So charm person makes someone think you are a aquintance but other charmed conditions let you create permanent acquitances.
Goodberry: get Magic Initiate and pick it as your free daily 1st level. Ferrie Fire is a favorite along with healing words being in almost all my lists. I love druids because I keep wanting to change Spells all the time. Entangle is also a favorite.v😊
This isn't the sword/knife I wanna die on, but one silver lining of ice knife is that there are no verbal components. Cast silence and re-flavor your ice knife as cold shuriken and be that ninja your party never expected
Fog cloud + turning into a giant constrictor for the blondsight can be good, at least till concentration breaks.
I think the weirdest effect of going full RAW on Fog Cloud is that you can have a gnomish rogue spend 72 hours straight setting up a moronic 360 no scope max range arcing volley blindfolded behind-the-back trickshot while wearing plate mail using a longbow against a prone, dodging, blurred target, and as long as you dump a fog cloud on them, they're rolling straight-up.
Faerie Fire is a blue spell if ever there was one. If a creature fails its save, it *will* die unless your concentration is disrupted or it can teleport away.
I'm a little surprised healing word is only green, taking20 (Another DND youtuber) rated it as one of the most broken spells in the game and made an entire video ranting about it. I don't think it is quite as good as he says it is, since you need still to keep one or two 1st level spell slots on reserve to get the value out of saving someone and you aren't using those spell slots pro-actively if your doing so, but the value of being able to bring an ally up from a safe distance and still have your main action is clutch when it comes up.
Unless you're at very low level, effective battlefield control, damage focus and defensive features will make characters going down a rarity. So Healing Word is only powerful in situations where things are going bad.
The main thing that people tend to overlook is that saving your main action, while not useless, tends to have disappointing value for full spellcasters since they can't use that action to do what they're best at; casting (non-cantrip) spells. It still holds value for casting cantrips or taking the Dodge action if nothing else, but it's not quite as potent as your action might normally be. The range of Healing Word is a great advantage at lower levels though.
I saw that. I disagree with his assessment.
@@fadeleaf845 our party just hit level 5 and we have 1 or 2 players going down every encounter. at level 2 or 3 we had a PC death purely because i chose to prepare cure wounds instead of healing word and the action economy/range of the fight made it so if i ever used an action and my movement to get to them for cure wounds i would have died. however our DM is also balancing each encounter very aggressively into the "deadly" rating. Every single encounter feels like we are on the edge of a TPK. My Spore druids main damage is already either a shillelagh or Chill touch and i literally dont have any other bonus actions so i am using healing word almost every turn along with a damage action and concentration spell like entangle active.
My players turned am otyugh from a dynamic encounter with a creature with multiple attacks and a disease half-hidden in sewage, to a piñata snooze fest.
Oof, that was a brutal assessment of Earth Tremor...
Healing Word is not overrated. I believe that the cost of a bonus action(especially to bring back a fallen ally) is extremely powerful in this action economy game.
Based on Crawford's ruling do you think goodberry would work with the Moon sickle? At first glance the wording is different. The Life domain feature saying "Whenever you use a spell of 1st level or higher to restore hit points to a creature" and the sickle reads "When you cast a spell that restores hit points...". So my thought is no it doesn't work because goodberry just makes berries but doesn't restore hp. However the life feature works tenuously suggesting it does restore hp and each berry could heal an additional d4 damage rolled at the casting of the spell. If it works the spell starts looking even better since it is just an uncommon item.
whats nice on the druid is that absorb elements works with thornwip
Thanks for making this video
I had to read the spell description for Earth Tremor several times and then go back and read the PHB section on spell ranges and areas of effect. It's still not 100% clear but I think Chris has it correct here. So here's (what I *think* is) the *incorrect* interpretation; does it make Earth Tremor more valuable and would you allow it at your table? The range is 10 feet, so the center of the area of effect can be 10 feet away from you. The area of effect is a 10-foot radius square (so, the same as Entangle or Faerie Fire).
It would definitely be a lot better
absorb elements does not say melee weapon attack
. it says melee attacks which i do believes counts for melee spell attacks doesnt it? so using thorn whip on the next turn would qualify. this spell is perfect for druid.
If the Rabbitfolk survive as they are, would the jump spell triple the distance of their Hop ability?
32:42 Taking20 video about this spell *cof* *cof*
Even if Goodberry is allowed to be used to bring back a downed opponent, how is this a better way to do so than Healing Word ? I understand that the berries can be spread around to all party members so anyone could do it, but it still requires moving over to the unconscious character and using your action to bring them up with 1HP, disrupting the current combat flow and wasting an entire turn for that character. Healing Word allows the Druid to stay put, raise a character and throw in a cantrip or, let's say..strike down a lightning from an active Call lightning Spell. Additionally, even if it can be combined with the Life cleric Disciple of Life, it usually won't, so it will still "only" heal 10HP (and more likely out of combat), which is good, but IMO Healing Word is still a go-to spell and the best at raising characters up.
I might take Longstrider at first or second level if I was playing, or the party included, a dwarf, gnome or halfling ... particularly one whose specialty is mixing it up in melee (Hello, Circle of the Moon druid!).
Also, one other (highly circumstantial) instance in which Purify Food and Drink could be useful: Court Intrigue or Espionage campaigns in which you're meant to either survive a feast with a notorious poisoner (think Livia from "I, Claudius") or protect someone politically important from poisoning. *STILL* super-circumstantial. but *I* might consider creating such a scenario specifically so a druid in the party could feel important in a social situation. ;)
Finally, one of my Moon druid buddies used to *LOVE* Thunderwave at second and third (character) level because he could cast the spell, drive at least a couple of creatures back to create an escape route, use his Bonus Action to Wild Shape into a wolf, and then use the wolf's 40' movement to go hide behind the fighters and heavily-armored clerics. Nice tactic for softening the enemy up for said fighters and clerics, though it certainly didn't last past character level 4 or so ...
What if we want to clean a polluted lake, so we just drop the druid in the middle and have them ritual cast purify food and water for a week. Maybe give them a stir every now and then
Great video as always, however I'm not sure Earth Tremor should be red. I've never used it and it certainly seems red but if its combined with Slow it could really stall enemy movement. Just happened to be looking at spells that affect movement and was literally reading Earth tremor when it came up on the list. Definitely wouldn't give it any better than orange but I think it could be useful.
Rule #1: If you can get Absorb elements as a caster, get Absorb Elements.
The amount of times this spell saved my bacon is immeasurable.
But maybe this is just my character wich seems to be draw "face-aggro" in every encounter. :o
If the Life Cleric ruling is allowed, Goodberry becomes even more crazy with a Moon Sickle, which is only uncommon so not that difficult to get. Making each berry heal for d4+4hps is crazy for a level 1 spell.
Still waiting for the moon sickle ruling. Because MS says "cast" while life cleric says "use"
Although I do like the idea of allowing it.
I don't think jump is a combat spell. Sure, circumstantially. But I think it was used as an utility spell. You cast it to make one jump. Like jumping from one roof to another to lose pursuers or bypass an obstacle while dungeon crawling, and being able to clear the way to the rest of the party.
Your experience with Entangle must be different than mine. I've casted it three times and everytime all creatures made their Saving throws and it restrained no one.
For me, Entangled is the spell I keep casting and nothing happens.
Have you done this for Cleric's already? I would like to be able to cast more spells than spirit weapon and spirit guardians.
The Wizard spell guide is still the most helpful as it works for Wizards, Sorcerers, and even Warlocks and somewhat for bards. Clerics have the smallest spell list but it's pretty much a completely separate list from the Wizard.
@@guardian_of_the_rune he did a written guide where he talked about it, though it's slightly outdated and also focused on a melee cleric build for Chult. So SW/SG was the staple anyways. Nowadays, most recommend using BA for telekinesis over spiritual weapon the vast majority of the time.
Really, clerics are super fun, but not very diverse a lot of the time. Bless, Healing Word, Aid, Spiritual Weapon, and Spirit Guardians are the classic hits again and again
Just popping up to say that Thunderwave can only move objects, but not creatures, so you can't push your enemies on spikes.
Not that it makes a big difference, but one good thing about Ice Knife is that it lacks a verbal component to cast.
Like you say the campaign dictates whether protection from evil is good or bad. If you're heavy into intellect devourer's, ghosts, or other creatures with power to possess a character, it could be blue.
I'm looking at the color coding of choice here like the quiz that tells you to identify the color of the words but you have words like "blue" colored purple and so on so it fries your brain just trying to process that. Decades of gaming have taught me that quality 1 is white, 2 is green, 3 is blue, 4 is purple, and 5 is orange....usually classified from common to legendary where the best of the best is orange, purple is epic, blue is mid, green is just better than the worst, and white is lowest of the low. The color coding of choice here just turns all that on its head.
44:00 Truth be told I don't see that at all. Animals don't consider important the same things we consider important.
Longstrider is one of those spells the Moon Druid loves.
It's better at higher levels
I'm purchasing the "official" D&D Druid Spell cards to make play easier & faster. I was going to get the Xanathar's Guide cards for the missing spells, but would Tasha's cards be a better spell supplement? Thanks to anyone who responds!!😘💖😘💖😘
I know Goodberry is already being rated as good, but you didn't touch on the food factor of Goodberry.
In some campaigns, DMs just don't care about food, but some do. Even if they don't, especially early on, when a party has very few assets and, from a storytelling and campaign construction perspective, are dealing with problems much more close to personal level, Goodberry is an incredible social tool as well. A full day's nutrition, likely two, is a great bargaining tool that costs the party only one point of healing that they may not even need anyways.
On the flip side, a particularly sinister DM, or one extremely miffed about their survival mechanics being circumvented may also make goodberry abuse have dire implications for a character's waistline.
I have a question regarding good berry. When I read “the berry provides enough nourishment to sustain a creature for one day” to me, that includes water. Am I wrong in thinking that?
I think it's open to interpretation
I mostly play some kind of gish. I don't think I've ever used the extra damage from Absorb Elements because I was either doing something else on my turn, or never hit an enemy who didn't have immunity.
Now funny story with it. I was playing a low level game and forgot the DM basically homebrew all his monsters.
"The goblin shaman casts fireball on your guys. Make a dex save."
"I cast Absorb Elements. Even if I make the save, I still could use the damage reduced by 7."
A Few Moments Later
"its a 2d6 fireball?!!!???"
Detect poison is great if someone in the party has a poisoner's kit and knows how to use it. Easy way to find raw materials.
My druid have a hawk as my best friend and traveling companion so with my master I chose the spell Besat Bond so that I can use the hawk to acquire information, in this situation it is considered a good use of the spell or is it worth using another spell?