Since I love the concepts around this subclass but didn't think it was all that useful, I figured I'd give a shot at giving it my own fixes and see what comes of it. Wasn't sure where to put this so I figured here will do for now. What I mostly did was tweak the Halo of Spores damage for more impact and made the Fungal Infestation feature more impactful while still putting up some barriers for balance sake so Necromancy Wizards don't sob from inadequacy.
Circle of Spores rework
Bonus Cantrip: When you choose this Circle at 2nd level, you gain access to the Chill Touch cantrip.
Halo of Spores: Starting at 2nd level, you can launch toxic spores at other creatures that get close to you. Whenever a creature that you can see moves while within 10 ft of you, you can use your reaction to deal 1d4 Poison damage to the target. (The wording may be off but this ability is focused around being a sort of crowd control type ability that punishes creature from getting to close and ignoring you by running past) This damage increases to 2d4 at 6th level, 3d4 at 10th level, and 4d4 at 14th.
Symbiotic Entity: At 2nd level, when you use your Wild Shape feature, you can awaken the spores within your body, rather than transforming into a beast. When you do so, you gain temporary Hit Points equal to your druid level times 3, the damage of your Halo of Spores feature doubles, and your melee weapon attacks deal an extra 1d6 poison damage on a hit. These benefits last for 10 minutes or until you use your Wild Shape again.
Circle Spells: At 3rd, 5th, 7th, and 9th level you gain access to the spells listed for that level in the Circle of Spores Spells table. Once you gain access to one of these spells, you always have it prepared, and it doesn’t count against the number of spells you can prepare each day. If you gain access to a spell that doesn’t appear on the druid spell list, the spell is nonetheless a druid spell for you.
Circle of Spores Spells:
Druid Level
Spells
3rd
Gentle Repose, Ray of Enfeeblement
5th
Animate Dead, Gaseous Form
7th
Blight, Confusion
9th
Cloudkill, Contagion
Fungal Infestation: At 6th level, your spores gain the ability to infest a humanoid corpse and animate it. If you slay a humanoid creature with one of your Circle of Spores features or a druid spell that deals poison or necrotic damage, the creature rises as a zombie at the end of your turn. It has the same stats as a regular zombie (stats provided by the DM). It acts immediately after your turn in the initiative order and it obeys your mental commands. It remains animated for 1 hour, after which, it collapses and dies. You can only use this ability to infect one corpse per turn.
Spreading Spores: At 10th level, as a bonus action, you can hurl fungal spores up to 30 ft away, where they swirl around in a 10 ft cube for 1 minute. While the cube of spores persists, any creature that starts its turn in the cube takes your Halo of Spores feature damage. The cube of spores vanishes early if you use this feature again.
Fungal Body: At 14th level, the fungal spores in your body alter you. You cannot be blinded, deafened, frightened, or poisoned, and if an attack is a critical hit against you, it doesn’t deal its extra damage to you. Additionally, you can use your Halo of Spores feature once per turn as a free action.
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"Whoever loves discipline loves knowledge, but he who hates correction is stupid." Proverbs 12:1
I always though this subclass was very cool, but a bit too narrow, specific in its theme. I'd rather make it into Circle of Rot, focusing on the theme of decay as part of circle of life and rebirth, and a force of natural selection. The druids' take on death. Also makes a good horror-themed druid that spreads contagion upon life that they deem unfit, and revels in parasite infestations that reset fragile, unbalanced ecosystes to simpler life forms. The whole idea of rot includes not only fungi and mold, but also parasites, diseases, and swarms of pests. It would take just a little reflavoring and minor mechanical tweaks.
The changes make a lot of sense for the CoS subclass. There's a lot of space for developing a druid subclass focused on death and decay. Most of all I love the subclass spells. Definitely makes the druid a more formidable caster, and more comparable to other casters, which makes for more balance.
The use of wild shape is unusual, but interesting. I suppose it's similar to the Circle of the Stars wild shaping, where you take on a different bodily form rather than a best. And it lasts 10 minutes :) I'd like to see how you develop the wild shaping as the subclass increases in levels.
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Started playing AD&D in the late 70s and stopped in the mid-80s. Started immersing myself into 5e in 2023
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Since I love the concepts around this subclass but didn't think it was all that useful, I figured I'd give a shot at giving it my own fixes and see what comes of it. Wasn't sure where to put this so I figured here will do for now. What I mostly did was tweak the Halo of Spores damage for more impact and made the Fungal Infestation feature more impactful while still putting up some barriers for balance sake so Necromancy Wizards don't sob from inadequacy.
Circle of Spores rework
Halo of Spores: Starting at 2nd level, you can launch toxic spores at other creatures that get close to you. Whenever a creature that you can see moves while within 10 ft of you, you can use your reaction to deal 1d4 Poison damage to the target. (The wording may be off but this ability is focused around being a sort of crowd control type ability that punishes creature from getting to close and ignoring you by running past)
This damage increases to 2d4 at 6th level, 3d4 at 10th level, and 4d4 at 14th.
Symbiotic Entity: At 2nd level, when you use your Wild Shape feature, you can awaken the spores within your body, rather than transforming into a beast. When you do so, you gain temporary Hit Points equal to your druid level times 3, the damage of your Halo of Spores feature doubles, and your melee weapon attacks deal an extra 1d6 poison damage on a hit.
These benefits last for 10 minutes or until you use your Wild Shape again.
Circle Spells: At 3rd, 5th, 7th, and 9th level you gain access to the spells listed for that level in the Circle of Spores Spells table.
Once you gain access to one of these spells, you always have it prepared, and it doesn’t count against the number of spells you can prepare each day. If you gain access to a spell that doesn’t appear on the druid spell list, the spell is nonetheless a druid spell for you.
Fungal Infestation: At 6th level, your spores gain the ability to infest a humanoid corpse and animate it.
If you slay a humanoid creature with one of your Circle of Spores features or a druid spell that deals poison or necrotic damage, the creature rises as a zombie at the end of your turn. It has the same stats as a regular zombie (stats provided by the DM). It acts immediately after your turn in the initiative order and it obeys your mental commands. It remains animated for 1 hour, after which, it collapses and dies.
You can only use this ability to infect one corpse per turn.
Spreading Spores: At 10th level, as a bonus action, you can hurl fungal spores up to 30 ft away, where they swirl around in a 10 ft cube for 1 minute. While the cube of spores persists, any creature that starts its turn in the cube takes your Halo of Spores feature damage. The cube of spores vanishes early if you use this feature again.
Fungal Body: At 14th level, the fungal spores in your body alter you. You cannot be blinded, deafened, frightened, or poisoned, and if an attack is a critical hit against you, it doesn’t deal its extra damage to you.
Additionally, you can use your Halo of Spores feature once per turn as a free action.
"Whoever loves discipline loves knowledge, but he who hates correction is stupid." Proverbs 12:1
This works pretty well
I always though this subclass was very cool, but a bit too narrow, specific in its theme. I'd rather make it into Circle of Rot, focusing on the theme of decay as part of circle of life and rebirth, and a force of natural selection. The druids' take on death. Also makes a good horror-themed druid that spreads contagion upon life that they deem unfit, and revels in parasite infestations that reset fragile, unbalanced ecosystes to simpler life forms. The whole idea of rot includes not only fungi and mold, but also parasites, diseases, and swarms of pests. It would take just a little reflavoring and minor mechanical tweaks.
The changes make a lot of sense for the CoS subclass. There's a lot of space for developing a druid subclass focused on death and decay. Most of all I love the subclass spells. Definitely makes the druid a more formidable caster, and more comparable to other casters, which makes for more balance.
The use of wild shape is unusual, but interesting. I suppose it's similar to the Circle of the Stars wild shaping, where you take on a different bodily form rather than a best. And it lasts 10 minutes :) I'd like to see how you develop the wild shaping as the subclass increases in levels.
Started playing AD&D in the late 70s and stopped in the mid-80s. Started immersing myself into 5e in 2023