I’ve asked this question a few years back and haven’t been very active lately. So perhaps a few things changed with all the new source books I’ve missed...
I want to go on some adventures as a character which isn’t a druid, but can turn in to a tiger... Like a were tiger, but without the humanoid shape. To do this I used to play a ranger with a few levels of druid. But I prefer some other way to get the shape. Is there a race, subclass, feat or something else? I don’t mind 3rd party rules, as long as they aren’t overpowered.
Does anyone know of some cool options? I’m looking foreword to the reaction, because normally they are always great! :-)
I’ve asked this question a few years back and haven’t been very active lately. So perhaps a few things changed with all the new source books I’ve missed...
I want to go on some adventures as a character which isn’t a druid, but can turn in to a tiger... Like a were tiger, but without the humanoid shape. To do this I used to play a ranger with a few levels of druid. But I prefer some other way to get the shape. Is there a race, subclass, feat or something else? I don’t mind 3rd party rules, as long as they aren’t overpowered.
Does anyone know of some cool options? I’m looking foreword to the reaction, because normally they are always great! :-)
The Shifter race in the Eberron book and the path of the beast barbarian subclass are the closest that I can think of. It wouldn't get right to a tiger per se, but you could flavor some of the look into it along with the mechanics of the subclass and the race. Shifter even makes a pretty solid barbarian. Not sure about 3rd party options.
Mechanically a Tiger? You have two strictly RAW options: Wild Shape (level 8, or level 2 Circle of Moon), or spells like Polymorph, Animal Shapes, or True Polymorph. Or I suppose you can take a risk on Wishing to be an intelligent Tiger with all of your class features.
thanks for the responses.... seems a druid dip is still the best way to go. Maybe the new race loft book will give some cool options, fits the theme :-)
thanks for the responses.... seems a druid dip is still the best way to go. Maybe the new race loft book will give some cool options, fits the theme :-)
It had an undead, vampire (dampyr), and some other race. Don't remember about the other stuff that was listed from the preview.
The proliferation of spells and features like the Wildfire Druid, Battle Smith Artificer, Summon Fey and the like, leads me to believe that a Wild Shape variant is around the bend that will use a modular Beast template similar to Summon Beast, rather than having you pick from the MM based on CR. If that doesn't come as a Druid variant rule, it might still be made available in a class feature feat like you're describing, because otherwise I just don't imagine there's any way to realistically ensure balance for non-Druids picking up vanilla Wild Shape, unless limited to a specific list of creatures like Find Steed or Find Familiar.
The balance would be that Druid Wildshape scales with Druid level. Any other class would be stuck with CR 1/4 creatures, wouldn't gain access to flying or swimming speeds, and would be limited to (1~2) 30~60min transformations per rest, so it would need to be used sparingly.
A Tiger is CR 1, so technically wouldn't qualify for this either, but for the sake of flavor, a Wolf could be reskinned as a tiger variant.
If the feat had the user select a single form, then it would operate more like an advanced shifter feat than Wildshape proper.
A high level Astral monk turning into an Owl could potentially surprise some folks... but (A) limiting them to baseline level 2 druid Wild Shape would close off flying creatures, and (B) monks already make good druids anyway, so that may not be any more of a problem than multiclassing already presents.
We'll see. I think that behind the scenes, WotC is aware that the current Wild Shape is as overly complex as I read it to be, and aren't going to invite even more class and race feature interaction questions about it than they're already leaving unsaid in SAC. Summon Beast really resembles some similar systems they were playing around with towards the end of the 3.5 erra, and the scaling companions in the Tasha's alternative to the Beast Master, and other recent pet classes, are better balanced as Player toys than MM Beasts ever have been.
I definitely agree that Summon Beast mechanics make life a lot easier. Beyond balance and useability, it also helps to address the issues of Beast CR level gaps for Circle of the Moon Druid, and the "Must have seen before" pre-requisite. There are a lot of common animals that don't have official statblocks.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Hi good people!
I’ve asked this question a few years back and haven’t been very active lately. So perhaps a few things changed with all the new source books I’ve missed...
I want to go on some adventures as a character which isn’t a druid, but can turn in to a tiger... Like a were tiger, but without the humanoid shape. To do this I used to play a ranger with a few levels of druid. But I prefer some other way to get the shape. Is there a race, subclass, feat or something else? I don’t mind 3rd party rules, as long as they aren’t overpowered.
Does anyone know of some cool options? I’m looking foreword to the reaction, because normally they are always great! :-)
The Shifter race in the Eberron book and the path of the beast barbarian subclass are the closest that I can think of. It wouldn't get right to a tiger per se, but you could flavor some of the look into it along with the mechanics of the subclass and the race. Shifter even makes a pretty solid barbarian. Not sure about 3rd party options.
Mechanically a Tiger? You have two strictly RAW options: Wild Shape (level 8, or level 2 Circle of Moon), or spells like Polymorph, Animal Shapes, or True Polymorph. Or I suppose you can take a risk on Wishing to be an intelligent Tiger with all of your class features.
Narratively a 'Tiger'?
dndbeyond.com forum tags
I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
thanks for the responses.... seems a druid dip is still the best way to go. Maybe the new race loft book will give some cool options, fits the theme :-)
It had an undead, vampire (dampyr), and some other race. Don't remember about the other stuff that was listed from the preview.
There's also the Leonin race...
Maybe ask your DM if you can re-skin your ranger beast companion (check out the new Ranger options) as you changing shape instead.
With the various feats that were introduced in TCoE, I almost expect similar feats to be introduced later this year for Druid/Cleric/etc.
That might allow non-Druids to gain a 1st level wildshape trick as a feat. Perhaps limited to a single form to avoid being too intrusive.
I'd talk to your DM about making a custom feat, and then using Custom Lineages to get it at 1st level as part of your racial features.
The proliferation of spells and features like the Wildfire Druid, Battle Smith Artificer, Summon Fey and the like, leads me to believe that a Wild Shape variant is around the bend that will use a modular Beast template similar to Summon Beast, rather than having you pick from the MM based on CR. If that doesn't come as a Druid variant rule, it might still be made available in a class feature feat like you're describing, because otherwise I just don't imagine there's any way to realistically ensure balance for non-Druids picking up vanilla Wild Shape, unless limited to a specific list of creatures like Find Steed or Find Familiar.
dndbeyond.com forum tags
I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
The balance would be that Druid Wildshape scales with Druid level. Any other class would be stuck with CR 1/4 creatures, wouldn't gain access to flying or swimming speeds, and would be limited to (1~2) 30~60min transformations per rest, so it would need to be used sparingly.
A Tiger is CR 1, so technically wouldn't qualify for this either, but for the sake of flavor, a Wolf could be reskinned as a tiger variant.
If the feat had the user select a single form, then it would operate more like an advanced shifter feat than Wildshape proper.
A high level Astral monk turning into an Owl could potentially surprise some folks... but (A) limiting them to baseline level 2 druid Wild Shape would close off flying creatures, and (B) monks already make good druids anyway, so that may not be any more of a problem than multiclassing already presents.
We'll see. I think that behind the scenes, WotC is aware that the current Wild Shape is as overly complex as I read it to be, and aren't going to invite even more class and race feature interaction questions about it than they're already leaving unsaid in SAC. Summon Beast really resembles some similar systems they were playing around with towards the end of the 3.5 erra, and the scaling companions in the Tasha's alternative to the Beast Master, and other recent pet classes, are better balanced as Player toys than MM Beasts ever have been.
dndbeyond.com forum tags
I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
I definitely agree that Summon Beast mechanics make life a lot easier. Beyond balance and useability, it also helps to address the issues of Beast CR level gaps for Circle of the Moon Druid, and the "Must have seen before" pre-requisite. There are a lot of common animals that don't have official statblocks.