Base Class: Druid
Druids of the Circle of Evolution cater to the fauna and flora around them, watching and observing their growth as well as protecting them. Many of the druids took in animals and sentient plants as a familiar and the focus of their studies. Their patience and keen perception allows them to grow a creature or plant with absolute care to the point that it can slowly evolve into a dominant or even stronger species.
Growth Focus
Starting at 2nd level upon choosing this Circle, you may choose a focus of either Flora or Fauna in which you gain Advantage to the first saving throw and skill check revolving an Animal or Plant that you have previously physically encountered due to careful study and firsthand experience.
In addition, you gain additional bonuses and access to spells according to your focus upon reaching certain levels. 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.
Fauna Focus
You began studying the various wildlife of the natural world, learning their habitat and routine. You may spend 10 minutes observing a creature in order to learn external information such as its eating habits, sleeping pattern, or just the general actions it usually does. You can cut the time in half by means of physically interacting with the creature, requiring a Bonus Action to make a Wisdom (Animal Handling) Check when in combat against it to gain deeper information such as its Attacks, AC, Senses, etc.
You gain the ability to cast Speak with Animals as a Bonus Action and you may use it up to 2 + half of your Druid level times between rests. At 11th level, this spell is now constantly active and you can use a Bonus Action to temporarily disable or re-enable this spell.
In addition you gain access to the following spells:
Level | Spell |
3rd | Animal Messenger, Beast Sense |
5th | Conjure Animals, Daylight |
7th | Dominate Beast, Locate Creature |
11th | Greater Restoration, Geas |
Flora Focus
You began studying the various species of plant life, may it be neutral or hostile to you and becoming adept in treating it with care. You may spend 10 minutes studying a plant in order to learn any properties as well as any information related to it.
You gain the ability to cast Speak with Plants as a Bonus Action and you may use it up to 1 + half of your Druid level times between rests. At 11th level, this spell is now constantly active and you can use a Bonus Action to temporarily disable or re-enable this spell.
In addition you gain access to the following spells:
Level Spell 3rd Spike Growth, Barkskin 5th Plant Growth, Erupting Earth 7th Conjure Woodland Beings, Grasping Vine 11th Commune with Nature, Tree Stride
Druidic Companion
At 2nd level, based on your Growth Focus, you may choose an Animal or Plant no larger than Medium and with a Challenge Rating of 1/2 or lower to become your Companion. You add your proficiency bonus to your Companion's AC, attack rolls and damage rolls, as well as any saving throws or skills it is proficient in. Its Hit Points is maximum equal to its normal maximum or four times your your Druid level, whichever is higher.
Your Companion obeys your commands as best as it can. It takes its turn on your initiative, though it doesn’t take an action unless you command it to. On your turn, you can verbally command the Companion where to move (no action required by you). You can use your action to verbally command it to take the Attack, Dash, Disengage, Dodge, or Help action. Once you have the Extra Attack feature, you can make one attack yourself and you can command the Companion to take an Attack action.
While traveling through your favored terrain with only the Companion, you can move stealthily at a normal pace. If the Companion dies, you can obtain another one by spending 8 hours magically bonding with another animal or plant that isn’t hostile to you, either the same type as before or a different one.
Like any creature, the Companion can spend Hit Dice during a short rest. If you are incapacitated or absent, the Companion acts on its own, focusing on protecting you and itself. It never requires your command to use its reaction, such as when making an opportunity attack.
Upon gaining a Companion roll a d4 to apply a trait for your Companion's evolution in which they obtain once you level up, this is repeated at 5th level. At 9th and 13th level, roll a d6. At 17th level, roll a d8 twice.
Alternatively, at 3rd level you can choose pick a trait of your choice from Rolls 1 to 4, but you no longer roll a trait at 5th level. At 9th level, you can instead choose a single trait between Rolls 1 to 6, but no longer roll a trait at 13th level. At 17th level, you can choose a single trait between Rolls 1 to 7.
Evolution Traits
Roll | Effect |
1 | Growing horns, spikes or even claws, your Companion develops a more lethal and predatory nature as it grows. Give your Companion +1 to its damage roll each time this trait is picked. If this trait has been picked three times or more, you may instead roll a d4 instead and add that to your Companion's damage roll. |
2 | Developing a hardened exterior or slippery skin, your Companion instinctively strives to survive against direct damage or outright avoid it with its elusiveness. You roll a d8 and add it to your Companion's Hit Point. If this trait has been picked three times or more, you may give your Companion +1 AC instead. |
3 | Your Companion develops a special organ or part that becomes a source of a new damage type. Choose one of your Companion's attacks and change its damage type to another of your choice. You may also choose to improve your Companion's attack instead, giving it +1 to the action's attack roll. |
4 | Your Companion has honed its senses to the point it develops its senses to perceive its surroundings through other means. You choose to grant your Companion Darkvision, Blindsight or Tremorsense of 15 feet. Alternatively, you may roll a d4 instead and gain either Darkvision (1), Blindsight (2), Tremorsense (3) or Truesight (4) of 30 feet. Each time you picked this trait, you may also choose not to pick a new Sense but instead double the range of one of your Companion's current Senses. |
5 | Being in your company has thought your Companion a few new tricks that its species normally couldn't perform. Choose a skill that you are proficient in and make your Companion also proficient with that skill. |
6 | Honing its strengths and weaknesses, your Companion takes an expeditious growth towards evolution. Choose one of your Companion's Ability Score and increase it by 2 or increase it by 1 which does not apply to the cap of 20. |
7 | Adapting to its environment, your Companion becomes more resilient and strong enough to live in hostile situations. Choose a damage type and roll a d8, your Companion reduces damage taken from that type by the amount you rolled. If taken more than once and you choose the same damage type, your Companion also gains Resistance to that damage type as well. |
8 | Growing stronger to the point it has reached the next stage of evolution, your Companion gains a Legendary Action in which can be used once in battle with any attacks it has. |
Sentience
At 6th level, your pursuit of knowledge and growth allows you to find a way to gather information much quicker. Up to three times per day, you can cast Awaken with halved component cost and casting time. You must also finish a Short Rest after casting all of it in order to use it the following day.
Companion Shapeshift
At 10th level, your strong bond with your companion allows you Wild Shape either yourself or your companion to the other. If you choose to Wild Shape to your companion, you also gain any traits it has obtained but, your language is replaced to that of your companion and you gain +3 to Wisdom (Perception) against you while in this form. The same applies to your companion, replacing its language to that of your's.
If at any point you or your companion exhibits behavior that is outside of the other's usual behavior, the next Wisdom (Insight) check made against you or your companion gains Advantage.
Synergistic Evolution
At 14th level, your talent for evolution has allowed you to take on a higher form with the aid of your trusted companion. Using your entire Turn, you combine with your nearby companion to temporarily transform into a new being. In this new form, you gain Temporary Hit Points equal to that of your companions' current Hit Points, taking all of the Traits it has obtained so far and gain the ability to use your companion's attack.
While you have Temporary Hit Points from this feature, you can maintain this form as long as you want but, once you lose your Temporary Hit Points, your new form ends after a number of rounds equal to for 2 + Wisdom Modifier. You may choose to use your Turn in order to end the effects and revert to your normal form early.
Once you revert back to your normal form and your Hit Points is below half of your Hit Points at the time you activated this feature, divide it evenly between yourself and your companion. If you have remaining Temporary Hit Points upon reverting back to your normal form, your companion recovers Hit Points 2d6 + remaining Temporary Hit Points. If you become unconscious while in this form, the effect immediately ends and you and your companion becomes unconscious.
Once you use this feature, you cannot use it again until you finish a Long Rest.
None of the spells from my growth focus get added to my character's list of prepared spells.
I couldn't help but notice that there's some strange overlap with the Ranger class here. It uses terms like Extra Attack and Favored Terrain, which Druids don't have.
the best master is incredibly weak. its famous for being the worse subclass in 5e. on a druid the action to attack thing is better but only 4 times the druid level in health is really bad when you need to resurrect it normally.
please change the sentient trait so you don't get awaken at sixth level
after re-reading the effect you actually wild shape into your friend and your friend wild shapes into you which is weird I think it should work like wild shape normally does except on your companion
Make the companion CR a little higher and let it attack on a bonus action. That should make it more balanced, so you can actually use the companion easily and to better effect.
Beast Master is incredibly weak, lol.
You can make the companion stronger and take the evolution thing even further with the 4th level spell giant insects. If you do this with a scorpion then you can cast this spell on it and make your companion reach CR 3, instead of the normal cap of 1/2. Could potentially make that a feature in the subclass (someway of changing your creature into a giant version of itself)
Could use some grammatical correction, but all right.
It’s taken directly from the Beast Master. How is it incredibly weak?
This is the perfect subclass for a Simic druid! Thank you!
How do you make the tables!? I have been trying forever without any progress!
Is the level 6 feature correct? You can now cast a 5th-level spell 3 times per day at half cost? Awaken is a permanent enchantment that gives you a charmed companion for 30 days. Seems out of balance for a level 6.
This subclass has amazing fluff and potential. I am starting to play it myself but I already see some issues, specially regarding the companion.
Firstly, it's exactly worded as in the animal companion feature from the Ranger, which the part about commanding an attack along yours with the "Extra Attack feature" is not valid since druids don't get that feature.
Secondly, there was an errata on November that reworked a lot about the interaction with the companion. You may look it up to change some of its features.
Finally, Awaken is a 5th level spell that you can cast at level 6. Maybe it was intentional but I find it a little too strong for the level, having the duration and cost benefits and you can even recast it that many times. The short rest restriction is not very effective since a long rest is implied to already have the effects of a short rest.
Somehow this doesn't give me the spells like beast sense automatically.
Does one have to add them manually?
Pretty cool concept tho :)
So at level 10 the companion can wild shape. I was curious if it retains any of it’s traits when it does so. Like would his ac change, attack and damage rolls too depending on the animal it changed into? I was just curious because I am currently playing this subclass in a campaign and I really enjoy it.😁
I really like this circle. And my daughter is already planning using it for her Aasimar Druid (Flora focus) and will be using the homebrewed Treant Sapling as her companion.
I'm thinking of making a couple of slight changes.
1) I won't require the character to command the companion to attack each and every time. Character says, "fight" and the companion fights till the encounter is over (unless otherwise directed by the character). But I may just make commanding a bonus action instead.
2) The synergistic evolution is a cool ability, and I understand that the 10th level companion shapeshift ability thematically leads to that... but the companion shapeshift in and of itself seems weak / not very useful to me. I think a telepathic bond between the 2 would be better and thus it would eliminate the concerns of action/bonus action commanding in item 1.
Thanks for your work on this. I'm looking forward to putting in our game.
While the subclass is indeed companion-focused, it gives them a slight benefit and a fun fluff as it evolves, but it focuses on the synergy of yourself as a Druid and your bit-stronger companion.
This seems like a pretty cool subclass, but isnt the companion potentially incredibly weak even with the buffs?