D&D: ‘Unearthed Arcana’ Druids – Putting The Wild Back Into Wild Shape, Sorta
In the latest Unearthed Arcana, Druids, and especially Moon Druid, get a lot more wild, bringing shapeshifting front and center.
Druids are such an interesting mix when it comes to their role in D&D. On the one hand, they’re the nature magic casters, all about using the primal forces to help allies and hinder foes. They make vines twist and grow, they summon spirits of the wild.
And yet they are also the ones who turn into bears, or horses, or whatever else and run around as an animal for an increasingly significant portion of the day. In this push and pull between primal magic and being a bear, the Druid exists.
Wild Shape, the power that lets them become a bear (or anything else) gets some fairly significant attention in the latest Unearthed Arcana, leaving the 2024 Druid looking up, as far as classes go.
Unearthed Arcana 8 – New Druid, New Beasts
The latest Druid is not too different from the last place we saw it. Primal magic still gets a buff, so hopefully Druids who do more than just become bear will see play in the 2024 Edition. Because that’s one of my own personal favorite Druid archetypes. The weirdo mystic in total communion with nature and who commands impossibly powerful forces.
Pour that on a cracker and eat it up.
But it’s telling what WotC thinks Druids should be, because the biggest and indeed only change to these Druids comes in the form of the new Wild Shape rules. Which are very similar to the old Wild Shape rules.
In a nutshell, you can use your Bonus Action to transform into a Beast. You stay transformed for up to half your Druid level in hours, unless you decide to change or get incapacitated/killed. You no longer replace your hit point pool with a separate pool of Beast Hit points that ablate any and all damage you might have taken, which is for the best. All this is old news. But what’s different is that now there’s a section on “Known Forms” in the rules:
“Known Forms. You know a number of forms for this feature equal to 2 plus half your Druid level (round up), chosen from among Beast stat blocks in the Player’s Handbook that have a maximum Challenge Rating of 1/4 and that lack a Fly Speed. Rather than choosing, you may start with the Riding Horse, Spider, and Wolf. Whenever you finish a Long Rest, you can replace one of your known forms with another eligible form.”
Druids now have a limited selection of animals. Sort of. By default, they are limited to the Beast stat blocks in the Player’s Handbook, though not long after, it says “when choosing a new form, you may look in the Monster Manual or elsewhere for eligible Beasts if the DM permits you to do so.”
In other words, if you let your players change into a broken new beast squirreled away in an adventure, that’s on you pal. But though there’s a limit to the number of forms you can assume, this is mostly irrelevant, since you’ll be picking from a pretty broad category of things. But where it does come into play is with the Circle of the Moon.
Circle of the Moon – Making Wild Shape More Magical
Circle of the Moon Druids are all about Wild Shape. They turn into Beasts and wade into combat. They’re as changeable as the Moon, so the description says. And this subclass gets a pretty significant overhaul, starting with a brand new feature: Circle Spells.
Circle Spells gives Moon Druids a list of bonus spells that they’ll always have prepared. Included on this list are a selection of Moon-themed spells, including Cure Wounds, Vampiric Touch, Moon Beam, and Dawn. But tagging along, are two new spells, Starry Wisp and Fount of Moonlight.
Starry Wisp is a new Cantrip that will be your Druid and Bard’s best friend. It’s a ranged spell attack that shoots a mote of light at an enemy, dealing 1d8 Radiant damage and making the creature hit emit Dim Light, negating invisibility for a turn.
Fount of Moonlight is a level 4 self-buffing spell that adds 2d6 Radiant damage to your melee attacks, makes you Resistant to Radiant damage, and lets you use a Reaction to Blind a creature that damages you.
Beyond these new spells, there’s more for the Circle of Moonlight Druid. Circle Forms is the new and improved Combat Wild Shape. It works most of the same way but gives you an improved AC (13 + your Wisdom Modifier) and three times your Druid level in Temporary Hit Points. Which is not bad.
At higher levels, Improved Circle Form lets you deal Radiant damage when attacking, which is nothing special but will help you overcome damage resistance, and you can add your Wisdom modifier to Constitution saves. This feature feels very meh as the highest feature most Druids are likely to see.
At later levels, Moonlight Step lets you teleport as a Bonus Action and gives you advantage on the next attack roll you make, while Lunar Form gives you extra Radiant Damage and lets you bring a friend when you use your Moonlight Step.
Check out the Unearthed Arcana Druid
All in all, the new Druid is looking pretty good.
