I just played through the story with my first Primalist/Druid and wanted to share my experience/thoughts on this class and subclass and why i think that the druid-subclass has not been thought through.
TLDR:
- Switch unlocks for Spriggan form with Werebear form, because Werebear synergises more with other subclasses, while Spriggan exclusively with Druid skills
- Switch unlocks for Swarmblade form with Summon Spriggan to allow Beastmaster Companion and posison synergy
- Make Ice thorns only target the player by default, so that the Thorn barrier defense is not wasted
- Give Spriggan form more ways to use normal skills like Companion abilities; feels bad if i cant uses my Spriggan companions active heal
Sepperate Spriggan form vale spirits from the Entangling roots trigger; This node feels wrong and counterintuative
Full Story: I wanted a plant-based Druid, something like the Spriggan form with the Spriggan companion and some vines and thorns
- Skill: Ice thorns; convert to physical; convert bleed to poisonProblem: Converting bleed to posison does not add the poison tagReason: This just feels wrong, and i hoped it would benefit from the Tongue of the abberant seer ring. I gues this could go for all Physical skills that have a add poison or conver to poison Node, though this might end up beeing to poerfull in this build atleast.2. Problem: It can targed allies with the Thorn Barrier Node instead of only the Protectors briar Node. Based on the description, it seems like a bug, but since it has been reported long ago and mulitple times ignored, it seems intended. In this case it should not be, because having this triggered on hit and then cast on miniions makes the Armour you get from Thorn Barrier useless (to the player)
Thorn Totem: not a fan of totems, so skipped that one (but will come back later)
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Skill: Serpent strike; feels VERY good, nice clear with plague, lots of poison stack for single targed; carried me
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Skill: Spriggan form; So i finally got my Druid Subclass and can start with the Spriggan stuff, but there isnt as much Poison scaling as i had hoped for my venomous plants, so pure poison-dot seems out of the question.
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Skill: Summon Spriggan; nice heals, fits thematically, solid companionProblem: I cannot use its companion ability while in Spriggan form. Cant trigger it or have my Spriggan use it on their own. Feels bad man.
Bug: Does not have the “Can be converted to cold” Icon next to the Skill, even though it has a Node that does this -
Skill: Swarmblade form: seems cool; can switch between Spriggan and Swarmblade; Can use Serpent strike tree (NICE!)Problem: Spriggan is ranged, so these dont combine nicely…Then i remember: There is this Aspect of the Viper and the scorpion, and both would be very cool with Serpent STrike and the Swarmblade. The Druid also has a Passive at 15 that gives melee bleed and spell poison chance, wich would be “useless” for a posion swarmblade…Problem: Swarmblade is 25 in Druid, therfore inaccessable to the BeastmasterSolution: make Swarmblad require less levels in druid, making it available to other classes. (but switch with what? - i’ll com back to that)
Now back to the Spriggan form, since i have a clearer pickture of what skills i can use that synergise and have points available. Since i cannot use my normal skills as Spriggan i want to trigger/use their trees atleast somehow, like the Swarmblade with Serpent strike or the Werebear with Leap and RoarProblem: Spriggan does not have any Node that would enable something like that.Okayokay, but there is a trigger Node for Entangling roots …? - exept its just bad, feels bad and makes little sense (to me)Reason: Triggering Entangling roots requires max Vales spirits, wich you get every 5th cast of Spirit thorns (or other ways with Idols or Nodes)
The Problems here are that it either takes very long to get one cast of, is unpredicatable when youll cast it, is not consistend or just annoying to set up.
The other Problem is the Node itself: Vale spirits themselves add projectiles to you spirit thorns, wich results in double damage at 3 spirits.The Node then adds +1/2/3 max spirits wich COULD be another big increase in damage, EXEPT once you reach max, you loose you spirits and 66% of you damage for a single cast of Entangling roots. This is just not worth it and feels bad.
Solutions: Split the Max spirits from the Trigger Node.Even if you just remove the +max spririts from the Node you immediatly remove this Problem of loosing lots of damage AND make the skill trigger more consistently. It also remove this Feeling of the Node working against itself.
Another solution would be to move the max spirits to the normal vale spirit node, increasing its max level to 6. Yes of course permanently having 6 vale spirits would be OP, but DAMN AWESOME with all those thorns flying around.
Another solution would be to change the Trigger: Instead of removeing all spirits, you keep most of them like so:"Whenever you would gain another vale spirit while at maximum vale spirits, instead remove one vale spirit and cast Entangling roots. …"Now you can keep your vale spirits up for more damage and can trigger the skill every 10 casts of Spirit Thorns. In this version though the boni for the cast should be changed.
I know that you could also just spam healing totem+Thorn totem with Vale Spirit on totem death/unsummon and mana on totem death/unsummon to freqeuently cast Entangling thorns. But my Problem is primarily the dissonance between getting extra projectiles per spirit and loosing these of casts. Id rather have another Node with “Shoot 1 extra projectile per vale spirit” (and remove this form the default vale spirits). This way i can choose wether i want to use them for casting (entangling roots) or attacking (with spirrit thorns)
IMPORTAN: i’m not saying “Buff Spriggan form”, im saying “I dont use these skills, because they feel bad” and i think changing these skills could enable more playstiles and make more players happy
- Skill: So now i finally have Entangling roots unlocked as as skill andts quite good. Its AoE means that its just better than Spriggan form for groups of small targets.This ofcourse makes me feel annoyed, since i cant reliably trigger or even just normal cast in in Spriggan form. Id rather have acces to Entangling roots with normal values and Rage instead of Manacost, instead of the Thorn shield.Or maybe add a Node for thorn shield to trigger Entangling roots, but it gains its Mana cost as rage Cost
As a result of this i didnt use this skill much, but heres what i found: The 360° node feels good and having it trigger when stunned helps with survival alot, especially if combined with healing spores. I really like the spores and the healing and vine Nodes for its, but i feel like the Haste node’s duration is to short. The Sporese also dont look very good/ are not very visible and blend too much with the environment. I also think the should be spread more evenly around the player and not clum up right next to each other (At least that happend in some situations where i could see them)Bug: Does not have the “Can be converted to cold” Icon next to the Skill, even though it has a Node that does this
I also now use the Healing-Thorn Totem Node with the “summon 3 at once” Node and it feels great. The Thorn totems look really great with homing thorns!I initially abuste the “summon 3 at once” with the “regain mana on death/unsummon” to regain my rage, but now i dont need that anymore and can instead use other cool Nodes (like the Homing)
Now, enough complaints about Spriggan form, onto the Druid itself:I find / as far as i cant tell, Spriggan form only synergises with Druid skills.On the other hand, Werebear and Swarmblade use Primalist skills.So why is the Werebear the Druids Subclass-Skill, instead of the Spriggan form ???
I already mentioned, how cool a poison-Swarmblade-beastmaster could be, but what about a Werebear beastmaster?Wouldnt it be “just natural” to become a bear and fight with your companions?The spriggan form doesnt even have companion ability triggers, but the Swarmblad has, so why is the Spriggan form available to all subclasses, but the Swarmblade not?It could synergise alot more with the Beastmaster than the Spriggan can!
And lastly: Think about "Lightning bear"Would it be cool th runn around as a bear and have lightning claws? - yes, it is! There are even Skills for the Werebear.So why is it that the Werebear is Druid-exclusive, while the (melee)Lighting Passives are behind the Shaman ???This again makes no Sense (to me)Solution: make the Werebear a unlocable Druid skill with less than 21 points required!
Now all this tells me that the solution to these Transform problems would be:Make Switch Spriggan and Werebear form and switch Summon Spriggan and Swarmblade.And as far as i know, there would be no Synergy that goes missing, but you add a ton of potential the the Werebear and Swarmblade with other subclasses!
Now that im finished ranting, please prove me wrong or tell me about synergies that are currently possible and better than what i proposed.
Or maybe if we all agree, just swap these 4 skills around.
And dont get me wrong: I really enjoyed playing Spriggan form and the things i mentioned were not roadblocks to me and this build, BUT i do now have a strong urge to play a lightning bear with storm totems and lighning claws!