Dungeons & Dragons Overhauls Druid's Wild Shape Ability

Almost every aspect of the Druid's Wild Shape ability has been tweaked in Dungeons & Dragons.

By Christian Hoffer

The Druid is getting an overhauled core feature in the new Dungeons & Dragons ruleset. Today, Wizards of the Coast released a preview of its new Druid class, one of the 12 core classes for Dungeons & Dragons. Like other classes, the Druid will receive a significant overhaul and upgrade to many of its abilities, but much of the new class's change involves Wild Shape, a core ability of the Druid that allows characters to turn into different animal forms both in and out of combat. The new Wild Shape rules provide the Druid with more versatility, better define its limitations, and make the actual Wild Shape forms significantly stronger. 

The biggest change to Wild Shape is that it now requires a Bonus Action to activate instead of an Action. This change means that a Druid can now Wild Shape and still make an attack on the same turn, or cast a spell, Wild Shape, and then move using the Wild Shape's movement speed. Additionally, where the Druid used to have only 2 Wild Shapes per Short or Long Rest, the Druid now gains access to a 3rd Wild Shape use at 6th Level and then a 4th Wild Shape use at 17th Level. However, the Druid now only regains a single Wild Shape use on a Short Rest. 

To somewhat offset this, the Druid's new Wild Resurgence allows a Druid to burn a spell slot to regain a Wild Shape use and alternatively burn a Wild Shape use to regain a Level 1 spell slot. Druids can also use a Wild Shape slot to summon a Wild Companion, providing a bit more versatility to the Wild Shape ability when players don't want to split off from the party or want to utilize a flying animal at lower levels.

Another key change is that Druids no longer use the Hit Points of the animal they transform into. Instead, the Druid retains their current HP total and also gains a pool of temporary Hit Points equal to their Druid level. Additionally, the Druid can now still speak while in Wild Shape form. 

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Finally, Druids are now somewhat limited to the number of known forms they transform into when they use Wild Shape. Initially, Druids have 4 known forms they transform into, with 2 additional forms gained (for a total of 6 known forms) at 4th Level and 2 more forms (for a total of 8 forms) at 6th level. Other restrictions, such as CRs and fly speed restrictions are still in space, although Druids can now transform into creatures with a Swim speed whenever they Wild Shape. 

These new changes provide a robust set of changes to the Druid, which also receives a new subclass in the Player's Handbook. You can check out the full slate of changes to the Druid here and check out the full changes to Dungeons & Dragons here.

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