Druid Raid Main Worthwhile?

Noticed they are in demand and generally under represented in raid forces.

Was planning on playing Cleric but considering rerolling as a Druid while there is still time.

For anyone that mains a Druid in a raid guild, what advantages/disadvantages do they bring over a Cleric?

I figure advantages would be not having to sit in a CH rotation and instead being free to patch heal as needed or DPS if you have enough healing already and less competition for some of the loot.

Disadvantage is a much harder time finding groups although that's mostly an issue in the levelling phases, can probably grind out aa solo via animal charm if needed.

Are the upsides worth the downsides?

There is a very large thread about druids somewhere in the tlp forum, from the recent past. I'd try to google it.

druids are underrated on TLPs. they are quite capable of coming near the top of parses on many classic fights due to their resist adjusted dots and variety of nukes. they can also heal more than adequately.

What server/era?

This is all based on playing classic - PoP(live), classic-kunark, classic-kunark, classic-kunark and now Classic - PoR (phinny).

Depends, a cleric is just a better healer by far, but a druid can flex into more roles. If you're on a newer TLP, chances are you have 6-8 clerics in your guild and a druid might be a better option. But if your guild needs a healer, you aren't really going to fill that role properly. It takes a LOT more effort to keep your groups up on a druid than it does on a cleric. A cleric's life doesn't change much through their career in EQ, it's CH rots, group heals and buffs. A druid actually evolves and gets stronger/weaker in certain areas each xpac. So do you want to be good at healing or mediocre at everything?

Few examples and a mini-rant. Our spells are way less powerful and cost way more mana. e.g. our first group heal comes in PoR - it costs 1100 mana and heals for 1500 (+65% focus + AA bonus = like 2600-3000 + chance to crit). Like... REAL bad ratio. We get no HoTs, let alone group HoTs. We do have Skin of the Reptile now though, which is really good. And we can heal better than shaman, but they get a group HoT, epic click is a free group HoT also, and group cures. We have one of the worst epic clicks, 100% bottom 3, it's just trash compared to the other two priests, and basically useless. Druids get the short end of the stick in almost every situation. When comparing just the three priests, every expansion, you'll notice that druids get the worst spells, worst AAs, worst class only loot, worst Anguish BP click, no group cures, no purify spirit or anything similar, EVERY XPAC. If you're playing during NToV era be ready to hate yourself, as you cast group circles and skin every 3 seconds for the entire raid. Or in GoD Tacvi, get ready to use that terrible poison cure and just chain cast it for the entire raid.

With that being said, I've mained a druid since '99, I like it just because I can fill in where needed and change my role up every raid. Sometimes I heal a caster group, sometimes we're overly healed and I can just DoT/nuke. Our lure magic DoT is AMAZING though, the first item I buy every xpac is the new magic focus, it's that OP. Druids make great pullers for XP groups. I can three box a lot though pretty easily as a druid, and ports are of course great. There are a lot of reasons to enjoy playing a druid, they just happen to be the red headed step child of EQ.

-Happyfeet

Coirnav, which is about a month into Classic.

Good answer, I think you've successfully sold me...











On staying with Cleric

Druids make excellent healers to supplement the Clerics. They keep the groups of DPS alive, splash heal the tanks, and cure Everyone of nasty dots/curses. They apply DoT's to supplement the DPS, they debuff the mob so other casters can not waste mana on spell resists. They can CC in a pinch (Demi bats anyone?).


A well played druid is amazing to behold.

Happyfeet is the best druid on phinny too, so if anyone knows, it's him.

I'd play what you like though. That's what I tell anyone. Do you like cleric better? Play cleric. Druid? Play druid! Rogue? Play a monk. Lol. Never play the "most in-demand class" or the "strongest class" -- play the class you find the be the most fun to play and I guarantee that even if it's something obscure, you'll play longer and be a better player than you would on whatever else you'd choose for reasons other than level of fun.

Druid in our raids is out healing the clerics.

Thanks for that, and that is 100% the key, play what you enjoy. I like playing a druid because I do get charm, evacs, and other stuff that allow me to do dumb stuff and get away with it. e.g. Trying to solo something I shouldn't be able to or whatever.
You really only need 1 druid and beyond that you'd be better off with more clerics, from a purely meta stand point. The 2-3 clerics and 1 shaman are always going to get keyed before a druid, that's just the waaaay it iiiiiis, some things will never chaaaaanggeee. But I still like being a druid.

Man, I remember when we did the last fight for my beastlord's 1.5. You kiting that room full of mobs in RCoD on one character while we burned it all down with the other.

Sounds like you have some pretty piss poor clerics. Smack your cleric officer/leader around and have them do their job. A mediocre cleric should never be out healed by a tree hugger, let alone a good one.

Druids are pretty alright. They have mgb wood that helps with that aoe damage. But beyond 1 or 2, I'd rather have more shamans because avatar and 1.5/2.0 are pretty awesome. Sure, they aren't quite as good healers, but the utility more than makes up for it and they heal just fine anyway.

Also, if you have lots of mages/wizards, druids help tons with those debuffs.

This response is a meme at this point, and pretty misleading/bad advice for most people.

Just for an example, if I was playing what I wanted, I'd be playing rogue. If I was playing rogue, I'd be frustrated consistently getting out dpsed by classes with more utility than me. I also really like Necro, but was pretty annoyed with twitching clerics, and putting in 3 times the effort of other dps classes, and only very rarely being able to top parse.

Most people care about their performance, and how useful they are/feel. If you don't care about that, by all means pick your class based on feel.

Maybe it's a meme, but it's mostly right. If you play something you hate, you're gonna have a bad time. Especially flavor of the month things. For instance, everyone says OGRE EVERY CLASS THAN CAN BE OGRED, but I cannot main anything that isn't an iksar. I just do not enjoy it, because I love the race, and the origin point. That limits my class choices a bit, but luckily, I've mained: Monk, Sham, Beast, and now SK. So I'm good. Maybe I lack stun resist, but I don't worry about min-maxing race/class combos, this is EQ after all.

That being said, you are right. Blindly picking a class could lead to a lot of downtime if you don't pick wisely. Most people have two or three classes they like, and you may have to make a choice between them if you want to get groups and not be sitting LFG forever. If you like monks or rogues, I'd pick a monk pre-omens as a DPS class, were I to roll. If you like Enc, Wiz, or Bard.. In classic, I might pick enc because they're so overpowered, but long term (post-PoP), the wizard or bard are going to be rarer and more useful on raids, if you like them just as much because you don't need more than 3 or 4 good encs for most content.

It is kinda funny that I put: "Rogue? Play a monk." in my post that you quoted though. I agree with you, rogues get gimped on progression servers pre-omens, and it sucks for them.

im curious why people think clerics heal circles around druids in early EQ, when they have the same heal spells minus CH. which isnt worth using in classic at all, and rarely in kunark.

druids get superior heal in classic now, which is also a clerics main heal. clerics get a new spell called healing light, but its almost the exact same mana:hp ratio as superior and hardly qualifies as substantially better healing than superior.

edit to add Healing Light 3.36 hp:mana and superior healing is 3.24. thats the definition of minimal difference. a little more than 1/10th of ONE hp difference in efficiency.

superior is more than sufficient to heal every encounter in classic and kunark

Druid heals are fine except -maybe- in velious at 60, in full gear, but Luclin/PoP bridge those gaps by a lot and it's no longer an issue. I sort of wish they'd insert 90% druid/sham rez into these servers in PoP like they did on Fippy, instead of during omens. Would make those classes way more popular for groups, since many people's main worry is they won't have a rez on hand, if they die.

Druids heal comparatively well to clerics in a group setting Classic-Velious. Their lack of CH only hurts them when you have a charmed pet tanking, in which case a Druid Healer really isn't viable, or when tanks start getting much better geared.

The Luclin/PoP Druid CHs suck. The Luclin one heals less than half that of a Cleric CH for the same mana, cast time and it cannot Critical heal. The PoP one heals about 50% more for 50% more mana and also cannot Critical.

Reptile in DoDH is a great addition to all areas of healing, with its strongest point being farming lots of blue cons in a group.

The Druid group heal in PoR is awful, so is the upgrade in TBS. It isn't until SoF that our group heal line is viable.

In PoR on Phinigel right now clerics have CH which still has some purpose, Light, Remedy, Desperate Renewal, 2.0, Divine Arb, Word Group heal, HoT. All tools they can fall back on when healing.

When a Druid is healing in PoR you have your ancient chlorobon and that's about it. The Druid CH is useless now. The Druid group heal isn't really worth loading. Convergence of Spirit and Spirit of the Wood are long recasts. Later expansions give Druids more tools:

TSS adds the Adrenaline line which is a 1.8s cast 15s recast large heal.

SoF adds Survival which is a 0.5s cast 90s recast (after AAs) group Emergency heal and by this point our normal group heal spell has been improved to useful status.

SoD adds Promised line of heals which has marginal uses.

HoT adds Rejuvenation 0.5s cast time 12s recast line of heals for emergency healing

So basically it isn't until HoT where Druids have almost a comparable number healing tools as a Cleric. In that time clerics also gained the 11th hour line and a few other kings as well but at least when we go to heal we have more than one button we can choose to press.

That being said, Druids do fine for all group activities other than Velious-GoD groups where you have a charmed pet tanking. In raids they can handle healing any group. They do fine hanging with clerics but don't have the emergency heal/balance tools clerics do until much later.

The value of the Druid is being able to fill multiple roles and do things on your own. You can heal a group or you can DPS in a group. You can charm level 14-100 or you can group in that time frame. Charm soloing is probably better AA EXP in PoP and GoD than most groups are also. On raids you will often need to keep a group alive or a tank alive and there are plenty of raids where you're free to do DPS.