Two easy Druid fixes (What Mepps Didn't Tell You!)

I played a druid to 65 on Agnarr and played a scrub druid on Rallos Zek 19 or so years ago. They're a versatile class. But today's early EverQuest has hit them where it hurts -- in the LFG marketplace -- and for good, valid reasons.

Druids get hit hardest by the TLP player power creep by way of their efficiency getting eroded. Namely, regeneration lines, damage shields, and DOTs. All 3 of these are the mainstays of a group druid, and they all need longer battles to really matter. But is today's EQ TLP bursts of short fights or long drawn-out battles? (The answer can be summed up with this, in the last pug I did, the only mob the ENC was mezzing was his pet.)

So, I can quickly think of a couple things druids can get helped on for the early TLP. Firstly, their epic clicky is brutal. Not only is it slow, but it never got the increase in damage. Cut the cast time down and up the damage to something worth casting. As it is, druids quite often literally don't bother casting their epic in group play. That is a bad sign.

The next fix will help them come Luclin, in the way of Nature's Recovery. This spell, as it currently is, is hard to justify for the spell slot. It's simply too weak. If this was tweaked to be something along the lines of a hybrid between regeneration and cele/torpor then it could be viable. Druids get no group heals, which really crushes them when multiple members take damage. It's just not the reality of today's EverQuest for a group to sit for 4 or 5 minutes while the group meds and regenerates health after each fight.

So, these 2 changes seem to be relatively easy fixes for druids to be more welcomed in groups and competitive in the LFG market.I'm sure there is more that could be done or said, but it's a start.

(Another PSA: If you're a druid, charm in Chardok and if you're a group in Chardok, take a druid if they charm in Chardok!)

When I think TLP & druids, the issue that stands out to me is their "complete heal" which is just... bad. Making it a real complete heal - even if it means costing 1.5 times more mana - would really help in the earlier expansions imo. Just my passing observation.

Giving druids a "real" CH would be an interesting balance decision. Either give rogues some meaningful utility, or up their damage, also!

If complete heal negates the value of all other healing tactics...

And content is already easy to defeat, trivial in era to even the most lacklustre raid force

Then maybe complete heal should be given the hard look, after all it was a design choice that was moved away from years and years ago? Just something to think about.

The problem with buffing druids or any other class* is we are so overpowered (brains & gear is a huge part of it) on early progression.


*rogues in classic is a different discussion, as the discussion has been rolling since classic and returned with progression servers.

from a TLP standpoint, an early rez say in kunark, would do wonders even if it was 50%
same for shaman

having to run back because you have a druid healer isnt a good thing

The druid can port you all back.

Druids should get an ability equivalent to Necro's mind wrack, then the class would have some juice.

Druids are fine. Rogues though, yuck.

yea, let me evac everyone out of the instance so we can go get the one guy and hope that our camp is not taken. a rez would help them

Druids also have DD spells, and their dots is revamped.
Necro dont have DD (only taps) and dots never revamped.

Necro need more attention i think

What? I mean I know your main point is that necros need their DoTs revamped, which of course I agree with. But necros get loads of DD spells too... Torbas poison line (turns into Neurotoxin, Venin, etc.) and Incinerate Bones line hit every mob type. The Demand For Blood line of nukes can hit any mob. They also get specialized DD's for undead and plant type mobs.

Forgot about this poison DD, sure necro have them, but anyway i think necro need more attention than druid

For Luclin-PoP the Druid CHs need to be revamped.

Firstly because they are percentage heals, they are flagged no critical. This makes them much weaker than standard CH. Remove this flag and allow them to critical.

Secondly, the level 58 Luclin Spell Tunare’s Renewal is 3k for 400 mana. The level 64 PoP Spell Karana’s Renewal is 4.6k for 600 mana. These values should be adjusted. Tunare’s should be bumped to 4.5k and Karana should be bumped to 6.5k for 400 mana putting it still behind Cleric Complete Heal which is 7.5k for 400 mana.

Overall, there are a few things that should’ve happened way earlier for Druids.

Blessing of Ro AA. This AA should’ve happened in GoD/OoW. Having to continue using level 44/62 Debuffs that take two slots and about 10 seconds to cast both until Underfoot makes ATK Debuffs not worth using in group content unlike Slow. If this AA came in much earlier they would have some value in groups for a debuffing role.

Spirit of the Black/White Wolf and Group Spirit of the Black/White Wolf. Lower levels of these AAs made available starting in Luclin and scaling up to fill in the gaps until their current release in TSS/SoD/UF would help balance them out. Providing more endurance in long fights or grind groups and provide utility to their group and raid.

Remote XYZFlare line of spells. The Target off Target Nuke/Heal combination line of spells introduced in Underfoot strikes me as a very Druidic thing and later on it becomes a core part of the class. Having lower levels of these available filling in from level 50-85 would make the class a lot more interesting to play earlier on.

However... these are TLP servers. Outside of the Druid CH changes, everything else would be a massive gameplay change and is more aimed at “if we were recreating the game from square one” type changes. I don’t think they really belong on TLPs.

The only balance changes that should be considered on TLPs to be honest are nerfs of things that didn’t exist in that era. Melee Innate DPS AAs or Origin AAs in classic for example. These sorts of things should be removed and it handles a lot of the other issues balance wise. But there will always be weak and strong classes on TLPs. People need to accept that certain classes go up and down as expansions go on.

I have tried for a long time to make a case for some changes in Druid healing. Here is just a part of my statement sent to Devs long ago.

Third, and I will be brief since this is already getting long. The level 60 Druid spell Nature's Recovery is completely useless in its current form and has never had any relevance other than to take up a slot in a spell book. This is a duration heal that does 30points healing per tick for 3 minutes, so a 900 point heal in total. That is not even worth casting in its current form. My suggestion would be instead to change this to a 150 point heal per tick over 36 seconds, a 6 tick total equaling 900 point heal. This would not be overpowered for its time but would help equal out healing power between the Druid/Shaman/Cleric by adding in a useful duration heal for Druids.

its why i have a bit of beef with the devs as it pertains to TLP servers.

Seeds of Destruction era added several quality-of-life changes to multiple classes. Rogue poison overhaul, Deflection Discipline on knights, melee/priest/hybrid research, and of course Incarnate Anew, the Druid/Shaman resurrection spell.

These were not directly added as features of an expansion release, but were decided on independently, with Incarnate specifically being released 2 weeks prior to SoD. Unfortunately, because of when they took place, it is "out of era", despite the tremendous good it would do for the game to include them. Frankly, if the devs' original intent was to make Incarnate Anew a SoD-era spell, they shouldve tied it to level 81 instead of level 59.

Another cool idea... could go with the healing percent thing they lready have and make natures 3 min regen do like 5percent Per tick.

Only reason I pick cleric over druid for grouping is Rez.
Give druids Rez then I'd pick them over cleric even if Rez is subpar.

That said clerics would need a boost to probably melee DPS to make up the difference or something else unique.

Shamans have slow so if I can't find a chanter for the life of me I pick up them up.

delete druids

The one real problem with druids is lack of a real group heal until DoDH.

I'm a great believer in "smooth progression".

Respect the past, serve up nostalgia, but don't be bound by the terrible design features, omissions and outright mistakes of the past.

I concede that it is hard to "smooth" out the classes, particularly when we have not settled the difficultly level of 40+ content to be anything resembling challenging, and this is most obvious classic to Velious, the group game ratchets up a bit in Luclin and is decently tuned come OoW. My understanding is most semi-serious raid guilds are finding the content pretty easy far past that...