Hello! I've been thinking about trying out a druid for Oakwyn after not really getting interested in a few others classes there during its start, but I'd like some input over its longevity through a server. I do my best to try and stick around way beyond PoP/GoD as well, despite the fact that I do not box. I was mostly curious if this would be the type of class that had any sort of luck finding groups/guilds without the needs to box. No, I do not want to play a necromancer as I've done this during the mischief tlp with...mixed results due to playtime.
I don't know how druids or necros will be past OoW, but just play what you like now and stop playing (a class or a game) when you stop liking it. It's really that easy. Good luck buddy.
You will never have trouble finding a guild as any class on a TLP. Druid is good for the first 3/4 expansions, then has a long low period until around the 70+ era where they come back into their own and eventually turn into very strong adps support healers.
You will struggle for groups if you rely on pugging. You'll be the last healer picked, as both clerics and shamans bring more to a group. Every guild wants at least 1 druid in a raid, but that is about all you need. And need is a strong word, my guild on Mischief spent most of it's time from classic to well, currently, without a druid, not even a box, with little negative impact. The ports are nice in Classic and Kunark where you do multiple targets in a single night but once Velious rolls around and you spend less time bouncing around on your raid nights it's meh. I was our one druid for a couple of expansions and felt pretty useless. I had one necro who asked for my HP buff and everyone else preferred to get cleric buffs and save the buff slots. Every other buff I had to offer someone else had a better version. So all I really brought to a raid was heals and both Cleric and Shaman did that better too.
Personally, I've always been a fan of the druid class, but that's just personal preference probably. Reality is that druids aren't picked first for healing, dps, crowd control, nor pulling. They obviously don't tank, so that pretty much covers the majority of the rolls in a group. Their heals are sub par to clerics, no rez ability early on, no slows, no mez abilities, HP buffs are subpar compared to clerics, and only gets STR buff to compete with Shamans for buffing. In a group, you are basically a secondary class for all roles. You don't fit the definition of any role, but... you are good at many things. You can snare and root for some crowd control. You can heal way better than a ranger, so there's that, and eventually your heals become pretty good. Your HP buffs, while not as good as clerics, do serve a purpose by letting the cleric save mana having you buff everybody other the tank. While a monk or bard will be chosen before you for pulling, in outdoor zones, you can effectively be the group puller. So, I mean, druid is not a worthless class. It is way better than a rogue so to speak. Poor rogues. Now as for soloing... that's where druids shine. But, you have to want to play that style. No reason to take a class that can do something really good if you don't like doing that thing they do really good lol.
But for some wicked reason they can no longer (dire) charm the lv 46 rats in Crypt of Decay which is a real bummer. It was working for years until about roughly 2 or 3 months ago and then it stopped working.
In HoT, Druids start getting aura spells that increase fire and ice nuke/dot damage. At this point they ideal healer for caster DPS group.
