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[Tikker]

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[Kaemon]

Tikk, I'd wait till they tweak their abilities a bit. Only one I know that played a druid is Rynin the Toothless.

-Kae

[Zanchief]

Better healers than shm.

Best group buffs.

In a small two man group different forms can be very useful when used right, in a large group they are buffers and healers.

I like druids, never played one but when I group with them either duo with my shaman or in a group they always do well.

[Ginzburgh]

I play a level 24 druid.

At this point I enjoy it so much that I am going to go druid on retail, no question.

They can most definitely be a good tank in bear form. However you will find yourself collecting three sets of gear. Tank gear, caster gear and melee output gear (cat form).

I have no basis of comparison on the damage output from catform to that of a regular rogue. But it definitly more than what I do in normal druid form. I am most certainly in cat form if my group has a healer and a tank.

Their healing abilities are great but were better before they nerfed our main heal. Now it takes a lot more mana to cast. However, we do have an insta-cast regen that owns, and a huge regen that costs a ton of mana but is great for right before the pull because it regens for a major amount of health.

Druid is a great class because we can:

Buff armor and stats
thorns
big single heal
insta regen
huge regen
tank - bear form
swim under water VERY fast - Walrus form
Invis ourselves - cat form
run 40% faster - travel form
dot - druid form
nuke - druid form
debuff - druid form

Granted there are a lot of those things that any main class can do better. Obviouisly a rogue is better at being a rogue, a tank is better at being a tank, a wizard is better at nuking, mounts are better for run speed, shamans are better buffers (not an option on alliance), priests are better healers etc.

Personally, I'd rather be in a class that can do it all. And with the right gear, a druid can be better than those main classes. For instance, a druid in bear form just broke 5k hp and tanked one of the hardest mobs in the game.

[Harrison]

Im seriously looking at either priest or druid come release.

Ill know more in a few days

[Captain Insano]

how are rogues... i love my new EQ rogue... ?

[Arlos]

Hey, Tikker, you fewlio, *I* Play a druid.

And I am likewise waiting til they finish tweaking the class, give us talents, and fix spirit mana regen, but as it stands right now, I would NOT play one on release.

It's the old Hybrid issues from EQ from back in Kunark all over again. There's nothing we can do that some other class can't do better. We can heal, but a) we have no instant-cast anything that will prevent death, so people who get low are likely dead, period, where a priest could keep them alive, b) We cannot rez, and c) Our mana pool is significantly less than priests, so we can't heal as much.

Bear form, we can tank, sort of, vaguely. It'd be almost, but not quite, as bad to use a druid in bear form to tank anything tough as it would've been to use a Paladin to MT the AOW. Last I checked, I had an armor value about 1500 pts less than a moderately equipped real tank, though my HP were vaguely equivalent. Also, we have no ability to use a shield, and don't get parry, so no chance to mitigate damage by either of those methods, which means we're taking more damage, apart from the armor difference.

Cat form, we can do DPS, sort of, but we get basically none of the stuns that rogues get, and we lack the single most important rogue skill that they're needed in groups for, Sap. Nor can we sneak as well, since we don't have distract.

Also, we can use NO items whatsoever in alternate forms. No rage potions, no AOE trinkets, no healing potions, not even food/drink. So, unlike a warrior, if we're tanking and get low and heal isn't about to land, we can't save ourself with a drink, especially because swapping back when you're low health as bear puts you at like 1hp in humanoid form.

Yes, we can now change forms more rapidly than before, and we can regen mana (slowly) while in alternate forms. That fails to make the alternate forms really any more useful however. This is especially true when you consider that for the most part, Druids are recruited into groups because the group needs healing, largely because Priests are rarer than hell. Since we cannot cast in alternate forms, those forms go pretty much unused in most groups, thus removing most of the adaptability that is supposed to be the druid hallmark.

So, we can't heal as well as a priest, therefore if it's a healer choice between druid and priest, we lose. We cannot tank anywhere near a warrior or paladin, so if it comes to a group needing tanking, we lose again. We do lower DPS than rogues, and have no capability to sap whatsoever, so again, if it comes to a rogue or druid decision, we lose a 3rd time. There is functionally no reason for any group, ever, to take a druid in the group, unless they have a priest and desperately need backup healing. And that'll only be alliance side, horde side people will take a Shaman.

I've posted my thoughts on the class a few times, and made suggestions on how to change it to be a lot more viable, but haven't heard anything. They mentioned before that they plan on doing more with druids, and I also need to see talents before I make any sort of final decision, but I'm pretty unhappy with the current status of the druid. Yeah, it's easier to switch forms now, that doesn't mean there's suddenly any point to DOING so.

-Arlos

[Ginzburgh]

Arlos definitly knows more about the druid than me. So listen to him.