How do you swap stats for Druids using Wildshape?

[MTS]

So a Druid hits level 2 and wants to use Wildshape. His current HP go into homeostasis while he is shapechanged, and he uses the Str, Dex, Con, and HP from the new animal if I'm reading the PHB correctly.

How do you handle this in Fantasy Grounds? Do you create a new animal PC for the druid every time he changes shape?

[Trenloe]

Discussed here: https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?24754-Druid-Wild-Shape

[MTS]

OH Nice!!! Thank you!

[Zacchaeus]

That post gives two options but I'd recommend creating the NPC as a new player; in fact you'll likely have to create several new players. I tried using a beastie and also changing stats on the character sheet using effects but I found neither method as being too satisfactory. In Wildshape the Druid takes on all of the goodies that the beastie has but retains some of the abilities. It also retains many of the features of the class as well as getting some new ones of their own such as Combat Wild Shape.

With so many changes necessary either to the original sheet or to the beastie sheet I found that it was way better and faster just to create a completely new character from scratch. The only downside is that you need a new character sheet potentially for every beastie that the Druid can turn into. I got around that by getting my wildshaping druid player to pick three and prepared sheets for only those.

[Wonderbringer]

I create them as items in the Druid's inventory. First I created a new NPC tab just for Wildshapes (this is so they can be dragged and dropped on a PC's sheet). Then I create Wildshape as an item in their inventory and each creature they frequently change into as an item "stored" within the Wildshape. I then open each creature's item window and simply drag-and-drop the NPC link to it. From there they can be viewed at any time by the player and edited as well.
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[MTS]

Both of these are great ideas. Zacchaeus's idea of creating individual PC's for each animal shape at first sounds like a lot of work, but I'm thinking if I saved them all in a library... that would make it easier.

What other problems do you have to think about? Is it easy to get the new PC to the player?

And Wonderbringer, when your druid wild-shape's into a beast, how does he go about it with your system? Do you then drag the beast into the Combat Tracker as a friendly ally, and hide the druid's token on the map?

[Wonderbringer]

Yep, simple as that.

[Trenloe]

What other problems do you have to think about? Is it easy to get the new PC to the player?
It's a PC available for the player to select from the Character Selection screen, pretty easy. If they need to see the character record before the game you can export the XML and email it to them.

You can also make copies of the base PC using character export/import and then modify the stats of the newly imported PC copy to reflect the changes due to wild shape. This makes it quite relatively quite to make the PC entries required.

[Zacchaeus]

Both of these are great ideas. Zacchaeus's idea of creating individual PC's for each animal shape at first sounds like a lot of work, but I'm thinking if I saved them all in a library... that would make it easier.

What other problems do you have to think about? Is it easy to get the new PC to the player?

The beastie is created as a player character so it is available to the player when he logs on to the campaign. He just selects it like a normal character. In other words the Druid has 4 characters in the game, his main one and three beasties. Some of the other advantages I found was that the beasties speed, AC, HP, special abilities and actions could all be kept in one place and more easily changed if needed. Also effects could be targeted exactly where they were needed and properly tracked. Wonderbringer's method is pretty much the same idea except he starts with the beastie and edits that instead of creating a new PC.

[Trenloe]

Other advantages of using a PC is that any hotkeys used are linked to the PC - so you can setup hotkeys specific to the wild shape PC being used. You can also setup effects specific to the wild shape being used and if you use the remove effect extension you can get pretty flexible in what effects you switch in and out. And, if this is something you care about, you can have different dice colours for each wild shape.

[MTS]

Nice! I'm really glad I asked about this, even though another thread already existed.

I love the hotkeys being per/PC. I didn't even think about that advantage. But I guess you end up with each beast-PC showing up as a player, right? With only one active at a time? Or can the player keep them closed until they're played?

[Trenloe]

But I guess you end up with each beast-PC showing up as a player, right? With only one active at a time? Or can the player keep them closed until they're played?
Only select the wild shape PC from Character Selection when you want to play them. Right-click on the portrait on the desktop and select "release" to stop using the a currently selected PC. Keep your base druid PC selected and then just select/release the wild shape PC as needed.

[Nylanfs]

Yea, otherwise you will have a dozen of portraits at the top. One gotcha is that if you use the automatic divy up of xp make sure they are on their main druid char or they might get their xp messed up.

[Trenloe]

Yea, otherwise you will have a dozen of portraits at the top. One gotcha is that if you use the automatic divy up of xp make sure they are on their main druid char or they might get their xp messed up.
The key here is to just have the main druid character in the Party Sheet. It actually has nothing to do with which PCs are active/selected at the time - it's all based off which PC's are in the party sheet when XP is shared out.

[Griogre]

Personally, I play a Druid of the Moon and I just keep it simple. I just use my base character. If I turn into a bear I just change my portrait to a bear, set my temp hps = to the bear's hps and open up the NPC Monster stats the DM shared with me. I hot key the various things I change into so I can easily open things the DM has shared. You can attack or save or do a skill roll off of the NPC's sheet. Simple and easy and they are static so as I level I don't have to adjust anything.

[Azngalahad]

is there any way to share a combat tracker npc with a player so they can use things like abilities? i thought about just dragging the monster in from the manual and letting them control it if that could work

[kylania]

Actually yes! Just drag the creature shield/dragonhead icon from the far right of the combat tracker onto the player's portrait in the top left of the screen. That will pop up the NPC sheet for that specific NPC. The player can than double click on the autoparsed Attack and Hit and other links to attack as that NPC.