Ultimate Guide to Druids in D&D 5e

Guide by Sam West, Twitter:@CrierKobold

Have you ever watched a bear flip a tent, and then thought "Wow, I really wish I could be that bear!" Maybe you've had passing fantasies about controlling plants with your mind, or lounging about as a cat all day with no responsibilities like taxes. Sometimes you just want access to a flock of giant owls; if any of these are true for you, Druid will deliver.

Druids are D&D hippies with a legacy of weird restrictions, broken summoning magic, and the power of shape changing in the form of Wild Shape. 5th Edition druids have some problems, but especially with some of their newer subclasses can be a wild and wonderful experience at most tables.

Foundationally, druids are full casters. Spellcasting is their bread and butter, agnostic of subclass. With you getting zero new features at 3rd and 5th level, you're completely relying on your new spells to do the heavy lifting when exploring the world, especially in the upper tiers. When coming to druid, even if you're eager to start mauling things as a wolf, I'd consider everything that isn't your spell list and spell slots as secondary options, with your primary focus being at its best when working in the spellcasting department.

Using This Guide

Druids have a messy image. Wild Shape is a long, complicated feature with nested abilities not apparently on display. Cantrips and spell selections are a whole beast of their own to tackle, and with how tied to summoning magic the class is, it can feel like everything Druids do is complicated. This guide aims to present these ideas in a digestible way for newer players while offering experienced druids some ideas for spell selections and subclass problem identification to assist in building the best druid you could ask for.

New Player: If this is your first time delving into the world of druid, I’d focus primarily on the first few levels here that cover the basics of Wild Shape and spellcasting, namely focusing on juggling your concentration and setting expectations for the role your spells fulfill. I’d also check out the section on the basics of summoning magic for how spells like Summon Beast and Conjure Animals function.
As prepared casters, you’ve got a lot of room to experiment around. Outside of cantrips, you have the ability to pick new spells every long rest to play with. Try stuff out, find out what you like!
Experienced Player: If you’re playing a druid already and finding some difficulty contributing meaningfully, each spell level section covers my general thoughts on some of Druid’s best spells and what spells of that level I’d avoid. Summoning magic tends to be what druids do best; if you’re struggling with a specific subclass (like Circle of the Moon), I’d check out that subclasses specific page for how you can navigate its problems.

Druid 101

Like all classes, Druids are built upon weapon and armor proficiencies that anyone can use to moderate effect in the low tiers before even delving into spell selection. Where most classes offer a subclass at 1st or 3rd level, druids are somewhat odd ducks in that they pick their circle at 2nd level. I’d highly recommend taking a glance at those subclasses when picking your Ability Scores, specifically if you want Wild Shape to be a major element of your character.

Ability Score Placement

Wisdom is the primary ability score druids care about, followed by Constitution and Dexterity. Wisdom fuels your Spellcasting feature, and Constitution helps you maintain concentration on your long-duration concentration spells which is core to druid’s 3rd level and up play.

I’d highly recommend getting as high a Wisdom modifier as possible. You can opt to also take a high dexterity to use your proficiencies for moderate damage output without needing to dedicate cantrips to dealing damage, or go with a higher constitution to help succeed on saves made to maintain concentration.

Your Wild Shape feature will do the bulk of heavy lifting (literally, in the case of Circle of the Moon) for your Strength score when you’d need it, and your Intelligence and Charisma don’t majorly contribute to any of your offered relevant skill proficiencies or abilities down the road. All three are optional for your skill desires, but not core to druid’s class performance.

Starting Proficiencies and Equipment

Druids get a specific list of relevant weapon proficiencies that will often overtake cantrips for your base damage option in the first few levels with a 14 or higher Dexterity. The standouts are scimitars, which are d6 light, finesse weapons that offer you off-hand weapon attacks out the gate, and daggers for a hybrid thrown/melee option. Slings aren’t great, but will do in a pinch if you want a reasonable and unique ranged option for encounters in the first couple levels of the game.

Past 3rd level, you’re probably going to be relying on your magic and subclass features to define your in combat capabilities, and won’t really need these weapons much anymore. Building a melee ranged druid tends to be best supported by the Circle of Spores, but even that option will have you focusing on short ranged spells rather than investing in feats and weapon improvements.

Druid AC. Most druids tend to favor medium armor, as that doesn’t require a major investment past your initial Ability Score assignments to get a solid AC. With a +2 Dexterity, you’re getting as much as you can from medium armor. You’re likely going to start out at best with a Chain Shirt or Scale Mail. Chain Shirts set your AC at 13+Dexterity modifier (maximum of 2), which typically looks like a 15 for most druids. Scale Mail offers you a bonus AC at the expense of taking disadvantage on your stealth checks made while wearing it.

You can invest gold into your AC as you progress, with Breastplate removing the penalty to stealthy Scale Mail imposes while maintaining the same AC, and Half Plate offering you an AC of 15+Dex modifier (max 2), but comes with the Stealth penalty as well.

This means your Druid, outside of Wild Shape, is going to have somewhere between 14 to 17 AC with a +2 Dexterity.

Druids by default start with Leather Armor from their equipment, which only offers an AC of 11 + Dex mod, usually setting you up with an AC of around 13. With any amount of gold, you can upgrade to Medium armor for an AC improvement; it's one of the first items I’d recommend seeking out for a passive improvement.

1st Level: Druidic and Spellcasting

Druids basically just get Spellcasting at 1st level, and as prepared casters, that’s a pretty fine place to start.

Druidic

Druidic is more a ribbon than a feature; you learn a druid specific secret language that will be akin to rogue’s Thieves’ Cant. You may be at a table where you meet zero other characters that use this language, and leave messages laying about. If you want to use this feature to communicate with other druids, I’d highly recommend talking to your DM about it prior. Without their buy-in, this is basically just a flavor enhancer for your character’s backstory.

Spellcasting

Druid’s entire fantasy is built around their spellcasting. They get the full suite of spellcasting tools: prepared casting, ritual casting, and full-caster spell slots. That means they get to pick whatever spells from the entire druid list they’d like to use each long rest to use, can cast prepared ritual spells without expending spell slots by just taking extra time to cast it, and get a ton of resources as the game progresses.

Being a prepared caster makes just knowing what options are at your disposal valuable. Some niche effects simply existing as druid spells empowers your character; knowing what you can prepare to confront niche situations can enhance your character’s fantasy tremendously.

You’ll still probably establish a list of spells you’ll regularly prepare that you can fall back on in most situations.

You can prepare a number of 1st level or higher spells equal to your Druid Level + your Wisdom modifier. You can prepare any spells on the druid spell list that you have spell slots to cast them with.

Multiclassing and Preparing Spells

There is a bit of rules clarifications that should be mentioned: as a druid, it states you can prepare spells for any spell slot level you have. Multiclass druids, then, could prepare spells of higher level slots than a single class druid of the same level would be able to prepare.

For example, a 5th level character with 1 level in druid and 4 in wizard would be able to prepare 1+ their Wisdom modifier druid spells each long rest, and because the character has 3rd level spell slots, could prepare 3rd level druid spells like Plant Growth.

In the multiclass rules, though, it states “You determine what spells you know and can prepare for each class individually, as if you were a single-classed member of that class.” This has led to many internet arguments, and ultimately no great answer as to if you can or can not prepare higher level druid spells as a low level druid multiclass.

I fall on the side of druids being able to prepare spells of spell levels they’ve got available, meaning just 1 level in Druid can open up 9th level druid spells to another full-caster, rules as written. As a DM, I’d house rule that’s dumb, and that druids shouldn’t be able to prepare spells beyond what a druid of that level could prepare without the other class contributing to their spell slots. That’s not what the rules state, but is how I’d run it.

If you plan to multiclass druid, I’d talk to your DM ahead of time about how they interpret these two specific rules, as it majorly impacts the multiclass option’s power.

Cantrip Recommendations

Druids have a pretty reasonable cantrip list with ample out of combat utility options alongside cosmetic options to give you the feeling of a natural magic user in tune with the world around them.

Frostbite is Vicious Mockery for druids; its reasonable damage, a great debuff effect, and fits thematically with some arctic druid vibes.
Guidance is an out of combat all-star, often feeling like the party passively is adding a d4 to important skill checks. It’ll vary somewhat table to table, but usually will be a readily available and empowering cantrip you can take. Your group rarely will need it twice, though, so if you’re journeying with a cleric, I’d chat with them ahead of time about if they plan to take it or not.
Shillelagh and Magic Stone are damage options that fit alongside the sling and scimitar, making your sling closer to a shortbow in power and your quarterstaff similar to a longsword. Neither is typically sticking around as you go to engage in combat past 3rd level, but prior to that both are entirely reasonable to use fight to fight.
Control Flames, Druidcraft, Gust, Mold Earth, and Shape Water all fit into a category I call the “cosmetic cantrips”. They offer some amount of fairly niche utility, and predominantly act as a tool you can use to feel like a specific kind of druid. Control Flames alongside Circle of Wildfire is a no-brainer for becoming a firebender. Gust fits great on druids looking to take to the skies and embrace bird life. Any one of these I’d recommend on its own, but wouldn’t recommend more than one out the gate. They can be great to pick up as the game progresses.
Create Bonfire is tricky; at 1st level, it's a great place to put your concentration. It alongside Magic Stone (or just a sling) can give you two damaging sources out at once without expending any resources. That’s pretty good.
Thorn Whip also plays nicely alongside Create Bonfire, and can be a tool you’ll want to consider if your goal is to create areas of misery for your enemies with spells like Entangle and Plant Growth. It can be difficult to meaningfully weaponize, though, and will often pair best with high speeds and team work to get the most out of in the mid to upper tiers.

Cantrips to Avoid

Resistance is like Guidance, but way less reliable. Spamming it on a barbarian ally to potentially help them avoid a single trap isn’t anywhere close to good enough, and when it costs you your concentration, is something you can’t even use to prep a fight in the mid to upper tiers. Not nearly enough utility for its cost.
Primal Savagery is a shorter range lower damage Poison Spray. Sure, it lets you make an attack roll instead of forcing a Constitution saving throw, but that isn’t anywhere close to a good enough reason to use this when Shillelagh is right there offering you a higher damage floor and ceiling in the early game, which is the only time you really want to be attacking with cantrips.

Beyond these two, there aren’t any horrendous cantrips on the druid spell list. Primal Savagery isn’t even the end of the world; a d10 acid damage is fine, and while it's definitely the worst comparative option against all of its competitors, it can satisfy the fantasy well enough to justify trying it out.

1st Level Spells of Note

Where druid cantrips are all pretty great, druids have a notoriously suspect 1st level spell selection, namely in lacking meaningful damage options.

I’ve broken down my recommendations into a few groups; having spells from all the groups will typically give you a wide selection of options to engage the world with during all forms of play.

General Recommendations

Healing Word is an easy spell you’ll regularly be glad you prepared. It heals a d4 at range for just your bonus action; you can still cast cantrips, attack with an empowered quarterstaff, or take other meaningful non-1st level or higher spell actions in the same round. That’s a big deal at getting action advantage.
Goodberry also gets a mention here; on characters with summoned companions, like a wizard’s familiar or your Wild Companion, this can be an even cheaper way to get allied characters up from death’s door. Why spend an action or bonus action when you simply need to speak to get somebody up by commanding a little squirrel or bird to feed them the goodberry? Having one of your spell slots be dedicated to providing the party with 10 1 hit point Potions of Healing can be great, especially at particularly lethal tables.
Absorb Elements is a spell that ages like a fine wine. Resistance to a damage type when you need it can save your life. 18d8 fire damage, turned down to 9d8 fire damage, is a HUGE difference at just the cost of a prepared spell and 1st level slot. The boon to damage helps smooth over its mediocrity in the early tiers, and in the upper tiers this feels like the Evasion or Uncanny Dodge features in power. I’d highly recommend regularly preparing this past 5th level.
Detect Magic is a useful ritual spell you’ll regularly get to ritual cast. Being able to determine if something is magical and of what school of magic something is helps identify illusions, traps, and other magical threats all while informing you about the world around you.

Stealth, Infiltration, and Exploration Options

Druids are not innately particularly stealthy, but do get some decent options for quick escapes and

Fog Cloud can be tricky to get a lot of use out of, but when applied at the right moment, can cause mass confusion and get you and the team out of a tricky situation.
Jump is a criminally underrated spell hamstrung by needing to know the jump calculations to use. Characters can long jump with a running start up to their strength score feet using movement; triple that for a barbarian and they can start clearing 30 ft. gaps. Want to leap rooftop to rooftop? Jump lets it happen! Plus, it comes with a vertical jump of at least 10 feet, sometimes up to 20 or 30 feet on particularly strong characters.
Speak with Animals I want to mention simply because it's a ritual spell that offers a surprising amount of useful information in a lot of environments. Insects, rodents, and birds are common in most settings, and tend to see what’s going on around them. Speak with Animals connects you to them all at no spell cost when out of initiative, and can be a tool to leverage in passively expanding out your available resources.

Support Options

Druids have a solid list for assisting allies and hampering enemies. They overlap a bit with bards and clerics, as they have some single target defensive boons, but also have a decent spread of area control tools that can help the whole team by slowing incoming enemies and making them waste time.

Protection from Evil and Good is a spell I rate quite highly, especially on prepared casters. Being able to provide a bubble of safety from six common enemy types is a ton, plus this mitigates many conditions that can debilitate your group. Sometimes the last thing you want to happen is for your barbarian to get possessed and turn on the group; Protection from Evil and Good has you covered there.
Entangle likely is the most iconic 1st level druid spell, as prior to Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything offering it to rangers it was a druid exclusive. A 20 ft. square of difficult terrain that can restrain does end up eating a good bit of melee enemy actions, and against specifically monsters that have to run at you, can win an encounter on its own. It doesn’t scale particularly well, as the game tends to start using wider varieties of creatures with various other modes of transit or ranged attack options, but early, Entangle is a banger at locking enemies down.

Area Damaging Options

Ice Knife lands somewhere between Burning Hands and Thunderwave in damage, has decent range, and gives you some interesting choices to make. From levels 1-3, I regularly see Ice Knife cast, and in those environments, it's entirely fine. If you’re in the market to deal damage at range, this will satisfy your wants.

1st Level Spells to Avoid

Cure Wounds is an action to cast, requires touch, and is only healing a few more points on average than Healing Word. You’re not going to often want the up-cast benefit, ever really. If you want a healing spell, Healing Word is way better, and Goodberry is another contender I’d take over this every time.
Earth Tremor is so challenging to make use of its baffling to me. No matter how many times I’ve tried it on characters built specifically with it in mind, the total effects end up being clunky and counterproductive sometimes, and with it dealing just 1d6 damage, you’d be better off casting anything else.
Detect Poison and Disease has always annoyed me. It is something you would only prepare when you KNOW you’re going into an environment where poisoned food is likely, and in that environment, you need to be in a situation where you need to identify it and use that information to some benefit beyond “don’t eat it”. A solution to suspecting poisoned foods is eating food you’re sure isn’t poisoned, and advising others do the same. The vast majority of the game will be played without any poison or disease coming up that is worth detecting.
Beast Bond is one of the worst spells ever printed. You have no reason to ever use this. Don’t use this. It only offers advantage on the creature’s attacks against something else within 5 feet of you, has to be a beast with Int of 3 or lower (making nearly every druid option you’d care to bond with off the table), and otherwise acts like a familiar, which you can already get with Wild Companion. You don’t ever need Beast Bond. Nobody does.

2nd Level: Wild Shape, Druid Circle, and Wild Companion

Druids hit their largest power spike at 2nd level with their Wild Shape, Druid Circle and Wild Companion all becoming available alongside another 1st level spell slot. Druid circles are not all created equally, some offering you powerful tools to engage with the world on a completely different axis, others being messy, game breaking, form swapping power spike nightmares.

Wild Shape

Wild Shape is messy but a blast to play with. I tend to think of it as a long list of expanded speeds and senses that help you disguise and fit into a wide variety of environments seamlessly. Its barriers (and in some cases, lack of) make it a deeply interesting feature that can feel somewhat overwhelming to play with.

There are some major important rules to keep in mind when using Wild Shape:

You have to have seen a beast to be able to Wild Shape into it.
There are no size restrictions (currently) on Wild Shape, meaning from tiny to gargantuan, if you’ve seen it and it’s of an appropriate CR, you can transform into it.
You get two uses that refresh on short and long rests.
You use the game statistics of the beast you transform into except for its Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma scores.
You can’t cast spells up until 18th level, which is a bummer.
You retain benefits from your class and race if your form is capable of using the benefits

If you’ve got darkvision, but your Wild Shape form doesn't, you don’t get darkvision in the form.
Racial traits like Halflings’ Bountiful Luck work, as would the class features Rage and Second Wind.

You get the beast's skill proficiencies in addition to your own, making beasts with skills options for getting bonus skills in a pinch.

You start by being able to transform into CR ¼ beasts with no swim or fly speeds, which improves to ½ or less with a swim speed at 4th level, and up to CR 1 or less with a fly speed at 8th level.

I’d talk to your DM about establishing either a list of your own of beasts you’ve seen, and build from there. Personally, I tend to allow players to turn into whatever beast they’d like of the specific CR, but your mileage may vary. Establishing early what you can and can’t turn into will be important.

I’d also recommend having the stat blocks on hand in the form of monster cards or some other quick to reference stat block. Putting that burden on the DM to just have on hand all the beasts you could potentially be is a massive amount of extra work for a single character. If you want to turn into all kinds of stuff, have them ready to go when you sit down.

Some druid circles use Wild Shape as a resource to fuel other things; normally, that other thing will be situationally better than transforming into an animal, but there will be plenty of times being able to transform and getting special senses and speeds is worth it.

Wild Shape Features Worth Getting

There are a huge amount of options available to druids to transform into; knowing what is on table can functionally offer your character these improvements passively.

Sizes. From tiny to large, all four sizes are available to you at 2nd level. Elk and Giant Lizards can be rideable options for medium creatures while spiders and weasels are tiny creatures capable of sneaking about unnoticed and get into spaces larger entities simply can’t.
Speeds. Plenty of CR ¼ beasts have at least a speed of 40, but the Riding Horse comes in with a base speed of 60, making it the fastest option for 2nd level characters. Giant Badgers have a unique burrow speed, making it a great option for tunneling and infiltration through the ground. Giant Wolf Spiders have a 40 ft. climb speed and Spider Climb, making them a great option to know about, as they can turn a Wild Shape into a self-cast of a Longstrider + Spider Climb for exploring big caverns or scaling the sides of castles.
Senses. Darkvision is plentiful across the beasts, with 60 ft. being a common option accessible. Giant Wolf Spiders have it alongside 10 ft. blindsight, which can come in clutch at detecting hidden creatures or uncovering illusions. Giant Centipedes are slightly slower, but do get a 30 ft. blindsight, which is massive early. Keen Hearing and Smell gives you advantage on Perception checks relying on the given sense; if you’re tracking, becoming a Wolf can help you find what you’re looking for easier.
Skills. Mules and Goats have Sure-Footed, providing advantage on Strength or Dexterity saving throws against effects that would make them prone. While usually spider climb will solve whatever problem you’re trying to get around, sometimes you need to carry some allies through a grease, and Mules are a great option to do so. Weasels (of the tiny and Giant medium varieties) have both proficiency in Perception and Stealth, making them a great form for hiding and sneaking about. Spiders also come with a Stealth bonus and are tiny insects with Spider Climb, making them exceptional at espionage.

Why Wild Shape, and When to Wild Shape

Wild Shape is primarily an exploration tool; at its best, it’s a bunch of speeds, senses, and skills bundled into an animal disguise that lasts for hours.

Some options at 2nd level can even contribute meaningfully in combat, like Wolves; 11 HP and a +4 to hit 2d4+2 bite is a great attack for a 2nd level character. Plus, Pack Tactics gives the attack advantage most of the time, and the bite can even knock the hit target prone.

Past 2nd level, though, turning off your access to spellcasting will often be net negative for your combat options. You’ll find regularly that a 3rd level druid has a lot more to offer a fight than a single Bite attack a round with advantage, and it only really gets worse from there.

Wild Shape shines brightest as the various speeds unlock, eventually giving you flight to explore the skies as a tiny to large bird that can carry friends and explore the darkness. If you want to fight as an animal, you’re going to likely be forced to go with Circle of the Moon to function in combat in the mid tiers. Combat Wild Shape beyond that is pretty terrible.

Druid Circles

Your Druid Circle will determine a large chunk of what your character will be doing in and out of combat. Each has its own unique offerings that set them apart, and while none are unusable, some are a lot stronger than others.

Circle of Dreams sells itself as the fey druid archetype, and while Balm of the Summer Court is a fine replacement for preparing Healing Word and needing to bank a spell slot or two just in case a friend goes down, the remaining features don’t do a great job selling the fantasy until 10th level with Hidden Paths. Its level 15 feature is also unbelievably hard to use effectively and consistently, making this a subclass for player’s who want the healer fantasy, and not a great subclass for anyone else.
Circle of the Land expands druids spellcasting to match Wizards in total uses early, while empowering them with some solid expanded spell lists that’ll meaningfully sell a specific character concept. Natural Recovery is a solid feature at tables that get a short rest now and then, and will help stretch your early spell slots just a bit further. Of the various land options, Mountain and Underdark stand out as having the most consistently powerful expanded spells level to level, but there are some excellent options in every other land such as Invisibility in Grassland and Misty Step in Coast. If you don’t care much for expanded spells and Natural Recovery, there isn’t anything else worth considering here, and you probably want to be any other druid subclass that gives you new things to do.
Circle of the Moon has a reputation for being wildly swinging and challenging to play and DM for. Multi-attacking beasts obtainable at 2nd level makes it a house in the early tiers with the short rest recharge and bonus 40+ hit points it offers, often quadrupling your effective hit point pool. Its eventual elemental upgrade is also pretty baller, but in the super late game can get repetitive and feel underwhelming, at least until 18th level when you can actually use the 1st through 9th level spells you’ve got access to in combat. It can be a rewarding subclass, but definitely asks you to do a lot of work to have your shapes stat blocks on hand and ready to go, as well as communicating with the DM beforehand about Wild Shape expectations, what shapes are available for your character based off of what they’ve seen, etc.
Circle of the Shepherd is the summoning circle granting you a totem that benefits you and your allies within an area, and eventually growing into boons for some of your summoned creatures. Summoning magic is already powerful, and the totem effects are pretty fun to play with. If you like druids thematically, and want to do what they’re good at but a bit better, Circle of the Shepherd is my number one recommendation.
Circle of Spores definitely is unique as far as druid circles go as it offers a completely different experience from the rest. Its Halo of Spores damage doesn’t scale great compared to multi-attacking and upper tier spells, but seeing as you get upper-tier spells anyway, this will function as a great early game melee range druid option that scales into big, nasty summon effects past 9th level. It also offers you a means of playing a necromancer-like druid that uses fungus to possess corpses, which is metal, and I love dearly. A great option for playing a druid closer to death and decay; I would recommend it to anyone who wants a shift from the traditional natural protector druid fantasy.
Circle of Stars meaningfully empowers a “full-caster” druid more than Land does with a neat star map, a flexible form empowering varying kinds of spells, and a battery of free Guiding Bolts that give you the feeling of endless resources at 1st and 2nd level. Its 6th and 10th level features are excellent boons to the option, and while its 14th level feature, Full of Stars, isn’t particularly riveting, the whole of the option will play great for the characters looking to play a traditional mage slinging damaging spells from the backline.
Circle of Wildfire is my top druid circle recommendation. Wildfire Spirit is a blast to play with, as not only does it come with a summonable companion with great ranged attacks, the companion can teleport you and your party around and aid in exploration in all kinds of fun ways. The expanded Circle Spells offer you great damaging options and support options alike with Burning Hands, Plant Growth, Revivify, and Fire Shield all being stand out all-stars. Enhanced Bond and Cauterizing Flames both are great improvements to your fire spell based casting repertoire, and while I am not a fan of features like Blazing Revival, as you don’t have much agency in actually using a feature that only triggers when you’d die, the rest of this option is so strong it doesn’t bother me in the slightest. Wildfire druids are delightful. If you want a circle that provides you with a myriad of choices to make round after round, Circle of Wildfire delivers in spades.

Wild Companion

Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything was an “unofficial” patch to the game that gave druids something they’ve been missing in the early tiers: animal friends in the form of Wild Companion!

Find Familiar is a spell I want regularly on basically every character I’m playing, as they often feel like a second character with enhanced abilities and senses for engaging with the world in various ways. Spending one of your two Wild Shapes per short rest to get an hour out of it is fine, but the cost is pretty steep, especially on circles like Wildfire and Moon who want to do way more powerful things with their Wild Shapes.

As the game progresses, you can start extending long rests by an hour to start the day with a few hours worth of a free familiar, though, and before every short rest you can always summon a buddy to help you out over the rest. This is a feature I’d keep in mind as you progress, especially seeing as past level 4, you get two hours out of it, making it something you can use, short rest, then have for “free” for a full hour after. Past 10th level, this is often going to just feel like you’ve got a familiar for most of the adventuring day for simply knowing this feature exists.

3rd Level: 2nd Level Spells

Summoning Magic

Druids received probably the largest spellcasting boon that they desperately wanted from Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything: Summon Beast.

Conjuration effects that bring you beast or fey allies have been core to druids' comparative power since 5th inception, and Summon Beast opens up a “fair” version summoning magic that is way easier to track and navigate with at 3rd level.

Since these kinds of spells are so core to druid, I want to quickly cover what options are available as you go, how they mechanically work, and what you might want to consider prior to picking them up.

Conjuration Options: Summon Beast, Conjure Animals, Summon Fey, Conjure Minor Elementals, Conjure Woodland Beings, Summon Elemental, Conjure Elemental, Summon Draconic Spirit, and Conjure Fey are the core ten summoning effects you’ll have access to. They’re broken down basically into two categories: Conjure spells, and Summon spells.

All Summon Spell Rules. Every spell that summons creatures follows a few specific rules, agnostic of when it was printed.

Each spell has a duration of an hour.
Each requires your concentration.
Creatures summoned with these spells require no actions to control, and accept verbal commands.

Conjure Spell Rules. Conjure Animals, Conjure Minor Elementals, and Conjure Woodland Beings all work with the following rules:

You pick from a list of four CR and quantity options with a lower CR resulting in a higher quantity of creatures.
Your DM then decides what creatures of the chosen CR or lower in that quantity are summoned.
You use the summoned creature’s stat block when determining what they can do, typically agnostic of your own ability scores and proficiency bonus.
They act on their own initiative count as a group, all of which take their actions and movement on that turn.
Up-casting these spells results in double, triple, or quadruple the quantity of creatures summoned for higher level slots.

In practice, these spells can be nightmares to run. Generally, the best option you can select for each is the highest quantity of creatures; in the case of Conjure Animals, you’re almost always going to want to pick eight beasts of CR ¼ or lower to get the most value out of the spell. Eight new creatures under your control with their own actions can flip any semblance of encounter balance on its head.

To make matters worse, it asks your DM to figure out what is “fair” on the spot. If they don’t want to have on hand all of the possible beasts and figure it out in the moment, they’ll often push that burden to the player which can result in wildly imbalanced encounters involving eight giant owls grappling any medium or smaller creature and flying up as high as they can each turn until the creature breaks free and plummets to their death.
And of the three multiple creature based conjure spells, Conjure Animals is the most tame.

Conjure Minor Elementals has a smaller list of possible summons which gives DMs less room to offer weaker options, often resulting in swarms of Mephits with breath weapons and disguises under your control for an entire hour.

Conjure Woodland Beings can be even harder to DM for; Pixies, in particular, are a low CR monster with a robust spell list that basically lets you trade a single 4th level spell slot for potentially eight casts of Polymorph and a wide variety of other spells.

All three of these spells can be a blast to play with, but I’d highly encourage you to discuss with your DM prior about you and their expectations for the spell, how they want to run it, and how often it can be expected to reshape encounters.

The other two Conjure Spells are slightly different; both summon just a single entity, with Conjure Fey once again leaving it in the DMs hands as to what monster is summoned, while Conjure Elemental gives you finite control over which of the four core elementals appears. Both also have potential disaster cases should your concentration break, as they don’t disappear, turn hostile towards you and your companions, and might attack up until an hour after you summoned it.

Summon Spells. The remaining conjure effects are the new Summon spells: Summon Beast, Summon Fey, Summon Elemental, and Summon Draconic Spirit.

When cast, you pick a mode from two to four options that offers you variations within a single stat block provided within the spell’s description.
The summoned creature shares your initiative, and takes its turn immediately after yours.
Summoned creatures have a number of attacks equal to half the spell’s level (rounded down) with their multi-attack.
Summoned creatures get more hit points when summoned with higher level slots.
Summoned creatures gain a bonus to AC equal to the level of the spell summoning them.
Each summoned creature tends to have a unique ability and speed that distinguishes it from other modes within the same stat block.

These are “fair” versions of the conjuration spells; instead of getting eight extra summoned allies your DM has to track, you get one that scales with the game as you get higher and higher spell slots.

Summon Beast defines druids in the low tiers, with Summon Fey being a great alternate option to pick from as the game continues. Each of these will meaningfully empower your druid in combat, as having a second multi-attack character past 7th level for just your concentration is exceptional, even if it isn’t as game warping as an army of mephits or angry bears.

If you or your DM is worried about how Conjure Fey or Conjure Minor Elementals will function, all of these are far more digestible options that still majorly empower your character without necessarily flipping the table on its head.

Other 2nd Level Spell Considerations

Beyond Summon Beast, there are some solid 2nd level spells to consider preparing day to day as a druid. Because Summon Beast is such a core pillar to a lot of druid’s power, spells that have concentration are quite a bit harder to get use out of, and unfortunately, most of druids moderately powerful 2nd level spells require your concentration. If summoning isn’t something you want to be consistently using encounter after encounter, some other concentration effects are pretty effective. The ones that don’t compete with Summon Beast because they function better in different situations shine brightest to me.

Pass without Trace offers the entire party a +10 to their Dexterity (Stealth) checks while they make them close to you. It's not quite Invisibility, but it is an excellent option for helping the group sneak about. This is my top pick, as the situations where you’re going to want Pass Without Trace don’t necessarily overlap that much with situations where you’ll want Summon Beast up.
Hold Person is a way to paralyze a humanoid; if it lands, it will decimate them by giving you and all your friends free crits on hit while eating their turns.
Moonbeam is a concentration damage alternative to Summon Beast, offering you a moon laser you can move about and burn things for 2d10 damage a round with. It plays well with lots of moving and shoving effects like Thorn Whip, often being able to get two instances of damage off in a single round against a creature, making it a fun build around spell to play with.
Heat Metal, like Moonbeam, competes with Summon Beast as a damaging option that asks you to concentrate on it. In the right encounters, though, it can debilitate an armored foe, frying them alive from inside their protective plate mail. Best part about it is the damage is unconditional; if they’re touching the metal, they’re taking the damage. Niche comparatively, but it does perform great in some encounters.
Spike Growth has some incredible build around potential in the low tiers; a 20 ft. radius area of 2d4 damage that triggers for each 5 feet moved, regardless of willingness, can weaponize any shoves, pulls, and pushes you’ve got access to. Thorn Whip going from 1d6 to 1d6+4d4 is a MASSIVE shift in damage, and while it can be tricky to line up perfectly, can be a great puzzle to get the most out of encounter to encounter.

Spells to Avoid

Find Traps is a non-spell. You need to already suspect traps are nearby to use it. When you do, it simply says “yes, your suspicions are right! There ARE traps nearby!” Well, it does that assuming you can see the trap, else it fails to even act as a confirmation that a trap is nearby. There are no good use cases for this; if you suspect there are traps nearby, searching for traps and actually disabling them is what you’re going to need to do anyway. Sometimes confirming their existence isn’t worth a 2nd level spell slot.
Beast Sense doesn’t work with the majority of features I’d want it to. Summon Beast already costs your concentration, so Beast Sense can’t pair with it. Your Wild Companions already have this ability, and thus don’t need Beast Sense to give you their senses. Conceptually I like this effect, especially given that its a ritual, but with its attachment to concentration and lack of actual practical uses at the majority of tables, I can’t foresee any encounter I’d want this prepared over basically every other comparative option.
Enhance Ability can easily be replaced by some well-placed Help actions, which anyone can take. You usually don’t need, nor want, this to take one of your few known spells.

Most other spells that you’d consider are fairly niche, but in the perfect circumstance, knowing they exist lets you prepare them when you need them, and forget them otherwise. These include Protection from Poison, Locate Animals or Plants, Locate Object, Lesser Restoration, Air Bubble, and Earthbind.

4th Level: Wild Shape Improvement, Feat, and Cantrip Versatility

4th level druids get three features: an Ability Score Improvement or Feat, an improvement to their Wild Shape, and Cantrip Versatility (from Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything).

Wild Shape Improvement

With 4th level, you now can transform into beasts up to CR ½, and now include any beasts with swim speeds!

Crocodiles are a bit slow, but have Hold Breath, a 30 ft. swim speed making them reasonable for encounters requiring both land and sea exploration. Giant Sea Horses have a 40 ft. swim speed and Water Breathing, making them the default under-water mobility option that can even carry medium and smaller friends.
Warhorses are a 60 ft. speed land option that has a 2d6+4 bludgeoning attack and 19 hit points alongside Trampling Charge; with a round of prep, engaging a fight with a charge that can drop something prone and hits like a truck will feel solid, but fall off quickly as other characters are getting extra attack and you get 3rd level spells to play with.
Black Bears, while having a low AC and HP, do come with Multiattack, making them an option for melee ranged druids like Circle of Spores to potentially get a bit of value out of before the damage numbers get a lot higher and make the form unlikely to stick for more than a round or two.

There are some tiny options that can be useful as well opened up here; Octopuses in particular are great for underwater stealth missions, as they have Underwater Camouflage, +4 to Stealth checks, Ink Cloud for a Fog Cloud like ability, and a solid 30 ft. swim speed.

Feat Considerations

Druids, more so than most other classes, do not want to lose concentration on their spells. War Caster helps defend your concentration. It is my number one recommendation for druids of all circles, but especially for Circle of the Moon, as they intend to get damaged to leverage their massive pools of hit points. Having your summoning or other important concentration effect up for longer will massively improve your performance in a lot of encounters.

Otherwise, as fullcasters, maxing your Wisdom score as fast as possible is great, but you can also consider some supplementary spell based feats to expand out your utility.

Fey Touched helps you satisfy your fairy-druid fantasies with a free Misty Step and another 1st level spell once per long rest. These being non-concentration options can give you a lot more options and out of combat, as again, long duration concentration effects majorly shape how druids play. Shadow Touched can serve a similar purpose.
Telekinetic and Telepathic fit a similar role, as can Magic Initiate and Ritual Caster if you want an expanded pool of spell options to explore the world with.
Eldritch Adept with Eldritch Mind is technically another way to get advantage on your Concentration checks if you’re opposed to War Caster for some reason. Fiendish Vigor, Mask of Many Faces, and Misty Visions all also can be a blast to play with on various druid builds, namely Fiendish Vigor on a Spores druid or Mask of Many Faces on a druid who wants the tools to disguise anywhere as anything.

Martial Feats for Moon Druids

Moon druids get their own feat selection options, simply because they function in such a different manner than the rest of the circles.

Piercer and Slasher are tricky; they can be great early options for Moon druids, eventually Elemental Wild Shape switches your damage over to primarily bludgeoning.
Crusher, then, is an option you can use with Water and Air Elemental based Moon druids. The bonus shove is neat, and can play well with spells like Spike Growth, which is neat. The bump to Constitution also helps defend your concentration, making it an appealing option to consider for melee Moon druids specifically.
Charger isn’t the greatest feat in the world, but with how few other feats offer a boon to your wild shape attacks, it can be an option in the upper tier to take to empower your engagements and throw people around.

Cantrip Versatility

Are you finding one of your cantrips isn’t getting much use? Now is the time to swap it out with Cantrip Versatility!

5th Level: 3rd Level Spells

5th level splits the game from the early tiers into the mid tiers with martial characters getting extra attack and full-casters getting 3rd level spells. Druid’s 3rd level spell options have some game breaking potential (see Conjure Animals in the Summoning spells breakdown earlier), but also offer meaningful “fair” improvements you’ll be excited to cast.

3rd-Level Spells of Note

Conjure Animals is a wildly busted spell with potential to flip encounters on their head if you get to pick the beasts, or your DM opts to give you basically any beasts that match the CR you picked. Generally, eight beasts of CR 1/4th or lower is the strongest option and should basically be the only one you pick if you want raw power. Conjure Animals is a spell you probably should talk with your DM about prior to picking it up, and discuss how it can be used and what you can expect from it.
Summon Fey offers you an alternative to Summon Beast that gives a bit more neat utility. 4th level casts give these spells multiattack, making them considerations for up-casting, but if you want a little more utility out of your Summon Beast, Summon Fey can deliver there.
Revivify is a spell you can stick on your prepared list and forget about with a handful of diamonds at the ready to mitigate death in a major way. This is particularly great for druids as their 3rd level spell slots aren’t getting eaten up by an endless barrage of Fireballs or anything; the perks of having one big concentration effect up at a time is you tend to save more upper tier spell slots, which makes having a 3rd level slot in the bank in case somebody dies easier.
Plant Growth can either be super difficult terrain in a massive area, or a flavor win that endears you to local farmers and woodland dwellers. A potential 100 ft. radius sphere over overgrowth that costs 4 feet of speed to move 1 foot will grind enemy advances to a halt, often locking down a massive space and wasting two or three enemy actions. It is area dependent, as plant-less spaces will remain plantless, but in a decent amount of mid tier environments, Plant Growth and hamstring melee enemies.
Sleet Storm locks down an area similarly to plant growth, but does so agnostic of the environment and blinds creatures in it to creatures outside it and vice versa. If you need to bail, or have a barrage of area effect damaging spells available, this spell can crush a group of enemies.
Erupting Earth may not be Fireball, but 3d12 damage that slows while not asking you to concentrate on it is about as good as druids get at 5th level. Tidal Wave fits a similar role; neither is revolutionary, but damage with a slow can eat actions while chunking down enemies and removing smaller foes from the fight all without asking you to give up your summoned allies.

Spells to Avoid

Elemental Weapon costs your concentration and is a slight upgrade to Divine Favor for two spell levels higher; even on the fighter making two to four attacks a round, you’ll routinely wish you picked any higher impact spell to dedicate concentration on.
Flame Arrows fills a similar role to Elemental Weapon. In the upper tiers, putting this on your ranger with Swiftquiver seems good, but when you acknowledge the cost of not having a 6th or 7th level concentration effect up, it becomes how apparently awful Flame Arrows is.
Feign Death, while near and dear to my heart, is so unbelievably niche you have to decide you want to use it first, then find ways to use it over other, lower level options to get the same effects with extra steps. Its utility isn’t nearly high enough for the cost, and that cost is really low as it's just a preparable 3rd level ritual.

6th Level and Beyond

What druids have left are subclass features, Wild Shapes with flight, higher level spells, and a handful of features ranging from near pointless to pretty nifty.

4th Level Spell Recommendations

Conjure Minor Elementals and Conjure Woodland Beings are outrageous summon effects I’ve mentioned before; as usual, the best option is the highest quantity of low CR creatures available. Mephits are the standout option to get from Minor Elementals with Pixies being game warping in power within Conjure Woodland Beings; I’d absolutely check with your DM about their expectations for these spell’s performance and utility prior to preparing them.
Summon Elemental, and all other Summon spells up-cast, now offer you a companion that gets multiattack. This is a huge bump in power. While Summon Elemental vacuums the flavor of Conjure Elemental out by removing most of the defining abilities the major elementals are known for, it still does a great job in giving you a companion to beat the crap out of monsters with.
Polymorph can trivialize some encounters with just one failed save. If the target fails the save, they can become a harmless squirrel or fish while you trounce the remaining baddies. Then the whole group ready actions and unleash fury upon the fish as it transforms back from the damage, usually ending the encounter on the spot. What’s more, Polymorph also can act as a way to transform an ally into an animal of their level or lower CR, meaning you can travel in wild shape with other animal friends. Alternatively, you can turn your friend into a Giant Ape and watch them smash everything around them.
Fire Shield doesn’t take your concentration. On a Moon Druid, this is the first spell I want, and I want to cast it prior to transformation every time. It pays off the massive hit point pool you have with fiery reflective damage. Plus, what looks cooler than a rampaging bear thrashing its enemies? Why, a FLAMING thrashing bear of course!
Blight plays better than it reads; yes, 8d8 necrotic damage to a single target is comparably lackluster to damage dealing all-stars Fireball and Lightning Bolt, but it being a druid damaging spell that doesn’t ask for your concentration makes it readily castable with a substantial impact.
Giant Insect is a summon-like effect that can be a great time; it asks you to have a collection of insects on you, which I absolutely adore thematically, for a payoff that is usually at its best as ten giant centipedes or five giant wasps. Any allied giant insect is great, though, and while this is comparably worse than basically all of the Conjure spells, is a reasonable middle ground between Summon spells and their busted Conjure brethren.

4th Level Spells to Avoid

Locate Creature is atrocious. Its range is tiny for what it’s trying to do, meaning you need to know you’re close to a creature before you cast it, and any running water arbitrarily nullifies it. You’ll probably never need, nor want, to cast this, and thus shouldn’t prepare it.
Guardian of Nature might be the biggest trap spell they’ve made in recent years. It clearly is aimed at Moon Druids who want advantage on their Strength based attack rolls, but 2d6 bonus damage a round and advantage on your attack rolls doesn’t compare great against having an extra beast friend next to you making two additional ATTACKS each round. If you absolutely want to be a lone wolf shredding things, its limited duration and awkward cast time makes it difficult to even set up; you’d have to cast this and spend a turn wild shaping, which wastes the first round of its effects. When an effect requires your concentration and does nothing the first round you cast it, you’re setting yourself up to get demoralized when your concentration breaks two to three rounds in and you’ve wasted time setting it up for less payoff than just taking regular actions with wild shape would have offered instead.
The tree form is cute, but difficult terrain within 15 feet of you isn’t regularly going to be useful, nor are the advantage on Dex and Wis based attacks. It sounds promising, but Guardian of Nature has major structural problems that lead it to typically making your character waste their time for no payoffs.

8th Level: Wild Shape Improvement

Flight unlocks the second to last Wild Shape improvement you get, with the final being Beast Spells at 18th level. For the rest of time, your CR cap is 1, and you can transform into any beast you’ve seen with a fly speed!

Giant Eagles are the main new addition you’ll want access to. They’re large, meaning they can carry a medium friend, have an 80 ft. fly speed, have Keen Sight for advantage on sight based Wisdom (Perception) checks, and in a pinch have a beak and talons multiattack. An 80 ft. fly speed is really freaking fast. With a single dash in one round you’re covering 160 feet, which for a 30 ft. speed ground creature would take nearly three rounds of dashing to cover.
Giant Vultures are the other new flying option, but because these have low hit points and comparatively weak to hits to martial characters, aren’t as useful as Giant Eagles. They’re better in combat, but you probably don’t want to be engaged in combat with your Wild Shapes at this stage.
Hawks are a tiny option with a 60 ft. fly speed for infiltration at a lower CR. Ravens are a bit slower but can use Mimicry to do some cool flavorful sound copying!
Giant Octopuses are large, faster versions of their CR 0 tiny counterparts. If you want to be bigger but still want decent underwater stealth and mobility, these are a great choice.

5th Level Spell Recommendations

Summon Draconic Spirit comes in as the 5th level conjuration effect I’d recommend. Notably, unlike most of the other summon effects, this one’s stat block has Hit Dice, meaning it works with all of Circle of the Shepherd!
Conjure Elemental isn’t nearly as potent as the other conjure spells, but access to a big dumb elemental can be exceptional when that’s what you want.
Cone of Cold is a giant area of damage that matches an up-cast Fireball. That’s exceptional for classes without Fireball. If you want to blast a huge area with massive damage, Cone of Cold has your back.
Awaken may not be a particularly practical effect, but it is easily one of my favorite effects in the game. Want to codify a specific plant or animal friend as a party member? Awaken is here for you. It’s silly and poses a bunch of wacky questions too. This isn’t something you’ll probably ever prepare more than once, but that one time you cast it will lead to NPCs you and your party will remember forever.
Mass Cure Wounds makes an appearance here namely because Mass Healing Word isn’t a druid spell. Getting multiple allies off of zero at once while offering some extra HP to other characters can turn a lost fight into a won fight. If you’re finding encounters are getting more and more lethal, this is an option, especially in the upper tiers, you’ll want a 5th level slot dedicated towards.
Reincarnate is my favorite resurrection spell in the game; knowing it exists can help keep allied characters alive, but alter them just enough to make death have some form of relevance. It isn’t for everyone, but as a player, I embrace death, and Reincarnate is one of the few effects I’d be excited to see one of my dead characters come back with, as now they’ve got some fun alterations I have to figure out how to work with.

5th Level Spells to Avoid

Antilife Shell could be an all-star… if you’re only fighting against a melee-ranged horde of non-construct, non-undead monsters. Like Hyenas or Wolves. You know, creatures that have long since passed their window of being reasonable, threatening encounters. With how easy it is to get accidently broken, alongside eating your concentration, I can’t recommend anyone try Antilife Shell.
Contagion would be something to consider for terrorizing a local village. As a spell you’d want to use against villains, a 5th level spell slot touch attack that leads to a series of save or dies before anything meaningful happens is awful. The different modes are cool and all, but in practice it is a glorified save or poison with no other text, and that compares terribly to all-star save or dies like Hold Monster and Polymorph.
Maelstrom and Wrath of Nature both suffer the problem of being upper tier concentration effects with a lower impact than basically all of their competition.

6th Level Spell Recommendations

Druids don’t have a particularly riveting 6th level spell selection; I’d consider up-casting a Summon spell for a 3rd attack on my companion over basically all of these effects, but there are a couple I’d point to as decent preparation options.

Heroes’ Feast in parties loaded with gold can feel like a passive boost to Wis saves and a bunch of temporary hit points. Before a big bad fight or tense dungeon crawl, padding out the party with some free stats is great, and usually isn’t actually costing you a slot in said adventure.
Conjure Fey has some neat options outside the Monster Manual that make it probably worth the cast, namely Annis Hags with 75 hit points, a 40 ft. speed, four damage resistances, some free fog clouds, three multi-attacks and a Crushing Hug that deals 9d6+5 and grapples, dealing the same damage at the start of each of the hags turns. It's a neat option, but the only one that reasonably competes with the other summon effects, making it something you’ll only want to be casting if you know you’re getting exactly it. You could alternately get a Mammoth with a decent chunk of hit points, but most of the time I’d rather up-cast other Conjure and Summon spells.
Sunbeam is a neat effect if you’re not going for summoning, acting like a repeatable radiant Lightning Bolt. If your resources are spread thin, this is a great spell to commit to a single fight should summoning magic not appeal to you, as otherwise 6th level summons are going to outclass this in nearly every way.

6th Level Spells to Avoid

Find the Path is Google Maps, but if it didn’t use roads. You don’t need this. A map will do everything Find the Path does better. You can make survival checks as a 1st level character to get where you need to go; why would you EVER cast this?
Flesh to Stone has all the problems Contagion has, and is more expensive. Hard pass.
The Investiture spells (Flame/Ice/Stone/Wind) all give you ten minutes of a new form that has some new attacks and abilities that you can spend actions on. They all suffer from typically not being better than just taking other actions you have available, and having a start up cost in their cast time, making them feel clunky to play with and ultimately not worth your time.

7th Level Spell Recommendations

Reverse Gravity will always earn a spot on my recommended lists for just how fun it is to play with. Throwing an encounter into disarray by thrusting all the enemies skyward is a joy. On top of that, it can throw environmental navigation and hazards out of order in wild, unpredictable ways. If you want a splashy spell that makes the whole table laugh while also having major moments to shine, Reverse Gravity is that.
Fire Storm, like Cone of Cold, is a giant area of effect damage that is close to an up-cast Fireball. It's a bit comparatively worse, as up-casting Cone of Cold will usually do about the same effect as this, but if you want damage variety or more finite control of the affected areas, Fire Storm is a reasonable choice.
Regenerate isn’t going to be a great fit for many tables, but at tables where you’re fighting five or six encounters per long rest that are regularly threatening your barbarian or paladin’s life, getting them repeatedly back to full hit points between fights is great. It doesn’t eat your concentration and has a meaningful effect that lasts over a series of encounters. If you aren’t getting at least 100-200 hit points that matter out of it, it's pretty terrible compared to Heal and Mass Cure Wounds, though, so I’d only take it on characters that know they can leverage the long duration.
Draconic Transformation gets a mention only because it's the dragon version of Sunbeam, with all the same considerations as it, but trading some damage for a fly speed and blindsight.

7th Level Spells to Avoid

Honestly, the druid 7th level spells have reasonable uses at specific tables. They are situational, but can find great utility on the right sheets with the right groups.

Symbol likely is the most niche of the bunch, though. A minute set up with specific conditions makes it an effect that is great when defending spaces in a game where you’re predominately invading. The “Dungeons” in Dungeons & Dragons aren’t ones you’re protecting, but ones you’re plundering. You can goad enemies back to it, and set it up should you know you’ve drawn attention to a specific area, but it will regularly be challenging to cast, and isn’t something I’d regularly prepare for that reason.

8th Level Spell Recommendations

The Summon spells (Draconic Spirit, Beast, and Fey) all can get up-cast here to get four attacks a round. Four is a lot. They’re pretty baller. Plus, some of the Conjure spells offer triple summons here, so all of those are usually excellent 8th level spell options.

Animal Shapes has a ton of cheese potential. We’ll cover it more in detail in the Munchkin nonsense section. If you aren’t doing the munchkin nonsense, it’ll probably feel like a bit more niche Wind Walk, which is still fine.
Sunburst gets the mention here where Flame Strike and Cone of Cold did earlier; a big area of moderate damage, this time with a reasonable blind stapled to it. Not something I’m ever eager to pick up, but it will be easily castable alongside your long duration concentration effects.
Earthquake doesn’t thrive in combat, but does offer a new tool that decimates cities and structures. 50 damage every six seconds for a minute is 500 damage to structures, with their collapse offering a way to engage an environment without ever having to enter it. With a cast range of 500 hundred feet, this can be a tool to hit an 100-foot radius portion of a keep to draw out enemies, or maim a large portion of forces within. It isn’t going to be consistently excellent, but is a major new effect for interacting with the world on a different axis than most lower level options.

8th Level Spells to Avoid

Incendiary Cloud mirrors the damage of lower level effects and eats your concentration, making it challenging to find perfect windows to get a lot of use out of effectively. The area is also really easy to get out of, as its damage triggers on entry or end of turn, making it normally some forced movement with 10d8 damage, which isn’t worth your concentration and an 8th level slot.
Control Weather is an effect you’d care about in a tier when mass teleportation wasn’t readily available. Druids have Transport via Plants and Plane Shift, with other classes having Teleportation Circle, Teleport, and other means of getting where you need when you want. Overcoming bad weather has long since passed as far as reasonable problems go. It does feel like something powerful druids should be able to do, so if in downtime you just want to make it miserable for the loggers in the logging company, go nuts. That’s typically the extent of it’s usefulness.

9th Level Spell Recommendations

Shapechange is the only 9th level druid spell I’d recommend, as its the only one that comes close to Wish, True Polymorph, Meteor Swarm, and Time Stop. Becoming any creature with a CR equal to your level opens up a world of busted options. Sure, no spellcasting is a bit of a bummer, but there are plenty of powerful traits, like Breath Weapons, you can pick up alongside damage resistances, immunities, and other outrageous passive abilities. Grab your Monster Manual and go nuts!

9th Level Spells to Avoid

As mentioned, I don’t love any of druid’s other options.

Storm of Vengeance is the druid exclusive 9th level spell. It takes forever to do any meaningful damage. On cast, you get a giant area of 2d6 thunder damage and a potential deafen. That’s abysmal. For your concentration, next round everything takes 1d6 damage. Round three finally offers a decent chunk of damage, 10d6, putting us three rounds in, and only having dealt, at most, 13d6 damage. Meteor Swarm deals 40d6 damage instantaneously. An 8th level Fireball deals 13d6 damage. Storm of Vengeance is a joke of a spell.
Foresight reads exciting, but in practice isn’t really doing a lot. Advantage on everything in a system where advantage is readily given as a reward for team work all of a sudden devalues all of the mechanics your group’s established over 16 levels prior. It doesn’t give bonus damage, resistances, help for saves, nothing but advantage, and for a 9th level slot, that’s just too mundane. Shapechange opens you up to using every creature in the game. Advantage on your attack rolls or saving throws just doesn’t come close to that kind of magical power.
As for True Resurrection, you’ve got cheaper and easier means to get this effect. If you lack the body, and want to bring somebody back, sure, prepare this. But the vast majority of the time, it's ghoulish overkill.

Timeless Body

Timeless Body is entirely a flavor ribbon to come alongside your 9th level spells. As far as ribbons go, this could really have used any other way to make you feel ageless, as simply stating “I don’t age” is about as much juice you can squeeze from it. Still, for narrative purposes and establishing the power and agelessness elvish archdruids come with, this is entirely fine.

Beast Spells

Beast Spells is another 18th level feature, this time actually empowering your Wild Shape to let spells function alongside it! For Circle of the Moon Druids, this is your top end fantasy, FINALLY unlocking the power to both make attacks and soak damage with huge pools of hit points while also casting big, splashy upper-tier spells.

There is a small hiccup, though: those spells are limited to those with only verbal and/or somatic components, as you still can’t provide material components for your spells, which is a bit of a bummer.

It is certainly too little, too late for most tables. For non-moon druids, this lets you hide away as a tiny creature while a devastating concentration effect ravages your foes. It single handedly lets Storm of Vengeance function, as without it, that spell is basically uncastable for a 9th level slot.

For most druids, this is a great new enabler to hide out with powerful spells active but for Moon druids this is finally reaching your top end fantasy.

Archdruid

Like Beast Spells, some circles will love Archdruid, while others will find it a neat, semi-useful feature. Circles like Wildfire and Moon use their Wild Shapes a lot. Going from two uses to infinite opens up a world of possibilities. Spores druids can now just always have access to their Halo of Spores, Moon druids will feel nigh unkillable with refreshable hundreds of hit points, and Wildfire druids can do around their spirits with no regard for their safety, summoning more round after round.

For Circle of Land, Dreams, Stars, and Shepherd, this will feel like a flavor enhancer that might give you a bit more flexibility in using your Wild Shape for exploration. The tier of play where Wild Shape is a particularly useful infiltration and investigation tool has passed, though, especially seeing as it's competing with all of the most powerful features and spells in the game at this point.

For the circles that want to Wild Shape a lot, Archdruid is phenomenal. A Circle of the Moon Archdruid villain presents an interesting encounter in the upper tiers for players to figure out, too, making it a feature DMs can consider playing with too.

Multiclassing Druid

Most of the interesting mult-class potential druid’s get comes with how other options interact with their subclass. Circle of Spores and Moon, for example, play well with a lot of martial character abilities, while Shepherd’s Spirit Totem offers some build around directions for maximizing Unicorn’s effectiveness.

Multiclassing from Martial Classes

Circle of the Moon wants features they can use in Wild Shape; by far my favorite is Barbarians for lower tier characters built around being a raging bear. Rage does play against spellcasting majorly, making it something that shines brightest in the low to mid tiers before you’d much rather attempt to keep up a summon or other defensive effect while raging, but a raging flaming bear rending enemies is metal, especially when it throws caution to the wind and recklessly attacks round after round to maximize their hit point well with all the damage resistances offered by Totem Warrior.

Fighter’s Action Surge is pretty outrageous with Multiattack early, offering a 4th level character four attacks in a single round as a bear, plus they get Second Wind for some bonus hit points. Fighting Style options are pretty barren, though, as you’re unarmored as a beast, making Defense and most of the weapon based options useless, but Blind Fighting and Superior Technique both can work for you.
Action Surge is also worth noting as it enables double spell casting in a single round, often empowering high tier druids to blast off multiple impactful spells at once.
While Moon never cares about getting Extra Attack, as their animal forms don’t tend to take the Attack action, they tend to take the Multiattack action, Spores druids get a bonus d6 damage on melee weapon attacks, making them excellent options for extra attack classes like Fighter and Ranger who also give them armor and weapon proficiencies that they can weaponize.
Monks are an interesting option to consider as well; Symbiotic Entity empowers melee weapon attacks, which unarmed strikes qualify as even though they aren’t “attacks with a melee weapon”. Not only is this the dumbest verbiage interaction in the entirety of the system, it is a great way to get a ton of bonus damage on a 4th level character with Flurry of Blows. Monks also work great for the multiclass, as they care about Wisdom for their AC and feel a ton better out of combat with a bit of druid magic to aid in exploration.

Spellcaster Multiclass Options

Because of how prepared casting works, if you don’t care about your upper tier spellcasting features all too much, mulit-classing into another prepared caster like Cleric can open up an entire extra spell list to prepare from using your upper level slots. You’ll want to communicate with your DM about their interpretation of the rules as written and intended for this, but getting Channel Divinity, a domain with its features, a boatload of bonus proficiencies, and a ton of new spell options will easily massively empower an early tier character.

Warlocks are one of the easiest classes to justify dipping into, as all of their Patrons, Pact Boon, and Invocations can provide a ton to any character. Druids can use this dip to get access to Eldritch Mind for advantage on Constitution saving throws to keep up your concentration, and get some short rest 1st or 2nd level spells alongside a pet familiar or book of cantrips as bonuses. Circle of the Coast paired with a Fathomless patron can build towards a master of the deep kind of aquatic build that could be blast; alternatively, a Wildfire druid making a pact with a Fiend for even more fire spells seems like a flavor win to me.
10th level Conjurer Wizards get a feature called Focused Conjuration, making your concentration unbreakable by damage while you're concentrating on your conjuration spells like Summon Beast or Conjure Woodland Beings. If you start with a couple of levels in druid, and use the multiclass rules interpretation where you can prepare spells of any spell level you have access to, reaching 12th level will give you a feeling of being unstoppable where you can even drop your powerful effects via damage anymore. Mixed with Shepherd and you’ve got a recipe for the ultimate summoner!

Munchkin Nonsense You Can Try

Druid’s have two main means of going full munchkin: conjuration magic abuse, or wild shape granting enormous amounts of hit points. There are some upper tier spells that also open up some crazy opportunities as well, namely Animal Shapes.

Getting to Choose in Conjure Spells Is Fundamentally Busted

We already mentioned the busted elements of Conjure Woodland Beings and Conjure Animals, but I’ll quickly go through what all the lowest CR summon options of each can offer. These both occur in the situation where a DM doesn’t want to choose what beasts you get, or the rules are misinterpreted to allow players their choice of summoned ally; as a DM, I can’t recommend enough not giving your players the following creatures in mass, else suffer a wildly imbalanced character that will skew game balance in a miserable direction for everyone else.

Pixies were printed at a CR of ¼, meaning you can get eight of them for a single cast of Conjure Woodland beings, a single 4th level spell slot. Up-cast to 8th level, you get twenty four pixies. Each pixie has the Innate Spellcasting trait, which gives them a once per day cast of Confusion, Dancing Lights, Detect Evil and Good, Detect Thoughts, Dispel Magic, Entangle, Fly, Phantasmal Force, Polymorph, and Sleep, with an at will Druidcraft.

That’s the equivalent of two catrips, three 1st level slots, two 2nd level slots, two 3rd level slots, and two 4th level slots per pixie.

With a 4th level cast, you get 16 cantrips, 24 1st level slots, 16 2nd level slots, 16 3rd level slots, and 16 4th level slots. They’re specific, but in raw quantity of spell casts, you’re trading one 4th level spell slot for eight Polymorphs and eight Dispel Magics. For an 8th level cast, you triple that. Want 24 casts of Polymorph? You got it with Pixies! On top of that, each has Superior Invisibility, which acts as an at will Greater Invisibility.

Conjure Animals is at its most broken at 3rd level with Giant Owls. When up-cast to 9th level, you get four times as many creatures, going from eight beasts to thirty-two. Giant Owls are large beasts with a 60 ft. fly speed, making them capable of lifting medium or smaller creatures and flying upwards with them at half speed while grappling. With just one round of flying upward after grappling, each can represent a 30 ft. fall for whatever it grabbed, with each subsequent turn of the grapple being maintained offering an extra 60 feet vertically. Creatures then are wasting actions to break free, and should they succeed, plummet for free damage, after which the owls can simply attempt to regrapple and fly up once again.

If grappling isn’t for you, twenty-four +3 to hit 2d6+1 slashing damage attacks looks like a maximum of 48d6+4d8 damage. That’s a lot of damage potential each round on 60 ft. speed, 19 hit point creatures. Against even a handful of multi-attacking creatures, these take forever to chew through, making them outrageous to deal with.

What makes this particularly busted isn’t what it does to upper-tier encounters, but what a 5th level druid allowed to pick their beasts can do to a 5th level encounter full of medium creatures. Turns out a bonus 152 hit points of 2d6+1 attacking owls that are crazy fast and can carry party members just snaps game balance in half.

For just these two basic examples, I’d recommend DMs work with your players about how many of a given beast will appear, and work ahead of time to make sure you, as the player, bring a variety of stat blocks your DM can quickly pick between to reduce their burden if you really want to play with these effects.

An Army of Peasants and Animal Shapes

Animal Shapes is such a fun spell to mess around with because on its own it has near limitless potential. However many willing creatures you can fit within 30 ft. of you that you can see determine the quantity of at will transforming beasts you get with refreshing hit points each time you opt to transform them into new forms of CR 4 or lower.

Lets say, generously, we just fill the 30 ft. radius on the ground around you with one willing creature per 5 feet, which is tame when you consider flying allied creatures, you yourself hovering in the air, and small and smaller willing creatures, but for sake of the example, we’ll say with one person per square within 30 feet if you, you’ve got one hundred and thirteen willing creatures. Perhaps a small town sick of a lich’s torment!

Now, each of these 113 creatures you can transform into any beast of CR 4 or lower, and there are some absolute bangers in this category.

Start out with some insects, like Spiders, for infiltration, or Hawks for a tiny invasion force flying at 60 ft. per move per round. Badgers have a 5 ft. burrow speed, meaning subterranean invasions are an option.

Once you’ve gotten to your target, as an action, you can transform the group into something like a Giant Scorpion. Giant Scorpions are CR 3 beasts that come with three attacks. With movement and shoving with some clever positioning and falls, you’re looking at potentially three-hundred and thirty nine attacks, for a potential total damage, including their poison save, of 113d10+226 piercing + 226d8+452 bludgeoning + 452d10 poison damage, which averages to right around 5,028 damage.

Now, most of that isn’t going to hit, but if a fifth of it does, that’s well over 1,000 damage a round from an army of angry peasants.

What makes it even more gross is if the creatures don’t take more than 52 + their base HP damage in a given round, you can reset them all back to full hit points by swapping their form. Wild!

Druids: Nature’s Wrath

Druids are one of the least popular classes in the game, but do offer a huge amount of potential. They’re definitely one of, if not the most complicated class in the game, but you can play a variety of druids in a straightforward, easy to manage way should you stick with their more modern subclasses and spells. If you want the highly dense and busted effects the class offers, its readily available, but is dependent on your DMs willingness to give you what you want in some instances, and otherwise will require a lot of preparation ahead of time with a whole extra folder full of form stat blocks ready to pull out as needed.

I’d still recommend Circle of Spores, Wildfire, and Shepherd to any players broaching druids for the first time. Their Wild Companion feature helps give you the utility of Wild Shape without needing to delve into all the options available, and their modern subclasses let you use your Wild Shape for other simpler, yet still powerful, effects.
Give druids a chance. They can be absolute powerhouses in the right hands.

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Druid 5e

Ultimate Guide to Druids in D&D 5e

Using This Guide

Druid 101

Ability Score Placement

Starting Proficiencies and Equipment

1st Level: Druidic and Spellcasting

Druidic

Spellcasting

Multiclassing and Preparing Spells

Cantrip Recommendations

Cantrips to Avoid

1st Level Spells of Note

General Recommendations

Stealth, Infiltration, and Exploration Options

Support Options

Area Damaging Options

1st Level Spells to Avoid

2nd Level: Wild Shape, Druid Circle, and Wild Companion

Wild Shape

Wild Shape Features Worth Getting

Why Wild Shape, and When to Wild Shape

Druid Circles

Wild Companion

3rd Level: 2nd Level Spells

Summoning Magic

Other 2nd Level Spell Considerations

Spells to Avoid

4th Level: Wild Shape Improvement, Feat, and Cantrip Versatility

Wild Shape Improvement

Feat Considerations

Martial Feats for Moon Druids

Cantrip Versatility

5th Level: 3rd Level Spells

3rd-Level Spells of Note

Spells to Avoid

6th Level and Beyond

4th Level Spell Recommendations

4th Level Spells to Avoid

8th Level: Wild Shape Improvement

5th Level Spell Recommendations

5th Level Spells to Avoid

6th Level Spell Recommendations

6th Level Spells to Avoid

7th Level Spell Recommendations

7th Level Spells to Avoid

8th Level Spell Recommendations

8th Level Spells to Avoid

9th Level Spell Recommendations

9th Level Spells to Avoid

Timeless Body

Beast Spells

Archdruid

Multiclassing Druid

Multiclassing from Martial Classes

Spellcaster Multiclass Options

Munchkin Nonsense You Can Try

Getting to Choose in Conjure Spells Is Fundamentally Busted

An Army of Peasants and Animal Shapes

Druids: Nature’s Wrath