Baldurs Gate 3: Best Druid Build [Race, Subclass & Skills]

In Baldur’s Gate 3, players can select from various classes and races and then personalize their character’s abilities and outlook according to their preferences. We will help you create the best Druid Build in Baldurs Gate 3.

Players can choose from many different builds at the start of the game. Druid is one of the builds players prefer because of its formidable shape-shifting and combatant experience. Druids exhibit versatility as shapeshifters, able to transform into various animals and wield the forces of nature. There are many ways to build a druid, but here are some common suggestions based on our experience and reviews across the web on how to make the best druid build.

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Key Takeaways

• We will choose the Circle of the Moon as a Subclass for this build.
• Additionally, Wood Elf is the best race for Druid Build.
• Animal Handling and Nature are considered the best skills for your Druid Build.
• Go with Folk Hero as your background for the build.
• You must pick cantrips and spells very carefully.
• Warcaster, Resilient and elemental adapt are some of the best feats for Druid Build.
• The best equipment for druid build is the Shapeshifter Hat and Knife of the Undermountain King.
• Players must also interact with different characters and factions in the game.

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Here’s a build overview of the best Druid build in Baldurs Gate 3.

Features	Best Choice
Subclass	Circle of the Moon
Race	Wood Elf
Cantrips	Produce Flame, Shillelagh
Spells	Entangle, Thunderwave, Iceknife Barkskin, Call Lightning, Freedom of Movement Conjure Animals, Speak with Animals, Greater Restoration, Mass Cure Wounds, Conjure Woodland Beings, Polymorph
Background	Folk Hero, Gold Dwarves
Feats	Warcaster, Resilient, Elemental adapt, Lucky
Skills	Animal Handling and Nature
Equipment	Shapeshifter Hat, Knife of the Undermountain King, Medium Armor and Shield

Subclass 

Circle Of The Moon (Shape-Shifter Build)

Circle of the Moon is a subclass of Druid build, which enhances your wild shape abilities, allowing you to transform into more powerful and diverse creatures such as bears, wolves, spiders, and more. Utilizing your wild shape is a bonus action, and casting spells while transformed into an animal is possible.

This makes Circle of the Moon Druid a very versatile and powerful class, as they can be a frontline tank, a ranged damage dealer, or a supporting character, depending on the situation. If you want to create the Best Druid build in Baldurs Gate 3, the “Circle of the Moon” subclass will take you one step closer.  

Recommended Stats for this Subclass are given in the table below.

Ability	Scores
Strength	10
Constitution	14
Dexterity	14
Wisdom	17
Intelligence	8
Charisma	10

These stats will give you a good balance of survivability, damage, and spellcasting ability. 

Here’s how to set up and play with this subclass:

• Primary Abilities: Wisdom should be your highest ability score since it determines your spellcasting capability as a Druid.
• Recommended Skills: Animal Handling, Perception, Nature, and Survival will complement your druidic knowledge.
• Spells: Prioritize spells that enhance your wild shape forms or provide crowd control effects like Entangle or Spike Growth.
• Wild Shape Forms: As a Circle of the Moon Druid, you can access more powerful wild shape forms earlier than other Druids. This transforms you into creatures with higher hit points and damage output.
• Combat Strategy: In combat, strategically utilize your wild shape forms. Consider using tanker animal forms like bears or wolves to soak up damage while dealing significant melee damage.
• Survivability: Take advantage of your increased hit point pool while in beast form and consider taking the War Caster feat, which allows you to cast spells even with your hands full.

Circle Of The Spores (Damage Over Time Build)

This subclass focuses on using fungal spores to deal necrotic damage and create zombie allies. You can use your halo of spores feature to damage nearby enemies and your symbiotic entity feature to double the damage and gain temporary hit points. You can also use your fungal infestation feature to reanimate dead creatures as zombies that fight for you.

Here’s how to set up and play with this subclass:

• Primary Abilities: Wisdom remains crucial for spellcasting proficiency, but consider investing in Constitution to increase durability.
• Recommended Skills: Choose skills such as Medicine, Insight, Stealth, and Arcana to round out this build’s utility outside combat encounters.
• Spells: Focus on spells like Infestation and Cloudkill that deal consistent damage over time while utilizing Summon Fungal Creature for additional assistance in fights.
• Feats/Abilities: Consider taking Spell Sniper feat to increase the range of spells like Poison Spray or Thorn Whip.
• Symbiotic Entity: The Circle of Spores grants you a Symbiotic Entity feature that enhances your melee attacks by adding poison damage and temporary hit points. During combat, it can be used as a bonus action.
• Fungal Infestation: Halo of Spores: Halo of Spores is an ability unique to this circle that deals necrotic damage to nearby enemies when they get too close. It’s an excellent way to deter foes from engaging in melee combat.
• Summon Fungal Creature: This unique ability lets you summon fungal allies into battle, providing additional support through their abilities and actions.

Circle Of The Land (Spellcaster Build)

Land Druid uses the terrain and natural elements to aid your allies and hinder your enemies. You can select a Land type that aligns with your preferred playstyle, such as arctic, coast, desert, grassland, mountain, or Underdark.

Every land choice grants you access to extra spells that are automatically prepared and do not contribute to your spell limit. You also gain the natural recovery feature that lets you regain some spell slots during a short rest.

Here’s how to set up and play with this subclass:

• Primary Abilities: Wisdom is crucial for this build to maximize your spellcasting potential.
• Recommended Skills: Choose skills like Insight, History, Investigation, and Persuasion to enhance your role-playing opportunities and knowledge base.
• Spells: Select spells based on your chosen land type. For example, if you select Forest as your favored terrain, prioritize spells like Barkskin or Call Lightning. This allows you to tailor your abilities according to your environment.
• Feats/Abilities: Consider taking Spell Focus feat to increase the saving throw DC of your druid spells or Observant feat for increased passive perception and investigation scores.
• Land Type Selection: When choosing this circle, select one type of land from the Arctic, Coast, Desert, Forest, Grassland, Mountain, or Swamp. Each land type provides different benefits, such as extra spells known and enhanced spellcasting within its favored terrain.
• Expanded Spell List: By selecting a specific land type at level 2, you can access additional spells associated with that land type. This expands your spellcasting versatility and allows you to adapt to different situations.
• Ritual Casting: Druids can cast certain spells as rituals without expending a spell slot, which is especially useful for utility or exploration purposes.

Spells & Cantrips

Druid Build offers you various sets of spells, with each level up to level 6. Althcane can unlock almost all spells till level 6. You have limited spell slots, which keep increasing with your build level.

You must make choices at each level since you cannot possess all the spells simultaneously. If you are going for the best Druid Build in Baldurs Gate 3, here’s a table to help you choose which ones to keep. 

Druid Level	Spells
1	Cantrips: Produce Flame Spells: Entangle, Thunderwave, Iceknife
2	Speak with Animals
3	Barkskin,Call Lightning
4	Cantrips: Shillelagh Spells: Sleet Storm, Moon Beam
5	Freedom of Movement, Conjure Animals
6	Greater Restoration
7	Transport via Plants
8	Conjure Woodland Beings, Polymorph
9	Mass Cure Wounds
10	Wall of Thorns
11	Plane Shift
12	Animal Shapes

Here are the details and properties of each cantrip or spell:

Cantrips

Produce Flame

A ranged attack that deals fire damage and can also be used as a light source. 

Shillelagh

Shillelagh takes a bonus action, empowering your quarterstaff with magical properties and enabling you to apply your Wisdom modifier to attack and damage rolls.

Spells

Entangle

Entangle is an area-of-effect spell that restrains enemies within a 20-foot square and makes them vulnerable to melee attacks.

Thunderwave

Thunderwave creates a wave of thunder that deals thunder damage and pushes enemies away from you. It requires being in melee range but has a high saving throw DC and can create distance.

Iceknife

Iceknife throws a shard of ice that explodes and deals cold damage to enemies within 5 feet. It does not require concentration, but it requires a ranged attack roll and can harm allies.

Speak with Animals

Speak with Animals lets you communicate with any beast for 10 minutes. This can help gather information, make allies, or avoid conflicts.

Barkskin

Barkskin increases your AC to 16 for an hour. This can boost your defense, especially if you use Wild Shape to transform into animals.

Call Lightning

Call Lightning is a concentration spell that summons a storm cloud that can strike enemies with lightning bolts. You can use your action to call down a bolt that deals lightning damage to enemies within a 5-foot radius.

Sleet Storm

Sleet Storm creates a storm of sleet and hail that covers a 40-foot radius area. The region transforms into challenging terrain, shrouded in heavy obscurity. Any creature beginning its turn in this area must make a Dexterity saving throw or risk falling prone.

Moon Beam

Moonbeam is a concentration spell that creates a beam of radiant damage that affects enemies within a 5-foot radius.

Freedom of Movement

It grants a creature immunity to difficult terrain, grappled, restrained, and paralyzed conditions for an hour. This can be useful for escaping or avoiding traps and enemies.

Conjure Animals

Conjure Animals is another concentration spell that summons up to eight friendly beasts of your choice that obey your commands. You can use them to fight, scout, or distract your enemies.

Greater Restoration

Greater Restoration is a spell that can heal a creature afflicted by one of the following conditions: blinded, paralyzed, poisoned, or petrified. It can also end one curse, one reduction to an ability score, or one effect that reduces the hit point maximum.

Transport via Plants

Transport via Plants lets you enter any plant within 10 feet and exit from any other plant of the same kind within any distance on the same plane of existence. You can also bring along other creatures that are holding your hand. 

Conjure Woodland Beings

Conjure Woodland Beings summons up to eight friendly fey creatures of your choice that obey your commands. You can choose from pixies, sprites, satyrs, dryads, and more. These creatures can have various abilities and effects, such as casting spells, flying, charming, or healing.

Polymorph

Polymorph is a concentration spell that transforms a creature into another creature of equal or lower challenge rating for an hour. You can use this to turn an enemy into a harmless animal or an ally into a powerful beast. 

Mass Cure Wounds

Mass Cure wounds that heal up to six creatures of your choice within a 30-foot radius sphere. This can be useful for restoring the health of your allies or yourself in a large-scale battle.

Wall of Thorns

Wall of Thorns creates a wall of thorny vines that blocks vision and movement. You can also shape the wall into a ring or a hemisphere to trap enemies.

Plane Shift

The spell Plane Shift enables you to move up to several willing creatures to a different plane of existence. You can also use this spell to banish an unwilling creature to another plane if it fails a Charisma saving throw.

Animal Shapes

Animal Shapes transforms up to ten willing creatures of your choice into animals of your choice for an hour. The transformed creatures retain their personality and alignment but gain the statistics and abilities of the animals they become. 

Race & Subrace

The role of races in your Baldur’s Gate 3 build is to provide you with different abilities, traits, and proficiencies that can complement your chosen class and subclass. Considering your favored playstyle and strategic approach, certain races might prove more compatible with specific classes than others.

Ultimately, the role of races in your build is to enhance your character’s strengths and personality but not to limit your choices or creativity.

For the best Druid build in Baldurs Gate 3, there can be many races that have different strengths and weaknesses that can suit different playstyles and strategies. We consider Wood Elf to be the best race for Druid Build; here’s why:

Wood Elf 

Wood elves are a subrace known for their agility, perception, and affinity for nature. They have a natural bonus to dexterity and wisdom, which can help in casting spells and using skills. These elves also have a dark vision, which allows them to see in the dark, and an extra proficiency in perception, which can help spot hidden enemies or traps. They also have a trait called Mask of the Wild, which allows them to hide in natural surroundings, such as foliage or heavy rain.

Wood elves can be an excellent choice for a druid build, especially if you want to focus on the Circle of the Moon subclass. Wood elves’ high dexterity and wisdom can help you increase your armor class, initiative, and stealth while in animal form, as well as your spellcasting ability and spell save DC. 

There are also other great race options for Druid Builds, such as Gold Dwarves and High Half-Elf.

Gold Dwarves

Gold dwarves are a subrace of dwarves known for their resilience, craftsmanship, and pride. They have a natural affinity for constitution and wisdom, which can help with casting spells and using skills.

Their dark vision allows them to see in darkness, and they are skilled in wielding light hammers, battleaxes, and war hammers. Additionally, they possess a characteristic known as Dwarven Resilience, which benefits them from saving throws against venom and resistance to damage caused by poison.

High Half-Elf

High Half-Elves have a natural affinity for charisma and two other abilities of their choice, which can add more versatility to their build. They also have a dark vision, resistance to charm effects, and an advantage on saving throws against being put to sleep. They also have an extra cantrip from the wizard spell list, which can add more options to their arsenal.

Feats

Feats are special abilities you can choose for your character when you reach certain levels in Baldur’s Gate 3. They can provide various benefits, such as enhancing your skills, attributes, combat abilities, or magic powers. However, choosing a feat means you cannot increase your ability scores at that level, so you must carefully weigh the pros and cons.

For a druid build, there are some feats that are more useful than others, depending on your playstyle and preferences. Here are some of the best feats for a druid build in Baldur’s Gate 3:

War Caster

“War Caster” is instrumental, enabling you to execute the physical components of spells even when holding arms or a shield. Additionally, it grants you an advantage on Constitution preservation throws required to sustain your focus on a spell in situations where you take damage.

Lastly, it permits you to employ a spell as an opportunity attack when an enemy moves beyond your immediate reach. This feat is excellent for a druid who wants to cast spells while in melee combat, especially if you use your wild shape ability to transform into an animal with natural weapons or armor.

Resilient

This allows you to raise a single ability score of your choosing by 1 point, with a maximum increase of 20 points. Additionally, it provides you with expertise in preservation throws that utilize the selected ability.

Resilient is useful for a druid who wants to boost their primary ability score (Wisdom) or their secondary ability score (Constitution or Dexterity). It also helps you resist some of the most common effects in the game, such as charm, poison, paralysis, or fear.

Elemental Adept

Through this feat, you can pick one of the subsequent damage types: acid, lightning, cold, or thunder. Spells you cast ignore resistance to damage of the chosen type. Furthermore, when you cause damage using a spell that you cast, causing damage of the chosen type, you can consider any roll of 1 on a damage die as if it were a 2.

This is particularly advantageous for a druid focused on elemental spells like Thunderwave, Ice Knife, Call Lightning, Produce Flame, or Sleet Storm.

Lucky

By selecting this feat, you receive three lucky points. Whenever you initiate an attack, an ability check, or a preservation throw, you can expend one luck point to roll an extra 20-sided die (d20).

These are some of the feats for the best druid build in Baldurs Gate 3. Of course, there are other feats that may suit your style better, such as Alert, Mobile, Observant, or Skilled. Ultimately, the optimal feat for your druid build hinges on your preferences and favored gameplay approach.

Background

Your background can give you extra skill proficiencies and personality traits, ideals, bonds, and flaws. You can choose any background that suits your character’s story and roleplay, but some of the best ones for a druid are:

• Folk Hero: It gives you proficiency in Survival and a tool of your choice, as well as the Rustic Hospitality feature, which lets you find a place to hide or rest among commoners. If you are a druid championing the people and the land, who fights against tyranny and injustice, then Folk Hero is your best option.

• Hermit: This will give you proficiency in Medicine and Religion and the Discovery feature, which grants you access to a unique and powerful secret. This background is perfect for a druid who is a recluse and a seeker of knowledge who has spent years in solitude studying the mysteries of nature and magic.
• Outlander: The Outlander background bestows expertise in Athletics and Survival. Moreover, it offers the Wanderer attribute, allowing you to recollect details about your surroundings’ settlements, terrain, and other features. Additionally, you possess a remarkable memory for maps and landscapes. This background is great for a druid who is a wanderer and an explorer who has traveled worldwide.

These are some of the best skills and backgrounds for the best druid build in Baldurs Gate 3. Of course, there are other options that may suit your style better, such as Acolyte, Guild Artisan, or Sage. Ultimately, the best skills and background for your druid build depends on your preference and playstyle.

Skills

As a druid, you have access to four skill proficiencies:

Skills	Attributes
Animal Handling	Helps you communicate and bond with animals, which can be useful for your wild shape ability and exploring the world.
Insight	Lets you read the emotions, intentions, and lies of other creatures.
Medicine	Lets you heal, stabilize, or diagnose the wounds and diseases of other creatures.
Nature	Helps you identify plants, animals, and natural phenomena, which can be helpful for your spellcasting and survival.

You can choose any two, but Animal Handling and Nature are the most useful.  Insight and Medicine are also good choices, especially if you want to play as a healer or a supporting character. These skills will help you make your Druid build the best in Baldurs Gate 3.

Equipment

The equipment for the best Druid build in Baldurs Gate 3 are:

Shapeshifter Hat

This unique item increases your Wild Shape charge by one, allowing you to transform into animals more often. Wild Shape is a powerful ability that lets you change your form, gain extra hit points, and access different attacks and abilities. You can find this hat in the Druid Grove, in the room where you meet Kagha.

Knife Of The Undermountain King

This is a rare dagger with a high chance of scoring critical hits and rerolling low-damage rolls. This can be useful for dealing extra damage with melee attacks, especially if you use the Shillelagh cantrip to boost your dagger with magic. You can find this dagger in the Underdark, in the Drow fort near the corpse. 

Medium Armor & Shield

These general items can improve your armor class and defense, making you harder to hit and damage. As a Druid, you can wear medium armor and shields without any penalties, as long as they are not made of metal. You can find various types of medium armor and shields throughout the game, such as leather armor, hide armor, wooden shield, etc.

The game has several quests and challenges, such as saving the Grove from the Goblins, finding a cure for the tadpole, discovering the secrets of the Undermountain King, and more. You can use your Medicine skill to heal or diagnose wounds or diseases or to identify their causes or cures. Animal Handling skills can also be used to tame or train animals or avoid conflicts.

You can find more interesting builds for Baldurs Gate 3:

• Baldurs Gate 3 Best Cleric Build.
• Baldurs Gate 3 Best Sorcerer Build.
• Baldurs Gate 3 Best Druid Build. 
• Baldurs Gate 3 Best Fighter Build. 

That is all we have on the best Druid build in Baldurs Gate 3. What are your thoughts and opinions on our build’s distribution of skills and subclass? Share with us in the comments section below. 

• Baldurs Gate 3 Best Fighter Build.
• Baldurs Gate 3 Best Races.
• Baldur’s Gate 3 Best Builds.