Circle of Growth

(Image by Teemu Husso)

 

Druid Level         Spells

       2^nd                  entangle, goodberry

       3^rd                  lesser restoration, spike growth

       5^th                  create food and water, plant growth

       7^th                  aura of life, grasping vines

       9^th                  greater restoration, tree stride

 

Green Thumb

Starting at 2nd level, you gain proficiency with herbalism kit and your proficiency bonus is doubled for any ability check you make with an herbalism kit and you gain proficiency in the Nature skill, and whenever you make an Intelligence (Nature) check, you gain a bonus to the check equal to your Wisdom modifier.

Your affinity for plants also manifests in odd ways due to your connection with nature, granting you the following benefits:

• Plants within 30 feet of you have limited sentience, giving them the ability to communicate with you. You can question plants about events, but they only remember things that happened within the past few days. You have advantage on all Charisma checks you make to influence them.

• When you sleep, small magical plants grow around you, taking the form of a cocoon, a bush, a short thicket or some other natural camouflage. You are considered to be hiding while sleeping in environments with plant life, this uses your passive Dexterity (Stealth). Creatures have disadvantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks to spot you while you're sleeping.

• The very ground you walk on helps muffle your foot falls and the plants seem to move to help conceal you, giving you a +2 Dexterity (Stealth) bonus to checks.

• As an action, you can create a small magical plant within 10 feet of you that can fit in your hand. The plant can be used in spell components, provided that it doesn’t have a listed gold cost. Any plant created by this feature fades away after seven days.

 

Wild Growth

Beginning at 2nd level, you cause a wild mass of vegetation to grow. As a bonus action, you can expend a use of your Wild Shape to cause thorny vines to sprout from the ground in a 30-foot radius centered on a point within 60 feet of you. This area lasts for one minute or until you use this feature again.

When you use this feature, you can designate any number of creatures you can see to be unaffected by it. An affected creature’s speed is halved in the area, and when the creature enters the area for the first time on a turn or starts its turn there, it must make a Strength saving throw. On a failed save, the creature is restrained by the entangling plants for the duration and takes 1d4 piercing damage. If a creature starts its turn in the vines it takes 1d4 piercing damage. A creature restrained by the plants can use its action to make a Strength check against your spell save DC. On a success, it frees itself.

Additionally, you learn the Thorn Whip cantrip, which doesn’t count against the number of Druid cantrips you know. When you cast it, you can have the vine originate from any plant or natural surface within 30 feet of you. On a successful hit, it pulls the creature to its point of origin, rather than to you. Starting at 10th level, you can cast Thorn Whip as a Bonus Action.

 

Sculpt Nature

At 6th level, when you cast a spell that magically creates or alters plants, such as Entangle or Plant Growth, you can designate a number of creatures equal to your Wisdom modifier that can ignore the effects of the spell. The designated creatures have half cover while within the area of such spells. 

Also, as an action you can touch a Huge or smaller non-magical living plant and encourage it to grow. You can reshape it into a simple form of your choice that does not vary significantly from its current shape, such as a make shift shelter, or a bridge.

You can also cause a plant to double in size over the course of 10 minutes. You can touch the plant again to cause it to revert to its former shape over ten minutes.

You can use this feature a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, regaining all uses when you complete a short or long rest.

Additionally, you learn the Plant Growth spell, you always have it prepared, and it doesn't count against your number of Druid spells prepared. You can cast Plant Growth without expending a spell slot. If you cast Plant Growth in this way, you can't cast it again using this feature until you finish a long rest.

 

Verdant Abundance

Beginning at 10^th level, you cause plants to blossom and grow wherever you linger. When you take a short or long rest, the effects of the 8-hour casting of Plant Growth immediately takes effect in the area around you, unless you choose otherwise.   

Additionally, the radius of your Wild Growth increases to 60 feet and produces a number of fruits equal to your proficiency bonus, that can help you and your allies. These fruits can only be picked by you or your allies, and each fruit has one of the following benefits when eaten:

Revitalizing: The creature regains hot points equal to 1d8 + your Wisdom modifier + your Druid level. Any hit points over their hit point maximum become temporary hit points.

Mystical: The creature regains one expended spell slot of a level equal to or lower then your proficiency bonus.

Rejuvenating: The creature is immediately cured of one of the following conditions: blinded, deafened, paralyzed, petrified, poisoned, a reduction to an ability score or their hit point maximum, or 1 level of exhaustion.

 

Natural Sanctum

Starting at 14^th level, you can draw magic from the earth itself to create a sanctuary. You can spend 1 hour conducting a ritual, which lasts for 1 week, and if done every week for 1 year it becomes permanent. You must complete a long rest before you can do this ritual again. During this ritual, a magically sanctuary is created around you, no larger than a 100-foot cube, you can designate creatures as friends, they will not be affected by any of the ill effects of your sanctum.

You and creatures you have designated as friends have the following benefits while in your sanctuary, immune charmed, frightened, can’t be possessed, or targeted by divination spells, has Darkvision inside the sanctuary, and if hit dice are spend to regain hit points, they are treated as if the maximum was rolled.

During the ritual, a number of spell effects equal to your Wisdom bonus can be placed throughout the sanctuary, these can’t be more powerful than a 2^nd level spell, examples include:

• Areas of thick brambles, or entangling vines, these would function like Entangle or Spiked Growth.
• Strong winds triggered by certain things, Orcs, Fog, Poison Gas, etc. this works like Gust of Wind.
• Thick fog might obscure parts of the sanctuary, this works like Fog Cloud but can be broken up into no more than 10 10ftx10ft cubes.
• You can create a bush or tree that produces nutritious fruits or berries, this works like Goodberry but the berries with wither if they leave the sanctuary.
• A pool or spring of everlasting fresh clean water, this works like Create Water.
• You can also make harmless sensory effects, such as dancing lights that resemble fireflies, light fragrant breezes, or the chirping of birds or crickets.

Additionally, if you use your Wild Growth feature in your sanctuary it lasts for 1 week, and any fruits produced by Verdant Abundance regrow at dawn.

A dispel magic cast on the area, if successful, removes only one of the sanctuaries effects, not the entire area. That spell’s caster chooses which effect to end. Only when all its effects are gone is the sanctuary dispelled.

 

 Variant version

Natural Sanctum

Starting at 14^th level, you learn to create a natural sanctuary. As an hour long ritual you create a 90 foot cube pocket dimension. During the ritual you decide the basic natural features, such as trees, grass, water features, the biome, temperate, etc., as well as the weather, this could be static, 75 and sunny all the time, or it could mimic the changing seasons of the material plane. Plants in the sanctuary are magically sustained, and will always stay at the state fitting of the season in your sanctuary, and re-growing any fruits, vegetables, or flowers picked after 24 hours. Each time you perform this ritual, after this first, it increases the sanctuary and 30 feet in all directions. Once you perform this ritual, you can’t do so again for 7 days.   

To enter the sanctuary, you perform a ritual that takes 1 minute, during which you designate what creatures are allowed to enter. You and any creature you designate can enter the sanctuary as long as the portal remains open. You can open or close the portal if you are within 30 feet of it. While closed, the portal is invisible on the material plane. As an action, you can revoke a creatures access to the sanctuary, if they are within the sanctuary when this happens, they are expelled into an open space nearest to the entrance.

While within your sanctuary you have control over it, allowing you to change it in the following ways:

• You can perform a 1 minute ritual to change the time of day, weather, or temperature.

• You can perform a 10 minute ritual to cause up to 5 foot of a specific plant to grow, such a wildflowers, berry bushes, or a fruit tree, etc.

• You can perform a 10 minute ritual to reshape any plant into a simple form of your choice that does not vary significantly from its current shape, such as a make shift shelter, or a bridge, etc.

• You can perform a 10 minute ritual to cause a specific thing, or area to perform a certain task when triggered, such as roots and vines to form a foot bridge when you approach a stream, or a tree to lower its branches when you reach a piece of fruit, etc.

• You can perform a 1 hour ritual to change major features, such as adding a stream or pond, bring forth hills or even mountains if you have the room, sculpt out caves, or change the season or biome.

• You can perform a 1 hour ritual to summon small animals to your sanctuary, such as fish, rabbits, foxes, birds, etc. The number of animals created can never exceed the available resources to sustain them, and will prevent new ones being born if it would cause an unbalance in the ecosystem.