Introduction
An immensely popular subclass since its introduction, the Circle of the Moon Druid is all about being better at turning into animals than every other flavor of Druid. Most of the time. Polymorph is still generally better than Wild Shape, but your possible uses of Polymorph don’t catch up to your likely number of uses of Wild Shape until level 10, by which point many campaigns are done. Additionally, Moon Druids get many neat tricks they get to add onto Wild Shape.
Having huge defensive capabilities makes them very survivable Defenders if they use their forms and tactics right or just durable Strikers if they optimize for that instead. The key to this subclass is always going to be figuring out what you maintain Concentration on while in animal form to maximize whatever tactic you’re trying to accomplish.
If the fantasy of turning into powerful animals appeals to you, this is the best way to do it repeatedly at low levels. It also has full Druid spellcasting to fall back on if those tactics don’t work, making it an exceptionally versatile character to play.
This article is for the 2024 rules. For the 2014 rules, see our 2014 DnD 5e Circle of the Moon Druid Handbook
Table of Contents
- Introduction
- Disclaimer
- Circle of the Moon Features
- Circle of the Moon Backgrounds
- Circle of the Moon Species
- Circle of the Moon Ability Scores
- Circle of the Moon Feats
- Circle of the Moon Weapons
- Circle of the Moon Armor
- Circle of the Moon Multiclassing
- Example Circle of the Moon Build – Cassie, the Woman Who Morphs Into Animals
Disclaimer
RPGBOT uses the color coding scheme which has become common among Pathfinder build handbooks, which is simple to understand and easy to read at a glance.
- : Bad, useless options, or options which are extremely situational. Nearly never useful.
- : OK options, or useful options that only apply in rare circumstances. Useful sometimes.
- : Good options. Useful often.
- : Fantastic options, often essential to the function of your character. Useful very frequently.
We will not include 3rd-party content, including content from DMs Guild, in handbooks for official content because we can’t assume that your game will allow 3rd-party content or homebrew. We also won’t cover Unearthed Arcana content because it’s not finalized, and we can’t guarantee that it will be available to you in your games.
The advice offered below is based on the current State of the Character Optimization Meta as of when the article was last updated. Keep in mind that the state of the meta periodically changes as new source materials are released, and the article will be updated accordingly as time allows.
Circle of the Moon Features
- Circle Forms: Circle of the Moon’s signature feature. Wild
Shape is mostly a utility feature for most Druids, but for Circle of the
Moon it’s a powerful combat option. Expect to spend most encounters fighting
while in Wild Shape.
- : The CR of your
beast forms will range from CR 1 at level 3 to CR 6 at level 18. This is
a big boost compared to other Druids, but you still need to use spells
to buff yourself in order to keep pace in combat.
the capacity for higher-level animal forms is both fun and frustrating as the number of beasts that are of a relevant CR, are mechanically interesting, but also don’t have a fly speed is pretty small and is covered in our Practical Guide to Wild Shape.
This is especially true because, in this edition, you’re limited to a set number of known forms which can only be changed one per Long Rest. With the overwhelming majority of play done between levels 3 and 10, this means you will get to primarily use a combination of 6 forms between CRs 1 and 3. That said, there are barely 6 optimal choices at those levels anyway, so that’s not a huge drawback and (in my opinion) mostly exists to prevent people from trying to pull out some random monster stat block and getting stuck for minutes looking for it.
- : Beasts have notoriously poor AC, which makes fighting as a beast dangerous for other Druids. This keeps your AC consistently high throughout your career. At high levels when monster attack bonuses start overpowering your anyway, the pile of THP is large enough to keep up the defensive side.
- : Three times as much temporary hp as other Druids, but still rarely enough to get you through a difficult encounter. Do not dump Constitution.
- : The CR of your
beast forms will range from CR 1 at level 3 to CR 6 at level 18. This is
a big boost compared to other Druids, but you still need to use spells
to buff yourself in order to keep pace in combat.
- : No longer are you
locked out of performing the healing role by being in Wild Shape. Every form
has a ranged attack that’s actually quite good. Summon your own crowd to
blend in with. It’s a great time.
- : A reliable ranged attack option, which is great since beasts almost universally can’t attack at range.
- : Decent healing, but you want to avoid using it in combat as much as possible. It also can’t restore THP, so you won’t need to heal yourself until enemies have cut through the THP granted by Wild Shape.
- : Passable area control, but it monopolizes your Action, the AOE is small, the damage is poor, and it’s a Con save.
- : Basically remote-controlled spirit guardians. It doesn’t need to stay within the spell’s range, just within sight, so you can drive this away from you huge distances with the 10-minute duration. If you can have a way to see through another creature’s eyes (use Wild Companion to summon a disposable familiar), you can drive this across huge distances, potentially clearing entire encounters without any risk to your party.
- : This spell is designed almost entirely to be a buff for Circle of the Moon. Pick a form with Multiattack, and you can apply the +2d6 damage boost repeatedly each turn.
- : Only situationally useful, but it does save you the trouble of walking over to whoever needs healing.
- Improve Circle Forms:
- : Essential for overcoming common resistances to weapon damage types.
- : Essential for maintaining Concentration. You use your beast form’s Constitution, but between this and potentially Resilient (Con) and War Caster, you can make Concentration very reliable.
- : Basically Misty Step, but slightly shorter range. It’s notably not a spell, so it doesn’t conflict with casting a spell with a spell slot on the same turn. You can use it both in and out of Wild Shape, too! This is easily worth a level 2 spell slot to recharge if you run out of uses.
- Lunar Form:
- : The extra damage amounts to roughly 7 DPR which, while not irrelevant, doesn’t feel hugely impactful at this level. It does say once per turn instead of once on each of your turns, so look for places you might be able to make Opportunity Attacks.
- : Interesting, but it either means you’re removing yourself (probably a Defender to some degree) from a fight to protect someone or putting someone close to a fight that presumably already has their own means of getting there if they’re playing an optimized character. At least you can still use the Advantage for Starry Wisp if you’re teleporting defensively.
Circle of the Moon Backgrounds
No different than other Druids, although Lucky will be useful for us as a way to help ensure our attacks (whose bonus never scale and are thus whatever it says on the stat block) are able to make it past scaling AC bonuses at least a few times per day.
For information and advice regarding Origin Feats, including those granted by your Background, see the Circle of the Moon Feats section, below.
Circle of the Moon Species
We should spend hardly any time in combat in our own body, so we want something that will provide utility. This probably means just picking Human for an Origin Feat you want that doesn’t have good stat choices.
Circle of the Moon Ability Scores
: Dump.
: Only relevant when we’re in caster form in combat which should be pretty rare.
: Useful for maintaining concentration (and remaining alive).
: We don’t care for Dex very much, so we could take on the Librarian role if need be with our leftover stats.
: Druids run on Wisdom.
: We don’t care for Dex very much, so we could take on the Face role if need be with our leftover stats.
| Point Buy | Standard Array | |
|---|---|---|
| Str | 8 | 8 |
| Dex | 12 | 12 |
| Con | 15 | 14 |
| Int | 13 | 13 |
| Wis | 15 | 15 |
| Cha | 8 | 10 |
Circle of the Moon Feats
Because we can use feats while in Wild Shape, we want things that are very different than a normal Druid.
: I cannot overstate how good this feat is for Moon Druids. By strict RAW, we will never actually get to use the Punch and Grab feature because we never use our Action for Unarmed Strike (the Action is Pounce, Bite, Tentacles, Claw, etc), but Attack Advantage and Fast Wrestler are both still very good for us in many of our best forms. Also, I believe many DMs could be convinced that all of those attacks are, in fact, Unarmed Strikes, but be aware that it’s an interpretation.
: Many Defender forms deal Bludgeoning damage, and getting a free reposition can be a huge benefit. It can also increase your Constitution, one of the few things that still matters while Wild Shaped.
: While the stat bonus won’t be helpful, anything with claws deals Slashing damage, allowing you to be a stickier Defender.
Circle of the Moon Weapons
Circle of the Moon Armor
Circle of the Moon Multiclassing
This section briefly details some obvious and enticing multiclass options, but doesn’t fully explore the broad range of multiclassing combinations. For more on multiclassing, see our Practical Guide to Multiclassing.
One of the primary reasons for multiclassing (fixing low AC) has been removed in the 2024 rules thanks to Circle Forms. That said, the new version of Martial Arts in Monk is incredibly strong as a single level will allow Moon Druids a consistent source of Bonus Action damage, and taking it up to 3 can get you hilarious things like 10 extra feet of reach (again, interpretable as it’s for Unarmed Strikes) or Open Hand Techniques.
Barbarians (traditionally a solid choice in 2014 5e) make much less sense now that we can cast things while Wild Shaped immediately on access to the subclass.
A single level of Warlock to get access to Armor of Agathys can also be very powerful. Armor of Agathys ends early if you have no Temporary Hit Points, but it doesn’t care where those THP come from, and Wild Shape gives you a huge pile of THP to work with.
Example Circle of the Moon Build – Cassie, the Woman Who Morphs Into Animals
Sometimes, all you need in the dark is a wolf and a light.
Ability Scores
As described above.
| Base | Adjusted | Level 20 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Str | 8 | 8 | 8 |
| Dex | 12 | 12 | 14 |
| Con | 15 | 16 | 16 |
| Int | 13 | 13 | 14 |
| Wis | 15 | 17 | 20 |
| Cha | 8 | 8 | 8 |
Background
Sage gets us some fun tricks and a pair of proficiencies, one of which we’re likely to use.
Species
Human gets us the Musician Origin Feat to up our quantity of Heroic Advantage even higher.
Skill and Tool Proficiencies
Sage gets us Arcana and History, we pick up Perception, Survival, and Herbalism Kits from Druid, and Nature from our Species.
Feats and Ability Score Increases
At level 1 we get Magic Initiate (Wizard) from our Background and Musician from our Species
At level 4 we’ll take Telepathic
At level 8 we’ll take an ASI to increase Wisdom to 20, keeping on track with Fundamental Math.
At level 12 we’ll take Grappler
At level 16 we’ll take Speedy
At level 19, for our Epic Boon we take Boon of the Night Spirit.
Levels
| Level | Feat(s) and Features | Notes and Tactics |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Cantrips Known: – Druidcraft – Guidance – Prestidigitation – Thorn Whip – True Strike Spells Prepared: – Entangle – Faerie Fire – Find Familiar – Healing Word – Thunderwave Primal Order: – Magician | Like some kind of arcane hierophant, we walk out as a Druid/Wizard hybrid. We’re a pretty basic Druid right now, except we also know True Strike and use it to fire a Light Crossbow, this being the highest DPR Cantrips can provide until level 11 and easily beating anything else we can do until we start turning into animals professionally. We have real Find Familiar so we don’t have to deal with that Wild Companion shenanigans. Read up on the Wizard Spell List Breakdown for all the good uses. Take package A from Druid and Package B from Sage. Use the money to buy the crossbow and a book on Nature. |
| 2 | Wild Shape: – Giant Badger – Giant Wolf Spider – Velociraptor – Wolf Wild Companion Spells Prepared: – Protection from Evil and Good | Spend one level being very sad that we know forms that are only sort of good right now. Ignore Wild Companion as we have a real familiar. If you want to be a little more defensible and feel absolutely compelled to be an animal at this level, cast Protection from Evil and Good before wading into melee if it will do you any good against your current enemies. |
| 3 | Druid Subclass: Circle of the Moon Circle of the Moon Spells Wild Shape: – Brown Bear – Dire Wolf – Giant Badger – Giant Toad Spells Prepared: -Enhance Ability | Immediately take 3 consecutive days off to long rest and change most of your known forms. Any form will have us at AC 16 with 9 THP, making us roughly as hardy as a Fighter of the same level. Brown Bear will have us in melee dealing DPR halfway between Target and High. If that doesn’t feel defensive enough for you, hang back and throw Starry Wisps from Dire Wolf form as needed. Pack Tactics will work on the attack roll just fine, and we can even use our owl familiar’s Flyby to keep it near enemies but safe if you prepare an action to Use Enhance Ability to be even better at Scouting while being a Dire Wolf. Use Moonbeam for extra damage in combat. |
| 4 | Feat: Telepathic (Wis 17 -> 18) Spells Prepared: – Aid New Wild Shape Forms: – Any – Any Cantrips Known: – Elementalism | Weirdly, Druids can now just speak in whatever form they turn into. That said, it’s much cooler if you just use thoughtspeech. Make sure to put all your in-character sentences in angle brackets while morphed. Also, because it’s a feature of a Feat and the Feat removes components, we can use our free Detect Thoughts while in animal form (which now lasts for two hours per use). If you need to go more than 4 hours between Short Rests, I would say something’s likely gone wrong. Aid is there for even more durability on top of our newly-improved Wisdom granting us +1 AC. We already have all the utility and combat forms we need, so pick up two more forms that will be good for hiding in plain sight in whatever campaign you’re playing. Rat is often a good choice. |
| 5 | Spells Prepared: – Pass Without Trace – Revivify Wild Resurgence | We pay the Revivify tax and pick up Pass Without Trace for a ludicrous bonus to all of our Stealth needs. As if that wasn’t a fast enough way to burn through spell slots, we can now also turn them into Wild Shape uses. This is important because, every time we summon up that animal DNA, we get 15 THP. That means every spell we cast needs to be at least as good as 15 THP. Conjure Animals becomes our main Concentration spell since it has a better damage type and better saving throw. |
| 6 | Improved Circle Forms Forms Known: Giant Toad -> Giant Constrictor Snake Brown Bear -> Polar Bear Giant Badger -> Aurochs Spells Prepared: – Augury Wild Shapes per Rest: 2 -> 3 | Immediately take another 3 or 4 days off for long rests. Bite with the fire of 1,000 Also, our Con saves are now even better than proficient, having a bonus of +7 compared to our Wisdom of +7. Only Dex falls behind, and that’s what the THP is for. Cast Augury as a ritual when you need an idea of what to do in the day. I’ve updated the forms on the left to match our new access to CR 2. What I haven’t done is mention the wording of Wild Shape and how it causes a problem. In this edition, Wild Shape says you pick something “chosen from among Beast stat blocks that have a maximum Challenge Rating of 1/4 and that lack a Fly Speed.” Why is this a problem? In the 2014 rules, it said “any Beast.” Now that it specifies Stat Blocks, Swarm of Poisonous (sic) Snakes is a perfectly valid choice by RAW. This gives you a huge list of condition immunities, resistance to physical damage types (that isn’t bypassed by magic), and Blindsight. Circle Forms still sets our AC to 17 and gives us 18 THP (which you can choose to gain before becoming the form because those effects happen simultaneously and you can choose which order to apply simultaneous effects in if it’s your turn). It does have the drawback of not being able to be healed, but we can always shift out on a later turn if you’re getting worried. We can also use this as a sort of “improved human form” and hang back, concentrating on Conjure Animals and firing Starry Wisps which have just improved to 2d8 damage. If your DM allows this, take this instead of one of the forms you picked up at level 4. At this level, Wild Shape now lasts for 3 hours. Somehow, being in another body for more than 2 feels inherently problematic, but there’s nothing mechanically wrong with it. |
| 7 | Spells Prepared: – Fire Shield Elemental Fury: – Primal Strike | At this level we can now cast Fount of Moonlight while in Wild Shape, a spell they seem to have explicitly made for Moon Druids and Dance Bards. It’s really good for Dance Bards. Is it any good for us? Let’s say we’re in Polar Bear form for the best multiattacking creature available to us right now. Its attack bonus is on par with fundamental math (until next level), so Fount adds 10.5 DPR, but not on the turn we cast it. If we’re assuming a 3-round fight as per the guide to building encounters, that means it’s actually 7 DPR. Compare that to Conjure Animals: also takes Concentration, also can be used while in Wild Shape, can be used at range, does an average of 22 damage per target if cast at the same spell level as Fount (possibly more than once per round if maneuvered correctly), and targets Dex saves which is much more reliable than making attack rolls. We should never use Fount of Moonlight. |
| 8 | ASI: Wis 18 -> 20 Spells Prepared: – Polymorph Forms Known: – Quetzalcoatlus – Giant Scorpion | AC in form caps at 18. Sometimes being a huge snake, a swarm of snakes, or even a flying dinosaur snake isn’t enough. Sometimes we need to be a Tyrannosaurus Rex. |
| 9 | Spells Prepared: – Greater Restoration – Wall of Fire Forms Known: Aurochs -> Spotted Lion | Spotted Lion and back to charging with Pack Tactics. Pack Tactics will absolutely count your familiar that rides around on your shoulder as an ally adjacent to your target (as long as you’re adjacent to your target). Does Pack Tactics make Fount of Moonlight better than Conjure Animals? Not even close. It ups the DPR to +8.6, still not even remotely approaching what we can get out of having a friendly spectral gorilla, hawk, elephant, tiger, and |
| 10 | Moonlight Step Spell Prepared: – Scrying Augury -> Commune with Nature Cantrips Known: – Mending | Advantage certainly helps fix our progressively worsening (compared to the Fundamental Math) attack bonuses, but there’s only so much of this and Heroic Advantage from Entertainer we can count on. Otherwise this is mostly a trick to charge something again without getting Opportunity Attacked for leaving. Unfortunately, it uses the Bonus Action, which is the same thing that many Pounce agilities use for the extra attack. We get a big upgrade to our Divination powers, and specifically our ritual. |
| 11 | Spells Prepared: – Heal | The only combat healing with casting that isn’t Healing Word to stabilize someone. |
| 12 | Feat: Grappler (Dex 12 -> 13) | Giant Scorpion is now very worth using. Moonlight Step for Advantage on the first claw attack (and use Heroic Inspiration if it still whiffs), then have Advantage on the second claw and tail. Finally, hold them up against the Conjure Animals or Wall of Flame you’re concentrating on. Wall of Fire can be a 20-foot diameter ring. Giant Scorpions are 10×10. Put yourself in the middle of the ring and point it inwards, scorching anyone in your grasp or who tries to get close to you. If your target gets away, just shoot Starry Wisps while surrounded by the best upgrade to Fire Shield imaginable. Alternately, pick people up in your pincers and walk them at your full 40-foot movespeed into even bigger problems. |
| 13 | Spells Known: – Reverse Gravity | Bigger problems like Reverse Gravity. Drop people in it and they don’t get the save, they just float there harmlessly dying to ranged attacks if they can’t fly or make ranged attacks of their own. |
| 14 | Lunar Form | Neat. |
| 15 | Spells Prepared: – Animal Shapes Forms Known: Giant Constrictor Snake -> Giant Crocodile Polar Bear -> Brontosaurus Improved Elemental Fury | If your DM has allowed you to be a swarm of snakes until now, enjoy the preposterous upgrade: a swarm of cranium rats. Cast Command, every turn, forever. Otherwise, be a Brontosaurus instead and charge in with your whole squad of animal morphed friends. |
| 16 | Feat: Speedy (Dex 13 -> 14) | We dramatically improve our Hit-and-Run tactics by being both faster and more evasive. |
| 17 | Wild Shapes per Rest: 3 -> 4 Spells Prepared:- Shapechange | Being the best Moon Druid we can be, we now completely ignore Wild Shape for one combat and instead turn into a Death Slaad. |
| 18 | Spells Prepared: – Foresight Forms Known: Mammoth Beast Spells | The biggest pile of damage we can ever Wild Shape into, this has been hilariously outclassed by Shapechange since last level. |
| 19 | Spells Prepared: – True Resurrection Epic Boon: Boon of the Night Spirit | Alternatively, once we get our Boon, find a friend to cast Darkness on you, turn into a swarm of snakes with blindsight, and wander around invisible, resistant to nearly all damage, with 54 THP for your troubles. |
| 20 | Spells Prepared: – Sunburst Archdruid | We thank WotC for more Wild Shape charges and probably never use them. |
