Apparently, I'm really bad at this.

tukor

I keep hearing that the Druid is the best class—the most powerful one, or the best at soloing.
After taking a break for a while, I’ve started playing again. I have a mid-level Druid (I’ve had higher-level ones before; this isn't my first), and honestly... I don't see what the big deal is... except that it’s true they can do a bit of everything (buff, travel, nuke, heal, etc.).
But I don't find it all that amazing; if others do, then I must just be bad at the game... which I probably am XD.

With this Druid—I think he's level 33—I go into the starter skeleton dungeon, and it takes forever to kill them unless I just nuke them straight out; but then I run out of mana pretty soon. Even in the lower zone, if a few of them come at me, I might just die, because they hit me harder than I hit them (if there are several).
Another thing is that, even though I'm carrying a decent melee weapon, I barely do any damage to them; I hardly ever land a hit, and it takes forever to kill even a light-green mob in melee combat.

I mean, I out-level them by a huge margin—it’s not normal. And yes, I have DS (Damage Shield) up.
Meanwhile, I see melee players 15 levels lower than me just tearing through them with ease.

Or green mobs in some areas of "The Deep" that absolutely thrash me. And this happens to me in many other zones, too.

The only solution seems to be charming a pet—which just got nerfed, by the way—or blowing all my mana on nukes to kill a single mob... one that I might out-level by 15 levels.

I wonder if this is just happening to me because I'm terrible, or if it happens to others too...

It's not that I'm complaining about the Druid. I love having tons of buffs and utility, and if that means struggling a bit with mobs while soloing, then fine.

But I'm talking about mobs I out-level by a huge amount—mobs that show up as light green to me. I just want to pass through the area; I'm not trying to farm them or anything.

Gathbard

I don't remember anyone stating that Druid being great at soloing had any reflection on how fast they kill, or that they're strong melee hitters. Their "melee" damage comes from thorns, not from actually hitting the mob in the face.
Plus, they don't even have to. They have the tools do deal with lots of dangers, they can root and meditate, they can run away, they can kite, they can snare, the can dot and kill (sometimes even before dying of old age themselves)...they can even aggro but never actually be forced to engage, with SoW.
But they are NOT a strong melee class, that's basically the only thing they don't have.

How can you have played any other class in this game and not see how incredibly more capable Druid is when solo?

Does it mean that it feels like playing WoW all of a sudden? Of course not. It's still a slog and it takes a long time, but that's the game as a whole. I think everybody should take that into consideration when reading "X class is great solo".
By other mmorpgs standards, there are no "strong solo classes" in the whole game.
Even the "fast" ones resort to trickery, creative use of gaming mechanics and "better take advantage of this now before they nerf it" skills.
If you don't embrace the pace of this game to begin with, every class will take forever to kill stuff.

Also two more considerations needed:

The class descriptions may say "solo capability" but they leave out the "technically" bit. For all that talking about wanting to leave some options for solo players available, you can feel how much they don't really want you to solo, which for some is an encouragement to solo even more, understandably.
All that class feedback was pre-Deeps, which are still very unfinished and possibly horribly untweaked, so it is entirely possible that some stuff down there, green or not, is incredibly overtuned, AND, the same patch brought a lot of small nerfs on all fronts, heavily impacting both the defensive and offensive potential of many classes.

tukor

Don't take this personally (because I appreciate your comment), but when I created the post, I imagined someone would say something like that—let me explain:

I’m not talking about how strong the class is, or how poorly it solos in melee, or complaining about any of that, as I already mentioned.

I’m asking if anyone else struggles to kill "light green" mobs—whether in melee or by going OOM to kill them.

Given the number of explorable areas where you run into light green mobs—enemies many levels below you—you often end up getting swarmed by them (like skeletons, etc.).
And honestly, having a group of six skeletons—enemies I outlevel by 15 levels—give me a hard time... well, I don't know about that.
I'm talking about levels 0–40 here. At higher levels, maybe it's normal, but having level 10–15 mobs give you trouble when you're level 35? That doesn't seem right to me.
It’s not that I want to be overpowered; I just don't want them constantly pestering me. Above all, I want to feel like I’ve actually improved and that leveling up has served a purpose.

This isn't exactly related to what you said, but I’d like to hear your opinion now that I’ve clarified that. And thanks!

Gathbard

tukor Oh ok, I didn't realize you meant a swarm of greens. I never struggled with very small groups of greens or blue (let's say 3 mobs), but I usually run when more show up, just in case.
To be clear, for struggle I mean reaching the "omg, I'm gonna die" stage. I still had to rest and kite a bit.
And I didn't play Druid over 30, so there might be a genuine balance issue there, can't exclude that possibility.

It is also entirely possible that the game is made around us NOT being able to handle that even if they're greens.
I remember FFXI where that would happen even with greys. They stopped aggroing, but if you did attack and they linked you were dead. That made farming difficult at times, but engaging.

Not sure it's the same mentality here, but I already strongly suspect that they don't want us to AOE farm anything until you can basically oneshot. AoE skills in general have been few and far between across all classes, which is a bit of shame.

As far as pestering goes, I think green should still aggro, but be easy to kill. Otherwise I agree, leveling feels less purposeful.
It's not workling this way at the moment, but I'm not entirely sure they have the ability/devpower to balance it, considered how they allegedly struggle with twinked characters obliterating yellows in low level zones.
Hopefully it will be something that improves post EA, but we have no way to know, which is an additional reason to consider paying for EA more of an act of faith than anything.

There have been many ups and downs and I personally still can't say if this dev team is actually capable of delivering, so I can't honestly say it will get better on that front, or that we'll even get clear communication on if it is working as intended or not.

Mesh

tukor
Is it a gear issue?

Some time ago they made changes to the game that made baseline spells less potent while increasing the scaling from casting stats in order to make upgrading your equipment more of a requirement.

Past the early game you'll start to struggle if you don't have a good amount of WIS and/or CHA.

Trying to face tank a group of undead mobs, even if they're significantly lower level than you, is not an ideal situation for Druid. Other classes with better AC and efficient damage sources (pets, physical attacks, etc.) will perform better in that specific scenario even if they're less capable of soloing overall. M&M Is not a game where mobs that are lower level than you just become trivial.

Druids are more suited to open spaces where they can kite or where there are beasts to charm.

Raven

BST solos way better than Druids.

Druids strength is in mobility, tracking, porting, farming nameds every where. Go left and right all over the map zone after zone tracking nameds that are way lower level than them and farming those items and going back to sell. This is how I understand druids. Yes they can root-rott, yes they can Kite, yes they can Quad-Kite, yes they can Charm Solo...etc. But I find soloing BORING so I always group with my druid.

Raven

tukor Are you soloing for XP or farming nameds?

If you solo for XP did you try Quad-Kiting?

Denerik

For starters, don't go into indoor dungeons. Being indoors is bad for druids.

You should be kiting enemies around outdoor zones. With snares, roots, and dots, coupled with your run speed enhancements you can run circles around your targets as they slowly die. With Mantle of Spring you can stay in it for bonus mana regen, limiting your down time. As you're kiting you'll have time to sit for a mana tick or three.

Dredlord

Here is why everyone keeps claiming Druids are OP. Historically, the issue was Animal Charm. Druids could level incredibly fast solo—taking about an hour per level compared to a static group's two or three hours. On top of that, they have an amazing utility toolkit: SoW, ports, gate, damage shields, snare, DoTs, and root. However, after the recent nerfs to both healing and charm, Druids can't even compete with Shamans or Clerics. Even with top-tier gear, good luck getting a healing invite to Fallen Watch. They feel fine for the first 20 to 30 levels, but after that, you just become a glorified port mule for the exact same people who complained they were overpowered. Static groups simply don't want a solo class to be able to kill named mobs and take the loot, which ruins the fun of playing solo to the max. It feels like the developers are catering exclusively to streamers and YouTubers instead of sticking to their own vision. They are forcing a heavy group focus onto the game. For casual players like me who only have an hour or two to play and can't commit to a group, this just isn't the game for us anymore. The game desperately needs a balance where solo players can enjoy the progression and gear up just as effectively as groups but the people playing this game for a living will disagree and will tell you this is not a solo game and you need to play something else. these same people will tell you that you can "still solo," but if you want any actual named gear, you're forced to buy it from them, the same people that wanted you nerfed.

Mesh

Dredlord

For casual players like me who only have an hour or two to play and can't commit to a group, this just isn't the game for us anymore. The game desperately needs a balance where solo players can enjoy the progression and gear up just as effectively as groups

Not sure what you mean by "any more." I have never once heard anyone from NWC state that M&M is designed for casual players or soloing.

There are some opportunities to solo and some classes do it better than others but that has never been the focus of the game.

jobanab

Gathbard

I don't remember anyone stating that Druid being great at soloing

The "Defining Traits" in the official Druid class description say:

Excels at solo play through control over animals and self‑sufficiency
One of the strongest solo classes

The Deep Dive for Druids also says:

They’re strong soloers

I can see why someone would expect them to be capable solo classes.

flmike

I haven't played druid in this game, but in EQ druid was one of the very best solo classes because outdoors it is very very safe. You can pull a yellow and use a dot to kill it and even if you oom it can never actually catch you to kill you. This doesn't mean you can run into a dungeon and do whatever. But outside it is very easy to level with very little danger of dying. Combined with ports, invis/camo, wolf form, you should be able to easily find a good camp that doesn't have anyone, break it and farm away. Root one, snare one, run to the zone line and kill the 3rd, if the fight goes out of control then zone. Charm isn't needed to make leveling very easy. Hope that helps.

riverbender

"CASUALS NEED NOT APPLY"
I invite everyone to look at Marathon (2026) and see how that worked for their player count while launching a paid open beta.

Gathbard

jobanab read what I wrote. That is not what you quoted. Had I stopped the phrase at your quote, you would be correct, and your reaction justified. That is not what I did. I encourage you to read the whole sentences before quoting them to avoid future embarrassments.

Unchainedfury

Dredlord developers are catering exclusively to streamers and YouTubers

I'm hearing this from multiple people, lately.

tukor

I’m not really talking about the things that some of you mention, regarding my original post.

I’m not talking about whether the Druid is this or that, or whether it’s already overpowered or not.

My point is that surviving against mobs that are a much (and I mean much) lower level shouldn't be so hard.
I’m not even saying I need to kill them quickly, but having 2 or 3 of them drain my health before I can finish them off... well...

It’s not fun. It’s not necessary: I already fought them 20 levels ago, I’ve run that dungeon plenty of times; now I just want to pass through, explore, or whatever.

But the fundamental problem for me is that I don’t feel more powerful as I level up, if the same mobs that were hard 20 levels ago are still hard now.

That’s what I’m talking about, regardless of how the conversation might drift toward other topics.

Dredlord

Mesh I never said the focus was to make this a solo game but I did my homework before choosing a class I can be self sufficient and enjoy not all but most of the content of the game solo.
This is coming directly from their website.
The Druid is also exceptionally self‑reliant. Their influence over animals allows them to bend nature to their will, giving them powerful advantages when traveling or fighting alone. Adaptable and resourceful, they move comfortably between supporting a group and thriving independently.

Excels at solo play through control over animals and self‑sufficiency

One of the strongest solo classes

I didn't make this up, they are literally telling you they are one of the strongest solo classes which they were until the heals got nerfed, sow got nerfed indoors and now charm is still doable but not worth doing with breaking every 5 secs and your charm pet doing 1/10 of the dmg. so atm I can't heal successfully the mid or highend content and I can't level efficiently since charm is useless. so they need to reword their class defining traits to the current changes.

Gathbard

Dredlord
That is what the druid is though. It actually is one of the strongest solo classes.
It's just that in this game soloing is different.
Everything in this game takes ages, and that applies to soloing most of all.
Druid is one the strongest solo classes.

I understand how it feels because it feels a bit dishonest to be told that you can solo when in fact everything in this game is built around the idea of discouraging you from soloing in every way possible and as hard as possible, but it's still technically true that Druid is one of the strongest solo classes in the game.

Mesh

tukor

But the fundamental problem for me is that I don’t feel more powerful as I level up, if the same mobs that were hard 20 levels ago are still hard now.

I think this is a problem of perception rather than design. Mobs lower level than you are not intended to become trivial in this game. Even at level 60, you can still die to level 30-40 mobs if you pull too many. The game is supposed to be challenging.

It's also no surprise that you're having trouble given that you likely don't have the best gear and you're choosing to play a Druid in probably the least effective way, expecting to be able to brute force mobs because of your level. M&M Doesn't work that way, nor do we want it to.

Dredlord

I did my homework before choosing a class I can be self sufficient and enjoy not all but most of the content of the game solo.

Sure but "excels at solo play" and "one of the strongest solo classes" are relative statements. Being stronger than some other classes at solo play in a game not designed for soloing means what? Certainly not that you should be able to solo "most of the content of the game."

I agree that NWC is making a lot of balance changes lately to bring some overtuned abilities in-line with the rest of the game and increasing difficulty in several ways. These are good things. The side effect of these changes is that it also makes the game harder to solo.

However, NWC devs have been clear from the very start of M&M that they are not balancing the game for soloing and that soloing will be difficult if not impossible in many areas. Tuning has been lax up until this point, letting players get away with more than they were supposed to.

If anything, you should expect soloing to continue getting harder as NWC continues the balancing. Logically, if the goal is for the game to be challenging for groups it makes sense that soloing should be very difficult.

Fell

Denerik

For starters, don't go into indoor dungeons. Being indoors is bad for druids.

^^ This. Druids are NOT the best soloing class -- they're probably about third ... they need a charm pet, some decent CHA, and room to work. And even this (as @Dredlord points out) is only true pre-charm patch. If the druids got hit as hard as enchanters did by that, then they'll definitely be in the lower half of the list solo-wise.

Group-wise druids are indeed the third best at healing. But if a druid is grouped with an enchanter who can slow, they're at least equal to a shaman.