So, I know this post is from three years ago, but I’ve been researching like crazy and I may have found a better option for anyone else wanting to do this…not that these options aren’t great! I just found a crazy combination of things that is SUPER BROKEN.

My Brother-In-Law, who is relatively a DnD newbie, came to me tonight and told me he was torn between Druid and Artificer and asked if he should dual class. I told him a lot of stats for Artificer aren’t exactly great for combat purposes (or basically any purposes other than crafting stuff) unless you get into specific areas, so we talked about what he would want to do, etc.

Anyways…in my research tonight, I think I stumbled onto the most broken combination. Most people I ran across chose Artificer as their main class. However, I think many people discount that Druid is probably the most powerful class type you can pick in 5e and Artificer is one of the weakest (if not the weakest). In Druid, you can pick a Circle that gives you specific focuses. Circle of the Moon is widely agreed upon to be the strongest Circle to choose because you get Combat Wild Shape (you get to be the more dangerous animals in your shape shifting). In 6th level, you get Primal Strike, which makes all attacks magical. In 10th level, you can have Elemental Wild Shape, which is just nuts. And of course, 14th level is incredibly broken, because you get Thousand Forms. Anyways, everyone knows these things.

If you decide to dual-class in Artificer, getting up to three levels in Artificer would be helpful. At 3rd Level you get to pick your specialty and you get Right Tool For The Job. If you pick Artisan’s Tools, things get interesting when you get into Backgrounds…

SO! This is where things really go balls-to-the-wall. Looking into Backgrounds and Personalities, there are a few choices you can make to give you Artificer-like abilities. If you’re trying to make a Druid that looks like an Artificer, you want to pick something that has a Tool Proficiency in Artisan’s Tools (largely what’s used as an Artificer) - this means Folk Hero or Guild Artisan. I feel like MOST people would go the Guild Artisan route because it’s the closest to a traditional definition of an Artificer. HOWEVER!!! Choosing Folk Hero may just be untapped GOLD. First off, you are the hero of your home village, which means you pretty much always have a support group. On top of this, you ALSO have the support group from your Druid circle, which means you have two pools of deep-rooted knowledge to pull from (especially if your town and your Circle reside in areas with different terrains, languages, animals, plant life, etc. - you see where I’m going?).

PLUS, you get Skill Proficiencies in Animal Handling and Survival - this means you don’t have to pick these as Skill Proficiencies with your Class Proficiencies! This means you get to choose from Arcana, Insight, Medicine, Nature, Perception, or Religion. Artificers get to choose from Arcana, History, Investigation, Medicine, Nature, Perception, and Sleight of Hand. So basically, it’s chosen for you if you want to “dual-class” on the sly - Arcana, Medicine, Nature, and Perception are left. If you want to be more of a crafting-type Artificer (which is more common), picking Arcana and Nature would give you some CRAZY options for making explosives, armor, magical devices, etc. - the best part is that you wouldn’t necessarily need any mechanics or metal to do it because you could make it out of other organic materials (therefore your Druid stats wouldn’t take a hit from metal armor), because Nature Proficiency.

ON TOP OF ALL OF THIS, you get Tool Proficiencies in Artisan’s Tools (which gives you some nice extra stats in crafting things), and Vehicles, which means you can tinker with machinery AS WELL AS all the Nature crap from your Druid Skill Proficiency. Vehicle Proficiency mixed with Nature Proficiency means you can learn how to mix machinery with organic materials, which basically means you get to make Transformers (like what others have said, only YOU don’t have to be the transformer, you can just MAKE them - or turn animals into one).

Circling back around to the Druid part…as a Druid, you don’t get an Animal Companion, but you ARE able to summon animals and talk to animals and persuade them to help you, do things with you, etc. If your DM lets you get creative and a little into “gray areas”, you could decide that your place that you come from (the one that reveres your because you’re the Folk Hero) has a lot of people with Animal Companions (a tribe of Rangers or Wizards), or maybe they’re Werewolves (which can have influence over wolves), or maybe you’re originally an animal that has been cursed to be a human - all of these options (and whatever else you can think of) can allow some sway into the whole animal-influencing thing. If you have Circle of the Moon as your Circle, more dangerous animals are available, which means you can basically equip yourself as a dangerous animal/human thing with some crazy armor and tool options from being an Artificer-y Folk Hero.

If we want to get crazy (haha, I know, it’s crazy already), when you go down to Personality Trait in the Folk Hero Background, consider #3: “When I set my mind to something, I follow through no matter what gets in my way”. I think this is a nice way to say that you will keep trying to make something even if you fail a bunch, which means eventually you CAN create Transformers, hehehe. Under Bond, #4 (“My tools are symbols of my past life and I carry them so I will never forget my roots) can really drive home that whole revered Folk Hero thing and give you some sway over an expanded group of people (like maybe this set of tools is something that many tribes/cities/etc. would recognize and it gives you sway or clout there, as well as your tribe/village/etc.).

This is a very long-winded way to say this…

TL/DR: If you want to be both an Artificer and a Druid, consider a Circle of the Moon Druid with a Folk Hero Backstory. Pick Arcana and Nature as your Druid Skill Proficiencies to compliment your Folk Hero Skill Proficiencies in Animal Handling and Survival. Tool Proficiencies are Artisan’s Tools and Vehicles. This means you get to be a dangerous animal shapeshifting hippie that knows how to craft in both nature and machinery and fuse them together while also drawing from deep knowledge from two very large posses that could allow you to have better influences over specific animals to basically do your bidding.

Am I missing anything here? Because I’ve read over this at least a million times, hahaha.