Druid - Circle of the Sands

by somanyrobots

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Druid Circle

Circle of the Sands

There are desolate and dusty places, where life clings to the rocks and scrabbles in the dust. And there are druids who look after such places - the Circle of the Sands. Sands druids are reclusive, often hermits, content to wander the lonely places of the world. Their connection to the deep desert and the arid waste grants them mysterious powers, though, abilities to summon up fearsome sandstorms and cause rare desert fruits to blossom.

Sands druids tend towards good or neutral alignments, as an openly evil person will find little to enrich or empower themselves in the quiet of the desert. They may come from any background - Sands druids are just as likely to be expatriates from settled cities as they are to be desert-born. They often have a monastic or self-sacrificing bent, willing to devote themselves to causes others do not comprehend.

Circle of the Sands Features

Druid Level Feature
2nd Circle Spells, Whirling Sands
6th Desert's Kin, Primal Scouring
10th Desert Blooms
14th Raging Storm

Circle of the Sands Spells

At 2nd, 3rd, 5th, 7th, and 9th level you gain access to the spells listed for that level in the Circle of the Sands Spells table. Once you gain access to a circle spell, you always have it prepared, and it doesn’t count against the number of spells you can prepare each day. If you gain access to a spell that doesn’t appear on the druid spell list, the spell is nonetheless a druid spell for you.

Spells marked with a K are by KibblesTasty and are included at the end of this document.

Druid Level Spells
2nd quicksand*
3rd siroccoS
5th wall of dust*
7th blight
9th tornadoK

Whirling Sands

At 2nd level, you can conjure up a spirit of the deep desert, creating a swirling, semi-sentient sandstorm. As a bonus action, you may expend one use of your Wild Shape feature to summon this sandstorm, which lasts for 1 minute.

The sandstorm appears in a 5-foot radius circle centered on a point you can see within 30 feet. Its space is heavily obscured and counts as difficult terrain. Creatures that begin their turn enveloped in the sandstorm take 1d4 slashing damage. At the start of each of your turns, the sandstorm's radius grows by 5 feet, to a maximum of 20 feet.

As a bonus action, you can cause the sandstorm to trigger one of the following effects:

  • Move: The sandstorm moves up to 20 feet along the ground.
  • Intensify: The sandstorm's radius shrinks by 5 feet, and all creatures inside it take 2d4 + your Wisdom modifier slashing damage.
  • Whirl: The sandstorm whirls fiercely, throwing all creatures within it 15 feet in a random horizontal direction.

You can choose to end the sandstorm at any time. If you become incapacitated, the sandstorm ends. The sandstorm also ends if affected by magical wind effects or dispel magic, cast at a spell level equal to or higher than your proficiency bonus. You may only have one sandstorm summoned at a time.

Desert's Kin

At 6th level, you gain resistance to fire damage, you are immune to any weather effects from desert travel, and you can ignore nonmagical difficult terrain caused by sand or desert. You are immune to all effects of your Whirling Sands feature, and your Raging Storm feature once you obtain it.

Primal Scouring

Also at 6th level, all damage dealt by your sandstorm counts as magical for the purpose of overcoming resistance and immunity to nonmagical attacks and damage.

Desert Blooms

At 10th level, your connection to the desert allows you to coax life into existence even amid desolation. Over the course of one hour as part of a long rest, you can conjure a desert plant which blooms with seven pieces of fruit. Each fruit supplies a different benefit, and a creature eating one of the fruits gains one of the following benefits of its choice:

  • It gains resistance to fire damage.
  • It gains temporary hit points equal to your druid level.
  • It gains advantage on saving throws against charm effects.
  • It gains advantage on Constitution saving throws and death saving throws.
  • Its movement speed increases by 10 feet and it can ignore nonmagical difficult terrain.
  • It gains tremorsense out to 30 feet.
  • It have no need to eat or drink.

A creature can only have one of these benefits at a time, and each benefit can only be gained by one creature. Uneaten fruit fades away when you complete a long rest, and eaten fruit ends its effects after a creature completes a long rest.

Raging Storm

At 14th level, your sandstorm grows more powerful. As an action while it is summoned, you can empower it by expending a spell slot up to 5th level. When you do so, the storm's radius increases by 5 feet for each slot level, and each creature inside it must make a Constitution saving throw. On a failure, a creature suffers 1d10 slashing damage for each slot level spent and is blinded until the end of your next turn. On a success, it suffers half as much damage and no other effects.

After you use your Raging Storm, your sandstorm deals twice as much damage until the start of your next turn.

Circle of the Sands quirks

The following are some optional quirks for a player of this Circle to choose from.

d6 Quirk
1 Your skin is leathery and weather-beaten, and the grit in your clothes never washes away.
2 You insist cactus fruit is the most delicious and nutritious of all fruits.
3 When you encounter a pool of water, you always stop to appreciate it.
4 Scorpions and beetles frequently appear from the folds in your clothes.
5 Mild weather makes you tense and uncomfortable.
6 If a meal doesn't contain something you foraged yourself, it's not a real meal.

Appendix: Spells

Quicksand

1st-level transmutation


  • Classes: Druid, Sorcerer, Wizard
  • Casting Time: 1 action
  • Range: 60 feet
  • Components: V, S
  • Duration: Concentration, up to 1 minute

You point at a 15-foot square patch of ground and cause it to liquefy. The area is difficult terrain for the duration. When a creature enters the spell's area or starts its turn there, it must make a Strength saving throw. On a failure, the creature's speed is reduced to 0 until the start of its next turn. If a creature fails a saving throw for this spell three times in a row, it becomes restrained until it succeeds.

At Higher Levels. When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 3rd level or higher, the square's dimensions increase by 5 feet for each 2 slot levels above 1st.

Sirocco

2nd-level conjuration


  • Classes: Druid, Ranger
  • Casting Time: 1 action
  • Range: 60 feet
  • Components: V, S, M (a breath of hot air)
  • Duration: Instantaneous

You summon a blast of hot desert air, which sweeps across the battlefield. This gust begins at a space you can see within range and sweeps through a line 15 feet wide and 60 feet long. All creatures the wind passes through must make a Strength saving throw. On a failure, a creature takes 3d6 fire damage and is pushed 10 feet in the direction the wind blows. On a success, it takes half as much damage and is not pushed.

At Higher Levels. When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 3rd level or higher, the gust deals 1d6 additional fire damage and pushes creatures 5 more feet for each slot level above 2nd.

Tornado

5th-level transmutation


  • Classes: Druid, Sorcerer, Wizard
  • Casting Time: 1 action
  • Range: 120 feet
  • Components: V, S
  • Duration: Concentration, up to 1 minute

A whirling tornado erupts, filling a 20-foot-radius, 40-foot-high cylinder centered on a point within range.

Any creature that starts its turn within the tornado must make a Strength saving throw. On a failed save, the creature takes 4d8 bludgeoning damage and is pushed 10 feet away and 40 feet up. On a successful save, the creature takes half as much damage and isn't pushed.

As a bonus action, you can move the tornado up to 30 feet in any direction. Any ranged weapon attack against a target within 20 feet of the tornado has disadvantage, and any ranged attack that passes through it automatically misses.

Wall of Dust

3rd-level transmutation


  • Classes: Wizard
  • Casting Time: 1 action
  • Range: 90 feet
  • Components: V, S, M (a handful of dirt or sand)
  • Duration: Concentration, up to 10 minutes
  • Replaces: Wall of Sand

You construct a wall of blowing dirt and grit at a point you can see within range. The wall can be up to 30 feet long, 10 feet high, and 10 feet thick. The wall blocks line of sight. When a creature enters the wall or starts its turn there, it must make a Strength saving throw. On a failure, moving within the wall requires 6 feet of movement for each foot traveled. On a success, movement within the wall only consumes 3 feet of movement for each foot. Regardless of the save, a creature is blinded and deafened while within the wall.

The wall disappears when the spell ends.

Changelog

v1.1

  • Replaced dust cyclone with sirocco
  • Added an additional option for Desert Blooms
  • Buffed Raging Storm (radius increases)
  • Buffed Intensify option on Whirling Sands

v1.0

  • Updated art and license

v0.5

  • Buffed Whirling Sands to avoid weird radius problems
  • 6th level grants immunity to whirling sands

v0.4

  • Small clarifications

v0.3

  • Finalized spell list and added custom spells

v0.2

  • Flavor and Quirks

v0.1

  • First Draft
Credits & References:

Circle of the Sands created by somanyrobots
Discord | Patreon


Spells
  • by somanyrobots: Quicksand
  • by somanyrobots & Omega Ankh: Wall of Dust
  • by KibblesTasty: Dust Cyclone, Tornado

Art

Circle of the Sands Druid, by Will Roqq


Background Image Stains

Jared Ondricek


License

© 2024 somanyrobots, CC BY-NC 4.0


Includes spells from Spells That Don't Suck by Omega Ankh and somanyrobots, which is licensed CC-BY and available here.


Includes spells from Kibbles' Casting Compendium 2.0 by KibblesTasty Homebrew LLC, which is licensed CC-BY and available here.


5E SRD Content
  • This work includes material taken from the System Reference Document 5.1 (“SRD 5.1”) by Wizards of the Coast LLC, available here.

  • The SRD 5.1 is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License available here.