[RPG] How does blindness affect a druid’s Wild Shape

class-featurednd-5edruidvision-and-light

One of my PC's is a halfling druid (Circle of the Shepherd) who was born blind. She has a familiar that she can see through and years of rigorous training of her senses and a connection to nature via her feet gave her 10 ft. blindsight, not in a way she can actually see but she can sense enemies in combat and such. My questions are: do creatures she's seen through her familiar count for Wild Shape? And when she wildshapes, would she still be blind?

You retain the benefit of any features from your class, race, or other source and can use them if the new form is physically capable of doing so. However, you can't use any of your special senses, such as darkvision, unless your new form also has that sense.

Emphasis is mine. It's a bit nebulous. You can't use any of your special senses, but does her blindsight qualify? Would the beast be blind to begin with, or would she be able to see?

Best Answer

You have a homebrew character concept where the DM may have different interactions in mind

You've got some houserule/homebrew in here with your character concept. The below represents a rules-based answer to support how it should work, but your DM may think otherwise based on how they constructed your character concept. If they say something else happens, then that's generally what happens.

You should be able to use your familiar to 'see' new forms

The requirements of Wild Shape simply state (emphasis mine):

Starting at 2nd level, you can use your action to magically assume the shape of a beast that you have seen before.

The requirement is that you have seen it. But, as you've stated, you're blind. So that presents an issue. An issue for which you have a resolution via find familiar(PHB, 240).

Additionally, as an action, you can see through your familiar's eyes and hear what it hears until the start of your next turn, gaining the benefits of any special senses that the familiar has. During this time, you are deaf and blind with regard to your own senses.

With a Familiar created by this method, you can use your action to utilize the familiar's senses and now you are seeing so that you can find a new wild shape option.

You shouldn't be blind in your wild shape

As you've quoted, you don't retain special senses and you gain the senses of your wildshape. You can utilize any senses they have, but you don't have your special senses or your own lack of sight.

Special Senses

As Dragoonkite's answer suggests, your description of your sense doesn't really match blindsense, but is closer to tremorsense:

...can detect and pinpoint the origin of vibrations within a specific radius, provided that the monster and the source of the vibrations are in contact with the same ground or substance.

Tremorsense can't be used to detect flying or incorporeal creatures. Many burrowing creatures, such as ankhegs, have this special sense.

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