Converting True Dragons

freyar said:

In that case, I guess we should take a look at those Mystarans!

Click to expand...

Fine!

There are four Mystaran Dragon Rules. Diamond the Star Dragon who rules Lawful Dragons, Opal the Sun Dragon who rule Neutral Dragons, Pearl the Moon Dragon who rules Chaotic Dragons and finally The Great Dragon who rules All Dragonkind.

Unless you have any preferences we might as well convert them in that order, which would put Diamond first.

I'll post the original stats shortly.

Come to think of it, most of their original appearances included all four dragons in one 'Dragon Ruler' entry. I'll email you a file with the original 4-dragon entries for comparison purposes.

freyar said:

Agreed with adding the flavor bit about Ahi to Rahab.

Click to expand...

Updating Rahab the Grey Dragon.

Dragon Rulers Original Stats

Dragon Ruler

Monster Type: Dragon, Planar Monster (Very Rare).

Each of the three Dragon Rulers is the leader of all dragons with the same alignment. These three rulers, in turn, obey the Great One, ruler of all dragons.

Pearl: Rules Chaotic Dragons (Black, Green, Red and Amber)

Opal: Rules Neutral Dragons (White, Onyx, Jade and Blue)

Diamond: Rules Lawful Dragons (Crystal, Sapphire, Ruby and Gold)

These creatures are extremely rare, almost never appearing on the Prime Plane unless there is great need. They are all Immortal. If a dragon ruler's material body is slain, the spirit goes to its home plane (one of the outer planes) and creates a new body.

Each of these dragons is bigger than the biggest gold or amber dragon; in natural form, each is over 100' long.

Pearl, ruler of Chaotic dragons, has scales like mother-of-pearl—white but iridescent, constantly shifting, like her Chaotic nature.

Opal, ruler of Neutral dragons, has scales which are white with thousands of tiny specks of color in all the hues of the rainbow.

Diamond, ruler of Lawful dragons, has scales with the refractive qualities of faceted diamond: They glitter and gleam with so much reflected light that it is hard to stare at this dragon.

The Great One has scales which glow brightly, like the surface of a white sun; no one can stare directly at him except through a darkness spell effect (through which he looks like an enormous three-headed white dragon).

Each ruler is always attended by four of his or her largest, most powerful followers. Pearl is always accompanied by four huge amber dragons, each with 176 hit points. Opal is always with four blue dragons, each with 144 hit points. Diamond is always with four gold dragons, each with 176 hit points. The Great One has a retinue of twelve dragons: four gold, four amber, and four blue, all sufficiently dedicated to serving the Great One that they do not get into fights based on alignment differences. All of these attendants can use spells.

When traveling, the dragon rulers usually bring one of each type of their largest subjects; for example, when on an excursion to the Prime Plane, Diamond brings one ruby dragon (160 hit points), one sapphire dragon (144 hit points), and one crystal dragon (96 hit points), in addition to the usual four gold dragons (176 hit points each).

All dragon rulers are immune to charm, hold, paralysis, slow, death ray, disintegration, and poison. Dragon rulers cannot be subdued or tamed like some lesser dragons.

The three lesser rulers are immune to normal and silvered weapons, to all spells of 6th level or less, and to all weapons of less than + 3 enchantment. The Great One is immune to normal and silvered weapons, clerical/druidic spells of 6th level or less and magical spells of 8th level or less, and weapons of less than +4 enchantment.
All dragon rulers are immune to all dragon breath weapons and are unaffected by dragon control magical items.

A dragon ruler can polymorph itself at will into the form of any of its follower dragons. Each ruler has a spell book containing all of the known spells, but must study and learn them just as a normal magic-user. Clerical spells are gained with the usual amount of meditation.

Each dragon ruler can use any breath weapon of its followers, each once per day, and while in either normal or polymorphed (to a lesser dragon) form. For example, Opal can breathe a cone of cold (as a white), line of acid-and-darkness (as an onyx), cloud of gas-and-disease (as a jade), or a lightning bolt (as a blue), for a total of four breaths per day. Each dragon ruler can attack up to nine times per round (with two bites, two claws, two wings, two kicks, and two tail).

The Great One can use any breath weapon of any dragon, each once per day, and while in either normal or polymorphed form. He has up to 10 attacks, using the tail twice.

The lair treasures of the dragon rulers always include at least three miscellaneous magical items usable by dragons; these items may be used against invaders, as appropriate. The Great One, in addition, owns one artifact. (The specific artifact is the DM's choice, but the artifact is not ultimately fatal to the dragon ruler, nor does it involve undead in any way.)
The Dragon Rulers act as leaders for all dragonkind. They arbitrate disputes between clans of dragons and occasionally—very occasionally—act on the behalf of lesser dragons against other species. They do not intercede when a party of heroes destroys a rogue dragon, but will act when a clan of dragons faces extinction or enslavement.

The three lesser rulers of dragonkind do not like or cooperate with each other, but neither do they fight each other. The Great One treats them equally, without a favorite. The origins of the rulers are unknown, but the lesser rulers may be the offspring of The Great One.

Terrain: Outer Plane (their own).

Load: Full speed when carrying 1,000 cn x HD in encumbrance; half speed when carrying 2,000 cn x HD in encumbrance.

Originally from Dungeons & Dragons Rules Cyclopedia (1991).


Dragon Ruler

Immune to: charm, hold, paralysis, slow, death ray, disintegration, poison, all dragon control devices, non-magical & silvered weapons.
Great One is also immune to spell levels 1-6 & magical weapons less than +3.





Dragon Statistics for Encounters

Originally from AC10 - Bestiary of Dragons and Giants (1987).


Dragon Ruler



Attacks and Damages (with dice used)
SPELLS (by level)—both types (CL and MU)

These creatures are extremely rare, almost never appearing on the Prime Plane unless there is great need. They are all Immortal. If a dragon ruler’s material body is slain, the spirit goes to its home plane (one of the Outer Planes) and creates a new body.

Each ruler is always attended by four of their largest, most powerful followers. Pearl is always accompanied by four huge brown dragons, each with 176 hit points. Opal is always with four blue dragons, each with 144 hit points. Diamond is always with four gold dragons, each with 176 hit points. All of these attendants can use spells. The dragon ruler often relaxes in the same form as its attendants, to confuse magical scrying or possible intruders.

When traveling, the dragon rulers usually bring 1 of each type of their largest subjects; for example, when on an excursion to the Prime Plane, Diamond brings 1 ruby dragon (hp 160), 1 sapphire dragon (hp 144), and 1 crystal dragon (hp 96), in addition to the usual 4 gold dragons (hp 176 each). Of course, all the dragon rulers travel in the same form as one of their attendants.

All dragon rulers are immune to charm, hold, paralysis, slow, death ray, disintegration, and poison. The three lesser rulers are immune to normal and silvered weapons, and to all spells of 3rd level or less. The Great Dragon is immune to all spells of 6th level or less, and to all weapons of less than + 3 enchantment. All dragon rulers are immune to all other dragon breath weapons of all types and are unaffected by dragon control magic items.

A dragon ruler can polymorph itself at will into the form of any of its follower dragons. Each ruler has a spell book containing all of the known spells, but must study and learn them just as a normal magic-user. Cleric spells are gained with the usual amount of meditation. The information on the spell chart applies to both cleric and magic-user spells.

Each dragon ruler can use any breath weapon of its followers, each once per day, and while in either normal or polymorphed (to a lesser dragon) form. For example, Opal can breathe a cone of cold (as a white), line of acid-and-darkness (as an onyx), cloud of gas-and-disease (as a jade), or a lightning bolt (as a blue), for a total of 4 breaths per day. Each dragon ruler can attack up to nine times per round (with 2 bites, 2 claws, 2 wings, 2 kicks, and 1 tail), maneuvering very quickly. The Great One has up to 10 attacks, using the tail twice.

The lair treasures of the dragon rulers always include at least 3 miscellaneous magic items usable by dragons; these items may be used against invaders, as appropriate. The Great Dragon owns 1 artifact in addition. (DM’s choice, but the artifact is not ultimately fatal to the dragon ruler, nor does it involve undead in any way.)

The 3 lesser rulers of dragonkind do not like or cooperate with each other, but neither do they fight each other. The Great Dragon treats them equally, without a favorite. The origins of the rulers are unknown, but the lesser rulers may be the offspring of The Great One.

Originally appeared in D&D Master Set (Mentzer, 1985).

Upon reflection, it's easier if I put the original stats for all four dragons Dragon Rulers in one post.

Editing Dragon Ruler Original Stats.

Note: Just as well I did that, since I noticed a few OCR typos in the stats. Nothing insufferable though - 1s instead if Is or 0s instead of Os and the like.

Anyhow, now I've typed out the stats I realize the original is clearly presented in the ascending order Chaotic => Neutral => Lawful => Great One rather than alphabetically Diamond>Moon>Pearl>The Great Dragon.

So I guess we should do the Chaotic Pearl Dragon first?

Strengthwise I guess we should aim for something on par with Tiamat (and Bahamut for the Star Dragon), with the Great One being even stronger.

I guess we could use the Manual of the Planes / Dragon #272 3E version of Tiamat as a benchmark for its strength?

I did quite a bit of fiddling with the tables and got them slightly more legible.

That'll do for today. . .

Wow, that's a lot to parse!

How about we settle a common thing or two before we get to the first one?

For example, I'd be in favor of the usual 1d4 round wait period for the breath weapon with no per day restriction and giving each of them multiple types of breath weapon. Would you agree?

freyar said:

Wow, that's a lot to parse!

How about we settle a common thing or two before we get to the first one?

For example, I'd be in favor of the usual 1d4 round wait period for the breath weapon with no per day restriction and giving each of them multiple types of breath weapon. Would you agree?

Click to expand...

Hmm… these are epic level beasties so I'd be fine making their breath weapon a bit faster. How can the PCs "enjoy" all the many breath weapon options available to their dragon opponent if the poor thing only has time to use it a couple of times?

Granted, the official 3E version of Bahamut is stuck with the 1d4 rounds restriction as you described, which always seemed a bit unfair when Tiamat's 1d4 round restriction only applies to each head and each head can breath separately as a standard action - so in effect she's got five parallel breath weapons.

Well, I'm fine with speeding it up. I just didn't like the daily use restriction. What about every 1d2 rounds?

All dragon rulers are immune to charm, hold, paralysis, slow, death ray, disintegration, and poison. Dragon rulers cannot be subdued or tamed like some lesser dragons.

The three lesser rulers are immune to normal and silvered weapons, to all spells of 6th level or less, and to all weapons of less than + 3 enchantment. The Great One is immune to normal and silvered weapons, clerical/druidic spells of 6th level or less and magical spells of 8th level or less, and weapons of less than +4 enchantment.
All dragon rulers are immune to all dragon breath weapons and are unaffected by dragon control magical items.

A dragon ruler can polymorph itself at will into the form of any of its follower dragons. Each ruler has a spell book containing all of the known spells, but must study and learn them just as a normal magic-user. Clerical spells are gained with the usual amount of meditation.

Click to expand...

This seems to be the same for all three versions. Immunity to paralysis (and I'd add sleep as true dragons) and poison, plus a list of spells. I'd extend the charm immunity to all charm effects, I guess. Then immunity to all dragon breath weapons and control (covered by charm effects?). DR/epic, would you agree? I'd go with Alternate Form but modified to allow them to keep breath weapons. And they seem to cast cleric spells as arcane spells.

freyar said:

Well, I'm fine with speeding it up. I just didn't like the daily use restriction. What about every 1d2 rounds?

Click to expand...

I would have gone for every round but will accept every 1d2 rounds.

Daily use restrictions were a standard feature of BECMI/1E dragons that 3E dropped entirely in favour of the "every X rounds" frequency.

I was thinking the dragon would be able to use the breath weapons of every dragon of its "class" but once it had used a particular dragon's breath weapon it couldn't use it again for, say, a minute.

We ought to provide a list of the breath weapons of the "standard" and Mystaran dragons of its alignment for the sake of convenience. In some cases it will have multiple dragons who breathe the same energy type (i.e. the Brass Dragon, Mystaran Amber Dragon and Red Dragon are all chaotic and can breathe fire), so the chaotic dragon could breathe fire three times in a minute.

We'll need to decide on what to use as the Neutral Dragons - in BECMI the Blue and White Dragons are neutral so I suppose we could do something with that with a note of "These dragons are identical to the SRD versions except the Mystaran blue dragon's alignment is always lawful neutral and the Mystaran white dragon is always chaotic neutral".

I'd be more inclined to use either the "Dragon, Neutrals" who appeared in various AD&D 2E Monstrous Compendiums of the Gem Dragons from AD&D's Dragon #37 and the 3E Monster Manual II (who were originally invented to fill the "Neutral Dragons" hole).

I'm inclined towards the MCA Neutral Dragons since (a) we have those in the CC and (b) the Gem Dragons are psionic casters.

That would make the dragon list as follows:

Chaotic Dragons: SRD's Black, Brass, Copper, Red, White and BECMI's Mystaran Amber, Brown.

Neutral Dragons: BECMI's Mystaran Jade, Mystaran Onyx plus others to be determined (Neutral's Amber, Jacinth, Jade (Pearl), Moonstone, Pearl OR Gem's Amethyst, Crystal, Emerald, Sapphire, Topaz)

Lawful Dragons: SRD's Blue, Bronze, Green, Gold, Silver and BECMI's Mystaran Crystalline Dragon, Mystaran Ruby, Mystaran Sapphire.

That's seven Chaotic Dragons, seven Neutral Dragons and eight Lawful Dragons. If the frequency rate is once every 1d2 rounds that's enough for them to be very unlikely to run out of options if they have a "wait a minute" refresh rate.

freyar said:

This seems to be the same for all three versions. Immunity to paralysis (and I'd add sleep as true dragons) and poison, plus a list of spells. I'd extend the charm immunity to all charm effects, I guess. Then immunity to all dragon breath weapons and control (covered by charm effects?). DR/epic, would you agree? I'd go with Alternate Form but modified to allow them to keep breath weapons. And they seem to cast cleric spells as arcane spells.

Click to expand...

Most of that seems reasonable, with the following exceptions.

I'd give them sorcerer casting AND cleric casting since the official 3E versions of Bahamut Tiamat have that:

Manual of the Planes said:

Spells: Bahamut is a 20th-level sorcerer and a 20th-level cleric with access to the Good and Air domains. (Bahamut also gains the granted powers associated with those domains.) In his natural form, Bahamut can cast his spells with but a word.

Spells: Tiamat is a 20th-level sorcerer and a 20th-level cleric with access to the Evil and Law domains. (Tiamat also gains the granted powers associated with those domains.) In her natural form, Tiamat can cast her spells with but a word.

Click to expand...

The immunity to dragon control magical items is presumably a reference to things like the Orbs of Dragonkind.

I'm inclined to generalize the immunities to all charm, hold, paralysis, sleep, slow, death, disintegration, and poison effects.

Incidentally, I was tempted to suggest generalizing the sleep and hold immunity to immunity to compulsion effects, i.e. antipathy, binding, confusion, crushing despair, daze, demand, dominate, feeblemind, geas, heroism, hideous laughter, hold, hypnotism, insanity, irresistible dance, mind fog, power word (blind, kill, stun), rage, sleep, suggestion, symbol (insanity, sleep, stunning or persuasion), sympathy, touch of idiocy. However, if we go that far it's almost the same as making it immune to enchantment or mind-affecting effects so I decided that was going a bit far. Although perhaps we could reserve immunity to compulsion/enchantment/mind-affecting for the Supreme Dragon?

We can do every round if you want, but some kind of recharge time just seems right. I'd lean slightly toward 1d2 rounds. I don't mind much one way or the other about a per minute refresh for each breath weapon.

I can go along with your dragon lists, using the MCA Neutral Dragons you have in green there.

Sorcerer and cleric casting is ok by me. We'll have to choose some domains, though I guess Chaos and Law are a couple of obvious choices.

I would go with immunities to all charm, hold, paralysis, sleep, slow, death, disintegration, and poison effects. But we should also include immunity to compulsions (any mind-affecting?) that specifically affect dragons.

Total immunity to mind-affecting or enchantment might be good for the Supreme Dragon, yes.