D&D 5E Half Dragon from the Monster Manual

Fuchi Miller · Sep 14, 2017

Would you ever give your players a chance to become a Half Dragon? you can have them become the Half Dragon via the Ritual Bath.

If you would give it to them, do you think a tiefling half dragon is too strong?

What about Fire Dragon Born becoming a Lightning Half Dragon? In the MM it says that they keep all their statistics so i assume their features too. and they gain resistance to the dragon, in this case lightning, and they gain a breath attack. Would a Dragonborn being able to use 2 breath attacks and natural resistance to 2 thing be too strong? Oh they also gain Blindsense up to 10 ft and Darkvision for 60 ft

Coroc · Sep 14, 2017

Yes, if I pull out my old Council of wyrms setting box which I never played back then in 2e and convert it to 5e.

Chances of this are quite low though, because there is so much other stuff I want to do with higher priority.

On your special case: gaining two resistances just from race is a bit OP I would not allow a dragonborn red to become a halfdragon blue and inherit all intrinsics. I would require the race to be transformed to be a human.

The halfdragons in Council of wyrms were a distinct race from humans interbreeding with dragons, back in 2e most dragons could shapechange to a human.

cbwjm · Sep 14, 2017

I'd allow it. I'm not sure what I would do with dragonborn and dragon sorcerers. I'd be tempted with one of the following options:

1. The ritual ignites the dragon blood already flowing through the dragonborn/dragon sorcerer. No matter the dragon type for the ritual, a dragonborn or dragon sorcerer becomes a half dragon of their type (A red dragonborn silver dragon sorcerer might be able to choose).

2. They gain the half dragon template for the dragon type listed in the ritual gaining all of the benefits of both their original dragon type and their half dragon type.
2b. I might allow this change to affect a dragon sorcerer in a manner that allows them to count as both dragons for the purposes of their subclass abilities meaning a red dragon sorcerer who becomes half-silver can gain a damage bonus on both fire and cold damage spells.

Mephista · Sep 15, 2017

The half dragon is basically a dragonborn Fighter with better breath weapon. So, no, I wouldn't consider giving it out, since you'd basically come down to "get two races for your PC." And that's just kind of awkwards in my opinion.

If you want to reflavor dragonborn to be a half-dragon, I'm down with that. Want to make a sub-race half dragon for your particular race? That's cool. Swap out race/sub-race? Okay, I'm down. But giving multipe race options to a single PC? Nah.

Istbor · Sep 15, 2017

If this is part of some story arc, time consuming quest, or a longing from the Character since childhood, I would allow it. In a game I ran, this would only ever occur when the PCs are of a pretty decent level, so I don't think the bump in power would be as noticeable.

As long as the player/character is willing to put in the time and effort to achieve this goal, I see no need to stop them. The case would be different if there were no motivations besides power gaming.