Okay, mr smartypants, give us a better example of a monster that you feel is true to canon as King of the Hill.
(And don't give me simple brutes like giants)
First off....it’s Dr. Smartypants, thank you very much.
Second off, I don’t really know what a “king of the hill” monster is. And why are giants a bad comparison? It sounds like you run dragons and giants identically.
Don’t you see that as a problem?
Then, not everyone thinks the way like you do.
Have a look at
http://themonstersknow.com/dragon-tactics-part-1/
In summary, whites and red stand their ground, fighting. One supremely stupid, the other supremely arrogant. Blacks, greens and blacks, you would have much more of a point.
I know not everyone thinks like me. But I’m not the one hoping for consensus in this matter in order to appeal to WotC for change, am I?
As for your source...meh. It doesn’t mean much. It’s not an example from fiction. It’s an anonymous guy on the internet who’s taken the MM entries and his own views and described the tactics he thinks are suitable. Nothing wrong with some of what he says, but if anything, I’d say his views of how dangerous dragons can be runs counter to yours.
Then, you're misrepresenting what I'm saying. I am definitely not suggesting it shouldn't use what's in the stat block.
I am merely saying it is dead on its feet even when it does. What you're saying is that it also needs to frustrate players by flying out of visual range? That's just a crappy boring tactic.
This is you saying not to use what’s in the stat block. Crappy boring tactic? It’s flight....it’s one of the most effective and game changing tactics there are. Not using this to the dragon’s advantage is like a Barbarian who decides not to use his Rage.
Have you seen what a level-appropriate party can do? (That is, a party perhaps five levels lower than the dragon; don't want you go hide behind "oh, the xp totals make this an easy fight, better give it some allies")
The designers sure don't seem to.
I’ve seen what a party can do, yes. And I know that the monsters are designed with an average party in mind. So for my players, who are all experienced players, I know that some monsters may need to be beefed up. Or that I have to match the players’ tactical ability.
That last part is key. If your players are tactful and have PCs that are optimized and incredibly complimentary to one another in combat, the answer is not to abandon tactics and go toe to toe. That approach makes zero sense. You have to answer with tactics of your own.
And if it was just a single (type of) monster, I would have written it off as a simple mistake.
But 5E is endemically carebearian. Almost no monsters make a challenge for properly played groups. They're laughably easy to shut down, since most of them have nothing but melee attacks (but no way to ensure the delivery of those attacks). Essentially, what you're doing is kiting them, only not simply by running around in a circle.
For single-digit CRs that might be fine, this edition being newbie friendly and all. But for CR 17? Not a chance.
This is fine. I don’t entirely disagree with you in this regard, although I think your assessment is extreme, and I think much of it is easily remedied. But this thread is about how to help the OP...it’s not about your critique of monster design. I suggest you start a thread specifically for that and stop using anything remotely related as a chance to rant about it again. This way when these kinds of conversations come up, you can just post a link to your monster design critique thread and let anyone interested join in that discussion.
So please stop denying the general - and very obvious - weakness of this edition's Monster Manual so we can get constructive!
What would have been constructive would be for you to have offered even one bit of advice to Reynard about his situation.
