Dragonborn Fighter looking for Tips and Tricks

[utopia27]

Dragonborn roleplaying thoughts

I just wrapped a 4-year long story-line running a 3.5 sorcerer. He started with a draconic bloodline, and was pretty obsessed with the whole draconic ancestry thing. Before the end-of-story-line "radiation accident", he had become a winged half-dragon sorcerer/dragon slayer/eldritch knight (++ECL adjustments..) with a wyrmling dragon familiar...

there was also a really interesting ongoing dynamic in the party - my character Kort was descended from a shadow dragon - chaotic evil as a group, and great-grandad (who Kort met once or twice briefly) in particular. Another member of the party, Sepun, was demon-descended - mom was half-succubus. The two characters had opposite takes on their ancestry. Kort started out chaotic neutral - walking the line to his chaotic evil ancestry, embracing the power and freedom of dragon-dom. Sepun was a lawful good samurai, regarding his demonic heritage as a temptation and a lurking stain on his honor. Created an ongoing debate and a lot of good 'unlikely buddy' stories. Interestingly, Kort mellowed a bit over time - over the course of the campaign went from CN -> CG -> NG, while Sepun hardened into the Lawful part of LG more. I'm still trying to decide if this is Kort's success in finding a 'middle way' with his ancestry, or a triumph of Sepun's inflexible LG-ness, or both....

Some draconic-related personality quirks:
- in social contexts, he was normally disguised (hat of disguise, later ring of chameleon powers) as his 'original' self. He'd occasionally drop it for dramatic effect/intimidation.
- frequently hung with kobolds, got a lot of mileage from the shared draconic heritage thing
- would buff his claws and scales. sometimes he'd sharpen his claws on the furniture (think of a house cat)
- studied up on dragons and general draconic lore. got to know the who's, why's, and how's of "the big boys"
- maintained a "bad of hoarding" - a bag of holding that he used as his personal portable horde. as a note, it was one-way - treasure went in, but didn't come out. Plot thread that went for a while revolved around another party member's cousin having been manipulated to steal the bag of hoarding. Amazing how touchy elves can be when you threaten to bite their cousin's face off for such a heinous offense...
- "shiny is good" much of what went into the bag of hoarding was prized for its "bling" - including the gold-plated sized-for-huge +1 club of clouting (really, and it opened doors well too...), and the football-sized fire gem that eventually became a soul-trap for a recurring baddie
- ferocious personal loyalty, coupled with callousness and general disrespect of socially-imposed affiliation. The character chose his friends and allegiances carefully, but if he hadn't chosen you or your group, he'd run roughshod over you
- a lurking 'grumpiness'. Normally very convivial, light-hearted and a great dancer. But when offended or threatened (himself, his heritage, his friends...) he would get very in-your-face, personal, physical, and sometimes brutal in a heartbeat. The gratification of dangling the Savant of Sharn by her neck over the council table was almost worth all the subsequent trouble...
- a touch of mocking arrogance. Dragons are the best. Pirates, kings and princes bow down. OK, maybe I'm just part-dragon, so they needn't actually bow, but they better remember they're no great shakes. IMPORTANT NOTE: does not apply to great wyrm dragons, because they ARE great shakes. and dragons. and dragons are cool.

 

[utopia27]

books of dragon-ness

<doh!> I forgot the reading list.. WotC 3.5 books, in order of preference:
Races of the Dragon - lots of good RP-fluff here for dragon-descended...
Draconomicon - from dragon supporter, dragon slayer, and dragon perspectives
Dragon Magic - largely player crunch, less RP-focused
Dragons of Faerun - mostly GM-focused...
Dragons of Eberron - also mostly GM-focused, but with some good core dragon fluff

non-WotC (again in order of preference)
MGP: Slayer's Guide to Dragons
Goodman Games: Complete Guide to Dragons
AEG: Dragons

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

The Kobold connection might also be interesting - A Dragonborn might have a certain "fatherly" attitude towards Kobolds. He might see them as a the "black sheep" of the Dragon followers, requiring shepherding to bring them back on the right path. Or he sees them as pathetic, trying to steal the glory of the real draconic people, and only usable as primitive servants. (Or a mix of both...)

 

[utopia27]

remember that breath weapons are for area-effect small-fry killing - helps shore up the fighter focus on individual opponents. I have to refresh my 4e reading on dragonborn breath weapons, but they probably require an action, and have too low a DC for boss-killing.

 

[Plane Sailing]

You'd probably get better responses on the 4e mechanics forum, to be honest.

No, it's fine here. It is mostly about roleplaying and with a dash of using abilities in practice rather than the specific rules about abilities.

 

[Baumi]

You guys are awesome

Just a quick comment about the dragonbreath ... the big advantage is that it is only a MINOR Actions and as a Fighter you can mark everyone in it. So even though it is not much damage it is still a good minion-killer, bonusdamage (since it doesn't cost you much of an action) and a great support for the fightermark.

The reading Material is great, I would only add the Races and Classes which have a much bigger background entry about all the core Races than the PHB.

 

[mlund]

My one piece of advice is not to go overboard with investing in feats and such to modify your Opportunity Attacks and Combat Superiority Attacks early on. You won't get much chance to use them. The merit of those those attacks is as a threat, not a damage source. At early levels your unmodified basic attack should prove deterrent enough that monsters won't leave an engagement with you and provoke attacks. Add on bonus's gradually to keep your OAs on a curve with the monsters, but don't go hog wild.

Ideally your fighter never has to make an OA or CS attack.

- Marty Lund

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

Some quick bits of tactical advice:

Don't get too far away from the Leader - you get more from quick access to your healing surges than other players.

Do your best to protect the wizard - for that purpose your targets should be mobile minions, nasty defenders, and strikers in that order. Defenders are bad versus Wizards cause they can really disrupt them with opportunity attacks.

Wedge yourseld into enemy formations - if you can hit an angle in the line rather than the line itself that's where you should go, it may seem like formations are what you're aiming for, but where you really shine is in disrupting actions.

Work with the Strikers - the other aspect of wedging into enemy formations is that it gives your strikers more options for creating combat advantage or moving around the blocks you create.

 

[pogminky]

Use your boobies as weapons of mass distraction.

Also, kick ass! Don't forget your breath weapon is a minor & use intimidate.