D&D 5E Dropping Flyers Cheese

[Dausuul]

Legendary Resistance doesn't apply to a skill contest. Have your Bigby's Hand grapple the dragon mid-flight.

A grapple ends if the target is moved out of the grappler's reach. Bigby's hand loses its grip as soon as the dragon starts to fall, whereupon the dragon is no longer grappled and stops falling.

(If the dragon were being grappled by a physical creature--a roc, for example--I would say that the grappler could choose to fall with the dragon and maintain the grapple. However, Bigby's hand is a spell effect rather than a physical object. There's no reason to believe it's affected by gravity.)

And let's say you do, by some means, cause the dragon to crash. What then? Falling damage is capped at 20d6; an average of 70 damage. That's a punishing hit, but an adult dragon can take it and keep going. Knocking the dragon out of the sky is a major accomplishment, as it should be, but it's not an automatic win.

 

[aramis erak]

There was another thread a few weeks back about the speed and distance things fall. The end result was something like 500 ft in the first round and 1000 ft every round after that until it hits ground, the exact real world numbers are a bit different but those are close enough in a game with hit points and dragons.

D=0.5AT²

T=6 seconds
A=32.2 feet/second²

D=0.5*32.2*6²
D=16.1*36
D=579.6 feet.

but there's an upper limit of about 183.16 fps... or about 1100 feet per round.

That's Round 1. and velocity accumulated is 32.2*6 fps... or 193.2 feet/second, or .1159 feet/round

Round 2, and each after, is another 1100 feet or so.... but no faster, so no more damage should accrue.

 

[DaveDash]

D=0.5AT²

T=6 seconds
A=32.2 feet/second²

D=0.5*32.2*6²
D=16.1*36
D=579.6 feet.

but there's an upper limit of about 183.16 fps... or about 1100 feet per round.

That's Round 1. and velocity accumulated is 32.2*6 fps... or 193.2 feet/second, or .1159 feet/round

Round 2, and each after, is another 1100 feet or so.... but no faster, so no more damage should accrue.

Assuming that things fall in your D&D world at 9.8m/s^2, which is an assumption, not a given.

DM's can make things fall as slow or as fast as they want.

 

[PnPgamer]

There's a few solutions, but, overall, I'm cool with flying creatures falling if their speed is reduced to 0. It makes perfect sense that a dragon whose wings get wrapped in a net would drop (and it makes sense that they would know this and take spells and tactics and strategies that would avoid that). I much prefer a plummet to the blatantly kid-gloved "balanced" approach. Some strategies should win the day, and that should include dropping a dragon off a cliffside.

...just don't put your dragons on cliffsides.

Doesnt many of the dragons live on some mountain and are surrounded by cliffsides?

 

[PnPgamer]

In pathfinder it was really hard to get flyers down, as web for instance required at least two walls and/or ceiling/floor to attach itself to. Flyers were really frustrating, andd i scoured through plenty of books to find that there were very few, if not any, solutions against flyers.

5e gives a nice change of pace.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Doesnt many of the dragons live on some mountain and are surrounded by cliffsides?

Don't dragons usually live in dungeons that are on those mountains and not just hanging out in a precarious nest?

Besides, a dragon fighting where it lives is already in trouble. Why would a dragon choose to fight where it lives? MUCH better to fight somewhere you can get the party to waste actions trying to protect innocent lives as you go about your business...

 

[PnPgamer]

Don't dragons usually live in dungeons that are on those mountains and not just hanging out in a precarious nest?

Besides, a dragon fighting where it lives is already in trouble. Why would a dragon choose to fight where it lives? MUCH better to fight somewhere you can get the party to waste actions trying to protect innocent lives as you go about your business...

Dont they like to pose all cool at the edge of a cliff?

 

[Klaus]

The whole "entangling dragon so it falls to its death" thing is the entire tactic used by dragon hunters in the movie Reign of Fire. Which is very cinematic, and in a world where dragons and other flying creatures are a concern, it's entirely believable that adventurers would come up with ways to bring down those flyers.

 

[Derren]

and in a world where dragons and other flying creatures are a concern, it's entirely believable that adventurers would come up with ways to bring down those flyers.

And in a world where those dragons and (most) other of those other flying creatures are (highly) intelligent they would have invented plenty of countermeasures for that.
Too bad you apparently do not take any damage when something is dropped on you from great heights. That rules out high altitude bombing as a tactic.

 

[Klaus]

And in a world where those dragons and (most) other of those other flying creatures are (highly) intelligent they would have invented plenty of countermeasures for that.

But you have to allow the players some mileage out of their good tactical thinking before putting in countermeasures. That's just basic storytelling: the DM is powerful enough to just say "that didn't work! Ha Ha!" to anything the players try, but does that make for a satifying game?

And do account for a dragon's overwhelming ego: a young or adult dragon would think itself nigh-invincible. An older dragon might be wary enough to know better, and respond accordingly.