D&D 2E Revised and rebalanced dragons for AD&D 2e

[Just Passing Through]

I just used to triple HP and damage of attacks. Found that worked pretty good.

Out of curiosity, how did fights with dragons typically go? Triple damage seems like it would lead to a ton of characters instantly dying.

 

[Flamestrike]

Out of curiosity, how did fights with dragons typically go? Triple damage seems like it would lead to a ton of characters instantly dying.

Tripling a d10 or d8 isnt that big a deal. I wouldnt triple the breath weapon damage; that was generally good enough on its own.

Im pretty sure Baldurs Gate had some pretty good math with its Dragons (and the engine runs of a modified 2e). Those suckers were pretty scary (a lot of which came from the magic though).

I had the same problem in 1E. Dragons were smashed way to easy by a party of triple weapon specialised multi-attacking Fighters, Wizards with the right spells and so forth. You had to basically double their HP (and melee damage) or triple it on the fly to make them a credible threat.

 

[Just Passing Through]

Tripling a d10 or d8 isnt that big a deal. I wouldnt triple the breath weapon damage; that was generally good enough on its own.

Im pretty sure Baldurs Gate had some pretty good math with its Dragons (and the engine runs of a modified 2e). Those suckers were pretty scary (a lot of which came from the magic though).

I had the same problem in 1E. Dragons were smashed way to easy by a party of triple weapon specialised multi-attacking Fighters, Wizards with the right spells and so forth. You had to basically double their HP (and melee damage) or triple it on the fly to make them a credible threat.

Yeah, dragons in 1e were in desperate need of buffing as well as revision. Since Celebrim covered the revision part pretty well, and other peaple have tackled the buffing part of 1e dragons, I have decided to give 2e dragons a shot.

 

[Zio_the_dark]

Im pretty sure Baldurs Gate had some pretty good math with its Dragons (and the engine runs of a modified 2e). Those suckers were pretty scary (a lot of which came from the magic though).

Well they were very easy in fact in the standard game. You had to use the stratagems mod to make them a credible threat (and deadly) and that mod increased battle script efficiency and tripled their hp...

 

[Flamestrike]

Well they were very easy in fact in the standard game. You had to use the stratagems mod to make them a credible threat (and deadly) and that mod increased battle script efficiency and tripled their hp...

I didnt find them easy, barring some very specific (and often cheesy) tactics, including gaming the AI, utilising certain combos (requiring a knowledge of their weaknesses) and such.

In a stand up throw down fight, they were quite challenging.

 

[Zio_the_dark]

I didnt find them easy, barring some very specific (and often cheesy) tactics, including gaming the AI, utilising certain combos (requiring a knowledge of their weaknesses) and such.

In a stand up throw down fight, they were quite challenging.

Well indeed if you go to them right out of Atkathla at level 7-9 they're almost impossible but if you fight them after the underdark they really become a piece of cake. The stratagems mod makes them completly impossible to fight before the underdark (and remove cheesy tactics too if you begin to buff in the same room they immediatly become hostile, they evade cloud effects and use their best attacks).

Also I must be a bit biased as I played the baldur trilogy more than any other game (I can't even count) and multiple times with stratagems that really provide a challenge with every encounter (not for the faint of heart ^^ ). Sorry for being a bit out of topic!

 

[Flamestrike]

Well indeed if you go to them right out of Atkathla at level 7-9 they're almost impossible but if you fight them after the underdark they really become a piece of cake. The stratagems mod makes them completly impossible to fight before the underdark (and remove cheesy tactics too if you begin to buff in the same room they immediatly become hostile, they evade cloud effects and use their best attacks).

Also I must be a bit biased as I played the baldur trilogy more than any other game (I can't even count) and multiple times with stratagems that really provide a challenge with every encounter (not for the faint of heart ^^ ). Sorry for being a bit out of topic!

Played it through twice - Once as a LG Human Paladin (Cavalier) taking the 'Good' dialogue options and with Good NPCs, and the second time as a LE Human Fighter (Kensai) that Dual Classed to Wizard after hitting 11th level in Fighter (for those sweet HP, AC and initiative bonuses and Weapon proficiencies) taking the Evil dialogue options and Evil NPCs.

Only cheats I did was give PC number two 6 pairs of boots of speed at char gen (to speed up the play through).

 

[dave2008]

I stopped at 21 hit dice because most of the dragon abilities hit there cap at around that amount. There saving throws max out, their armor class hits the typical cap for the edition, and there THACO hit 0, which I feel is a good stopping place for it as it makes calculation relatively easy. I could have gone beyond 21 hit dice (and in fact, I still might do an extension of the table and rules) but I would have to abide by those caps, which would make future progression all but stop with the exception of hit points and damage.

As for the damage, remember that PCs cap out at 9 or 10 hit dice (unless you happen to be playing an Athasian dragon or other advanced being) only gaining tiny amounts of hit points after that point. Also, the only ones who can gain more than 2 extra hit points per hit die are fighters, and even they cap out at 6 if they somehow end up with a 25 con score. Outside of playing a Athasian half giant, the maximum hit points for a character is somewhere around 150 for a fighter with a 25 con score who rolled maximum for all there hit points. Most characters will have one third to one half of that hit point amount. So while a dragon's damage may seem low, the damage that they do deal will very quickly add up.
Also dragons under my system have much, much better survivability than normal dragons. A 21 hit die dragon has well over 200 hit points, only fails saving throws on a roll of 3 or less, takes reduced damage from many attacks, has 50% MR, and can suffer several instant death attacks without going down. A fight with a dragon is unlikely to be a quick affair, so the damage a dragon can deal will add up round after round.

Plus adjusting the damage up is relatively easy. My personal suggestion for doing so if you think that their damage is too low is too increase the damage a dragon deals with each attack by an amount equal to half its hit dice. That way as a dragon increases in size, its damage will grow both through the damage die and through a static modifier simultaneously.

Thanks for the response.
I will say that upping defenses and lessening damage seems like a recipe for making the fight a slog, have you tried these out yet?
Also, for me it is an issue of verisimilitude. The idea that a 300' long dragon only does 20 damage with its bite attack seems a bit crazy to me. I would rather each attack be deadly than try to imagine why the dragon is so toothless. I guess you could take them back down to 1e sizes and that would make more sense.

Also, how are you getting over 200 HP for a 21 HD dragon? Wouldn't the average be 94 HP and the max 168 HP?

 

[Just Passing Through]

Thanks for the response.
I will say that upping defenses and lessening damage seems like a recipe for making the fight a slog, have you tried these out yet?
Also, for me it is an issue of verisimilitude. The idea that a 300' long dragon only does 20 damage with its bite attack seems a bit crazy to me. I would rather each attack be deadly than try to imagine why the dragon is so toothless. I guess you could take them back down to 1e sizes and that would make more sense.

Also, how are you getting over 200 HP for a 21 HD dragon? Wouldn't the average be 94 HP and the max 168 HP?

The number below the hit dice is a modifier to there hit point total.

I agree that a fight with one of these might end up being something of a slog, unfortunately, I have not gotten the chance to playtest one of these yet. The playtest session where the pc's would have encountered one of these never actually got off the ground.

I originally did plan on making there sizes closer to there 1e ones, but then you have the issue of them having seemingly too many hit points for how small they are. One solution I have considered is to massively increase the damage dealt by there attacks (double or triple), but make it so that they cannot attack an individual creature with more than one or two of there attacks per round (due to their massive size hindering their coordination). The end result would be that they do about the same damage as they do now per target, but it would feel much more appropriate for there 2e sizes.

Now if I did this I would have to revise there special attacks so they did less comparable damage, as keeping the same damage ratio would lead to massive AOEs that deal 70+ damage to everyone near the dragon each round with the bigger ones. Hmmm....does anyone have any suggestions for this?

 

[dave2008]

The number below the hit dice is a modifier to there hit point total.

OK, I was wondering what that number was. I initially thought it was the combat bonus!

I agree that a fight with one of these might end up being something of a slog, unfortunately, I have not gotten the chance to playtest one of these yet. The playtest session where the pc's would have encountered one of these never actually got off the ground.

I originally did plan on making there sizes closer to there 1e ones, but then you have the issue of them having seemingly too many hit points for how small they are. One solution I have considered is to massively increase the damage dealt by there attacks (double or triple), but make it so that they cannot attack an individual creature with more than one or two of there attacks per round (due to their massive size hindering their coordination). The end result would be that they do about the same damage as they do now per target, but it would feel much more appropriate for there 2e sizes.

Now if I did this I would have to revise there special attacks so they did less comparable damage, as keeping the same damage ratio would lead to massive AOEs that deal 70+ damage to everyone near the dragon each round with the bigger ones. Hmmm....do you have any suggestions for this?

Hmm. I think maybe reduce the size some and increase the damage some, so they meet in the middle so to speak. Personally, I wouldn't worry about a great wyrm red dragon doing insane amounts of breathweapon damage. IMO, they should and the PCs need to find was to counter this (fire resistance, bonus to saving throws, etc.) or avoid the dragon or figure out another way to deal with it. However, my general stance is that most PCs should be a TPK against a great wyrm, so I am biased.

I think smaller size (and possibly less HP) and more dangerous attacks will make a fight with a dragon more memorable.