D&D 5E Observations and opinions after 8 levels and a dragon fight

[Dausuul]

Dragons with overlarge egos don't live to be old. So we don't play them with an ego that makes them want to enter melee and risk their hide. We play them with an ego more like an evil genius where they use their physical superiority in a very intelligent way that disallows the party from bringing their full might upon the dragon.

Mm... I would say that a typical dragon does have an extremely large ego, enough that it can be a disadvantage. However, it isn't stupid. It's a cunning, resourceful fighter and uses its abilities to the fullest. It certainly doesn't land and go into melee just for the heck of it.

Tactically, the dragon's weak point is that it hates to admit defeat, even temporarily. If it discovers that its opponents have unexpected resources, it's likely to stay in the fight rather than pull back and reassess. Only when it's clearly losing will it try to retreat, and by then it may be too late. Likewise, if its opponents withdraw to a position where the dragon can't easily get at them, it may try to force its way in or it may try to wait the opponents out, but the one thing it won't do is concede a draw and fly away. The longer its victory is denied, the more irritated it gets. When presented with a way to end the fight quickly, it's apt to take it without more than a cursory check to see if it's a trap.

 

[Celtavian]

Mm... I would say that a typical dragon does have an extremely large ego, enough that it can be a disadvantage. However, it isn't stupid. It's a cunning, resourceful fighter and uses its abilities to the fullest. It certainly doesn't land and go into melee just for the heck of it.

Tactically, the dragon's weak point is that it hates to admit defeat, even temporarily. If it discovers that its opponents have unexpected resources, it's likely to stay in the fight rather than pull back and reassess. Only when it's clearly losing will it try to retreat, and by then it may be too late. Likewise, if its opponents withdraw to a position where the dragon can't easily get at them, it may try to force its way in or it may try to wait the opponents out, but the one thing it won't do is concede a draw and fly away. The longer its victory is denied, the more irritated it gets. When presented with a way to end the fight quickly, it's apt to take it without more than a cursory check to see if it's a trap.

If you want to see dragons in that fashion, by all means I leave that up to you.

My preference is to make long lived dragons accept the reality of their reality. Their reality is that a prepared adventuring group of humanoids is very dangerous and should be assessed before engaging and reassessed if a surprise tactic is used. I picture dragons talking of the small folk in parables that make dragons pause when dealing with them. A dragon may be very powerful, but if anything is dangerous to them it is unknown small folk with the audacity to enter their lair. Dragons that don't take them seriously do so at the risk of their nearly immortal existence. Why would a dragon grow impatient? They live so long that time is on their side. They could even wait for a powerful hero to grow old before they kill him.

Why would a dragon admit defeat if it isn't defeated? A near immortal race of beings would not worry about short-term retreating.

I'm not saying there are no dragons with the type of personality that leads to the thinking you outlined. I believe absent that personality trait, I see no reason to believe dragons would think in the fashion you outlined given their only real threat is small folk. A young dragon acting in a brash manner committing to a battle to the death without reassessing I could imagine. An old dragon that has survived for hundreds or thousands of years I doubt would act in that fashion. Survival relies on them being able to outwit the one threat to their existence. Their egos leading them to stay in fights they're losing doesn't seem like a sensible decision for long-term survival.

I wrote a background for a dragon that was such a bastard that he used polymorph to live near the hero that was tracking him, seducing his wife while he was gone, and having her bear his child, then telling the hero what he did and laughing at him. The hero had to decide whether to kill the half-dragon offspring. He decided to raise it to kill the dragon. Killing a single dragon can become the life goal of a family for generations due to their cunning.

 

[CapnZapp]

This is one area where a finesse DEX based fighter can really shine. Using a bow when needed or a rapier in melee is a strong combination.

I have a theory:

In every rpg it is always better to maximize DEX and find ways to avoid/negate the drawbacks of having a non-stellar STR, than to maximize STR and realize you lose out on flexibility, speed, and defense.

I realize some games try harder than others to avoid this, such as making martial abilities specifically dependent on Strength. But even these games, sooner or later, will offer ways around STR...


(Obviously this is mostly a concern for games trying to make the fantasy of the big dumb brute actually making it in the world into something that actually works..!)

 

[CapnZapp]

If you want to see dragons in that fashion, by all means I leave that up to you.

My preference is to make long lived dragons accept the reality of their reality. Their reality is that a prepared adventuring group of humanoids is very dangerous and should be assessed before engaging and reassessed if a surprise tactic is used. I picture dragons that talking of the small folk in parables that make dragons pause when dealing with them. A dragon may be very powerful, but if anything is dangerous to them it is unknown small folk with the audacity to enter their lair. Dragons that don't take them seriously do so at the risk of their nearly immortal existence. Why would a dragon grow impatient? They live so long that time is on their side. They could even wait for a powerful hero to grow old before they kill him.

Why would a dragon admit defeat if it isn't defeated? A near immortal race of beings would not worry about short-term retreating.

I'm not saying there are no dragons with the type of personality that leads to the thinking you outlined. I believe absent that personality trait, I see no reason to believe dragons would think in the fashion you outlined given their only real threat is small folk. A young dragon acting in a brash manner committing to a battle to the death without reassessing. An old dragon that has survived for hundreds of years I doubt would act in that fashion. Survival relies on them being able to outwit the one threat to their existence. Their egos leading them to stay in fights they're losing doesn't seem like a sensible decision for long-term survival.

I wrote a background for a dragon that was such a bastard that he used polymorph to live near the hero that was tracking him, seducing his wife while he was gone, and having her bear his child, then telling the hero what he did and laughing at him. The hero had to decide whether to kill the half-dragon offspring. He decided to raise it to kill the dragon. Killing a single dragon can become the life goal of a family for generations due to their cunning.

Yeah, well, now we're pretty far from the situation where you put an entry from the Monster Manual ahead of the heroes and say "GO!".

In other words, I sincerely hope you don't expect game mechanics to cover your wants and needs.

At all.

It is the "Monster" manual after all, not the "Evil Overlord" manual, I mean.

 

[EroGaki]

If you want to see dragons in that fashion, by all means I leave that up to you.

My preference is to make long lived dragons accept the reality of their reality. Their reality is that a prepared adventuring group of humanoids is very dangerous and should be assessed before engaging and reassessed if a surprise tactic is used. I picture dragons talking of the small folk in parables that make dragons pause when dealing with them. A dragon may be very powerful, but if anything is dangerous to them it is unknown small folk with the audacity to enter their lair. Dragons that don't take them seriously do so at the risk of their nearly immortal existence. Why would a dragon grow impatient? They live so long that time is on their side. They could even wait for a powerful hero to grow old before they kill him.

Why would a dragon admit defeat if it isn't defeated? A near immortal race of beings would not worry about short-term retreating.

I'm not saying there are no dragons with the type of personality that leads to the thinking you outlined. I believe absent that personality trait, I see no reason to believe dragons would think in the fashion you outlined given their only real threat is small folk. A young dragon acting in a brash manner committing to a battle to the death without reassessing. An old dragon that has survived for hundreds of years I doubt would act in that fashion. Survival relies on them being able to outwit the one threat to their existence. Their egos leading them to stay in fights they're losing doesn't seem like a sensible decision for long-term survival.

I wrote a background for a dragon that was such a bastard that he used polymorph to live near the hero that was tracking him, seducing his wife while he was gone, and having her bear his child, then telling the hero what he did and laughing at him. The hero had to decide whether to kill the half-dragon offspring. He decided to raise it to kill the dragon. Killing a single dragon can become the life goal of a family for generations due to their cunning.

So basically, any dragon in your game is not going to be out smarted, goaded, or reduced to any sort of disadvantage whatsoever? At that point, I wouldn't bother fighting it; let it have all the virgin princesses it wants; it can't be beat, and I'm certainly not going to play its stupid little of game of "fight me when I have every advantage always because I'm perfect."

Yuck. No one likes a flawless boss.

 

[Celtavian]

Yeah, well, now we're pretty far from the situation where you put an entry from the Monster Manual ahead of the heroes and say "GO!".

In other words, I sincerely hope you don't expect game mechanics to cover your wants and needs.

At all.

It is the "Monster" manual after all, not the "Evil Overlord" manual, I mean.

Not even sure what you mean with this post. Game mechanics are irrelevant to what I wrote. Game mechanics don't alter how each DM chooses to play a dragon. Some DMs make dragon fights straight forward. Some don't. No, I don't expect game mechanics to fit my sensibilities.

Story telling is my job, not the job of game mechanics. I choose to run dragons as I do for story telling purpose and because I enjoy thinking about the psychology of a near immortal creature. I find it interesting. I also know most that play D&D don't explore the psychology of immortality and how that would affect a creature's worldview. They pretty much run encounters in a mostly mechanical fashion with little interest on the psychology of the creature they're fighting.

 

[Shadowdweller00]

So basically, any dragon in your game is not going to be out smarted, goaded, or reduced to any sort of disadvantage whatsoever? At that point, I wouldn't bother fighting it; let it have all the virgin princesses it wants; it can't be beat, and I'm certainly not going to play its stupid little of game of "fight me when I have every advantage always because I'm perfect."

Yuck. No one likes a flawless boss.

I find that presuming that a creature who supposedly spent CENTURIES growing up in a dangerous world where it was NOT the big cheese might be not reasonably wary of its primary enemy - adventurers (well...aside maybe from other dragons) - to be BY FAR the more absurd, ridiculous, and unfun.

 

[Umbran]

I find that presuming that a creature who supposedly spent CENTURIES growing up in a dangerous world where it was NOT the big cheese might be not reasonably wary of it's primary enemy - adventurers (well...aside maybe from other dragons) - to be BY FAR the more absurd, ridiculous, and unfun.

Well, there's a demographic question: How many adventurers has the dragon seen?

If you are in FR, it strains credulity to say a dragon doesn't understand how dangerous adventurers can be.

If you are playing in a world where all the NPCs are, in essence, playing E6, while the PCs are almost the only ones to rise to upper tiers of power, then maybe the Dragon hasn't had a serious challenge in a century or more! It may well have gotten to the point of forgetting the time when there was real risk to its personage.

One iconic dragon fits this bill. Smaug, from The Hobbit. There are few things on the planet capable of taking Smaug down in a direct confrontation, and the ones capable of the feat he largely knows by name, and has had coffee with them in the past. An entire city of dwarves didn't have the ability to take him down. So, yes, he gets cocky and arrogant, and that's his downfall.

 

[Chocolategravy]

So it came down to your party having 3 useless characters in it because none of them bothered to have a ranged attack.

The dragon's speed isn't going to be enough to keep it out of range unless it's not attacking. Dragons for level 8 aren't legendary. I assume it was vertically challenging the party rather than horizontally.

Blindsight has limited range so a rogue can easily hide at range to get sneak attacks off.

The fighter didn't seem to do anything at all. Battemaster? Give the rogue extra sneak attacks. Eldritch Knight? Throw stuff.

Similarly the paladin sounds like he got one attack off or something.

Ideally the fghter would have barb levels and be taking half damage from everything and been throwing stuff, or gone dex and be using dual hand crossbows. The Paladin would have a couple warlock levels and be using eldritch blasts. The rogue been hiding and getting 2 sneak attacks off per round thanks to the battlemaster fighter. But even skipping any sort of min-maxing, had these three characters even just bothered to bring throwing weapons or something, things would have been different.

 

[Chocolategravy]

Also it appears blindsight doesn't do anything against stealth. The rogue class ability blindsense does.