D&D 5E 5th Edition has broken Bounded Accuracy

[Hussar]

If I was an Adult Red Dragon my lair would be close to or inside a magma pit at the base of a volcano. I would have used Efreeti slaves (probably by giving a high level caster a favour) to forge a protective treasure room off to one side so as not to be destroyed by the magma every time the volcano erupts. To actually reach the inner core of my lair, you'd have no choice but to fly over swim through magma.

See, to me, I have no interest in running a dragon like that. Bleachhh. It's about as far from a mythical dragon as you can get. What's the difference between your dragon and, say, a high level wizard or virtually any other BBEG? A dragon doing a favour? Really? I want my dragons to be like Smaug or the dragon from Dragonslayer - engines of destruction. I do not want another moustache twirling villain.

I mean, heck, Smaug didn't build his lair, he just killed the inhabitants. I'm actually drawing a blank on any inspirational fiction where the dragon goes out and hires contractors to build his lair for him.

To me, that's about as exciting as watching paint dry.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

See, to me, I have no interest in running a dragon like that. Bleachhh. It's about as far from a mythical dragon as you can get. What's the difference between your dragon and, say, a high level wizard or virtually any other BBEG? A dragon doing a favour? Really? I want my dragons to be like Smaug or the dragon from Dragonslayer - engines of destruction. I do not want another moustache twirling villain.

I mean, heck, Smaug didn't build his lair, he just killed the inhabitants. I'm actually drawing a blank on any inspirational fiction where the dragon goes out and hires contractors to build his lair for him.

To me, that's about as exciting as watching paint dry.

Not to mention the whole "swimming through magma every time you want a bite to eat" thing. Red dragons don't even have a swim speed in water, let alone molten rock (should probably require both fire immunity and a burrow speed, given how dense it is). It would be kind of like a human being building a house with no door, which you can access only via underwater passageway from the swimming pool. In my game, a red dragon who does something that paranoid is hiding from something (perhaps another, older dragon). It is not normal behavior for a dragon.

Normal behavior for my dragons is to sit back in their lairs and demand occasional tribute from the lands they rule via proxy ("I feel like it's time for you to give me another 30,000 gold. How about it?"), fondling their treasure and competing socially with other dragons for face, and occasionally acting as their own enforcers when one of their subject kingdoms starts getting frisky. (Show up in the middle of the night, burn down the palace, send a messenger the next day appointing a new king.) Hiding in a private magma chamber all day every day just isn't something they're interested in.

 

[Celtavian]

If it's easy for a red dragon to reach, it's easy for a giant owl. Convenience and security are tradeoffs.

Owls only because they can fly like the dragon, but not skeletons. Not as spread out as you want them to be. A red dragon can literally sleep in lava and environment that would kill owls or skeletons.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Owls only because they can fly like the dragon, but not skeletons. Not as spread out as you want them to be. A red dragon can literally sleep in lava and environment that would kill owls or skeletons.

Giant Owls are big enough to carry skeletons, and both they and the skeletons are expendable. You can ferry skeletons up to wherever you're going in small squads of three or four at a time in order to limit exposure, or even one at a time if you really want to stay completely dispersed.

A red dragon cannot sleep in lava. He'll die of suffocation after nine and a half minutes if adult, or twelve minutes if he's an anicent red.

 

[DaveDash]

Not to mention the whole "swimming through magma every time you want a bite to eat" thing. Red dragons don't even have a swim speed in water, let alone molten rock (should probably require both fire immunity and a burrow speed, given how dense it is). It would be kind of like a human being building a house with no door, which you can access only via underwater passageway from the swimming pool. In my game, a red dragon who does something that paranoid is hiding from something (perhaps another, older dragon). It is not normal behavior for a dragon.

Normal behavior for my dragons is to sit back in their lairs and demand occasional tribute from the lands they rule via proxy ("I feel like it's time for you to give me another 30,000 gold. How about it?"), fondling their treasure and competing socially with other dragons for face, and occasionally acting as their own enforcers when one of their subject kingdoms starts getting frisky. (Show up in the middle of the night, burn down the palace, send a messenger the next day appointing a new king.) Hiding in a private magma chamber all day every day just isn't something they're interested in.

Darwin dictates Dragons ran by you wouldn't reach adult ages.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

I think you mean "vanilla dragons run by you in a high-magic, FR-style campaign setting with ubiquitous adventurers wouldn't reach adult stages." As I've explained, what, three times so far in this thread?--Darwin is right! All of those dragons don't exist in my game. The dragons all have Sorcerer levels (generally level 9 to 12 by adult age, higher if on the verge of ancient status) which makes them far more dangerous than vanilla dragons, and invalidates many of the easy strategies discussed in this thread.

Plus, I'm a lot strategically smarter than you are, judging by this thread, so my dragons are correspondingly better at leveraging the advantages they do have to stay on top of their client state auxiliaries, effectively acting as their own Imperial Legion. (You use auxiliaries to fight external enemies, and you use the Legion to put down internal revolts among the auxiliaries.) I've pointed out more than twice that my dragons proactively exploit stealth, mobility, and diplomacy. "Adventurers" showing up on their doorstep to steal treasure just isn't a thing.

 

[Celtavian]

Not to mention the whole "swimming through magma every time you want a bite to eat" thing. Red dragons don't even have a swim speed in water, let alone molten rock (should probably require both fire immunity and a burrow speed, given how dense it is). It would be kind of like a human being building a house with no door, which you can access only via underwater passageway from the swimming pool. In my game, a red dragon who does something that paranoid is hiding from something (perhaps another, older dragon). It is not normal behavior for a dragon.

Normal behavior for my dragons is to sit back in their lairs and demand occasional tribute from the lands they rule via proxy ("I feel like it's time for you to give me another 30,000 gold. How about it?"), fondling their treasure and competing socially with other dragons for face, and occasionally acting as their own enforcers when one of their subject kingdoms starts getting frisky. (Show up in the middle of the night, burn down the palace, send a messenger the next day appointing a new king.) Hiding in a private magma chamber all day every day just isn't something they're interested in.

But they can be killed by a bunch of flying owls and skeleton archers in your campaign. Why wouldn't a hundred human archers or more be even more dangerous? In your campaign, Smaug would have next to no chance in Lake Town. They're so easy to kill from 600 feet away as they're flying in. Have your town defended by a few hundred human archers with sharpshooter that fire at the dragon as he is flying in.

I know you'll probably say you use the spellcasting variant to make up for this. Smaug wasn't a spellcaster. So the non-spellcasting dragon must be near extinct in your campaign, since marching a bunch of skeletons and owls into its lair is fairly easy. Humanoids would be able to do it even easier. Poor, easily killed 5E dragon.

At least in 3E/Pathfinder dragons were a great deal harder to kill by anything less than powerful adventurers. Now kingdoms don't even need heroes to stop marauding dragons. Just get the archers and mages out in great number and unleash the arrow volleys.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

But they can be killed by a bunch of flying owls and skeleton archers in your campaign.

No they can't. I already walked you through the math. Shield plus Blur is a hard counter for owls and skeletons.

Eight thousand hobgoblin archers could certainly be dangerous, yes, but eight thousand hobgoblins led by a hobgoblin warlord who knows, deep in his bones, that trying to attack the dragon will get him personally killed by a dragon in the middle of the night... that hobgoblin army is less dangerous. Shield plus Blur factors into this in making it possible for the dragon to take out the hobgoblin leader (prevents "200 hobgoblin bodyguards" from being an effective countermeasure), but the key factor is strategic, not tactical: the generals don't want to fight the dragon.

I know you'll probably say you use the spellcasting variant to make up for this. Smaug wasn't a spellcaster. So the non-spellcasting dragon must be near extinct in your campaign, since marching a bunch of skeletons and owls into its lair is fairly easy. Humanoids would be able to do it even easier. Poor, easily killed 5E dragon.

Of course I'd say this. I've been saying it over and over throughout the course of this thread, haven't I? Vanilla 5E dragons are weak, apparently by design.

In fact, you've said it yourself, only your preferred fix is to give them 5000 HP instead of sorcerer levels. Different strokes.

 

[Celtavian]

Giant Owls are big enough to carry skeletons, and both they and the skeletons are expendable. You can ferry skeletons up to wherever you're going in small squads of three or four at a time in order to limit exposure, or even one at a time if you really want to stay completely dispersed.

A red dragon cannot sleep in lava. He'll die of suffocation after nine and a half minutes if adult, or twelve minutes if he's an anicent red.

I did not say fully submerged. He can sleep in it like a comfortable mud bath with his head resting on the edge. Yet your skeletons and owls would not find the environment so friendly. Plenty of ways to counter your strategy using the lair. It's fairly simplistic. I would be very surprised if an adult or larger dragon couldn't counter it with fair ease. I don't think it would have much trouble getting the drop on your skeletons and owls either. I think the probability of your strategy is fairly low and requires a rather specific class combination. Yet you seem to think it has a high probability of working as you march all your owls and skeletons in there, set them up in perfect formation, while the dragon sits about waiting for you to do it like he is watching some decorate his house. Not sure why you think the dragon would do that. It's another white room strategy that usually fails during execution.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

I did not say fully submerged. He can sleep in it like a comfortable mud bath. Yet your skeletons and owls would not find the environment so friendly. Plenty of ways to counter your strategy using the lair. It's fairly simplistic. I would be very surprised if an adult or larger dragon couldn't counter it with fair ease.

[shrug] It's not a very sophisticated strategy. I'd be disappointed if it couldn't find some way to counter it on its home ground. But we've already covered what happens to a dragon that can't play offense effectively--unless you can interdict all intruders with perfection, a purely defensive game will always lose strategically. You'll starve to death if nothing else.

Edit: BTW, if he's not fully submerged, what's to prevent attackers from shooting him in his sleep? The dragon's passive perception is only 23, everyone in the party can beat that except maybe the paladin (if he stays in full plate).