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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Victim" data-source="post: 27937" data-attributes="member: 78">One:Kill the Cleric!A dragon's damage output in melee will almost certainly require chain healing spells to allow most characters to survive more than a round of attack.  At higher levels, Heal and Harm become availible, and even worse, Mass Heal.   Heal spells can negate several rounds worth of actions, at the expense of one - thus giving the group a huge advantage; perhaps 7 effective rounds if the one PC takes the brunt of 2 rounds attacks.  Mass Heal provides an even greater time advantage.  Harm negates one of a dragon's greatest assets, a massive store of HP.   Clerics sometimes have Dispel Magic resposibilities.  Since a dragon is usually an effective lower level caster for most spells, any spell he uses might be removed or countered.Also, if a group's main healer is dead, then the dragon can beat a retreat, rest, and then come back.  Without access to healing, the group will be very weak.  Clerics are usually the main source of elemental resistance buffs, GMW, Bull's Strength etc.  Killing the Cleric and then retreating gives these spells time to fade, and they won't be replaced easily.2: AbilitiesDragons get both cleric and sorcerer spells.  They fight better than fighters.  They sometimes will have better skills than the rogue.  A whole adventuring party in one extra large winged reptile package!  Unfortunately, Dragon's don't get sneak attack, so they lose out on some major uses of their skill.  Even so, the Fighter/Mage/Cleric combination was a 2e favorite.  And now, the buff spells are much better.  The only real flaw that Dragon's will usually have is a lack of action parity; while a dragon combines skills from all 4 adventuring types, he'll act at 1/4 the effective rate of a 4 man party.Therefore, dragons must use haste if they can, and they must attempt to deny it to enemies.  A hit and run game can work for drawing out the short lived haste. Dragon's must have at least one healing spell, preferably Heal.  If a dragon is vulnerable to an element, it should have a good protection spell against that element.  Elemental protection is a good idea anyway.  Powerful, long ranged spells can foil a dragon's great mobility.  Most of these spells are elemental attacks.Dragon's have impressive damage and defense in melee.  However, sometimes even they need a little help, especially with stoneskin and other High Dr effects, since they lack Magic Fang type spells to give their bite and claws plusses.  A dragon with the proper spells can boost his combat power to near unheard of levels.  Dragons can benefit from:Mage armor-stacks with natural armor, long durationshield- +7 AC to most attacks, blocks magic missilesDivine Favor: +to hit, +damage, stacks with almost everythingShield of Faith: More AC stacking fun.  PCs do it, so can you!With just a few of these low level spells, a dragon can boost his AC to insane levels.  Consider a CR 6 Young Red Dragon.  We'll give him Shield and Mage Armor as his two first level spells.  Divine Favor is mostly for higher levels anyway.  His AC goes from 21 to 32 if shield applies.  A Raging, 1/2 orc barbarian focused in his weapon, with a +2 sword, 5 points Bull's strength and amxed out starting strength has a +19 attack.  He hits less than half the time, compared to almost automatically.  Cases with less extreme characters have it worse.  Also, the dragon's touch AC goes from an easy 9 to a 16.  More pesky rays will miss, thus negating another big advantage for the would be slayers.  HIgher level spells = bigger advantage.  However, even adept draong's don't get spells very quickly, so I'll leave my example to jsut the lower levels ones.</blockquote>

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