Converting True Dragons

[Nookie]

Maybe the breath turns the enemy into a stature but it has about the same consistency as a sand castle, It holds the person shape but is frail. If disturbed (like even a single HP damage) than greater measures are needed to fix it.

 

[Cleon]

Maybe the breath turns the enemy into a stature but it has about the same consistency as a sand castle, It holds the person shape but is frail. If disturbed (like even a single HP damage) than greater measures are needed to fix it.

How about we model it on disintegrate? That spell turns things into dust, and turning them into sand isn't that far off.

So it does a lot of HP damage on a failed save, but only a little damage on a successful save, and any creature killed is as hard to return to life as a creature turned to dust by disintegrate.

 

[Cleon]

Well, this is an interesting one. My first thoughts: I'd just give it the ability to cast druid spells along with Sorc/Wiz spells. That's considerably easier and consistent with other divine-casting dragon conversions. I also think we need to tone down the breath weapon in some way, maybe by making it easier to reverse at least for lower age categories.

Yeah, I was expecting we'd go the druid spells as sorcerer spells route. It's the obvious solution, and we have some druid-casting 3E dragons as precedents.

 

[freyar]

I like the disintegrate model of hp damage plus a nasty death. I'm just not sure if I want to require resurrection to bring a victim back to life, at least at the likely CR of the first few age categories. I guess stone to flesh isn't much lower level than resurrection, so maybe it's ok. Actually, does reincarnate work on disintegrated victims? I would be ok if reincarnate worked here.

 

[Cleon]

Actually, does reincarnate work on disintegrated victims? I would be ok if reincarnate worked here.

Yes it does. The spell does not require any bodily remains, just that the subject's soul is free and willing.

 

[freyar]

Breath Weapon (Su): A sand dragon has one breath weapon, a line of light??. A victim that makes a successful Ref save takes only 1/4 damage, but victims killed by the breath weapon are turned to a dust of sand. The effect of the breath weapon is otherwise like the disintegrate spell.

How's that?

How do the abilities compare to other 1e dragons? We should set the progressions.

 

[Cleon]

Breath Weapon (Su): A sand dragon has one breath weapon, a line of light??. A victim that makes a successful Ref save takes only 1/4 damage, but victims killed by the breath weapon are turned to a dust of sand. The effect of the breath weapon is otherwise like the disintegrate spell.

How's that?

It just calls it a "ray" in the original, without specifying what it looks like.

Maybe we should just call it "strange energy" to be on the safe side?

A couple of questions occur to me.

Its effects are described as "turns any living thing it touches into pure, loose, white sand", so what, if anything, does it do to non-living targets like undead, constructs, or carried equipment?

That also makes me want to include the "fine white sand" bit in the description.

Is it the equivalent to a petrification attack or a disintegration attack, or a combination of both? I'm wondering whether immunity to petrification would prevent any damage.

The original description makes mention of a "rock to mud, mud to rock, stone shape, and stone to flesh" method of restoring characters, so I'd like to have at least some reference to that.

How about this revision...

Breath Weapon (Su): A sand dragon has one breath weapon, a line of strange energy that causes X damage per age category. A victim that makes a successful Reflex save takes only 1/4 damage, but any living creature killed by the breath weapon is turned into a pile of fine white sand. Creatures who are immune to petrification are unaffected by this breath weapon.

A creature that has been turned to sand can be restored to life with a wish, reincarnation or resurrection spell - the sand counts as the small portion of a body required for resurrection. Alternatively, a make whole spell can turn the pile of sand into a petrified corpse, which can then be turned into a fleshy but still dead body with a stone to flesh spell, then returned to life with a raise dead spell.

How do the abilities compare to other 1e dragons? We should set the progressions.

They're at the high end.

• Armor Class 0 is the same as a Bronze Dragon but not as good as a Red (-1) or Gold (-2).
• Hit Dice 10-12 is the same as a Gold Dragon.
• 1-8 Claw Damage is the same as a Red or Gold Dragon, but
• 2-20 Bite Damage is weak, the same as a Green Dragon.
• Special Abilities are generally better - no standard Chromatic or Metallic dragon has Magic Resistance or a 9 in 10 chance of surprise in 1st Edition.
• Intelligence is equal to a Bronze, Silver, or Red Dragon.
• Size of 38' is in the middle - they're two feet longer than a Copper or Green Dragon (36') and four feet shorter than a Blue or Bronze (42').
• Spell Use is equal to a Red Dragon in spell levels (who also get a 1/1/2/2/3/3/4/4 progression) but not in type (since they have some Druid spells).
• Speaking/Magic-Use/Sleeping - the Speaking/Magic Use chance of 80%/80% is between a Red (75%/40%) and a Gold (90%/100%), while the Sleeping chance of 30% is the same as a Blue Dragon.

As to how that translates into 3E stats will require some debate.

 

[freyar]

If you allow miracle and perhaps limited wish to work as well, I'd be happy enough with the breath weapon. I assume the damage will go in the usual table.

Well, at least the mental stats should follow a Silver or Red dragon progression. The rest will take some discussion.

 

[Cleon]

If you allow miracle and perhaps limited wish to work as well, I'd be happy enough with the breath weapon. I assume the damage will go in the usual table.

I'm fine with miracle but it seems a little too good for a limited wish, since the strongest spells a limited wish can duplicate are a 6th level sorcerer/wizard spell (e.g. flesh to stone) or a 5th level non-sorcerer/wizard spell (e.g. raise dead), and you need both to restore the victim to life.

I'd think it would require two limited wishes - one to reconstitute the victim into a "petrified statue", and another to restore the statue to life.

How about:

A creature that has been turned to sand can be restored to life with a wish, miracle, reincarnation or resurrection spell - the sand counts as the small portion of a body required for resurrection. Alternatively, a make whole spell can turn the pile of sand into a petrified corpse, which can then be turned into a fleshy but still dead body with a stone to flesh spell, then returned to life with a raise dead spell. Two carefully worded limited wish spells can also restore the victim - the first to transform their remains into a petrified body, and the second to return the body to living flesh.

Well, at least the mental stats should follow a Silver or Red dragon progression. The rest will take some discussion.

Well they certainly seem somewhere in that area. I'd like to give them good Wisdom scores, since that's the key ability of the Druid spells the original version had (our version will use Charisma to actually cast them, of course, as we'd decided earlier on the "can pick druid spells for its sorcerer spellcasting" route).

 

[freyar]

Noticed a typo: the spell is reincarnate, not reincarnation.

I proposed the possibility of limited wish because reincarnate is a Druid 4 spell, so I don't think you'd need two limited wishes.

Let's get down to progressions. In 3.5e, Bronze is between Red and Silver in terms of mental scores, so why don't we go with that progression? Wis is already the highest score (by a touch). HD like Gold should work. To deal with the size and damage values (which are tied together), I suggest going with a medium size progression like Brass or Bronze and then a weak physical ability progression.