Dragons Are Disposable(D.A.D.)Membership drive

[Kunimatyu]

For those who like the feral dragon, there's a great template from Advanced Bestiary that accompishes exactly this. It's great for letting your PCs fight a Gargantuan dragon without actually being close to Epic level.

 

[Brother MacLaren]

most dragons in the ruleset are scaled geniuses with fat spell-stacks and fly speed of harrier jet type and deserve to be played as such.

Of the chromatic dragons in the core rules, less than half have an Int of 16 or higher and less than 1/3 have an Int of 18 or higher. A 16 Int doesn't even appear until CR 13. Best casting for a CR 13 chromatic dragon is 5th-level sorcerer.

In other words, for most of the levels at which the game is played (especially considering how common low/mid-level play is), using dragons of CR=APL+1-2, dragons are not geniuses and do not have fat spell-stacks. But, yes, the insane fly speed is what makes them frustrating opponents. They can run away really well if the battle goes against them.

 

[Aeric]

Hear hear!

I like my dragons to be physically powerful, but no smarter than the velociraptors in Jurassic Park. No talking, no shapechanging, no spells...just tooth and claw and thick scaley hide.

 

[Mark CMG]

For those who like the feral dragon, there's a great template from Advanced Bestiary that accompishes exactly this. It's great for letting your PCs fight a Gargantuan dragon without actually being close to Epic level.

Yupper. That's a particularly good template for this vision of a dragon.

 

[frankthedm]

For those who like the feral dragon, there's a great template from Advanced Bestiary that accompishes exactly this. It's great for letting your PCs fight a Gargantuan dragon without actually being close to Epic level.

It does that well, only problem is it makes the dragon even MORE vulnerable to attacks that target Dex.

 

[phindar]

I like my dragons to be physically powerful, but no smarter than the velociraptors in Jurassic Park. No talking, no shapechanging, no spells...just tooth and claw and thick scaley hide.

Wait a minute, those velociraptors were geniuses! By the third movie, they were talking. Actually, there was a good parody of that on The Critc tv show (cartoon, Jon Lovitz), where they're watching a clip of the movie and the 'raptor breaks out into a British accent with, "I've arranged transport to Costa Rica where I have rented a small villa under the name Mr. Higginsbottom... or perhaps I've said too much."

Reign of Fire had pretty good beastly dragons. They were cunning but you didn't get the feeling they were taking night classes at the learning annex. The sharks in Deep Blue Sea are another good example. My problem isn't that certain creatures in D&D are too intelligence, its that their intelligence is too human.

 

[Hammerhead]

Dragons are there to die.

 

[frankthedm]

In other words, for most of the levels at which the game is played (especially considering how common low/mid-level play is), using dragons of CR=APL+1-2, dragons are not geniuses and do not have fat spell-stacks.

No, the younger ones do not do not have all that jazz , but most of those are effectively children and teenagers. Now not all evil dragons may care about their young, but I've seen greens treated as "Forest Farrellis" and blues being virtual "Desert Dons" with Great Wyrm Godfathers. And as obnoxious* as that is, it really is reasonable with the mental stats of the typical 3E dragon.

*Having spent several levels fleeing the wrath of a Green dragon because we killed one of his half dragon sons, I may be a little biased towards having dragons be less sentient.

This dragon is a very young or young green. Momma is at least 5-6 CR higher and covers 240 miles in one day of flight.

 

[Victim]

Even CR 18 Reds (Mature Adult) are still within normal human range of INT and only cast as 9th level sorcerers. Sure, they're geniuses. But wizards of that level are typically even greater geniuses. They just aren't that impressive mentally or as casters inside the CR 20 range.

So if you definition of children or teenagers is "not ancient or older," then yeah.

 

[PapersAndPaychecks]

I wish to become a member of Dragons are Disposable!

Signed, P&P (player of 1e dragons).