Dragons... has the icon been lost?

[Raven Crowking]

Removed

 

[TheAuldGrump]

Because the draconic icon has always been a huge, rampaging, unstoppable beast...

Or maybe not.

The Auld Grump

 

[BryonD]

I dunno.

I look at my 1e MM and the example of a party smacking a dragon into submission and I think that they've come a long way into being icons.

No, they don't match archetypal dragons well. A Red Dragon isn't close to Smaug. But, a wizard isn't close to Gandalf either.

There are plenty of options out there for deadly super animal dragons (I like Green Ronin's Feral Dragon myself).

But I also really like the D&D dragons. They are exactly what I want in my current games.

I've got no issue with wanting different. But I'll stand by the D&D version and saying they make you twitch seems to smack of the whole "bad wrong fun" thing.

 

[Ibram]

Personaly I like dragons that are crafty and full of sorcerous power. It lets them do realy crazy things... like eat every left handed person in a kingdom, or return every 50 years to ravage a kingdom, then come one day early on the 51st year.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Long ago, I seperated dragons into 2 seperate species - true dragons (those with sharp minds & spellcasting) and their larger and less intelligent relatives, the drakes.

Ignoring, of course, some of the critters that are also called drakes.

But since the Drakes lost that spellcasting power, they needed something else.

Usually, I started by increasing the size 33%, and doubling the HD.

Thus, I get to have my cake and eat it too.

 

[Moon-Lancer]

I bet dragons like cake. probably chocolate, no… triple chocolate.

 

[VirgilCaine]

You need to take out your 1st Edition MM or your blue box set and check that again.

Some dragons had spells. Some did not.

I think you're making too fine a distiction there.

Dragons have very slow spell progressions relative to HD. To me, it's annoying that they don't have better progressions.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Removed

 

[Aaron L]

Wow, a complaint that dragons can use magic.

That blows my mind!

 

[Elric]

I don't mind dragons as smart and powerful spellcasters. I do wish that buffing was less important to the game. It would be great to have more high level opponents that can challenge a high level party without having to buff to avoid being taken down in a single round by a prepared party.

I think this is where the problem lies- if you look at the dragon's tactics, it has so many buff spells to cast in advance. Then in combat it has a Dispelling Breath spell that exists so it can dispel the party's buff spells! I can't stand buff spells . Reminds me why I now play Mutants and Masterminds.