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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Iron Sheep" data-source="post: 1878623" data-attributes="member: 4965">So my last post got me thinking about just what the risks of dragon hunting for peasants are like.Just for fun, lets imagine a group of 8 warriors with the non-elite array of abilities Str 13, Dex 11, Con 12, Int 10, Wis 8, Cha 9 (the best peasant fighters that a village can muster) in leather and with shortswords (which they have weapon focus in) against a wyrmling white dragon.  So the warriors are basically +0 Init, 5 hp, AC 12, +3 melee for 1d6+1 and with a Ref save of +0; the dragon has  +4 Init, 22 hp, AC 14, bite +5 (1d6) and 2 claws +0 (1d3) and a breath which does 1d6 cold (DC 12), feats are Improved Init and Improved Natural Attack (bite).  And let's assume that they have it cornered, since it will be significantly more deadly if it can strafe.In the first round, a warrior has a 25% chance of beating the dragon's initiative, so 2 of them go before the dragon.  They have to roll an 11 to hit the dragon, so that's a 50% chance to hit, so on average one of them hits, doing 4.5 points of damage and leaving it with 17.5 hp.The dragon steps back and breathes, catching half the group in its breath.  The warriors need to roll 12 to make the save, which is a 45% chance.  So on average 2.675 damage each (=3.5*0.55+1.667*0.45), so let's assume 2 take 4 points, and 2 take 1 point.  On average, none of them are out of the fight.All the warriors get to attack before the next action the dragon gets, so they do an average of 18 points, which means that the dragon is dying at this point, but only just (-0.5 hp, on average).If the dragon survived to make a melee attack, it would hit with its bite 70% of the time for 3.5 damage, and with its claws 45% of the time for 2 damage for 4.25 points of damage.  Given that the dragon will most likely attack the wounded opponents, it should be enough to reduce one of them to negative hit points.  Since it is tiny, it takes an attack of opportunity for doing this, taking another 2.25 points of damage, so it may get taken out before it gets to make the attack (and more likely it would try to flee in this situation).  So a group of 8 warriors are likely to survive a typical fight with a wyrmling white dragon.  However, it doesn't take much to go the dragon's way for the fight to be a lot more deadly for the warriors.  If the dragon rolls a 5 or a 6 for its breath weapon then the warriors who fail their save are effectively out of the fight (we'll assume that warriors with 0 hp try to save themselves rather than continue fighting).  If the wyrmling can choose the battleground so that the warriors are grouped together, and it is aware of the warrior's approach so that it has surprise, that effectively means that there is a 1/3 chance that on average 4 of the warriors are out of the fight before their first action, and the rest have taken 2 or 3 points of damage.That dramatically tilts the advantage to the dragon, as an average of 1 warrior will beat it's initiative and it will only suffer an average of 2.25 points of damage from the remaining warrior's attacks before its next attack.  The dragon has a 1 in 4 chance of being able to breathe again this round, and if it does, with the warriors still largely clustered together, the fight is likely to be over: the breath will take out those warriors that fail their save 75% of the time, and take out everyone 1/3 of the time.  Even if only those who fail their saves die, the dragon will probably mop up the 2 survivors (who will only have 1 or 2 hp left) without too much difficulty.  So  if the dragon knows you are coming and you are fighting on its home turf, then you have about a 6% chance of the dragon breathing twice and taking out most of the warriors before most of the warriors get to act.Assuming the dragon doesn't get to breathe again, the bite will take out a remaining warrior 52.5% (=0.7*(0.5*5/6 + 0.5*4/6)) of the time, while the claw attacks have a 22.5% chance each of removing a remaining warrior.  Since it is tiny, it takes an attack of opportunity for doing this, taking another 2.25 points of damage.  The dragon will almost certainly take out at least one warrior.  So let's assume that there are 3 warriors left standing after the dragon's second attack, and for sake of argument all get to close and attack before the dragon's next attack. This will do on average about 7 points of damage (possibly a bit more if flanking it taken into account), so the dragon is most likely still only down about 12 points.This will mean that the dragon will most likely survive to make a 3rd attack, which may even be another breath weapon attack (although it is unlikely to be able to get all of the remaining warriors with the breath, it can probably get 2 of them). This has a good chance of being deadly for 1 or 2 of the warriors, so we can probably assume that if the dragon gets to breathe a second time at this point there are only 1 or 2 warriors left standing, and again at this point the dragon will probably survive long enough to kill them even if it doesn't get to breathe again.  If the dragon doesn't get to breathe this round, then it will most likely take out another warrior with bite and claw and be down an average of 14 hp.At this point, things are getting touch and go for the dragon to survive.  There are 2 warriors left, so the dragon will take on average about 4.5 damage, so it will probably survive to attack once more.If it can breathe again, then it has a good chance of taking out 1 of the remaining warriors, and may be able to take out both.  The most likely outcome is that there will be just one badly wounded warrior left at this point, and the dragon has a good chance of winning (although it's not certain).  If the dragon can't breathe this round, then it will be able to next round, so its best strategy is probably to use its superior speed to get out of melee and line up so it can both of the remaining warriors with its breath weapon next round.  Even if the warriors win from this position, there is a good chance that several of them will bleed to death rather than stabilize.So if the dragon gets the drop on the warriors then it has (very roughly) maybe a 25%-30% chance of total victory.  In the other 70-75% of cases, the warriors win with maybe a couple of people downed, maybe 1 dead if they are unlucky.  Not good for the dragon, but also a significantly risky proposition for our peasant adventurers.If the dragon has more of a tactical advantage (say a series of caverns connected by long passages or climbs, where it can continually drop back and ambush with its breath weapon and avoid melee combat and ranged weapon fire), then the risks go up significantly for the warriors.  Of course, if the warriors can surround the dragon in the open and are trained and armed with bows, then the dragon is in deep trouble.And the reward?  Triple a CR 2 treasure, or 1800 gp on average.  That's 225 gp each on average, or a bit less than a year's income for a peasant.  And 150 xp each.  The downside? the loss of future earnings from 8 of your best young people.  Roughly speaking, if the life expectancy of a typical young villager is more than about 4 years, the village will be worse off if it sends out its youngsters on dragon hunting missions.  Possibly worth the risk if you are desperate enough (war, famine, plague, extreme poverty) or if the dragon is causing your village direct damage (eating livestock and killing people).So there is probably a fair bit of social pressure being exerted to stop your typical group of villagers going adventuring.</blockquote>

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