Fighting Dragons

[Family]

Are they just too powerful? Even a level 3 white dragon would go through a level 3 party like so much cake. I guess that's the name of the game though. The only thing I can think of is bringing in the other D of D&D and limit their mobility in a Dungeon. But out in the open? Forget about it.

 

[jedrious]

Well, from experience running dragons, one in a cavern, one out in the open and one on a bridge, the main determining factor is party mobility as oppossed to the dragon's, coupled with the luck of the recharge (my group wants to ban me from running dragons because I've had 7 rounds total out of around 40 where the breath didn't recharge but that's the swinginess of a )

 

[brehobit]

Are they just too powerful? Even a level 3 white dragon would go through a level 3 party like so much cake. I guess that's the name of the game though. The only thing I can think of is bringing in the other D of D&D and limit their mobility in a Dungeon. But out in the open? Forget about it.

I've not tried the fight yet, but the 3rd level white dragon looks okay for a well-designed party of 5. More like a 5th level encounter, but doable with the right classes.

The black dragon, with the crazy darkness, looks beyond reasonable.

 

[Shalimar]

When we played through the DMG adventure a group of 6 1st level characters beat the White Dragon without anyone going unconsciuos let alone being close to deat. My rogue blinded it the first round, dazed it the 2nd and we just had a good old time fighting it.

The party was:

Human Fighter
Human Rogue
Human Warlock
Human Wizard
Tiefling Warlord
Dragonborn Paladin.

 

[Runestar]

I suppose if you have the dragon hover out of reach of the party and attack them with impunity, while the party is fairly weak in ranged attacks...

That said, I think that the concept of solos might be a little flawed, in that the idea of 1 powerful foe vs a well-coordinated party may be too risky, as you are essentially placing all your eggs into the same basket. Perhaps it is not yet so apparent at low lvs when your party has access to too few resources to take advantage of this, but still...

 

[DLichen]

I thought that the older blue dragons look nuts overpowered with their AOE at-will stun the entire party for a round attack, but that's just on paper. It seems that parties really need to hit with some of their nastier dailies to make it through alive though.

 

[Runestar]

Or a paladin with certain justice.

 

[ki11erDM]

Are they just too powerful? Even a level 3 white dragon would go through a level 3 party like so much cake. I guess that's the name of the game though. The only thing I can think of is bringing in the other D of D&D and limit their mobility in a Dungeon. But out in the open? Forget about it.

Our level 1 group took out the dragon in the DMG with no issue at all.

How many encounters have you run with a dragon in 4e?

 

[Nail]

Our level 1 group took out the dragon in the DMG with no issue at all.

What tactics did they use? Number of PCs present? Etc?

 

[Ravingdork]

We are DRAGON KILLERS!

In a 2nd-level game a while back we encountered a white dragon in a dungeon and totally pwned it. My human cleric with his super high Wisdom as well as the Skill Training: Perception and Alertness feats heard the dragon's heavy breathing before we ever made it to its cavern. After warning the party of the noise, we sent the Stealth-trained Eladrin wizard in to investigate.

After seeing that it was a dragon (and the dragon seeing that it was an Eladrin Wizard) Mr. Not-So-Stealthy Wiz-Kid ran down the hallway to warn everyone (mostly by screaming "DRAGON! DRAGON!" with arms flailing wildly).

When the dragon came barreling down the hall after our wizard the poor lizard was stopped in his tracks with a maul to the face from our warforged fighter.

The wizard did an about face and conjured up a Flaming Sphere behind the beast in order to trap it in the narrow hall between the fighter and the sphere. He then got out of breath weapon range and continued cooking the dragon twice each round for the rest of the encounter.

My cleric pelted the dragon with his Lance of Faith power (granting the defender attack bonuses) while our other cleric, a human, pelted it with her Sacred Flame power (granting the defender hit points or saves as needed). We both healed the fighter and others with our Healing Word class abilities and potions whenever they called for it. Sadly, all our cleric powers had a maximum range of 5 squares, like the dragon's breath weapon, so we had to expose ourselves to attack at least every other round while making our own attacks and healing/buffing the party.

The human ranger in our party bounced in and out of melee, striking the dragon with Twin Strike and other double attack powers as much as he could while luring the dragon into making futile opportunity attacks so as to grant the fighter free attacks enhanced by his Potent Challenge feat. Between my Shield of Faith power and the ranger's Defensive Mobility feat the striker was nigh unhittable (though he did gain some new scars from a lucky critical).

Two or three characters went down at various points, but thanks to two clerics and several potions, nobody was out for more than HALF a round. The fight must have been over in about 9 rounds. Dragon never knew what hit him.

We ate well that night as we sorted out our large pile of treasure.

I loved this battle because it was an awesome example of how well the class roles work together when done right. The fighter was defending, the ranger was striking, the wizard was controlling, and the clerics were buffing and leading. It made us feel like we could take on almost anything. This is the first time 4E has really truly shined for me and I was hoping to share that feeling with all of you.

LESSON LEARNED: Level appropriate dragons that can't fly are going to die.