D&D 5E Green Dragon Lair

[Plaguescarred]

You could even use old existing material, like this map from Dwellers of the Forbidden City. This lost, overgrown city ruins would make a great dragon's lair. In fact, the lake originally is home to a dragon IIRC.

This is an iconic place that brings back memory man! Not sure if i'd want it under the Gnarley Forest though.

Things like thorn bushes as well. An overhrown colliseum could be an idea or a demiplane even.

Over grown floating asteroid on a demi plane or astral plane set over a vortex to somewhere unpleasant.

Oh i really like the idea of an extraplanar lair even if partial, like a section of the lair "overgrowing" into a demiplane or into Arvandor, Arborea, the Beastlands, Arborea or the Feywild.


Yan
D&D Playtester

 

[Plaguescarred]

They battle it across an uneven sea of green, never sure when they might misplace a foot and vanish downwards into the dark to cling fearfully at some branch and from there to hurry back to their comrades following the moving sounds of battle above. And even if they don't fall through the canopy, he dragon does - time and again vanishing down into the shadowed depths, becoming a moving cacophony of snapping branches and terrified birds taking flight only to burst up wings unfurling where the heroes least expect it or reach through the very branches on which they stand and yank them down inside to see it twined around the giant trunks, finding easy purchase with its claws. The plate armour the fighter wore in expectation of it being a blessing, instead makes it harder to prevent herself from falling. The firespells of the wizard ignite parts of the terrain and produce great clouds of black smoke from the green foliage burning. And the PCs learn what true terror is, facing the dragon between forest and sky.

----

So in game terms, all you really need is an amorphous area for the canopy, an upper layer for the very tops (somewhere for archer PCs to climb and shoot from Legolas-style) and a lower layer and some weak areas for PCs to fall through and the dragon to erupt from. You could even just handle it abstractedly with rolls by players to avoid falling through and placing perilous wholes in the map where the dragon has erupted from. If a player plunges down a level or two, well they're going to have make some athletics rolls to get back up there. They might even get the odd spell off as the battle moves in and out of view above them but they'd best not stay down there too long lest they end up facing the dragon alone (or her minions).

Bonus points if during this battle the impossibly ancient treant titan they are fighting in the top of is roused from a few hundred years of sleep by the battle and sets off walking whilst they fight, causing everything to sway even more alarmingly than before.

This is interesting especially the battleground, i like the idea of a ground strong enought to support humans despite the sparse spot of weaker vegetation that can suddenly bent under their weight, while in the meantime being enought flexible canopy to have the dragon come from all sides and have the vegetation close back behind him. It could even use a sort of phasing in/out tactic that phase spiders use with the ethereal, but outside the treetop canopy!

Bonus XP for the slumbering treant possible awakening idea! Especially of the tree top is in fact the headtop of a colossal treant slumbering for a milenium... Surprise when the lair itself awaken !!


Yan
D&D Playtester

 

[Plaguescarred]

A massive downed tree with multiple "side tunnels" and exits that its branches or roots. The PC's enter near the top of the tree and make their way through traps, sentient evil plants, poisonous fungi and other hazards until they reach the bole/base of the tree.

There the dragon waits surrounded by a pool of fungi, toxic pools of water and hanging (man-eating) vines...

I could see the side tunnels being a maze to get to the middle lair where the dragon resides

What level(s) are your PCs?

Level 6 - 8 when they reach it they still have a few things to do and travel there.

When I saw the picture, my first thought is giant overgrown sinkhole. Kind of cave-adjacent but with lots of light and green.

This is a nice spot!

Ruined elven tree settlement by a lake. Underneath the entire area runs a network of flooded tunnels with many outlets hidden in various locations. Some of the tunnels are designed to be collapsed so as to divide enemy invaders. On the surface, the dragon can try to use tree foliage for cover against ranged attacks; and/or try to lure combatants up into the branches (along old elven tree-paths) where it can knock them down with wing attacks.

I love this idea too it could have multiple gateways path to exit or move from one spot to another. Funny it just conjure the image of a "whack a Beaver" kind of tactic...


Yan
D&D Playtester

 

[Plaguescarred]

Dragon lairs should be like onions - none more so than those of the scheming green.

Thanks for all the ideas pretty good!

Wild Elves (grugarch?) would make perfect involuntary minions. They already hate outsiders, but are too weak to kill or drive him off. They would want someone to kill him, but couldn't accept aid from outsiders (even other elves). It could create some interesting RP situations, assuming the pcs don't just attack everything on sight.

I'll second plant monsters as actual minions, so long as they are neutral to evil, such as shambling mounds and vegipigmies (sp?).

Yeah the Gnarley Forest is full of them too!


So many good suggestions thanks guys!


Yan
D&D Playtester

 

[knasser]

This is interesting especially the battleground, i like the idea of a ground strong enought to support humans despite the sparse spot of weaker vegetation that can suddenly bent under their weight, while in the meantime being enought flexible canopy to have the dragon come from all sides and have the vegetation close back behind him. It could even use a sort of phasing in/out tactic that phase spiders use with the ethereal, but outside the treetop canopy!

Bonus XP for the slumbering treant possible awakening idea! Especially of the tree top is in fact the headtop of a colossal treant slumbering for a milenium... Surprise when the lair itself awaken !!

If you go with this, a couple of things that will help sell it to the PCs are emphasizing how large the branches are - wide enough to stand properly on in places - and maybe having branches tangled together and even moss beds matted together between them. Sort of a soft spongy ground with a terrifying drop below it. Will make it all the more terrifying as the dragon shreds more and more of it during the battle adding a sort of destructing battle ground scenario to it as well.

The network of traversable branches and treacherous moss beds could make for a fascinating and terrifying encounter and a diving and re-surfacing dragon is a fresh variation on the old "flying out of reach" tactic. Basically, when the dragon is hurt enough (by a lot of HP damage in a round) it breaks off and disappears preparing to strike from a different angle.

 

[Charles Rampant]

There is a Green Dragon lair in Rise of Tiamat. It's short, like all the dungeons in that module, but does have an interesting twist on the cave theme, as it is located behind a waterfall in a forest, and the only two ways into the Dragon's sleeping chamber (as opposed to outer chambers) is either through an underwater tunnel or secret doors.

I'll try linking a small version of it, from Jared Blando's website:

Edit: I see that you're a playtester, so apologies if you already know about this one and mentioned it upthread; I just skimmed to see what images had been shared already

 

[Plaguescarred]

Thanks yeah i know about this one and i'd like to go with something less standard than cavern lair


Yan
D&D Playtester

 

[smbakeresq]

There was an old dragon magazine adventure wherein drow tunneled out a tree and lived inside it. There was even a room where they fed the tree directly to keep it healthy and strong. I think it's dragon magazine 73 or 79, something in the 70's.

The drow would be fine to use, the extensive forest canopy, it's called Gnarley, would protect them from sunlight. They could have tunneled up through the roots, allowing the dragon to have a non-traditional escape root

 

[smbakeresq]

Another thing, if you decide the dragon has access to awaken or speak with animals it will have a great idea about all the characters when they get there and will be impossible to surprise.

The treasure of the dragon might be inside another tree that the PC wouldn't even notice, maybe an awakened tree that has been convinced to grow over the treasure and protect it.


Greyhawk is still the best world

 

[smbakeresq]

Remember too the dragon has had a few hundred years to grow this tree to a shape, and magic means to enhance and direct growth. So anything is possible.