D&D 5E How soon is too soon to fight a Dragon?

[blueherald]

I have recently embraced the philosophy that if you wait 'until they are powerful enough' for everything, you'll never do everything cool that you want to do in your game.

FWIW, my newbie players (an elf ranger, a dwarf cleric, a human fighter and a human bard) fought the young green dragon in Lost Mine of Phandelver at level 3 and survived. This is normally a deadly encounter for level 3, but the encounter is written to have the dragon flee once it is reduced to half hit points. This is likely designed to specifically reduce the recharge odds by reducing the rounds of combat.

They survived - but they were not unscathed.

They were smart enough to not bunch up immediately so they got a few rounds of combat in having only to deal with bites and claws. Eventually they did get breathed on, and the average 42 damage was higher than all their max hit points.

The ranger made his save because he had been inspired by the bard, but he was already injured and went down from the half damage.

The bard saved without advantage (cause you cant use BI on yourself) and stayed conscious after half damage but was wobbly.

The cleric flubbed the save but survived because of dwarven resistance to poison, also wobbly.

Before the battle the cleric had cast Protection from Poison on the fighter, so he similarly saved with advantage and survived, and was the least wobbly. Between Second Wind and the cleric and the bard having heal spells they were able to survive and get the dragon to half hit points before a recharge.

Had a recharge come and the dragon had a chance to breathe again, there likely would have been deaths. Maybe not a TPK because they did keep moving and not bunch up.

So, new players got to fight a dragon and live to tell the tale, and I think this hooked them into sticking with the game. Which might not have happened had I "waited" to use a dragon.

But it was tough and heroic and exciting and dangerous and not easy - as a dragon fight should be at any level.

 

[TheCosmicKid]

But I do get what you're saying. My main reason for including the Wyrmlings at all was so that the players would have literally experienced "Dungeons" and "Dragons".

That green dragon I mentioned upthread was the first time in fifteen years or so of DMing that I actually wrote a dungeon with a dragon in it. The players' reaction was priceless.

 

[CTurbo]

Our 3 man party killed a young black dragon at level 3. It was not easy, and it took a while, but non of our characters REALLY came close to dying. The Cleric and Sorcerer did get knocked out once or twice, but were always able to revive/heal each other quickly. We did roll for stats though so we're a little stronger than the normal level 3 characters would be. My Goliath Barb hacked it up with 2 hand axes every turn. 1d6+7 + 1d6+2

 

[steeldragons]

As soon as makes sense in the world is precisely when they should find/meet/run across one one.

Did the first level characters stumble into a dragon's lair? Well then they have some choices to make, don't they?

Did some party of 5th level characters inadvertently awaken/release from some eternal prison the grandfather of all evil dragons without realizing it when they slew that sphinx that told them to leave for a pile [a large pile, but still] of shiny coins and gemstones, and took that funky, dragon shaped, sapphire idol as booty, too?

Did the 10th level party slay an evil wizard and now have two good dragon wrymlings [that were his prisoners/he was going to experiment on or drain their magic or whatever] to deal with?

Are dragons in the world so rare, that at 20th level your PCs still haven't seen one, despite knowing all of the stories and legends about them?

There is no "when." There are, however, "whys" that need answering. Why would a dragon be where it is that the characters would come across it? Why is a dragon coming to the town/city [pillage treasure? hungry? really is just bored and wants to visit (or wanton destruction for a laugh)? needs help?]? Why did a dragon lair where it is [assuming of course that any stories legends about such things are accurate, which they needn't be]? Why and to what extent are they willing to fight or flee the encounter?

Dragon encounters are awesome. They're half the title of the game! hahaha. And they require thought and planning as much as any other game/story element. But, I have found over the years, in my best games (that I've enjoyed either DMing or playing), there are no "level minimums" that make an encounter "right." There are no "good times" to do things with the PCs. You make the world. You put the world before them and have it react to their input and actions accordingly.

If that brings 3 2nd level characters nose-to-nose with Tankodeth the Terrible, ancient red dragon, steed of the fire giant god, then so be it. It's the characters' actions (players' choices) that matter. It's their choices and actions that get them into things...and their choices and actions that get them out...or not.

 

[Leatherhead]

You could always use a Half-Dragon at CR 2 if you don't want to use wyrmlings.

And honestly, if you are giving your PC's an ally, a wyrmling might be more appropriate than other options.

 

[Maxperson]

My players were definitely scared of the Wyrmlings. In fact the Barbarian of the group ran away by crawling through a hole in the wall he was so scared. If anything, for new players at least, having a taste of a baby dragon has only made them give more respect to dragons in general.

But I do get what you're saying. My main reason for including the Wyrmlings at all was so that the players would have literally experienced "Dungeons" and "Dragons".

Sure, you can use a baby dragon to scare low level PCs. I would never do that, though. To me it relegates dragons to being little better than orcs or ogres. Dragons in my opinion should be awesome to behold and terrifying to even the mighty. I don't even use dragons in every campaign I run, and my campaigns last 12-18 months usually. When a dragon does make an appearance, it's something the players are going to remember for a long, long time.

 

[Sunseeker]

I think assisting in a fight between two dragons way outside of their league is different from fighting a dragon on their own. Personally I wouldn't have them actually engage with the "bad" dragon. I'd say that the "bad" dragon has set some traps for the "good" dragon as the bad one is younger and weaker and the party can take those out while the good dragon holds his opponent at bay. Perhaps this can even be a "lesser of two evils" choice, two dragons fighting near a town or settlement of some sort, but both of them chromatic and the players have to make a choice on if they should stay out and hope the victor makes no further moves against the town, or get involved and hope that the victor feels the party is now owed a favor for aiding them.

I'd set this encounter around level 4 or 5, as a lead in to something obviously dragon related that spans at least levels 5-10. With whatever side the party having picked eventually leading to a rematch with the party potentially founding out they picked the wrong side, or perhaps their was no "right" side. Dragon A wanted "The McGuffin" to do "powerful effect" while Dragon B wanted it to do some other thing, neither with a positive outcome for the party or any non-dragons in the vicinity.

I actually ran an encounter like this a few months back, a blue and a gold were fighting, the party allied with the gold and got some neat rewards but it was more of a sandbox setting and the party never followed up on the reasons for the fight to begin with. I made the Gold fairly closed regarding his reasons, and the party face bit the dust early in the fight. (actually, at the start of the fight. He failed (nat 1) his reflex save and was crushed to death when the entangled dragons crashed to the ground).

If the breath weapon is a concern make one of the have a line and the other a cone, (red v gold, gold v copper, blue v black) so if the party in-character doesn't know which might have which, they can at least pad their odds by siding with the dragon whose breath weapon they feel most competent to handle.

Some other notes: This would be a great excuse to have two metallic dragons fighting, as fighting them is rare in D&D.
-In my game, the loser dragon died. Thinking on it, he should have run away. Dragons aren't idiots and they know when they're losing.

 

[Lanliss]

I think assisting in a fight between two dragons way outside of their league is different from fighting a dragon on their own. Personally I wouldn't have them actually engage with the "bad" dragon. I'd say that the "bad" dragon has set some traps for the "good" dragon as the bad one is younger and weaker and the party can take those out while the good dragon holds his opponent at bay. Perhaps this can even be a "lesser of two evils" choice, two dragons fighting near a town or settlement of some sort, but both of them chromatic and the players have to make a choice on if they should stay out and hope the victor makes no further moves against the town, or get involved and hope that the victor feels the party is now owed a favor for aiding them.

I'd set this encounter around level 4 or 5, as a lead in to something obviously dragon related that spans at least levels 5-10. With whatever side the party having picked eventually leading to a rematch with the party potentially founding out they picked the wrong side, or perhaps their was no "right" side. Dragon A wanted "The McGuffin" to do "powerful effect" while Dragon B wanted it to do some other thing, neither with a positive outcome for the party or any non-dragons in the vicinity.

I actually ran an encounter like this a few months back, a blue and a gold were fighting, the party allied with the gold and got some neat rewards but it was more of a sandbox setting and the party never followed up on the reasons for the fight to begin with. I made the Gold fairly closed regarding his reasons, and the party face bit the dust early in the fight. (actually, at the start of the fight. He failed (nat 1) his reflex save and was crushed to death when the entangled dragons crashed to the ground).

If the breath weapon is a concern make one of the have a line and the other a cone, (red v gold, gold v copper, blue v black) so if the party in-character doesn't know which might have which, they can at least pad their odds by siding with the dragon whose breath weapon they feel most competent to handle.

Some other notes: This would be a great excuse to have two metallic dragons fighting, as fighting them is rare in D&D.
-In my game, the loser dragon died. Thinking on it, he should have run away. Dragons aren't idiots and they know when they're losing.

In this case the "good" Dragon will be the younger one, and the "bad" one has lower intelligence, and is much more animalistic in behavior. The young one is defending its territory from the Chaos Dragon, as she has made it her duty to defend those who have "entrusted" their land to her. If the current party presses her for info she should get along well with the party Wizard, since they both want to rid the world of the Chaos that causes things like this. Possibly a fair amount of questing to be had, should they follow her research, although how much questing would be a subject for another thread.