ideas for building a dragon killing druid (needed for backstory)

[two]

Sorry, I didn't realize.

The dragon can't? I would assume that most animals in the area know about the dragon and act like animals do... Keep away from the big hungry strong thing.

Oh, sorry about that. You are right. There is no way the druid could ever attempt to sneak up to the dragon, no matter how long the dragon hung out in the druid's territory. Or even engage the dragon at anything resembling a reasonable range (50'? 100'?).

Better just ditch the backstory, dude. Any tale of how a Druid10 beat a dragon will come across as unbelievably silly. Sorry about that. Obviously even in a story, truth can only be stretched so far, and as dragons are immune to pretty much any attempt to engage them except when they want to be engaged, and when the dragon knows exactly who is attacking, and when the dragons knows where the attacker is, and the dragon knows why the attacker is attacking -- well, it's just to much to ask of the story's listeners.

Ah well. Good show. Better luck next time. Or rather, next time, pick a monster for the Druid10 to defeat that is not onmipotent, all-knowing, all-seing, or a combination thereof.

 

[Brother MacLaren]

Ah well. Good show. Better luck next time. Or rather, next time, pick a monster for the Druid10 to defeat that is not onmipotent, all-knowing, all-seing, or a combination thereof.

Yeah, two, what were we thinking? An adult black dragon has an Int 12, Wis 13, and caster level 3. Clearly we are dealing with a super-intelligent archmage here, and there is no way it could possibly be tricked.

Darklone - I was assuming that the black dragon was hanging out in a swampy lake, as black dragons sometimes like to do. Hence the crocodiles. If the dragon is in the air, go for several juvenile arrowhawks. No save, no DR, no SR, ranged attack, almost guaranteed to hit, and you can just wear down the dragon a few HP at a time. Don't let it rest to regain HP. (The druid doesn't need to rest 8 hours straight for spells, he just gets recharged at dawn or noon each day.) As for it noticing the caster ahead of time, even if it could somehow identify which animal is a druid and not the next meal, long and medium-range spells put the caster out of blindsense range.

I'm playing a druid right now and would dearly like the opportunity to, with the party, confront a well-played equal-CR dragon. I know they're not chumps, but I also know they're not invincible. So I welcome challenges to any of my ideas.

 

[Storyteller01]

Not being rude, but...

How can you cast from 600' in a swamp? Most times, you're lucky to see past 50'. Same goes with flyers. Mobility is really limited for them.

Intelligence of twelve is above average for a human. That means the dragon is aware of the use of tactics, strengths, and weaknesses (per examples of fighter feats such as expertise and the like).

Throw in the fact that a Black can cast underwater (bad for the dragon if you're using Call Lightning, but you better not be in the water) and you have a nearly invisible enemy that can decern between targets (who is what, because your the only creature not running like he.. when a major spell is cast).

I guess you'd have to actually get the dragon into the forest (and out of its environment). Maybe prep a LOT of cure potions before hand?????

 

[Sejs]

How can you cast from 600' in a swamp? Most times, you're lucky to see past 50'. Same goes with flyers. Mobility is really limited for them.

For the most part the only 600' feet away you're going to get and still have line of sight to the dragon would be 600' up, and even that would require that the dragon be in a clearing of some kind and not under canopy. But that's okay - 100' or 200' is much more doable, and the dragon would still have a devil of a time spotting you at that range, particulary if you're wild shaped into something small and have plant cover.

Intelligence of twelve is above average for a human. That means the dragon is aware of the use of tactics, strengths, and weaknesses (per examples of fighter feats such as expertise and the like).

The funny thing there being that with an Int of 12, the dragon can't qualify for Expertise. It's not smart enough. An Int of 12 is a -bit- above human average. A super-genius this dragon ain't. It cannot see all ends.

Throw in the fact that a Black can cast underwater (bad for the dragon if you're using Call Lightning, but you better not be in the water) and you have a nearly invisible enemy that can decern between targets (who is what, because your the only creature not running like he.. when a major spell is cast).

The black dragon has a caster level of 3. And it's a sorcerer. It can't even cast second level spells yet. There are no "major" spells the dragon can cast whatsoever. 10th level druid spell casting trumps 3rd level sorcerer spellcasting every day of the week. Magic is not this creature's strongpoint. It can't even do the cool divine-as-arcane spells trick that some its cousins can.

 

[Brother MacLaren]

Not being rude, but...

How can you cast from 600' in a swamp? Most times, you're lucky to see past 50'. Same goes with flyers. Mobility is really limited for them.

Sometimes true, sometimes not. Real swamps vary quite a bit in geography. Marshes tend to have relatively few trees and are fairly flat (think of the Dead Marshes from LOTR), so visibility there would be much better than in a forest. Some swamps have scraggly trees that don't provide a solid canopy so you can go vertical. If it's a swamp with denser trees, then you're right in that mobility is limited for fliers, but that's probably to the druid's advantage, right? In wild shape, he'll be able to maneuver better than the dragon will, and I believe the arrowhawks I mentioned are "perfect."

 

[Derren]

The dragons doesn't even have to know which animal is real and which one a druid. He would just kill everything in the area.
And even when using natural spell you must cast the spell with all its components and that is noticeable. When the bird sudenly waves arround with its wing and makes strange noises a simple spellcraft check is enough to tell that its casting a spell. So the dragon has a good chance to notice the druid with all its ranks in Spot and keen senses.

The promblem with the arrowhawks is that they are slow and the ray has a short range. The dragon can just fly outside the range, turn and charge them which kills an arrowhawk. (Or more if the dragon manages to end his turn threatening other arrowhawks as they will definately draw an AoO)

If you really want to have this kind of backstory and your DM wants an explanation you have to spend some of your starting wealth.
A scroll of miasma at 19th caster level would kill the dragon, as would a scroll of an extended miasma at lowest possible caster level (13)
Now you only need an explanation how you could use this scroll at close range and escaped.
This of course only works when your DM allows the extreme broken spell and doesn't uses the unofficial errate which allows a save.

 

[two]

*sigh*

Unless people are using different spot and listen check modifiers than the ones listed in the DMG, it is not going to be trivially easy for a dragon to identify a shapeshifted druid coming towards it in, for example, crocodile or fishy form. Or any other animal form, for example an owl at night, or whatever.

And if the dragon does spot it, so what? The druid gets blasted, maybe, with a breath weapon, doing no long-term damage, and the druid leaves. And comes back a few hours later to try again in another form, or just goes back the next day, fully healed. Repeat. With care, the Druid will be able to get close enough to cast a spell every day or two. Then the dragon retaliates, and the Druid leaves for the day. Repeat. It's the Druid's home. The Druid heals a lot faster, has a lot more options, and can just wait for his chance. One of these days, the dragon fails a fort save and turns into a bunny, or gets blasted by one too many lightining bolts. Since the Druid always has Freedom of Movement running during these mini-attacks, the dreaded "dragon grapple" death is completely avoided.

When time is on your side, you have a very powerful ally. Now, would the dragon flee at some point, after being harassed for a few weeks or months? Probably. But, if it's stubborn and not wise, maybe not.

 

[Derren]

A adult black dragon has a +24 bonus for spot checks and only get half the penalty for range so it can see something at 600 ft. with a roll of 7. The druid on hte other hand with maximal 13 ranks and maybe +6 through wis has to roll something arround 60 to spot the dragon at this distance.
Serious advantage for the dragon.
At night the dragon has a even greater advantage.

And how should the druid leave? Escaping is no automatic. When the dragon spots the druid it runs to him and stands next to him while the druid is still shapshifted.

 

[Vysirez]

I think a lvl 10 druid could do this without too much trouble. I havent planned out a ton of tactics but I have thought of a couple. First a couple comments.

The druid mems tree stride and casts it before he attacks, so if he wants to get away he just steps into a tree and hops from tree to tree til he's far enough away. Tree stride is a 5th lvl spell that lasts an hour per lvl or til you use it.

Second a dragon is pretty big and if you wildshape into something small, it wouldnt be too hard to get to a place where you can see the dragon but he cant see you. But even if he can see you, you don't plan on doing any casting while he can see you.

So my first tactic is you wait til it's a somewhat stormy day, not really bad but enough to bump up your call lightning damage. Then you put up your longer then 1r/lvl buffs like bears end and barkskin or whatever. Be sure to put up protection from acid for his breath weapon and a freedom of movement just in case. This is all far enough away that he can't see or hear you casting.

Then you cast call lightning and use your lesser metamagic rod of empower to empower it. Giving you 10 3d10x1.5 lighting bolts you can summon over the next 10 minutes. Then you use your last 2 lvl 5 slots and most of your lvl 4 slots to summon juvenile arrowhawks. Now with 2 5th lvl SNAs and say 3 4th lvl SNAs I figure your gonna have about 7 Juvenile arrowhawks. They only have about 20hps and 20AC, but they are fast and they are immune to acid. So no breath weapon worries. So you send in your 7 or so arrowhawks to attack and then follow yourself. They fly around zapping him with +9 to hit touch attack(vs his 9 touch attack AC) doing 2d6 damage each. So he is chasing them around and you just start zapping him with call lightning. If your first call lightning runs out you move behind a tree and cast another. Just for refernce call lightning for a 10th lvl caster has 200ft range. Ignoring the Arrowhawks that is an average of about 25 damage per lightning bolt. Even if he saves for half on all of them thats still 125 damage from that one spell. If he doesnt get perfect saves and the arrow hawks do at least a bit of damage he's going down.

Doing this he never sees you cast a spell, you are just some random animal that is pretty hard to identify. And even if he does find you you can either wildshape into a combat form to finish him off if he's low, or tree stride away and repeat tomorrow.

Another version I figured was without arrowhawks and used animal growth with a large horde of summons for basically the same effect.

Overall the dragon is going to have little to no chance to figure out who is the real enemy and even if he does you have a pretty much certain getaway. The only problem is that I can't really think of a way of keeping him from running away. But since it's backstory you can said that he did or didnt run away in time depending on what you want to do.

edit: Just to refute a previous comment I had see about arrowhawk speed. Yes they only have 60 vs his 150 but they have perfect move and he has poor so I think it would be pretty difficult for him to catch them easily. Could he catch them? Sure, and any he got in melee range of would likely die. But The rest of them zap him as he flies by. And all of the damage they do is bonus ontop of the call lighting damage you are doing to him.

 

[Derren]

Interesting, but there are some problems with your first plan.

1. The dragon is only large (Not really a problem).
2. Tree stride can be only used once.
3. Call lightning (storm) has only medium range. One move from the dragon and he is out of range.
4. The summons only last one minute. Not enough time to precast them and then approach the dragon. You have to cast them near the dragon (arrowhawks are slow) which makes you a target for the dragon.
5. You must concentrate to call a lightning bolt which is noticeable with a spellcraft check only with a higher DC.
6. On stormy days it might be a bit hard to catch the dragon outside of his lair.

The arrowhawks may have perfect fly ability, but thats only usefull in close combat. The dragon would just double move away from them, turn and then charge. Except for an readied action the arrowhawks have no chance of hitting the dragon and the dragon can cover the distance between the save zone and the arrowhawks in one move, meaning at lwast one arrowhawk is going to die. And if the dragon ends its turn threatening an other arrowhawk the only thing it can do is attacking with its bite. Everything else gives an AoO.