ON the superiority of dragons

[Numion]

At higher levels the dragons breath weapons and mobility aren't as powerful as before. PCs can match it's flight, and use spells to negate the breath weapon.

Which makes the dragon a really tough melee combatant with spellcasting ability. A tough challenge, yes, but not an automatic TPK.

A simple Anti-life Shell by a cleric can prove very difficult for a dragon. Dragons are a few levels behind in spellcasting levels, and thus have a hard time dispelling the PCs spells. Thats just one example. So I don't think that the original poster is right.

 

[LGodamus]

A well played dragon can make it hard on PCs with levels higher than their challenge rating...especially if you custom pick his spell list ....

 

[Plane Sailing]

ON the superiority of dragons

A friend of mine were talking about dragons, and there role in this genre. He claimed, and, after looking, I think I might agree, that at any given challenge rating above about 5, a dragon IF PLAYED INTELLIGENTLY (as they should)

Although actually, they should NOT all be played intelligently.

A CR6 white dragon has an intelligence of 8, and should be played as such. Even a CR15 White dragon only has an intelligence of 15.

The key thing is to play a dragon appropriately for its intelligence.

 

[Sejs]

Working from the bottom of the scale up, CR 5 for most dragons is somewhere between Young and Juvenile, with an average int of 12-14. And the poor, poor white dragon bottoming out the scale at int 6. Poor little guys. Anyway.


Int 12-14 is bright. Quick, sure, but not can-forsee-all-ends kind of end of the world smart. And always do keep in mind that smart doesn't mean omniscient. The same way it's important to seperate player knowledge from character knowledge, it's just as important to keep dm knowledge and monster knowledge seperate as well.

 

[Sejs]

A CR6 white dragon has an intelligence of 8, and should be played as such. Even a CR15 White dragon only has an intelligence of 15.

The key thing is to play a dragon appropriately for its intelligence.

*nod* The one thing the white dragon has going for it, is that its native environment is ever so hostile to most forms of life. Sure they may not be too bright, but it doesn't take too much brain power to grab an opponent, fly off and drop 'em in arctic ocean. Then just breathe on the water some to make themselves a nice ice perch to sit on while the victim drowns and/or freezes to death, pop out that 60' swim move and immunity to cold and retrieve the body.

^_^

 

[langolas]

Dragons played right are tough. A group of about 4th level characters went into the lair of a Black Dragon (I forget what age) and it cast a globe of darkness on the torch. It took us forever to figure out what happened and it did clean the floor with a few of us. We drove it off however . . .

If dragons aren't tough in a fight, you're not playing them right, or the party is just too powerful!

 

[tauton_ikhnos]

Depends on party, dragon, situation.

In our group, three fighters at 12th beat down mature adult white (CR 12) in 2-1/2 rounds. I almost died (down to 3 hp), other two unscratched. We'd left paladin, wizard and druid behind, in case we needed backup, but we didn't want to risk wizard or druid initially against obscene reach critter, and paladin there to protect them/get them out of there.

However, our party is comparatively tough, well-organized, vicious, and munchkinned for combat. Dragon had max hp (350+), but was not otherwise tweaked (of 30,000 gp hoard, about 10,000 in items; and only 3rd level sorcerer). So this case not true of all groups.

 

[Endur]

Preparation is the key. If the party is expecting the Dragon and the Dragon is unaware, they should do ok. If the Dragon is expecting the party and the party is unaware, could be a TPK.

For instance, one party I was in faced a mature white dragon with a fiendish template. The Dragon lasted one round.

My Paladin was hasted, flying, and had used a holy sword scroll (D&D3.0) to raise his weapon to +5 and to do double damage against evil. Partial charge, followed by full attack. No more dragon.

 

[frankthedm]

A problem iam seeing is DMs not having the dragons go for the kill, If someone pulls back from combat, the dragon should be taking them out if he is smart enough to see that sign of weakness.

4 people loosing 80% of thier HP sounds fishy to me, now 3 people loosing +100% of thier HP sounds more like a dragon fight.

 

[Zappo]

It depends on what "played intelligently" means. All too often, I've seen DM confuse "play intelligently" with "metagame", often under the shaking justification that the dragon is superintelligent and can deduce everything about the party abilities from little or no information. In reality, a well played dragon is a very tough challenge for its CR, but not unbeatable and not a necessary TPK, unless the party is caught really at the wrong time - for example, some games ago we were ambushed by a dragon only minutes after another fairly tough fight. That was a near TPK, but then again, I can't think of a worst situation.