Poly'ing into Dragon: what age category?

[azhrei_fje]

I think "average" means that a 15th level wizard can't choose to be a juvenile black dragon who has advanced to 15 hit die, but a standard juvenile dragon is just fine.

Agreed. Except that the new FAQ revision says advancement is fine. It might actually benefit the player to choose a younger dragon and advance it (due to the STR bonus).

Though remember that the monster's HD is limited by your caster level, so at best a 7th level wizard could be a Very Young black dragon.

Yes, you're right. My bad.

But my point remains: does the entry for Black Dragon actually represent multiple "average members", one for each age category? This is one suggestion:

If there is a monster manual entry it's considered typical of the race. So there are typical Young Dragons and typical Juvenile dragons, you may choose either. This has always been the most popular option, because it doesn't require the work to advance or devolve the creature. The New FAQ acknowleges this and points out doing the work ahead of time (and I'd add get it checked and approved by the DM).

Except that if I choose not to use the FAQ in my game (let's leave out whether the rulings in it are "official" or not!), do the RAW support allowing a spellcaster to choose a specific age category and say that they want to become "one of those"? (Btw, notice TheGogmagog, that the dragon's age categories do not correspond exactly to creature advancement.)

You will note that Dragon's don't come up often as ideal forms for polymorph, because they arn't that impressive.

True. But if you need transportation (flying) or the ability to dig a tunnel (burrowing), a dragon can be a good choice. And they do have certain racial immunities that can be a big advantage.

As in anything, there is always a reason to choose a particular creature. As the reasons change, the creatures will change.

You make a good point about the Wyvern, though. I may be house-ruling that the FAQ is wrong on this one: no advancement, no templates. And ditto for the troll with class levels. If a player tried that with me, I'd just change him into a troll. When they tried to use some feature of the Troll Hunter, I'd tell him he couldn't do it. And when he asked, I'd say it was because polymorph doesn't grant class levels. (And I use DMGenie on my laptop at the gaming table. I can select a combatant, click the "Use" button on the Polymorph special ability, and then select the creature that the spellcaster wants to polymorph into. All done! I now have modified stats, including attack routines and everything. The Polymorph special ability is a user-contributed script that can be added to DMGenie. Some special abilities might not be implemented by the script, though.)