D&D (2024) Testing against the Gold Dragon

[dave2008]

ASIDE: Monk Vs. AGD

So... just a quick thought, and I don't know if this would work, but could the dragon just shapechange into a 20th-level "mirror" monk and kick the other monk's butt? I mean, it would be practically identical but with over 500 hp. Seems like an auto-win for the drgaon if it can...

Or with Stunning Strike would it just come down to who wins initiative?

Seems like it might, the spell isn't clear about matching classes / class levels or not. It seems to be up to the DM, so...

 

[Stalker0]

View attachment 393668
At the end of the Dead Luca's Turn the Dragon uses Guiding Bolt on Ellidira (she has three quarter cover from the current angle I checked) she gets hit and loses concentration on the sword she is not lucky.

View attachment 393670

Loonas uses his tactical shift to catch up again, and is much more unlucky with his attacks against the Dragon, he can turn one of them into a hit, but it does not solve the problems with others missing. He action surges to try and get more damage in, and takes only minor damage from the Pounce in return.

View attachment 393671

Belemur is brough back near the Dragon and quickly knocked unconscious before he can start healing anyone. Some more hits go into the fighter as well from the Dragon. Elidria tries to blast the Dragon with an upcasted Witch Bolt but misses. At the end of her turn the Dragon tries to banish Loomas again and even with Indomitable he fails again (Man I didn't expect him to fail with an Indomitable ever). Belamur fails his death save, and the Dragon misses with Guiding Bolt cause of a Nat 1.

man this party is SO damn unlucky! But its still a good run, these are the kind of fights that can turn a fight super deadly, and so we will see how the party manages.

 

[Clint_L]

Is there any possible way we can take ALL of this commentary into the several other threads about MM monsters and dragons, and leave this thread to the actual test being conducted (both direct commentary/questions and the actual test rsults).

It is damn annoying to come in to look at the test and have to wade through 6 pages of other discussion.

Fair enough.

 

[Demetrios1453]

man this party is SO damn unlucky! But its still a good run, these are the kind of fights that can turn a fight super deadly, and so we will see how the party manages.

They have managed to bring the dragon down by 400 HP, and it has even less HP than the fighter does right now. But still, it seems that even if they had been a bit luckier, this would still have been a challenging fight with one or more characters going down.

 

[MonsterEnvy]

Luca and Loonas''s turns pass with the Dragon tossing and missing with it's first guiding bolt and hitting with the second. The Dragon Drops Loonas next to Elidira at the start of the turn for it's big move.

The Dragon Drops a Flame Strike on Elidira and Loonas who fail their saves, Loonas uses Heroic Inspiration to reroll (saving Indomitable for the next banish).

Elidira fails her first Death Save and Loonas is blasted with a high rolling Guiding Bolt, Belamur passes his first Death Save following which the Dragon sends another Guiding Bolt at Loonas, I then remember that Guiding Bolt would be at advantage and roll to check if it would be a crit, which it happens to be adding another 47 damage onto the fighter.

 

[Chaosmancer]

I play monsters wanting to win and willing to do whatever it takes. If it were me, that dragon would be bringing the banished heroes back over a chasm or pit of lava.

Now, that isn't to say the DC on that banishment might not be overtuned. It may be. We don't have the MM yet to know.

I really am stunned by the number of people that think banishing the wizard (polymorph, hold monster, forcecage, wish, ect ect) or the cleric (all the healing abilities, all the buffs, ect ect) or the Rogue (critical sneak attack) would somehow mean the dragon is throwing the fight instead of banishing the fighter again and again and again and again. Heck, your "drop them into nearby lava" plan would actually make MORE sense to cycle them, because the characters might not immediately be able to rush back into melee with the dragon.

 

[Chaosmancer]

It wouldn't matter if the dragon dropped ta 20th level monk from 120ft in the air. The monk would reduce 12d6 falling damage by 100 and take nothing. It doesn't counter @dave2008's argument, and I'm not trying to, but it's another little piece of @Clint_L's story.

I think the truth is that it doesn't matter if the monk 100% solos the dragon or not. The fact that it can come close is... not great for the dragon.

Eh, I don't really think it is that bad for the dragon. In an actual game, the dragon is getting 6 rends, not 4, because you won't be soloing the monk.

And the thing that gets missed in these discussions about "look how broken high level monks are" is they are constantly placing the monk in the absolute most ideal situation, with the only subclass that can both debuff an enemy and heal themselves significantly (not going to have nearly as easy of a time with a shadow monk against an ancient dragon)

But the biggest part is the solo fight. Monks are now designed as duelists. They are very very good at 1 v 1 and much less good at 1 v 3 or 4 or 5. So despite the predictions that the Monk is going to be the strongest class in the game bar nothing... we've actually yet to see that filtering through the game yet. And I doubt we will, because soloing a monster on paper doesn't translate as impactfully to fighting a group alongside a party.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Yes that is RAW, but not ROI.

I think it is intended, to weaken the creature against smaller parties, but the text actually reads thus:

Only one legendary action option can be used at a time and only at the end of another creature's turn.

Which means if the monster has allies, it can use it's LAs at the end of their turn.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

I think it is intended, to weaken the creature against smaller parties, but the text actually reads thus:


Which means if the monster has allies, it can use it's LAs at the end of their turn.

Not sure if it is not intended. Against smaller (less than 4 characters) parties, the Dragon can´t use their bonus lair action and would still get extra XP for being in their lair. I think the idea of legendary action is not balancing it against smaller parties but spreading the damage over several instances so the legendary creature does not always do all damage at once. So the characters have always have a chance to do something in between. Heal a bit and so on.
I even think 3 legendary actions against a 4 person party is perfect, as it goes LC(normal turn), C, LA, C, LA ,C , LA, C and then it is the legendary creature´s normal turn again. The extra lair legendary action will cause the legendary creature to more or less make a double turn. The reposition legendary action will be very helpful.

Against a smaller party I would actually allow the legendary to spend their remaining lair actions at some point in the middle of the initiative list.

So lets see how this is explained in the MM explanation section.

For the dragon I´d say, I wish they had kept legendary reactions and increased the use to account for the normal reaction. And then I had made banishment as a reaction to being attacked.

 

[Weiley31]

Is there any possible way we can take ALL of this commentary into the several other threads about MM monsters and dragons, and leave this thread to the actual test being conducted (both direct commentary/questions and the actual test rsults).

It is damn annoying to come in to look at the test and have to wade through 6 pages of other discussion.

It's okay we got the important gist of it all in this thread that it was about:

" Banishment (Ancient Gold Dragon) is OP and is the ONLY thing it should be using. Every other attack it does is useless/pointless. Ancient Gold Dragon has nightmares of Monks. Snarf hates Bards."