The Sades - epic campaign characters and their allies and foes

[Dark Dragon]

That's a hugely nasty power. Even nastier because the save only halves the effect. The average roll is 50, so even if you make the save, you're aging 25 years.

Very true. It forced the party to turn all attacks against the dragon to eliminate the threat of being aged to death (except for the druid, who is immune to magical aging, and the elf, who has lots of years before him).

I'd say that CR 16 is appropriate for THIS special dragon. Magic Missile, Bigby's Grasping Hand, and Mordenkainen's Sword (and the cleric spell...Ghost Hammer???) are and were very effective against this particular creature.

A true dragon with this template would be a totally different matter and should have a much higher CR adjustment.

 

[Quartz]

Very true. It forced the party to turn all attacks against the dragon to eliminate the threat of being aged to death (except for the druid, who is immune to magical aging, and the elf, who has lots of years before him).

A big problem with this power from a gaming perspective is that it doesn't scale: consider a group of 4 of these critters. +2 CR. Except it's an automatic aging of +100 years - instakill -even if you make your saving throw.

As a one-off, it's nicely horrible!

 

[Dark Dragon]

A big problem with this power from a gaming perspective is that it doesn't scale: consider a group of 4 of these critters. +2 CR. Except it's an automatic aging of +100 years - instakill -even if you make your saving throw.

Yes, that is often a problem with the CR system. Another example is the balor. A party of level 18 has no chance against this CR 20 monster, IF the DM plays it properly (i.e., the balor uses blasphemy and summons up another balor to finish the group off).

I knew that the aging breath is a big problem for some party members, so I used only one pseudodragon.
It was a horrible surprise for the players