Turning evil dragons good

[Corsair]

Background: Our party is mixed level 13 and 14 characters. One of whom is a pixie arcane trickster. She has in the past "adopted" a neutral evil goblin, and over time turned him to good (or at least neutral) through kindness and hands on shared adventuring. That was about 5 levels ago.

Now our party has just killed a mature adult green mommy dragon, and found two almost ready to hatch green dragon eggs. Based on the experience with the goblin, the pixie thinks she can raise the dragons to be good (ignoring the fact that when they hatch, they will already be intelligent evil dragons).

Issue: How would you go about raising two wyrmling green dragons to turn them semi-not evil? The description of crystal dragons in MM2 talks about them sometimes raising white dragons to be neutral instead of evil, so in THEORY it should be possible if not very very very rare.

So if you're a 14th level pixie arcane trickster, how would you go about doing this?

 

[frankthedm]

Background: Our party is mixed level 13 and 14 characters. One of whom is a pixie arcane trickster. She has in the past "adopted" a neutral evil goblin, and over time turned him to good (or at least neutral) through kindness and hands on shared adventuring. That was about 5 levels ago.

Then her previous success will now be tempered with failure.

Now our party has just killed a mature adult green mommy dragon, and found two almost ready to hatch green dragon eggs. Based on the experience with the goblin, the pixie thinks she can raise the dragons to be good (ignoring the fact that when they hatch, they will already be intelligent evil dragons).

Fatal optimism. Bluff, Hide, and Move Silently are considered class skills for green dragons. They’ll act the part when pixie tries to reform them until the get a chance to CDG somebody in the party in their sleep. The pixie has magic abilities to see this coming so thankfully she will have the chance to wise up and put them down.

Issue: How would you go about raising two wyrmling green dragons to turn them semi-not evil? The description of crystal dragons in MM2 talks about them sometimes raising white dragons to be neutral instead of evil, so in THEORY it should be possible if not very very very rare.

That is splat material you as DM chose to include or not include. It should definitely take about half a century and the psi power of psionic dragon.

So if you're a 14th level pixie arcane trickster, how would you go about doing this?

UMD scroll of wish or miracle or helms of opposite alignment.

 

[Corsair]

I should note I am not the DM, I am a fellow player, and de facto party leader. The stance I took with the pixie was that while I understood and agreed with her sentiment, I would not support any action of this sort unless she could come up with a possible plan that would have a VERY strong chance of being successful, as it's much easier to smash an egg than to try to track down an escaped dragon, baby or not. (More for the nuisance factor, not because it would be difficult to do.)

I pointed out to her most of the issues you brought up, but she has been adamant thus far, but I am holding my ground until she can come up with a very high probability solution. She did come up with the Helm of Opposite Alignment idea too (which appeals to the pixie since she is CG)

Considering Wish/Miracle: We don't have access to anyone who can cast Wish, though there is one high level NPC cleric we might be able to beg/trade favors with for Miracle. Not sure if that alone is enough, considering the existence of Sanctify the Wicked, and it's high cost.

 

[Firedancer]

Check with the DM if he thinks this is possible (changing an always E creature through nurture), and see what he says, then you, the trickster and DM all understand if this is permitted in the rules.

Then you can see about the in charactrer discussion (as the always evil part is rules related, not character related). If I DM this I would say the character can try but the dragon will remain evil unless other means are used to forcibly change the alignment.

If the DM lets this go then the trickster will need to spend lots of time and patience raising a creature that will be evil despite its efforts (does the dragon speak common, what do you feed it etc). From the character point of view perhaps you need to let him/her run with it, but agree on what stage its classed as failed and needs resolving.

Using magical means to alter the personality of a creature - just how comfortable is a Good character with this? If go with this route you need to make sure its permanent.

 

[FireLance]

Only your DM knows whether this is even possible, so your best best is to ask him, either directly, or indirectly with commune or a similar spell.

In my games, I would allow a character to shift another creature's alignment one step towards good with a successful Diplomacy check. The DC of the check is 20 for creatures that are "often" a non-good alignment, 30 for creatures that are "usually" a non-good alignment, and 40 for creatures that are "always" a non-good alignment (like a green dragon). A character may only attempt this check on a subject whose attitude towards him is Indifferent or better.

A check represents one month of continuous work with the subject. The character making the check must spend at least an hour every day interacting with the subject. Ideally, the subject should be able to observe the character to see how he practices his alignment. The character gets a +2 bonus on his check for each significant act of good that he performs in front of the subject (DM's judgement). However, he suffers a -5 penalty on his check for each time that he suffers a significant negative consequence for an act of good (again, DM's judgement). If the character simply preaches without setting an example, or if the subject was not able to observe him performing acts of good, he suffers a -10 penalty on his Diplomacy check.

A character may attempt a "rushed" Diplomacy check, with a penalty of -5 for two weeks, -10 for a week, -20 for one day (i.e. one hour's interaction), -30 for ten minutes, -40 for one minute, and -50 for one round. If the process is interrupted (the character does not interact with the subject for a day, for example), apply the penalty for the longest uninterrupted period to the check.

If the character fails the Diplomacy check, the subject's attitude towards the character worsens by one step. The character may immediately make a second Diplomacy check to mitigate this using the subject's new attitude as a base (this does not require an action, and represents how well the character has managed the subject's annoyance at his preaching). This second Diplomacy check cannot improve the subject's attitude by more than one step (to what it was before the conversion attempt).

The character may retry the check after a minimum of 24 hours, provided the subject's attitude to him is still at least Indifferent, and provided he can improve his chance of success in some way, e.g. by interacting with the subject for a longer period of time, by performing more significant acts of good in front of the subject, or by improving his base Diplomacy modifier.

 

[Umbran]

Well, the MM entry lists them as "always lawful evil" - so they are born that way, or have a natural predisposition, but changing the alignment of an individual is possible.

I think part of the issue to note is that by the listing, they are as lawful as they are evil. That is important, as it gives you something you can use - the creature likes an organized framework in which to operate.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

'tis easy: Paint their scales silver and tell them they're metallic dragons.

 

[Slife]

Helms of opposite alignment are the way to go. If possible, have an artificer craft them up with this restriction:

Item Requires Specific Class or Alignment to Use

Even more restrictive than requiring a skill, this limitation cuts the cost by 30%.

Make the alignment Lawful Evil. This will ensure that the helms can't be used against you, and at the same time saves you some cash.

 

[Vorput]

I think the flavor text given under "always" (x alignment) is that exceptions are one in a million. I gotta say, green dragon eggs saved after their mother's death, then hatched, protected, and cared for by a powerful good creature may well be that one in a million exception.

This makes some assumptions about the world of course- and while this would be a heck of an uphill battle, very well possibly doomed to failure- I don't think I'd say it's impossible.

The hardest part, in my mind, would be the pixie doing it. Dragons would simply relate better, and pay more attention- to another dragon (crystal dragon example given above). Same species and all that- so the pixie might be best dropping them off with a handy metallic dragon (assuming said dragons don't have some ingrained instinct to immediatly attack each other).

Are divinations a possibility? Could the cleric contact their God asking if such a thing is feasible/possible? Could the wizard do research to find if such a thing has ever been attempted before? If your DM enters into this knowing he's not going to let it work, it might be best to find that out early on.

Vorp

 

[Corsair]

For those asking about the DM's opinion on if it is possible: My character is a loremaster with silly-high knowledge arcana (which includes dragons). I've mentioned the bit about crystals and whites and the DM did not contradict me, so I suspect that it is possible in his world.

The main issue with the helm of opposite alignment is that 1) we don't have one, and 2) it would probably take much longer to craft than we have time before they hatch. We don't have access to 8th level spells for temporal stasis, so I'm not sure what we'd do with the evil buggers in the mean time.

I also agree that we would be better served having a good dragon doing this rather than a pixie (or the surrogate, the pixie's human druid cohort) though we have very few contacts in that area.