D&D 5E What can a dragon do to accelerate its aging?

[Enevhar Aldarion]

To add to my half-serious ghost solution, you could make it serious and make it the PCs fault that it happened because they chased the dragon into the place with the ghosts, but they were unable to follow and finish the job. So the dragon is back for revenge from all that he went through to survive whatever haunted place he ended up.

 

[Flamestrike]

Sorry, do you have a problem?

I made the thread to mine for good ideas. I'm perfectly aware I can make the reason as simple as "Oh he found a magic rock in the woods, lucky him!" I wanted to hear suggestions from the community, and I'm pretty happy with a lot of these answers, being a balance of creative and working within the game's rules logically.

If you don't like the thread question, don't participate. There's no reason to get snarky.

Im not being snarky. Im giving you a suggestion. Several in fact.

 

[Dioltach]

Maybe the dragon just has a big brother or sister.

Actually, in one of my campaigns, I gave dragons Size categories instead of Age categories. And the way they grew was by eating gold. (So this small lizard-sized dragon that the PCs adopted secretly ate all their gold and started getting bigger ... and I don't like the idea of Good dragons.)

 

[Seramus]

There is a new Dunamancy spell that ages you to 30 days before you die.
Thats a great way to suddenly become a great wyrm right before you become a Dracolich.

First fight could be young. Second fight could be Great Wyrm with Disadvantage. Third fight could be Dracolich.

 

[MarkB]

Here's an alternative: Don't age the dragon. Have it start out as already Adult, bordering on Ancient.

Instead, build into its history that it's just survived some form of near-death experience - maybe it defeated a rival at great personal cost, or completed a ritual which granted it some form of awesome new capabilities or minions at the cost of sapping its life-force.

As a result, when the PCs first encounter it, it's only at a fraction of its full strength, and as the campaign progresses it gradually heals itself and builds itself back up to its true power.

Make the PCs well aware of this, so that it feels like a time pressure on them - they don't yet know where it is, or what its ultimate plans are, but they do know that the longer it takes them to find and confront it, the more of its strength it will recover. Maybe some of their quests can revolve around hearing about some item or organisation which can accelerate the dragon's recovery, and trying to get to it before the dragon does.

 

[jaelis]

Alternative: the players go to the feywild and find that centuries have passed when they return. That way the time shenanigans happen “on screen.”

 

[jasper]

Hard living. S(beep) drugs and rock and roll.

 

[Nebulous]

Dude, you're the DM. If you want the Dragon to age or get tougher and stronger as the players do, just make it happen.

Flamestrike, even if you did not intend for your comment to be snarky, and your later answers WERE good suggestions, this opening line in internet context comes off as dismissive and condescending to the DM (some dude), where you clearly emphasize that he should know he's the DM and has the power to do whatever he needs, as if he had not thought of that already. The italics add emphasis that can be interpreted in various ways. That, I think, he what he took offense to, not your actual suggestions. If you had just typed this a different way, such as,

"Well, as the all powerful DM of course you can make happen whatever you want, and you could also blah blah blah.." I don't think the OP would have said anything other than thank you.

 

[Shiroiken]

Unless the entire campaign concept revolves around this being a singular dragon, I think you might be better off dealing with a family instead. If you throw the young dragon at the party when they're too low level, it can just decide the PCs aren't worth their time (or flee if reduced to half HP). The next time, the party should be powerful enough to face it, but it still might be able to flee before being slain. Once the party eventually slays the young dragon, its elder sibling could take over the roll, repeating the same cycle. Once the adult is dead, then Mom comes into the equation, who's going to be VERY unhappy with the PCs killing two of her children. This allows the dragon family to be the longstanding villains, and most things I think you might do with a single dragon could be done just as easily with the family.


Edit: I just thought of something as well: if you want to make a single dragon "stronger" over a period of encounters, you could just raise its maximum HP between each. It won't make the attacks or damage stronger, but would allow it to fight longer.

 

[Maxperson]

Hi! So I'm curious about making a specific dragon a recurring enemy, but I want her to grow stronger as the party does.

Of course, dragons do have several stages of life, but they grow slowly with age; the difference between a "young" dragon and "adult" dragon can be decades, and the difference between adult and ancient can be hundred of years.

So my question is... what can a dragon do if it decides to accelerate its own aging, in an effort to defeat troublesome adventurers?

The idea is that this young dragon failed to defeat the heroes within it's own lair, and although escaped, sees no other recourse but to "hit puberty quick!"

The dragon does have some humanoid assistance in local followers, including lizardfolk, ogres and bullywugs. What I want suggestions for are things like specific spells, rituals, items or patrons that the dragon would seek out to accelerate its aging.

If you can, point to a source in a D&D book where this has happened (I'm sure it has somewhere). But if you've got a great idea, I'd love to hear it!

EDIT: It's a black dragon, starting this as young.

Change the Orbs of Dragon Kind to age dragons to the level of the orb when ingested. The dragon can grow with the party and eventually they can figure it out to try and stop him from aging again or surpassing them.