The Problem with Dragon Combat Encounters...

In this video we will use bio-mimicry to combine various real-world animals and fabricate a terrifying combat strategy for your D&D dragons.

[tomb]

I feel like this should come with a disclaimer. An encounter like this should Always be proceeded by significant foreshadowing, clues, and even straight up warnings. Unless the party has willingly been traveling blindly, and stupidly, they should be aware that a dragon of this power is in the area, and they need to be ready for life-or-death combats like this.

[patricksanders]

I love your description of the dragon's tactics. The dragon's intelligence is rarely played up to its potential. I could even see a dragon picking off party members one at a time, months apart. Like flies to wanton boys. That said, much of your description seemed quite foreign to me. I come from a time of yore when an Ancient Red Dragon had a Negative 3 Armor Class, 11 hit dice, 88 hp and was terrifying. Jesus Saves, everyone else takes half damage. Grognard's Delight. It's okay, Gary sent me.

[davidm]

Regarding crushing damage from a dragon landing/falling on someone, what you would realistically expect to see would be parts of them turning into liquid. That's what happens when a forklift runs over meat and bone. It doesn't just smoosh and flatten everything, it makes soup. If the victim could evade most of the impact then what you would see would be a shearing injury as if they got chopped by a big sword; I've seen rolls of soft plastic cut people like a knife at work just from the pressure of the weight.

[irtehdar]

I dont see why a dragon wouldnt run away even when defending its treasure.
We are a weeks travel from the nearest settlement and the adventurers can only carry so much. Thinking they have won the adventurers fill their pockets and start heading home. 2 days later the adventurers are near crippled from exhaustion and slogging through a swamp. And while the Adventurers are trying to haul as much gold they can as fast as they can the Dragon has had a drink of water, a nap and a nice stretch. It knows what direction the adventurers are going, it knows the timeframe it has to work with and it knows the best ambush locations along their route.
Time for round 2.

Id say a dragon is definately smart enough to plan such a scenario in advance all the way back when it initially picked a nest site.

[blakec]

People always forget that old dragons reach that for a reason and rain hellfire on their prey.

Amazing work as always sir!!!

[jaimetheone]

In this episode of "How to TPK":
Dragons!

[Barquevious_Jackson]

This is unbridled savagery, I have to deploy something like that with a flying enemy some time.

The most original D&D content creator on youtube, great work as always.

[johnsikking]

Just remember PCs are not the only things a dragon can drop. They are big strong creatures with four amazingly strong claws. They could be holding large stones to pummel the PCs with, B-29 style.

[MrPtrlix]

The biggest problem with TTRPGs is that it needs to be fun. Playing dragons intelligently can be brutally effective at the cost of players' fun (hit&run tactics).

[liondovegm]

5:32 in 10 years I have never once seen a Cleric that fits such a description

[DungeonDad]

This was really neat! Definitely going to steal some of these ideas!

[jimmd]

Nice video! There were a number of articles in Dragon Magazine back in the '70s & '80s that had similar themes: How to take what's written in the rules and make it better, tougher, etc. Good to see a similar thought process here in the 2020's.

[jim]

I was actually thinking over this subject just the other day.
Another possibility to go along with dragons carrying players up into the air actually works in conjunction with their breath weapon - specifically, a dragon could scoop up a PC in their mouth and fly up, and follow that up by firing their breath weapon directly upwards.
Even if we assume that the kinetic force of a breath weapon wouldn’t be enough to push a PC at its maximum range, it’s still tossing them upwards while them in the process. In fact, you could even argue that such an attack would take care of the druid’s outs: transforming in free-fall is one thing, but transforming after (basically) being shot out of a canon full of napalm is another. Or, if it’s a red dragon specifically, have them fly up to sixty feet and bave them fire their breath weapon DOWN while the druid’s in their mouth.
Also, if anyone is familiar with Monster Hunter, then Valstrax’s dive-bomb attack might be something to consider instead of just having a dragon drop on a PC. If you think a 160 ton armored reptile FALLING on you is gonna do some damage, then imagine it diving at you, using its wings to accelerate the drop. If you want to get REALLY goofy with this, have the dragon dive-bomb one PC WHILE ANOTHER IS IN ITS MOUTH.

[LionlordEbonfire]

For those DMs that saw Fizban’ Treasurery of Dragons and are picking fights with dragons I think that while dropping a target is nice, it has some issues. If the DM goes after the cleric, they should know Clerics are not defenseless since Command is a 1st level that only requires verbal and the words “Dive” and “Land” is a horrible thing to say to a dragon that really wanted to get away (but heya great way to burn those Legendary saves but hey you do have some proficiency to it but expect silvery barbs advantage escape).

But honesty the thing to get occupied and out of the battle is a Sharpshooter Ranger. They will hit at range for all 600’ coming in and going back out. That is a couple of turns of damage and if you dropped a cleric or other they can revive dropped targets while the dragon attempt to get a second target. (Fighters are an issue as well if they have Sentinel + Heavy Weapon feat (you can tell from that Glaive) or Cavaliers just don’t head on attack near them.)

Don’t forget Wizards, Sorcerers and the Erdrich beams of a Warlock. An EB that can move a target, can remove your victim by pulling them out of your claws. The Wizard and Sorcerers both can fly, teleport targets and even more annoyingly cast things like web (for you young dragons), wall of force and Force cage set to cast once you get close. Those held spell actions are an issue. And when you have a Sorcerer in claw expect Subtile spells.

Lastly, there is nothing worst for your dragon to do then pretend that they are just animals. Dragons know themselves and what they can do and others can’t. They have a horde of magic items. Allies. Personal spell casting. Polymorph. Then can tunnel or come up out of the water and then take a target back under with them. Even the “Stupid” white dragons can formulate a surprise attack and then retreat.

Nice video and fun to watch.

[fadeleaf]

There's even a few additional assets individual dragon species have. Each dragon is immune to one type of damage, which naturally inclines a dragon to set its lair in an environment where this kind of damage is either ubiquitous or easy to set up (Red Dragons in particular can employ flammable surfaces on their lair). Additionally, Black Dragons can swim and Blue Dragons can burrow, offering more kinds of movement options that are harder to deal with as a flying dragon is quite attackable with ranged weapons. Ambush locations offer ways for a dragon to go into hiding and await the right moment to strike.

[Dyrnwyn]

Sometimes it SHOULD be DM VS. players in tactical combat, not DM facilitating drama to make the players feel like they achieved something in a fight balanced in their favour.

[Jpteryx]

"With multiattack, the dragon has three opportunities to succeed grappling."
Technically this is not in the rules. A PC's Extra Attack action lets them use any attack, including a grapple, but a monster's Multiattack only allows a few specific attacks, usually not including grappling.

Also, if the dragon is a young dragon, and it tries picking up a heavily-armored cleric with Athletics proficiency, the grappled cleric can just grapple the dragon back, sending *both* plummeting to the ground and preventing the dragon from just flying away on its next turn (this happened in one of my games!).

Anyway, I just had the dragon pick up the cleric to make the fight more interesting, but I'm not sure grappling is often useful for a dragon. A young red dragon's multiattack deals 46 damage if every attack hits (and with +10 to hit, it has a high probability to hit). Meanwhile, flying 40 feet up on its turn will eventually deal a mere 14 falling damage to whatever it has grappled. I think a stronger tactic in most situations is to swoop in and out of melee with its chosen target, heedless of opportunity attacks thanks to 18 AC, until its breath weapon recharges.

[eaglescott]

Dungeon Masterpiece: "There is one party member that the dragon is terrified of."
Me, who mains a Druid: "It's the Druid, isn't it."
DM: "It's the Druid."
Me: "LOL!"

[serviceisstrength]

The only problem I can see with running a dragon like this is the potential for it to be uninteractive for some players. The melee-only paladin would basically be forced to find somewhere to hide, as there is realistically no reason for a smart dragon to ever close with it in melee (if the opponent has no ranged options, the dragon would logically minimize risk by spamming its breath, staying out of range as it recharges). I do think a lot of the tactics you covered were brilliant, especially the point about scattering the party being the main point, I'm just worried that it might be too effective at neutralizing some player characters, forcing them to twiddle their thumbs while the encounter shreds the party.

[SignoftheMagi]

I feel this skips two major weapons in a dragon's arsenal: magic and environment.
Nearly all dragons are spell-casters in their own right, equal to at least a mid range sorcerer. Some are as strong as max level wizards. This means dragons can employ a wide variety of traps and manipulations,
Second is environment. Every dragon enjoys an extreme elemental environment as a home. It is not just the open air adventurers must fear, for some can swim or borrow. Swamps, quicksand, sudden lava flows, subzero temperatures, toxic clouds and plants. Dragons are intelligent beings. Use that.