The Best of Dragon Magazine

[Tibbaerrohwen]

Many D&D gamers and fans know about Dragon Magazine and take inspiration from article and variants published there-in. I am curious, playground:

1) What are some of your favourite things published in Dragon Magazine?

2) How do you find them useful?

3) What issue were they published in?

I'm a big fan of the para-genasi from issue 297 and the fighter variants from issue 310. The para-genasi are just very flavourful races and the fighter variants give you so many more option with everyones favourite feat bank, making more than a two level dip far more practical.

[FMArthur]

I think Mystic Ranger from 336 is one of the clear winners. As a Ranger alternate - or even fix - it's quite good with Spell Compendium access and generally makes them more interesting to play from a lower level. Alongside the alternate Combat Styles from 326 and in combination with the plethora of WotC Ranger ACFs, Dragon material has made the Ranger class more fun to build and play by a massive amount. It's not "premade Fighter plus racism" anymore like it was with just PHB.

In general the Class Acts are lovable. It's rare that they actually fix anything about bad classes, but they often give more variety to the boring ones that make them more distinct and interesting to play at least. The Soulknife feats from 341 for example are good for adding variety and unique options to a class that got barely any love from WotC. They're not amazing but they fill a hole where there should have been support from the outset; I printed those pages out, stuck them into my EPH and now pretend they are part of it.

[Dusk Eclipse]

My favourite thing from Dragon is the Mystic ranger from D 336 IIRC, a skillmonkey-gish-tracker in can? yes please, and a side order of SoTAO for a Lighting Warrior-lite flavour (though it still doesn't get a familiar.)

I also really like the half-X templates (can't remember the issue), Half minotaur is just evil on a Varag base :smallamused:

Edit: I forgot, there was one which expanded the lore on Hobgoblins and I REALLY loved that article, definitely one of my favourite non-crunch article ever.

[Urpriest]

The very last Dragon, where they gave a template to cobble together Demon lords out of other monsters, was something I've always wanted to use.

I also love their Dark Sun content for 3.5. That stuff was almost all interesting, both mechanically and fluffwise.

[Tibbaerrohwen]

I think Mystic Ranger from 336 is one of the clear winners. As a Ranger alternate - or even fix - it's quite good with Spell Compendium access and generally makes them more interesting to play from a lower level. Alongside the alternate Combat Styles from 326 and in combination with the plethora of WotC Ranger ACFs, Dragon material has made the Ranger class more fun to build and play by a massive amount. It's not "premade Fighter plus racism" anymore like it was with just PHB.

In general the Class Acts are lovable. It's rare that they actually fix anything about bad classes, but they often give more variety to the boring ones that make them more distinct and interesting to play at least. The Soulknife feats from 341 for example are good for adding variety and unique options to a class that got barely any love from WotC. They're not amazing but they fill a hole where there should have been support from the outset; I printed those pages out, stuck them into my EPH and now pretend they are part of it.

I have to agree; I love the class acts. Mystic Ranger is also, by far, one of the best ACF ever. Period.



I also really like the half-X templates (can't remember the issue), Half minotaur is just evil on a Varag base :smallamused:

Edit: I forgot, there was one which expanded the lore on Hobgoblins and I REALLY loved that article, definitely one of my favourite non-crunch article ever.

Can anyone tell me which issues have this, cause both sound fantastic. It will be nice to have more Hobo fluff.


The very last Dragon, where they gave a template to cobble together Demon lords out of other monsters, was something I've always wanted to use.

I haven't read that yet, but it does sound amazing.

[Taelas]

Half-Minotaur is from Dragon #313. It's a rather brutal LA +1 template.

[Metahuman1]

I liked the Faerie Mysteries Initiate, Keen Wit (Or was it called Keen Intellect?), and Kung Fu Genius. I like a basically useful stat like Int being made more so by allowing it too fuel other things.

Heck, with just what I listed you could drop Con and Wis for everything except Skills and fort save, and those would be easy to Homebrew a feat for.

[Zaydos]

Dragon #313 (can I just say all of it? Mostly the were-creature monster classes, the draconic delusions, and the half-templates even if some are brokenly good for their LA and character type they support [half-minotaur/ogre I'm looking at you]).
Dragon #310 (the fighters... I need to find my copy of this issue).
The two issues with Dragon Monster Classes; they're a little too weak even for IRL games I play (by this board's standards that's really low op for the most part but usually Tier 3+ classes just because my group did not enjoy mundanes) but useful for making your own if nothing else.
Class Acts in general (#323 and later).
The Modrons, definitely the modrons (too bad they didn't have hierarchs), but I forget the number.
The Demonomicon segments were nice too (forget when they introduced this).
The Dark Sun was kind of neat but didn't leave me satisfied (reminded me of how much the game has changed too and how difficult it is to recreate Dark Sun in 3.X)
The two issues with stuff focused on old campaign settings both got into my favorites (#316 I believe, had Strahd on the cover, and #328 I believe with the Lady of Pain on the cover).
Dire Ferrets were neat (in the male section in issue #301 I believe; one was on the cover of issue #304 or #302 and asked about).

[Tibbaerrohwen]

Half-Minotaur is from Dragon #313. It's a rather brutal LA +1 template.

Thank you.


I liked the Faerie Mysteries Initiate, Keen Wit (Or was it called Keen Intellect?), and Kung Fu Genius. I like a basically useful stat like Int being made more so by allowing it too fuel other things.

Heck, with just what I listed you could drop Con and Wis for everything except Skills and fort save, and those would be easy to Homebrew a feat for.

I think it's Keen Intellect, which is a feat I lvoe for Factotums. I believe it also subs Int for Will saves. Faerie Mysteries Initiate and Kung Fu Genuis are both, also, great feats.

[Malimar]

Chicken Infested. Just... Chicken Infested.

[Tibbaerrohwen]

Chicken Infested. Just... Chicken Infested.

I do not comprehend...

[slaydemons]

I do not comprehend...

its a flaw for commoners that give you a chicken half the time you draw something anything some builds make use of this

[Tibbaerrohwen]

its a flaw for commoners that give you a chicken half the time you draw something anything some builds make use of this

That is so awesome! What issue is this from? How would you use this for a build?

[slaydemons]

That is so awesome! What issue is this from? How would you use this for a build?

chicken infested flaw then take quick draw asap I don't know what issue it is from but I will look it up

#330


The most common CI build is Commoner1/Warlock8 with The Dead Walk invocation. Nab Corpsecrafter and Destructive Retribution from Libris Mortis: The Book of Bad Latin, and go to town. Get a spell component pouce (always a free action to draw from) and start drawing stuff out. Half of it will be chickens, so just toss em on the ground. Have someone with Great Cleave or similar kill ALL of them. Next round reanimate them all as skeletal chickens (1/4 HD?) with The Dead Walk, and apply all of your Corpsecrafter feats. Now, in the next 8 minutes, sick your hoarde of angry death chickens on whatever it is that drew your ire and watch as they all explode upon death into 1d6 negative energy damage bursts. Hillarity ensues.

Plus, since its only temporary, you don't have to pay the expensive material components for Animate Dead....unless you want it to be permanent.

A more elaborate build would be Commoner1/ClericX using a DMM: Fel Animate Greater Consumptive Field. GCF automatically kills anything with 8 HP or less, and Fel Animate automatically raises anything killed by the spell as a zombie. Then just start drawing chickens and each one will be an expoloding zombie doom chicken.

And for extra kicks, grab the feat Tomb Tainted Soul, also from LM, so that negative energy heals you and positive hurts you. Now all of your exploding chickens will HEAL you, giving you a nearly infinitely supply of healing.

[Malimar]

Not to derail this into another Chicken Infested thread, but I do dispute the legality of much Chicken Infested cheese (even beyond "there's a limit to the number of free actions you can take in a round"). Sure, it's a free action to draw a weapon with Quick Draw, and it's a free action to draw a spell component... but a chicken is neither a weapon nor a spell component, so drawing a chicken is always a move action. If you actually proceed to bludgeon people about the head and neck with the chicken, or if you can show me a spell that has "one live chicken" as a material component, then I'll accept drawing chickens as a free action, but not before.

I don't even like it for the crazy things you can supposedly do with it, though; I just like the "Towering over the enemy, preparing to strike them down where they stand, Ludgeblatt the Barbarian, conquerer of worlds, draws his mighty greatswo... er... uh... chicken!" effect. It fills me with an indescribable glee.

Also good: the "Corpse" flaw from the same article.

[Treblain]

My favorite Chicken Infested builds involve chicken nunchucks.

[Tibbaerrohwen]

My favorite Chicken Infested builds involve chicken nunchucks.

A build with levels in Drunken Master would be awesome. If you take the build above and apply it, they explode and heal you when you roll a 1.

EDIT: We totally got off topic here. Malimar, we got derailed. Quick, someone put us back!