Where thar be Steam Dragons?

[Afool]

I'm planning on running a mini campaign called 'Steam Dragon's Revenge' but unfortunately it heavily lacks in the dragon department. My players are going to be ELC 12 so I plan on altering it a bit to present more of a challenge.

I tried googling stats for a Steam Dragon but nothing came up so I was wondering if anyone knew of a quick adaptation I could use to make the session a bit more interesting. The goal is for them to face a few young to juvenile Steam Dragons along with the ice gnomes of the original conflict before facing Momma :smallbiggrin:

[Flickerdart]

Check out this true dragon index (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/True_Dragon_Index_%283.5e_Other%29).

What makes a steam dragon, though? Scalding hot breath? There's a ton of dragons that shoot fire. Mist? Dragons that are a challenge for your party have high enough spellcasting to just cast Obscuring Mist.

[Afool]

Well at the moment they're playing very young dragons with a smattering of class levels so they don't have much spell casting and the last mini campaign I sent them through they breezed through so I thought I'd try to challenge them a bit. So dragons. Really the easiest way I can think of is to take a one of the standard True Dragons and recolor it a bit but I guess what I'm looking for is which dragon to use, how to properly change up its breath weapon, and what immunities it should have.

[satorian]

Obviously, you are going to have to customize. You want the Green's shape of breath. You want fire type damage, flavored as steam. To me, this would mean water elemental stuff would actually resist as they would water things, and not be vulnerable, but otherwise it would be the same. Color the dragon grey. For CR, that's based more on the hit dice and spellcasting than damage type or breath shape. So, use, say green as the base, use everything the same, change the color and the breath weapon and you are good to go.

Exception: do you think your steam dragon should have an alternate weapon, like paralyze or stun? Then use a silver or bronze base (and reflavor/type the breath weapon).

[Deathkeeper]

You could also try using the stats for some of the dragons besides the normal ones, like the Primals.
And I admit, when I first read this I thought you were asking about steam-powered dragon constructs for some reason. Oh, well.

[silverwolfer]

There be steam cooked humans! bababoom

[Afool]

satorian that's exactly what I'm looking for, thanks for posting that. I'm still learning how to refluff and work out mechanics so that's a great help :smallsmile:

[Rejakor]

http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2011/087/d/e/sunset_fog_by_cynder_dragon_spyro-d3cns9e.png
Steam Dragon, Mature Adult

Size/Type: Huge Dragon
Hit Dice: 24d12+168 (378 hp)
Initiative: +12
Speed: 40 ft. (8 squares), fly 50 ft. (perfect)
Armor Class: 28 (-2 size, +8 Dex, +7 natural, +5 insight), touch 21, flat-footed 22
Base Attack/Grapple: +24/+39
Attack: Bite +32 melee (2d6+3+2d6 fire)
Full Attack: 2 claws +30 melee (2d4+2+2d6 fire) and bite +30 melee (2d6+3+2d6 fire) and 2 wings +30 melee (1d6+2+2d6 fire) and tail slap +30 melee (2d4+2+2d6 fire) and crush +30 melee (2d6+3+2d6 fire)
Space/Reach: 15 ft./15 ft.
Special Attacks: Boil(DC 23), Breath of Steam, Boiling Touch
Special Qualities: body of steam, immunity to fire, create steam, control heat, dissipation, frightful presence(DC 26), spells, spell-like abilities, SR 22, DR 10/Water
Saves: Fort +21, Ref +22, Will +17
Abilities: Str 17, Dex 27, Con 25, Int 27, Wis 17, Cha 23
Skills: Pick 15
Feats: Alertness, Flyby Attack, Snatch, Improved Initiative, Dodge, Mobility, Elusive Target, Combat Expertise, Improved Trip, Improved Grapple, Weapon Finesse, Multi-Attack
Environment: Desert
Organization: Solitary or Pack (2-4)
Challenge Rating: 15
Treasure: 3x Standard
Alignment: Usually neutral

Boil: As a full-round action a Steam Dragon may try to turn the blood of one living creature with blood in it's veins to steam. That creature immediately must make a fort save or die unless it is immune to fire damage. The DC for this ability is Con-based. If the creature has fire resistance, it may halve that number, and add it to it's fortitude save as a bonus.

Steam Breath: As a standard action, 60' Cone of Steam. Does 14d4 fire damage, reflex half. Area remains filled with steam-like fog for 2d4+2 rounds, acting as a fog cloud spell in the area filled by the breath weapon, and doing 2d6 fire damage to anyone who ends their turn inside it.

Boiling Touch: All the steam dragon's natural attacks do an extra 2d6 fire damage because it is made of boiling steam. (already factored into stat block). This ability interacts with Control Heat.

Body of Steam: The Steam dragon halves all weapon damage dealt to it, like a swarm, but is damaged normally by anything that would damage a swarm normally. It may squeeze into any space, regardless of size, and suffers no penalties for squeezing.

Create Steam: As per fog cloud, but the fog also does 2d6 points of fire damage to anyone who ends their turn inside it. The 2d6 points of fire damage degrades one step (2d4, 1d10, 1d8, 1d6, 1d4, 1d2, 1) every single turn until the cloud of steam is simply warm to the touch and not scalding.

Control Heat: The Steam Dragon may instantly energize any water, turning it into boiling steam, or take boiling steam and turn it back into water. This ability used on another Steam Dragon, turning steam to water, is a Save or Die with a DC equal to the Steam Dragon's Boil ability. Using this ability on itself as a full round action increases the damage dealt by Boiling Touch by 1d6 for 1d4+1 rounds, up to a maximum of 5d6. Using this ability on a cloud of steam previously created by the Create Steam ability re-energizes them to the state of dealing 2d6 fire damage per round, which decays into non-damage normally.

Additionally, the Steam Dragon may activate this ability as a full-round action to turn all water in 100'/HD into Steam, and all ice in 100'/HD into Water.

Dissipation: By focusing for a full round, a Steam Dragon may dissipate and re-appear somewhere with enough steam to form a body. Use the teleport rules for knowledge of location/misfire (can only misfire to a source of steam), but there is no range limit on this except that it must be on the same plane.

Spell-like Abilities: Invisibility, Major Image at will, Veil, Mirage Arcana 3/day, 1/day Screen

DR/Water: Only a weapon coated in liquid water or ice, or made of liquid water or ice, or an attack performed after liquid water or ice was thrown onto the Steam Dragon may bypass this DR.



Alternatively, Clockwork Dragon.


http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs51/i/2009/258/8/c/Clockwork_Dragon_by_TheOutcast1821.jpg

[Flickerdart]

Whoa, spoiler those images, they're breaking the frame to pieces.

[LeshLush]

I think Draconomicon has a Steam Drake, but I'm AFB. Also, this topic takes me back to my misspent youth of reading Xanth novels and Stanley Steamer, the steam-breathing dragon who patrolled the gap.

[Rejakor]

You mean your monitor just can't handle the raw power

BURN

[DarkEternal]

How does a 24d12 dragon have 26 hp? I'm confused.

[Rejakor]

Answer: It does not