Advice for Tyranny of Dragons

[TheBoatAnchor]

So this is about my 2nd serious campaign I’m running. I decided to put my players through the 5e Tyranny of Dragons. In Hoard of the Dragon Queen, the players come across 3 dragon eggs. It’s assumed that the players will destroy the eggs. My group (there’s 4 of them) decide to keep and hatch the eggs. I figured it won’t be too bad. I did a lot of research to figure out stats and growth of the baby dragons.

What I need some help or advice on is what to do with the dragons. There are 3 dragons and 4 players. All of them want to keep a dragon for themselves and train it as a pet. This will leave 1 player without a baby dragon. I don’t want to force the to do anything and take away any fun. My number 1 rule is to make sure the players are having fun. I thought about having them find another baby dragon along the trail as they follow the Cult of Dragons from whom they got the 3 eggs from.

Any advice on how I should go about this?

[mephnick]

There's lots of places they could find another egg, just throw it in there.

HotDQ doesn't have a whole lot of downtime for faffing about though. A cult is doing crazy stuff! So I'm not sure there's going to be time to raise dragon babies, that's not what the campaign is about.

And definitely don't let them use them in battle unless you feel like rewriting every encounter in the book.

[Treantmonk]

So this is about my 2nd serious campaign I’m running. I decided to put my players through the 5e Tyranny of Dragons. In Hoard of the Dragon Queen, the players come across 3 dragon eggs. It’s assumed that the players will destroy the eggs. My group (there’s 4 of them) decide to keep and hatch the eggs. I figured it won’t be too bad. I did a lot of research to figure out stats and growth of the baby dragons.

What I need some help or advice on is what to do with the dragons. There are 3 dragons and 4 players. All of them want to keep a dragon for themselves and train it as a pet. This will leave 1 player without a baby dragon. I don’t want to force the to do anything and take away any fun. My number 1 rule is to make sure the players are having fun. I thought about having them find another baby dragon along the trail as they follow the Cult of Dragons from whom they got the 3 eggs from.

Any advice on how I should go about this?

One of the eggs hatches to twins. Now all 4 players have a baby dragon.

However, note that ToD does NOT have a lot of downtime. Your players will find it difficult to find time to do any training at all with their baby dragons.

If you make some alterations, you could probably fit some downtime in somewhere, where at least they can build some affinity with these dragons, and the players can use them.

Another option is to run something after ToD is over - maybe 10 years passes...

[Willie the Duck]

Or, 3 players get pet baby dragons (I see no problems with this scenario), and because the fourth player does not get one, they will be on the lookout for something else fun to waste their time on/fill that niche. That could be an alternate pet like a Pegasus or displacer beast or something else zany, or it could be a pirate ship, thieves guild, henchmen, etc. If you wanted to help those along, that could be quite fun.

Of course, as mentioned, ToD is not the best scenario for either type of side-endeavors, pet dragons and otherwise.

[JeffreyGator]

This appears to have come up before:

Raising-an-Evil-Dragon (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?403865-Raising-an-Evil-Dragon&highlight=dragon+hatchling)

Help!-My-players-want-to-raise-a-dragon!-(HotDQ) (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?450913-Help!-My-players-want-to-raise-a-dragon!-(HotDQ)&highlight=dragon+hatchling)

In a co-gm campaign, I really wanted to steal a baby white dragon, but my character was foiled in that attempt. Another character did succeed in getting a Blood Hawk pet and my character eventually succeeded in forming an alliance with a silver dragon.

One potential pitfall of powerful pet acquisition is that it steps a bit on the toes of the beast master and to a lesser extent paladin's mounts.

OTOH, the pet is harder to replace.

[qube]

3.5 Draconomicom also elaborated on how to hatch a dragon egg & how to raise/train a dragon

[Asmotherion]

Pets? No. Dragons are no pets.

Have them raise the Dragons as responsible Foster Parents, that is the acceptable RP option. When they get to see how much responsibility, money and attention raising a baby DRAGON needs, perhaps they won't be so eager in doing so.

If they want a pet, give them a Guardian Drake or a Half Dragon Steed and be done with it. If they want a Dragon, it means they are ready to take all the RP that comes with it.

If their Dragon Dies, it's on their hands. If their Dragon happens to like an other player more than them, and thus Bond with them, it's also their fault.

Dragons don't Belong to them. They will just happen to be raised by them. Don't go at it as if they are 1 dragon for each of the players.