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rferries
2018-12-08, 08:31 AM
This wyrm is a low-magic variant; still sentient but lacking the spellcasting and SLAs of true dragons.

Note also that I've removed the standard dragon-type immunities (why are dragons immune to sleep? They sleep more than cats!), though those are easily restored.

DRAGON, MOUNTAINHUGE DRAGON
Hit Dice: 12d12+72 (150 hp)
Initiative: +4
Speed: 40 ft. (8 squares), fly 80 ft. (poor)
Armor Class: 23 (+3 Dex, +12 natural, -2 size), touch 11, flat-footed 20
Base Attack/Grapple: +12/+32
Attack: Claw +20 melee (1d8+12) or bite +20 melee (2d6+12) or tail slap +20 melee (2d6+12)
Full Attack: 2 claws +20 melee (1d8+12) and bite +17 melee (2d6+6) and tail slap +17 melee (2d6+6)
Space/Reach: 15 ft./10 ft.
Special Attacks: Breath weapon
Special Qualities: Damage reduction 15/adamantine or magic, darkvision 60 ft., immunity to fire, low-light vision, scent
Saves: Fort +14, Ref +11, Will +11
Abilities: Str 34, Dex 16, Con 22, Int 8, Wis 16, Cha 16
Skills: Appraise +14, Intimidate +18, Knowledge (dungeoneering) +14, Listen +18, Spot +18, Survival +3 (+5 underground)
Feats: Ability Focus (breath weapon), Flyby Attack, Hover, Multiattack, Snatch
Environment: Warm mountains
Organization: Solitary or family (1-2 plus 2-5 hatchlings)
Challenge Rating: 12
Treasure: Triple standard
Alignment: Always chaotic evil
Advancement: 13-17 HD (Huge), 18-23 HD (Gargantuan), 24-30 HD (Colossal)
Level Adjustment: +0 (cohort)

The dragon is truly awe-inspiring, in spite of its wickedness. The last light of the sunset gleams on its crimson scales as it stretches its great wings and swivels its head to regard your party.

"What's this? Mortal mice come to pilfer my wealth?"

Dragons are the malevolent fire-breathing, treasure-collecting, winged reptilian creatures of legend. Brutish (yet not without a certain cunning), they often lay waste to kingdoms for leagues in every direction in their search for wealth and prey. Adventurers seek them out to plunder their hoards, benefit from the miraculous powers of their blood and hearts, or fashion armour from their scales.

Dragons are immortal, though they can be slain. Elder wyrms grow to unsurpassed size yet spend most of their time asleep amongst their hoard, and can even be sources of wisdom for adventurers who bargain with them for information.

A dragon speaks Common, Draconic, Dwarven, Elven, Giant, Gnome, Goblin, Orc, and Undercommon.

Combat
A dragon relishes the savagery of melee combat against heroes, but does not hesitate to loose its breath weapon early and often against ranged or elusive opponents. If facing peasants or mortal armies, it simply uses its Flyby Attack feat to incinerate them from above with its breath weapon.

Breath Weapon (Su)
50-foot cone, once every 1d4 rounds, damage 12d6 fire, Reflex DC 24 half. The save DC is Constitution-based. The flames ignite flammable material and even melt certain metals, as a fireball.

Dragon Hoards
All dragons amass colossal treasure troves, far beyond even what would be indicated by their treasure rating. Their lairs are filled with gold coins, piled high and strewn with sparkling jewels, various art objects and plenty of magic items. However, much of this wealth is under a terrible curse - mortals who seek to collect the entire hoard will eventually be transformed into avaricious dragons themselves.

Plundering adventurers are free to collect whatever treasure the GM rolls for the dragon's "triple standard" rating - it is assumed that this is the treasure the PCs encounter "first" from the hoard. However, attempting to collect excess treasure fills a character with an intense feeling of foreboding - an untrained DC 10 Knowedge (arcana) check is sufficient to know that coveting a dragon's hoard results in becoming a dragon oneself.

A character who persists in gathering the treasure gains the half-dragon template after 1d10 days, and completely transforms into a dragon after another 1d10 days (losing all class levels and effectively becoming a hostile NPC ). The only way to reverse this transformation is to restore all the excess treasure to the hoard's original site (which the new dragon will instinctively attempt to do, albeit for selfish purposes), then cast break enchantment on the new dragon.

Dragons and Aging
Dragons do not accumulate aging penalties to their physical ability scores and have no maximum age. However, they accumulate aging bonuses to their mental ability scores for reaching the middle-aged, old, and venerable age categories (at the same rate as elves (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/description.htm#age)). Older dragons spend more and more of their time in deep slumber (often lasting centuries at a time) and typically gain ranks in Knowledge (history).

Dragon eggs and hatchlings are helpless noncombatants, though they make for extremely valuable commodities if they can be captured.

Dragon Varieties
The above entry describes the traditional mountain-dwelling dragon, but other varieties exist. The traits of the varieties described below replace those of a mountain dragon.

Polar Dragon
These creatures have snow-white scales and dwell in the coldest arctic regions. They have immunity to cold, and ranks in Knowledge (nature) rather than Knowledge (dungeoneering). Their breath weapons deal cold damage.

Swamp Dragon
These creatures have viridian or inky black scales and dwell in the murkiest bogs. They have the [Aquatic] subtype (and the Amphibious special quality), swim speeds of 60 ft., immunity to acid, and ranks in Knowledge (nature) rather than Knowledge (dungeoneering). Their breath weapons deal acid damage.

New Feats
Dragon Slayer
You have slain a dragon, and bathed in the creature's magical blood or feasted on its mighty heart.

Prerequisites
Must have directly participated in slaying a dragon.

Benefits
You gain damage reduction 5/magic.

You gain resistance 10 against the energy type of the slain dragon's breath weapon (typically fire).

Dragonlord
You are served by a mighty dragon.

Prerequisites
Character level 15th; must have raised a dragon from an egg, or defeated one in magical or physical combat.

Benefits
You gain a dragon as a cohort. This is in addition to any cohort you acquire from the Leadership feat, or any animal companion, familiar, and/or special mount to which you are otherwise entitled.

Dragonscale Armour
Masterwork armour fashioned from the scales of a slain dragon is imbued with powerful magic, even if forged by a non-spellcaster. Such armour has an enhancement bonus of +1 per four Hit Dice of the slain dragon, and grants energy resistance 10 against the energy type of the dragon's breath weapon (typically fire). The energy resistance improves to 20 for medium armour and 30 for heavy armour.

Druids may wear dragonscale armour without penalty.

nonsi
2018-12-08, 09:01 AM
.

1. Nice and clean solution.
2. Make the breath weapon of swamp dragons a line, then add one that deals electricity damage - would create a nice symmetrical elemental square.
3. What about wyrmlings and the in-between age steps? (those don't have to amount to 12 of course)
4. Something doesn't add up for me with the saves. 22 Con vs. 16 Dex is +3 modifier diff, whereas Fort vs. Ref is +5 diff.

noob
2018-12-08, 09:10 AM
So a dragon using ability rip(from a wondrous item for example) can make their hoard disappear if they want to?

Altair_the_Vexed
2018-12-08, 12:48 PM
I like the idea of the cursed horde, but I'd like to see some rules for it.

Firstly, how can the dragon slayers possibly know what "triple standard" treasure amounts to? This is a metagame concept, not usually part of the game setting.
Perhaps there is a legendary amount - the worth of the dragon's weight in gold, or something like that. Otherwise, you're inviting the players to break the 4th wall.

At the moment, a "curse" is easily removed by the party cleric. Also, what will stop the party from cataloguing the horde, then taking the best possible items as the "triple standard" treasure? While you have a nebulous horde size, the possibility of any given magic item or jewel or art piece being present isn't defined.

I think you'd need to put some numbers on the horde scale, so that it could be generated - and then let the party choose their loot from that list.
This way, they'd have to be careful they don't underestimate the value of any items, in case they go over the allowed amount.

rferries
2018-12-09, 10:04 AM
.

1. Nice and clean solution.
2. Make the breath weapon of swamp dragons a line, then add one that deals electricity damage - would create a nice symmetrical elemental square.
3. What about wyrmlings and the in-between age steps? (those don't have to amount to 12 of course)
4. Something doesn't add up for me with the saves. 22 Con vs. 16 Dex is +3 modifier diff, whereas Fort vs. Ref is +5 diff.

1. Thanks!

2. I'm going to leave it as a cone - a black dragon's line never made sense to me (that feels more like "spitting" than an exhaled "breath"). Similarly, I'm not going to do electricity/sonic/force/negative/psionic/etc versions for flavour reasons (just my preference, not because you're wrong). Even the polar and swamp versions are a bit much, firebreath is a classic for a reason :D

3. I added in a minor note about aging; for simplicity these dragons are treated the same as manticores, elementals, etc or any other monster in that they don't vary wildly with age.

4. Nice catch! I must have been mid-way through editing their feats with Great Fortitude etc and forgot to edit the saves. Replaced feats now.



So a dragon using ability rip(from a wondrous item for example) can make their hoard disappear if they want to?

Hahahah I had forgotten that spell. I'm going to ignore it - raises all sorts of questions e.g. would it work with sarrukh abuse etc. But for simplicity, I'll shift the Hoard from being a supernatural ability to a different subsection.


I like the idea of the cursed horde, but I'd like to see some rules for it.

Firstly, how can the dragon slayers possibly know what "triple standard" treasure amounts to? This is a metagame concept, not usually part of the game setting.
Perhaps there is a legendary amount - the worth of the dragon's weight in gold, or something like that. Otherwise, you're inviting the players to break the 4th wall.

At the moment, a "curse" is easily removed by the party cleric. Also, what will stop the party from cataloguing the horde, then taking the best possible items as the "triple standard" treasure? While you have a nebulous horde size, the possibility of any given magic item or jewel or art piece being present isn't defined.

I think you'd need to put some numbers on the horde scale, so that it could be generated - and then let the party choose their loot from that list.
This way, they'd have to be careful they don't underestimate the value of any items, in case they go over the allowed amount.

Righto, I've edited that section.

noob
2018-12-09, 11:25 AM
So now if 5000 persons kills a dragon which had 4 times the normal treasure in his hoard and then that the people who slayed the dragon starts accumulating as much hoard as possible do we get 5000 dragons by virtue of those people getting a total of hoard superior to 3 times the normal hoard(for example a king sends an army to kill a dragon in an opponent kingdom for making a dragon swarm and destroying the nearby kingdom)?
Now let us say that the adventurers went and killed the dragon and took their fair share of loot exactly then that ten years later a bird grab a single shiny item from the hoard do the bird starts transforming into a dragon?

rferries
2019-01-02, 12:29 AM
So now if 5000 persons kills a dragon which had 4 times the normal treasure in his hoard and then that the people who slayed the dragon starts accumulating as much hoard as possible do we get 5000 dragons by virtue of those people getting a total of hoard superior to 3 times the normal hoard(for example a king sends an army to kill a dragon in an opponent kingdom for making a dragon swarm and destroying the nearby kingdom)?
Now let us say that the adventurers went and killed the dragon and took their fair share of loot exactly then that ten years later a bird grab a single shiny item from the hoard do the bird starts transforming into a dragon?

Hey, sorry I missed this comment earlier!

5000 people killing a dragon and turning into a plague of dragons - sounds like a plot hook! Though the dragons would be uncontrolled, and would presumably slay each other for the original treasure before trying to accumulate more.

Remaining hoard - another plot hook! However I'd rule the curse only affects humanoids (or whatever races the PCs are using), so no random animals turning into dragons. I like the idea of a cave full of abandoned cursed treasure, though a Knowledge (history) check tells you to "look but don't touch".

noob
2019-01-02, 07:17 AM
Also if someone delegates the pillaging does that person counts as pillaging?
now let us say that there is a president of the republic which is picked by the nation and that according to the law what he does represents what the people wants and that this president recruits a team to kill the dragon and take its hoard then that this team kills the dragon and recruits a single person and tells him to get the hoard then that they go away and kills demons in an evil church during the looting and that this person takes 3.001 times the normal amount of hoard
Does 1: The last recruited person turns into a dragon
2: The recruited person and the adventurers turns into dragons
3: The recruited person, the adventurers and the president turns into dragons
4: Everybody in the nation turns into dragons.
5: Only the president is really responsible and he is the only one to turn into a dragon since he is the first source of the order to take the hoard.

And now if the ruthlessly evil adventurers kills the dragon and gets a person to put a reasonable amount of treasure in the treasury of the kingdom and tells this person to get too much hoard for itself and turn into a dragon and that the adventurers kills the new dragon then that they restart doing the first step does it allows over time with a huge loss of life to finally uncurse the entire treasure and farm tons of xp?(And making sure there is no treasure that turns people into dangers)
Of course they even could do that with people condemned to death thus allowing to progressively get rid of the hoard with not too much evil behaving.
Even more evil people could get rid of the cursed hoard by redeeming the dragon who have this hoard then convincing it to it take the wow of poverty which will cause the dragon to not be able to use magic items to cover its weaknesses(which will make that poor dragon weaker) and the dragon will be forced by the wow of poverty to destroy economy and make people die of hunger by giving so much gold to poor people that gold stops being used as an unit of money due to how it is more common than food and tools thus making the current economy collapse.

(redeeemeries are place where people have their alignment forcibly changed to good through varied means such as shouting at them with the right prc or using the reedeming rules from the book of exalted deeds)
And now if I set up a redeemery chained with the cursed hoard and turn evil people into dragons before redeeming them does it means I can accumulate good dragons very fast?
Does the value of the living dragons counts as part of the hoard?
Would my redeemers become dragons by virtue of getting more than 3 times the normal amount of treasure under the form of evil dragons to redeem?

The curse is in fact probably more valuable than the treasure so should the coins have adjusted value in function of the value of the curse and instantly have all a value of more than 3 times the normal amount of treasure due to them being more valuable due to being more valuable(and have a value increase loop) or should the lack of scarcity reduce the value of the curse and have the coins stabilize in value at a value inversely proportional to the size of the hoard?

rferries
2019-01-03, 12:04 AM
Haha sounds quite complex, but fun! :D

jqavins
2019-01-03, 06:01 PM
Curse complexity and abuse. Umm, yeah.

I'd either eliminate the curse part (not my top choice, since I like the flavor) or detail it more or modify it. One possibility for an alternate version:

Anyone entering a dragon's lair and participating in slaying it can take as much as s/he (and perhaps his/her mount) can carry without fear of a curse. Those who go to great length to gather more, or spend an extended period cataloging the hoard in order to take only the exactly most valuable load possible, gradually become cursed to ever growing avarice, continuing to grow beyond the greedy behavior displayed in the lair. S/he will begin to steal, become ever more stingy and jealous, alienating family and friends. Insanity soon sets in, as the greed is joined by a grossly exaggerated sense of his/her power, abilities, and (ironically) wealth; no matter how much s/he has and believes s/he has it is never enough. While not physically transforming into a dragon, s/he comes to behave like one until, inevitably, s/he eventually runs afoul of someone stronger and is defeated. The usual outcome of this final confrontation is the death of the accursed and the taking of his/her hoard, which may pass the curse on if the new slayer should prove overly greedy.

nonsi
2019-01-03, 11:58 PM
.

What part does Remove Curse play in the curse of dragon wealth?

rferries
2019-01-04, 02:33 AM
.

What part does Remove Curse play in the curse of dragon wealth?

I figured break enchantment was sufficient. But sure, remove curse could be an alternative too. There's too many spells that do the same thing haha.

rferries
2019-01-04, 02:42 AM
Curse complexity and abuse. Umm, yeah.

I'd either eliminate the curse part (not my top choice, since I like the flavor) or detail it more or modify it. One possibility for an alternate version:

Anyone entering a dragon's lair and participating in slaying it can take as much as s/he (and perhaps his/her mount) can carry without fear of a curse. Those who go to great length to gather more, or spend an extended period cataloging the hoard in order to take only the exactly most valuable load possible, gradually become cursed to ever growing avarice, continuing to grow beyond the greedy behavior displayed in the lair. S/he will begin to steal, become ever more stingy and jealous, alienating family and friends. Insanity soon sets in, as the greed is joined by a grossly exaggerated sense of his/her power, abilities, and (ironically) wealth; no matter how much s/he has and believes s/he has it is never enough. While not physically transforming into a dragon, s/he comes to behave like one until, inevitably, s/he eventually runs afoul of someone stronger and is defeated. The usual outcome of this final confrontation is the death of the accursed and the taking of his/her hoard, which may pass the curse on if the new slayer should prove overly greedy.



This is a flavourful variant, though I'd still prefer they ultimately become a monster (though your progression is much nicer than my bland "1d10 days" haha)

jqavins
2019-01-04, 09:12 AM
The progression pretty much came out of my getting on a roll. The important point was to change from a hard limit where one gold piece over 3×standard would kick in the curse, to the curse arising from a display of undue avarice; that requires some DM judgement, and that's a drawback, but one I could happily live with. It's also an oblique nod to Tolkien, where Thorin's obsession with one particular bit of treasure weighed on him like a curse (even if not actually one) while good-and-pure Bilbo took only what his pony could carry - less than the fourteenth he was promised - and that was enough to make him filthy rich for the rest of his days.

It also eliminates some of the silly abuses. For instance:
The aging king wants to do one epic thing to aid his people before he dies. He assembles a party of the greatest adventurers from across the eleven realms to slay the dragon that has plagued the his kingdom for centuries. He promises them everlasting glory and all the treasure they can carry.

They kill the dragon, but not before one of them is killed. Most of the remaining heroes take enough treasure to live like kings and suffer no curse. One, however, spends two days scouring the hoard for the most precious jewels and most powerful magic, loading up not only his hoarse but also that of the fallen comrade. He falls under the Curse of Dragon Gold. Within a month he has become a dragon himself (and his former comrades have to kill him).

Later, the king sends soldiers and accountants to haul out and inventory all the rest of the hoard. The coins are placed in the kingdom coffers as compensation for the harm the dragon has done his people for nearly three hundred years. A few choice jewels and magic are added to the crown jewels collection, and some of the magic is entrusted to the army for the kingdom's defense, the rest being liquidated and also added to the coffers. While this constitutes many times "standard treasure", the motivation and disposition of the loot are such that no curse is invoked. Neither the king nor anyone else turns into a dragon.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. All else being equal it's better to have clear rules than to rely on judgement, but there are times when hard rules must be so elaborate (in order to cover all cases and avoid abuses) that all else is not equal and good judgement should be employed instead.

rferries
2019-01-05, 04:17 AM
The progression pretty much came out of my getting on a roll. The important point was to change from a hard limit where one gold piece over 3×standard would kick in the curse, to the curse arising from a display of undue avarice; that requires some DM judgement, and that's a drawback, but one I could happily live with. It's also an oblique nod to Tolkien, where Thorin's obsession with one particular bit of treasure weighed on him like a curse (even if not actually one) while good-and-pure Bilbo took only what his pony could carry - less than the fourteenth he was promised - and that was enough to make him filthy rich for the rest of his days.

It also eliminates some of the silly abuses. For instance:
The aging king wants to do one epic thing to aid his people before he dies. He assembles a party of the greatest adventurers from across the eleven realms to slay the dragon that has plagued the his kingdom for centuries. He promises them everlasting glory and all the treasure they can carry.

They kill the dragon, but not before one of them is killed. Most of the remaining heroes take enough treasure to live like kings and suffer no curse. One, however, spends two days scouring the hoard for the most precious jewels and most powerful magic, loading up not only his hoarse but also that of the fallen comrade. He falls under the Curse of Dragon Gold. Within a month he has become a dragon himself (and his former comrades have to kill him).

Later, the king sends soldiers and accountants to haul out and inventory all the rest of the hoard. The coins are placed in the kingdom coffers as compensation for the harm the dragon has done his people for nearly three hundred years. A few choice jewels and magic are added to the crown jewels collection, and some of the magic is entrusted to the army for the kingdom's defense, the rest being liquidated and also added to the coffers. While this constitutes many times "standard treasure", the motivation and disposition of the loot are such that no curse is invoked. Neither the king nor anyone else turns into a dragon.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. All else being equal it's better to have clear rules than to rely on judgement, but there are times when hard rules must be so elaborate (in order to cover all cases and avoid abuses) that all else is not equal and good judgement should be employed instead.

I take your point, but I'm not sure those particular abuses are relevant. PCs are very unlikely to fall to the curse (at least one PC will make an untrained DC 10 Knowledge (arcana) check, I would hope!), and if the DM wants to have a dragon's hoard as a backstory they could have handwaved that anyways (since the king and his soldiers and subjects would all be NPCs).

As for the latter part of your writeup, the curse would still be invoked. Once the "triple standard" portion of the treasure is removed (however much that may be for a given party fighting the dragon at a given level), the remaining excess falls under the curse's aegis. The curse would presumably affect the soldiers sent to physically raid the hoard (again, PCs would simply sense it was a bad idea and leave the hoard), +/- the king, rather than the entire kingdom though. I might not have been explicit enough about what "excess" means, of course.

I do like the idea of the hoard being used for benign purposes by an entire kingdom, though - could make for a flavourful backstory re" the founding of a kingdom.

The hoard curse is purely to maintain verisimilitude and flavour - the PCs can have a climactic fight a dragon in the centre of a classically prodigious hoard but can't actually use that hoard to break WBL.

I suppose to make it more relevant to PCs, one could devise a "Fafnir" template similar to a lich template, for PCs who want to become a monstrous (half-)dragon-type creature.