Dragons in war

[Zilong]

So, I think we are all familiar with the theorycrafting that goes into calculating how many soldiers you would need to fend off an adult dragon. Not a month goes by without some sort of speculation about the DPR of dragons vs the average villager. Most agree that such fights are hard to simulate since dragons are super-intelligent flying death lizards who would rarely stand and fight when not sure of absolute victory.

What I am curious about is what happens when dragons are applied more like snipers than sledgehammers. What if a kingdom, mostly made of humans, have draconic allies. if they had some two-legged meatshields, how would that affect a battlefield?

The Temeraire novels by Naomi Novik goes into the concept a bit, but the Napoleonic technology is a bit more advanced than what I usually run. In a setting with more medieval/early renaissance technological levels like the Forgotten Realms, what could a flight or pair of dragons do for a country's defense?

Granted this changes from edition to edition and system to system, but I'm primarily running 5E, so I figured I'd ask here.

[Legendairy]

IMHO it would change it exponentially. They could be used as artillery and pepper the enemy front lines or used to take out the archers in the back lines while traditional forces advance. The breath weapon depending on type can be devistating to large groups of low hp soldiers. They can stand behind front lines and use fear auras for initial clashes, or generally use them against the lower level forces.

Something me and a few of my old school group has done is we have the dragon fly down land on part of the invading force and just crocodile role and smash lines, use its fear aura so it’s not taking much damage then fly out.

You can use them as utility to haul large objects to the field of battle, also for recon and tactical advantage with a mage with sending and an eye in the sky type deal. Dropping large rocks using hit and run tactics high enough for archers to be ineffective or carts full of basketball sized rocks.

Dragons change the whole landscape of battle, especially if you are the only side that has them.

[Man_Over_Game]

A Dragon needs to survive to be dangerous, so it's no good if it dies into the first hour. It's primary benefit is its ability to deal AoE damage and fly.

Ideally, the Dragon would wait until both armies clash, before it swooped overhead and started melting the opposing side. Anyone that's played Faster Than Light understands that two problems at once is insanely harder than two problems, one at a time. Enemy Archers would have either shot their barrage at the allied army, or they'd likely be too distracted by the clash to be ready to fire at the Dragon. Not only would the enemy be clumped together, but they'd be less able to retaliate, making it the perfect time to attack with the Dragon.

Dragons would also do well with hit-and-run tactics, preferably on lightly guarded supply caravans. It wouldn't take much to burn the horses or cart to render the supplies useless or isolated.

Lastly, I'd see Dragons be a terrifying tactic for a city-wide assassination. While the army's away doing war, the Dragon just flies past them to torch their homes. It'd cause enough panic for the army to know what's happening to their families that it might just break lines in the chaos and give the allied army the advantage.

See, the allied army doesn't do much to protect the Dragon, but it does very well at preventing the enemy from doing anything about the Dragon in the first place. You can't afford to protect everything, all at once, from a Dragon you're unsure of where it's going to attack. You ARE sure of the enemy army charging up the hill. So you attack the army, leave behind enough archers to protect your base of operations from the Dragon should it decide to attack. The Dragon then attacks everything else (like the residential/farming areas, supply caravans, unprotected units), and the general is left with unused Archers.

The army with the dragon lost 50% of their troops. The army without the Dragon lost 25% of their troops and much, much more.

[Unoriginal]

A Dragon's main advantage over humanoid opponents are its flight and its breath.

This means that meatshields would be at best inefficient. A dragon needs to fly to get a good mobility, and need to get relatively close to the enemies in order to breath at them, which means that putting them in an unit of protectors negates their advantages.

Now, the issue is that if a dragon flies and charge directly at the enemies, they're easy picking for archers, crossbowmen, war engines, and the like. Anyone with two braincells would target them, given the amount of damage and terror they can unleash, and then they'd be toast (if young enough).

So, the optimal Dragon-At-War tactic is to high above the battlefield (which is also an ideal scouting position if they have a way to communicate with the allied tacticians on the ground), out of the enemy weapons' range, watch the battle carefully, then drop dramatically at the right time when the ranged attackers are busy, targeting war engines/troops close of each others/leaders and commanding officiers/other strategic points with their breaths, and then get back up ASAP. Rince and repeat.

[NecessaryWeevil]

Are dragons the only fantastic element in such a scenario? Do they get spellcasting? Does anyone else?

[Imbalance]

Uh, given their superority, you don't command a dragon; you put the dragon in command. Shock and awe, tactics, recon, and, oh yeah, roasting legions - these are the things your friendly flying serpent does anyway, so let it. And when it says to have your infantry advance while deploying your battlemages to the south along the river, that's what you do. More than anything, if you want the dragon to stay friendly, you better cough up the gold.

[Rukelnikov]

Lastly, I'd see Dragons be a terrifying tactic for a city-wide assassination. While the army's away doing war, the Dragon just flies past them to torch their homes. It'd cause enough panic for the army to know what's happening to their families that it might just break lines in the chaos and give the allied army the advantage.

See, the allied army doesn't do much to protect the Dragon, but it does very well at preventing the enemy from doing anything about the Dragon in the first place. You can't afford to protect everything, all at once, from a Dragon you're unsure of where it's going to attack. You ARE sure of the enemy army charging up the hill. So you attack the army, leave behind enough archers to protect your base of operations from the Dragon should it decide to attack. The Dragon then attacks everything else (like the residential/farming areas, supply caravans, unprotected units), and the general is left with unused Archers.

The army with the dragon lost 50% of their troops. The army without the Dragon lost 25% of their troops and much, much more.

This. In the longest running campaign my group has, our characters were running their kingdom west of the High Forest, and a white great wyrm came to demand tribute, we had the odds in a fight, but if the dragon decided to attack the main city, the destruction would have been terrible. A similar situation happened a couple years ago when a rogue Solar servant of a previous campaign's BBEG came to attack the city to avenge his boss, we took the fight and the losses were heavy. We ended up striking a deal with the dragon, we pay him 12k in gold and gems as tribute each year, and he would protect the main city in case of enemy invasion.

[OverLordOcelot]

So, the optimal Dragon-At-War tactic is to high above the battlefield (which is also an ideal scouting position if they have a way to communicate with the allied tacticians on the ground), out of the enemy weapons' range, watch the battle carefully, then drop dramatically at the right time when the ranged attackers are busy, targeting war engines/troops close of each others/leaders and commanding officiers/other strategic points with their breaths, and then get back up ASAP. Rince and repeat.

The drawback to this is that it assumes they're facing a conventional army and not a fantasy army. The way I treat armies is that the leaders and commanding officers are high level, and are or have casters of various sorts with them; in a small army there would be the equivalent of a mid-level adventuring party at the head, a larger army would have multiple mid-level equivalents and at least one equivalent of a high-level party. So unless the fight is pretty trivial in the first place, this can be a really dangerous tactic for the dragon. The dragon flying high away from his allies is at risk of getting ambushed by the enemy, and if he tries to swoop in on commanders he may well bite off more than he can chew. Also note that earthbind is only a 2nd level spell, so it's not hard to have casters with it or spell scrolls of it handy - at 150gp each (using AL prices) they're not exactly cheap, but getting ten of them to had to company wizards instead of one suit of full plate will force the dragon to be wary.

Against what I'd consider a D&D world army, I'd expect the dragon to either act as close support for the army he's with, to coordinate with the elite forces of his own side to launch focused attacks at enemy elites, or to raid rear areas where he won't encounter anything that can really threaten him. Trying solo attacks isn't a good idea if the enemy is not trivial to beat.

[Unoriginal]

The drawback to this is that it assumes they're facing a conventional army and not a fantasy army. The way I treat armies is that the leaders and commanding officers are high level, and are or have casters of various sorts with them; in a small army there would be the equivalent of a mid-level adventuring party at the head, a larger army would have multiple mid-level equivalents and at least one equivalent of a high-level party. So unless the fight is pretty trivial in the first place, this can be a really dangerous tactic for the dragon. The dragon flying high away from his allies is at risk of getting ambushed by the enemy, and if he tries to swoop in on commanders he may well bite off more than he can chew. Also note that earthbind is only a 2nd level spell, so it's not hard to have casters with it or spell scrolls of it handy - at 150gp each (using AL prices) they're not exactly cheap, but getting ten of them to had to company wizards instead of one suit of full plate will force the dragon to be wary.

Against what I'd consider a D&D world army, I'd expect the dragon to either act as close support for the army he's with, to coordinate with the elite forces of his own side to launch focused attacks at enemy elites, or to raid rear areas where he won't encounter anything that can really threaten him. Trying solo attacks isn't a good idea if the enemy is not trivial to beat.

Of course a dragon would have to be wary, especially against an army that can prepare for their intervention.

But that's where the "pick the right moment" part comes into play. A dragon would dive and attack when the enemies give them an opening, be they a spell being cast, a volley of arrows, or other such occurrences. And their flying position would give the dragon a good view to pick which target is the most vulnerable (ie, can't react adequately) at the given moment.

Also keep in mind than mid-level adventurers are already "Masters of the Realm" in term of weight class. You'd need a *huge* army to have several groups of those.

[krugaan]

I mean, meteor swarm seems more dangerous to any army than a dragon.

Four 40' radius AOEs dealing an unsurvivable 40d6 damage (for your average soldier), from a distance of up to mile away. That's over 20000 square feet of dead army, burned siege engines, etc.

Hmmmm, are level 17 bards / sorcs / wizards rarer than mercenary dragons?

[Unoriginal]

I mean, meteor swarm seems more dangerous to any army than a dragon.

Four 40' radius AOEs dealing an unsurvivable 40d6 damage (for your average soldier), from a distance of up to mile away. That's over 20000 square feet of dead army, burned siege engines, etc.

Hmmmm, are level 17 bards / sorcs / wizards rarer than mercenary dragons?

Define "mercenary".

Dragons that are willing to fight alongside an army for their goals? Way more numerous than lvl 17 casters.

The Githyanki are known to take several adult (or older) Red Dragons along for their raids, for example.

Dragons that make a career of fighting for others in exchange for coins? That's rarer.

[noob]

The thing is that due to how 5e bows works like modern rifles warfare look a lot different and so you can not assume it will look like real life medieval warfare.
The real use of dragons(assuming casting or shape-shifting dragons) is infiltration and assassination and not for its flight because when the dragon takes off it dies fast as it becomes an easy target for many archers and the lucky strikes stacks quickly.
If 5e dragons no longer have casting or shapeshifting then it have a value comparable to the one of a bunch of knights but not much more.
Because yes: aoe attacks are so common it is normal for an army to spread its soldiers.
Between wizards, magical siege weapons, all those monsters with aoe attacks and so on spreading your army is a very useful thing and being able to compress or spread fast is a good thing (compress in case of melee heavy armor assaults such as a bunch of knights) so having a lot of squads of like 40 soldiers that spreads over a wide area and are still close enough for regrouping in one round of fast movement is probably the good way for fighting until you meet truly huge armies in which case due to having to manage to keep all your archers within the right range of the opponents you might have your archers clustered more than that and start being really vulnerable to aoes or you have archers out of range that does not participate at the same time but if your opponent is forced to spread too due to you having aoe attacks it evens out and it ends up being the one which brings the highest archer spam that wins.

[LudicSavant]

If you want to make dragons insanely dangerous, especially against mook swarms/armies of villagers, make them spellcasting dragons or otherwise give them a way to reliably impose Disadvantage on attacks against them.

This makes a big difference in how many villagers with crossbows they can survive. For examples, without Disadvantage a villager can land 1 in 20 attacks. With Disadvantage they can land 1 in 400 attacks.

[Rukelnikov]

Define "mercenary".

Dragons that are willing to fight alongside an army for their goals? Way more numerous than lvl 17 casters.

The Githyanki are known to take several adult (or older) Red Dragons along for their raids, for example.

Dragons that make a career of fighting for others in exchange for coins? That's rarer.

Way more numerous? Where do you get this from?

Larloch alone has 60 liches in his fort with him, that's a similar quantity to the amount of known dragons in all of faerun (adult or older)


If you want to make dragons insanely dangerous, especially against mook swarms/armies of villagers, make them spellcasting dragons or otherwise give them a way to reliably impose Disadvantage on attacks against them.

This makes a big difference in how many villagers with crossbows they can survive. For examples, without Disadvantage a villager can land 1 in 20 attacks. With Disadvantage they can land 1 in 400 attacks.

Well, the dragon's frightful presence has a pretty good chance of affecting commoners and that gives disadvantage, it only works for a couple rounds sadly.

[LudicSavant]

Let's say you have a Spellcasting Ancient Red Shadow Dragon flying around at night. This dragon will have Resistance to attacks that aren't Force, Psychic, or Radiant, and villagers will be unable to target them in the first place due to the fact that they Hide as a bonus action every turn, and when they can attack the Shadow Dragon at all, they have a 1 in 400 chance of hitting the bugger for piddly damage through its arcane defenses.

And its breath weapon creates an army of shadows out of every cluster of mooks hit.

This is how you make an army-clearing monster. It's basically everything the Tarrasque wishes it was.

[stoutstien]

In one of my campaigns I had a clan of black dragons that works like a company of mercenary. They would use humanoid form for stealth/ assassin and just dropped huge rocks and other payloads from far above large open conflicts.

[Man_Over_Game]

If you want to make dragons insanely dangerous, especially against mook swarms/armies of villagers, make them spellcasting dragons or otherwise give them a way to reliably impose Disadvantage on attacks against them.

This makes a big difference in how many villagers with crossbows they can survive. For examples, without Disadvantage a villager can land 1 in 20 attacks. With Disadvantage they can land 1 in 400 attacks.

Solid point, but most villagers won't have proficiency with a Longbow. A dragon's breath attack has range of up to 90 feet, enough to impose Disadvantage.

You could also just say that the Dragon can do a version of his breath attack that takes a Legendary Action to double its range, which I think is fair.

[LudicSavant]

A Spellcasting Ancient Red Shadow Dragon won't just take out a basically unlimited number of villagers, they'll be able to take out a basically unlimited number of average soldiers, too.

[Rukelnikov]

Let's say you have a Spellcasting Ancient Red Shadow Dragon flying around at night. This dragon will have Resistance to attacks that aren't Force, Psychic, or Radiant, and villagers will be unable to target them in the first place due to the fact that they Hide as a bonus action every turn, and when they can attack the Shadow Dragon at all, they have a 1 in 400 chance of hitting the bugger for piddly damage through its arcane defenses.

And its breath weapon creates an army of shadows out of every cluster of mooks hit.

This is how you make an army-clearing monster. It's basically everything the Tarrasque wishes it was.

The Tarrasque is immune to nonmagical attacks, he can take on those villagers without needing to hide...

[LudicSavant]

The Tarrasque is immune to nonmagical attacks, he can take on those villagers without needing to hide...

Not really. Throw in a few high elves with horses and he's in trouble.

[Rukelnikov]

Not really. Throw in a few high elves with horses and he's in trouble.

Elves, as a race, are op, for instance they were the first to tame dragons in faerun and Durothil became the first dragon rider.

Against (almost) any other race, the tarrasque is pretty set.

[Unoriginal]

Way more numerous? Where do you get this from?

As I said in my post, Githyanki are known to take several adult or older dragons with them on their raids.

Also unless I'm mistake, this also happen several times in the Tyranny of Dragon module(s)



Larloch alone has 60 liches in his fort with him, that's a similar quantity to the amount of known dragons in all of faerun (adult or older)

Where do you get this from? A 5e source?

[stoutstien]

Elves, as a race, are op, for instance they were the first to tame dragons in faerun and Durothil became the first dragon rider.

Against (almost) any other race, the tarrasque is pretty set.
It explains why they need a few dragons

[Rukelnikov]

As I said in my post, Githyanki are known to take several adult or older dragons with them on their raids.

Also unless I'm mistake, this also happen several times in the Tyranny of Dragon module(s)



Where do you get this from? A 5e source?

Ed Greenwood, he's higher canon than 5e sources in my book.

Also for example:

"In the Year of Lightning Storms, 1374 DR, over two hundred liches attacked the Knights of Myth Drannor while seeking to corrupt part of the Weave. All bore Larloch's mark. A great many were defeated by the combined might of clockwork soldiers created by Mystra and the Knights, but the liches did succeed in corrupting dozens of baelnorns to their will, who also perished in the battle. Larloch later appeared to the Knights to apologize, explaining that he'd simply given the liches their freedom as a test, to see what they did with it, and called their actions foolish. He said he only sought greater power in the Art of magic, and would not battle those who served Mystra. He was fascinated by Storm Silverhand's silver fire, desiring its power for his own but fearing that it could destroy him. Storm allowed him a close look, and he said it was the first kindness he'd been given in a long time"

Probably more than a hundred 17th levels casters there.

[LudicSavant]

Elves, as a race, are op, for instance they were the first to tame dragons in faerun and Durothil became the first dragon rider.

Against (almost) any other race, the tarrasque is pretty set.

They're really not. But I'm not even going to get into rehashing the thousand different ways for intelligent humanoids to kill the Tarrasque, because this one's already enough. If your anti-city monster can't take a few people with cantrips, they are not an anti-city monster in any practical sense.

[Rukelnikov]

They're really not.

This discussion would be extremely off topic, lets just say I disagree


But I'm not even going to get into rehashing the thousand different ways for intelligent humanoids to kill the Tarrasque, because this one's already enough. If your anti-city monster can't take a few people with cantrips, they are not an anti-city monster in any practical sense.

The average village doesn't have dozens of people capable of casting acid splash willing to take on the tarrasque for minutes on end. The tarrasque is not taking on Silvery Moon or Waterdeep. The shadow dragon isn't either if we're using npcs as bots.

[OverLordOcelot]

But that's where the "pick the right moment" part comes into play. A dragon would dive and attack when the enemies give them an opening, be they a spell being cast, a volley of arrows, or other such occurrences. And their flying position would give the dragon a good view to pick which target is the most vulnerable (ie, can't react adequately) at the given moment.

Dragons don't fly that fast, they only move 80' per round. Longbows have a max range of 600', even simple light crossbows have a range of 320', and Earthbind has a range of 300'. They can't loiter out of range then fly in and do something in between spells being cast or arrows being volleyed, it's going to take 2 rounds of dashing to move from 'out of range' to 'in range', and the caster or archer has an action on each of those rounds. The speed of people's actions compared to the dragon's movement is just too high. Sure, a spellcasting dragon can use something like dimension door - but that's going to require DD - breathe - DD and expose them to multiple rounds of fire from the army. And that's not a weird gamey effect, historical archers would fire 10-15 rounds per minute, which corresponds to 1-1.5 arrows per D&D round.

I also question how much a dragon is going to be able to see if it stays out of arrow range. They have good perception, but I think that discerning what an individual is doing from 500' or more away (especially while moving) is more than a little difficult. https://static.prisonpolicy.org/images/geographypunishment/w03_500.jpg


Also keep in mind than mid-level adventurers are already "Masters of the Realm" in term of weight class. You'd need a *huge* army to have several groups of those.

Level 5-10 characters are not "Masters of the realm", at least not in FR or the background amount of power that makes sense to the power levels in published adventures. Waterdeep has multiple level 20s, level 5-10 characters are not going to master a single ward in there, much less 'the realm'.

[Unoriginal]

Level 5-10 characters are not "Masters of the realm", at least not in FR or the background amount of power that makes sense to the power levels in published adventures. Waterdeep has multiple level 20s, level 5-10 characters are not going to master a single ward in there, much less 'the realm'.

Level 5-10 isn't "mid level". Well, lvl 10 could be described as mid-level.


Level 5-10 is defined as "Heroes of the Realm", btw.

[LudicSavant]

The average village doesn't have dozens of people capable of casting acid splash willing to take on the tarrasque for minutes on end. The tarrasque is not taking on Silvery Moon or Waterdeep. The shadow dragon isn't either if we're using npcs as bots.

I can't help but notice that I didn't say anything about an average village, or Silvery Moon or Waterdeep (in which case, we're talking about fighting lots of high level spellcasters).

[krugaan]

The average village doesn't have dozens of people capable of casting acid splash willing to take on the tarrasque for minutes on end. The tarrasque is not taking on Silvery Moon or Waterdeep. The shadow dragon isn't either if we're using npcs as bots.

If the dozens of "if you had one cantrip IRL" threads have proved anything, the Tarrasque would be really clean, and not drenched in acid.

[Fat Rooster]

They are not the supersonic unkillable monstrosities that they are in 3rd ed, but they are still extremely potent. Armies actually clashing is not where their major impact will be though. Their biggest impact will probably come from a passive perception of 17+, fast flight, and the ability to nuke a juicy target. Scouting and harassment of enemy supply lines are their bread and butter. Decent stealth and intelligence make them powerful special forces even multiple days travel into enemy territory. Throw on amphibious or burrow and then in many cases they can rest extremely safely.

I would expect a decent number of young dragons to spend time as mercenaries, especially if they have particular tastes for their hoard. You are unlikely to find exactly what you want by raiding, while a paymaster might be able to find it quite easily. A young dragon can be as young as 6, and while they are already very intelligent at that age they can still be manipulated. They may be wise enough to realise that their power vastly exceeds their experience, and that guidance and protection from an organisation that has helped dragons find their wings in the past (and has draconic members currently) could be beneficial. On the other side, a mercenary group that gets a reputation of being able to bring dragons to war would find that extremely lucrative.

[OverLordOcelot]

Level 5-10 isn't "mid level". Well, lvl 10 could be described as mid-level.

5-10 most certainly is mid level as I would use the terms, 11+ would be high level. I don't accept defining level ranges in such a way that the vast majority of campaigns never even hit mid-level, and from the data that WOTC has released only 10% of campaigns ever go past 10th level.


Level 5-10 is defined as "Heroes of the Realm", btw.

And there are likely to be a lot of heroes on a big battlefield.

[Rukelnikov]

I can't help but notice that I didn't say anything about an average village, or Silvery Moon or Waterdeep (in which case, we're talking about fighting lots of high level spellcasters).

No, I did:

"he can take on those villagers without needing to hide..."

To which you replied:

"Not really."

And we kept going from there

[Throne12]

The thing is yall are thinking about army tactics of the 1300 and older. With magic, dragons and people wearing plate and swing heavy weapons. Making 4 attacks and running 30ft all in 6 secs. Wars would not be fought in large Battalions. I see using more modern tactics better. Having smaller highly trained squads fighting as teams be better.

So where would dragons fit in at. Well they would act like helicopter like in today's age. They can swoop lay down heavy damage with there breath attack. As soldiers rush to climb onto of it. Then fly away to safety. They can be used are carpet bombing with it death attack. A wizard can Polymorph it into a crow then. Puff there is a dragon in the middle of the city.

[noob]

The thing is yall are thinking about army tactics of the 1300 and older. With magic, dragons and people wearing plate and swing heavy weapons. Making 4 attacks and running 30ft all in 6 secs. Wars would not be fought in large Battalions. I see using more modern tactics better. Having smaller highly trained squads fighting as teams be better.

So where would dragons fit in at. Well they would act like helicopter like in today's age. They can swoop lay down heavy damage with there breath attack. As soldiers rush to climb onto of it. Then fly away to safety. They can be used are carpet bombing with it death attack. A wizard can Polymorph it into a crow then. Puff there is a dragon in the middle of the city.
I already started explaining that medieval would be nonexistent and that people would be spread with the possibility of regrouping in case of a really strong melee force ramming them at high speed..

[ShikomeKidoMi]

The real use of dragons(assuming casting or shape-shifting dragons) is infiltration and assassination and not for its flight because when the dragon takes off it dies fast as it becomes an easy target for many archers and the lucky strikes stacks quickly.

Assuming it stupidly takes off in range of enemy archers, sure. But there's absolutely no reason to do that, when, as others have pointed out, it can just fly around the entire battle and either enter the field at a time and place of its choosing or act as a raider and hit undefended (or lightly defended) targets. With flight faster than a horse on the ground and high perception, you can hit supply lines, enemy cities, burn fields, etc.

[noob]

Assuming it stupidly takes off in range of enemy archers, sure. But there's absolutely no reason to do that, when, as others have pointed out, it can just fly around the entire battle and either enter the field at a time and place of its choosing or act as a raider and hit undefended (or lightly defended) targets. With flight faster than a horse on the ground and high perception, you can hit supply lines, enemy cities, burn fields, etc.

Except you are assuming only one side have a fast striking force while there is many things other than dragons which can fill that role and once both armies are subjected to the same pressures it becomes symetrical and so if any army is unable to defend its supply lines from either a hundred invisible trackers or a dragon or a simulacrum of a lich that uses invisibility and then meteor shower(or even flight then meteor shower) or one of the hundred other options for attacking behind the lines then this army is not able to do anything therefore we conclude supply lines if they are not obsoleted by some sort of magic(such as outsiders that teleport at will) are defended as much efficiently as the rest of the army and that the cities are also defended massively(ex: all the commoners have longbows and there is a bunch of lich or wizards or titans or whatever in addition to those villagers)

[Tvtyrant]

The biggest advantage of 5E dragons IMO would be as super cavalry. Your supply line gets mauled every night, your villages and fields are destroyed if you leave them unguarded, and your routing soldiers will be turned to ash.

Just having it fly over a camp, blast it in a flyover and leave would have massive detrimental effects on morale. The army needs to keep enough archers awake to fend it off, who are then tired the next day while the dragon naps somewhere.

[noob]

The biggest advantage of 5E dragons IMO would be as super cavalry. Your supply line gets mauled every night, your villages and fields are destroyed if you leave them unguarded, and your routing soldiers will be turned to ash.

Just having it fly over a camp, blast it in a flyover and leave would have massive detrimental effects on morale. The army needs to keep enough archers awake to fend it off, who are then tired the next day while the dragon naps somewhere.

You are forgetting the army only have archers and a bunch of knights and/or casters: normal melee soldiers are obsolete in dnd5e armies because bows are roughly as deadly as modern rifles against normal soldiers.
Also the knights might also be wearing ranged weapons if they are allowed to switch weapons.

Also the deadliest armies if we remove elites(likes knights or casters or invisible trackers and so on) are probably kobold armies if they have the right to use the longest ranged weapons(pack tactics + umbrellas).

[Tetrasodium]

So, I think we are all familiar with the theorycrafting that goes into calculating how many soldiers you would need to fend off an adult dragon. Not a month goes by without some sort of speculation about the DPR of dragons vs the average villager. Most agree that such fights are hard to simulate since dragons are super-intelligent flying death lizards who would rarely stand and fight when not sure of absolute victory.

What I am curious about is what happens when dragons are applied more like snipers than sledgehammers. What if a kingdom, mostly made of humans, have draconic allies. if they had some two-legged meatshields, how would that affect a battlefield?

The Temeraire novels by Naomi Novik goes into the concept a bit, but the Napoleonic technology is a bit more advanced than what I usually run. In a setting with more medieval/early renaissance technological levels like the Forgotten Realms, what could a flight or pair of dragons do for a country's defense?

Granted this changes from edition to edition and system to system, but I'm primarily running 5E, so I figured I'd ask here.


The question depends heavily on the setting. With that said, in eberron The Dragons as a species have gone to war a couple times. The first was during the age of demons (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Age_of_Demons) (-10,000,000YK) they had a war against the demon overlords that was not going well for The Dragons until the Couatl (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Couatl) sacrificed themselves to bind the demon overlords & other children of khyber. The second time was far more dramatic and similar to when the Dal Quor ("]vorlons are motivated into solving your problem[/url].

After The Children of Khyber were bound to khyber, The Dragons looked around & decided that the giants were an interesting race that they would share the secrets of magic with. Fast forward 40,000 years from there and the giants were being invaded by the Quori from the plane of dreams ([url="https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Dal_Quor)) resulting in a war that was not going well for the continent spanning giant empire/civilization. In a desperate move, the giantsturned to mass blood sacrifice of their slave race (the elves they created) and possibly others. Through that sacrifice, the giants destroyed one of Eberron's 13 moons and shifted Dal Quor into a new orbit that made it impossible to access outside of dreams & Eberron impossible to access from Dal Quor by extension. Depending on the source, the dragons looked in horrorat this terrible use of the knowledge they gave freely and/or it caused some problems with The Prophecy (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Draconic_Prophecy). In response, The Dragons destroyed one of the most advanced civilizations in d&d, seem to have cursed the Giant race (who may have cursed themselves for power), destroyed the entire continent spanning empire, cursed the continent in a way that causes anyone who becomes too advanced to kill themselves off. That curse remains tends of thousands of years later and adventurers/explorers often find the remnants of civilizations that wiped themselves out because of that curse. That was not the end though. Travel through Xendriik is not as simple as walking from point A to point B on the map, the landscape itself will change & shift as the traveler's curse (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Traveler%27s_Curse) will warp time & space there.

This (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Traveler%27s_Curse) is a great podcast about dragons in eberron

The Emerald Claw (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/The_Emerald_Claw), and Vvaraak (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Vvaraak) are two historically documented incidents were individual dragons got involved with goals other than just amusement and the results were only slightly less dramatic.

[Unoriginal]

Keep in mind that while longbows are impressive, they're also expensive. A longbow with a quiver full of arrows is worth more than one month of pay for an elite soldier.

There's a reason why the typical humanoid armed force in 5e is composed in majority of Guards, with on average 20% of Veterans.

[Zilong]

Thanks for the responses.

I did have in mind that they would probably be best as force multiplies, taking out strategic targets like supply chains/depots and officers. Good to know my thinking makes sense.

But, on the battlefield, as others have pointed out, it looks like most agree that dragons would probably be best deployed as a massive morale shock.

THought, I've always felt there was an overabundance of dragons and high-level characters in these considerations. Yes, they would exist, but I've always assumed, even for the hypersaturated magical setting of Faerun, that such immensely powerful entities would still be relatively rare. Like one in several hundred thousand rare. That story of the lich battalion is amusing and one I've not seen before.

[Unoriginal]

Thanks for the responses.

I did have in mind that they would probably be best as force multiplies, taking out strategic targets like supply chains/depots and officers. Good to know my thinking makes sense.

But, on the battlefield, as others have pointed out, it looks like most agree that dragons would probably be best deployed as a massive morale shock.

THought, I've always felt there was an overabundance of dragons and high-level characters in these considerations. Yes, they would exist, but I've always assumed, even for the hypersaturated magical setting of Faerun, that such immensely powerful entities would still be relatively rare. Like one in several hundred thousand rare. That story of the lich battalion is amusing and one I've not seen before.

Yes, they would be rare. Elite troops and the casters you'd see in that kind of fights are generally around what could be expected of lvl 5-6 PCs.

[Tvtyrant]

You are forgetting the army only have archers and a bunch of knights and/or casters: normal melee soldiers are obsolete in dnd5e armies because bows are roughly as deadly as modern rifles against normal soldiers.
Also the knights might also be wearing ranged weapons if they are allowed to switch weapons.

Also the deadliest armies if we remove elites(likes knights or casters or invisible trackers and so on) are probably kobold armies if they have the right to use the longest ranged weapons(pack tactics + umbrellas).

Where am I forgetting this? I said "don't use it in direct combat, it is a raider." The dragon travels faster then its opponents and can burn up supply lines and civilians like nothing else, it is a bit fragile in direct combat (although casters with buffs can help.)

[OracularPoet]

The question depends heavily on the setting. With that said, in eberron The Dragons as a species have gone to war a couple times. The first was during the age of demons (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Age_of_Demons) (-10,000,000YK) they had a war against the demon overlords that was not going well for The Dragons until the Couatl (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Couatl) sacrificed themselves to bind the demon overlords & other children of khyber. The second time was far more dramatic and similar to when the Dal Quor ("]vorlons are motivated into solving your problem[/url].

After The Children of Khyber were bound to khyber, The Dragons looked around & decided that the giants were an interesting race that they would share the secrets of magic with. Fast forward 40,000 years from there and the giants were being invaded by the Quori from the plane of dreams ([url="https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Dal_Quor)) resulting in a war that was not going well for the continent spanning giant empire/civilization. In a desperate move, the giantsturned to mass blood sacrifice of their slave race (the elves they created) and possibly others. Through that sacrifice, the giants destroyed one of Eberron's 13 moons and shifted Dal Quor into a new orbit that made it impossible to access outside of dreams & Eberron impossible to access from Dal Quor by extension. Depending on the source, the dragons looked in horrorat this terrible use of the knowledge they gave freely and/or it caused some problems with The Prophecy (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Draconic_Prophecy). In response, The Dragons destroyed one of the most advanced civilizations in d&d, seem to have cursed the Giant race (who may have cursed themselves for power), destroyed the entire continent spanning empire, cursed the continent in a way that causes anyone who becomes too advanced to kill themselves off. That curse remains tends of thousands of years later and adventurers/explorers often find the remnants of civilizations that wiped themselves out because of that curse. That was not the end though. Travel through Xendriik is not as simple as walking from point A to point B on the map, the landscape itself will change & shift as the traveler's curse (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Traveler%27s_Curse) will warp time & space there.

This (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Traveler%27s_Curse) is a great podcast about dragons in eberron

The Emerald Claw (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/The_Emerald_Claw), and Vvaraak (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Vvaraak) are two historically documented incidents were individual dragons got involved with goals other than just amusement and the results were only slightly less dramatic.

I do love Eberron, but my first love was Krynn. If you want some inspiration and a lower technology level than Eberron, read the first Dragonlance trilogy. If you like that, read the second trilogy. And then don’t read anything else of the novels.

[Dr. Cliché]

Regarding the issue of Dragons being vulnerable to archers, I wonder if the real issue is people not seeing past their statblock?

Yes, Dragons are known for breathing fire and doing so requires them to get relatively close to their enemy (well within range of any archers), but this is just their 'default' method of attack.

What if instead, dragons took off carrying boulders or flechettes or barrels of acid/alchemists fire? Now you've got the fantasy equivalent of long-range bombers. What's more, with this scenario, the dragons never need get within range of archers. They can drop their makeshift bombs from 1000ft in the air - well beyond the range of spells and arrows.

Hell, Red Dragons could carry rocks coated in tar (or some other flammable substance), ignite them when they get over their target (not like they have to worry about burning themselves) and then drop them into an enemy city.

Might take some practise for the dragons to get good at aiming their bombs, but they're basically untouchable against anything that can't fly.

[rlc]

I'd say you should think of dragons in terms of aerial warfare, with the exception that they'd have to fly pretty low in order to use their breath weapon. As has been said earlier, they could help carry supplies or used to drop large rocks on the enemy, but also remember that their breath weapon brings them into range of ranged weapons and spells, so they might not be too effective when it comes to napalming your enemies more than a couple times, when it comes to facing actual armies. Of course, if you have multiple dragons, that changes a little bit, and having dogfighting dragon armies sounds like it would be fun to watch.

[OmSwaOperations]

I think the key advantage of Dragons, which has been gotten at a little in the thread already, is simply the fact they can fly - and fly fast.

They would be the perfect raiding cavalry, able to strike without warning well behind enemy lines, destroy vital infrastructure, penetrate the defences of walled fortresses, and so on. To kill a dragon, you probably need a bunch of conventional forces. But conventional forces move slowly, so the only reason why a dragon would ever lose to them would be ambush or overconfidence. So Dragons could evade the main counter to them with ease, whilst slowly whittling away enemy populations, supplies and will to fight.

[awa]

also remember that at least for fire breathing dragons (and possibly lightning), fire spreads.
If a dragons swoops in at midnight drops a fire blast on the town then books it, their is little opportunity to do anything about the dragon who you cant see in the dark anyway and now you have a large fire to deal with. Towns burn, fields burn, ships burn, forests burn. A dragon is a devastating stealth bomber.

[Bloodcloud]

Yeah, best use of your dragon is as supply line breaking, field devastation and economy ruining. Night dragon attack on the enemy camp would be the best use.

I could see them charging along the cavalry providing air support, because you can ignore neither target.

[Throne12]

The biggest advantage of 5E dragons IMO would be as super cavalry. Your supply line gets mauled every night, your villages and fields are destroyed if you leave them unguarded, and your routing soldiers will be turned to ash.

Just having it fly over a camp, blast it in a flyover and leave would have massive detrimental effects on morale. The army needs to keep enough archers awake to fend it off, who are then tired the next day while the dragon naps somewhere.

Yall keep taking about supply lines. But ya'll are for getting spells like create food and water or goodberry. Ya you would need arrows, spell comp, and other non food stuff. But you can use bags of holding and teleport spells. So why would there be supply lines.

[awa]

Yall keep taking about supply lines. But ya'll are for getting spells like create food and water or goodberry. Ya you would need arrows, spell comp, and other non food stuff. But you can use bags of holding and teleport spells. So why would there be supply lines.

that assumes a fairly high proportion of casters to mundanes who have nothing better to do with their spells.

Also a real army needs a lot of supplies. While the game is abstracted enough that pcs dont need to worry about replacing their shoes and coats a real army would.

[Unoriginal]

Yall keep taking about supply lines. But ya'll are for getting spells like create food and water or goodberry.

What.

Do you have an idea how many spell slots you'd need to feed an army with magic?


Ya you would need arrows, spell comp, and other non food stuff. But you can use bags of holding and teleport spells.

If you can pay a fortune in gold and favors, maybe.


So why would there be supply lines.

Because magic is not practical for it.

[rlc]

Create food and water takes care of like 15 people (eta: or 5 steeds). Casting it 1000 times is fine for when you're just holding ground, but when you're actively engaged in a siege, you'll want to be casting offensive spells.

[noob]

was there creatures with at will teleport in dnd 5e?

[Tvtyrant]

Yall keep taking about supply lines. But ya'll are for getting spells like create food and water or goodberry. Ya you would need arrows, spell comp, and other non food stuff. But you can use bags of holding and teleport spells. So why would there be supply lines.

Even assuming that 1/5 your army is mages if some stripe and you have a relatively high number of high level mages so teleport and bags of holding are available you are still leaving your civilian population to starve or be burned.

The dragon can simply burn villages at night and fields or flocks by day, and will soon destroy the country the army originated in. If the army divides up to defend the country side you just use more concentrated forces to defeat them in detail while the dragon keeps thek from assembling.

[Throne12]

Again you all arent thinking. Wars would not be fought with large standing armies. It would be a stupid and Suicide way to wage war. Because of what a dragon can do. A dragon can swoop in and instantly kill a large amount of soldiers standing in nice neat formations. It can intercept supplies lines so dame quickly. It can use the scorched earth Strategy but then you aren't getting those Resources when you take over that territory. It's a tactic used when your Retreating not advancing. Remember back then people fought over land and resources unlike to day wars.

Just having a present of a dragon would change war strategy and tactics.


Dragon can drop oil, rocks, alchemist fire, infested dead bodies, any really from so high up archers cant reach them. They can also have a group of archers on there back firing down on enemy archers. While still being out of range from the ground bowman.

A army can put a large amount of money into creating wands of magic missile then. In times of war drafting Citizens then train them stupidly fast to use the wands. When the dragon gets in range to use it breath weapon the general with give command to fire. Now just imagine a 100 wands of MM going off no make it 1000 to 3000 of them. That dragon isnt going to get its breath attack off.

Before you say well that cost to much gp. Countries have spent so much money into armies it's not even funny. War is humans most expensive hobby and in 2011 use had a $680 billion budget for the military.

So wars would look more like today wars with magic and magical creatures at a countries.

[rlc]

We have planes, which are probably much better weapons than dragons, and we still have standing armies and wars over land and resources.
Even with magic missile wands and arcane archers with longbows, you'll still have a need for standing armies in warzones, even if it's just to hold ground.
You'll also have to do more than just burninate the enemy, especially if they also have dragons.

[Tvtyrant]

Again you all arent thinking. Wars would not be fought with large standing armies. It would be a stupid and Suicide way to wage war. Because of what a dragon can do. A dragon can swoop in and instantly kill a large amount of soldiers standing in nice neat formations. It can intercept supplies lines so dame quickly. It can use the scorched earth Strategy but then you aren't getting those Resources when you take over that territory. It's a tactic used when your Retreating not advancing. Remember back then people fought over land and resources unlike to day wars.

Just having a present of a dragon would change war strategy and tactics.


Dragon can drop oil, rocks, alchemist fire, infested dead bodies, any really from so high up archers cant reach them. They can also have a group of archers on there back firing down on enemy archers. While still being out of range from the ground bowman.

A army can put a large amount of money into creating wands of magic missile then. In times of war drafting Citizens then train them stupidly fast to use the wands. When the dragon gets in range to use it breath weapon the general with give command to fire. Now just imagine a 100 wands of MM going off no make it 1000 to 3000 of them. That dragon isnt going to get its breath attack off.

Before you say well that cost to much gp. Countries have spent so much money into armies it's not even funny. War is humans most expensive hobby and in 2011 use had a $680 billion budget for the military.

So wars would look more like today wars with magic and magical creatures at a countries.

Except magic in D&D is not analagous to technology. It is limited to a tiny part of the population, and a wand of magic missles takes (I'm away from book) but a year I think?

Say a small country has 3 million people. Of that 1/1000 is an arcane caster (so 1,000.) You can only make 1,000 wands a year, and this will cost you all casting for the year and millions of GP. If you spend years stocking up in peacetime you will have an army of 10,000 men costing a massive and arbitray amount of gold.

Someone invades and simply hires mercenaries at the price of 10GP each, spending the same amount of money to have an army ten times as large. You have now been destroyed for your frankly terrible strategy.

[noob]

Except magic in D&D is not analagous to technology. It is limited to a tiny part of the population, and a wand of magic missles takes (I'm away from book) but a year I think?

Say a small country has 3 million people. Of that 1/1000 is an arcane caster (so 1,000.) You can only make 1,000 wands a year, and this will cost you all casting for the year and millions of GP. If you spend years stocking up in peacetime you will have an army of 10,000 men costing a massive and arbitray amount of gold.

Someone invades and simply hires mercenaries at the price of 10GP each, spending the same amount of money to have an army ten times as large. You have now been destroyed for your frankly terrible strategy.

where do your spell caster to population ratio comes from?
If it comes from a setting you might want to know that if magical creatures starts being used in warfare then people would probably start investing in teaching magic to as many people as possible as it is extremely useful when there is magical creatures around participating in warfare within armies.(like for example if you want to kill invisible trackers some way of seeing invisibility before being hit is a great thing)

[Tvtyrant]

where do your spell caster to population ratio comes from?
If it comes from a setting you might want to know that if magical creatures starts being used in warfare then people would probably start investing in teaching magic to as many people as possible as it is extremely useful when there is magical creatures around participating in warfare within armies.(like for example if you want to kill invisible trackers some way of seeing invisibility before being hit is a great thing)

I picked it off 3.5s numbers and because 1/1000 makes for easy math. Give me an arbitrary percentage and we can work from there, but the answer is going to be the same. 1 year to make a musket by a rare and expensive expert is bad math, especially when the musket has a terrible range and you can hire crossbowmen or horse archers for less to just kill them.

At the point where casters are so common wands are readily available, your army would be better served just using casters in combat and having ye olde pile of peasants screen them.

[noob]

I picked it off 3.5s numbers and because 1/1000 makes for easy math. Give me an arbitrary percentage and we can work from there, but the answer is going to be the same. 1 year to make a musket by a rare and expensive expert is bad math, especially when the musket has a terrible range and you can hire crossbowmen or horse archers for less to just kill them.

At the point where casters are so common wands are readily available, your army would be better served just using casters in combat and having ye olde pile of peasants screen them.

Piles of peasants does not protects against aoe spells or invisible creatures.
Also in 3.5 assuming small 100 person villages are common it is more 3% of the people that is casters in those so it depends on which way you use to spread towns: either you make a few big towns then have way too high level casters rather common or you make a lot of small hamlets and a huge proportion of the population is casters(up to something like 10 percent casters in the most silly small town spam).
the 3.5 way of calculating classed people is so silly I think making some sort of assumption like "only X% of the people have the ability to learn magic"(with X being as high or low as you want and some people decide x is near 0) and then the proportion of the people who learns magic depends on how much they have access to the means to do that is probably a simpler and better way.
In 5e since the removal of non inherited magic (learned wizardry is no longer a thing) it means that now people can not decide "let us raise the proportion of casters to 100%"

[rlc]

Piles of peasants does not protects against aoe spells.
I wouldn't say that. Invisible creatures can be special ops, sure but never underestimate the power of the numbers game, especially when your aoe damage is based on finite resources.

In 5e since the removal of non inherited magic (learned wizardry is no longer a thing) it means that now people can not decide "let us raise the proportion of casters to 100%"
Sorcery is still a thing, but it's admittedly not a sure thing. This is more of an "ackchyually" argument, though, so fairly moot.

[Throne12]

I picked it off 3.5s numbers and because 1/1000 makes for easy math. Give me an arbitrary percentage and we can work from there, but the answer is going to be the same. 1 year to make a musket by a rare and expensive expert is bad math, especially when the musket has a terrible range and you can hire crossbowmen or horse archers for less to just kill them.

At the point where casters are so common wands are readily available, your army would be better served just using casters in combat and having ye olde pile of peasants screen them.

5e rules wand of magic missile is a uncommon item with no attunedment needed. So it would only take a few days to make. Also if they Commission or train Artificers it cost less and work faster lol.

If you where a king or a leader of a nation. Would you not train spellcasters or commission magical wands and other magical arms and armaments.

[noob]

I wouldn't say that. Invisible creatures can be special ops, sure but never underestimate the power of the numbers game, especially when your aoe damage is based on finite resources.

Sorcery is still a thing, but it's admittedly not a sure thing. This is more of an "ackchyually" argument, though, so fairly moot.

what I mean is that making a 100% spell based army is way harder in 5e than in previous editions: you either need some level 17 casters(that operates indirectly through simulacrums) or you need to massively fund magic and even then you will still be capped in caster amounts

[krugaan]

We have planes, which are probably much better weapons than dragons, and we still have standing armies and wars over land and resources.
Even with magic missile wands and arcane archers with longbows, you'll still have a need for standing armies in warzones, even if it's just to hold ground.
You'll also have to do more than just burninate the enemy, especially if they also have dragons.

Bolded for emphasis. If you just want to burn a country to the ground, dragons are a good way to do it. If you actually want to *hold* territory ... you're going to need an army.


Except magic in D&D is not analagous to technology. It is limited to a tiny part of the population, and a wand of magic missles takes (I'm away from book) but a year I think?

Say a small country has 3 million people. Of that 1/1000 is an arcane caster (so 1,000.) You can only make 1,000 wands a year, and this will cost you all casting for the year and millions of GP. If you spend years stocking up in peacetime you will have an army of 10,000 men costing a massive and arbitray amount of gold.

Someone invades and simply hires mercenaries at the price of 10GP each, spending the same amount of money to have an army ten times as large. You have now been destroyed for your frankly terrible strategy.

I don't think 3 million is a small country, at least in terms of Forgotten Realms. Googling says that Waterdeep has a population of 130,000, and that's like the largest human city in the realms, I think.

[Tvtyrant]

Bolded for emphasis. If you just want to burn a country to the ground, dragons are a good way to do it. If you actually want to *hold* territory ... you're going to need an army.



I don't think 3 million is a small country, at least in terms of Forgotten Realms. Googling says that Waterdeep has a population of 130,000, and that's like the largest human city in the realms, I think.

Cities are less then 10% of a pre-modern population in most cases, Waterdeep would require hundreds of thousands of surrounding farmers to be viable. Farmers can only sell a snall percentage of their crops due to inefficient practices, you need a lot of farmers to have a sufficient surplus.

[krugaan]

Cities are less then 10% of a pre-modern population in most cases, Waterdeep would require hundreds of thousands of surrounding farmers to be viable. Farmers can only sell a snall percentage of their crops due to inefficient practices, you need a lot of farmers to have a sufficient surplus.

Makes a bunch of sense now that I think about it, but even assuming a conservative 5%, that would make the "country" of Waterdeep only 2.6 million.

This is diverging pretty radically off topic, but I would think any decent kingdom would be sending roving bards / druids with plant growth (a level 3 spell) to help the farmers out.

[Unoriginal]

In 5e since the removal of non inherited magic (learned wizardry is no longer a thing)

What are you talking about?

Learned wizardry IS a thing. That's what wizards are all about, every descriptions of the class cover that.



I don't think 3 million is a small country, at least in terms of Forgotten Realms. Googling says that Waterdeep has a population of 130,000, and that's like the largest human city in the realms, I think.

5e's Waterdeep is 2 mio of people.

[Tetrasodium]

Quote Originally Posted by Throne12 View Post
Yall keep taking about supply lines. But ya'll are for getting spells like create food and water or goodberry. Ya you would need arrows, spell comp, and other non food stuff. But you can use bags of holding and teleport spells. So why would there be supply lines.
Even assuming that 1/5 your army is mages if some stripe and you have a relatively high number of high level mages so teleport and bags of holding are available you are still leaving your civilian population to starve or be burned.

The dragon can simply burn villages at night and fields or flocks by day, and will soon destroy the country the army originated in. If the army divides up to defend the country side you just use more concentrated forces to defeat them in detail while the dragon keeps thek from assembling.

In a setting where you could plausibly have that many mages, there are other problems too, Specifically the fact that those mages almost certainly have responsabilities of their own relating to things other than your war. Take eberron
House Lyrander: Prior to the invention of airships (very late in the last war), their primary role in society was as raincallers for crops. Obviously that is an important role that can not be diverted from
House Cannith: They make, well... everything. Everbright lanterns, hot/cold plates for cooking, wands, trinkets, weapons & armor for your army, the fancy plows your farmers use when plowing the fields a Lyrander heir is irrigating, etc.
House Orien: They ship things around. While some Orien Heirs can teleport, there are limitations to what they can carry with them & it's more effective to have them zipping a caravan along an orien maintained road.
House Siviis: They handle communications & have the equivalent of an arcane telegraph network
House Jorasco: Healers. They might have a well equipped tent to handle some of your wounded, but no army will attack them & you won't impersonate them because you probably aren't a halfling and more importantly you don't want to lose access to house jorasco either.
House Ghallanda: The mark of hospitality is probably going to be the most likely one capable of casting those spells and/or activating a dragonmarked focus item capable of casting them... but again, they run all of the inns, hotels, etc that you can trust your enlisted & officers to be safe & secure inside. Not to mention that shutting down all of the inns and hotels would cause massive problems. You might have a few Ghallanda heirs feeding parts of your army, but there simply are not enough of them to feed every unit in an army of any notable size
Other houses (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/The_Dragonmarked_Houses) have areas of expertise in entertainment/investigation/spying/assassination/policing/body guarding/etc that are not useful or come with problematic things like massive expenses if relied on too heavily.


Yes you could train people to cast these kinds of spells... but that takes time & effort which is at a premium when you need to start needing to replace them as aundair (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Aundair) was doing for much of the last war & still gearing up to continue If you are training mages anyways, you might as well train them as aundair (and others) did during the last war (http://keith-baker.com/tag/fighter/) for maximum effectiveness in the war instead of training them to do a job that could be replaced by a couple guys pulling a wagon or two of food every so often to the and serving it up to the army.

[krugaan]

5e's Waterdeep is 2 mio of people.

Ah, K. like, the "greater metropolitan Waterdeep area", or the "country of Waterdeep?"

I guess those are pretty much the same thing, though.

[JoeJ]

5e rules wand of magic missile is a uncommon item with no attunedment needed. So it would only take a few days to make. Also if they Commission or train Artificers it cost less and work faster lol.

If you where a king or a leader of a nation. Would you not train spellcasters or commission magical wands and other magical arms and armaments.

By the crafting rules in the DMG, a wand of magic missiles requires 500 gp and 20 caster days of crafting. Commissioning something like that makes sense, and I could also easily see spell casters being expected to pay their taxes in magic items.

[Tetrasodium]

Quote Originally Posted by Unoriginal View Post
5e's Waterdeep is 2 mio of people. Ah, K. like, the "greater metropolitan Waterdeep area", or the "country of Waterdeep?"

I guess those are pretty much the same thing, though.


If waterdeep were in any sort of prolonged war, especially one with high powered magic on both sides... that two million would dwindle fast, here (https://davidthomasdevine.wordpress.com/tag/eberron/) is a great breakdown on one of the five nations showing how that single nation's losses were likely on par with the combined deathtoll of all nations in ww2. It also talks about how such incredible losses can be explained as wotc oversight, but the deathtoll in the last war was significant enough for every nation that they started using undead, (illegally)magebreeding humans, and "created" a free willed intelligent slave race (warforged) simply to be used in war.

[noob]

What are you talking about?

Learned wizardry IS a thing. That's what wizards are all about, every descriptions of the class cover that.



5e's Waterdeep is 2 mio of people.

It is simply not just learning you also need to be born with the ability to do magic in 5e in order to become a wizard unlike in previous dnd editions where just learning was enough.

[Unoriginal]

It is simply not just learning you also need to be born with the ability to do magic in 5e in order to become a wizard unlike in previous dnd editions where just learning was enough.

No, this is not true, and it is not supported by any of the published books.

Wizardry is hard to learn, but it doesn't require some innate ability to do magic.

[noob]

No, this is not true, and it is not supported by any of the published books.

Wizardry is hard to learn, but it doesn't require some innate ability to do magic.

so I guess some 5e people were assuming their setting assumptions applied to the rest of dnd and told me setting specific information as if it was non setting specific.

[Tvtyrant]

Makes a bunch of sense now that I think about it, but even assuming a conservative 5%, that would make the "country" of Waterdeep only 2.6 million.

This is diverging pretty radically off topic, but I would think any decent kingdom would be sending roving bards / druids with plant growth (a level 3 spell) to help the farmers out.

Absolutely they could, and the reason the population doesn't explode is the violent monster attack rate. That is essentially the Tippyverse's universe; big cities protected by magic surrounded by monster filled wastelands.

[Unoriginal]

so I guess some 5e people were assuming their setting assumptions applied to the rest of dnd and told me setting specific information as if it was non setting specific.

Possible. Not everyone can be a wizard, but it's in the same way as "not everyone can be a brain surgeon", not some kind of innate gift à la Harry Potter.

[Tetrasodium]

Possible. Not everyone can be a wizard, but it's in the same way as "not everyone can be a brain surgeon", not some kind of innate gift à la Harry Potter.

Probably still setting specific since there is at least one setting where the butcher, baker, seamstress/tailor, maid, mason, & more are likely to know know at least one or two ritual cantripsthey use as part of their day to day job

[MaxWilson]

Possible. Not everyone can be a wizard, but it's in the same way as "not everyone can be a brain surgeon", not some kind of innate gift à la Harry Potter.

Maybe in your campaign. 5E's ruleset doesn't say one way or the other.

[Unoriginal]

Maybe in your campaign. 5E's ruleset doesn't say one way or the other.

I'm talking about 5e's default lore.

[krugaan]

Absolutely they could, and the reason the population doesn't explode is the violent monster attack rate. That is essentially the Tippyverse's universe; big cities protected by magic surrounded by monster filled wastelands.

I dunno, in a lot of the published adventures so far, a lot of these towns don't seem to be very well protected. Hell, the first half of SKT seems to be explicitly about how all these towns are helpless against giants.

[Tetrasodium]

I dunno, in a lot of the published adventures so far, a lot of these towns don't seem to be very well protected. Hell, the first half of SKT seems to be explicitly about how all these towns are helpless against giants.

That is a faerunism. Both eberron & to a different degree (I think?) darksun would react in ways far from helpless & be almost certain to have a better post-attack reaction than getting crushed. The giant "attacks" themselves are pretty sad by khorvaire (eberron) standards & would just act as an excuse to mobilize armies in prep for another war.

[krugaan]

That is a faerunism. Both eberron & to a different degree (I think?) darksun would react in ways far from helpless & be almost certain to have a better post-attack reaction than getting crushed. The giant "attacks" themselves are pretty sad by khorvaire (eberron) standards & would just act as an excuse to mobilize armies in prep for another war.

Probably, but aren't both eberron and darksun more ... harsh settings?

Plus, you know, it *is* the official setting for 5e.

[Unoriginal]

Probably, but aren't both eberron and darksun more ... harsh settings?


I'm far from an expert on Eberron, but pretty sure that if the Giants attacked settlements en masse it'd be seen as kinda apocalyptic by a lot of people.



Plus, you know, it *is* the official setting for 5e.

No, it is not.

Forgotten Realms is not 5e's official setting. They published a whole guide explaining in which way FR was different from 5e's default.

[krugaan]

No, it is not.

Forgotten Realms is not 5e's official setting. They published a whole guide explaining in which way FR was different from 5e's default.

Sorry, I guess I must have just assumed that given all the published adventures are set there.

[MaxWilson]

I dunno, in a lot of the published adventures so far, a lot of these towns don't seem to be very well protected. ----, the first half of SKT seems to be explicitly about how all these towns are helpless against giants.

They should have used the Israelite/Philistine model, where the source of conflict is "giants have conquered the humans towns and are oppressing them with tribute demands." It creates a sense of urgency but also explains why the humans are still alive to plead for the PCs' help.

[krugaan]

They should have used the Israelite/Philistine model, where the source of conflict is "giants have conquered the humans towns and are oppressing them with tribute demands." It creates a sense of urgency but also explains why the humans are still alive to plead for the PCs' help.

Yeah, maybe that would have been better, but that wouldn't work with some of the set pieces, like nightstone and the ... one where they're attacked by frost giants. Here's how that battle played out for us:

Me: I'm going to run up and try tank these giants with shield and AC flourishes. /rolls

DM: ok. this guard comes up to help you. he attacks once /roll

Me: wait, he only gets one attack?!?

DM: yup. lets see, 7 damage.

Me: oh jesus.

[Tetrasodium]

I'm far from an expert on Eberron, but pretty sure that if the Giants attacked settlements en masse it'd be seen as kinda apocalyptic by a lot of people.



No, it is not.

Forgotten Realms is not 5e's official setting. They published a whole guide explaining in which way FR was different from 5e's default.

If the giant empire of xendriik were to rise from being destroyed & suddenly decide that khorvaire should be targeted, it would likely be ww3 style apocalyptic with all of khorvaire immediately banding together, the giant empire suddeenly being somehow not destroyed by The Dragons, and possibly The Dragons all piling on in a blink... but the giant nobodies of SKT would be murderized & have their tech stolen if not already known in short order.

With that said, the giant empire of Xendriik was destroyed by The Dragons & The dragons appear to have cursed their entire race/continent/etc in ways that make SKT itself a harder sell even beyond the setting problems I noted earlier.



Probably, but aren't both eberron and darksun more ... harsh settings?

Plus, you know, it *is* the official setting for 5e.


Darksun is absolutely a "harsh" setting where any cities will need to deal with regular threats from the waste (halfling tribes & many others). Eberron however... not so much, they had almost a century of ww1/ww2 style civil war that just ended with an uneasy peace leaving everyone feeling cheated (because nobody knows why one country blew up (http://keith-baker.com/tag/mournland/)). The five nations themselves are all gearing up for the next war in their own ways & trying to delay/incite the needed spark as suits their needs. Otherwise though, no most of khorvaire is going to be fairly safe & that goes double if you stick to orien roads & such. Even a place like droaam where you might need a travel banner (ie a tax stamp in flag form) to travel safe from locals trying to eat or enslave you is likely to be reasonably safe if you have a banner & proper guide. Eberron is more of a complicated web than just "harsh".


the "offal setting" thing is problematic because it has frequently been used to justify inserting setting specific stuff into core rules & rulebooks or to heavily corrupt a "setting neutral" adventure with so much setting specific stuff that it becomes needlessly difficult to convert to anything other than faerun<>greyhawk. Someone else noted how having the giants move in & extort tribute/tax/etc from the towns would solve a lot of problems with the towns earlier.. but such a slant would also strip out/dilute "The Ording (https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Ordning_(social_structure))" & its ties to forgotten realms specific lore in ways that would again be likely to make it easier to adapt SKT to other settings.

Offal may have been a typo initially, but I chose to leave the highly descriptive word.

[JackPhoenix]

Probably still setting specific since there is at least one setting where the butcher, baker, seamstress/tailor, maid, mason, & more are likely to know know at least one or two ritual cantripsthey use as part of their day to day job

And neither of those can be a wizard either.

[Tetrasodium]

And neither of those can be a wizard either.

Citation needed.... A best you are being vague and metaphorical. Being a wizard has nothing to do with learning magic either.

[Unoriginal]

Citation needed....

Woah. Seriously?

Even just using the PHB, aka player options, without even mentioning the hundred options NPCs could have:



Ritual Caster
Prerequisite: Intelligence or Wisdom 13 or higher
You have learned a number of spells that you can cast as rituals.



A best you are being vague and metaphorical.

No, he is not. There is nothing metaphorical nor vague in "you don't need to be a wizard to use rituals, and a baker/butcher/basket weaver is not likely to be a wizard".



Being a wizard has nothing to do with learning magic either.

By all the gods and their blood-splattered shades of angels.

PHB :


SCHOLARS OF THE ARCANE

Wild and enigmatic, varied in form and function, the power of magic draws students who seek to master its mysteries.[...] Though the casting of a typical spell requires merely the utterance of a few strange words, fleeting gestures, and sometimes a pinch or clump of exotic materials, these surface components barely hint at the expertise attained after years of apprenticeship and countless hours of study.

[...]

They learn new spells as they experiment and grow in experience. They can also learnthem from other wizards, from ancient tomes or inscriptions, and from ancient creatures (such as the fey) that are steeped in magic.

p.112


[
THE LURE OF KNOWLEDGE
Wizards' lives are seldom mundane, The closest a wizard is likely to come to an ordinary life is working as a sage or lecturer in a library or university, teaching others the secrets of the multiverse. [...] But the lure of knowledge and power calls even the most unadventurous wizards out of the safety of their libraries and laboratories and into crumbling ruins and lost cities.


p. 113


YOUR SPELLBOOK
The spells that you add to your spellbook as you gain levels reflect the arcane research you conduct on your own, as well as intellectual breakthroughs you have had about the nature of the multiverse.


p. 114.


ARCANE TRADITIONS
The study of wizardry is ancient, stretching back to the earliest mortal discoveries of magic. It is firmly established in the worlds of 0&0, with various traditions dedicated to its complex study.

[...]

In some places, these traditions are literally schools; a wizard might study at the School of lllusion while another studies across town at the School of Enchantment. In other institutions, the schools are more like academic departments, with rival faculties competing for students and funding. Even wizards who train apprentices in the solitude of their own towers use the division of magic into schools as a learning device[...]

p. 115


Four pages back-to-back that do nothing but establish that being a wizard has EVERYTHING to do with learning magic (and learning in the academical sense, too).


Then the Xanathar's, in case the PHB wasn't enough for some reasons:


It takes years of study, instruction, and experimentation to learn how to harness magical energy and carry spells around in one’s own mind. For adventuring wizards and other spellcasters who aspire to the highest echelons of the profession, the studying never ends, nor does the quest for knowledge and power.

[...]

Few aspiring wizards undertake the study of magic without some personal goal in mind.



p. 58



Endless hours of solitary study and research can have a negative effect on anyone’s social skills.

p. 59


This forum really makes me wonder if I'm not just goddamn crazy.

[Tetrasodium]

Woah. Seriously?

By all the gods and their blood-splattered shades of angels.

This forum really makes me wonder if I'm not just goddamn crazy.

Indeed.... This thread got off on a tangent with noob putting forward the position of "It is simply not just learning you also need to be born with the ability to do magic in 5e in order to become a wizard unlike in previous dnd editions where just learning was enough.", to which people rightfully pointed out how that is setting specific at best & not supported by the rules. You brought up how not perhaps not everyone can be a wizard akin to how not everyone can be a brain surgeon rather than it needing an innate gift like harry potter or something... to that I did not disagree, I simply noted the presence of a setting where your average skilled tradesperson right down to maid/seamstress/etc likely knows at least a cantrip or two that they use in their day to day work stacks against the need for any kind of special or even rare levels of talent being needed to learn magic. You followed that up with reams of quotes about how wizards are masters of learning it, but there is A: no minimum stat requirement to gain levels in a class, just multiclassing in/out of one or take certain feats... and B: there is no background requirement/exclusion part of any class...

So C: The only thing preventing a "butcher, baker, seamstress/tailor, maid, mason, & more" from becoming a wizard(as you asserted they can not) is the fact that none of those exist as backgrounds. Without resortiong to setting specific restrictions; why specifically is it that you feel a lineup of butcher, baker, seamstress/tailor, maid, mason, & more should be met with "none of those can become a wizard"?

[Unoriginal]

to that I did not disagree, I simply noted the presence of a setting where your average skilled tradesperson right down to maid/seamstress/etc likely knows at least a cantrip or two that they use in their day to day work stacks against the need for any kind of special or even rare levels of talent being needed to learn magic.

And as me and JackPhoenix pointed out, knowing a cantrip or two does not make you a wizard.



You followed that up with reams of quotes about how wizards are masters of learning it, but there is A: no minimum stat requirement to gain levels in a class, just multiclassing in/out of one or take certain feats... and B: there is no background requirement/exclusion part of any class...

No, you tried to pretend that being a wizard had nothing to do with learning magic.


Being a wizard has nothing to do with learning magic either.

To which I responded that it was wrong and that being a wizard has everything to do with learning magic.



So C: The only thing preventing a "butcher, baker, seamstress/tailor, maid, mason, & more" from becoming a wizard(as you asserted they can not)

I have never asserted they cannot become wizards.

I have asserted that knowing a couple cantrips or rituals do not make them wizards.



is the fact that none of those exist as backgrounds.

Guild Artisan, PHB p. 132.




Without resortiong to setting specific restrictions; why specifically is it that you feel a lineup of butcher, baker, seamstress/tailor, maid, mason, & more should be met with "none of those can become a wizard"?

It's kinda insulting you think anyone would fall for your transparent attempt at strawmaning this argument by trying to put words in my mouth.

I have never said that a lineup of "butcher, baker, seamstress/tailor, maid, mason, & more" should be met with " "none of those can become a wizard".

Not everyone can become a wizard, the same way as not everyone can become an adventurer or not everyone can become a doctor. In particular, becoming a wizard requires studying, and quite a bit of money on top of that due to the expensive tools of the trade. So most of the people in a "butcher, baker, seamstress/tailor, maid, mason, & more" lineup will just not have the drive or the means to pursue that path, when they already have a trade they can pursue. Some will, no doubt, if they have the opportunity. Some may even become adventuring wizards.

And before you try to pretend that this is setting-specific and that there's settings where it's not like that, sure, if you want to play the exception game, but let me remind you that the Eberron you like so much also asserts this. Back in 3.X, it literally added a NPC class to create magic items and cast low-level utility spells rather than saying "everyone can be a wizard".

[noob]

And as me and JackPhoenix pointed out, knowing a cantrip or two does not make you a wizard.



No, you tried to pretend that being a wizard had nothing to do with learning magic.



To which I responded that it was wrong and that being a wizard has everything to do with learning magic.



I have never asserted they cannot become wizards.

I have asserted that knowing a couple cantrips or rituals do not make them wizards.



Guild Artisan, PHB p. 132.




It's kinda insulting you think anyone would fall for your transparent attempt at strawmaning this argument by trying to put words in my mouth.

I have never said that a lineup of "butcher, baker, seamstress/tailor, maid, mason, & more" should be met with " "none of those can become a wizard".

Not everyone can become a wizard, the same way as not everyone can become an adventurer or not everyone can become a doctor. In particular, becoming a wizard requires studying, and quite a bit of money on top of that due to the expensive tools of the trade. So most of the people in a "butcher, baker, seamstress/tailor, maid, mason, & more" lineup will just not have the drive or the means to pursue that path, when they already have a trade they can pursue. Some will, no doubt, if they have the opportunity. Some may even become adventuring wizards.

And before you try to pretend that this is setting-specific and that there's settings where it's not like that, sure, if you want to play the exception game, but let me remind you that the Eberron you like so much also asserts this. Back in 3.X, it literally added a NPC class to create magic items and cast low-level utility spells rather than saying "everyone can be a wizard".

to be fair that additional class did have a good synergy with mundane jobs unlike wizard.(except if you factor in feats)

[Unoriginal]

to be fair that additional class did have a good synergy with mundane jobs unlike wizard.(except if you factor in feats)

Never said the contrary.

Though I'm really not in favor of the "all humanoid NPCs have classes" approach.

[MaxWilson]

And neither of those can be a wizard either.

Can you please rephrase? I'm having trouble parsing that sentence in context. Do you mean "it's possible that the cook/maid/baker/etc. are all not wizards," or do you mean "it is necessarily the case that the rules forbid cooks/maids/bakers from being wizards?" The context of your response seems to suggest the former but the words you use suggest the latter. Please clarify.

[Tetrasodium]

I have never said that a lineup of "butcher, baker, seamstress/tailor, maid, mason, & more" should be met with " "none of those can become a wizard".


No, JackPhoenix did with this flippant comment (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=23777724&postcount=90) , to which I which said citation needed (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=23777771&postcount=91) and you had this (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=23777883&postcount=92) apoplectic response to it.


Currently being a wizard is not the same as having the capability to become a wizard. The existance of an official setting (AL legal one even) with a page that covers a bunch of common professions along with the kind of cantrips & spells they are likely to know very heavily demolishes the idea that you need to be born with something special.

Further demolishing that is the fact that a volos orc(-2 int) who manages to start with an int of one can be a wizard as long as they start that way at level 1 & never multiclas out. I'm not sure why anyone in that situation would want to, but there is no mechanical thing preventing said hypothetical magic missile shield& the like spamming wizard from being a 100% legal character.

[krugaan]

this thread has wildly derailed itself since I fell asleep.

as a side note, you guys are good training for reddit, thanks for that.

[Tetrasodium]

Never said the contrary.

Though I'm really not in favor of the "all humanoid NPCs have classes" approach.

the ones I listed are all skilled jobs that require some level of training to perform well (if not to perform at all). It's much differently described & explained (https://twitter.com/JM13136849/status/1106622640704442368) than you are painting it to be.

[Tetrasodium]

this thread has wildly derailed itself since I fell asleep.

as a side note, you guys are good training for reddit, thanks for that.

Agreed... So anyways, why would dragons involve themselves subserviant to humanoids in a humanoid war? The reasons would dramatically influence how much of a threat & how interested in that war the dragon might be. I might have missed that earlier.

[MaxWilson]

The existance of an official setting (AL legal one even) with a page that covers a bunch of common professions along with the kind of cantrips & spells they are likely to know very heavily demolishes the idea that you need to be born with something special.

...in that setting.

Magic often works differently in different settings. See e.g. Athasian defiling.

5E as a system is completely silent on what is required from an in-world perpspective to gain levels in a class or gain spellcasting (of any type)--character generation and advancement is treated as something outside of normal play. You can infer certain things from the ruleset itself (e.g. clerical magic is Dispellable by wizards so it can't be be a miracle in the sense a modern reader would use the word "miraculous"--it's being done by the cleric themself, not directly by a God) but whether it's possible to take 100 people in a village and turn them into 100 wizards is not one of those things. 5E doesn't even tell you how many of those villagers can gain XP and become first-level anythings, let alone whether that "anything" is or can be "wizard".

[krugaan]

Agreed... So anyways, why would dragons involve themselves subserviant to humanoids in a humanoid war? The reasons would dramatically influence how much of a threat & how interested in that war the dragon might be. I might have missed that earlier.

the mercenary dragon idea is actually a worthy one, I suppose. Wealth is typically generated as a function of society, and the humanoid races are the largest concentrations of wealth. A young dragon might hire itself out as an aerial shock troop to an appropriately reverent "supplicant" who would flesh out its horde. This makes much less sense for adult dragons and larger, though, unless it was a particularly prideful dragon.

Metallic dragons are allied with human houses, but that's more like a master / pet sort of relationship.

Klaus (or whatever his name is) the red dragon has his own sphere of influence in the north.

[Unoriginal]

No, JackPhoenix did with this flippant comment (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=23777724&postcount=90) , to which I which said citation needed (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=23777771&postcount=91)

To which you said that being a wizard had nothing to do with learning magic.



Currently being a wizard is not the same as having the capability to become a wizard. The existance of an official setting (AL legal one even) with a page that covers a bunch of common professions along with the kind of cantrips & spells they are likely to know very heavily demolishes the idea that you need to be born with something special.

One, I already made clear in this very thread that no, you do NOT need to be born with something special to be a wizard.

Two, again, knowing cantrips or spells or rituals do NOT make you a wizard. The same way that knowing how to change a car's oil does not make you a car mechanic, even if can be useful to know how to do it.

Three, the existence of Eberron does not prove anything about everyone being able to become a wizard, because those Eberron common-profession-magic-users are not wizards, for the most part.

You're "demolishing" a point no one except noob made, and even then noob admitted it was probably someone telling them something setting specific as if it was general as soon as it was pointed out.



Further demolishing that is the fact that a volos orc(-2 int) who manages to start with an int of one can be a wizard as long as they start that way at level 1 & never multiclas out. I'm not sure why anyone in that situation would want to, but there is no mechanical thing preventing said hypothetical magic missile shield& the like spamming wizard from being a 100% legal character.

Yes, and there is nothing innately stopping an orc from being a brain surgeon either.

But it doesn't change the fact that being a brain surgeon requires studying, spending quite a bit of money, and having either an existing source of knowledge or a lot of experimentation to figure out what works and what doesn't.

And even if this particular orc manages to do it and become a brain surgeon, it doesn't mean ALL the orcs can. Because some don't have the time to study, others because they don't have the money, others still because they don't have the dedication to stick to the grueling work, a fourth group because they don't have access to a source of knowledge on the subject so they never think about it, etc.

It doesn't change that Doctor Dorkork, who is a Bard with Expertise in Medicine, the Healer feat and proficiency in healer's kit, is a 100% AL legal character. But neither does it change that not everyone in the setting can be a medical expert Bard.



the ones I listed are all skilled jobs that require some level of training to perform well (if not to perform at all). It's much differently described & explained (https://twitter.com/JM13136849/status/1106622640704442368) than you are painting it to be.

That screenshot's text literally describes those people as being magewrights (or adepts, if they use divine magic instead of arcane), not wizards, and make the distinction on how their magic & spells work compared to the one of the adventuring classes.

So thank you for destroying your own point so thoroughly.

[Tetrasodium]

the mercenary dragon idea is actually a worthy one, I suppose. Wealth is typically generated as a function of society, and the humanoid races are the largest concentrations of wealth. A young dragon might hire itself out as an aerial shock troop to an appropriately reverent "supplicant" who would flesh out its horde. This makes much less sense for adult dragons and larger, though, unless it was a particularly prideful dragon.

Metallic dragons are allied with human houses, but that's more like a master / pet sort of relationship.

Klaus (or whatever his name is) the red dragon has his own sphere of influence in the north.


It's not just mercenary dragon, take eberron where dragons effectively wield powers restricted to the gods in other settings. Earlier I noted a couple times why individual dragons got involved in humanoid affairs, but there are a couple others that are more likely to be seen in a campaign. Both of those reasons come with very different levels of power that can be expected. First is The Draconic Prophecy (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Draconic_Prophecy). Second is teenage rebellion & adolescent hormones of a better word

The Draconic Prophecy is a major component of eberron that comes up time & again through the setting's history & lore. In a nutshell, it predicts how... everything... can & will unfold in a fantastically complex manner. That complexity is to the extent that dragons might spend most of their (barely) mortal lifespan trying to understand just a small piece of it only to figure it out in their old age just before the events that scratch in the surface involved are about to unfold. This can result in dramatic godlike power coming to bear on your foes... but it can and very likely requires more than just red team beats blue team in the battle of whatever, it might require two specific bloodlines to come together in the seventh son of the seventh son who uses a blade forged in a a specific manner in a specific place in order to kill someone specific of $other bloodline(s) believing that he did it for the greater good of his nation. Your little war is completely irrelivant to making sure the blade is forged right, making sure that the right person has seven kids, making sure that seven of them are boys, making sure that the seventh son also has seven boys, making sure that the seventh son of the seventh son sees things the right way without noticing, making sure that the kid gets the blade, & making sure he is in a position to kill the person he needs to kill with that blade. All of that might very well be the thing that ends your war and allows you to declare victory, but the prophecy might not care if you lose your entire army & most of your nation's population are starving to death... beware the aid of dragons, you are simply ants to them. This can be deep into blue & orange morality (https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BlueAndOrangeMorality) because all that matters is guiding The Prophecy how it needs to be, if that means looking past, enabling, or committing things such as atrocities, war crimes, genocide, or whatever... that is the route they will take no matter their thoughts on those particular actions... Beware, you might as well be a particularly intelligent insect in their eyes.

Adolescence plays another big role in dragons. I mentioned how the dragons went bonkers after Erandis Vol was born with the mark of death (a veryBadThingTM for The Prophecy), but The dragons have never been too keen on necromancy & the elves still practice a form of it using Irian(?) positive energy to make their best & brightest into "deathless" instead of negative energy from Mabar to make traditional undead because that is part of their tradition as elves. The Dragons aren't too keen on that, but don't seem to care enough about it to take action like they did against the giant empire of Xendriik. So every so often a few young/adolescent dragons team up & go raid them some elven cities to prove themselves, blow off steam, or whatever. Since these raids are close to being the draconic equivalent of just bunch of teenagers going off on on a drunken bar brawl with a rival sports team, the older dragons with real power don't involve themselves & the raids are relatively minor to elven society as a whole (even if those raids themselves are devastating to the people hit by them). This is kind of the grouping where your mercenary dragon fits best


The Prophecy is one of those things in eberron that is explicitly never to be defined.

[JoeJ]

It doesn't change that Doctor Dorkork, who is a Bard with Expertise in Medicine, the Healer feat and proficiency in healer's kit, is a 100% AL legal character. But neither does it change that not everyone in the setting can be a medical expert Bard.

I don't know. A setting where all orcs are healing bards would have some interesting potential.

[Imbalance]

I don't know. A setting where all orcs are healing bards would have some interesting potential.

Right? My next character will be an orc wizard-surgeon, but that's just his background. He's set all of that aside to pursue his passions of candle making and classical guitar, and he's leaving his homeland to escape the oppressive taxation. Apparently, the kingdom hired a dragon mercenary they have yet to fully reimburse.

[krugaan]

The Prophecy is one of those things in eberron that is explicitly never to be defined.

Sounds like a Macguffin, pretty much.


Right? My next character will be an orc wizard-surgeon, but that's just his background. He's set all of that aside to pursue his passions of candle making and classical guitar, and he's leaving his homeland to escape the oppressive taxation. Apparently, the kingdom hired a dragon mercenary they have yet to fully reimburse.

Orc knitters have "chin-cozies", which they hang from their lower fangs. Other races have speculated about the use of such a thing, and have come to the conclusion that its purpose is to shield the orc's chin from blood spatter, when they beat your face in for asking about their chin-cozies.

[Tetrasodium]

Sounds like a Macguffin, pretty much.


To a degree the prophecy is extremely useful for justifying certain things yes, but there are some details on it. Eberron has a lot of things that are explicitly never to be defined by WotC. What the mark of death does, what caused the day of mourning, & a few others are in that same basket. It avoids the problem of "well actually in drizzt novel 42 page elev eleventy twelve it clearly says that so so and so caused X by doing Y, it's the book's main plot thread" when the gm starts being a gm & creating stuff.

[furby076]

A Spellcasting Ancient Red Shadow Dragon won't just take out a basically unlimited number of villagers, they'll be able to take out a basically unlimited number of average soldiers, too.

and there is a reason why said dragons couldn't care less about humanid affairs, even if the king of a large kingdom asked. If the king could afford the dragons price, assuming he could get an audience without being fried (his emmisarries would be fried), then the king is probably powerful enough to do his own dirty work.

Yes, dragons can do it...but why would they work for someone when they could just be the ones in charge. Dragons are not only notoriously greedy (even the good ones), but they are self-centered egomaniacs with solid gold chips on their shoulders

[noob]

and there is a reason why said dragons couldn't care less about humanid affairs, even if the king of a large kingdom asked. If the king could afford the dragons price, assuming he could get an audience without being fried (his emmisarries would be fried), then the king is probably powerful enough to do his own dirty work.

Yes, dragons can do it...but why would they work for someone when they could just be the ones in charge. Dragons are not only notoriously greedy (even the good ones), but they are self-centered egomaniacs with solid gold chips on their shoulders
you did not see he was speaking of a specific kind of dragon.
dragons that are not as good at imposing disadvantage or casting spells can not beat giant armies alone.
do not generalize based on one specific dragon.
Or else I might say "kings does not care about dragons because my king which is a mindflayer alobeth wizard cleric god of level 500000000 can kill all the dragons just by thinking about them thanks to its unlimited telepathic powers"
Specific individuals in a category does not allows to conclude things about the category except that in this category there is those individuals.

[stoutstien]

and there is a reason why said dragons couldn't care less about humanid affairs, even if the king of a large kingdom asked. If the king could afford the dragons price, assuming he could get an audience without being fried (his emmisarries would be fried), then the king is probably powerful enough to do his own dirty work.

Yes, dragons can do it...but why would they work for someone when they could just be the ones in charge. Dragons are not only notoriously greedy (even the good ones), but they are self-centered egomaniacs with solid gold chips on their shoulders
Maybe said king knows the location of a particular item the dragon covenant.
The other faction has allied with a rival dragon.
King has draconic blood.
Maybe the dragon is young and egger to watch an army cower and flee from there greatness.
Enemy's goals are mutually dangerous to the dragon

[JoeJ]

Maybe said king knows the location of a particular item the dragon covenant.
The other faction has allied with a rival dragon.
King has draconic blood.
Maybe the dragon is young and egger to watch an army cower and flee from there greatness.
Enemy's goals are mutually dangerous to the dragon

Maybe the dragon is a king, with it's own army.

[furby076]

Maybe the dragon is a king, with it's own army.

Great, now we are in Athas. At this point, offering the dragon a druid who will willingly cast create water each day is sufficient payment

[JoeJ]

Great, now we are in Athas. At this point, offering the dragon a druid who will willingly cast create water each day is sufficient payment

I don't know that much about Athas. Kobold Press's world of Midgard has dragon rulers, though.

In my own World of Battersea, I have (so far) only placed three ancient dragons. One, a green, is queen of an entire country while the second, a black, is her consort. The third, a red, rules an island and collects tribute from passing ships. All of them cast spells, and none would be easily dislodged by an attacking army (or navy, in the case of the third one).

[PhoenixPhyre]

I don't know that much about Athas. Kobold Press's world of Midgard has dragon rulers, though.

In my own World of Battersea, I have (so far) only placed three ancient dragons. One, a green, is queen of an entire country while the second, a black, is her consort. The third, a red, rules an island and collects tribute from passing ships. All of them cast spells, and none would be easily dislodged by an attacking army (or navy, in the case of the third one).

My (non-standard) dragons rule 2 nations and a continent.

An adult brass "rules" (really just watches over and makes sure they don't do anything stupid, she's rarely involved in day-to-day operations but has a veto over the ruling council) over one nation, because she's one of the founders. She was a mortal sorceress who was transformed into a dragon via divine power.

A trio of dragons (gold, silver, and bronze) rule over another nation. They're considered weird by their fellow dragons, because they see the nation as their hoard and share it. That's considered a bit kinky.

Both of them have armies at their command. The trio has a whole nation of fanatics--they're into cultural brainwashing (in a very lawful sort of way). Peaceful and "happy", but very ordered. All 4 are spell-casters, by definition. In my setting, the difference between chromatics and metallics (since I don't have alignment) is that metallics are all spell-casters in the mortal sense, while chromatics don't cast notable spells. Learning to cast spells alters your color.

And then there's the half-continent of South Oelfra, where dragons are the dominant species. They each rule over bands of goblins (mostly) with some dwarves. Giants have North Oelfra, also with goblins and dwarves. Humans didn't come into existence until after the continents split, so they're really rare (descendants of merchants and explorers). Elves...don't have the best reputation, since they were responsible for the splitting of the continent and both dragons and giants have long memories. Orcs are like humans, too new for this. And kobolds only came into existence about 3-4 years ago, so they're only in one tiny band in Noefra.

[Tvtyrant]

Maybe the dragon is a king, with it's own army.

Everyone knows dragons are bankers who invented paper money and created the first backed currencies. More deposits!

[JoeJ]

Everyone knows dragons are bankers who invented paper money and created the first backed currencies. More deposits!

I thought that was gnomes.