What would the ultimate party of four dragon slayers be?

[redking]

Let's say that a party of dragon slayers had to go against a powerful dragon, for example, the quasi-deity Tchazzar from the Forgotten Realms setting or any other great wyrm. What would a party of four dragon slayers be? What classes, what feats, items, magic and so on.

[Mechalich]

Unfortunately the boring answer is just 4 Tier Is, probably Cleric, Druid, Wizard, Wizard, suitably optimized. Figure you want a buffer, a debuffer, a mailman (or any sort of build that can deal huge piles of no save no SR damage), and a minionomancer to bring forth disposal pawns who can absorb the truly absurd series of attacks an Epic-level dragon can dish out.

Tchazzar's stats are kind of ridiculous (the system isn't really intended to output a being with over 1,000 HP), but like most NPC statblocks he's not very optimized. His spell list is kind of bad and he's spent a lot of feats making his breath even more potent. He does, however, have Antimagic Field and uh, it would be the rare character who can survive him managing to land that trap. So the standard anti-antimagic tactics apply.

[lylsyly]

Pretty much what Mechalich said but:

Dwarf Dragonborn Cleric 4/Crusader 1/RKV 10/Cleric +5 (DMM using buff/debuff/frontliner)
Human Dragonborn Druid 20 (Frontliner/summoner)
Elf Dragonborn Elf Generalist Wizard 20 (Utility/debuff/summoner)
Spellscale Dragonborn Paladin 2/Battle Sorcerer 18 (Mailman)
All pretty well optimized.

I say this because this exact party made mincemeat of a well built and well played Red Great Worm with 10 levels of Fighter (using the feats to improve it´s natural attacks) in a campaign I once ran. Now I have to go into the attic and see if I can find the stats on the dragon ;-). I may actually still have them.

[Seward]

, a mailman (or any sort of build that can deal huge piles of no save no SR damage)

Because of the antimagic field issue you might want a tier-4 totally optimized martial who can dish out a few hundred points of damage in a full attack (and more if antimagic isn't in play) to be the subject of the buffer character's supercharging. Said martial might need a rez after the fight, but if we're talking epic, death is just a speedbump if the dude who can cast true rez is a survivor.

An archer can be especially effective against an antimagic-dragon type strat because most of the buffs he's got will still be on him (outside the AMF) while only those specific to the projectiles will be suppressed, plus the AMF prevents most reactive ways of simply blocking arrows (full concealment, full cover etc) once the threat is revealed. Also your optimized martial doesn't have to stand in full attack range to do his 200-300 pt/damage/round which greatly reduces the chances of needing a true rez after.

I'd go with a minionomancer to draw out the dragon and get him to commit, while the buffer is charging up the archer and the debuffer/battlefield control/utility guy is laying down anti-escape stuff. Don't reveal the offense till you can burn the dragon down in as few rounds as possible, as containing dragons is a full time job for your battlefield control guy. Strip as many buffs off the dragon as you can just before your offense goes to work.

Ideally both a Mailman and a Martial go to work simultaneously, it's damn hard to defend against both. Note that tier 1s can often do several roles for brief periods. You can fake being a mailman if it only has to sustain that output for a couple rounds a lot easier than you can build one to last for a normal number of encounters.

All of this assumes you can't just shut the dragon down with an empowered, maximized, reach shivering touch for whatever reason.

[Thunder999]

My initial thought was just someone with maximised reach shivering touch, which is certainly specialised, but the sort of always strong parties mentioned would certainly work.

Mailman should be able to handle AMF, you just stand 15ft away and launch your instantaneous conjuration (creation) Orb of Force spells at them.

[Mechalich]

All of this assumes you can't just shut the dragon down with an empowered, maximized, reach shivering touch for whatever reason.

Tchazzar, specifically, has immunity to that tactic. His Dragon Ascendant abilities include immunity to Energy Drain, Ability Drain, and Ability Damage; also, Polymorphing, Petrification, and any form-altering attack, and all Mind-affecting attacks.

[Melcar]

4 wizards!

[Gruftzwerg]

Let's say that a party of dragon slayers had to go against a powerful dragon, for example, the quasi-deity Tchazzar from the Forgotten Realms setting or any other great wyrm. What would a party of four dragon slayers be? What classes, what feats, items, magic and so on.

It all boils down to the amount of optimization. The question is, are you asking for an enjoyable fight for your table or is this a theoretical RocketTag scenario. I mean, imho it's not that hard to pull off an overkill here.



Unfortunately the boring answer is just 4 Tier Is, probably Cleric, Druid, Wizard, Wizard, suitably optimized.

K, lets play a game: I beat that with a single Tier II build of mine:
Cooperative Dvati Sorcerers of the Arcane Legion (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?639734-Cooperative-Dvati-Sorcerers-of-the-Arcane-Legions)

Preparation:

The twins will buff themselves (and their BoB clone legion) with their daily persistent spells and chose some defensive form via shapechange. (dunno, maybe a Golem or something..)

Cooperative Contingency: Acid Orb (via Miracle since the build doesn't know the spell; rest 24 h and rebuff) for all twins/clones

Cooperative Miracle: Greater Teleport into casting range (75ft)

781.250 Acid Orbs launched at the dragon, each dealing 15d6 dmg.

= (15 x ~3.5 - 25 DR) x 781.250
= (~52.5 -25 DR) x 781.250
= ~27.5 x 781.250
= ~21.484.375 acid dmg instantly on approach (even overcoming a possible AMF)

So, who gets it down to Tier III ?^^

[Melcar]

Let's say that a party of dragon slayers had to go against a powerful dragon, for example, the quasi-deity Tchazzar from the Forgotten Realms setting or any other great wyrm. What would a party of four dragon slayers be? What classes, what feats, items, magic and so on.

4 wizards/ dweomerkeepers!

[Mechalich]

The general point I was making with the 'Four Tier Is' answer was that, even without various TO absurdities, the list of 'anti-dragon' abilities simply isn't good enough to make up the difference between the class tiers. For example something like Paladin 10/Dragonslayer 10 will probably be better at fighting dragons than a Paladin 20, but will still be worse than a generic Sorcerer 20. Even most of the various anti-dragon Feats and Items aren't really worth bothering with versus simply taking feats and items that contribute to a build's overall power.

Partly this has to do with how the abilities of D&D style dragons interact with the 3e rules set. A powerful dragon is basically a high-level sorcerer matched to a powerful template that in many ways mimics the effects such a being would normally have from items: flight, SR, some energy immunity, and so forth. As such the strategy for fighting a dragon is more or less the same as fighting a high-level caster and a big beatstick they happen to have as a minion.

[Gruftzwerg]

The general point I was making with the 'Four Tier Is' answer was that, even without various TO absurdities, the list of 'anti-dragon' abilities simply isn't good enough to make up the difference between the class tiers. For example something like Paladin 10/Dragonslayer 10 will probably be better at fighting dragons than a Paladin 20, but will still be worse than a generic Sorcerer 20. Even most of the various anti-dragon Feats and Items aren't really worth bothering with versus simply taking feats and items that contribute to a build's overall power.

Partly this has to do with how the abilities of D&D style dragons interact with the 3e rules set. A powerful dragon is basically a high-level sorcerer matched to a powerful template that in many ways mimics the effects such a being would normally have from items: flight, SR, some energy immunity, and so forth. As such the strategy for fighting a dragon is more or less the same as fighting a high-level caster and a big beatstick they happen to have as a minion.

I agree. Basically a dragon is a mediocre optimized sorcerer gish.
And great ancient wyrms like Tchazzar only have some big stats and a few unique abilities. Nothing that special.
Thus, once you know how to work around those abilities and stats, everything else becomes a piece of cake (for optimized builds/parties).

[the_tick_rules]

No love for vassals of bahamut? they are actual dragon slayers.

[Mechalich]

No love for vassals of bahamut? they are actual dragon slayers.

A Vassal of Bahamut is a Paladin with a small boost to WBL, 3 bonus feats, and the Dragonwrack ability, which is a decent (4d6 per melee attack at 10th level isn't bad) but decidedly not overwhelming damage boost. It's nowhere near as good as having spellcasting. The same thing is true of the Dragonslayer and Dragonstalker PrCs from Draconomicon. Both classes make martial characters significantly better at killing dragons than they would otherwise be, but not as good as they would be by virtue of simply being a spellcaster. Dragonslayer, which is actually half-caster class, is probably the best of them and can be useful for a Gish - especially as several of its benefits apply against everything, not just dragons. Ex. DR 3/- is never a bad thing to have, even if you could do better. But even against a dragon something like Ftr 5/Clr 5/Dragonslayer 10 isn't even close to contributing at the level of a Clr 20.