LibriumArcana.Games

Of all the monstrous races in D&D, one stands head, shoulders, wings, and often waist above all others in the 'Want to play' category: Dragons. Iconic beasts capable of being legendary heros or diabolical villains with a plethora of fun toys at their command.

They're also one of the poorest examples of the Level Adjustment mechanic in the game.

Starting with either a +2 or +4 LA and it getting worse steadily really does highlight how badass they should be.. But perhaps it's time to reconsider. Balancing them against a class that has alot of the same powers: The Dragonfire Adept from Dragon Magic.

A fresh hatched Bronze(Being the middle power Metallic) has an ECL of 10 according to the published stats. Let's stack this up with an average DA.

Stats:
An 'Average' Bronze has 13, 10, 13, 14, 15, 14. By this point, the DA's had two 'adjustments' from his levels, and can buy a few items buffing his initial stats, allowing him to easily keep pace.

HD.

A fresh hatched Bronze has 6D12 for HD; this'll average out to around 40HP, plus constitution bonuses(45, according to the book). A 10th level DA has 10D8, 44, not counting Constitution. Edge: DA.

BAB/Grapple: +6 for the Bronze, +5 for the DA. Grappling, however, is in the DA's favour: +6 + Strength bonus, probably a +7 or so, vs. a +3 for the dragon. This one's a tossup.

Saving Throws: +7, +3, +7 for DA, +6, +6, +6 Dragon. Edge: Dragon.

Breath Weapon: Dragon, 2d6, 1d4 rounds. DA: 5D6, every round. Edge is in a big way to the DA, who also gets to modify his easily.

Speed: DA, as race, plus the Lesser Invocation Draconic Flight, allowing Good maneuverability at land speed. Dragon, average maneuver, 100ft flight, 40 on the ground. Edge: Dragon.

Defense: Dragon, +5 Natural Armour. DA, +3 Natural Armour, DR 2/magic. Edge: DA. Always, always, always get DR.

Special: Dragon, water breathing, immune to electricity, plus dragon tricks like blindsense. DA: Can actually keep pace. Aquatic Adaptation is availiable as a Least Invocation, as is Seen The Unseen. Voidsense grants the coveted Blindsense, and even back at 6th level you could nab elemental resistance 10.

Later benefits.

Alternate Form/Humanoid Shape(Lesser Invocation). Frightful Presense(Again, a Lesser Invoc). SR is harder to obtain, though.

In short, by examining a class meant to emulate dragons, we quickly see the current Level Adjustment setup is unbalanced against the dragon. If I remember, following posts will propose new tweaks to make they playable at more appropriate levels.

SirNitram wrote: Stats:
An 'Average' Bronze has 13, 10, 13, 14, 15, 14. By this point, the DA's had two 'adjustments' from his levels, and can buy a few items buffing his initial stats, allowing him to easily keep pace.

Don't forget: Player wealth is by ECL, so the Dragon have just as much cash to spend as the DA.

Having a natural fly speed also qualifies our draconic VERY early for Flyby attack: by far one of the best feats int he game (hello 'spell on the run'.). Beyond that, there are Metabreath feats, which I'm not certain Dragonfire Adepts actually qualify for (if you read the requisite. I seem to remember there being a ruling on this, but I'm hazy at best on the actual verdict.).

Simply things for consideration. Dragons probably function WAY better within a dead magic zone, also, so a combining one with an Initiate of Mystra would result in devestating effects--but thats probably an exercise in irrelevancy concering 'draconic' balance.

The CharOp boards on Wizards recently had a few lenghty discussions to the tune of this exact topic in the past week, that may merit research, but buyer beware: folks there tend to read what they want to see, as opposed to whats there.

LA is just plain disfunctional. Its bad for drow and its worse for dragons, which is one of the reason I allow LA buy offs the Unearthed Arcana.

Dragons don't need to be boosted; if anything that demonstrates that the prestige class is overpowered. A dragon is supposed to be upper end for it's CR.

Rogue 9 wrote:Dragons don't need to be boosted; if anything that demonstrates that the prestige class is overpowered. A dragon is supposed to be upper end for it's CR.

CR doesn't enter into this discussion at all. It's the value of the dragon's LA and whether that is appropriate that's the issue.

Ah. I misread.

But yes, the level adjustment system is broken, but I don't know what else to do with it besides redraw the line of what calls for a level adjustment and what does not.