Hi, I am running this battle tonite in about 7 hours and I need help! I have never run a dragon battle before and I do not want my players to be like "That was a stupid dragon". So, what kind of tactics do you think it should use? My characters are a little overpowered (they've had few tough times so far).
The four characters are IMC:
A fighter, a barbarian, a warlock and a priest.
If anyone has any tips on making this battle great that would be awesome!
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For one thing, in stead of her waiting directly in front of the entrance, have her enter from behind and on the wing. Maybe a surprise round of breath weapon while they're unawares.
I agree with Andrea, take out the spellcasters first. The priest would probably be a better bet, as he/she can heal. The warmage could go downeasier if she picked him up and chuked him.
Just some ideas.
Never land, at least not until the half of the party drops (preferably the fighter and barbarian)It really depends on how bloodthirsty you want the dragon to be. A smart dragon will probably never land, relying on her breath and mobility to keep any martial character from getting a full attck, even flying. This, however makes for a long, slightly boring fight, so after playing cat and mouse, full attack the most injured or the seemingly most invincible (a couple full attacks on an 11th level Bar-Bar, even raging, will probably drop him)Unless the party is absolutely stupid, don't count on the breath weapon doing any real damage (even with the poison augmentation), instead relying on Ilthane's mobility and ability to dish out massive amounts of damage in a turn. A single full attack will scare the pants of any of your PCs. Don't give them to much time to prepare (Stoneskin, protection from elements, and all of the buffer spells can turn the fight into a dragon-slaughter if you give them too much time.) In my opinion, it's more important for the encounter to be exciting than fair, but don't neglect to reward the PCs if they do something crafty (like dimension dooring a three-hundred pound rock five hundred feet above the dragon then featherfalling through the rock's wake.)
The trouble with this encounter, from the point of view of making it as tough as it could be for the PC's, is that Illthane's motivation is to keep the PC's from getting into the Cairn. So hit and run tactics, while they mean the dragon isn't in much danger, also mean the PC's can easily run into the cairn and hide away just like Allustan has. Also, the PC's know they are looking for a black dragon, so they can prepare for it accordingly.
When I ran it, it was certainly tough, but not as tough as it could have been in different circumstances. For starters, your PC's should all have some form of acid resistance up, so her breath weapon is near useless - I had her breathe once, then move to melee attacks. From there, she doubled back towards the entrance, and focused on anyone who looked like they were headed for the inside ofthe cairn. The group was a bit surprised by some of her options (wingover, Str damage from her breath, etc), but overall their plans worked well (spread out, and hit her from range) especially given the dragon's tactics. I think she only got one or two full-round attacks on the PC's, but they were certainly scary as they dealt out huge damage (and the PC's struggled to hit her at times). But she did get nailed by a few good spells that damaged her and slowed her down for a bit, plus some smiting worked. Near the end, the party animal companion ran into the cairn, and got killed by the Dragon as she chased him in, but then the rest of the group came in and killed Illthane (just). That was certainly memorable enough for my group (although they were only two PC's, one follower, and an animal companion; one PC was missing that week).
I guess if you're worried about her not being challenging enough, you should give Illthane another 2 HD or a similar boost. But be careful, dragons are tough with few if any weaknesses and it's easy to kill a whole party if you go over the top. I'm not sure optimising her tactics to try and make her as nasty as possible makes sense; her motivations and tactics as described in the printed adventure, while not optimal, do make reasonable sense given the circumstances (she's kind of backed herself into a corner).
What are the chances they'll be able to kill the dragon? My party is pretty straightforward in tactics, am I to assume if they don't do anything to actually restrain it, then it will run away?
IIRC, Ilthane's motive for parking on top of the cairn entrance is to catch Allustan when he comes back out again. She doesn't necessarily know the PCs are back in town, but when they show up, she is probably motivated to take some risks to defeat them, since she has probably figured out by this time that they are responsible for foiling her plans in the mistmarsh. If she runs, it will be because she is about to die otherwise, and she'll be back after she nurses her wounds. She might even intercept the PCs when they exit the cairn, drained of power and laden with treasure.
As a dragon, Ilthane has keen senses and has a good chance of spotting the PCs first. If so, she'll certainly take to the air, where she has an advantage, and buff, and possibly use spells to help conceal her position. If she gets surprise and wins initiative on the next round, she can catch the party in formation with her breath weapon and follow up with a flyby attack on a wimpy spellcaster before they can react. (I don't have stat bloc handy, to give my personal suggestions). If she has flyby attack, use it to minimize the party's chance of landing a full attack, and I'd definitely try to take out spellcasters first. Even if the party tank gets buffed with a fly spell, she can outmaneuver him in the air to avoid him, then swoop in periodically to slash at the spellcasters. The breath weapon may not damage them much, but is good for softening up the party. I'd use it a couple or three times if possible, so that most of the party will fail at least one save and take strength damage.
Illthane...
I plan on bumping her up to huge size (whatever age category), and she'll abduct Allustan during her scouring of Diamond Lake. The PCs return to ruined buildings, their own homes flattened, and a missing Allustan.
They'll track Illthane through the Mistmarsh (with the help of the lizardfolk there) to her stronghold where she is served by draconic lizardfolk and kobolds. I'll be using the DL Classics module Dragons of Despair, using Xak Tsaroth as Illthane's lair, where she will hold Allustan captive much like Khisanth held Raistlin, with one claw poised over the wizard as the PCs advance. I'm replacing draconians with draconic lizardfolk warriors and the gully dwarves with draconic kobolds. Of course, there's a harem of female adepts and a half-dragon barbarian chieftain. Of course.
If they save Allustan, they can move on to Whispering Cairn once again to breach that sealed chamber leading to Icosiol's tomb.
I'm excited to take that turn. I'm making a lot of changes to Age of Worms, including using Sons of Gruumsh in place of Hall of Harsh Reflections, though I'll keep that module on-hand should I have need of it. I also MUST include Vampires of Waterdeep in this campaign somehow (one module, bits of all of them, something), probably setting that into motion after Champion's Belt. I'm making one of my players a good-aligned lycanthrope, so the connection is too strong to ignore. They're great modules, too! A great side quest if the PCs wish it.
You don't need to swap her spell list to give her obscuring mist. She already has darkness. To PCs without magical light from a 2nd-level or higher spell, they will quickly get lost while Ilthane with her blindsense will run circles around them.
How does this flyby attack work? Can she fly by attack, and then not let the pcs attack her on their round?
To attack a creature (like Illthane) using flyby attack, I believe a PC would have to actually ready an action and stand there, waiting for Illthane to dive and attack, before that PC would get an attack. The benefit of flyby attack is that the flying creature ends its round in the air (should it choose to do so) as oppose to on the ground after attacking.
Without flyby attack, Illthane would have two choices concerning flight and combat: either attack before her move (drawing attacks of opportunity when taking flight and moving out of PC threat range) or after her move (either landing and attacking, or diving straight into the ground).
Harpoons and hold spells work great against flyby attack, as well as wall of force. ;-)
If a PC readies an action can it make a full attack, or just one attack?
If Ilthane does a fly by attack, does it get a full attack or just one?
Does anyone get an Attack of Oppurtunity if they didnt ready an action?
Basically the dragon gets to move, attack and then move again. So when it ends its turn it is no longer in melee range of the characters. They can still fire ranged attacks or if they can match its movements get up there and attack again. Since most things can't match its flying, they will either have to return fire with ranged weapons (typically they don't do as much as melee), split up with those who can fly going up there (great time for the dragon to hover and do a full attack since it is mano-a-mano) or look for cover to remove the dragons bonus from being so mobile.
Not sure if Ilthane can snatch and drop someone since I don't have the stats handy, but that is a great tactic to combine with flyby attack.
Sean Mahoney
I just read Improved flyby attack which reads:
IMPROVED FLYBY ATTACK [GENERAL]
Prerequisite: Fly speed, Dodge, Flyby Attack, Mobility.
Benefit: If the standard action taken by a creature during a round in which it uses Flyby Attack is a melee attack, the creature provokes no attacks of opportunity from moving out of squares threatened by its target.
Normal: Without this feat, a creature making an attack as part of a Flyby Attack maneuver provokes attacks of opportunity as normal from moving out of squares threatened by its target.
So I guess since Illthane doesnt have Improved flyby, the players might get an AoO even if they didnt ready an action.
It was a memorable fight :-)
Even that my group knows that there might be a black dragon lurking the beast struck them nearly completly by surprise and unprepared. A few seconds before the dragons attack, most of the horses and animal companions fled. Because Ilthane strikes not from the Cairn but from behind, she gets a surprise round and was able to catch half of the party with their breath weapon. Because she was high on initiative whe got a second breath attack before anybody could react properly.
Ilthane than hovered above a fighter to make a snap attack. The party wizard desperatly fireballd her which makes the fighter suffer as well. Ilthane made her save and only gets 15 damage - this in fact was the only damage the party was able to inflict!
The groups psion never touches the dragons mind because Ilthane was able to made each save. The wizard never rolls high enough to beat hers SR. The fighter did not gets close enough.
Whenever a PCs wants to drink a potion (healing potions most of the time) they mostly failed the save against the dragons corrupt water ability.
After nearly disloving an animal companion and the druid with a third brath attack from afar, Ilthane wents into melee with the fighter. In her first round she misses her bite attack. The fighter was not able to hit her. In the second round she unleashes a full 7 attack volley on the fighter dropping him to minus 9.
The party than decides to flee into the Cairn which makes a pretty interesting chase. All went in but they now that the dragon will be waiting outside...
It was a memorable fight leaving high level PCs trembling in terror. That is how I ever wanted to play a fierce dragon that stood above any monster that normally gets killed in 6 to 24 seconds.
(As the party has 6 10th level PCs, I upped the dragon one age level)
So with a flyby attack does the dragon make its full attack? Or just one attack?
So with a flyby attack does the dragon make its full attack? Or just one attack?
One attack, preferrably with power attack beefing it up a bit. Or a breath weapon if that works better.
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I'm looking at this encounter coming up soon too.
I have seven PCs most of which I expect to be 11th level by the time they face Ilthane. I was considering advancing Ilthane to a CR14 Black Dragon (Huge) but using the gargantuan figure because it looks that good (perhaps Ilthane had a growth problem somewhere?) However, from experience and from what people have said, Dragon CRs tend to be a little funny. Will a CR14 black dragon be too difficult for seven PCs of levels 10 to 11? I'm wondering how to mix this encounter up. It is the group's first dragon in this campaign and I've built her up already from EaBK.
Best Regards
Herremann the Wise
I built up Ilthane too, and it came back to bite me...
This encounter ended up being memorable, but not in the way I would have liked.
Ilthane started off flying up behind the party, using her breath weapon, then landing on the Cairn. Her next move was to try Grappling the halfling wizard with a flyby attack. However, she rolled a 1 on her touch attack, and since I used fumbles she re-rolled another 1.
What happened was Ilthane dove for the wizard, who scarted backpedaling in fright. Instead of snagging a mouthful of halfling, she got a mouthful of dirt and flipped end over end, coming to rest right in front of the party's monk. He and the other meleers started in on her, and she didn't back up off the ground. A few rounds later, Ilthane was toast.
I still get ribbed about that combat...
Hah, well the betten went pretty good for me.... My party ripped him apart. Warlock used a confuse spell on him, it worked and beat SR! The Goliath Barbarian got a Critical Hit with his x4 warhammer doing something like 120 damage.... Enough said. Good fun!
I had a party of 8 adventurers not including cohorts, companions or familiars and i beefed up ilthane to a huge black dragon so i could use the new fig. Imagine my crushed
DM ego when the elven wizard "Ta'Mahs Blackheart Dezeiron"
nails Ilthane with an empowered maximized ray of enfeeblement.
eventually the party reduced Ilthane's strength to a meak score of 2, and I struggled to find rules concerning wheter a creature of that size can even flee from combat with such a low strength.
P.S.: DMs everywhere watch out for empowered/ maximized rays of enfeeblement!
I had a party of 8 adventurers not including cohorts, companions or familiars and i beefed up ilthane to a huge black dragon so i could use the new fig. Imagine my crushed
DM ego when the elven wizard "Ta'Mahs Blackheart Dezeiron"
nails Ilthane with an empowered maximized ray of enfeeblement.
eventually the party reduced Ilthane's strength to a meak score of 2, and I struggled to find rules concerning wheter a creature of that size can even flee from combat with such a low strength.P.S.: DMs everywhere watch out for empowered/ maximized rays of enfeeblement!
I used to make this mistake too, until it was pointed out to me. Ray of Enfeeblement imposes a strength penalty for a limited time, and does not do strength damage. The penalty doesn't stack, so if you're under the effect of multiple castings of the spell, you just take the highest penalty, not the combined total of the penalties. So using this metamagic combo you can drop the strength score by what, about 10?
Ooooh, nice catch Peruhain. I've learned that before and forgotten it. That is certainly worth remembering.
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Hmm, this post vanished last time...
Anyways, the ranges of the Strength penalty, for each metamagic feat, are as follows:
Regular Ray of Enfeeblement- 1d6+5= 6 to 11
Empowered Ray of Enfeeblement- 1d6 x 1.5 +5= 6 to 14
MaximizedRay of Enfeeblement- 11
Empowered, Maximized R of E- 11+ 1d6 x .5= 11-14
Remember, the Empower Spell ignores level-based constants and you still roll the extra die, even when the spell is Maximized (e.g. a Max, Empowered fireball is 60 + 5d6)