So, dragons.
There doesn't really seem to be many in the AP, does there?
One of my PCs is a dragon shaman (gold) and since he seems to be one of the more survivable party members (Con 18, plus dwarven save bonuses, plus near-max rolls for hp at each level so far, plus a one-level dip into Crusader that's given him a lot of healing-related maneuvers) it's probably fair to assume he'll be around for a while. Given that (and given that the character background is that of a weird dwarven loner who was exiled for his eventually fatal fascination with dragons) I'd kinda like to have some sort of draconic presence in the AP, just to give the player some pay-off. I'd especially like to introduce a gold of some sort, though there'll probably also need to be a more powerful chromatic on the scene to balance things out. The Dragons of the Great Gamer template from MMV might come in handy, methinks - the PC has 'exarch' written all over him.
I'm not really willing to wait for another 15 levels until Enemies of my Enemy and the linnorms come around, so does anyone have any ideas as to how I can introduce (preferably recurring) dragons into the campaign? I'd thought maybe there could be one lurking in the jungles of the Isle Dread, perhaps a rival of Khala for control of the Isle? Or I suppose Tavey could be a juvenile dragon in alternate form, though having a powerful ally like that around would reduce the impact of HTBM sadly, I think. Maybe the Sea Wyvern's figurehead could be a dragon polymorphed into sculpture form by an enemy ages ago (what worse insuly could you do a dragon than making it look like a mere wyvern?) Any other ideas?
Forgive me if I seem dense but I'm not quite sure why you want to do this...it seems to me that there are already a lot of tough enough opponents.
It's a character thing. The PC has dragons as a major plot element in his background, and I want to be able to sping something off that. Makes for a better campaign, in my opinion. Plus, the AP is a bit short of ongoing subplots and lesser antagonists already, in my opinion.
And I've got no qualms cutting out some of the extraneous opponents from the modules (flotsam ooze, I'm looking at you...) or making the party's dealings with the dragons more ambiguous than 'slay, slay, slay!' if necessary to keep the XP and loot levels in check...
Add a polymorphed Dragon into the population of Farshore, That's what I did. I had her disguised as a sorceress, who knew various bits of lore. You can put her working with the Elf Vesarin, or make her a friend of Atwaddle. Just keep her in the background during the seige, otherwise you can tip the ballance too far in your player favor.
I was SO glad we were going to have a break from dragons! Thank you, Paizo! My group was just about dragon-ed out.
Bronze dragons are the ones most likely to be encountered near or at sea.. Draconomicon has tons of useful information about their habits and lairs.
Recurring becomes more of a problem, as you are travelling far beyond normal civilization, even for dragons.
Is your dragon shaman player going to be disappointed if there aren't dragons every few levels in the adventure path?
I'm playing a Chultan Bronze Dragon Shaman in our FR STAP, and we've had a couple encounters with dragons thrown in, but I don't know which were already scheduled and which DireWeasel threw in because they were neat and made sense
About a week out from Sasserine we encountered a Bronze flying the opposite direction as ourselves, that dove under the water when passing us and surfaced well away to continue on.
We just made dock in Renkrue, and about a week back encountered a flight of wyverns playing in our path who just raced the ships some, and stared at our figurehead til they got bored and left.
We also have Guttugger onboard as he agreed to join us after Rowyn abandoned him.
The gold Dragon could be Atwattle. Hundreds of years ago some of his kind lived on the Isle of Dread. They disappeared. This gold has come looking for signs of what happened to them. He/She could know some facts about the Isle as well as create additional reasons for them to go onto the isle to find things out.
In later modules they could find hints about what happened to some of the dragons when the tide hit!
Add a polymorphed Dragon into the population of Farshore, That's what I did. I had her disguised as a sorceress, who knew various bits of lore. You can put her working with the Elf Vesarin, or make her a friend of Atwaddle. Just keep her in the background during the seige, otherwise you can tip the ballance too far in your player favor.
might be a double post here, my apologies, but this message came in while i was replying to begin with.
Simply make the attack even bigger than normal, so the npc dragon has somethign to do "over there" while pc's help "here" Especially if the dragon has been living here for a long time, there may be "greater good" things it must do that the players wouldn't consider worth protecting as they don't know why they're important to the dragon.
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Any other ideas?
- The aquatic hydra in SWW could easily be a Black. Fighting a dragon from a rowboat would be a tough proposition for the PCs.
- There's lots of options for a Green or a Black in the forests and swamps the IoD.
- The swampy conditions of the Wreck might make a good home for a big ol' Black that's allied with the Crimson Fleet.
Also, remember that there's a godawful big Red hanging out in the lava on Dividend's Ire.
Tom
There was a Green dragon on the Isle of Dread in the original module X1. I believe there are still rumors of this Green residing on the Isle in the AP. One of my players went through X1 when I DM'ed it back in the 70's and is geeking about running into that dragon again in the AP. Not sure how I will add it back in but since they do have a party of 5 they are a little behind on XP. If they are still lagging on XP I could throw in the green as an extra encounter.
There was a Green dragon on the Isle of Dread in the original module X1. I believe there are still rumors of this Green residing on the Isle in the AP. One of my players went through X1 when I DM'ed it back in the 70's and is geeking about running into that dragon again in the AP. Not sure how I will add it back in but since they do have a party of 5 they are a little behind on XP. If they are still lagging on XP I could throw in the green as an extra encounter.
There is officially a green dragon on the Isle, mentioned in passing in (I think) "Tides of Dread". I think it's Old or Very Old, so as written it doesn't work well as a combat foe (since the PCs will be long gone from the Isle before they can plausibly challenge it), but it'd be easy for a DM to change that to whatever works for the group.
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What dragons are in the AP as written? Here's what I can recall:
* "There is No Honor": Gut-Tugger (a stretch, but felldrakes are officially of the "Dragon" type)
* "Sea Wyvern's Wake": flight of wyverns (optional encounter)
* "Tides of Dread": the dragon turtle
* "Into the Maw": that 100% awesome fire drake that rises out of the caldera
* "Enemies of My Enemy": linnorms
I'm in a simular situation to the OP (having a dragonborn, dragon shaman and dragonblooded characters in the group.)
I think James Jacobs said some thing along the lines of: 'Xiureksor' being the only true dragon to live on the Isle of Dread! Xiureksor may or may not be dead and does not appear in the Savage Tide adventure path as written. She's a very old green dragon.
I plan on using her as a major hook for my players fairly early on. Also I think its kinda cool that she is the only true dragon on the isle -I mean WHY? Just whats going on? What does dragonkind know about the isle? These are some of the things I intend to explore during the campaign.
Creative Director
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The small number of dragons in Savage Tide is 100% intentional. We did a LOT of stuff with dragons in "Age of Worms," so we kind of wanted to steer into new territory.
Additionally, if there's one thing I've learned working at Paizo for the past four years, it's that our readers hate "throwaway" encounters with dragons. Whenever we have smaller or minor encounters with true dragons, there's a minor uprising. We've been trying to restrict them to major encounters where we can detail histories and personalities and all that when actual dragons appeared in Dungeon as a result.
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The small number of dragons in Savage Tide is 100% intentional. We did a LOT of stuff with dragons in "Age of Worms," so we kind of wanted to steer into new territory.
Additionally, if there's one thing I've learned working at Paizo for the past four years, it's that our readers hate "throwaway" encounters with dragons. Whenever we have smaller or minor encounters with true dragons, there's a minor uprising. We've been trying to restrict them to major encounters where we can detail histories and personalities and all that when actual dragons appeared in Dungeon as a result.
Good call; familiarity breeds contempt. The "sense of wonder" moments are what I live for as a DM, and this kind of thinking in adventure design makes it much easier for me to achieve that for my players.
Sorry to threadjack this into "I <heart> Paizo" time.
Whenever we have smaller or minor encounters with true dragons, there's a minor uprising.
"The Paizonians are revolting!"
"You don't have to tell me!"
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What dragons are in the AP as written? Here's what I can recall:
* "There is No Honor": Gut-Tugger (a stretch, but felldrakes are officially of the "Dragon" type)
* "Sea Wyvern's Wake": flight of wyverns (optional encounter)
* "Tides of Dread": the dragon turtle
* "Into the Maw": that 100% awesome fire drake that rises out of the caldera
* "Enemies of My Enemy": linnorms
Hmm. Looking at the Nimbus Bow, which has an additional +2 to hit and +1d6 damage against reptilian monsters (including all dragons) and creatures with the Earth subtype, I would have thought that the placement of such an artifact would signify that a lot of viable targets for the bow's bonuses would be coming down the pike.
I can't think of any Earth subtype creatures; the obvious non-dragon reptilians are dinosaurs, but haven't most of the ones in the AP been encountered before the bow is discovered in "City of Broken Idols"?
[I can recall about five dragon encounters, including Gut-Tugger.]Hmm. Looking at the Nimbus Bow, which has an additional +2 to hit and +1d6 damage against reptilian monsters (including all dragons) and creatures with the Earth subtype, I would have thought that the placement of such an artifact would signify that a lot of viable targets for the bow's bonuses would be coming down the pike.
I can't think of any Earth subtype creatures; the obvious non-dragon reptilians are dinosaurs, but haven't most of the ones in the AP been encountered before the bow is discovered in "City of Broken Idols"?
Well, there are about a hojillion yuan-ti in "Serpents of Scuttlecove". And an argument could be made that Demogorgon is reptilian, though I don't know whether or not that would be correct, strictly speaking. Oh, and the T-rex bodaks in "Enemies of My Enemy".
(And on an unrelated topic, I'd just like to state how much I love this icon.)
.... Also I think its kinda cool that she is the only true dragon on the isle -I mean WHY? Just whats going on? What does dragonkind know about the isle? These are some of the things I intend to explore during the campaign.
This is what I settled on, and though I do not have the answer a dragon shaman would be the ideal person to ponder this question. Perhaps even the dragons have wondered this and have not been able to get to the island themselves, hence the dragon shaman was (somewhat indirectly) sent.
I did not play AofW and am not burned out on dragons yet, and since OP wanted to know where to place a gold:
*Draconomicon shows an underwater observatory in the gold dragon 'typical den'. Add one of these to a small island somewhere near the IoD or along the SWW.
*Twin volcanoes on the island, one has bats, but the other?
*Trapped in the fog of HTBM a gold decided to simply sleep, he awakens when the fog is lifted. More likely he was sleeping when the fog was first created.
*As a prisoner in the Maw, some powerful magic (or other plot device) needed here as to how it did not escape.
*Replace the friendly Coautl with a gold.
*Tlalalc's Tear is powered by the spirit of a gold (not all the olmans and destroying it releases her.
As I said my favorite option is 'why not?' it will be a sense of mystery on an already mysterious locale.
Just to make it clear that the point of this thread wasn't to complain about the lack of dragons. I can understand perfectly why Paizo wanted to take a bit of a break in that department after the last two APs. But my group didn't play either Shackled City or Age of Worms, so they're not suffering from dragon-overdose at all...
You notice in another thread here there is someone talking about the huge Green dragon that is on one of the smaller islands. That might be an interesting element.
The huge very old green dragon is on the island and should surely be up to something.
Definiately either replace the coatles with golds or just play them up as their exotic dragon selves.
No reason the crimson fleet can't have some dragonfire adepts. Also no reason you couldn't have a lemorian half fiend dragon as the captain of a ship.
Of course, there are lots of mentions of wyverns, plus the dragon turtle. Either of those could be true dragons if you wanted them too.
Several Months late....
Why couldnt this legendary old green dragon have sired offspring? Maybe the PCs can meet this offspring at some point?
Age of the offspring can easily be tailored to whatever the party's level is at the time the DM wants to throw it in.
