Hi there,
Im about to start a campaign where i'll be playing a black dragon disciple.
Basically im a black dragon reincarnated into a human body whos powers will surface little by little. Ill be playing a melee DD.
I'm looking for advice and ideas on what my characters goal should be (except world domination - it is an evil campaign). Who should be my enemies and what do i want to achieve with the new frail body??
Thanks for the help
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Black Dragons are CE, of the "Satisfy my sadistic personal whims" variety, so aside from a sadistic streak a mile wide, feel free to improvise.
Though, like all dragons, acquiring treasure and servants seem like they're reasonable priorities. As does avenging himself on whoever stuck him in this frail human form, now that I think about it.
Well, since you're playing with a party its best to assume some goals that will give you a reason to adventure. Very dragony reasons to adventure include
amass a large pile of treasure for you to roll around on
acquire funds and territory to build a secure lair
Accrue enough magical knowledge to get yourself out of the soft little hairless monkey body and back into your true form.
Black dragons are the more conniving of the chromatics. As they start out in life tiny, they learn early to use guile and their wits to survive more than tooth and claw. Most of the other things that share their chosen environment are much larger than they are through the first several years of life.
These are lessons even larger black dragons keep with them, using traps and arranging their lairs with false rooms and corridors. They use pre-set ambush points to defend their lairs, but also leave 2 or 3 avenues of escape. They seek to gain treasure hoards and power like other dragons, but are less willing to die to keep them.
Like all dragons, they realize they are the top of the food chain, and treat others as inferior. They are most vindictive, and hold grudges.
Your character may not be so concerned about world domination, but regaining his place in the natural order of things, and will most likely HATE the position he's in now, and this will probably cloud his interaction with others. His enemies will most likely be people that have slighted him when he was a dragon or even those that caused his predicament.
I don't think I can match the greatness already posted above. From experience though it always seems that black dragons are the easiest to defeat. As soon as the players ask the color of the dragons scales, they always sigh in relief if its a black dragon.
One thing you may want to consider is proving to the world, not necessarily how powerful a black dragon can be, but how powerful acid can be. Perhaps carry around vials of acid to poor up your dead (or captured) enemies. Your character could become known as the first ever Acidmancer.
Just a thought.
Wow boring, that was great. That makes me want to make a similar character.
Arh Boring is a person... Thought i was;)
Character so far.
Black dragon Xathara’kurian( meaning Emerald eye because of the dragons green rather than red eyes)
Concept
Demonoligist serving the god of deceits raised the Xat in the body of his killers son who they've kidnapped without his fathers knowledge.
Motivations:
Regain control over the sunken castle. A castle build in a swamp underneath which he has Xat dug his lair.
Regain his divine form as a dragon
Exterminate the paladin order who ended his reign
Regather his kobold minions who fled under the paladin siege.
Slay the men who put him in this frail hairless monkey form. In time. They will live as long as they serve his purpose.
What else?
There are some pretty cool ideas here. Now I too want to play a DD.
Id say first of all, do you want to be of the typical Black Dragon, or run it in a different manner. Ie, bad turned good (or better).
The d&d book Draconomicon gives a great description of all the dragons as well as samples of each at different ages, with descriptions of the character. (my fav book i own).
"Black dragons are among the most evil-tempered true
dragons. They prefer dismal swamps or bogs, the more
stagnant and fetid the better, but can be encountered anywhere
water and dense vegetation are found together—
including jungles, rain forests, and moors. They have no
natural enemies, though they attack and kill almost anything
unfortunate enough to stumble upon them."
"Black dragons dine primarily on fish, mollusks, and other
aquatic creatures. They also hunt for red meat but like to
“pickle” it by letting it lie in ponds within or near their lairs
for days before being eaten. The rotting flesh helps make the
area even more foul—just the way the dragon likes it.
Black dragons are especially fond of coins. Older and
craftier dragons sometimes capture and question humanoids
about stockpiles of gold, silver, and platinum coins
before killing them. Others move out into nearby rivers or
lakes, where they menace boat traffic and demand that passing
vessels pay tribute.
In keeping with their reputation for ferocity, black dragons
usually fight for their mates. The females do most of the
fighting, flying far and wide to locate a desirable male and
then impressing him with a victory over a rival. Eggs are usually
laid near the male’s lair, and the male is left to guard the
young. Black dragon parents are protective, but give their offspring
little support beyond the occasional bit of advice.
Eventually, the parent advises its offspring to leave the area
before the older dragon decides to eat the youngster.
Although capable of breathing underwater, black dragons
do little actual swimming; instead, they wallow in the
shallows, enjoying the feel of the mud or simply lying in
wait for prey. Black dragons prefer to ambush their targets,
using their surroundings as cover. When fighting in heavily
forested swamps and marshes, they try to stay in the
water or on the ground; trees and leafy canopies limit their
aerial maneuverability. When outmatched, a black dragon
attempts to fly out of sight, so as not to leave tracks, and
takes refuge in the deepest water it can find."
Thats a couple exerts from Draconomicon. Here's a couple sample ones.
"Eliinwyluwyther
Mature Adult Black Dragon
Eliinwyluwyther is a leader, a diplomat, and a ruthless tyrant.
She rules a small empire of several lizardfolk tribes, an
enslaved clan of barbaric wild elves, and several chuuls. She
makes her lair in an ancient ruin at the heart of a vast
swampland, built by a long-forgotten race to honor their
bizarre and alien deities. In her innermost sanctum, these
deities whisper to her while she sleeps, planting the seeds of
madness in her mind. Her behavior now is unpredictable—
she can change in a heartbeat from smooth diplomacy to
uncontrolled savagery, and her subjects have grown to dread
any audience with her."
"Iyriddelmirev
Very Old Black Dragon
On the edge of a vast swamp stands a small city of humans
and their kind, a river port where herbs and woods from the
marshlands are shipped to a nearby seaport and out to other
lands. The brackish water of the river flows through the
sewers beneath the city, and this is where Iyriddelmirev
makes her lair. Most often, however, she is found in the city
above, polymorphed into the form of a black-skinned human
woman. She leads a gang of thieves, most of them
human and almost none of them aware of her true identity.
The gang benefits greatly from their leader’s knowledge of
the city sewer system, and its members often make their
escapes through water-filled passages the city authorities
believe to be impassable."
Hope that helps, and isnt too much info. But i love dragons and that book.
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A conflicting and desperate mix of shame, self-hatred, impotent rage at his low state, and a desperate desire to return to his previous greatness are all on his mind.
This could be a key factor. Even as a dragon, he was a creature of sadism, cruelty and rage, drawing satisfaction from the suffering and misery of others.
Now he's trapped in this absurbly fragile tiny toothless clawless scaleless wingless and breath-weapon-less form. His anger, frustration and hatred must expand exponentially at the circumstances he has found himself in, and he'll likely lash out at any foe with as much savage cruelty as he can manage, living for those happy moments when a foe has been defeated, but not killed outright, so that he can take out his frustrations upon it (not that he isn't above tearing apart a corpse in a blind rage, leaving behind a 'crime-scene' that looks like the floor of a slaughterhouse after a busy day of butchery).
Being unable to lord it over his party members, and forced to rely on them for healing, 'tanking,' trapfinding, etc. will rankle him and fester within him like a salt-stung wound. To succeed at all, he'll have to swallow that anger, and cooperate with those insufferable inferiors, savoring every disrespectful word or action as a fresh source of anger (which will keep him strong), with every time he has to *ask for help* eating away at him inside, like the acid that used to flow so freely in response to his exhalation. He may see the bitterness and anger and resentment within himself as the symbolic remains of the acid that he once contained (and will again, as he transmutes his human body back into a dragon body, and his spite and wrath into endless oceans of acid, with which he longs to bathe the world that has so wronged him).
Angry fantasies of his glorious retribution will occupy his mind, as he dreams of seas turned too acid to support life, with dead and partially skeletonized whales rotting on the beaches, having desperately attempted to escape the acid seas by driving themselves onto the sands. Desert oases will be surrounded by the corpses of creatures that knew they should not trust the water, but desperate and dehydrated, attempted to quench their brutal thirst, only to be have their tongues and throats melted from the tainted water. Trees will be bare and leafless skeletons of their former selves, tracked with countless wormwood scars, not from insects, but from the rivulets of acid rain sluicing down their truniks.
Whether or not such fantasies are realistic, or would ever be within his power to accomplish, on even a small scale, is irrelevant, they are reflective of the depths of his hatred and wrath, which is without limit.
There are some pretty cool ideas here. Now I too want to play a DD.
Would be awesome if everyone who posted here could make a Dragon Deciple, and we all fly to Florida or something and have a mega, mega session with our guild of DDs. Don't suppose any of you are millionaires and are prepared to front the bill for a buncha complete strangers? :-)
lol, yeah. if i was a millionaire, id of made the matrix for pathfinder and wouldnt be talking here. lol
Great thread. Deadmanwalking, Kryzbyn and Set said everything I wanted too and much more.
You left your young dragon child, whom you felt was finally old enough to stay at home by himself, in your lair guarding the largest rock of star metal known on the planet.
Fast forward a few days, you come back and your child is gone, not even a body, just a pile of ash, and the treasure, ALL of it, is gone. You know of a great seer that your god gave to your people, and after speaking to him you find out that an androgynous elf disintegrated your child.
Fast forward a few years of searching and you find this elf, alone aside from a small worthless demon, on an island. Better yet (s)he just used all of its upper level spells. Your chance for revenge is now! After toying with the elf and making sure it knows who you are and why you are doing what you are doing you leave the elf on the island with the knowledge that you will go and kill its androgynous mate and two children and in the middle of your revenge the elf comes back with immeasurable power and kills you then revives your head just to tell you of a horrible new spell called familicide which kills all of your family, all of their families and anyone related to either group, successfully killing a quarter of all black dragons on the planet.
Your god has given you a second chance, even though you do not deserve it, but as punishment for not finishing what you started you were sent back in the form of a human, weak dirty monkey human. Your goal is to first regain your previous glorious form, then make sure the entire world knows that NOONE gets the better of a dragon. And the world will speak of your glorious revenge for generations.