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My regular group is diverting out of our campaign for a one-shot while one of our members goes on vacation. The GM for this one-shot is a wily old hand who’s been playing and GMing since D&D 1e. Pretty much all he’s told us is that we’ll be hunting a dragon. He mentioned that the scenario he had ready was easy to convert to PF1e (I’m guessing it’s written in 3.5, that’s what he prefers playing), and called for four 12th level characters, but since there’s only three of us we should make 13th level characters instead. That’s about all I know. You should be able to extrapolate from there ther rough power of the dragon we should expect. As I said, our GM’s crafty. I was just discussing with the others a story he told us about running a dragon fight years ago in another edition where a Red Dragon had been burning towns, stealing gold, eating maidens, etc etc, and the heroes got all tooled up with Protection from Fire spells, Cold blasts, etc etc, and only after they were in its lair did they learn they were actually facing a Blue Dragon that had been using magic to hide its true nature. I fully expect those sorts of shenanigans. One player is going to play a gunslinger, the other a buffer of some sort (though one still able to melee in a pinch, exact class wasn’t specified yet), and I’m thinking a magus, but I’m open to other possibilities. Some options are pretty obvious: scroll of True Seeing, Dragonfoe Amulet, Dragon Bane weapon, Dragon Defiant armor, resist energy, etc. But lots of y’all have played this game much more than me. So how would you build a Dragonslayer? To reiterate, 13th level, standard WBL (pregame crafting allowed, though), ability score array of 18, 16, 14, 12, 10, 8, all official PF1e options are on the table. (Try to stick to PC races though, no monster PC or templates. I’m not looking to get *too* crazy). I’m open to any level of help, from “make sure and take this one somewhat-obscure spell” up to a full statblock, lol.
Edit: Our buffer says she’s taking Craft Wondrous and Scribe Scroll. The three of us will be talking through things together while we build, so feel free to give me advice to pass along to them.
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A Paladin with the Unsanctioned Knowledge feat and Dragon Turtle Shield hitting with Smite Evil, a Holy enchantment, power attack, and Blade Tutor’s Spirit will do significant damage AND significantly reduce the dragon’s damage output with its natural attacks. If you go all in on Charisma, chances are you will make your saving throws versus breath weapon. Between that and Resist Energy (which you can easily have running in advance), you’ve mitigated a great deal of the danger.
And again, if you went all in on Charisma and have a +6 headband, you’ll have two 4th level spells at 13th level. Dimensional Blade will give you a full round’s worth of targeting Touch AC, while Divine Power (again, via Unsanctioned Knowledge) will give you a big attack/damage bonus and a bonus attack. At this point, you’re probably doing most of the work for your party. The biggest challenge at this point will be getting a monster that can easily outpace any non-6th/9th spellcaster.
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If you are going with a paladin, the Oath against the Wyrm is a no-brainer. This gives you Evasion vs a dragons breath weapon, the ability to ad dragon’s bane to your weapon, and adds enlarge person to your spell list. Make sure to take Dragon Bane Aura to give all allies (including yourself) a +4 Moral bonus vs dragons' breath weapon.
Unsanctioned Knowledge is not a good choice with your stat array. It would require putting your 3rd highest stat into INT. You would be better off putting that into CON instead. You could put the 12 in and use the 12th level increase to get to 13 but means your DEX would be 10. For stats I would recommend going with STR 18, DEX 12, CON 14, INT 10, WIS 8 CHA 16. Go for human and take dual talent and boost both STR and CHA. You should be able to afford a +4 Headband of CHA and a +6 Belt of STR. A Cloak of Resistance +4 will put your reflex save at 15(14 when enlarged). Vs. dragons' breath that goes up to +18. Get dragon slayers shield and that goes up to +20. If one of the party can cast haste that puts your reflex save vs breath weapon at +21. Oath against the Wyrm means if you make your save you take no damage.
You should also be able to afford a +2 Holy Sword and +4 Plate. That will give you a 33 AC with Smite evil. Assuming you can get Enlarge Person, Divine Favor and Hast going you will have 4 attacks at +31/+31/ +26/+21 doing 2d6+37 +4d6 per hit.
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A good old Ranger will be on their third Favored Enemy by 13, so their first will be a +6 to attack/damage... Rapid Shot/Manyshot is 5 arrows. Flurry of Bows via Sohei or Zen Archer is also 5 arrows at level 13. An Orc HornBow is doing 2D6+Strength rating... a ZAM with Zen Arrows and a Monk's Robe could be doing 2D8+Str with any bow. Sohei could be flurrying with a bow, AND have Weapon Training in said bow... opening up BS like Ace Trip.
Warpriests' Sacred Weapon damage is up to 1D10 at level 13... Fervor is up to 4D6, by this level you got four bonus feats, and 5th-level spells. Arsenal Chaplain can get Weapon Training, Divine Commander can get a Mount and Tactician... lots of good options with Warpriests.
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Step 1: Purchase a Large-sized Double Hackbut.
Step 2: Cast Shrink Item on the Double Hackbut and put it in your pocket.
Step 3: Cover yourself in ketchup, mustard, and other spices and get swallowed whole by the dragon.
Step 4: Once you're in the dragon's stomach, cast Dispel Magic on the Double Hackbut and pull the trigger, carving the dragon a new poop hole.
Step 5: Use the Double Hackbut to continue carving new poop holes until the dragon decides to quit his nasty oxygen habit.
Step 6: Take a Prestidigitation shower to remove all the blood, guts, and gore.
Step 7: Loot!
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Hear me out...use a gun.
Dragons notoriously have high SR/Saves/AC and like to fight from afar....but have trash touch AC. Which means that a good gun can do some real hurt.
get you spell cartridges to do force damage on touch attacks that they probably cant resist and hit them a lot. Try an eldritch archerX /spellsplinger1
That will kill the f&%! out of a dragon.
One of the other players is already doing a gunslinger.
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A really fun way to screw with dragons is to find a way to cast calcific touch.
The dragon might make the fort save, but the save is only to negate the slow effect, not the dex damage. Each touch attack will deal 1d4 dex damage. Old (age category) dragons and older have really terrible dex, were talking like 10. With an average of 2.5 dex damage per successful touch attack you can paralyze the dragon in 4 touch attacks or less.
It's an incredibly humiliating way to defeat a dragon that they have almost no defense against, and a GM is unlikely to see and defend against.
You basically just need to survive long enough to get the touch attacks in.
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Calcific touch needs to get past the dragon's spell resistance. An old blue dragon spell resistance of 27 which means they have a 70% chance to ignore any spell that allows spell resistance.
The first thing you should be doing when building a dragon slayer is to make sure your character can survive long enough to kill it. Coming up with the perfect way to kill the dragon in 4 rounds does not do any good if it can kill you in 2.
The first thing any character facing a dragon needs to figure out is how to survive the breath weapon. This usually means ways to boost your reflex save and getting the appropriate energy resistance. Evasion is also very useful here. Dragons usually do a decent amount of so ignoring this is likely to prove fatal.
The second thing you should figure out is a way to deal with their frightful presence. Since this is a free action, it does not prevent the dragon for doing something else. If you don’t have a way to defend against this you are -2 on all attack rolls, saving throw, skill checks and ability checks.
Next you need to figure out how to survive an attack by the dragon’s natural weaponry. Dragons usually have a very good chance to hit, and they don’t take penalties for making multiple attacks. This means that getting your AC high enough to not get hit is going to be difficult. Look for ways to reduce or otherwise negate the damage. Stoneskin and a paladin’s lay on hands are fairly effective at this.
The last thing you should be worried about is the dragon’s spells. Older dragons are spell casters and if you ignore that you could end up in big trouble. Getting hit with something like Enervation in addition to the frightful presence means you are -6 on all attacks and saves. This means you need to have decent saves and cannot ignore touch AC.
It is probably impossible to build a character that does not have any weakness the dragon can exploit, but you can minimize them. For example, a paladin has good saves and does not have to worry about the frightful presence. The Oath against the Wyrm means he is well defended against the breath weapon. If someone in the party can get a stoneskin on him, he is probably pretty good vs the natural weapons. The paladin’s big weakness vs the dragon is probably going to be his touch AC.
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Calcific Touch focused Dragonslayer:
Elf Wizard
Str 8
Dex 21 (16 base +2 racial +3 TransmutationSchool)
Con 12 (14 base -2 racial)
Int 29 (18 base +2 racial +3 level +6 headband)
Wis 12
Cha 10
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Traits:
Magical Lineage (Touch of Gracelessness)
Wayang Spellhunter (Touch of Gracelessness)
Do anything you want with the Elf Traits, but do not trade out: "Elven Magic: Elves receive a +2 racial bonus on caster level checks made to overcome spell resistance."
School: Transmutation (Enhancement)
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1: Spell Focus (Transmutation)
2:
3: Greater Spell Focus (Transmutation)
4:
5: Heighten Spell, Empower Spell
6:
7: Preferred Spell (Calcific Touch)
8:
9: Spell Penetration
10: Reach Spell
11: Improved Familiar (choose any familiar that can UMD wands) -- or -- Weapon Focus (Ray)
12:
13: Greater Spell Penetration
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Equipment: WBL: 140,000gp, and since you're allowed to pre-craft items, the below costs should be halved.
+6 Headband of Vast Intelligence (36,000gp)
Level 4 Pearl of Power x2 (16,000gp each = 32,000gp) - because this particular character is using a lot of level 4 spell slots
Metamagic Rod of Quicken Spell, Lesser (levels 1-3) (35,000gp)
Dragonfoe Amulet (20,000gp) - roll two Spell Pen checks vs. Dragons and take higher result, gain Evasion vs. dragon breath attacks.
Dweomer's Essence (500gp) +5 Spell Pen on a single spell, so probably buy a couple pinches
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With Preferred Spell in Calcific Touch, you can pump MM feats into Calcific Touch on the fly. So, boost Calcific Touch with Reach +1, +2, or +3 to make it a Close, Medium, or Long range Ray effect, or Empower Spell, as needed every time you cast Calcific Touch. Empowered Calcific Touch will deal 1d4 +50% Dex damage. +3 Reach Calcific Touch is a 7th level spell slot, and can reach 400ft + 40ft/lvl, so use this to your advantage to keep the pressure on the dragon while he is far from you. A CR13 Dragon should be ~24 SR, and your Spell Pen check should be 1d20 + 13CasterLevel + 4SP/GSP + 2ElfRacial + 5DweomerEssence = 1d20 + 24. Your DM is probably not going to use a CR13 Dragon on you, lets be honest, so this 1d20 +24 is overkill for a reason.
This is important! Don't let your GM metagame you! You're not a one trick pony here by focusing on Calcific Touch and Touch of Gracelessness, you can use all these SF/GSF Transmutation feats and Spell Pen feats on Disintegrate and Flesh to Stone as well. Both of these will benefit from SF/GSF for a +2 DC in your Transmutation spells, and these can help you clear enemies in any fights on your way to the Dragon's Lair with Disintegrate and Flesh to Stone. <--- This is key, because your GM might metagame you if you use Calcific Touch or Touch of Gracelessness on any enemies otw to the dragon's lair and realize what you've built.
Pre-fight: Have Greater Invisibility, Haste, and Fly active when the fight starts and use these and Dimension Door to get into position. I would probably have two Emergency Force Sphere spells prepared. Or, have one Emergency Force Sphere prepared but plan on using one of your Pearls of Power on it. Buff yourself with a +4 Enchancement bonus to Intelligence using the Transmutation (Enhancement) school ability to increase your spell DC's by 2.
Fighting a Dragon: Fighting a Dragon is tough. I'm not sure what your experience level is or how many dragons you've fought, but they always start out with something to completely mess with your plan so that the whole thing goes to $*#% real fast. Fighting a Dragon is a scrappy fight to say the least Honestly, your first two rounds of combat will be stripping the dragon of his defenses until you face the "real dragon". He'll start out as an illusion (or back to back illusions) to bait your party's first volley of spells/attacks, all the while he's probably invisible in the ceiling of his lair with a Fly spell active so you don't hear his wingbeats. He's definitely going to start out with Spell Turning and/or Contingency active, so you'd probably want to start this fight very cautiously and using Dispel Magic on any possible illusions and Glitterdusting the lair where you think he might hide. Luckily, you're a Ray caster, so Spell Turning won't work vs. your Rays.
Round 1, Fight! In your first round of "ok now we're fighting the real dragon", you should be able to Lesser Wish for a -7 to Saves, and use Metamagic Rod of Quicken Lesser on a Empowered +2 Reach Touch of Gracelessness prepared in a 3rd level spell slot for 1d6+5 +50% Dex at Med range 100ft +10ft/lvl. This averages out to be 8.5 Dex damage in round 1 if the Dragon fails, or 4.25 Dex damage if the Dragon saves. If the dragon fails, he loses a step in his Fly maneuverability, so Poor -4 becomes Clumsy -8. This isn't super important to completely jack up his Fly checks, but it's a nice added bonus. An Adult Dragon has a Fly check of around +10 or +11, so once you start beating up his Dex and decrease his Maneuverability, he will start failing any DC 20 checks for making any complex maneuvers or collisions or any DC15 checks to hover, and he will fall. CR13 Dragon has ~Fort +15, so Lesser Wish reduces this to +8. Your Empowered +2 Reach Touch of Gracelessness should be 10 + 3SpellLevel + 2SF/GSF + 1Int = 26DC, so he needs a roll of 18 or higher on the Fort Save. Either way, you'll cause a decent amount of Dex penalty, with about a 66% reducing his Dex to 1 or 2 and a 33% reducing his dex to 3 or 4 in the first round if he fails.
Tbh, you'll probably face a CR17 dragon, so ~ Fort+19 and SR28. He would still need a 14 or higher on a roll to save vs. your Touch of Gracelessness, and even if he does save, he still takes an average of 4.25 Dex penalty. Luckily, CR17 dragons have Dex of ~8.
Rounds 2+ Pump any MM feats you need on the fly into Calcific Touch and Empower or Reach as necessary to reduce his Dex to 0. Touch of Gracelessness is only a penalty to Dex, but Calcific Touch deals actual Dex damage. So even though you drop the dragon to 0 Dex and he's immobilized, you'll still have to deal ~8to10 Dex damage before he's actually petrified. But, he's immobilized as early as round 1 if he fails. Very humiliating death indeed.
Dex Scores:
0 –6 Incapable of moving (but not unconscious)
1 –5 Barely mobile, probably significantly paralyzed
2-3 –4 Incapable of moving without great effort
4–5 –3 Visible paralysis or physical difficulty
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Round 1, Fight! In your first round of "ok now we're fighting the real dragon", you should be able to Lesser Wish for a -7 to Saves, and use Metamagic Rod of Quicken Lesser on a Empowered +2 Reach Touch of Gracelessness prepared in a 3rd level spell slot for 1d6+5 +50% Dex at Med range 100ft +10ft/lvl.
This averages out to be 8.5 Dex damage in round 1 if the Dragon fails, or 4.25 Dex damage if the Dragon saves.If the dragon fails, he loses a step in his Fly maneuverability, so Poor -4 becomes Clumsy -8. This isn't super important to completely jack up his Fly checks, but it's a nice added bonus. An Adult Dragon has a Fly check of around +10 or +11, so once you start beating up his Dex and decrease his Maneuverability, he will start failing any DC 20 checks for making any complex maneuvers or collisions or any DC15 checks to hover, and he will fall. CR13 Dragon has ~Fort +15, so Lesser Wish reduces this to +8.Your Empowered +2 Reach Touch of Gracelessness should be 10 + 3SpellLevel + 2SF/GSF + 1Int = 26DC, so he needs a roll of 18 or higher on the Fort Save. Either way, you'll cause a decent amount of Dex penalty, with about a 66% reducing his Dex to 1 or 2 and a 33% reducing his dex to 3 or 4 in the first round if he fails.
Tbh, you'll probably face a CR17 dragon, so ~ Fort+19 and SR28. He would still need a 14 or higher on a roll to save vs. your Touch of Gracelessness, and even if he does save, he still takes an average of 4.25 Dex penalty. Luckily, CR17 dragons have Dex of ~8.
I re-read this and realized I made some math errors and typos, my apologies.
First edit:
Empowered +2 Reach Touch of Gracelessness prepared in a 3rd level spell slot for 1d6+5 +50% Dex at Med range 100ft +10ft/lvl. This averages out to be 8.5 + 1.75 = 10.25 Dex penalty in round 1 if the Dragon fails, or average of 5.125 Dex penalty if the Dragon saves.
Second edit:
Your Empowered +2 Reach Touch of Gracelessness should be 10 + 3SpellLevel + 2SF/GSF + 9Int = 24DC, so he needs a roll of 16 or higher on the Fort Save. You'll have a 100% reducing his Dex to 1 in the first round if he fails. Even on a roll of two 1's or a 1 and then a 2 on the 1d6+5 +50%, thats still 7 Dex penalty. Your Calcific Touch spells can do the rest from here.
Third edit:
Tbh, you'll probably face a CR17 dragon, so ~ Fort+19 and SR28. He would still need a 12 or higher on a roll to save vs. your Touch of Gracelessness, and even if he does save, he still takes an average of 5.125 Dex penalty. Luckily, CR17 dragons have Dex of ~8. So absolute worst case scenario: If the dragon saves and then you roll two 1's or a 1 and then a 2 on the 1d6+5 +50%, thats still 4 Dex penalty.
Pre-fight: Have Greater Invisibility, Haste, and Fly active when the fight starts and use these and Dimension Door to get into position. I would probably have two Emergency Force Sphere spells prepared. Or, have one Emergency Force Sphere prepared but plan on using one of your Pearls of Power on it.Buff yourself with a +4 Enchancement bonus to Intelligence using the Transmutation (Enhancement) school ability to increase your spell DC's by 2.
I'm dumb. The enhancement bonus from the headband of +6 Int and this ability won't stack, so nvm. I'd use the +4 enhancement bonus to buff your Wisdom so you can pass the Frightful Presence Will Save easier.
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Final Thoughts:
This Lesser Wish + MM Rod Quickened Empowered +2 Reach Touch of Gracelessness is merely a gambit or a "let's see if we can get lucky" to knock this dragon down to Dex 1 and Clumsy -8 Fly manueverability in the first round, and if you can pull this off, the entire rest of the fight isn't going to be a breeze but it's going to become significantly more manageable. Calcific Touch is the way you're going to kill this dragon. So if poop hits the proverbial fan, which there's a 147.39% of definitely happening, ditch the Lesser Wish + MM Rod Quickened Empowered +2 Reach Touch of Gracelessness strategy and go straight to Empowered Reach Calcific Touch spells, and use Lesser Wish for something you really need instead.
One of the best benefits of going Preferred Spell in Calcific Touch is that you no longer need to prepare Calcific Touch at all. You now have the freedom to load your entire spell list with all your favorite utility spells you think you might want, and then once the fight starts, trash each utility spell as you realize that you're not going to need it and pump any MM feat you want into Calcific Touch to heighten, empower, or reach on an as-needed basis. If you're close range, Empower +1 Reach in a 7th level slot or +1 Reach in a 5th level slot. If you're Medium Range, +2 Reach as a 6th level slot, or if you're long range, +3 Reach as a 7th level slot. If you find yourself within melee range, then may the gods be with you, but hook him up with an Empowered Touch range in a 6th level slot or a standard Calcific Touch as a 4th level slot.
If you are able to pull off this gambit, the next thing your dragon will be thinking will be to teleport or become ethereal or some other type of plane-shifty dimensional shenanigans, so you should probably consider Dimensional Anchor in a 4th level slot
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How are you precrafting for half price without any craft feats?
OP said they have a crafter in the party and that the GM is allowing pre-game crafting.