So in RAW, it doesn't appear a polymorphed dragon has access to their breath weapon, which is understandable if polymorph presumes a complete biological transformation and not something that can somehow retain the dragon's breath weapon "biological" basis.
That said, I've got or adapted an NPC Ancient Copper dragon who spends a lot of time in an espionage capacity and conducts that work largely in the form of a human. As means to thwart some PCs curiosity about her, and a possible useful power set as ally or adversary in the future, I'm toying with allowing an instance of slowing breath while in human form to throw off pursuit. I'm wondering if anyone has also allowed disguised dragons to keep their breath weapon in a scaled capacity. So in this instance, since the dragon is polymorophed into medium sized being, the breath weapon would be equivalent to what a wyrmling could breath.
I mean I suppose it's possible that this particular dragon uniquely learned how to do this through careful tailoring of the polymorph process, and if the party ever comes across another dragon in human form and encourages it to use its great the response could be a "I never learned how to do that" or "I didn't know we could do that. Who did that?" moment. But I'm just wondering if anyone sees this as a particularly problematic modification.
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Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Yeah, I'm aware of that, I"m just wondering if I make this a house rule for "all dragons" if there's something I might be breaking, so I'm looking for more "been there done that, this is where it's going to come back and bite you" type stuff. Either that or validations of my creative genius in regards small modifications :)
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Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Unique monsters are perfectly acceptable, especially when they are old enough to remember the rise and fall of civilizations. If you make a broad modification to a creature type in general, a player will eventually find a way to exploit it.
Rather than making one rule apply to "All Dragons", just roll with the principle that intelligent, powerful creatures are clever, and that cleverness manifests itself in different ways. Maybe retaining a breath weapon is a common adaptation, but it probably shouldn't be baked in by default.
For example, a 17th level character could be True Polymorphed into an Adult Gold Dragon and gain access to Change Shape, so whatever you allow a dragon to do, by default, the player becomes eligible for.
So in RAW, it doesn't appear a polymorphed dragon has access to their breath weapon, which is understandable if polymorph presumes a complete biological transformation and not something that can somehow retain the dragon's breath weapon "biological" basis.
That said, I've got or adapted an NPC Ancient Copper dragon who spends a lot of time in an espionage capacity and conducts that work largely in the form of a human. As means to thwart some PCs curiosity about her, and a possible useful power set as ally or adversary in the future, I'm toying with allowing an instance of slowing breath while in human form to throw off pursuit. I'm wondering if anyone has also allowed disguised dragons to keep their breath weapon in a scaled capacity. So in this instance, since the dragon is polymorophed into medium sized being, the breath weapon would be equivalent to what a wyrmling could breath.
I mean I suppose it's possible that this particular dragon uniquely learned how to do this through careful tailoring of the polymorph process, and if the party ever comes across another dragon in human form and encourages it to use its great the response could be a "I never learned how to do that" or "I didn't know we could do that. Who did that?" moment. But I'm just wondering if anyone sees this as a particularly problematic modification.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Yeah, I'm aware of that, I"m just wondering if I make this a house rule for "all dragons" if there's something I might be breaking, so I'm looking for more "been there done that, this is where it's going to come back and bite you" type stuff. Either that or validations of my creative genius in regards small modifications :)
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Unique monsters are perfectly acceptable, especially when they are old enough to remember the rise and fall of civilizations.
If you make a broad modification to a creature type in general, a player will eventually find a way to exploit it.
Rather than making one rule apply to "All Dragons", just roll with the principle that intelligent, powerful creatures are clever, and that cleverness manifests itself in different ways. Maybe retaining a breath weapon is a common adaptation, but it probably shouldn't be baked in by default.
For example, a 17th level character could be True Polymorphed into an Adult Gold Dragon and gain access to Change Shape, so whatever you allow a dragon to do, by default, the player becomes eligible for.