So for a while now, i found a new friend who got invited to our table for almost a year now (wow, time flew by...) and he wanted to play a dragonborn draconic ancestry sorcerer and asked me if it's possible or not. I kept it as, maybe. After the sessions passed a while ago he got his hand on a creature (homebrew moonlight butterfly that gives wishes) and wished he'd be able to become a dragon. they were like level 7, and i somewhat got panicked because it's still too early for it, but to keep the integrity of the campaign i had him and the party sent to another timeline where he'd be able to do that. Man, he transformed into a young or an adult black dragon and things went crazy there. he was dealing a lot of damage (of course i told him legendary action and resistances are out of the table). But things went hectic and decided to go back since every thing changed and so he asked a dragon god (homebrew, since both tiamat and bahamout are considered dead ).
TLDR: Now the question is, how do i give the character a way to transform into a dragon? i don't want his entire reason for this character to go away for the sake of balancing and making sure the others aren't out shined and jealous of him.
Note: His wish was to make polymorph capable of transforming him into a full dragon.
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Born under the watch of something from the furthest corners of the far realms.... It knows all.... it sees all... and it asks: "What is it that you want to see?"... and my answer is... ALL"
Yeah I’d say becoming a dragon is Level 20 kind of stuff, but it could be the start of a grand adventure. Gathering artifacts, seeking sage wisdom and forgotten knowledge, and bit by bit unlocks different dragon aspects and features. So it’ll take some time for it to happen but I’d say make it feel earned, have fun with it. Of course you still want your game to be balanced but see what y’all can work out. And of course you as DM have final say in the matter and the extent of it all.
A)The dragon god could grant the wish, but it only works once. An hour later they revert to normal and it never works again.
B)The dragongod could simply say that altering that spell is beyond its control and the player has to talk to whatshername about it.
C)The dragongod could say that altering that spell is beyond its control and if they don’t wanna go talk to whatshername then they have to do some other epic 10 level long quest and it’ll figure something out.
D)The dragongod could say that altering that spell is beyond its control and if they don’t wanna go talk to whatshername then the best it can do is make them a Half Dragon. That would grant them 10’ blindsight and 60’ darkvision, a recharge and an upgrade to their breath weapon, and a tail (technically Dragonborn don’t have tails but Half Dragons do). I would not give them the Multiattack, however. If you wanted to be extra nice give them a 1d6 piercing bite, 1d4 slashing claws, and maybe a 1d4(maybe 1d6?) bludgeoning tail (maybe 10’ reach?). Maybe a +1 Natural Armor? Depends on how generous you’re being. They are level 7+ after all. Their Draconic Bloodline Sorcerer feature will eventually give them the wings and Draconic Presence so you don’t have to worry about those. (Half Dragons used to be PC available before WotC invented Dragonborn. You would effectively be making the PC a Half Dragon/half Dragonborn so they could get the best of both.)
E)The dragongod could say that altering that spell is beyond its control and if they don’t wanna go talk to whatshername then The best it can do is slowly transform the PC into a Wyrmling over the course of the next year or so. Then the PC has to grow up a bit (up to another 5 years) before it gets to “Young.”
Technically the dragongod has to un-grow the PC into a younger state (to make them more malleable) and then regrowing them into a dragon. So as they “un-age” they slowly revert to Wyrmling stats and HP and everything. Once the transformation is complete they loose their Sorcerer levels and have to use the “Dragons as Innate Spellcasters Variant Rules” from the MM. By the time the PC is anywhere close to Adult age the campaign will be over, they will now be a persisting NPC in your world. I would never let them play as an adult dragon unless all the other PCs got to be that special too.
Yeah I’d say becoming a dragon is Level 20 kind of stuff, but it could be the start of a grand adventure. Gathering artifacts, seeking sage wisdom and forgotten knowledge, and bit by bit unlocks different dragon aspects and features. So it’ll take some time for it to happen but I’d say make it feel earned, have fun with it. Of course you still want your game to be balanced but see what y’all can work out. And of course you as DM have final say in the matter and the extent of it all.
I agree, the best way to handle this is to make his desire to turn into a dragon into his whole character arc, rather than worrying how to achieve it ASAP. Likely when they came up with the idea of such an extravagant goal, they realized it's something they wouldn't just get handed to them on a plate. Instead, it should be treated as a long term goal, something for them to always be working towards a little bit at a time over the course of a whole campaign.
Have them uncover ancient secrets, search for rare experimental components, have him conduct biomorphic experiments (turning rats to lizards or something small scale to test on), let him use his tool proficiencies in his experiments, allow him to spend gold on supplies to advance his goals, etc.
Tl;dr: turning into a dragon is a BIG ask. Your player should understand this. Don't make it impossible, just make it a BIG process.
Also, out of curiosity, why did you give your player access to a Wish at such a low level when you knew what he'd wish for AND that it'd be too much? Short answer here is just don't give him a wish granting butterfly.
Also, out of curiosity, why did you give your player access to a Wish at such a low level when you knew what he'd wish for AND that it'd be too much? Short answer here is just don't give him a wish granting butterfly.
Yeah, I was wondering that too. It’s been my experience that DMs only give out Wishes if they actually want to give PCs crazy $|-|!+, want to screw the PCs/players bad, or want an narrative excuse to blow up the campaign. I figured he was going the first way so I was throwing out ideas for him. Most of them involved long story arcs too.
Does he want to be a dragon for some reason beyond RP?
If it's just for RP purposes, I would do this:
Look at a hybrid caster/ fighter. Perhaps try to build a level 8 fighter/ mage class. Then reassign his cantrips to some kind of breath weapon, natural ability. For his claws/ tail, look at typical weapons available at that level. You can use the dragonborn race as a decent metric of how to do stat bonuses. It would be a larger OOC project but if you approach it from the point of "You want to be a dragon and I don't want you to break my game. Let's make this work."
If he just wants access to the Dragon Stat box because it'll blow up lots of bad guys fast? ehh... no. The game needs to be fun for ALL of the players.
Polymorph to a young copper dragon shouldn't be more powerful than polymorph into a giant ape (both CR 7).
While I agree you should never give level 7 characters access to wish I don't think it is a game breaker to allow the wish if the CR restrictions are maintained i.e.
a) you can't polymorph into a a creature with a CR higher than your level
b) As no beasts (I'll ignore Traxigor) is higher than level 8 I would put that as a limit as well (or possibly make it 10 so all young dragons are allowed)
I would let him play a Dragonborn Draconic Sorcerer where he’s the same dragon type in both and flavor it as a half dragon. And after 20th level when you grant boons to the other PCs, grant him boons that make him more like a dragon. Start with granting him the ability to cast Enlarge/Reduce on himself at will without expending a spell slot and grant more boons from there that make him more and more a dragon.
A "best of both worlds" solution could be that he gains a new trait that gets stronger at appropriate levels. For 1 minute or 1 hour once per long rest, he can transform to a dragon of a specific power level. The higher in level he gets, the stronger of a dragon he can turn in to.
The specifics of this would be up to you to decide what you're willing to allow.
@CharlesThePlant, I had intended it for another player whose been losing family members left and right (but I found out the player gave me a list of 33 npcs that he doesn't care about.............) but the dragonborn was the one to pick up the hint. The dragonborn player was too excited to get his dragon form at level 6. Despite my warning to him that his wish might backfire he went for it regardless. I gave him 1 month in real life to think about it since most players were travelling. But in the end he still went becoming a red dragon.
I am liking the whole project to get to be a dragon at higher level, but it's kinda sad for it to happen just as the campaign ends just like videos games when you get the most powerful weapon and you don't get to use it. But it can't be helped if it isn't/can't be balanced.
A side note for those who asked: he is a red dragonborn with a shadow dragon ancestry (backstory reason).
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Born under the watch of something from the furthest corners of the far realms.... It knows all.... it sees all... and it asks: "What is it that you want to see?"... and my answer is... ALL"
One of my players is the last remaining prismatic dragon. Dragons can take humanoid forms a they choose for mingling reasons.
Biggest thing to remember is balance. Now my player can't turn into a dragon at this time. He just recently got a breath attack after drinking a rather strong alcoholic beverage at the tavern. As he grows so does his powers and he'll eventually learn new spells as he levels.
So a player being a dragon is fine as long as they are still balanced with the rest of the group. Being overpowered is no fun for the others. So trial and error.
I am liking the whole project to get to be a dragon at higher level, but it's kinda sad for it to happen just as the campaign ends just like videos games when you get the most powerful weapon and you don't get to use it. But it can't be helped if it isn't/can't be balanced.
It can happen in stages, but if they turn into a dragon by level 17ish it shouldn’t be so bad.
Note: His wish was to make polymorph capable of transforming him into a full dragon.
I would just have it that True Polymorph would be added to his spellbook for free. If his class can't cast true poly, then I would allow his class to be able to cast it. Granted he would still need to be able to cast 9th level spells so it would be level 17 at the earliest and it goes by the CR of the dragon not being higher than the level of the character.
It's also worth noting that, in lore, red dragons are chaotic evil, so that could be a way of introducing consequences to it if he changes too early again. Maybe he becomes evil and risks losing control of his character as it becomes a villain and he has to roll a new character to help fight it.
It's also worth noting that, in lore, red dragons are chaotic evil, so that could be a way of introducing consequences to it if he changes too early again. Maybe he becomes evil and risks losing control of his character as it becomes a villain and he has to roll a new character to help fight it.
If I were gonna do that I’d probably treat it more like possession by an intelligent weapon. It can be no fun having you sheet yanked and being told that after finally getting to do the thing the DM said you could do that you now have to roll new and go on a quest to kill your old character. In another circumstance it might be hilarious fun, but I think this player would be super crestfallen.
Have you looked at the Feat lists? There are Dragonborn-specific ones that do precisely this. (Dragon Hide - scale armor and claw weapon, Dragon Wings - wings and flight)
A player can use these most common five options. One, they can use True Polymorph to be a dragon for 1 to 10 minutes. Two, bath in 25 gallons of a dragon's blood for 1 hour. Three, becoming a Dragonborn. Four, retrieve the heart of a dragon and use necromancy to put it in your body, gaining all it's power. And five, receiving the power of a dragon for
So for a while now, i found a new friend who got invited to our table for almost a year now (wow, time flew by...) and he wanted to play a dragonborn draconic ancestry sorcerer and asked me if it's possible or not. I kept it as, maybe. After the sessions passed a while ago he got his hand on a creature (homebrew moonlight butterfly that gives wishes) and wished he'd be able to become a dragon. they were like level 7, and i somewhat got panicked because it's still too early for it, but to keep the integrity of the campaign i had him and the party sent to another timeline where he'd be able to do that. Man, he transformed into a young or an adult black dragon and things went crazy there. he was dealing a lot of damage (of course i told him legendary action and resistances are out of the table). But things went hectic and decided to go back since every thing changed and so he asked a dragon god (homebrew, since both tiamat and bahamout are considered dead ).
TLDR: Now the question is, how do i give the character a way to transform into a dragon? i don't want his entire reason for this character to go away for the sake of balancing and making sure the others aren't out shined and jealous of him.
Note: His wish was to make polymorph capable of transforming him into a full dragon.
Dragons take millennia to become full size. At best he could be either a wyrmling or a young dragon. From 5E lore perspective he'd be a sorcerer for class. The damage capacity for him as a dragon is going to be too high. You could either create a custom character class where he can get draconic capabilities and rarely like once a year go full dragon till he gets significantly higher leveled like level 15+.
A young black dragon is equal to a level 13 fighter in stats and capabilities for a party at level 7. What's next you have a player who wants to become a beholder so he can randomly poly into a beholder and go hog? I know if I had you as a DM, I'd want that capability as well seeing as the other guy got to be a black dragon. Its the beginning of a Monty Haul campaign for a game that is already quite broke turning players into super heroes.
As a DM you want to give a steady progression of power to the players, whether it be through XP, phat lewtins or followers. But that isn't steady progress its strapping rockets to him. Next you put him in the form of a black dragon, they aren't exactly known for being pro-social. If you want to play a game where the lore doesn't matter its possible, but the more you break lore for player whims are you playing a game or simply reading a choose your own adventure book and making sure the players always select the right choice?
I'd simply tell him he has a choice, if he wants to become a dragon you are going to make a new player class for him and its going to be much closer to a fighter with very limited spell casting capabilities. The dragon form will share his hit points, it won't be a free polymorph and there will be a financial cost to the player to do it to the point where he won't be doing it once a session. Call it cost to his horde. Essentially his player class will dragon, he'll get some extra hit points, armor and standard ASI's with a few class features. Look at some fighter subclasses and figure out how to make it work without making him OP. Tell him specifically he will NOT be stronger or better than any existing player class and do your best to ensure that.
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So for a while now, i found a new friend who got invited to our table for almost a year now (wow, time flew by...) and he wanted to play a dragonborn draconic ancestry sorcerer and asked me if it's possible or not. I kept it as, maybe. After the sessions passed a while ago he got his hand on a creature (homebrew moonlight butterfly that gives wishes) and wished he'd be able to become a dragon. they were like level 7, and i somewhat got panicked because it's still too early for it, but to keep the integrity of the campaign i had him and the party sent to another timeline where he'd be able to do that. Man, he transformed into a young or an adult black dragon and things went crazy there. he was dealing a lot of damage (of course i told him legendary action and resistances are out of the table). But things went hectic and decided to go back since every thing changed and so he asked a dragon god (homebrew, since both tiamat and bahamout are considered dead ).
TLDR: Now the question is, how do i give the character a way to transform into a dragon? i don't want his entire reason for this character to go away for the sake of balancing and making sure the others aren't out shined and jealous of him.
Note: His wish was to make polymorph capable of transforming him into a full dragon.
Born under the watch of something from the furthest corners of the far realms.... It knows all.... it sees all... and it asks: "What is it that you want to see?"... and my answer is... ALL"
Have him turn into a Wyrmling. It’ll take 5 years in game to grow enough to be a problem, by then the rest of the group should be much higher level.
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Yeah I’d say becoming a dragon is Level 20 kind of stuff, but it could be the start of a grand adventure. Gathering artifacts, seeking sage wisdom and forgotten knowledge, and bit by bit unlocks different dragon aspects and features. So it’ll take some time for it to happen but I’d say make it feel earned, have fun with it. Of course you still want your game to be balanced but see what y’all can work out. And of course you as DM have final say in the matter and the extent of it all.
—Polymorph is Concentration up to an hour.
A)The dragon god could grant the wish, but it only works once. An hour later they revert to normal and it never works again.
B)The dragongod could simply say that altering that spell is beyond its control and the player has to talk to whatshername about it.
C)The dragongod could say that altering that spell is beyond its control and if they don’t wanna go talk to whatshername then they have to do some other epic 10 level long quest and it’ll figure something out.
D)The dragongod could say that altering that spell is beyond its control and if they don’t wanna go talk to whatshername then the best it can do is make them a Half Dragon. That would grant them 10’ blindsight and 60’ darkvision, a recharge and an upgrade to their breath weapon, and a tail (technically Dragonborn don’t have tails but Half Dragons do). I would not give them the Multiattack, however. If you wanted to be extra nice give them a 1d6 piercing bite, 1d4 slashing claws, and maybe a 1d4(maybe 1d6?) bludgeoning tail (maybe 10’ reach?). Maybe a +1 Natural Armor? Depends on how generous you’re being. They are level 7+ after all. Their Draconic Bloodline Sorcerer feature will eventually give them the wings and Draconic Presence so you don’t have to worry about those.
(Half Dragons used to be PC available before WotC invented Dragonborn. You would effectively be making the PC a Half Dragon/half Dragonborn so they could get the best of both.)
E)The dragongod could say that altering that spell is beyond its control and if they don’t wanna go talk to whatshername then The best it can do is slowly transform the PC into a Wyrmling over the course of the next year or so. Then the PC has to grow up a bit (up to another 5 years) before it gets to “Young.”
Technically the dragongod has to un-grow the PC into a younger state (to make them more malleable) and then regrowing them into a dragon. So as they “un-age” they slowly revert to Wyrmling stats and HP and everything. Once the transformation is complete they loose their Sorcerer levels and have to use the “Dragons as Innate Spellcasters Variant Rules” from the MM. By the time the PC is anywhere close to Adult age the campaign will be over, they will now be a persisting NPC in your world. I would never let them play as an adult dragon unless all the other PCs got to be that special too.
PS- The PC is what color Dragonborn?
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I agree, the best way to handle this is to make his desire to turn into a dragon into his whole character arc, rather than worrying how to achieve it ASAP. Likely when they came up with the idea of such an extravagant goal, they realized it's something they wouldn't just get handed to them on a plate. Instead, it should be treated as a long term goal, something for them to always be working towards a little bit at a time over the course of a whole campaign.
Have them uncover ancient secrets, search for rare experimental components, have him conduct biomorphic experiments (turning rats to lizards or something small scale to test on), let him use his tool proficiencies in his experiments, allow him to spend gold on supplies to advance his goals, etc.
Tl;dr: turning into a dragon is a BIG ask. Your player should understand this. Don't make it impossible, just make it a BIG process.
Also, out of curiosity, why did you give your player access to a Wish at such a low level when you knew what he'd wish for AND that it'd be too much? Short answer here is just don't give him a wish granting butterfly.
Yeah, I was wondering that too. It’s been my experience that DMs only give out Wishes if they actually want to give PCs crazy $|-|!+, want to screw the PCs/players bad, or want an narrative excuse to blow up the campaign. I figured he was going the first way so I was throwing out ideas for him. Most of them involved long story arcs too.
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Does he want to be a dragon for some reason beyond RP?
If it's just for RP purposes, I would do this:
Look at a hybrid caster/ fighter. Perhaps try to build a level 8 fighter/ mage class. Then reassign his cantrips to some kind of breath weapon, natural ability. For his claws/ tail, look at typical weapons available at that level. You can use the dragonborn race as a decent metric of how to do stat bonuses. It would be a larger OOC project but if you approach it from the point of "You want to be a dragon and I don't want you to break my game. Let's make this work."
If he just wants access to the Dragon Stat box because it'll blow up lots of bad guys fast? ehh... no. The game needs to be fun for ALL of the players.
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Polymorph to a young copper dragon shouldn't be more powerful than polymorph into a giant ape (both CR 7).
While I agree you should never give level 7 characters access to wish I don't think it is a game breaker to allow the wish if the CR restrictions are maintained i.e.
a) you can't polymorph into a a creature with a CR higher than your level
b) As no beasts (I'll ignore Traxigor) is higher than level 8 I would put that as a limit as well (or possibly make it 10 so all young dragons are allowed)
I would let him play a Dragonborn Draconic Sorcerer where he’s the same dragon type in both and flavor it as a half dragon. And after 20th level when you grant boons to the other PCs, grant him boons that make him more like a dragon. Start with granting him the ability to cast Enlarge/Reduce on himself at will without expending a spell slot and grant more boons from there that make him more and more a dragon.
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A "best of both worlds" solution could be that he gains a new trait that gets stronger at appropriate levels. For 1 minute or 1 hour once per long rest, he can transform to a dragon of a specific power level. The higher in level he gets, the stronger of a dragon he can turn in to.
The specifics of this would be up to you to decide what you're willing to allow.
@CharlesThePlant, I had intended it for another player whose been losing family members left and right (but I found out the player gave me a list of 33 npcs that he doesn't care about.............) but the dragonborn was the one to pick up the hint. The dragonborn player was too excited to get his dragon form at level 6. Despite my warning to him that his wish might backfire he went for it regardless. I gave him 1 month in real life to think about it since most players were travelling. But in the end he still went becoming a red dragon.
I am liking the whole project to get to be a dragon at higher level, but it's kinda sad for it to happen just as the campaign ends just like videos games when you get the most powerful weapon and you don't get to use it. But it can't be helped if it isn't/can't be balanced.
A side note for those who asked: he is a red dragonborn with a shadow dragon ancestry (backstory reason).
Born under the watch of something from the furthest corners of the far realms.... It knows all.... it sees all... and it asks: "What is it that you want to see?"... and my answer is... ALL"
One of my players is the last remaining prismatic dragon. Dragons can take humanoid forms a they choose for mingling reasons.
Biggest thing to remember is balance. Now my player can't turn into a dragon at this time. He just recently got a breath attack after drinking a rather strong alcoholic beverage at the tavern. As he grows so does his powers and he'll eventually learn new spells as he levels.
So a player being a dragon is fine as long as they are still balanced with the rest of the group. Being overpowered is no fun for the others. So trial and error.
Have fun with it.
It can happen in stages, but if they turn into a dragon by level 17ish it shouldn’t be so bad.
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I would just have it that True Polymorph would be added to his spellbook for free. If his class can't cast true poly, then I would allow his class to be able to cast it. Granted he would still need to be able to cast 9th level spells so it would be level 17 at the earliest and it goes by the CR of the dragon not being higher than the level of the character.
It's also worth noting that, in lore, red dragons are chaotic evil, so that could be a way of introducing consequences to it if he changes too early again. Maybe he becomes evil and risks losing control of his character as it becomes a villain and he has to roll a new character to help fight it.
If I were gonna do that I’d probably treat it more like possession by an intelligent weapon. It can be no fun having you sheet yanked and being told that after finally getting to do the thing the DM said you could do that you now have to roll new and go on a quest to kill your old character. In another circumstance it might be hilarious fun, but I think this player would be super crestfallen.
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Uhhh true polymorph? Done and done.
Have you looked at the Feat lists? There are Dragonborn-specific ones that do precisely this. (Dragon Hide - scale armor and claw weapon, Dragon Wings - wings and flight)
A player can use these most common five options. One, they can use True Polymorph to be a dragon for 1 to 10 minutes. Two, bath in 25 gallons of a dragon's blood for 1 hour. Three, becoming a Dragonborn. Four, retrieve the heart of a dragon and use necromancy to put it in your body, gaining all it's power. And five, receiving the power of a dragon for
Dragons take millennia to become full size. At best he could be either a wyrmling or a young dragon. From 5E lore perspective he'd be a sorcerer for class. The damage capacity for him as a dragon is going to be too high. You could either create a custom character class where he can get draconic capabilities and rarely like once a year go full dragon till he gets significantly higher leveled like level 15+.
A young black dragon is equal to a level 13 fighter in stats and capabilities for a party at level 7. What's next you have a player who wants to become a beholder so he can randomly poly into a beholder and go hog? I know if I had you as a DM, I'd want that capability as well seeing as the other guy got to be a black dragon. Its the beginning of a Monty Haul campaign for a game that is already quite broke turning players into super heroes.
As a DM you want to give a steady progression of power to the players, whether it be through XP, phat lewtins or followers. But that isn't steady progress its strapping rockets to him. Next you put him in the form of a black dragon, they aren't exactly known for being pro-social. If you want to play a game where the lore doesn't matter its possible, but the more you break lore for player whims are you playing a game or simply reading a choose your own adventure book and making sure the players always select the right choice?
I'd simply tell him he has a choice, if he wants to become a dragon you are going to make a new player class for him and its going to be much closer to a fighter with very limited spell casting capabilities. The dragon form will share his hit points, it won't be a free polymorph and there will be a financial cost to the player to do it to the point where he won't be doing it once a session. Call it cost to his horde. Essentially his player class will dragon, he'll get some extra hit points, armor and standard ASI's with a few class features. Look at some fighter subclasses and figure out how to make it work without making him OP. Tell him specifically he will NOT be stronger or better than any existing player class and do your best to ensure that.