A Wood Elf ranger to with 18 Dex and Con could do it. White dragon wyrmling: 32 hp, 16 AC, 9 DPT (+4 to hit). Ranger 2: 20 hp, 17 AC (studded leather), DPT 14 (+8 to hit). The ranger can take it out in 3 turns, as the ranger is likely to hit most turns. If flying, the dragon will end up 95 ft from the ranger after 3 turns. Even then it can't attack.
You forgot the breath weapon which does 22 damage on failed save, 11 on success.
Studded leather with 18 DEX is 16 AC, and with 18 CON a level 2 ranger would have 24 HP. I'm also not sure where you are getting 14 damage per turn, with 18 DEX and Hunter's mark it would average 12.
But, yeah a level 2 ranger has a much better chance of winning assuming the wyrmling was spotted from a distance and there was nothing for it to take cover behind as it approached.
The dragon's breath only has a range of 15 feet. The ranger would win.
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All stars fade. Some stars forever fall. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Homebrew (Mostly Outdated):Magic Items,Monsters,Spells,Subclasses ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- If there was no light, people wouldn't fear the dark.
The breath attack may only be a 15 ft range, but the wyrmling can also fly at twice the speed that most characters can move. It can potentially fly higher than the 150 ft to impose disadvantage on the ranger until it's ready to strike or burrow until it's ready to strike to gain total cover. Even if the wyrmling flew right at the ranger, average damage suggests that the ranger would need 3-4 successful attacks to win, whereas the wyrmling can 1-2 shot the ranger, potentially with one saved breath attack and one AoO. The ranger needs to be near perfect and threw wyrmling needs to be nearly imperfect for the ranger to win. The beta encounters doesn't downgrade a generic character soloing the wyrmling from a deadly encounter to a medium encounter until level 5. The ranger has some optimization that can skew that lower, but still a challenge.
I was talking about a Wood Elf ranger, they have 35 speed. And with Zephyr Strike...
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All stars fade. Some stars forever fall. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Homebrew (Mostly Outdated):Magic Items,Monsters,Spells,Subclasses ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- If there was no light, people wouldn't fear the dark.
All stars fade. Some stars forever fall. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Homebrew (Mostly Outdated):Magic Items,Monsters,Spells,Subclasses ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- If there was no light, people wouldn't fear the dark.
I was talking about a Wood Elf ranger, they have 35 speed. And with Zephyr Strike...
Wood Elf Ranger has 35 speed, [monster]white dragon wyrmling[\monster] has a flying speed of 60. If the wyrmling can't attack, it will either dash or dodge. [spell]Zephyr Strike[\spell] gives the Ranger the ability: "Until the spell ends, your movement doesn’t provoke opportunity attacks." That is the only ability that the spell gives for the full duration, and the concentration on the spell can be interrupted if the Ranger takes damage. Since the goal of the Ranger will be to maintain range as long as possible, that aspect won't be as useful. The other part of the spell, says "Once before the spell ends, you can give yourself advantage on one weapon attack roll on your turn. That attack deals an extra 1d8 force damage on a hit. Whether you hit or miss, your walking speed increases by 30 feet until the end of that turn." The 30 feet of movement doesn't seem to occur until the Ranger gives itself the advantage on an attack that then deals an extra 1d8 (4.5 average) force damage on a hit. This means that on the turn that you use the [spell]Zephyr Strike[\spell] one time use, you'll get to quasi-dash after making a 2d8+dex modifier attack with advantage (call the dex modifier +3 for a standard array/point buy arrangement). That means that attack will average 12 damage, but could bump to a lovely 21 average damage on a crit. If you want to look at it with max damage, it certainly looks more manageable with a 19 or a 35 crit. At level 2, you can cast that twice. Two normal hits drop the wyrmling down to 8 HP, meaning that you still need to hit it two other times with average damage on a longbow (1d8 or 4.5) and a dex modifier of +3 (total of 7.5, which may or may not actually kill the wyrmling). Keep in mind that if the wyrmling is dashing, it's still moving at 120 feet through the air per turn. The ranger with the movement activated is moving 65 feet and the wyrmling is closing by 55 ft per turn. It can fly up to the 155 ft mark to impose disadvantage on attacks, which would negate the advantage that Zephyr Strike would give. Or it burrows and it doesn't matter how far the ranger can fire because it can't hit something behind total cover. The wyrmling does have 10 ft blindsense to help it figure out where the Ranger is, though the ranger can simply run around randomly in hopes of not coming within range of the wyrmling. That is not victory, but stalemate. Also acknowledging that the burrow speed is only 15, meaning that it might be able to dash for 30. It's not likely to find you that way, but you're also not going to find it to kill it.
If the wyrmling instead decides to dodge while approaching, it is still making the attacks against it have disadvantage or negating the advantage granted by [spell]Zephyr Strike[\spell]. I would probably have the wyrmling come right at you with dashes until the first arrow hit, then dodge while it found cover or climbed to altitude. It does have a +2 stealth bonus (on a +0 dex) so it has a workable knowledge of trying to move stealthily and the type of terrain that the fight takes place in will certainly change things.
A White Dragon’s Lair
White dragons lair in icy caves and deep subterranean chambers far from the sun. They favor high mountain vales accessible only by flying, caverns in cliff faces, and labyrinthine ice caves in glaciers. White dragons love vertical heights in their caverns, flying up to the ceiling to latch on like bats or slithering down icy crevasses.
That doesn't sound like the terrain that would be conducive to hit and run (away) tactics, though there could be some additional opportunities to hide.
You can attempt to hide even when you are only lightly obscured by foliage, heavy rain, falling snow, mist, and other natural phenomena.
“attempt”—- have you ever tried hiding from something staring at you?
second: this doesn’t change how you smell. You just hide visually.
3rd- Have we even talked about how at level 1 the odds of hitting the 16-17 ACs of wyrmlings is at best 50%
Mask of the Wild is a decent option if there is some phenomena that is lightly obscuring the area, particularly if you've taken damage and need a moment to regroup and down a healing potion. It's also a decent opportunity to try to regain advantage in hopes of getting a crit. As Robazathus indicates, it doesn't change your smell or any noise that you make. It also doesn't negate the 10 ft blindsense that the wyrmling could use to luck into finding you.
I'll assume that the Ranger is going Archery fighting style for the +2 to hit bonus, giving them a +7 total bonus (+ 2 archery, +2 proficiency, and +3 dex modifier on a 16 or 17). The [monster]White Dragon Wyrmling[\monster] has a 16 AC meaning that the Ranger hits on 9s. That's 12/20 possible rolls or 60%. Every indication thus far has indicated that the Ranger would be fishing for advantage in every way that it could, including using Mask of the Wild to try to hide and attack from a hidden position and using [spell]Zephyr Strike[\spell]. That might be one of the better spell options considering that [spell]Hunter's Mark[\spell] only has a range of 90 ft (to place the mark) meaning that you can't mark the wyrmling until it's uncomfortably close anyway. The wyrmling has +2 saves on Strength, Dexterity, Wisdom, and Charisma coupled with a +4 to constitution. It's intelligence is it's only weak point at -3 saves. That means that [spell]Hail of Thorns[\spell], & [spell]Snare[\spell] are saved around half the time, particularly if the ranger eschews wisdom for more constitution (with a likely score of either 14 or 16, the Save DC would be a 12 or 13). [spell]Fog Cloud[\spell] could give you an opportunity to hide where you might be far enough back that the wyrmling couldn't get you with a breath attack while remaining outside of the cloud, but it's the same size as you and can follow you in until it bumps noses with you.
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The dragon's breath only has a range of 15 feet. The ranger would win.
All stars fade. Some stars forever fall.
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Homebrew (Mostly Outdated): Magic Items, Monsters, Spells, Subclasses
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If there was no light, people wouldn't fear the dark.
The breath attack may only be a 15 ft range, but the wyrmling can also fly at twice the speed that most characters can move. It can potentially fly higher than the 150 ft to impose disadvantage on the ranger until it's ready to strike or burrow until it's ready to strike to gain total cover. Even if the wyrmling flew right at the ranger, average damage suggests that the ranger would need 3-4 successful attacks to win, whereas the wyrmling can 1-2 shot the ranger, potentially with one saved breath attack and one AoO. The ranger needs to be near perfect and threw wyrmling needs to be nearly imperfect for the ranger to win. The beta encounters doesn't downgrade a generic character soloing the wyrmling from a deadly encounter to a medium encounter until level 5. The ranger has some optimization that can skew that lower, but still a challenge.
I was talking about a Wood Elf ranger, they have 35 speed. And with Zephyr Strike...
All stars fade. Some stars forever fall.
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Homebrew (Mostly Outdated): Magic Items, Monsters, Spells, Subclasses
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If there was no light, people wouldn't fear the dark.
Also Mask of the Wild.
All stars fade. Some stars forever fall.
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Homebrew (Mostly Outdated): Magic Items, Monsters, Spells, Subclasses
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If there was no light, people wouldn't fear the dark.
Mask of the Wild
You can attempt to hide even when you are only lightly obscured by foliage, heavy rain, falling snow, mist, and other natural phenomena.
“attempt”—- have you ever tried hiding from something staring at you?
second: this doesn’t change how you smell. You just hide visually.
3rd- Have we even talked about how at level 1 the odds of hitting the 16-17 ACs of wyrmlings is at best 50%
Wood Elf Ranger has 35 speed, [monster]white dragon wyrmling[\monster] has a flying speed of 60. If the wyrmling can't attack, it will either dash or dodge. [spell]Zephyr Strike[\spell] gives the Ranger the ability: "Until the spell ends, your movement doesn’t provoke opportunity attacks." That is the only ability that the spell gives for the full duration, and the concentration on the spell can be interrupted if the Ranger takes damage. Since the goal of the Ranger will be to maintain range as long as possible, that aspect won't be as useful. The other part of the spell, says "Once before the spell ends, you can give yourself advantage on one weapon attack roll on your turn. That attack deals an extra 1d8 force damage on a hit. Whether you hit or miss, your walking speed increases by 30 feet until the end of that turn." The 30 feet of movement doesn't seem to occur until the Ranger gives itself the advantage on an attack that then deals an extra 1d8 (4.5 average) force damage on a hit. This means that on the turn that you use the [spell]Zephyr Strike[\spell] one time use, you'll get to quasi-dash after making a 2d8+dex modifier attack with advantage (call the dex modifier +3 for a standard array/point buy arrangement). That means that attack will average 12 damage, but could bump to a lovely 21 average damage on a crit. If you want to look at it with max damage, it certainly looks more manageable with a 19 or a 35 crit. At level 2, you can cast that twice. Two normal hits drop the wyrmling down to 8 HP, meaning that you still need to hit it two other times with average damage on a longbow (1d8 or 4.5) and a dex modifier of +3 (total of 7.5, which may or may not actually kill the wyrmling). Keep in mind that if the wyrmling is dashing, it's still moving at 120 feet through the air per turn. The ranger with the movement activated is moving 65 feet and the wyrmling is closing by 55 ft per turn. It can fly up to the 155 ft mark to impose disadvantage on attacks, which would negate the advantage that Zephyr Strike would give. Or it burrows and it doesn't matter how far the ranger can fire because it can't hit something behind total cover. The wyrmling does have 10 ft blindsense to help it figure out where the Ranger is, though the ranger can simply run around randomly in hopes of not coming within range of the wyrmling. That is not victory, but stalemate. Also acknowledging that the burrow speed is only 15, meaning that it might be able to dash for 30. It's not likely to find you that way, but you're also not going to find it to kill it.
If the wyrmling instead decides to dodge while approaching, it is still making the attacks against it have disadvantage or negating the advantage granted by [spell]Zephyr Strike[\spell]. I would probably have the wyrmling come right at you with dashes until the first arrow hit, then dodge while it found cover or climbed to altitude. It does have a +2 stealth bonus (on a +0 dex) so it has a workable knowledge of trying to move stealthily and the type of terrain that the fight takes place in will certainly change things.
A White Dragon’s Lair
White dragons lair in icy caves and deep subterranean chambers far from the sun. They favor high mountain vales accessible only by flying, caverns in cliff faces, and labyrinthine ice caves in glaciers. White dragons love vertical heights in their caverns, flying up to the ceiling to latch on like bats or slithering down icy crevasses.
That doesn't sound like the terrain that would be conducive to hit and run (away) tactics, though there could be some additional opportunities to hide.
Mask of the Wild is a decent option if there is some phenomena that is lightly obscuring the area, particularly if you've taken damage and need a moment to regroup and down a healing potion. It's also a decent opportunity to try to regain advantage in hopes of getting a crit. As Robazathus indicates, it doesn't change your smell or any noise that you make. It also doesn't negate the 10 ft blindsense that the wyrmling could use to luck into finding you.
I'll assume that the Ranger is going Archery fighting style for the +2 to hit bonus, giving them a +7 total bonus (+ 2 archery, +2 proficiency, and +3 dex modifier on a 16 or 17). The [monster]White Dragon Wyrmling[\monster] has a 16 AC meaning that the Ranger hits on 9s. That's 12/20 possible rolls or 60%. Every indication thus far has indicated that the Ranger would be fishing for advantage in every way that it could, including using Mask of the Wild to try to hide and attack from a hidden position and using [spell]Zephyr Strike[\spell]. That might be one of the better spell options considering that [spell]Hunter's Mark[\spell] only has a range of 90 ft (to place the mark) meaning that you can't mark the wyrmling until it's uncomfortably close anyway. The wyrmling has +2 saves on Strength, Dexterity, Wisdom, and Charisma coupled with a +4 to constitution. It's intelligence is it's only weak point at -3 saves. That means that [spell]Hail of Thorns[\spell], & [spell]Snare[\spell] are saved around half the time, particularly if the ranger eschews wisdom for more constitution (with a likely score of either 14 or 16, the Save DC would be a 12 or 13). [spell]Fog Cloud[\spell] could give you an opportunity to hide where you might be far enough back that the wyrmling couldn't get you with a breath attack while remaining outside of the cloud, but it's the same size as you and can follow you in until it bumps noses with you.