Ice Walk. The dragon can move across and climb icy surfaces without needing to make an ability check. Additionally, difficult terrain composed of ice or snow doesn't cost it extra movement.
Legendary Resistance (3/Day). If the dragon fails a saving throw, it can choose to succeed instead.
Multiattack. The dragon can use its Frightful Presence. It then makes three attacks: one with its bite and two with its claws.
Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +19 to hit, reach 15 ft., one target. Hit: 34 (6d10 + 8) piercing damage plus 16 (4d8) cold damage.
Claw. Melee Weapon Attack: +19 to hit, reach 15 ft., one target. Hit: 29 (4d6 + 10) slashing damage.
Tail. Melee Weapon Attack: +16 to hit, reach 20 ft., one target. Hit: 20 (6d6 + 10) bludgeoning damage.
Frightful Presence. Each creature of the dragon's choice that is within 120 feet of the dragon and aware of it must succeed on a DC 17 Wisdom saving throw or become frightened for 1 minute. A creature can repeat the saving throw at the end of each of its turns, ending the effect on itself on a success. If a creature's saving throw is successful or the effect ends for it, the creature is immune to the dragon's Frightful Presence for the next 24 hours.
Cold Breath (Recharge 4–6). The dragon exhales an icy blast in a 90-foot cone. Each creature in that area must make a DC 25 Constitution saving throw, taking 100 (25d8) cold damage on a failed save, or half as much damage on a successful one.
The dragon can take 3 legendary actions, choosing from the options below. Only one legendary action option can be used at a time and only at the end of another creature's turn. The dragon regains spent legendary actions at the start of its turn.
Detect. The dragon makes a Wisdom (Perception) check.
Tail Attack. The dragon makes a tail attack.
Wing Attack (Costs 2 Actions). The dragon beats its wings. Each creature within 20 feet of the dragon must succeed on a DC 25 Dexterity saving throw or take 20 (2d8 + 8 ) bludgeoning damage and be knocked prone. The dragon can then fly up to half its flying speed.
Description
An ancient and powerful beast unlike its more common White Dragon cousin, the Ice King rules over White Dragons, even ancient ones. With its massive size and strength, no dragon dares to intrude on an Ice King's territory, and any who are foolish enough to either end up as servants of the Ice King or dead. From claws and teeth as sharp as swords and ice breath that could freeze a river solid, this dragon is a living weapon, crafted over thousands upon thousands of years of evolution to be the perfect hunter of the icy north.
The Ice King's Kingdom
Every king needs a kingdom, and the Ice King is no different. With such a enormous amount of power, the Ice King holds a very large territory. With several, and maybe even dozens of other dragons, mostly White Dragons, under its control, the Ice King is capable of protecting a very large territory, especially if it allows its servants to live in their own lairs away from the Ice King's nest. With so many dragons in one area, few dragons dare to enter the region occupied by an Ice King, but those who do will almost certainly be attacked by the Ice King's servants. However, as part of the Ice King's ancient tradition, any dragon that can defeat more than one of its minions earns the right to face the Ice King in combat if it wishes. Those who accept are often brutalized by the Ice King in a show of dominance over its minions, but few are powerful enough to survive the Ice King long enough that the Ice King recognizes them as powerful and "allows" the dragon to serve him/her.
The Ice King's Castle
Just as every king needs a kingdom, every king also needs a castle. Ice Kings typically live in either high mountain caves or incredibly low caverns. Either way, these natural caves are then dug to be deeper and larger by the Ice King and covered in ice with it's Cold Breath. Once the cave is covered in ice, the lair is finished and the Ice King makes it its nest. Ice Kings will often make these lairs larger by digging side chambers closer towards the entrance for their servants to live in, but they almost never allow other dragons into the heart of their nest. Any dragon foolish enough to do so is likely to get killed.
The Ice King's Throne
In the heart of the Ice King's lair is the nest, though humans often refer to this as "The Throne". By far the largest chamber in the entire lair, all but one entrance to the nest is blocked by ice from the dragon's breath. The one unblocked entrance serves as the only way in and out of the nest, but if the Ice King needs a different escape route, it can simply break open the ice.
The Throne itself sits either in the center of the nest or in a smaller chamber dug out to the side of the main nest. Either way, the Throne is where the Ice King sleeps, eats, and guards its egg if it has one. It is considered to be the location of where the dragon allows itself to be the most vulnerable, which is why the Ice King makes practically no exceptions to its practice of killing anything that enters its nest, even its own servants.
Ice Dragon Mating
As an apex predator and the master of massive amounts of a specific type of territory, there are very few Ice Kings that exist. With numbers suspected to be only in the double digits, possibly even single digits, the Ice King almost never comes into contact with another of its kind. There are two exceptions to this general rule of thumb; when one Ice King challenges another for control of its territory and servants, and when a male and female Ice King mate.
Little is known about when Ice Kings mate and what events surround it because few humanoids see Ice Kings and live to tell the tale about it, and even fewer see these reclusive reptiles being a little less reclusive. All that is known is that Ice Kings will only mate twice in their entire lives. Most likely because they know that the population maximum is limited and because the creation of new Ice Dragons means more competition for the parents. By producing two eggs in a lifetime, the Ice King's population remains virtually the same from generation to generation, only changing when Ice Kings meet an untimely demise or when an Ice King lives long enough that they decide to produce a third offspring.
It is unknown how Ice Kings decide which parent will care for the egg after it is laid, but some scholars suspect that the younger dragon is responsible for the caring of the egg, as Adult Ice Kings are more commonly reported to have an egg than Ancient Ice Kings.
Ice Dragon's Place in Food Chain
Ice Dragons are at the very top of the food chain. No creature will ever try to kill an Ice King as food. Typically only another Ice King can kill one, but there are rare cases of a Tarrasque fighting and killing them, but these two beasts are often evenly matched. Also, they don't occupy the same territory, so it is incredibly rare for these two to meet, let alone thinking that they can take the other on in a fight. Because of this, the Ice King eats pretty much whatever it wants. Because it lives in the cold and icy far north, their is little prey to eat. Preferring to not leave its nest unguarded, an Ice Dragon will send its servants to retrieve food for it.
Lair and Lair Actions
An Ice King'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, but some also live closer to the ground in caves and burrows. Ice King's prefer large open areas that give them extra room. Because they are often the alpha of other dragons, they enjoy showing off their power by holding a massive lair.
A legendary Ice King's innate magic deepens the cold in the area around its lair. Mountain caverns are fast frozen by the Ice King's presence. An Ice King can often detect intruders by the way the keening wind in its lair changes tone.
Ice Kings fear pretty much no other creature, including other dragons, so they often sleep in the center of their nest or in a smaller side chamber connected to the main nest. The entrances to their nest are sealed with ice except for one, which they use to go in and out, but the Ice King does rarely ice the main entrance if they sleep or leave their nest for a decent length of time.
Lair Actions
On initiative count 20 (losing initiative ties), the dragon takes a lair action to cause one of the following effects; the dragon can’t use the same effect two rounds in a row:
- Freezing fog fills a 30-foot-radius sphere centered on a point the dragon can see within 120 feet of it. The fog spreads around corners, and its area is heavily obscured. Each creature in the fog when it appears must make a DC 15 Constitution saving throw, taking 20 (3d8) cold damage on a failed save, or half as much damage on a successful one. A creature that ends its turn in the fog takes 10 (3d6) cold damage. A wind of at least 20 miles per hour disperses the fog. The fog otherwise lasts until the dragon uses this lair action again or until the dragon dies.
- Jagged ice shards fall from the ceiling, striking up to three creatures underneath that the dragon can see within 120 feet of it. The dragon makes one ranged attack roll (+10 to hit) against each target. On a hit, the target takes 15 (5d6) piercing damage.
- The dragon creates an opaque wall of ice as long as their is at least two anchor points it can build off of at a point it can see within 120 feet of it. The wall can be up to 30 feet long, 30 feet high, and 2 feet thick. When the wall appears, each creature within its area is pushed 5 feet out of the wall’s space, appearing on whichever side of the wall it wants. Each 10-foot section of the wall has AC 5, 60 hit points, vulnerability to fire damage, and immunity to acid, cold, necrotic, poison, and psychic damage. The wall disappears when the dragon uses this lair action again or when the dragon dies.
Regional Effects
The region containing a legendary white dragon’s lair is warped by the dragon’s magic, which creates one or more of the following effects:
- Chilly fog lightly obscures the land within 6 miles of the dragon’s lair.
- Freezing precipitation falls within 6 miles of the dragon’s lair, sometimes forming blizzard conditions when the dragon is at rest.
- Icy walls block off areas in the dragon’s lair. Each wall is 1 foot thick, and a 10-foot section has AC 5, 30 hit points, vulnerability to fire damage, and immunity to acid, cold, necrotic, poison, and psychic damage.
If the dragon wishes to move through a wall, it can do so without slowing down. The portion of the wall the dragon moves through is destroyed, however.
If the dragon dies, the fog and precipitation fade within 1 day. The ice walls melt over the course of 1d10 days.
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