Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

Any D&D/D20

Shadowrun

World of Darkness

Palladium

Other (feel free to post about it)

[Bohandas]

I don't see why not. Do you have an example?

an animated companion cube?

Animated objects aren't considered alive. No constructs are. Even the warforged are only partly living.

[TheBiggerFish]

I don't see why not. Do you have an example?

an animated companion cube?

Animated objects aren't considered alive. No constructs are. Even the warforged are only partly living.

But Companion Cubes might be peeeeeooooppppllleeeee.

[Criptfeind]

Dead bodies are also not considered alive.

[TheBiggerFish]

Dead bodies are also not considered alive.

Alive people.

[Criptfeind]

Dead bodies are also not considered alive.

Alive people.

Not when Chell got though with them.

[Rolan7]

Dead bodies are also not considered alive.

And yet there is a vampire bloodline.
And an elemental bloodline

It's not the same as "half" but it raises many questions.

[Bohandas]

alternatively, the family of the dragon decides to get a big revenge against you and everyone related to you.

or the dragon turns out poor and you lost money.

or the hoarde is trapped and next time you try to withdraw from your portable hole, you blow up.

before doing such exploits, be sure your GM will like them, or be prepared for consequences. Also, always remember the rule 0, that can get in the way of such brilliant schemes sometime. ( it can also help them however. In a campaign I played in, we used gaseous poison to clear a mine from kobolds, in a way that I am sure is not exactly as written in rules. sadly, the poison turned out to be permanent, requiring gas masks. but that was a nice flavor and appropriate penalty for skipping the challenge)

There's a spell in Dragons of Krynn that basically magically krazy glues all the items in a dragon's horde together so it can't be easily moved

Globular Hoard
Transmutation
Level: Sor/Wiz 5
Components: V, S, M
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: Medium (100 ft. + 10 ft./level)
Effect: One collection of objects up to one 5-ft. cube/level
Duration: 1 day/level
Saving Throw: Will negates (object)
Spell Resistance: No
This spell bonds all unattended objects that are touching one
another within the spell’s effect. The  hoard is considered one
item, with a total weight equal to the combined weight of
every affected object. A  globular hoard is often difficult (if
not impossible) to move, since a large collection of items can
easily weigh several hundred pounds. It is likewise difficult to
place the hoard in any container, including magical containers
such as  bags of holding , as its total size is usually larger than
the container’s opening.
You can force an individual object free from the hoard
by making a DC 32 Strength check. Once an object has been
removed, it is no longer affected by this casting of the spell—
another casting is required. All objects to be affected must be
in contact with one another when the spell is cast. Thus, you
must cast this spell twice if you want to protect two piles of
objects, or if you want to add an object (such as a magic item)
to an existing  globular hoard .
Dragons developed this spell to secure their hoards when
they must leave for extended periods of time. This spell can be
made permanent with a  permanency spell.
Material Component: 250 gp worth of gold dust,
encased in gum arabic.

[Criptfeind]

Dead bodies are also not considered alive.

And yet there is a vampire bloodline.
And an elemental bloodline

It's not the same as "half" but it raises many questions.

Well, easy enough to answer. Apparently vampires can breed with humanoids (and giants), but not dragons, for some bizarre reason. So really, just bang in some vampire blood, then add dragons for as many generations as it takes for the offspring to count as a dragon, and then it has a vampire (and a human) bloodline! Bing bang bosh jobs a donen.

Also man, elementals aren't dead. They are like. Hyper alive. Exceedingly alive. You can get some hot fire elemental on dragon action any day of the week if you go to the right demiplanes.

[Rolan7]

Oh yeah, I love elementals and they're absolutely alive and pure.
Just... good luck boning a rock or a fire or *freakin air*

[My Name is Immaterial]

I'm going to cite the Asari for lack of necessity of boning.

[GiglameshDespair]

Oh yeah, I love elementals and they're absolutely alive and pure.
Just... good luck boning a rock or a fire or *freakin air*

[Rolan7]

Maybe it's telling that I sorta ranked fire as more bonable than air?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCKpzP5SGYw

I like that "bonable" isn't a word, but can mean either "sexable" or "capable of good".

[GiglameshDespair]

The man who buggers a fire burns his penis

Truly, the Romans were wise people.

[scriver]

They were indeed a culture more in touch with nature than us.

[Kadzar]

Hey, if the dragon's family wants some action, bring it. Same trick would work on them too. I'll carpet my home base in red dragon leather.

Ultimately the strategy is exploiting the two glaring weaknesses of dragons: low touch AC and low Dexterity. Now, typically it's not a problem since most effects that inflict Dexterity damage or drain are either poisons with a fortitude save before they work, or spells that are subject to the dragon's extremely good SR. It just so happens that this one item manages to bypass both defences completely. I'll most likely get a pass on this strategy for the current encounter for creativity, then there'll be a houserule that it's banned from future games.

Frankly, I see it as fair turnaround for the DM throwing a creature at us that's 5 CR levels higher than the party average. It's pretty much expected that we'll have to find some loophole to defeat it, since there's zero chance of us surviving a straight up fight. If the intention was for a balanced encounter that involves standard combat, we should have been given a monster that was level appropriate. It's certainly not like I haven't investigated alternative methods of completing the encounter. I initially approached the dragon diplomatically, offered it a 1,000 gp tribute, stroking its ego and doing the best I could to attempt to have a nice peaceful chat. It demanded all my character's equipment instead, then tried to fry me with dragonbreath when I declined. So now we're at the point where only one of us is walking away alive, and I intend for that to be me and my party.

As for traps at the end, if the DM wants to play sore loser and screw us over on the loot, that's not something I can control so I'm not gonna worry about it. I'll still have the rogue check the horde over for traps and give it a good old scan with Detect Magic before we loot the thing though, because you can never be too paranoid.

I don't really know the circumstances of your game, but who's to say you're actually meant to fight the dragon? If there was a 100 foot tall frictionless pole in your path, would you complain that you can't climb it, or would you just go around it? I agree it's bullshit when a DM insists you must fight an impossible fight, but when you have other options, it's reasonable that some things are beyond your powers.

And it seems like you probably have other options, considering the fact that you seem to be able to go out and buy several doses of some obscure magic poison, so it doesn't sound like you're trapped there. (And, reasonably, you should have trouble trying to buy enough cockatrice grit in a short enough timeframe to do the job, but it sounds like your DM isn't one to limit abuse of magic marts).

And if you do try to go up against the dragon, no one here is saying you have to face it in a fair fight. But the opposition is more to you exploiting the system, rather than exploiting the current situation. Anyone can run Pun-Pun with a sufficiently lenient DM, but most people would consider any victories gained by such a character to be cheap. A good plan should be something that, even if DM doesn't allow it or it doesn't work, makes people think, "That was a pretty cool plan". The retelling of the story of how you implemented your plan should ideally require very little rules explanation for anyone who doesn't know the system.

Finally, something that bothers me a little personally is that your plans don't seem to really involve the rest of your party at all. If this is a recurring theme for you, I would discourage it, not only because most people don't like it when they have to sit back while someone else does all the cool stuff, but you lose a lot of strength when you make a plan as a member of a team and only count on your own.