Topic: A dragon spell resistance?

[rdanhenry]

Sure, Presence will work -- but you have to cast it first. It may be PP-free, but it is still and spell and you need to cast it. I doubt dragons have nothing better to do with their time than keep casting Presence on the off-chance that some invisible, scentless, silent intruder has arrived in the last few minutes -- or concentrating on that one spell all day to keep it from expiring. For that matter, the Presence sense can be fooled, too. And with a range of 10', it will alert the dragon rather late in the intrusion. A surprise attack would still be rather effective and a thief isn't about to come that close to the dragon while trying to pick up some of the treasure off the fringes of the hoard. Any respectable dragon's treasure (i.e. like that in illustrations) sprawls well beyond the wyrm's body.

If the dragon is worried about some undetectable being penetrating his lair, he's better off making it difficult to access and employing some security measures such as subordinate monsters and traps.

Anyone who is willing to try assassinating a dragon should not be denied some small chance, given that failure will mean destruction and leaving behind a reputation for being a mad idiot, regardless of any former deeds.

[mocking bird]

Yes still have to cast it - 20' radius after 10' range.  But it is a nice back-up after the dragon simply spots the invisible thief - as they are immune to invisibility and illusion - 'In addition, their enchanted senses of smell, hearing, sight (they have Nightvison and Darkvision), and intuitive feeling give them the inherent ability to discern illusions and invisible beasts.'

Anyone who is willing to try assassinating a dragon should not be denied some small chance, given that failure will mean destruction and leaving behind a reputation for being a mad idiot, regardless of any former deeds.

I suppose it all depends on what you mean by a 'small chance' as well as how much fear you want to strike into your players hearts at the mention of a dragon.

[rdanhenry]

Yes, any being with excellent smell and hearing has the inherent ability to discern invisible beasts. If you can *also* negate those senses and don't do anything (like displace a coin) that would tip off the dragon's intuitions, the dragon cannot simply see invisible without giving it an additional power that is not in C&M. If the writer meant dragons can see invisible things, then he would have to have been a complete idiot to write about their other senses instead of mentioning that their powers of sight could frustrate attempts at invisibility.

[markc]

 Another option is to create a Dragon Spell list or a Dragon skill list that Dragons can either gain for free as they age or can pay Exp for. It has been a while since I looked at it but did not D&D 3.5 do something like this?

MDC   

[rdanhenry]

Rolemaster had a spell list for dragons way before D&D 3.5 came out. "Heartfires" in RoCoVII (copyright 1993). I don't see the problem with dragons not being able to detect someone who has become undetectable. It takes a lot of effort to become undetectable. Anyone who can do so likely will be toast if he ends up fighting the dragon (I mean more so than typically for anyone fighting a dragon of like high level) -- and this is solo mission stuff. You are not going to get a whole group into a dragon's lair under this kind of spell load that makes coordination difficult.

And intelligent dragons will just use some of the same techniques to confound invisible intruders as humans will, if they are common enough to worry about (and a dragon may consider once a century sufficient cause to set up security measures).

Then you can reveal the secret entrance that the dragon doesn't know about if you want the players to be able to circumvent the dragon's defenses.

[black flag]

Rolemaster Companion VI stated :

RR for Monsters from "secondary" race stats page 56.

Option 1: Animals are very resistant to poison and disease because of their environment. Therefore al "Animals" receive a poison/disease RR mod +25, "monsters" due to their enchanted nature, also receive this +25 mod.
Option 2: Animals, being creatures not particulary attuned to magic have a -15 mod to RR against spells. Monsters, being magical creature, have a +15 mod to RR against spells. However, a GM could very easily reverse these bonuses by using the same argument!