Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 sithlore Jan 13, 2009 13:37:46	So ok, my players are about to play a game where, if they correctly handle a negotiation, a drow trader offer them a rare adult black dragon for sell, since they are "good customers". But how much should an adult dragon cost?
#2 sparkchaser Jan 13, 2009 13:42:12	How common are dragons in your world? Is this "once in a lifetime deal" a ploy for a TPK while the party sleeps? :P
#3 oxybe Jan 13, 2009 14:15:20	depends... how much does the dragon think it's worth? dragons as mounts have always been (IMO) an iffy subject, since you're usually asking a much smarter & stronger creature to carry you into mortal peril. in games i've played in this usually required a deal to be made with the dragon itself... but if sold as a slave/mount? i can see a TPK coming if the dragon isn't a willing mount.
#4 nowiwantmydmg Jan 13, 2009 15:48:15	That depends, is it tame? or wild/hostile A tame one: 2 million gp sounds about right, with a 10% discount for being "good customers" so 1.8 million gp. wild/hostile: near free since obviously a plethora of RP opportunities will present themselves.
#5 sithlore Jan 13, 2009 16:32:50	In my campaign, Dragons are not unique nor common, more uncommon. Still, they can be tamed when they are young and they can be bargained with( f they have free will). Since they are intelligent creature, they are releashed when they become ancient ( if they want to leave service). I consider them almost like the dragons we can find in the Dragonlance campaign setting.
#6 Book5 Jan 14, 2009 11:29:58	So what your really saying is that some dude is "leveraging" a contract of service between a Black Dragon and the PCs .... I'd say treat it like hireling in that it would be a daily charge. Several hundred GPs instead of silver though.
#7 vforge Jan 14, 2009 20:41:50	Well. That is a good question. It's all dependent on your world view. Do you really see dragons as livestock? Go read the hobbit again. Does smaug sound like the kind of critter that sounds like it'll bend to the will of anything that wants a ride? I suppose the older historical version might work better but one look at St. George and the Dragon does not leave you with the impression that dragons are anything but very wild animals of chaos. Not very tamable. So where do you get your vision of them? The never ending story? Take a look at dragonlance as your best example. The dragons in those books were not exactly slaves. The good dragons were more partners than mounts. The evil dragons were equal or servants but no dragon would have accepted a rider that didn't earn their respect first. That's because they were very smart creatures. A dragon lives for a long time. Longer than many or most animals. So If you plan to have a character get one as a mount there might be more hoops to jump through than simply doling out cash. Only a sacred order of paladins might have earned the rights to apply to become a rider for a holy cause that the dragons order finds noble. Have you ever heard of a paladins mount? There was a reason it was hard to get. I'd dare say that a dragon was a FEW steps above the horse version. Dragonheart was a good movie. I hated the premise, but god what a great dragon. It's always possible for a dragon to partner with a character that the dragon feels like following. The dragon might be simply amused or feel respect for the character. It's unlikely that anything that smart would ever stick around long enough to be a mount against it's will for more than a single ride, if that long. If the player has to have a dragon then make it a mindless construct or a wyvern or something stupid. They like the poison tail better anyway i find.