HOW much XP for a dragon?

bighara · Post by **bighara** » Fri Nov 14, 2008 8:16 pm

I was looking over an old post on DF and came across an unanswered question:

How much XP would an elder Red dragon be worth?

serleran at the time that the chart progression would lead to

13,530 ; 34 ; 8,150; 11,900; 13,530.

For 34HD.

Using that info, by my estimation, an elder (Age 12) Red Dragon would have somewhere in the vicinity of 200hp (on average) and be worth about 34,000 experience points?

13530 Base

34 per hp: 34*12/2 = 204. 204*34 = 6936

13530 for Special III

13530+6936+13530 = 33996

Unless of course it doesn't rate Special III. Then it would be less, but still at least 28K or so.

Does that sound right? I realize that anyone defeating a 34HD dragon is less impressed with 34K xp than lower level PC, but still. WOW!

Treebore · Post by **Treebore** » Fri Nov 14, 2008 8:25 pm

Its been a while since I have done similar computing for dragons fought in my game, but I do believe when I converted Sabre River the Dragon was worth around 35,000 XP all by itself. Its the dragons hoard that really brings in the XP's.
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anonymous · Post by **anonymous** » Sat Nov 15, 2008 3:19 pm

If anything you've underrated the dragon - Special XP additions are not one-shot; if the monster has more than one ability it gets the bonus multiple times. Look at the Medusa, for instance.

serleran · Post by **serleran** » Sat Nov 15, 2008 5:23 pm

As with everything, XP awarded is based on what threat the monster poses -- if you have a dragon that never gets its breath weapon off, never casts a spell, and attacks only once... I'd award next to nothing for it.
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DangerDwarf · Post by **DangerDwarf** » Sun Nov 16, 2008 2:17 am

How much XP for an elder red dragon?

A BUTTLOAD.

34d10 breathweapon > You.

Screaming, burning adventurers make me smile.

DangerDwarf · Post by **DangerDwarf** » Sun Nov 16, 2008 2:21 am

I wish I could find my conversion of Cinder from my Dragonlance C&C game. The Xp was crazy, but the PC's earned every last point in that fight.

C&C dragons are crazy wow. Super old and mighty dragons even more so.

Lord Dynel · Post by **Lord Dynel** » Sun Nov 16, 2008 2:34 am

serleran wrote:
As with everything, XP awarded is based on what threat the monster poses -- if you have a dragon that never gets its breath weapon off, never casts a spell, and attacks only once... I'd award next to nothing for it.

Indeed. If you're not faced with all the danger, why get the full XP?
I am rather curious as to why the Base for a 34 HD creature is so high? I'm not knocking serleran's logic (he wrote the book , for cryin' out loud! ), but I wonder...does the XP ramp up exponentially at some point to justify the high base?

I was extrapolating some numbers to the best of my ability; I was looking at the difference of bases. After 10th level the bases fluctuate between 150 point (difference between 10th and 11th) and 400 (difference in bases between 14th and 15th). There doesn't seem to be a constant gap though. There was an average of about 250 XP between HD starting at about level 15 on to 20.

I used these numbers as a base and kept escalating them up as the book seems to do and I got 9500 XP as a base. Again, that was done by taking the differences in XP bases from levels between 10 and 20 (i.e. the difference between 9-10, 10-11, 11-12, 12-13, and so on) and just keep the pattern going all the way to 34. There was a gradual increase in the differences, which led to the final tally of 9500. This is probably what I would use as a base but I don't recommend anyone to take me for any official arbiter of such things. However, if anyone wants to see the numbers behind my blathering, let me know and I I'll post them.