Sovereign Dragon (Adult, Spellcaster)
Level 15Attacks
Abilities
The dragon can automatically detect if a creature, effect, or item is sanctified, and whether it's holy or unholy.
90 feet. DC 34 will
Trigger A creature within the sovereign dragon's reach critically hits the dragon
Effect The sovereign dragon makes a claw or tail Strike against the creature, after applying all the effects of the critical hit to the dragon.
The dragon takes on the appearance of any Small or Medium humanoid. This doesn't change its Speed or attack and damage bonuses with its Strikes, but might change the damage type its Strikes deal (typically to bludgeoning).
Frequency once per hour
Effect The dragon's armor glows with a golden light. The dragon gains a +2 status bonus to AC and resistance 15 to acid, cold, electricity, fire, and sonic damage. Each enemy in a 20-foot emanation must succeed at a DC 36 fortitude save or be Dazzled. All these effects last until the end of the dragon's next turn.
(3d10+8)[bludgeoning], DC 36 fortitude
Frequency once per day
Effect The dragon chooses a mortal and offers their august blessing in exchange for the creature carrying out a specific directive, such as defeating a tyrant or protecting a sacred site. If the creature agrees, until its next daily preparations, it gains a +1 status bonus to the dragon's choice of attack rolls, AC, or all of the following: Perception, Will saves, and Charisma-based skill checks. The dragon can Dismiss this benefit, which they're swift to do if the m
The dragon unleashes a roar charged with psychic energy, dealing 16d6 mental damage in a 40-foot cone (DC 36 will save). The dragon can't use Sovereign's Rebuke again for .
There were supposedly dragons of pure elemental earth, once. These were imperial dragons who, like their other elemental counterparts, came to the Universe, lived, and died, their bodies becoming part of the continent. As fire became lava, wood became forests, water the seas, lakes, and rivers, and metal the veins of precious minerals, so earth became the land, the stone, the mountains. By way of logic, if there exist such environments and entities today, then earth dragons must exist too. Or have existed, once upon a primeval time.
And yet among the imperial dragons today there are only sovereign dragons, who leave serpentine skeletons behind upon death in place of rock, stone, or land. The dragons' innate spellcasting, weakness to unheated iron, and other traits highly suggest that they're associated with elemental earth. The rest of their powers have little to no such association, instead centered on the mysteries of the metaphysical spirit and mind.
There's no clear explanation for why sovereign dragons are the way they are today. Some guess it might have been a deal to fulfill personal ambition, to go from those tasked with selecting rulers to becoming the rulers themselves. Others wonder if the lands of Tian Xia were corrupted in the past, and the earth dragons walked away from their elemental natures to save themselves. Perhaps they too became empyreal dragons, but then returned to the lands of mortals when no suitable ruler rose to the throne.