An easy and reliable way to kill the Adra dragon even with low level parties

[antaran]

Hey guys

 

I know I am a little bit late to the party with White March Pt1 released now, but I just wanted to share that:

 

I recently finished Od Nua and encounterd the Adra Dragon. Naturally like many I had big problems dealing with him, as his AOE attack instantly knocks my party out. Since I was finishing Od Nua in Act 2 my low level party (level 9 everbody) contributed to the problem. So naturally I googled the internet, but it was not very helpful. The ways described to kill him didnt really worked for me. So I came up with an unique (albeit cheesy I admit) way. I googled a bit around and it seemed to me nobody else had posted this way in the internet yet, so I want to share it. If this way is already known, I excuse myself.

 

To kill the dragon easily just do the following steps:

 

Prerequisite: The dragon must have appeared. You have to talk to him and tell him that you are totally going to help him escape Od Nua. Whether you betray him in the afthermath to the dragon hunter is up to you, it doesnt matter.

 

Step 1: You go back up those broken stairs in front of the dragon pit (or dont go down if you have betrayed him) with the RPG text-sequence. You position your party a bit away and equip them all with ranged weapons. You also activate the AI so that they automatically attack enemys.

 

Step 2: You get one of your spellcasters standing on the broken stairs as low as he can go. You need an AOE spell with a large area of effect. One example is Hiravias's Hail Storm on level 4. You cast this spells in the right edge of its range into the fog of war so it "touches" the Adra dragon. When you select the spell and hover in the fog of war with the selection circle you see where the dragon stands, so its very easy to hit him.

 

Step 3: Once you hacv cast the spell, the whole map becomes aggro. All monsters will now run to the stairs. How every, as you see they cant go up, but you can attack them with ranged weapons and spells. The biggest threat are the adragons, as they cast strong spells on you. In return, you should use your own spells, to shut them down quickly. Remember, you can always pull your party from the stairs. The fight wont stop, but you can reorganize your party. The enemies will wait at the stairs.

 

Step 4: When you have killed the other enemies, you can kill the dragon. You usually wont see him, but your companions can autoattack him via the AI. Watch out, that you dont stand too low on the broken stairs with too many party member, sometimes (very seldom) the dragon still uses his AOE breathing attack. Its enough to let 2 of your companions (e.g. Sagani and Eder with an crossbow) stand about halfway the walkable part of the stairs up and let them auto attack the dragon.

 

Step 5: Grab a beer and surf the internet. After some time (several minutes) the dragon is dead. If the fight has not ended yet, you have to cast some summons down below of the stairs, e.g. with Kaana. I had the case the two of Xaurips returned to their starting position for whataver reason. You have to kill all the minions to make the fight stop so you can leave the area and/or descend the broken stairs again.

 

Step 6: Descend the stairs and enjoy your victory. I made an Imgur gallery for all steps including description:

 

http://imgur.com/a/qDImK

 

I hope I may have helped some people defeating the dragon more easily. I have read about other ways (using traps, or knocking him down constantly, but this didnt worked really well for me, as it seemed to be pretty random), but I think this method is the most No-RNG way to safely kill him. I for sure think I would have had even problems at level 12 to defeat him, which is (was) the level cap...

Edited October 7, 2015 by antaran

[Nobear]

lol yeah that's cheesy but funny. Congrats on discovering that it works .

[FluxWing]

This encounter begs for cheesy strategies imho. Simply because it is such a big difficulty spike compared to the rest of the enemies you encounter on your way down.

 

For others the Adra Dragon at level 9, my advise is as follows:

Build the warden's logdge in your keep, so you can to the ~20 bounty quests. Those quests provide a good source of experience and items are both more suitable for your level.

Also do the expansion's quest area, perhaps even before the bounties. The expansion is not like Throne of Bhal, in that it should be played after the end.

 

And the best all the non-cheesy advise I found on this forum for the actual dragon fight was to place the Mage spell Force Wall and the Druid equivalent to land Hobbled and Sickened. Drink a deflection potion for the tank, and after that, the Dragon is quite manageable.

 

This is the alternative to using save and reload stun-lock tactic, which I just couldn't get myself to use, no offence to people who prefer it that way. Perhaps I will have to resort to just that when I try PotD-difficulty next.

[brabe]

Thx for the Help

[hilfazer]

My favourite trick is going to treasure corridor and killing all xaurips but archers. They can't harm you but can block dragon quite nicely.