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** Several members of the council of metallic dragons have a beef with some of the humanoid races. Protanther the gold dragon despises elves because they created the ''Dracorage mythal'', which drives dragons homicidally insane. Otaaryliakarnos the silver dragon resents dwarves because they killed her niece in one of their dragonmoots.
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** Several members of the council of metallic dragons have a beef with some of the humanoid races. Protanther the gold dragon despises elves because they created the ''Dracorage mythal'', which drives dragons homicidally insane. Otaaryliakarnos the silver dragon resents dwarves because they killed her niece in one of their dragonmoots. The book outright says that any race the dragon's have issues with will cause them to be less likely help, and essentially demand an official apology from the player character's race for a past misdeed to get their aid.
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* EnemyMine: Several of the allies you get for the finale of ''Rise of Tiamat'' include Giants, Metallic Dragons, Devils, and naturally the various mortal races and their factions, many of whom hate each other. Despite how much they hate each other, all of them agree that letting Tiamat be summoned is a ''bad idea'', and so join forces with the players to stop her.
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* TeethClenchedTeamwork: Despite the EnemyMine situation of the finale, the various allies the players gather don't like each other enough to, at times, work well together. The book mentions that some of them may not be as helpful if put together, such as having Devil allies be near any good aligned group. If the players aren't careful with approaching the finale, their allies can end up losing due to simply not being able to put aside their differences to fight.
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* TheEvilPrince: Neronvain is the son of the elf king Melandrach and was formerly prince of the Misty Forest until his father banished him for his cruelty. Now he is one of the Cult's five wyrmspeakers, and terrorizes the elves of his former homeland with the aid of the green dragon Chuth.
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* SquishyWizard: By the standards of cloud giants, Blagothkus is one. He has 138 hit points compared to the typical cloud giant's 200, lower Strength and Constitution scores, weaker saving throws, and less accurate melee attacks. In exchange, he has an arsenal of wizard spells that can inflict high amounts of damage. Mind you, he's still a ''giant'' with superhuman levels of strength and durability, so his squishiness is relative.
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* TheVeryDefinitelyFinalDungeon: The final episode of ''The Rise of Tiamat'' takes place at the Well of Dragons, a VolcanoLair which serves as the Cult's headquarters and is surrounded by their armies of evil mercenaries, giants, devils, and chromatic dragons. In the volcano's caldera stands the Temple of Tiamat, an eldritch castle that exists simultaneously on the Material Plane and in the Nine Hells, where Severin and Rath Modar are conducting their ritual to summon Tiamat.
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* AcidAttack: Rezmir has the acidic breath you'd expect from a half-black dragon, and she can also hurl magical "caustic bolts" at her enemies.
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* SpiritualSuccessor: To the classic ''TabletopGame/{{Dragonlance}}'' series of modules, to the point adapting it to that setting has been very popular among the fans.
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* DistressedDude: The monk Leosin Erlanthar was captured by the Cult while infiltrating their camp near Greenest. The players can rescue him during their own infiltration of the camp, but it won't be easy as his captors have thrashed him and strung him up in a very conspicuous spot.
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* DiscOneFinalDungeon: Skyreach Castle is an OminousFloatingCastle that serves as a major stronghold for the Cult of the Dragon. It is home to multiple boss-level enemies including a vampire, a cloud giant wizard, an adult white dragon, two Red Wizards of Thay, and Rezmir. It serves as the climactic finale to ''Hoard of the Dragon Queen'', but not to ''Tyranny of Dragons'' as a whole (unless the characters all die, of course).
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* TheMarvelousDeer: In ''Hoard'', the player characters might encounter a gold-furred stag while traveling from Bladur's Gate to Waterdeep. The book offers three possibilities as to the stag's nature: a majestic but completely normal animal that the local farmers view as a bringer of good fortune; a mysterious fey entity that offers the characters cryptic advice and a +1 longbow before vanishing into thin air; and an ancient, cursed elf prince who turns into a stag whenever he leaves the ruins of his castle.
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* MaskOfPower: The five dragon masks are magical artefacts that grant their wearers supernatural powers, most notably the ability to speak Draconic and influence chromatic dragons. Bringing them together makes them combine into the Mask of the Dragon Queen, which is a crucial component of the Cult's ritual to summon Tiamat.
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* MaskOfPower: The five dragon masks are magical artefacts artifacts that grant their wearers supernatural powers, most notably the ability to speak Draconic and influence chromatic dragons. Bringing them together makes them combine into the Mask of the Dragon Queen, which is a crucial component of the Cult's ritual to summon Tiamat.
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* ObviousBeta: The module is well known for being this. It was being developed alongside 5E, but due to the changes made to the edition as it was developed, many of the modules balancing is quite poor as the creators were going off of what they had at the time. This can be seen in the first chapter, as the enemies encountered for level one characters are too strong for many characters, and many elements of the modules suffer from being designed counter intuitively to how the edition came out being. Modules after became much better balanced by comparison.
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* PhysicalGod: The players will have to face Tiamat in physical form if they can't prevent Severin's summoning ritual. May the gods help them if she comes through the portal at full power, because she is one of the nastiest critters in all of 5th edition: a CR 30 monster with slightly less health than the Tarrasque, more uses of [[NoSell legendary resistance]], complete immunity to all spells of 6th level or lower, and the ability to inflict over 400 points of damage ''every round'' between her multiattack and legendary actions.
* PlayingWithFire: Severin exclusively attacks with fire magic.
* PlayingWithFire: Severin exclusively attacks with fire magic.
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* IcePalace: Skyreach Castle is basically a flying glacier carved in the shape of a palace scaled for giants.
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* ShaggyDogStory: Two episodes of ''The Rise of Tiamat'' turn out to be big wastes of time, either for the players or for the Cult itself.
** [[spoiler:The wyrmspeaker Varram has lost the white dragon mask, so he travels to the Tomb of Diderius to consult the divination pool there in the hopes of finding the mask. He gets captured by the yuan-ti that have taken over the tomb and will likely end up dead or a prisoner of the players, but before that happened he managed to look at the pool… which showed him that the mask had already been found and reclaimed by other members of the Cult.]]
** [[spoiler:A paranoid cultist stationed at Xonthal's Tower wants to defect and is offering the blue dragon mask in exchange for asylum. The other cultists discover his treachery shortly before the party arrives; by the time the players get past all the tower's defenses and reach the defector, he will be dead. And the mask he died for, and which the party went through so much trouble to obtain? It's a well-made fake.]]
** [[spoiler:The wyrmspeaker Varram has lost the white dragon mask, so he travels to the Tomb of Diderius to consult the divination pool there in the hopes of finding the mask. He gets captured by the yuan-ti that have taken over the tomb and will likely end up dead or a prisoner of the players, but before that happened he managed to look at the pool… which showed him that the mask had already been found and reclaimed by other members of the Cult.]]
** [[spoiler:A paranoid cultist stationed at Xonthal's Tower wants to defect and is offering the blue dragon mask in exchange for asylum. The other cultists discover his treachery shortly before the party arrives; by the time the players get past all the tower's defenses and reach the defector, he will be dead. And the mask he died for, and which the party went through so much trouble to obtain? It's a well-made fake.]]
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* TheDragon: Severin leads the Cult of the Dragon and acts as Tiamat's primary agent in the Material Plane.
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* EnemyCivilWar: The players can instigate one amongst the Cult’s forces at Castle Naerytar. The lizardfolk tribe that works for the Cult resents Pharblex Spattergoo and his bullywugs for killing their shaman, bossing them around, and otherwise treating them like dirt. It won't take much convincing to get them to turn against the Cult and the bullywugs, provided that the players don't alienate them by indiscriminately killing every lizardfolk in sight.
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* AntiRegeneration: The sword ''Hazirawn'' inflicts magical wounds which temporarily prevent the victim from regaining hit points.
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* HauntedCastle: The top floor of Castle Naerytar's northwest tower is haunted by half a dozen specters. They're content to stay in their room and ignore everything else going on in the castle, but if something intrudes upon their privacy, the enraged specters will emerge and attack everyone in sight.
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* TheHeavy: Rezmir is one of the Cult's five wyrmspeakers, and while she is not the BigBad of ''Tyranny of Dragons'', she ''is'' the main antagonist of ''Hoard of the Dragon Queen''. That module’s entire plot revolves around the party tracking her as she makes her way up the Sword Coast with the plunder her forces stole from Greenest, culminating in a final battle with her at Skyreach Castle.
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* HedgeMaze: Xonthal’s Tower is surrounded by a magical hedge maze that distorts space. Navigating it is the only way to get into the tower, as it has no physical entrance. If the players don't figure out the trick to navigating the maze, they'll be wandering its trapped and monster-infested paths for quite a while.
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* CoupDeGrace: If Langdedrosa Cyanwrath wins the duel in the first episode of ''Hoard of the Dragon Queen'' (and he [[EarlyGameHell probably will]]), he will administer a final blow to his unconscious opponent. This will kill an NPC outright and inflict a death save failure to a player character.
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* AssassinOutclassin: By ''The Rise of Tiamat'', the Cult knows that the players represent the biggest threat to their plans. They will send specially prepared hit squads to take the party out, often striking in places where the players would normally feel safe or at times when they aren’t at their full strength. The player characters will need to fight for their lives if they want the campaign to continue.
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* NobleDemon: In the first episode of ''Hoard'', Langdedrosa Cyanwrath will offer to release some of the Cult's prisoners—specifically, a woman and her three children—if someone agrees to face him in single combat. If one of the players (or an NPC) takes him up on that offer, he'll keep his word no matter who wins.
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* TheExile: Rath Modar and the other Red Wizards allied with the Cult are exiles from Thay. They oppose Szass Tam's rule of the nation and are lending their arcane powers to the Cult in the belief that Tiamat will help them depose him.
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* GrimUpNorth: One episode of ''The Rise of Tiamat'' has the party traveling far north to the Sea of Moving Ice in search of a missing member of the Arcane Brotherhood. Their search will eventually lead them to Oyaviggaton, the iceberg lair of the cruel white dragon Arauthator.
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* MindRape: [[spoiler:If the players visit Thay to negotiate with a representative of Szass Tam, a group of Red Wizards will enter their dreams while they're asleep to torture and interrogate them. How well they hold up under this torture, and the answers they give, will determine whether Thay allies with the Council of Waterdeep in opposing the Cult.]]
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* VolcanoLair: The Well of Dragons is an extinct volcano and former dragon graveyard. The Cult took over the place and built a citadel there long before Severin came to power: under his leadership, it serves as the Cult's primary headquarters and the site of their summoning ritual.
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* MageTower: One episode of ''The Rise of Tiamat'' is set in Xonthal's Tower, the former home of a reclusive wizard. He disappeared years ago and the Cult of the Dragon has recently moved in, taking advantage of the tower's [[AlienGeometries weird spatial properties]] to keep out nosy intruders while they conduct experiments.
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* ApocalypseCult: Under Severin's leadership, the Cult of the Dragon has switched goals from creating dracoliches to freeing Tiamat from her imprisonment in the Nine Hells and summoning her into the material plane. Their success would mean the collapse of human civilization, as Tiamat would lead her chromatic dragon hordes to conquer the world.
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* ApocalypseCult: Under Severin's leadership, the Cult of the Dragon has switched goals from creating dracoliches to freeing Tiamat from her imprisonment in the Nine Hells and summoning her into the material plane. Material Plane. Their success would mean the collapse of human civilization, civilization itself, as Tiamat would lead her chromatic dragon hordes to conquer the world.
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* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: [[spoiler:If Severin and Rath Modar successfully summon Tiamat, her first act will be to eat them both while laughing maniacally.]]
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* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: [[spoiler:If Severin and Rath Modar successfully summon Tiamat, her first act will be to eat them both while laughing maniacally.]]]]
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->''[[TheStinger DISCLAIMER:]] Under no circumstances shall the [[ApocalypseCult Cult of the Dragon]] or its adherents, affiliates, partners, licensors, or thralls (enchanted or otherwise) be liable for [[ApocalypseHow any direct, indirect, incidental, consequential, or cataclysmic damages to the Material Plane, its features, denizens, geographies, spheres, or natural laws]], arising from the acts, incarnations, servants, and ruinous whims of [[DraconicAbomination Tiamat, Queen of Dragons]]. Those seeking to avoid abject draconic annihilation should relocate to the nearest convenient afterlife or just try and stop us.''
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->''[[TheStinger DISCLAIMER:]] Under no circumstances shall the [[ApocalypseCult Cult of the Dragon]] or its adherents, affiliates, partners, licensors, or thralls (enchanted or otherwise) be liable for [[ApocalypseHow any direct, indirect, incidental, consequential, or cataclysmic damages to the Material Plane, its features, denizens, geographies, spheres, or natural laws]], arising from the acts, incarnations, servants, and ruinous whims of [[DraconicAbomination Tiamat, Queen of Dragons]]. Those seeking to avoid abject draconic annihilation should relocate to the nearest convenient afterlife or just try and stop us.''
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* CuttingOffTheBranches: If the players didn't play through ''Hoard of the Dragon Queen'' before starting ''The Rise of Tiamat'', the events of ''Hoard'' will have taken place with another adventuring party standing in for the player characters. These adventurers will have sacrificed themselves to [[spoiler:crash Skyreach Castle]], depriving the Cult—and the party—of a valuable asset.
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* HumanSacrifice: The ritual to summon Tiamat requires the sacrifice of hundreds if not thousands of lives. The Cult's raids are as much about capturing prisoners for this eventual mass sacrifice as about gathering treasure for the Dragon Queen's hoard.
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* AttackAnimal: The Cult makes heavy use of trained guard drakes and ambush drakes.
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* DragonHoard: The ritual to summon Tiamat requires the Cult to gather a hoard worthy of the Dragon Queen. To that end they have been raiding towns and communities throughout the Sword Coast, funneling the stolen plunder to the Cult's headquarters at the Well of Dragons. ''Hoard of the Dragon Queen'' has the players follow a large chunk of the plunder as it makes its way north, and will likely end with them doing something to keep that chunk out of the Cult's hands.
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* LoadBearingBoss: [[spoiler:If Blagothkus dies, his spirit will assume direct control of Skyreach Castle. He will then steer the castle into the nearest mountain to crash, hoping that this will eliminate his killers and keep the castle out of their hands.]]
* MakeMeWannaShout: The ''draakhorn'' is a magical horn whose sounding is loud enough to be heard throughout the Sword Coast. Standing directly in front of it while it’s being sounded is not a good idea.
* MakeMeWannaShout: The ''draakhorn'' is a magical horn whose sounding is loud enough to be heard throughout the Sword Coast. Standing directly in front of it while it’s being sounded is not a good idea.
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* MundaneUtility: The Cult is using a summoned air elemental to blow the ''draakhorn'' 24/7.
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* TheUndead: Some of the Cult's longest-serving members are undead, like the elf vampire Sandesyl and the wight Naergoth Bladelord.
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The adventurers have arrived in the town of Greenest, only to find it under attack by an army of raiders accompanied by a blue dragon. After doing their part to fend the raiders off, the players are tasked with tracking down the raiders' camp so they can retrieve the townsfolk's stolen valuables and rescue some hostages. From there, they become embroiled in a struggle against the Cult of the Dragon, which is conducting these raids as part of a greater plan to summon the dragon goddess Tiamat into the material plane.
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The story begins with the adventurers have arrived arriving in the town of Greenest, only to find it under attack by an army of raiders accompanied by a blue dragon. After doing their part to fend the raiders off, the players adventurers are then tasked with tracking down the raiders' camp so they can to retrieve the townsfolk's stolen valuables and rescue some hostages. From there, they become embroiled in a struggle against the Cult of the Dragon, which is conducting these raids as part of a greater plan to summon the dragon goddess Tiamat into the material plane.Material Plane.
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** Several members of the council of metallic dragons have a beef with some of the humanoid races. Protanther the gold dragon despises elves because they created the _Dracorage mythal_, which drives any dragon in its vicinity homicidally insane. Otaaryliakarnos the silver dragon resents dwarves because they killed her niece in one of their dragonmoots.
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** Several members of the council of metallic dragons have a beef with some of the humanoid races. Protanther the gold dragon despises elves because they created the _Dracorage mythal_, ''Dracorage mythal'', which drives any dragon in its vicinity dragons homicidally insane. Otaaryliakarnos the silver dragon resents dwarves because they killed her niece in one of their dragonmoots.
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[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/rise_of_tiamat_tvtropes.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:350:some caption text]]
''Tyranny of Dragons'' is a storyline for the fifth edition of ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons''. It is broken up into two adventure modules: ''Hoard of the Dragon Queen'' and ''The Rise of Tiamat'', both of which were released in 2014.
The adventurers have arrived in the town of Greenest, only to find it under attack by an army of raiders accompanied by a blue dragon. After doing their part to fend the raiders off, the players are tasked with tracking down the raiders' camp so they can retrieve the townsfolk's stolen valuables and rescue some hostages. From there, they become embroiled in a struggle against the Cult of the Dragon, which is conducting these raids as part of a greater plan to summon the dragon goddess Tiamat into the material plane.
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!!This adventure provides examples of:
* ApocalypseCult: Under Severin's leadership, the Cult of the Dragon has switched goals from creating dracoliches to freeing Tiamat from her imprisonment in the Nine Hells and summoning her into the material plane. Their success would mean the collapse of human civilization, as Tiamat would lead her chromatic dragon hordes to conquer the world.
* DeadMansSwitch: Rezmir's personal chest has been enchanted to teleport its contents away in the event of her death. If the party kills her before opening the chest, they'll lose out on the loot.
* DragonRider: Some members of the Cult ride wyverns into battle. The wyrmspeaker Neronvain rides the green dragon Chuth.
* EarlyGameHell: The first chapter of ''Hoard of the Dragon Queen'' can be rough. The players are all 1st level, they have few hit points, and they’re expected to deal with encounters that pit them against large groups of enemies who, while frail, can inflict a high amount of damage for that point in the game. Then there are the encounters with Langdedrosa Cyanwrath and Lennithon. The former is a half-dragon fighter with 57 hit points, and his attacks (of which he can make two per turn, or four if he action surges) inflict enough damage to cripple or kill a 1st level character in one hit. The latter is an adult blue dragon who attacks exclusively with his breath weapon: most 1st level characters wouldn't survive that even if he rolled nothing but 1s and the character made their saving throw to halve the damage. The players aren't expected to win against either of them at this point, but even so they can still bring the campaign to a premature end.
* EmpathicWeapon: Rezmir's sword ''Hazirawn'' has a mind of its own and can speak two different languages.
* EvilVersusOblivion: By ''The Rise of Tiamat'', the Zhentarim and the Red Wizards of Thay are both willing to join the other major factions of the Sword Coast in opposing the Cult of the Dragon. Both groups are unquestionably evil, but the Zhentarim want to rule the world and Szass Tam wants to keep ruling Thay: neither group gets what they want if the Cult summons Tiamat and she destroys human civilization.
* FantasticRacism:
** Dralmorrer Borngray is a member of the Eldreth Veluuthra, an elven supremacist group which hates humans and wants to remove them from Faerûn. He joined the Cult of the Dragon in the hopes that Tiamat will exterminate humanity while sparing the elves of Evermeet.
** Several members of the council of metallic dragons have a beef with some of the humanoid races. Protanther the gold dragon despises elves because they created the _Dracorage mythal_, which drives any dragon in its vicinity homicidally insane. Otaaryliakarnos the silver dragon resents dwarves because they killed her niece in one of their dragonmoots.
* FightingAShadow: [[spoiler:Destroying Tiamat's physical form doesn't actually kill her: it just banishes her back to the Nine Hells.]]
* ImperfectRitual: In the final episode of ''The Rise of Tiamat'', the players have many opportunities to sabotage Severin's summoning ritual. Each successful bit of sabotage will weaken Tiamat, and enough sabotage will stop her from coming through the portal altogether.
* TheLegionsOfHell: The Cult of the Dragon has summoned numerous devils from the Nine Hells to assist them in completing their plans. They can do this because some devils—most notably Zariel, the archdevil of Avernus—are fed up with Tiamat and want her out of the Nine Hells. Other devils want Tiamat to stay right where she is, however, and they may offer the players some unholy assistance in thwarting the Cult.
* MaskOfPower: The five dragon masks are magical artefacts that grant their wearers supernatural powers, most notably the ability to speak Draconic and influence chromatic dragons. Bringing them together makes them combine into the Mask of the Dragon Queen, which is a crucial component of the Cult's ritual to summon Tiamat.
* TheNecrocracy: In ''The Rise of Tiamat'' the players may need to go to Thay, the magocratic state ruled by the lich Szass Tam and his undead zulkirs.
* OminousFloatingCastle: The climax of ''Hoard of the Dragon Queen'' takes place in Skyreach Castle, home of the cloud giant Blagothkus. He has forged an Alliance with the Cult of the Dragon and allows them to store a large portion of the titular hoard in his flying fortress, which can then transport it to the Well of Dragons.
* PurpleIsPowerful: The highest-ranking members of the Cult of the Dragon are the Wearers of Purple. They are often skilled warriors or powerful spellcasters.
* RelationshipValues: In ''The Rise of Tiamat'', the party is brought into the Council of Waterdeep. The actions they take while fighting the Cult of the Dragon will affect the opinions of the various councillors, who represent many of the major factions and kingdoms of the Sword Coast. Impress a councillor enough, and they will commit every force at their disposal to the final battle at the Well of Dragons; otherwise they will commit only a token force to the fight. The book includes a helpful scorecard for the DM to keep track of the party's reputation with each councillor.
* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: [[spoiler:If Severin and Rath Modar successfully summon Tiamat, her first act will be to eat them both while laughing maniacally.]]
[[caption-width-right:350:some caption text]]
''Tyranny of Dragons'' is a storyline for the fifth edition of ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons''. It is broken up into two adventure modules: ''Hoard of the Dragon Queen'' and ''The Rise of Tiamat'', both of which were released in 2014.
The adventurers have arrived in the town of Greenest, only to find it under attack by an army of raiders accompanied by a blue dragon. After doing their part to fend the raiders off, the players are tasked with tracking down the raiders' camp so they can retrieve the townsfolk's stolen valuables and rescue some hostages. From there, they become embroiled in a struggle against the Cult of the Dragon, which is conducting these raids as part of a greater plan to summon the dragon goddess Tiamat into the material plane.
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!!This adventure provides examples of:
* ApocalypseCult: Under Severin's leadership, the Cult of the Dragon has switched goals from creating dracoliches to freeing Tiamat from her imprisonment in the Nine Hells and summoning her into the material plane. Their success would mean the collapse of human civilization, as Tiamat would lead her chromatic dragon hordes to conquer the world.
* DeadMansSwitch: Rezmir's personal chest has been enchanted to teleport its contents away in the event of her death. If the party kills her before opening the chest, they'll lose out on the loot.
* DragonRider: Some members of the Cult ride wyverns into battle. The wyrmspeaker Neronvain rides the green dragon Chuth.
* EarlyGameHell: The first chapter of ''Hoard of the Dragon Queen'' can be rough. The players are all 1st level, they have few hit points, and they’re expected to deal with encounters that pit them against large groups of enemies who, while frail, can inflict a high amount of damage for that point in the game. Then there are the encounters with Langdedrosa Cyanwrath and Lennithon. The former is a half-dragon fighter with 57 hit points, and his attacks (of which he can make two per turn, or four if he action surges) inflict enough damage to cripple or kill a 1st level character in one hit. The latter is an adult blue dragon who attacks exclusively with his breath weapon: most 1st level characters wouldn't survive that even if he rolled nothing but 1s and the character made their saving throw to halve the damage. The players aren't expected to win against either of them at this point, but even so they can still bring the campaign to a premature end.
* EmpathicWeapon: Rezmir's sword ''Hazirawn'' has a mind of its own and can speak two different languages.
* EvilVersusOblivion: By ''The Rise of Tiamat'', the Zhentarim and the Red Wizards of Thay are both willing to join the other major factions of the Sword Coast in opposing the Cult of the Dragon. Both groups are unquestionably evil, but the Zhentarim want to rule the world and Szass Tam wants to keep ruling Thay: neither group gets what they want if the Cult summons Tiamat and she destroys human civilization.
* FantasticRacism:
** Dralmorrer Borngray is a member of the Eldreth Veluuthra, an elven supremacist group which hates humans and wants to remove them from Faerûn. He joined the Cult of the Dragon in the hopes that Tiamat will exterminate humanity while sparing the elves of Evermeet.
** Several members of the council of metallic dragons have a beef with some of the humanoid races. Protanther the gold dragon despises elves because they created the _Dracorage mythal_, which drives any dragon in its vicinity homicidally insane. Otaaryliakarnos the silver dragon resents dwarves because they killed her niece in one of their dragonmoots.
* FightingAShadow: [[spoiler:Destroying Tiamat's physical form doesn't actually kill her: it just banishes her back to the Nine Hells.]]
* ImperfectRitual: In the final episode of ''The Rise of Tiamat'', the players have many opportunities to sabotage Severin's summoning ritual. Each successful bit of sabotage will weaken Tiamat, and enough sabotage will stop her from coming through the portal altogether.
* TheLegionsOfHell: The Cult of the Dragon has summoned numerous devils from the Nine Hells to assist them in completing their plans. They can do this because some devils—most notably Zariel, the archdevil of Avernus—are fed up with Tiamat and want her out of the Nine Hells. Other devils want Tiamat to stay right where she is, however, and they may offer the players some unholy assistance in thwarting the Cult.
* MaskOfPower: The five dragon masks are magical artefacts that grant their wearers supernatural powers, most notably the ability to speak Draconic and influence chromatic dragons. Bringing them together makes them combine into the Mask of the Dragon Queen, which is a crucial component of the Cult's ritual to summon Tiamat.
* TheNecrocracy: In ''The Rise of Tiamat'' the players may need to go to Thay, the magocratic state ruled by the lich Szass Tam and his undead zulkirs.
* OminousFloatingCastle: The climax of ''Hoard of the Dragon Queen'' takes place in Skyreach Castle, home of the cloud giant Blagothkus. He has forged an Alliance with the Cult of the Dragon and allows them to store a large portion of the titular hoard in his flying fortress, which can then transport it to the Well of Dragons.
* PurpleIsPowerful: The highest-ranking members of the Cult of the Dragon are the Wearers of Purple. They are often skilled warriors or powerful spellcasters.
* RelationshipValues: In ''The Rise of Tiamat'', the party is brought into the Council of Waterdeep. The actions they take while fighting the Cult of the Dragon will affect the opinions of the various councillors, who represent many of the major factions and kingdoms of the Sword Coast. Impress a councillor enough, and they will commit every force at their disposal to the final battle at the Well of Dragons; otherwise they will commit only a token force to the fight. The book includes a helpful scorecard for the DM to keep track of the party's reputation with each councillor.
* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: [[spoiler:If Severin and Rath Modar successfully summon Tiamat, her first act will be to eat them both while laughing maniacally.]]
