Editing Athasian Dragon (section)

===Defiler Metamorphosis Epic Spells===
In an improvement from 2nd Edition, casting the defiler metamorphosis spells no longer has a chance of killing you outright. Instead, they use the "backlash damage" mechanic, which is less swingy and gives the defiler a better chance of surviving. Higher-level spells in the chain also require other casters to contribute high-level spell slots, and the final spell requires the dragon to personally kill a 20+HD creature that could cast 9th-level spells.

The bonuses here are similar to the bonuses in 2nd Edition. The dragon increases in size, gains bonuses to its physical ability scores, and gains natural armor bonuses. Eventually, it increases in size, first to Large and finally to Gargantuan (if the original creature was Medium). Along the way it gains dragon abilities like Frightful Presence, damage reduction, Spell/Psionics Resistance, appendage attacks, and finally a breath weapon of superheated sand.

At ''defiler metamorphosis V'' and onward, except for ''X,'' when the dragon successfully casts the spell, it enters a period of animalistic rage lasting a number of months "equal to the backlash roll of the spell." (The final spell in the rage section of the chain has a backlash of 34d6, meaning on average a dragon at this stage will be rampaging for ''[[RAGE|ten years]].'' Better keep that demiplane handy.) Thankfully, the rulebook only "suggests" that DMs "may" want to make your character an NPC for these parts of the game.

Once the dragon has metamorphosed for the last time, it is able to swallow obsidian power orbs and use them as normal, effectively giving maxed-out Athasian Dragons an unlimited supply of power points and spells. But at this point, you've already beaten Athas, so who cares?