Wind drake

Version 0.30: This article may not be up to date for the latest stable release of Crawl.

For a list of all lesser dragons, see list of dragons.

wind drake k
HP	39-80
HD	8
XP	285
Speed	12
AC	3
EV	14
Will	40
Attack1	12 (bite: plain)
Resistances	None
Vulnerabilities	None
Habitat	Land
Intelligence	Animal
Uses	Uses nothing
Holiness	Natural
Size	Large
Type	drake, wind drake
Flags	Flying Warm-blooded

A small but powerful dragon, particularly adept amongst its kin at manipulating the currents of air that surround it. It can exhale powerful blasts of wind.

Useful Info

Wind drakes are one of the weaker lesser dragons, but they are still capable of irritating and injuring adventurers. Their Air Magic can pummel you with smite-targeted wind damage or push you around the battlefield, and they have a naturally-occurring Repel Missiles effect at all times. They can be encountered in the Shoals, some of The Lair endings, and can be summoned by enemies with the Summon Drakes spell.

Spells

Tile	Name	Damage	Range	Flags
	Wind Blast	2d10*	LOS	Natural flag, Breath flag
	Airstrike	2d7+(2/space)	LOS	Natural flag
	Deflect Missiles	—	—	Natural flag

Tips & Tricks

• You should treat Airstrike like a stronger Smiting. It checks AC, but deals much more damage in an open area. Not great when Shoals is filled with open areas.
  • Specifically: for every empty tile adjacent to you, Airstrike deals more damage. Surrounding yourself with summons, or standing adjacent to a wall, will decrease the amount of empty spaces available.
• Wind drakes make stairs much less reliable, since Wind Blast can knock you back, interrupting the stair. If a wind drake is in view, don't attempt to stair dance, and don't expect stairs to be a reliable way of escape.
• Repel Missiles will greatly reduce the accuracy of ranged attacks, so it can be difficult for Ranged Weapons or certain spells to hit.
  • For any character, using a wand of flame over water can be a decent option. It creates steam, which can kill the drake after a couple puffs of flame. For Fire Magic specialists, a Fireball or so is much more effective.
  • Attacks that never miss, such as your own Airstrike, obviously ignore RMsl.
  • Wind drakes have low willpower for this stage of the game, so status wands can all work well.
  • Yara's Violent Unravelling or a wand of quicksilver (if it hits) will dispel the status, forcing monsters to activate it again.

History

• Prior to 0.29, the open space bonus for Airstrike was much weaker.
• Prior to 0.27, Airstrike dealt extra damage to flying targets.
• Prior to 0.25, wind drakes had a permanent Deflect Missiles effect instead of Repel Missiles.
• Prior to 0.19, they had wind resistance and were immune to Airstrike and Tornado.
• Wind drakes were added in 0.14.