This is one of the few subclasses that works when it starts at level 3: it was an egg. You spent two levels protecting the drake egg while your Cleric and Warlock and Sorc all started with their subclass.

Errata: I forgot that Longbows are considered Heavy and that Heavy weapons would impose disadvantage for our little kobold! Using a shortbow instead would only lower our DPR by 1-2 per round, depending on enemy AC, so not a huge impact, but worth noting. I have updated the spreadsheet/graphs with the new numbers. Also: I misspoke when I said Summon Beast lasts for 10 minutes - it's an hour.

A Backstory: You are a cleric of Bahamut. One Faithful Night you receive a vision of a dying massive golden dragon. With only your faith to guide you you set out to find this ancient being of great power. When you finally reach your destination you do indeed find the dragon on its death bed. You use your Emboldening Bond and all the magic you can muster to try and save it. Alas you fail to save it, but it uses your bond to add a sliver of it essence to you and you pass out. When you wake you are now nature and soon to be dragon inclined. You also have a few of it memories and its a jumble, the one thing you do know was that the dragon was guarding a artifact of grave power and danger to the world and you must hunt down what ever did took this artifact and face what ever was strong enough to kill an ancient gold dragon. ...... I want to play this.

Level 1:(see above) [cleric 1, sub-class & race] Level 2:(see above) [ranger 1] Level 3:(@16:28) [ranger 2 & fighting-style] Level 4:(@17:42) [ranger 3 & sub-class] Level 5:(@23:52) [ranger 4 & ASI] Level 6:(@24:43) [ranger 5] Level 7:(@29:22) [ranger 6] Level 8:(@29:50) [ranger 7] Level 9:(@33:56) [ranger 8 & ASI] Level 10:(see above) [ranger 9] Level 11:(@40:59) [cleric 2] Level 12:(@42:23) [cleric 3] Level 13:(@43:57) [cleric 4 & ASI] Level 14:(see above) [cleric 5] Level 15:(@46:00) [cleric 6] Level 16:(@47:25) [cleric 7] Level 17:(@47:56) [cleric 8 & ASI]

Man they did the Fizban subclasses dirty. All Paladins get a pegasus at level 13, Lore Bards can get it at level 10. Let me ride a flying lil dragon at level 11 Drakewarden Ranger gosh dangit!

Just so you know, sometimes, when I'm in a hurry, I watch the video at 1.5/2 speed (i would rewatch it later at normal speed) BUT the intro I cannot speed up. It's so relaxing, soothing and welcoming, I LOVE IT

"hey gm, can my character have a dragon" "what type of dragon" DRAGON DESE NUTS "roll for initiative"

So, I built a fun character with this class back when it was originally in UA (I wanna say it was for a level 10 oneshot a buddy of mine ran). He was a 10 year old street urchin, who was blinded by an accident a year earlier. If I remember correctly, I did 3 levels of Arcane Trickster Rogue (just to have a bat Familiar so he can see) and the rest in Drakewarden Ranger. It was amazing to have the drake get in melee range and then be able to do sneak attack anytime I wanted. Plus he was a fun character to play! Might pick him back up again someday now that the Drakewarden is out!

Fun build! Nit picky mechanics, though: don't small size creatures have disadvantage on attack rolls using heavy weapons?

You should really read the Kobold section in Volo’s. They’re really not evil at all. I kind of love the lore.

I just suggested this character to one of the players on the planescape campaign I'm starting up. She loved the idea. And in the process of me sharing your video with her, you got a new fan. She's a statistics professor and a D&D geek. Of course she was going to love your channel!

Tanis is the reason why half elf rangers are my favorite class, because of the books and how cool Elmore made him look on the covers

As a native New Yorker, I find that I have to listen to this at either 1.25x or 1.5x speed to feel conversational.

Regarding sunlight sensitivity you could pick up fog cloud and cast it above you to block out the sun.

Last tiem I played a sunlight sensitive character I said to my DM "I'm not going to keep asking about this because that will get annoying, if it's bright sunlight you'll have to tell me" He was fine with it and promptly forgot to ever tell me the weather ever ^_^

I love this build concept so much! When you first said you were going kobold and starting cleric i assumed you were going to try to use the twilight cleric to eliminate sunlight sensitivity

I enjoy watching these videos for the multiclassing. I am currently building my first multiclass; a Gloomstalker Ranger/Phantom Rogue multiclass and it's fun to see how you mix and match your classes.

Nice vid! I’d love to see a sort of “dnd unoptimized” character where you just go for the worst dnd character you could possibly make. Weird subclasses and feats and asi’s. I don’t know why I want to see this but it makes me laugh thinking of it

Emboldening bond is strong but I think RAW protective bond is the overpowered part of Peace domain. Maybe at least. Teleporting and soaking an AoE sounds super strong. But I guess that's up to DM interpretation.

Been looking for a good drakewarden build for a while now, thanks for doing one!

Love your videos! Currently sick at home and this will help me take my mind off that

About the Mounted Combat: Specific rules beat general rules, meaning you can still have the drake attack on your turn while controlling it. Cause the feature says you can. Whether you mount the drake or not, it obeys your commands.

Love your opening since chapter 1. Really makes me feel we share a hobby.

Peace Domain can be used as so many interesting ways, (Peace Maker for example) i saw a quote from Megatron that make me laught, it was "I will create desolation and call it peace!" Heh and Gandhi also said something about using violence when there is no other way (when there's no other way then violence, so violence can be the way), it is part of the nature itself and can't be eliminated, but it can be disciplined. A good quote a "pacifist" cleric could use to introduce the party would be "I particularly don't like violence, that been said... you now are in the presence of some violent individuals"

Cleric/ranger is such a good combo. Glad to see you playing with it!

My day is always made when you upload. My new fav channel so keep up the amazing work.

Already recommended this build to a friend and am totally going to be build this but reskinning it as a Summoner from the Taren Matheru summoner series.

Colby: *Says anything* Me: *simping* "Yes, that is amazing how smart"

This is the best build you’ve done in a while.

Thanks for being good company while I do the dishes!

You have such a soothing voice, a great storyteller!

Congrats on 50k! I just rewatched this episode and I have a suggestion for those who do not like to take the peace cleric subclass. What about taking the tempest cleric instead? You loose Emboldening Bond but still get Bless for those early levels. Instead you get a reaction to push enemues away from your character, which comes handy for a ranged character. Then later on, you replace the Peace Clerics features with Destructive Wrath and Thunderous Strike as well as Storm themed damage and control spells. Then you could grab the 11th lvl Drakewarden Feature for massive Breath Weapon attacks, maximizing Lighting damage with destructive wrath and feuling this ability with more spell slots from the cleric right at cleric lvl 2. I am not sure if Thunderous Strike works RAW with the drakes reaction, since the lightning damage would come from the drake, but if your dm rules this in your favour, you also get a reliable way to push enemies around with attacks. When in doubt, maybe you could get a weapon that deals additional damage instead. Flavourwise I think a tempest cleric would mix very well with a drakewarden. Flavour him like a Stormknight that rides a blue dragon, which are known to be the rulers of storms.

Love the outtakes this week! Lol

A great DM tool is a "good/evil" tool. (I use Fudge Dice, another GM I know uses a coin) Something to answer questions which you do not necessarily know the answer to. So like, if it is a part of the plot that they are in a storm? It's cloudy. If it's a part of the plot that it's sunny? It's sunny. But if I don't as a GM care, then I roll my die and answer it that way. Plus, if your PCs know you do this, it gets past the whole, "Does my DM hate me?" when you ask, "Is it sunny?"

loving the dragon themed builds

Greetings from Denmark. I feel so much alike you and it’s amazing: - I love the idea of monks needing nothing but their minds resolve and physical control no matter the situation. My first character was also a monk and I am inspired by monks in my own personal aspirations. - I like to crunch numbers and used ludicsavant’s damage calculator before I found your channel - It seems like you try to formulate your thoughts without wasting words. I appreciate that and strive to do the same. You are adept at keeping things on track and creating a nice overview of your videos in the comments as well as during your analyses. - I am a sucker for cliche dragons and Dragonslance was insta-love. I’ve never read so many books in any other series (maybe ASOIAF has as many words. But there are also dragons!). - I also think a small half tabaxi half gnome sounds cute as well as all the other cute things that sometimes present themselves in your videos. I think the Thundeball, Greased Lightning and Drakewarden are my favorite builds of yours. Please keep on coming up with story ideas for your characters. I’m always excited about them. You have no idea who I am but I feel like you’re a kindred spirit who welcomes me home. Thank you so much. I have been a member for a couple of months and hope you can keep the channel going for a long time.

Again, these bloopers are just great.

Also the eldritch sorcerer you did is one of my favorites and this is on par damagewise so job well done as far as I'm concerned 👏👏👏

I loved the Jane Yolen Pit Dragon series. Highly recommended.

I'm a huge fan of Dragons and the Drakewarden was gonna be my return to 5e character.... You're content has gotten you a new subscriber... Keep making more awesome videos like this one... Now time to watch so I can either edit my comment or post a new one after I finish the video...

the drakewarden has always been flying under my radar but this seems like a lot of fun

I'm glad you did a vid on this as this was the subclass i was excited about with the new book. sadly, i still think the beastmaster is better though this is still solid. I did build and play a wis based beastmaster and yes i was getting charge off almost every turn (along with an opportunity attack) as i was using primarily dissonant whispers (via feytouched). i agree that the beastmaster's companion is more accurate (especially with the new moon sickle from tasha as it scales off of your spell attack bonus) so i'm on board with your way of boosting the accuracy of the drake. personally though i dislike wasting my action on the 1st round to setup emboldening bond/bless (unless i'm out of range) so personally i would've multiclassed elsewhere like the diviner wizard for portent or war cleric for war god's blessing for free action ways to boost the drake's accuracy as needed. I love multiclassing as well. probably the main reason i enjoy theorycrafting in dnd. I haven't played a drakewarden yet and i'll probably play one once i can get into a game during the holidays. rough theorycrafting now baed on my input above for level 10 i'd probably go with 2 fighter (as usual), 6 drake and 2 diviner wiz similar to my beastmaster setup going wis based and leveraging off of dissonant whispers. i defintely enjoyed the vid as you called out a major weakness of the drakewarden so i'm definitely mixing diviner there for situational accuracy boosts. i may even go battlemaster so i can use distracting strike as reaction attack (off of dissonant whispers) just to give the drake advantage on it's attack.

I got a chance to play a drake warden, sadly game ended before I got past level 5 but it’s a super fun subclass. My drake dragged around small creatures like goblins, which was really useful

A magic item that gets rid of sunlight sensitivity (plus other benefits) is Knave's Eye Patch it's a rare magic item that requires attunement and here's what it does While wearing this eye patch, you gain these benefits: You have advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight. If you have the Sunlight Sensitivity trait, you are unaffected by the trait. You are immune to magic that allows other creatures to read your thoughts or determine whether you are lying. Creatures can communicate telepathically with you only if you allow it.

I looove the idea of this character. When I get home I’m going to fiddle around with trying to squeeze in either Druidic warrior fighting style or magic initiate Druid for magic stone and go full wisdom for a little extra pet buff to hit.

Easy work around for the heavy weapon problem is to go a short bow. It is 1d6 instead of 1d8, but still gets archery, sharpshooter, and works with extra attack.

I'm going to be running a goliath drakwarden in a buddys game. Using the sling and magic stone combo with a dip into rune knight

I tend to combine drakewarden with scout rogue so I can add the damage from sneak attack to whatever damage I’m using, usually archery. Also my dragon can just stay close to the enemy so I can effectively use sneak attack almost whenever. Also this just allows me to not need to focus my skills on survival and nature with added bonus of being expertise level. Add to that, the skirmisher feature allows me to be more dodgy and harder to hit. And there is no sneezing at being able to bonus action disengage when if that leaves your dragon to just use the dodge action. I usually combine the feat “gift of the metallic dragon” and, being in close proximity with my dragon allows me to better protect them with the shield like feature baked into the class, not to mention allows me to be supplementary healer. To be honest, I feel this is a very good class that allows a lot of flexibility to design around the make up of the group you play with. I’ve functioned as a tank, as a ranged damage dealer, and even a medic for my group. Usually I just fill the exploration and tracking role but I really love the flexibility of the class and this subclass I feel has a lot to offer regarding it. I’ve actually made several drakewardens due to all this. My most recent drakewarden is a tad new so isn’t close to optimized yet. I started with an astral elf and took the light spell since the game was designed less for combat and more for intrigue and roleplaying. This was also important I felt because the other two players and their characters were of races without darkvision so I took it to optimize the group until the wizard is far enough in to get the darkvision spell. As for the element I chose for my dragon once I had it, I focused on lightning. I’ll be able to change it later of course but lightning is a good general type I felt. Anyway, for initial spells I took absorb elements (since I would be more likely in a position of tanking in such a small group) and entangle. Entangle I feel is always critical to controlling the field and I have already used it very effectively during these early sessions. Once even in combination with the wizard’s sleep spell which allowed us to end the battle more peacefully. Now, normally when I add my third spell I take zephyr strike, a very good spell to stay dodgy and hit harder and move faster. This time I did not. I took Goodberry. This was because I felt a need for this group to keep rations stocked (until the cleric can) and to supplementary heal. So I felt this was the best way to optimize my group over my drakewarden in particular. My plan is for the next spell addition, which will be 2nd level ones, that I can take pass without a trace, which I’m looking forward to. It will allow my group to optimize for stealth missions which are more important in the type of game we are playing, which as I said is more intrigue and roleplay heavy. I quite like this build and see it playing well. I’m still trying to decide which feat I might go for in level 4. Sharpshooter can be great but it’s might serve me better, weirdly enough, to act as translator with linguist. And of course there is many other things available including the elven feat for elven accuracy. I could also optimize my close combat better by taking an additional fighting style for two weapon fighting (my elf has two scimitars). The decisions are difficult but I might just end up going with whatever feels right when we finally get there. After all, my character took sylvan during their level 3 (already knew draconic) due to the fact that they tamed a wynling by accident and now it’s staying with the party (fed it too many sweet buns and rolled a nat 20 for that final animal handling check when trying to release it back to the wild). Anyway, that’s how one of my recent drakewarden’s is playing out. All things considered I might crossover some cleric levels for this one. It’s a good idea and thematic enough I have realized.

I would say that the roving feature really synergizes with the Balm of Healing ability you got for 2 levels in peace cleric.

This is a definetively the most bahamutian peace cleric you could made imo.

I love to is build! The only thing I’d change would be to take Order cleric so when we cast bless or other ally targeting spells, our drake can make a melee attack as a reaction :D

Love the concept of a cobold dragon rider! Im currently on the proccess of making a multi personality Echo Knight/Trickery cleric and i wd love to see your thoughts on optimizing that! Keep up the great work.

I spit out my water when you said Draconic essenccccccce the third time 😂

I was building a peace cleric/drakewarden when this video came out. Now I shall steal your build instead. Also doooo a Loxodon barbarian/soulknife grappler build!

Hey Colby I've been obsessed with these videos for the last two weeks and you are a very relaxing vibe to watch! Can I make a very polite request for a Druidic warrior ranger? Keep making nerdy shit!!

Bond of Fang & Scale, don't Mount it, instead have it Grapple you. Sure it's Speed is cut in half but that's fine, you're not moving anyway. Its young and only just got its wings. This way, you can still gain the benefits of flight. Spell Points instead of Spell Slots keep costs to Drake Breath or Summon Drake at a minimal. Order Domain Cleric with Spell Points, who also has a Background in a Strixhaven, can get access to the all-powerful Silvery Barbs OR Featherfall. Some even come with Haste. This means that the Mount would be able to attack for Action, Hasted Action, & Reaction, while it costs you Bonus Action & Reaction, leaving your Action completely free. A feat I would recommend: Chef. The Drake has a BA completely free and having treats every round to buffer damage, it might not sound like much but it really does add up & saves you on Spell Points/Slots. Treats= #Proficiency, providing a number of THP= Proficiency. So at: 2, 4 THP or 2 THP/round. 3, 9 THP or 3 THP/round. 4, 16 THP or 4 THP/round. 5, 25 THP or 5 THP/round. 6, 36 THP or 6 THP/round. And if you really needed to, you can cook several batches of treats for about 6-7 hours as the treats no longer provide THP if they aren't eaten before 8 hours of making them. But if eaten, THP lasts until the end of the next Long Rest.

"Draconic Essence." I love it!

I love this build!! Thanks! I have a human ranger that just graduated to level 3 drakenwarden... Im this case, without the pack tactics of the kobold, wouldn't be better to just use Crossbow Expert + Sharpshooter and use the drake for meat-shield + attacks of opportunity?

You could also ready an action for after your drake takes its turn. Helpful if you want to use sharpshooter and ask your drake to give the help action

Im playing an Eladrin College of Glamour Bard who is multiclassing into Drakewarden. Im excited to have a character who looks different every day and a drake that matches. Especially because my party is very backline except for a Hexblade, it will be nice to have a frontline pet.

I don’t think elemental damage types being resisted more then bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage matters in this case because you will usually be able to choose an elemental damage type that is not resisted by that particular foe. (I.e. Cold for fire elementals, lightning for frost giants, etc.)

I mean even humans have trouble functioning on bright days, especially bright days with snow. Sunglasses are popular for a reason. Maybe kobold could just wear some sunglasses? Got to embrace weaknesses. Being good at everything all the time is boring.

I loved Dragonlance as a kid too

Nice. I think I will go with a gem dragon bourn built for strength. Think charging lances and pole arm, plus all those wonderful breath weapons!

These draconic classes are great :). Coolest combo I've found so far is ascendant dragon monk + thief + oil flasks to add 5 to the damage of each unarmed strike. Could also add in some genie warlock so you can trigger the fire and sneak attack with the same strike?

You should be allowed to buy a common magic item, Sunglasses....for about 50 gold.

Loved the build, I want Fizbans really badly.

PACK TACTICS!!!!!!!!!!! You better pick Fog cloud now and casting it above you or else I'm going to be mad!

Weird idea....what about a "Living Wagon" character? Optimize a character to have the greatest carrying capacity.

I like this subclass. I did a build with it that was focused about empowering pets damage more then mine. The whole build is lvl 11 drakewarden ranger/ lvl 5 shadow magic sorcerer /lvl4 The Genie ( Dao)( pact of the chain). I went Custom lineage as a point buy i did it as 8 str/14 dex/12 con/14 wisdom/15 Cha. As for racial bonus i added the +2 to to charisma, and for the free feat i went Skill Expert and put that +1 point to cha, so it is at lvl 1 actually 8 str/14 dex/12 con/14 wisdom/18 cha. Unlike colby's build i went with main weapon as Eldritch Blast. The idea of this build is to up cast dragon's breath spell as high as I can use with Twinned spell to give it both to the imp and drake. The imp mostly stays alive because you can trigger dragon's breath spell and it doesn't break its invisibility. Eventually it will be up cast with a lvl 5 slot and twinned with it doing 6d6 damage in a 15 ft cone, but instead of being close to the ground they would fly up 15ft above the target point and then use the breath straight down making it a 15 ft radius. I would take invocations agonizing blast, investment of the chain master, and Gift of the ever living ones from eldritch adept, for metamagic i am thinking Twinned spell, Distance spell, quickened spell, and transmuted spell. Feats / ASI : At our table we get a choice between magic adept, tough or skilled as free feats as we are sort of testing stuff for dnd one, I took tough. For the free feat from race i took skill expert as i said already. then took feats in progression : Eldritch adept , war caster, Metamagic adept, and an ASI for +2 Cha to make it out at 20. I started lvl 1 as sorcerer for the free con saves. ranger at lvl 2 then worked out all 4 lvls of warlock of warlock, then Ranger again for 3 lvls to get to next ASI, then for lvls in sorcerer to finish it out. After that i just went ranger til lvl 20. Ideally I would have done it as tasha's beast master but couldn't do 15 lvls in it to get shared spells feature , so switched it to drake warden. but would have wanted to do it as 15 lvls of ranger, with 3 lvls of both sorcerer, and 3 lvls of warlock , then when i twinned it as beastmaster I would hit imp with dragon's breath then me, and since a spell targeted me, it also buffs beast too so all 3 would have dragon's breath... but can't becaus that would be 21 lvls It would almost have worked as 15 lvls ranger, 3 lvls warlock, and 2 lvls of sorcerer. and get metamagic from metamagic adept, but the thing is sorcerer can get the dragon's breath spell but like that it can't hit lvl 2 spells, and warlock and ranger can't get it. You could do it that way with ashardalon's stride but as the spells says once you hit it with the fire damage it can't take that damage again that turn. So having 2 others with it would be redundant.

Great build! Sad that we couldn’t get the full dragon, but dps is dps. I love the idea of a little kobold making friends with dragons and fey alike!

for splitting up your graphs, i recommend limiting the info you see- Just the build in question, the lowest damage build in that tier, the highest damage build in that teir, and the average of all builds in that teir

Been watching a lot of your vids this week. And there's something I think would be a big improvement. You've already done an amazing job with time stamps. If you added one more "starting setup" at the level 1 section it'd be great. So many of these are varient human or elf and I get why I'm not mad at that. But when I click level 1 and there's another 3 minutes explaining why a Feat at level 1 is a good thing... And I'm listening to 10 of these at work I'd just love it if another chapter was added to the time stamp

Once your drake can fly it can totally just grapple you and fly you around at half speed btw, even if you can't mount it. Maybe not great for combat, but great for exploration and escaping.

I dub this episode 6d6... lol. My buddy is playing a Drake Ranger soon, I'm sending him this video for reference. Thanks Colby!

For a very simple core plus 1 book build with no multiclassing but still solid damage just go variant human ranger with the sentinel feat and build for melee. Keep dragon close or mounted and when ever your dragon is hit you are getting a free attack. I suggest sword and board for a dragon knight. It's not amazing but it's easy to run.

"legend says that when the ground quakes or lava spews from the earth, it's the dragons" Edit: maybe you mentioned it but I have a question about using longbows or heavy crossbows as a small creature cause they're heavy

Is it daylight? If yes see below Is the source of the light being provided by the daylight? If yes see below You suffer from sunlight sensitivity Overcast does not stop sunlight sensitivity. Curse of Strahd mentions this specifically.

I really like the fact this build ends off on drake warden early and here’s how I’d do it because of that fact! I like the idea the character is a chirpy wannabe dragon rider, stealing an egg from a nest they expect something great by the time it hatch’s, but instead, they get a wyvern, take the poison damage (or acid if you don’t wanna be resisted all the time) and it’s pretty on theme. The creature grows a decent amount, but it’s certainly no immense dragon and doesn’t even have a breath weapon, and you spend much time arguing and struggling to bond with the beast, but eventually in your clerical pursuits you learn to make peace and find peace in this, and use its unique abilities to your advantage.

My nephew is playing a Ranger as his first ever D&D character, and I just ordered the dragon book, expected to arrive next week. I'm planning on begging our DM to allow him to play a Drakewarden, assuming he likes the idea (which part of me thinks he would, but I could be wrong).

So my next character is either going to be an astral self monk (based off the grappler monk build you made with my own tweaks) or a drake warden but I didn't know what build to go. So this is perfect timing!

2 years back I actually played a kolbold cleric named kolby lol. I made him a cleric light domain, becuase I liked the thought of him praising the sun, even though it made things harder on him. A bit of the bare you cross mentality maybe? Plus casting daylight to give yourself disadvantage was fun and funny. Only played him for about 3 sessions before my curse of forever DM returned to me.

What race would you use for this build with the MOM changes and how does this effect the power of the build.

YOU KNOW I'VE BEEN WAITING FOR A HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON BUILD SINCE FIZBANS!

Beast of the land charge bonus DMG will probably happen once per 1-2 rounds of combat before lvl 11, but after that, it will happen 1-2 per round. because beast can attack two times, so it can gain this bonus against that enemy twice per turn. If you share Haste, there is even possibility to do this charge bonus dmg 3 times per round, which is significant bonus!

I would take favorite enemy dragons, only to have extra knowledge about them

I really want to make a mounted combat bugbear with this class. 15 foot melee range with a lance seems fun

My idea for this subclass would you take some points into fighter for the interception fighting style, and fight next to the drake on the front lines. Absorbing some of the damage the Drake takes and holding the front line. Possibly taking the Cavalier subclass, and a small race such as Kobald, or something for increased wisdom. I've not read through all the features yet, so I'm not 100% on how all the skills would interact, or even how good this will be in the end. Was just my initial thoughts

better have 3 level warlock dip for a pseudodragon to go with your drake dragon, or riot!

A fair dm rolls for weather in these situations.

Played a Kobold sorcerer ones. RAW sunlight sensitivity hits, when you or your target are in direct sunlight. Although the target part is out of your control, the you part is easily solved: Get a nice hat.

Another great build! It's like watching Marvel films you have to stay to the very end....

I think you overlooked something: You have cleric 1 in your build, which means your spell slots are the same as a 1+half your Ranger level. This means that at level 9, you get level 3 spell slots

I like to think that this kobold is still evil, just a very rare emissary chosen by tiamat to negotiate border disputes, mating arrangements, and alliance negotiating between her chromatic children to keep them strong and prosperous in spite of the lesser races rebelling against their rightful rule and hunting them for trophy or hides. I love the idea of a tiny kobold deemed sacrosanct as a matter of religious dogma by these much more massive and powerful dragons. Also, dragon custody battles.

In regards to the drake's turn going after yours, could you take the fighting initiate feat with maneuvering attack to help out there? Also I'm surprised you didn't go fighter and use Cavelier

27:30 i do this but i also have a familiar (dm gave us a free feat at lvl 1, i took magic initiate) familiar uses the help action for drake, me and beast have pack tactics. All three of us essentially always have advantage

I think I would prefer going with melee combat and spending my concentration on fog cloud with blindfighting.Then I would have a way to deny the sunlight sensitivity if I needed to and make sure I always have advantage. Plus a sword on a dragon sounds cooler to me. More mounted like combat stuff.

The problem with pack tactics on the drakewarden is that the pet acts after your turn. You can command it to move next to an enemy to gain pack tactics, but you won't gain the benefit until the following turn.

A gith that, after being named a traitor to it's own kind, stole a dragon egg right under their noses, and trained it to seek freedom.

Dragons and Drangonlance are my favorites too