Know when a dragon is about. As soon as you hear a loud roar in the distance, one that echoes around your surrounding area, stop what you’re doing and look up at the sky. Scan it for dragons. Some of them will continue flying around and ignore you no matter how close you get, but most will start attacking you the moment they spot you. You will know a dragon has chosen to attack you when a distinct soundtrack reserved for dragon fights starts up, giving you a few extra seconds to prepare yourself for combat. You will also see a rapidly moving red dot on your compass bar.
Find cover. As soon as you find yourself under attack by a dragon, run to the nearest solid cover you can find. Look for solid pillars, boulders, walls, or structures to hide behind. Trees can provide some cover if they are thick enough, but they are generally unreliable at completely stopping a dragon’s breath from damaging you. If you want to engage the dragon from afar, find an area that is thick with cover where the dragon can’t land to engage you in close quarters combat. If you want to engage the dragon in melee combat though, then find cover near a wide-open space. This will give the dragon a spot to land so you can get up close and personal with it.
Identify the type of dragon you are facing. Take note of the dragon’s color, its physical features, and the element of its breath attacks. This is another reason for finding cover as soon as possible, as it gives you more time to safely study your opponent before charging in. If you identify the type of dragon you are fighting against, you can take advantage of that dragon’s weaknesses while preparing your own potions and enchantments to protect yourself against their attacks. Basic Dragons are the first dragons you will encounter at random. Bronze and white dragons spit fire attacks and are both vulnerable to frost damage. Brown dragons can spit fire and ice attacks. Fire-breathing dragons take bonus damage from frost attacks, while Frost-breathing dragons take bonus damage from fire attacks. Blood Dragons are green, have large sails on their backs, and start appearing when you hit level 18. They can spit either fire or ice attacks and are vulnerable to the element opposite the one they breathe. Fire-breathing Blood Dragons can also knock you around with an Unrelenting Force attack, causing your character to ragdoll and spend a few extra seconds slowly getting up. The other advanced dragons from this point on will be able to Shout Unrelenting Force as well. Frost Dragons are grayish-white, have large black spikes on their back, and start appearing at level 27. They breathe frost, can knock you around with Unrelenting Force, and can cast slow-moving but extremely painful Ice Storm spells. They are resistant to frost attacks but will take bonus damage from fire attacks. Elder Dragons have are large bronze dragons, have wings with two-toned colors, and start appearing at level 36. You have fire and frost variants, with each being resistant to their own element while being vulnerable to the element opposite theirs. Fire variants spew out Fireballs that can hurt you from behind cover if they land beside you, while frost variants toss out Ice Storms that can quickly cut you down if you get in their way. "Ancient Dragons are copper-colored dragons with black-and-red scales, have barely no ridges on their backs, and start appearing at level 45. They are identical to their Elder counterparts in terms of function (from elemental strengths, elemental weaknesses), except they do much more damage with all their attacks. Serpentine Dragons appear if you have the Dragonborn expansion installed and have reached at least level 55. They are blue with large lower jaws, and can be found on Solstheim. They are functionally similar to Ancient Dragons except that they have a bit more health for you to chip away. Revered Dragons come with the Dawnguard expansion and start appearing once you reach level 59. They are bright orange have broad, flat bodies with an equally long and flat tail. They only breathe fire and are thus weak to frost attacks, but they have the Drain Vitality shout, which drains your health, your magicka, and your stamina for 20 seconds. Make sure to pack a lot of potions to compensate for this; otherwise, you could find yourself in serious trouble if they manage to corner you while you’re being drained. Legendary Dragons come with the Dawnguard expansion and start appearing once you hit level 78. Their black and purple scales along with the prominently curved horns on their hide make them easy to spot. They are also the hardest randomly-encountered dragons to deal with, as they not only come in frost and fire variants but can also unleash a Drain Vitality shout that hits harder than their revered counterparts.
Hit dragons with ranged attacks. Dragons can be very dangerous if you charge them head-on. Dragons also have an annoying habit of hovering in the air or landing on top of tall structures where you can’t engage them in melee combat. It is for this reason that it is always handy to pack a bow or prepare some offensive magic to help damage the dragons from afar. You can also “kite” the dragons by hiding behind cover when the dragon spits out a breath attack against you then popping back out after the dragon is finished with its attack. It is worth noting that you can poison your arrows to give them a little extra punch for dealing with dragons. Just make sure you land these poisoned arrows, as the poison effect will disappear after firing them. Remember to cast spells of an element opposite the dragon’s breath. If you see it breathing fire, slam it with frost spells. If you see it breathing frost, blast it apart with fire spells. Enchanted bows with opposite elemental damage works to add additional damage.
Stagger dragons to disable their breath attack. There will be windows of opportunity where a timely bash, power attack, or Impact-talented dual-cast spells will cause the dragon to recoil and cancel its breath attack. The most notable is when the dragon is rearing its head to unleash a breath attack. Once it starts this animation, quickly slap the dragon with a staggering blow. The window for successfully doing this is very short, so you’ll need to act fast to ensure that you don’t get your face melted off. If you do enough damage with an Impact-talented dual-cast spell, you can also knock down a hovering dragon and cause it to land for a few seconds.
Build your elemental and magic resistances. The usual health, magicka, and stamina potions will come in very handy when fighting dragons. You will, however, find potions that increase your fire, frost, and magical resistances. These potions significantly reduce the damage of breath attacks, giving you enough survivability to go toe-to-toe with dragons. Using enchanted equipment to protect you against fire, frost, and magic will also stack with these potions. Get enough resistance, and you could virtually laugh off the elemental shouts that the dragons will toss at you. Do note that Skyrim caps elemental resistances at 85% and magic resistances at 85%. This will ensure that you will always take damage from spells and dragon breath attacks. If you do manage to get maximum magic and elemental resistance though, you will negate 97.5% of the total incoming damage.
Bring along a follower that cannot be killed (essential followers). Most followers in the world of Skyrim can be killed if they take too much damage—a serious problem when facing dragons that spit a stream of hard-hitting breath attacks. You will thus want to bring along followers that are marked by the game as “essential” and cannot be killed. Cicero, Farkas, Serana, Derkeethus, Mjoll the Lioness, and Dark Brotherhood Initiates all cannot be killed. They will simply fall on their knees when their health drops below a certain level, and they will survive subsequent damage that would have normally killed other followers.
Use shouts to give you a tactical edge. Having the ability to Shout is an extremely useful thing when fighting dragons. They can help you kill dragons faster, survive what would have been a fatal ordeal, force dragons to the ground, and even shift the weather to make it easier to track dragons as they soar through the sky. Dragonrend—A must-have for melee characters who need to force dragons to the ground. You will get this shout by finishing the quest “Alduin’s Bane,” a part of the main quest, and will force dragons to the ground by experiencing mortality. Wait until the dragon hovers in the air or is perched atop a tall structure before unleashing Dragonrend. This will cause the dragon to land in the nearest available clearing, opening the way for you to chop it up as you please. Marked for Death—A very useful shout for characters that use weapons. Even the first word of the shout will drain a hefty amount of armor per second for 60 seconds, making your physical attacks hit that much harder against the thick hide of dragons. Become Ethereal—This skill is extremely useful for archers and mages that have a low health pool. Even warriors can find it useful if they have trouble with particularly hard-hitting dragons. Shouting the first word will cause you to become impervious to damage for 8 seconds with a 20-second cooldown. This can save you when you are out of cover and a dragon blasts you with a breath attack. Do note that most potions won’t work while you’re ethereal, but your stamina and magicka will regenerate as usual. Elemental Fury—Dual-wielding berserkers can absolutely demolish a dragon with this shout. The enhanced attack speeds coupled with dual-wield power attacks and lots of stamina potions have the potential to end a dragon in a matter of seconds. Battle Fury—This shout is very useful if you are attracting the attention of a dragon and have a particularly powerful, well-equipped companion. Its relatively short cooldown makes it useful to combine with other low-cooldown shouts. Clear Skies—This utility shout, gained after completing the quest “Throat of the World,” and is extremely useful if you find yourself being attacked by a dragon during a blizzard or thunderstorm. The fair weather will make it a lot easier to spot the dragon and to properly aim your shots. The best part is that the shout has a pretty low cooldown, allowing you to use and better aim other low-cooldown shouts.
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