Also, to defeat the dragon, first produce an accurate sketch of the dragon's armour. Take it to a safe to identify which mastersmith's handiwork it is. Track down the (presumably) long ruined dwarven kingdom. Fight through it to find the secret plans, and identify the weaknesses deliberately installed by the dwarves as a safeguard against draconic aggression.

It suggests an opportunity for an enterprising party to act as a go between dwarven smiths and a dragon, taking a cut of the vast sum charged - another way of "looting" the dragon.

Or pretend that you are there for legitimate business, but instead scouting out weaknesses or just stealing treasure.

But then if these deals happen every few centuries, these tricks will have been played before, and so even honest parties will meet suspicion from the dragon.

Also the next sentence is "[Dragons] can't make a thing for themselves, not even mend a little loose scale of their armour."

Which suggests that Tolkien's thought is maybe that dragon's scales are not grown but built??

In Chapter 12, Smaug says "I am armoured above and below with iron scales and hard gems".

All of which may just be poetic language from Tolkien. But what if it isn't? What if dragons commission armour from master smiths?

It really makes sense of D&D groups that award XP for loot even before selling it - clearly all denizens of fantasy worlds can just see the value of treasure hovering above it in yellow numbers.

(2/2)