Celestial dragon

Celestial dragons are modified white dragons that use temporal abilities to stun their opponents. They can be found in the Dragontooth Island resource dungeon after the One of a Kind quest is complete.

During the quest, an instanced version of the resource dungeon is visited with around six attackable Celestial dragons which drop only Dragon bones - they do not appear to respawn. After that stage is complete, the full version of the dungeon is available.

The celestial dragon was the winner of one of the January 2014 Power to the Players ruby-tier polls, beating the alchemical, gemstone, and gold dragons, which were the other options.



Getting there
The quickest way to get to the Celestial dragons is by teleporting to the Dragontooth Island resource dungeon with either a Hoardstalker Ring, or the skill portal in the Max Guild. An alternative method would be to teleport to Port Phasmatys with an Ectophial and then running south-east to the boat that travels to Dragontooth Island. A ghostspeak amulet, or completion of the hard Morytania Tasks, is required to talk to the ghost sailor.

Strateg
The celestial dragon's special ability freezes the player in time and prevents the dragon from receiving any damage, as well as stopping any damage over time effects for roughly three seconds. It also traps your familiar/follower in space and time, making it disappear from the current realm for the duration of the freeze, at the end of which it returns. The animation for this ability shows the dragon raising its wings as it casts a spell, followed by a green orb expanding around you. Anticipation will not stop the stun from occurring, but you can break free from the stun with Freedom.

Celestial dragons seem to use their time trapping ability roughly every 5-6 attacks and always attack with dragonfire or melee (depending on the player's distance away) 5-6 times after being engaged before using this. As such, if the player can deal enough damage to kill the dragon in a short period of time, this attack can be avoided altogether. One may stun a dragon with Binding Shot to delay its next attack, effectively delaying the time trap.

The time trap ability does not reset if the dragon has been left alone. Therefore, if a dragon attacks four times and is left alone (full life point restoration), the next attack or second attack from the dragon when attacked results in a time trap.

Because mages or rangers take no damage from celestial dragons other than dragonfire, (unless, of course, they stand within melee range) it is recommended to use the gear with the best damage bonuses specific to the style used. For those who don't use expensive degradable gear, Warpriest of Bandos/Armadyl armour is a good choice due to its high chance of reducing the cooldown of abilities. Void Knight equipment is also useful due to its accuracy and damage boosts.

Using demon slayer armour or other ranged power armour, super antifire potions or wyrmfire potions, and a crystal or higher bow, and super, grand, or extreme ranging potions, these dragons can be killed very quickly and possibly only being frozen once. The only thing to remember is to stand at least a few spaces away from the dragon, make sure you drink a dose of super antifire/wyrmfire, and then you will take no damage at all. A healing familiar will not be needed, so a combat familiar such as a shadow nihil can be used for fast kills.

As these dragons are weak to arrows and have very high defence, it is important to note that magic and bolt-firing weapons (unless used with dragonbane bolts) are not as effective as arrow-firing weapons. A player who does not have the required level to make super antifires will find it very long and time consuming to kill those dragons. A good strategy for players who do not have access to these potions is to fight the dragons in melee range with a bow and regular antifires, while having a melee protection prayer on. When combined with a healing familiar, this strategy will be almost as effective as super antifires, the only downside being the damage taken.

Trivia

 * There is a glitch where, if a dragon is killed just as the player is about to be trapped in time, no death animation occurs.
 * Celestial dragons originally counted as steel dragons for slayer assignments. With the update on 14 April 2014, they were made a category of their own.
 * The time stop ability used to make any followers or familiars temporarily disappear for the duration of the move. Dreadnips would not, as they are not actual followers.
 * This ability also seemed to negate the effects of the spring cleaner for that kill. If the dragon dropped a Rune platebody, the spring cleaner would not dismantle/convert into xp.
 * Prior to 5 January 2015, the dragon slayer gloves did not work against them, despite the fact that they are dragons.
 * For a long time after release, the dragon would leave combat with the player if the player did not resume attacking within a certain period of time after its time trap wore off. This was fixed as of 18 August 2014.
 * If the dragon uses its time stop ability, players will suffer a 3 second stun and bind. If they use Freedom during or before the time stop, provided that the effects of Freedom are still in effect, only the stun effect will take place, with the bind effect being prevented or removed. This does not work with Anticipate, and may be a glitch.