oracrest said:If your talking about the dragon in 1-2, don't try and shoot him when he "lands." He will fly away after a while.
Stand on top one of the battlements, and shoot him as he passes through doing his fire run. Lots of arrows (or magic), but the satisfaction of ridding the world of that guy feels great.
First playthrough is boring, and perhaps the best is just to bring about 120 arrows and the compound short bow to the top of tower one, aim a tthe door to the bridge in the distance and shoot when the dragon gets half way to the tower. He will run into your arrow 3-quarters of the way to the tower...you will get a glimpse of the health bar this way. (you only need 70-80 arrows but newbies miss a lot!) One time I sat there for an hour and use all my arrows...thankfully the crossbow also works or I would have wasted my time) I'll often get my compund long bow and start upgrading with spider stone in 2.2. before coming back for the dragon.
The fastest way is to do it in NG+ etc.
take MOrian bladde and clever rats ring and lava bow with the highest damage arrows you have....heavy arrows form Patches do nicely.....do shooot him in the face when he is perched with his lovely wife blue dragon while you are clearing 1.1. I found the best was to go the far right side...less misses. He will get up and leave when he gets down to about 1/3 health....but th e time it takes in hyper mode with morian and clever rat is ridiculously fast compared to waiting for the stupid thing to fly around in circles for the whole process. I can't remember exactly but I thing I used about 40 arrows total in NG++. Make sure to wear the ring of avarice as well!