I'm doing the dragon flashback atm... and it's destroying me. Is there some magic way to avoid being burnt to death in an instant?

Not only you I am having a ton of trouble with this bit too...

I'm glad I'm not the only one, I'm finding this more annoying than demon's souls or ninja gaiden... It's feels hard in a stupid way, as opposed to being my fault.

I am playing on medium difficulty and got passed it.

Here's what I did:

First of all, the obvious thing is to hide under the wood. Keep rolling around to avoid enemies attacking and let the fire burn the enemies, as well as letting your allies hit them. Once your enemies are occupied, swiftly kill them and wait until you see the dragon burning the right side. Advance and repeat the strategy. Let the enemy be distracted by your allies. Don't go attacking them like you're some kind of god.

Remember, you're faster than them but you are not capable of attacking three at once (yet). So as I said, let your allies attack them and kill them off when only one is attacking you. Rolling around is very useful.

Another hint: Since you have access to all your signs, use the Quen sign. It will absorb damage

Just keep on trying. Hopefully this worked for you.

(p.s I got killed about 5+ times too before I made it)

I just got through it with sheer luck and didn't get cooked that much. Sometimes I would be on fire I noticed and other times I would not be, or I would get stuck behind Triss and get nuked by the dragon.

The problem I am finding now is as you mentioned Ninja Gaiden whilst hard has a tight as control scheme - and whilst the game can be dificult if you master the contols you are a god. At the moment I find myself fighting a lot with the controls in W2 I hope this does not persist but I find myself losing fights now because I cannot get Geralt to move or dodge correctly or the camera gets hung somewhere or focuses on the wrong part of the battle.

The key is to stick with your allies. Rushing ahead just gets you burnt by the dragon, which takes a huge chunk out of your health. Wait for Foltest to engage the enemies, and pick them off when they're distracted with him. I had a lot of problems with this segment too, until I figured this out. After that I got by with little difficulty.

In all my years of gaming this is by far the absolutely stupidest intro to a game Ive ever seen. I had to pause the game even to come type this to vent my frustration. God damn...

After running into cover I just simply allowed the other characters to do the killing. The combat is a pain even after you figure out how it works. Hopefully abilities will 'fix' this later on.

I'm finding if I wait for my allies to do the fighting the wood burns down and then burns me...

i play on hard and it is easy to get through this part. just let your friends kill the enemies, wait for them to cross to the next cover, you might get burned by the dragon but you will still have about 1/3 health left. about combat, learn to time your block, rolls and magics.

Interesting that you all are saying to stick with your allies. I died several times, until I went through the right tunnel by myself instead, and got through first try. I reckon those so-called allies were getting in my way.

Now the battle in the court yard, that took me a good 2 hours to luck past...

I was a god at the end of the first Witcher. Geralt needs to quit being a dick and start putting some effort into it like the old days.

Not to mention how the camera gets messed while you're figting since there's no invert Y-axis. What is this? ;) (just frustrated)

That battle was pretty insane. However I killed off the weaklings first. Then I ran around and used my Axii sign. It a charm sign and it will make the enemy become your ally for a short while. Which means it will attack someone else. That other person will attack the charmed person. So you only have 1 person fighting you. I did not see any other way to get it done. Sometimes if you're lucky, an Aard sign works too. I felt proud I got past it.