Underworld Dragon

…Aaaand we’re back!  With the underworld dragon, no less!

Futsanglungs aren’t the most powerful imperial dragons by any means—that honor goes to the aptly named sovereign dragons—but they’re still no slouches at an eventual CR 16.  With adamantine claws, repel metal or stone, and hefty fire and stone-related abilities, they’re more than a match for armored-up dragonslayers.  Worse yet, an underworld dragon’s lair will likely be about as forgiving as the Plane of Fire, so full of heat, smoke, and lava that the PCs will have to use precious resources counteracting the environment itself even before the dragon starts spewing fire at them.

I’m going to assume you know how to use an underworld dragon in an Asian-inspired adventure.  (“Can my samurai fight a dragon?”  “Yes.”  “I don’t trust the shogun’s treasurer in the dragon scale robes.”  “Good call; roll for initiative.”)  But there’s plenty of room for them in a traditional Western RPG setting as well. 

First of all, they make great dragons period—just call them orange or gray dragons and they’ll fit right in with your chromatics, or call them obsidian or jet dragons and they can be dark reflections of your chromatics.  As lawful evil creatures, they work especially well with duergar, azers, efreet, or fire-loving devils, and might even shift the balance of power away from the drow and urdefhan nations.

They’re also great as the thing that doesn’t belong. I can easily picture a campaign with the standard chromatics and/or metallics, plus underworld dragons—strange beasts that claim tunnels the way other dragons claim the sky.  They’d likely be considered alien and dangerous, though brave blue dragons might enter into tenuous alliances with them.  Or they might be the only dragons in you campaign—dark creatures cursed by the gods to crawl beneath the ground hunting for wealth.

Finally, you can play up the underworld side of the equation.  What if underworld dragons actually are the guardians of the underworld, the gates of Hell, or some other mythical location?  No one says they have to be all about treasure—they might guard souls or the secrets of the hereafter just as closely.

The new crime lord of Borsus is said to be no more than a teenager.  Actually, he is a young underworld dragon that has just learned to change shape.  For the moment he is having trouble balancing both roles—when he is not actively planning a new score in human form, he is obsessively tunneling under the depths of Borsus, hollowing out caverns for other monsters as he digs ever deeper toward the magma chambers that are his birthright.

The lord of the Unseelie Court is a mysterious figure indeed.  Not only does he rule his faerie subjects with an iron fist (quite unlike the light touch of his chaotic good Seelie rivals), but he is not even fey himself.  The Lord of the Sealed Vaults is actually an underworld dragon, who uses his great might and ample stores of gold to terrify or enthrall the subterranean faeries into doing his bidding.

Scholars vary on exact the number of the Precincts of Death—the Reformists say seven, the Yishraeites nine, and the Najj 14.  But all agree the Fourth Precinct is guarded by the underworld dragon Morgus and his Iron Pack—a mix of cerberi and Nessian hell hounds.  Morgus denies no one entry into the Fourth Precinct, but he jealously guards the exits back to the lands of the living.  Spirits may pass, but corporeal undead, mortal adventurers, and especially oracles and witches can expect to face his wrath if they are not stealthy.

—Pathfinder Bestiary 3 102–103

I’m sure the phrase “precincts of death” has been used elsewhere, but my direct inspiration was Garth Nix’s Lirael and Abhorsen, which I’m currently enjoying on disc.

So no posts last week—New Hampshire called for New Year’s, and I answered.  Hope you all had a great holiday season.

After weeks of no swipe access and late radio shows, someone finally left the doors open for me!  …So of course I was late, thanks to ice.  Sigh.  But there’s a radio show for you.  Download it here and fast-forward to the 18-minute mark.

PS: In the pre-Christmas rush I completely failed to post or even copy for myself my Christmas show (Saturday, 12/21).  If by some miracle you downloaded it, give me a holler—I’d love the file.  Thanks!

Sovereign Dragon

Sovereign dragons, the mightiest of the imperial dragons, are all about balance—lordly creatures that sit at the fulcrum point of history and guard against the fortunes of war, technology, or philosophy tipping the scales too far to any one side.

(Speaking of which, the power of sovereign dragons is likely to be a bit of an existential rebuke to metallic dragons and the forces of good, who are used to their side at least having the upper hand in terms of stat blocks (gold dragons vs. red, solars vs. pit fiends and balors, etc.), if not numbers.  To have such powerful neutral beings remain skeptical of the value of their grand benevolence must be highly aggravating.)

Give their lofty perches and remote throne rooms, sovereign dragons aren’t likely to interact with PCs on a regular basis—your average adventurer is simply beneath their notice.  But when they do, they’re likely to drive your PCs nuts.  Sovereign dragons’ powers are all weighted toward avoiding extremes (detect evil/good, dogmatic discordance, calm emotions, etc.) or frustrating action (calm emotions again, golden armor, master counterspelling, violent retort, moment of prescience, and so forth).  Even their sonic breath weapon and prismatic spray seem calculated to knock out all assailants equally.

If sovereign dragons have a flaw, it’s that they’re far too invested in the status quo, and their natural hesitancy is so profound as to almost be a gravitation force.  When they do act, it should be as if heaven and earth is moving into alignment, bringing the divine judgment of the gods, the sun, the moon, and the stars all bearing down on those who have upset the natural order of existence.

Long tormented by an autocratic governor, a cell of rebellious peasants abduct a very young sovereign dragon.  They hope to convince it that aiding their revolt will serve the Balance.  Meanwhile the young dragon’s mother is beside herself with worry and wounded pride.

A sovereign dragon leads a team of proteans and entropic chimeras to destroy an axiomite mathematicyst.

The golden-armored paladins of St. Crucien are stunned to discover that the wizened dragon matriarch who has been their sponsor for so many generations is no gold dragon at all, but a sovereign dragon.  Worse yet, while she has rallied them to snuff out evil and chaos, she has also at times allowed and even encouraged rebellion, lawlessness, and wickedness behind their backs so that the Balance would be maintained.  This revelation causes a schism among knights who want to continue the sovereign dragon’s mission, knights who seek to convert her to the side of good and order, and knights who wish to put the wyrm to the sword.

—Pathfinder Bestiary 3 100-101

Sky Dragon

Okay…you know we’re both thinking it.  So let’s just get it out of the way, shall we?

“I’m a LUCK dragon!”

Anyway, sky dragons are the preëminent aerial dragons—they may never even touch the ground in their lifetimes—and this fact, along with their lawful good natures and celestial emissary ability, means they practically blur the line between mortal and celestial creatures.  Most adventurers who encounter sky dragons will hopefully be on the receiving end of their beneficence—the hero who befriends a sky dragon gains an ally who can turn him into a near-celestial and blast his enemies out of the sky—but if you want to use sky dragons in a more adversarial role, the adventure seeds below should be a good start.

PS: One imagines that sky dragons’ battles with the evil underworld dragons are legendary.

Also, despite being dragons, these guys are apparently born aloft.  One wonders if they’re ovoviviparous or if Mom just a really secure grip…

The Khan is coming, bringing a horde of several tens of thousands to smash the Wall of Destiny.  But his mount is a sky dragon escorted by three kirin…in which case, his intentions must presumably be noble…which puts adventurers charged with preserving the Wall and protecting the emperor in a tight spot.

The aerial might of Zenoa must never be threatened.  So ingrained is this policy that Zenoans declare war on any other nation that develops air power, regardless of intent or alignment.  Even sky dragons are not immune, for though they represent no nation, their grounding breath is considered a profound threat to the Zenoan Storm Griffons.  The Zenoans will marshal rangers, dragonslayers, and irregulars of all kinds to form hunting parties the moment a sky dragon is sighted.

No collector has ever obtained a sky dragon egg.  But the ifrit shogun of the Wyvern Clan insists that he will possess one before he dies, and he offers titles and land in the once-secret Valley of Opals for in return for such a prize, with no questions asked beyond verification of the egg’s provenance.

—Pathfinder Bestiary 3 98–99

Happy Labor Day Weekend!  If you’re looking for the skunk, he’s hiding out with the giant skunk.

Sea Dragon

I should have mentioned that it’s Sea Week here on The Daily Bestiary.  (Like Shark Week, but with less chum.)  It’s five solid days of sea creatures!

The imperial sea dragons are perhaps best played like irascible sea captains—full of bluster and brass.  Chaotic good in nature, they cannot be relied upon for any length of time (their lack of focus is why they have made so little impact compared to the many weaker but more organized malevolent aquatic races), but they make excellent allies for brief periods (and make perfectly reasonable deus ex machinas for GMs when parties get into trouble at sea).  Like any good-natured dockside drunk, they will fight with PCs at the slightest excuse, but if the PCs give as good as they get without retaliating lethally, they might find their former adversary proposing they team up to go devilfish hunting only minutes later…

Sea dragon Llanfairdyfedgogerywyverthelm lives in the many lochs and isolated harbors of Heathershire, casually sea striding between them, even far up into the freshwater mountain lakes.  His habit of stealing sheep to devour and chasing selkies drive both the local villagers and fey to distraction, and he tends to average a duel per season with the county cavaliers.  But he is also what keeps Heathershire free of sahuagin and gargoyles, so driving him off or offending him could turn out to be a mistake.

A samurai skips a duel with a sea dragon, sacrificing his honor to save his life.  The outraged jiaolung threatens to flood his home with a tidal wave if the now-honorless and masterless warrior refuses to fight him.

The red dragon Carneliastrix reigns supreme over the skies of Staern—even the mighty simurghs are forced to pay her homage.  She has become so accustomed to her mastery that she rarely even needs to rage anymore—setting just a single nation aflame every 30 years or so does the trick.  But the discovery that there is an entire species of dragon she was not aware of offers her first surprise in more than a century.  And the revelation that these benevolent sea dragons rule an undersea empire (really an exceedingly loose confederation, but such distinctions are lost on Carneliastrix) that dwarfs hers drives her absolutely insane.  Her mad plan is to literally boil the seas away.  But first she wants a captured jiaolung to experiment on—and retrieving one is where blackmailed adventurers come in handy.

—Pathfinder Bestiary 3 96–97

I am really enjoying the new Pathfinder Campaign Setting book Dragons Unleashed.  That is all. 

Wait, that’s not all.  Yes, I am paying (necessarily abbreviated) homage to the town of  Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch above.

Want to hear what a DJ on five hours of sleep and with no prep time sounds like? Download this!

(Music starts 3:45 into the file (sorry, I was late!). If the feed skips on your computer, Save As an mp3 in Firefox or Chrome and then enjoy in iTunes.)

Forest Dragon

Our first imperial dragon, courtesy of the Bestiary 3!  There are lots of ways to handle the imperial dragons, depending on your campaign.  Maybe they’re just yet another branch of the dragon family, albeit with some nifty/nasty special abilities and breath effects.  Maybe, as in Naomi Novik’s Temeraire series (and as is implied in Paizo’s various Golarion products), they are actively engaged in shaping human societies, unlike the more secretive or standoffish Western dragons.  Or maybe, given their polar alignments, they are signs, signifiers, and enforcers of greater cosmic principles—nearly semi-divine beings.

Meanwhile (egad, yet another two-paragraph intro!), forest dragons can be just a regional result of the dragon flowchart: “Let’s see…evil, setting is vaguely Asian, adventure takes place in forest…forest dragon.”  Or you can throw them pell-mell into your typical Pathfinder campaign.  How would lawful greens react to the stronger chaotic competition?  How would elves adapt to defending against two kinds of evil wyrms?  How would other earth powers like a blue dragon or shaitan respond to the forest dragons’ close connection to its element?

A forest dragon and a coven of green hags play a game of chess using a whole forest as a board. Agreed upon landmarks and vegetation from the squares, other woodland denizens are their game pieces, and adventurers their pawns.  Naturally, both sides also cheat whenever possible.

To Western adventurers, a grove of petrified statues of pain-wracked corpses seems to clearly be the work of a medusa.  But hunting reptilians is likely to only anger the local nagaji (Dragon Empires Gazetteer 10).  If the victims are restored to both flesh and life, they can attest that the real culprit was an ancient forest dragon who took their promised tribute offerings and then slew them anyway.

As long as anyone can remember, a mysterious greater earth elemental has appeared once a month to clear stones away from an avalanche site at the base of a wooded mountain.  Intrigued and hoping for treasure, the local hidalgo has encouraged villagers and nearby monks to aid the elemental’s work.  If they do, they will find no good deed goes unpunished—the avalanche conceals a buried forest dragon.  Traditionally called by the dragon’s breath, the elemental now responds to the hibernating dragon’s instinctive mental cries for aid even across planar boundaries.

—Pathfinder Bestiary 3 94–95

I’m getting so behind on my reading.  I just got Jade Regent: Tide of Honor in the mail, only to turn around and then get JR: The Empty Throne and Pirates of the Inner Sea two weeks later…