D&D General Companion to D&D Survivor: Gem Dragons

[Corinnguard]

Because I've never really understood it apart from "they're psionic."

I think it was the fact that these dragons didn't rely on arcane magic like most dragons did. Having them as psionicists made them 'exotic'. An example of the 'Our Dragons Are Different' trope.

 

[Tonguez]

"Sardior was the dragon god of night, psionics, and secrets, and he was also the Master of gem dragons."

Citation: The Legend of Sardior.


If we consider "somebody's home game" to be the correct description of the official Forgotten Realms canon, sure. Note that that "published on the official site" thing is simply reprinting and translating to 3.x statistics something that was written in 1980 (Dragon Magazine #37.)

You can find the actual magazine online and see the text yourself. It calls him the "Master of gem dragons," of course, but it also speaks of him moving his domain about through the planes. That's something only gods do, AIUI.

Edit: Ed Greenwood explicitly says Sardior is worshiped as a god in FR. So that would mean, officially, he is one in both 3e and 5e.

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Separately from the above, can someone explain like...what exactly it is that makes gem dragons cool/interesting?

Because I've never really understood it apart from "they're psionic." No intent to yuck anyone's yum (I get enough of that as a metallic fan, not gonna do it to anyone else!), I just generally don't feel anything about gem dragons and thus wonder if I'm missing something.

Also...what's the deal with topaz dragons having backwards wings? Like...just....why?

They're not backwards, that particular image just had its wings flexed upwards so the viewer could see the undersides - it was caught in mid stroke, and would be 'normal' backfacing winds on the down stroke.

Gem dragons are more interesting than metallic because 1 - they're psionic and get to use both arcane and divine spells to build their repertoire, 2 - by being neutral theyre not hamstrung by stupid alignment 3 - they actually have some interesting abilities that tie in to their 'nature' 4- they're different enough ie they're not direct analogues to chromatics

Of course the DnD trope of colour-coded dragons is a bit run out and needs to die so that every single dragon that appears in a game is Unique and not part of a collectable set.

 

[Corinnguard]

Of course the DnD trope of colour-coded dragons is a bit run out and needs to die so that every single dragon that appears in a game is Unique and not part of a collectable set.

I heard that Pathfinder 2e Remastered is trying to do this with their dragons. How would you make them unique?

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I heard that Pathfinder 2e Remastered is trying to do this with their dragons. How would you make them unique?

Well, there is crazy amount of different types of dragons in D&D, probably way more than there will be individual dragons in any campaign, so you could easily have each dragon to be unique.

 

[Corinnguard]

I think Tonguez was referring to how D&D has been filling in the boxes between the Chromatic, Metallic and Gem Dragons for years. For instance, you have Red Dragons, Ruby Dragons and Orium Dragons representing different versions of the color red.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

They're not backwards, that particular image just had its wings flexed upwards so the viewer could see the undersides - it was caught in mid stroke, and would be 'normal' backfacing winds on the down stroke.

It's not just this image. There are multiple official images which very clearly show that their wings have the phalanges pointing forward and the wrist bones pointing backward.

Gem dragons are more interesting than metallic because 1 - they're psionic and get to use both arcane and divine spells to build their repertoire, 2 - by being neutral theyre not hamstrung by stupid alignment 3 - they actually have some interesting abilities that tie in to their 'nature' 4- they're different enough ie they're not direct analogues to chromatics

1: I guess I just don't see how that's interesting in and of itself. Good dragons blend divine and arcane already.
2: Don't understand how being officially Neutral (often the most schizophrenic alignment) breaks you out of being on the alignment spectrum.
3: Such as?
4: Different alone is not particularly interesting to me.

Of course the DnD trope of colour-coded dragons is a bit run out and needs to die so that every single dragon that appears in a game is Unique and not part of a collectable set.

Unlikely to gain wide appeal for exactly the reason that it's not identifiable. A zillion unique things, no matter how individually cool, washes out into an indistinct blob.

Artistic and thematic identity is kinda like magnetism with more than two poles. Unless you have things mostly pointing in a common direction, there won't be a magnetic force in any clear direction. A single powerful thing works fine; a small set of individual things can work if you put in the effort; a hundred things pointing in a hundred directions rarely works unless you tap into deep mythic resonances.

A thousand different things, nobody's going to remember anything but what they all share in common, and if they're all pointedly unique, then few will remember anything about them at all.

 

[Corinnguard]

Unlikely to gain wide appeal for exactly the reason that it's not identifiable.

Game Inertia? D&D has had color-coded dragons for 50 years. It will be hard to replace them with something more or less unique to satisfy some within the D&D community.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Game Inertia? D&D has had color-coded dragons for 50 years. It will be hard to replace them with something more or less unique to satisfy some within the D&D community.

Sure, that's a part of it. I think my explanation is better for indicating why such things generally don't build up steam on their own though. Myth and legend work because they always start local and get woven together over time (well, that and they tend to lean on other archetypes instead.)

Dragons in fiction, fable, legend, and myth can be almost anything because they have been woven from so many things. Dragons in a created work need a clear identity lest they simply fade back into the canvas that they were drawn from. Like how there are a zillion fae beings, but if you want your fae-centric work to stand out, it must give clear thematic identity to each. Either have just a few with unique identity, or have classes or types that can be easily identified. In the absence of such identity, they will wash out.

It's an unfortunate limitation to be sure. But I'm not sure of any way around it. Human minds have limits.

 

[Scribe]

 

[JoeyD473]

I (jokingly) object to this poll on the grounds that it failed to include the first Gem Dragon - Vorel, elder brother to Tiamat and Bahamut.

And yes, I know that there is nothing official that explicitly ties Vorel to being a Gem dragon ... but his name means beautiful, and in draconic lore it has most commonly been used to describe beautiful gems ... and what is more beautiful to dragons than Gems?

I declare Vorel the winner by default.

I think this actually belongs here