Can a world overrun by dragons survive?

[Storyteller01]

You should have seen this coming...

Check the Dragon Star campaign setting form FFG. Dragons rule the galaxy economically and imperically.

It fits well with your idea about scaling as well. The current emporer is a great wyrm red, so those fighting in a rebellion will be working against his resources as well as himself (and he is know for placing his children at key strategic locations, both half-and full dragons).

Mioght not be what your after per se, but the setting provides examples of what dragons may do if they ruled, both in everyday life (political) as well as the fight against good/evil.

Dragons are 'pure bloods', being the only one's with high politacal position. Half dragons are half bloods, and usually can't expect to get higher than ruling an aristicorp (corporation run by a dragon family). Next are sorcerers, if they are dragon blooded (they usually are). Others will gain rank based on relative power and importance, but they never gain real power (story wise).

Nice side note: The dragons believe that if you have to work at magic to learn it, then you shouldn't learn it. It's unnatural! Because of this, wizards are treated as second class citizens (about the same treatment that a deulist for hire can expect).

 

[Storyteller01]

Dragon 320 has an article about what dragons would do if they ruled the area. You might want t o check that out if you want WotC's view on the matter.

Everyone wants an 'official' source.

 

[Celebrim]

In a world overrun with humaniods, could dragons survive?

 

[F5]

I guess one of the question you need to decide on is how powerful the dragons are relative to the main society. Are you talking about a Reign of Fire world, where humanity has been pushed to the very margins and they are desperately striving not to be wiped out. Or Something more equal see-saw battleish.

One suggestion I would have is that you make dragons non-sentient until fairly large sizes. Doesn't mean that they are stupid, they can be quite clever and nasty, but just without that ability to look at the larger picture and plot larger strategy. It could make for quite a nasty shock for the PCs, they've gotten used to dragons that are tactically vicious, but strategically unaware. Then they run into a dragon that is clearly thinking circles around them, knows all about them and has counters for their favorite tactics and strategies.

Reign of Fire was definitely playing a part in thinking about this concept. I figured that having the dragons "win" limits the kind of game you can run, though, so I was thinking something where the balance of power was more "see-saw"-ish.

You're right that in order to explain why dragons haven't completely taken over, it helps to make wyrmlings not sentient (or, barely sentient...say INT 3. I still want them to be evil).

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

While I liked Reign of Fire, I don't think it's necessarily an accurate account of what would happen if D&D dragons as written took over. The dragons of RoF were pretty animalistic, whereas D&D dragons are for the most part, pretty intelligent.

I think there'd be an awful lot of in-fighting between the evil dragons, but could easily see each dragon having its own fief, to limit territorial disputes.

 

[F5]

Richard A. Knaak has written a series of books about this sort of thing. The books have the dragons as the all powerful overlords, yet they need to have humans alive to grow them food and be food. Plus, the dragons are low in number, and are not sure that they could defeat the humans due to their mass numbers.

Haven't read anything by Richard Knaak. I may have to check him out.

I'm not a fan of the "Dragons keep humans alive as fodder" school of thought, though. If I were a dragon picking a species to use as livestock, I'd go for something a little more manageable. Something without the potential to learn to cast Meteor Swarm, say...

 

[F5]

I think you can do this if you do a couple of things:

Dragon wyrmlings are born in nests away from dragon lairs and are left to fend for themselves. If you have a dragon society where a mother is protective of her young, your PCs will find themselves facing the wrath of an older dragon long before they are ready.

Dragons are the main enemy of the player races, but the main enemy of dragons are other dragons. Some older, more powerful dragons may be able to hold together a clan of dragons, but for the most part they fight and plot against each other. The player races, like the dragon's servitor races are pretty much disdained unless they start getting a little uppity or step out of line.

I really like the idea of dragon's achieving full sentience only at the larger sizes.

I like your suggestion that wyrmlings are hatched in remote nests. It makes sense; if dragons are territorial, they'll want to keep their greedy little offspring as far away from their own terrotories as possible. And if adult dragons are rivals, what better way to create a buffer between your territory and a rivals' than by populating it with your own hungry little spawn?

It would take a powerful dragon to hold together a clan. Probably only the most powerful could do it. But I could see a juvenile controlling a pack of wyrmlings and youngs through bullying. Roving gangs of fire-breathing thugs.

 

[Rackhir]

In a world overrun with humaniods, could dragons survive?

See any around?

 

[azmodean]

Just a few ideas, more crunch than story wise:
1. Get used to the half-dragon template, you could get a lot of mileage out of it.
2. If you don't like the idea of "orphan wyrmlings" you can see about creating other draconic creatures at the lower levels, both the half-dragons as mentioned, wyvern-like creatures, and other monsters with their descriptions shifted to be draconic. (for example, with just a slight change in description, an arrowhawk makes a great draconic monster)
3. Pick up the draconimicron if you don't have it already, heck, get it even if you don't run this campaign.
4. Decide on what the different dragons like to eat, make those the new currency. (golds are noted as liking to eat precious gems and pearls for instance, this could be expanded to other varieties)

 

[F5]

Love the idea, especially if you throw enough twists in to make it clear that dragons aren't just your usual uber-powerful foe. Something like:

- Sorcerers, being the spies and agents of Dragons, are either hated and reviled, or would act as the "Inquisitors" for a dragon-centred religion

- Dragon Disciples would be an aspiration for almost every class, and would probably need breaking into multiple PrCs - I imagine a Black Dragon Disciple would be a very different beastie (with different requirements) to a Gold Dragon Disciple

- Dragons would control trade. Merchant dragons are something I've used in a campaign before, and work very well even at quite low levels. The PCs freak when they discover that the trade caravan they're protecting is owned by a Blue, and it's being taken through a Red's trade zone.

- Still on trade, bartering would be the name of the game for the "common" races - all gold and gems would be state (ie, dragon) controlled.

- Dragon Eggs. Forget gems - these beauties are the major currency. Just one single gold dragon egg could be fought over and covetted by both good and evil factions for their own nefarious reasons

- Playing a party of dragons would be fun, and possible (using the rules in Savage Species) to play all the way from low to epic level. You'd need a good reason to get all of those different colours and chromes to work together though I bag the Red Dragon barbarian!

- Lots more arial combat. Dragons think in 3d and certainly won't be limited to flat surface combat. This will also affect architecture too - no low-slung buildings. Think tall, narrow spires, vertical dungeons and huge plateaus

- Expect a lot of regional variations for the core races, similar in type to the dragons themselves. I'd expect Red Elves and Gold Elves to hate each other, and White Dwarves to live in the snow capped wastes while the Green Halflings toil in the swamps.

In other words, sound like a great idea - run with it!

Some great ideas. Hmm...dragon eggs as currency...interesting thought. Especially if hatchling dragons are not intelligent, they could be trained, maybe? Probably not, they ARE evil, and would be too likely to turn on a trainer if they were frightened/hungry/bored. Something that could hatch into a ravenous monster is probably too volatile to be used as actual currency, but they could still be valuable contraband. Enemy territories are seeded with black dragon eggs, as a kind of biological weapon. That's pretty cool.

The idea of state=dragon...what do you all think of this? Would a dragon set itself up as a "king", and control aspects of its' kingdom such as trade and legal affairs? Or would it not want to get involved in the "affairs of men". Maybe its' lizardfolk underlings manage the day-to-day workings of the "kingdom", while it sits on its' gold and ponders the infinite?

I think each type of chromatic would have it's own strain of lizard-men and kobolds. Maybe with a special ability related to the progenitor's type...fire resistant red kobolds, and etc.