D&D General Dinosaurs in your campaigns

[Kobold Avenger]

I've always found it amusing that Dinosaurs have been ever present in D&D. But I'm wondering how common or rare are they in your campaigns, for something that's extinct in our world.

Are they everywhere, or only live in secluded places?
Based on some more recent findings about Dinosaurs, do they have feathers or not on your campaign worlds?
Is there a Pleisosaurus that lives in a lake somewhere?

 

[mamba]

Are they everywhere, or only live in secluded places?
Based on some more recent findings about Dinosaurs, do they have feathers or not on your campaign worlds?

one continent has them, along with generally being more ‘lizard’ focused, ie it is where Lizardmen, Kobolds and other lizard-y creatures are originally from

And yes, mostly no feathers, but a few do have them

 

[ezo]

Are they everywhere, or only live in secluded places?

Some games have them in "lost lands", some games don't have them, some games have them as "brought from another time/ world".

Based on some more recent findings about Dinosaurs, do they have feathers or not on your campaign worlds?

Some with, most without.

Is there a Pleisosaurus that lives in a lake somewhere?

In one of the above areas in my first answer? Sure. In a random lake, only if "brought there" somehow but very unlikely.

 

[Oofta]

I have regions with dinosaurs because why not? I've also had King Kong, there's an island ruled by a kaiju, the occasional floating city. Dinosaurs are fun and a more grounded monster that we can easily envision. It can feel more "real" than some of the more abstract monsters.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I've pretty much never used them in my D&D campaigns

 

[prabe]

So far, none of the PC groups I've DMed for have found dinosaurs, but that's not dispositive.
They might exist on the primary world in my setting--that world isn't all defined; if not, they almost certainly exist on some other world the PCs can plausibly get to.

 

[RoughCoronet0]

In my world dinosaurs can be found in many places, along with various gigantic versions of regular animals and Avatar the Last Airbender style hybrid animals.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

If druids and spellcasters with Polymorph are a benchmark, they are common in all ecosystems across all worlds. Drives me batty, that does.

I limit dinosaurs to a few locales if I include them at all. Unless it's a world that specifically calls for them, I'd prefer if they weren't there at all. I've never cared for dinosaurs in D&D. They are inherited from a very specific pulp style that I don't tend to evoke in my games.

 

[MarkB]

If druids and spellcasters with Polymorph are a benchmark, they are common in all ecosystems across all worlds. Drives me batty, that does.

Having a wider selection of higher-level beasts to choose from would solve that easily enough.

 

[Voadam]

I do not specifically exclude them but I generally have not used them.

In my 1e group the party traveled to a "Celtic world" and did the first series of C4-C5 adventures but made it home to Greyhawk before they got to the Pteranodon riding war boomerang throwing amazon one, which disappointed me a little as I was really looking forward to running it.

I really like dinosaur mounts as high fantasy D&D.