Cadfan said:
Acid is black, and makes everything around it shadowy? Lightning is blue and lives underground?
Bad: We need a dragon that is red. We'll make it breathe fire, and live in a volcano, because those are also red.
Good: I want a volcano themed dragon. He'll live in lava, breathe fire, and be fiery colors. Red will be prominent.
Both approaches may lead to the same place in some situations. But you probably won't see this:
Bad: We need a dragon that is blue. He'll breathe lightning, because we gave cold to the white dragon, because lightning hasn't been used yet, and because nothing else is remotely close to blue. He'll live in a desert even though deserts aren't really famous for their thunderstorms, and he'll burrow underground, because we haven't used those yet.
You might see this though:
Good: We need a storm dragon. He'll breathe lightning and love stormy weather and rain. He'll be mostly blue, with the following other details. Etc, etc, etc.
Good: We need a desert dragon. We'll make him brown and patterned like a snake. We'll give him a habit of lurking with his body mostly covered in sand, then leaping out to devour people. That way his pattern and his habits work together- its camouflage!
Now your point is more than clear, and I think I completely agree.
I also think that, at least partially, 4e will get closer to this philosophy. Me too I, for example, always felt that the Blue was just wrong.
I can speak since 3rd edition only, I had 1st edition Basic, but I don't remember any difference between chromatic dragons other than color and breath weapon, I mean, I think I can recall they looked pretty similar.
However about the Blue, I'd always imagined it as a SLIM dragon, with slick scales and an air-dominance role. Seeing it as a burrower desert dweller with the most bulky head and body always was a little strange to me.
The Black, I se no problem with it. Always pictured it as the bog dweller and both darkness and acid are well connected with bogs.
However yes, I'd split the Blue dragon as they split the elves.
Take the desert-ventriloquism-mirage part and make a new brown dragon with a very strong cobra-resemblance and a really evil lurker nature. A dragon who relies on illusions to lure preys in his lair and then kill them with a dreadful breath weapon, maybe inflicting psychic damage by the means of a terrible narcotic venom or sound.
Then take the lightning-blue-badass part and make a dragon that inhabits the highest peaks or maybe simply passes most of his time in the high sky, bringng thunderstorms, spitting lightnings and maybe sometimes allowing epic heroes to ride him.
However...
Mouseferatu said:
As far as "more breadth, less depth," perhaps you should wait and see what's in the book before deciding if it's too deep, too shallow, too broad, or too narrow.
There's a lot more variety to the material in the book than you might expect.
If the creator of the Shadowcaster is involved in the Draconomicon, I will definitely buy the Draconomicon!
