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Message: <blockquote data-quote="JoeGKushner" data-source="post: 2010970" data-attributes="member: 1129">The Draconomicon has many ties to older products. For one, it's not the first book in the D&D history to have that title. Second, it's not the first book to be 'lavishly illustrated', as a series of books focusing on monsters, Monstrous Arcana I believe, paved this road long ago. The good news is that this book takes some of the better material and ideas from previous products and updates it to the new 3.5 rules.Now does it get everything? Is every dragon covered? No. Heck, not even every 3.0 official dragon or dragon like monster is covered. Does it do a good job of making the dragon not only a force to be feared, but easier to use? Yes.I say easier to use for a reason. I hate the way dragons are listed in the Monster Manual. Each age with it's own information and then special information in tables and other places making a dragon something you don't want to use as a random encounter on the fly. No, it's easier to use because they've provided statistics for all of the Monster Manual Dragons in all of their ages. Some odd 120 dragons are presented. Each one has a full color page with the creature in various age stages with a humanoid for comparison, ideas on customizing them, brief background information, and sample lair. That's utility. It makes me wish that all monsters in every book had a little abbreviated stat block at the bottom of the fully detailed stat block. Ah well. To dream and all that.For those who GMs that don't need prewritten dragons, there are lots of other options. For example, there are new dragons. I was a little disappointed that some 3.0 stuff was converted over and that some of the really old stuff, like Cobra Dragons, weren't updated. I mean I know that Ed Greenwood did the Fang Dragon and I know that Felldrakes are supposed to be cool with the miniatures and all, but I want the rest of the Chromium Dragons from the old Dragon magazines. Still, there are a lot of variants here ranging from templates like skeletal and zombie dragons, to elemental drakes and landwyrms. Suffice it to say that while not every dragon is updated, there is enough variety here to run over twenty games with a different dragon in each one.One thing I didn't like about this is that there wasn't a lot of consistency in the process of which dragons were updated Why update the dragonkin from Monsters of Faerun and not the Deep, Song or Ibrandlin Dragons? That would eliminate a book from their master listings of dragons.Now to me, one of the coolest dragon hoards I've ever seen was in Dungeon #1 with Flame, the good old red dragon. He had some great and unique types of items in his lair. An appendix, The Dragon's Hoard, helps the GM to insure that no two lairs and hoards are ever exactly alike with advice and good old tables to help the GM move things along a little quicker. One thing that I'd like to see in another source, was the trade bars. One platinum bar is worth 50 platinum pieces. Mix that with some fine wine and some satin with silk, and you've got the makings of a unique hoard. The twelve different tables for different items is also a useful tool. Get a chess set made of mother of pearl or a plate made of darkwood. The sample hoards provided don't go into the level of detail I'd enjoy, but are useful for those off the cuff opportunities.Now for those interested in dragons and in ways to customize them, the book gives you lots of information, both in terms of role playing and in game mechanics. This ranges from the senses a dragon has, which abilities are magical in nature and which are supernatural, to lots of new crunch for dragons.I know, a dragon needing a PrC, feats, spells or magic items doesn't seem too likely and it can lead to some weird situations where younger dragons are more powerful than their older siblings if they have the proper levels but it's the direction D20 is going with monstrous stats just being another level based variable. The PrCs look at some old favorites from the adventure line via Disciple of Ashardalon, members of an ancient cult of a red dragon, to classics like Sacred Warder of Bahamut and Unholy Ravager of Tiamat. These PrCs combined with the feats can make a dragon basically unstoppable unless the players are on their best game, the dragon's on it's worst, and the GM isn't using the Epic Level Handbook for the Dragons.Now with all of this focus on the Dragons, why would players be interested in this book? How about material for players ranging from advice on fighting or serving dragons, to game mechanics to follow that advice. This ranges from new feats like Deft Strike, where you find that missing scale and ignore that natural armor bonus, to new domains like Domination and Greed. The new spells are also done up in standard D&D style with a breakdown of all the spells by class, level and in arcane terms, school, and then fully detailed out.The rules, despite having a player focus, are good for GM's as well since some of the PrCs like the Dracolyte worships dragon gods or the dragonkith who aid dragons, might not be for every player. No, the players will more likely be interested in dragonslayers or dragonstalkers, foes of the wyrms that have special abilities against those great drakes. The mix allows characters of almost any class to get in on the action on either the side of the  dragons, great for those parties with a dragon patron, or for those who want to finish off the foul beasts.One thing that I've been playing with in my campaign is the idea of dragons as components for magic items. Other sources have hit on this before. Iin one way, I don't like it as it reduces a dragon to cool components. On the other, I'm always interested in new mechanics and if they're well received, maybe we'll see something for other creatures like outsiders.The dragon based items here include blood elixirs, potions that are crafted from dragonblood that provide minor bonuses to stats and feats, to dragon armor or even dragon based weapons. These weapons often have a nonmagical bonus to attack rolls and deal extra energy damage It's a small section, the magic item one is just as big if no bigger, but it does provide that something different for the campaign.The book isn't perfect. For example, there's no index. In a big book like this, an index is a  crucial thing to have for listings of PrCs, Feats and other goodies. I also would like to see stats for Tiamat and the Platinum Dragon in the book about dragons. Sure, it's nice to have the various gods and their information here, but where are the hard statistics?  I also wanted more dragons to be updated to 3.5. Still, outside of the index, those are fairly minor things. The heavy art use in the book, especially considering the high quality of most of it, makes up for any issues I have. This ranges from the various diagrams for wingspan and age categories, to dragons in action. The artists include Ron Spencer, Sam Wood, Todd Lockwood, Steve Prescott and numerous others who do a fairly great job. The maps by Todd Gamble are also useful visually but without scale making them less then ideal.  The book has a board focus on a narrow subject. If it involves dragons, in game mechanics or in role playing, in fighting them or using them as a GM, the book covers it. Hopefully it's not the only book of it's kind and sets an example for futures books to improve upon with minor things like say, an index.</blockquote>

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