Dragon resitrictions too rigid?

[DWARF]

Personally, I dislike the absolute good/evil dichotomy in DnD. Some say it's necessary, some say otherwise.

My personal beef is with the metallic / chromatic division. Why do Dragons have to be straight-jacketed into moral absolutes? True, DM's can change things, but player's would probably become frusterated if they ran into lots of evil gold dragons and helpful red wyrms.

So I was thinking of making basic dragons, along the general outlines of the chromatics. So there would be red dragons (fire), blue dragons (air), white dragons (water), green dragons (poison) and black dragons (earth). But these would have personality's like humans. They can pick whether to be good or evil, or something else.

Then, if you do want "for sure" good and evil dragons, apply the celestial/fiendish templates to them. Or even the half-celestial and half-fiend templates.

Does this shound like a good idea, or will I be crossing a line that shouldn't be, somehow?

 

[Technik4]

So, youll start having good goblin warbands and evil celestial outsiders? Just kidding, but nothing in d&d is "in stone", only to save on time and in the interests of fun. If you think its more fun and have the time to give dragons the will to choose between good and evil, then I'm all for it.

Personally, I think there may be a a few rogue dragons, with alignments starkly contrasting their racial norms, but that is the subject of an adventure, not something I would put in as the common.

It could definitely work, but think of all the pissed older wyrms youd have on your ass if you flaunted your drastic "differentness". Older dragons rarely need a good reason to kill their young, I'd say the ones that were different wouldnt last very long unless they were very tricky.

If youre talking as a whole campaign concept, I think oriental dragons have more loose alignments, but dont quote me.

Technik

 

[EOL]

One the one hand I feel your frustration and in my own campaign there are metallic dragons who appear to be evil (though mostly they are just operating from a different premise than the PC's) On the other hand the fact that one side is all evil and the other side all good led to some valuable campaign history reasons as to why this should be so. And rather than making the dragons flat it actually made them richer because of the additional background.

 

[Staffan]

In the AD&D version of Mystara, dragons were tied to the Law/Neutral/Chaos axis by "race", but not to the Good/Neutral/Evil axis. Then each dragon race had a certain chance of being a specific Lawful/etc. alignment. I don't have the Mystara MC appendix in front of me, but it could be something like this: "Green: Neutral (15% Good/40% Neutral/45% Evil)" I do remember that Gold dragons were still almost exclusively LG (something like Lawful (90% good/9% neutral/1% evil) and Red dragons were almost all CE (something similar but in reverse).

 

[Jeph]

Personally, I think that applying the celestial/fiendish template for distinction is a great idea. It a) customizes your campaign, and b) enhances the mysticalishnessocity of the dragons, both good things.

It's your campaign! They're your dragons! Go for it!

 

[drnuncheon]

Personally, I dislike the absolute good/evil dichotomy in DnD. Some say it's necessary, some say otherwise.

My personal beef is with the metallic / chromatic division. Why do Dragons have to be straight-jacketed into moral absolutes?

In my game, the only types of creatures with unvarying racial alignments are things like celestials, demons, and devils - usually outsiders that are basically the personification of an alignment. Oh, and animals/other creatures not intelligent enough to have an alignment. Everything else is up to a wide variety of things (like the culture they grew up in).

On the other hand, as I read once somewhere, you have to ask yourself "why wouldn't a red dragon be chaotic evil? He's in all probability the biggest, baddest SOB in the land. 'Lawful' and 'good' are for people who need cooperation to survive.

J

 

[DWARF]

drnuuncheon, good point. But then by comparison, why would a Gold Dragon be Lawful Good, since he's also one of the biggest baddest things out there?

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

Here's an idea for you--I don't know if it's what you're looking for but it might help.

You've probably read the Martin Luther King speech "...that one day we will be judged not by the color of our skin but by the content of our character." Right. But what if, for dragons, the content of their character shows up in the color of their skin? A red dragon who began to entertain thoughts of law and good might lose his color. If his scruples developed further and he became committed to righteousness and honor, his scales would emerge a bright gold. You could assign each dragon alignment to a color or metal and go from there. (I'd recommend white for neutral--torn between two masters and unable to serve either others or themselves wholeheartedly, whites are the weakest and stupidest of dragonkind. . . .

 

[drnuncheon]

drnuuncheon, good point. But then by comparison, why would a Gold Dragon be Lawful Good, since he's also one of the biggest baddest things out there?

Why indeed?

"Hey, wait, gold dragons are supposed to be..." (Famous Last Words)

To answer your question, it's probably how they were raised. Gold dragons read the latest parenting manuals, nurturing and encouraging their child to grow, while red dragons are neglectful, abusive parents.

J

 

[ruleslawyer]

Here's an idea for you--I don't know if it's what you're looking for but it might help.

You've probably read the Martin Luther King speech "...that one day we will be judged not by the color of our skin but by the content of our character." Right. But what if, for dragons, the content of their character shows up in the color of their skin? A red dragon who began to entertain thoughts of law and good might lose his color. If his scruples developed further and he became committed to righteousness and honor, his scales would emerge a bright gold. You could assign each dragon alignment to a color or metal and go from there. (I'd recommend white for neutral--torn between two masters and unable to serve either others or themselves wholeheartedly, whites are the weakest and stupidest of dragonkind. . . .

I just have to say that this is utterly brilliant. Congrats, EB!

IMC, "evil" (really neutral selfish to truly demonic) dragons are the norm, and there aren't really any good dragons running around. They generally are also chromatic, the color of their scales corresponding to one of the facets of their creator, Io/Asgorath. Good dragons, by contrast, are direct servants of the powers of good, and their metallic color corresponds to their status in the celestial hierarchy. They are also incredibly rare on the Prime, and generally come from the Outer Planes (often having the celestial template).