D&D General Dragonborn Physical Features

[Vaalingrade]

Why is there an anti halfling rant in the middle of the not-dragon-enough people talk?

 

[Vaalingrade]

The questions about wings and flight are interesting, too. Maybe I'll do a poll someday about whether dragonborn wings should be completely cosmetic, or extend your Jump distance, or reduce fall damage, or give a Fly speed, or something else.

Same for tails: should they be purely cosmetic? should they grant advantage on Athletics checks to resist being knocked prone? should they be fully prehensile and able to grip weapons? could/should they have spikes or spurs, and if so, would that allow a dragonborn make Tail attacks? What if they had rattles on them like some snakes, and could be used for Intimidate checks?

I am a fan of giving species physical features and then making proficient use of them a feat.

My dragonsired have tails, wings and claws, but you need to commit feats to make the claws or tail any better than a normal sad melee strike and flight is clumsy.

My catfolk miare have tails, but you need a feat for it to be usefully prehensile and to invest in climb to use your claws to do so.

My spider hengeyokai lasconti have spinnerettes, but need feats to make useful things from the webs.

 

[jmartkdr2]

They better represent tropes of an alien mindset, 'other' and potentially different than the core of the genre.

Okay but what does that have to do with Dragonborn?

 

[Scribe]

Okay but what does that have to do with Dragonborn?

Nothing, that they are both reptilian, but one has no tropes associated with being as such, and instead is very 'human' is just one of the reasons I feel Lizardmen are the more distinct option, again with the limitations of the (2014 especially) Dragonborn option.

As noted, the solution I believe is to have a Wings and Tail.

 

[Stormonu]

The questions about wings and flight are interesting, too. Maybe I'll do a poll someday about whether dragonborn wings should be completely cosmetic, or extend your Jump distance, or reduce fall damage, or give a Fly speed, or something else.

Same for tails: should they be purely cosmetic? should they grant advantage on Athletics checks to resist being knocked prone? should they be fully prehensile and able to grip weapons? could/should they have spikes or spurs, and if so, would that allow a dragonborn make Tail attacks? What if they had rattles on them like some snakes, and could be used for Intimidate checks?

I don't know why I'm fascinated with (fixated upon?) dragonborn physiology all of a sudden, but that's just how my brain works. Best to just roll with it.

In both cases, I think they should be optional "upgrades" a dragonborn can take, akin to the dragon's sorcerer's ability to gain dragon abilities of flight and such.

Ornamental wings might be a freebie for certain ancestries, glide might be an origin (1st level) feat, true flight a 4th level feat.

Tails could be the same thing - ornamental as a freebie for certain species and special abilities as feats.

It's what I did for my dragonborn - the Al'galue have ornamental wings that can gain true flight at 5th, the Tyres Haul get glide at 1st level. True dragonborn get natural armor that can be improved (+3 at 1st, +5 w/ feat, +7 w/ 2 feats).

Hadn't done anything with a tail, but now it's got me thinking...

 

[Mind of tempest]

glances over at the formative works for Fantasy I guess we disagree.

the whole point is they were meant to be stand-ins for the average person, it was never about them being cool but more that everyone could in principle do it.

Meditations is still selling. Same with the Tao Te Ching.

and yet how many others were lost never to be seen again?

The questions about wings and flight are interesting, too. Maybe I'll do a poll someday about whether dragonborn wings should be completely cosmetic, or extend your Jump distance, or reduce fall damage, or give a Fly speed, or something else.

Same for tails: should they be purely cosmetic? should they grant advantage on Athletics checks to resist being knocked prone? should they be fully prehensile and able to grip weapons? could/should they have spikes or spurs, and if so, would that allow a dragonborn make Tail attacks? What if they had rattles on them like some snakes, and could be used for Intimidate checks?

I don't know why I'm fascinated with (fixated upon?) dragonborn physiology all of a sudden, but that's just how my brain works. Best to just roll with it.

depends on how you build dragonborn structaly as that determines weather tails would add to athletics

Nothing, that they are both reptilian, but one has no tropes associated with being as such, and instead is very 'human' is just one of the reasons I feel Lizardmen are the more distinct option, again with the limitations of the (2014 especially) Dragonborn option.

As noted, the solution I believe is to have a Wings and Tail.

lizardmen are to alien more built to never change, hell the warhammer bio constructs would make more sense than the ones we got

 

[CreamCloud0]

The questions about wings and flight are interesting, too. Maybe I'll do a poll someday about whether dragonborn wings should be completely cosmetic, or extend your Jump distance, or reduce fall damage, or give a Fly speed, or something else.

Same for tails: should they be purely cosmetic? should they grant advantage on Athletics checks to resist being knocked prone? should they be fully prehensile and able to grip weapons? could/should they have spikes or spurs, and if so, would that allow a dragonborn make Tail attacks? What if they had rattles on them like some snakes, and could be used for Intimidate checks?

I don't know why I'm fascinated with (fixated upon?) dragonborn physiology all of a sudden, but that's just how my brain works. Best to just roll with it.

dragonborn tails i imagine are apt for making a trip attacks, sweeping the leg as it were.

 

[Scribe]

the whole point is they were meant to be stand-ins for the average person, it was never about them being cool but more that everyone could in principle do it.

Which is very cool.

 

[Mind of tempest]

Which is very cool.

the problem is all subsequent fantasy realised you can just use humans for that and things have been bad for them ever since

 

[Scribe]

the problem is all subsequent fantasy realised you can just use humans for that and things have been bad for them ever since

Last I checked, the dominant IPs for RPGs are still using them.

"You can just use Humans for that." applies to any and every trope imaginable and is a valid option until you say "I actually want to just be fully magical, and have wings."