Half-Dragons. Do you used them? (And WotC's half-breed fetish)

[Gez]

Half-elf half-dwarf? In my next homebrew it will be possible... Because elves and dwarves will be the same race, just with very strong sexual dismorphism. Dwarves will be the males and elves the females.

 

[poilbrun]

Eggsactly.... templates for new monster creation is cool. I despise half-whatever templates when in use by PC's as usually it is simply the desire to powergame that drives the players to want such a template.

I absolutely love the various templates as a DM tool to create strange and unique enemies however. This is actually also a reason not to want them as PC races, as then it is less 'exotic' to meet this humanoid being that suddenly breathes fire onto its enemies, folds out wings and takes flight.... I use templates to 'explain' why certain enemies have special powers...

I whole heartedly agree with you on this one. Templates in general are a great way to add a "little something" to an NPC to either add an ability, counter a weakness (Half-troll/Half red dragon anyone?), or sipply make it different than the others...

I don't allow templates for PC, except in exceptional case. I have contemplated doing a campaign with half-dragons in the Council of Wyrm setting.

 

[Li Shenron]

I think that when 3ed started, there were cool ideas for weird PC/NPC characters to drop in the world. When you read the descriptive text in D&D products it always seems like this sort of things are RARE, just as many monsters also are said to be extremely, so that few people in the world should know they exist... even core classes, or at least some of them, are supposed to be rare: the Paladin being someone who became enlightened to fight against evil, the Sorcerer is said to have dragon blood and is some sort of outcast because of him being unique, the Monk being a strange person coming from a distant exotic culture... The fact that they are rare and "special" is in line with them being PC, since they are the protagonists of the story.

However, once you get used to this sort of stuff, the player's perspective change the world completely, and everyone (the authors first and foremost) suddenly percieves the fantasy world completely full of the most diverse people and creatures.

Personally I think that the gaming group should still be the responsible for choosing in which kind of fantasy world they want to play, it doesn't matter if the book says "there is only one platinum dragon in the universe" but then gives a prestige class tied to a society of half-platinum dragons.

Books should always be used as tools, but never have the right to tell you what exists or not... as such, just consider the half- stuff around as tools or mere ideas, and don't feel compelled to use what you don't like

 

[Zappo]

I've had half-dragon PCs, but it was a fairly lighthearted campaign. As a general rule, I think they do not fit the settings I am currently using.

 

[Psion]

I do not mind half-X templates, and use them.

What I do mind is the blase manner in which they are used in products (mainly talking about WotC adventures and online products here, but a lot of third party publishers followed suit.) AFAIAC, you can't just get a crossbreed by having two creatures of totally different species get busy.

What does work for me is the concept that magical experimentation would create a breed of superior warriors (or whatever) -- and in fact, the backstory of my campaign (which predates 3e) includes such a breed of half-dragons. But if you use the casual attitude towards halfbreed creation, it makes tales of mad wizards creating crossbreeds somewhat pointless.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

Templates are cool.

Dragons banging anything they run into is not cool.

 

[Raven Crowking]

I've never used a half-dragon, either.

In an upcoming session, my PCs will encounter a psuedonatural fiendish mummy, though, which I considered making a half-dragon as well. One of my players (not PCs) is big into dragons, so I considered it to make him happy. But, then, I want dragons to be kinda rare and special. None of the dragons IMC follow the color/metal rules (they are all individuals), so I would also have had to consider who the sire/dame was very carefully!

RC

 

[Raven Crowking]

Templates are cool.

Dragons banging anything they run into is not cool.

I'd often wondered how low-level characters survived their encounters with dragons....now I know!

RC

 

[Desdichado]

Just a quick comment before I discuss the nature of the thead: redmetal, that is a damn cool avatar image.

The existence of a half-dragon (or half-anything else) template does not imply that dragons (or what have you) are into what must amount to their version of bestiality. You think it pointed that DragonLance does not have half-dragon templates, but on the other hand, aren't the draconians pretty much the same concept? There are other ideas and other explanations for how those templates come about; I'd say it's in your case, tell the player that he needs to come up with a better backstory than papa dwarf "made it" with a polymorphed gold dragon.

 

[Desdichado]

But, then, I want dragons to be kinda rare and special. None of the dragons IMC follow the color/metal rules (they are all individuals), so I would also have had to consider who the sire/dame was very carefully!

Yeah, I'm all about that. Have you read the dragons entry in Monsternomicon? If I end up using dragons again, that's how I'll do it...