(un)reason
Legend
Dragon Issue 356: June 2007
part 3/6
Top 10 most wanted dragons in D&D: Oh joy. Top tens. The perfect way to look back and end a series. :sigh: Yup, looks like we will be having some content low nostalgia-fests to round out these last few issues along with the important stuff. Oh well, it just reminds me that at no point has the magazine ever been perfect, even in it's "classic" era, and it probably never will be, even with the digital issues offering the possibility of making corrections after release. They range from hatchlings to epic levels, and old to recent creations, and include horrors like Borys, Dragotha, Dungeon Magazine's mascot Flame, and scariest of all, Phil & Dixie's Growf.
So for those that were there, this'll bring back some serious memories, and for those that weren't, it'll give you a whole new set of things to torrent buy. This is why you keep the old stuff available and remind people of it occasionally. It may not make you immediate money, but the long-term benefits are quite substantial.
Ferrous dragons: Here's another nostalgic callback, but one that actually has a practical use. The ferrous dragons were introduced in issue 170, more than half the lifetime of the magazine ago. They added a somewhat more organised, yet still mostly indifferent to humanity dragon group to the standard chromatic, metallic and gem dragons. Since moral ambiguities like that make things more interesting in a big campaign world, and even the evil ones are generally less destructive than the chromatics, it's good to see them included in 3e before it ended. It does look like there's going to be a fair degree of mechanical reimagining, including making them all lawful when before they covered the whole range of alignments, and adding an additional innate power common to them all. Let's see if this is an improvement that gives them a stronger collective niche or not.
Chromium Dragons are still way too similar to silver dragons in appearance, while being very different indeed in personality, sadistic in a predatory, feline way. They retain their ability to reshape ice, ensuring they have swankier lairs than the average dragon. Looks like these will be retaining most of their signature traits from the past.
Cobalt Dragons may be cruel and bossy, but they do at least have a real sense of responsibility towards their subjects, which also means they make better (if pushy) parents than most dragon types. With their love for traps and reshaping the landscape, they have an even closer bond with kobolds than most dragons. That makes a good deal of sense as an addition to their personalities.
Iron Dragons have their ability to turn you to stone given more flavour by turning you into an iron statue instead. As the bosses, they're confident enough in their strength to not be cruel, but will still take what they need to feed and breed. Talk to them rather than leaping straight into combat and it will almost definitely turn out for the better.
Nickel Dragons have their original editing snafu fixed and are actually the lowest HD this time around as well as in the hierarchy. They retain both their mobility and their amusing power to make you itch, which makes them quite effective at nonlethal fights if they choose to. That's something they never would have added if they were writing them now for the first time.
Tungsten Dragons remain the somewhat snobbish good guys who mostly stay at home and give any suspicious sorts who venture in the spontaneous combustion gaze. They'd make a perfect guardian for an old school hobbit settlement.
So while they miss out statting the dragon ruler, most of this conversion is pretty faithful, with the new tweaks they've made generally improvements. Pretty pleased with the care they've gone to in updating this particular set of obscure creatures.
part 3/6
Top 10 most wanted dragons in D&D: Oh joy. Top tens. The perfect way to look back and end a series. :sigh: Yup, looks like we will be having some content low nostalgia-fests to round out these last few issues along with the important stuff. Oh well, it just reminds me that at no point has the magazine ever been perfect, even in it's "classic" era, and it probably never will be, even with the digital issues offering the possibility of making corrections after release. They range from hatchlings to epic levels, and old to recent creations, and include horrors like Borys, Dragotha, Dungeon Magazine's mascot Flame, and scariest of all, Phil & Dixie's Growf.

Ferrous dragons: Here's another nostalgic callback, but one that actually has a practical use. The ferrous dragons were introduced in issue 170, more than half the lifetime of the magazine ago. They added a somewhat more organised, yet still mostly indifferent to humanity dragon group to the standard chromatic, metallic and gem dragons. Since moral ambiguities like that make things more interesting in a big campaign world, and even the evil ones are generally less destructive than the chromatics, it's good to see them included in 3e before it ended. It does look like there's going to be a fair degree of mechanical reimagining, including making them all lawful when before they covered the whole range of alignments, and adding an additional innate power common to them all. Let's see if this is an improvement that gives them a stronger collective niche or not.
Chromium Dragons are still way too similar to silver dragons in appearance, while being very different indeed in personality, sadistic in a predatory, feline way. They retain their ability to reshape ice, ensuring they have swankier lairs than the average dragon. Looks like these will be retaining most of their signature traits from the past.
Cobalt Dragons may be cruel and bossy, but they do at least have a real sense of responsibility towards their subjects, which also means they make better (if pushy) parents than most dragon types. With their love for traps and reshaping the landscape, they have an even closer bond with kobolds than most dragons. That makes a good deal of sense as an addition to their personalities.
Iron Dragons have their ability to turn you to stone given more flavour by turning you into an iron statue instead. As the bosses, they're confident enough in their strength to not be cruel, but will still take what they need to feed and breed. Talk to them rather than leaping straight into combat and it will almost definitely turn out for the better.
Nickel Dragons have their original editing snafu fixed and are actually the lowest HD this time around as well as in the hierarchy. They retain both their mobility and their amusing power to make you itch, which makes them quite effective at nonlethal fights if they choose to. That's something they never would have added if they were writing them now for the first time.
Tungsten Dragons remain the somewhat snobbish good guys who mostly stay at home and give any suspicious sorts who venture in the spontaneous combustion gaze. They'd make a perfect guardian for an old school hobbit settlement.
So while they miss out statting the dragon ruler, most of this conversion is pretty faithful, with the new tweaks they've made generally improvements. Pretty pleased with the care they've gone to in updating this particular set of obscure creatures.