"I don't really like dragons, guys..."

Sossedov los mul, perhaps you're drawing inspiration for your dragons from the wrong setting?

I'm running an evil campaign where the PCs are helping an adolescent blue dragon overthrow an adult gold. They're currently sowing discord throughout the local city (which the gold dragon protects), lever themselves into positions of power, and then lead a grand army against it.

I'm also a player in a game where the GM has given us a silver dragon as a mentor character. She doesn't ask us of anything really, but after meeting her by chance during another quest we've started coming to her more often for bits of advice. Don't know of the GM's got major plot stuff lined up for her, but she's become a recurring character.

Just use a dinosaur then, they're pretty underutilized in rpg settings compared to dragons.

Why not a dinosaur dragon

>What gold dragon is an unlikable cunt
Most of them since they're the 'that paladin' of dragons. Silvers are the true nice guys.

They are pretty good for when you are running a game where the party is evil.

Monster Hunter is supremely underrated for Veeky Forums material.

Mine is an intelligent, but pretty much angry all the time, flying lizard. But there is only one dragon.

You're thinking of Bronze Dragons, the ecoterrorist dragon who hates being reasonable and likes being angry all the time.

Gold Dragons are more like the 'ends justify the means' sort of good who don't see mortals as anything other than tools to be used to do good. Silver dragons are friendly as hell though.

Pretty soon we're gonna get hit with "what system can I run a Monster Hunter setting in" threads when the new game hits its peak.

True

Well yeah, I don't like dragons or can think of anything you could do with them to make them less lame.

That's not contrarianism. That's going back to your roots.

This 100%

Well, I've already seen attempts at stats and whatnot for a couple of MonHun monsters for 5e. Theoretically, they should adapt to any system just fine.

I wanna know how you adapt the ultimate bard weapon, the Hunting Horn.

>posting parthy as anything but a soul-drained corpse
The only good dragon is one under the LDB's bootheel.

I mean, I don't. In most fantasy settings (especially D&D) they don't have any real flaws to define them and make them interesting. They're like that one annoying kid you were always forced to play with because your parents liked his parents

Alright, so we go up and try kill the monster
>Nuh-uh, you can't do that! He's 200 feet long and weighs infinity+1 tons, he can kill you just be flicking his finger!
Ok, we'll figure out how to kill it from afar
>Nuh-uh, you can't do that! He can fly! And breathe fire! And do magic!
Then we'll sneak in
>Nuh-uh, he's a 3000 year old super genius who can see anything you do coming a mile away!
Well at least he's big, we'll know when he's coming
>You're such a retard, user, he can shapeshift! *forced condescending laugh he thought sounded like Kaiba but is closer to the bully from Cool Cat Saves the Kids*

The only thing dragons are good for is their sex toys

>Choosing cucked Blades over chad Paarthy
>Choosing playing with katanas like a fedora-wearing beta over careful meditation on words of power

This tells me everything I need to know.

>They're like that one annoying kid you were always forced to play with because your parents liked his parents

A shitty DM tells you "nuh uh, you can't kill him, 'cause I said so".
A good DM tells you "Sure", makes you fight an engaging fight where you manage to almost kill the dragon, but he still overpowers all of you, leaving your players choose between running to live another day or attempting to take down dragon with them in a blaze of glory.

I don't mean that's how I'd use them in an encounter, I mean they're just sort of good at everything in a way I don't find very compelling

>using the "m-muh that kid" argument in a fucking fantasy game
WAAAAAH MASTER THE TARRASQUE IS TOTALLY THAT KID IT'S ARMORED AND ONESHOTS EVERYTHING WHY ARE THINGS IN FANTASY OVERPOWERED WAAA

Care to explain why dragons are good villains, then? What kind of fear they inspire beyond "big thing that can kill you?" What that fear says about the human condition other than "I don't want to die?" What motivates them beyond boredom and love of shiny things?

>implying that parthy is anything less that a traitorous dog that deserves to be put down before his way of the voice swings into it's peak
>implying that I actually care about those weebs
>or that you'll actually get to enjoy meditation before Hermaeus Mora decides that he wants to get his LDB in mint condition safe in Apocrypha

That'd need an entire new class desu, based around doing buffs in between hits. Even the simpler MonHun weapons are pretty complex, and Hunting Horn is not one of those simpler weapons.

>Offby-One Kenobi
Who got >?

>Care to explain why dragons are good villains, then?
Old ass creatures with the strength of a giant who is also intelligent enough to rival most Wizards in their prime.
>What kind of fear they inspire beyond "big thing that can kill you?"
Big thing that can not only kill you physically but is also capable of beating mentally, which puts them several leagues above most other creatures in its size category.
> What that fear says about the human condition other than "I don't want to die?"
Knowing that human(oids) aren't the apex predators of the setting, even with the aid of magic at their disposal.
>What motivates them beyond boredom and love of shiny things?
Greed

Good. Because you're in a dragon-slaying quest.

What's wrong with monster hunter?

Monster hunter treats it's dragons like apex predators of the world rather than generic goodie goodie fantasy monsters that can turn into humans out of their ass for no reason
To those with no taste this is unacceptable

>dragons have to be intelligent to use magic
Let me show you a magical dragon done right

The one dragon in my setting was wounded after killing a god. All he does now is sleep to prevent the divine wound from getting worse. He did spawn dragonborn and northern kobolds to tend to him and otherwise anger the children of said dead god.

So basically he shat out little dragon men while sleeping?

Magic fuckery. Dead god fucked wildlife to gain offspring, said god was a relatively young boi when goddo slew all of his kin. Used magic and fuckery to lay man eggs, expect 75% of the eggs that were supposed to be ubermensch dragonmen are kobolds. Kobolds are last in line with succession law.

I like dragons. I like how they're basically an expression of the Serpent with a bunch of scary animal parts tacked on. Some have magic powers.

Fuck I mixed things up. Dragonboi was too young for fugg when his kind was originally killed off.

Tell that to this 3 headed cunt

>expect 75% of the eggs that were supposed to be ubermensch dragonmen are kobolds
Now that's just sad

That's where you're wrong

Think glorantha trolls. Anyway the dragon's called the white wyrm and his personality is: asleep. Before his divine coma he managed to outwit and eventually slay the god who doomed his species to extinction. Kind of an asshole but entirely ignorant of modern affairs should a poor bastard wake him.

Sounds pretty cool, if he looks like anything like the dragon in the previous pic then i assume he sleeps in some kind of mineral cave deep underground

Also, so long as the base is a serpent, the number and configuration of limbs, wings, heads and tails doesn't matter. They're all part of the dragon genealogy.

As it stands mechanically he's a genius ancient white dragon. Having a mineral aspect would be cool tho. His minions are all frost resistant but have kobold light sensitivity, even dragonborn. The sun does not shine on the isle of the white wyrm etc etc

>It is contrarian to do things a little bit more old fashioned

>using metallic and chromatic dragons instead of your own homebrewed totally balanced lore-appropriate versions

kek

I just want to say that Anjanath has levels in Rogue, and nothing can convince me otherwise ever since he dynamic entry'd onto me while I was gathering mushrooms.

Anjah is a smart boy
Won't be smart for long after Deviljho drags it to the shadow realm tho

Yeah, looking forward to finally laying my eyes on the legendary doompickle, since World is my first MH game.

Oh you're in for one hell of a ride, everyone had their hunts ruined at least once by the pickle

Dragons are viciously territorial but are most often disguised as the local population.

Should they encounter eachother and one believes it is revealed, it will immediately revert form and try to kill the other dragon.

Unfortunately for adventurers and townsolk alike, the remaining dragons have grown quite paranoid and have routinely been known to explode from brothels and guard houses trying to eliminate what they believed was another clever dragon seeing through their disguise.

That said, they're otherwise content to wander indulging in the pleasures of the area just the commoners do. They see their overwhelming dominance well secure and will not ordinarily worry about small infractions. Even going so far as allowing themselves to be falsely imprisoned, mugged, humiliated, or getting high with the village idiot. They're basically slumming it but go full murder snake the moment they think another dragon is aware them.

>Big thing that can not only kill you physically but is also capable of beating mentally, which puts them several leagues above most other creatures in its size category.
>Knowing that human(oids) aren't the apex predators of the setting, even with the aid of magic at their disposal.
There are many, many, MANY monsters that fit that discription, even if they aren't quite dragon sized. What makes dragons more interesting than Aboleth, for example?
>Greed
AKA love of shiny things

They also find dragonborn pretty distasteful but know they're just mortal. So they are most comfortable around them, albeit outright bullying them the entire time, since they'd never disguise themselves as something so obvious. Like being a vampire with all his passwords being blood puns, or a snakeman and adding extra sss's to everything. It's just cringy to dragons.

>There are many, many, MANY monsters that fit that discription, even if they aren't quite dragon sized. What makes dragons more interesting than Aboleth, for example?
Beyond the fact that you aren't going to encounter one unless you happen to travel to the elemental plane of water?
>AKA love of shiny things
Greed encompasses much more than material wealth user, it's just the most common because people associate dragons and greed with gold and jewels.

>Beyond the fact that you aren't going to encounter one unless you happen to travel to the elemental plane of water?
Yes, there's any number of ways around that
>Greed encompasses much more than material wealth user, it's just the most common because people associate dragons and greed with gold and jewels.
Pedantic quibble

>Yes, there's any number of ways around that
And these ways are much more difficult to justify than saying "hey, watch out for these mountains, there be a [chromatic] dragon there that will attack travelers if you stray too close."
>Pedantic quibble
If you didn't have anything to say, why not say nothing?

>And these ways are much more difficult to justify than saying "hey, watch out for these mountains, there be a [chromatic] dragon there that will attack travelers if you stray too close."
"In this setting, Aboleth live deep under the ocean." You still haven't given a single reason dragons are better once they're introduced to the story, stop trying to derail
>If you didn't have anything to say, why not say nothing?
I did have something to say, that "love of shiny things" is just a flippant way to say "greed." You're the one resorting to Babby's First Internet Argument grade deflections in lieu of even trying to address my points

Yes, it is when your motive is that it's contrary to how other people do it.

>His dragons can't shapeshift into cute girls

>"In this setting, Aboleth live deep under the ocean."
Even if we assume that the setting takes place near/around the ocean, they'd probably be too deep to encounter anyways unless the party decides to dive several miles under the sea to encounter them, which is unlikely considering how rare they are vs. how large an ocean actually is.
>You still haven't given a single reason dragons are better once they're introduced to the story, stop trying to derail
I've given you plenty of answers, they just weren't the answers you wanted to hear, which is decidedly a (you) problem, not a flaw in the concept of dragons as a whole.
>I did have something to say, that "love of shiny things" is just a flippant way to say "greed." You're the one resorting to Babby's First Internet Argument grade deflections in lieu of even trying to address my points
So says the user who writes "pedantic quibble" and then gets defensive when people call it a non answer.

>T. Contrarian Edgemaster
>Kills one of the best characters in the game
>Dislikes the Way of the Voice because it isn't edgy enough for him
>Pretending he killed Paarthy on moral principle rather than just "lol cool sowrds!!!1!!"
>Not becoming part of Akatosh's immortal oversoul upon death because he took Mora dick up the ass

Wow, I bet you collected all the other Daedric artifacts too, not a smart move my nigger. That's a LOT of Daedra dick in your mouth.

I have never enjoyed shapeshifting creatures besides werewolves. Whenever it is tacked on to something that is not a werewolf, the humanoid form always, always overtakes their natural form and persona in importance and portrayal. Whenever people have a shapeshifting dragon in stories, they almost always forgo or forget that the character is meant to be a dragon, and the dragon aspect of their character might as well be dropped because what they actually want is something more like an elf or immortal human, instead of a dragon.

Honestly, I'd use Silcore or something similar.

Parthy is a wolf in sheep's clothing and he's got all the time in the world to wait for you to leave Nirn for good before he decides to pull some shit. Also I care nothing for edginess and I don't even use swords so the blades have nothing to offer me as a faction. Also you're retarded if you think that Mora is going to let you die regardless of your behavior in in Daedric quest and the Dragonborn DLC.
Dragon maid pretty neatly avoids that problem though. Tohru uses her hybrid form a large portion of the time and Kanna whenever she isn't at school. And they switch back to their original forms whenever possible. Plus there's the massive cultural differences that are constantly in play.

I've done it

This. You might as well just not use a dragon if it's going to look and act like a human all the time. Making the character a demigod or a spirit or something would likely fit better.

Also I'm sick of anime calling things dragons and demons when for all story and character-design purposes they function as humans.

Paarthurnax gives you absolutely no reason to doubt his intentions. Why would he go to the trouble of secluding himself to a mountaintop for thousands of years with only five human followers if he had any tyrannical aspirations whatsoever? Your argument makes zero sense and is based on the flimsy premise of "hurr durr dragon bad!"

Maybe if the game went to the trouble of making him and the Greybeards seem a little more ambiguous in terms of morality it might lend you some plausibility, but as it stands you just look like a screeching retard.

He literally tells you that trusting him is a bad idea if you bring up the topic. The very nature of Dragonkind, yourself included, make it blatantly clear that he shouldn't be trusted given how he interacts with you.

Plus his tyrannical aspirations are pretty clear after you kill Alduin.

You're being very selective with your examples, he does say "It is always wise to mistrust a Dovah" but immediately after follows up by saying he can be trusted but the Blades (who have never met him) don't know that, thus why they want to kill him. One of his best lines is "What is better? To be born good, or to overcome your evil nature through great effort?"
Intrinsic nature can be overcome, and Paarthurnax has overcome his over many many years. There was no true Dragonborn in the intervening years after Tiber Septim who were known to use the voice, and by the time of the Oblivion Crisis almost everyone had forgotten about them. If Paarthurnax had wanted to strike, he could have done so at any time and probably could have carved out a small kingdom and a new Dragon Cult for himself, but he didn't.

He lived on his own at the top of a mountain with four humans and didn't speak to anyone, that's hardly tyrannical. As to his tyrannical aspirations, once again you're being very selective and twisting what's being said.
Paarthurnax seeks to bring more dragons into the fold of the Way of the Voice, a doctrine of peace, which is tyrannical to Dragons due to their dominant nature, Oodhaviing states that much, but tyrannical to humans and mer? Definitely not.

Either your memory isn't so great, or you're picking lines of dialogue out of context to suit your argument.

>his dragons aren't feral predators that are butthurt at everything
Look at this fucking hipster faggot trying to beat the classics

I’ve come to dislike them as well.

Why do these exist? Literally nobody ever uses them for anything.

There’s only one Tarrasque, and it’s not a supergenius, or a shapeshifter, or a masterful social manipulator.

>His dragons are weak fodder or BBEG
Distasteful. Dragons should be so powerful and monstrous you spend the entire campaign avoiding them. Slaying a dragon is a mere accident, the misunderstanding causing you to be elevated as a hero.
Anyone who actually purposefully goes out to hunt a dragon is foolish enough they will not be successful.

Fuck that fight with a wrench. Bastard had too much health for too many oneshot attacks

If your dragons are ancient beings made of magic by the creators then yes. Otherwise they die when you poke enough holes in them just as easily as any other meatbag in the world.

Those just... have no style. They aren’t interesting.

The only thing I’ve ever run across that made that kind of dragon appealing was that anime about dragon maids.

>Dragon likes you.

>Otherwise they die when you poke enough holes in them just as easily as any other meatbag in the world.
Yeah, but that doesn't stop them from being killing machines easier to be avoided since they can fly, breathe fire, and are as intelligent as a adult human.
You can kill a dragon if you can poke enough holes in it, but good luck ever getting close enough to do that. Unlike humans, dragons don't need peers to survive. Marching an army at it is only going to make it fly away and then harass you. A small party is probably going to die. An accident like some cunts stumbling into a unknown entrance to it's lair then stabbing it in the throat while it's asleep because the dragon believes its closest enemy is a few dozen miles away and it collapsed every entrance into it's home it knew about other than the one it can fly out of sounds more plausible.

should have gone with a fairy, ice, or (ironically) dragon type.

I mean it actually feels like you're fighting a dragon since it takes ages to kill and hurts like a mofo

>Gold Dragons are more like the 'ends justify the means' sort of good who don't see mortals as anything other than tools to be used to do good.

So a paladin

Krosis

I heard "ancient beings made of magic" and got here as fast as I could.

Also in Edgemaster flavor.

Midir used to be a noble defender of the hidden city though: he just pulled an artorias and got dark tainted into monster mode. Pretty cool idea to have a dragon raised by the gods after they were done fucking his ancestors into degenerate decay.

He was pretty much a watchdog, we dont have anything to suggest he was intelligent instead of tamed