Let's Dissect 2e's Dragons, Draconomicon Edition - Mercury Dragon

This illustration isn't actually in the book, but it's contemporary, so shush.

Because you knew I had to talk about this book's dragons sooner or later.

Yeah, yeah, I know I still have more of the MM to go, but doing things in this order is just how this dragon rolls, and he'll roll on you if you have a problem with it!

Anyway, without further ado, let’s get a-mockin’!

Mercury dragons are fast, highly-maneuverable creatures with relatively small bodies and long tails.
Their size is listed as “H (25’ base)”, so make what you will of that “relatively”. No indication of how long their tails are, sadly.

Although basically good in alignment, they are very whimsical creatures, making decisions and changing them at the drop of a hat. Their behavior is almost impossible to predict.

You could say they’re… Actually, no, I won’t insult your intelligence with that punchline. I will ask, though: are metallic dragons’ scales supposed to be made of that particular metal? I hope not, because that’ll mean problems for our friend here.

Let's Dissect 2e's Dragons Pride Month Special! - Rainbow Dragon

Hot damn, where to start with this guy. He's pretty much all frills and pointy bits. I feel stabbed just looking at him. Meanwhile, everyone around him is randomly doing the YMCA dance. Maybe he's just providing the lights for a rave?

 Yeah, yeah, talk about waiting until the last minute. But hey, better late than never, right? I can’t think of a better way for this blog to cap off Pride Month than with an extra-gay D&D dragon.

I didn’t think it was possible that any dragon gayer than me or my brother could ever exist, but here we are. And before you say it, yes, I know that tearing this one page from Dragon Magazine #146 is wayyyyy out of order, but guess what?

I’m Paphvul the gay dragon, I shitpost where I wish, and none dare resist!

Behold, the Rainbow Dragon!

This Strawberry Shortcake sumbitch is a real thing that got published in official D&D materials.

And I love him to death.

Let's Dissect the 2e Monster Manual's Dragons - Brown Dragon

Whoops! Wrong brown dragon.

There we go!

Hey, been a while, hasn’t it?

Well, after we’ve done the Chromatics and Metallics both, you’re probably wondering how many more dergs D&D could possibly have left to throw at us.

As it turns out, D&D’s remarkable tendency to whore out and reiterate a concept until the original luster is long gone doesn’t exclude its titular handsome reptiles. We ain’t scratched the fucking surface of this giant gay lizard iceberg.

And good thing, too, Gosh only knows what would happen if I ran out of quick, easy material to bang out posts about.

The Flight of Dragons Cartoon, Part 1

The Flight of Dragons cartoon is a fascinating hot mess.

Now, to be perfectly clear, I’m going to spoil the entire plot. This essay assumes you’ve seen the film in question, and if you haven’t, go give it a watch! It’s far from perfect, but it’s an interesting enough film that I had to write down my thoughts on it.

To give all this some context, I’ll briefly recap the history of this strange film.

Peter Dickinson had been on a train, looking at the cover of the Earthsea Trilogy, when he wondered how the hell something so big could fly, especially with such little wings. He came up with the same answer then and there that nature had come up with for us millions of years ago back on VolRei: dragons fly using lighter-than-air gas (or just burning said gas, in our case), necessitating our enormous size.

Not quite chubby enough to fly, but what would I know?

Well, he let that idea ferment a little, and came up with a theory for how the dragons presented in folklore might have really existed on Earth. His agent saw the end result, and sent it to a publisher. A few publisher-mandated extra pages later, and we got the speculative evolutionary text known as The Flight of Dragons.

Let's Dissect the 2e Monster Manual's Dragons - Silver Dragon

I'm certain I've seen this guy on a metal album co- wait, did I already say that? *checks* Not exactly, at least not in THIS series.

Alrighty, Silver Dragon time, here we go!

Silver dragons are kind and helpful. They will cheerfully assist good creatures if their need is genuine. They often take the forms of kindly old men or fair damsels when associating with people.

Silver dragons are known to turn into silver foxes on occasion.

Let's Dissect the 2e Monster Manual's Dragons - Gold Dragon

I could swear I've seen this guy on the side of some Chinese restaurant.

For some reason, I was under the impression we’d be doing Silvers first, despite this book listing them all in alphabetical order.

Anyway, today we’ll be covering the resident noodle dragons!

Gold dragons are wise, judicious, and benevolent. They often embark on self-appointed quests to promote goodness, and are not easily distracted from them. They hate injustice and foul play.

And, as you can see, it’s every stereotype about Eastern dragons compounded with D&D’s usual crusader shit. Still, it’s nice to have a powerful “good” guy actually being proactive in a setting like this.

Let's Dissect the 2e Monster Manual's Dragons - Copper Dragon

Doesn’t he just look jolly?

For the record, I’m still working on the rest of the UHoG series, but when you have to write a blog post that’s nothing but a bunch of reviews of dad games, I think you can understand my lack of enthusiasm.

I’m sure there’s an ACAB joke you guys can make, but you’ll want to save it for later. Possibly a lot later, but trust me. It’ll be worth it.

Copper dragons are incorrigible pranksters, joke tellers, and riddlers.
Prankster + D&D 2e = Oh Gosh’s fucking beer gut.

Yes, it’s the “Just a prank, bro!” dragon, in all his glory.