Board Thread:Suggestions forum/@comment-32013442-20180413150815/@comment-32013442-20180413205202

Sir Lazuli wrote: I would love to see various dragons added to the game. However, just to be clear:


 * I don’t think drakes are different from dragons. Smaug was a fire-drake as opposed to a cold-drake, not a dragon as opposed to a drake.


 * I also think worm applies to dragons like Smaug, but to dispel confusion it would probably be a good idea to call the wingless ones worms.

I believe Smaug was the last great dragon, but not necessarily the last dragon. Thus to contain a full spectrum of dragons from lore, we need the following:


 * Flying fire-breathing dragons


 * Flying dragons that don’t breathe fire


 * Wingless fire-breathing dragons


 * Wingless dragons that don’t breathe fire

There isn’t anything proving that cold-drakes actually breathed cold; they could just be dragons that didn’t breathe fire. However since the mechanics are already in place for heat and frost damage, I think it would be a good addition to have the following as well:


 * Flying frost-breathing dragons


 * Wingless frost-breathing dragons

Perhaps some distinction between shorter lizard-like dragons and longer worm-like dragons would be good, as you mention. I’d also like to see sea serpents and other sea monsters.

However, that’s all aside from the difficulty of actually adding them. Personally I would prefer to have flying and fire-breathing dragons to fight, but it’s up to the mod team as to whether this is feasible.

If dragons are added, there should be dragon-hoards in the Grey Mountains / Withered Heath that spawn very rarely. These would have treasure piles and chests like troll hoards, but lots more, and a high chance of a dragon guarding the loot. It would also be cool if goblets &c could spawn on surfaces around; stealing a golden goblet from a hoard should definitely grant some achievement. Burglar maybe? It’s an act we see Bilbo perform in The Hobbit that mirrors an escaped slave in Beowulf.

However the problem with bosses so often is that it just comes down to getting enough armour, brews, and powerful weapons to spam them to death. Dragon’s shouldn’t be like that. They are a foe that should take some cleverness and skill to defeat and outsmart. I’m not sure how to do this, but it would be disappointing if it were just like a troll or something. Something involving speaking with dragons would be really cool, but I’m not sure if that only applied to great dragons.

Anyway those are just a few of my many thoughts on the subject. It’s how I envision dragons being added if added at all, but I don’t think all of it is feasible to actually code.

One other thing, I wish there was a wider area dragons could inhabit than Grey Mountains / Withered Heath as those would rapidly get overrun on servers. But I’m not sure what places would be good candidates.

@Draugthalion Tiruial: One dragon would be far less laggy than 200 other large mobs put together.

EDIT: Thinking about it more, dragons with hoards should have a high chance to be found sleeping. Stealing a golden goblet from a sleeping dragon would grant the achievement. Stealing from a sleeping dragon would cause it to wake sometime within one day/night cycle; it would likely be angry and ravage the surrounding landscape. This is when it could be fought.

If attacked while sleeping in its den by an adventurer the dragon would awake and fight there.

1st. A dragon is not a drake. That is a common misconception. Look up the terms Dragon, Drake, and Wyvern to get an idea of some of the physical characteristics of the different dragons.

2nd. No frost dragons. Though that would be cool, it is not canon. A cold drake is a drake that cannot breath fire, hence the term "Cold".

3rd. Most importantly, no Dragons. No flying. No breathing anything of any kind. Period. If we want to see any form of lore friendly dragon in the mod, then a few compromises need to be made.

As for dragon hoards, that would be a cool idea. Eventually.