Dragons, Coal Dragons
aka Smoke Dragon, Soot Dragon, Black Dragon, Iron Dragon
Coal dragons are slovenly and gluttonous, enjoying foul environments and the base desires to excess. They live under crowded cities choked by smoke, the grand sewers under the oldest large cities, muck pits of the Underdark, or fetid swamps and tar fields. They are mistaken as black dragons, especially when found in wet swampy regions. While they have forward-facing horns, they have four of them and they spread out much wider. Two come from behind the jawline, dropping down, sloping outward, and then forward. With age, they develop a bit of an upward hook when older. The upper are similar to that of a black dragon. They are thicker and rounder on top forming around bridge over the skull. The thick round horns extends further out to each side of the head before twisting forward and down to point forward. They are oversized and dramatic, and on adults, they can be ten feet wide and larger. They extend to the length of the nose, but some ancients have been depicted with horns that extend 10 to 20 feet beyond the nose of the dragon.
They are masters of machinery. Coal dragons have an innate sense of geometry and physics. They understand buildings and machinery. This is not the delicate stuff of Gnomian whitesmiths. They know how to build great furnaces, pumps, dams, cranks, lifts, machinery that create fuel and pumps it through pipes that a city could use. They understand how things fit together and how cogs use smaller cogs to do the work for them. The industries of coal, bitumen, charcoal, soot, and smoke are their evils on the races, and a celebrated one. Their lairs are always rich in these raw resources. They are shapeshifters by the time they become young adults (150-200 years). Through humanoid forms they seed ideas and machinations into the societies they corrupt. They have no desire to lead the races. This would be akin to wanting to be king of the cockroaches. Their joy is the corruption and watching them destroy one another, with a front-row seat to the show.
Alchemists note that coal dragons are related to the material element of carbon. Carbon deposits surround their lairs which feeds the industries they whisper about in the ears of men. Metallurgical coal, lignite, oil shale, black shale, bitumen, oil, all these fuel industrializations. It may be present as discrete occurrences of tar, bitumen, asphalt, petroleum, coal, or carbonaceous materials.
When a coal dragon makes a city their home, you will see the machinery arise. Wonderful mechanical marvels will appear and the city will become famous for its great works. But it always has a price. These cities usually struggle with pollution, pungent air, soot and foul-tasting waters and sickness. Wealth, corruption, balck markets all follow. They become the perfect lair for a coal dragon. Fetid waters fill the sewers, with rancid smells overwhelming the streets, buildings become covered in soot—these are mistaken as the standard hallmarks of the mechanical age. However, in distant Gnomian territories, clockworks and engineering have a different tone and air choked by soot is not commonplace there.
Coal dragons can be one of the most insidious of evil dragons. They possess a hatred that only needs to find a target. New Breda and High Orbriss are likely lairs for coal dragons. Both cities are exploding with technological advancements and machinery. New Breda builds the massive train wagons that use the Grand Traversal to move goods to and from the mainland quickly. They are a wonder to see and a rare advancement of technology. But New Breda has also become overcrowded, dirty, and developed large seedy underbellies. And that influence has spilled over into larger towns along the Alabrad peninsula.
Coal dragons enjoy the basest of desires. Sleeping, eating, hunting, killing, even to perverse levels. Coal dragons may sleep for decades at a time. Cruelty comes naturally to them. They like to play with their prey. Terrorizing the farm animals (what they call the races of the world) is a sport to be enjoyed-even to compete with others. They can never have too much of this fun. They find humor in the misery of others. Other dragons are, at best, competition.
Coal dragons appear to go through hermitic and social cycles. And both have terrifying effects on the world. A coal dragon pulled back from the world broods with only its own foul thoughts. Nothing good comes from that.
Their acid bite can send an acidic poison into the body. An acid injects through the fangs continues to do half damage each round. CON Save will halve it. Three saves and the poison are exhausted. A Cure Disease or Lesser Restoration can remove it. The dragon chooses when to use it. You don't want to dissolve your dinner.
Coal dragons are slovenly and gluttonous, enjoying foul environments and the base desires to excess. They live under crowded cities choked by smoke, the grand sewers under the oldest large cities, muck pits of the Underdark, or fetid swamps and tar fields. They are mistaken as black dragons, especially when found in wet swampy regions. While they have forward-facing horns, they have four of them and they spread out much wider. Two come from behind the jawline, dropping down, sloping outward, and then forward. With age, they develop a bit of an upward hook when older. The upper are similar to that of a black dragon. They are thicker and rounder on top forming around bridge over the skull. The thick round horns extends further out to each side of the head before twisting forward and down to point forward. They are oversized and dramatic, and on adults, they can be ten feet wide and larger. They extend to the length of the nose, but some ancients have been depicted with horns that extend 10 to 20 feet beyond the nose of the dragon.
They are masters of machinery. Coal dragons have an innate sense of geometry and physics. They understand buildings and machinery. This is not the delicate stuff of Gnomian whitesmiths. They know how to build great furnaces, pumps, dams, cranks, lifts, machinery that create fuel and pumps it through pipes that a city could use. They understand how things fit together and how cogs use smaller cogs to do the work for them. The industries of coal, bitumen, charcoal, soot, and smoke are their evils on the races, and a celebrated one. Their lairs are always rich in these raw resources. They are shapeshifters by the time they become young adults (150-200 years). Through humanoid forms they seed ideas and machinations into the societies they corrupt. They have no desire to lead the races. This would be akin to wanting to be king of the cockroaches. Their joy is the corruption and watching them destroy one another, with a front-row seat to the show.
Alchemists note that coal dragons are related to the material element of carbon. Carbon deposits surround their lairs which feeds the industries they whisper about in the ears of men. Metallurgical coal, lignite, oil shale, black shale, bitumen, oil, all these fuel industrializations. It may be present as discrete occurrences of tar, bitumen, asphalt, petroleum, coal, or carbonaceous materials.
When a coal dragon makes a city their home, you will see the machinery arise. Wonderful mechanical marvels will appear and the city will become famous for its great works. But it always has a price. These cities usually struggle with pollution, pungent air, soot and foul-tasting waters and sickness. Wealth, corruption, balck markets all follow. They become the perfect lair for a coal dragon. Fetid waters fill the sewers, with rancid smells overwhelming the streets, buildings become covered in soot—these are mistaken as the standard hallmarks of the mechanical age. However, in distant Gnomian territories, clockworks and engineering have a different tone and air choked by soot is not commonplace there.
Coal dragons can be one of the most insidious of evil dragons. They possess a hatred that only needs to find a target. New Breda and High Orbriss are likely lairs for coal dragons. Both cities are exploding with technological advancements and machinery. New Breda builds the massive train wagons that use the Grand Traversal to move goods to and from the mainland quickly. They are a wonder to see and a rare advancement of technology. But New Breda has also become overcrowded, dirty, and developed large seedy underbellies. And that influence has spilled over into larger towns along the Alabrad peninsula.
Coal dragons enjoy the basest of desires. Sleeping, eating, hunting, killing, even to perverse levels. Coal dragons may sleep for decades at a time. Cruelty comes naturally to them. They like to play with their prey. Terrorizing the farm animals (what they call the races of the world) is a sport to be enjoyed-even to compete with others. They can never have too much of this fun. They find humor in the misery of others. Other dragons are, at best, competition.
Coal dragons appear to go through hermitic and social cycles. And both have terrifying effects on the world. A coal dragon pulled back from the world broods with only its own foul thoughts. Nothing good comes from that.
Their acid bite can send an acidic poison into the body. An acid injects through the fangs continues to do half damage each round. CON Save will halve it. Three saves and the poison are exhausted. A Cure Disease or Lesser Restoration can remove it. The dragon chooses when to use it. You don't want to dissolve your dinner.
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