DRAGON WEEK 2025 - PARTING THOUGHTS
Dragon Week is behind us, but I greatly enjoyed the collaborative videos from some of my favorite content creators, and even some new ones I found while searching for Dragon Week videos. These creators put out some great content in the way of their favorite dragons from TTRPGs, stories, myths, their suggestions for running them at your table, and new and interesting ways for making them memorable in your games. This got me to thinking, what is it about dragons that grips our imagination? What is it about these fearsome creatures that strikes awe and fear in us? Surely the old myths and tales are partly responsible for their impact on our imagination, stories like Saint George and the Dragon, Norse myths like Fafnir, old tales of fearsome fire breathing monsters that could lay waste to a village in moments, burn down the bravest knight, and the hoard….the magnificent treasure hoards these beasts collected and guarded from fortune seekers.
Where did it begin for me? I can trace it back to February of 1981 when a very young kid was taken to see the movie “Dragonslayer” in theaters. This movie is heavily influenced by European dragon myths, but for a young, impressionable boy the dark setting, a wizard mentor, a fire breathing dragon, this was the stuff that grabs the imagination and takes it to a place of fantasy and wonder. I left that theater craving more. I read the saga of Sigurd and his slaying of the wyrm Fafnir. Then my cousin suggested “The Hobbit”. I was at that point unfamiliar with Tolkien, but quickly became spellbound by Middle Earth, and particularly Smaug, the great fire drake that drove the Dwarves out of Erebor and stole their vast treasure trove. This led me to The Silmarillion, a daunting read for someone my age, but the dragons…the Dragons!
Glaurung, the first of the great dragons unleashed by Morgoth upon the unsuspecting peoples of Middle Earth. Ancalagon the Black, first and greatest of the winged dragons whose fall from the sky when slain leveled mountains. These tales fired (no pun intended) my imagination and had me excited to read more fantasy stories, explore worlds like those Tolkien had created. Later that same year my cousin introduced me to Dungeons & Dragons. I mean come on, it has dragons in the name! How could I go wrong?
Dragons still hold my imagination, a special place in my mind and within the games that I run. They are majestic, legendary creatures, with wisdom and the ability to be mentors or quest givers to parties that seek them out. They can be cunning and vicious adversaries for a band of adventurers, the ultimate apex predator, capable of using magic (it’s about time the WoTC got around to fixing that omission from the stat blocks!), corrupting the land around them into a deadly environment that the brave players must make their way through in order to confront the monster. Recently I have even considered them as patrons for Warlocks seeking power, this after seeing some great videos online from creators who envision a dragon pact as a means of empowering players. There is simply so much potential for stories, plot hooks, and great memories at your table, all at the fingertips of a Dungeon Master. For me it is simply too tempting to not delve into.
In the paid 5E game I run currently one of my players is a Cleric of the War Domain who worships Tiamat. Her backstory is that her parents died at sea to a pirate attack, so being the DM I am, I decided to weave in some threads that would reveal themselves at later levels. As she has proven herself a loyal cleric of Tiamat and the Dark Queen she has taken on two aspects of the Lady of Dragons; a small spread of white scales that offers resistance to cold, the ability to sprout wings of a green dragon granting flight for one minute per day. Others will come in time. I have had the player give me some of her thoughts on how these aspects should manifest, and we will see how it plays out as the game progresses. Only recently did she learn that her mother was a benevolent red dragon that had taken the form of a human woman so she might live in the world of men and love the man who saved her. I have thoughts on how that particular blood legacy may play into our campaign as we move higher in levels. I haven’t fully taken the leap to allow a full dragon player at my table as Gary Gygax said was allowable, but maybe one day.
What are your thoughts? How did you discover dragons? How do they play into your games and stories? Share with us in our Discord. Not a member? Follow the links. We’d love to hear from you and share lore and stories with you.
Until next we meet, keep your sword arm free and watch the skies for dragons!
