[[http://www.paulkidby.com/ http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/kidbydragons01.png]]
[[caption-width:233:[[DiscWorld And these are just the ones dredged out of the local swamp]]]]
->'''St. George:''' We heard there was a dragon operating in this neighborhood. We just want to know if you've seen him.
->'''Knave:''' Sure, I've seen him.
->'''St. George:''' Could you describe him for me?
->'''Knave:''' What's to describe? You see one dragon, you seen 'em all!
->'''St. George:''' Would you try to remember, Sir? Just for the record. We just want to get the facts, Sir.
->'''Knave:''' Well, he was, you know, he had orange polka dots...
->'''St. George:''' Yes, Sir.
->'''Knave:''' Purple feet, breathing fire and smoke...
->'''St. George:''' Mmm-hmm.
->'''Knave:''' And one big bloodshot eye right in the middle of his forehead and, uh, like that.
->'''St. George:''' Notice anything unusual about him?
->'''Knave:''' No, he's just your run-of-the-mill dragon, you know..
-->''-[[StanFreberg St. George and the Dragonet]]''


This trope deals with big (maybe) strong (possibly) scaly (sometimes) flying (perhaps) fire-breathing (at times) lizard (usually) monsters (traditionally).

Nearly every culture has myths about something someone is willing to call a 'dragon', despite the fact none of them can agree on what exactly dragons are: How big are they? What do they look like? How many heads do they have? Do they breathe fire? Do some of them breathe ice? Do they fly (and if so, with or without wings)? Are they dumb as planks, or superintelligent? Are they low reptilian pests, or as rare and ancient as the Earth itself? Most importantly, do they think we taste good with ketchup?

The answers to these questions generally fall within two traditions, Western and Eastern.

Western Dragons:
* Are [[ReptilesAreAbhorrent scaly and reptilian]] (outwardly, anyway), and usually serpentine.
* Tend to be large.
* Are usually [[KillAllHumans antagonistic towards humans]].
* [[BreathWeapon Breathe fire]] -- a Medieval addition.
* Kidnap [[DamselInDistress damsels]] and/or hoard treasure. Often greedy and/or insatiable, especially in the latter regard.
* Have a variable number of heads and legs, though one head and six limbs (four legs, and a pair of wings) is the most common configuration. More divergent types (no legs, multiple heads, etc) seem more likely to be brainless bestial monsters than the "basic" form.
** The most popular variation recently has been the Wyvern, a dragon with a somewhat birdlike configuration: the forelimbs are bat-like wings and the rear limbs are their two legs. In some settings ''all'' dragons are Wyverns (some writers evidently prefer ''realistic'' flying, fire-breathing Uber-serpents). In other settings, Wyverns are not considered 'true' dragons at all, but a related, usually less powerful and intelligent species. Wyverns, when they are treated separately from dragons, often lack a breath weapon, but they often have a poisonous stinger in their tails and viper-like fangs.
* Either [[GiantFlyer fly with bat-like wings]], or they lack wings and don't fly.
* Have varying levels of intelligence. Prior to [[TropeMakers Tolkien]], they rarely spoke. After Tolkien, they are often portrayed as at least as clever as men, and frequently [[MagnificentBastard (much) more so]].
* Often have some form of innate magic if intelligent.
* Live for a very long time, if not actually immortal.
* Are [[FlyingBrick incredibly strong]] and [[HealingFactor hard to kill]] but usually have one or two [[AchillesHeel fatal weak spots]]. This is traditionally under the chin, but post-Tolkien, it's more likely to be on the chest or belly, and [[GoForTheEye the eye]] is popular too.
* Sometimes have poisonous blood, breath, saliva, or some such. Often, this will kill you after you kill it.

Eastern dragons, on the other hand, come from totally different traditions and as such aren't technically dragons; Westerners who encountered stories and images of Chinese ''lóng'' and Japanese ''tatsu'' just sprung on the superficial similarities to the European dragon and couldn't think of anything better to call them. With that in mind, Eastern "Dragons":

* Are MixAndMatchCritters:
-->His horns resemble those of a stag, his head that of a camel, his eyes those of a demon, his neck that of a snake, his belly that of a clam, his scales those of a carp, his claws those of an eagle, his soles those of a tiger, his ears those of a cow. ''([[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_dragon#The_dragon_as_mythical_creature From The Other Wiki.]])''
* Are benign, but capable of destructive force.
* Are associated with water, or believed to have [[ElementalPowers power over weather]].
* Breathe ''sheng chi'', the essence of life.
* Are intelligent.
* Most often have one head and four legs.
* Can fly via magic even if they lack wings, which they usually do. When they do have wings, they are often birdlike.
* Often have the ability to [[VoluntaryShapeshifting transform into other animals]] and may even [[HumanityEnsues assume human form]].
** The latter is the [[ShapeshiftingSquick reason why]] [[HalfHumanHybrids there are half-dragons in Fantasy]].
* May be an out and out PhysicalGod.

Even within these traditions, however, there is much variability. This has increased in modern times, as Western and Eastern authors have blurred the traditions by mixing and matching attributes from both (benign Western Dragons are quite popular these days, for instance). Some authors invent completely new attributes to set their dragons apart from the crowd.

A more recent trend has been to try and make dragons that could actually exist in the real world. Naturally, these tend to either use ScienceFiction concepts or be very different from traditional dragons. Also common in later works is a tendency for dragons to [[BondCreatures form a life-long]] bond with any human or humanoid who is [[ABoyAndHisX present when they hatch]]. This gives writers a way to give dragons unique psychology without having to come up with unique motivations for them. It also explains why humanoid {{Dragon Rider}}s can boss them around.

You'd think regular old dragons were boring or something!

Compare GiantFlyer, and other DragonTropes.

Not to be confused with TheDragon, a position only sometimes held by a real dragon (while dragons themselves can just as easily be {{Big Bad}}s).

Note: In real life there is a really big lizard referred to as a dragon, the Komodo Dragon, it is not like your typical dragon but it should be noted they are [[DemonicSpiders extremely dangerous]].
----
!!Examples:

[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder:Anime]]
* In ''TheSlayers'' universe, the "demon race" and the "godly race" are vying for control of the world. The godly race usually take on the form of Western-style dragons, but can assume human form if they so wish. Filia, a character from the third season, is a Golden Dragon that apparently isn't much used to her form as a blonde human female -- her pointed tail frequently pops out from under her dress whenever she's emotionally excited (which usually tends to happen when she's in the presence of the {{Trickster}} demon, Xellos).
** Though technically, Filia isn't a god herself. The Shinzoku do often resemble dragons, but actual flesh-and-blood dragons like Filia are just a mortal race that serves them. Which explains why they're so much weaker than their supposed opposite numbers, the Mazoku...
** I don't think you can say that they're much weaker. If compared with lesser Mazoku, Filia is actually quite powerful, and she's just a child by dragon standards. Comparing her to Xelloss isn't really fair, seeing as how you can count on ''one hand'' the number of Mazoku who are more powerful than he is.
*** True, but the novels themselves state that dragons are far, ''far'' outclassed by Mazoku. It's actually a minor plot point in the seventh novel.
* ''{{Yu-Gi-Oh}}'' and it's attendant CollectibleCardGame feature a number of dragons, most famously Kaiba's iconic Blue Eyes White Dragon.
** Most of {{Yu-Gi-Oh}}'s most powerful cards are in fact dragons (if not, they most likely have "Dragon" in their name somewhere). To wit: Stardust Dragon, Dark Armed Dragon, Judgment Dragon, etc. etc...
* As do ''DuelMasters'' and its CCG. Shobu's signature card is Bolshack Dragon. Worth noting is that there are four types of dragons, including zombie dragons, not to mention "wyverns" that look like dragons but don't count as them (uh...), "Dragonoid" lizardmen, and giant reptiles called Dune Geckos. This was a CCG that was fond of horrible, destructive, scaly things.
* ''RecordOfLodossWar'' has at least three distinct "flavors" of dragons. Wyverns are small (read: elephant-sized), unintelligent, non-fiery, two-legged dragons that are domesticated and flown by knights. "Common" dragons are bestial, apparently wingless (we only ever see one so it's hard to judge all of them), huge fire-breathers. The Great Dragons, of which only five exist, are monsters the size of mountains with incredibly vast powers of intelligence and magical skill and close ties to the gods, who guard legendary treasures.
* ''Dragon Half'' features Mink, a [[HumanoidAnimals half-dragon girl]] with horns, tiny bat wings on her back (which somehow let her fly) and the ability to breathe fire. Her mother is portrayed as a shapeshifting white Western dragon.
* Dragons in ''NaruTaru'' are about as different as they can get: [[spoiler: ''baby planets'' shapeshifted into vaguely starfish-like flying immortal monsters with the power to duplicate any object they come in contact with who need to fuse with a human host then join with another dragon/human pairing to grow into an actual planet.]] And the series is still chock-full of traditional dragon lore symbolism.
* In ''The Five Star Stories'' the word dragon is best read as "mysterious alien god". Despite looking more or less like typical European dragons with a few more Eastern influences & some vaguely insectoid characteristics & pretty much living like animals most of the time, they are superintelligent & telepathic (even being able to ''hack computers with their minds'') & breathe ''quasars'' instead of fire. It is said they are actually a form of {{Organic Technology}} {{Superweapon}} created by a lost civilization. Luckily for the humans, it seems they just want to be left alone.
* ''MagicalGirlLyricalNanoha'' has Friedrich, a silver dragon whelp that can grow to adult size when [[TheBeastmaster Caro]] unseals him, and Voltaire, a massive, humanoid, ancient black guardian dragon that can launch searing torrents of flame from its mouth and wing tips.
* Igneel, Natsu's dragon foster-father in FairyTail, is notably a typical Western dragon, in order to fit the pseudo-European setting of the story.
* YuYuHakusho has Hiei and his Black Dragon spirit.
** for those not in the know, it's called the Dragon of the Darkness Flame (in the English dub, at least) and is made of black fire. He usually keeps it sealed in his right arm.
* Dragons are apparently little more than very very dangerous beasts in MahouSenseiNegima. So far, three? have appeared. One was inside the library for some reason, guarding something. Another got its face stomped on by Kaede for a bounty, and [[TookALevelInBadass Yue]] took down a Griffon Dragon with barely any supplies except her magical artifact once she bothered to actually study magic. Sooo... the whole 'danger' factor is highly reduced by the fact that they're [[EliteMook not really]] characters.
** Then one showed up, an ancient Guardian Dragon who can match Jack Rakan in combat. Scary.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Comic Books]]
* The dragons in ''{{Bone}}'' come in a variety of shapes (for example, the Great Red Dragon has rabbit-like ears and a goatee), but they're all large, intelligent fire-breathers who want what's best for humans. And then there's Mim, the Queen of the Dragons, who is part Ouroboros, part living CosmicKeystone. She's several miles long, and capable of single-handedly causing TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt.
* The titular team in the comic ''SouthernKnights'' included the character Dragon, who was originally conceived of as a [[ShapeShifting person who could transform into a dragon]]. It was later decided that he was a [[HumanityEnsues dragon who could transform into a human]]. Either way, he was a good guy.
* The Dragons in ''Series/GoldDigger'' were originally genetically engineered by a long-extinct race called the Saurians. They come in four different flavors, Iron, Copper, Gold, and Platinum, who all look like Western Dragons with Platinums being the stand-out, having magical 'vents' instead of wings. Also hatching from dragon eggs are two sub-types, Wyrms and Drakes, who look like limbless dragons and two-legged two-winged (as opposed to the normal four-legged two-winged) dragons respectively and who get little rights in draconic society. ''All'' can turn into a human form, and all full dragons (but not wyrms or drakes) can intuitively use draconic magic which not even they understand the mechanics of, just the usage. Dragons tend to be highly intelligent, but arrogant as heck. The oldest dragon Exthilion ironically looks like an oversized Wurm with a frill, but has all the talents and magics of all the true dragon varieties.
* In the alternate history fantasy series ''Arrowsmith'', the protagonist is an airman, a soldier who flies by magically transferring the flight ability of a dragonet (baby dragon) into himself. Each airman has his own dragonet companion who typically rides his shoulder, and he wears strips of skin shed by the dragonet's mother to help form a bond between them.
* The ''Fantastic Four'' villain the Dragon Man was a hi-tech robot built in the shape of a gargoyle-like dragon, animated by alchemy. It breathes fire, flies, and is super-strong. Despite its name, it does not especially resemble a man any more than your typical dragon does.
** Other MU dragons include the Midgard Serpent and Fin Fang Foom who is actually an alien.
* Dragons in the erotic comic ''Ironwood'' are all-male and reproduce by shapechanging into human males and seducing a woman; the offspring will be a full-blooded dragon, but for the first hundred years or so, he'll be infertile and trapped in human form (although ridiculously strong and tough). Since dragons enjoy sex as much as anyone else in the comic (if not moreso), they avoid overpopulation by tracking down adolescent dragons and trying to kill them (along with most of the town they're hiding in). This also ensures that a dragon that survives his "egg years" will be really tough.
* Crossgen Comics's ''Scion'' features genetically engineered dragons used as aerial tanks by the techno-medieval Heron and Raven empires. A (seemingly) more conventional dragon appears in one arc of the straight-fantasy Crossgen title ''Sojourn''.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Film]]
* TamoraPierce's dragons live in their own realm (imaginatively named [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Dragonland]]), are essentially immortal, can [[GiantFlyer fly]], and are both magical and absurdly intelligent. Interestingly, they don't have a huge antipathy towards humans unless provoked - they more or less consider the puny humans to be below their notice.
* ''StarWars'' has the Krayt Dragons: giant, nonsentient carnivorous lizards, and just about the nastiest monsters in the entire galaxy far, far away. Obi-wan scared the Sandpeople away from Luke by imitating the Krayt mating call. The skull and backbone behind C-3PO when he first sees the Jawa sandcrawler was that of a Greater Krayt. Krayt Dragons only appear directly in the ExpandedUniverse.
** In the Prequel Trilogy, the planet Utapau is home to a wide variety of dragonlike creatures used as mounts. Western-style winged dragons are seen in the background, and Obi-Wan Kenobi rides on an Eastern-style dragon, complete with lionlike mane (in fact, several fans think that this creature is a smaller, friendlier variety of Krayt Dragon).
** Also from the ExpandedUniverse: the Duinuogwuin, or Star Dragons, are sentient and (mostly) peaceful. Their bodies are centipede-like, and they are capable of fire-breathing (allegedly powered by cold fusion) and unassisted interstellar travel. I kid you not.
* The Dragon from ''{{Shrek}}'' at first appears to be an old-fashioned unintelligent monstrous Western Dragon, but is soon revealed to be [[TheUnintelligible mute but sentient]]. And female. Although she isn't capable of human speech, per se, she's capable of grunts, growls, and other sounds that work as a language well enough for Donkey, at least, to understand.
* The film ''Dragonslayer'' was mediocre at best, but featured an absolutely amazing stop-motion dragon, Vermithrax Pejorative. As in the typical scenario, the townsfolk fed her young virgins, though it appears they thought it up themselves to save their own hides rather than the dragon specifically demanding it. Vermithrax was nonsentient and lacked forelimbs, walking on the ground like a gigantic bat.
* The dragons in ''ReignOfFire'' are pretty normal, though they follow Vermithrax's "giant bat" design (same studio, please note; Disney likes Wyverns), and they produce fire by spitting out two reactive chemicals. Oh, and the entire worldwide population has only ''one'' male.
** Didn't stop the filmmakers from claiming that it was a completely original design that they just came up with.
* King Ghidorah of the {{Godzilla}} franchise is loosely based on the Yamata-No-Orochi (A dragon of Japanese folkore), albeit one with only three-heads instead of eight (This is [[JustifiedTrope Justified]] in ''GMK'' which explains that Ghidorah isn't fully mature enough to have grown all eight heads.
** Likewise, Manda is loosely based upon a typical Eastern dragon.
** While technically a [[DinosaursAreDragons mutated dinosaur that spews radiation instead of fire]], Godzilla bears some traits similar to that of Japanese Dragons (IE: Living under the ocean and wreaking havoc if disturbed or enraged). For the record, it should be pointed out that Godzilla has always been a mutated dinosaur according to WordOfGod, and that he has more in common with [[FollowTheLeader ''The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms'']] than with Japanese mythology.
*** The confusion in the fandom over this has much to do with the Godzilla films of the 1950s-1970s, which are more ambiguous to what Godzilla is. Some regard him as a legendary monster, others merely an ancient amphibious reptile. See DinosaursAreDragons for more on this.
* Mushu in ''{{Mulan}}'' is an Eastern dragon reduced to being a ComicRelief EmpathyPet. His lack of powers may be due to his being demoted after failing as a family guardian. He claims that his small stature is intentional ("I'm travel-sized for your convenience"), but is most likely a bluff. He can breathe fire (a little) and fly (with help), which comes in handy later on.
** This troper remembers reading somewhere that Mushu was considered too fearsome of an idea until they read that in Chinese lore, dragons can be any size.
* DragonHeart
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Literature]]
* Janet and IsaacAsimov's ''Norby Chronicles'' have Jamyn dragons, intelligent beings bioengineered on another planet by the {{Precursors}} known as The Others; they fly using anti-grav collars.
* In ''Mathemagics'' by Margaret Ball, this is subverted in that after a Bookstop Sci-Fi/fantasy section is mathemagically transported to another planet, the peasants there start seeing "Generic Dragons"-white with bar codes on their sides, which could come from any of a number of series. This also leads to a great line "There's a dragon on the cover of this book, there's a dragon on the cover of this book. He is green, and he has scales, and he is NOWHERE in this tale, but there's a Dragon on the cover of this book!".
* In the ''Dragonlord'' series by Joanne Bertin, wild magic long ago split all the dragon's [[OurSoulsAreDifferent souls]] in twain. They are now born within human bodies, and at some point in the human's life they discover that they are an [[OurWerewolvesAreDifferent immortal were-dragon]] (called a Dragonlord), and are compelled to seek out their "soultwin," the person who has the other half of their dragon soul. When they grow tired of life, the human soul seeks oblivion, and the dragon soul, long dormant, comes to the fore. They lose their ability to [[VoluntaryShapeshifter shapeshift]] and become "truedragons." Dragons in her world are nearly point-for-point classical Western dragons, except for the ability to breathe "Healing Fire," which is ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin. Eastern dragons that live in the water and can turn to mist are also present in her world, but they are hatched instead of cursed this way. Real dragons (who have never been Dragonlords) do exist; they can also mate and produce ''truedragon'' offspring - but these are vanishingly rare and the death of one of these young dragons is treated as a massive catastrophe for the race.
* The dragons raised by the ogre Mulgarath in ''TheSpiderwickChronicles'' generally follow the Asian serpentine design, though with several sets of legs and a venomous bite. Despite their lack of wings, they can fly by catching the air currents and "swimming" through them like a sea snake.
* In Patricia Briggs' ''Dragon Bones'' and ''Dragon Blood'', the dragons look like Western dragons. They're actually intelligent, magic-using shapeshifters and on at least one occasion have intermarried with humans. [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt This ended badly.]]
* Strabo from TerryBrooks' ''Magic Kingdom for Sale/Sold!'' appears at first to be a typical Western dragon, but turns out to be quite intelligent (almost GenreSavvy at times) and sensitive, having a self-admitted soft spot for pretty girls. It appears that he's decided that since everyone assumes he's evil, he may as well make the most of it.
* StevenBrust's ''{{Taltos}}'' stories have literal dragons, huge creatures with triangular heads and prehensile tentacles which they can use to get psychic impressions of animals; and [[ProudWarriorRaceGuy Dragons, a House of Dragaerans named for the animal]]. There are also jheregs, who look like very small dragons with only two legs and a poisonous bite, and [[ThievesGuild Jheregs, a House of Dragaerans named for the animal]].
* Chris Bunch's ''Dragonmaster'' trilogy has dragons very much in the western style, although without the ability to breathe fire. They get used by both sides of a war as aerial scouts and couriers, initially, before the protagonist had the bright idea of taking up crossbowmen and bombs (ranging from incendiaries through to enchanted rocks and ballista bolts), and his nemesis had the smart idea of using them as airlift. It is perhaps worth noting that while the dragons are treated as non-sentient flying cavalry mounts in the first two books, there are hints [[spoiler:(which if this Troper remembers correctly are confirmed in the third book)]] that they are reasonably intelligent and possibly telepathic.
* Though we don't know much about them, there ARE dragons in JimButcher's ''{{The Dresden Files}}'' universe. From what little we saw of Ferrovax in ''Grave Peril'', he's able to [[VoluntaryShapeshifter turn himself into a human]], he's [[MagnificentBastard very intelligent]] and he's incredibly [[CulturedBadass badass]]. WordOfGod says he'll be back for a bigger role sometime in the future.
**There was also another dragon involved in the background relating to how Michael Carpenter met his wife Charity. It actually involved [[spoiler: the leader of a cult of magic-users trying to sacrifice Charity to the dragon to gain more power.]] Michael, being [[KnightInShiningArmor Michael]], kicked said dragon's ass.
* The idea that every fantasy world ''has'' to have its own unique variant of dragons is both subverted and {{Lampshade}}d in Glen Cook's ''Garrett P.I.'' novels: dragons are evidently the only fantasy-staple creatures which are ''genuinely'' mythical in that world. Amusingly, dinosaurs (called 'thunder lizards') are commonplace in some regions of this world, and statues or paintings of 'dragon-slayers' often depict pterosaurs or dinosaurs in the 'dragon' role (because their artists {{Did Not Do The Research}}).
* In Cressida Cowell's ''HowToTrainYourDragon'', dragons are usually small and trainable (if frequently disobedient). There are also some that look like sharks, that have no eyes, or are teeny-weeny and spark electricity.
* ''Dragons Can Only Rust'' and ''Dragon Reforged'' by Chrys Cymri are about a robot dragon on a quest to learn [[DoAndroidsDreamOfElectricSheep whether or not he has a soul.]]
* ''TheFlightOfDragons'' by Peter Dickinson is a "speculative natural history" book, explaining how dragons might have evolved, how everything about them from hoards of gold to breathing fire was based on their flight mechanism (they were essentially living dirigibles), and why there aren't any fossils (once they died, the complicated chemical processes they used to produce hydrogen dissolved their bones).
** This [[InNameOnly vaguely inspired]] elements of the cartoon film of the same name (including the main character being named Peter Dickinson), although the plot was based on ''The Dragon and the George'' by GordonRDickson -- and wasn't much like that either!
* ''The Fire Within'', the first book of Chris D'Lacey's Fire Star chronicles, indicates that real dragons disappeared from earth long ago. However, their fire is kept alive in clay models of dragons who serve as helpers to the person they were made for.
* The dragons in DianeDuane's Middle Kingdoms setting are essentially highly intelligent immigrants from outer space, having left their dying homeworld for greener pastures long ago (and apparently under their own power rather than via ships). They also practice a form of racial immortality by letting the spirits of their departed coinhabit the bodies of the living -- which is a major plot point in ''The Door into Shadow'' when [[spoiler:a dying dragon ''and all his ancestors'' end up in the body of the main human protagonist]].
* There's only one dragon in David Eddings' ''{{Belgariad}}'', a female, who's all that's left after the two males killed each other during their first mating season. The dragon in that series is stupid, animalistic and has burning blood, but besides the blood is more of a shot at the Smaug-dragons of the twentieth century (see below).
* In ''DragonCharm'' by Graham Edwards, only dragons make up the character cast. Specifically, the large flying lizards which are your "Natural" dragons with no special traits and the "Charmed" dragons which can use magic as they see fit and tend to modify their appearance to suit their needs.
* Michael Ende's ''TheNeverendingStory'' has Falkor the Luck Dragon, a white fur-covered Eastern dragon in an otherwise Western story. In TheFilmOfTheBook, he looks quite a bit like a flying dog.
* [=~Raymond E. Feist~=]'s [[TheRiftwarCycle Riftwar books]] have dragons which are unintelligent beasts for most of their lives, only becoming sentient in their final (gold) stage of life. Most dragons never make it that far, as they tend to get killed by humans long before then because they're giant flying fire-breathing pests. No one has seen a gold dragon for years, but this isn't because of the hunting: they gain ShapeShifting at the same time as intelligence, so they've all simply started living disguised as humans.
* Lynn Flewelling's {{Nightrunner}} series includes dragons who become more sentient as they age. Their bites are also poisonous. The most commonly seen are small finger-sized baby dragons, which are largely harmless. Dog-sized dragons are considered extremely dangerous because they aren't old enough to be able to communicate, but are big enough to kill you with a bite. Dragons that are old enough to be fully sentient and have language abilities are extremely rare and have yet to be seen.
* The dragons of BarbaraHambly's ''Winterlands'' series are telepathic, magically endowed, and fairly intelligent, if a little isolated and alien in mindset. They have an honest-to-goodness addiction to gold, which is why they tend to hoard it.
* RobinHobb's ''Assassin'' trilogy features human-built dragons made out of stone, imbued with human memories, that are used as allies in a war; her ''Liveship Traders'' trilogy, set in the same universe, has a backstory of near-extinct serpentine dragons. The climax of the ''Tawny Man'' trilogy has a battle between two real dragons and an animated stone one.
* ''Nothing But Blue Skies'' by Tom Holt is an AffectionateParody of Eastern dragons and the associated mythology, with an emphasis on a) their powers of weather control and b) their ability to [[VoluntaryShapeshifting take human (and other) forms]]. The reason the British summer is usually canceled due to rain is that the main character is a dragon in human form, and doesn't have full control in that form. So it rains whenever she's annoyed. Which happens a lot. The plot concerns another dragon [[ModeLock trapped in the form of a goldfish]]; [[CoversAlwaysLie the cover, naturally]], shows a Western dragon crammed into a fishbowl.
* ''{{Havemercy}}'' by Jaida Jones and Danielle Bennett features dragons that are in fact [[RealRobot machines]]. A look at [[http://www.amazon.com/Havemercy-Jaida-Jones/dp/0553806963#reader the cover]] provides but a taste of the awesome.
* No actual dragons have yet appeared in RobertJordan's ''TheWheelOfTime'' -- "the Dragon (Reborn)" is a title used by {{The Chosen One}}s. However, a dragon appears on his primary banner, and the name must have come from ''somewhere''. (At one point Rand's previous incarnation/the insane voice in his head snarls that his enemies will learn what it means to "rouse the Dragon", which of course is an old proverb almost everywhere.) Given the cyclical nature of his world, the whole concept of "dragons" might even be a StableTimeLoop situation in which mythological dragons derive from the Dragon's behavior and his banner.
* In {{Mercedes Lackey}}'s ''{{SERRAted Edge}}'' series, there is a huge Western-style dragon with a vast, disorganized library, a love of Japanese, and the ability to shapeshift into a human. He wears Armani suits and ''loves'' popping popcorn. He also has a half-brother who is half human. His human apprentice and adopted son (even though he has a perfectly normal relationship with his parents proper) Tannim (meaning "son of Dragons") is the main protagonist of the book in which he first appears.
** There's also another [[spoiler: very antagonistic]] dragon who has a half ''[[FantasyKitchenSink kitsune]]'' daughter [[spoiler:who becomes Tannim's SO]].
* Another MercedesLackey example is the Dragon Jousters quartet, which is set in something like {{Ancient Egypt}}. These dragons come in two Western-style types. One is the crocodilian "swamp dragon" which likes water, the other is the more brightly colored, larger "desert dragon". They're established to be as smart as a bright dog (and able to [[EvilDetectingDog sense evil]]), can't breathe fire, and they imprint. Dragons taken from the wild as fledglings are forcibly trained to accept riders who treat them like flying chariots and have to be drugged; dragons raised from the egg are tame and fussed over by the ones who raise them. Riders mostly use them for patrols in which they make the enemy cautious and "joust" against enemy riders, knocking them out of the saddle to fall to their deaths. It's a major plot point that tame dragons can be trained to catch a falling man, and that another use is to pick out a human, snatch him up into the sky, and drop him.
* [[UrsulaKLeGuin Ursula K. Le Guin's]] [[EarthseaTrilogy Earthsea]] series has an interesting take on dragons. In the earliest books they resemble [[TheHobbit Smaug]] (intelligent, capricious Western Dragons), but gradually become more varied. They are highly magical, and indeed seem to be affected by the geographical limits to magic -- magic in the West Reach, where dragons are huge, cunning, and rich, and rule both the skies and islands, is different from magic in the East Reach, where dragons are very small, unintelligent, and often domesticated as housepets. Only one dragon was wise enough to learn how to {{shapeshift}}, and only one wizard, Ged, was ever able to gain the dragon's respect.
* CSLewis' ''TheChroniclesOfNarnia'' had a few Western dragons:
** Eustace sees a dragon die of age in ''The Voyage of the Dawn Treader''. He then discovers the dragon's treasure hoard, and falls asleep on it, thinking "greedy, dragonish thoughts". The next morning, he finds himself [[{{curse}} transformed into a dragon]].
** In ''The Silver Chair'', Eustace and Jill see dragons among the many creatures sleeping under the earth, waiting for [[TheEndOftheWorldAsWeKnowIt the end of the world]].
** When the world ends in ''The Last Battle'', these dragons and other creatures awake, eat all Narnia's trees, scorch the earth, then die.
* Elizabeth A. Lynn's ''Dragon's Winter'' and ''Dragon's Treasure'' features were-dragons who are born human (mostly) and ascend into their powers as adults with the aid of a personal talisman. They can't transform without the talisman, but ''can'' summon fire. They're rare nowadays, and considered lords over the other [[VoluntaryShapeshifter shapeshifters]]. They also tend towards violent, short lives with a hint of madness in their veins.
* Dragons in ''ASongOfIceAndFire'' are mostly stereotypical Western dragons, although it is specified that they are a OneGenderRace that reproduce by parthenogenesis and strengthen magic just by existing (or at least, Fire and Blood Magic; the magic of the Others and the Old Gods were shown to be operating fine before the dragons' rebirth). It remains to be seen just how intelligent they become. In addition, George R. R. Martin, has [[WordOfGod specified that they have only four limbs]]; that is, the forelegs are part of the wings.
* James Maxley's "Bitterwood" represents an combination of traditional and quite different draconic designs. While the books have traditional western-style dragons as the ruling sun dragons, there is also the agile, wyvern-like sky dragons, and the anthropomorphic turtle-like earth dragons. These are implied to be [[spoiler: an set of geneticly engineered game-races, which eventually out-hunted humanity over most the world, driving humans into a slave-caste]]
* {{Anne McCaffrey}} is very firm in stating that her dragons are different. Anyone reading the ''DragonridersOfPern'' series will be constantly reminded that the empathic, symbiotic dragons are genetically engineered creatures, despite being "classic" Western dragons physically. Even the fire-breathing and [[PsychicPowers telepathy]] have a scientific basis rather than a magical one. This attribute keeps the series firmly in the "{{science fiction}}" section of book shops, rather than the "{{fantasy}}" shelves.
** Her dragons do have at least one characteristic that quite unique--the ability to teleport (called "going ''between'' ") not just through space, but through ''time'' as well. Going ''between'' is dangerous enough, if the rider doesn't have their destination firmly fixed in their mind dragon and rider may end up entombed in a mountain or even disappear forever. ''Timing'' has the added bonus of causing massive amounts of mental stress if there is more than one of you at that time.
***Additionally going ''between'' has other effects, such as inducing miscarriages and occasionally kidney damage. So why use it? It kills any Thread that might have landed on you, plus it's a fast way to travel in an otherwise Medieval society.
**There are two other closely related species.
***Firelizards, the species from which dragon were genetically engineered. They are much smaller, able to sit on your shoulder, and appear to be about as smart as a really smart dog. They are also apparently do not age.
***Watch-whers were the result of a mistake during the development of the dragon species. They are about the size of a very large dog or small pony. They are flightless and photophobic, and while they may develop a liking to certain individuals they do not Impress. They are often chained to a wall and used as guard dogs.
* Juliet E. Mckenna's ''TheAldabreshinCompass'' novels feature western style dragons that are a {{Godzilla}} level threat. Even one can devastate a small nation. They are tied to one of the four classic elements (Earth, Wind, Water or Fire) and while they do hoard the gem associated with that element, it is only so they can meld enough gems into a magic egg. True dragons have such a gem for their heart, illusory dragons summoned by only the most powerful wizards (or at least only by those who get page time) can become real and self aware if they rip out a true dragon's heart and eat it, [[NeonGenesisEvangelion remind you of anything?]]. An easy way to tell if there is a true dragon around is to look at the nearest wizard, if they exploded due to their powers going haywire, [[OhCrap it's a real dragon]].
* Dennis L. McKiernan's ''{{Mithgar}}'' series has two types of dragons: the bad kind that breathe gas and burn up in sunlight, and the not-so-bad kind that's still unpleasant but not downright evil. They sleep for half-millennia and make a big mess whenever they wake up. And they ''breed with krakens''.
* ''Dragonhaven'' by Robin [=McKinley=] is set in a world with no overt magic, so the dragons are natural animals. But they don't seem to be related to any other kinds of animals, and are rarely seen. And their remains (except for scales) decay very quickly so they can't be studied. They do breathe fire, but it comes from a fire-organ in their stomachs. Also, they are Australian and have pouches, a fact many people like to ignore so they can keep on thinking of dragons as romantic creatures. And it turns out that [[spoiler: they are intelligent, on the same level as humans. They have a language, which is [[StarfishLanguage very, very alien]] and based on what appears to be telepathy. But most people are uncomfortable with that idea, and say, "the T-word."]]
* The dragons in MichaelMoorcock's ''{{Elric of Melnibone}}'' series are fairly standard for the "dumb animal" type Western Dragons... except that they don't actually breathe fire. This is a misinterpretation of their ability to spit a caustic venom that tends to burst into flame at the slightest provocation.
* GarthNix's ''TheSeventhTower'' has just one dragon: the mirror-scaled Sharrakor. He is highly intelligent, and serves as TheDragon (ha!) of sorts to the Chosen Empress, [[spoiler:but in reality is the BigBad]]. Oddly enough, breathing fire is the one thing he ''doesn't'' do, although at one point, in [[LivingShadow shadow form]], he projectile-vomits a piece of himself as an attack, which then recombines with him. He prefers, in battle, to use his tail, claws, and light magic.
* AndreNorton examples:
** ''Dragon Magic'' has only two actual dragons, featured in different short stories: Fafnir (see NorseMythology below) and sirrush-lau (a swamp monster captured by the men of Meroe). The latter is nocturnal, has to be kept in water, and eats only plants (although it kills in a NightmareFuel way when startled or angry).
** ''Quag Keep'' is a DungeonsAndDragons novel set in the world of Greyhawk; the Golden Dragon Lichis appears briefly, acting as a consultant to the adventurer protagonists.
* Naomi Novik's ''{{Temeraire}}'' series involves an AlternateHistory version of the Napoleanic Wars in which Western dragons are real and have been domesticated since Roman times. Also contains variations on East and West, in that many Chinese dragons are shown to be markedly more powerful than their Western counterparts -- it's hinted that modern dragon breeding techniques originated in China -- and are treated as citizens equal to humans. The ''really'' valuable dragons, of course, are the rarest; the elite class, the Chinese-bred Celestials [[spoiler:which the title dragon is discovered to be]], can't even breed true.
** These dragons also learn human and other languages while in the egg, and can speak very soon after hatching. In places there are wild dragons living in their own communities with their own languages. The book set in Africa shows us that at least one culture there tends to freshly laid dragon eggs by telling them stories about people who have just died; the belief is that the dragons are reincarnations of their ancestors, and those dragons seem to concur. This lead to a situation where a small, young female dragon is the culture's king.
* The dragons in Christopher Paolini's ''TheInheritanceTrilogy'' have the same powers as your average Western dragon, and like many modern dragons they're highly intelligent. They can psychically talk to their [[strike: partners]] masters and (excepting the wild ones) are quite friendly to humans.
* The [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin red dragons]] of Meredith Ann Pierce's ''FirebringerTrilogy'' are wingless, have jewel-encrusted hides, live deep beneath a volcanic mountain range, and spend most of their (very long) lives asleep and [[spoiler: watching the goings-on of the world through their dreams, as the main character discovers to his dismay in the third book.]] The queen and her mate (the only black dragon) are the only dragons to have wings, and a queen loses hers after her mating flight while her erstwhile consort flies off somewhere unknown, though the queen will continue to produce eggs from that one mating for the rest of her life. A male is only born every thousand years, and it's only a queen and her consort who breed; thus, all dragons are closely related sisters (or aunts and nieces depending on the generation(s) living) and [[BrotherSisterIncest a queen's consort is always her brother.]]
* TerryPratchett features two types of dragons in his ''{{Discworld}}'' novels: noble dragons are typical Western dragons, but have to feed on high levels of magic [[{{Deconstruction}} to get away with their impossible physiology]]; as such, they are effectively extinct on the Discworld, having migrated to [[SealedEvilInACan a pocket dimension]]. They're used as mounts by the Dragonriders of Wyrmberg (from ''Discworld/{{The Colour of Magic}}''), who live in a highly-magical area. The far more common swamp dragons, on the other hand, are small, rather friendly Western dragons as they'd have to be ''without'' magic: rather than huge, majestic, and cunning monsters, they're small, ugly, and rather dim creatures that can barely fly, and are only dangerous because they tend to explode when ill or overexcited (due to the complicated internal chemistry set that allows them to breathe fire).
** When the characters travel to the moon in ''Discworld/TheLastHero'', they find another kind of dragon, similar to the swamp dragons, but much more graceful in the low gravity, and with the fire coming out the other end as a rocket boost, [[spoiler:much like Errol the swamp dragon from ''[[Discworld/GuardsGuards Guards! Guards!]]'']]
*** Also found in the The Last Hero is a space-faring dragon, Hundreds of metres long, that looks suspisiously like a [[SpaceWhale certain popular space-faring cetation...]]
* Dragons in Michael Reaves' ''The Shattered World'' are of the Western sort, and apparently not sentient. They're also being hunted to extinction for their hides and bones, which are the only known materials from which dragonships, enchanted vessels used to sail between the fragments of [[ShatteredWorld the broken planet]], can be crafted.
* Mike Resnick's ''DragonAmerica'' is an AlternateHistory in which North America, for some reason, is inhabited by many varieties of dragons, which died out long ago in the rest of the world. Some of them seem to be merely surviving dinosaurs ... but there '''are''' firebreathers, too. This comes in handy when George Washington sends Daniel Boone to learn from the Native Americans how to control dragons to help fight the Redcoats.
* Dragons in JohnRingo's ''ConcilWars'' series were genetically engineered by, amusingly, Disney Genegeneers in the early 21st Century. They made two different varieties, the large, sentient Greater Dragons and the smaller Wyverns that were roughly equivalent to horses in intelligence. The only reason they're able to fly at all is because of muscles and bones made from incredibly strong and light 'bioextruded carbon-nanotube'. The smaller, nonsentient ones are called wyverns, the larger, intelligent ones are dragons.
* Christopher Rowley's ''Bazil Broketail'' series contains flightless, wingless dragons with aquatic ancestry. They are integrated into human society and fight with swords and use tools. There are also wild winged dragons, but neither type breathes fire.
** Properly only the winged dragons are called dragons in the series. the non-flying ones are referred to as Wyverns.
** Another note is that 'The Wild Purple-Green', during one particularly strenuous battle [[spoiler:after he joins up with Basil's unit]] wishes he had the fiery breath of his ancestors. Whether that is fact or just a dragon legend is never elaborated on.
* In ''Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them'', JKRowling describes describes all sorts of dragons which possess powerful magic but aren't especially bright. Most are European in design, except for the Chinese Fireball. In ''{{Chamber of Secrets}}'', Harry also kills a Basilisk ([[OurMonstersAreDifferent here portrayed as a giant, vaguely dragonish snake]]), and nearly dies of its venom. This may be a ShoutOut to Beowulf, Carston, Sigurd, Thor, and many, many others.
** On the other hand, JKRowling is supposedly a fan of Graeco-Roman mythology, and basilisks as described by Pliny are so poisonous that when a man on horseback once killed one with a spear, the poison traveled up the spear, killing the rider and the horse as well.
* Smaug from ''TheHobbit'' broke from the Western tradition by being intelligent, magical, and capable of speech, and the author's depiction of him resembled a serpentine eastern dragon with wings. This was so successful a [[TropeMakers trendsetter]] that the older mindless, animalistic Western dragon is now a decided minority (at least in {{fantasy}} {{literature}}). He did, however, hoard treasure, and was even enraged by the theft of a cup from his stockpile, just like the one that finished off {{Beowulf}}, presumably in order to keep the folkloric basis of the book prevalent.
** Interestingly, in the animated version of ''TheHobbit'', Smaug has [[http://www.thehobbit-movie-buzz.com/wp-content/uploads/hobbit/large_smaug_dragon_from_thehobbit_animated-r7nn9rsi.jpg a furry back ruff and somewhat lupine/vulpine head,]] but also a large body and wings, a sort of Eastern/Western hybrid. Perhaps this is due to it being a Japanese/American co-production.
** There are three kinds of dragons in Middle Earth, actually- winged dragons, like Smaug; fire drakes, which can breath fire but can't fly, and cold drakes, which can do neither. All are descended from the ancient fire drake Glaurung, whose origin was never totally revealed, save that it was connected to Morgoth. All the dragons seen on page were evil and also highly intelligent and magically powerful, to the extent that they might be said to have MagnificentBastard as their [[PlanetOfHats hat]].
*** In the various background writings, dragons, like the Balrogs, are described as lesser Maiar corrupted by Morgoth, warped by him into reptilian form. Nearly all the evil races and beings were similarly created by Morgoth, out of corrupted Maiar or Elves.
* The dragons in Alan F. Troop's ''Delasangre'' series are arrogant, amoral, long-lived [[VoluntaryShapeshifting shapeshifters]] who are [[MarySue just too awesome to take seriously]].
* AndreNorton and MercedesLackey teamed up to write ''TheHalfbloodChronicles'', in which a half-elven girl is raised by a foster family made up of dragons. Together with her Dragon foster brother, the heroine fights for freedom and subverts almost every worn-out fantasy trope you can think of. The dragons are from another world, are evidently mammalian, have electricity-based powers and poisonous talons, and are supremely talented [[VoluntaryShapeshifting Shapeshifters]]. Quite a few of them also seem to have the XanatosRoulette power...
* David Weber's ''HellsGate'' series features dragons used as weapons of war by the Arcanan Union, though these dragons are the result of a long-running magical bioengineering program and come in several different varieties, including transport and attack versions, the latter divided by their type of breath weapon. They are intelligent, at least on level with horses, seem to have some degree of psionic sensitivity, and for all intents and purposes are living, breathing WW2 combat aircraft-the dragon-riding corps is even named the Arcanan Air Force.
* Seeing how "Dragons" are in every book title of the ''EnchantedForestChronicles'' by PatriciaCWrede, she says quite a good deal about her dragons. Her dragons mostly fit the western stereotype as far as physical looks, but otherwise they act about as human as the rest of the characters. They speak, read, collect stuff, and have their own society and government. They fly and breathe fire, and can do magic because they are creatures born with magic inside (as opposed to the wizards, who must draw out magic from other sources). Dragons are generally more clever and wise than any of the other races, but there are several exceptions. They also die, age (albeit much slower than humans), shed their scales, and produce offspring.
** Although, there are certain rules that require dragons to act in a noble manner. Because if they stop acting like dragons [[spoiler:they turn into frogs.]]
* Western type dragons in the myths of the world in ''TheNameOfTheWind'' are based on a creature called a Draccus, which is more like a giant iron-scaled, fire-breathing, herbivorous lizard-cow. The iron comes from the absorption of minerals into the draccus's body from ground up gizzard stones, and the fire is caused by a buildup of methane gas that the draccus ignites as a mating display. They are normally harmless, though [[spoiler: the one in the book isn't because it went crazy after swallowing some narcotic trees.]] (ItMakesSenseInContext)
* An interesting variation shows up in the novel ''The Iron Dragon's Daughter.'' The dragons in this world are completely mechanical, although sentient and sapient, and are used as the in-world equivalent of fighter jets.
* Terek Domar of [[http://thelonelywinds.com/library.php The Lonely Winds]] is a monster we are told once ravaged ancient lands that now, for some reason, spends time sitting around an abandoned warehouse in the city. This dragon fits many of the modern characteristics, being massive, highly intelligent, a user of potent magic and being a physical powerhouse, in addition to having a *very* short temper. Though in early installments the dragon seemed to be in some sort of bondage, more recent issues have had him do some pretty scary things. Another dragon, nicknamed “Cinder,” was a considerably more pleasant creature that was participating in a plan to essentially assassinate Terek Domar. [[spoiler: It didn’t work out, as Terek Domar nearly tore Cinder to shreds in the process of killing him.]]
* Lord Ebondrake from the ''{{Warhammer 40000}} GreyKnights'' novel ''Hammer of Daemons'' takes the form of a large bipedal Western dragon. The effective ruler of Drakaasi, with the necessary intelligence, he's described as [[LightningBruiser having "speed and grace alien to his size"]], wears armour, has flight-capable wings and breathes black flame.
* Edith Nesbit's "The Dragon Tamers" includes a Western style dragon covered nose to tail in rusty armor plating; after a set of adventures (including a fight with a giant), he ends up befriending the blacksmith's son and the other children in the village, after which the armor falls off and the dragon turns out to be the world's first cat. [[BetterThanItSounds Check it out here]] http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks07/0700681h.html
* ''Jennifer Scales''.
* The lloigor of H.P. Lovecraft's ''Cthulhu Mythos'' fiction are invisible alien horrors, but can create reptilian bodies for themselves which are rumored to have inspired the dragons of myth (notably in Wales, where dragon iconography is 'rampant' in the local heraldry).
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Live Action TV]]
* The Discovery Channel MiniSeries ''FlyingWithDragons'' is a pseudo-documentary all about a "recently discovered" species of prehistoric [[DoingInTheWizard scientifically possible]] dragons.
* In {{Knightmare}} there seem to be three differenttypes of Western style dragons, based on color. The smallest and weakest are blue and are never actually seen, just mentioned. Greens are the friendliest (in the sense that they are willing to deal at all with humans). Red dragons are both the most powerful and most wildly destructive.
* In {{Merlin}} [BBC], the (male) dragon lives under the castle in a cave, can talk and knows magic.
* In ''LostTapes'' a "Dragon" appears, but as a variant of the RealLife Komodo Dragon that was thought to be extinct: the Megalania. It eats a SurvivorMan wannabe.
* ''SpecialUnit2'' references European and Asiatic dragons, and prominently features a "Native American" dragon. However, it acts like (and vaugely resembles) the stereotypical European portrayal in terms of behavior, is armored like a Tank and has a taste for gnomes.
* ''KamenRider'' has had three dragon featuring seasons so far. ''KamenRiderAgito'' is a chinese dragon based humanoid and the show implies that humans will become like Agito. ''KamenRiderRyuki'' has the twin dragons Dragredder and Dragblacker. Finally, ''KamenRiderKiva'' has Tatuslot as Kiva's power-up.
**How could you forget Castle Doran and his chibi power-up?
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Mythology]]
* One of the dragons that Saint George fought was smart enough to try to kill him by carrying him high into the sky and dropping him. While older examples exist, this was the first well-known and really popular example of a dragon obsessed with devouring young maidens, and may be the TropeMaker.
* The story of Saint Margaret and the dragon is usually dated to the same time as the more popular St. George legend; she's usually differentiated from the other canonized Margarets as "Saint Margaret the Virgin". She was swallowed whole by {{Satan}} in the form of a dragon and walked out alive. She's not quite as well known today, but at one point, there were nearly 300 churches dedicated to her in England alone, and the cult of Saint Margaret was quite widespread at the time the trope was probably first being forged.
* {{Satan}} is described as a red dragon with seven heads ("the Beast") in the Biblical [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt book of Revelation]]. His tail knocks a third of the stars out of the sky, and he spews a river from his mouths.
** The Beast of Revelation was an allegory for Rome, thinly disguised so as to sneak past Roman censors. ("The seven heads are seven hills.")
* [[TheBible the book of Job]] describes the Leviathan, a creature covered in air-tight sword/spear/arrow-proof scales, weilding [[BreathWeapon fire breath]], and with the ability to [[SuperStrength snap iron like it was straw]].
* {{Beowulf}} kills a dragon and then dies of its venom, awoken after a servant steals a cup from its treasure hoard. There's also much confusion over whether Grendel and/or his mother are dragons, ogres, demons, monstrous humans, or something else entirely.
* Nidhoggr from NorseMythology gnaws on the roots of [[WorldTree Yggdrasil]], waiting to be freed and wreak destruction come [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt Ragnarok]].
* Fafnir, also from [[NorseMythology Norse myth]], was a man (or dwarf, in some tellings) who turned himself into a dragon so that he could better guard an enormous pile of treasure. (Other versions of the story have him just be a dragon from the start, but the treasure is always there.) Sigurd (who is his nephew in the once-human versions of the story) killed him by stabbing him through the weak point under the chin, and narrowly missed being killed by poisonous blood. Most of the dragonslaying tropes [[TropeMakers derive from this chap]].
** And yet Sigurd also gained invulnerability from bathing in the blood (leaving an AchillesHeel on his shoulder), and the ability to comprehend all languages (or at least the language of birds) by tasting it... (the particular story I've read has him burn his finger while prodding the dragon's heart that he was cooking. After sticking his finger in his mouth, he began to hear birds talking about how he was to be betrayed by his greedy dwarf companion)...
*** That's pretty much how it happens in RichardWagner's ''Siegfried'' -- the blood is acidic, and when Siegfried touches it his finger burns (chemically). He sucks on his finger to quell the burn, and suddenly can speak with birds. Since birds in German poetry represent truth, the birds he talked to were essentially Omniscient. (Although in ''Götterdämmerung'', we learn that he stopped listening to the birds since he got a girl. Message, Wagner?)
** Wagner does not actually say the blood is acidic. It might be, but then again, it might not. All that we know is that Siegfried says, „''Wie Feuer brennt das Blut!''‟ Considering that it just came out of a dragon, it could well be merely superheated.
*** Note that Fafnir could talk, and heavily inspired Tolkien's dragon Glaurung. Thus, most modern portrayals of Western dragons trace their roots back to Fafnir.
* ''Again'' from Norse myth, at Ragnarok, Thor is supposed to die after killing Jormungandr the World-Serpent from its poisonous breath.
* The Mordiford Wyvern was killed by a convict named Carston in exchange for his freedom. Carston hid inside a barrel coated with spikes, and when the dragon tried to eat him, ended up impaling itself on all the spinities. However, its blood trickled in and poisoned Carston to death.
** Note that there are at least four folk tales, very similar to this, from around the British Isles. For example, the Sockburn Wyrm (or Wyvern) was slain by John Conyers, who wore a set of spiky armour so that the Wyrm impaled itself while it was trying to crush him to death, and Conyers then hacked it to pieces with his falchion. The falchion with which he supposedly killed the Wyrm is still in the Durham Cathedral Treasury.
** Then there's the Laidly Worm, where the princess ''is'' the dragon; the Lambton Worm, which grew from a creature no larger than your thumb and which laid a curse upon nine generations of its slayer's family; and the Linton Worm, whose death throes created the "Wormington".
* In Welsh mythology, the god Dewi takes the form of a giant dragon: the western variety of course.
* Greek myth has Jason slaying a dragon who doesn't sleep to claim the [[MacGuffin Golden Fleece.]]
[[/folder]]

[[folder:NewspaperComics]]
* The fen dragons in early ''PrinceValiant'' strips were basically gigantic crocodiles who dwelt in the swamps. A much more recent story arc pitted Val against a truly titanic lizard from a LostWorld, which attacked Camelot [[MonsterIsAMommy seeking its stolen egg.]]
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Tabletop RPGs]]
* ''DungeonsAndDragons'', naturally, has a panoply of them. The most common kinds are divided into good and evil [[ColorCodedForYourConvenience by color]]; the metallic dragons (gold, silver, bronze, copper, and brass) are good, and the chromatic dragons (red, black, blue, green, and white) are evil. There are also many weirder kinds, such as fairy dragons, gem dragons, planar dragons, and the extremely rare and powerful "epic" dragons. And, of course, some of these can not only shapeshift into humans, but [[ShapeshiftingSquick breed with humans whilst transformed]], giving us [[HalfHumanHybrids half-dragons]]. There's the dragon ''type'', which features creatures with draconic traits that don't quite measure up to "true" dragons. And then there's the Eastern dragons... Let's just say that there's a reason that dragons get title billing second only to "Dungeons".
** Dragons are also powerful spellcasters in ''D&D'', to the extent where many "spontaneous" arcane casters--that is, those who don't have to study or prepare spells--are said to be descended from dragons, as dragon blood can influence a line for a thousand generations.
** The queen of the evil chromatic dragons is Tiamat, who has five heads (one of each color) and a wyvern-like stinger. In [[Series/DungeonsAndDragons the cartoon series]], she was a secondary threat to Venger. The good dragons have Bahamut, the Platinum Dragon, who of course sold more than a million copies. Neutral dragons have Chronepsis, the AnthropomorphicPersonification of complete indifference.
*** And those are all descended from Io, the other TrueNeutral god of all dragons.
** The ''Draconomicon'' is a {{Sourcebook}} for 3rd Edition ''D&D'', dealing ''entirely'' with different types of dragons, dragon society, dragon characters, etc.
*** 4th edition is apparently going to release several, seeing as the most recently released version was for chromatics only. Chronepsis is now connected to the Raven Queen, the goddess fo death; deep, fang, and sand dragons are now chromatic rather than "dragons from nowhere", there are fairy dragons the size of halflings, and then there's the Squamous Things, which are what happens when dragons are hatched in Far Realm-tainted areas...<[[NightmareFuel Shudder]]>
** The {{Eberron}} campaign setting subverts ColorCodedForYourConvenience--at least, the morality side of it. Whereas dragons all have "Always [CharacterAlignment]" in the core books, in Eberron this is changed to "usually" or "often". Surprise your party with a [[ChaoticGood principled revolutionary]] red dragon fighting against a [[LawfulEvil charming but tyrannical]] gold dragon!
*** Eberron's dragons are also uniformly obsessed with the Prophecy, which is long, conveniently obscure, drawn-out, and ridiculously complex. Between fighting off mad adventurers and hoarding wealth, they pore over old relics and occasionally share notes with their, er, colleagues.
*** The ''Player's Guide to Eberron'' begs to differ - there are dragons all over the world who have grown up in the local environment and may never have even heard of Argonnessen. As the Guide puts it, "It could just be hungry. Good luck with it."
** Interestingly, D&D dragons in general seem to combine features of Eastern and Western dragons. The 3rd Edition Gold Dragon looks especially Eastern.
** Dragons in the Mystara setting have their own civilization, complete with dragon temples, dragon villages, and ''dragon shopkeepers'', high in the Wyrmsteeth Mountains. Mystaran dragons, like those of Eberron, are not strongly tied to their alignments ... which is a good thing for everyone, as the ''only'' metallic varieties found there (barring DisContinuity) are gold.
** Way back in second edition, there was a setting called CouncilOfWyrms - basically, a planet ruled by dragons. Demihumans are the dragons' servants, whilst humans are the barbaric savages and murders thereof. The player characters are indicated to be agents of the Council - young dragons from all the D&D dragon types, given to the Council as eggs and bound to act as investigators and troubleshooters.
** In DarkSun, unlike any other D & D campaign world, all dragons are the result of evil sorcerer-kings [[ScaledUp transforming themselves into dragons]] to increase thier power. They use and consume even more life-force energy (thereby changing the world into a barren desert) than they could do if they remained in human form.
* Palladium's ''{{Rifts}}'' and related games feature almost as many dragons, based on Western, Eastern, and Mythological sources, plus their own imaginations, from Hydras to Chiang-Ku to Ogopogo to Crystal Dragons. Unfortunately for would-be heroes, these are not color-coded, although there are some species that tend to generally be nicer than others. It even allows you to have a young hatchling dragon as a playable character.
* ''{{Shadowrun}}'' divides its dragons into "normal" and greater varieties. Regular dragons are simply incredibly powerful, yet vicious and feral, sentient beings, while greater ones are immortal {{Bad Ass}}es with intelligence only matched by their power (both physical and magical), strange, alien motivations few can even hope to comprehend, and centuries-long {{Xanatos Gambit}}s in play. Both varieties come in both Western and Eastern forms, as well as the feathered serpents common to Central American mythologies.
** Oh, and one (of the Greater variety, of course) got elected President, but was assassinated before he could take office; the method of said assassination (blowing up his limo) only worked because the dragon was in his [[MadeOfPlasticine squishy human form]], since any assassination attempt while he was in dragon form would have required anti-tank weaponry at the very least. Regardless, the dragon's death left a gigantic, mysterious rift in the astral plane. And, of course, it later turned out that his own death was just the crowning step in that particular dragon's XanatosGambit.
** It was later revealed that Great Dragons are simply very very old dragons. Regular dragons were 'feral' because unlike their elders, they had no experience in living as part of a civilized society and very little socialization with humans. By the time of 4th edition, pretty much ''all'' dragons have moved past this -- having been 'awake' for nigh-on 70 years now, the only dragons who don't function well in civilized society are those who don't ''want'' to, they've all had ample opportunities for modern education from their elders. Granted, a 'civilized' dragon is still likely going to be an extremely arrogant, self-centered being -- they're just going to use more lawyers and less flame breath as they go about it.
*** Obviously EvenEvilHasStandards don't come into play.
* Dragons in the ''IronKingdoms'' resemble the traditional Western versions superficially, but cleave a little closer to {{Cosmic Horror}}s in the details. They aren't "alive" in the same sense as other creatures; instead, their life force is concentrated into a small, nigh-unbreakable stone located inside their heart, and unless that stone is consumed by another dragon, a "dead" dragon can simply resurrect itself (if it wants to -- at least one dragon in the setting currently finds it more useful to remain in rock form and manipulate others into doing his bidding). If that weren't enough, exposure to a dragon's blood or body parts causes severe, painful mutations in the victims, and a dragon can also simply shed its own blood to create dragonspawn: blind, soulless monsters that only vaguely resemble the beast that spawned them.
* Dragons in ''{{Warhammer}}'' are intelligent, though it is unclear exactly ''how'' intelligent, and whether they can speak. The setting also has wyverns, raised by Orcs. They are about as smart as horses and are smaller and less powerful than true dragons.
** Said dragons are also said to be the oldest living things on the planet, dating back to an age before the [[{{Precursors}} Old Ones]] came and made the planet warmer. The oldest dragons are sleeping, waiting for the days when the world will cool again, while the younger ones can sometimes be roused by powerful magic or great heroes to fight alongside them.
** ''{{Warhammer 40000}}'' has no true dragons in sight (besides name references, particularly among Eldar) but it's a big galaxy. Certain types of [[ZergRush Tyranid]] and [[TheLegionsOfHell Daemons]] get close, and then there's the mysterious EldritchAbomination known as the Void Dragon...
** who gets a lot more coverage in GrahamMcNeill's HorusHeresy book ''Mechanicum'', fitting the trope very, very closely.
* In the Old WorldOfDarkness, dragons were immensely powerful Mythicals which were variously described; while it is never clear, they appear to be either the (non-)AnthropomorphicPersonification of everything humanity fears and/or doesn't understand, or [[PhysicalGod avatars of deities]] outright. There are probably more than one type, but since only Changelings and the most powerful of archmages could ever encounter them (and even then often only realized it after the fact), the whole thing is shrouded in mystery even by White Wolf standards. The only dragon clearly shown is Pelé, the Hawaiian volcano goddess, who either lives in the volcano of the same name or ''is'' the volcano itself; she appears in human guise to warn a wandering group of Kithain of an imminent eruption, because she's trying to maneuver them into an encounter with the native faerie folk.
** The Mokole werelizards from Werewolf:TheApocalypse are arguably dragons depending on how one defines them. They can shapeshift (obviously), have access to powerful magic, and have inspired dragon legends everywhere outside Europe (where they are rare).
** In the new World of Darkness dragons are the legendary predecessar inhabitants of Atlantis, who left for parts unknown before humans came to inhabit the island. Items theorised to have been dragon bones are purported to have had the property of allowing one to attempt Awakening at will (as opposed to the period covered by known history, in which Awakening appears to be a mostly random process).
*** There's also a dragon written up for ChangelingTheLost -- Dzarumazh, one of the True Fae. His stats are ''ridiculous'', completely up in the VillainSue territory.
* In Castle Falkenstein, dragons are evolutionary descendants of pteranadons and other ancient flying lizards, having gained immense magical powers along the way. While some still behave like classic dragons, demanding virgin sacrifices (albiet [[FaceFullofAlienWingWong with a sexual twist]]) most are more civilized, using their magic to shapeshift and court human women. This goes over surprisingly well given their tremendous wealth, a decided virtue within the game's Victorian setting. As a side note, their evolutionary origins also gives them surprisingly brittle bones.
* {{GURPS}} has a recently released sourcebook detailing dragon stats, physiology and abilities. They also appear in a few campaign settings.
* The {{HORDES}} BigBad Everblight, though he is more of a [[TheDarkLord Dark Lord]].
* Dragons in ''Talislanta'' are HUGE, aggressive, wingless, and mostly non-sentient or uncommunicative. They hatch out as larval "wyrmms", then metamorphose into their adult forms (land dragons, sea dragons, kaliya [multi-headed], or crested dragons). Land dragons are sometimes tamed and used as living tanks by saurans.
* In the lesser-known (and discontinued) RPG ''Fireborn'', the PCs are dragons. During character creation, the player creates both a humanoid, weaker modern version, as well as a high-powered dragon form which is played during flashbacks to a prior life.
* In {{Exalted}}, Dragons are elemental beings, born from leaking life energy of the flat planet, who may-or-may-not have empowered the divine champions known as the Dragon-Blooded. And the Dragon Kings are humanoid dinosaurs.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Video Games]]
*''{{Lineage 2}}'' usually (read: nearly always) follows the western style of dragons, despite this being a Korean game. Hey, it is a medieval European setting... Within this though are somewhat large variety of them, sometimes taken to extremes verging on BeyondTheImpossible. This goes all the way up to the terrible twosome, Antharas the green earth dragon, and Valakas, the four-winged red fire dragon. Both of them are, from the player's perspective, probably as big as oil tankers. And I'm talking about SHIPS, not trucks.
* ''{{Lunar}}'' dragons resemble Western dragons, but it's notable that young dragons look like small, winged cats. And apparently, they shit diamonds (At least the White one does. You might get Rubies/Sapphires/Onyx from the other three.).
* ''FinalFantasyVI'' had eight legendary dragons in the World of Ruin (which were simply {{Palette Swap}}ped versions of other enemy sprites). Beating all eight would unlock a powerful summon that deals a lot of unblockable damage to everyone on the battlefield, [[AwesomeButImpractical your party members included]], which was otherwise unobtainable. Of course, you had to be near the very end of the game to beat all eight dragons anyway.
*''FinalFantasyXI'' has several distinct types. There's the small baby wyvern that Dragoons get as a pet (that have arms), much larger wyverns (that apparently shed their arms as they grew) that are often encountered as high level normal enemies, and dragons that often have some magic and are only ever bosses (and are ugly as sin). Finally, there are wyrms, which are huge western-looking dragons that wield magic and are highly intelligent, and mostly represent one of the game's basic elements. Wyrms can take anywhere from 18-36 people to kill. Bahamut, incidentally, is also known as the Wyrmking who, as the name implies, rules over the rest of the wyrms. There's a battlefield where you have to face him and other wyrms ''simultaneously.''
** Dragoon's wyverns are actually baby wyrms, SE just added them before they had added the wyrms to the game. According to the game, the dragoon's wyvern "is marked with the holy crest" that makes them good, while shadow dragons and wyverns don't have the crest and are either evil or animalistic. The wyrms are benevolent and work for Bahamut, and one of the wyrms mentioned above was actually the wyvern of the last dragoon. (before the player characters, anyway) You fight them for convoluted plot reasons, this being Square after all.
* ''FinalFantasyXII'', meanwhile, classified ''all'' large reptiles as dragons, including the expected wyrms and wyverns, but also [[DinosaursAreDragons dinosaurs]].
* Almost all ''FinalFantasy'' games have Bahamut, one of the most reoccurring and strongest summons in the games. He's more western style.
** ''Compliation of FinalFantasyVII'' ups the ante with ''five'' Bahamut variations: Bahamut, Neo Bahamut, Bahamut Zero, Bahamut Fury, and Bahamut SIN, in order from weakest to strongest. They're all western style dragons, of course.
* ''JadeEmpire'' is a Western game, but its world is a fantasy version of ancient China, so the Water Dragon is wholly Eastern- she's [[spoiler:the Goddess of water]] and [[spoiler: responsible for shepherding the souls of the dead into the next life.]]
** Various ingame EncyclopediaExposita also mention a 'Great Dragon', the local Creator and [[HaveYouSeenMyGod (apparently on sabbatical)]] head of the CelestialBureaucracy.
* ''{{Pokemon}}'' considers "Dragon" to be one of the many elemental types that a Pokemon can have, but also features a few non-Dragon Pokemon who definitely fit the classical mold, namely [[http://i417.photobucket.com/albums/pp255/spekkie_the_first/revamp/dezard.png Charizard]] (Western) and [[http://i372.photobucket.com/albums/oo169/maxiree_photo/gyarados.jpg Gyarados]] (Eastern). And there's also some Dragon-type Pokemon who are ''very'' different ([[http://i313.photobucket.com/albums/ll384/DarkLucario000/altaria.jpg Altaria]]).
** What are the iconic dragons of {{Pokemon}}, Dratini-Dragonite? Eastern for Dratini and Dragonair, but Western for Dragonite?
*** Not necessarily, dragons and [[StockNessMonster sea serpents]] have a long history of overlap.
* The Draic Kin of ''TheLongestJourney''. They resemble the Western variety physically (although they can disguise themselves as humans) but have the nature-spirit culture of the Eastern dragons. In fact, they are actually aliens with powers akin to God who lived on Earth for over twelve millenia and helped humans to split the planet in two.
* ''WarCraft'' dragons look Western, but the leader of each Dragonflight is called an Aspect. Each Aspect is charged by the gods with protecting a specific domain, like time, earth, magic, life, or dreams on the world of Azeroth. Some of the Dragonflights have become corrupted or mad over time.
** Red dragons are generally benign but are still predators (they have a burning hatred for Orcs after War Craft 2). Green are usually benign but rarely seen (some have gone insane). Blue and bronze dragons are LawfulNeutral or TrueNeutral. Black dragons used to be good, but that changed after Death Wing went insane possibly after the death of one of his beloved children.
** Naturally, there is plenty of opportunity to fight dragons in ''WorldOfWarcraft'', from whelps that are barely more than a annoying common enemy up to 40-man raid encounters.
** An interesting variation are the dragonkin, which look more like lizards. They don't have wings but instead an extra set of limbs, exept a few that ahve 6 limbs and a pair of wings. According to the official [=RPGs=], they are former mortals who served the dragons so long that they took on their traits. They are usually found together with the whelp variety (adult dragons are fairly rare).
** There are also drakonids, which are [[HalfHumanHybrids half-man, half-dragon]] creatures created in the laboratories of Blackwing Lair.
*** Though there are also drakonids that serve the other dragonflights and could not have possibly been created in Nefarion's laboratories. They have been stated to have naturally come about. [[YouFailBiologyForever Try not to think too hard]] about [[HotSkittyOnWailordAction that one]]
** There's also wyverns, but they don't appear to be related to dragons in any way. They look like lions with batlike wings and a scorpion-like tail (your encyclopedia of mythology would identify these as traits more befitting a Manticore). They are apparently quite intelligent and used by the Horde as flying mounts.
** Players can use some dragons as mounts: There are Nether Dragons in Outland, introduced in the ''Burning Crusade'' expansion. These dragons descended from Black Dragonflight eggs that were caught up in the storm of energy that broke Draenor, and ended up with a strange physiology (almost shark-like heads, one-fingered wings like a pterodactyl, and a fin on the end of the tail). They are a faction that players can befriend, and after a lot of work, they can earn the right to ride one as a flying mount. In the upcoming expansion, ''Wrath of the Lich King'', players can win an Albino Drake mount after completing the achievement "Leading the Cavalry", which is given for owning a total of 50 mounts.
*** Proto-drakes also appear in ''Wrath of the Lich King''; they are said to be the primitive ancestors of modern intelligent dragons. They look similar to wyverns (two legs and two wings). They are obtainable as mounts via completing certain achievements, or a single rare spawn in Northrend, that will always give the mount when killed.
**** Which is odd, given that according to the lore the Titans created the dragons directly, to help battle the Old Gods. Which is made odder still by the fact that apparently all titan creations are made of metal, and the aspects, who were supposedly made by the titans, are flesh and blood. Except Deathwing, who is evil.
**** Actually, it has not been stated that the Titans created the dragons. The background seems to suggest they already existed when the Titans came, as the Aspects are described as being created by the Titans empowering already existing dragons. However this seems to have been retconned in Wrath of the Lich King, where it is stated that the Titans created the Aspects using the giant protodrake Galakrond as their progenitor. Presumably they then created the dragonflights after the Aspects.
**** Proto-drakes acutally have 6 limbs, two legs, two wings, and two very short and stubby t-rex like arms.
***** Then there are [[http://www.wowwiki.com/Frost_wyrm frost wyrms.]]
* ''WildArms'' dragons are very different. How different? Well for one thing, they're [[MechanicalLifeforms sentient robots]] [[TransformingMecha that transform into jet fighters]] when they fly.
* ''{{Runescape}}'' uses Western dragons, (Ice) Wyverns, a three-headed Black dragon (which has been shown to be sentient), and... [[RuleOfCool Metal dragons!!!]]
* In ''TheElderScrolls'' universe, the Dragon is the symbol of the Tamrielic Empire. Interestingly, although the Empire itself is styled after the historical Roman one, the dragons are definitely of Eastern variety, to the point that the Imperial Throne of Tamriel is called "The Dragon Throne", just like the one in Imperial China. There are also western style dragons in the earlier games, Daggerfall featured baby dragons as high-level enemies, while Redguard had you fight a [[http://www.imperial-library.info/bestiaries/bestiaryredguard.shtml#Dragon,%20Great%20Wyrm fully grown one]]. There's also a [[http://www.imperial-library.info/dfbooks/b100_complete_edward.shtml story]] featuring western dragons, but they're fictional.
** YMMV, the statue in Ebonhart in Morrowind is pretty clearly a western dragon.
* ''{{Nethack}}'''s dragons are kind of western -- huge (as defined by the game's size logic), flying, and equipped with a different breath depending on their colour... and they look like capital Ds.
* The ''MightAndMagic'' series does the Western variation almost by the book. In the ''Heroes of Might and Magic'' games, they tend to be among the most powerful creatures, and many factions have some sort of Dragon as their strongest (tier 7) creature, such as Green/Gold Dragons for Rampart, Red/Black Dragons for Dungeon, and Bone/Ghost Dragons for Necropolis. Some of the games had even stronger neutral dragons.
** In ''Might and Magic VIII'' there were playable dragon characters and were a major race in the game.
** ''Might and Magic VI'' had a "promotion" quest for the paladin class whereby a dragon must be slain. It didn't do any good to go to the area that was swarming with dragons, though. You had to specifically kill a "named" dragon, of which there was, of course, just one in the game.
** In ''Dragon Rage'' the protagonist, Cael Cyndar, is a dragon.
** ''Heroes of Might and Magic V'', the latest in the series, features a pantheon of Dragon Gods. There's Asha, the Dragon of Order and creator of Ashan as well as the 8 Elemental Dragons, and her counterpart Urgash, Dragon of Chaos and creator of the demons. The Elemental Dragons are mainly worshiped by one of the remaining races, and are likely the reason for the (lesser) Dragons being a rather common tier 7 creature for most of the races.
* ''Legend of Dragoon'' has some of the strangest variations of dragons imaginable, neither fitting Western or Eastern examples. These dragons vary from looking like giant insects, to giant catfish, to floating tanks. The only dragon that remotely resembles any more typical dragon at all would be the Divine Dragon, who is a massive, absolutely terrifying looking flying abomination that sacrifices traditional breath attacks for an extremely destructive ''cannon'' and missile like attacks.
* Dragons in TalesOfVesperia are members of the [[{{Precursors}} Entelixia]] race, who have developed a [[KillAllHumans thorough dislike of humanity by the time the game begins]]. [[spoiler:Given that their race's souls are used to power [[PoweredByAForsakenChild blastia]], it's easy to see why.]]
* Dragons in the ''BreathOfFire'' series are shape-shifters who spend most of their time in human form, sometime unaware of their true nature. In the fourth game, they're also "Endless", the [[PhysicalGod physical gods]] of that verse.
** Just to make things confusing, ''BreathOfFire'' can't seem to decide what type of dragons they want. The first two games feature exclusively Western types (though the Agni/Infinity dragon of the first game looks more like a ''lizard-centaur''). The third game has mostly Western dragons, but a few special transformations (namely the fire/ice/thunder gene mix) are explicitly Eastern. The fourth game has mostly Eastern dragons, but the protagonist changes into exclusively Western dragons. ''Dragon Quarter'' goes all the way back to Western dragons exclusively (though, since there's only ''two'' dragons in the game, it's not that big a leap).
** In ''Dragon Quarter'' the "D-Constructs" are apparently some kind of artificial life form that are able to fuse with humans and give them vast amounts of power at a cost of [[BlessedWithSuck slowly taking over the body of their host]], although the estimated chance to successfully complete the fusion is [[TitleDrop only 1/4 at very best]]. While they do look like normal Western dragons in their natural state (accomplished by either fully taking over their host's body either via repeated use of their powers or when the host dies in another manner), they appear as featureless black humanoids with TronLines running through them in their dormant state. It's also possible to forcibly implant parts of their dormant form into humans for a moderate power increase, but this also leads them into looking like a combination of a zombie and a battle-damaged Terminator. The successfully fused form, on the other hand, looks similliar to the Warrior form in the previous games of the series: humanoid in size and overall design, with scaled hands and feet and a pair of small wings engulfed in flames.

* Ridley from ''{{Metroid}}'' is a ''[[RecycledINSPACE space dragon]]'' (and [[TheDragon The Dragon]] in almost every game) that fits the Western definition on almost all points -- he flies, he breathes fire, he seems to show up at least once per game regardless of how many times he's actually been killed (the series has a chronology and no ResetButton), follows the six-limbs morphology, is fairly large, possesses weak points on his chest and in his mouth, and is generally guarding or hoarding something, be it a new route or a new weapon.
** Ridley only has a weak point in his chest in the 3d games. In 2d games he's actually the only boss without a weak spot (hit him anywhere but the tail and it harms him). He's still a very difficult boss, especially in Super Metroid, where he took an absurd amount of punishment, was very fast and flew around more or less randomly.
** [[AllThereInTheManual The prequel manga explains]] Ridley's tenacity as the result of a powerful HealingFactor which lets him absorb the biomass of creatures he eats... [[KickTheDog including Samus's parents]].
** [[InformedAttribute The games never really show this]], but Ridley is also noted to be extremely intelligent, and holds a high military rank in the Space Pirate hierarchy.
* In ''PuzzleQuest: Challenge of The Warlords'', you're led through a realm populated by Western-style dragons. One of whom you can optionally add to your party. You can also capture a wyvern for a mount.
** There are also dragon ''spiders''. The only thing they have in common with normal dragons is the ability to breathe fire.
* [[SuperMarioBros Bowser]], The King of Koopas. Though shaped more like a turtle, he displays all sorts of dragony characteristics, down to the fiery breath.
** There is also Yoshi, although he's more like a dinosaur horse at first glance. However, under certain conditions, he can spit fire and grow wings to fly. There are also other breeds of Yoshi, sporting different colors, that present different abilities, though the green is the most versatile.
* ''TheLegendOfZelda'' has a handful of dragons as bosses. Both variants, no less. And some ''hybrids''--Volvagia breathes fire and is a dangerous monster, and has a head like a Western dragon--but his body type and the way he flies suggest an Eastern dragon, Valoo has a more Eastern face but a Western body type, Argarok is more a Wyvern than anything and so is the OneWingedAngel version of [[spoiler: General Onox]].
* Don't forget the dragons of ''Panzer Dragoon'', which tend to have the shape of dragons combined with an utterly alien physiology.
* There's also ''SpyroTheDragon''. In the original ''Spyro the Dragon'' game, there are five dragon breeds named after what job that dragon breed does: Artisan, Peace Keeper, Magic Crafter, Beast Maker, and Dream Weaver. The different dragon breeds all live in different realms and have different body types and horn shapes. For example, the large, stout Beast Maker dragons have thick curled horns and live in swamps while the spotted, muscular Peace Keeper dragons have straight horns and live in a desert region. All the dragons lay their eggs during the Year of the Dragon, and every dragon is granted a dragonfly, which in turn grants the dragons some of their magical power, when he comes of age.
**In the ''Legend of Spyro'' trilogy, different colours tend to be representative of a dragon's element and they are usually only privy to one. Spyro himself is an exception, as he is a purple dragon, which in themselves are extremely rare (there's only been two in that world's history, Malefor (AKA, the BigBad) being the other one, though he claims that there have been many). Cynder is an exception due to being exposed to dark magic throughout her life. Her appearance is rather unique among dragons as well, though this may be just a gender thing, since she's the only female dragon seen in the trilogy.
* SwordOfTheStars: You know the myth of feathered serpents on Earth? Big, intelligent, powerful, proud? [[AncientAstronauts Those are Morrigi females]]. Concendentally, [[OurAngelsAreDifferent their males are angels]], but thats due to their [[PsychicPowers Glamour]] making them appear as winged {{Bishonen}} of the onlooker's race.
* Dragons are a staple of the ''FireEmblem'' series and have appeared in every game. They are typically of the western variation but can take on human forms.
* In the ''Monster Hunter'' franchise, most of the enemies you fight are actually wyverns - two legs, two wings, tail. In the original PlayStation 2 game, the dragons were online-accessible only - this changed with the PSP port. The major distinguishing characteristics were that one dragon was so big that you were literally barely as big as one of its TOES. The other was also huge, and could damned well kill you with one of any sort, though it was smaller than the other dragon...who was running away from IT. The sequel added an additional 4 new dragons, two fire-breathing beasts that looked like lion-western dragon hybrids, one that looked like the traditional western dragon with a permanent wind aura, and one that is actually a giant chameleon with wings that spends most of its time kicking your ass...while invisible. Oh, and stealing your items. And poisoning you, making your defense non-existent, and sapping your stamina completely. Of course, they also considered the electric powered ki-rin to be a dragon in the latest portable incarnation, so make of that what you will.
** Justified in the sense that in that game, the term "dragon" was used for everything that couldn't be classified. Why they used that word, however...
* In ''Heart of Winter'', the expansion of ''Icewind Dale'', the source of all the trouble turns out to be [[spoiler: a dragon's ghost. Apparently, she had been killed sometime before, and her spirit trapped by the sword that broke off in her heart. When the sword was removed, she escaped, possessed the body of a recently deceased barbarian chief, and began working to bring the Barbarian Tribes and the Ten Towns to war. She also killed her mate and ripped the souls out of her own offspring so that she could have a body. Her motivation for all this was that she "had a broken heart".]]
* ''ChronoCross'' features six elemental dragon gods, who are all pretty standard Western dragons (except for one, who is [[spoiler: a female human sized and shaped harlequin with a french accent]]. They fuse together to form a protoplasmic WMD created by dinosaurs in another dimension.
* The Sky Dragons in ''CaveStory'' are unintelligent winged reptilian fire-breathers. They're also a bit on the SuperDeformed side.
* Dragons in ''Dragonseeds'' were cloned from fossils discovered in ruins, and come in a wide variety. Apart from the traditional Saurian and Winged varieties, there are such oddities as crabs, bees, one-eyed golems and animated coffins.
* MonsterRancher has Dragons of all sorts of varieties.
* ''NoMoreHeroes'' has [[spoiler: a ''lightsaber dragon'']]. I repeat, a [[spoiler: dragon that ''comes out of a lightsaber''. Too bad you don't get to fight it... or just as well.]]
* TheBattleForWesnoth had normal western dragons along with the Drakes. The Drakes basically can be described as [[NinjaPirateZombieRobot "Magical Samurai Dragon(Western) Blacksmiths"]]. They are a sentient race of dragons that have a warlike way of life that follows a strict heirarchy code of honor (you have to be the strongest warrior to be the leader, and dirty tricks such as poison and stealth are disonorable for them). They are powered by an internal magical flame that would consume them when they die. They are also famed for their craft in creating Armour.
* One of the expansions for TheSims, the original, Makin' Magic let you hatch your own small dragon for a pet and they come in three colors, Red, Gold and Purple. The Red ones...well, hope you have a fire alarm handy.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Web Animation]]
* ''HomestarRunner'': [[http://www.homestarrunner.com/sbemail58.html "TROGDOR the BURNiNATOR"]].
** [[http://www.homestarrunner.com/trogday08.html "THE S is for SUCKS DRAGON"]].
** Trogdor may be a man, a dragon-man, or maybe he's just a dragon. (The confusion probably arises from the "big beefy arm" he has coming out of his back.)
*** But he's still TROGDOOOOOOOOOOOOR!
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Webcomics]]
* ''GunnerkriggCourt'' has Rogat Orjaks ("horned giants"), which are large, human-like lizard things. They're intelligent, benign, and keep to themselves. The passage formerly quoted at the top of the page implies that there ''were'' real dragons, until they were exterminated for showing off a bit too much:
-->''"We like to keep a low profile. Best not to draw attention to ourselves, unlike those [common dragons]. And where are they now, eh?"'' - '''Kos, Orjak'''.
* ''GirlGenius'' features the Dragon King of Mars in one of the fictional Heterodyne Boys stories. He looks like a robotic Western dragon. Mars, in this story, seems to be inhabited by such robot dragons.
* ''KayTheCookieJarDragon'' is actually a miniature CuteMonsterGirl. One of the characters hangs a lampshade on this, talking about all the things that dragons ''should'' be; Kay simply replies, "But I ''am'' a dragon", and this is taken as a perfectly good excuse.
* ''OrderOfTheStick'', in its eternal quest to mock ''DungeonsAndDragons'' tropes to death, of course covered this, even [[TropeNamer giving us the term]] ColorCodedForYourConvenience.
** The colour coding of dragons appears to have been ''slightly'' subverted recently with [[spoiler: the mother of the dragon killed by Vaarsuvius turning up. She is quite loving of her (now dead) son and husband, and was apparently "open-minded" enough to tolerate her son having a crush on "a nice green dragon". Her grief over her son's death has led her to a vendetta against Vaarsuvius. However, she's still clearly evil through and through.]]
*** [[spoiler: And dead.]]
* Llewellyn of ''OzyAndMillie'' is essentially a lovably eccentric Englishman -- and a wise, kind-hearted adoptive father -- in dragon form. Oh, and he's also ReallySevenHundredYearsOld.
* ''SluggyFreelance'' featured a ''flower''-breathing dragon that "terrorized" the Dimension of Pain for a while... until Reakk boinked it.
** Aylee also took on a fire-breathing dragon form for a while, as a reaction to being stuck in cryo for months. Most of her forms after that and the one just before it were dragon-like.
* ''{{Erfworld}}'''s "dwagons" are diffewent, resembling giant stuffed toys. However, in combat they seem to be about as tough and dangerous as traditional Western dragons.
* [[http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2006/6/14/fine-distinctions/ This Penny Arcade comic]] shows involves a calling out out on essentially, a book's dragons being not-so-different.
* ''TheInexplicableAdventuresOfBob'' posits that dragons evolved from [[http://www.scientificblogging.com/news_releases/kuehneosaurs_just_as_cool_as_archaeopteryx_but_50_million_years_older kuehneosaurs.]] They had an advanced civilization but destroyed it in a war, taking the dinosaurs with them. The survivors became pastoral. When humans evolved and came into conflict with them, the dragons avoided a war with the primitives by leaving Earth for Butane, a planet in the Kuiper Belt. They are part of Princess Voluptua's space empire.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Web Original]]
* [[LimyaaelsFantasyRants Limyaael]] has a few [[http://limyaael.livejournal.com/134532.html suggestions...]]
* TalesOfMU has recently introduced [[http://www.talesofmu.com/story/other/silver-tongued-charmer Vice-Chancellor Edmund Embries.]] He seems to be a classical Western dragon with silver scales, capable of taking on human form--the only form in which he's been seen thus far. He's very charming, very pretty, and ''very creepy.'' As Professor Hall says, "Few people mistake a ''noble'' dragon for a ''nice'' one more than once."
* While we don't yet seem to have seen a 'real' dragon, the WhateleyUniverse has already featured a few variations on the theme. One student has a pet dragon (named [[DragonridersOfPern Pern]], of course) who's apparently a product of her manifestation power and can grow quite a bit in a hurry from his normally small-and-cute stature if bothered. At least two characters, one a student, are known to be hosts to dragon ''spirits'', and then there's Tywyswyr...who, if we can believe his tale, is actually 'just' a very dragon-looking ''alien'' who's nonetheless quite wealthy and apparently a not-so-minor political player living right in the US.
* Among the Agents of the ProtectorsOfThePlotContinuum are dragons and part-dragons from several different continua.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Western Animation]]
* In ''AmericanDragonJakeLong'', Dragons are a special type of human... or are real dragons who can turn into humans... or... you know what, [[MST3KMantra forget it]].
* Adding to its egregiously long list of MixAndMatchCritters, dragons on the Asian-influenced ''AvatarTheLastAirbender'' are, like [[TheHobbit Smaug]], a hybrid of Western and Eastern dragon types. They are like eastern ones except they have wings, are associated with fire and are kept by humans as a means of transportation, and appear quite intelligent. [[spoiler:It later turns out that they are thought to be extinct, since people started hunting them to get the title "dragon", and are actually the source of a firebending.]]
* There are quite a few ''{{Transformers}}'' who transform into dragons, despite real dragons generally ([[http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Dragon but not always]]) being nowhere to be seen. Aside from all being Western-style dragons, they're as different as the individuals that turn into them.
* ''SonicTheHedgehog'' had a frankly bizarre interpretation of dragons. Basically, take bits of every animal that lives in Australia, stick them together, add giant creepy lips and a nosering, and there's Dulcy the dragon.
* The animated feature ''{{Hellboy}}: Sword of Storms'' apparently set out to make its dragons as different as possible, stretching the definition of "dragon" a bit further than it could go in the process. Everything from human-sized, human-shaped ogres with lightning powers to unimaginably [[CosmicHorror huge, squashy undersea demons]] are identified as dragons. This might not have been so jarring if we saw anything onscreen that anyone off the street would call a dragon.
** Note that these creatures were all called "Dragons" as more of a title than an actual description. They were all relatives of the Ogdru Jahad, who were also known as the Seven Dragons ([[CosmicHorror not that they are anything like dragons either]], although they do have a few [[DinosaursAreDragons Dinosaur-like characteristics]]).
** ''Hellboy'' has also fought regular dragons in some of the spin-offs, including ''The Dragon Pool'', which features a Eastern-style dragon who breathed fire. As well as, in typical ''Hellboy'' fashion, his ''zombie offspring'' and the result of his long-ago ''breeding with humans''. He also fought & defeated (sort of) the St. Leonard Wyrm, which looked more like a cross between a giant python & a saltwater croc than anything.
* If ''Hellboy'' stretched the definition of "dragon", the short-lived series ''TheDragonSlayers'' broke it. It did have a few traditional dragons. It also had big giant warty hoglike things, floating blobby tentacled things, and one of the main characters was a "dragon" who was basically Ren with a couple of horns for garnish.
** The comparatively better-known ''DaveTheBarbarian'' similarly had a small dragon who looked like a winged pig.
* The main antigonist of ''JackieChanAdventures'', Shendu, is a dragon, a demon one at that. He has traits from both the Western and Eastern aspects of dragons, which is probably not a surprise given that it is a Western show that has an emphasis on Eastern traditions.
* ''MyLittlePony'': Spike actually learns this as an Aesop in "Spike's Search". Additionally, the dragon (though he is curiously never refered to as such) in "Through The Door" is literally just a PunchClockVillain (they really like that trope) and is very {{Emo}} about having to be the bad guy all the time.
* From XiaolinShowdown, Dojo, is a Eastern Dragon in a Western Animation. He spends most of his time in a very small form, but can shift into a wide variety of shapes, and serves as the team's transport.
* {{Wakfu}}, who shares the universe with the MMORPG ''Dofus'', takes a different way. The god Osamodas, creator of all living things, once had three mythical dragons, who shaped themselves into the world of Dofus. Therefore, there were other dragons, about a dozen, who were strong powerful creature of magic and have the power to create the eponymonous Dofus, magical dragon eggs. Nobody knows how many have survived to the cataclysm who leads to Wakfu, but we can see at least one in the serie: Grougaloragran, dragon of fire, shapeshifted in an old man, who bring TheHero to his adoptive parent.
** It gets worse: [[spoiler: those dragons can also lays Eliatrope's Dofus, a single egg who contain a baby dragon and a baby human, the latest gaining teleportation-related power. And yes, Yugo, TheHero, hatched from one of those eggs.]]
* As the name suggests, ''Dragon Hunters'' takes this trope and runs with it. Gwizdo and Lian-chu, the titular hunters, go after a number of different kinds of dragons over the course of the series, and no two alike. With all the variety, it seems most likely that any creature that is threatening enough to make a village hire hunters to get rid of it is labeled a "dragon" for simplicity's sake.

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