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And this isn't even the half of it!
Dragons are practically a necessity in most tabletop RPGs, and tabletop games in general to a lesser extent, so expect lots of variety here.
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    Board Games 
  • BattleCON: Dragons are the standard huge, ruthless lizards, who used to rule the world until humanity overthrew them thousands of years before the game's present. They have powerful magical abilities and Voluntary Shapeshifting powers, allowing some to survive into the present day disguised as humans.
  • Res Arcana: Most Dragons are big, spiked creatures. There is one for each of the four classical Natural Elements, with only the Fire Dragon actually breathing fire. There's also the Bone Dragon, the Sea Serpent (which counts as a dragon), the Prismatic Dragon (the only dragon who can't attack, instead preferring to deal with essences) and the huge, expensive Ancient Dragon. The Dragons are implied to hoard gold, as the Dragon's Lair is very centred on the gold essence.

    Card Games 
  • Magic: The Gathering: Dragons are the iconic creatures (that is, a large, powerful creature that shows up as a rare card once a set) of Red (the color of chaos, fire, mountains and raw emotion), although they've showed up in all other colors with less frequency. As such, there's been a lot of them, and they regularly show in places where you wouldn't normally expect them but with some concessions to the set's tone, such as the Gothic Horror plane of Innistrad, which gets dragons with wings like stained glass, or the crocodile-headed dragons of the Egyptian Mythology-inspired plane of Amonkhet. All dragons, on all planes, are descended from the Ur-Dragon, the Progenitor of Fire and the avatar of all dragonkind itself. It occasionally visits a plane and beats its wings, and from its wingbeats dragon eggs fall. These give birth to Elder Dragons, whose descendants become the rest of dragonkind.
    • Hellkites are a recurring type of dragon found on many planes, including Dominaria, Mirrodin, Ravnica, Alara and Zendikar. They're the archetypal fiery monsters of modern fantasy, inhabiting volcanic mountains and raiding lowland settlements for prey and treasure, and are portrayed in cards and stories alike as fiery engines of destruction and some of the most powerful living things in their respective planes.
    • Individual dragons of interest include Niv-Mizzet, a supergenius of downright transhuman level who leads the Izzet guild of Mad Scientists on the city-plane of Ravnica, and Nicol Bolas, a staggeringly powerful dragon Planeswalker who caused almost every major disaster in the setting’s modern history in his quest to recover the power he lost in the Mending (he’s still far more powerful than any other being alive, but for all intents and purposes he used to be a god). There are also the five primeval dragons of Dominaria (Rith the Awakener, Dromar the Banisher, Treva the Renewer, Darigaaz the Igniter and Crosis the Purger), as well as the five sprit dragons of Kamigawa, one for each color of mana, who were some of the few spirits to remain loyal to the mortals when the kami declared war on the physical world.
    • The dragons of Mirrodin, like all other beings that were brought into the plane, have extensive metallic components incorporated into themselves. They have literal furnaces burning in their chests, which provide them with both their fiery breath and with propulsion — the wings of Mirran dragons are highly atrophied and lack webbing; they instead fly thanks to exhaust vents under their main wing joints, streaking through the sky like living rockets.
    • Tarkir has some very unique dragons. For starters, they're not conventional biological beings, being instead born from the elemental storms created by the spirit dragon planeswalker Ugin (a very strange dragon himself: he's a borderline Eldritch Abomination not aligned with the colours of mana, who specialises in the conversion of matter into energy and vice versa), which in contact with various terrains result in different dragon species, each lead by a brood leader. The Green/White dragons live in the deserts, have thick scales immune to most weapons, and breathe beams of light. The White/Blue dragons live in the frozen mountains, have feathered wings and breathe ice. The Blue/Black dragons live in the jungles, look like flying snakes and perhaps appropriately breathe toxic gases and poison. The Black/Red dragons live in the steppes and have four feathered wings, which allow them to be incredibly fast, and they breathe lightning. And the Green/Red dragons from the mountain forests are rather conventional looking western dragons, but nonetheless have huge claws, fur, antlers, and breathe green fire.
    • The plane of Ikoria is home to sprite dragons, small and insect-winged creatures typed as both Faeries and Dragons.
    • Dragons on Kaladesh have tiger-like characteristics.
    • The world of Arcavios is home to exactly five dragons, all of whom are impossibly ancient Elder Dragons spawned from storms of raw opposing-colored mana. They are referred to as the Founder Dragons, because they founded the five colleges of Strixhaven Academy.
    • Ziatora, the only living dragon in New Capenna, is also a demonic crime boss and leader of a corrupt construction union.
    • In the original sets that take place on Ixalan, is is believed that the world has no native dragon population (with a variety of dinosaurs filling a similar niche). On a subsequent visit, it is revealed that the plane is home to the Dracosaur species, which is both.
    • While true dragons are chiefly Red-aligned, Blue (the color of the mind, air and water) gets the majority of the Drakes, smaller and less powerful relatives of dragons with animalistic intellects and two legs and two wings rather than four and two. Wyverns appear as a rare subset of the drake creature type, with the distinction seeming to be that wyverns walk on their hindlegs like birds, rather than walking batlike on all fours.
    • There are also Wurms, chiefly aligned with Green (the color of beasts and nature), which resemble large serpents or legless dragons, although in more recent depictions they're more wormlike than anything.
    • Supposedly, all these creatures (at least on the world of Dominaria) can trace their descent to the godlike Elder Dragons of the distant past, who fought a massive, possibly even multiverse-spanning war. The losers lost their power, limbs and intellect and became the first wurms (although the wurms of Innistrad at least are stated to be manifestations of the plane’s Green mana instead), while the winners became the ancestors of regular dragons, drakes and the Viashino Lizard Folk. Nicol Bolas and his twin brother Ugin are the last two Elder Dragons remaining.
  • Unstable Unicorns: The Dragons expansion includes, besides some fairly typical Western dragons, dragoncorns, which are dragons with a single horn like a unicorn.
  • Yu-Gi-Oh! has this in extremely heavy arrays. Jumping from elemental dragons, to dragons from different mythologies, different dimensions, and even Darker and Edgier versions of already existing ones. The Yang Zing archetype introduced a new Type of monster called Wyrms, which look like Dragons with a more spiritual, mythical, metaphysical look, and are based heavily on Asian dragons, as opposed to the more Western designs of many Dragon-Types.

    Role-Playing Games 
  • Anima: Beyond Fantasy has its share: among others standard Western dragons, C'iel and Gaira dragons (divine creatures, that are Expying Final Fantasy ones and grow to a size of several kilometers), and the first form of Omega who is a centaur-like version of the Beast mentioned in Revelations.
  • Bleak World has Dragons for many of the enemy types' Nightmare Level enemies. For the most part they fulfill the western dragon archetype, but Dragons created by The Darkness breathe darkness instead of fire. The Jotun can create robot Dragons and various Princesses can summon a Dragon to their side during combat.
  • Call of Cthulhu: While the story in which it is based on is far too nebulous in the description to be explicitly dragons, the Hunting Horrors and the Haunter in the Dark are clearly dragonoid in appearance, and are even labeled as such in the d20 version of the game.
  • Castle Falkenstein: Dragons are descended from pterosaurs, having gained immense magical powers along the way. While some still behave like classic dragons, demanding virgin sacrifices (albeit 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.
  • The Dark Eye: Multiple types of dragon exist, which can vary greatly from one another, but most tend to be very large, very dangerous, strictly reptilian in appearance and provided with multiple limbs, which may or may not include wings. With a few exceptions, they all breathe fire and gather hoards of treasure. They all have a red stone in their brains, which is called a carbuncle and is the source of their magic. They also have small areas on their bodies where their scales are weaker, and where they're consequently less well-protected. They are divided between the large, powerful and intelligent greater dragons, whose lifespans typically run from one to two millennia, and the smaller lesser dragons of purely animalistic intelligence, who tend to live for a century or so.
    • Cave dragons are wingless, serpentine creatures with either six or eight pairs of limbs, the foremost pair useable as arms. They're classically covetous beasts that lurk in isolated places, terrorizing isolated settlements for treasure and sacrifices, preferably virgins, although any healthy youth is acceptable, or living as isolated wilderness predators. They generally lair in caverns or underground complexes, heading out only by night — they can't see very well in bright light — although some make their homes in dense forests. They're also ancient enemies of the dwarves, and are some of the few dragons to regularly make their way into dwarven holds.
    • Giant wyverns are some of the most common and feared dragons. They possess six legs, two wings and three monitor lizard-like heads — their carbuncle is tripartite and at the base of their necks — which can grow back when cut off, but over an extended period and without their previous memories. They typically lair in high mountains, periodically flying out to terrorize towns for plunder and sacrifices, and while strong and fearsome are also fairly dim and easily outwitted.
    • Glacier worms resemble typical fantasy dragons with light gray to ice-white scales, although they're born as caterpillar-like beings that mature into their adult forms in their thirteenth year of life. They're found in the far north, only coming south during particularly cold and bitter winters, and breathe freezing wind. They're cruel, wicked creatures, and are said to be the most evil of all dragons.
    • Pit worms are lesser dragons that resemble nothing so much as oversized, smelly lizards. They live in swamps and gather no hoards. For unclear reasons, all other dragons, greater and lesser alike, despise pit worms and try to kill them on sight.
    • Tree dragons are small — about human-sized — lesser dragons that live in forests with large, tall trees. They make their nests high in the canopies and mostly hunt small prey. They gather hoards, but these mostly consist of whatever shiny rocks and trinkets catch their eye and are almost entirely worthless.
  • The Darksword Trilogy: While only one dragon appears in the story proper, the companion book, The Darksword Adventures, which provides rules for playing a tabletop game in the story's world, boasts five different species of dragon complete with stats and background for each.
    • Golden Dragons are by far the most powerful. There are only ten in total, and they are all vastly intelligence, magically powerful, and functionally immortal beings of pure goodness. They even have a special ability that allows them to sing a song that causes opponents to fall down weeping at the loss of their own innocence. Native to Thimhallen, when humans crossed over, the dragons met with Merlyn and offered their alliance, granting him ten talismans that could be used to summon the dragons in times of need. When the Thimhalen Civil War broke out, however, the summoned dragons were so distraught by what humans were willing to do to one another, they refused to give aid to any side in the war and left. They have not been seen since, but some of the talismans remain, meaning it is feasibly possible to summon them again.
    • Water Dragons are the other native species of Thimhalen, closely allied to the merfolk who help watch over the dragons' nesting grounds. With lithe, snakelike bodies the colors of the sea, these dragons are able to swim across vast oceans faster than anything save a portal. Rather than fire or lightning these dragons spit water in a powerful jetstream that can blast holes in the thickest hulls. Very intelligent, they will coordinate attacks on enemies, often forming whirlpools to sink problematic ships or reduce seaside keeps to rubble. In the story proper, Joram, while at sea, encounters one by accident when he looks over the side of ship and notices what he thinks is a patch of coral suddenly blink at him before descending below the waves again.
    • When the Golden Dragons refused to take sides in the war, the mages if Thimhalen were forced to make their own. One of the first were the Dragons of the Sun, great flying lizards colored red and bronze that could breathe fire across the battlefield. Active only during the day (hence their name) the dragons' wings could also reflect such heat as to melt armor. Having escaped their creators' control, as with most of the warchanged, they now make their homes in volcanoes where they can be warm, only coming out to ravage the countryside and collect gold tickets with which they like to make sparkle with their flames. They are quite fond of humans, and will often take a captive back to their den for some lively conversation before eating them. Each of the dragons also has a large ruby implanted on their brows which, if one can touch it, grants command over the dragon. Fortunately the dragons lack any ability at magecraft and, like many of the war changed, are sexless and incapable of breeding, meaning the species will eventually die out.
    • Dragons of the Moon were created as a counterpoint to the Dragons of the Sun, so it should come as no surprise that they are colored in darker hues as befits a nocturnal creature. They breathe lightning and, upon opening their wings, fire small pinpricks of light that burn through masses of opponents with ease. More isolationist than their day-dwelling brethren, they make their homes in deep caves, preferably gem mines where they can use their breath to make the stones sparkle for their amusement. These dragons prefer centaur meat, and have been known to decimate entire herds of the vicious bandits. In place of the ruby, each has a large opal grafted to their heads which grant those bold enough to touch it dominion over the dragon.
    • Stone Dragons are Exactly What It Says on the Tin, gigantic dragons made of solid stone. Easily one of the biggest mistakes concerning the warchanged made, these dragons were created to destroy fortifications and castles by absorbing the rock into their bodies, leaving vast holes in walls, foundations, and towers as they passed like fish through water. Unfortunately the creature was so stupid as to be unable to remain focused on a single task for more than a few seconds before moving off on its own, and the spells needed to control the beasts have been lost to time. Nigh invulnerable, these lumbering behemoths lack any true malevolence, the destruction they cause being more due to them simply moving about. They are prone to settle in one spot for years-long naps too which, combined with the fact that a sleeping stone dragon is indistinguishable from basic landscape, has caused more than one building to come tumbling down when the ground it was built on decided to get up.
  • Dragon Dice: Dragons can be summoned via magic. Once summoned, they appear to closely resemble Western drakes (winged) and wyrms (ground bound) — they have all of the characteristic toughness, strength, breath weapons, and even a weak spot on the belly. They are different from the typical fantasy dragon in that they seem to lack significant intelligence or magical ability — once summoned, they will attack anything in their vicinity that isn't a dragon of the same color, and never use magical abilities.
  • Dungeons & Dragons has a panoply of them, naturally. An editor of the official Dragon magazine Lampshaded this trope waaaaay back in issue #52, writing that "There are as many varieties of dragon as there are people to think them up." There have been a number of Sourcebooks over D&D's history called Draconomicon, all of them dealing entirely with different types of dragons, dragon history, dragon society, dragon characters, dragon-fighting characters, magic items made from dragons, etc. It has also been very common for the Monster Manuals, Draconomicons and special editions of Dragon magazine, among others, to introduce new dragon types by the handful, often by simply taking a new adjective or descriptor and sticking it in front of "dragon", resulting in the game's immense draconic bestiary.
    • "True" dragons are characterized by having four legs and two wings, a Breath Weapon, innate magical abilities (in some editions, each dragon is simultaneously a physical powerhouse and an increasingly-powerful Sorcerer), a frightful presence that can send lesser enemies fleeing in terror, and for growing through a series of age categories, from a humble wyrmling to a mighty great wrym. They are among the most dangerous creatures in the setting, as even without their magic, a dragon has substantial natural armor, and an array of combat options, ranging from bite and claw attacks to tail slaps or crush attacks. The oldest of dragons can be enormousAD&D red or gold great wyrms were larger than even an An-225, while in 3.5th Edition a full-sized red is "merely" 120 ft. long from nose to tail-tip, with a 150 ft. wingspan. Despite their size, dragons move with a feline grace, and despite their fearsome appearance, they can be very intelligent. Thanks to Genetic Memory, an hour-old wyrmling is self-aware, capable of speaking Draconic at the very least, and as smart as an average adult human (not to mention powerful enough to tear one to pieces). Finally, dragons have an instinctive urge to accumulate a Dragon Hoard over their lives (which they can consume in their twilight years before flying off to a dragon graveyard), so that they typically have three times as much treasure as a monster of their equivalent Challenge Rating. They can be grouped into several subtypes, often Color-Coded for Your Convenience:
      • Chromatic dragons are the "always evil" dragon family. From weakest to strongest, they are white (animalistic arctic predators that breathe cones of ice), black (swamp-dwelling sadists that breathe lines of acid), green (forest-dwelling manipulators that breathe a cone of chlorine gas), blue (desert-dwelling overlords that breathe lines of lightning), and red (classic avaricious, murderous, fire-breathing terrors of the mountains). Tiamat, the goddess of evil dragonkind, takes the form of a massive dragon with five heads, each representing one of the above kindreds, as well as a wyvern's stinger tail. She appeared in the animated series as a secondary threat to Venger. In 4th edition, a number of previously unrelated dragons of evil or chaotic alignment are redefined as chromatics, described as the result of growing in-universe understanding of dragons and some changes in the actual breeds; these are gray dragons (formerly fang dragons, violent brutes from mountainous lands), brown dragons (formerly sand dragons, desert-dwelling gourmets of sapient prey with the ray-like wings normally associated with metallics) and purple dragons (formerly deep dragons, liars and manipulators from the depths of the Underdark).
      • Metallic dragons are the "always good" dragon family, though that doesn't mean they can't be materialistic and condescending, and are unique for having two breath weapons, one elemental and the other non-lethal. The iconic quintet, from weakest to strongest, is brass (gregarious desert-dwellers who can breathe a line of fire or a cone of sleep gas), copper (incorrigible pranksters and riddlers from dry uplands who can breathe a line of acid or cone of slow gas), bronze (coast-dwellers with a strong sense of justice, who can breathe a line of lightning or cone of repulsion gas), silver (dragons that often live among mortals in humanoid form, and breathe a cone of cold or paralyzing gas), and gold (noble sages who live wherever they please, and can breathe a cone of fire or weakening gas). The patron deity of good dragonkind is Bahamut, the Platinum Dragon, who is locked in an eternal conflict with his sister Tiamat. Interestingly, the metallic dragons take a lot of cues from Oriental dragon designs, to the extent that early depiction of golds were genuine Chinese dragons — nowadays, golds have "whiskers" on their faces that give them a sagacious look, silver dragons have a frilled "beard" on their chins, and brass, copper and gold dragons all have "manta" wings that run from their shoulders to the ends of their tails, which give them a graceful, rippling flight motion. Finally, metallic dragons differ from chromatics in that their teeth are hidden when their mouths are closed, and their tongues are not forked.
      • Gem dragons are the oldest of the "tertiary" dragon families, though unfortunately they never really caught on due to how different they are from metallics or chromatics. These "always neutral" dragons have Psychic Powers rather than innate arcane spellcasting, and can be found on the Inner Planes as often as they lair on the Material Plane. Their primary species are crystal (curious and friendly dragons from icy mountain peaks, who breathe a cone of blinding, searing light), emerald (inquisitive but paranoid creatures who favor dormant volcanoes for lairs, and breathe a cone of deafening sonic energy), sapphire (antisocial cave dwellers who breathe a cone of infrasound that damages and frightens victims), topaz (erratic and selfish coast dwellers who breathe a cone of dehydrating "water"), and amethyst (regal, wise advisers who prefer the Elemental Plane of Earth and breathe a line of concussive force, or spit an explosive crystal lozenge). Lesser gem dragons introduced in a 2nd Edition Monstrous Compendium lack psionic powers, and include the amber, jacinth, jade, moonstone, and pearl species.
      • Ferrous dragons are a "lesser" branch of the metallic dragon family, consisting of species based around base metals and characterized as the "Always Lawful" dragon family. They include the chromium, cobalt, iron, nickel, steel and tungsten dragons. In 4th Edition, cobalt, iron and steel Dragons are reinvented and made part of the metallic dragon family, and the adamantine, mithril and orium (orichalcum) dragons are added to the group as well.
      • Lung dragons are explicitly Asian-flavored creatures based on Japanese and Chinese mythology. They begin their lives as Carp Dragons, which look like giant fish with Asian dragon heads and claws, then mature into one of several other species, consisting of the Earth, Sea, Spirit, Coiled, Celestial, River and Typhoon Dragons. Each has its own traits, but most of them are good, except for Typhoon Dragons, who are evil, toad-like storm-controllers.
      • Arcane Dragons were introduced in 3rd Edition, in Dragon #343. They embody the "dragon as master of magic" archetype that D&D lore created but never really lived up to. There are only two species in this family: the malevolent Hex Dragon, which practices necromancy and enchantment magic whilst wielding retributive curses, and the benevolent Tome Dragon, a sagacious and benevolent dragon with an innate aptitude for conjuration and divination.
      • Planar dragons are species that have adapted to life on the Outer Planes of the Great Wheel (or closer dimensions, in the case of the Astral and Ethereal Dragons). They are the Radiant Dragon of Celestia, Adamantite Dragon of Bytopia, Elysian Dragon, Beast Dragon, Arboreal Dragon, Battle Dragon of Ysgard, Chaos Dragon of Limbo, Howling Dragon of Pandemonium, Chole Dragon of the Abyss, Tarterian Dragon of Carceri, Gloom Dragon of Hades, Pyroclastic Dragon of Gehenna, Hellfire Wyrm of Baator, Rust Dragon of Acheron, Axial Dragon of Mechanus, Concordant Dragon of the Outlands, and the Oceanus and Styx Dragons, who dwell in their respective cross-planar river systems. Arcadia, whose inhabitants are not fond of dragons, notably has no extant native dragon species.
      • 4th Edition introduces Catastrophic dragons as the edition's "third dragon family", replacing the gemstone dragons. They descend from both chromatic and metallic dragons who were captured by the Primordials in the distant past of the world and warped into vaguely draconic Elemental Embodiments. They consist of the blizzard, earthquake, volcano, avalanche, tornado, typhoon, and wildfire dragons.
      • Epic dragons are just that, so powerful that only a party that has gone beyond the game's normal Level Cap has any chance of surviving an encounter with them, and so large that they hatch from eggs the size of peasant huts, while their great wyrms get their own "Colossal+" size category. Force Dragons are aloof and surly, breathe a cone of raw force and are immune to such effects, and gradually fade from sight as they age, until at great wyrm stage they're naturally invisible. Prismatic Dragons are curious and charismatic creatures whose breath weapon is a prismatic spray, and are immune to any effects using light. Then there are the mightiest of epic dragons, as revealed in Dragon's final print issue: Time Dragons. A Time Dragon wyrmling has 44 Hit Dice, compared to a Gold great wyrm's 41, while at almost a hundred HD and a Challenge Rating of 90, a Time Dragon great wyrm is probably the most powerful monster in D&D history (for comparison, Great Cthulhu's 3rd Edition stats put him at CR 34). They can age from newly-hatched to a great wyrm in a matter of minutes, do not need to sleep, cannot die from disease, poison or old age, and are immune to any effect that is not instantaneous due to their connection to the timestream. They can travel through time at will, and their breath weapon can age targets or displace them through time. Time Dragons lair in places so distant in space and time that they are virtually unreachable, and rarely deign to converse with anything less than a god... and sometimes, not even with them.
      • Other true dragons don't fit into any of the above families: shadow dragons that have been corrupted by the influence of that plane, the deep dragons of the Underdark, the exclusively-female song dragons that prefer to live in human disguise, fang dragons with stunted wings but more than enough spikes to make up for it, desert-dwelling brown, sand and rattelyr dragons, the latter distinguished by their rattlesnake tails, cobra hoods and lack of wings, the reclusive cloud and mist dragons, and the solitary and secretive yellow dragons.
    • Then there are a lot of things with the "Dragon" type, but which lack one or more of the traits of the above "True" Dragons:
      • Wyverns are stupid and animalistic even compared to White Dragons. They don't have forelimbs or a breath weapon, but have a poisonous stinger on their tails. Even when fully-grown, they're smaller than proper wyrms at Large size, while true dragons will go at least two size categories beyond that.
      • Dragon turtles are enormous oceangoing dragons resembling monstrous sea turtles with draconic qualities (including a Breath Weapon of superheated steam). They're pretty clever creatures, with the same greedy and self-centered attitude of Chromatic Dragons, but are considered True Neutral rather than evil. They're not really turtles that look like dragons, but rather dragons that look like turtles.
      • Dragonets are a group of Shoulder-Sized Dragons, such as the ill-tempered, flame-spewing firedrakes, surly, burrowing mole dragons, and brash, scalding geyser dragons. Other breeds are more benign, like the crow's nest dragon, whose flocks form symbiotic relationships with sailing vessels, or the beautiful, psionic pavilion dragon. Pseudodragons, meanwhile, are cat-sized (and cat-like in temperament), have a paralytic stinger rather than a breath weapon, and are sought-after as Familiars due to their intelligence and telepathic abilities — they're even known to ride on their bondmate's head. Finally, faerie dragons have butterfly wings, a permanent mischievous smile, breathe a cone of euphoric, dazing gas, and uniquely among Dragonets advance through age categories that grant them additional magical abilities (which they mainly use for pranks) and change the color of their scales. Note that while pseudodragons and faerie dragons are both of good alignment, they aren't necessarily always well-behaved, especially if they feel like they've been mistreated. Or haven't been pampered enough. Or are bored.
      • Linnorms are thought to be a primeval offshoot of the dragon family tree, and borrow heavily from Norse mythology. Their serpentine bodies lack wings or hind legs, and their malevolence is only matched by their physical and magical might. Beyond variants adapted to specific environments, some of the better-known Linnorm breeds include the massive Dread Linnorms, whose two heads can breathe cones of fire or frost, and the hideous Corpse Tearers, natural necromancers who breathe clouds of disease or paralytic gas, and whose scaled hides are covered in slime, moss and cilia. The only good thing about Linnorms is that they're probably going extinct, since no juveniles have been sighted for centuries and every individual encountered is ancient.
      • Drakes are animalistic kin of dragons that tend to look like small wingless dragons or stereotypical theropod dinosaurs. They come in a variety of breeds like guard drakes, rage drakes, needlefang drakes, and spitting drakes, and can be domesticated by intelligent beings as attack animals and bodyguards.
      • Landwyrms are reptilian predators with four legs and no wings or breath weapons, and come in a variety of subtypes adapted for specific environments, from the scrawny, pathetic Plains Landwyrm to the colossal Mountain Landwyrm.
      • Elemental drakes are wyvern-like creatures imbued with the power of the Inner Planes, from the straightforward air, earth, fire and water drakes to the "Paraelemental" ice, magma, ooze, and smoke drakes.
      • Sea drakes are serpentine aquatic dragons that are intelligent and gregarious, but also fiercely territorial. They demand a toll of any ship passing through their territory, though on the upside, they consider it a point of pride to keep their stretch of sea clear of pirates and other sea monsters. They lack a breath weapon, but are fully capable of constricting and crushing all but the largest of ships, and can emit an ink cloud to cover their retreat if necessary.
      • A little-known fact is that purple worm is referred to as the purple dragon in D&D co-creator Gary Gygax's notes: "the purple, or mottled, dragon is a rare, flightless worm with a venomous sting in its tail."
      • Dragons are infamous for their cross-species virility, hence the "half-dragon" template. Some dragons (usually metallics) learn to shapeshift to engage in Interspecies Romance, others are happy to make an attempt with something in their natural forms, and some randy chromatic dragons are known to mate with other species just to see what kind of halfbreed results. In some cases, this has resulted in species of hybrid creatures with strong enough draconic traits to be given the Dragon type: dragonnes/liondrakes (part lion, part brass dragon), dragonnels (draconic pegasi), dracolisks (black dragon/basilisk hybrids), and dracosphinxes (red dragon/sphinx hybrids). "Drakken", in contrast, are animals with a clear draconic heritage, but lack their ancestors' arcane abilities, and so creatures like drakkensteeds and phynxkin have the "Dragonblood" subtype instead.
      • Some humanoids can claim some degree of Dragon Ancestry, so that many (but by no means all) Sorcerers claim that their innate spellcasting ability comes from dragon blood, and there are several Prestige Classes dedicated to unlocking further innate draconic powers. Close bonds with dragons have produced entire humanoid subraces like Deepwyrm drow, Glimmerskin halflings, Silverbrow humans, or Viletooth lizardfolk, all of whom have the Dragonblood subtype and supernatural abilities based on their draconic ancestry.
      • There are also several races of Draconic Humanoids in the game, such as dragonkin, dracotaurs, spellscales, and perhaps most iconically, kobolds. These weak but cunning creatures have an innate need to serve dragons, but kobolds console themselves with the truth that they are kin to these great wyrms. "Dragonwrought" kobolds occasionally hatch with wings and stronger signs of their heritage, and sure enough are classified as proper Dragons rather than "Humanoids (Dragonblooded, Reptillian)."
      • 3.5th Edition introduced the Dragonfall War, a conflict in which Tiamat raised an army of evil dragonblooded creatures by mutating the eggs of her followers to hatch a staggering variety of part-dragon monsters, from clutches of scaled humanoids to draconic war beasts, that have gone on to breed true. In response, Bahamut created the Dragonborn, mortal champions who are reborn into a draconic form to battle evil dragonkind.
      • Dragons can become undead just like most other creatures, thanks to D&D's template system. Zombie dragons are slow, mindless brutes that lose most of their supernatural abilities save for their breath weapons. Skeletal dragons aren't as slow, but lose their breath weapons and the ability to fly or swim. Ghostly dragons haunt sacked dragon lairs and can only be laid to rest when a treasure of equal value to their lost Dragon Hoard is returned, at which point the ghost settles upon it and disappears with it into the afterlife (yes, dragons love treasure so much they can take it with them). Vampiric Dragons share many traits with classic vampires, though running water doesn't bother them, they rest upon their hoards instead of in a coffin, and while they still can't enter a home uninvited, "most simply destroy the home and then pick through the rubble for their victims." And the fearsome Dracolich loses little of the dragon's physical strength, while enhancing its magical and physical resistances.
      • As previously mentioned, dragons have their own gods. Besides Bahamut and Tiamat, some of the better known draconic deities are Chronepsis, the dispassionate observer, Falazure the Night Dragon, and Io the Ninefold Dragon, the True Neutral progenitor of all dragonkind. Some dragons even become devotees of their deities and gain special abilities in the form of Prestige Classes, though it's noted that while some devout chromatic dragons build shrines to Tiamat, they never put them in their own lairs, lest the Creator of Evil Dragonkind covet her worshipers' treasure hoards.
    • Council Of Wyrms is set in a continent ruled by dragons. Demihumans are the dragons' servants, whilst humans are a race of barbaric savages and dragon murderers (secretly being manipulated by Io, the supreme dragon god) from lands beyond the archipelago that the Council claims as its territory. 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 Dark Sun, unlike any other D&D campaign world, all dragons are the result of evil sorcerer-kings transforming themselves into dragons to increase their 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.
    • In The Delver's Guide to Beast World, a third-party setting published by Heartleaf Games, dragons are anthropomorphized like many of the world's mammals but originated from Another Dimension where they looked more like traditional D&D dragons. They're divided into the standard five chromatic and five metallic colors, but whether a given dragon becomes chromatic or metallic depends on their moral choices rather than hatching with an inherent morality.
    • Dragonlance features mostly traditional western dragons in the typical D&D color scheme, but the Fifth Age introduced a number of Great Dragons. Heavily implied to be immigrants from some other world, they were immensely larger and stronger than Krynn's native dragons and had the ability to absorb the life energy of dragons whom they killed. This led to a decade-long purge where the Great Dragons (and one or two natives who learned the knack) slaughtered their rivals and set up a series of fiefdoms, even using the captured life energy to reshape large chunks of the continent to environments more to their liking. Malastryx, the greatest of red dragons, burnt Kendermore to a cinder and turned the grasslands into massive volcanic mountains. Likewise, large chunks of desert were made into swampland, and islands with heavy forestation turned to frozen tundras. The two major elven kingdoms, traditional temperate forests both, were made into a sweltering overgrown jungle and a twisted mockery of life beyond the reach of light and hope, respectively.
    • DragonMech, a White Wolf D20 setting, has both regular dragons and the freaky lunar dragons, which can't fly as well on the unnamed world as they can on their celestial body of origin, have no taste for treasure, worship Eldritch Abominations, and have More Teeth than the Osmond Family.
    • Eberron: Dragons live on their own continent of Argonnessen and spend their time studying the Draconic Prophecy — a worldwide natural phenomenon that can be used to predict and manipulate the future — and engaging in manipulative plotting. As part of Eberron's drive against Always Chaotic Evil, all bets are off when it comes to predicting a dragon's alignment through its appearance. Then there are the Progenitor Dragons who seem to be dragons In Name Only. One of them (Siberys) is dead and the remnants of its body are a ring encircling the world. The other two are the world itself (Eberron) and the deep places inside the world (Khyber).
    • Mystara: Dragons 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 variety found there (barring Fanon Discontinuity) is gold. Mystaran dragons also answer to their own Immortal dragon rulers — one for each of Basic D&D's three alignments plus the Great One, who oversees them all. It's implied in several places that these are positions more than necessarily individuals; were something permanent to happen to, say, Diamond the Star Dragon, who rules over all Lawful dragons, he would be replaced (eventually) by a suitable successor who would adopt both the name and the title. Mystara is also home to a variant of drakes which are shapeshifters, Medium-sized, intelligent, and associated with the fey.
    • La Notte Eterna, a third party setting: The dragons were driven out of Neir and into the western continent of Larass'hra, where they have formed a prosperous civilization. To the people of Neir, where nobody in living memory has seen a dragon in the flesh, they are the stuff of myth and legend.
    • Strixhaven: In 5th ed., a Wizarding School from Magic: The Gathering was created by 5 unique and benign dragons. Each of them are a bit different from the stereotypical dragon and include a dualistic element to their character. This can lead to some oddities such as one dragon, Tanazir Quandrix breathing out a mathematical formula that saps the victim of strength.
  • Exalted: Dragons feature prominently in the setting, typically as entities of immense power. In appearance, they're chiefly of the classical Chinese type.
    • The primary dragons of the setting are the Elemental Dragons, divine entities that serve as the leaders of Creation's elementals. These are all of the East Asian kind in character and appearence.
      • The Five Elemental Dragons are souls/children/creations (depending on edition) of the Primordial Gaia, who inhabit and power Creation's geomancy. They're the highest-ranking elemental entities in the setting, and the overall leaders of all of Creation's elementals.
      • Lesser and Greater Elemental Dragons are common elementals who have developed sufficiently in power that they assume draconic form. Lesser Elemental Dragons usually occupy low-to-middle level positions in the divine courts. Under normal conditions, elementals are seen as somewhat embarassing country cousins by the true gods; Lesser Elemental Dragons are an exception, and hold legal status as true gods, partly due to their power and partly due to the Five having been clearly displased at the continuation of legal discrimination when the first Lesser Dragons emerged. They can become Greater Elemental Dragons if they refine their power further, at the cost of becoming mindless engines of destruction that need to be sealed away for Creation's safety.
    • In addition to the Elemental Dragons, there is a variety of lesser elementals, creatures and beings with draconic names or appearences:
      • Cogwheel dragons are metal elementals native to the world-body of Autochthon who resemble immense, wingless, mechanical dragons made out of gleaming brass. Despite their appearance, they're not true dragons in the sense that the Elemental Dragons are — indeed, it's fairly rare for them to evolve into one of Autochthon's own Elemental Dragon natives — they just look similar. They exist to guard and protect important areas, especially metal-rich ones.
      • The Dragon Kings are humanoid dinosaurs and pterosaurs who once ruled a sophisticated and advanced civilization before being reduced to savagery by a long history of disasters. Relatedly, the Unconquered Sun's most well-known form besides his humanoid one is the golden dragon he appeared as when he was worshipped by the Dragon Kings.
      • There are also two draconic Yozi: the Ebon Dragon, a great Chinese wyrm made of living shadow, and Oramus, the Dragon Beyond the World, currently trapped in a prison made from his own seven wings.
      • Among the demons there is Iyutha, the Vitriolic Dragon, a demon of the second circle who resembles a massive black-and-purple dragon with translucent wings. She hates all forms of love, beauty and order, and seeks to wreck or subvert them wherever she finds them.
      • Halkomelem is a dragon-headed serpent made entirely of crimson paper scribed upon with golden ink, flies endlessly through the skies of Malfeas, and seeks nothing but to add ever more knowledge to that already recorded on its archive-body.
      • Several mortal beasts are likewise named after or resemble dragons to various degrees. Apart from the "natural" examples — such as ox-dragons (ceratopsians), pelagic dragons (huge plesiosaurs), sea dragons (mosasaurs) and river dragons (enormous crocodilian creatures) — there are also creatures affected by the Wyld such as the snow wyrms, 200-foot monsters that look like traditional Eastern dragons but behave more like traditional Western kind, and the Behemoth Sayla the Yellow Wyrm, an immense serpentine reptile who guards a hoard of precious crystals in an underground lair and can fly without wings.
      • Algal dragons are monsters of the Underworld resembling immense reptiles made out of seaweed and the bodies of their victims. They roam the Underworld's black oceans, destroying any ship they find to add its wreckage to their nests and the corpses of its crew to their bodies.
  • Fabula Ultima:
    • Drakes, from the core rulebook, are effectively classical European dragons minus the wings: quadrupedal reptiles with red scales and the ability to breathe fire. They are described as lazy and the weakest of all dragons, but formidable despite their shortcomings.
    • The Flame Dragon from the Fabula Ultima Atlas: High Fantasy sourcebook is a classic European dragon, possessing two wings, four legs, sharp claws and fangs, and fiery breath. It has humanlike intelligence, an immunity to fire, a vulnerability to ice damage, a tough hide that gives it resistance to all other damage types while airborne, and a roar that can strike terror into those that hear it. The book includes tips for creating variant dragons associated with different elements, such as lightning-spewing Storm Dragons and light-breathing Divine Dragons.
  • FAPP (NSFW warning):
    • Being an adult tabletop RPG made by and for furries, there are naturally many types of dragons that show up in supplements, with Dragon Layer being the biggest example since it focuses on dragons. What's more, like most creatures in the land of Jizzral, the dragons have abnormally high levels of libido, to the point that the aforementioned supplement mentions that they "often leave mass pregnancies in their wake" and "are well known for sowing their seed amongst mortals without hesitation."
    • Within the context of the RPG's main setting, Jizzral, dragons are born from the deity Bahamut who, in an inversion to how he's usually depicted in Dungeons & Dragons, has several heads; one of those happen to be Tiamat, ironically, but one of FAPP's supplements, Dragon Layer, also reveals the rest of the heads to be Nidhogg, Ryujin, Leviathan, Vritra, and Typhon. It's also in that supplement where Tiamat takes over Bahamut's body and banishes him, kicking off the events of the premade adventure for it. She too inverts D&D tradition here by having only a single head during Dragon Layer.
  • Fireborn: The PCs are dragons. During character creation, the player creates both a humanoid, weaker modern version and a high-powered dragon form which is played during flashbacks to a prior life.
  • In the Bio Punk setting of Gene Funk 2090, the leader of the Busan Triad is a woman who implanted her brain into a genetically engineered chinese dragon body. Making her a literal Dragon Lady.
  • GURPS:
    • GURPS Dragons details a wide range of dragon types, with game stats, physiology, and abilities. It gives an overview of dragons' history in mythology, describes a number of types — subdivided into limbless, snakelike wyrms, including two-legged lindorms and winged serpents; four-limbed wyverns; classic western dragons, including wingless varieties and ice dragons; Sea Serpents; and eastern dragons, including the growth stages of dragons who begin life as carps, various types of dragons holding authority over different parts of nature, and dragon turtles — their enemies and foes, and how they might play out as antagonists, allies, powerful NPCs and player characters. It also explores several scenarios in which The Dragons Come Back.
    • Off-beat dragons also appear in a few campaign settings. For example, in GURPS Technomancer, there are various kinds of dragon. "Blue" dragons are intelligent, friendly Western dragons, who work for the US Air Force as self-aware aircraft; their scales are green, "blue" refers to their employment. "Red" dragons are really of the same color, but worked for the USSR. "Black" dragons also work for the USAF, but have been genetically engineered into Magitek stealth fighters.
    • GURPS Fantasy Bestiary includes a section dedicated specifically to dragons, and describes several types:
      • Firedrakes are the standard Western dragon — Long-Lived, four-legged, winged, fire-breathing terrors, intelligent and capable of speech and powerful magic but chiefly concerned with hunting and hoarding treasure. They hatch already the size of an adult man and keep growing throughout their lives. They don't grow weak or senile, and only become stronger and wiser as they age. They're even said to never die of old age at all. Luckily for other creatures, they're not common — it takes a lot of prey to keep one fed, and they also experience high mortality rates as hatchlings.
      • Chinese dragons, or lungs, are also covered at length. They have features from almost ever animal — except tigers, their mortal enemies — pearls under their chins and magical growths on their foreheads that allow them to fly. Only the males have horns and whiskers. They are strongly associated with water — they typically live in deep pools and underwater caves or behind waterfalls — are adept shapeshifters and their temperament varies depending on whether they lean more towards Yin and Yang: when Yang is dominant, they are preservers and protectors; when Yin is dominant, they are destroyers.
      • Several types of lung exist. Kioh-Lung are the youngest of their kind, have not yet grown horns or back legs and mature into one of the various kinds of adult dragons at 500 years of age. Li Lung are the least magical of these, resemble dragon-headed lions who fly with physical wings, cannot breathe water and can cause earthquakes. Lung Wang resemble giant dragon-headed turtles, and live in the ocean. P'an Lung are slender, serpentine creatures that live in the sky and can control rain. Shen Lung rule over freshwater, are immune to poison and can make people supernaturally lucky or unlucky. P'an Lung and Shen Lung speak the same language, and can create "water fire" that can only be put out with regular fire.
      • Other types of dragon include rooster-like, mace-tailed aitvaras; azhi dahaka, evil, three-headed legless dragons with a different Breath Weapon for each head; the seven-headed, snakelike and maiden-eating herren-surge; the kakutan, which resembles a horse with a dragon's head; snake-headed, eagle-legged and scorpion-tailed mushussus; aquatic, fishlike tarasques; worms or wyrms, wingless creatures closely related to firedrakes and able to breathe out clouds of poison gas; and animalistic, stinger-tailed wyverns.
  • Legend: "Dragon" is a racial track — about one-third of a character class that also defines the character's race — which is Medium (humanoid) size, has wings, and gains several improvements to its durability as it levels up. A combination of feats and tracks from other classes can be used to build dragons in a variety of ways based on this template — the classic huge fire-breather (Juggernaut feat and Elementalist [fire] track) is just one of many, many combinations.
  • Middle-Earth Role Playing: Dragons are immense reptilian monsters bred by Morgoth in the First Age, although their precise origins are not very clear. Many died during Morgoth's wars and downfall, but others escaped and haunt the wildernesses of the world. They come in multiple kinds, distinguished by different powers, size, and number of limbs, and each drake is unique in its own manner, but all dragons are serpentine reptilian beasts of physical power unrivaled by anything save a Balrog, and are virtually immortal; those dragons that fly do so with forelgs modified into wings. In personality, dragons are vain, arrogant, deceitful and easily angered, and covetous of both land and treasure, but are also very fond of riddles, debates and games of wit. Most are also powerful spellcasters and can dominate the minds of others. They generally live alone, only meeting to battle over territory or to mate.
    • Cave drakes, or Rondóloki, are one of the oldest breeds of dragons. Since they date back to before the dragons' more refined features were bred into them, they lack wings, magic, breath weapons, or much in the way of intelligence, and rarely grow very large or ambitious. They mostly live as wilderness predators and are terrified of their greater kin, although they'll bluster shamelessly when confronted with Men, Elves, or Dwarves. They lie easily and often, but are very bad at it. Cave worms are a variant that resemble limbless, slimy serpents and live in the deepest recesses of the earth, burrowing through the rock and eating anything they stumble into. They're never seen on the surface, but many entered Moria when the Dwarves' mines breached into their homes.
    • Cold-drakes, or Helkalóki, are the most ancient true dragons. They lack breath weapons and most, but not all, are flightless, but they remain cunning, powerful predators with a keen sense of smell. They originated in the Utmost North and still prefer cold climates, and mostly inhabit the wastes of the far north or high, cold mountains. Most are grey or white in color.
    • Ice-drakes a variant of cold-drakes that inhabits glaciers, ice caves, and boreal seas, mostly preying on marine creatures. Besides their living preferences, they're distinguished by their ability to ingest large quantities of water and ice and spewing it back out as a sort of mock breath weapon.
    • Fire-drakes, or Urulóki, are the descendants of Glaurung. They lack the raw physical power of cold-drakes and are poor swimmers, but can breathe out streams of fire and cast powerful spells. Some are winged and some are not.
    • Water-drakes, or Nénilóki, are an aquatic offshoot distinguished by elongated bodies, webbed or fin-like legs, the ability to ingest water and regurgitate it in a powerful spray, and difficulty in moving about on land. They are divided between the rain-drakes and true water-drakes. Rain-drakes are a less specialized breed, still capable of limited movement on land and mostly found in lakes and deep rivers. True water-drakes, also known as Sea Serpents, are entirely water-bound and found in the seas and Beneath the Earth.
    • Were-worms are a very unusual breed capable of altering their shapes. They are divided between sand-drakes, animalistic beasts that can mimic the characteristics of objects their touch, and true were-worms, intelligent beings who use sorcery to take on the forms of other things.
    • Fell-beasts are not true dragons, but were bred from winged drakes to serve as steeds and messengers and resemble smaller, smellier and animal-minded versions of their ancestors.
  • Numenera: Xi-drakes resemble a white take on a classic wyvern, with two wings, two legs, a long tail and a large crest on their heads. This crest also contains an organ that helps them fly, but no one is really sure how it works. They are intelligent and can read minds, and are extremely long-lived.
  • Only War: Cuyavale is home to Drakons, flying reptilian predators firmly at the top of the local food chain. They lay enormous clutches of eggs at a time, which hatch into swarms of ravenous newborns that swarm into the global forests, eating everything that they can catch (and also one another). After a horde of Orks invaded the planet, the greenskins have taken to trying to tame the beasts as flying mounts.
  • Palladium Books: Rifts, Palladium Fantasy and related games feature a multitude of dragons, based on Western, Eastern, and other mythological sources, plus good ol' imagination, from Hydras to Chiang-Ku to Ogopogo (based on a real-life Canadian legend) to Crystal Dragons. Rifts even allows you to have a young hatchling dragon (as young as "just hatched a few minutes ago") as a playable character. Palladium's dragons are extremely powerful, both physically, psychically and magically, with many species capable of transforming into a human form; they're born able to do things like speak and do math due to Genetic Memory, and can live for thousands of years. Adults can take on a Humongous Mecha and expect to win most of the time, while the most ancient can even give a god a hard time.
    • In general, dragons are believed to hail from some unknown world and to be the progeny of a god called Styphon, but have long since spread throughout The Multiverse and can now be found on almost any world where magic is strong enough — they're quite common in the High Fantasy world of Palladium Fantasy, and flocked to Earth in droves when magic returned with the Rifts.
    • In Atlantis, dragons are respected and influential creatures who rule their own city, Dragcona; they're some of the very few creatures whom the monstrous Splugorth who rule the continent respect and treat as equals, although the dragons themselves very much do not view the Splugorth as equal peers. Atlantean dragons preach a religion called Dragonwright, which teaches that might is right, magic is the greatest might, the strong should rule over the weak, dragons are the mightiest and most magical creatures alive and the Atlantean dragon king Styphathal is a living god.
  • Pathfinder has the same chromatic and metallic dragons as D&D, although they are given different designs due to Pathfinder being a separate game. There are numerous other types of dragons, such as Oriental-style imperial dragons, primal dragons which represent the elements, the space-faring outer dragons, planar dragons native to the Outer Planes and esoteric dragons connected to occult matters.
    • The main difference between Pathfinder and Dungeons & Dragons dragons is that Pathfinder has a design goal to only add true dragons in connected groups of five, like the original chromatic and metallic families, while D&D feels comfortable throwing in additional dragons in existing groups or simply not indicating a group. The end result is that D&D has more true dragons (as of February 2018) while PF has more true dragon types.
    • Besides metallics and chromatics, Pathfinder has developed a large stable of families of true dragons:
      • Primal dragons are elemental beings native to the four elemental planes and the Plane of Shadow, which cover the five neutral alignments. They count the Lawful Neutral brine dragons, arrogant tyrants who rule much of the Plane of Water; True Neutral cloud dragons, inveterate wanderers whose wanderlust takes them far from their homes in the Plane of Air; Neutral Good crystal dragons, vain but benevolent creatures who rule over a patchwork of fiefs and realms in the Plane of Earth; Chaotic Neutral magma dragons, emotional and unstable beings who lurk in places of intense heat; and Neutral Evil shadow dragons, who thrive wherever there is darkness and plenty of spectral undead to eat.
      • The imperial dragons are based and named off of several specific types of dragons from classical Chinese myth. Forest dragons, or dilungs, are evil forest-dwellers who never make a pact they won't gladly go back on and breathe a swarm of insects. Sea dragons, or jiaolungs, are boisterous adventurers of the open ocean. Sky dragons, or tienlungs, are sky-dwelling paladins and crusaders who rarely set foot on solid land. The sovereign dragons, or lungwangs, are ethereal and aloof philosophers said to have been charged by the gods with maintaining balance in the mortal world. The underworld dragons, or futsanglungs, are cruel and calculating manipulators who rule over large portions of Tian Xian's Darklands. There are also the immensely powerful shens, shapeshifting and mirage-making relatives of true imperial dragons, which are based on a likewise shapeshifting draconic sea monster.
      • Outer dragons dwell on celestial bodies and in the depth of space, and tend to be very powerful beings. They include ice-breathing lunar dragons, fire-breathing solar dragons, void dragons driven mad and twisted by things they found in the deep void, vortex dragons who can travel between the stars and serve as messengers for powerful beings, and immensely powerful time dragons who dwell in isolated strongholds in the cosmos.
      • Occult dragons are associated with transitive planes, demiplanes and eldritch lore, and possess Psychic Powers. They include the dream and nightmare dragons of the Dimension of Dreams, the etheric and astral dragons of the Ethereal and Astral Planes, and magic-obsessed occult dragons that infiltrate humanoid society to access esoteric knowledge and magical items.
      • Planar dragons are the exception to the five-species-a-group rule, largely as a result of a communication error — they were originally intended to only represent the hybrid alignment and True Neutral planes, with the others reserved for another family, but a Lawful Neutral was printed anyway and by then it was too late to course correct. One species exists for each outer plane, and in adulthood they migrate to the Material Plane to terraform parts of it to more closely resemble their homes — a decent deal when one comes from heaven, less so when another claims the countryside in the name of hell.
    • Drakes are a group of smaller, weaker relatives of true dragons — relatively speaking; they're still about as tall as a typical peasant house — that usually serve their stronger cousins as expendable minions or make dangerous nuisances of themselves in the countryside. Many drake types correspond to true dragon types (flame drakes for red dragons, forest drakes for greens, ice drakes for whites, lava drakes for magma dragons, and so on), although many — many — other kinds exist, and early products describe them as the degenerate results of draconic inbreeding. This was eventually dropped for a number of reasons, and drakes are nowadays more often described as descendants of interbreeding between dragons and wyverns.
    • In addition to these, there are also the savage linnorms, wyrms (typically with only two arms for limbs) that normally live up in the cold North; tiny fairie dragons and pseudodragons, which can be taken as familiars; the jabberwock; two-headed elder wyrms created by gods to punish mortal civilizations; and even a dinosaur-like African cryptid, to name a few.
  • Ponyfinder: In addition to the basic dragons of Dungeons & Dragons and Pathfinder, the setting has a few original dragon varieties.
    • Luminous dragons are the descendants of a dragon who was friends with Luminance and who became a divine guardian of her realm after she became a goddess; they originated in the Outer Planes, and were brought to the mortal realm as a trick by the Unspoken. They are fairly small, resembling the wyrmlings of other species even when adult and never growing much larger than a pony, and can be of any color. They're typically more friendly, sociable and even-tempered than other dragons, who scorn them as soft and weak, but lack the ties to destiny that ponies have and consequently aren't intrinsically drawn to lawful alignments. Depending on the individual, they may be flightless or winged and may or may not possess strong claws or horns.
    • Rift dragons are tied to, and believed to be born from, areas of elemental imbalance. They gravitate to areas where the elemental planes bleed into the material world, which they fiercely defend from interference and attempts to dissipate and pacify. They're highly resistant to divine magic and metal weapons, making them seem created to counter civilization as a concept. Their breath weapon changes nature based on the primary form of elemental influence in the area where they currently live; outside of such areas they cannot use it.
  • RuneQuest: Dragons are incredibly ancient and powerful beings, and an important part of the cosmology and backstory. Human beings can become dragons if they follow Draconic Mysticism, and the Empire of Wyrms Friends wanted to assimilate everybody into being dragons. Or at least part of the messianic Great Dragon to Come.
    • True Dragons are beings of unfathomable power and age, and are large enough for their sleeping forms to mostly be mistaken for features of the landscape. Luckily for humanoid peoples, they don't usually move around much. They spend most of their time asleep, dreaming dreams that bleed over into reality.
    • Dream Dragons are created from the manifest dreams of the slumbering True Dragons, and are the big, flying, treasure-hoarding lizards that Gloranthans interact with the most often. They only exist as long as the dreams sustaining them do, and instead of decomposing they slowly fade away if they're killed. They're much smaller and weaker than True Dragons, but still quite capable of leveling cities and destroying armies on their own. Because they originate from fragments of the True Dragons' subconscious minds, they're often ruled by base impulses and emotions.
    • There are also the Ancestral Dragons, as far above the True Dragons as True Dragons are above Dream Dragons. They participated in the creation of the world, but no longer manifest in physical reality. The next step above them is the Cosmic Dragon, which includes the whole universe within itself, and Ouroboros, which includes the whole universe and everything else as well.
    • Beyond the main family of dragonkind, there's a great variety of lesser strains descended from them by various circuitous means. Wyverns are two-legged creatures created when Dream Dragons born from lustful dreams mate with each other, and have established wild populations. Wyrms are great legless serpents with wings; they split off from other dragons in the distant and unrecorded past, and are the friendliest dragon breed to humans. Stoorworms are monstrous, poison-breathing beasts created when draconic beings are corrupted by Chaos. Dragonewts are reptilian humanoids who are immortal, and grow over the centuries in size, wisdom and power, until one day they die and reincarnate as True Dragons — in fact they need to die and reincarnate several times for this to happen, but they always retain all the memories from their previous lives. They form the oldest and perhaps the most aliennote  civilization in Glorantha. The parent dragons mostly let the dragonewts fend for themselves, but on one famous occasion when enemies tried to destroy the one place in the world where dragonewts can be reborn, the dragons took a hand. The resulting "Dragonkill Wars" weren't named for what happened to the dragons... and ever since, wars against dragonewts have stopped short of trying to exterminate them. Dinosaurs are further descended from dragonewts, originating from dragonewts who lost sight of their goal due to becoming lost in emotional impulses, degenerated into beasts and became permanently trapped in flesh.
  • Shadowrun:
    • Dragons awoke during the Awakening and have been active ever since (in the "present day" of 2080, about 70 years now). They are often citizens of nations or megacorps, and are invariably as wealthy and influential as they are manipulative and scheming. Never, ever, cut a deal with one.
    • Dragons come in both Western and Eastern forms, with the Eastern in turn having a subspecies of sorts known as the sirrush with longer limbs and head and a shorter tail, as well as the feathered serpents common to Central American mythologies and seagoing leviathans.
      • All types come in "normal" and "greater" varieties: Greater dragons are very old, very experienced and very powerful individuals and survivors of the Fourth World (and therefore thousands of years old). Regular dragons are bad enough, being arrogant, manipulative beings that can pull the strings of cities and corporations. Greater Dragons pull the strings of megacorps and nations if not the world itself and are basically Plot Devices; they have stats, but they're clearly not meant to be fought (the great dragon Alamais was direct-hit by a orbital laser satellite and survived). One greater dragon even became president of the UCAS before being assassinated (in his human form) by a Blood Magic nuke (and it's ambiguous whether it actually killed him). Fortunately for humanity they're about as cooperative as a bag of angry cats and expend most of their energy squabbling with each other and the various nations and MegaCorps. Never, ever, cut a deal with one.
      • They have a rather peculiar reproductive system — after two dragons mate, having selected their partner solely based on who they think will give their offspring the best genes, the female puts her eggs into the care of a great dragon. The great dragon cares for the clutch as it incubates, communicating telepathically with the young inside until they hatch and molding their minds before they're even born. On hatching, the newborn dragons inherit the features of the great dragon who cared for them rather than those of their parents — a western dragon's eggs cared for by a great feathered serpent, for instance, will hatch into feathered serpents. The great dragon who hatched and raised them (referred to as their sire) is thus who dragons perceive as their actual parent, and most neither know nor care about their original progenitors.
    • While possessing a small population, the Dragons' ability to gather wealth and influence, and ability to outplan most humans give them disproportionate levels of influence. In a lesser case, a dragon named Eliohann was kidnapped by a megacorporate subsidiary and was their main test subject, and became the subsidiary's president before its collapse. Other instances are the Great Dragon Lofwyr becoming undisputed master of Saeder-Krupp, currently the number two megacorp; the Great Dragon Hestaby being a long-serving member of the ruling council of the elven nation of Tir Tairngire (which she shared with Lofwyr, before he resigned to focus on his corporate interests). Fortunately for humanity, dragons are about as cooperative as a bag of angry cats and expend most of their energy squabbling with each other and the various nations and MegaCorps.
    • The Great Dragon Dunkelzahn, despite being a Great Dragon, was charismatic and personable enough to become wildly popular with metahumanity, enough to become the American President until he was assassinated 8 hours after being sworn into office. While there are those who are skeptical, they are often dismissed as cynical by those who see the Big D with rose-colored glasses. The truth, of course, is more complex: while Dunk was a genuinely benevolent being, he could be quite cruel to those who wronged him or the people D cared about. And he wasn't above messing with people. His will incentivized massive innovations, destroyed the lives of several people, and turned the established world order on its head.
    • For all their arrogance and the suffering they cause, dragons do serve an important role in Sixth World society. While they do view metahumanity as subordinate to them, and varying between a tool to use or an obstacle to crush under talon, many do look out for metahumanity's collective well being. For others, it's simply a matter of practicality, as their truest enemies are... monsters, which manifest when magic reaches its highest point.
    • In some editions, dragons also had the ability to master Edge. Specifically, they had the ability to cancel a character spending Edge to ensure a lucky shot, make sure they dodged an attack, etc.
    • A number of lesser draconic creatures, referred to collectively as dracoforms, also exist.
      • Wyverns are animalistic predators closely related to feathered serpents, and are found in North America and Europe.
      • Drakes are shapeshifters who can alternate between a metahuman form and one resembling a miniature dragon of any breed; they were created in the Fourth World to be servants of the dragons, and their lines endured through the mana-less Fifth World as seemingly normal humans. They reappeared when the mana surge that came with Halley's Comet caused hundreds of unsuspecting metahumans to suddenly turn into drakes, which were then either rounded up by the dragons or went into hiding.
      • Hydras are large, amphibious creatures resembling seven- or nine-headed dragons, and are only found in Greece.
      • Drakas (known as drakes in the first two edition, before the later drakes were introduced in 3rd) are wingless, primitive dragon relatives about as smart as orangutans, and are often used by true dragons as guard animals. They come in a fire-breathing variant and an ice-breathing one, but sometimes crossbreed to create hybrids with both types of breath. They are also related to seadrakons, mosasaur-like sea reptiles the size of a whale.
      • Gorgons are amphibious dracoforms with gills and manes of fleshy, mobile tendrils.
      • Lake serpents and Sea Serpents are plesiosaur-like dracoforms native to freshwater lakes and oceans, respectively. The former are herbivores, the latter aggressive carnivores.
    • There are also dracomorphs, which resemble dragons but aren't actually related to them; examples include chimeras (Awakened iguanas with prominent horns and frills and a fiery breath) and lindworms (Awakened, sapient serpents that grow a pair of front legs as they age, and often serve dragons as messengers and go-betweens).
  • Space 1889: The main book mentions the Sand Wing, a truly huge vicious flying creature capable of flying off with a ruumet breehr (elephant equivalent), that supposedly looked a lot like an oriental dragon (and that's what the illustration shows). It is thought to have been hunted to extinction.
  • The Splinter: The Dragons are shape-changing were-creatures, as are most other sentient beings within the universe that they inhabit. Instead of breathing fire (though that is well within the scope of their power) they alter the very fabric of reality with their world-breathing.
  • The Strange:
    • The dragons of Ardeyn, creations of Lotan, are massive, feathered, exceptionally territorial and competitive. They love games of all sorts, especially ones that end with the nondragon loser being eaten.
    • The glass dragons of the Glass Desert are creatures of magic, spawned by the destruction of the Maker's Hall that also created the desert itself. Learned sorcerers suggest that other dragons of disaster probably exist in Ardeyn, having been spawned by various catastrophes. They are draconic only in broad outline, appearing as animate collections of shattered glass.
    • Demon drakes are the biggest, rarest and strongest demons in Hell Frozen Over. They refer to themselves as lords of Hell and play up their demonic role to the fullest, but are well aware of the Strange and enjoy the status as the biggest fish in their recursion. Their bodies are covered in scales that seem almost metallic.
    • A nameless dragon resides in Oceanmist, and the resident pirates bring it booty and treasure as a sign of respect. The dragon is scaled, not feathered like those in Ardeyn. Clinically depressed, it only rouses if forced to defend itself or its hoard, or if visitors suggest a game. Each of the prominent natives of Oceanmist with the spark independently concluded that it was necessary to win the dragon as an ally.
    • Tetsu are dragonlike creatures seeded by Japanese myth. Despite a lack of wings, a tetsu's magic allows it to fly and gives it a host of potential abilities. Even the smallest lake in Seishin Shore is usually guarded by a territorial tetsu that regards the mote as its home.
  • Tails of Equestria:
    • Dragons are a playable race and a type of monster. Like in the show, they're a civilized race that start out not much stronger than ponies.
    • Bookwyrms resemble dragons made out of book pages, ink and bindings. They're summoned into existence using magic, and are given a single command that their existence then revolves completely around following. Once their task is done, they cease to exist.
  • Talislanta: Dragons are huge, aggressive, wingless, and mostly non-sapient or uncommunicative. They hatch out as larval "wyrmms", then metamorphose into their adult forms (land dragons, sea dragons, multi-headed kaliya, or crested dragons). Land dragons are sometimes tamed and used as living tanks by saurans.
  • The World of Darkness:
    • Old World of Darkness:
      • Dragons were immensely powerful Mythicals which were variously described; while it is never clear, they appear to be either the (non-)Anthropomorphic Personification of everything humanity fears and/or doesn't understand, or 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 Pele, 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.
      • Werewolf: The Apocalypse: The Mokole werelizards 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).
      • Werewolf: The Apocalypse also has the Zmei, a group of seven Wyrm dragons whom Baba Yaga summoned to fight Absimiliard.
    • New World of Darkness:
      • Mage: The Awakening Dragons are the legendary predecessor 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).
      • Changeling: The Lost: Dzarumazh, one of the True Fae, takes the form of a dragon. There is also an entire "Draconic" kith that Changelings can take after, although it also covers devilish themes.
      • Beast: The Primordial: There are multiple Families that could draw power from a draconic Horror, but dragons are often associated with the Ugallu, who represent the fear of predators/judgment from on high.
      • Dragon: The Embers: Dragons are the player characters here, portrayed as a dying race that cannot reproduce. New dragons can only be made by eating the heart of an existing dragon. In addition, dragons require tribute to survive, and without it they will eventually turn to stone and die.
  • World Tree (RPG):
    • Zi Ri are a species of small, hermaphroditic dragons who are often very different, even from each other — Zi Ri are very physically varied, and can range from regular if miniature Western dragons to bird-winged and/or -beaked versions of the same to reptilian birds. Some even look like tiny griffins or lizards, although deliberate self-mutation is probably at play there.
    • Merklundum Harnispundum, the god of water, typically appears as a dragon made out of woven brambles.
  • Wyrmlings: Dragons in Wyrmlings are powerful creatures with a great deal of magical power. While young ones are quadripedal, adults can stand on two legs or four depending on their personal preference. They do have the conventional fire, lightning, and ice, but also have more unusual types such as Sand and Forest.

    Wargames 
  • Iron Kingdoms: Dragons resemble the traditional Western versions superficially, but cleave a little closer to Eldritch Abominations 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.
  • Warhammer:
    • Warhammer: Age of Sigmar: Dragons are mostly associated with the various Order factions, and especially with the realm of Azyr, due to the influence of the star-dragon Dracothion, who has lived there since the realm's creation, and dragons as a whole are believed to be descended from Dracothion and his progeny.
      • A number of dragons and dragon-like beings native to Azyr are used by the Stormcast Eternals as mounts. The winged Stardrakes retain more direct heritage from their ancestor, and are intelligent and magical beings. More bestial, wingless offshoots include the muscular, tusked Dracoths and the Dracolines, which combine draconic characteristics with those of predatory mammals.
      • The Draconith are a race of very large, intelligent dragons, whose civilization once spread across the Mortal Realms. Their Breath Weapon depends on their realm of origin; Azyrite Draconith breathe lightning, while Ghurish ones breathe slag that solidifies into amber. They were brought to the brink of extinction by the bestial warlord Kragnos, leaving only the brothers Krondys and Karazai and a number of unhatched eggs, which were rescued and guarded by the reptilian Serapho. In the modern day, a new generation of Draconith has been reared and allied itself with the Stormcast, agreeing to serve as mounts in exchange for help in rebuilding their civilization.
      • Black dragons are a breed native to Ulgu, the Realm of Shadows, exhale a powerful corrosive breath and are hatched from eggs infused with dark magic; they are mostly used as steeds by the sorceresses of the Darkling Covens and the Dreadlords of the Order Serpentis, an order of aelves who match the dragons' intense viciousness.
      • Ignax, the Solar Drake, is an ancient Godbeast — an immortal, semi-divine monster — resembling a huge, limbless serpentine dragon. She's a daughter of Vulcatrix, the the Mother of Salamanders, and was bound by the god Grimnir to serve as a sun for the realm of Aqshy. She was eventually corrupted by Chaos to serve as a powerful war monster, was temporarily re-captured by the forces of Order, and ultimately broke free and hid herself away deep beneath the world, to recuperate far from the machinations of gods and mortals.
    • Warhammer Fantasy Battle: Dragons are intelligent, and according to The Old World Bestiary can speak, often in multiple languages. They are also said to be the oldest living things on the planet, dating back to an age before the 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.
      • True dragons come in several varieties, including the dragons that fight alongside the High Elves and start their lives as fierce and impetuous Sun Dragons before growing wiser and more powerful as they age into Moon and Star Dragons, poison-breathing Forest Dragons from the Enchanted Forest of Athel Loren, Carmine Dragons imbued with the magic of the Wind of Death, monstrous Black Dragons and Sea Dragons employed by the Dark Elves, the Imperial Dragon that the Emperors of the Empire can sometimes convince to carry them to battle, monstrous two-headed Chaos Dragons in the service of the Ruinous Powers, undead Zombie Dragons used as steeds by vampires and necromancers, the hideous and wingless Toad Dragons of the Cold Mires, serpentine Shard Dragons who live Beneath the Earth and are covered in knifelike scales, hulking Magma Dragons who dwell in volcanoes and hunt other monsters, immense sea-dwelling Merwyrms, and Warpfire Dragons which feed upon solidified Chaos energy and emit an aura that withers living creatures.
      • There are also wyverns, raised by Orcs as war mounts. They are about as smart as horses and are smaller and less powerful than true dragons, from which they're also distinguished by their smaller size, poisonous sting and vicious temperament.
      • The Warhammer Chronicles supplement The Lost Valley of the Dinosaurs describes Great Wyrms, dragon-sized wyvern-like creatures that fly over the skies of the Dragon Isles, preying upon pterosaurs and other flying creatures.
      • Warhammer: The Old World introduced Eastern-type dragons. These are a different tribe of dragons who made their home on the other side of the planet and are fewer in number, but the few who are not hilbernating take a much more active role in the world. Two of their number, Xen Yiang and Quai Yin, revealed themselves to the humans who had settled the eastern lands and formed the Empire of Grand Cathay that they still rule to this day. Unlike the dragons native to Ulthuan, the eastern dragons can take human form and cast spells, and refuse to view any mortal as their equal: they find the fact that other dragons lets mortals ride them scandalous and demeaning to dragonkin at a whole.
  • Warhammer 40,000 has no true dragons in sight (besides name references, particularly among Eldar) but it's a big galaxy, and certain creatures are very similar to classic dragons.
    • Heldrakes are biomechanical living weapons cast in the shape of monstrous dragons, with plated metal wings anchored onto their forelimbs, razor-sharp steel talons and flamethrowers built into their jaws that spew corrupting Warpfire. They're intelligent enough to fly and pick out targets without need of handlers or directions and to form packs ruled by the strongest and most experienced Heldrakes, and are thought to descend from fighter aircraft of the Traitor Legions that mutated and fused with their pilots when the legions fled into the Eye of Terror.
    • There's also the mysterious Eldritch Abomination known as the Void Dragon, who gets a lot more coverage in Graham McNeill's Horus Heresy book Mechanicum, fitting the trope very, very closely. To make a long story short, it was big, its scales were made of fluid metal, it had a nasty temper, it ate stars, and it was defeated by shoving a lance into its wing joint.
    • Nocturne, the home planet of the Salamanders Space Marine chapter, has giant fire-breathing reptiles called fire drakes that are pretty much flightless dragons. They live in the volcano of Mount Deathfire. Both Vulkan and the Emperor have slayed one, and it's common for the Space Marines to slay them. The Salamanders even name some of their units after these mighty dragons, known as the Firedrakes.
    • Wyvachs are wyvern-like creatures known for being able to form mental bonds with psykers, and are often sought out as familiars for this reason.
    • The mjordhainn, a species of alien raiders native to Thusel Prime before their extermination by the White Scars, rode four-legged, winged serpents called tchorlau.

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