"Half red dragons don't come from red dragons and humans mating" I see the council has come to a decision, but seeing that it's a stupid ass decision, I've elected to ignore it

Red Dragon Mentality \ \ Do I own it? / \ No Yes / \ Burn it Does someone else want it? / \ No Yes / \ Add it to the Horde Burn it / Did someone steal it? / \ No Yes / \ Get minions to guard it Hunt down the thief and burn their entire village to the ground

I think i have just been inspired into thinking up an adventurer’s idiom about the importance of moderation and thinking long term. “Kill enough Goblins and you might becomes famous. Kill enough Kobolds and some dragon will decide you’re too inconvenient to leave alive.”

An hour of Dragon lore? Truly, you spoil us, oh Great Sage.

The idea of a Red Dragon being born good and having to grapple with the fact it is an outcast and hated by it's own kind sounds like an interesting baseline for a dragon npc.

Dragons:This infinite plane of existence ain't big enough for the two of us.

I once ran a max level one-shot (big mistake) where the players had to fight an ancient black dragon. They didn't stand a chance... the ancient black dragon has taken over the world by acidifying the oceans and lived in an adamantine fortress at the bottom of that ocean, contained within is an artifact which blocked conjuration magic (that includes Wish) within a mile of the fortress, which is itself guarded by acidified water elementals (invisible in the ocean) and Clay Golems that heal insane HP every round because of the acid ocean. So yeah, you can make dragon encounters nearly impossible to win without too much creativity.

Oh Lord an entire hour! Grab a tasty beverage, this is gonna be extra nerdy!

“Half red dragons are NOT the result of a red dragon mating with a humanoid” And with that it’s as if millions of bards cried out and were silenced

Literally, I would argue, the most iconic D&D monster.

Now I have the image of a 1 foot tall baby Half-Dragon running through the back alleys of Waterdeep, chasing down and pouncing on rodents, strays, and house pets alike to appease the ever present hunger that fuels its rapid growth.

Capitalist red dragon running a fleet of ships, several caravans, warehouses and several trade companies, with the mercenaries to protect their goods.

A tip to anyone trying to raise a dragon that is typically evil aligned in nature- if you want to successfully raise it to be of good alignment incubate the egg on one of the Upper/Celestial Planes that are basically infused with and radiate good. Just as a Red Dragon can be mutated by being on a lower plane, incubating and raising one on an Upper Plane can have equal effect in influencing their development. The earlier after being laid that you can deliver the egg safely onto an Upper Plane the greater the effect prior to hatching. This is clearly not an undertaking for the unprepared.

"Do you think flattery will keep you alive?" ~Smaug

Player group: Can we fight a Red dragon? Me the DM: There's a reason it takes up two pages of the monster manual, is on the standard DM screen, and gets an hour on AJ's channel.

35:08 Red dragons are the reason that the game is calls Dungeons and Dragons? Well played sir.

One of my favorite things to do with any fire breathing dragon is to whip up a bunch of sand with the wings to fill the area, then breathe fire up into the sand cloud to rain down burning droplets of liquid glass for a few rounds.

Campaign Idea: all players play Red Dragon Males on a dating show trying to charm the DMs Female Red Dragon, ending in boss battle mating. Miningames include hyping yourself up to the mate and securing an expensive and impressive mating gift.

33:20 "red dragons were an issue until one innovative wizard invented the spell, 'Leaderboard'. After that, the reds sorted themselves."

"Bilbo was now beginning to feel really uncomfortable. Whenever Smaug's roving eye, seeking for him in the shadows, flashed across him, he trembled, and an accountable desire seized hold of him to rush out and reveal himself and tell all the truth to Smaug. In fact he was in grievous danger of coming under the dragon-spell.""

"It is within the power of dragons to destroy the Abyss and restore the multiverse to what it once was." Wait, what? Really?! That's a deeply nerdy bit of lore I've gotta know about!

"If you manage to give the hatchling a sound thrashing it will see you as a rival - " Yeah, I can see that. "- and possibly a potential mate." Oh no.

I had a campaign involving a very wealthy human master thief who specialized in putting together Ocean's Eleven-style heists on Red Dragon hoards. Turns out that she's actually a female Red Dragon herself in polymorph who is running this operation in order to rob her mates blind. She actually mates with lower, more insecure males as a way to case their lairs and hoards, playing on their insecurities and ego in order to get them to "show off" their hoard, usually by implying that she heard that her mark's hated rival has a bigger treasure hoard and should probably go mate with _him_ instead. This tactic works more often than you'd think. This way, when she puts together a team of professional adventurers and thieves later, she knows the layout, the traps, and the defenses the mark has and can prepare accordingly. Obviously, her accomplices will get a cut, but she's secure in the knowledge that she'll be getting that gold eventually: most of the places they're likely to spend their loot are either owned by her or are paying her extortion money. In this method, she's amassed a gargantuan treasure hoard, which she takes pains to keep hidden.

Now we are going to expect an hour for every dragon type.

you know you're a fan of The Mighty Gluestick when an 1h video isn't long, but just making justice to the majesty of the monster.

“Stupid as a bag of ogres” is the funniest thing I’ve heard all month

Best Red Dragon encounter I ever ran was in 3.5, with the player's having been tasked to take out an ancient red dragon. The dragon in question lived inside of a volcano, complete with rivers of lava. On the way into the lair, the players was forced to fight a pack of hell hounds, which due to the party's level was a very easy encounter. But the hell hounds was never meant to stop a serious threat to the dragon, they were an early warning system. So when the party got into the main lair, the dragon was nowhere to be seen, because the players didn't look straight up. On the wall, right above the entrance, with the head towards the floor (thus seeing the party as it entered the lair), was the dragon, all thanks to a little first level spell that most players discard as irrelevant: Spider Climb. So imagine the players surprise as they all had to save against the dragons fire breath before even rolling for initiative. Half the party got stunned before even getting the protective wards up, even the party rogue got severely burned due to a failed reflex save (had they not had uncanny evasion the blast would have killed them outright), This lead to an epic fight with the dragon throwing spells and using its breath weapon and frightful presence scarily effectively. By the time the dragon was dead (one and half hours later real time), a third of the party was dead (ranger died by getting crushed by a falling dragon, lol). But ultimately the party persevered.

I just started rereading a book that made me think of this video, and the classic greedy Smaug-like dragon I absolutely love: The Dragon's Banker by Scott Warren. The premise is that a medieval/early modern kingdom has just adopted fiat currency, and so an ancient red dragon so old that no one knows he isn't a myth kidnaps a banker to demand of him why pitiful human beings trading paper is supposed to devalue his hoard. The concept itself is funny, but the main character is wealth-obsessed in a way that lends to interesting descriptions and observations, and his meeting with the dragon is very insightful. Hope you don't mind media recommendations, I figure it could help develop NPC dragons, but if it's obnoxious let me know and I can take it down.

The only to actually cook red dragon meat is with acid. My in-game tavern is now serving Red Dragon Ceviche. Thanks AJ!

I personally use Nurture Over Nature for most dragons in my games. My players have met a Good White Dragon who sells Ice Cream form a stall in the city market. They have also learned of an Evil Silver Dragon who runs an international slave trade.

+1 for the fraggle rock reference.

This was great affirmation that I ran my party's red dragon boss fight appropriately. Also thanks for answering my question on famous ancient reds.

Dragons are like students, it's hard to know how many there are at any time as they spend 90% of their time in deep slumber.

A Masterclass Indeed Sage. Your hard work has definitely paid off.

The dragons can destroy the abyss?! Damn, really want to hear more on that one! Thanks for great content.

So that means that there are three choices for the origin of a Red Half-Dragon - magical mishap/experiment, the essence transfer, and finally a polymorphed Red Dragon that is completely and utterly cracked in the coconut.

Man this gave me a really cool idea. An ancient, massive, powerful and arrogant red dragon wakes up, expecting a tribute from the nearby kingdom. Except there's nothing there. The dragon investigates and find the kingdom celebrating. It demands to see the king, and is led to the castle. The dragon demands triple tribute, to include every child of the king, and takes a moment to bask in the terror. Except instead of terror, the dragon is met with laughter from the king, who offers the dragon a chance to surrender unconditionally. The enraged dragon prepares to burn everything when suddenly the ground beneath its feet buckles. It barely makes it into the air in time to avoid the collapse, and watches in absolute terror as something climbs free of the Earth. A clockwork dragon, made of gold, silver, electrum, and platinum, so large that the red looks like a pseudodragon in comparison. The clockwork dragon grabs the ancient beast around the neck, shrugging off its struggles and flames. It chokes the red dragon to the point of near unconsciousness and spits in its face before hurling it through the air and into the side of its own mountain lair. The last thing the ancient wyrm sees before losing consciousness is the construct stalking towards it, malice in its black stone eyes and mouth filling with some sort of energy.

That was the shortest hour I've had in a long time. 👍

I have a bit of a headcanon. I believe that red dragons actually aren’t the strongest of dragons, they’re just the most vicious and unfair. They’ll use any tactics necessary to win a fight, even if it’s unfair. Not only that, but they only pick fights they can win, and they prey on weaker dragons. I wrote about a red dragon named Inferno, and one of his victims described him as being “the most wretched of predators.”

Lol, my party became evil while raising a red dragon, it absolutely played them. They became its minions and were later sacrificed for its goals. It did feel a moment of conscious sadness before devouring their remains. I also let my red dragon polymorph just like metallic dragons, I can't see why chromatics couldn't though most wouldn't.

I like how you described alignment here. I tend to agree: alignment is a product of personality characteristics, which is itself a combination of choice, dispositions, and environment. A red dragon has characteristic aggression, arrogance, and greed. With the right training, it could be lawful good, but that might look more like the lawful good of a bronze dragon (I think) where they think they are right and will oppress people who disagree with them. They might still love burning things to the ground, but only inflict such wrath on demons. Interesting thought experiment on how alignments change as a result of environmental, and may be expressed differently.

I like the idea of good aligned devils. Many of them started off as Celestials, after all. Why not let them still be good but cursed to their infernal form because they took part in the war against the Abyss. If a Solar can fall, why can't a Pit Fiend raise??

Im really interested in the dragons destroying the abyss comment that you made. Really got my brain going on how they could accomplish that feat.

Your dragon series was how I originally found your channel.

You have failed to convince me that Red Dragons don't do love. You have instead only convinced me that Red Dragons are into BDSM.

Time to incorporate a red dragon into my next campaign

Are silver's next ? An hour on silver dragons would just be awesome

knee jerk response: How in the world did the red dragon never get covered before? See video length: Ohhhh, AJ was doing a dissertation level deep dive, now I get it

Redeem dragons, maybe, yes. But to 'redeem' a demon, that would be an impossibility. In the D&D multiverse, demons are quite literally concentrated evil given physical form - they cannot exist as anything else, therefore if they were to somehow switch alignment, the demon would be utterly and completely destroyed. Redemption of a devil may be possible, if they were once celestial (like the Erinyes, or certain Arch Devils like Zariel) but unlikely.

All my dragons have crystals that grow in their necks surrounded by blood vessels as an explanation to their breath weapon. Gives the party something to grab

Campaign Idea: A group of Legendary human adventures/rulers find and revive the dead God of Humanity by sacrificing their souls to in order to bring it back > The God tells Humans about the Illithids that killed it and recruits various Human nations to wage war on the Illithids now that Humans have grown stronger and more advanced(Humans would have been cave folk back when the God died) > The God grants magic, blessings, and maybe advanced magi-tech from its long forgotten Celestial Realm to the nations that follow it, leading to them quickly overwhelming other surface cultures that don't submit to the God > After gaining control of the vast majority of the surface world, the God starts Humans and their nonHuman allies(most of which have converted to the Human God) on their March Against The Underdark(possible Campaign Title). This is where players come in. You are an "Advanced Auxiliary Unit" that is traveling ahead of the bulk of the Human Army to find safe routes, identify dangers, convert/ally with some Underdark cultures and fighting against and freeing the cultures that are allied with or subjugated by the Illithids.

Although I love your shorter videos as well, there is nothing quite like leaning back after a long, stressful day and listening to almost an hour of lore. Awesome vid as always, the level of detail was legendary! I've got a question regarding Tiamat, and would very much appreciate your input. I've always wondered how the lore of Tiamat as the evil sibling of Bahamut fit in with the lore of Tiamat as originally having come from Earth and becoming part of the Untheric pantheon when the Imaskari captured themselves their human slaves (see 2e Powers & Pantheons). Has this ever been resolved?

If you *really* want to be evil, give your red dragon an iron golem that obeys them as part of their hoard. Not only is it immune to getting caught in the fire breath, it heals from it.

Male Dragon: "Be gone thot!" Female Dragon: "So anyways I started blasting."

This is by far one of my favorite videos, 10/10 This is what motivated me to start creating my own campaign set around dragons and the dragon Gods 🐉. What if a new dragon god were to come to power how would the curent pantheon react? How would the dragons of the prime material plane be influenced? Once again AJ delivers a unique and much appreciated lore video on D&D monsters, 10 /10 thank you and keep up the great work

I like to think that Dragons can channel their sorcery through their breath/vomit. Like their fire is non magical, but they can weave their magic in to it as an excellent conductor, much like their blood

Old Snarl is a personal favorite

54:00 Be the dragon, think like the dragon. Throw cultists and rocks like the dragon.

This nerd (meant as a compliment),, just made me sit here for an HOUR, soaking up the lore of a classic game, that I haven't played in over 20 years! (GREAT JOB GUY!!👍💯)

Try this out! A red dragon that keeps a flesh golem in its lair that is made from wyvern parts!

That ‘dungeons and dragons’ joke was amazing. But the info of potential context that the joke gave? Priceless.

The Astral Plane...the Gith that keeps on giving...

_"Revenge! Revenge! The King under the Mountain is dead and where are his kin that dare seek revenge? Girion Lord of Dale is dead, and I have eaten his people like a wolf among sheep, and where are his sons’ sons that dare approach me? I kill where I wish and none dare resist. I laid low the warriors of old and their like is not in the world today. Then I was but young and tender. Now I am old and strong, strong, strong, Thief in the Shadows! My armor is like tenfold shields, my teeth are swords, my claws spears, the shock of my tail a thunderbolt, my wings a hurricane, and my breath death!"_

I honestly love intelligent enemies in dnd in general due to the creative means they can fight. On the mention of hoard defenses, I had a great blue dragon with a massive pile of diamond dust which it threw up in a directed blast with big beats of its wings. This dust not only obscured visioned but became a choking hazard for party members directly hit by the blast. It's stuff like that, which makes the dragons fun.

A whole hour on red dragons you say? Well I say yes!

I'm a former U.S. submariner. Seeing a colossal dragon compaired to the class of ship I've stood upon makes me hope I never encounter one in game.

Holy Bahamut this is gonna be one juicy video

Well played, this was a deep dive into the mentality of the Red Dragon..

“Look upon my works ye mortals and tremble! For I am death destroyer of worlds. Pick one amongst you to herald how you perished this day!” Attributed to Pothromok the Ashen Wake as recounted by Galinda the Bard on the annihilation of Constious 1377 DR.

I wonder if some of the Githyanki and the Red Dragons maintain any post-service contact with one another. A few centuries of millitary service gives you an appreciation of one another even if actually friendship is rare. Tipping one another off when their special interests collide. A dragon finds some mind flayers and passes along that information to the githyanki; with the understanding that some loot from a raid will be forthcoming. Some githyanki dispatch of some obnoxious adventurers for some continued co-operation from a specific Red Dragon.

Listening to you wax and wane about the grandiose and magnificent habits and history of dragons is truly a pleasure, as always sir.

Also do red dragon have higher opinions on different races and cultures? Like orc,dwarf, elves, ixitxachitls, humans, and the such?

Using a red dragon in my campaign now and every time he is mention the players cringe with fear

What was that about dragons being able to destroy the abyss?

The greatest D&D channel one can fine greatest quality, quantity, expectations are constantly surpassed. Aj you do great work sir please don’t stop.

7:13 now i'm just imaging a female red dragon going to a moutain top and yelling "I SHALL HAVE COITUS!"

That was a 601 level presentation! Loved it.

59:01 beautifully put. I really want to put together a really good dragon fight one of these days, and I hope it isn't a total stomp on either side.

Absolutely crushed it.. grab a 6 pack of tasty beverages and get super mega ultra nerdy with this absolute unit of a video

Draconomicon was one of my favorite pieces by WotC EVER!

AJ. I know that weekly videos this in-depth is a big ask. But I loved it. There is so much info all in one place I will be listen to it from start to end many times through.

Dragons may not have an after life of sorts, but they do have souls, so much as there are plenty of dead and undead dragon forms. Like Ghost Dragon, or Wight and Wraith Dragons wich need souls, or even Dracolich, as exemples.

An idea I had about what you told at the beggining of the video is that you could basically raise a dragon into thinking that making good deeds increases their reputation. Like, doing good stuff makes them respected and valuable, and so they could just do good to make themselves seen as a respectable and valuable member of society.

It's been two years and I'm still laughing at Swolbolds. 😂😂😂

This was outstanding. I very much enjoyed it all, especially the bit at the end, detailing how ridiculously tough it should be to fight one of these in its lair. I was hoping to hear about the unique ability shown by Malazan, a sub-villain in book two of Year of the Rogue Dragons (such a great series!) wherein she makes herself bleed and the coating of blood on her scales makes her AC go up and enrages her and I think makes her able to simply burst into flame entirely!

I shudder to think of how black half dragons are made.

A whole hour? Whelp, time to get comfy. Snacks are at the ready. let's go!

God damn, what a video. Easily your best one yet.

26:30 Don't apologize. It was appreciated.

I'm about to watch this for the 4th time! Amazing work, AJ!

Raising a baby red dragon from the egg or from just born is a task not to be taken lightly. You will get burned literally and figuratively. Raising any dragon is dangerous, risky, makes you a target of many powerful entities, and highly expensive to say the least. Anything is possible, but why set yourself up for so much struggle? I would recommend against any player of normal levels and race who is good aligned avoid attempting auch a foolish errand. Raising a red dragon tends to end badly for everyone, sometimes including the dragon. Like, seriously, just get a cat. Even quasits are a pain in the butt. You want a pet dragon? Gee i cant see how that might go wrong at all. But you do you. Adopt a red dragon and take him home to your wooden house full of combustibles👌 You might want a resist fire and some healing salve on hand , just saying. Maybe even a lead on a new house, just in case?

Red Dragon Campaign Idea (Steal it if you want) Campaign idea, best implemented after another campaign. Your players will build new characters, give them a reason to be in a local town at the same time. then, put those new characters on pause after the initial meet up session in the tavern (classic start). Now the stage is set, and these new characters have even had a session of roll play or even a bar brawl under their belts. Now, in the next session. the players go back to their characters from the previous campaign. They receive news that a Red dragon is long overdue to awaken, and that he always causes great problems for around ten years, and then goes back to sleep after filling his horde. The players think they can solve the problem. So they head off to the dragons lair. At the door, or the beginning of the players trouble, tell your players that this is the point of no return. Their characters have chosen death. And it is only now how this happens that will be discussed and acted. The players travel through the dungeon, at any point even before the true battle a player can die with no plot Armor or mercy. And in the end they will fail. The Ancient Red Dragon that they have just awoken however is not content to sleep, he prepares for war. And his first target is the town. The next session starts up right where the the first one with their new characters ended. And it’s right at the start of the dragons first attack of revenge against human kind. Any number of dragon minions are assaulting the town, and the dragon himself is flying over head cursing the humans with words and burning down the city. Exclaimer: if a player is not interested in killing their character and wants them to survive, let them make a new character that they don’t mind killing, to test some character multiclass or play a class they don’t often play. And when the story starts proper, the character they want to play is waiting and ready in the town.

Very badass old boy you should redo all the old dragon videos, and the giant ones to their my favorites.

4:17 Figuring out the best way to raise a creature that's going to grow up really fast and surpass you in a couple days is an absolutley incredible psychological experiment IMO

I like to think that modern Dragons aren’t the result of any divine meddling; but somewhere along the line Natural Selection simply shat the bed and made some random winged lizards magic. Dragons’ power wasn’t given to them, they took it for themselves.

This was so amazing I had 3 tasty beverages. There should be nothing generic about Dragon encounters. Your talking about intelligent creatures that have survived for centuries, fighting for their own survival, against really tough opponents.

Hmm, I've had this flavor of glue stick before. Cherry-Cinnamon. I like it! :9

Poor good red dragon gonna be bullied but it’s evil siblings :(

"Dragons make people who make dungeons...dungeons and dragons" oh yeah it's all coming together

For the half dragons part, there is another potential source for them that has been mentioned but not really covered much in lore. There is a group of dragons that seems to have been a move away from the normal draconic society, though with several ties. Basically, it's dragons realizing that the could obtain more power and comfort by taking humanoid form and "blending" into society, often setting things up in higher society positions, often having marriages and children to blend in as a part of society, while often pushing for higher positions with as much power and authority...and as little larger responsibilities as they can get away with. Sure, they may then kill their children and use their name and appearance to continue their position, but not always...