Results 301 to 308 of 308
-
2019-04-10, 04:17 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Feb 2017
-
2019-04-10, 08:27 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Sep 2015
Re: Wait a minute, why did the ABD care that V killed her son?
Attention LotR fans
Spoiler: LotRThe scouring of the Shire never happened. That's right. After reading books I, II, and III, I stopped reading when the One Ring was thrown into Mount Doom. The story ends there. Nothing worthwhile happened afterwards. Middle-Earth was saved.
-
2019-04-10, 10:20 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- May 2009
- Location
- In a castle under the sea
- Gender
Re: Wait a minute, why did the ABD care that V killed her son?
It can sometimes be hard to tell...
The line between different types of reptilian beasties can be awfully blurry. Especially when the book I read about this creature from had an illustration of what was definitely a small dragon next to the story.
...Or was it just mentioning that one when talking about another poisonous dragon? Look, I haven't actually cracked open the book in years and it's sitting in storage, I'm a bit fuzzy on the details.
On one hand, "chimera" is often used as a word to describe amalgamations of other living things. On the other hand, I don't know why, because zillions of monsters are amalgamations of other living things.
(Maybe it means something fusiony or liminal in Greek?)
And one weirdo made it some kind of feral Bowser thing.
Spoiler: Martian Mister
Reeally wish I had my old dragon-mythology books right now...it was conveniently organized by shape, e.g. separating two-legged winged dragons and four-legged winged dragons into chapters separate from big snakes, lindworms, four-legged wingless dragons, f*ing weird dragons...
Well, this is what Wikipedia is for. (I didn't even have to go deeper than the "list of dragons" entries that got put into the table! Convenient.)
Wyverns and Y Ddraig Goch (aka "that dragon on the Welsh flag") are the obvious examples. Wikipedia also mentions the zomok (a Hungarian flying snake), the Cuélebre (Asturian/Leonese flying snakes), the Bolla and its "evolved"* form Kulshedra (winged snakes...with four legs, not sure that counts), multi-headed Slavic dragons which leave trails of fire as they fly, shape-shifting (but naturally winged) dragons from Chuvashian legend, and a bunch of dragons that are mentioned as sometimes being portrayed with wings.
Also a dragon that only wakes up on St. George's day, which seems like a bad sleep schedule if that's the St. George I think it is.
Chinese dragons are more closely resemble chimeras as they too made out of many different animals.
Twilight vampires comes to mind...
I also don't think there is much correlation between DnD and chinese dragons. It's not like "not all dragons are evil" is a sentiment that needed to be came from chinese. It's a logical step for species with human-like intelligence.
Besides, it's not just "not all dragons are evil". If you knew half of what you imply you do about Eastern dragons, and read the Gold Dragon's monster manual entry, you'd recognize some pretty dang transparent references to Chinese beliefs about dragons. No Western dragons I'm aware of regularly shapeshift into human form, live in undersea pearl palaces, or have f*ing catfish whiskers!
*That is how Wikipedia describes it. I guess it's a mythical Pokemon?
-
2019-04-10, 10:32 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Dec 2009
- Location
- Birmingham, AL
- Gender
Re: Wait a minute, why did the ABD care that V killed her son?
Cuthalion's art is the prettiest art of all the art. Like my avatar.
Number of times Roland St. Jude has sworn revenge upon me: 2
-
2019-04-10, 02:33 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Jun 2008
- Gender
Re: Wait a minute, why did the ABD care that V killed her son?
Wow. I haven't seen a Adult Black Dragon discussion in years. Man this takes me back.
Anyway to answer the OP, the Adult Black Dragon cared because she cared. Even given the premise that dragons don't generally care about their offspring after their birth, dragons have usually been represented as intelligent creatures.
*B.I.T.T. thinks about the Empress of the Kingdom of Blood*
Sentient...they're represented as sentient creatures. Thus they all have their own sets of values. The Adult Black Dragon clearly valued her family, probably even more so after losing her mate (as mentioned in OOTS #628). No doubt there are plenty of dragons who regard their children in much different ways. Any that's just my two cents on the matter."Nobody likes a screaming clown. It puts one off one's feed." - Lore Sjoberg
-
2019-04-10, 05:18 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Aug 2013
-
2019-04-10, 05:47 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Jul 2010
- Location
- Turkey
- Gender
Re: Wait a minute, why did the ABD care that V killed her son?
Not the Chimera, chimera with lowercase. "Any fantastic creature with parts from different animals."
Spoiler: Great Wyrm GoldReeally wish I had my old dragon-mythology books right now...it was conveniently organized by shape, e.g. separating two-legged winged dragons and four-legged winged dragons into chapters separate from big snakes, lindworms, four-legged wingless dragons, f*ing weird dragons...
Well, this is what Wikipedia is for. (I didn't even have to go deeper than the "list of dragons" entries that got put into the table! Convenient.)
Wyverns and Y Ddraig Goch (aka "that dragon on the Welsh flag") are the obvious examples. Wikipedia also mentions the zomok (a Hungarian flying snake), the Cuélebre (Asturian/Leonese flying snakes), the Bolla and its "evolved"* form Kulshedra (winged snakes...with four legs, not sure that counts), multi-headed Slavic dragons which leave trails of fire as they fly, shape-shifting (but naturally winged) dragons from Chuvashian legend, and a bunch of dragons that are mentioned as sometimes being portrayed with wings. Also a dragon that only wakes up on St. George's day, which seems like a bad sleep schedule if that's the St. George I think it is.
*That is how Wikipedia describes it. I guess it's a mythical Pokemon?
Like these?
Spoiler
Besides, it's not just "not all dragons are evil". If you knew half of what you imply you do about Eastern dragons, and read the Gold Dragon's monster manual entry, you'd recognize some pretty dang transparent references to Chinese beliefs about dragons. No Western dragons I'm aware of regularly shapeshift into human form, live in undersea pearl palaces, or have f*ing catfish whiskers!Last edited by martianmister; 2019-04-10 at 05:48 PM.
Spoiler
-
2019-04-10, 11:04 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- May 2009
- Location
- In a castle under the sea
- Gender
Re: Wait a minute, why did the ABD care that V killed her son?
A couple of other people responded to chimera-related points. I wonder how they feel about being ignored.
I'm not sure how famous are those, or how reliable that list is. It even list a turkish dragon named Evren (Universe?!) I never heard before. Dragons are not really a part of turkish myths.
2. Define "reliable". You're not, I dunno, accusing Wikipedia editors of making up dragon myths or anything, are you?
3. You sort of abandoned the part of the debate where you were claiming that dragon-like creatures which were different in some ways from (your conception of) "famous medieval dragons" weren't real dragons.
Like these?
Spoiler
Yes, sometimes there were stories with friendly dragons. There are sometimes stories with friendly [insert most kinds of monsters here]; does that mean it's incorrect to say zombies/vampires/Black Lagoon monsters/etc are often portrayed as inherently evil?
Perhaps it's not surprising that you half-abandoned this part of the argument. It doesn't have much ground to stand on.
Yet only Golden Dragons had that distinct look. There is many kinds of inspirations behind DnD dragon designs, chinese dragons are just one of them.
Besides, you said:
I'd call a core species of dragon being almost wholly constructed out of Chinese dragonlore "much".