But what IS a Dragon?

[Gideon Falcon]

I really like reconstructionism. I like breaking ideas down to the basic concepts that make them up. It's what draws me to works like Terry Pratchett's, and it's got a big hand in my style of worldbuilding that I've started to develop.

In the stories I'm working on, the setting takes a lot of influence not just from D&D, but from Lovecraft and Shonen influences and of course the aforementioned Pratchett. The cosmology skews the 'Great Wheel' idea far into Nordic and Middle-Eastern myth, and the magic system underlying it all is based on the best reconstruction I can do of what magic means at the core and how that can influence its application in a story.

Now, the specific thing I wanted to talk about is Dragons.

I don't really need to explain why I want Dragons to be big in this setting- and I do want them big. I want them to have the proper scale that the most iconic mythical creature deserves- the original Kaiju, the beings with the most staying power of any invention- and as such I'm tying their nature in to the nature of the Cosmology.

In search of this, I've done some amount of ameteur research into what, at heart, a Dragon is. Looking at the earliest myths, how they evolved, what ideas really define them, and taking inspiration from that. I've basically sorted this into the two obvious categories of good and bad Dragons, and what makes each of them.

The Bad Dragons are tied into my method of bringing Lovecraftian elements into the cosmology- the earliest dragon-like creatures we know of, to my understanding, were tied in with creation myths- the Middle-Eastern model I use that was found in Babylonian, Caananite, and Akkadian mythologies (and referenced if not necessarily touted in the Bible) often describes a great serpent (the word Dragon comes from words for serpents or 'keen-eyed ones') that personified the Primordial Chaos: Tiamat, Yam, Lotan, or Typhon. A great warrior god, Baal or Marduk or Zeus, slays the dragon and its corpse becomes the land of the world.
In these cosmologies, the world was seen as an island in an infinite ocean- this ocean was Chaos. Other draconic adversaries and natural disasters were attributed to this Chaos- the water trying to reclaim the land, being held back by the gods or being unleashed by God as the case may be.
Now, ancient monsters invading the universe from outside it, trying to undo creation? That's foundation for a Lovecraft-style Mythos if I ever heard one.

So, basically, the Eldritch elements of the setting are tied back to this concept of Chaos. The place outside all places from back at the time before time, call it Nothing or Chaos or Darkness or Outside, was not on board with the whole 'Universe' thing from the start- Existence meant rules, meant substance, meant structure, meant a million things foreign to the Outside that it reacted to with the functional equivelent of revulsion. It's not unanymous, nothing is with Nothing, but some aspects of the Outside want the universe gone, and they slip their influence or their substance in through the cracks from time to time.

When something comes in from Outside that's powerful enough to really start breaking things? That is what becomes called a Dragon.
In order to accomodate the utterly alien nature of Eldritch Abominations, the bad Dragons don't necessarily conform to the full visual description of a dragon, more focusing on one or two things and accentuating them- and that's what I'll get back to.

Good Dragons, then, need a very different origin. The most predominant benevolent dragons are in Chinese and other Oriental myth- many early Chinese myths described a person or people raising Dragons or training them, or alternately being descended from Dragons. These Dragons were also tied to water, but as life-bringing rain and moisture rather than the Primordial Chaos.

To fit into my cosmology, the Good Dragon needs to be an embodiment of life, a guardian, servant and ruler- in a setting where the universe is invaded by Outsiders, it makes sense for them to be like the universe's immune response. The myths also show Dragons as growing beings, though, be it Korean proto-dragons that must live a millenia to ascend, or the dragons raised by great men in Chinese legend. Dragons may originate as something much smaller, something that may originate from the inhabitants of the universe and needing to be raised by them in order to prepare for its eventual role. As representing the natural, these can also have a more concrete, classical appearance drawing from the animals within the universe, put into an arrangement echoing the dead Outsider whose death created the world.


Now to be more specific. Among all the other elements in my stories, I have six Bad Dragons and one Good Dragon. They don't necessarily immediately interact, the stories have a few separate parallel plotlines that share the universe, but the thematics are used. In the plotline with the Bad Dragons, I may also bring in the concept that the heroes, in rising up against the Chaos, are defining themselves as Good Dragons (thank you to VSauce2 for that idea), especially as Oriental dragons were sometimes depicted as human.

My idea with the Good Dragon: the overarching villain of the series was a member of the Precursor race that first developed interstellar/interplanar travel on a large scale that was subverted by the Outside and used a complex ritual to become a god of Chaos before, like Tharizdun, he was imprisoned to stop him destroying the universe. During his reign of terror, though, other Precursors began seeking a way to combat the Outside and began forming an opposing ritual of creation in order to give birth to a champion that could protect the world against incursions. They had to sacrifice their lives to fully complete the ritual, however, to give it the most power and best chance of success. The result had a setback in that the newly created Dragon was dormant within its egg, only millions of years later when the ritual site (possibly on a space/plane ship) is finally discovered by others that somehow rouse the egg into hatching.
This Dragon is the more classical; long and serpentine but with limbs like a mammal or dinosaur, proudly horned head, great talons, massive wings (I've opted for the feathered variety). It's one of my newer ideas to really develop this, so I don't have a ton worked out, but basically as part of his growth he needs to absorb some quota or obtain some mastery over each of the six pillars of magic in the setting's system- Sympathy, Numerology, Alchemy, Loquation, Psionics, and Harmonics; image, number, material, word, emotion, and song.

As for the Bad Dragons, and the main question I have: The ritual used by the villain to Ascend involved preparing it by causing six massive incursions in strategic parts of the universe similar to the bloodshed used by Homonculus in FMA to create the giant magic circle; each of these incursions involved making local systems of magic based on different pillars clash in ways that caused a glitch in the universe- destroying the civilizations involved and letting in a ton of Outside essence, the leftovers of which became Dragons embodying some aspect of the disaster. Let me summarize these ones:

Spoiler: Six Evil Dragons

Show

1: Sympathy magic corrupted by Alchemy: a Lighthouse intended as a renewable energy source instead goes mega-nuclear. The resulting Dragon is a miniature sun with 'flares' that form serpentine arms like depictions of the Aten. Embodies the classical fiery breath.

2: Numerology magic corrupted by Harmonics: a city in the atmosphere of a Gas Giant becomes a giant wind instrument that drives the citizens insane and possibly opens portals to Pandemonium equivalent. Resulting Dragon is a winged serpent that constantly flies around at near-sonic speeds and screeches, howls, or whispers. Embodies the feathered serpent archetype.

3: Psionic magic corrupted by Numerology: Monastic temple complex accidentally built into shape of magic circle that drains life and will to live. Resulting Dragon is a thick, cloying smoke that chokes and saps the life of anything near the mountain it was born on. Embodies the corruption of the land typical of Fafnir and other venemous Dragons.

4: Harmonic magic corrupted by Sympathy: Oceanic abyss terraformed into near copy of Abyss equivalent (my version actually looking like a giant chasm), opening up portals. Resulting Dragon is an adapting regenerator, eventually evolving into a giant mass of sea serpents connected at the tail. Embodies the Hydra and water Dragons.

5: Alchemy magic corrupted by Loquation: Arthropod society only communicates with pheremones, tries to figure out writing and speech on encounter with refugees from 6 below- mass of desperate, unanswered communication implodes like Ankh-Morpork Post Office. Resulting Dragon I have a concept for its appearance, but no tie to disaster, it's a big, three-headed lizard made of magma and obsidian. Embodies the simple bestial aspect of non-intelligent Dragons.

6: Loquation magic corrupted by Psionics: Proto-faeries are infected by a dangerous Meme; an idea that causes madness and is spread through their word magic. May outwardly manifest itself as moss? Some plant connection, society lives inside titanic tree. Resultant Dragon is unknown, I want it to be something plant-like but I don't know what Draconic concept does that but also works with Meme idea. Serpent from Eden, maybe?

So, that's about where things stand; The Good dragon I have a solid idea for the base, but not much direction on where to go from there. Two Evil Dragons I'm stuck with, hence me coming here, but obviously their end course is just 'the heroes beat them' (spoiler?)

So, for those two Bad ones I'm stuck on, the questions lie:

How can I tie a primal, three-headed lava dragon to communication breakdowns? What's a convincing way that the Word magic implosion leads to that concept?

What sort of draconic archetype or idea has to do with both plants and infectious ideas? As I was writing this, the idea came to me of the serpent from the Garden of Eden, but I've never really seen that used in a way that didn't leave a bad taste in my mouth, so how can I avoid that?

Any thoughts you may have on those, or feedback on the other ideas, would be welcome and a great help. Thank you.

[Yanagi]

So, for those two Bad ones I'm stuck on, the questions lie:

How can I tie a primal, three-headed lava dragon to communication breakdowns? What's a convincing way that the Word magic implosion leads to that concept?

What sort of draconic archetype or idea has to do with both plants and infectious ideas? As I was writing this, the idea came to me of the serpent from the Garden of Eden, but I've never really seen that used in a way that didn't leave a bad taste in my mouth, so how can I avoid that?

Any thoughts you may have on those, or feedback on the other ideas, would be welcome and a great help. Thank you.

For (6) consider looking at the mythology of Nidhogg (Níðhöggr) the Norse serpent/dragon (linnorm) that gnaws at the base of the World Tree. "Infectious ideas" is a very modern concept and really doesn't really mesh with dragon myths. The closest you'd get would the the Zoroastrian Zahhak, who's one of those Satan-like-or-just-Satan dragons, and is associated with lies and manipulation. Personally I'd lean towards the Nidhogg imagery, but then take the idea of "tree destroyer" and segue over into fungi, and from fungi into psychoactives, and thus sort of back-end into the idea of induced ideas via way of spores or ergotism or plant poisons like datura.

No idea for (5). Kind of feels like a reach, also the volcano/fire imagery seems a bit redundant with the sun/fire imagery. Personally I'd merge elements of the two descriptions and have (1) be obsidian plus star-like heat and light, and three-headed because the original fiery dragon is the Russian three-headed Zmei Gorynych...then make (5) something different. I'm only half joking when I say that (5) should be an invocation of Leviathan but also Hobbes' Leviathan.

[Gideon Falcon]

Thanks for the input! I agree that the volcanic theme seems redundant with the sun theme, but the two creature designs both have this really iconic quality to them that I don't want to lose- these stories are ones I'm planning on making into a webcomic, and so the visual aspect definitely has a lot of weight. I had the designs pinned down before I had the Dragons idea, and those two and the wind serpent were the ones that really stood out the most- a ridiculously long eyeless snake with all of the wings and a huge, gaping maw; an angular, rocky behemoth with a bizarre imitation of an organic anatomy; and a literal version of the Aten sun disk with arms extending not to give bounty but to lay waste.

If it helps, the original scheme I used to categorize them, and one which I intend to just be a subtle thing for clever people to notice, is the D&D six element scheme- the four classical elements and Positive and Negative energy. Number 1 obviously is fire, 2 is air, 3 is Negative energy or death, 4 is water, 5 is earth, and 6 is Positive energy or life. So the volcanic aspect is more focused on the earth-ness than the fire- the magma aspect is mostly for the idea that parts of the thing are less stony and seem like actual organic skin, but are still cracked like a lava flow.

As for 6, that is something to think about- focusing on the fungal idea, like the moss, can express the idea of the infection- sort of acting in reverse of the Cordiceps concept, as the altered thoughts spawn the fungus rather than the other way around. Words act as the spores, spreading the idea into people that then start sprouting fungus as they go crazy- and it can still have the effect I had in mind on the environment, because the fungal infection will spread from the frantically scrawled written forms of the vector- combining the Resident Evil 7 style mold with the room full of crazy with a meaningful link.
I might still have some merit in the 'Satan in Eden' thing, it may be that the bad taste I've had in the past is just due to the very different ideas of the events that the other authors are basing things off of, either an interpretation I disagree with or an outsider deconstruction that feels antagonistic whether intended or not. If I were to (not overtly) base some of the process of not only how the Dragon works but how they beat it on my understanding of the Eden story, I could probably get what I was missing in those other examples.

As for the ideology with 5. Hm. Hobbes' Leviathan, that is an idea, I suppose since it's supposed to invoke a simplicity to it, that might be stretched to represent the human capacity for savagery? Especially since it's supposed to have come from a bloated attempt at crossing language barriers that could result in conflicts and tension even before it reached critical mass. I dunno, I'd have to actually drudge through the thing, which is daunting for a Locke man like myself. That idea of the bloatedness, the sheer amount of the magical input being corrupted could probably help tie the event to the result- I can make 5 really cemented as the biggest one, which was originally reserved for 3 as I first had it being the actual mountain itself, with the Negative being represented by the freezing cold (basically a Xixecal fed through an Escher painting). It works better anyway, as being a mountain makes more sense for Earth- the Dragon could lie dormant in the shape of a miniature mountian range inside the insect race's cavern home. (By that time the heroes may call it from the get-go that those mountains are actually the monster)

So, yes, great ideas, thank you! Looking forward to any other feedback anyone might have.

[Yanagi]

Thanks for the input! I agree that the volcanic theme seems redundant with the sun theme, but the two creature designs both have this really iconic quality to them that I don't want to lose- these stories are ones I'm planning on making into a webcomic, and so the visual aspect definitely has a lot of weight. I had the designs pinned down before I had the Dragons idea, and those two and the wind serpent were the ones that really stood out the most- a ridiculously long eyeless snake with all of the wings and a huge, gaping maw; an angular, rocky behemoth with a bizarre imitation of an organic anatomy; and a literal version of the Aten sun disk with arms extending not to give bounty but to lay waste.

Good to know. I was thinking this was a game design query and thus thinking in terms of description at a tabletop.

If it helps, the original scheme I used to categorize them, and one which I intend to just be a subtle thing for clever people to notice, is the D&D six element scheme- the four classical elements and Positive and Negative energy. Number 1 obviously is fire, 2 is air, 3 is Negative energy or death, 4 is water, 5 is earth, and 6 is Positive energy or life. So the volcanic aspect is more focused on the earth-ness than the fire- the magma aspect is mostly for the idea that parts of the thing are less stony and seem like actual organic skin, but are still cracked like a lava flow.

So if (5) is Earth...if you look over in the liminal areas between giant serpents and semi-humanoid giants, there's a bunch of mythic beings associated with earthquakes (Typhon) and drought (Vritra). Just for visual inspiration, consider the bixi...turtle dragon...which is often depicted as carrying stones or mountains.

As for 6, that is something to think about- focusing on the fungal idea, like the moss, can express the idea of the infection- sort of acting in reverse of the Cordiceps concept, as the altered thoughts spawn the fungus rather than the other way around. Words act as the spores, spreading the idea into people that then start sprouting fungus as they go crazy- and it can still have the effect I had in mind on the environment, because the fungal infection will spread from the frantically scrawled written forms of the vector- combining the Resident Evil 7 style mold with the room full of crazy with a meaningful link.
I might still have some merit in the 'Satan in Eden' thing, it may be that the bad taste I've had in the past is just due to the very different ideas of the events that the other authors are basing things off of, either an interpretation I disagree with or an outsider deconstruction that feels antagonistic whether intended or not. If I were to (not overtly) base some of the process of not only how the Dragon works but how they beat it on my understanding of the Eden story, I could probably get what I was missing in those other examples.

Sporification of ideas was I was thinking about. I guess Cordyceps has turned up in medium a bunch recently, but are you familiar with the history of ergot? It's mold that develops on rye, and if consumed tends to create ugly spooky hallucinations. It's associated with witch scares, and in specific Salem Witch trials, because people have proposed that ergotism prompted some of the claims and accusations. There's also fly agaric...which you'll recognize because it's pretty much the visual shorthand for poisonous/hallucinogenic mushroom.

Another plant- referent to consider would be Meosamerican vision serpents (even if only for visuals) and their connection to hallucinogen culture (ayahuasca being the most famous but not only). However, serpents are generally positive symbols in Mesoamerica, akin to tian-lung in China.

As for the ideology with 5. Hm. Hobbes' Leviathan, that is an idea, I suppose since it's supposed to invoke a simplicity to it, that might be stretched to represent the human capacity for savagery? Especially since it's supposed to have come from a bloated attempt at crossing language barriers that could result in conflicts and tension even before it reached critical mass. I dunno, I'd have to actually drudge through the thing, which is daunting for a Locke man like myself. That idea of the bloatedness, the sheer amount of the magical input being corrupted could probably help tie the event to the result- I can make 5 really cemented as the biggest one, which was originally reserved for 3 as I first had it being the actual mountain itself, with the Negative being represented by the freezing cold (basically a Xixecal fed through an Escher painting). It works better anyway, as being a mountain makes more sense for Earth- the Dragon could lie dormant in the shape of a miniature mountian range inside the insect race's cavern home. (By that time the heroes may call it from the get-go that those mountains are actually the monster)

So...funny thing...I was just in Goreme, Cappadocia, about a month ago--which is the putative origin point of the St George and the Dragon myth, and the depiction in the Church of the Black Snake is pretty much the launch point of the iconography.

So...with that in mind..consider: while the St George myth almost certainly derives from Chaoskampf stories, the "dragon" does not represent the same thing. The dragon is not a force of the indifferent and dangerous nature that precedes man, but a thing of want reflecting spiritual ugliness. Ultimately dragons are tied to Satan and immorality not, "chaos" in the primal tohu wa-bohu sense (see: Revelations). This concept of dragon as manifestation of human vice turns up in other European stories, like the Lambton Worm.

In the same vein, in the Shahnamah there's the tale of Zahhak e-Tayi, who grows serpent heads from his shoulders after being corrupted by Ahriman (the evil spirit of Zoroastrianism). Not only does he engage in personal immorality, he becomes a tyrant with an entire complicit system indulging his whim (and need for human brains to feed his serpent heads). Again, the dragon/serpent imagery is connected to human immorality...specifically the idea of the cosmic "Lie" (druj) that tries to obscure the moral and divine truth (apha). But, in a sense, the "terror" of Zahhak isn't just the dragon-man himself, it's the way his charisma and intelligence creates an entire corrupt system that persists. The end of this particular dragon-slaying myth isn't just a single hero (Feridun) beating the monster, but an entire rebellion (led by a different hero, Kave).

Now let's consider Hobbes' Leviathan. The monster's name is used as a metaphor for assembled mass of humanity operating under a social contract with an absolute monarchy (hot take: I am not a fan of monarchy). If you look at the frontispiece of the original publication, it's a big 'ol king hovering over the landscape, but his body is made of people.

(Also interesting: dragons as representations of amassed people is also a thing: in Welsh myths, the red dragon and the white dragon are metonyms for the Welsh and Anglo-Saxons).

Piling all this together:
- Dragons are also symbols of mortal vice and immorality
- Dragons are used as a representation of the assembled power of communities, for good or ill
- Dragons are associated with power and control over others, through words and charisma as well as physical force

Thus a slightly different riff on something you're directed toward: a "dragon" that is both literal dragon (the equivalent of Zahhak e-Tayi) acting as a ruler or king, but also a society, a mindset, a culture...a whole system that wreaks devastation and harm because of culture that allows for the expression of ugliness and whim. That makes it "large" but not simply in the sense of physical imposition, so you can keep another dragon as the "biggest," but also represents a different kind of challenge (but since there's a king-who-is-a-dragon, for plot purposes there's still an identifiable central figure both in visual and plot terms).

This idea also meshes well with an origin rooted in words and lost communication.

(Also, if part of the idea is to check off dragon archetypes, then beings that are both humanoid and snake-/dragon-like is a category unto itself...look at Echidna, Typhon, Vritra, Gunggung, nagas, drakaina)

[Gideon Falcon]

Woah, I thought you had good stuff in the first one.

Okay, let's go through all this...

I actually did see a Bixi statue picture during my dip into the Chinese dragon myths. I'll definitely look back at those things if I need to redo some of the details for the Earth Dragon.

Yeah, I do recall Ergot now you bring in specifics; I just mentioned Cordyceps as the most well-known example aside from 'Truth Shrooms' of mind-affecting fungi. But I think we're about on the same page- the words act as the 'spores' for the idea that lets it spread- and, heck, going back to Cordyceps, what better than those signature brain-stalks you see coming out of the ant heads to really represent a twisted version of that Zahnak e-Tahyi (who is also a good reference because that is an awesome name for a villain)- the original Demagogue agent would be a potentially recognizeable figure from the fungal growths being much more all-consuming on them, while that Leviathan reference would work even better for 6 because, since the 'Dragon' is an idea, it makes sense for its physical form to be the culture and system perpetuated by that idea- an idea that creates savagery and capriciousness. Like you said, the Earth dragon is technically the biggest on its own, but the Fungus dragon is big because it is its influence- opposing the Death Dragon that just poisons and drains the land, the Life Dragon becomes the land and living things around it.

But yeah, I was very aware of the connection between Dragons and vice. The Chaos connection was likely the earlier idea with the whole Chaoskampf mythos, but there's an easy leap from natural chaos to human chaos- That's part of why I didn't do anything with the idea of Hoards in defining the Dragons, as I feel the hoarding aspect is simply the most well-known manifestation of that connection to vice- the Western dragons post-Revelation would be attributed all of the Deadly Sins, hence their arrogance, habit of taking really long naps, monstrous appetite, and absolutely their Greed. (Lust probably wasn't depicted so much because nobody wanted to figure out the logistics of that nightmare). In going back to earlier roots, I guess I'm also just focusing on more general and fundamental expressions of vice.

The Earth Dragon, in terms of origin, would then sort of be the opposite of the Life/Fungus Dragon as it stems from communication failing rather than communication working too well. I'm starting to get a picture where the size comes from the mass of words as mentioned before (A lot of words means a lot of magic, and a lot of words that didn't get anywhere is a lot of onry magic), and the nature of the beast comes from the mindless and fiery brutality that broke out as people dealt poorly with the culture shock and language gap. That combined with the available materials and created a Dragon that was bloated, simple-minded, and simmering.

Other than the individual corrupted minions that make up the Fungal Dragon, I don't know that there's much room for a humanoid dragon (except possible shape-shifting given to the good Dragon later on in its development, but even that's iffy), simply because it's not quite eldritch enough. But then, if the idea is less checking off archetypes and more twisting archetypes, that's exactly what the Fungal Dragon is.

Anyway, thank you so much! You seem to have done a lot more research than I have, and you've given me much more than I could have hoped for. Awesome to get word from someone so in-the-know.

One thing I did note, though, is I think the serpent figures in Mesoamerican legend varied in benevolence- I've heard of versions of Quetzalcoatl/Kukhulkhan/etc. that demanded human sacrifice or opposed it (the latter possibly being developed by rebels that were sick of getting sacrificed), and the source on the demanding one was marginally more substantial. Not necessarily immediately relevant, but I felt the need to point it out.

[Yanagi]

Anyway, thank you so much! You seem to have done a lot more research than I have, and you've given me much more than I could have hoped for. Awesome to get word from someone so in-the-know.

I appreciate the feedback. I'm glad some of the stuff I'm pelting at you sticks and is useful. I rarely get to build for my own usage and frequently stall out on projects because of writer's block, and find it very cathartic to fiddle with other people's ideas...which does result in a bit of information glut.