| rdfs:comment | - Only the most arrogant enthusiast might claim certain knowledge of dragons’ origins, and such a claim should be taken with a grain of salt. Legends and the knowledge that sages do have, however, stretch back for centuries and hint at what might have been. Sometimes new stories come to light, prompting reassessments of the existing body of knowledge and speculation regarding dragon inception.
- The latest edition of Dungeons & Dragons classifies dragon as a type of creature, simply defined as "a reptilelike creature, usually winged, with magical or unusual abilities". The dragon type is broken down into several classifications. True dragons are dragons which increase in power by age categories (wyrmling to great wyrm). Lesser dragons do not improve in age categories and may lack all of the abilities of true dragons. Examples of lesser dragons include dragon turtles and wyverns. Other creatures with the dragon type include drakes, felldrakes, elemental drakes, landwyrms, linnorms, and wurms.
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| abstract | - The latest edition of Dungeons & Dragons classifies dragon as a type of creature, simply defined as "a reptilelike creature, usually winged, with magical or unusual abilities". The dragon type is broken down into several classifications. True dragons are dragons which increase in power by age categories (wyrmling to great wyrm). Lesser dragons do not improve in age categories and may lack all of the abilities of true dragons. Examples of lesser dragons include dragon turtles and wyverns. Other creatures with the dragon type include drakes, felldrakes, elemental drakes, landwyrms, linnorms, and wurms. In Dungeons & Dragons, there are many color-coded races of dragons, each of which breathes a different element; for example, red and gold dragons breathe fire, white and silver dragons breathe frost, and blue and bronze dragons breathe bolts of lightning. Some dragons (particularly metallic dragons) have two different kinds of breath, usually a lethal one (fire, ice, acid, electricity, etc.) and another that is typically non-lethal (paralysis, repulsion, confusion, etc.). Dungeons & Dragons divides true dragons further into three main categories: chromatic dragons, such as green and black dragons, which are evil-aligned; metallic dragons, such as gold and silver dragons, which are good; and neutral-aligned gem dragons, rare creatures that possess psionic abilities. In addition, there are other sub-species of true dragons that don't fit into the three main categories. For example, mercury and steel dragons would seem to be metallic dragons, but in the Dungeons & Dragons world they are considered to be outside of the main family of metallic dragons because of various biological differences (though the book Dragons of Faerûn does list them as metallic dragons). The "lung dragons" or spirit-dragons of Oriental Adventures are also true dragons. There also exist the 'planar dragons', a very distinct classification. Examples of 'planar' dragons are the Tarterian dragon or the radiant dragon, the chaos dragon, etc. Detailed information about D&D dragonkind may be found in the Draconomicon, a D&D supplement book designed especially for draconic information.
- Only the most arrogant enthusiast might claim certain knowledge of dragons’ origins, and such a claim should be taken with a grain of salt. Legends and the knowledge that sages do have, however, stretch back for centuries and hint at what might have been. Sometimes new stories come to light, prompting reassessments of the existing body of knowledge and speculation regarding dragon inception.
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