Preamble: This is an expansion of a comment I wrote on the Dragonlance Nexus' article on Aasimars on Krynn you can find here: https://dragonlancenexus.com/aasimar-the-light-bearers. This post will serve as a public expansion on the subject.
Drakeling: The Dragon-touched
 |
| Touched by a Dragon by Illy Kostova |
And legends and stories tell of the physical union of such dragons with mere humanoids: The sacrifice of Huma and Heart, as well as the tragedy of Gilthanas and Silvara's love. But if history has told the physical union of dragons and humanoids (humans, elves, ogres, etc.) is possible (the dragon taking the physical form of their humanoid lover), it has also told this union is sterile.
Or is it?
Sometimes, a "miracle" happens.
To the surprise of everyone, no matter the parents, the resulting baby seems like a normal humanoid (i.e. of its humanoid parent's race), but has within them the "magic" of dragons, even if it remains dormant. This person can then grow, and have children of their own, this subtle magic remaining dormant, generation after generation, until, something, be it chance, randomness, tragedy, will cause this "magic" to awaken.
Sometimes, this results in innate magical abilities (see the Draconic Bloodline of the Sorcerer class). Sometimes, this results in physical traits, the signs of this person being "dragon-touched", or, as sometimes known in academic circles, a "drakeling".
Appearance
A drakeling can originate from any race, but its draconic traits will somehow override the traits inherited from their parents.
Most commonly, a drakeling will show a random set of draconic traits and behaviors, which varies from subject to subject. Among them, a peculiar color of hair, of eyes, or even skin, or also having vertical pupils, vestigial horns, a few scales, vestigial wings or tails, claws instead of nails, pointed teeth, unusual blood color, etc..
More subtly, as they bear the power of the dragons, they usually show some kind of strange charisma, as well as an unexpected resistance to extreme elements, like fire, or cold.
Freaks of nature?
The drakeling are so rare, generations could pass without one appearing, which explains both the lack of folk knowledge about them, as well as the poor academic writings on their subject. And the initial appearance of one does a lot to cement a perception of that person in the eyes of onlookers.
During the time of the Kingpriest of Istar, or after the capaclysm, during the rise of false religions here and there, as dragons had become a legend, the birth of a baby with such signs would probably condemn them to a horrible life as a freak, if not outright death (and the same for their parents) by superstitious mobs, who would consider them the spawn of evil, or the result of a horrible sin by their parents.
Few would see them as a sign of luck, or even divine favor (and most of them would have happened before the Third Dragon War).
Dragons themselves, no matter their alignment, might find such "dragon-touched" concept strange, alien, or even abhorrent, to be pitied or vilified.
Unless they hide their physical alterations, drakeling will, at the very best, provoke suspicion around them, explaining a life of adventure and/or loneliness.
D&D5 Traits
Drakeling share certain racial traits as a result of their draconic ancestry.Ability Score Increase: Your Charisma score increases by 2.
Age: Drakelings mature at the same rate as humans but live a few years longer.
Size: Drakelings are about the same size and build as humans. Your size is Medium.
Speed: Your base walking speed is 30 feet/9 metres.
Darkvision: Thanks to your draconic heritage, you have superior vision in dark and dim conditions. You can see in dim light within 60 feet/18 metres of you as if it were bright light, and in darkness as if it were dim light. You can’t discern color in darkness, only shades of gray.
Draconic Legacy: You know the thaumaturgy cantrip.
Draconic Aura: Starting at 3rd level, you can use your action to unleash the draconic energy within yourself, causing your eyes to turn into pools of color related to your dragon ancestry, and two incorporeal wings to sprout from your back.
The instant you transform, other creatures within 10 feet/3 metres of you that can see you must each succeed on a Charisma saving throw (DC 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Charisma modifier) or become frightened of you until the end of your next turn.
These incorporeal wings can enable you to control your fall: Using your movement provides you with the equivalent of a Feather Fall.
At the 10th level, the wings can actually enable you to fly, as per the Fly spell.
Once you use this Draconic Aura trait, you can't use it again until you finish a long rest.
Languages: You can speak, read, and write Common and Draconic.
Subraces: Dragon Ancestry
While the dragon ancestry can be considered a subrace of the drakeling, in rule terms, they are all the same, providing the same kind of powers, templated after the dragon ancestry.
Ability Score Increase: Depending on your ancestry, and how it altered you, another Ability is increased by 1 (by default, Intelligence).
Draconic Resistance: You have resistance to one damage type depending on your draconic ancestry (e.g. a red drakeling would resist fire, a silver drakeling would resist cold, etc.).
Alignment: The alignement of the dragon ancestry also seems to color the morals and ethics of the drakeling, even if this effect is far from being dominant.
Appearance: The physical alterations of the drakeling are usually tied to the specifics of their dragon ancestry.
Conclusion
While I'm not sure aasimars and tieflings are adapted to the Dragonlance setting, them missing as a player option is problematic.
The drakeling is similar enough in concept with these races, and can integrate easily within the Dragonlance universe without stretching its credibility and coherence.
And with their origin, which is probably a tragic story (impossible/forbidden love, or something much darker), their existence is so exceptional it would have a potential for grandeur and tragedy.
P.S.: Design Notes
As a Dragonlance dungeon master, I try to keep only the subset of rules and options that is Dragonlance-friendly. For example, as orcs do not exist in Dragonlance, half-orcs are not an option. And yet, the concept is still available to players with half-ogres.
Two races are, in my humble opinion, really problematic: the aasimar and the tiefling, because these taste too much of angels and demons (see The role of Fiends in Dragonlance, and Why reworking the "afterlife" for my campaign? for more details on that).
And yet, the concept is intriguing, and D&D5 players might feel cheated if they wanted to play one, and found no Krynn native equivalent to these races.
So, let's assume aasimar and tiefling do not exist in Krynn, as angels and demons do not (again, this is a personal take on Krynn), and that we need a similar concept to still keep the players' options open.
So, if we look up for mythical and powerful creatures in Dragonlance, the best we can find are... Dragons.
As proper to the setting, dragons are the apex creatures of the world, and can easily fill the role of angels and demons. And the canon already have stories of tragic love affairs between dragons and humanois (see Huma/Heart, as well as Gilthanas/Silvara). The fact such love is supposed to be sterile is an invitation to exceptions.
So, let's ask the rethorical question: "What if Huma and Heart had a baby?
So, an aasimar/tiefling-style race originating from a forbidden union between a dragon and a humanoid is not only possible, but adapted to the setting.
In rule terms, the drakeling race is obviously based on the aasimar and tiefling races, which share the same D&D5e stats, so it was natural to reuse these stats, mostly unmodified.
Also, the way aasimars and tiefling traits appear, out of nowhere, from seemingly normal parents, is conserved with the drakeling.
In the end the only change is the original union: Instead of one angel or devil ascendant, we have a dragon ascendant, which obviously is much more dragonlance-y.
The last thing is to keep their number extra-low: There are no mention of such phenomena anywhere in the books (of course), so we can't just retcon everything. Few, if any, would suspect the "dragon gene" to be passed through generations, and most, if not all, would suspect something more like a spontaneous mutation.
Drakeling vs. Dragonborn vs. Draconians
The three races remain different.
A drakeling is obviously an humanoid, despite so traits. A dragonborn is a "walking lizard" with physical dragon powers, including dragon breath (also, there are no dragonborns in my campaign, obviously). Also, dragonborns mating would result in a dragonborn baby. A draekelin's offspring would be of its humanoid's race (perhaps with the "magic of the dragon" hidden gene)
The difference with the draconian similar, but with the following specifics: The draconian is a corruption of the parent dragon, and are sterile (if we except those having found a way to reproduce).
Appearance?
As said before, like the aasimar (and, to a less extent, the tiefling), there would be little difference between the drakeling and their humanoid parents, if we except random draconic traits.
One major difference with the aasimar is the the feathered-style wings we see in D&D5e aasimars are instead draconic-style wings for the drakeling. Instead of the devil-like deformities of tieflings, these might be draconic, too (not that this would change a lot).
Draconic traits vary from subject to subject, and could be peculiar colors of hair, eyes,
or even skin, slit pupils, blood color, vestigial horns, a few scales,
vestigial wings or tail, nails, pointed teeth, etc..
Sources
This drakeling/dragon-touched was inspired by Dragonlance' mythology, and reusing the standard D&D5 tiefling race stats, while giving a look to the aasimar found in the Volo's.
But, for what is worth, here's a playable race, available on the Dungeon Masters Guild. I didn't read it, but it might be interesting.
No comments:
Post a Comment