Preview: “Draconomicon: Metallic Dragons”

Through an unexpected source, we were able to get our hands on an early copy of the sequel to last year’s Draconomicon, this one focusing on the metallic dragons. In previous editions, metallic dragons were good aligned, meaning that a DM would have to either create reasons that that the dragons were violently opposed to the PCs, or just ignore the “Always Lawful Good” and similar alignments. As we already knew from Monster Manual 2, this default assumption has changed a bit, tossing many of the metallic dragons squarely into the Unaligned category, giving some wiggle room to those playing it by the book. Draconomicon: Metallic Dragons takes it even further, providing a variety of motivations for metallic dragons, and like the original Draconomicon, giving you some new metallics for good measure.

The book opens with a lot of story elements to work into your game when using metallic dragons: their origins, personalities, and suggestions for using them in your campaigns. There’s some new dragon lair traps, and draconic skill challenges. There’s some adventure suggestions, artifacts, and organizations. Like before, a big chunk of the middle of the book is filled with Dragon Lair encounters/delves. At the end, there’s new monsters, including full stat write-ups for 7 new metallic dragons, and a few famous metallic dragons, including multiple stat blocks for Big Bad Bammy himself, Bahamut the Platinum Dragon God. There’s fewer other, dragon-related monsters then there were in Draconomicon, which is disappointing to me since it’s generally easier to use non-solo monsters in an adventure. There are still a few that are cool, like classic Dragonlance Draconians, and the ready-to-ride Drakkensteeds. 

Since we previewed Primal Power on Twitter, we decided to do some previews in a different venue, and answered questions on ENWorld about the book. Some excerpts that you might want to know:

What new (to 4e) metallics are there?

Brass

Bronze

Cobalt

Mercury

Mithral

Orium

Steel

Are there any cool alternate powers?

Adding shapechanging is one easy one, but I also like the gold dragon’s luck field (which is a cool callback), bronze dragons surrounding themselves with water (that gives vulnerable to lightning as well as forcing attackers to swim) and the mithral dragon’s powers to go into extraplanar stasis to recover health.

Is there any flavor text about useing good dragons as allies, and mentors?

Some, it varies by dragon but strongly emphasizes that they’re not always good anymore. There’s a section called “Dragons in the World” that talks about metallic dragon patrons, dragons as mysterious strangers, and occasional allies. My favorite though is a section on using Bahamut’s “Old Man with Canaries” as a supporting ally for the party taking on a big threat.

What surprised you?

In addition to the lack of other dragon monsters as mentioned earlier, I was also surprised at the use of DMG2 materials like organizations and campaign arcs. I was also pleasantly surprised that Council of Wyrms got a mention.

What the heck is orium?

“A crimson-hued metal used by ancient empires” that is supposed to enhance magic and may have originated in the Feywild, but is mostly long lost. Ari Marmell and Logan Bonner, who worked on the book, weigh in on ENWorld about where it came from and how it changed during development.

Look for Draconomicon: Metallic Dragons in November.

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