The World Of Khoras - Fauna and Flora

Introduction
No other creature captures the imagination as does the dragon. And no other creature inspires such fear or is written into historical texts so often. Because dragons are such mighty and long-lived creatures, they have been woven into tales and legends. Their lairs have been marked on maps. Myths and fables are heaped upon their name.

Appearance
Dragons are winged reptiles of fantastic size. Typically, such a behemoth will boast a 150 foot wingspan, though this is known to vary by as much as 50 feet. Despite lean frames, dragons often weigh in excess of 80 tons. The length of a dragon, from its saurian head to its spiked tail is always the same as its wingspan. The huge wings of a dragon are made of flexible leathery skins stretched over a spiny frame similar to a bat. Both forelimbs and hind limbs are heavily muscled and very dexterous.

The Dragons of Khoras

Khorasian dragons are very different than the dragons one might find in the Forgotten Realms and the World of Greyhawk. The wyrms of those worlds are intelligent, speaking, magic-using creatures that tend to be downright common. In fact, those dragons tend to be weak and anemic little things. Hardly worthy of the name.

Khorasian dragons are animals. Immensely huge, powerful, iron-clawed, scale plated beasts. They do NOT speak and do NOT use spells. They are the most dangerous animals on the planet. They can grind most other creatures into powder with little effort. Taking on a Khorasian dragon is near-suicide, even for high-level "hero" types. Slaying a dragon is a rare event - the kind of once-in-a-generation, kingdom-saving, legendary feat that the bards sing about. The dragons of WotC are "cute" by comparison.

In gaming terms, dragon armor is almost impenetrable. Magic swords will shatter against their hides. Dragon breath is hot enough to melt plate armor, shatter stones and level forests. Exact statistics will vary depending on your gaming system of choice. Below I put some 2nd edition AD&D stats as an example only.  Suffice to say that if your players plan on taking on a dragon, adjust the dragon's stats in your game system so that the heroes have no hope whatsoever of success. Then triple those stats. If they actually go through with it and challenge the dragon, kill them and don't feel guilty about it.

Gaming Statistics for a Khoras Dragon

For those of you who are curious and really want to know what the previous section was talking about, read on for the stats on a Khorasian dragon using 2nd Edition AD&D rules and D&D v3.5 rules. You, of course, can use any game system you like.

Gaming Statistics - AD&D 2nd Edition

Climate/Terrain: Any - varies with individual.
Frequency: Very Rare
Organization: Solitary
Activity Cycle: Varies with individual
Diet: Carnivore
Intelligence: Animal (1)
Treasure: Varies with individual
Alignment: Neutral (and ruled by instinct as with all true animals)

No. Appearing: 1
Armor Class: -10 (or better... be prepared for your nifty vorpal blade to shatter...)
Movement: 24" (ground)/ 24" (swimming)/256" (flying Man. Class D)
Hit Dice: 100+  (Typically between 1000 and 2000 hit points.)
THACO: 1
No. of Attacks: 5 (2 claws, 1 bite, 1 tail strike, 1 wing buffet)
Damage/Attack: 5-50 (Claws), 10-100 (Bite), 3-60 (Tail Strike), 3-60 (wing buffet)
Special Attacks: Breath Weapon (Typically a cloud of fire with a volume of 100,000 cubic feet delivering 12d10+50 points of damage). On average, a dragon can use this weapon as often as once every 30 seconds and up to 15 times in one day.
Special Defenses: Immune to fire, poison, stun effects, disease, psionic attack and mind-affecting spells. Most directional spells will reflect off.
Magic Resistance: 50%
Size: Huge (100-200 feet long with an equal sized wing span - typically 60 to 200 tons).
Morale: Special (you'll have to break out the tac-nukes to get one of these beasts to retreat).
XP Value: First, kill it. Then we'll talk...

Regeneration
Dragons regenerate 2 hit points per combat round. This allows a dragon to heal all wounds and regenerate to full strength in one day.

Gaming Statistics - Dungeons and Dragons v3.5

Hit Dice: 100 or more (The average dragon typically has 2000 hit points)
Initiative: +0
Speed: 120ft (ground) 600 ft (clumsy), swim 90 ft
Armor Class: 60 (-8 size, +58 natural)
Base Attack/Grapple: +75/+150
Attack: Claw +100 (4d12+25)
Full Attack: 2 Claws +100 (4d12+25), 1 bite (6d12+50), 1 tail slap (6d6+6)
Space/Reach: 40 feet
Special Attacks: Breath Weapon 10d6x10 (100-600 points of damage) (DC 60), crush, frightful presence, swallow whole
Special Qualities: Invulnerable to fire, immunity to all mind affecting magic, DR30/magic, spell resistance 50, low light vision, keen senses, blindsense
Saves: Fort + 100, Reflex +30, Will +50
Abilities: Str 60, Dex 15, Con 50, Int 1, Wis 1, Cha 1 (animal intelligence)
Skills: Intimidate +50, Jump +75, Listen +60, Search +50, Spot +70, Swim +50
Feats: Awesome Blow, Flyby Attack, Cleave, Combat Expertise, Great Cleave, Hover, Improved Bull Rush, Improved Initiative, Improved Natural Attack (bite), Iron Will, Lighting Reflexes, Multi-attack, Power Attack, Snatch, Wingover
Environment: Any
Frequency: Very Rare (and thank goodness)
Organization: Solitary (isn't one enough!?!?!)
Challenge Rating: 400 (in other words, flip a coin... heads, you die... tails, you die painfully).
Treasure: Expect lots of loot.
Alignment: To hell with alignment. The dragon eats you.

Combat

These flying behemoths can crush armies under foot, strafe villages with fire from the air and raze whole cities without even landing. Dragons prefer to fight from the air when outside. A dragon’s most potent weapon is its fiery breath. A dragon can exhale a stream of fire which will reduce everything before the dragon to ash. Other combat tactics include wing buffets, tail strikes, trampling, goring, ramming large opponents with high speed power dives, picking opponents up and dropping them from high altitudes, scattering sharp rocks or crystal shards about the lair and beating wings to stir up a windstorm of sharp, flying objects. No dragon has ever retreated. In fact, dragons apparently have no fear. Either through sheer will or radically different thought patterns, mind affecting magic does not work on them.

Subduing a Dragon

Khorasian dragons can NOT be subdued. If you whack one of these dragons with the flat of your blade, he will eat you. Likewise, dragons do not sleep any more than other animals. Because of their remarkably acute senses (see below), you will likely be facing a fully alert dragon by the time you reach the inner chambers of his lair.

Dragon Senses

Even though dragons have excellent color vision, they don't rely on sight alone. Dragons also have excellent hearing and will pick up the smallest sound from even the most careful intruder. A dragon's sense of smell is so sensitive that the dragon can locate and do battle with an invisible opponent with no penalties. When outdoors, a dragon can often smell prey at a range of several kilometers. 

Habitat

Dragons have no society. They only encounter each other when mating and this is rare. Each dragon claims its own territory which may be in any climate and may be as large as forty thousand square kilometers. Within its territory, a dragon may hunt anything it considers edible. Dragons often hoard anything with sparkling beauty. This includes reflective or brightly shiny metals, gems and jewelry, magic items that glow or items that light up in some way. Such items are scattered about the innermost part of the lair, the sleeping chamber.

Fiery Breath

Dragons have a special internal organ which generates a flammable liquid. In combat, the dragon exhales forcefully and injects this flammable liquid into the air stream. A split second before this concoction is released, it is ignited by a spark generated when the dragon scrapes its horny tongue along a groove in the mouth. The stream ignites at a point just within the mouth. A dragon never burns itself since the inner tissue of the mouth is resistant to heat and the stream is directed outward.

A dragon exhales a stream of fire which blossoms into a cloud of flame at the target end. This cloud of flame will typically fill a volume of 100,000 cubic feet (that's a hundred 10'x10'x10' cubes). That's enough to vaporize several buildings in one breath. This cloud will, of course, shape itself to the area it encounters, flowing along the ground, between stone walls, etc. It's usually enough to blow a wooden building to pieces. And even stone buildings tend to crack and break apart under repeated hits.

Dragon Scales

Dragon scales are likewise impressive. Each dragon has a unique set of scales. Like a fingerprint, no two dragons have identical scales. So, a scale can be used to identify a specific dragon. Dragon colors vary from dragon to dragon. Different body areas will also exhibit variations in coloring. Dragon scales found near lairs show that grey, black, green and red are the most common colors. White and blue scales have been found but are less common. Scale sizes vary depending on what part of the body they cover. The largest scales cover the breast and back. The smallest scales cover the head around the eyes and mouth. The former may reach 18 inches in length while the latter are about 6 inches long.

Dragon Immune System

Like the shark, the dragon has a remarkable immune system. They are immune to all disease, viruses, infections, toxins and poisons. This is partly because of the dragon's massive size. An average dose of poison is simply lost in the river of blood coursing through the dragon's circulatory system. Beyond this, the dragon has an aggressive immune system that purges a dragon of the most deadly diseases and poisons very rapidly.

Reproduction and Life Cycle

Dragons meet only when fighting each other for territory (a rare event) or mating. Female dragons enter heat once every 12 years and only mate if they find a male. Successfully breeding produced one to five eggs (on rare occasions, as many as eight). Only the female raises the young. Hatchling dragons fight each other for the first few months until only a few (usually three or less) are left. The victors eat the losers. This cannibalistic nest war insures that only the strong live to maturity. Young dragons live and hunt with the mother for the first three years (at which time they are typically about twice the size of a large horse) and then leave to fend for themselves.

Dragons mature quickly reaching full size in less than 15 years. It is not known exactly how long dragons live but is suspected to be between 300 and 600 years old.

Dragon Behavior

Dragons do everything in a magnified way. When they eat, they consume whole farms. When they sleep, they tend to hibernate for weeks at a time. When they fight, they reduce everything in the area to ash and crush the bones of opponents into powder. When they travel long distances, they fly higher, faster and farther than other creatures dream of.

Dragon Subspecies

Every individual dragon could be considered a variant. There is only one species of dragon. There are no subspecies. The cultured races of the world sometimes label dragons as "swamp dragons" or "desert dragons". This is, in part, due to the environment of the dragon’s chosen home and partly because of slight difference’s in appearance. The truth is that each individual in unique. Dragons vary slightly in size and shape. Some dragons are faster than others, while some have more effective breath weapons. Each dragon has a unique set of scales and has a particular color. Other variations may include horns, fins, bodily ridges and eye color. Dragons tend to chose their lairs in climates and terrain types that they are suited for. They also adopt certain characteristics based on their environment and adapt to their environment.

Dragon Lairs

Most dragons will create a permanent lair (a cavern or extinct volcano usually). These lairs often have several inner chambers. Each chamber (and the connecting tunnels) are enormous... usually much larger than the dragon to allow him to fly into and out of the lair. A dragon's lair always has more than one entrance. A band of would-be dragon slayers will not be able to trap a dragon in his lair. In fact, they may find the dragon double back through the tunnels and surprise them from behind.

A dragon will claim a vast area as its personal hunting ground. The exact size varies depending on the size and habits of the dragon - typically a 100 to 200 kilometer radius around the lair. Within this area, dragons have been known to hunt anything and everything. They have been known to attack caravans and villages on occasion, though this is rare and usually provoked. It is an established fact that dragons tend to avoid cities although it is not known why.

Rogue Dragon

The exception to this pattern is the rogue dragon. A rogue dragon is one that does not claim a hunting area or establish a permanent lair. Instead, a rogue dragon roams frequently traveling the world and changing lairs every few weeks. About one in fifty dragons is a rogue. There have been only four known rogue dragons in all of recorded history. Rogue dragons hunt anything in their flight path, including caravans, ships, villages and even cities. It is not known how far a rogue dragon travels, but it is undoubtedly farther than any of the cultured races have sailed.

Dragons of the World

The map below shows the locations and approximate territories of all known dragons. Click a number of details on that specific dragon. Click elsewhere on the map for a larger version.

Detailed Descriptions

The following list describes those dragons that are known and well documented. This list is by no means complete. In fact, it is widely believed by dragon scholars that there may be one to two undocumented dragons for each dragon which is known. Many dragons may simply be dwelling in more desolate regions and have not been encountered by scouts or travelers yet.

This page last updated Monday, October 08, 2007. Copyright 1990-2008 David M. Roomes.

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