So yeah, another posting in a thread in the SR4 forum got me thinking. Basically FrankTrollman manged to totally spin the DF into looking like their actually worse than the Azzies, and the DF dances to the Big D's tune even after his death (more or less anyway)

And in some other thread, I dont remember which one now, I'd been wracking my brains to try to think of one dragon who doesnt seem to have a stich of 'bad' associated with him. Finally found his entry in the Dragons of the Sixth world book. Damon AKA Dion.

Sooo anyway. Here's the thing, we all know plenty of dragons are 'the devil' and mega all time super schemers. Afterall there's the rightfully feared Lofwyr. And Dunkie sure proved to have (and may yet still prove further) that not only was he a grand schemer in life, but also in death.

And since you dont have 'clearcut' lines in dragon behaviour (Ultimately good/bad) as you do in D&D (Metalic good vs Chromatic evil dragons) I'm trying more or less to get a proper 'feel' for dragons as a whole. DOTSW goes a long way towards helping with this.. but it also presents what at least appears to be almost polar opposites. Dragons, who are.. for the most part, no different than metahumanity as a whole.

For example, there's Damon/Dion who apparently at least for now, runs about the world attenting and indulding in all sorts of various pleasures of life. Gambling, clubbing, driving fast cars really really realy fast... stuff like that.

And you've got Perianwyr who used to be a hitman for the Azzies, broke off, is into music, helped startup a denver club and still occasionally runs the shadows (supposedly, and quite likely for Ghostwalker, since it is Ghost's turf afterall, which begs, given dragon SOP that something in return must be given.)

And you've got sort of.. inbetweens.
Ghostwalker himself, who.. far as I can tell is neither really good, nor bad. Just.. somewhere in between.

Hestaby who's supposedly 'good' but has a much darker underbelly.

Celedyr who strikes me as a more or less 'ok guy' for a dragon.

Lofwyr seems to be effectively satan incarnate

Rhonabwy is abit of an oddity since he seems to be some big time schemer, yet also apparently has a great love for music of all kinds.

So while apparently the vast majority of dragons will lead you down the roads of temptation and into damnation.. will all of them do so? Or are there really some dragons out there that really are 'good' at heart and arnt out to do you harm unless, of course you are out to do -them- harm, or are percieved as such?

I suppose what I'm really trying to figgure out, is if there's really some dragons out there that really -do- have a live and let live sort of outlook on life, as opposed to being allways out for power, money, and total control of their ever expanding domains? Ones that for example, should they start a buisiness and be outdone by a competitor (and we'll assume, even though it's quite likely otherwise) that beat them fairly, wont infact turn around, scheme to ruin that persons life, the life of tehir children, their childrens children, and then 1000 years down the road, massacre that person's entire bloodline right down to the pet goldfish in revenge?

And I suppose, it also comes down to the big question of.. is there ever a dragon you can really, truely trust? One that isnt simply using you but may infact actually genuinely consider you a friend/confidant etc?

Or are they all realy out to scrag the world, dominate metahumanity, make us all their slaves in their demonic games of chance and chess? To friviously build up and destroy as they see fit and as may strike their whim and fancy at the time and frag you and what ever you think about the matter!?

Just food for thought

I see most of Dragon activities as minimizing risk. All of that movie revenge crap largely increases thier risk, not reduces it. Hell if you live for thousands of years, the chance of you falling down in the bathroom and breaking your skull open start to look pretty high. So the main dragon objectives would be for thier security. This means that if they see a threat they'll take it out, but they won't go out of their way to manufacture them. This means that most dragons should be live and let live type of guys, until you become threatening to them.

What will really scare the dragons will be power blocks that are largely outside of their control. Imortal elves, mega-corporations, etc. In the modern age, any yahoo with a nuke or pack of ATGMs of whatever can take out a dragon. That is why dragons are more involved in the modern age (as opposed to just sitting in on thier hoards looking at dragon porn). There are a lot of power blocks that can threaten them and they all need to be watched.

So, looked at this way, dunklezhans (sp?) talk so, etc were part of his survival strategy. Through propoganda, he was enestially able to place himself in the minds of most people as 'just a guy' as opposed to huge man eating beastie.

I don't think dragons fall in categories of good or evil. Like every person they fall into different shades of grey. But there is one thing that all dragons seem to have in common: The ruthlessness which they show when necessary to further their agendas.

Simple answer - NO.

Side point - An appreciation of music does not make you good (your comments imply this), Peri is an ex hitman for the Azzies and is Ghost Walkers hatchet-wyrm so he's not entirely nice. Rhonabwy is a date rapist, see the whole thing with the Sea Dragon in DotSW.

Complicated answer - Still no. All dragons are megalomaniacs who see the world as theirs. However some see the lesser beings as snack, slaves, or means to an end (Sirrurg, Alamaise and Ryumyo respectively), while some take a more "benevolent" view and see us as their responsibility and think that they have a duty to rule us and the world(Lofwyr) or in some cases do more than that and attempt to encourage us to improve as a species (Dunkelzahn, Hestaby and Ghostwalker all fit this sort of idea well). The big thing with Dragons is they are working towards a picture that is to big for us to see, yes the DF is collecting Bloodmages and Toxics, and hell yes they are using them, the question is why and what for? The way i see it is that on global scale the DF are good guys but personally that means not one jot if it suits their agenda they will kill babies, it's all for the greater good. Of course without Dunk controlling things the DF may have become corrupt nut who knows?

To ask a question implied by the original one, Is there such a thing as an 'evil' dragon?

I say yes, in the form of the wholely selfish Ryumyo who would destroy the world in his quest for the power of a God.

Of course there is. All the ones with metallic scales are good and all the ones with dully non-shiney scales are evil (watch out for the wierd scales though).

Oh, wrong setting. Dragons are sentient, as capable of good and evil as humans. That's what should scare you.

Although, you might like Arleesh, Damon or Nebelherr.

Why would you say Lofwyr is satan incarnate? Is being effective such a sin for you?

~J

Isn't this sort of like asking if insects think that people are evil?
The humans either squash the bugs or destroy their home (bad), ignore them as insignificant, or maybe poke at them harmlessly (neutral) or protect their environments with some long-term ecological plan that the bugs aren't aware of, can't possibly understand, and will take hundreds of lifetimes to have any real effect (good).

Unless of course the farmer is some wacky Jainist who won't walk in the grass for fear of accidentally ending the life of a bug.
Is that what Kesslan is looking for? A wacky Jainist dragon that cares about all life, no matter how annoying and/or insignificant it is? Like humans?

I find that a Dragon smothered in a nice orange hickory glaze is quite good.

The only good dragon is a dead dragon.

But they're not evil. It's just that from a human POV, they tend to look that way because people as a rule don't like to be treated like something bigger's toys.

Without getting too into specific dragons, I have one fundamental trait that I infuse into any dragon, no matter what. They are a predator. Everything else, no matter what tastes, habits, inclinations and propensities they may acquire, is built on this different foundation.

Humans aren't predators. Not really. They can be nasty, cruel and strive with each other for dominance, but on the whole there's the warm fuzziness of the social mammal deep in your marrow. Not the dragons. Although they may not all be scheming for worldwide power, I play all of them as capable of killing someone for dinner. Because they are capable of that and it's their nature. If you want a good dragon personality, take someone that you know and is vaguely interesting, and rework them on the understanding that they once killed someone you knew and ate them. Keep all the rest of them but re-interpret in this light. There you go - Dragon.

Lofwry? Power-hungry status player that has killed to establish dominance, not once, but hundreds of times. A vaguely more secretive chairman Mao.

Dion? A womaniser and a hedonist with a dark side. An american psycho sort of dangerman.

Rhonabwy? A beast that can be charmed by beauty. Like a big scaly cerebus or Shariah in the Arabian Nights. But still a beast.

Dunklezahn? Good guy? No - he wanted a logical, harmonious order and he would crush those that opposed him. Like an obsessive conductor harrying his string section. Only in this case the musicians are people and organisations, all playing to his score.

Dragons good? No. All too predatory for that.

Dragons are solitary creatures, not eusocial creatures like bees or even social creatures like wolves or men. Dragons do not, on a gut level, understand the concept of friendship. Dragons only recently acquired the ability to get even the barest intellectual grasp on loyalty - and even that is expressed in purel mathematical terms.

Hestaby understands the Prisoner's Dilemma, and also understands that the world is best approximated by an open ended number of trials. But she doesn't "get it" on an instinctual level. In any case where she believes that she is playing a one-time game she will always defect.

It's not that she can't be trusted. Within their byzantine and far seeing minds, dragons are extremely predictable. They always, always choose the best choice for them. Which means that they don't pick the best choice for everyone, which means that everyone else should play hardball back, which means that ultimately thedragons are screwing themselves.

The best result of the Prisoner's Dilemma is if neither person defects. Humans can understand that, and act accordingly to be "good" even in isolated instances with no future reprecussions. Dragons don't. They are not "good", nor can they be.

-Frank

couldn't it be argued that Dunk, having "gotten" the prisoner's dilemma, decided to take non-defection to its logical extreme? self-sacrifice can, from my limited understanding of game theory, be thought of as self-defection.

i think Dunk was a major force behind Aztechnology's blood magic. i also think he was a 'good guy'. blood magic is powerful magic, and, despite its dangers, could be used to the benefit of the planet. in the long run, all the bad stuff Aztechnology did could well be outweighed by the good the knowledge of blood magic they build.

i think it's possible that Hestaby might be starting to 'get it' as well, though i doubt she'll do anything like Dunk did.

Lofwyr is, i think, the ultimate example of a guy who doesn't get it. you gotta kinda admire him for it.

either way, i don't think it'll be possible to tell who gets it and who doesn't (and who doesn't care) by watching their actions. dragons work in timespans way too long to judge 'em by what they do now. you have to judge 'em on what effects their actions have ten, fifty, or a hundred years from now--if not longer. as Frank said, i don't think any dragon will ever really match up with a human definition of "good". they've got that whole Dune thing going on, where in order to fix the future (assuming a given dragon wants to), they have to really tear up the present.

In the grim future of the 6th world, is there such a thing as a "Good" anything?

The Dune reference is probably a good example for long-term planning. The God Emperor held humanity in stagnation for a few thousand years, and was generally seen as an evil tyrant (except by those followers that worshipped him as god, of course). Iirc even the Bene Gesserit grasped the meaning of his Golden Path only a few hundred years after he sacrified himself.

(This reminds me, the first part of the seventh Dune book is available since a few months...)

What is "good"?

..

No, seriously. How do you define a "Good Guy"?

I'm seeing many, many definitions of good here -- and they all seem to equate to "Nice". Why is that? Dragons aren't "Nice", they aren't social, and they are self-centered. None of those preclude being "Good". Dunkelzahn was waging a war nobody other than dragons and IEs even knew was going on -- of course he was ready to smash opposition. He eventually bought it to buy time for everyone else to get their acts together.

Lofwyr, Hestaby, all the major greats -- do you really think they aren't looking around the world and going "Ulp, this could be the big one" with regards to the Coming Scourge? Yes, they for the most part are trying to get control over everything -- because they have the long view, and a united front has a far better chance at surviving in a conflict. Whether it's by hiding or by fighting.

Sure, some of them eat annoyances. Why not? Literally, think about it. They aren't human, so it's not cannibalism. It's not nice, nobody will argue that. It's an evil act most of the time, in that it's killing. But nobody I'm aware of does only good acts.

nah, nice and good aren't the same thing. i think dragons can act nice, but they'll never actually be nice for the reasons Frank described. as for 'good', to me, it's a question of whether they work to increase or decrease the amount of misery on the planet.

it's not that it's untrue, understand. it's very true: every action a person takes, even self-sacrificial actions, are undertaken because the person believes he will derive benefit from the action. the thing is... so what? that's like saying the gasoline in your car is selfish because it's chemically predisposed to burn under certain conditions. people have motives; if they didn't, they'd be completely random. you have to judge the motive as well as the action, or you're just jerking off. a broad example of a bad motive would be doing something in order to hurt someone else, because making them hurt will make you feel better. a broad example of a good motive would be helping someone else, because making them feel good will make you feel good. both motives have, at their base, you feeling good. the difference is what it is that makes you feel that way.

edit: from your edit, you may be talking about something else. hm.

Dragons aren't good. They aren't evil.

And it's not that they're predators and we're not -- because we are predators. We may be social predators, but that doesn't take away our predatory behavior.

No, what dragons are is alien.

They're big friggin' solitary nearly immortal sentient reptiles. They're about as different from a human as you can get.

An immortal elf has a way different perspective than a mortal elf or human. Living for centuries and millenia will do that to you. Now take away their basic humanity. Take away all group/social instincts. And and then, their mammilian instincts. Add reptilian instincts, an extremely healthy appetite, permanent dual-naturedness, the ability to perform magic from birth, etc, etc.

They're totally alien. While we may be able to judge them as good or evil, I would strongly suggest not attempting to attach such labels to them. These things are animals.

They're intelligent, sentient animals, but for our purposes... still animals. Go to the SR3 companion. Read the section on shapeshifters. That's what I'm talking about, except they're reptiles, not mammals or birds.

Trying to attach human values to dragons is pointless.

gonna leave my above post to stand on its own, since it's viable.

re: self-sacrifice, we're also wired for self-preservation. different people are wired more strongly towards one or the other. the term 'wiring' is misleading though, because it implies that people are helpless to alter their wiring. choosing to make yourself the sort of person who is wired more towards self-sacrifice is a good thing.

Shadowrun needs an Alignment system to help solve these dilemmas.

Ah... No.

I know you guys are kidding, but I swear if that happens I'm making a railgun that shoots d6s and going crazy.

n odragon sees themselves as evil. They are working for their own good, just like everyone else and if that happens to help others, hey, nice. Hestaby and Dunkelzahn seem to be the best of the dragons for "not eating maidens."
But I'm sure all the dragons could justify their behavior as being for the overall good of metahumanity.

I disagree on "incapable", more "unlikely". As an example, I'd say Dunk and Hestaby had 'pure' motives. As in, thy really mean what they say. But as far as tehey are concerned, the ends do justify the means. They might had an outlook that certain things that we would consider "good" need to be done, like meta-equality, but they do it all in a draconian way.

Ok, I'm not going to say you know nothing about game theory, because you obviously do know something about it, but somewhere in there a lot of "just plain wrong" got mixed in. After some sleep I'll try to evaluate what you said out of the context of the prisoner's dilemma, but for now I'm just going to say that it has to be evaluated out of that context, because what you're talking about has essentially nothing to do with the prisoner's dilemma. That or you're working at a completely different scope of abstraction from me, which I doubt accounts for all of it, but like I said, too tired to evaluate.

~J

@Kesslan - I was being picky I admit...

On Lofwyr, this may sound to some a little controversial, but i think he's closer to a good guy than a bad guy. Why? Simply put he judges everyone by their ability rather than their species. He like all dragons believes the strongest should survive and rule the lesser beings, but unlike most dragons he doesn't see only dragons as the strong. Anyone who can compete with dragons is considered a worthy opponent by him. Okay I suppose that doesn't make him good as such but it does make me like him as a character better than some other wyrms. I suppose the idea of a big guy like Lofwyr being capable of respecting humans strikes me as a positive in a dragon.

i wouldn't call Lofwyr good, but he's definitely a pure example of what he is. he exemplifies what he is; you can't get leaner and meaner than Lofwyr.