This is half a question on whether anyone has ever done this or if it's ever come up in cannon, and half a question on what people think of it...

The description for the powers common to dragons goes as follows:


Note the "usually Fire" under Elemental Attack. I don't remember ever coming across a dragon in the setting that used something other than fire for its breath weapon - I'm pretty certain none of the greats in DotSW are mentioned as having anything else, but it's a vivid idea. I can see Leviathan's with Elemental Attack (Sonic) which could be pretty nasty underwater. But Blast, Electricity and Cold would also be pretty dramatic.

The only advantage I've taken of the above quoted section is to have a feathered serpent with a sting in its tail (venom). Has anyone else had any Blue, White, Green etc. dragons in their games?

-Khadim.

I've made a point of not really dealing with dragons much (IC or OOC), but I can't help but wonder why you felt you had to post all of a Dragon's innate powers to ask a question about one.

Unlike D&D, a dragon's scale color generally has bupkiss to do with their personal powers. But yeah, there are reports of a dragon (the so-called "Lightning dragon") whose Elemental Attack is electricity.

Well it was worth quoting the line in question because it's a line I'd not really paid much attention to and I expect other people had forgotten / never noticed. In Shadowrun, it seems to me that Dragon Breath = Fire but the rules don't support that.

As to posting the whole paragraph, well I noticed that there were a few other things in there that seldom get noticed (I think), e.g. Noxious Breath, Corrosive Saliva, Fear). I'm also interested in people applying these powers in interesting ways also. Noxious Breath rounds out the D&D set of dragons whilst I would picture a dragon with corrosive saliva belonging to a dragon of particularly sinister aspect - something slinking along in a jungle swamp, perhaps.

Really? That's the first cannon reference to a non-fire breathing dragon I've come across. Do you know where it was?

As to D&D colour-coding, heh - indicating the powers of dragons is nothing compared to the way it gives away their personality in that game. It reminds me of an old D&D thread on How to Pick Up Dragons which had the advice "first, locate a dragon of metallic colour." I wasn't suggesting any sort of colour-coding for dragons in Shadowrun.

Booryazmei the "Storm Serpent" in Shadows of Asia.

My 2 cents, I have always felt that dragons in SR should be treated as individuals. Prominant NPC's rather than throw away monsters. As such, though this is only implied, signature powers are par for the course as each dragon is unique. The spell list alone makes for interesting reading. How could the runners really tell if the that fire sprayed from the dragon was its innate spell or just one of its many learned elemental manipulations spells for example? I essentially agree with your findings adn hope that it ellusidates others to a how dragons can be portrayed.

i'd say that leviathan dragon . . that female in great britain, has probably some water based thingie O.o

It fits the water theme but... it makes no practical sense. Firstly, it will be used underwater so any attack that has to plough through that resistance is already impaired. Secondly, many of your potential targets will be aquatic creatures, either through nature or magic or science, meaning that a water attack may be less effective.

On the other hand, a sonic weapon underwater might likely have increased effect as water is a far better conductor of sound waves than air, is it not?

I also quite like the idea of eastern dragons commonly having lightening instead of fire, or maybe smoke. The temptation to have a pure black dragon dwelling in a swamp and having an acid breath weapon must be resisted however. Or maybe not... it would certainly add some more edge to a dragon encounter. Hmmmm.