Hi all

One of my player's wants to play a drake.

He's working on an elven magician adept but wants the latent metamorphsis ability. The problem is he doesn't want to be a Western Dragon drake but his background is from Tir na nog. He keeps talking about playing some sort of wingless drake metavariant based off the celtic wyrm. However most of my research into Celtic mythos suggests all celtic dragons have wings, hence the inspiration behind the western dragon (and the name!). His proposal was to use the eastern dragon stats or to make a hybrid.

If this was D&D I'd probably do this in a heartbeat. With SR I'm loath to deviate from canon and create something special just for him. I'm curious if other GMs handle this? Do you capitulate to a player's desire in order to make them happy and give them what they want or do you enforce the archtypes and variants provided and force them to play within that framework?

- J.

In this case, I would say no.

If it was a new spell, weapon, or similar - sure (as long as the character has the necessary skills to research/construct it). This extends to basically anything that can be "built", such as the Tremere quality I designed (& still have not finalized); basically a special, ritualized "infection/inhabitation".

Anything that requires adding to the game's history however (such as this), is a flat no without a very good reason.

Just use eastern dragon stats and apply whatever fluff you want to it. Eastern dragons are very snake-like anyway, much like the description of a wyrm.

I'd make him work within the framework. Partly because I'm lazy and partly I have no idea where he's getting this idea of Celtic wyrms from. I mean, yes, there's Celtic language speaking areas in which dragons are part of their legends, but the only one I can think of off the top of my head right now is Wales, and they happen to have a big honkin' winged red dragon as their bloody flag. I'm pretty sure the word wyrm is actually fraggin' Germanic or Saxon, not Celtic.

This is what we were initially discussing. At a high level it works and doesn't require any additional in game changes. I just don't like revisionist history or PCs being "one of a kind" if you know what I mean.

Having said all that, all my research in Celtic mythos and dragons seemed to suggest that virtually all dragons in that entire side of the world had wings with exception to the wingless wyrm variety - which could be argued aren't truly a dragon.

I am no Celtic expert however.

- J.

There's always the Leviathan.

So he wants a wingless drake? Use the Sea Drakes.

Ninja'ed. Merry Christmas, people.

i was thinking the very same thing

oh, and:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_dragon

I'm Ancient History, and as the writer of the new drake rules I approve of this thread.

Also...and I do this just to screw with you...this comes perilously close to an SoLA reference.

ah, that famous lost file. have fastjack been able to restore it from the corrupted databanks of shadowland seattle yet?

So what are you saying? Sea Drakes/leviathans are in?

- J.

Yup. It's all good.

Actually, the Welsh dragon Rhonabwy was described as wyrmlike and wingless in SR2's Prime Runners, in spite of the fact that he has an otherwise startling resemblance to the dragon in the Welsh flag.
Not sure wether this was changed in later editions.

The old Tir na nOg sourcebook also mentions that there are no known dracoforms in Ireland, which some people contribute to the legend of St. Patrick driving all the snakes out of the emerald isle.

Not that i would mind if one player in my game would decide to play an Irish drake with the stats of an eastern dragon or a leviathan.
However, i'd first suggest using a Welsh drake for that and as far as the wings are concerned...they are not really needed for the flying capabilities of a dragon, nor do they offer any other kind of mechanical advantage.
I wouldn't mind leaving them out for style reasons, no matter how much or little they had to do with canon or actual Celtic mythology.

Wouldn't that make him a Wyvern?

Wyverns have wings.

Wyverns have wings.

The player wants to be a Drake with no wings, not a Drake with no arms.

edit: Didn't refresh thread, someone beat me to it.

I'm sorta in this boat. I mean, by the look of things the guy isn't trying to make some uberpowered crazy-combo 6-winged, 8 legged monster drake form, he wants to be a...dragon with no wings for flavor and character purposes.I dunno, I mean, I have trouble imagining that every drake in the world(not many, i'm sure, but still) comes out looking EXACTLY the same. I don't see why one of the drakes might have gotten some sort of mystical sort of...something to develop slightly differently in appearance.

You gotta know when just to say 'no'.

You gotta know when just to say 'no'.


Wasn't saint Patrick, but yeah, someone makes sure dragons don't set up shop in the Tir.

Also, the Sea Dragon lives off the welsh coast, does she not? So there's even a somewhat plausible connection to canon celtic dragons for the leviathan drake.

BURN HIM.

noo!
Our Preciouss! wee needs it!
our poor dear old aunty ancient ^^

There's also a Norse variant of dragons called Linnorms/Lindworms that are wingless. They were a popular myth in ancient Germanic tribes as well, such as those that spread out into Ireland in the 6th to 3rd centuries BCE. The exact translation can be used for anything from dracoforms to common snakes, but it gets the point across.

Why does a mage want to take the Latent Dracomorphosis quality? Does he not feel the hate of the Karma already? If it isn't enough that he needs it for skills and stats, he also has a new stat to dump it in, Initiation, Metamagics, spells, binding foci, long-term binding, some metamagics require/suggest karma expenditures, Enchanting needs it, and now he wants to burn 120 when he draco-forms?

Sit him down with some loved ones and call an intervention. He needs some serious help.

EDIT: Edited for topic help: Like many others in this thread, I suggest using the Eastern Dragon stats and changing the thematics for a more celtic-y appearance. Or just use a leviathan.

All are valid points.

First fair warning, I think Drakes are one of the stupidest ideas in SR which has a long history of stupid ideas, beginning with those dam elves.



I don't see why this is a problem. I mean if you are already cool with him playing a drake which already a pretty fragging weird (and lame) race variant, then what is the problem with letting him play a 'unique' drake. There can't be more then a couple hundred drakes (if that) in the whole world anyways. So they all qualify as unique, all of them are pretty much 'one of a kind.' So I say let 'em. If there is no staistical difference, and thus no additional balance cocurns, why care. It's just some wierd flavor for his race, just like a more 'normal' characters hair color or such.

But I wouldn't allow it. Cause I think drakes are stupid. So there

Looks like we'll use the Sea Drake/Leviathan variant in the end as that fits the bill nicely.

In discussing the elemental breath weapon variants I'm giving said PC the option to change his breath weapon to acid if he pays karma (I figure such a creature would be able to burrow easily using its breath weapon).

Max-
The player wants to play a drake, has a nice concept and we've come up with a more flexible system that he will forgo 50% of all karma rewards to pay back the debt so he can still advance skills and stuff. As the GM I'm not keen on forcing him to payback all karma immediately and something phased allows the player to still advance (albeit very, very slowly).

- J.

He can change his breath weapon to whatever element he wants for the low low cost of 15 karma. Elemental Attack (Metal), Elemental Attack (Ice), or (my favorite) Elemental Attack (Radiation)!

so Radiation would turn you into GODZILLA muahahaaha