# Why Dragons Halt Progress



## arboriad (Jun 7, 2016)

Hi friends, just discovered this Nerdwriter video about the impact dragons have on a medieval-ish society, and why they up-end how we've come to assume the flow of history. 

Very valuable for how to brainstorm and approach our stories; for dragons, insert any ultimate power situation like magic, wizards, etc. 

[video=youtube_share;PDdKmx0PW7s]https://youtu.be/PDdKmx0PW7s[/video]

I'm wondering though what it would take for cannons to be built anyway, perhaps as the only real way to fight a dragon, and what an ensuing world might look like. 

Enjoy!


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## Miskatonic (Jun 7, 2016)

It depends on how you write the dragons. Are they extremely intelligent beings that value wisdom and peace? Or are they destructive monsters that are constantly threatening humans?


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## jm.milks (Jun 7, 2016)

It's very likely that in a world where dragons, assuming they attacked humans and their settlements for whatever reasons; hunger, being Dick's, ect... that human society would realistically evolve on the defensive, and not on the offensive. 

They would live in fortified locations, such as mountains and underground, because anyone living in plains or forests would ultimately be screwed. 

In the case on an attack, I don't see cannons being very affective against high speed aerial objects, as historically they haven't. Instead, they would develop alternate strategies. What I'm thinking is that people would develop ways to debilitate, or cripple the dragons mobility. Instead of cannons, more likely harpoons chained to anchors to weigh it down or trap it so a group can barrage it with other projectiles, possibly cannons in this situation, but personally, I believe that they would use arrows or serrated objects would be ideal because people would attempt to harvest whatever they could from a downed dragon, from scales to organs, bones, ect. It would be ideal to not bludgeon something, or infect it with gunpowder residue or other chemicals.

Just a few cents of mine.


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## La Volpe (Jun 7, 2016)

arboriad said:


> I'm wondering though what it would take for cannons to be built anyway, perhaps as the only real way to fight a dragon, and what an ensuing world might look like.


Naomi Novik took a stab at this with _His Majesty's Dragon_. It's basically the Napoleonic war, but with dragons instead of planes.


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## AJ Stevens (Jun 7, 2016)

In terms of military prowess, I always think dragons are the equivalent of a WWII bomber. Something that is well armoured, capable of flying out of reach that can devastate large areas. Imagine dropping that technology into medieval times. Its wielder would command absolute power.

It just so happens that anti-aircraft technology was around as aircraft appeared, so a defence mechanism was in place pretty quickly. That gives a clue as to what you'd need to fight a dragon. Armour-piercing projectiles that you can fire at high speed and high frequency. Or indeed, another dragon.

As Jm.Milks said, it would probably force humans into places that were heavily fortified and inaccessible to dragons. Think of Zion in The Matrix.


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## Svrtnsse (Jun 7, 2016)

One thing to consider, but which doesn't seem to be much of a factor in GoT, is if there are fantastical means of dealing with dragons.

There may be magical means to defeat them, or you could have your own dragons to fight the other guy's dragons.

It's a really interesting question though, because it feels really common that fantasy worlds are stuck in some kind of medieval age.


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## AJ Stevens (Jun 7, 2016)

Svrtnsse said:


> It's a really interesting question though, because it feels really common that fantasy worlds are stuck in some kind of medieval age.



Or a return to this way of living following the collapse of an 'advanced' civilisation, resulting in a (sometimes questionable) loss of knowledge.


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## Garren Jacobsen (Jun 7, 2016)

All of this seems to be an ex post facto justification for the fantasy trend of being stuck in the Middle Ages.


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## Lunaairis (Jun 7, 2016)

Kind of the reason why dragons in my world of "in the black"  can never be much larger   tigers, and have a similar temperament.  Only dumb people would try to ride and care for a winged tiger that can breath fire.   The rest of the time dragons aren't much bigger then house cats. And fewer of those spiecies can breath fire.  So humanoids are still the sort of apex predator in my world, which is what has let them create modern style cities with cars and guns.


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## Devor (Jun 7, 2016)

Ohh I don't know.  Game of Thrones isn't quite the definitive fantasy story.  There's a lot of fantasy that uses steam-tech or other fantasy-thing-fueled devices.  And there's always other magical beasts and spellcasters.  Dragons aren't always the capstone they are in Game of Thrones.

I would also suggest that there was something much bigger holding the world back during the middle ages - say, the guild system, which was focused on keeping technology scarce to drive up prices for its members.  Consider what would have happened if a revolution in commerce had happened _before_ the advent of cannons, gunpowder, and in turn, as the video suggests, centralized government - political ideologists could have a field day figuring out that fantasy story.


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## troynos (Jun 7, 2016)

jm.milks said:


> It's very likely that in a world where dragons, assuming they attacked humans and their settlements for whatever reasons; hunger, being Dick's, ect... that human society would realistically evolve on the defensive, and not on the offensive.
> 
> They would live in fortified locations, such as mountains and underground, because anyone living in plains or forests would ultimately be screwed.
> 
> ...



Ever watch the movie Dragonheart?  That's how the hunters in that deal with dragons.  They net them, bring them down and then come in with spears.





I haven't really fully developed dragons in my world yet.  I want to avoid the standard D&D hyper-intelligence, ancient and powerful dragons. They world's just not big enough for that many of them at that scale.

Most likely, dragons will be smaller, like what would be a drake in some settings. A wyvern is a sub-species, lion/panther sized, well dragons would elephant sized and drakes would be horse/bear.

Something like that.  Dragons would still be intelligent, but not on the scale of the standard D&D.


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## Miskatonic (Jun 7, 2016)

Record of Lodoss Wars, the anime at least, did a pretty good job with dragons. Some were evil tyrants, others were noble and fought against the evil dragons. Others were just forces of nature that you just stayed away from, like a predator in the wild.

Dragons play a big part in the mythos of my story but are not as large a presence in the present. They developed their own hierarchy and the "good" dragons keep the "bad" dragons in check when need be. Though they prefer to live in remote areas where there are no humans.


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## jm.milks (Jun 7, 2016)

troynos said:


> Ever watch the movie Dragonheart?  That's how the hunters in that deal with dragons.  They net them, bring them down and then come in with spears.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



I haven't seen that movie, but I just added it to my watchlist for later. 

That sounds like a good idea. If you're making them smaller, I wouldn't write them as hyperintelligent, but smarter than the average animal is a good idea. Something the size of a wyvern would greatly benefit from pack hunting, which would likely be an eventual evolutionary trait, as well as reasoning skills and maybe even early forms of communication (sending out calls for help, or coordination with each other on the hunt). Something the size of a Drake would benefit from smaller groups of 2-3

That would surely make writing a story based around them a little more interesting. 

Man's greatest weapon is their brain. Giving them a foe with, not as powerful of a brain, but one that rivaled it would provide an extra sense of struggle and make fighting them more intriguing. 

Maybe they'd pass the mirror test.


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## TheKillerBs (Jun 7, 2016)

I'm going to poke a hole in this theory right from the beginning. The idea that cannons making fortresses obsolete forced large armies into existence, therefore forcing strong centralised governments ignores the millennium or so that preceded the Middle Ages, in which _vast_ armies (funded by strong centralised governments), which dwarfed anything in the medieval or Rennaissance periods, regularly succeeded at besieging fortified cities.


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## ChasingSuns (Jun 14, 2016)

I've been exploring this concept in a way, but with magic instead of dragons. The current series that I'm working on is high fantasy in a pretty standard issue package (think ASOIAF, LOTR, and WOT). Magic is very prominent, but there are those who despise it. After this series is finished, I plan on writing another series that takes place in the same world, but many years later. It'll be more of a high fantasy/steampunk setting. The logic behind the shift is that after the events of the first series, magic becomes frowned upon by pretty much everyone. This causes it to be outlawed across the entire continent. Due to the lack of magic, technological advances are made, therefore leading to a more modernized version of society. I feel like it will be fun to explore the changes that are made to government, religion, and whatnot in a scenario like this.


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## TheKillerBs (Jun 14, 2016)

ChasingSuns said:


> I've been exploring this concept in a way, but with magic instead of dragons. The current series that I'm working on is high fantasy in a pretty standard issue package (think ASOIAF, LOTR, and WOT). Magic is very prominent, but there are those who despise it. After this series is finished, I plan on writing another series that takes place in the same world, but many years later. It'll be more of a high fantasy/steampunk setting. The logic behind the shift is that after the events of the first series, magic becomes frowned upon by pretty much everyone. This causes it to be outlawed across the entire continent. Due to the lack of magic, technological advances are made, therefore leading to a more modernized version of society. I feel like it will be fun to explore the changes that are made to government, religion, and whatnot in a scenario like this.



I don't understand this line of thinking. Why wouldn't magic be the technology that advances civilisation? Most magic is in fact technology as the literal word details it - a craft or skill that is studied. If you have a freezing spell, I doubt it would take long before a group of schmucks start bewitching closets to freeze stuff in them. Now your people have freezers. Spells for water can be used to irrigate crops. Droughts aren't as devastating as before, because now you have frozen meat and artificially irrigated fields. The surplus of food means that more people can specialise, which means that more and more people are doing things for cultural and technological advancement. Progress.


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## ChasingSuns (Jun 15, 2016)

TheKillerBs said:


> I don't understand this line of thinking. Why wouldn't magic be the technology that advances civilisation? Most magic is in fact technology as the literal word details it - a craft or skill that is studied. If you have a freezing spell, I doubt it would take long before a group of schmucks start bewitching closets to freeze stuff in them. Now your people have freezers. Spells for water can be used to irrigate crops. Droughts aren't as devastating as before, because now you have frozen meat and artificially irrigated fields. The surplus of food means that more people can specialise, which means that more and more people are doing things for cultural and technological advancement. Progress.



I understand your point for sure. I'm just coming from a traditional fantasy angle with this. In the first series, the setting is very medieval in nature. In regards to certain things like the freezer concept, I'd have to explain the magic system in order to explain how that wouldn't work. Same with the water spell thing. The magic in this world does have certain limitations. Also, even though magic is prominent, a very large portion of the population don't use it for various reasons. And magic does make certain things easier, but it also represents (at least, to the people in this particular world) latching on to the old way of doing things. People are very locked in to tradition in this story. After the events of the first series though, people begin to turn away from tradition. This, coupled with the hatred for magic that grows after the events that happen, lead them to turn towards tech to solve certain problems. It causes everyone to start thinking differently about a lot of different aspects of society as well (hence the changes made to governments and whatnot).

You definitely have some great ideas about everyday devices that are created with magic. That could be a cool idea for a story


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## Miskatonic (Jun 15, 2016)

Brian Scott Allen said:


> All of this seems to be an ex post facto justification for the fantasy trend of being stuck in the Middle Ages.



You mean a pale imitation of the Middle Ages.


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## Drakevarg (Jun 17, 2016)

I dislike Medieval Stasis as a trope, which is why I give my setting a lengthy timeline so that I can tell stories at different eras. That said, technology and culture moves at a very slow and anachronistic pace in my setting according to my tastes and/or lack of research.

As for the subject of dragons, I like having them around just to enjoy the idea that humans are by no means the apex predators of this world. My dragons are roughly dinosaur-sized, but between their magic, flight, and thick hides when they decide to pick a fight with humans it's basically a kaiju attack. 99% of the time you don't even try to fight it, you just run. Thankfully dragons are relatively rare (a single dragon can occupy a territory hundreds of miles in diameter) and are prone to lengthy hibernation so humans aren't forced to live in caves.

Personally, I prefer the "hyperintelligent" variant of dragon, so some of them even create cults to worship them, often as a sort of livestock-by-proxy since it's more efficient to get humans to offer them sacrifices than to devour them directly. The cults are usually small, maybe a single family or small village, but one kingdom was rather well-known for having a dragon cult as a state religion, complete with dragonrider military.


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