Dragons in your world?

[S.T. Ockenner]

What are dragons like in your world? What do they look like? What is their society like? What are their powers? Are they magical, or are they just animals? Can they take other forms? How/why? Are they intelligent? How many are there? etc.
There have been many interpretations of dragons, all throughout fantasy, and many traits they often share include:
1. Flight (do dragons in your world fly?)
2. Breath attacks (How? Magic or biological reasons? Is it only fire?)
3. Resembling large, winged snakes with limbs

 

[Chasejxyz]

There's mutiple species* of dragons, all within the order Draxia. They all share certain traits, like being scaled, having magic**, and can see/sense in the infrared spectrum. And, technically, all dragons on this one continent which most of the stories take place have all dragons belonging to one "noble house," to which they pledge allegiance to over individual cities/rulers/countries. They're supposed to be neutral and not get involved in politics but some kinda ignore that.

• Great dragons: these are the classical hexapodal fire-breathing dragons that talk and think and have lots of magic. They keep growing as they get older and their magic grows with them, but moving that much bulk takes up so much energy that the big ones really...don't move all that much. Once they get good enough at magic they can eat pretty much anything and draw energy from that, though it's not a pleasant experience to switch from "real" food to pure energy. They tend to sit around and observe natural phenomena, such as the stars and weather patterns, so you can get a good star chart from them, but they have no need of money, so you will have to trade with things they find interesting (like art or maple syrup). Some can take the form of a human or some sort of animal, but they figure it out on their own (compared to birds, where you can go to how2human school).
  
• Hive dragons: they come in a ton of different forms: two legged, 4 legged, sea dragons, taurs, you name it. Some are very intelligent, some are as dumb as the dumbest animals. But they're all able to interbreed and have an insect-like "colony" society. It's very weird and they live in a corner of the continent that is not pleasant to live in (plus the dumb dragons have no qualms eating you). Not a lot is known about them, but sometimes you can buy a dumb one as a pet. They've been causing trouble for their neighbors due to climate change affecting food/water supplies.
• Steppe dragons: They don't grow very big and are more shaped like Asian longbois and tend not to use magic besides breathing fire. They live on the steppe and are mostly solitary and hunt the megafauna there. You might be able to convince one to join your hunting party. They can live a long time but tend not to since they're more "active" and require more food/put themselves in danger more often.
• unDragons: A dragon that has a draconic genotype but a human-y phenotype, aka genetically they are a dragon but do not have the body/shape of a dragon. Hybrids look/are shaped most like the parent that gestated it, so 2 dragons in human form would make offspring that is also in human form. They probably have magic but don't have (and cannot gain) the ability to change into a dragon form. They tend to do better than unBirds and do stuff for the "noble house" with their human-y bodies that can be difficult to do for a giant dragon. A lot of them are made on purpose, which brings us to...
• Draxelle: They're the only entry on this list which aren't part of order Draxia (they're mammals, technically) but they're very obviously draconic. Intentionally bred from humans and unDragons (plus some of this changeling-y species for good measure), they're bipedal, rarely have magic and have features like horns, claws, wings and tails. They can't breathe fire. Since they're intentionally made there's...opinions about them, and their rights to exist, and they have their own opinions about their situation, too.

*Hive dragons is a genus of closely related dragon species but pretend they're all just one species for this high-level discussion

**"having" "magic" is defined as different things in different cultures but for here we'll just say it's the ability to "do magic" like one would normally expect in a fantasy story

 

[Maker of Things Not Kings]

I've never used dragons in a setting though I have sketched out a world called Kisturada which is comprised of an island continent that is home to nine forests, each one the domain of one of nine species of a hybrid, fox/dragon/gargoyle. Each variance is patterned after a true fox species so; Red, Kit, Fennec, Arctic, Bengal, Corsac, Pale, Sand and the ninth being the legendary Kitsune.

They all share some traits so, in answer to your three characteristics:

1. Flight (do dragons in your world fly?)
Yes, though flight is limited (why they've never left their ocean-bound homeland) and not nearly as useful in attacks like fantasy dragons.

2. Breath attacks (How? Magic or biological reasons? Is it only fire?)

No fire, but they do possess the ability to control/conjure winds with their breath when animated and, as gargoyles, to emit a dust-toxin from their mouths.

3. Resembling large, winged snakes with limbs.
No, obviously winged foxes bear little resemblance to reptilian dragons.

And your other questions:

What is their society like? They are worshipped by the humanoid inhabitants (hence the gargoyles) AND hunted (when animated).
What are their powers? All things foxy. And the above mentioned powers of light, wind control etc.
Are they magical, or are they just animals? The magic is that of those who created them ages before.
Can they take other forms? They shift between stone/gargoyle, where they still have awareness and presence of mind, and full-living.
Are they intelligent? VERY.
How many are there? While eight of the species are numerous(meaning I don't really know yet) there is only thought to be one Kitsune, and if anything happened to it, they would remain stone forever.

 

[Insolent Lad]

Aside from a few mentions in stand-alone stories, I have two rather different sorts of dragons from two different 'universes' in which I have set my tales. There are similarities and differences. In both they are mammalian (and essentially very large weasels), have four limbs (none of this 4+2 legs-and-wings bit), and pretty smart. In my series of Greenmeadows short stories, they are somewhat magical, definitely as smart as humans (they would claim to be smarter), and can transform to human shape. I have only the one sort. These are comic stories and the dragons reflect that point.

In my primary fantasy world, the one in which most of the novels are set, there is more variety but no magic to them. Not all are of human-level intelligence; some might be seen as the 'missing links' of dragondom, with more like ape-level brain power. There are water dragons, wingless, that are supposedly closer to the original stock (and resemble nothing so much as giant otters). There is the Basilisk — a small dragon (maybe up to eight foot length) that haunts deep places. it would not be as intelligent as the true dragons, but a sort of offshoot branch of the ancestral stock. It has vestigial wings, some varieties can perhaps glide a little. It hunts small creatures among the mountains, is bad tempered but not likely to tackle a man, usually.

It and most dragons would have ‘fire’ in the form of an anal discharge, in skunk-fashion. The 'big' dragons are slender and light-weight, in order to fly. I recognize that there are natural limits to such things and wrote them accordingly. They are quite intelligent — intelligent enough to avoid humans as much as possible. They are, of course, furry and have external ears, not looking at all reptilian aside from their slender 'snaky' bodies. Wyverns, on the other hand, are flying reptiles and a completely different breed. Dragons do not understand how humans can mistake one for the other.

 

[Flight]

I'm currently creating a short story or poem about a hunting trip of a dragon. The dragon in my story is quite classical "the Hobbit" style of dragon. Four limbs + wings. It breaths fire, but not when hunting for food. Fire is reserved for general mayhem and fighting. The dragon is colored in blue with very light blue belly to help it camouflage in the sky.

The behaviour of my dragon is quite animal like with the intelligence of a predator, but nothing super smart. It doesn't speak in the story, but it can certainly think human like and it thinks that he is more powerful than anything around him. That arrogance also becomes its folly. In the end it gets tricked and captured by some brave heroes.