![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
which_chickFor some reason the Insta algo has been showing me little clips (everything is little clips on Insta, I don't know why I have to clarify that they're short form video things) of D&D related content.
I do not play D&D but I live in a D&D Adjacent world where I know people who do this, have read books where D&D knowledge is useful to understanding the plot mechanics, and am somewhat familiar with the genre as a whole. Like, I know there are dice and elements of randomness and there's a DM and there are player characters and so forth, like, it's a narrative worldbuilding thing where everybody kinda does theater only without costumes and blocking and rehearsals. It's... fantasy improv storytelling with dice, kinda?
Right, so I'm coming to these little clip videos from this perspective.
In the clip that I saw during this morning's two minutes hate... er... allotted doomscrolling time between the First Alarm and the I Really Mean It alarm, DM is sitting there looking smug while players are high fiving and celebrating and stuff, caption is something like "The players don't know that it was the baby dragon..." In the interests of Show Don't Tell, I have internetted enough to find the damn clip and here it is.
And what popped into my head right then was the fact that what this group of players really needed was some sort of woodland/nature skilled person with a FIELD GUIDE to the proper area. Like, y'know, Eddark's Guide To The Western Reaches or whatever. The nature person would have picked up this guide for a few silver in the last big town because while they're good at woodland/nature shit, this is a new ecosystem and it's helpful to have a field guide for new areas.
So, the players are trying to track down a dragon, let's call it a brown dragon (I know nothing about what types of dragons are for what or how they work or fuck all about that. Someone can totally Well, Actually... me about what "real" dragons are like according to Third Edition or whatever, but if you're going to correct me about the natural history of pretend animals, maybe you need to go outside more often, ok?) that has been eating farmers' cows on the outskirts of whatever shithole town they've just been through. And there's a reward for killing this brown dragon, which, as dragons go, is not very big or dangerous. Kind of... a large lizard without flight or any interesting powers. They can totally take a brown dragon. So that's what they're looking for, and bang, they find a dragon. It's the right size and it's brown-ish and they can see it down in the valley below and they're are all set to ambush the dragon and get the reward offered by... dairy or beef farmers which clearly isn't going to be much money because dairy and beef are not super lucrative industries and this is a rural part of the country, but w/e.
Whereupon their fighter/leader person Helmut hissed "Let's go, guys! That's the varmint right there!"
But Jake the Nerdy Forest Guy held up his hand. "Hang on, are we sure that's a brown dragon? It says here in Eddark's Guide to the Western Reaches, sixth edition that Brown dragons and Red dragons can be confused."
"Jake, don't be a complete numpty. Everyone knows that Red Dragons are fucking scarlet red, 50 feet long, and have big wings. And mindspeech. That thing can't be more than fifteen feet long and it's BROWN and has no wings and it isn't talking to us and we're totally within range." This, from the wizard Ka'alden, who thinks she knows everything about everything because wizard and has yet to realize that fireball isn't always the answer. She's a joy to have on the team, tbh, but sometimes the answer is indeed fireball and when that's the case, it's best to have someone who can fireball. This doesn't make Ka'alden any easier to live with, though.
"JUVENILE RED DRAGONS ARE BROWNISH FOR CAMOUFLAGE," continued Jake the Nerdy Forest Guy, reading a bit louder from his slightly foxed (he bought it used) copy of Eddark. "And the wings do not appear until they have reached their tenth year, when they also develop the power of mindspeech with non-dragonkind."
"Izzat so?" sneered Helmut. He sighed heavily and leaned against a tree, arms crossed. "Fine. It truly is A Biologic Compendium Of Useful Information just like it says on the cover. Does the book say how to tell them apart, or is that too much utility to hope for?"
"The brown dragon displays a spiked tail and has three forward facing claws on the front feet, while the juvenile red has a smooth tail, two forward facing claws and one rear-facing claw on each front foot, and slightly reddish scales around the snout and eyes. It is important to correctly identify the dragon for while brown dragons are relatively common livestock predators, red dragons are not..."
"That's an understatement," interrupted Methred, willfully ignorant of the fact that Jake was mid-sentence. The group's archer, he peered into the distance, squinting a bit. "Red dragons are damned smart and famously lethal." Checking out the smallish dragon in the valley below, he reported back. "Tail is smooth. I can only see two claws on the front feet... and there are reddish scales around the snout. This is probably not a brown dragon. Also... it appears to be ... frolicking with butterflies?"
Jake continued reading, "Red dragons have low fertility and treasure their young. Since the juveniles rely on camouflage and threat displays for defense, the parents are typically close by, monitoring telepathically and ready to render aid at the slightest hint of trouble."
"Hunh." Helmut grunted. He spat to the side and rubbed his chin. "Bit wordy, your book, but that's useful enough," he admitted grudgingly. "Probably if we'd gone for it, Momma would have come blazing out the sky and ended us all."
*Daddy* sounded a bass voice in his head.
"What?" Helmut jolted upright from his studied tree-leaning. He looked around and saw nothing.
*DADDY.* The voice was almost smug. *I'm her daddy, not her momma. Her mom's off hunting the Southern Ocean. The orcas are migrating this time of year and it takes a lot of meat to feed a growing girl.* It chuckled.
"Are you OK, Helmut?" asked Ka'alden. "You look like you've seen a ghost."
"It's the dad. He's in my head."
"Oh shit."
*Yes. About that. I assume you won't be attacking my daughter?*
"No, of course not." said Helmut. And after a pause, he added, "Sir."
"Helmut? What's going on?"
"Shhh."
*Beedee has been practicing her threat display. If you look convincingly scared while running away from her, I'll give you two sides of bacon and a ham.*
"He's offering us... charcuterie?" said Helmut, who was struggling to keep up.
"Ah, yes, the book mentions something about that, too," said Jake, who flipped a few pages before reading more. There really was a lot of information about red dragons in the guide. "The red dragon does not keep traditional treasure like gold or gemstones. They... make and hoard preserved meats. Smoked, salted, etc. They're masters of the craft, with lifespans of hundreds of years to perfect their art and obviously, built-in fire for smoking. A side of their bacon is worth a king's ransom."
"We will be very, very scared." said Helmut firmly. He was already somewhat scared and trying hard to not show it.
*Good.*
"All right, no live steel. Sling your bow, Methred. Ka'alden, you just keep your hands in your pockets. We are NOT GOING TO ENGAGE. We're going to happen upon this dragon by way of a slow and steady chance encounter (the air quotes were visible) and then be terrified and flee when she does her threat display. Remember to sell it!"
They wandered along, chatting and "oblivious", getting slowly closer and closer to the young dragon so that she could notice them coming and scare them off.
When Beedee noticed them, she reared up on her hind feet. It took her two tries to get up all the way, but she managed. Her first screech was a bit strangled, but the second one swelled in power and confidence. Clearly getting the hang of things, she snaked her head around threateningly and bared her needle-sharp teeth. Her balance stabilized, so she risked clawing her front feet at the air to go along with the final screech. The whole thing was pretty convincing and only a little unsteady around the edges.
Helmut got the play by play via mindspeech.
*That's my big girl! You are very fierce! Good job, baby, you're doing it!*
"Gods Above, it's a DRAGON! Run for your lives! Run, Run!"
"Get out of my way!"
"HELP! AAAAARGH!"
The adventurers scrambled and yelled and flailed and fled, all very convincingly, finally grinding to a halt under the cover of a fairly distant copse of trees. They were out of breath and red-faced.
*Well done. I'll drop your bacons and ham at the Crossroads Inn, I know the innkeeper there. Road's to your left, about half an hour of walking, and then make a right turn, you'll reach it by mid-afternoon. Thanks for playing!*
Jake looked at the book, the Eddark book. It was slightly singed and smelt vaguely of smoke and all of a sudden, Jake had a thought that maybe his Biologic Compendium Of Useful Information wasn't so much foxed as... dragoned.
"Dragon?" asked Jake. He didn't know if the dragon would answer, but he had had a thought, y'see, and he wanted to know. Methred had, in Jake's hearing, once described an arctic blizzard as being somewhat chilly and had frequently referred to Emtal the Furious as slightly tetchy at times, though not in Emtal's hearing of course. But Methred had said they were damned smart.
*Yes?* At once, Jake realized why Helmut had looked so shaken. That was a voice with weight and authority.
"What's your name?"
*The short form of my name is Blood Red Darkens the Skies.* There was a brief but clear pause, and then the dragon continued, kindly but quickly. *Young Jake, normally I'd let this conversation play out more naturally but there's another group coming in from the north-east and they didn't buy a copy of the book. Here are your answers: First, Beedee calls me Eddark. Second, I only hunt the dumb ones. Third, your gift meats are from cloven-hooved pigs with curly tails and not from... the other kind.*
I do not play D&D but I live in a D&D Adjacent world where I know people who do this, have read books where D&D knowledge is useful to understanding the plot mechanics, and am somewhat familiar with the genre as a whole. Like, I know there are dice and elements of randomness and there's a DM and there are player characters and so forth, like, it's a narrative worldbuilding thing where everybody kinda does theater only without costumes and blocking and rehearsals. It's... fantasy improv storytelling with dice, kinda?
Right, so I'm coming to these little clip videos from this perspective.
And what popped into my head right then was the fact that what this group of players really needed was some sort of woodland/nature skilled person with a FIELD GUIDE to the proper area. Like, y'know, Eddark's Guide To The Western Reaches or whatever. The nature person would have picked up this guide for a few silver in the last big town because while they're good at woodland/nature shit, this is a new ecosystem and it's helpful to have a field guide for new areas.
So, the players are trying to track down a dragon, let's call it a brown dragon (I know nothing about what types of dragons are for what or how they work or fuck all about that. Someone can totally Well, Actually... me about what "real" dragons are like according to Third Edition or whatever, but if you're going to correct me about the natural history of pretend animals, maybe you need to go outside more often, ok?) that has been eating farmers' cows on the outskirts of whatever shithole town they've just been through. And there's a reward for killing this brown dragon, which, as dragons go, is not very big or dangerous. Kind of... a large lizard without flight or any interesting powers. They can totally take a brown dragon. So that's what they're looking for, and bang, they find a dragon. It's the right size and it's brown-ish and they can see it down in the valley below and they're are all set to ambush the dragon and get the reward offered by... dairy or beef farmers which clearly isn't going to be much money because dairy and beef are not super lucrative industries and this is a rural part of the country, but w/e.
Whereupon their fighter/leader person Helmut hissed "Let's go, guys! That's the varmint right there!"
But Jake the Nerdy Forest Guy held up his hand. "Hang on, are we sure that's a brown dragon? It says here in Eddark's Guide to the Western Reaches, sixth edition that Brown dragons and Red dragons can be confused."
"Jake, don't be a complete numpty. Everyone knows that Red Dragons are fucking scarlet red, 50 feet long, and have big wings. And mindspeech. That thing can't be more than fifteen feet long and it's BROWN and has no wings and it isn't talking to us and we're totally within range." This, from the wizard Ka'alden, who thinks she knows everything about everything because wizard and has yet to realize that fireball isn't always the answer. She's a joy to have on the team, tbh, but sometimes the answer is indeed fireball and when that's the case, it's best to have someone who can fireball. This doesn't make Ka'alden any easier to live with, though.
"JUVENILE RED DRAGONS ARE BROWNISH FOR CAMOUFLAGE," continued Jake the Nerdy Forest Guy, reading a bit louder from his slightly foxed (he bought it used) copy of Eddark. "And the wings do not appear until they have reached their tenth year, when they also develop the power of mindspeech with non-dragonkind."
"Izzat so?" sneered Helmut. He sighed heavily and leaned against a tree, arms crossed. "Fine. It truly is A Biologic Compendium Of Useful Information just like it says on the cover. Does the book say how to tell them apart, or is that too much utility to hope for?"
"The brown dragon displays a spiked tail and has three forward facing claws on the front feet, while the juvenile red has a smooth tail, two forward facing claws and one rear-facing claw on each front foot, and slightly reddish scales around the snout and eyes. It is important to correctly identify the dragon for while brown dragons are relatively common livestock predators, red dragons are not..."
"That's an understatement," interrupted Methred, willfully ignorant of the fact that Jake was mid-sentence. The group's archer, he peered into the distance, squinting a bit. "Red dragons are damned smart and famously lethal." Checking out the smallish dragon in the valley below, he reported back. "Tail is smooth. I can only see two claws on the front feet... and there are reddish scales around the snout. This is probably not a brown dragon. Also... it appears to be ... frolicking with butterflies?"
Jake continued reading, "Red dragons have low fertility and treasure their young. Since the juveniles rely on camouflage and threat displays for defense, the parents are typically close by, monitoring telepathically and ready to render aid at the slightest hint of trouble."
"Hunh." Helmut grunted. He spat to the side and rubbed his chin. "Bit wordy, your book, but that's useful enough," he admitted grudgingly. "Probably if we'd gone for it, Momma would have come blazing out the sky and ended us all."
*Daddy* sounded a bass voice in his head.
"What?" Helmut jolted upright from his studied tree-leaning. He looked around and saw nothing.
*DADDY.* The voice was almost smug. *I'm her daddy, not her momma. Her mom's off hunting the Southern Ocean. The orcas are migrating this time of year and it takes a lot of meat to feed a growing girl.* It chuckled.
"Are you OK, Helmut?" asked Ka'alden. "You look like you've seen a ghost."
"It's the dad. He's in my head."
"Oh shit."
*Yes. About that. I assume you won't be attacking my daughter?*
"No, of course not." said Helmut. And after a pause, he added, "Sir."
"Helmut? What's going on?"
"Shhh."
*Beedee has been practicing her threat display. If you look convincingly scared while running away from her, I'll give you two sides of bacon and a ham.*
"He's offering us... charcuterie?" said Helmut, who was struggling to keep up.
"Ah, yes, the book mentions something about that, too," said Jake, who flipped a few pages before reading more. There really was a lot of information about red dragons in the guide. "The red dragon does not keep traditional treasure like gold or gemstones. They... make and hoard preserved meats. Smoked, salted, etc. They're masters of the craft, with lifespans of hundreds of years to perfect their art and obviously, built-in fire for smoking. A side of their bacon is worth a king's ransom."
"We will be very, very scared." said Helmut firmly. He was already somewhat scared and trying hard to not show it.
*Good.*
"All right, no live steel. Sling your bow, Methred. Ka'alden, you just keep your hands in your pockets. We are NOT GOING TO ENGAGE. We're going to happen upon this dragon by way of a slow and steady chance encounter (the air quotes were visible) and then be terrified and flee when she does her threat display. Remember to sell it!"
They wandered along, chatting and "oblivious", getting slowly closer and closer to the young dragon so that she could notice them coming and scare them off.
When Beedee noticed them, she reared up on her hind feet. It took her two tries to get up all the way, but she managed. Her first screech was a bit strangled, but the second one swelled in power and confidence. Clearly getting the hang of things, she snaked her head around threateningly and bared her needle-sharp teeth. Her balance stabilized, so she risked clawing her front feet at the air to go along with the final screech. The whole thing was pretty convincing and only a little unsteady around the edges.
Helmut got the play by play via mindspeech.
*That's my big girl! You are very fierce! Good job, baby, you're doing it!*
"Gods Above, it's a DRAGON! Run for your lives! Run, Run!"
"Get out of my way!"
"HELP! AAAAARGH!"
The adventurers scrambled and yelled and flailed and fled, all very convincingly, finally grinding to a halt under the cover of a fairly distant copse of trees. They were out of breath and red-faced.
*Well done. I'll drop your bacons and ham at the Crossroads Inn, I know the innkeeper there. Road's to your left, about half an hour of walking, and then make a right turn, you'll reach it by mid-afternoon. Thanks for playing!*
Jake looked at the book, the Eddark book. It was slightly singed and smelt vaguely of smoke and all of a sudden, Jake had a thought that maybe his Biologic Compendium Of Useful Information wasn't so much foxed as... dragoned.
"Dragon?" asked Jake. He didn't know if the dragon would answer, but he had had a thought, y'see, and he wanted to know. Methred had, in Jake's hearing, once described an arctic blizzard as being somewhat chilly and had frequently referred to Emtal the Furious as slightly tetchy at times, though not in Emtal's hearing of course. But Methred had said they were damned smart.
*Yes?* At once, Jake realized why Helmut had looked so shaken. That was a voice with weight and authority.
"What's your name?"
*The short form of my name is Blood Red Darkens the Skies.* There was a brief but clear pause, and then the dragon continued, kindly but quickly. *Young Jake, normally I'd let this conversation play out more naturally but there's another group coming in from the north-east and they didn't buy a copy of the book. Here are your answers: First, Beedee calls me Eddark. Second, I only hunt the dumb ones. Third, your gift meats are from cloven-hooved pigs with curly tails and not from... the other kind.*
no subject
Date: 2024-07-04 03:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-07-04 04:00 pm (UTC)