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Dragons: The Great Victims of Worldbuilding (sheepandsorcery.blogspot.com)

submitted 4 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 4 months ago (2 children)

This article is dumb. It claims that diversity among dragonkind is reductionist? No, what's reductionist is claiming all dragons should be Smaug.

What are the essential parts of a dragon? There are literally none. The terrasque of myth had a lion's head, turtle's shell, scorpion's tail and no wings, but it was still called a dragon. Eastern dragons are commonly wise sages and protectors. Artwork of Saint George has the dragon barely bigger than his horse.

Saying "all dragons have to be this specific thing" is terrible worldbuilding advice.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago

It claims that diversity among dragonkind is reductionist?

Yeah, I got a couple paragraphs in and couldn't take any more. It was incoherent noise from someone whose personal dragon fantasy comes from being scared of them as a toddler.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

If I make a story about how a stegosaurus did amazing feats to the point they became blessed gaining feathered wings and flight, becoming the first dragon, then that's still a dragon.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago (3 children)

"Nooooo you can't have nuanced or benevolent dragons, they can only be evil and kidnap princesses and hoard gold! That's how it's been for centuries, it's totally not an overdone trope! Fantasy worlds aren't supposed to have depth!"

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Technically, it's not an overdone trope. Because it's hardly done at all.

In most folktales with a dragon as a villain, they either hoard wealth or hold a woman captive before eating her, rarely both. And they don't even need to kidnap her, because she's offered to the dragon as a tribute to avoid its wrath. And this isn't even mentioning worldwide variations on dragon mythology.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

Username checks out.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

That or some vore shit...

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

I do not agree with a lot of the person's ideas here, but it was a fun read. And I will give them that

Big
Snake-like
Flight
Breathes fire

is primarily how I'll visually recognize a dragon. You can differ from this template, but I'll probably always recognize it as a variant drawing from this.

And I do also personally dislike dragons shapeshifting, especially into humans, and sorting dragon personality by color, though I could not say why. It's always interesting to see someone I disagree with have a few opinions that resonate with me.

Overall, I think this person is very much a fantasy trope traditionalist: stick with the established dragon stereotype and don't move too far from its spirit; while a lot of people nowadays (including myself) like playing with it much more.