The dragons of the Red World come in five kinds. They all have the following features: Take your average dragon body and attach the wings at the sides. Wings are rectangular, not triangles, with the long sides connecting to the body. From the posterior end of the body comes two legs, thick like an elephant's that end with three claws, sort of like a chicken's. Between the two legs hangs back a long tail that gradually tapers to a point. From the other end of the body is a long neck that ends with a head. I will post a picture someday, perhaps.

The five kinds vary in both physical characteristics and in craft (see my post in the Magic forum) abilities. The five kinds follow the traditional Greek elements plus a unique addition.

Fire Dragons: These are the most common in the contemporary Red World (contemporary to my completed novel). These are considered the "normal" size, somewhere around the size of a horse for the body I suppose. As with most other dragon types, they specialize in the craft of their name. These tend to have red scales.

Water Dragons: These are almost never seen in the contemporary Red World. Long ago they followed their leader in rebellion to live out on islands in the sea. These dragons have limited swimming abilities, but that exceeds the normal. They specialize in the water craft and are usually very skilled in it. Deep blue is their typical color.

Air Dragons: These dragons were nearly annihilated early in Red World history. Only a few survived after the leader of the water dragons ordered them to be destroyed. These tend to be white in color, and know the air crafts best.

Earth Dragons: The earth dragons split into two separate species. Both are brown in color and know the earth craft best. One kind lived in caves in the mountains and gradually became very small, so as to live in caves better. The others, of yet undetermined habitat, became very large (maybe an average thirty feet long not counting the tail). Both are devastatingly effective in their craft and rarely if ever allow those that meet them to survive, preferring seclusion.

Star Dragons: There is only one of these left. Some knowledge of the star craft is required to utilize any of the others. This particular dragon is very large, rivaling large earth dragons in size, and is perhaps the most powerful being in the Red World excepting Aerykun. He prefers seclusion and rarely ventures from his mountain home, only in the times of deepest need.

Nicely thought out I like these dragons, well I like all dragons hehe but yea i like them Well done.

Nicely thought out, Reiyen. I really like the star dragon--he sounds interesting. Is it possible for another star dragon to maybe be born from another kind of dragon? Or is he the last one?

eruheran

Poor, poor, lonely star dragon. I hope he meets friends They all sound like they could be very interesting. Since you're basically playing with elements here... do water dragons have an advantage of fire and stuff like that?

There are definite advantages of some elements over others, but it is not like a rock-paper-scissors game. Naturally, constructing a shield of ice will be more effective against a wave of fire than it would against a stone being hurled against you. Star craft is essentially the fuel for all other crafts, so in a way it is the most important.

And yes, that lone star dragon is a loner. He pops in and out of the story often enough though that you know he is in contact with the big and important people.

It sounds interesting. I'd like to see a few of these dragons battle it out

Do any of them fight each other? Is there any rivalry? Do they communicate with people? If so, how?

The dragons go to war with each other only rarely. However, there are a few instances. In fact, it isn't that uncommon for two sides of a war among men to have dragons as mounts or dragon mercenaries. Even the evil armies will contain dragons. In my completed book one of the three great battles contains some epic dragon fighting.
Individual dragons will fight fairly often. By the time of my book many dragons have become so unintelligent they can no longer speak, much less work magic, and so they are essentially nothing more than wild beasts, to be feared somewhat more than lions.

So they tend to fight more by "tooth and claw" in your book, right?

Very much tooth and claw. One favorite tactic, and fairly basic, is to clench another dragon's flank with the jaw. This pulls the scales closer together, leaving exposed flesh. Then the the attacking dragon just breaths out some good ole fire into the exposed area and burns the flesh.

Ouch. That is an interesting and painful tactic.

Do only the fire dragons breath fire? They sound very interesting. Do any species tend or to good or evil? Are they mortal, even the star dragon? Has there always been only one star dragon?

The dragons and the vaeances both breath fire, though the vaeances in smaller qualities and less often.

Water dragons are all evil; I know not of a single exception. Fire dragons are like horses in that they are evil depending only on the side, and as the most common they are the ones most frequently found in armies. Air dragons pretty much do not exist, they haven't done anything important in recorded history for many ages. Anyhow their morality is only personal choice, no tendencies. Earth dragons are reclusive, so they are bad in that they don't do anything good for a long time as a nation, but I'd say they tend toward good. The Star Dragon is in some ways proud and aloof, but is definitely on the good side.

All are mortal. Some, those of the first few generations, have no biological limitations on life-span, that is, they don't age, but even they can be cut down by weapons or magic. The later generation dragons do age and eventually die.

The Star Dragon does tend to seem immortal though. This is because, as the first generation dragon, he does not age, and he is so powerful anything killing him would be amazing. He has existed as long as the world, so he is in that sense immortal as well. If my current views of history are right though, he will die eventually.

Has there always been one Star Dragon? Well, he is the only dragon of the first generation. He had no offspring; the second generation was created and he is called "first generation" mostly as a title. Thus, the first generation dragon was pure star, mastering all of them. The second generations were all star but generally leaned toward one of the other elements and not-so-much towards others. Examples are Blurin the Water dragon and Kion's unnamed father the fire dragon. Blurin is the only second-generation dragon remaining to history and he was corrupted so that he no longer knew Star crafts, and thus was not star anymore. So, in a way, there were at one time other star dragons.

It seems strange that a water dragon should breath fire. So were the second generation star dragons the fathers of the other dragon races, or just a part of two races?

Admittedly that is strange. I suppose they don't do it half as often though, seeing as it isn't so useful out in their environment. Maybe they don't at all; I'll work on that idea.

The second generation star dragons are the forefathers of all other dragons of all the kinds/races. They themselves were not so much divisible into fire dragons, water dragons, etc, but showed tendencies. These tendencies passed on such that even by the third generation Kion was identifiable as a fire dragon and not anything else. I am not yet sure about the number of second generation dragons, though it must have been high, and I am still working on the method of reproduction for dragons. Dragon offspring should be fairly rare, but I need a big population early in history.