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[VerdantSF]

So I finally got around to breeding my pair of dragons.  I used [Child:1].  However, now that I think of it, for a creature with such a long lifespan, perhaps a higher number is more appropriate.  How long do think a dragon should remain a hatchling?  Maybe a decade or two?

[ORCACommander]

I'll consult my pathfinder bestiaries in the morning but i remember somewhere someone said in the df it takes dragon's a millennium to mature to full size in worldgen.

[VerdantSF]

Ah, Pathfinder! Great suggestion!  I just looked up the dragon entry:

1 Wyrmling, 0–5
2 Very young, 6–15
3 Young, 16–25
4 Juvenile, 26–50
5 Young adult, 51–100
6 Adult, 101–200
7 Mature adult, 201–400
8 Old, 401–600
9 Very old, 601–800
10 Ancient, 801–1,000

Since the child tag determines when a creature can breed, I'll set it at [Child:51].

[Thuellai]

Should probably set up scaling bodysizes too if you want to simulate D&D-style dragons.  Perhaps even extend their body-size - very old and ancient dragons are positively MASSIVE, and it would mean dragons that make it past their adulthood would become real terrors - imagine a dragon who actually lived through a 1000 year world-gen.

[Repseki]

I bet that would be one heck of a Dragon. At least until your Speardwarf, with trusty leather buckler, walks up to it and stabs it in the lung...

[Snaake]

I just recently did my first RAW tweaking (stuff from the Mods you make every game including giving Dragons and GCS CHILD tags. I put both at 50, which apparently was quite accurate for dragons, since I was trying to base it loosely around D&D 3.x edition dragon age categories as well. Putting it somewhere in the middle of Juvenile would also be justified, since I've always understood that as the "teenage" age category - transitioning from child to adult, and sexual maturity can come during that process, not necessarily at the end of it. Of course, I mainly wanted dragons to breed during worldgen (not sure if they actually do, but eh), and for captured, older dragons to be able to breed. It's unlikely I'd play for long enough to have fortress-raised hatchlings actually mature to adults. If you want to raise your own breeding population, then something like [CHILD:10] is more reasonable, if somewhat cheaty(?). At 10 years, a dragon is already about 250 000 cm³, which is larger than a grizzly bear, or the same as a troll.

Should probably set up scaling bodysizes too if you want to simulate D&D-style dragons.  Perhaps even extend their body-size - very old and ancient dragons are positively MASSIVE, and it would mean dragons that make it past their adulthood would become real terrors - imagine a dragon who actually lived through a 1000 year world-gen.

When fully grown at 1000 years old, a dragon is huge, 25 million cm³, or in other words, the biggest land-dwelling creature in the game. How much larger do you think they should be? AFAIK the ease of killing them is due to other factors; such as not being made out of bronze and so on... give them adamantine scales or something if you want them to be tougher (would also nicely fulfill the "weak point" trope à la The Hobbit and various other sources)

Edit: GCS are adolescents at 1 year old and fully grown at 2, so should probably lower their child value accordingly. whoops.

[Thuellai]

At 10 years, a dragon is already about 250 000 cm³, which is larger than a grizzly bear, or the same as a troll.

So growth IS continuous, with bodysize growth points used to set the curve.

Useful to know.

[Snaake]

At 10 years, a dragon is already about 250 000 cm³, which is larger than a grizzly bear, or the same as a troll.

So growth IS continuous, with bodysize growth points used to set the curve.

Useful to know.

That's what I've read, every time it comes up, and the wiki agrees. Linear between the set points.

[krenshala]

Ah, Pathfinder! Great suggestion!  I just looked up the dragon entry:

1 Wyrmling, 0–5
2 Very young, 6–15
3 Young, 16–25
4 Juvenile, 26–50
5 Young adult, 51–100
6 Adult, 101–200
7 Mature adult, 201–400
8 Old, 401–600
9 Very old, 601–800
10 Ancient, 801–1,000

Since the child tag determines when a creature can breed, I'll set it at [Child:51].

You should make it the following:

Hatchling 0
Wyrmling 1-5
Very Young 6-25
Young 26-50
Juvenile 51-100
Young Adult 101-200
Adult 201-400
Mature 401-600
Old 601-800
Very Old 801-1000
Ancient 1001+

It just wouldn't be right without the hatchling stage.

[kesperan]

You do realise this means you have to keep your long-running fort alive for ANOTHER 50 years before that dragonling will be mature?

[ORCACommander]

Dragons and megabeasts do breed in worldgen on 2 conditions. 1 if they have a living mate. 2 if the the megabeast count drops below the setting defined in worldgen.

damn it verdant you did that work for me so now i will consult a different book about dragons: A Practical Guide to Dragons

Wyrmling 0-5
Very Young 6-15
16-50 Juvenile
51-100 Young Adult
101-200 Adult
201-400 Mature Adult
401-600 Old
601-800 Very Old
801-1,000 Ancient
1,001-1,200 Wyrm
1,2001+ Great Wyrm

A slightly different scale.


A thing to note: Adulthood not coinciding with sexual maturity is a recent development human history. Since this is a high fantasy setting with much the same moral and societal structure pre 1,000 c.e. adulthood is reached when you are capable of breeding. And then these numbers would would reflect the average range for the given species of dragon. unfortunately toady has not coded in Poisson distributions for creature genetic traits... yet

[VerdantSF]

You do realise this means you have to keep your long-running fort alive for ANOTHER 50 years before that dragonling will be mature?

I'm in it for the long haul .

[SRD]

A slightly different scale.

A SLIGHTLY DIFFERENT SCALE, SCALE! HAH! GET IT? SCALE? HAHAHAHASYUDGASHDSDFBJ.

[VerdantSF]

A slightly different scale.

A SLIGHTLY DIFFERENT SCALE, SCALE! HAH! GET IT? SCALE? HAHAHAHASYUDGASHDSDFBJ.

I admit, I chuckled.