Dragon Hoards
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 3 ต.ค. 2024
- A podcasty episode all about Dragon Hoards, aimed at providing inspiration and creative leads for your worldbuilding and gameplay.
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aj pickett, the mighty gluestick, dungeons and dragons, roleplaying, tabletop, 5E, 5th edition, faerun, toril, forgotten realms, Eberron, pen and paper, Dungeons and dragons lore, monsters, magic, magic items, monster ecology, greyhawk, mystara, krynn, golarion, spelljammer, planescape, dragons, draconic ecology, treasure, fantasy economy, wealth, character development, dragon hoards, magic item economy, social progress, strongholds, keeps, lairs, dragon species, dragon tactics, dragonborn
I like the idea of lung dragons having sand mandalas and zen gardens of crushed gems and mineral salts.
This is going in my game
Same.
Zasek, have you considered a career in Youtubing?
@@AJPickett I don't have the dedication and focus for it. I might have some good ideas but my mind keeps going in 6 different directions at once. I think I'd end up disappointing an audience.
@@Zasek2112 What about joining with another person or a group of people for a single channel. Like how Overly Sarcastic Productions does it? I personally think you could do a good job, even if you just make it a hobby and not a career. As long as it makes you happy.
Kobold: how about we invent a system of letters of credit, so humans stop using gold as a currency.
Dragon: ... You're promoted.
lol, a totally lawful dragon. The group keeps getting attacked by lawyers, accountants and city guard "just following orders" until no one in the area will do business with them.
@@Zasek2112 use enchantment to have them go insane problem solved
@@charlottewalnut3118 I don't really see a problem. To me that would count as humor.
Kobold: "We shall call it 'The Federal Reserve!'"
an ancient dragon and a lich who have slowly built a friendship over a few centuries. now they have a traditional full moon capture the flag game between their minions for honor, loot, and occasionally just for fun.
Fun
@@lorekeeper685 no I get how ridiculous that sounds! But in the Lich video Aj highlights how disassociated and nihilistic older Liches can become. Imagine the relation between his lair and a nearby dragons territory. It starts as hatred. Must destroy etc. But after a few skirmishes there is a begrudging respect for the tactical mind of ol skelly boy and the raw might of mr dragon. After a few decades the tradition is essential set in stone. And any instance of disruption will merit the full power of both individuals and their armies. (I really liked this video)
@@AmigoRoberto like how centuries of war made France and England buddies
I am a complex nerd, but i see Aj covering something draconic and i click.
"That should be the normal order of things!"
It *was!* Back in the day, it was fully expected that adventurers would start establishing their own keeps around level nine.
yes
Yes!
Dragon: "Come, mortal! Look upon my hoard! Look and marvel at the cumulative wealth that is my life eternal! Gaze upon the treasure that will farry me to the next world!"
Adventure: "Oh My God! Is that a real 1443DR, 5 compartment, Lantanese Rubber Lined, Mordenkainen's "The Balanced Meal" Lunchbox?? But how? Only 8 of those were ever made because of the recall on the toxic rubber....."
Dragon: "Pretty sweet, right?"
Well this has to do with a character concept backstory, But I had this idea for Kobold cleric whos clan worshiped and kind of good aligned Buddhist like Blue Dragon inspired by the Japanese Shinto Priestess Inari. Her hoard was pack Flail Snails that she would task her Kobolds take care of. Farming and taking care of the snails made the Kobolds peaceful and my Kobold cleric walk around like a Buddhist Monk carrying a little snail in a cage as he traveled.
This is amazing
“There’s blood on the hands of any ruling family, I assure you” 18:53
AJ has the noble background, confirmed
Yep, golden blanket. There goes a D&D reason to fight over a blanket. I can imagine a dragonborn throwing a tantrum like a petulant child that lost their favorite "blanky".
That is a dangerous tantrum
I mean if someone stole that much gold for me I’d be in a pretty good murderous rage to
"It didn't break your imagination, right?"
*Sweating profusely in euclidian geometry*
And now I'm imagining an ancient dragon with a collection of human-sized statues s/he paints for fun. Yes, a dragon "miniature" collector. :D Who knows, maybe some (or all) of them are actual people turned to stone.
Not just fun. Souls are incredidly valuable. Turning them into objects and posessions and adding them to the value of the horde as art pieces.
@@Zasek2112 Indeed, and not only that: they become precious historical artifacts! Imagine a society of dragons that keep exchanging these rare 'miniatures' from different cultures and eras, which is not so far-fetched, considering the dragons' passion for history, collecting memorabilia, skill with magic, superiority complex and the Chromatics' cruelty. These very statues become living repositories of ancient cultures, in many ways keeping them alive. Also, quite an excellent way to avoid your target's raising/resurrection/passing into the afterlife for an extended torturous existence, should you care for it enough (a little Mending/Make Whole here and there)...
Imagine some particularly cruel and wasteful/spoiled Chromatics who even fancy pitting parts of their collections against others', essentially going from a figurine collectors to straight-up Pokémon trainers of sorts, lol.
'I bet you one Spartan figurine that two of my 15th century samurais can beat three of your Imperial Roman Legionaries!'.
@@Harrowed2TheMind Hags might play that game as well ;p
@@Harrowed2TheMind There's a hell of alot of plot hooks in this idea for dm's. The whole mission might be to save an npc instead of killing the dragon, but then the npc turns around and INSISTS the group help them kill the dragon. It should be a huge pain to revive someone tho. Like, you need a wish or a favor from a good dragon or something. Depends how figurine magic actually works in your game.
I remeber my DM really catching us with our pants down.
We raided a dragons horde. And blew the gold, sold of everything we could. Etc etc. Typical lowbrow mentality playing.
After some time from town to town. People stopped trading and bartering with us. We could figure out way.
After a few towns we found out that after a few days after we leave town, village, etc etc. Small farmhouse in the middle of nowhere. Would be utterly destroyed.
We also noticed that the gold coins always seemed to come back to us.
Long story of death and destruction later. We found out that this ingenious dragon cursed his coins. And as a dragon. Always knows where its hoarde is. It cursed it in a way that it always found it's way back to the one/ones that stole it.
As a player I was blown away by this.
In short. Like a thief in the night, stole all the gold from my party, and returned it to the dragon. Plus interest. For its pain and suffering. It let me live. My party on the other hand. Well...... for not being upfront and honest......
I was digging graves for a bit.
The thought of Dragons creating all the maps makes way to much sense. Every major feature named after Dragons, vague descriptions and convenient blank spots all throughout the map.
It is easier to make a map when you can fly over head to really see what everything looks like.
@@joshdavis4438 And miss the unimportant non treasury details of the landscape.
I mean, it's easy for dangerous, inaccessible spots that clearly are just wild lands to be omited from the strangely highly detailed map with draconic names and marked small lairs of lesser monsters that can tempt aventureers to try their luck there instead of exploring the unknown.
A dragon playing their version of a table top wargame amuses me greatly. I can easily see a red dragon with a huge rule book and immensely pleased with his kobold army with Lizardfolk auxiliary troops. Wanting to face off against his lich friend's skeleton army and bone constructs.
That was kinda the main story line in the old comic in Dragon magazine "Wormy", the dragon had a huge sand table with a castle he ordered and was being built by trolls , so he could play a massive wargame with some efreet/devil buddies, using regenerating races as pawns. Ah the good ole days of D&D :)
Wormy was awesome.
@@Danpanzer88 sounds fun
Once had the party wind up inside a dragon's hoard. It was a giant, neatly organized warehouse with shelves up to the 120 ft ceiling with pallets of treasure, and kobolds with steam powered forklifts constantly rearranging it to the dragon's whims. Kobolds arguing over which aisle a chest that looks suspiciously like the Ark of the Covenant goes on. Twas a fun one.
Warehouse 13 dragon hoard edition.
One way to emphasize both the wealth and size of a dragon is for them to use large items as jewelry or accessories. A pair of golden sarcophagi for earrings, a magic lance for a toothpick, a fine silk carpet for a napkin, a row boat as a gravy boat. Drives home both massive size and ridiculous wealth.
Excellent
How do you use earrings when you have no ears
Horn rings wing edging and banding thier scales in gold
@@charlottewalnut3118 Most dragons have ears.
Having undead air fresheners guarding a hoard is the best idea I've ever heard🤣 I can imagine you subtly warning your players by telling them the room smells amazingly good for a cave full of treasure
Giant Lizard sees shiny thing.
Giant lizard takes that shiny thing.
Tiny apes get angry.
An ancient dragon would have the resources of a nation likely with enough servants to wage a legitimate war
Yep
blue dragons are most fitting to use their pile of metal as defense, fist sign there is a dragon in there is that the floor covered with coins suddenly electrocute everyone. then they got to move around on the electricity transmitting floor in attempt to get to it before the next breath attack and it confuse and teases them, it will strike but only once it thinks they are weak enough or once someone is isolated from the others.
Wyrm Sign!
The dragon below listens in with satisfaction.
As wyrmlings dragons often stack coins into arrangements like sand castles or houses of cards. Even those who grow out of this tendency tend to resume stacking coins as a well aimed tail swipe can turn such stacks into improvised grapeshot against intruders.
Sharpen the edges + wing buffet = Room full of flying razors life hack.
@@rachdarastrix5251 no we don’t gold is worth much more than paper
I vaguely remember that dragon hoard has some impact on dragon's afterlife. The bigger the hoard the better the afterlife. But I'm not sure if it is in lore, or if I made it up.
It does in a sense. Ghost dragons oft haunt their horde. They'll eat a part of their horde and pass on, to a the eyrie, or not have enough and kind cursed or bless by the God Task.
I think this was in Runesmiths video.
Yes he did cover that. Much of the information can be found in the 3.5 book called "Draconomicon" Mrrhexx also covers it in a lot of detail on his video when dragons die.
It's 5:06 AM and I just got home from work but damn you, now I have to watch this whole video.
On the topic of magic items, my party found an artefact that blocks the view of the gods. It’s a tapestry depicting their many many failures and embarrassments and offends them to look upon it (based of the Arachnid legend from Greek myth). It also has some spider magic, is made of silk, and gods can only influence the region it’s in if they manifest an avatar there. The party used it to hide another artefact they have, a tome from an ancient necromantic empire that has cleric healing spells converted in to arcane spells that wizards can learn and craft scrolls for. The gods demanded that they hand over the book and the party did, but they hid a number of healing spells as scrolls out wizards could learn, as well as the knowledge of how to perform the magic contained within the old book. The gods were not happy
in 2e wizards could cast cleric spells, two levels and vice versa.
since clerics were limited to 7'th level meant, with enough time you could cast any cleric spell. except quest spells.
23:00 This is exactly how Ivaldi went from a character I played to a recurring NPC that own several very successful businesses.
He won D&D, now he gets to be an NPC with broken stats and Nostalgia Armor so thick that fan art of Lolth gets jealous.
When I think of Dragon Hordes I try and think of unique variants, most tied to Dragon Psychoses. A Gold Dragon who has a penchant for lore about different planes, and the royalty therein might have more than just a gold mound to laze about in but also a VAST library with floating shelves filled with scrolls and tomes of mind-melting information. Perhaps a Fang Dragon has a massive hallway carved into it's lair with row after row of taxidermized figures of the many mighty beasts and enemies it's slayed over the centuries, quite the trophy room to show off to any daring to enter. Better yet a Green Dragon might have an exit from it's lair leading out into a well protected and very secretive grove where it cultivates especially deadly plants and fungi for use as guards and sentries. Any one of these would also be worth a thief risking their lives to steal from as precious lore, rare raw materials components and one of a kind plant species would fetch a much higher price than the fistful of gold they might usually come away with.
Imagine a stupid noble persuading a group of adventurers to hunt down an old dragon that secretly is keeping a bunch of horrors from invading the land
I was halfway through this video when I had to pause it to start planning my next campaign, featuring the antics that follow tracking a dragon down and killing them.
I'm sure the end of the video is lovely, I'll swing back around and catch it some other day.
This is the correct way to watch this video.
When a wizard threatens you by saying they'll open a book and spit facts at you, you should take heed lmao
Decapitating a wizard is usually an effective way to avoid this peril.
@@shishoka Why would you decapitate AJ?
@@shishoka oh I see auto correct changed heed to head.....
@@shishoka that's untill they come back later lol
That awkward moment when the players burst into the dragon's lair. Only to find that she is otherwise engaged with her much bigger boyfriend.
Had a terrifying idea for a magic item for Monks or martial characters that focus on unarmed combat, just now. Bigby's Boxing Gloves: For ten minutes a day, the wielder summons a pair of large phantasmal hands that can punch, block. or grapple at the wielders command.
Personally I assumed that dragons had hoards for the same reason as magpies and bower birds had shiny stuff.
An evil party kills a gold dragon only to find themselves hunted by a red dragon that lived nearby, it was always jealous of the gold dragon’s hoard and in its own weird way it liked and respected its metallic neighbour. It’s very upset that these upstarts got the hoard before it did and hates them for killing a dragon stronger than itself (though they’ll never admit that)
entirely plausible,
AJ: "You can be a DM without any players at all."
I was not expecting to be attacked this early in the morning.
*NO ONE* Expects The Spanish Inquisition!
Story idea: Famous goldsmith screwed up with some nobles, and is now trading their talents to a dragon in exchange for refuge. The dragon get statuary and other things more easily traced than a few specific coins, the goldsmith gets not only to continue practicing their art, as well as that whole "living" thing. Inciting incident for the plot maybe being that someone wants it to end, or perhaps to get in from the beginning and negotiate the arrangement.
I had a wonderful thought listening to this. What about a dragon librarian? Dragons know every piece of treasure down to the clipped coin, so a library dragon would have read and memorized every piece of information in every book or scroll it has ever read. A great source of information for the players, for a suitable price.
A second thought: a dragon of an advanced age would have collected thousands of artifacts of historic value. Why not open a museum? A dragon curator would put the British Museum to shame without a doubt.
I was legit thinking about this while falling asleep last night. GET OUT OF MY HEAD, AJ!
Kobold Press's Tome of Beasts has Air Dragons that migrate on the wing for months on end like albatrosses. They have a super small horde of super valuable treasures that they keep clasped in their claws. I always found that interesting.
I dare you to goose one.
Now I'm imaging a fat, nerdy dragon who's obsessed with showing his collection of "miniatures" to any adventurers unlucky enough to visit.
(Edit: spelling)
That sounds like a bronze dragon as they have the higher amount of dragons with collections that matter to themselves.
A Dragon Hoard could be enchanted to become a Gold Elemental (reskinned Earth Elemental), or a Dragon Mage could cast Animate Objects to turn it's treasure hoard into a weapon.
I once had an ancient red dragon that melted their massive piles of gold coins into the very caldera of the volcano, eventually it got to the point where about half of the magma was liquid gold.
Not only is it extremely stylish, it's also a great anti-theft measure (If being an ancient red dragon wasn't enough)
They also owned several iron golems; they had a deal with a nearby dwarvish clan that in exchange for lending it's dragonfire to their finest artisans once a century, they would get some magical items - the golems just happened to be favorites, but there were plenty of other magical items
Iron golems are hard enough to fight, but when they're healing off of an ancient red dragon's breath, well, it's not exactly a fair fight
* notes to self *
i recall that complete scoundrel had some nasty ideas for an 'unspendable' dragons hoard. fused into a giant lump so you cant move it, coins with evil symbols on them so no-one will accept them, ect. that book had the idea that the hoard was the adventure because of all the problems it caused for the players.
I've always wondered the effects dragons have on the economies of various kingdoms near them. Hoarding most of the currency, i suspect, would make a lot of guilds and rulers jealous/angry. Plus if you do manage to kill the dragon and claim it's horde, suddenly flooding the market in a spending spree isn't necessarily a good idea either. That's just the gold/jewels. Don't get me started on all the artifacts, art, and magical items they would have.
Dragonlord Silumgar from the Magic the Gathering setting Tarkir, is an excellent example of a decadent & gluttonous dragon that lounges on it's hoard attended by it's literally gilded undead minions and supported by his clan of assassins & sorcerers (who's previous leader's mummified corpse he now wears as a pendant around his fat neck).
I have returned to continue to request for a Bard and a monk class video please do it if you can.
The scene of the various party members finding their personal delights in a hoard was terrific
In my campaign world I have an ancient gold dragon that considers the library at one of the most prestigious royal universities to be his hoard. He acts as the chief librarian while polymorphed into a fastidious old man. He allows patrons to use the books, but only the most trusted and respected are allowed to borrow a book. Any late fees can be...extreme.
POV: You snuck into the dragon's hoard and got set on fire.
Character idea: Kobolds who go out and join adventuring parties specifically to learn what magic items are available for their Dragon Lord, and eventually lure the party to their home so that the dragon can kill the adventures and as their gear to their hord.
Legend has it that if you capture a dragon he'll tell you where his pot of gold is...
Oh wait wrong creature.
Yes I agree DMing is basically it's own hobby because you get to craft your own lore and read on lore and do lots of other things so it basically is a sub hobby to D&D
I'm not a great storyteller. I love theory building but I don't have the charisma score for DMing.
I can only base my judgement of you on your writing here Zasek, but I'd rate you pretty high in the wisdom department,
@@AJPickett I sometimes like to think so, but we all fail our rolls sometimes.
edit: After a second to think, yes, it probably is my best score.
edit 2: 😍 I'll take the compliment tho.
Co-DMing and DM assistant/consultant should definately be a thing imo.
A red dragon in my game actually has a bunch of kobolds dressed in revolutionary war colonial uniforms having mock battles for entertainment.
Great worldbuilding for how to handle progression through a campaign, especially the "what adventures do with the treasure?" portion which can fit with all type of situations
One 'treasure' that's almost universally overlooked is bone. If your world doesn't have cheaply available metal or plastic, bone is an immensely superior material to wood. Right up to the 18th-century bone tools were widely used and the whaling industry wasn't just about oil. If any predator had accumulated hundreds of large bones that would be a treasure in itself. Particularly if it included things like elephant tusks or rhino horns.
scrimshaw is an art that used to carve images on bones maybe the dragon did that to pass the time
fun
@@rachdarastrix5251
There's a curse in dnd that forces you to eat bones?
@@comradenixon4453 bestow curse can do that
@@rachdarastrix5251 Today plastics and cheap metal have replaced bones as building materials. In a game setting, it should depend on how big they are. A whale skull weighing a tonne would be worth far more than a tonne of chicken bones; far more options of what to carve out of it.
AJ, you are amazing. Thank you for sharing your ideas with the world! Always a great watch.
Even if the party managed to somehow get the hoard quickly enough, the draconic activity in the area would explode, from dragons looking for the hoard to increase theirs, to fighting for the territory, scarring and changing the landscape in their scuffles. The potential hyperinflation in the economy with the sudden influx of precious metals, assassination attempts, political moves, potential fall of entire branches of the economy, etc.
Now that I think about it, except for a few cases, killing a dragon isn't worth the effort for anyone.
Now you can imagine a faction that works against would-be dragon slayers? You're all geared up and ready to assault a dragon lair, and suddenly this group of eldritch knights show up, ready to either talk you out of it, or put you down...
@@AJPickett Or just locals that that think that the dragon do a good job of a keeping the area free of bandits.
@@AJPickett We have Followers of Tiamat as enemies in the campaign we're playing currently. Worst part is that they're mostly financed by the hoards of the dragons (an adult green dragon that played politics, pitting elves, humans and orcs against each other and a legendary red great wyrm) our group killed without looting them (I wasn't there, this would never happen under my watch! *Facepalm*). Our group wasn't too smart about it either: they didn't even get rid of the bodies or took out all precious ingredients out of the fallen foes (Man, I regret not being there... at least, the Great Red's Fundamentum is now powering an overpowered forge!), so we barely stopped the cult from raising a hybrid of both corpses they stitched together to create some sort of 'Servitor of Tiamat' abomination by essentially slaughtering all of them before they could finish the ritual. Among those Followers were the green dragon's super beefy elven lover and their half-dragon progeny that we'll have to deal with eventually.
Worst part is, with the adventurers' 'Shoot First, Ask Questions Later' attitude, we're not even sure what their long-term goal was, lol. They could be aiming at helping with the whole planar instability issue we're facing, for all we know...
Currently running a game where the party found a dragon hoard in a sunken ruin, in the middle of a very large lake. The hoard was only accessible by a magic portal that opened to the plain of water. It was kind of like an extra dimensional space that had a whirlpool pouring into it making it very difficult to get out once in unless you figured out the magic to...shut off the faucet as it were. They did and discovered a sea bed of coin and treasure plus a single dragon egg that was directly under the waterfall. They took the egg some coin and quickly picked out a single weapon they could see. Since shutting the water off alerted the Sea Dragon that was nearby. They fled to the surface just getting to the ship before the dragon could get to them. Then engaged in a fight as she would blast the ship and crew into the water to finish them off. However, they did manage to nearly kill her with the aid of ship canons before she fled. The next day they left the coastal town with the dragon egg, coin, and magic sword. Hiding the egg in a barrel filled with water. Days later they were met by some refuges of the town they left to find out it was destroyed by 2 Sea Dragons. Also, according to the reports one is clearly bigger than the other. They have done some research in the towns they have been to since looking up anything they can on hatching a dragon egg. Not much was found but they pooled their coin placed it in the barrel with the egg and water. This caused some color to return but not much. Eventually they found the best way to try and hatch the egg, besides letting the dragon do it, is to have it in freezing cold moving water, sitting on at least 1000 gp of coin, and turned over once a day. It would only hatch under a full moon under these conditions which has taken them a month in game time to figure out. Meanwhile they don't know that shipping has become more dangerous in the region lately due to sea creatures attacking ships. Loving this game so far.
I'm fond of the idea that dragons are compelled to hoard because as they age, their ability to absorb energy from the world around them improves. Eventually, dragons no longer need to hunt. By resting atop their hoard, they receive all the sustenance needed via magic.
This also solves the issue of, in a world of super predators like dragons, they would over hunt the world. There wouldn't be enough food for their entire race.
But I also like the idea that it's good for their scales. That's pretty dope.
Completely agree with all those statements.
It also makes dragons not seem greedy, since dragons ambitions are often as simple as animals, so it makes sense that a dragon would mark wealth as an essential to there survival.
What would a flight of dragons do on the hypothetical golden planet where all the rocks are gold and dirt is the rare resource?
Presumably, they would grow extremely large and healthy because of how it affects the ambient elemental energy.
Fight over rare volcanic or meteoric rocks? I dunno, interesting concept... the mass of that planet would be insane.
@@AJPickett Good point. They wouldn't just stop being greedy. They'd definitely find something other than gold to compete, fight, and bicker about.
So there is this dragon god named "Task"
forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Task
I think this dragon God of greed might have found a good origin story in your comment here
I could see a grop of adventurers kill a dragon, and end up having to fund teh creation of a library with a dozen sages to figure out what all the crap in the hoard is.
LOL! When I saw the title I thought that it was about a HORDE of Dragons! I'm just picturing that, like a wave of very angry death sweeping across the land. This is much safer!
On Toril they call that a "Flight of Dragons".
@@AJPickett And on Krynn they call it "Tuesday“.
I figure the reasons for the horde are multiple, and they all play a part in every dragon's horde.
1) Dragons are curious. They seek out things of interest, usually attractive oddities, because those things tickle the dragon's fancy.
2) Dragons are old. Even a relatively young dragon has lived 50 years or more. Think of how much junk a human acquires over their life and multiply that by a factor of 10 or 20 or 30.
3) Dragons have enemies. Stockpiling magic weapons, spell research, and valuable reagents not only gives the dragon a potential weapon but deprives a rival of that same weapon.
4) Dragons are vain. Much as humans may show off their possessions to impress neighbors, a dragon may gather impressive trinkets to one-up other dragons.
5) Dragons have minions. All but the most antisocial dragon is going to attract lesser races into their social orbit. A very old dragon might be a kingdom just by himself, with human nations signing treaties and making alliances as if the dragon were just another nation. A stockpile of valuables serves as adequate promise to bribe the lesser races of the world.
There's more of course but those are the Big 5 for me.
Speaking of unusual dragonhoards. I just had a hilarious thought. Imagine a powerful dragon settles near a ruin in which there is a planar portal that is guarded by a gynosphinx. The dragon considers the portal part of its hoard, and the sphinx a minion specifically set to guard said piece of the hoard. The dragon also likes the sphinx because it has finally found someone highly intelligent with which to have conversations without risking its hoard. Of course, said dragon would get very angry if someone threatens or harms its sphinx. The sphinx itself is fine with the situation as it also gets someone to talk to who isn't interested in going through the portal.
Excellent
Why do dragons hoard treasure? For the same reason my dog rolls in stinky stuff or cats chase invisible birds. It's what they do.
Damn good video. When I am playing with my more roleplay loving players, I love putting kool, but questionably useful, items in hoards. Things like magic ovens, that can cook without a fuel source, or magic candles that light up when commanded, or sets of sports armor, for some fantasy version of hockey (and if they fail rolls, they have no idea what this stuff is). I don't detract much, or any, of the actual gold they get, but it adds to the bulk of the hoard (which like you said, I feel is important because they have to get it out of there) and every once in awhile it has lead to some hilarious incidents.
I'll be re-watching this video next time I make a hoard. Thankx again AJ.
This was wonderful.
Your videos on dragons have entirely changed the way I think about them and intend to implement them in campaigns; that suggested description of the Black dragon's layer was epic, and is just the newest instance of that.
Dragons describe gems and metals not just by color but by SMELL! Amethyst smells like lavender maybe gold a citrusy odor that maybe even tastes rather sour well! thanks for that bit of inspiration from this video amongst other things! This one is simply chock full of ideas!
The David Eddings Red Gold is a cool idea for what might happen to draconic treasure. It is also a great call back to one of my favorite series of novels.
Ever play geneforge? They have dragons that no longer care for mortal trinkets, they instead hoard the essence of other creatures and use thier hoard as a means to exchange.
In Tolkien's universe, Smaug's underbelly was soft and vulnerable. He laid on his bed of gold so that metal and gems became embedded in his underbelly so he was almost invulnerable - almost. He was literally described as having a "waistcoat of fine diamonds"
I wonder what exotic dragons horde
Like do mercury dragons horde heavy metals?
Collections of exotic poisons.
awesome video topic!
Dragon Hoards...AKA Murderhobo Piggy bank. Ways Of Dealing With Over Rich Players....The Tax Man Cometh (Backed By The Army), The Hoard's Former Owner Returns, and (My Personal Favorite) Are You SURE That's Real Gold. Programmed Illusion and Iron Pyrite have caused many a dragon's foe to languish in squalid conditions for the Horribly Horrendous Crime of issuing fake gold.
I truly love my job...
What comes to mind is the series "Warehouse 13" :)
With the dragon minions scouring the land to find dangerous items to the dragon and then store them 'safely' in a vault. Only to be found by real brave adventures. Or a dark vault with highly cursed items.
If you haven't seen the series, it's a fun binge watch:-)
Yay!
Excellent work, AJ!
Wow, AJ. Inspirations galore
First, the line about wealth, power and outrageous hats. Good one.
This is what I took away from this:
Your inference about Dragons and Dragonborn, the relation to sleep and elemental energies made me think about their lifespan (Where Dragonborn get ripped off....as well as tails and Darkvision. I mean, come on.) My thought was that hoards, especially coinage, leveled out a dragon's elemental energies and allowed for deeper and longer sleep. Dragons are well known for long periods of sleep. Deeper and longer sleep prolonged their lifespans. Therefore, more treasure equals a longer life. Simple self interest. Riffing off this, a Dragonborn might place coins inside their bedroll or pillow to ease their sleep. Not a lot, but just enough to get that effect. Perhaps the richer the coin, the fewer they need - using the scale of 1 gold on down to 100 copper.
Furthermore, the concept of reshaping or repurposing treasure made me think about how such treasure would be personalized both to serve the needs of a particular dragon and also make it harder to just carry off. What if a Red Dragon used it's fiery breath to melt down gold and silver to be poured into molds and sculpted into massive statues of itself. Their hoard would be a gallery. Statuary and mirrors would appease it's vanity, project power, and ease it's sleep (see above). It would make theft difficult as each statue would weigh tons. Imagine the value of a gallery of gold statues and silver mirrors. Being accused or inferred that said dragon actually is paying tribute to a Gold Dragon could be the inciting incident to a massive attack and thus a campaign.
Third, the idea of a Dragon being a benefactor or noble in an area, and entertaining guests with mock battles between "armies" of kobolds is hilarious. Restored siege weapons firing massive stuffed cloth "boulders" and armies of padded weapons performing for their "Lord" to the delight of the crowd...
I've already taken running Dragons (and their related kin) very seriously, making them a huge threat. This just adds to the colour and depth of their lives. Well met, AJ. Well met.
I havent watched in awhile but the dragon hoard brought me back
Welcome Back!
I've started using your videos to create scenarios in the Aurora engine (yes I still play NWN), thanks for being consistent with the great ideas!
Cheers for taking the crazy time to put theses things together.
I've wrote a campaign from level 1-5 using xp in a homebrew world and your videos are great at inspiring ideas!
I hope you enjoy making them as much as I enjoy listening haha
I once had a party in the desert meet a great blue wyrm . It had a dragon sized sand wedge ( golf club) of dragon slayer slaying. The trigger word? " Fore!"
So it was living in the sand trap? Where was the ball?
@@gmradio2436it laired in a sand trap, yes;dragon slayers would certainly be a ball. Never heard a more menacing golf warning
@@naughtseeingeye7767 I hope it had a thick Scottish accent.
@@gmradio2436 I made my voice deep , growly & menacing as possible. Scottish would've been good
@@naughtseeingeye7767This is awesome. The crazy that only exists in RPGs.
gemstones from any 2e elf-supplemental realms sourcebook are a good treat
I’m the loser dm with no players. But I fng love it. (Your vids are huge part of it all for me too. Very helpful and thorough Lore for idea and character inspiration)
Did someone say dragons?
Damn. Finally somebody gets it. I play a lot of D&D, but only once or twice a decade with other people.
/ sounds like what my sex life felt like before I found the right girl.
Which dragon has a copy of the Book of Vile Darkness written in the hand of Vecna and where on Krynn is the lair of Cyan Bloodbane?
Hmm I don't know which dragon does, I do know about the Dragonspawn of Nhagruul, is it one of them? As for Cyan Bloodbane...deep beneath the Tower of Shalost.
I think Daurogoth the black dracolich would. A nice CR 50 by himself.
forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Daurgothoth
@@AJPickett Thank you so much.
I know that a dragon is as familiar with every single piece of their horde, down to the smallest coin, as a human is with their own fingers. But I do have want to know, in the hobbit gandalf mentions how smaug's horde is tainted with "dragon sickness". Is there similar curse or condition in d&d?
Its "tainted" because it causes a similar greed to that of the dragons on those who visit the horde.
In game you could do a will saving throw for dwarves & humans who are very susceptible to greed.
I just had an interesting Idea!
What if the long proximity to the dragon "infused" the treasures of its hoard with elemental energy? What if it now could also work as an conductor or empowers magic?
Or what if it is so infused with magic, that it now creates minor phenomena if in a pile? Or tends to spontaniously discharge magic effects?
I think that could be an interesting story point: the adventurers slay an really ancient Dragon and take its hoard, only to discover later, that the treasure is so infused with magic energy, that it spontaniously discharges magic effects, and/or spells cast within proximity to it have a high(er) chance of going wild, so they try to get rid of it as fast as possible, buying large amounts of stuff at different locations, changeing currency, etc. to spread it as far as possible, to minimize the risk of a sudden arcane explosion or something being their fault.
Basically, the treasure turned into a powder keg that could detonate any time as long as a large amount of it is at one place, until the Magic dissipates.
Ah important lore
Positive comment
Very nice of you.
@@danagroupsrl6613 commenting boosts the video in the TH-cam algorithms. It costs nothing to be polite
Lizardfolk make excellent coin couriers, provided no one offers them food for your coin, then...well...you're shit outa luck.
My party accidentally got a city wiped out while a ancient wyrm chased us.
@4:15 "Size will probably be a factor." It's confirmed then.
I always love listening to your videos at work, it always gets my mind moving. Like what if a dragon, using a series of magical bullshit, had an Ice block suspended midair that would suck in any stray magic like spells or the random discharge of his hoard. And then used the melted water to create a wine or grow fruits that were much more intoxicating to dragons than normal. What if that effects extends to other draconic species, like dragon born or wild wyverns
Damnit now I have to write a campaign about a dragon trying to get power from their treasure and attract better mates.
All so I can voice a dragon like Al Pacino to say "first you get the money, then you get the power, and then you get the women."
All the different things different dragon types might find attractive in each other are alot of fun to think about. All sorts of draconic Romeo and Juliette stories must happen.
Fun video idea I would enjoy for you:
Dragon crafting
Just watched your spell book and some of your artifact videos and latched onto the red dragon skin as book binding.
Definitely like the concept of using all parts of a kill and most especially with dragons.
Good idea
Hey man, this is a great idea. How about some films on traps, magical devices, dungeon tricks and secret doors?
Sure.
I used to played with a guy who was an architect. He'd find the secret door Every. Single. Time. It used to upset the DM a little bit 🤣🤣🤣.
@@Zasek2112 As a DM, I have mad respect for a PC that can find a secret door based on a map. I would probably really appreciate playing with that dude.
@@TheLoyalOfficer If he couldn't find secret doors he'd stoneform and hold an arm into the wall looking for hollow spaces. He lost an arm once doing that. He played a druid/theif. The groups scout.
Do you think you could do a podcast episode on ancient empires and ruins ,like what kind of traps and treasure to use? Also excellent episode!
Good idea Moonring
That is an excellent idea, thank you Moonring.
To keep in mind, are the traps self resetting? If not then expect to encounter sprung traps alongside the corpses of earlier adventures/grave robbers. I can however envision an, let's say a golem that clean up the place and reset the traps when needed.
I personally own a silver dragon in control of a clan of ice kobolds, living in a secluded citadel in Icewind Dale, over the generations the kobolds have acquired more and more silver blood and thus look the part... They are also a somewhat competent host of paladins and clerics. She acquires more riches by keeping the surrounded lands and roads safe and fetching tolls at key parts of them. As for what I envisioned her to do with her hoard? Invest into the citadel, shiny armaments, siege weaponry, ornate doors and gates, a vault door for her hoard. And she in my vision it is part of her healthy diet, something I borrowed from the book series "Age of Fire" essentially metals are part of the diet for healthy and sturdy scales, and the high silver and platinum content of her own diet is excellent for the shinyness and health of her coat of scales
I use the old loot category "treasure" for stuff like art, trinkets and heirlooms. The PCs can use the stuff as money (ie, you have X amount of gold "in treasure"), spending treasure as money in lieu of finding a place to sell it, then spending the cash. I also will let them decorate things with it, give it as gifts or bribes or (in the case of some types) wear it to affect an increase their perceived social status. Rarely, I'll have the history of a specific piece in mind that may play a part in the outcomes when they use the treasure in whatever way
TLDR; there's a lot more to loot than gold, gems and magic items, and sometimes different loot can have effects on the plot
Good video AJ