The Unhinged Dragon From D&D's Forgotten History

hello and welcome to monster of the week the only show on the internet that knows Mercury isn't just a planet or an element it's also a crazy type of dragon today we're going to learn everything there is to know about yet another lesser-known metallic dragon that was sort of Left Behind in D D's history as we made the move to 5th edition we'll be going over the Mercury dragon's in-game war in history as well as its real world publication history and the ways it changed between editions and then of course we'll talk about the Dragon's Lair some story ideas you can use in your game and as always we'll be converting the dragon into 5th edition d d along with some shiny new artwork regular viewers will know that I tend to space out my dragon videos because every one of them is just such an undertaking and I know we just talked about steel dragons like a couple weeks ago but this week's sponsor specifically asked to be paired up with a big badass monster and it doesn't get much bigger or more badass than a dragon so before we dive in head first here I want to give a special shout out to ryoko's guide to Yokai Realms now on Kickstarter ryoko's Guide to the Yokai Realms is a colossal expansion to D inspired by mythology folklore and popular culture including sakuro Avatar and biokai legends this massive book includes a slew of new content for d d 5th edition that I personally cannot wait to get my hands on there's a new epic combat system for battling gargantuan Kaiju and you all know how much I love a good Kaiju Battle as well as over 50 new monsters all inspired by East Asian folklore and brought to life with some truly spectacular art there's so much in this book that I could go on about but to keep it as concise as possible we've got five new adventures 12 new races 12 subclasses a bunch of ninja prosthetic items inspired by sakuro over 100 craftable magic items over 40 spells party combo Mechanics for combat weapon Mastery skill trees and what might be my favorite feature over 10 new incredibly adorable familiars each with its own unique skill tree this book is going to be awesome and if you have any interest in the source material or just mythology in general I highly suggest you check out the link in the pinned comment or the description down below this is one of the hypest kickstarters of the Year for me and I am truly stoked to make my next character a Shinobi Wizard and for those of you who aren't aware this Kickstarter is being put together by someone you might know and that would be my buddy will over at d d shorts will brought in two amazing lead creators and Yoshinoya Frank and daijia wrong he who have really brought these myths and legends to life so you can thank him for bringing us this draconic episode of Monster of the week a little bit early but jumping over and checking out his Colossal Kaiju Kickstarter campaign and why do I consistently write lines for myself that are impossible to read I wrote the script no joke that took like at least 10 takes now let's set it on an adventure to discover the most unhinged member of the metallic dragon family tree thank you in much the same way that creatives working on DND in the late 80s and early 90s began fleshing out the missing colors on the chromatic spectrum of dragons traditionally considered to be of evil alignment the metallic side of things typically leading towards good was no exception and among the many different metallic dragons pitched outside the core group of metallic dragons the Mercury Dragon might be my favorite it first appeared in the a D and D second edition monstrous manual which was a massive amalgamation of the two previously released monstrous compendiums along with a bunch of new creatures that had never been seen before and among these new faces the first depiction of the Mercury Dragon would appear their bodies are long and slender allowing them to move at incredible speeds even for a dragon they're so fast in fact that they even managed to outpace the yellow dragon which up until now was the fastest of the true dragons we talked about on this channel I'm fast as [ __ ] boy their Sleek form is also dotted with countless tiny scales that also seem to flow together giving the impression that the creature is perhaps coated in some kind of liquid in reality the dragon scales are just very small and they lay in such a way that it creates this illusion of metallic reflective skin its other most notable features include a long whip-like tail and a pointed elongated snout all of this paints a picture of an aerodynamic Titan capable of not just fast movement but also very sudden and unpredictable moves that are sure to keep any opponent guessing but that's all very on brand for the Mercury dragon or Quicksilver dragon as others might call them because their personality is nothing if not unpredictable Mercury dragons fall into one of the rarest alignments you can see actually represented in DND they are chaotic good which basically means that while they are good-natured creatures they also tend to do whatever the [ __ ] they want but the Mercury Dragon isn't just a good guy who hates rules their personality is so chaotic they can honestly be hard to tell precisely what their true motives actually are this is because while they definitely have motives those motives are liable to change at the drop of a hat they're known to get completely sidetracked in the middle of conversation just changing the subject from one thing to another and then back again expecting the person they're speaking with to just keep up all my fellow ADHD homies out there know exactly what I'm talking about but of course being a dragon they take this tendency to its most extreme they're also just ridiculously fast talkers and when you combine these two attributes you get one of the funniest traits that I've ever seen on a monster sap walk as per the original second edition lore anytime a Mercury dragon is talking to someone who isn't another Mercury Dragon there's only a 75 chance you can actually understand what's being said in my conversion of this monster I worded it so that anytime someone is having a conversation with a Mercury Dragon they need to succeed on a DC-10 intelligence check and if they fail that check they just can't really tell what's being said I figured this was a good but less punishing way to preserve the dragon's fast talking tendency it's up it's a PM to determine exactly what the character hears or understands if they fail this check so I feel like this could lead to some really funny role-play moments it's just such a goofy Quirk and I love the idea of a party casting slow on this Dragon just so they can be able to understand what's being said but I mean they only talk so fast because they have a lot to say Mercury dragons are fond of meeting other creatures and making new discoveries they love to chat with creatures they've never seen before and they especially love to trade in order to get new Treasures for their horde and oh man their horde is just it's a whole thing the horde of a Mercury Dragon consists of whatever the hell the dragon feels like collecting they are textbook hoarders their collection is just as likely to have heaps of seemingly random junk as it is to have a holy Avenger or the book of vile Darkness Mercury dragons just like stuff and they don't often bother with collecting duplicates of that stuff so rather than amassing mountains of gold pieces that all look the same they find it much more interesting to keep a smaller collection of coins where each coin in the pile is from a different Kingdom or a different minting or a different metal altogether they also don't operate on the intrinsic value of their possessions but rather on how interested they are in the thing itself I'll go 275 that's the best I can do for example a Mercury Dragon who has two sunblades kicking around might be willing to trade you one of them for a really beautiful piece of sea glass you found the last time you were at the ocean as far as the dragon's concerned it's already got two Sun blades it doesn't need both of them but it doesn't have a piece of sea glass with that part particular Hue this makes trading with a Mercury Dragon potentially very frustrating but also potentially very lucrative it's not about matching them in value so much as it's about finding something they like for one reason or another but for what it's worth despite the truly chaotic nature of their collections they always seem to know exactly where everything is and exactly what they have and while stealing from a dragon's horde is never really a great idea it's especially a bad idea to steal from a Mercury Dragon because underneath all the disjointed conversation and seemingly unhinged Behavior it's easy to forget that you're still dealing with an apex predator and the only thing scarier than a dragon that wants you dead is a dragon that wants you dead with the disposition of the Mad Hatter so let's talk about exactly what this bad boy can do when it comes to combat [Music] as always this dragon has claws and Jaws capable of rending most things and people to bits however given its long and lean physiology there are a few little Mix-Ups here when it comes to the typical dragon's abilities for one as mentioned these dragons are extremely fast the proverbial bullet train of dragons is a fly speed of 200 feet per round and a movement speed of 80. so they're going to be very effective skirmishers and any melee combat that happens will likely be on their terms their tail attack is also a little bit different it deals slashing damage and more of it than most other dragon tail attacks and it has an extended range of 20 feet in terms of legendary actions it can do the same stuff most other dragons can however it does have one very unique option as long as there is at least dim light shining down on the dragon it can use its mirror-like wings to reflect a concentrated beam of light in a specific area it can see this not only allows the dragon to essentially act as the world's scariest Lighthouse it can also temporarily blind its enemies if they don't avert their eyes and that's pretty cool but of course the one thing everyone always wants to know about a brand new dragon is what is its breath weapon like and I can assure you the Mercury Dragon does not disappoint it breathes a line of super concentrated light that causes a ton of radiant damage to any creatures caught in the blast zone but not only that if you're unfortunate enough to be in the area it also sets your ass on fire along with any other flammable objects that are in the line being on fire is generally considered pretty bad and until the creature takes an action to douse the Flames or jumps on a body of water they'll be taking fire damage at the start of every turn and that's pretty much the dragon in a nutshell when it comes to its combat abilities aside from one other little Quirk that I think is just hilarious and while very unlikely to come up in combat for some groups or certain enemies it could cause huge problems what I'm talking about of course is the Mercury dragon's very poisonous flesh I'm sure many of you might be aware of this but mercury in the real world is extremely toxic ingesting Mercury either by eating it or inhaling Vapor that is Laden with Mercury just reeks havoc on the human body it can do lots of nasty stuff to basically every major organ you have but it's most infamous for causing neurological damage that can mess with your motor skills cognitive abilities and lead to all kinds of weird side effects this phenomenon is where the term mad as a Hatter actually comes from see back in 18th century England Mercury was used in the production of felt which was very often used to make hats and while a massive exposure to Mercury can definitely just kill you gradual exposure over several years as was common in the Hat making industry wouldn't kill you outright but it would quite literally make you go insane the neurological damage could be so bad in some cases that people would actually hallucinate not to mention a Litany of other awful side effects and this is no doubt where the general idea that mercury dragons are somewhat unhinged originated it's also the inspiration for the Mad Hatter from Alice in Wonderland sorry if you're finding out this way but back to our 5th edition stat block here whenever someone hits the dragon with a bite attack or consumes its flesh and anyway that creature is gonna get poisoned and while poisoned in this way they're basically under the effects of the confusion spell in addition to the other negatives associated with being poisoned so long story short don't eat Mercury kids even if it's in Dragon form now with the dragon's General combat prowess and that tangent about the consumption of dangerous Metals behind us let's move on and talk about the place that this Dragon might call home [Music] the Mercury Dragon's Lair is often just as chaotic as the creature itself they gravitate towards places that are unpredictable and that usually means places that are hostile to most life anywhere the general weather is unpredictable makes a fine Nest but they especially love fault lines and active volcanoes they're really fond of active volcanoes they love to just hang out in the volcanic Vents and let the magma wash over them not only does this probably feel like the best heating pad ever it also washes away any dirt grime or other impurities thus making the dragon scales as shiny as possible and they like fault lines so much due to the commonality of earthquakes and such locales so in other words if there are any Mercury dragons hanging out in the good old USA they're probably either in Hawaii or California as far as actually doing battle in the Dragon's Lair I gave them a handful of layer actions that I felt really fit with their personality what will you do now boom man first off the layer might just Quake knocking everyone on their ass pretty standard layer stuff but I also gave them the ability to mix things up literally one of its layer actions allows the dragon to randomly swap around the location of All Creatures including itself within the layer so long as there's room for each creature in its new destination and lastly it can attempt to afflict a single creature in the lair with crown of Madness using a layer action these abilities are all pretty straightforward but I do think they will lend to making the fight a bit more interesting and a bit more chaotic now in terms of passive Regional effects afflicted by an ancient Mercury Dragon they're generally just gonna destabilize the area that they're in within six miles of the Dragon's Lair volcanic eruptions and earthquakes are going to become extremely common not only does this make the landscape more volatile but it also opens up dozens of hidden underground cave structures with each new Quake so I mean you never know what might come crawling up out of the ground or what might be waiting for you down down there if you're brave enough to check it out now the weather within eight miles is also changed but not in the way you might think while winds are bound to be less predictable the sky itself is going to remain cloudless allowing the full light of the sun to bake the countryside even the Moonlight here is going to be bright enough to allow the dragon to make use of its reflective scales and lastly within six miles of the lair creatures are going to find it really hard to focus their minds will start to wander in all sorts of different directions this effective gives everyone disadvantage on concentration checks to maintain spells but the players might want to use this as a chance to role play a bit too which is fun speaking of role play I feel like there are a lot of different ways you could use this Dragon to tell a story such as [Music] all right so first off I feel like this goes without saying but I'm gonna say it anyways I think the Mercury dragon can very easily fit into that Mad Hatter type Ally role for a d d party even from a young age they have a vested interest in just following their whims so there are a multitude of reasons why they might agree to help out a group of good-natured adventurers if you want to use the optional rules that allows Dragon to cast magic in 5V you could also consider giving them spells that a Mercury Dragon might find interesting polymorph is always going to be a winner because they can use that to disguise themselves as other creatures or adjust the form of another creature into something they think is funny so who knows maybe the local mad scientist type guy is actually a Mercury Dragon just set on hanging out in humanoid form for a while and doing some weird science but according to Third Edition they also like using spells like hypnotic pattern color spray and Mirror Image all of which make sense to me keeping in line with that thought process though I could also see them using something like hallucinatory terrain to great effect if you're running a more evil or morally ambiguous us D party the Mercury Dragon doesn't like what they're doing they could make a great opposing Force to mess with them but for a more traditional fare perhaps the dragon's Madness is becoming infectious and it's making life very difficult for the town or city nearby its nesting Place finding a way to convince that Dragon to clear off could be an interesting challenge giving the creatures volatile nature something also mentioned in pretty much every d d book these guys show up in is that they tend to get a bit more chaotic and unpredictable with each passing year so maybe an ancient great worm is pushing several thousand years in age and has become a bit too unstable the players could always take it down by force to just eliminate the threat but perhaps they can find another way maybe there's some sort of method that will help quell the creature's magic and allow it to get itself back under control maybe the madness is even being induced by some third party who's hoping to use the Mercury dragon as a force for evil and destruction so by eliminating that party it allows the dragon to kind of bring Break Free of its shackles of Madness lastly I do think there's a bit of room to explore the Mercury dragon and a potential connection with the feywild given the generally chaotic and Whimsical nature of the feywild in d d it feels like a place that the Mercury Dragon would fit right in they may not be native to that plane but perhaps they have a portal in their layer that opens up to the feywild and what that portal looks like should definitely be something weird I just imagine a Mercury Dragon trying to convince a bunch of adventurers to jump into a volcano as it erupts telling them that it's definitely for sure a magic portal for the feywild and if the players actually go through with it sure enough it takes them to the feywild Where the mercury dragon has lots of fave friends it likes to come and visit from time to time this could just be like a funny character trait for a Mercury Dragon but it could also be a really interesting and unconventional way to kick off an adventure that's going to be taking place in the feywild maybe the Mercury dragon in question is still on the younger side and isn't quite powerful enough to deal with the threat threat that is now presenting itself in the feywild so it comes to a group of adventurers to try and convince them to jump in its volcano follow them through to the feywild and go on an adventure whatever you choose to do with this monster I just think that they're a lot of fun and I hope that you like them half as much as I do I think Mercury dragons can inject a lot of interesting role play in truly memorable moments into a campaign so if you do want to use it as always the stat block is linked in the description down below and of course if you are one of my lovely patrons you can find the dungeon dad patreon page also linked in the description down below where you'll be able to find the hi-res PDF dungeon dad style stat block complete with this new Fantastic artwork done by Maxwell polikov I adore the direction he took in this and I'm sure we'll see his art in the channel again sometime and a special thanks to our patron of the week this week's randomly selected Patron is Dundee thank you so much for the support done dude couldn't do it without you and thank you for watching as always if there is a monster you would like to see featured on Monster of the week please leave a comment down below let me know in the monster suggestions channel on Discord or tweet at me on Twitter or whatever the hell we're calling that website these days and sure enough I will add it to the monster suggestions list and who knows you might just see it show up on a future episode speak of Discord the link to that is in the description as well and we have a really awesome community over there mostly centered around d d monsters but kind of all aspects of d d and role-playing games are welcome for sure including monthly contests where we all submit Homebrew monsters and the community votes on which one they like the best there's no big prize or anything it's just for fun and a cool way to create some new monsters again thanks for watching this video this is a dragon I've wanted to talk about for such a long time because I think they're just so fun I'm stoked that we're now talking about the metallic dragons because as much fun as it was doing all of the chromatic dragons in that video series there's just as many actually I think there's even more weird and interesting metallic dragons out there and rest assured we are gonna get through them all I've been seeing a lot of comments about you know are you going to talk about iron dragons or Cobalt dragons and like the fairest dragons which are a weird part of the metallic family tree that we're gonna get to and the answer is yes we're gonna talk about all of them in what order at what time I'm not sure you can let me know what dragons you are most hyped to see the next one we're probably gonna do is the Iron Dragon but I don't know convince me otherwise but rest assured we will get to all of them eventually with all that said at the end of the video there's a preview of what's coming next week and I'll see you then bye for now [Music] dungeon dad avoids the trolls and takes us back to the days of a d and d but proceed with caution not everything is As It Seems is this creature simply A Bridge Too Far next episode spanner [Music] tune in next time for lots more fan service [Music]

Channel: Dungeon Dad

Views: 230,427

Keywords: How to play Dungeons and Dragons, dungeons and dragons lore, dungeons and dragons combat, d&d lore, d&d story, d&d online, d&d basics, d&d battle, dnd monsters, d&d monsters lore, dnd monsters explained, dnd monsters for level 1, d&d game breaking monsters, best d&d monsters, d&d cool monsters, creepy d&d monsters, d&d 5e custom monsters, classic d&d monsters, Dungeon Dad, Monster of the Week, D&D 5e, Dungeons and Dragons 5E, aj pickett, mr rhexx, D&D explained, homebrew

Id: vrQOkL8MCEs

Length: 21min 36sec (1296 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 13 2023