Flame drake

Flame drake

(Creature)

2E1E

Common

Large

Dragon

Fire

Level

5

Alignment

LG	NG	CG
LN	N	CN
LE	NE	CE

Images of flame drakes

Source: Monster Core, pg(s). 129-130

Flame drakes had the

CE

trait in Bestiary 131.

Type

Dragon
(fire)

CR

5

Environment

Temperate mountains or hills

Alignment

LG	NG	CG
LN	N	CN
LE	NE	CE

Images of flame drakes

Source: Bestiary 2, pg(s). 106

Ⅰ

Ⅱ

Flame drakes are well described as powerful, brutal, and demanding. These menacing creatures are not to be reasoned with, not because they do not want to be, but because they simply do not understand rational arguments.

Appearance

A typical flame drake has scales that are mostly red and sometimes shift to black or gray on the edges of their leathery wings or the tip of their long tail. They have large horns that point backward from their head. Unlike dragons, flame drakes do not have forearms and walk bipedally.

Abilities

Like most dragons, flame drakes can naturally see in the dark and detect nearby creatures by their scent; they can also see through smoke. They are immune to being paralyzed, put to sleep, or fire, but weak to the cold. They can speak and understand Draconic.

A flame drake can exhale an explosive primal fireball.

Ecology

A flame drake attack.

Flame drakes usually live in volcanic areas near magma, but individuals occasionally travel to nearby forests or wooded hills.

Male and female flame drakes usually live in gender-segregated packs known as rampages, only coming together once a year to mate. The females then choose a spot in the mountains where they build a nest and lay two or three eggs, brooding them and raising the resulting young for two years before abandoning them and returning to their pack. The infants are thereafter left to fend for themselves in the three remaining years until adulthood.

Society

Flame drake society is a loose one at best, and centered on the pack. Members of a rampage can cooperate enough to hunt, but once the kill is made the drakes descend into squabbling and bickering over the meat.

Some flame drake rampages force settlements to give them tribute and enforce their dominance with the threat of destruction. Even so, flame drakes also welcome refusals to pay since this gives them an excuse to indulge in violence and destruction. Some rampages begrudgingly agree to co-exist with fire giant clans to avoid being forcibly removed.

On Golarion

On Golarion, flame drakes inhabited Varisia's Bloodsworn Vale until adventurers wiped most of them out; some hatchlings survived, however, and on reaching adulthood have begun to form alliances with evil fey and giants in the Mindspin Mountains in order to take revenge on the Varisians. Flame drakes also inhabit Darkmoon Vale alongside forest drakes.

References

For additional as-yet unincorporated sources about this subject, see the Meta page.