Incoming transmission… from space!
Greetings! This is the Starfinder Team, here to interrupt your regularly scheduled Pathfinder dragon blogs with a dragon blog of our own! There are plenty of awe-inspiring dragons appearing in Pathfinder Monster Core 2 and Pathfinder Lost Omens Draconic Codex, but we have a few of our own to share. Starfinder Alien Core has four new dragons—one of each magical tradition—which can travel through space! Because Starfinder Second Edition is completely compatible with Pathfinder Second Edition, GMs can use these “alien dragons” in both Starfinder and Pathfinder campaigns.
One of the great things about this cross-compatibility is that the Starfinder team knew from the beginning that Starfinder GMs would already have access to all the Pathfinder dragons they wanted. You’ve already got your basics covered with adamantine dragons, diabolic dragons, and so many others, so we got to design totally new dragons for Alien Core, both narratively and visually. If you’ve seen the cover of Starfinder Player Core, you know what we mean! The Akashic dragon’s “primary” eye can fire cones of lasers, and the eyes embedded along its body can also fire a defensive laser grid. These occult dragons spend lots of time inside the Akashic Record—a plane where records of all facts and events are stored—and consider themselves curators of knowledge.
Illustration by Sophie Medvedeva
Akashic dragons have an abundance of spells and abilities that reflect their connection to the Akashic Record, so it’s hard to get the upper hand against them, both in combat and in a duel of wits. While their laser barrages and typical loadout of dragon attacks make them formidable foes, they’re also especially suitable for roleplaying encounters!
Illustration by Sophie Medvedeva
The next dragon we’ll show off today is one that’s much more likely to make the players go, “aaaaugh, squish it, smash it, make it go away!” No, it’s not a spider… but it is a host dragon.
These primal dragons are covered in bugs. (They literally have an ability called “Covered in Bugs.”) They draw their power from the primal instincts of insects, and, in a way, they are the very insects that live inside them. They can disgorge swarms of insects much like other dragons might breathe fire, and older host dragons can transform entirely into a swarm of bugs. Host dragons are ravenous creatures and while they can technically survive just by eating the bugs that constantly spawn from their bodies, they generally prefer to eat other creatures, making them a menace on whatever planet they might come across. (For all you Pathfinder GMs, might I suggest Golarion?)
There are two more dragons in Starfinder Alien Core—abysium dragons and cosmic dragons! Abysium dragons are arcane dragons related to a radioactive starmetal called abysium, and cosmic dragons are divine dragons that draw power from the balancing cosmic forces of the stellar bodies across the universe, much like solarians do. We don’t have detailed previews for you about these two dragons in the blog, but the good news is that Alien Core is available right now, so there’s no need to wait!
Stay tuned for more blogs from the Starfinder Team detailing other exciting creatures in Starfinder Alien Core and other great (and terrifying!) things to come.
The Starfinder Team