At least as shown in Pathfinder artwork true dragons (such as a bronze dragon) are all shown having 4 legs (the front two of which are good at manipulating things). They are like legs with hands, rather than arms, since they are often shown standing on all 4.
I would treat them as a quadruped for carrying capacity calculations.
That said, if this is ultimately about an argument for using a dragon as a mount...well I'd say your GM is free to disallow this since dragons aren't typically allowed as mounts. The closest you can normally get is a drake, which has some strict requirements and aren't very good actually.
The only thing I can see that you could use would be the fact that dragons have a bonus to trip CMD. Quadrupeds get a +4 against trip attempts which is the difference on a dragons CMD.
It is not mount related, my level 5 Tiefling Wizard was given a Wish for a quest completion and said, " I Wish to become a Bronze Dragon as per the Polymorph Any Object spell."
So, I'm trying to figure how much I can carry now. I'm looking for rules/mechanics support for one over the other.
I have bad news for you.
Polymorph any object works like greater polymorph, except for duration.
The duration is probably at best going to be a week, not permanent. You would get +5 for same kingdom and maybe a +2 for same intelligence or lower (depends on your character's intelligence). You're definitely not the same classification, same size, or related. So with a +7 duration modifier it last at best a week.
Now beyond that, Greater Polymorph says it works like Form of the Dragon 1, and tells you all the changes you make to your character. You don't get the bronze dragons stats or special abilities (for the most part). You just get some bonuses to things.
+4 str
+2 con
+4 Nat Armor
Fly (60ft poor)
Darkvision
Breath Weapon
Energy Resistance to one element
And some natural attacks
But for that week you will calculate your strength score as 4 higher and carryign capacity as a quadraped.
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I'd verify that your GM see it the same way as you, because I don't.
While form of the dragon might turn you into a medium dragon, when you say "Bronze Dragon" I think adult bronze dragon, which definitely isn't medium regardless of what effect the spell actually has.
But honestly any effect like this is going to be GM discretion anyways, since it's a permanent free powerup.
Also, even if it is duration permanent, do keep in mind that a dispel magic (of sufficient strength) will remove it.
Dragons can be both bipedal and quadrupedal, so I would imagine that it depends on how the dragon is carrying the object.
I think we are missing the most obvious question here.
How is the dragon supposed to carry the stuff?
All equipment he has when he transforms merges into his body, and are unreachable until he changes back. Constant effect bonuses, like from rings, still work (except AC from armor).
So, with his backpack merging into his body, he doesn't really have any pockets in his new form.
I think we are missing the most obvious question here.
How is the dragon supposed to carry the stuff?All equipment he has when he transforms merges into his body, and are unreachable until he changes back. Constant effect bonuses, like from rings, still work (except AC from armor).
So, with his backpack merging into his body, he doesn't really have any pockets in his new form.
that's why you cast the spell naked. Things only get merged into your body at the time of casting. Once you're a dragon you can carry things around in your dragon sized backpack.
In that case, what doomman47 wrote was the most important information.
Every leg beyond the 2nd grants a +2 bonus vs. trips, so even if description and/or illustration are unclear, the very stat block tells you the number of rule relevant legs a creature has.
All three bronze dragon stat blocks in the Bestiary list them with a +4 bonus vs. trips. Therefore, bronze dragons are beyond any doubt considered four-legged, i.e. quadruped, for rules.
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I don't understand. Form of the Dragon I states "you become a Medium chromatic or metallic dragon" in its opening line, and it lists Bronze as one of the Dragon options. Medium sized bronze dragon is what the spell does.
So maybe it's just the vindictive GM in me that loves for players to do non-standard things with wishes but:
I Wish to become a Bronze Dragon as per the Polymorph Any Object spell.
When I hear that wish, I default to adult bronze dragon, even though Polymorph Any Object can't actually fulfill that. But the wish attempts to fulfill it to the best of it's abilities. If you had specified a Young Bronze Dragon I would agree on the size part.
But I also would have told you that it wouldn't work exactly as you envision, and not just waste your wish.
Dragons are technically hexapedal, their wings being an extra set of limbs. But in regards to carrying capacity, yes, they are quadrupeds.
The pedal implies they walk on those limbs.
While dragons have 6 limbs (do heads count as limbs) they definitely don't walk on their wings.
Humans have 4 limbs, but are bipedal.
I suppose it could imply that. But here's a head-scratcher: All vertebrates, with the exception of fish, are tetrapods. Even animals without limbs like snakes. This is because we are all descended from tetrapods, early transitional creatures between fish and amphibians. I learned this reading articles by British paleontologist Darren Naish, who is far from the only scientist who holds this view. I was pretty blown away by that when I first read it.
I'll stop derailing the thread now.
Quadrupedalism is about moving around on four limbs. Tetrapod means having (or having used to have, in the case of snakes) four limbs. Just because the terms mean the same in their original languages (latin and greek, respectively), doesn't mean the terms are interexchangable.
All vertebrates, with the exception of fish, are tetrapods.
In real life yes, in fantasy, no.
The roots of tetrapod is tetra and pode and is Greek. Tetra meaning four and pode meaning foot. Though it's modern meaning is more generally 4 limbed, rather than "feet" specifically.
Bipedal and quadrupedal have the latin root word pes, meaning foot as well but in our modern sense are used to refer to movement not number of limbs.
The two really aren't related, except that most creatures on the planet regardless of whether they are bipedal or quadrupedal are tetrapods.