How heavy is a Dragon?


Rules Questions


So me and a friend of mine are looking for general weight for various dragons types and ages, but have been unable to find anything as of yet. Does anyone know of anything covering this? The reason behind this inquiry is because me and my friend were going over rules covering the price of magical meat (which is a pound for pound bases), and sense dragons are some of the most magical meat out there, we are trying to calculate how much cash we could get for the different types, and ages of dragons.

P.G. 96 of Ultimate Equipment
Inns with frequent adventurer clientele may have more exotic meats on the menu such as the meat of basilisks, dinosaurs, dire animals, giant scorpions, girallons, hydras, or shocker lizards, costing anywhere from 1–100 gp per meal depending on the danger and rarity of the creature

Liberty's Edge

I don't think that the weight of dragons has ever been addressed in Pathfinder. The two products about dragons, Dragon unleashed and Dragon revisited have no indication of the dragons' weight.

After that, you need the evaluate the weight of the non-edible parts and what you need to do to make the meat of some dragon edible (I would think twice before eating the untreated flesh of a green dragon).

The pragmatic way to do that is to consider the flesh of the dragon as part of its treasure and give it a value based on that (and the value of the bones and blood, think about having a wand or staff made with the wing or finger bone of a dragon).

The other option is to decouple WBL from actual wealth, limiting the value of the equipment of the PCs, but not how much money they have at home, the land they possess, and so on, and give a ballpark value.

You can find some indication about that in Ultimate Wilderness, under trophies.


No specific rules, and it would of course depend on the size/age of the dragon. You could probably make some rough calculations that a large sized dragon weighs the same as a horse. A huge the same as an elephant, and continue from their for larger sized dragons. Of course the total weight would be different than the available meat weight.

Lastly, dragons being intelligent creatures would have some potential repurcussions (depending on societal norms of the area).

Liberty's Edge

bbangerter wrote:


Lastly, dragons being intelligent creatures would have some potential repurcussions (depending on societal norms of the area).

You don't read Japanese isekai, right?

The characters in those books eat anything. ;-)


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see Creature Sizes which contains a rough estimate of weight in the last column.


Diego Rossi wrote:
bbangerter wrote:


Lastly, dragons being intelligent creatures would have some potential repurcussions (depending on societal norms of the area).

You don't read Japanese isekai, right?

The characters in those books eat anything. ;-)

I do not. But I did say potential repurcussions :). Some societies might not have a problem with it.


Slightly OT but possibly relevant. In NZ it is illegal to sell Marlin or Swordfish. The meat can be given away but not sold and the carcass must be disposed of properly. The intent being that if they are caught, they are returned alive.

Now if it was illegal to sell Dragon meat, several tons of the stuff would not likely have much value. In fact, thinking whilst typing. If a Dragon was treated in the same way as a shark in NZ fisheries, where the fins have value but the whole shark must be sold - leading to piles of finless sharks being sold as 'lemonfish'. Then you might get a premium for the blood but spend most of it getting rid of the meat.


Not as heavy as your mom.

Azothath has the best answer.

Sovereign Court

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It may not be Pathfinder canon, per se, but old 3rd Edition Dungeons and Dragons Draconomicon has a lot of really detailed lore, including age, length, height and weight of the Core Ten Dragons. Could be worth a look-see. Otherwise, yeah, Azothath has the best answer.


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It's considered a huge faux pas to ask such a question, because the answer is often about to increase by however much you and your equipment weigh. :)


Diego Rossi wrote:
bbangerter wrote:


Lastly, dragons being intelligent creatures would have some potential repurcussions (depending on societal norms of the area).

You don't read Japanese isekai, right?

The characters in those books eat anything. ;-)

Cannibalism is when you eat a member of your own Species.

Xeno-Cannibalism is when you eat a member of a different, intelligent Species.

Speaking as a Paladin of Iomedea, I would have to condemn your putative Xeno-Cannibalism. And try to stop you... barring special circumstances.

These 'Japanese Isekai' people you speak of sound like terrible barbarians. (Note the small 'b'. Amiri the Barbarian is okay, if a bit crude...)


The weight ranges from the creatures by size table are going to be your best guide. If you want to get more specific, then I'd recommend erring on the heavier side. Dragons are strong, dense, well armored, and at least pseudo-reptilian. All of those factors lend themselves to greater mass/weight by volume.


Azothath wrote:
see Creature Sizes which contains a rough estimate of weight in the last column.

Oooh, there are rules on it. I never realized that chart had a weight entry.


It is entirely up to the GM, but for ballpark weights, use the Weight in the Creature Sizes. Huge Dragons would be 2-16 tons, Gargantuan Dragons would be somewhere between 16-125 tons, Colossal Dragons would be somewhere 125tons+, etc.


Just for the sake of my own sanity, can anyone point me to a source for the height/weight info that is not d20pfsrd? Going nuts trying to run it down.


Pathfinder Maps, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
Java Man wrote:
Just for the sake of my own sanity, can anyone point me to a source for the height/weight info that is not d20pfsrd? Going nuts trying to run it down.

I think they copied it from this table at d20srd.org.

That would mean that this table is most likely from the D&D 3.5 Dungeon Master's Guide. I don't have my copy handy at the moment to check it for sure though.


Creature Sizes are on p194-195 of the CRB and it doesn't give weights. I think David Knott 242 is correct that it was just a copy/paste from 3.5


It is core material from DnD 3.0/3.5 thus valid via the OGL. Chart appears with different column order on pg 29 of DMG DnD3.5.
Essentially it's extra data that got omitted in order to simplify the game. Facing in squares, non-square occupancy on map squares, etc got changed for simplicity.
How many dungeons you know of have pillars sized and spaced at a reasonable safe distance? How much can a uniform stone slab of common strength actually hold? What if it is formed into a truss? Will the bridge give out before the abutments? Does knowledge engineering in the game actually cover this kind of physics and engineering know how? (ahh... the evils of the Technologist Feat) Remember medieval and renaissance architects mainly made models and then scaled them up to size. Failures were mainly due to poor workmanship ya know! Even today you can see where components of flying buttresses and wall connections have given way where the joint is under insufficient compression (sometimes tension!).


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Sysryke wrote:
The weight ranges from the creatures by size table are going to be your best guide. If you want to get more specific, then I'd recommend erring on the heavier side. Dragons are strong, dense, well armored, and at least pseudo-reptilian. All of those factors lend themselves to greater mass/weight by volume.

As flying creatures, they would probably be on the lighter side rather than the heavier side. Also, a large percentage of their mass (possibly up to 50%) would probably be in their wings.


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I dunno - if you want more realistic data for a model, I'd use pterosaur info. Given that it's somewhat estimated (as they're all long gone), we got fox bats, condors, golden eagles or maybe you can get some info on a chickenosaurus ;^)

Clearly dragons use magic to fly ♬♪~ヾ(^∇ ^)


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Azothath wrote:
Clearly dragons use magic to fly ♬♪~ヾ(^∇ ^)

Perhaps, they're full of hydrogen and are 'natural' airships. The breath weapon evolved from expelling excess hydrogen.


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Hugo Rune wrote:
Azothath wrote:
Clearly dragons use magic to fly ♬♪~ヾ(^∇ ^)
Perhaps, they're full of hydrogen and are 'natural' airships. The breath weapon evolved from expelling excess hydrogen.

are you suggesting Hydragons?

the wizard next to me wants to know what is this hi-dro jinn you speak of, it's not on the short list of known alchemical elements and seems more a aqueous magical being.


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Your wizard friend likely knows of it by the more common alchemic name, phlogiston.


Hugo Rune wrote:
Azothath wrote:
Clearly dragons use magic to fly ♬♪~ヾ(^∇ ^)
Perhaps, they're full of hydrogen and are 'natural' airships. The breath weapon evolved from expelling excess hydrogen.

That could explain the high squeaky voices some dragons have.


Java Man wrote:
Your wizard friend likely knows of it by the more common alchemic name, phlogiston.

this is the problem of clerics getting involved in refined alchemical research that requires a noble & superior approach.   ༼༼(⇀‸↼‶)༽༽༽


Dragonchess Player wrote:
Sysryke wrote:
The weight ranges from the creatures by size table are going to be your best guide. If you want to get more specific, then I'd recommend erring on the heavier side. Dragons are strong, dense, well armored, and at least pseudo-reptilian. All of those factors lend themselves to greater mass/weight by volume.
As flying creatures, they would probably be on the lighter side rather than the heavier side. Also, a large percentage of their mass (possibly up to 50%) would probably be in their wings.

I would normally be inclined to agree with you with real world animals. My reasoning stems mostly from the 3.x Draconomicon. In that source dragon anatomy is most closely linked to feline mammalian and reptilian models, without truly being either. It's also implied that at least some of the impetus for their flight comes from magic supporting the activity of the wings. Obviously differing GM's will have different views on this, but I err on the side of the dragon being quite massive. Perhaps less than a drake, or some other terrestrial behemothic creatures, but still up there. YMMV. Cheers.

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