Dragon meal size [Archive] - Wizards Community

Dragon meal size [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
MidnightLightning
11-10-05, 05:53 PM Hey, random flavor question: I'm going to have a family of dragons out for a 'picnic' in my campaign, but the thought blossomed, "How much would a dragon eat at a meal?" Does anyone know if there's an established (either D&D or Real World) how much (percentage of body weight) a creature of a given size will eat per day? Would a standard cow be a good meal for a Huge dragon, or would it need 8?
Raymond_Luxury_Yacht
11-10-05, 06:38 PM For endothermic carnivores, 0.75(mass)^0.11. Or it might be 0.11(mass)^0.75.

I'll have to get back to you on that.

Edit: It's 0.11(mass)^0.75.
savant_warlord13
11-10-05, 07:30 PM Dragons aren't carnivorous!!

And they would eat ALOT more than that at a sitting, then not eat again for up to a month
Raymond_Luxury_Yacht
11-10-05, 07:36 PM Dragons aren't carnivorous!!

I only used carnivores because it's a fixed amount. The nutrients in meat tend not to vary much, unlike in plants.

Incidentally, the most an animal can consume in one sitting is about 25% of their body mass.
Rhomphaia
11-10-05, 09:28 PM I only used carnivores because it's a fixed amount. The nutrients in meat tend not to vary much, unlike in plants.

Incidentally, the most an animal can consume in one sitting is about 25% of their body mass.

Granted I am a bit overweight, but my healthy weight (as I am told by my doctor) is around 200 pounds...I doubt very much that I can eat 50 pounds in one sitting.

Of course, some animals have more capacity than humans, but still, isn't 25% a bit of a high figure?
obrysii
11-10-05, 10:13 PM Keep in mind that dragons have an amazing metabological system: they can gain all of the nutrients they need from a very small amount of material, and that material needn't be organic!

A dragon can live perfectly healthy on rocks, or in the case of brass dragons, morning dew.
savant_warlord13
11-11-05, 09:09 AM Some snakes can eat 3 times their body weight in a sitting
MidnightLightning
11-11-05, 10:21 AM Of course, some animals have more capacity than humans, but still, isn't 25% a bit of a high figure?
Some snakes can eat 3 times their body weight in a sitting
Actually, I found the relevant quote in the Draconomicon, and it states that a dragon can eat up to 50% of its body weight in one sitting. Which the surrounding text seems to describe as 'gorging' itself, but sees a dragon could do that once per day. The MM Dragon entry doesn't give weights for the individual dragon types and ages, but the Big and Little Creatures in Combat (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/movementPositionAndDistance.htm#bigandLi ttleCreaturesInCombat) does give rough weights. So, my one Old Copper dragon (Huge) would weigh in at 2-16 tons (9 on average), so could consume up to 4.5 tons of material in one sitting. That's the upper limit, but the Dracomonicon doesn't give a 'normal' meal size.

Using Raymond_Luxury_Yacht's formula, (since the Dracomonicon does say Dragons are endothermic) we get 0.11*9 tons^0.75. Which, with my order of operations I learned in high school, the 9 would get taken to the 0.75th power first, before multiplying by 0.11, giving 0.571576766 tons. Assuming that's per day, a 9 ton dragon would need one half a ton of food per day to keep going, according to real-world carnivores. Since dragons are magic and are going to be eating things other than meat (which apparently they get more nutritional benefit out of, rather than less), let's take that figure in half, giving 0.285788383 tons, or roughly 572 pounds (259 kg) of food. And going off the fact that dragons can eat rocks, this meal of 572 pounds in the form of granite would be about 0.1 m^3 (according to this page (http://www.allmeasures.com/Formulae/static/materials/32/density.htm)), or a 1m x 1m x 10cm slab of rock per day, so each meal would be 1/2 or 1/3 of that. That seems reasonable; thanks for your suggestions, all!

P.S. for the more carnivorously-oriented Chromatic dragons, 0.5 tons of meat a day is 1,000 pounds of meat, or roughly three Medium-sized virgins per meal. :devil:
Fenrisulven
11-11-05, 04:23 PM Wyverns are draconic and require 1 horse per day, but they're avaricious and don't hibernate like true dragons.
MidnightLightning
11-14-05, 10:32 AM Wyverns are draconic and require 1 horse per day, but they're avaricious and don't hibernate like true dragons.
Where does it say True Dragons hibernate? And that Wyverns need one horse per day?
obrysii
11-14-05, 10:57 AM The Draconomicon lists weights for each size of each breed of dragon.

Being able to eat 50% of its weight would equal over 500,000 pounds for a Great Gold Wyrm.
Derren S.
11-14-05, 12:25 PM Considering the radiclly different digestive system of dragons it useless to use real world formulas on them.
They don't even need calories to burn. To dragons it doesn't matter what they eat as they convert everything to elementalenergies which sustain them.
MidnightLightning
11-14-05, 01:41 PM Considering the radiclly different digestive system of dragons it useless to use real world formulas on them.
They don't even need calories to burn. To dragons it doesn't matter what they eat as they convert everything to elementalenergies which sustain them.
Hmmm... So, one could either reason that a dragon with a cold-dealing breath weapon has to eat items that deal cold damage to it each day, which could count just as the weather where a White or Silver could live, or that they need to get in a battle with adventurers each day and get Cone of Cold sprayed down their throat. It could eat snow and ice all day, but a thrown snowball doesn't do cold damage, so they wouldn't necessarily be eating items that were "elemental" types.

Or, let's try this game: using a real world theory to parallel this, let's assume that Dragons are breaking down any matter they eat into energy (not game world elemental energy, just real world energy), using some percentage of the E=mc^2; formula. So, does some dietician want to chime in with how much energy in raw calories a Large sized creature would need per day (or someone who knows the formula, convert Raymond_Luxury_Yacht's forumula into calories or jules), then someone could figure out how much mass a dragon would have to eat if it was converting it all into pure energy.

Which raises another question; do dragons (in D&D)poop? I don't recall the Draconomicon mentioning anything to that effect, though I don't have it in front of me. If they convert all their meals into energy directly, and are 100% efficient at it, there would be no waste. I know some mythologies have dragon dung being extremely good fertilizer, so let's assume that D&D dragons are in that boat and are not 100% efficient at converting food to energy, and only can get 50-75% of the raw energy out of what they eat. How much mass would they have to eat then? Does anyone know how efficient humans are at converting food to energy? That would be a good rule of thumb to know if these percentages are way off or not.

Anyone more versed with physics or nutrition or both want to help me get started (if you know what formulas are needed here, I could do the math, I just don't know where to start)?
kalstrand
11-14-05, 02:09 PM P.S. for the more carnivorously-oriented Chromatic dragons, 0.5 tons of meat a day is 1,000 pounds of meat, or roughly three Medium-sized virgins per meal. :devil:

Those are some really big virgins.

At 333 lbs each I can see why they are still virgins.
MidnightLightning
11-14-05, 02:16 PM Those are some really big virgins.
At 333 lbs each I can see why they are still virgins.
I'm sorry, I was assuming 3 meals/day, so 110 pounds each virgin, nine total virgins per day.
Rhomphaia
11-14-05, 02:31 PM Those are some really big virgins.

At 333 lbs each I can see why they are still virgins.

Actually, in some societies, a big woman is better. Tend to be stronger and better able to withstand the rigors of birth.
MidnightLightning
11-14-05, 03:05 PM Okay, here's some number wrangling that perhaps some physicist or dietician can correct me on:

Humans need on average 2,000 kcal to live day to day. Assuming that is standard for a Medium sized creature, D&D creatures go up by a factor of 8 each size category, making Colossal creatures need approximately 8,192,000 kcal/day to survive. Using E (joules) = m (kg) c^ (m/s^2) transforms to m (kg) = c^2/E. c^2 in m/s^2 is 8.98755e16. 1 kcal = 4,184 joules, so that Colossal dragon needs 34,275,328,000 (3.4275328e10) joules of energy per day. This comes out to 0.000381364 g/day for 100% mass conversion to power this monumental creature. Assuming only 1% conversion, that's still only 0.0381364 grams of material/day (and produces 0.037 grams of waste).

That means gorging (eating 50% of its body weight, or 640,000 pounds) once is 290,299.117 kg, meaning this dragon won't have to eat again for 28,000 years if it converts 1% to pure energy! Since dragons only liveto be about 4,000 years max, I'm guessing some numbers are way to good here. Any takes on which one(s)?
Derren S.
11-14-05, 03:28 PM Lightning, it doesn't matter what a dragon eats. A Red dragon can eat ice and digest it, its only a matter of taste.

And you still assume that dragons use joule instead of elemental energy. that is wrong. Elemental Energy is the only thing which keeps the dragon running (That and air). I don't know if they can convert 100% of their food, the draconomicon says a vast majority and as the dragon use elemental force to digest their food there probably won't be much left.
MidnightLightning
11-14-05, 03:38 PM Lightning, it doesn't matter what a dragon eats. A Red dragon can eat ice and digest it, its only a matter of taste.
Hence I started down the matter conversion route; it doesn't matter whether the item eaten has Iron, Potassium and Vitamin B12, the dragon isn't eating it for the compounds in it, it's eating it for the energy, and hence anything will work, and the amount of energy it gives is dependant on the mass of the object.

And you still assume that dragons use joule instead of elemental energy. that is wrong. Elemental Energy is the only thing which keeps the dragon running (That and air).
Okay, I was taking the gameworld mechanic of "elemental energy" and translating into the real-world equivilent of "energy" measured in joules and kcals. If you think that's incorrect, what is a better real-world comparison to this "elemental energy" you're picturing.
kalstrand
11-14-05, 09:09 PM Actually, in some societies, a big woman is better. Tend to be stronger and better able to withstand the rigors of birth.

Ah but 333 lbs for any human is bad.
Rhomphaia
11-15-05, 12:13 AM Who said they were human virgins? 333 lb half orc virgins tend to be more muscle and bone than fat. Also, I hear they crunch better when you chew on them...Then again, I will just have to trust that old black dragon that told me that. I am not eager to try it for myself.

Also, this thread is starting to remind me of a song by Three Dead Trolls in a Baggie.
Prak, the Mad
11-15-05, 01:41 AM Lightning, it doesn't matter what a dragon eats. A Red dragon can eat ice and digest it, its only a matter of taste.

And you still assume that dragons use joule instead of elemental energy. that is wrong. Elemental Energy is the only thing which keeps the dragon running (That and air). I don't know if they can convert 100% of their food, the draconomicon says a vast majority and as the dragon use elemental force to digest their food there probably won't be much left.
so they prolly sh*t carbon or ice cubes...
obrysii
11-15-05, 09:54 AM Perhaps the Draconis Fundementus uses a form of fusion when it transforms inorganic matter into joules for the dragon to use?

And that way, if it has that feat where it explodes when it dies, you have a good explanation for it! :D
MidnightLightning
11-15-05, 10:12 AM Perhaps the Draconis Fundementus uses a form of fusion when it transforms inorganic matter into joules for the dragon to use?

And that way, if it has that feat where it explodes when it dies, you have a good explanation for it! :D
After sleeping on this issue (I also had a strange dream about whales being trained to be living submarines and getting equipped with side-scanning sonar, but I don't think that's related), I realized I like the idea that Dragons are essentially fusion or matter-reduction engines, but to remove the issue of allowing the dragon to eat once and not again for 27,000 years, the solution is storage. If a human had to store 27,000 years worth of energy to keep its body going, a human body would have to store it as fat (and then carry around all that stored energy for 27,000 years). The Draconomicon states that Dragons don't get fat; they convert it to energy. So, Dragons don't store energy as fat. In which case, it's probably being stored as energy in their Draconis Fundementus, like a battery. But all batteries have a maximum limit to what it can store.

So, for the sake of an argument, I'm going to say Dragons are somewhat like real world snakes, and if they eat one gorging meal, they don't have to eat again for a week. So, if a dragon eats a gorging meal (defined as 50% of their body weight, by the Draconomicon), that fills their Draconis Fundementus to the maximum (which we'll say is 10 days, so the dragon can wait a week and then spend a few days looking for food; they're not starving after 7 days). So the maximum amount of energy that a dragon can store is 10 days worth of energy, and it can get that much energy from 50% of its body weight in matter of any type. We can't define for certain how many food calories a dragon needs per day, nor what efficiency their matter-reduction is operating at, but using this rule of thumb, we don't need to know; we can measure their energy storage in lbs or kgs instead. So, a Huge dragon weighs 20,000 pounds, so could eat 10,000 pounds in one sitting (that much fits in its stomach). So, the capacity of its Draconis is 10,000 pounds of energy (unusual measure of energy, but it means whatever amount of energy a dragon can get from 10,000 pounds of matter, that is how much this dragon can store at "maximum charge"). If 10,000 pounds powers the dragon for ten days, 1,000 pounds powers a dragon for a day. Concluding that a dragon must eat 1/2 x 1/10 or 1/20 its body weight each day to keep energized. This means for a Medium-sized dragon (weighing 320 pounds), it would have to eat 16 pounds of food per day, according tho this line of thinking. That looks plausible to me!
obrysii
11-15-05, 11:46 AM Of course, keep in mind they can also eat inorganic matter...so really, a dragon never needs to worry about starving. Trapped in a dungeon? Eat the walls! Surrounded by water, and nothing else? You can eat the water.

In an online RPG I did, the DM let me hunt without needing survival checks because if all-else failed, I could just eat dirt if I wanted to. :P
Klytus
11-15-05, 12:03 PM Of course, keep in mind they can also eat inorganic matter...so really, a dragon never needs to worry about starving. Trapped in a dungeon? Eat the walls! Surrounded by water, and nothing else? You can eat the water.

In an online RPG I did, the DM let me hunt without needing survival checks because if all-else failed, I could just eat dirt if I wanted to. :P
I'd allow that. Of course, I'd also rule that certain foods would give better nourishment and last longer, depending on the dragon type. Gold dragons, for example, are best nourished by pearls and gems, while red dragons seem to get the most nourishment from female virgins.
Otherguy
11-15-05, 12:23 PM All those calculations are wonderful, but don't forget one of the key factors of a dragon: The Breath Weapon. Depending on the circumstances, a dragon might burn a lot of energy frying/melting/whatevering things with its BW. And since that isn't a spell, but rather a supernatural ability (I think), it means that it's pulling right out of its daily alotted energy. I suppose it's a good thing the big guys can just eat what they fight, then.
d_nychus
11-15-05, 12:35 PM I'd allow that. Of course, I'd also rule that certain foods would give better nourishment and last longer, depending on the dragon type. Gold dragons, for example, are best nourished by pearls and gems, while red dragons seem to get the most nourishment from female virgins.

You can rule that, but that is not how it works in the normal game.

A dragon that eats rock gets just as much nourisment as a dragon that eats meat.

With dragons, it really does not matter what they eat. They convert everything into energy. In fact, the only reason that dragons ever would bother to hunt would be a matter of taste.
Prak, the Mad
11-15-05, 04:40 PM this all has me thinking about playing a red dragon in an ECL 30 gestalt game my friend's going to run...

and actually, isn't pure carbon a good fertilizer? if so, the old legends about dragon dung being good for crops would be true with pure elemental breakdown of food...
MidnightLightning
11-15-05, 05:39 PM and actually, isn't pure carbon a good fertilizer? if so, the old legends about dragon dung being good for crops would be true with pure elemental breakdown of food...
I think charcoal (carbon) mixed with soil is good just becuase it creates air pockets in the soil and absorbs toxins in the ground, which makes it a good "fertilizer" even though it's not absorbed by the plant itself, I don't think. It's Nitrogen in the soil that's the real nutrient to plants.
Prak, the Mad
11-15-05, 06:15 PM well that works too...

sorry, I was just amused by the thought of a red dragon excreting carbon or a white dragon excreting ice cubes...

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
MidnightLightning 11-10-05, 05:53 PM	Hey, random flavor question: I'm going to have a family of dragons out for a 'picnic' in my campaign, but the thought blossomed, "How much would a dragon eat at a meal?" Does anyone know if there's an established (either D&D or Real World) how much (percentage of body weight) a creature of a given size will eat per day? Would a standard cow be a good meal for a Huge dragon, or would it need 8?
Raymond_Luxury_Yacht 11-10-05, 06:38 PM	For endothermic carnivores, 0.75(mass)^0.11. Or it might be 0.11(mass)^0.75. I'll have to get back to you on that. Edit: It's 0.11(mass)^0.75.
savant_warlord13 11-10-05, 07:30 PM	Dragons aren't carnivorous!! And they would eat ALOT more than that at a sitting, then not eat again for up to a month
Raymond_Luxury_Yacht 11-10-05, 07:36 PM	Dragons aren't carnivorous!! I only used carnivores because it's a fixed amount. The nutrients in meat tend not to vary much, unlike in plants. Incidentally, the most an animal can consume in one sitting is about 25% of their body mass.
Rhomphaia 11-10-05, 09:28 PM	I only used carnivores because it's a fixed amount. The nutrients in meat tend not to vary much, unlike in plants. Incidentally, the most an animal can consume in one sitting is about 25% of their body mass. Granted I am a bit overweight, but my healthy weight (as I am told by my doctor) is around 200 pounds...I doubt very much that I can eat 50 pounds in one sitting. Of course, some animals have more capacity than humans, but still, isn't 25% a bit of a high figure?
obrysii 11-10-05, 10:13 PM	Keep in mind that dragons have an amazing metabological system: they can gain all of the nutrients they need from a very small amount of material, and that material needn't be organic! A dragon can live perfectly healthy on rocks, or in the case of brass dragons, morning dew.
savant_warlord13 11-11-05, 09:09 AM	Some snakes can eat 3 times their body weight in a sitting
MidnightLightning 11-11-05, 10:21 AM	Of course, some animals have more capacity than humans, but still, isn't 25% a bit of a high figure? Some snakes can eat 3 times their body weight in a sitting Actually, I found the relevant quote in the Draconomicon, and it states that a dragon can eat up to 50% of its body weight in one sitting. Which the surrounding text seems to describe as 'gorging' itself, but sees a dragon could do that once per day. The MM Dragon entry doesn't give weights for the individual dragon types and ages, but the Big and Little Creatures in Combat (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/movementPositionAndDistance.htm#bigandLi ttleCreaturesInCombat) does give rough weights. So, my one Old Copper dragon (Huge) would weigh in at 2-16 tons (9 on average), so could consume up to 4.5 tons of material in one sitting. That's the upper limit, but the Dracomonicon doesn't give a 'normal' meal size. Using Raymond_Luxury_Yacht's formula, (since the Dracomonicon does say Dragons are endothermic) we get 0.11*9 tons^0.75. Which, with my order of operations I learned in high school, the 9 would get taken to the 0.75th power first, before multiplying by 0.11, giving 0.571576766 tons. Assuming that's per day, a 9 ton dragon would need one half a ton of food per day to keep going, according to real-world carnivores. Since dragons are magic and are going to be eating things other than meat (which apparently they get more nutritional benefit out of, rather than less), let's take that figure in half, giving 0.285788383 tons, or roughly 572 pounds (259 kg) of food. And going off the fact that dragons can eat rocks, this meal of 572 pounds in the form of granite would be about 0.1 m^3 (according to this page (http://www.allmeasures.com/Formulae/static/materials/32/density.htm)), or a 1m x 1m x 10cm slab of rock per day, so each meal would be 1/2 or 1/3 of that. That seems reasonable; thanks for your suggestions, all! P.S. for the more carnivorously-oriented Chromatic dragons, 0.5 tons of meat a day is 1,000 pounds of meat, or roughly three Medium-sized virgins per meal. :devil:
Fenrisulven 11-11-05, 04:23 PM	Wyverns are draconic and require 1 horse per day, but they're avaricious and don't hibernate like true dragons.
MidnightLightning 11-14-05, 10:32 AM	Wyverns are draconic and require 1 horse per day, but they're avaricious and don't hibernate like true dragons. Where does it say True Dragons hibernate? And that Wyverns need one horse per day?
obrysii 11-14-05, 10:57 AM	The Draconomicon lists weights for each size of each breed of dragon. Being able to eat 50% of its weight would equal over 500,000 pounds for a Great Gold Wyrm.
Derren S. 11-14-05, 12:25 PM	Considering the radiclly different digestive system of dragons it useless to use real world formulas on them. They don't even need calories to burn. To dragons it doesn't matter what they eat as they convert everything to elementalenergies which sustain them.
MidnightLightning 11-14-05, 01:41 PM	Considering the radiclly different digestive system of dragons it useless to use real world formulas on them. They don't even need calories to burn. To dragons it doesn't matter what they eat as they convert everything to elementalenergies which sustain them. Hmmm... So, one could either reason that a dragon with a cold-dealing breath weapon has to eat items that deal cold damage to it each day, which could count just as the weather where a White or Silver could live, or that they need to get in a battle with adventurers each day and get Cone of Cold sprayed down their throat. It could eat snow and ice all day, but a thrown snowball doesn't do cold damage, so they wouldn't necessarily be eating items that were "elemental" types. Or, let's try this game: using a real world theory to parallel this, let's assume that Dragons are breaking down any matter they eat into energy (not game world elemental energy, just real world energy), using some percentage of the E=mc^2; formula. So, does some dietician want to chime in with how much energy in raw calories a Large sized creature would need per day (or someone who knows the formula, convert Raymond_Luxury_Yacht's forumula into calories or jules), then someone could figure out how much mass a dragon would have to eat if it was converting it all into pure energy. Which raises another question; do dragons (in D&D)poop? I don't recall the Draconomicon mentioning anything to that effect, though I don't have it in front of me. If they convert all their meals into energy directly, and are 100% efficient at it, there would be no waste. I know some mythologies have dragon dung being extremely good fertilizer, so let's assume that D&D dragons are in that boat and are not 100% efficient at converting food to energy, and only can get 50-75% of the raw energy out of what they eat. How much mass would they have to eat then? Does anyone know how efficient humans are at converting food to energy? That would be a good rule of thumb to know if these percentages are way off or not. Anyone more versed with physics or nutrition or both want to help me get started (if you know what formulas are needed here, I could do the math, I just don't know where to start)?
kalstrand 11-14-05, 02:09 PM	P.S. for the more carnivorously-oriented Chromatic dragons, 0.5 tons of meat a day is 1,000 pounds of meat, or roughly three Medium-sized virgins per meal. :devil: Those are some really big virgins. At 333 lbs each I can see why they are still virgins.
MidnightLightning 11-14-05, 02:16 PM	Those are some really big virgins. At 333 lbs each I can see why they are still virgins. I'm sorry, I was assuming 3 meals/day, so 110 pounds each virgin, nine total virgins per day.
Rhomphaia 11-14-05, 02:31 PM	Those are some really big virgins. At 333 lbs each I can see why they are still virgins. Actually, in some societies, a big woman is better. Tend to be stronger and better able to withstand the rigors of birth.
MidnightLightning 11-14-05, 03:05 PM	Okay, here's some number wrangling that perhaps some physicist or dietician can correct me on: Humans need on average 2,000 kcal to live day to day. Assuming that is standard for a Medium sized creature, D&D creatures go up by a factor of 8 each size category, making Colossal creatures need approximately 8,192,000 kcal/day to survive. Using E (joules) = m (kg) c^ (m/s^2) transforms to m (kg) = c^2/E. c^2 in m/s^2 is 8.98755e16. 1 kcal = 4,184 joules, so that Colossal dragon needs 34,275,328,000 (3.4275328e10) joules of energy per day. This comes out to 0.000381364 g/day for 100% mass conversion to power this monumental creature. Assuming only 1% conversion, that's still only 0.0381364 grams of material/day (and produces 0.037 grams of waste). That means gorging (eating 50% of its body weight, or 640,000 pounds) once is 290,299.117 kg, meaning this dragon won't have to eat again for 28,000 years if it converts 1% to pure energy! Since dragons only liveto be about 4,000 years max, I'm guessing some numbers are way to good here. Any takes on which one(s)?
Derren S. 11-14-05, 03:28 PM	Lightning, it doesn't matter what a dragon eats. A Red dragon can eat ice and digest it, its only a matter of taste. And you still assume that dragons use joule instead of elemental energy. that is wrong. Elemental Energy is the only thing which keeps the dragon running (That and air). I don't know if they can convert 100% of their food, the draconomicon says a vast majority and as the dragon use elemental force to digest their food there probably won't be much left.
MidnightLightning 11-14-05, 03:38 PM	Lightning, it doesn't matter what a dragon eats. A Red dragon can eat ice and digest it, its only a matter of taste. Hence I started down the matter conversion route; it doesn't matter whether the item eaten has Iron, Potassium and Vitamin B12, the dragon isn't eating it for the compounds in it, it's eating it for the energy, and hence anything will work, and the amount of energy it gives is dependant on the mass of the object. And you still assume that dragons use joule instead of elemental energy. that is wrong. Elemental Energy is the only thing which keeps the dragon running (That and air). Okay, I was taking the gameworld mechanic of "elemental energy" and translating into the real-world equivilent of "energy" measured in joules and kcals. If you think that's incorrect, what is a better real-world comparison to this "elemental energy" you're picturing.
kalstrand 11-14-05, 09:09 PM	Actually, in some societies, a big woman is better. Tend to be stronger and better able to withstand the rigors of birth. Ah but 333 lbs for any human is bad.
Rhomphaia 11-15-05, 12:13 AM	Who said they were human virgins? 333 lb half orc virgins tend to be more muscle and bone than fat. Also, I hear they crunch better when you chew on them...Then again, I will just have to trust that old black dragon that told me that. I am not eager to try it for myself. Also, this thread is starting to remind me of a song by Three Dead Trolls in a Baggie.
Prak, the Mad 11-15-05, 01:41 AM	Lightning, it doesn't matter what a dragon eats. A Red dragon can eat ice and digest it, its only a matter of taste. And you still assume that dragons use joule instead of elemental energy. that is wrong. Elemental Energy is the only thing which keeps the dragon running (That and air). I don't know if they can convert 100% of their food, the draconomicon says a vast majority and as the dragon use elemental force to digest their food there probably won't be much left. so they prolly sh*t carbon or ice cubes...
obrysii 11-15-05, 09:54 AM	Perhaps the Draconis Fundementus uses a form of fusion when it transforms inorganic matter into joules for the dragon to use? And that way, if it has that feat where it explodes when it dies, you have a good explanation for it! :D
MidnightLightning 11-15-05, 10:12 AM	Perhaps the Draconis Fundementus uses a form of fusion when it transforms inorganic matter into joules for the dragon to use? And that way, if it has that feat where it explodes when it dies, you have a good explanation for it! :D After sleeping on this issue (I also had a strange dream about whales being trained to be living submarines and getting equipped with side-scanning sonar, but I don't think that's related), I realized I like the idea that Dragons are essentially fusion or matter-reduction engines, but to remove the issue of allowing the dragon to eat once and not again for 27,000 years, the solution is storage. If a human had to store 27,000 years worth of energy to keep its body going, a human body would have to store it as fat (and then carry around all that stored energy for 27,000 years). The Draconomicon states that Dragons don't get fat; they convert it to energy. So, Dragons don't store energy as fat. In which case, it's probably being stored as energy in their Draconis Fundementus, like a battery. But all batteries have a maximum limit to what it can store. So, for the sake of an argument, I'm going to say Dragons are somewhat like real world snakes, and if they eat one gorging meal, they don't have to eat again for a week. So, if a dragon eats a gorging meal (defined as 50% of their body weight, by the Draconomicon), that fills their Draconis Fundementus to the maximum (which we'll say is 10 days, so the dragon can wait a week and then spend a few days looking for food; they're not starving after 7 days). So the maximum amount of energy that a dragon can store is 10 days worth of energy, and it can get that much energy from 50% of its body weight in matter of any type. We can't define for certain how many food calories a dragon needs per day, nor what efficiency their matter-reduction is operating at, but using this rule of thumb, we don't need to know; we can measure their energy storage in lbs or kgs instead. So, a Huge dragon weighs 20,000 pounds, so could eat 10,000 pounds in one sitting (that much fits in its stomach). So, the capacity of its Draconis is 10,000 pounds of energy (unusual measure of energy, but it means whatever amount of energy a dragon can get from 10,000 pounds of matter, that is how much this dragon can store at "maximum charge"). If 10,000 pounds powers the dragon for ten days, 1,000 pounds powers a dragon for a day. Concluding that a dragon must eat 1/2 x 1/10 or 1/20 its body weight each day to keep energized. This means for a Medium-sized dragon (weighing 320 pounds), it would have to eat 16 pounds of food per day, according tho this line of thinking. That looks plausible to me!
obrysii 11-15-05, 11:46 AM	Of course, keep in mind they can also eat inorganic matter...so really, a dragon never needs to worry about starving. Trapped in a dungeon? Eat the walls! Surrounded by water, and nothing else? You can eat the water. In an online RPG I did, the DM let me hunt without needing survival checks because if all-else failed, I could just eat dirt if I wanted to. :P
Klytus 11-15-05, 12:03 PM	Of course, keep in mind they can also eat inorganic matter...so really, a dragon never needs to worry about starving. Trapped in a dungeon? Eat the walls! Surrounded by water, and nothing else? You can eat the water. In an online RPG I did, the DM let me hunt without needing survival checks because if all-else failed, I could just eat dirt if I wanted to. :P I'd allow that. Of course, I'd also rule that certain foods would give better nourishment and last longer, depending on the dragon type. Gold dragons, for example, are best nourished by pearls and gems, while red dragons seem to get the most nourishment from female virgins.
Otherguy 11-15-05, 12:23 PM	All those calculations are wonderful, but don't forget one of the key factors of a dragon: The Breath Weapon. Depending on the circumstances, a dragon might burn a lot of energy frying/melting/whatevering things with its BW. And since that isn't a spell, but rather a supernatural ability (I think), it means that it's pulling right out of its daily alotted energy. I suppose it's a good thing the big guys can just eat what they fight, then.
d_nychus 11-15-05, 12:35 PM	I'd allow that. Of course, I'd also rule that certain foods would give better nourishment and last longer, depending on the dragon type. Gold dragons, for example, are best nourished by pearls and gems, while red dragons seem to get the most nourishment from female virgins. You can rule that, but that is not how it works in the normal game. A dragon that eats rock gets just as much nourisment as a dragon that eats meat. With dragons, it really does not matter what they eat. They convert everything into energy. In fact, the only reason that dragons ever would bother to hunt would be a matter of taste.
Prak, the Mad 11-15-05, 04:40 PM	this all has me thinking about playing a red dragon in an ECL 30 gestalt game my friend's going to run... and actually, isn't pure carbon a good fertilizer? if so, the old legends about dragon dung being good for crops would be true with pure elemental breakdown of food...
MidnightLightning 11-15-05, 05:39 PM	and actually, isn't pure carbon a good fertilizer? if so, the old legends about dragon dung being good for crops would be true with pure elemental breakdown of food... I think charcoal (carbon) mixed with soil is good just becuase it creates air pockets in the soil and absorbs toxins in the ground, which makes it a good "fertilizer" even though it's not absorbed by the plant itself, I don't think. It's Nitrogen in the soil that's the real nutrient to plants.
Prak, the Mad 11-15-05, 06:15 PM	well that works too... sorry, I was just amused by the thought of a red dragon excreting carbon or a white dragon excreting ice cubes...