Editing Dragonborn (section)

==Dragonborn in 5e==
* Ability Score: +2 Strength, +1 Charisma.
* Typical Alignment: Favor Lawful Good or Chaotic Evil.
* Size: Medium. They are stated as growing to well over 6 feet in height and averaging about 250 pounds.
* Speed: 30 feet base walking speed.
* Draconic Ancestry: Choose one of the five Chromatic Dragons (Black, Blue, Green, Red, White) or Metallic Dragons (Brass, Bronze, Copper, Gold, Silver); this affects your other racial abilities.
* Breath Weapon: As an action, you can exhale your Breath Weapon, inflicting 2d6 damage on targets caught in the area of effect (half damage on a successful save, save DC is 8 + your Con modifier + your Proficiency bonus). Once you've used your breath weapon, it can't be used until you complete a short rest. Damage increases to 3d6 at 6th level, 4d6 at 11th level, and 5d6 at 16th level. Your breath weapon's style (Blacks, Blues, Brasses, Bronzes and Coppers have Line type breath weapons; Golds, Greens, Reds, Silvers and Whites have Cones), damage type and the ability score used to save against it (Greens, Silvers and Whites attack Constitution, everything else attacks Dexterity) are all determined by your Draconic Ancestry.
* Damage Resistance: You have Resistance to the same damage type that you inflict with your Breath Weapon.
* Languages: Common and Draconic.

A highly self-sufficient and clannish race literally born of dragons, in that they were created from dragon eggs either by the draconic gods themselves or by powerful dragons. Some still serve as faithful servants, especially as soldiers, but many more are now without a purpose and try to find a reason for their existence. First generation dragonborn more strongly resembled their ancestors, especially in terms of scale color, but generations of interbreeding have created a more unified appearance, with common scale colors being brass, bronze, scarlet, rust, gold, or copper-green. Strongly blooded individuals, whose coloration (and sometimes appearance) again calls to mind their Chromatic or Metallic ancestors, do occasionally appear and are considered marked by destiny.

The dragonfear dragonborn "subrace" of 4th edition was resurrected through a feat in Xanathar's Guide. "Dragon Fear" grants +1 to Str, Con or Cha and lets them burn a use of breath weapon to instead utter a terrifying roar to activate a "draconic presence" aura, forcing a Wisdom save on any creature within 30 feet that can hear or see the roaring dragonborn; if they fail this save, they are frightened of the dragonborn for 1 minute, but can retake the saving throw each time they take damage. Why the fuck these biological features only turn up once your dragonborn stabs enough goblins to reach 4th level is left unexplained.

The dragonborn are somewhat behind the curve in 5e. With the possible exception of the [[paladin]] and [[Warlock|bladelock]], there are choices for any particular class that are simply better, and even there the dragonborn's breath attack and resistance simply can't compete with a variant [[human]]'s free [[feat]], the [[half-orc]]'s resilience and bonus critical damage, or the [[half-elf]]'s bonus to another stat ''and'' pile of extra bonuses. Additionally, they trade poorly with their 4e predecessors in every way: the breath weapon's damage scales up worse than a cantrip now and is a full action rather than a bonus action to use, to say nothing of how the switchover from 5 minute short rests to 1 hour short rests hoses its viability, they've lost all of the breath weapon buffing feats they had in 4e, they flat-out have half as many racial features as any other race (not even ''darkvision''), and zero features for the social or exploration pillars of the game beyond a somewhat-rarer language, and, to add insult to injury, they actually ''lost'' their free History skill.  Also, they bear the dubious honor of being the only race in the game to have a racial feature that scales off a stat they don't get any kind of innate bonus to.  

Volo's Guide also introduces additional "bruiser" races in the [[goliath]], [[firbolg]], and [[bugbear]], each of which puts the dragonborn to shame. The dragonborn aren't "bad" mechanically, but they are by far the weakest playable race in the game that didn't originate from a ''[[Plane Shift]]'' article.

The official adventures and settings books also tend to act as if they don't exist at all.  Tomb of Anihilation, Decent into Avernus, and Horde of the Dragon Queen all feature half dragons but no Dragonborn.

===Variant Dragonborn===
The first real variant dragonborn came with [[Critical Role]]'s unique variant race of Ravenite Dragonborn. While initially penned in Matt Mercer's ''Tal'Dorei Campaign Setting'', Wizards would not only make their own version of the Ravenites in ''Explorer's Guide to Wildemount'', but also port over the Draconblood subrace as well.

'''Draconblood Dragonborn'''
::Ability Score Modifier: +2 to Charisma, +1 to Intelligence
::Creature Type: Humanoid
::Size: Medium
::Speed: 30 feet
::Chromatic Ancestry: As before
::Draconic Resistance: As before, you resist the element associated with your Ancestry
::Breath Weapon: As before
::Forceful Presence: You can gain advantage on an Persuasion and Intimidation check once per rest.

'''Ravenite Dragonborn'''
::Ability Score Modifier: +2 to Strength, +1 to Constitution
::Creature Type: Humanoid
::Size: Medium
::Speed: 30 feet
::Chromatic Ancestry: As before
::Draconic Resistance: As before, you resist the element associated with your Ancestry
::Breath Weapon: As before
::Vengeful Assault: Once per rest, you can immediately counter-attack right after getting hit by an enemy within reach of your weapon.

A sort-of revamp of the race would be introduced in the April 2021 issue of [[Unearthed Arcana]]. This new version of the dragonborn does away with that whole homogenized scale color thing, opting for a closer resemblance to their ancestors. Also, instead of being one race, it's now ''three'': the [[Chromatic Dragon]]born, the [[Metallic Dragon]]born, and — perhaps most shockingly — ''[[Gem Dragon|Gem]]'' Dragonborn. These would later be officially released in ''Fizban's Treasury of Dragons''.

'''Chromatic Dragonborn'''
::Ability Score Modifier: +2 to one ability score of your choice and +1 to a second ability score of your choice, or +1 to three different ability scores of your choice. After the release of [[Tasha's Cauldron of Everything|Tasha's]], this has become the standard for all new and UA races.
::Creature Type: Humanoid
::Size: Medium
::Speed: 30 feet
::Chromatic Ancestry: As before, Black (acid), Blue (lightning), Green (poison), Red (fire), or White (cold)
::Draconic Resistance: As before, you resist the element associated with your Ancestry
::Breath Weapon: As a Chromatic Dragonborn, regardless of your element, your breath weapon takes the form of a 30 ft line that is 5 ft wide. It's a Dex save against 8 + Con mod + proficiency. The four key differences are that it can now replace ''one'' of your attacks instead of requiring an action of its own, it does ''2d8'' damage instead of 2d6, it scales up by one die at levels 5, 11, and 17, and—most importantly—you can use it a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus per long rest, instead of once per short rest.
::Chromatic Warding: At 3rd level, once per long rest, you can use an action to become completely ''immune'' to the damage type you normally resist for 10 minutes. FTD nerfs this to last only 1 minute and at level 5.

'''Metallic Dragonborn'''
::Ability Score Modifier: As above
::Creature Type: Humanoid
::Size: Medium
::Speed: 30 feet
::Metallic Ancestry: As before, Brass (fire), Bronze (lightning), Copper (acid), Gold (also fire), or Silver (cold)
::Draconic Resistance: As above
::Breath Weapon: All the same changes as above, except your breath weapon is always a 15 ft cone
::Metallic Breath Weapon: At 3rd level, once per long rest, you can replace one of your attacks with yet ''another'' breath weapon. Same range, same DC as the standard one, but this time you can either choose to knock your enemies prone (requiring a Strength save) or incapacitate them until your next turn (requiring a Constitution save). FTD would delay this to level 5.

'''Gem Dragonborn'''
::Ability Score Modifier: As above
::Creature Type: Humanoid
::Size: Medium
::Speed: 30 feet
::Gem Ancestry: Choose Amethyst (force), Crystal (radiant), Emerald (psychic), Sapphire (thunder), or Topaz (necrotic)
::Draconic Resistance: As above
::Breath Weapon: Same as the Metallic Dragonborn's regular breath weapon
::Psionic Mind: GOOlock's Awakened Mind, but this time it specifies that the creature can't respond
::Gem Flight: At 3rd level, once per long rest, you can use a bonus action to let give yourself a flying speed equal to your walking speed and the ability to hover for 1 minute. FTD delays this to level 5.

This take on the race is... bizarre. The improvements to the breath weapon are welcome, as they do a lot to make the ability more uniform ''and'' more uniformly ''useful,'' but the Chromatic Dragonborn's third level ability is pretty blatantly more situational than the Metallic Dragonborn's, and the Gem Dragonborn's is ''crazy'' useful compared to either of the other two. All in all it still has its flaws, but it's still a ''massive'' and much-needed improvement over the PHB Dragonborn.

===Other Alternatives to Vanilla Dragonborn===
The fanmade [[Anchorome]] setting introduces a new dragonborn subrace, the '''Tanarvraki''', who are descended from Mirage Dragons (a [[Planar Dragon]] native to the [[Feywild]] descended from [[Chromatic Dragon|Green Dragon]] stock). These dragonborn have Psychic Damage Resistance and their Breath Weapon is a 15ft cone that does Psychic Damage and is resisted with a Wisdom save.

In [[Midgard]], dragonborn are known as '''Dragonkin''', and are the foremost race serving the dragon rulers of the Mharoti Empire. Their origins are unknown, but they resent any implication that they might bear humanoid blood. They have a unique statblock, which currently can only be found in the ''Midgard Heroes'' splatbook; a small races collection that also includes the [[Alseid]], [[Centaur]], [[Elf|Elves]] and [[Half-Elf|Elfmarked]], [[Gearforged]], [[Darakhul]] Ghouls, [[Kobold]]s, [[Minotaur]]s, [[Ravenfolk]], [[Shadow Fey]] and [[Trollkin]].  Midgard Dragonborn are divided into four elemental subraces (Flame/Fire, Storm/Wind, Stone/Cave and Wave/Tide) and a mixed-breed subrace commonly called the "Edjet" or "Soldier" subrace. These Dragonborn gain Darkvision and Proficiency in Persuasion over the standard version, have a stat bonus of +2 Charisma/+1 by subrace, and swap their breath weapon for a Charisma-based cantrip determined by subrace, although they still have Energy Resistance determined by subrace.
* '''Flame/Fire Dragonkin''' get +1 Strength, can cast Produce Flame, and are Resistant to Fire.
* '''Storm/Wind Dragonkin''' get +1 Intelligence, can cast Shocking Grasp, and are Resistant to Lightning.
* '''Stone/Cave Dragonkin''' get +1 Constitution, can cast Blade Ward, and are Resistant to Acid.
* '''Wave/Tide Dragonkin''' get +1 Wisdom, can cast Poison Spray, and are Resistant to Cold.
* '''Edjet Dragonkin''' gain +1 Dexterity, can cast Shillelagh, and are Resistant to Poison.