Flight

SCENT

A dragon’s sense of smell is nearly as well developed as its vision. This refined sense of smell is only partly dependent on the dragon’s sensitive nose; it also uses its forked tongue to sample the air, just as a snake does. A dragon’s ability to sense the presence of other creatures by scent makes it difficult to catch a dragon unawares, and hiding from a dragon is nearly impossible once a dragon is close enough to pick up the quarry’s scent.

HEARING

A dragon’s ears are about as sensitive as human ears, and the range of tones a dragon can hear is similar to what a human can hear. Even the youngest of dragons, however, has sharper hearing than a typical human, thanks to its ability to recognize important sounds for what they are and to filter out background noise and focus on significant sounds.

BLINDSENSE

One outstanding example of a dragon’s sensory prowess is its blindsense—the ability to “see” things that are invisible or completely obscured. By using its nose and ears, and also by noticing subtle clues such as air currents and vibrations, a dragon can sense everything in its immediate vicinity, even with its eyes closed, when shrouded in magical darkness, or when swathed in impenetrable fog. Of course, some phenomena are entirely visual in nature (such as color), and a dragon that cannot see cannot perceive these phenomena.

TASTE

A dragon’s sense of taste is highly discriminating. Dragons can note the slightest variations in the taste of water or food, and most dragons develop some peculiar culinary preferences as a result. Copper dragons, for example, relish venomous vermin. Perhaps the most infamous draconic taste is the red dragon’s preference for the flesh of young women. Curiously, dragons don’t seem to respond well to sweet flavors. Whether this is because they don’t like sweets or because they have difficulty distinguishing sweet flavors is unclear. Most dragons refuse to discuss the matter.

TOUCH

Thanks to its thick, scaly hide and clawed feet, a dragon has very little tactile sense. Smaller, younger dragons who have yet to develop impressive natural armor have better senses of touch than older dragons, making touch the only one of a dragon’s senses that gets less acute as a dragon grows and ages. A dragon interested in a object’s texture might touch or stroke the object with its tongue. Even so, a dragon’s tongue proves better at tasting than touching.

A dragon’s muted sense of touch might explain its preference for nests made from piles of coins, gems, or other treasure. A bed of so many small, hard, sometimes pointy objects might prove highly uncomfortable to a human, but to a dragon such an arrangement offers a comfortable tickle, like a nubby wool blanket.

“A dragon in flight? Do you call that flying?” —Kal’ ostikillam, djinni

“Dragons are stately and powerful flyers, able to stay on the wing for days.”

—Yunni Cupuricus, sage

Some sages speculate that a dragon’s ability to fly is partially magical; however, dragons have been known to take wing and maneuver inside antimagic areas where their spells and breath weapons do not work. A dragon owes its ability to fly, and its flight characteristics, to its peculiar anatomy and metabolism. A dragon weighs much less than a strictly terrestrial creature of the same size does, and its muscles—particularly the ones that enable it to fly—are exceptionally strong, giving the dragon’s wings enough power to lift the dragon into the air.

A dragon’s biggest problem in flight is just getting aloft. Given the chance, a dragon prefers to launch itself from a height, where it can