Bestiary/Swamp Dragon

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Swamp Dragon

The regular swamp dragon. Infobox values apply to both kinds.
General
Type	Animal / mount
Category	Mounts
Alignment	Evil
Karma	−2,000
Fame	2,000
Behavior	Only when attacked
Speed	Medium
Stats
Strength	201–300
Dexterity	66–85
Intelligence	61–100
Hit points	121–180
Stamina	66–85
Mana	61–100
Damage	3–4
Armor	0
Taming
Tameable	Yes
Min. skill	93.9
Control slots	1
Bondable	Yes
Rideable	Yes
Favorite food	Meat
Resources
Carving	19 raw ribs, 20 hides, 5 green scales

The Swamp Dragon is a rideable lizard that only fights when attacked. It needs 93.9 Animal Taming, but once tamed it always obeys and any owner can bond with it. The scaled swamp dragon is an armored version with the same stats.

Overview

• In-game name: both are called a swamp dragon and leave a swamp dragon corpse.
• Looks: the regular swamp dragon is green (body 0x31A, hue 0x851). The scaled swamp dragon uses the armored body (0x31F).
• Behavior: it leaves you alone unless you attack it, then fights in melee.

• 
  Swamp dragon
• 
  Scaled swamp dragon

Stats

Stat	Swamp dragon	Scaled swamp dragon
Strength	201–300	201–300
Dexterity	66–85	66–85
Intelligence	61–100	61–100
Hit points	121–180	121–180
Stamina	66–85 (same as its Dexterity)	66–85 (same as its Dexterity)
Mana	61–100 (same as its Intelligence)	61–100 (same as its Intelligence)
Melee damage	3–4	3–4
Armor rating	0	0
Fame / Karma	2,000 / −2,000	2,000 / −2,000

Skills

Skill	Swamp dragon	Scaled swamp dragon
Anatomy	45.1–55.0	45.1–55.0
Magic Resistance	45.1–55.0	45.1–55.0
Tactics	45.1–55.0	45.1–55.0
Wrestling	45.1–55.0	45.1–55.0

Abilities

Dispels summons

While it's wild, any summoned creature that can be dispelled is destroyed instantly when it hits the swamp dragon in melee or when the swamp dragon hits it. Blade spirits, energy vortexes and summoned elementals or daemons won't help you here. A tamed swamp dragon loses this ability.

Barding

A swamp dragon can wear barding (dragon armor). With barding on, it switches to its armored look (body 0x31F) and takes the color of the metal the barding was made from. Barding has 1,000 durability, or 2,500 if it's exceptional, and exceptional barding shows its crafter's name. How much damage barding absorbs, and how it's put on, aren't defined in the swamp dragon's own script and aren't covered here.

Taming

Requirement	Swamp dragon	Scaled swamp dragon
Minimum Animal Taming	93.9	93.9
Control slots	1	1
Maximum owners	5	5
Bonding	Yes	Yes
Rideable	Yes	Yes
Favorite food	Meat	Meat

Below the minimum Animal Taming you have no chance. Each previous owner makes it harder to tame.

• It fights back. The swamp dragon usually gets angry instead of letting you start: on 95% of your taming attempts you'll see "You seem to anger the beast!" and it attacks you. Bring a way to survive or escape. It won't attack if your Honor virtue is active.
• Success chance. For a first-time tame, your chance of success at the end of an attempt is about 12% at 100.0 skill, and it improves as your skill rises. Every previous owner adds 6 points to the difficulty.
• Don't hurt it. If it takes any damage during your attempt, taming fails with "The animal is too angry to continue taming."
• Stay close. You must stay within 6 tiles of it and keep a clear path to it.
• Obedience. Once tamed, both always obey their owner; their code skips the usual control check, whatever your skill.
• Re-taming. If you've owned this one before, taming it again always succeeds ("That wasn't even challenging.").
• After its first tame, its skills drop to 90% of their wild values, or 86% if it was paralyzed while you tamed it. Its stats don't drop.
• Scaled swamp dragons don't get angry. The angering on 95% of attempts only applies to the regular swamp dragon; the scaled one's script doesn't include it.

Bonding

Only the owner can bond with a swamp dragon, and its script waives the usual skill requirement, so any owner can bond with it. Feed it to start bonding, then feed it again after 7 days to finish. When you see "Your pet has bonded with you!", it's done.

Riding

Double-click your tamed swamp dragon to ride it. It can run 4,480 steps before it gets too tired to move, compared with 3,840 for a horse. Only running counts (walking doesn't tire it unless you're overloaded), and it recovers 1 step per second while it isn't running.

Loot

It carries no loot.

Carving

Use a blade on a regular swamp dragon's corpse to get:

• 19 raw ribs
• 20 hides
• 5 green scales

The scaled swamp dragon's script sets nothing to carve, so its corpse gives nothing.

Tips

• Taming is the hard part: at 100.0 skill each attempt has only about a 12% chance.
• The regular swamp dragon angers on most attempts; the scaled one doesn't.
• After taming it always obeys, you can bond with it whatever your skill, and it only takes 1 control slot.
• While they're wild, both destroy summoned creatures that touch them in melee, so don't rely on summons to tame them.
• Carve the regular one for green scales.
• Keep it away from savages and Chaos Dragoons. Savages, savage riders, savage shamans, Chaos Dragoons and Chaos Dragoon Elites deal triple melee damage to a swamp dragon, so a tamed one can die fast against them.