Dragon Apocalypse!! New Setting-Help Deveolping.

[Whisper rider]

Greetings.
I have been playing D&D for a couple of years now, and i want do a first (for Real) Try at DMing, since i´ve play a couple of adventures with some of my new at D&D Friends.
I was thinking on a Custom Setting, A post apocalyptic World Where dragons are the rulers.
My initial thoughs on this are.
*Great Numbers of ruined cities all around the continent.
*probably dragons rule over one continent not all around the globe.
*Most remaining cities are inside mountains or very well hiden or have some kind of arrengement withthe rulin dragon of that area.
*Some resistance groups have being formed.
*Most people are nomads.
*Homebrew kobolds exist, besides the lesser, kobold.
*half breeds are uncommon, but exist.

I came here searching for some awesome imput and flavor, as you guys alwasy have some great ideas. I´m planning on my Players start a campaing on this setting from level 1 or 2 onwards. so help with this would be awesome.
thanks

[ArcturusV]

One of the first things I'd consider for this? Nix the Color Coded For Your Convenience thing. If Dragons are ruling the roost, have them interbreed and swap abilities, etc. Now you have Red Dragons who can spew acid, Purple Dragons who can shoot Lightning, etc. You want to keep players on their toes because chances are they're going to go dragon hunting. And since Dragons are ruling the place and don't have to hide in caves, this seems a logical step for me. With my own experience? It makes players panic when that happens. "Wait... that black dragon just breath weaponed ice at us?! THE HELL?!"

You might want to look towards books like Midnight Mass. Sure it's Vampires, not Dragons. But what I'm talking about here is the interconnected nature of the occupiers, and the "Cowboy" (or as the heroes called it "Vichy") use.

This way you can prevent certain shenanigans that might happen. Because the Dragons are mingled as occupiers, that means if you have something like that Familicide spell... one casting of it doesn't depopulate entire segments of the Dragony empire. Might cut down their forces in the area by 1/3 or something, but not free and clear. Also helps with other shenanigans like Love's Pain, etc.

The Cowboys or the Vichy should be obvious. If dragons are ruling the roost, some people are just naturally going to throw their lot in with the dragons. They can be the people minding the slaves mining new shinies for them, capturing humanoids who are trying to hide with Anti-Dragon countermeasures ("Whew, we're safe, we have Invisibility from Dragons persisted on us... oh crap here comes a Vichy Elf...").

[Waker]

One of the first things I'd consider for this? Nix the Color Coded For Your Convenience thing. If Dragons are ruling the roost, have them interbreed and swap abilities, etc. Now you have Red Dragons who can spew acid, Purple Dragons who can shoot Lightning, etc. You want to keep players on their toes because chances are they're going to go dragon hunting. And since Dragons are ruling the place and don't have to hide in caves, this seems a logical step for me. With my own experience? It makes players panic when that happens. "Wait... that black dragon just breath weaponed ice at us?! THE HELL?!"
I would be less concerned with the dragons having different elements and more concerned on the matter of alignment. I say go the route of Eberron and make it so Dragons don't derive their alignment from their color anymore.
What is it that prompted the Dracopacolypse? Was there some prophecy in play that said one day the little bipeds were going to wipe out Dragonkind, so they decided to preempt them? Did some atrocity get commited by us softskins, like defiling a sacred site dedicated to Io? Did someone play with dangerous magic and the dragons had to move to save the world and us from ourselves?
How organized are these Dragons? Is it every Dragon for himself, a nation unto his own? Or is there perhaps a confederation? A single empire with various dragons owing fealty to a Dragon Emperor? Is there any unifying code of conduct among them?
What is the theme that you want the party to run with? Are they freedom fighters out to overthrow the tyrannical Dracogracy? Are the ruling dragons more of a background piece, something that the party is aware of and deals with, but is not necessarily in conflict with?

[A.A.King]

I would suspect that in these refuge cities warlords rise up. If you have to hide in a mountain and can't go outside sooner or later one of the more stronger people realizes "I can be king here". These could make for great early level villians. Before fighting dragons, have them sort out a warlord or 2.

You could also have a very weak dragon who while looked down upon by all other dragons can live on the reputations of Dragons alone. He could rule a small city, maybe from the shadows while controlling a warlord. This way they could fight a dragon who at a place that's supposed to be dragon free and weak enough to be defeated at a very early level. Next add a truely strong dragon just to scare them a little, to make them realise that their big dragon end boss was really just the runt of the littler from the original runt of the litter's litter.

[Whisper rider]

I would be less concerned with the dragons having different elements and more concerned on the matter of alignment. I say go the route of Eberron and make it so Dragons don't derive their alignment from their color anymore.
What is it that prompted the Dracopacolypse? Was there some prophecy in play that said one day the little bipeds were going to wipe out Dragonkind, so they decided to preempt them? Did some atrocity get commited by us softskins, like defiling a sacred site dedicated to Io? Did someone play with dangerous magic and the dragons had to move to save the world and us from ourselves?
How organized are these Dragons? Is it every Dragon for himself, a nation unto his own? Or is there perhaps a confederation? A single empire with various dragons owing fealty to a Dragon Emperor? Is there any unifying code of conduct among them?
What is the theme that you want the party to run with? Are they freedom fighters out to overthrow the tyrannical Dracogracy? Are the ruling dragons more of a background piece, something that the party is aware of and deals with, but is not necessarily in conflict with?
Thruth be told I haven't thought of what actually prompted this dragons to take over...
maybe dragons were asleep for centuries. Milenia..... they have returned and... well they are dragons.. they take what they want. Giagantic cities full of treasure seems like a good place to take over.
Nah... im thinking more on a savage world... not an orginezed dragon rulership.
Mmm maybe... dragons come for a far away continent.. maybe a couple of old dragons with riders. And since then dragons ar migrating to this continent.
So theres not that many dragons but some really powerfull ones..
at first i want them to survive... then attack... finally conquer and rule.

[Kuulvheysoon]

You could take some prompting from the Forgotten Realms, and then mix it up a bit.

Say that someone wanted to destroy a specific culture/race, and decided to use Dragons as their weapon. So they create a Dracorage Mythal (see Dragons of Faerun for more information) and point them towards the target.

Since they're going around in a blind rage, what if their handler looses control? Widespread devastation. When the Dragons come around again, the survivors notice that they humanoid populations have been devastated, and the lands are ripe for conquest.

[Whisper rider]

Probably i'll take out the good dragons... doing something like reing of fire.

[Vaz]

My current campaign is something similar, although not post apocalyptic.

It has Dragons as the movers and shakers, so much so that they have split into the individual factions, based on their colour. Each one is involved in the Great Game, however, and the PC's are unaligned adventurers, but eventually begin to create their own identity and join the different totem dragons. Each Dragon type owns a realm, but they are continually struggling against one another in the game.

For example, Red Dragon A could be involved in a conflict with Blue Dragon A, but Blue Dragon is a Vassal of Red Dragon B, and this creates a 3 way conflict. If the Blue Dragon is killed by the PC's, this could result in Red Dragon B taking vengeance; through its Exarchs or its own personal views.

To mix things up, all the Planar races like Demons, Devils, Yugoloths, Angels etc are all involved in a planar conflict that has just so happened to progress to this world.

Essentially, Planar War, mixed with Game of Thrones politics.

Yes, I know it bears similarities to Warcraft, but that was hnintentional.

[Fouredged Sword]

I would remove the color coding. You have fire dragons (red body type), acid dragons (green)... ect ect, but the colors are all shades of grey/brown/beige scales

Make those the players make knowledge checks about the dragons though. You shouldn't be able to tell what type without training. "Aye, that be a lighting dragon. You can tell by the shape of the wings. They are shaped like a manta-ray." not "Aye, you can tell that be a lighting dragon because it is bright neon blue"

[ArqArturo]

It could perhaps be not something that the tiny little ape-things did, but something that dragons did.

Let's say, a venerable gold wyrm is dying, and he wants to ascend. Suddenly, a red dragon comes, kills him, raises him as a his minion, and starts pillaging the land. Suddenly, you have metallic dragons (plus a few nations and several heroes) rise up against the duo, then you have followers of this dragon and his new minion, whom they might believe they both are either messengers of a deity, or gods themselves. Not only that, you could see potential rivals of that red dragon.

Suddenly you have a massive war going on... A way that a ruthless red dragon could win. Remember, red dragons are proud, but they are still dragons, they are cunning. The dragon somehow manages to trick its rivals into killing his enemies, and suddenly the few metallics left are on the run, or killed on sight by the ever-growing number of minions. The destruction caused by the dragon war makes people resentful of dragons, and while they may not be able to taken on one themselves, they start to lynch kobolds, dragonborn, and supposed 'dragonblooded' sorcerers in their early stages of the war.

Chaos rules, the red dragon is now content, and expands its power ever more. No one has seen him in years, and is believed to be in his keep, they only see the undead gold dragon.