Motivations for a fey mentor?

[Elvensilver]

I need help determining the motivations for a fey NPC in a campaign I DM.

In the game (Pathfinder 1e, but that does not matter for my question) both players play wyrmling white dragons. One of them is a hydrokineticist (essentially a water-bender from Avatar the last Airbender). In that character's backstory, she learned her skills from a powerful aquatic fey. (an oceanid, https://aonprd.com/MonsterDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Oceanid)

Now I want to include said fey into the campaign, but I'm unsure about her initial motivations. Why would she decide to tutor a (baby) dragon? I imagine that fey as a sort of nature spirits and dragons who are kind of tied to a climatic region through their color would normally just co-exist without much conflict or cooperation, except if there are outside influences or they are of opposing alignments. What prompted this fey to reach out and teach a wyrmling she saw hunting in her waters her language and how to manipulate water?

Any suggestions?

(aside froms "it amused me", which would fit well enough for a tempestuous, CN fey creature, but makes for poor story hooks)

[Unoriginal]

I need help determining the motivations for a fey NPC in a campaign I DM.

In the game (Pathfinder 1e, but that does not matter for my question) both players play wyrmling white dragons. One of them is a hydrokineticist (essentially a water-bender from Avatar the last Airbender). In that character's backstory, she learned her skills from a powerful aquatic fey. (an oceanid, https://aonprd.com/MonsterDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Oceanid)

Now I want to include said fey into the campaign, but I'm unsure about her initial motivations. Why would she decide to tutor a (baby) dragon? I imagine that fey as a sort of nature spirits and dragons who are kind of tied to a climatic region through their color would normally just co-exist without much conflict or cooperation, except if there are outside influences or they are of opposing alignments. What prompted this fey to reach out and teach a wyrmling she saw hunting in her waters her language and how to manipulate water?

Any suggestions?

(aside froms "it amused me", which would fit well enough for a tempestuous, CN fey creature, but makes for poor story hooks)

She has a rival, who was bragging about how great their current waterbending student was, so the Oceanid boasted she could teach even a baby dragon to water-bend better than her rival could teach their student.

Bonus point if the Oceanid's title is My Fair Lady.

[Mastikator]

Some ideas I had:


Dragons grow up and become extremely powerful, so it's a useful friend to have. Especially if the fey has rivals or enemies.
The wyrmling was a struggling orphan and the fey took pity on it and/or the fey used to have its own child but it was lost/deceased so she adopted the wyrmling.
The fey did it as a favor to the wyrmling's parent. The dragon parent is either not around/dead to make good on the favor, or might return. Either way the fey took a liking to the wyrmling and keeps mentoring it.
There is a prophesy involving a white dragon and the fey wants to manipulate the future, so she orchestrates events such that the dragon fits the description and will use the dragon to fulfill the prophesy.
The fey secretly wants to eat/steal its power of the white dragon when it grows up, so it's keeping it alive and maintaining its trust for this reason.

[Elvensilver]

I love these ideas!


She has a rival, who was bragging about how great their current waterbending student was, so the Oceanid boasted she could teach even a baby dragon to water-bend better than her rival could teach their student.

Great one, the adventure hook - go out, challenge that other hydrokineticist - practically writes itself, and all while possibly still obscuring her motive so she stays mysterious.


Dragons grow up and become extremely powerful, so it's a useful friend to have. Especially if the fey has rivals or enemies.
The (...) fey took pity on it and (...) adopted the wyrmling.
The fey did it as a favor to the wyrmling's parent. (...)
There is a prophesy involving a white dragon and the fey want to (...) use the dragon to fulfill the prophesy.
The fey secretly wants to eat/steal its power of the white dragon when it grows up, so it's keeping it alive and maintaining its trust for this reason.
I love how manipulative some of these motivations can be, even if some may take years to pay of. They really run the full gamut of altruistic to evil! (The wyrmling's parents are established to be typical chaotic evil white dragons, so a favor to them has some interesting implications...)

[LibraryOgre]

Some ideas I had:


Dragons grow up and become extremely powerful, so it's a useful friend to have. Especially if the fey has rivals or enemies.
The wyrmling was a struggling orphan and the fey took pity on it and/or the fey used to have its own child but it was lost/deceased so she adopted the wyrmling.
The fey did it as a favor to the wyrmling's parent. The dragon parent is either not around/dead to make good on the favor, or might return. Either way the fey took a liking to the wyrmling and keeps mentoring it.
There is a prophesy involving a white dragon and the fey wants to manipulate the future, so she orchestrates events such that the dragon fits the description and will use the dragon to fulfill the prophesy.
The fey secretly wants to eat/steal its power of the white dragon when it grows up, so it's keeping it alive and maintaining its trust for this reason.


Dammit, Mastikator, you took most of mine. :smallwink:

I'd also add... the fey was lonely. Adopt a mortal, they're gone in an eyeblink. Adopt a dragon, and you have a friend for a very long time. One who gets VERY powerful.

Stealing from Kingmaker, she also might have done it as a punishment... she must prepare this white dragon as an offering to a more powerful fey.

[Bohandas]

Also, loneliness' cousin, boredom. It's something to do.

[Unoriginal]

Other ideas:

- One of the Oceanid's foes has dedicated considerable ressources to be able to beat Feys, and she figured someone who does that would probably not be able to do the same for Dragons, or even think about doing it.

- The Oceanid is actually a distant relative of the Dragon, and think of hydrokinesis as a family heirloom.

- The Oceanid needs a heir and figured out a student is good enough.

- The Oceanid was sentenced by the ruler of the Fey Court to teach her art to mortals for a few centuries, in order to learn some humility after she messed up big time. She thought it would be less bothersome if she taught one mortal for said few centuries. The ruler is not pleased at all by her planning to rule lawyer next time she has to officially report on her situation, but won't do anything until said official report. Which is soon.

- The Wyrmling taught something to the Oceanid, during their first meeting, without realizing it. The Fey considers what she learned extremely important and won't stop helping until she thinks the debt is repaid.

- The Oceanid needs "the scale of an hydrokinesist master who has not immerged in water for six full moons", and figured that making a master out of a scaled creature that doesn't live in water would be easier than the alternatives.