Blue Dragon [Chromatic]

A blue dragon's scales thicken and harden with age but hardly grow. They range from shimmering azure to deep indigo and stay glossy, polished by windblown sand, which makes the dragon conspicuous in open desert, so it often buries itself with only part of its head exposed. Some match the desert sky closely and use that in battle. It speaks its own tongue and the evil dragon tongue, and 12% of hatchlings can talk with any intelligent creature, rising 5% per age category.

Territorial and ravenous, blue dragons spend hours laying ambushes for herds and careless travelers, then hours more gloating over their success and their trophies. They prefer fighting at range, so victims witness the full power of their breath while the dragon stays safe, often diving from straight overhead or bursting from the sand once foes are within 100 feet. Older ones use powers such as hallucinatory terrain to disguise the ground and improve surprise. Thinking retreat cowardly, they flee only when gravely wounded.

The breath is a lightning bolt 5 feet wide and 100 feet long, halved by a save vs. breath weapon. Spells and powers work at 7th level adjusted by combat modifier. Blues are immune to electricity from birth, and with age gain create or destroy water three times daily (young), sound imitation at will (juvenile), dust devil once daily (adult), ventriloquism once daily (old) and hallucinatory terrain once daily (venerable).

Their homes are deserts, arid wind-scoured plains and hot, humid badlands, loving land so empty that only a rare outcrop or dune breaks the view. They soar in the daytime heat and spend long hours watching their domains for trespassers. Most live alone, but in a family the male fiercely defends his property, meaning mate and young, and the female joins in if the danger is real.

Humans hunt them for skin and treasure, and brass dragons compete for the same terrain; a blue will hound a brass in its region until it is dead or gone. Hoards fill huge underground caverns, and though blues take anything valuable, they love gems, sapphires most of all.

They can eat nearly anything and sometimes must settle for snakes, lizards and desert plants, but herd animals such as camels are the favorite, and whole caravans are cooked by lightning bolt before the dragon gorges.