Okay so I am thinking of going with essentially a bunch of city-states each headed by a ruler, usually a dragon.
My idea is that dragons are usually thought of as magical, powerful, intelligent, gold loving, long lived and most importantly, prideful and prefer to go solo.
So the idea is that the "country / tribe" of dragons needs to be in essence loosely ruled for the most day-to-day part but with a heavy authority otherwise. They wont be democratic or hereditary, but would be based on a system of pride, power and honour. I am thinking of using something akin to a Village Assembly.
My current plans for hierarchy amongst dragons is to have,
- None of the positions are hereditary, mostly coz hereditary doesn't exactly work when peeps live for dozens of millennia.
- A group of five at the top - there decision is the final one and they only make decisions in case something affects the whole country or their is no other way to solve the dispute.
- Any position can be obtained by beating the previous holder in an honorable duel.
- The above point is open to everyone, and by everyone, I mean every species within the country / tribe. It is just that for most of recorded history, even dreaming of beating a dragon solo is something most species would considering something only fit for the insane.
- As such for the most part, the ones in charge are the dragons - there have been exceptions ofc, there have been records of city states being ruled by exceptional individuals of other species.
- The duels for each top position are different (Raw Strength, Intelligence, Magical Prowess,
A game of Aoe2 *cough* The one with most gold, The ruler of the capital city)
The geography of the country will be,
- The whole country is a collection of snow-covered mountain ranges littered with mountain cities.
- There is a central dragon tribe living on the largest mountain - this is where the group of five are situated and where Rose was taken in by the dragons. This is also where important buildings such as the Grand Library is situated.
- Other cities are on nearby mountains and are mostly independent of one another. All of them are allied and are obliged to follow the group of five. They are ruled over by someone who is usually a dragon.
- The other cities are sort of an outskirts, kinda,
Q. What stops the dragons from exploiting other races and owning massive amounts of slaves whose job is to do nothing but dig more gold?
A. It is the belief amongst the dragons that everyone, even other species, have their own honour that should be respected. In case a dragon doesnt adhere to it, the other dragons will beat the shit out of it.
The dragons also sort of mellow down with age, as long as it is not something staining their honour or life threatening.
