WizKids has just released not one but two adult dragon miniatures, ready to bring doom down on any adventuring party. Sold separately, the D&D Icons of the Realms Adult Red Dragon and the Adult Black Dragon come pre-painted, in dynamic poses, bringing the most iconic monsters of Dungeons and Dragons to life. However, the monsters might be in the title of the game but should these grace your table? Let’s find out!
The Adult Red Dragon is perhaps the most iconic of any dragon when it comes to D&D. It’s been depicted on the front of sourcebooks and appears in a range of adventures, including Storm King’s Thunder, Tomb of Annihilation and Dungeon of the Mad Mage. Adult Red Dragons are associated with breathing fire and smelling of sulfur, all whilst wanting to horde gold and treasure.
Coming in a flying pose the Adult Red Dragon is just taller than the Adult Black Dragon, reaching just over 26cm tall, being more imposing as a result. It comes not only pre-painted but fully assembled – with no need to pop in the wings or the curling tail. As miniatures go it is rather sturdy, as you can pick the miniature up by the wings without fear of damaging it. A few of the sculpt joins can be noticed when looking closely, though they have been hidden well within the contours of the dragon’s scales and muscles.
The paint job on the miniature is impressive with a gradient of red used across areas such as the wings, with the colouring getting darker towards the bottom of the wings. The horns on the dragon’s head pop, there is a clear line where the underbelly starts and stops, and generally it will inspire fear onto the characters that come up against it.
Unlike their red counterparts, Adult Black Dragons can often be found in swampy areas or making their lair in abandoned ruins – with collapsed humanoid race settlements amongst their favourite locations. They too seek treasure but not just any gold will do, wanting items from fallen civilizations. A nice quirk with black dragons is that they will poison the water around them, which could lead to some additional environmental issues for adventurers that get too close.
Standing 25cm tall, thanks to its fully extended wings, the Adult Black Dragon isn’t exactly a “mini” by normal terms. The pose is completely different to that of the Adult Red Dragon, almost ready to play with its prey – instead of fiercely burning them. One unique aspect of the sculpt for the black dragon are some small holes in its wings. These give the dragon more of a survivor feel – as clearly it has gone through fights before and not come out unscathed.
Both the adult dragons feature in the basic rulebook of D&D, with the miniature sculpts and paint jobs tremendously capturing the looks and bringing the artwork from books to life. Based on their stat blocks the bases are too big, though a white ring is clearly visible on the clear base. This denotes the correct 3 inch size that a huge creature should occupy. This works seamlessly with the clear base, with the grid still visible below the adult dragon’s base. This wouldn’t have been possible with the old solid black bases, at least not to the same extent, and shows a real advantage of the switch to clear bases.
The only real drawback is that the names, on the bottom of the base, are minutely harder to read. Due to the size of the dragon bases the font isn’t exactly small though. The large clear bases are, despite their size, only just big enough to stop these huge adult dragons from toppling over. Due to the way their large wings add weight, they are somewhat top heavy. Thankfully, even with a good prod they don’t overbalance.
These huge Adult Red Dragon and Adult Black Dragon miniatures are not cheap, but they truly bring something special to the table. Coming pre-painted to a high quality, with interesting sculpts and poses, they are ready to rain fire or acid down onto adventurers – straight out of the box. These are huge in both monster terms and reality, dominating the table when put into play. Gamers will probably not need both, with the two offering visual variety and more accuracy if trying to portray a specific type of dragon. Regardless of if players get the iconic Adult Red Dragon or the slightly more battle hardened Adult Black Dragon they will have an epic miniature to form a campaign around.
(Editor’s Note: The D&D Icons of the Realms Adult Red Dragon and the Adult Black Dragon were provided to us by Asmodee for the review. They are both currently available from local board game stores! Find your local store here.)
