Guild Wars 2

I am curious on exactly what they are. As many know, drake in other forms of media is often associated with a type of dragon. However in Guild Wars 2, they seem to be wildlife, that can have draconic abilites, specifically breath attacks. Now the Guild Wars wiki (Guild Wars not Guild Wars 2) states that drakes are a type of dragon. Yet in the GW2 wiki, they are stated as “amphibious reptiles”. Now I know personally that there are the Elder Dragons, and to my knowledge, I don’t know if there are any other kind of dragon, also, the GW wiki states that dragons found not within Cantha are known as drakes, so my question is this ultimately:

Are drakes a kind of sub-dragon? Or are they just simply another species of animal that coincidentally has a name akin to a type of dragon?

Back in GW1, drakes were mechanically part of the same overarching family (a mechanical setting that things such as disease and edge of extinction triggered on). Lorewise, they were not dragons. Nothing lorewise points them to being dragons.

This said, dragons in Cantha were a very certain thing and some were similar to drakes in general (mainly the Turtle Dragons – and the Dragon Moss was also very similar, though being a plant not reptile). So there are non-Elder Dragon-related dragons (also, all the Bone Dragons).

Which means they are in fact just a big species of reptile, nothing more correct?

I do think there were a couple times when saltsprays were called drakes, so it seems likely that they were at least related to dragons… but as we understood the term in guild wars 1. Even saltsprays were really nothing more than magical reptiles, albeit with intelligence not demonstrated by any Tyrian drake. No reasonable grounds to assert that they’re connected to the Elder Dragons, or the Elder Dragon champions that are now what is usually meant by the term “dragons”.

RedSpectrum.1975:

Which means they are in fact just a big species of reptile, nothing more correct?

In most universes, the same is true for dragons :P

But yeah, as we know it Drakes simply are a large ‘class’ of reptiles, and dragons are another species.

For all we know, bone dragons may be more related to drakes then current dragons/dragon champs.

Or they could be similar to dragon champions, but decay took most of their bodies.

Interesting, thanks for the responses guys

I recall a long time ago in prerelease people saying that drakes were effectively the game’s term for dragons, and were emphatically told that they were NOT dragons. That was before Rotscale and Glint became known to the public, let alone Canthan dragons…

There’s very little information on what exactly a ‘drake’ is, but I’m inclined to think that drakes are essentially to non-Elder dragons as monkeys are to humans – they’re related and have similar magical abilities (apart from the more primitive Elonian drakes in Nightfall), but are only if animal intelligence (although they may still be intelligent animals) while dragons are sapient unless something (such as the Jade Wind) robs them of their sapiency. This is where Saltsprays are distinguished from drakes – there are a few we can talk to (Shiny is capable of speaking, albeit fairly childishly, immediately after hatching) and it’s implied that those we can’t are because they’ve been corrupted by the Jade Wind.

If evolution works in any normal sense in Tyria, my gut feeling is that drakes evolved from crocodiles or a similar form of archosaur in Elona, and then spread north to Tyria proper where they developed into more advanced forms. There dragons evolved from drakes, but when the Elder Dragons evolved or arose (whichever it happens to be) they consumed or corrupted the Tyrian dragons, but those capable of long-distant flight or swimming were able to flee to Cantha.

Most of this is my own interpretation, though – we haven’t had much of anything on drakes lorewise.

Western dragons/drakes from the Middle Ages and later usually have wings. Elder dragons, and some of their champions do have wings, and are very western looking.

Ancient/classical dragons, and Eastern dragons on the other hand, don’t have wings, and tend to be serpentine and/or piscine. In some Chinese myths dragons are related to carp and goldfish.

GW2 drakes don’t have wings, but are clearly not serpentine or fish like.

I’d say that GW2 drakes have nothing to do with dragons, and the name is a misnomer.

Middle Eastern dragons were akin to European dragons, but wingless (or had such small wings they couldn’t fly), Wanderer. There’s more kinds of dragons than just the European standard and the Asian standard.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Middle Eastern dragons were akin to European dragons, but wingless (or had such small wings they couldn’t fly), Wanderer. There’s more kinds of dragons than just the European standard and the Asian standard.

This. There are SO many variants of ‘dragon’ it’s insane.

You have the ‘standard’ four legs, two wings dragon. Then you have ones where it’s four limbs (two wings acting as front legs, two back legs), so on, so forth.

Well, drakes don’t resemble middle eastern dragons either. Middle Eastern dragons were more like serpents. Also, there aren’t any middle eastern dragons in the game for drakes to be related to.

Actually, even just in Europe, there’s an insane range of dragon forms. The ‘classical heraldic dragon’ with four legs and two wings that everyone with a Western background thinks of when they hear ‘dragon’ (and probably most people of non-Western backgrounds too, since Asians have their own name for their local dragons) is just the most common.

Referencing just one of my sources, we have:

“In Europe, there were tales of several kinds of Dragons. The kind known as a Worm resembled a gigantic snake, sometimes with four legs. A Firedrake was a four-legged cave Dragon, often with batlike wings. A Wyvern was also winged, but had only two legs.”

Bolded sections are mine for emphasis – demonstrating that from the mythology ‘drakes’ are in fact a category of dragon, and that while the classical heraldic dragon fits within the firedrake category, the wings are not a necessary part of this category. And this listing, incidentally, is missing some of the weirder things like linnorms (forelegs but no wings or hindlegs) and amphipteres (wings and no legs).

When you look at the etymology, the term ‘dragon’ actually comes from the Greek ‘drakon’ – ‘dragon’ and ‘drake’ come from the same root.

Now, in contemporary fantasy, the common convention is for ‘dragon’ to be a term used for the true dragons in the setting, while ‘drake’ is used for something similar and related, but weaker and lacking some of the abilities of true dragons. That seems to be pretty much exactly what we have here – we don’t know for sure if the drakes are actually biologically related to dragons, but they do certainly seem to have similar appearances and powers.

draxynnic.3719:

Now, in contemporary fantasy, the common convention is for ‘dragon’ to be a term used for the true dragons in the setting, while ‘drake’ is used for something similar and related, but weaker and lacking some of the abilities of true dragons. That seems to be pretty much exactly what we have here – we don’t know for sure if the drakes are actually biologically related to dragons, but they do certainly seem to have similar appearances and powers.

This is what I interpreted, they aren’t dragons per se, but akin to them. However at first I was unsure if there was another kind of in game dragon other than the Elder ragons, so I was under the assumption that saying drakes are somehow related to Elder Dragons was a pretty bold claim. No offense to any drakes that may be reading this topic but I didn’t believe them intelligent enough to be on par with contemporary dragons.

Drake and Dragon both derive from the ancient Greek Drakon, which was the term for a sea serpent or sea monster. Drake is English via old German, while Dragon comes via old French. They both mean the same thing. For instance Smaug is referred to as a Dragon and a Drake.

Words get tossed around a lot in taxonomy. Look at the Komodo Dragon – it doesn’t really resemble any mythical dragons, but someone thought it would be a good name for a big lizard.

Maybe someone in Tyria had heard of these giant reptiles and mistook a Tyrian drake for an actual dragon.

However, apart from the wings, drakes have a lot in common with dragons. They have similar powers, albeit on a much smaller scale (for instance, a drake’s breath only affects a small area, while the breath of a dragon champion can cover an army of players), a generally reptilian appearance, and similar, albeit less fancy, crests. In a magical world, a simple lack of wings does not, I think, bar them from being related.

Furthermore, the Rockhide Dragons of Cantha also lack wings, and generally look and fight similarly to Sand Drakes of the Crystal Desert.

As I said before, my feeling is that drakes are to dragons as monkeys are to humans – considerably less powerful and intelligent, but nonetheless members of an overarching taxonomic group. The Elder Dragons can then be related to dragons as the gods are to humans – we’re not entirely sure the Elder Dragons actually evolved from dragons or whether they’re something else that is choosing to take draconic form, but they’re obviously something substantially more powerful again that nonetheless has some connection.