By Tooth And Claw Dragons, my original high fantasy role-play forum, turns twenty-one years old this month - and it's time to advertise! We are a creative-freedom focused worldbuilding project with over ninety different playable races (including all of your favorites such as dragons, wolves, elves, dwarves, humans, etc as well as many of our own custom species!) and several well-developed worlds in a vast open universe. BTACD is old, and has lots of lore, but very very little needs to be consumed before you hop in - our website is like a wiki, to be consumed at one's leisure.
The vast majority of my non-adopt art and all of my commissions I buy from other artists are all BTACD related. Almost anything is possible, from character appearance to abilities. Hybrids (even crazy ones!) are welcome, magical experimentation, whatever you'd like - as long as it's balanced and makes sense within the established lore surrounding the species you'd like to focus on, chances are it'll be accepted! We love player-run groups, such as families or clans, and have plenty of free resources (like premade bases) for our members to enjoy.
Think you may get lost in all the lore? We have a specific set of older members called mentors who can help you sort your first character out, and help get you into your first thread! Mentors are able to answer any BTACD-related questions, and will teach you how to find different lore bits and information on the website. The key is to memorize how to get to information, not memorize the information itself (I wrote half of this and I still look stuff up LOL).
Here are some examples of different BTACD-related designs I've made! (Keep in mind most of these are dragons, I can't draw many of our other races LOL)
And here are various BTACD-related commissions and designs I've bought from other amazing artists!
Interested? Please check out the links below to look at our forum and website, and don't forget to join the group and discord server!
It's been a rough road and a wild crazy year, but I ended my contest on October 1st so here we go!! I got a good handful of entries, and my goodness everyone absolutely deserves to win! @_@ Alas, I can only choose a few of you - man, hard decision!! xD
FIRST: VexingYA!!
First of all - WOW! This absolutely blew me away! I can't believe that it so perfectly captures both of her forms, BUT ALSO it's ANIMATED! AAAH! Top tier quality and beautiful execution, totally deserves first place!! <3
SECOND: Dgslash!!
I CAN'T STOP STARING AT THIS AAAHH <3 I absolutely love the dynamic poses, and the colors! And shading!
THIRD: Naeomi!!
This is quite possibly one of my FAVORITE pieces of any of my galamutts I've gotten - just LOOK at my boy Osiris and how absolutely lethal he looks! <3 <3 <3
FIRST: Sumoka!!
Despite being the only piece of art submitted to the design contest, HOO BOY WOW! I mean, look at this beast! 8D The anatomy, the shading, the... literally everything! It deserves first place, for sure! <3 <3 <3
Congrats to stelamoris - you won the flatcolor animal design from me! Just Note me with what you want me to draw! <3 It will be in the style of these:
I'm going to be saving up from both work and commissions (opening tonight or tomorrow morning!) and on my next sizable paycheck, I'll be able to send out prizes! I had it until my radiator decided to blow up... bah xD BUT! It shouldn't take me long, maybe a few weeks to a couple of months.
I'm also going to offer this, though I don't think any of y'all will take it LOL: If you'd like to exchange your cash prize for art as payment, let me know! I will do art of an equivalent value. <3
Welcome to our monthly dA newsletter! Though not as detailed as the forum newsletters, this will provide some updates on the ongoing progress of BTACD! <3
New month, new updates!!
You guys might remember this one, but the atlantean subspecies the nabari has gone live! These guys are giant, prehistoric seekers of knowledge dwelling in the deepest depths of the sea. They may surface to study current events, taking the shape of a giant bird of aquatic giant!
As part of our continuing religion expansion, Noctis has been completed! Take a look at the balanced faith of Dualism, the severe Order of Seiten, and the mysterious, chaotic cult of Albanites!
A new landmark has been discovered! Deep in the Millirandian country of Jes're'en, there exists a tree like no other. It's a large, ancient weeping willow who's branches drift in the wind... and the roots that spread beyond its floating chunk of rock reach towards the waterfall below it. Behind the waterfall, secrets await!
We are embarking on a new redux project, now that full species are done! With this, we'll be focusing on subspecies and revamping any that need a lil love (because some are HELLA old). First on the list was the chimera subs, the manticore and nue! These have been fully updated into sapient races, instead of the semi-intelligent monsters they were before. Still scary, though! ;D
There has been a timeskip! The gods held council and made a startling decision: Nina and the Faction have to be stopped, at any cost, no matter what. Thus, they decided to begin working on divine intervention. It's been two months since they dispersed...
Across both Kurai and Felnova, the balance has tipped dangerously. The earthquakes never cease, and the Faction of Hope is splintering beneath its own weight and the fears of those trapped with no way out. While most seek to only stay alive as the two worlds fall apart, Nina moves closer and closer towards her goal.
Welcome to our monthly dA newsletter! Though not as detailed as the forum newsletters, this will provide some updates on the ongoing progress of BTACD! <3
First, we're super excited to release the Millirand religion expansion! This Realm's religion section has been expanded into four different faiths: Trae'vinn Yi'fae'n, Solari, Sagoism, and the now-familiar, Faction-born Order of Fraemyth. Check them out~
Next, concepted by @Vizier, we have the oni subspecies of ogre! These Kuraian ogres are split into the four Kingdoms and have unique traits for each!
Last but not least, we have our last two species reduxes done and finalized!! Check out the brand new rathar and halfling species!
And, what's this?! Oh my goodness! After three long years our species redux project is complete!! What does this mean for the monthly content releases, you ask? Now that our main species have finally been brought up to site standard, we're going to be focusing on the subspecies of our races, and after that we have other redux projects planned. Stay tuned!
There has been a timeskip! The gods held council and made a startling decision: Nina and the Faction have to be stopped, at any cost, no matter what. Thus, they decided to begin working on divine intervention. It's been two months since they dispersed...
Across both Kurai and Felnova, the balance has tipped dangerously. The earthquakes never cease, and the Faction of Hope is splintering beneath its own weight and the fears of those trapped with no way out. While most seek to only stay alive as the two worlds fall apart, Nina moves closer and closer towards her goal.