Basgiath War College · Riders Quadrant
Dragon Tail Types
Six tails are named in the books. Five of them are weapons with a distinct way of killing: blunt, edged, barbed or spiked. The sixth is the feathertail, the juvenile form, and the only one that cannot fight at all.
The short answers
- Named tail types
- 6
- Set by colour
- No. Tails are described as a matter of choice and need
- Most lethal sub-category
- Blue daggertail
- Only known morningstartail
- Tairn
- Juvenile tail
- Feathertail
- Feathertail capabilities
- No claws, no fire, cannot carry a riderFourth Wing
- Tails still unrecorded
- Some dragons have no confirmed tail typeShown as Not yet established
Anatomical Plate
Open each tail to read its structure, its tactical consequence and the dragons recorded under it.
The six tails
| Tail | Structure and function | Dragons recorded | Provenance |
|---|---|---|---|
| Daggertail | A tail tipped with knifelike spikes rather than a blade or a weight. The blue daggertail is the rarest and most lethal sub-category, and the field guide says its tail spikes can disembowel an enemy with one flick. A close-range killer. It rewards a rider who can hold a line and finish a fight quickly, and it is the least useful tail for striking at structures or at anything the dragon cannot reach. | Sgaeyl, Feirge, Deigh, Marbh, Glane, Solas, Claidh | Established |
| Swordtail | A flat, blade-like tail used for slashing. It cuts rather than crushes, and it is built for a wide arc through a target rather than for a single point of impact. Effective against riders, gryphons and wyvern in the air, and less effective against fortifications. It pairs with an aggressive, mobile fighting style. | Codagh, Cath, Sliseag, Aotrom | Established |
| Clubtail | A blunt, heavy tail built for bludgeoning. Green clubtails are singled out in the field guide as prized siege weapons because the green intellect is matched to raw physical force. A structure-breaker. It is the tail a command reaches for when a wall, a gate or a wardstone needs to stop existing, and it is slower than the bladed tails in a turning fight. | Fuil, Molvic | Established |
| Scorpiontail | A tail tipped with venomous barbs that deliver a sting. The field guide names red scorpiontails as the quickest of all dragons to temper. A killing weapon rather than a brawling one. The sting rewards patience and a single committed strike, and it is the tail most feared by infantry. | Chradh, Baide, Cruth | Established |
| Morningstartail | A composite tail that carries the bludgeoning weight of a clubtail and the eviscerating spikes of a daggertail on the same weapon. The most flexible of the six. It can break a formation and then finish what is left of it, which is why it is treated in the ledger as the strongest tail a run can produce. Tairn is the only known morningstartail in the series, and he is proud of it. | Tairn | Established |
| Feathertail | The juvenile tail. A feathertail has feathers rather than a weapon, and it has no claws and cannot breathe fire. It cannot carry a rider, and it cannot form a traditional signet bond. None in a fight, and that is the point of the entry. Because a feathertail cannot channel the way an adult does, it can instead give its full power directly to a human, which is unpredictable and can burn the dragon out. The books establish that every dragon passes through this stage, and that the adult tail is then decided by choice and need. | Andarna | Established |
Blunt, edged, barbed, spiked
The clubtail ends in a mass of bone and hits like a hammer. Green clubtails are the ones the field guide singles out, because intellect plus raw force makes a siege weapon. The swordtail trades weight for an edge and slashes. The daggertail keeps the edge and concentrates it into a point that can open a body in one flick. The scorpiontail carries venomous barbs and delivers a sting rather than a blow.
Then there is the morningstartail, which is not a compromise between those four but the sum of two of them: the bludgeoning weight of a clubtail with the eviscerating spikes of a daggertail. Tairn carries the only one on record, and he is proud of it.
Read together, the five weapon tails describe five different ways a dragon solves the same problem. Which one a dragon has is not a statement about its rank. It is a statement about how it fights.
Where the record stops
Some dragons have no confirmed tail at all. Teine is described as a green but never given a tail in reachable sources. Cuir, Bodhi Durran green, is in the same position. Thoirt is recorded with no colour and no tail. Those fields stay open in the registry.
The tails with no named dragon are worth noting as well. The books name six tail types but only a fraction of the dragons that presumably carry them. A tail type with no dragon attached is not a missing record. It is a category the books simply have not filled.
The feathertail is the juvenile stage of all dragons
Spoilers: Fourth Wing
This section contains material from later in the series.
The feathertail reads as a separate breed for most of the first book. It is not. It is the juvenile stage of every dragon, which is why a feathertail has feathers instead of a weapon, no claws, no fire, and no ability to carry a rider or form a traditional signet bond.
What a feathertail can do instead is gift its full power directly to a human. The transfer is unpredictable and can burn the dragon out. Andarna does exactly that, and the first book is careful to show the cost.
This is also why feathertails are never seen in the adult bonding pool, and why the site gates the tail to juvenile scenes in its own engine.
After maturation
Spoilers: Onyx Storm
This section contains material from later in the series.
A matured feathertail grows into a weapon tail. Andarna matures into a scorpiontail and kills Solas with a poisoned barb, which retires the idea that a small golden dragon is harmless.
Sources
Questions people actually ask
Six are described: clubtail, daggertail, swordtail, scorpiontail, morningstartail and feathertail. Five of them are adult weapons and the sixth belongs to young dragons.
It is tipped with knifelike spikes. The field guide says a blue daggertail can disembowel an enemy with a single flick of the tail, which makes it the most feared close-range tail in the ledger.
No. The books state that tails are determined after the young stage by choice and need. Clubtails, daggertails, swordtails and scorpiontails are all recorded across more than one colour, and this site never maps a colour to a tail as a rule.
On the field guide record, the blue daggertail is the most lethal sub-category, and a morningstartail adds blunt force to the same weapon. Scorpiontails kill with venom rather than with a strike.
Yes. Colour and tail are decided separately, so any colour can in principle carry any adult tail. The per-dragon records show the pairings that are actually attested, and the registry lets you filter them.
3 further answers are held back because they give away a plot point. Raise your spoiler setting in the header to read them.
Ready to be chosen?
The engine decides the tail from your run, not from your colour.