Where most dragons make their lairs in distant mountains, forbidding swamps, and the deepest forests, the rare steel dragons thrive in the company of humans and other “lesser races”. Steel dragons are born with the innate ability to assume the shape of humans, a talent they use to infiltrate human society and lead double lives as sages, scholars, and intellectuals while making occasional trips to the country to hunt in dragon form.
Steel dragons are insatiably curious and endlessly sociable, allowing them to fit in with humans with ease. They often seek to build great repositories of knowledge, valuing books and scrolls almost as much as their hoards of gold and jewels. Steel dragons also have a natural appreciation for law and ordered systems; with their skill at mind-bending magic, they make ruthless politicians, shaping their home cities’ politics for generations.
Due to their brightly reflective scales and generally nonviolent nature, steel dragons are typically categorized as metallic dragons. However, gold, silver, and other metallic dragons blanch at steels being lumped in with them due to the steels’ lack of commitment to good. Though they prefer peaceful solutions to their problems, steel dragons can be utterly ruthless when angered, and give little thought to the “little people” harmed by their pursuit of knowledge and power.
Steel dragons’ scales are dull blue-gray as hatchlings, gaining increased shine and luster as they age. In human form, a steel dragon always has one steel-gray feature, such as hair, eyes, or nails.
Steel dragons can be found in cities throughout Golarion, but they are closely associated with the City at the Center of the World, Absalom, which hosts multiple clans of the dragons. For this reason, they are sometimes known as “Absalom dragons”.
Steel dragons are found in cities across Cerul, but in Gladia they favor Munab’s city-states. Their association with cities and their imperious natures lead them to frequently venerate Yennba, god of rulership. They are fairly reclusive, with a given city usually only holding a mated pair and their offspring at most. Rumor suggests that a steel dragon inhabits the School of Sunken Stone, masquerading as a higher-ranking faculty member.
Shores of Swords 