I've been trying to stick with the (very) early '80s artwork in these recent posts (Otus, Dee, Roslof, etc), but man, I think I may have to turn in my pro-googler membership card after today's quest. I couldn't find a silver dragon by any of the real old-schoolers. I do like this work by Todd Lockwood though, so I guess I'll roll with that.** EDIT **
Well, until I find a better scan or do it myself, here's what I wanted in the first place. I seriously couldn't find this darn thing online....jeesh! Ah well, here's Sutherland's Silver Dragon from the 1st ed AD&D Monster Manual (RE-EDITED: no longer in a horrendous yellow-orange hue):
Draco Nobilis Argentum** END EDIT (and END RE-EDIT) **
Anyway, recently Jay asked in a comment about the Best Buy exclusive silver dragon mini that came with my Dungeons & Dragons: Complete Series DVD box set (the animated show), which I mentioned in this previous post on various Green Dragon minis.
I actually snagged the box set back when it came out, from a local Best Buy. They often have exclusive stuff with their box sets and special edition DVD releases. In this particular case the packaging included a clear plastic section sticky-tack'd to the top of the DVD box, containing this little silver dragon mini. It was labeled as a Best Buy exclusive fig. I've seen the box set at Best Buy recently, but the packaging is new. It is now in a black box (mine is the older red one) and this new version does not have the mini included. Weird.
At any rate, Jay asked for a pic of it, and I actually found one in my folder of shots I took when I was recently comparing some dragon minis (among other creatures) from various companies. Here's one I took of the Best Buy mini on the left compared to WotC's Young Silver Dragon from the Dungeons of Dread set...oh and that crazy old dude in the bathrobe snuck into the shot too:
If you've been following for a bit around these parts, you might recall that I've shown a couple shots of that bigger Young Silver a while back in a post about a heavily-modified game of Crossbows & Catapults with my son.
Regardless, you may have also seen them around in your gaming circles as WotC has released a number of silver dragons, including these beasts:
the Young Silver Dragon shown above in my pic:
the Large Silver Dragon from the Archfiends set:
the Medium Silver Dragon from the Underdark set:
Now the Best Buy mini, which is labeled on the bottom of the fig as "Knights of the Silver Dragon" 2004, was supposedly a promo for the young reader book series of the same name. As far as I can tell, and as you can see from the pics, it is just a renamed/relabeled version of the Underdark set's Medium Silver Dragon.
Googling like an archfiend myself, I also found a few more comparison shots of the Large Silver vs the promo mini. This pic is from Merric's D&D minis site, in the promos section:
I highly recommend Merric's site for some very nice info and pics on WotC's D&D figs.
Additionally, as a source of some of the other links/pics above, check out Paizo.com for some other good minis pics, stats, and other cool info. They are also a great resource for some awesome RPG loot in general. Just be prepared to part with those gold pieces...
"Come'on, I'm good for it. This is a Bag of Holding, dude!"
