Dungeons & Dragons: Dragonshard is a real-time strategy role-playing video game, developed for Microsoft Windows by Liquid Entertainment, and published by Atari in September 2005. It takes place in Eberron, one of the official Dungeons & Dragons campaign settings. The game combines elements of traditional real-time strategy gameplay with role-playing elements such as hero units, and questing. Dragonshard includes two single-player campaigns, single-player skirmish maps, and multiplayer support. The single-player campaign follows the struggles of three competing factions to gain control of a magical artifact known as the Heart of Siberys.

Updated versions of Demon Stone and Dragonshard were released for the PC in August 2025.

Gameplay

Dragonshard combines aspects of real-time strategy (RTS) and role-playing games (RPGs). Unlike most real-time strategy games, all units are available at the beginning of the game, rather than having prerequisites to allow their construction.

Armies consist of the following unit types:

  • Champions: the game's hero unit. In campaign mode, the player chooses a champion before starting a map. In skirmish, and multiplayer modes, the player summons a champion from the city headquarters. Each race has four champions: which focuses underground gameplay on a party of individual units rather than the surface world's squad-based armies, and plays more like a role-playing game.
  • Gold: used to construct units and buildings. Buildings generate a small amount of gold over time,

Experience points

Experience points in Dragonshard are assigned to a global pool. The player spends experience points at unit-producing structures to level up captains. Once the player levels up a captain type, all captains of that type belonging to the player are leveled up, and new captains of the type start at the upgraded level. To train a captain above level two, the player must build two or more unit-producing structures of the same type in the same group of four building pads. To reach the maximum captain level of five, the player must fill a group of four building pads with four unit-producing structures of the same type. Instead of filling a group of four pads to maximize a captain's level, the player may opt to build one or more monuments that grant bonuses to all unit types produced from adjacent buildings. Champions do not level up but they can be upgraded in campaign mode with "Champion Artifacts".

Game modes

Dragonshard has single-player campaigns for the Order of the Flame and Lizardfolk factions, each of which includes seven missions,

Order of the Flame

The Order of the Flame is the military wing of the Church of the Silver Flame, an organization dedicated to banishing evil. The Order of the Flame is an alliance of cultures and traditions including humans, dwarves, halflings, and celestials. Led by the cleric Lady Marryn and guided by the Dwarven shaman Amathor, the Order travelled to the Ring of Storms to capture the Heart of Siberys and claim its magical power, but were annihilated by the Lizardfolk in a cataclysmic battle for the Heart of Siberys. Amathor, the Titan Bastion and barely an eighth of the original population of the Order's followers escaped to their spaceports so that they could evacuate from Eberron and set course for pastures new. The Order of the Flame can recruit Archons of the heavens, mighty Warforged Titans, fierce Sorcerers and Deathless Guardians.

Umbragen

The Umbragen are rumored to be the remnants of a race of elves that inhabited the ancient city Qalatesh. Qalatesh was destroyed and sank into Khyber after an apocalyptic shard storm, some survivors of the storm fled into Khyber. To survive against the horrors of Khyber, these elves harnessed Khyber's dark energies and integrated them into their culture, becoming the Umbragen. Led by the evil Satros, their goal is to drain the Heart of its power and use it to unlock the secrets of the ruins of Qalatesh. The Umbragen has dark shadow creatures, including flying demons and knights of darkness.

Lizardfolk

The lizardfolk are the native inhabitants of the Ring of Storms. They are rumored to have been placed in the region by dragons to protect the Heart of Siberys. Over time, exposure to the energies of the Heart altered them and granted them sentience. They were united by the hero Darroc, who sacrificed his life to defend the Heart from Order of the Flame invaders. The lizardfolk lived in peace for centuries since Darroc's death, but the Order and Umbragen incursions forced them to take up arms again. Darroc was resurrected later on by the four greatest living heroes of the Lizardfolk people; Redfang the Drakelord, Silverblade the Yuan-ti Pureblood, Wowen the High Shaman and Blackclaw the Master of Decay, and oversaw the bonding of the War Feldrakes for use in the coming war, but was later destroyed for the second and last time when the Ilithid Enchanter Orobus pulled down an especially huge Dragonshard that smashed Darroc's avatar to pieces. Lizardfolk focus on brute force, with units such as giant turtles and dragons.

Reception

Dragonshard received generally positive reviews from the gaming press. The main criticism for the game was that it had a short single-player mode, underscored by the complete lack of an Umbragen campaign.

The editors of Computer Games Magazine named Dragonshard the sixth-best computer game of 2005. They wrote that the game brings more ideas than other D&D games.

See also

  • List of Dungeons & Dragons video games

References

  • (archived)