The full sentence is “Their small, fine scales are usually brass or bronze in color, sometimes ranging to scarlet, rust, gold, or copper-green.” So a red one is kinda like a real life human with ginger hair; uncommon, but not weird. There’s also the bit about dragonborn with a particularly strong influence of their draconic ancestor shortly afterwards that says, “These dragonborn often boast scales that more closely match those of their dragon ancestor - bright red, green, blue, or white, lustrous black, or gleaming metallic gold, silver, brass, copper, or bronze.”
Rare, yeah, but still a valid possibility. But the main part I wanted to bring up is that the sentence you were referring to actually already includes “scarlet” as an ordinary colour, so the red one in the accompanying picture fits just fine
Or a one note one. But, while I like monstrous races as options, I dislike the trend of 5e to make our characters “special”, unique, or noteworthy before the adventuring even begins.
(If this is duplicated for some reason, I’m sorry. It tried editing and that didnt’ seem to take, then I tried deleting my original message and reposting. Not sure what’s up.)
Counterpoint - PCs are special and unique by necessity. The vast majority of creatures in whatever world your DM runs do not engage in the adventuring lifestyle. Many are happy to live quiet lives settled in relative comfort and peace. When you create a character, one of the things you need to think about is the impetus that sets them apart from those other people that don’t delve into musty old tombs and dank caves looking for trouble - otherwise, as soon as the PC gets their hands on a sizable sum of gold, they don’t really have a reason not to split and live like a king with the fortune they’ve amassed. Additionally, characters with class levels are de facto exemplary, and the intro blurb on each class description that everyone skips over to get to the meat of character creation includes questions that probe why your character is interested in sticking their neck out.
That’s not to say that you, personally, can’t play Johnny Hayseed, the Human Fighter 1 who signed up to be in the army with all his buddies and has no distinguishing features, traits, or characteristics that set him apart from the average person, but as a good player who facilitates the story the rest of the group is trying to tell, you will need a reason to travel with these weirdos who are all strange and different, and that’s going to be the thing that sets your character apart.
Official Dragonborn PHB description say Dragonborns are brown/rust coloured, with some being rust-copper green.
Artwork on the same page is a red scaled dragonborn.
The full sentence is “Their small, fine scales are usually brass or bronze in color, sometimes ranging to scarlet, rust, gold, or copper-green.” So a red one is kinda like a real life human with ginger hair; uncommon, but not weird. There’s also the bit about dragonborn with a particularly strong influence of their draconic ancestor shortly afterwards that says, “These dragonborn often boast scales that more closely match those of their dragon ancestor - bright red, green, blue, or white, lustrous black, or gleaming metallic gold, silver, brass, copper, or bronze.”
You omitted that the draconic colored scales are from extremely rare and isolated clans.
Rare, yeah, but still a valid possibility. But the main part I wanted to bring up is that the sentence you were referring to actually already includes “scarlet” as an ordinary colour, so the red one in the accompanying picture fits just fine
The player characters are generally adventurers fated to achieve greatness, for them the extraordinary is just ordinary.
Which is exactly the sort of origin that makes a fun character.
Or a one note one. But, while I like monstrous races as options, I dislike the trend of 5e to make our characters “special”, unique, or noteworthy before the adventuring even begins. (If this is duplicated for some reason, I’m sorry. It tried editing and that didnt’ seem to take, then I tried deleting my original message and reposting. Not sure what’s up.)
Counterpoint - PCs are special and unique by necessity. The vast majority of creatures in whatever world your DM runs do not engage in the adventuring lifestyle. Many are happy to live quiet lives settled in relative comfort and peace. When you create a character, one of the things you need to think about is the impetus that sets them apart from those other people that don’t delve into musty old tombs and dank caves looking for trouble - otherwise, as soon as the PC gets their hands on a sizable sum of gold, they don’t really have a reason not to split and live like a king with the fortune they’ve amassed. Additionally, characters with class levels are de facto exemplary, and the intro blurb on each class description that everyone skips over to get to the meat of character creation includes questions that probe why your character is interested in sticking their neck out.
That’s not to say that you, personally, can’t play Johnny Hayseed, the Human Fighter 1 who signed up to be in the army with all his buddies and has no distinguishing features, traits, or characteristics that set him apart from the average person, but as a good player who facilitates the story the rest of the group is trying to tell, you will need a reason to travel with these weirdos who are all strange and different, and that’s going to be the thing that sets your character apart.