Let's talk: Dragon Classes

As for the stuff I want to discuss at this moment:

Groncicle and Sand wraith should switch class

Start off with the reclassification topic. I think the one or two I'm really passionate about is Groncicle and Sand wraith. Groncicle I think should be in Tidal class. The only reason it's in the boulder class seem to be because they're relate to Gronckle and perhaps because they're tough and I think that's not it. and no I didn't class it as Tidal just because they relate to ice either. Groncicle is aquatic. They're excellent swimmer, can freeze water around it and it live in the area that's surrounded by water. (Look even the wiki are agree with me on this...heck even SOD description agreed with me on this) It has nothing relate to rock, doesn't eat rock and spit it back out unless they count snow as mineral. They're not even brute-based as far as the text said, they doesn't have bludge tail like gronckle, there body are more steamline and rely more on their ice power more than their brute force.  Like I said, it seems to only be in boulder class because of it relation of Gronckle.

Sand wraith. Sand wraith is the tidal class because they swim in the sand like water, they lived on the beach near water and that they're aquatic too okay yeah that's fair that's in the text as much as the text said about Groncicle being aquatic. but then that beg question of, what about Desert wraith? For desert wraith the only thing it has going for being in tidal class is for swiming in the sand like water. but absolutely has no water attribute whatsoever. and you can say "Hey that's subspecies, that's not fair" Enter, Wood wraith. Wood wraith is a wood living subspecies Snow wraith that's not relate to snow. however it'd still make sense for it to be strike class because their strike-behavior is still the same despite the lack of snow. I find it weird that sand wraith in Rise of berk despite being a tidal class dragon is the only tidal class dragon that's not given a tidal class hbitat. So are they the ground-based dragon that just happened to be able to swim? A dragon that has more going on about sand than their water nature?  Because of this I think they'd be more fiting to be a Boulder class dragon than Tidal. Because Hey if Groncicle is a boulder class dragon that is aquatic, so can sand wraith, right? The different being that Groncicle is more water relate than they are earth relate and Sand wraith is more earth related than they are water related. But wait. What about the mystery class. Sand buster is esstially a canonifield Sand wraith and they're in mystery and not Boulder right? honestly I'm not sure what's up with that either but i'd say that Sand wraith being a mystery class dragon (or heck Groncicle being a mystery class dragon) is fair game as well

Dragons I'm okay with their current class but can bring up an interesting discussion of they're in different classes

I think there're a lot of dragon fit into this but some how the only one I could think of right now is Buffalord. They're in mystery because they're so rare and surprisingly jack-of-all trade which is fair, but I also think their explosive and surprisingly firey demeanor can land them in stoker as well. I also think Stormcutter isn't as out of place in the stoker. since time and time again cloudjumper has demonstrate to have very powerful tornado fire

Sentinel? Sentinel made sense why they're boulder because they're pretty rocky but I can see them being Mystery too.

Class symbol

There're a very old thread here discussed how outdate the class symbol are and I don't want to dig that up all the way from 2014. However I do want to bring up that yes. The dragon class symbols with dragon on it is very out date, that's true. WIth Nadder still on Sharp and Zippleback on Tracker. But something need to be said that it's because those symbol ARE outdate and they do have the update one already which is this:

Which is the symbol they've been using after the changes for quite sometime now. You can see it in the maze, in the painting etc.

Classification based on action (and others)

When I discuss about why Stormcutter is in sharp class despite not having much sharp attribute similarly to Scuttleclaw, Raincutter etc. I reasoned that it might be classified based on their attacks. In hindsight maybe this classifiacation isn't as good if we just view dragon as their fighting skill rather than just being an animal that live day to day and doesn't need  to fight for their live all the time but let's role with it for now. what we got is something like:

Strike class: Speed and element of surprise. (would suggest Range and ariel as well but Deathgripper and Triple stryke kinda muddle the water with this one. I still look at them and have the word Strike pop up to them but that kinda beck the question of what about something like Speed stinger? What about ambush predator dragon that strike like Sand wraith, Sand buster and sweet death?)

Stroke class: Fire power. Most of dragon already have their fire attack so to be in stoker class they have to be more stand out on that field or is an average joe that doesn't or can't rely much on their physical attack ie. Night terror and Hobblegrint (weak physical body)

Sharp: Sharp Physical attack. If the dragon is kind of an average joe with fire and claw then they mostly rely on or standing out more in their physical attack more than their firepower.

Boulder: Brute Strength or ground attribute. Something like if the dragon ram its body or use strangle something with their body ie. Grapple grounder, Crimson goregutter. 

Mystery: Grimmick/Unique ability. Like singing song, hypnisize, collecting bone, etc.

Tidal: Being in Water (not action based)

Tracker: Tracking attibute. The dragon can be tough(Rumblehorn) or Sharp (Nadder) or firey but if they have great tracking attribute it negate all other attribute

Excerpt from the stormcutter essay of why it shouldn't be strike class

Tldr; Stormcutter is an excellent flyer but is not fast dragon. They're intelligent but intelligence should not be the main criteria of putting dragon in strike class. Their attack is not ranged based. Honestly they're quite average dragon with claw and fly and flight and the things it has going for them is the four wing which might not enough to place it in Mystery. Its fire power that well incredible is not its more standout enough compare to its massive four wing body which is stormcutter's most striking attribute; physicality. Stormcutter usually seen using physical attack like bird of prey and that huge talon on the four wing might be why it's in Sharp class

Average joe dragons

Been mentioned a lot prior to this already but basically Average joe dragon is dragon that, just shoot fire, flying and has claw.  And it's usaully a fair game if it'd be classify into Stoker or Sharp. Maybe the physical body is more standing out like Stormcutter, then sharp. Maybe it is small but has great firee power compare to their body like Terrible Terror. Then Stoker. 

Triple stryke-Deathgripper-Speed stinger???

I don't really have answers for this one, I just mentioned about it prior and want to bring it back up in case someone want to discuss about it. They're screaming speed striker but they're more physcial and less range and ariel compare to other Strike class dragon and Speed stinger isn't even strike but they share common behavior with both Triple Strike and Deathgripper. or maybe Strike really need to be ariel even though triple stryke are seen to be more comfortable fighting on the ground. Discuss?

Sand wraith(again), Sand buster and Sweet death???

Again much like mentioned prior, these three seemed to give me a headache as well. All has ground attribute, all are ambush predator, striking unaware prey (can also Put snaptrapper into the mix as well) yet two of them are mystery and not either boulder or Strike. Sweet death I can argue that much like Snaptrapper it has the gimmicky attribute going on. and it's true that when I see these three dragon, they don't exactly scream strike class dragon unlike Triple Stryke and Deathgripper, perhaps because yet again, Speed, Ariel, and firepower are not their most stand out quality and maybe Strike doesn't need to be solely about ambush predator. Discuss?

Strike description doesn't make sense

There're a lot of things that bother me about the Strike description. 'Vice like jaw strength and extremely intelligent" seems like something that descirbed toothless (retactable teeth) and they just put it as Strike class description because it described toothless or something that the strike class dragons has in common but not the main criteria to put the dragon into this class. On Intelligence, there're a lot of other dragons that are intelligent that isn't nesscary a strike class dragon. On jaw strength. With excaption of deathgripper---all their jaw strength stats are the joke. all of them has 6 jaw strength while most other dragons from other classes has twice more. which is why when I think a dragon is fit for this class I rarely look at these two attribute. 

Fear class

Fear class no longer exist because viking are no longer fearing dragon and that's not a very good enough excuse. A lot of people seems to want a fear class back. However upon further inspect I think I do understand now why they get rid of it. First of fear is rather subjective. One dragon can be scary to one and not the other. Secondly if we inspect Fear class original criteria, a lot of them do stard to muddle with Mysterious class even when they both exist at the same time. The dragons that were originally in fear class are; Flightmare, Snaptrapper, Hideous Zippleback while Mystery class(during when fear class are still existing) are Changewing, Boneknapper and smokebreath. Fear class are descriped to be scary, stealth, sneaky while Mystery back then are described to be well mysterious. Multiple head are kinda scary okay, Flightmare strikes fears in viking for generation okay but so is Boneknapper, a ghostly bone wearing dragon of the myth. or Changewing who is the textbook sneaky and stealthy so much so Viking know little about them. Or how Flightmare is as far away as stealthy as can be. Smokebreath is also stealthy and sneaky but also mysterious, shrouded in the smoke. You see what I meant now? Appearance is too subjective and Sneaky stealthy can also be seen as Mysterious. The water is too muddle for the clear classification between the two. Where is the line between being mysterious, being unique and gimmicky, being scary and being sneaky?

New classes

There's a lot of discussiong about the new class. So far I agree that there should be ice/glacia class for Groncicle, snow wraith(even though wood wraith would be the problem), Bewilderbeast, Windgnsher(still debatable) and Wooly howl. During this threat however, I start to agree now that there shouls be a poison/stinger class dragon for Triple stryke, deathgripper, speed stinger and slitherwing. there might be a little problem for dragons that do have venom like Terrible terror and Scauldron though but maybe their other attribute is more outstanding. do flightmare's paralyze mist count as venom?

Hmm this is why like I said, I see more the criteria of the mystery class being a gimmick dragon more than them being unknown or undiscovered otherwise, like you said Night fury would have been clasified as Mystery. I would argue to your point that Smokebreath producing smoke to masked their body and make them look like smoke demon land them nicely in mystery class on the same legth as the like of Boneknapper and Changewing like when the class first introduced tho.