Bahamut is one of those legendary individuals from the lore of Dungeons and Dragons, a massive platinum dragon that rules as king of the good dragons. And also happens to share a name with a giant fish from Arabic mythology that holds the world on its back, but that’s all they share (hence, not including ‘folklore’ or ‘mythology’ in the classifications). I’ll be honest, I haven’t delved much into the lore–but when a literally gargantuan figure shows up in the house, it needs to be on the Monster Toy Blog!
The general history of Bahamut is as one draconic offspring of a dragon god; in the D&D lore, two siblings figure most prominently–Bahamut and his sister and antithesis Tiamat, a multi-headed queen of evil dragons (I’m not going to look, but I guess the other siblings just stand in the middle of them nervously). The presence of Bahamut and Tiamat has been a driver for many stories within the D&D lore. Bahamut is described as a massive serpentine metallic dragon, covered completely in silvery-white scales (so…platinum) with cat-like eyes that are usually blue but can vary with mood. Bahamut may also be found in a human form as an old man, accompanied by seven canaries that represent his accompanying seven wyrms.
In-game, Bahamut is of course incredibly powerful and associated with good, with no tolerance for all things evil (but still okay with violence…he’s a magic dragon after all). But this also extends to the human form–not to get deep into stats, but he’s a Level 36, with 1600 HP as the old man and 1300 as a dragon. If you don’t play…that’s a lot. And speaking of in-game, they do like to make figures, but Bahamut has been kind of uncommon, possibly because of the size–the various figure makers tend to keep things roughly to scale, and a figure of this size would have been quite a feat in the older metal figure days (oh Ral Partha…) But now, with the rise of the WizKids Icons of the Realms in plastic, it seem that they’ve been motivated to go all out. In general, most of their figures are small and reasonable with a variety of sizes in scale, but a few have required this highest size classification–gargantuan–and it’s awesome for those rare campaigns that use them (the level required alone would be a long stretch for most groups) but it means some massive investment in money and space. So of course my son, a DnD player and collector of their various larger and giant dragons, finally caved with this one.
So how does Bahamut look? In a word, impressive, standing at over 42cm (16.5″) tall at the highest point, and 44.5cm (17.5″) wide at the widest points on the outstretched wings. For those who need to know, DnD is generally a 30mm game (so, human figures are 30mm to the eyeline)–this is a scale then of about 1:60 but it’s not a hard and fast rule for the game. The figure is not particularly serpentine, but more of a traditional European dragon with a massive body and longer, sinuous tail. The pose is upright and semi-seated in a kind of three-point stance (think Black Widow pose–one foot, one knee, one hand on the ground) with one arm reaching forward; the tail curls around the right of body along the ground, and the massive wings are fully extended out, shadowing anything underneath him. The overall look could be taken as a giant ‘good’ dragon dispensing wisdom or orders; or it could be a dragon about to deliver a crushing smackdown with one hand. Maybe both.
The whole body is a metallic shiny dull silver with a hint of dark–so, platinum–which is fairly simple as far as their dragons go, but gives it an imposing look of statuary or even an idol. The only other colours are in the mouth, which is pink, with a purple tongue, white teeth, the characteristic light blue eyes, and black claws on the tips of the fingers, toes, and second joint of the wings. The paint is applied very well, with each tooth painted individually and with no apparent bleeding onto the purple gums.
In terms of sculpt detail, they went all out. Muscles are defined on each limb and joint, and skin is covered in naturalistic wrinkles and folds. Scales are picked out all along the body. They are small and somewhat diamond shaped along the back and sides, and on the upper surface of the arms, legs, and tail. The throat, chest, and underside of the tail is a single of wide, armored plates, edged with larger, thicker scales. Heavy scales outline the brows and nose, with very small scales along the face. There is a recurved horn extending out from each side of the head; there is a slight black wash on these horns.
The back features a tall, pointed crest extending from a single horn at the back of the head all the way to the tip of the tail; the crest is held up by long, sharp spikes throughout. The elbows feature a similar crest with 3 spikes. And when I say sharp, I mean stabby sharp. I’ve hurt myself a few times just handling the figure. The cheeks also have a flared, spiked crest, in classic dragon style. The wings have a leathery appearance, with heavy finger-like support spines; think a bat arm, but of course the wings are the 3rd pair of limbs. The body features several literal scar details including a few clawmarks on the neck and arm, and many on the wings. The seams at the legs, wings and tail are visible but not too troublesome.
The dragon model itself comes in one massive assembled piece, but there are a few accessories and even the opportunity to change it up. The tongue is actually removeable, and can be replaced by a massive silvery breath weapon–from what I can tell, Bahamut has a ‘cone of cold’ so I have decided that it’s liquid nitrogen. Whatever it is, it’s equally enormous, and sculpted with a hollow centre so that a standard character figure fits easily inside. The removal of the tongue is difficult so we haven’t actually done it; if the insert peg on the breath weapon is any indication, it sits deep within the throat. Attaching the weapon also makes Bahamut fill even more space on a shelf, which is awkward. But it can at least be set to rest roughly in place to fit a display.
The figure also comes with two small figures–one is a small human wizard-looking guy known as Fizban. This is the usual human guise used by Bahamut to move a little more discreetly than as a dragon the size of a hill. The other figure is a small ring of canaries, the seven companion wyrms also in disguise. The best thing about them is it allows a great sense of scale between a ‘medium’ character and a ‘gargantuan’ one. In terms of overall design, they’re fine. The Fizban is fairly well-painted with his fancy green cloak. The ring of canaries is a little more nondescript. If this were the Animal Toy Blog I’d have a lot to say, but at minimum, it look like 7 yellow bird shapes in a circle.
In general, this is an awesome, massive figure that is just really cool. Honestly not sure how often game play would call for it (again, it’s going to take a very long-term party of players to get to this level of creature) but would be great on the shelf. For those with the inclination (again, pretty high chance with RPG players) I think there is an unpainted version also available. It is a little less expensive, but I don’t think is otherwise much different. Speaking of expensive…this figure, like the other gargantuan models, is not for the faint of heart or wallet; they are more in line with statue and maquette prices. But for players of DnD and fans of dragons, it’s pretty awesome if you have the space!
… liked this!