I dunno, I think he looks all right without a beard. :)

It stems mainly from the sexual dimorphism of the full-sized dragons. Males are almost without exception larger than females, and in the gold subspecies the male has thick, bluish-black silky hair running down his backbone, along his jawbone and behind his arms. The tradeoff is that the female, who has no hair (other than eyelashes which are present in both genders) has far greater developed psionic powers, and since she chooses her mate-for-life, she has the power. Females are the dominant gender of my dragons, though males outnumber them about five to one. The most powerful elder dragonesses may be completely withered and aged, but they can kill the largest male instantly with a look and a mental flex. Sexual stuff is hugely important to the full-sized dragons, as they have huge fertility problems (they make love like crazy, and are famously passionate with incredible vigor and stamina---but females conceive only under certain very specific conditions!) Though the anthro-dragons breed as easily as humans they're almost as obsessed with their sexual lives as the full-sized dragons.

I must admit I was influenced by this Larry Elmore picture (the cover of the old D and D "Master" boxed set about 20 years ago:

http://home.flash.net/~brenfrow/dd/dd-mbox.jpg

Much of this carries over to the anthro-dragons. Pauly the Anthro-Dragon is proud of his maculinity and takes care of himself. So he has a beard, too. I personally cannot grow in a good looking beard, so my mustache compensates.

The regular anthrodragons will be very grotesque (at least the first few generations whose numbers will be significantly culled in battle) and be much more mongrel-ish than simply a dragon with human proportions. They won't look like things from the Isle of Doctor Moreau, though.

Short answer: draconids usually can't grow facial hair.

Longer answer: I was just asking because you seem to enjoy facial hair a lot, and I wanted to share my view that dragons tend to look a little strange with full beards. I've seen them with mustaches, much like the Chinese dragons of old legends, but I believe you're the first one to have created a race of dragons, anthro and otherwise, that have full facial hair like that. I guess it just doesn't do much for me, though I don't mind it, either. Still, I prefer him more shaven like that. *grin*

My dragons' features are generally Western, but there are some Eastern influences in them as well. The full-sized dragons are neither mammalian nor reptilian nor anything else (they are their own animal class!) while the anthros are mammals by default (because of the human blood, as well as the alien Yourubi blood species, which is mammalian despite having no hair anywhere besides eyelashes).

I haven't designed all the other subspecies (including one that is covered in fur similar to a horse's coat) but generally speaking there will be clear sexual dimorphism favoring males in all of them though the minority females are the dominant gender in all of them. Not too sure how many of them will have hair . . . originally gold dragon depictions were generally of east Asian descent, and of course the five-clawed Imperial Chinese dragon is a gold dragon. That's a big reason why my gold subspecies (including pureblood gold anthros) feature them prominently on the males. (Unlike the east Asian dragons, they have no mustaches.) However, since most full-sized dragon males do not become fathers, there are those who shave their beards. Some even goes as far as to file down the spines along their backbones (the spines are generally hidden by the hair growing along the backbone). The backbone-filing is usually done by some gay dragons. Gayness is openly accepted---after all, the 80% of all males who don't become fathers need some kind of sexual and emotional outlet, so why not? They are far more tolerant and far less inibited than most humans.

In the future I could draw a situation where the P-the-AD temporarily loses his hair (but keeps his spines). Anything's possible there . . .

My dragons' features are generally Western, but there are some Eastern influences in them as well. The full-sized dragons are neither mammalian nor reptilian nor anything else (they are their own animal class!) while the anthros are mammals by default (because of the human blood, as well as the alien Yourubi blood species, which is mammalian despite having no hair anywhere besides eyelashes).

I haven't designed all the other subspecies (including one that is covered in fur similar to a horse's coat) but generally speaking there will be clear sexual dimorphism favoring males in all of them though the minority females are the dominant gender in all of them. Not too sure how many of them will have hair . . . originally gold dragon depictions were generally of east Asian descent, and of course the five-clawed Imperial Chinese dragon is a gold dragon. That's a big reason why my gold subspecies (including pureblood gold anthros) feature them prominently on the males. (Unlike the east Asian dragons, they have no mustaches.) However, since most full-sized dragon males do not become fathers, there are those who shave their beards. Some even goes as far as to file down the spines along their backbones (the spines are generally hidden by the hair growing along the backbone). The backbone-filing is usually done by some gay dragons. Gayness is openly accepted---after all, the 80% of all males who don't become fathers need some kind of sexual and emotional outlet, so why not? They are far more tolerant and far less inibited than most humans.

In the future I could draw a situation where the P-the-AD temporarily loses his hair (but keeps his spines). Anything's possible there . . .