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"The Dragon Slyrak sleeps within this armor, and the knight within the Dragon waits. Beware you do not wake them both."
Sir Davion, Dota 2

Everyone knows the classic tale of the Knight in Shining Armor and his quest to slay a dragon, often to rescue a princess from the dragon's clutches, or to claim the dragon's hoard. So what do you get when the dragon and the knight are one and the same? You get the Dragon Knight.

A Dragon Knight is a knight that assumes the abilities or appearance of a dragon, often combining swordplay with dragon-like abilities, such as fire breath. Sometimes a Dragon Knight is a Draconic Humanoid who has taken a knightly mantle, and sometimes a Dragon Knight is simply a knight with a dragon motif in their armor and weapons.

They may even be an actual dragon, though they're often shapeshifted into a humanoid form.

In any case, a Dragon Knight character is an easy way to add a touch of awesomeness to your story; dragons are cool, so it stands to reason that a Dragon Knight would be even more so.

Compare Monster Knight and Armored Dragons. Contrast Dragons Versus Knights. Dragon Riders, Dragon Tamers (If fighting's part of the job description), and (ironically) The Dragonslayer are almost always examples. They're usually a Magic Knight as well, and are another way Our Dragons Are Different.

Not to be confused with The Dragon Knight series of books, Kamen Rider Dragon Knight, the manga Dragon Knights, or Kung Fu Panda: The Dragon Knight.


Examples:

    open/close all folders 

    Anime and Manga 
  • Berserk: Grunbeld has dragon-themed armor, a flamethrower in his shield, and can turn into a dragon with scales that are harder than steel.
  • Digimon: A lot of Digimon turn into one of these in their later forms:
    • Digimon Adventure: WarGreymon, while it doesn't have the usual knightly aesthetic, is a warrior-type evolved from the dinosaur-like Greymon line, and significantly smaller and more humanoid than its prior forms. It wields a set of Dramon Killers that are the Kryptonite Factor to any dramon-species Digimon, it carries the Brave Shield on its back, and is much more of a close-quarters combatant than its pre-evolutions. Digimon Adventure: (2020) takes this further, giving it a massive size buff as well as a bigger offensive and defensive game.
    • Digimon Adventure 02: Imperialdramon's Fighter Mode resembles a warrior. This is taken further in the anime movie Revenge of Diaboromon with Imperialdramon Paladin Mode. Outside of the Adventure continuity, Imperialdramon PM is the founder of the Royal Knights and is their version of King Arthur.
    • Digimon Frontier: EmperorGreymon is a Dragon Warrior digimon with a BFS and fire-based abilities, including the ability to summon multiple dragons made of flame. Dynasmon of the Royal Knights is also one, having a draconic appearance and the ability to transform into a massive ethereal dragon. The two have a tendency to gravitate towards each other when the Royal Knights fight the heroes.
    • Several of the Royal Knights, an order of extremely powerful knights who serve as protectors of the Digital World and appear as either Big Goods or dangerous Knights Templar, are based off of dragons or flat out are dragons:
      • The clearest examples are Examon, who is straight-up a giant bipedal western dragon, and UlforceV-dramon, a more humanlike Draconic Humanoid.
      • Gallantmon, while visually a typical humanoid knight, has an alternate form as the destructive, purely draconic Megidramon, and some media suggests that the two are simply the same being when perceived differently.
      • In addition, a significant majority of Royal Knights evolve from purely draconic Digimon as well. Examon is the culmination of a line of increasingly powerful dragons, UlforceV-dramon and Magnamon both evolve from the humanoid drake V-mon, Gallantmon evolves from the dinosaurian dragon Guilmon, Alphamon is the ultimate form of the dinosaur dragon wolf DORUmon, Jesmon comes from the metal-plated dragon Hackmon and Omegamon is formed from the fusion of the ultimate forms of a dragon Digimon and a wolf Digimon.
  • In Fairy Tail, Natsu, Gajeel and Wendy are all humans who use draconic magic, which they all learned from dragon foster parents.
  • Future Card Buddyfight: They exist, but ironically they are not the cards called Dragon Knight (those are actually Dragon Riders). Rather, the ones closer to this description are the Armordragons, including The Hero Drum Bunker Dragon and The Rival Jackknife Dragon. Armordragons usually wear at least some armor and use weapons, although the Crimson Battlers prefer Good Old Fisticuffs.
  • Yu-Gi-Oh!: Season Four involves three knights who were transformed into dragons. Yami figures out how to return them to their human forms.
    • Joey at one point in the same season fuses his Red-Eyes Black Dragon with an armor card he's wearing and becomes Lord of the Red.
    • In Yu-Gi-Oh!: Capsule Monsters Joey again fuses with Red-Eyes, albeit this time it's corrupted by a cursed sword stuck inside its back, so Joey himself becomes possessed as well. Later, Yami Yugi uses the Duel Armor to fuse with Blue-Eyes White Dragon, and against the Final Boss he fuses with the four dragon monsters his friends and grandfather collected during the season.

    Card Games 

    Comic Books 
  • Nemesis the Warlock: Nemesis looks very draconic, and he's also an alien Magic Knight. Oh, and he can actually breathe fire, as well as levitate.
  • Venom: The dark god Knull is a humanoid deity clad in black symbiote-armor with red dragon emblems, which can manifest a draconic-looking helmet.

    Fan Works 

    Film — Animated 
  • How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World: The entire gang wears armor made from their dragons' scales. Snotlout's raid armor is especially designed to resemble Hookfang, his dragon. The hat routinely gets in his way, and the cape keeps getting snagged on things.

    Film — Live-Action 

    Literature 
  • The Beginning After the End: The main protagonist Arthur Leywin is a legacy Beast Tamer who was given his Beast Will by the dragon Sylvia, which allows him to borrow her abilities in combat. Not only that, but before she died she entrusted him with caring for her daughter Sylvie, who becomes his bond and frequently serves as his mount in battle. Later on, he becomes one of the Lances, the most powerful Magic Knights in Dicathen. In Volume 8, his mana core is damaged beyond recovery due to him overexerting himself in the climax of the previous volume, which in turn prevents him from using his Beast Will. However, thanks to Sylvie performing a Heroic Sacrifice to keep him from tearing himself apart in the process, his body has become part draconic. From that point onward he eventually finds a way to Re-Power himself through mastering aether, and he even gets access to an ancient suit of Powered Armor. In an ironic twist, at the same time he learns that the dragons were responsible for committing genocide on the ancient Djinn, who as it turns out his family are descended from.
  • The Dragon Knight: James Eckert, the titular Dragon Knight, is one of these as well as a Magic Knight. That being said, the Knight aspect is a bit of a lie - he isn't one, not that this detail doesn't make him any less awesome.
  • Magical Girl Raising Project: La Pucelle uses a dragon motif. La Pucelle's armor and swords have dragon-like markings all over them. The whole outfit is completed with dragon eyes, horns, and a dragon tail. In-Universe, La Pucelle's nickname is even "Dragon Knight".
  • A Song of Ice and Fire: The Targaryens, historically the ruling family of Westeros, have a three-headed dragon as their sigil. They have a mystical connection with dragons and in the past were Dragon Riders. After dragons went extinct, many of them remained Dragon Knights by motif if not by ability. Prince Aemon Targaryen, second son of King Viserys II and Lord Commander of the Kingsguard, was reputedly one of the finest knights in the history of the dynasty and was known as the Dragonknight.
  • Tales of the Five Hundred Kingdoms: In One Good Knight, the knight Champion Gina is transformed into a dragon so that she can be with her love Adamant, a dragon, while Adam's brother Periapt is turned into a human so that he can be with his love, Princess Andromeda. Adam decides that he wants to become a Champion, and he and Gina are the first dragon Champions.

    Live-Action TV 
  • House of the Dragon: Daemon Targaryen owns an impressive armor with dragon-like features, and possibly like in the books, he and the rest of the Targaryens might be genetically connected to dragons.
  • Kamen Rider:
    • Kamen Rider Ryuki / Kamen Rider Dragon Knight, for obvious reasons. Not only applies to the titular hero, but also their resident Palette Swap (named Kamen Rider Ryuga in Ryuki and Kamen Rider Onyx in Dragon Knight).
    • Kamen Rider Wizard can also qualify, as his powers stem from the Dragon Phantom within him, though he's more of a Dragon Mage than a knight.
    • The Riders of Kamen Rider Ex-Aid can gain a power up from the video game Drago Knight Hunter Z, which gives them dragon armor and weapons. Bonus points when Brave uses it, as he's knight-themed to begin with.
    • In Kamen Rider Build, Kamen Rider Cross-Z is another Rider with a dragon theme. Build can also borrow the dragon powers from him, but can't use them as strongly (as he uses mashups of two separate powers and so at best would only be half-dragon-themed).
    • All the Riders of Kamen Rider Saber are modeled on knights, and both Saber himself and his Evil Counterpart Kamen Rider Calibur have dragon-themed powers. Saber goes even further in his Mid-Season Upgrade, where he no longer channels the power of just a dragon, but a "Dragonic Knight" itself.
  • The Mystic Knights of Tir Na Nóg: Rohan's armor has a draconic appearance, which is to be expected given that his elemental power is fire.
  • Super Sentai and Power Rangers have a few of these:

    Professional Wrestling 
  • The Mexican luchador Drago wears a costume making him look draconic.

    Tabletop Games 
  • Dungeons & Dragons, unsurprisingly, eventually had to have those.
    • As occasionally depicted, the Dragon Highlords of the armies of Takhisis in the Dragonlance setting naturally tended to have a draconic motif to their armors, although in their case it was mostly cosmetic and they remained fully human (or whatever) underneath.
    • Starting from 3rd Edition, it was suggested that a non-negligible number of bronze, gold and silver dragons become paladins (although the degree they kept to a draconic motif when in an alternate form varied). Many of them go on to become great dragonslayers, since, being dragons, they tended to focus their specific campaign against evil on evil dragons.
    • D&D's 4th edition gives players the dragonborn — reptilian humanoids with a breath weapon and stat bonuses that happened to line up just right to make them potentially great paladins as well — as a standard player character race right in the first Player's Handbook. A female Dragonborn Paladin can be dragon, knight and damsel-to-be-rescued all in one.
  • Warhammer: The Dragon Princes of Caledor are noble scions of the elven realm who used to ride dragons into battle in ancient times. As dragons have become very rare in the setting's modern day, modern Dragon Princes instead ride on horses with barding fashioned after draconic scales, spines and frills.
    • Imrik is the greatest living member of those Dragon Princes: he is also very arrogant. He led his household during the Great Chaos Incursion to protect the sleeping dragons, and he took part in the Siege of Couronne defending King Charlen of Bretonnia. As his homeland is threatened by invasion again, he assembles the Dragon Princes and attempts to awake the dragons of Ulthuan.

    Video Games 
  • In AdventureQuest, both dragonslayers and dracomancers have elements of this.
    • Dragonslayers are a knight-like class with skills specifically meant to kill dragons. Their armor consists of a helmet resembling a dragon's head, and their ultimate class skill gives them the ability to summon the Fire Dragon to attack foes.
    • Dracomancers are a warrior-like class that harness the abilities of dragons to attack. Their ultimate class ability allows them to transform into a Draconic Humanoid.
    • Dragonfable, the prequel game, has Dragonlords, which are defensive Magic Knight class that uses the spirit of the eight main elemental Dragons to fight. Dragonlords in general are also Dragon Riders and have their own special (read: barely better) of the standard Fighter, Mage, Thief trio imaginatively named Dragonwarrior, Dragonrogue, and Dragonmage.
  • BlazBlue: Kagura Mutsuki is somewhat downplayed: He's a knight with a BFS and his moves have names related to dragons and have dragon imagery in them (and he sometimes shouts names of various dragons in different myths in his attacks), and... that's it.
  • Crystal Story: In Crystal Story 2, the protagonist is a dragon in humanoid form. His initial talent build is of a melee fighter, though he can specialize in other fighting styles later on.
  • Dark Souls: All three games feature the Path of the Dragon in various forms, an obscure warrior cult who seek to transcend humanity and become dragons, in emulation of the Everlasting Dragons of old. Progressing down this path will grant items that allow the user to partially transform themselves into a dragon, at least until the next time they die. Downsides: you can't wear armor. Upsides: Fire breath, and you look like a dragon, and in Dark Souls II the scales are actually a unique and fairly decent suit of armor.
  • Defense of the Ancients / DOTA 2 have the hero, Davion the Dragon Knight, who mixes dragon and knight elements and can transform into a full-fledged dragon. Unlike other examples of this trope, he fights as a knight, with a short sword and shield bashing... until he later transforms into a full dragon anyway.
  • Divine Divinity:
  • Dragon: Marked for Death: One of the player characters, the Warrior, is clad in a suit of living draconic armor formed from his body after making a pact with the Draconic Abomination Atruum.
  • Dragon Quest:
    • The series has dabbled with this with some of its monsters. The Dragon Rider line, introduced in Dragon Quest IV, is Exactly What It Says on the Tin; knights riding dragons. The Mandrake line of monsters introduced in Dragon Quest V are draconian sword-and-shield fighters. There's also the Hackasaurus line, introduced in Dragon Quest VI, that is only a little knightly by being bipedal dragons with axes but no armor — except for one variant in Dragon Quest X, Paladinos, that do have armor.
    • Both Dragon Quest VI and Dragon Quest VII allowed the party to learn draconic skills, as the Job System in each includes vocations based on monsters, including dragon options. VI in particular had just two monster vocations, and "Dragon" got one of the exclusive slots (the other was Metal Slime).
    • It wasn't until Dragon Quest VIII that there was actually a full blown Dragon Knight in the party: the Hero's Spear weapon-tree contains many skills that are typically associated with Dragon Knights. At level 70, the Hero is capable of learning "Dragon Soul", a move that actually calls onto the powers of Dragon. Two of the hero's special armors, Metal King Armor and Dragovian Armor even look very similar to the "Dragoon" Armor you'd find from the Final Fantasy series. The reveal of the Hero's true heritage as Half-Human, Half-Dragovian makes this go full circle and makes him a literal Dragon Knight.
  • Elden Ring has a few different flavors of dragon knights:
    • The Dragon Cult knights are the main bulk of the forces of the capital city of Leyndell; they worship the ancient dragons and wield lightning incantations.
    • While the Dragon Cult worships dragons, the warriors of Dragon Communion consume Dragons, specifically their hearts, to use their powers in battle. We don't see any Dragon Communion warriors in the game... except the Magma Wyrms, Dragon Communion warriors that have eaten so many dragon hearts they have transformed into pale imitations of dragons that can only crawl on their bellies instead of flying majestically through the air (just like in previous FromSoft games, trying to turn yourself into a dragon never goes well). However, the Player Character can get in on it by trading dragon hearts for incantations at either the Church of Dragon Communion in Limgrave, or the Cathedral in Caelid. While they can't consume enough to go full Magma Wyrm, their eyes will eventually turn yellow and slitted like a dragon's.
    • The Crucible Knights draw their power and name from "the primordial crucible of life", but in practice most of these manifest with a draconic theme, as the dragons are tied to primordial life - particularly the fire breath attack.
  • The Elder Scrolls:
    • The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim: Alhough not technically a knight, the Dovahkiin (literally "Dragonborn") can have elements of this depending on player build. The Dragonborn can also create dragon scale or dragon plate armor, and use fire-based shouts and magic to complete their dragon personage effectively and accurately. Extra dragon points if the Dovahkiin is an Argonian.
    • The Dragonknight class of The Elder Scrolls Online is exactly what it says on the tin, having the ability to breathe fire and grow scales among other draconic abilities.
  • Emerald Dragon: Atrushan is a dragon, who takes human form to avoid the anti-dragon curse that is placed on the human world. During his time there he dons armor and fights with a sword, returning to his original form only for one-off Limit Breaks, that hurt him.
  • Fate/Grand Order: Lancer Artoria Pendragon Alter wears armor that is clearly inspired by a dragon.
  • Final Fantasy: The Dragoons, who have a distinct dragon motif in their armor and are famed for their jumping attacks and spears. Oddly, the translation's name them for a type of real-world soldier that has nothing to do with spears, jumping, or dragons; they are properly "dragon knights" in the Japanese games. Translations of the SNES-era ran into Character Name Limits, and Woolseyism stepped in.
  • Fire Emblem has the Wyvern Rider class (also referred to by other names such as Wyvern Knights or Dracoknights, depending on the game), the Spear Counterpart of the all-female Pegasus Knights. In addition to mounting wyverns, their armor often has draconian-style plating.
  • Gorasul The Legacy Of The Dragon: Roszondas. The player decides whether he is a knight or mage; whatever the case, he can randomly manifest dragon-powered fear, strength, or fire breath as a Desperation Attack, and also has a passive Dragon Eyes skill to let him see farther than other party members can.
  • Guilty Gear has an example, but you'd never realise it unless you really pay attention: the protagonist, Sol Badguy. He wields a large sword and uses fire magic, and his true form is that of a humanoid dragon. He was also once part of a knightly order.
  • Halo: The Master Chief Collection's Season 8: Mythic features an unlockable set of armor that resembles knight armor with a dragon motif.
  • The King of Dragons has the Great Dragonian, a gold-armored dragon with Whip Sword, shield and fire breath.
  • League of Legends has Shyvana, who mixes dragon and knight elements and can transform into a full fledged dragon. Unlike other examples of this trope, she uses gauntlets shaped like a dragon's head.
  • The Legend of Dragoon has the titular dragoons who turn into powerful a powerful Winged Humanoid in dragon armor through a Power Crystal. Each character has a separate element and color that their dragon magic is themed after.
  • The Legend of Zelda:
  • MediEvil: The Dragon Potion (called Dragon Armour in PSP remake) gives Sir Fortesque a dragonlike appearance, invulnerability to fire and an ability breathe it.
  • Ogre Battle: The March of the Black Queen: Fogel, mightiest of the Three Knights and master of the floating island Shiguld, was transformed into a reptilian freak by the dying curse of a Divine Dragon. He kept his kickass fencing skills and got a powerful dark blade out of the deal, though, so it's not all bad. Defeat him as a lawful, popular Opinion Leader while holding the Star of Heroes, and he'll join your army.
  • Scribblenauts: Downplayed. The player can create a dark knight, or black knight, and his armor looks distinctively dragon like, complete with horns.
  • Sengoku Basara: Date Masamune is a samurai version of this. His name is "the One-eyed Dragon", his sheathes for his 6 swords have "webs" in-between that gives them the splitting image of dragon's wings, and the dragon imagery comes up in some of his attacks.
  • Skylanders Trap Team introduces Blades, who is a rare take on the trope as he's a full-fledged dragon that also has the rank and armor of a knight.
  • Soul Series: In Soul Calibur V, a Dragon Skull is available as Downloadable Content headgear, and "dark knight greaves" that look like a dragon's talons are one of the pre-order bonuses.
  • Tales of Maj'Eyal features the Wyrmic class, which is a two-hand-weapon fighter with nature-based powers taken right from the dragons, including six different types of dragon breath (fire, ice, lightning, acid, sand and venom), which effectively allow them to become multi-hued dragons (which are a kind of monster in the game). But beware — enemies (and not only dragons) can use these powers as well.
  • Total War: Warhammer: The Dragon Princes of Caledor, the High Elves' highest tier of cavalry, wear armor fashioned to resemble the dragons of the Caledorian mountains and ride horses decked in similarly themed barding. Their Regiment of Renown variant, the Fireborn, even wield flaming lances.
  • In Warframe, Chroma is based and inspired by this concept mixed with Nemean Skinning of a draconic pelt. His Prime version is a basically a Shout-Out to Final Fantasy Dragoons.

    Webcomics 

    Web Original 

    Western Animation 

    Real Life 
  • Real-life dragoons were not knights, but mounted infantry. They were named after dragons, an early wheellock firearm that was often carved with a dragon motif.

 
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Alternative Title(s): Dragoon

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Flight of the Dragoons

To slay a dragon, sometimes you need to fight like one.

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