Dragons of the Red Moon are an ENNIE award winner 2023!
It was a proud moment for Draco Studios when the three plastic dragons from our Dragons of the Red Moon set won a silver ENNIE award at Gen Con 2023.
We entered them into the ‘Best RPG Related Product’ category and were happy to discover a little while ago that they were nominated by the judges and went through to the voting stage.
The full list of nominees for Best RPG Related Product looked like this:
- Owlbear Plush, Metal Weave Games **Gold Winner**
- Dragonbond: Dragons of the Red Moon, Draco Studios **Silver Winner**
- Epic Encounters: Cove of the Dragon Turtle, Steamforged Games Ltd
- Improv for Gamers, Second Edition, Evil Hat Productions
- The Fablemaker’s Animated Tarot Box Set, Hit Point Press
We know a lot of Dragonbond fans voted for our dragons, and so we want to say a huge thank you to every single one of you for helping us to win a silver award. We genuinely couldn’t have done it without you, and we hope you’re as happy as we are.
We’re also delighted that the wider gaming community recognizes the craftsmanship of the talented creators we’re proud to call our own here at Draco Studios.
Since the company began back in 2018, so much hard work and effort have been put in by so many passionate people.
Winning this award is a recognition of that and also helps to bring the rich fantasy universe that is Dragonbond to a wider audience.
The Dragons of the Red Moon
The Dragons of the Red Moon were created as miniature accompaniment to ‘Great Wyrms of Drakha’, a 180-page book containing seven 5e compatible high-level adventures for your tabletop roleplaying games.
When we say ‘miniature’, they are 200mm gargantuan scale, so perhaps not so ‘mini’…
The concept art for all three of the dragons was done by Tom Babbey, and the sculpts all made by Dani Ehrli. We recently created a couple of videos that show the creative process behind our dragon sculpts.
Firstly Tom explains how he creates a dragon from a combination of nature, his phenomenal imagination, and a bunch of ‘scribbles’.
Dani then took that sketch, and, using his incredible talent, sculpted the 3D dragon in digital clay.
Truly mind-blowing.
Although these videos capture the creative process for our newest dragon, Vexzilon Izerxzes, the process was the same for the three that won the Ennies award. And it’s time we reminded ourselves of their scaly magnificence…
The ENNIES Awards 2023 Silver Winning Dragons
Aureus Fulgen
Baastherox
Kuxcoatl
It was only right that once we knew the dragons had been nominated for a 2023 ENNIE, the two people that were most responsible for bringing them to life were there to represent Draco at the awards ceremony at Gen Con 2023.
Tom and Dani collected the award, and had this to say in their speeches:
“This has been a dream of mine since I was a child. I want to thank the Draco team for bringing me on for this project. Thanks to all of you for voting for this—it means the world to me. I wanted to bring these kind of dragons that show real life anatomy into the world, that feel believeable, and the Draco team helped me make that happen. And it opened the door to lots of dreams since then. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart, it means everything.”
– Tom Babbey, Art Director for Draco Studios
“It’s amazing! This project was actually born in Gen Con. We came all the way from Mexico as a small company and we came here to scout out things and we wanted to do some great dragons, and then we found an artist who I love (Tom) and we said ‘let’s make them!’ And thankfully you guys liked them. Thanks to everyone who voted for us!”
– Daniel Ehrli, Creative Director and Sculptor for Draco Studios
It was a happy day all around for Draco to be among the winners at the 2023 Ennie Awards, and it only fires us up even more to continue pushing the boundaries in creating stunning miniatures for tabletops around the world.
To see the full list of Ennie award winners from this year’s nominees, check out the official list here.