In this Dragon City guide we will go through the basics of the game, and what you should learn + focus on at the very beginning.
A lot of this advice is best practise playstyle for Dragon City and may change over time. If something is out of date, confusing or wrong please reach out via the "contact" form in the footer! we want to update anything that isn’t useful to new dragon city players!
Dragons
The game cant be called Dragon City without Dragons!
There are currently 2007 in dragon city to collect
Dragons come in 6 rarities: Common, Rare, Very Rare, Epic, Legendary and Heroic On a high level these rarities determine how hard they are to obtain, their overall dragon stats and their usefulness. Dragons provide you with gold over time, can be powered up with food to produce more gold, and used in battles. Dragons have up to 4 elements, which determine the move types a dragon can learn. A dragons first element indicates its weakness in battle.
Habbitats
Each dragon element has its own time of habitat. these habitats house the dragons you collect, and can be levelled up to hold more dragons and store more gold before it needs to be collected. Habitats can be placed in any available space where you can place dragons and start collecting gold. it is advised that you collect a wide range of different habitats - and multiple - because having a larger number of habitats means you can collect more gold. You can read more about habitats here:
Gold
Gold is collected from dragons you place in habitats. Each Dragon in Dragon City has a unique formula and stats that relate directly to collecting gold Dragons of higher rarity usually have a higher income of gold. There are also some trends you can observe - Terra dragons usually have higher incomes but the habitats hold less gold when full - Ice and Sea element dragons usually have slower gold earnt, but habitats hold lots of gold.
Player Level and Experience
Player level can be observed at top hand corner of Dragon City. It does not have a huge influence over how you play the game, but at the early stages of the game, it unlocks new elements, and buildings you can access. Your player level will also be used in Leagues and Events to match you will similarly leveled players. in some cases it might be beneficial to NOT level up if you want to compete against lower level Dragon city players - as lower level players are usually less serious about the game, and easier to defeat.
Example of why you might want stay at a lower levelThe most common example of wanting to not level up is Heroic Races, where you race against 7 other players completing the same tasks faster than the other players - if your competition is lower level, they may be less serious players Heroic races award the winner with 1 heroic dragon, which are the best rarity dragons in Dragon City and significantly better than all the other dragons See our full player level guide:
Expanding your islands!
If you do want to progress through the game pretty fast by levelling, you will want to expand your islands pretty quick! There are 9 islands you can unlock without paying money on Dragon City. and the first 2 are unlockable just by clearing land (with gold) and having the appropriate number of Facebook friends. Unlocking these islands will increase your playable space, and boost your overall level progression, because you can collect more gold, and buy more food. The islands eventually only let you expand with gems, which is a shame. but getting to the first 3 islands can be pretty easy.
Events!
Events are our favourite part of Dragon City. They usually last about a week, and are cycled between different events. Those events include:
Heroic Races
Race against 7 other people completing tasks, rewards the winner with a Heroic Dragon
Maze Islands
Collect maze coins through normal gameplay and use them to free dragons in the maze
Puzzle Islands
Get puzzle moves through completing tasks, and use them in the candy crush minigame to unlock new dragons
Tower Islands
Collect tower coins through normal gameplay and use them to climb to tower and collect rewards
Runner Islands
Get runner moves through completing tasks, and use them in the temple run game to unlock rewards
Fog Islands
Get runner moves through completing tasks, and use them in the temple run game to unlock rewards
Check out our in depth Event guide pages here:
Event Information Pages!
Food
Food is purchased with gold, as also rewards XP when claimed. Each amount of food takes a different amount of time to complete. The cheapest food option gives the most food per minute but you have to constantly replant it every 30 seconds. This is where its more favourable to plant the more expensive food, because you can come back later and collect it. Food is used to feed to your dragons, which will increase their level
Breeding
Breeding in Dragon City is a little bit complex.
Some dragons are breedable, others can never been acquired through breeding
You can search the Dragon Book for the little Heart icon to see which Dragons are easily breedable. Dragons that are not breedable are usually acquired in other ways such as events, quests, summoning via orbs, or a limited time breeding events like breeding event island. For a full rundown on breeding, you can check out our Breeding guide:
Battling in Dragon City
Another use for your Dragons in dragon city is battling with them. this can be overwhelming at the beginning; however once you understand each battle process it can be easy. Most battles in Dragon city are turn based, so two dragons are placed in an arena and take turns to use their attacks. Each dragon has the same type attacks as their elements, It is extremely rare for a dragon to have an attack that isn't shown as the dragons elements. Whoever goes first in battle is random, so there is no way to ensure your dragon will attack first (which can be a big advantage)
There are 5 types of battles Arena Battles
Pick a team of 3 Dragons within the restriction of the Arena
(Eg Terra arena requires 1 Terra element in each dragon) Fight against other peoples designated team of 3 Dragons which you can see before starting. Winning battles lets you improve your ranking score and move up arenas.
Losing battles makes your dragons have a cooldown, and you can only battle 6 times before waiting to battle more
League Battles
Select your top 3 highest Dragons to battle. You will battle another player your level - you cannot see their dragons before starting battle You get 3 tries every 6 hours to complete these battles.
Quest Battles
Quest battles are either Permanent of Temporary sets of battles, that each give progressive awards for winning. The average level of each Quest battle is level 15 Dragons
Permanent Quests usually reward dragons, and are always available
Temporary Quests usually give something like Event currency or Dragon orbs.
These battles can sometimes have a requirement to use a specific Dragon in battle
Event Battles
When completing events like Heroic Race or Maze Island you will sometimes have to battle to progress in the event You will be placed in a 1v1 battle where you can see the dragon you need to defeat beforehand. Usually there are 2 or more dragons with cooldowns in between
Dragon Rescue
A special type of event is Dragon Rescue, where you must complete a series of 6v6 Dragon battles, once you select "Fight" you do not have control over which dragon attacks and you must watch the automated fight take place
