In my setting, Axeoth, the continent of Lushria, is home to dinosaurs from all 3 periods. Lushria is a tropical continent, and when I created it, it was meant to be based on South America. (Because the Jurassic franchise is set off the coast of Costa Rica and I had already filled the other continents) Thus, I have modified the species who lived in non tropical climates and remade them for tropical climates. Thus, you probably won't find Dinosaurs as we know think they looked and will get outdated looks. But I have decided that their skeletal features, and currently believed behaviors and diets, remain mostly in tact.

Since Lushria is based on South America, I populated the continent with South American animals as well. And the reason why Anacondas and Jaguar's have been able to coexist with T. Rexes and Velocipraptor's, is because in Axeoth, I created my own version of the Tree of Life. Partially based on the one created by Disney for The Lion Guard, this tree keeps Axeoth's wild working in a way that defies modern science, allowing animals living and extinct in the real world to coexist. And in some parts of Axeoth, the connection is stronger, allowing certain wilds to be exist partially outside of reality, making them bigger on the inside, enough for animals normally meant for different ecosystems to coexist. And Lushria, is the largest of these spots.

And since real life Velocirators were not that big, and the biggest raptor dinosaur looked nothing like the movies, I created a number of fictional species that the locals of Lushria use as beasts of burden and war. And this includes a pack hunter that resembles the Jurassic franchises Velociraptors, and can be used as a mount.

All current real species of Dinosaurs I have are as follows

1. Allosaurus

2. Ankylosaurus

3. Apatosaurus

4. Camptosaurus

5. Coudipteryx

6. Coelophysis

7. Deinosuchus

8. Gallimimus

9. Herrarasaurus

10. Iquanodon

11. Kentrosaurus

12. Lambeosaurus

13. Plateosaurus

14. Plesiosaurus

15. Pterodactyl

16. Spinosaurus

17. Stegosaurus

18. Styracosaurus

19. Triceratops

20. Tyrannosaurus Rex

21. Velociraptor

What about you? How do you utilize Dinosaurs for your own settings and lore?

I have dinosaurs, but as the world is not earth, they aren't even close to Earthly ones.

That said, they are as accurate as my limited amount of research can make them, and I did use some Earthly versions as models to help guide it.

So accurate that a velociraptor is about as big as a medium-sized dog and the deinonychus antirrhopus has feather-like structures on its body.

I don't get too hung up on zoological accuracy in my own campaigns.  I'm fine having whatever dinosaurs feel fun in the moment in a "land lost to time" jungle.  I wouldn't have dinos running around in the wider world, however - I definitely prefer them to be a niche creature in a specific region.  

Well I have no issues with them in game, I mean look at Chult 

Dinosaurs are around, but the big therapods like Tyrannosaurus or Giganotosaurus aren't interested in chasing human-sized prey.  Not worth the effort to eat something that small.  They typically only attack if someone gets too close to their eggs or babies.  It's the smaller ones like Dakotaraptor and Baryonyx that will hunt humanoids.

If and when I use dinosaurs, their level of 'real' is roughly equivalent with dinosaurs in World of Warcraft.

Quote from Acromos >>

If and when I use dinosaurs, their level of 'real' is roughly equivalent with dinosaurs in World of Warcraft.

 I can relate to that paradigm

Quote from Erik_Soong >>

So accurate that a velociraptor is about as big as a medium-sized dog and the deinonychus antirrhopus has feather-like structures on its body.

 Probably. The raptor dinosaurs popular in the Jurassic franchise and King Kong, their a fictional species used by Lushria's sentient races as cavalry. Does anyone actually know if there were species of raptor dinosaurs who were that big and looked like that? Or are they just movie inventions?

I have them tucked away in a corner of the world for fun and excitement. I don't worry at all about accurately depicting the proper set of dinosaurs from the Earth timeline. I just use what feels fun and enjoy it.

That said, they are extremely rare in my setting.

Quote from DruidofMN >>

Quote from Erik_Soong >>

So accurate that a velociraptor is about as big as a medium-sized dog and the deinonychus antirrhopus has feather-like structures on its body.

 Probably. The raptor dinosaurs popular in the Jurassic franchise and King Kong, their a fictional species used by Lushria's sentient races as cavalry. Does anyone actually know if there were species of raptor dinosaurs who were that big and looked like that? Or are they just movie inventions?

 Utahraptor, Dakotaraptor, and Archillobator all reached that size, but all three were discovered after the first Jurassic Park film was released.

I like to add magical tweaks and otherworldliness to my beasts, so I don't use particular real world species. My campaign world also lacks paleontologists and taxonomists, so big feathered raptors are called Racers, trikes and the like are Behemoths, sauropods are Shakers, and so on.

Quote from DruidofMN >>

Quote from Erik_Soong >>

So accurate that a velociraptor is about as big as a medium-sized dog and the deinonychus antirrhopus has feather-like structures on its body.

 Probably. The raptor dinosaurs popular in the Jurassic franchise and King Kong, their a fictional species used by Lushria's sentient races as cavalry. Does anyone actually know if there were species of raptor dinosaurs who were that big and looked like that? Or are they just movie inventions?

 It is very likely what they called the velociraptor in JP was actually a deinonychus antirrhopus. The size is about right for them and based on the skeleton, they look much like oversized velociraptors. Actual velociraptors were about the size of a turkey and mostly fed on small prey about the size of house-pet lizards and small birds.

I just looked it up and more recent examining methods have proven that both species had feathers, but were symmetrical feathers and thus, these were not flying species.

Quote from Erik_Soong >>

Quote from DruidofMN >>

Quote from Erik_Soong >>

So accurate that a velociraptor is about as big as a medium-sized dog and the deinonychus antirrhopus has feather-like structures on its body.

 Probably. The raptor dinosaurs popular in the Jurassic franchise and King Kong, their a fictional species used by Lushria's sentient races as cavalry. Does anyone actually know if there were species of raptor dinosaurs who were that big and looked like that? Or are they just movie inventions?

 It is very likely what they called the velociraptor in JP was actually a deinonychus antirrhopus. The size is about right for them and based on the skeleton, they look much like oversized velociraptors.

In the original novel they were Deinonychus antirrhopus, with Creighton choosing to call them Velociraptor because he'd consulted with a fringe paleontologist who had been trying to make the case that Deinonychus was actually a species of Velociraptor (something that basically no one else took seriously).  In the film, Spielberg went with oversized raptors that were almost twice the size of any then-known species because he decided that even the largest ones weren't intimidating enough (D antirrhopus only stood about three to four feet tall).  Robert Bakker, one of Spielberg's scientific consultants for the film, told him to go ahead and make an oversized raptor if he wanted to on the grounds that there was no reason that a giant species couldn't have evolved, and shortly thereafter, the first specimen of Utahraptor ostrommaysi was discovered and coincidentally was almost a perfect match for "The Big One" from the film in size.

Dang this thread's gotta long ass a name

Quote from 6thLyranGuard >>

Quote from Erik_Soong >>

Quote from DruidofMN >>

Quote from Erik_Soong >>

So accurate that a velociraptor is about as big as a medium-sized dog and the deinonychus antirrhopus has feather-like structures on its body.

 Probably. The raptor dinosaurs popular in the Jurassic franchise and King Kong, their a fictional species used by Lushria's sentient races as cavalry. Does anyone actually know if there were species of raptor dinosaurs who were that big and looked like that? Or are they just movie inventions?

 It is very likely what they called the velociraptor in JP was actually a deinonychus antirrhopus. The size is about right for them and based on the skeleton, they look much like oversized velociraptors.

In the original novel they were Deinonychus antirrhopus, with Creighton choosing to call them Velociraptor because he'd consulted with a fringe paleontologist who had been trying to make the case that Deinonychus was actually a species of Velociraptor (something that basically no one else took seriously).  In the film, Spielberg went with oversized raptors that were almost twice the size of any then-known species because he decided that even the largest ones weren't intimidating enough (D antirrhopus only stood about three to four feet tall).  Robert Bakker, one of Spielberg's scientific consultants for the film, told him to go ahead and make an oversized raptor if he wanted to on the grounds that there was no reason that a giant species couldn't have evolved, and shortly thereafter, the first specimen of Utahraptor ostrommaysi was discovered and coincidentally was almost a perfect match for "The Big One" from the film in size.

Brilliant piece of info! Thank you for sharing.

In my campaign world, dinosaurs only exist in the deep jungles, or in the savage lands (much like the savage lands from Marvel comics).

Quote from Jacqsynn >>

Well I have no issues with them in game, I mean look at Chult 

 And Xen'drik, Valachan, Mwangi Expanse, Gruul...

Also, what difference does it make. The dragons of my game settings are way more real than their real-world counterparts. And arguably, the same is true for dinosaurs. I could reasonably state that it's a shame the real world so poorly represents my sentient dinosaur scientists (which is a Doctor Dinosaur reference, in case anyone was wondering).

If anyone wants some really big Dino's you can also look at the MTG Planeshift: Ixalan setting which has some legendary CR30 Dinosaurs one of which has a constant Call Lightning effect active. Link to the wiki here : https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/Plane_Shift