Calling all the more experienced role players!

How do you role play your Dragonborn's diet?

Do they do solely civilized foods you'd find in a typical tavern/inn; meals like stew, sandwiches, etc.? 

Do they scavenge rodents and eat plants like other reptile-like species? Or both?

I don't think there's a wrong answer because I've not seen it in any documentation of 5e (unless I missed it, please point it out), just curious what's common?

I had this posted under rules and game mechanics originally because 'Food, Drink, and Lodging' as well as 'foraging' are part of the game mechanics and rules in the PHB. But I got trolled by one guy and it got moved here. 

Just asking for some feedback from other players man... freaking forum nazi's.

My dragon born is tending to the mostly carnivorous side, a stew where everything is mixed together she may eat, but a sandwich she would take apart for the meat.  She is a Red and prefers her meat slightly charred but still rare, we also pondered and decided she was more a tear a chunk and swallow rather than chew eater like many lizards

That is helpful. Thank you :)

Gilvore,

I feel your pain.

I would assume Dragonborn have a culture of their own and therefore they have special dishes that are the staple of their diet, and certain dishes that are delicacies.  But, just as would have happened to you if you visited the orient in the 1700s, you would eat what they served unless you fell into some special circumstances.  A good social encounter could be built from that idea.

So what would be a staple in a dragonborn's diet?  What is the climate where they would be found?  The mountains?  Rams and mountain goats perhaps, and mushrooms, and things that live in or near conifer forests.

So I don't have an answer for you, but I hope I gave you something to consider.  Good luck and enjoy the game.

Dragonborn can have different Draconic heritage. It's possible that their tendencies differ based on that. Note that I typed "tendencies". Dragonborn are free to choose their lifestyles regardless.

I would expect they generally prefer meat over other foods, but I don't see any particular reason they can't eat other things just as well. I'd just use it as a flavor thing when ordering food or buying trail rations, kind of like a fitness nut on a protein heavy diet. You could also have your character develop a quirky preference, like the Lizard Priest from Goblin Slayer becoming absolutely enamored with cheese as an exotic treat because his people don't have refined dairy products.

There diet is likely to be as varied as they are. Since each Dragonborn bears traces of a primary dragon type (breath weapon scale colors, resistances, etc) their dietary preferences my trace back as well so you may want to note what the different dragon types eat and use that as a basis for variety.

I imagine some Dragonborn eat different things like some gold Dragonborn eating minerals and some green eating pretty much every plant

just pointing out, dragonborn don't have any molars(flat teeth) they cant chew plants. strictly meat.

Really, dragonborn eat whatever the player - or maybe GM - says they eat. Thematically though, they kinda oughta eat what their dragon ancestor eats, in my opinion. So, most likely eat raw or charred meat, and a few variants might eat meat that's been tenderised in either acid, or spending a couple of weeks underwater. And ... sure, I suppose some get by just fine swalling small prey whole. 

Maybe they need special stuff too - to feed whatever strange biochemistry enables their breath weapon? I don't know what one might eat that results in acid, or chlorine gas, or fire for that matter, but coal might be a thing, or large amounts of salt, or .. well acid could come from many sources, but the interesting ones might again require salt or sulphur.

Pretty disgusting to have to eat like .. bat guano. 

Quote from Acromos >>

Maybe they need special stuff too - to feed whatever strange biochemistry enables their breath weapon? I don't know what one might eat that results in acid, or chlorine gas, or fire for that matter, but coal might be a thing, or large amounts of salt, or .. well acid could come from many sources, but the interesting ones might again require salt or sulphur.

 fire. bananas. (potassium)

lightning. lemons, salted fish (electrical reactions)

acid. oranges or lemons. (citric acid)

poision. anything from coffee to ruhbarb. heck, there's trace amounts of arsenic in the food we eat (natural poisons)

cold. organs (nitrogen, witch is supercooled by the dragonborn's body systems)

Acid is not a problem - regular stomach acid is HCl but buffered to protect the stomach lining, the cells producing it could be dumping it into a separate silicified organ for storage. 
fire isn’t too hard either - the use of phosphate rocks (apatite) or silicic rocks (quartz) in an HCL rich “gizzard” in the digestive tract could produce phosphine or silane gases that could be stored and expelled igniting on contact with air. Chlorine isn’t too hard either - since stomach acid is HCl something in the digestive tract could be liberating the chlorine or storing it to create HCl. Creating a cold breath and a lightning breath are actually the hard ones. Lightning is somewhat easier as there are organic ways to generate potential ( think electric eel) , but the eel traps the subject of the charge between head and tail in a wet environment. Generating a directed bolt in a dry environment is harder. Cold pretty much calls for magic although there might be some sort of endothermic reaction that could be centered on the lungs that could generate a blast of cold air for the cold breath. But getting cold enough would be very hard.

Hm. Cold damage. Something with pressure? Like, liquid nitrogen? Not precisely sure why it's be cold, though. How much does it cool when it decompresses?

Eh, maybe we should just handwave that one as magic =D

How much it cools depends on how large the pressure differential is. However if it’s an expanding gas the greater the pressure differential the greater the velocity of the gas’s so if it’s under high enough pressure to be ultra cold it’s also at high enough velocity that it should be doing bludgeoning damage as well as cold damage. 

There's really no way to remotely have a freezing effect like that biologically.  The best you could get is two chemicals that when mixed undergo a strongly endothermic reaction but even that's not really going to be sufficient to cause multiple d10s worth of tissue damage.

As far as dragonborn and plant matter goes, lacking molars (if they actually do so, I don't believe I've ever seen a canon image of their full dental arrangement) doesn't mean they can't eat plants.  It just means they can't chew their food before swallowing it, which is true for all species of birds, reptiles, and amphibians anyway.  It's really not that big an issue.

Hate to say it, but guys; did you look on the timestamp of the first post? I'm not sure this is relevant anymore. (Though you guys do seem to have started a good conversation about it...)

Quote from Wi1dBi11 >>

How much it cools depends on how large the pressure differential is. However if it’s an expanding gas the greater the pressure differential the greater the velocity of the gas’s so if it’s under high enough pressure to be ultra cold it’s also at high enough velocity that it should be doing bludgeoning damage as well as cold damage. 

 Well .. yes, but .. the pressure does start dropping as soon as it leaves whatever high pressure organ the dragon has. By the time it reaches the unfortunate player characters, they can at least hope it's mostly high pressure super cold gas. Although, to be fair - and completely unrelated to this thread - last time I used a white dragon it has equal parts cold damage and piercing (from the breath weapon forming icicles - essentially spears).