In Dragons of Eberron, one can find the Sovereign Dragon Archetypes; Alternative rules for Dragons that switch out some bonuses they get for other bonuses.
Throughout the paragraph, it keeps making mentions of True Dragons. However, it never outright states (as far as I noticed) that only True Dragons can choose these options. It DOES however, mention that if a creature does not have the abilities that it needs to give up for this archetype (Mostly Cleric Spellcasting) it can still pick the archetype and simply lose nothing.
With that in mind,
could anything with the Dragon type pick a Sovereign Dragon Archetype, can only True Dragons pick a Sovereign Dragon Archetype?
Best Answer
Rules-as-written, it is unclear if lesser dragons can take sovereign archetypes, or what happens if they do.
The relevant paragraph starts
And then it describes how sovereign archetypes work for the “most [of true dragons, who all have the potential to use arcane magic],” followed by
Here “those” most likely refers back to “true dragons [who all] have the potential to use arcane magic.”
So we have rules for how sovereign archetypes work for true dragons who get some cleric spells, and for true dragons that don’t get cleric spells. What we don’t have are rules for what happens if a lesser dragon takes the rules, or even if that is possible. Thus the general consensus is that only true dragons can be sure to take sovereign archetypes, RAW.
And the “RAW” qualifier here is important because the abuse of these depends on RAW. Arguing that dragonwrought kobolds are true dragons, RAW, and can thus take loredrake, RAW, is a theoretical optimization exercise, not intended for a real game. In a real game, the answer to the question of how these rules are parsed is immaterial, because the fundamental issue is achieving a fun game. Loredrake dragonwrought kobolds generally are not that (at the very least, not for everybody else). Even real dragons with loredrake may be problematic (the rest are probably underpowered if anything and are unlikely to cause problems except with dragonwrought kobolds). So in a real game, some kind of houserule about loredrake and/or dragonwrought kobolds is simply to be expected because the rules-as-written are so problematic.