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View Full Version : Eberron Uber-Campaigns and incorporating Sarlona (Spoilers alert)



Egiam
2009-01-14, 04:25 PM
This is a warning to players in Eberron games, this thread may easily contain spoilers. If you are a player, please do not read for the sake of your DM's sanity.
You have been warned.




Ok, so I have seen a whole bunch of ideas in the ECS that are just begging to be part of an awesome, ultra-epic campaign. Think Ashtakala, Lady Vol, The Spheres of Korrandar and Ran-Ishiv (Secrets of Sarlona), The Glowing Chasm in the mournland, Rhasaak, Slaying Khyber, a Daelkyr-based Apocalyptic invasion, The Quori and the change of the era (secrets of Sarlona), The Sulatar (secrets of Xen'drik) and the Apocalypse of fire, and a host of other ideas. These things are so massive that I just feel useless in trying to use them in a satisfying way that the players can feel proud of afterwards.

If any of you DM's in the playground sucessfully pulled one of these off or have an awesome idea, please share.

My second thing is Sarlona. Its an awesome idea, but I can't figure out how to include the Adar-Riedra conflict in a way that the players feel like Riedra is powerful, but not Player killing. I want to have the khorvaire born P.C.s in Riedra, fighting the inspired in a way that they can actually fight them without making fighting the devourer trivial. How do I get them there, Then how do I get them interested. Is it possible to have Khorvaire P.C.s motivated?

Am I asking the impossible?

Egiam
2009-01-15, 01:03 PM
Huh, I'm beggining to think that's a no...

Kalirren
2009-01-15, 02:06 PM
I ran a similar Eberron campaign on similar scale, so I speak from experience. Some things to consider:

Eberron is a rather anthropologically coherent world. It is the most such of any fantasy universe I know, even including many of those that are based off of the real world. I played this up when I ran my campaign, but even if you don't play this up, keep it in mind. Populations and ideas migrate together.

Idea: the giants evolved the drow by artifical selection as warriors against the Quori. Makes sense when you think about it; spell resistance, trance instead of sleep, immunity to sleep, resistance to enchantment affects.

Idea: The War of the Mark occurred 1500 years ago. That's about when the Quori started trying to take over Rierdra. Coincidence? I doubt it. What else was obliterated in Khorvaire aside from the aberrant and mixed dragonmarks?

Observation: Airships are meant to be stolen. The question is, how do you keep players under control once they get one?

Related Observation: If you use airships, be sure to work out the geometry of the world. Eberron's maps suck. I'm sorry, I understated; they seem to have been made with exceptional cartographic ignorance. Map distance does not seem to scale with latitude, as it must on any remotely spherical world. We decided to impose a mercator projection on the mess, which changed certain distances, but still made the entire mess workable. I recall that we concluded it takes about 1 month to fly over one quarter of the sphere in the pimped-up airship we had; so from the North pole in Frostfell (yes, we went there) to Stormreach, which is on the equator, was one month. For a standard house Lyrandar airship it would be about 5-6 weeks. This accounts for the existance of a sizeable "pacific ocean" that is not shown on the map, which we had to impose in order for the tropics to be at the correct latitude, assuming that the coloration of the Khorvaire map is reasonably accurate and that Eberron's axial tilt is the same as that of Earth's.

Related observation: Sharn is supposed to be London in essence, but do remember that it is at about the latitude of Vietnam. The surrounding mountain ranges suggest it may also have a monsoon season. Food for thought.

As for the whole Sarlona thing: What you ask is difficult. I had a advantage when running my campaign in that one of the PCs was an Adaran expatriate (Rationalization: Every two years, there's one boat that goes to Ardhemen, for the people who can't take it anymore. It takes maybe 5, 10 people every year. Maybe one out of 20 makes it out of Ardhemen alive.) I relied upon this PC heavily to move plot in Sarlona, since due to him it was possible for the PCs to maintain involvement based solely upon personal loyalties.

Realize that as the diplomatic status quo is given, any Khorvairean will likely have a far more positive impression of Reirdra than they do of Adar. The Reirdrans have brought up time and again, in the most sympathetic manner to nations that deal with internal strife, that they have their own parallel in Adar. As far as the Khorvaireans are concerned, Adarans are terrorists, separatists, nationalists of the worst kind. The only way you could get them fighting Reirdra on behalf of Adar is if you brought Adarans into the PCs' personal sphere. Paradoxically, that would greatly compromise their ability to infiltrate Rierdra, unless their connection to Adar was kept very heavily closeted. Perhaps only one PC need have a personal connection which he keeps secret, and convinces the other PCs that there's more to the story than Rierdra gives out. The other PCs could then better infiltrate Rierdra.

On the other hand, it would be rather easy for the PCs to be fighting Reirdra on behalf of someone else. As most historians would say, Rierdra won the Last War. It was the only nation whose gains were more or less complete on all fronts when all was said and done. They came out looking better to everybody. Someone on Khorvaire has got to be concerned about this. I would think it would be Aurala or Kaius, seeing as Thrane can't see beyond its own nose and Breland is too rich for its own good.

As for dealing with Reirdra itself: think of Reirdra as even further out than Communist China. In Communist China, the right hand does not know what the left hand is doing. In Rierdra, it's worse: the right hand does not know what the left hand -is-, much less what the left hand is doing. This is both their strongest point and their weakest. It is strong in that they are diplomatically invincible, even to mind-reading magic, and that it is impervious to domestic subversion, because no one communicates with anyone else except through the Quori. It is weak in that it is vulnerable to foreign subversion, which to some extent has a pretext for being interested in anything and everything, and is able to provide alternate lines of communication.

It follows that to trick the left hand, all one needs to do is pretend to act on behalf of the right hand. Having a diplomatically tactful psion in the party, or at the party's disposal, will help dramatically when dealing with an Inspired, or even posing as one. Then when you're talking to the right hand and things go awry as they inevitably will, blame the left hand, which no one knows what to make of anyway. The Inspired will sort things out in some way, but if these things keep happening, the Quori's masquerade will unravel piece by piece.

Keep in mind, the Inspired are people too. They're probably just as paranoid as the rest of the Reirdran people, if not more so because they have more to lose. They are probably very eager to get information on other regions of the world, especially other Inspired, that comes from sources other than the Quori. Their trust can be gained. If you can get them, as individuals, to be scared of altavars posing as the voices of il-Yannah, you have a good foothold. With operations constantly and consistently taxing the Quori machine, eventually a circumstance will arise that will leak the influence of the Dreaming Dark, even if it can't be named as such, and then once you have that, you're in very good shape. If you can get the Inspired to be afraid of the Dreaming Dark, as they well should be, then you can collapse Rierdra. Once the Inspired are -collectively- afraid of the Dreaming Dark, and would rather trust each other, then you've practically won, and just need to convince enough of them to blow up monoliths.

Getting your PCs involved in the area, at least transiently, or for the duration of a single mission, is definitely possible. Getting them involved against Rierdra in a chronic, meaningful manner is more difficult. Recognize that they may not prove to be a group cut out for the task, or that they may have to be supplemented by another agent. You may have to prime them with training in Khorvaire; infiltrating organizations, making them assume positions of leadership, yadda yadda.

Infiltrating Rierdra is a long project, one that I wouldn't suggest attempting before 9th level in any case. And that's -with- feat chains and prestige classes for the psion and the rogue that I had essentially homebrewed/adapted/constructed from existing mechanics for that purpose. I would suggest looking at the class feature "deep cover" in the PrC Zhentarim Spy (PGtF).

Stephen_E
2009-01-15, 04:40 PM
Wow!

Very impressive Kalirren.
I'm going to store that in case I get to run an Ebberon campaign.

Stephen E

Egiam
2009-01-15, 09:14 PM
*jaw drops*

wow.... no, seriously.... that rocks.
omg.




DO NOT READ THE FOLLOWING IF YOU HAVE A DM WHO DOES EBERRON.
(he might want to use it, heh heh)
















Here is an idea that I just got (albeit cliched):
How about a maintenance system that the giants left behind? A later civilization that learned about their ancestors work build a machine to stop the deterioration of the binding of Dal Quor. The artificers realized that repeated "maintanance" would destroy Eberron, but another one was going to be needed in, say, 20,000 years. Good thing that they set it up, because the City-State was taken over by the Curse of Many (or whatever it's called). I imagine a book that is to fall in the hands of four heroes (the P.C.s, duh) destined by the draconic prophecy. It has 3 slots for a specific dragonshard of each type. When found, it is blank, but when the stones are placed within it, a certain section is revealed. The book would explain how to perform the task and explain all that awesome fluff in Secrets of Sarlona and Xen-drik.
It would also have maps to the ruins that hold the Lens's of Power. The lens's are something like "The lunar lens" or "The lens of elemental fire" or "The lens of chaos". Which classification of len's should I use?
The docent named Shira would make an awesome villain for this game.
The Dreaming Dark would be the villians, along with the Lords of Dust (The Quori want to stop it and the Rakshasas want to abuse it). The P.C.s would be originally hired by the Chamber, who see the P.C.s as the "chosen ones".

Do you have any more great additions?

P.S.
I faintly remember the giants like having explorers go to Riedra, could this be their motive?


Egiam

edit: thanks for the help with the tab! :smallwink:

Colmarr
2009-01-15, 11:02 PM
(could not get spoiler tab to work)

Take the / out of the first spoiler tag.

So [ spoiler ] [ /spoiler] instead of [ /spoiler ] [ /spoiler ].

Kalirren
2009-01-16, 12:29 AM
wow.... no, seriously.... that rocks.
omg.

Thanks. :smallbiggrin: I'm glad you thought it was good. I sure spent a lot of time in the shower thinking that stuff up...



Here is an idea that I just got (albeit cliched):
How about a maintenance system that the giants left behind? A later civilization that learned about their ancestors work build a machine to stop the deterioration of the binding of Dal Quor. The artificers realized that repeated "maintanance" would destroy Eberron, but another one was going to be needed in, say, 20,000 years. Good thing that they set it up, because the City-State was taken over by the Curse of Many (or whatever it's called). I imagine a book that is to fall in the hands of four heroes (the P.C.s, duh) destined by the draconic prophecy. It has 3 slots for a specific dragonshard of each type. When found, it is blank, but when the stones are placed within it, a certain section is revealed. The book would explain how to perform the task and explain all that awesome fluff in Secrets of Sarlona and Xen-drik.
It would also have maps to the ruins that hold the Lens's of Power. The lens's are something like "The lunar lens" or "The lens of elemental fire" or "The lens of chaos". Which classification of len's should I use?
The docent named Shira would make an awesome villain for this game.
The Dreaming Dark would be the villians, along with the Lords of Dust (The Quori want to stop it and the Rakshasas want to abuse it). The P.C.s would be originally hired by the Chamber, who see the P.C.s as the "chosen ones".

Do you have any more great additions?

P.S.
I faintly remember the giants like having explorers go to Riedra, could this be their motive?



Response spoilered for the benefit of those who didn't want to read the original suggestion either:


Your suggestion is actually quite similar to a rather pivotal idea from my campaign that we never really got to in depth because the PCs decided to go off and conquer Frostfell instead of stay in Xen'drik...namely,

Idea: The giants were crazy awesome mages in their heyday; one might say, even, the first true -wizards-, since the civilization before them was that of dragons, and dragons are -sorcerers- and psions. The giants built Stormreach, after all. There's a -reason- why it's on the equator.

If you look at the description of Stormreach you'll see that the giants knew whole lot about the planes, too. Since all of the wild planar zones and the Traveler's Curse are Xen'driki phenomena, one may easily infer that the giants were capable of manipulating the planes, and that their empire is responsible for the current state of Xen'drik.

This comes back to the lenses. I think any big-time giant artifacts would naturally be related to planar magic, possibly a Lens of Power for each plane. (Or each plane that existed at the time of the lenses' creation. Maybe the giants knew enough planar mechanics to make planes.)

Egiam
2009-01-16, 12:04 PM
He he he.... ULTIMATE PLANAR POWER!!!!!!!!!! :smallamused:

Now I NEED my players visiting every plane in the setting!!!!
(this is going to be great) So, an idea:
Throughout eberron are gates to temples on other planes. Each temple (a dungeon crawl) has a lens of power. For example: The lens of Shavarath is in a vault in a ruined castle, currently used as a fort for a demon brigade. The P.C.s know how to get in because of the book, but it still is not easy. In the vault is the lens and another dragonshard, this one showing the way to a half-submerged castle off the coast of a beach in Lammania, and a floating tower in the Azure Sky, recently taken over by a dragon, who just added the lens to his hoard, not sure what it does.
This whole time Shira is tagging along, being helpful, but actually telepathically communicating with the Dreaming Dark.

After they have the last lens, the book directs them to place them in a fortress in "Onuradin'anam", a place on a map exactly where modern stormreach is! :smallwink: *another dungeon crawl* they find a mile-deep chasm and the slots for the len's in a volcanic tunnel (Que epic fight with quori, leaping from platform to platform). I think you get the picture.


OOOHHH, even better idea! 20,000 years ago a giant wizard blindly following the prophecy went to investigate the LAIR OF THE KEEPER (tingles in anticipation) and got sucked in. All those years later the P.C.s (hired by the Chamber) are going through and find him. He bestows the book upon the players, and gives him the holy quest (que Legend of Zelda Music).

Thanks soooooo much for all those awesome ideas!

It's Xen-drik dungeon crawls on other planes!

It's Super Paper Mario all over again!

It's Epic!

(if I haven't said it yet, the book allows only the P.C.s to open the vaults)


What do you think, Kalliren?

Kalirren
2009-01-16, 08:47 PM
Not bad at all. Definitely not something -I- would come up with, but ancient wizards are just not my style, so no surprise there.

If it excites you, run with it. It's the only way you'll ever make your players excited.

Samakain
2009-01-17, 06:41 AM
Also prudent not to forget the Kalashtar shadow war against the dreaming dark, which is everywhere from what i've read. Small bands of psonically powered operatives dukeing it out in all the dark places of the world, last eberron campaign i ran introduced us to Salonia and all its wonders by comming across 4 soulblades fighting it out on one of the lower walkways of sharn, one of which ended up being a PC.

Something to keep in mind, the conflict is in Khorvaire, and in the streets of Stormreach and anywhere else you care to mention.

another thing to think about is how much does the 5 nations know of Salonia? the handbooks might give you a clue, but you don't have to run with it :)

Oh and Kalirren, great post, i am writing an eberron campaign now and while my players seem predominately interested in digging up shiny things in Xendrick your've given me alot to think about for future campaigns. And i agree with you in regards to the eberron maps, i'm pretty sure they where designed by a creature who resides in a universe with either more, or less physical dimensions as our own :P

hamishspence
2009-01-17, 06:46 AM
If campaign is running Epic, Player's Guide to Eberron has suggestions for incorporating epic content (and Artificer epic progression)

Samakain
2009-01-17, 06:54 AM
and breaking salonia like a raw egg, setting the monoliths of fire to the cries of the inspired, the sky of an entire continent red with the fires of rebellion, freeing millions of psonically repressed souls and helping Adar liberate a once proud land...

well damn

sounds pretty freaking epic to me :D

hamishspence
2009-01-17, 07:46 AM
high end, world shaking campaign doesn't have to be Epic in the level sense, but it does open things up. a Lord of Dust rajah is in Dragon mag- demigod level of power. The Giants apparently used epic magic, asnd possibly so did Argonnessen when they crushed Xendrik.

Samakain
2009-01-17, 07:55 AM
world shaking doesn't have to be epic no

But chicken doesn't have to be chicken either, you can get that soy-based faux chicken vegans eat. Only problem is it tastes like peanuts and ass :smalltongue:

As for the other huge campagin ideas, you said you had problems tackling them as a DM in one of your campagins? each of these is a focus, a single point to spiral your party towards, or let them choose which big bad there going to go after.

My person fav is Lady Vol, evil evil crone she is, take the 13th mark off her withered corpse and fashion me some type of hat.. o.O

Lords of Dust comes after her, Poor backward hands freaks need to be put down.

The BBEG i'm using for the initial part of my eberron campagin are the swords of liberty in breland, mucho fun to be had there.