[3.5] Eberron campaign question

[AntiTrust]

I'm thinking about DMing a game set in Eberron and I don't think any of my players have played in the setting before. For starting knowledge should I just have them read the players guide? I sort of feel thats a lot of information your average character just wouldn't know. It's also got a bunch of side bars with knowledge checks to know more which seems odd for the players guide to have. Is there another Eberron that's actually better to get the players immersed, but leaving some of the juicy details obscure?

[RFLS]

First of all, I wouldn't be overly concerned with your players knowing more about the setting than their characters would, unless they can't control metagaming. Because of that, yes, I think they should read the ECS. Not only will it provide them with a general perspective on the setting, it'll give them character creation ideas. This is fairly important if they've never played in a setting that's similar to the pseudo-magipunk that Eberron is.

[Regitnui]

I'd agree with RFLS. I'm actually allowing my players to read both ECS and the Player's Guide as they want to. Of course, I do my best to point them to something in particular, like an elf wizard needing to read the section on Aerenal, or the ranger being shown the table of animal companions by region of origin in the ECS.

[kpenguin]

I'd say the ECS is honestly better than the Player's Guide for Eberron knowledge, even for players. the Player's Guide feels like a collection of Dragon articles on Eberron to me.

[137beth]

I'd say the ECS is honestly better than the Player's Guide for Eberron knowledge, even for players. the Player's Guide feels like a collection of Dragon articles on Eberron to me.

Seconded. Unless your players are bad at metagaming, it shouldn't be a problem for them to read the ECS. I've read every WotC Eberron source, and I can still play in it:smalltongue:

Also, a lot of the stuff that could cause "meta-gaming problems" are adventure-specific stuff which is left to the DM. So ultimately, there shouldn't be an issue.

If you want them to become more familiar with the world, you could have them read the non-mechanical portions of the 4e Eberron player's guide, which IMO is better written an organized than the 3.5 one. It is longer, but they can skip over the game-mechanics portions.

[Yora]

Expecting players to do some significant reading in preparation for a campaign?

Preposterous!

My personal experience, which I've heard from many other GMs as well, is that players won't read any background information you provide for them. There's always the small chance that one player might do it, and once when the stars are right, maybe even two. But even then you still have to explain everything again to those players who didn't.

I think with Eberron, you can actually quite well throw the players into the cold water. Just pick a starting point where the unique traits of the setting are highly pronounced, like Sharn or Stormreach, and have the PCs start as nobodies from the countryside, who don't really know much more of the greater world beyond their town.
Then you can have them run into warforged and shifters and getting attacked by dolgaunts and hobgoblin soldiers, and explain things to them by how the other NPCs they encounter react to those. So you might have a gang of street thugs, and they just seem to have to happen a golem with them wearing the same dirty rags. You only have to tell the players that they've heard that there have been iron soldiers build by one army in the last war, but they've never seen one in their small town. That's good enough. Characters usually know significantly less than you learn from a single quick read through a setting book. Veteran adventurers and sages would of course know about these things, but the PCs wouldn't be starting as those.

[Prime32]

I should note that much of Eberron fluff is written to be ambiguous. There will never be a canonical explanation for the Mournland, or for the warforged gaining sentience, so that whatever reason you come up with will be a mystery. Likewise most of the major NPCs have complex enough motivations that they could be depicted as heroes or villains.

For instance, we know Cardinal Krozen does some dark stuff in trying to protect the integrity of the Church of the Silver Flame, which he hides from Jaela. But is he doing it to protect an innocent child or to use her as a figurehead while he controls the Church himself? Is he using his religion as a veneer or does he genuinely believe in it? We know he tries to stamp out the extremists and demon-worshippers, but what is his view on people who believe that, say, the Flame appeared on a Wednesday rather than a Thursday? Would he risk hurting innocent people to get to the demon-worshippers or not? If yes, would he feel bad about it or just shrug and say it was necessary?
The answers to any of these questions are supposed to vary from table to table, or even change over time due to the events of your campaign.

In short, spoilers aren't really a big deal.