So how do you think 5th will handle the Eberron campaign setting. Or will it?

[Deadkitten]

So from the feel of 5th edition it seems like it is a low magic edition. So I was wondering, IF they are even planning on returning to the campaign setting, how would they go about it?
Is it even possible to represent Eberron with how the rules are designed in 5th edition?

[FadeAssassin]

The game isn't necessarily written so that you can't have a high-magic world. It just doesn't require magic items, b/c of B.A. (except at a certain point you better get a magic weapon or you won't be able to get past non-magical resistence)

But I think Eberron could work. You just need to understand that in a high magic world the DM would have to tak into account that magic items are more common when building encounters.

I think it could work though.

[eastmabl]

So from the feel of 5th edition it seems like it is a low magic edition. So I was wondering, IF they are even planning on returning to the campaign setting, how would they go about it?
Is it even possible to represent Eberron with how the rules are designed in 5th edition?

Having read the DMG, it looks like Eberrron will get revisited. I would presume that the Eberron book would wind up having alternate rules for magic in the world. It will be difficult.

Some thoughts:

1.) The rarity of magical items would be redesigned, making magical items somewhat more common on the whole.

The list of common magic items would be more substantial than it is in the core rules. This expansion of common magic items would allow artificers to craft the notable magical properties in Eberron more quickly.

2.) Presumably, there would feats which increase the speed of crafting. While players could take some advantage of it, the feats would really exist to justify NPC artificers/magewrights being able to crank out magic items.

3.) Dragonmarks would be achieved through either a dragonmarked version of a race (e.g. dragonmarked human) or a subrace (e.g. House Jorasco halfling).

4.) With a higher magic system, the book should also provide a revised system of calculating encounters.

However, as for artificers, I don't know how you make them as a character class. The magic portion isn't hard to duplicate, but the magic item crafting is very hard to do.

[Totema]

I'd presume that they would have a little chart or somesuch for readjusting encounter CR to accommodate the higher level of magic in the setting.

[CyberThread]

Why not, they took a high magic mary sue setting called Forgotten realms and made that default. While Eberron isn't as high powered, it has as much magic in low powered ways.

[Pex]

The Siberys Mark could be a feat with the prerequisite of can't already have a dragon mark. However, 5E feats don't use prerequisites, so either it's unique to Eberron or something else is done.

Warforged will be a problem because there will be players who want Mithral or Adamantium bodies. Giving the higher magic it may be ok to have platemail equivalent AC at 1st level. It's technically possible for a monk or barbarian to have AC 18 with the dice rolling method at 1st level even in generic 5E, granted rare. They may use the metals as material effects only instead of AC, such as Adamantine Warforged turn all critical hits into normal hits while Mithral Warforged might never have disadvantage on stealth. Warforged would be three subraces, Metal, Mithral, and Adamantine with the latter two providing a little more AC if not going all the way to platemail equivalent.

They'll have to make 5E psionics for Kalashtar.

[SharkForce]

forgotten realms is high magic. eberron is more like... I dunno... wide magic.

there's lots of magic, but it's mostly low level stuff, with the exception of crazy-expensive projects that you basically can only afford if you're some sort of nation.

so sure, there's magical streetlights... and the light spell isn't exactly high level now, is it? there's magical trains, but those are the work of hundreds of people and cost so much money that only an obscenely wealthy merchant house has them, and everyone else pays to use them. there are even magical airships, but again, not available to everyone.

you might be more able to find the lower tier of magical items, but people who can craft the really powerful stuff still generally have better things to do with their time, and even if they don't they're very rare.

edit: and I'm pretty sure I've seen prerequisites on some feats in 5e already. they're certainly a great deal less likely to have prerequisites, but afaict they still have them when they feel it's appropriate.

[Madfellow]

I don't think it would be too difficult. The DMG already has guidelines for high-magic games and for the rudiments of a magic item economy. Dragonmarks could be represented easily enough by a feat. So while I don't think it'd be difficult, I hope it doesn't happen for a very long time because Eberron... bugs me. A lot*. At the very least, I'm sure it won't happen until after Wizards has published rules for psionics in 5th. So there's that to look forward to.

* In case you're curious, it's mainly because Eberron takes the idea of magic and turns it into something mundane, something that everyone can have access to. It takes the wonder out of it.

[Justin Sane]

FR is Middle-Ages-ish, Eberron is more modern (seriously, they have telegraphs and credit cards). Overall, same magic level, just distributed differently. FR aims for the whole "abandoned artifacts of ancient ages" shtick, Eberron aims for mundane utility.

[hamishspence]

Alignment is a bigger difference - Eberron monsters had a much wider variation in their alignment than their core counterparts.

That said - 5e has moved away from "clerics can Fall and lose their powers" - which ironically is the same change that Eberron made - it removed "falling" for clerics.

[Knaight]

So from the feel of 5th edition it seems like it is a low magic edition. So I was wondering, IF they are even planning on returning to the campaign setting, how would they go about it?
Is it even possible to represent Eberron with how the rules are designed in 5th edition?

It tones down the minimum expectations of magic compared to D&D 3.0, 3.5, and 4. It's not low magic by any stretch of the imagination, given the existence of caster classes which get tons of spells per day, spells which still often have some pretty dramatic effects, and the continuation of casting mechanics in which using spells is cheap, easy, and pretty much doesn't affect permanent or even long term resources.

Eberron should still work fine. If anything, mechanics like attunement will help it work better, as that minimizes balance concerns for a magic item saturated style.

[Sindeloke]

Alignment is a bigger difference - Eberron monsters had a much wider variation in their alignment than their core counterparts.

That said - 5e has moved away from "clerics can Fall and lose their powers" - which ironically is the same change that Eberron made - it removed "falling" for clerics.

Clerics are actually the biggest real problem I see. Divine Intervention doesn't exactly make sense in a world with no interventionist gods.

[hamishspence]

Plenty of Outsiders though. I could see solars devoted to the appropriate deities, doing the "intervening", on their own initiative.

[Person_Man]

I think it would be pretty easy.


Write a low level spell called Enduring Magic. It takes 8 hours to cast, and has the effect of changing the duration of the next non-instantaneous duration spell that you cast to be Permanent-ish (maybe 1 year?), with the requirement that X spellcasters all cast Enduring Magic and the spell that want to make Permenent-ish together at the same time, and expend Y gold pieces as a material component, with the number of spellcasters and gold required increasing based on the spell level.

Now assume that the world is filled with low level spellcasters, but that typical D&D parties will still be relatively small.

That creates a world filled with organizations/guilds/houses of spellcasters and low level magical stuff. But players themselves can't churn out magic items. (Though they could presumably join a House or whatever and get some share of them, assuming they are willing to put in the hours required). It would also encourage Mage-ogracy governments, since the small number of high level spellcasters could band together to make high level magic Permenent-ish.

Now adjust your magic item rarity charts, add a few custom races and Feats, and you're set.

[silveralen]

Plenty of Outsiders though. I could see solars devoted to the appropriate deities, doing the "intervening", on their own initiative.

Stills seems odd for what is actually an agnostic world to have direct intervention by angels.

[Shining Wrath]

Stills seems odd for what is actually an agnostic world to have direct intervention by angels.

Quite frankly, Eberron botched religion. The deities are all distant and clerics can't fall, but the traditional D&D character classes are all still there with the same mechanism to obtain spells. How do you have a Paladin with no interaction with a deity? How do you have the Lords of Dust and demons, but instead of gods keeping them in check it's coatls?

They started down an interesting path - agnostic D&D - and then couldn't close the deal.

[Fwiffo86]

I don't think it would be too difficult. The DMG already has guidelines for high-magic games and for the rudiments of a magic item economy. Dragonmarks could be represented easily enough by a feat. So while I don't think it'd be difficult, I hope it doesn't happen for a very long time because Eberron... bugs me. A lot*. At the very least, I'm sure it won't happen until after Wizards has published rules for psionics in 5th. So there's that to look forward to.

* In case you're curious, it's mainly because Eberron takes the idea of magic and turns it into something mundane, something that everyone can have access to. It takes the wonder out of it.

This. So completely this.

Here here!

[silveralen]

Quite frankly, Eberron botched religion. The deities are all distant and clerics can't fall, but the traditional D&D character classes are all still there with the same mechanism to obtain spells. How do you have a Paladin with no interaction with a deity? How do you have the Lords of Dust and demons, but instead of gods keeping them in check it's coatls?

They started down an interesting path - agnostic D&D - and then couldn't close the deal.

Paladins don't have to interact with dieties. In fact, in 3.5 (when eberron was released) paladins were completely seperated from gods and were only tied directly to them in the forgotten realms (in 2nd edition at least, I don't recall the third edition setting mentioning it explicitly). Did you mean clerics?

Eberron was focused on the living races, so the idea was they kept alot of that in check. The Druidic orders, old magic spells from giants, and other intervention from the humanoid races kept things from spiraling out of control, rather than depending on gods to do it. A lot of people prefer this sort of narrative.

[RedMage125]

Stills seems odd for what is actually an agnostic world to have direct intervention by angels.
That's what's been the MO for Eberron since the 3.5 days. The gods may or may no exist, but the belief in them is not exclusive to the mortal races. There are celestials that also not only believe in the gods, but believe that they are their servants. A Solar is immensely powerful, and can easily answer a cleric's divinations.


Paladins don't have to interact with dieties. In fact, in 3.5 (when eberron was released) paladins were completely seperated from gods and were only tied directly to them in the forgotten realms (in 2nd edition at least, I don't recall the third edition setting mentioning it explicitly). Did you mean clerics?

Eberron was focused on the living races, so the idea was they kept alot of that in check. The Druidic orders, old magic spells from giants, and other intervention from the humanoid races kept things from spiraling out of control, rather than depending on gods to do it. A lot of people prefer this sort of narrative.

THANK YOU!

I was going to respond to Shining myself, but you beat me to it.

For some reason, people are entrenched in the idea that paladins get their powers from gods. In every pre-4e edition, they do not necessarily have a connection with deities. The 3.x PHB says "devotion to righteousness is enough".

Personally, I blame the 3.0 supplement Defenders of the Faith, which lumped cleric and paladins in the same boat, and from there, paladins were constantly portrayed with the holy symbols of deities on their person, furthering the idea that they served deities like clerics. Forgotten Realms had paladin orders that were all devoted to deities, but keep in mind that even commoners had to have a patron deity in FR, or be bricked into a wall in the afterlife. Hell FR druids worshiped nature deities, not nature itself.

Paladins are not "warriors of a deity or faith" they are "honorable knights" or "defenders of a noble cause". Pre-4e versions of paladins always adhered to that. Which is why that answer to the complaint "why don't evil gods have paladins?" is properly "because those who dedicate their lives to the worship of evil deities do not devote themselves to the ideals of righteouness and Good". 4e altered that, re-defining paladins as warriors of faith, allowing for the "evil paladin". 5e has removed the mechanical requirement for paladins to be Good, but left a lot of the fluff in place to support the idea that paladins are "usually" Good, thus trying to satisfy both camps in the paladin debate.

Re: Eberron and the Lords of Dust: The Sovereign Host does not actively oppose the Lords of Dust, individual entities of good like the couatls do. The Silver Flame is an active force of Good, and very real. There are still cosmic forces of Good and Evil in Eberron, there just aren't deities who exist as active individuals with agendas of their own.

[Yenek]

I'd also like to note that the Silver Flame is basically a depersonalised bunch of couatls (and Tira).

[Joe the Rat]

It'll be a different flavor, and probably an awesome show of a setting with different base assumptions, and variant rules settings by default. If you bake the assumptions of minor magic into the setting and its monsters, everything should even out. Heck, the ubiquity of common magics probably undercuts caster superiority, as anyone can have a bit of the batman wizard's utility.

There will probably be some edition melding to make things work, such as using the hermit-crab approach to armor from 4th ed. rather than fixed AC bodies for the 'Forged. (http://keith-baker.com/extra-life-hacking-the-warforged/)

[SharkForce]

I'd also like to note that the Silver Flame is basically a depersonalised bunch of couatls (and Tira).

could've swore the silver flame actually was a specific couatl and a specific rakshasa or something like that. which is why you get a lot of the not-so-righteous zealotry and persecution. there actually *is* an evil being in the silver flame egging you on to slaughter heathens in it's name.

[Shining Wrath]

I'm outnumbered, but I still maintain that having all the trappings of gods - religions, clerics, temples, celestials, fiends, planes with alignments - and then saying "but the gods are distant and no one has heard from them in like forever" is just weird.

I like Eberron, just not how Baker handled his agnostic world with full divine casters.

[Justin Sane]

I'm outnumbered, but I still maintain that having all the trappings of gods - religions, clerics, temples, celestials, fiends, planes with alignments - and then saying "but the gods are distant and no one has heard from them in like forever" is just weird.Try saying that near the Vatican. Proof defeats the purpose of faith, does it not?

[Pex]

I misremembered. A few 5E feats do have prerequisites, so there is precedent. However, the different warforged body types would have to be subraces anyway instead of feats as 3E had it since you don't get a feat at 1st level.

[WickerNipple]

Pre-4e versions of paladins always adhered to that.

Not always, 2e Birthright they chose and worshiped deities and got benefits from god selection the same way clerics do.

It's been done both ways.

To the OP: They'll handle a new campaign setting the way they handle all of them - by adding a bunch of cool toys and handwaving away issues like you're worried about, just like how Eberron always did with divine magic.

[Baptor]

Eberron kind of painted itself into a corner by being a campaign setting designed around a gaming system. Baker has admitted that he thought up the concept of Eberron by looking at the 3.5 rules for magic and thinking, "what if this were real, what would a world with this much magic look like?" Eberron was so insanely well suited for the 3.5 rules set it boggles the mind. Baker is one of my favorite designers/writers to date, and of course Eberron still works great with Pathfinder. :smallbiggrin:

That said, its not like it cant work, just that it won't work as well. Baker has said time and again that its only commonplace magic that's common; the things that would be available in the 18th-19th century on Earth but in magical form. Actual adventuring gear (i.e. +1 swords) were still supposed to be rare and expensive in Eberron. So this being said, all a DM would need to do is change a bit of flavor and Eberron would work just fine in 5e. :smallwink:

Baker has admitted himself, however, that the Dragonmarks in particular would present quite a challenge. :smallconfused:

[RedMage125]

I'm outnumbered, but I still maintain that having all the trappings of gods - religions, clerics, temples, celestials, fiends, planes with alignments - and then saying "but the gods are distant and no one has heard from them in like forever" is just weird.

I like Eberron, just not how Baker handled his agnostic world with full divine casters.

You're applying metagame thinking to the in-game world.

The clerics and priests and everyday lay followers in Eberron absolutely believe the gods are real. Just as much as the faithful in Forgotten Realms do. Clerics get their spells from the power of their faith, just like a cleric in 3.5e D&D can have no deity, and still receive spells.

When clerics in Eberron cast spells like Commune, they reach a powerful celestial-like a Solar-who also, likewise believes that the Sovereigns are real beings.

Not to mention religions like the Cults of the Dragon Below, who have very real forces with whom they communicate (the Lords of Dust); The Church of the Silver Flame, which reveres a very real force for Good (which has a voice in Tira; and of course, The Undying Court, the one unquestionably real divine force in Eberron, which gets power from the faithful, and is able to direct it with the consciousness of the collective power of the ascendant councilors. A power which has maintained a stalemate in a war with an entire continent of dragons.

Keep in mind in standard D&D, paladins, druids and rangers wield divine magic, and have no connections with deities. That, coupled with the "atheist cleric" options from 3.x, and you have evidence that divine magic does not (despite the name) necessarily come from actual gods.

[Baptor]

You're applying metagame thinking to the in-game world.

The clerics and priests and everyday lay followers in Eberron absolutely believe the gods are real. Just as much as the faithful in Forgotten Realms do. Clerics get their spells from the power of their faith, just like a cleric in 3.5e D&D can have no deity, and still receive spells.

When clerics in Eberron cast spells like Commune, they reach a powerful celestial-like a Solar-who also, likewise believes that the Sovereigns are real beings.

Not to mention religions like the Cults of the Dragon Below, who have very real forces with whom they communicate (the Lords of Dust); The Church of the Silver Flame, which reveres a very real force for Good (which has a voice in Tira; and of course, The Undying Court, the one unquestionably real divine force in Eberron, which gets power from the faithful, and is able to direct it with the consciousness of the collective power of the ascendant councilors. A power which has maintained a stalemate in a war with an entire continent of dragons.

Keep in mind in standard D&D, paladins, druids and rangers wield divine magic, and have no connections with deities. That, coupled with the "atheist cleric" options from 3.x, and you have evidence that divine magic does not (despite the name) necessarily come from actual gods.

Yeah, the idea that "the gods are 100% real and we have all seen them" comes mainly from the Forgotten Realms Setting post Avatar Crisis. Before that, it was like any other world, but when the gods were forced to walk the planet in human form it became pretty obvious that they were 100% real.

The Forgotten Realms thing, however, is an exception, not the rule. The rule is that divine casters receive amazing powers and wondrous miracles. They all claim it comes from gods, and most people believe it, mainly because they have no reason not too. Something is granting those powers, why not call such a mighty being a god? In the Planes, most berks call them "the Powers" because out there close to the gods its more apparent that they aren't really "divine" in a sense but just really, really, really powerful spirit creatures.

[Fralex]

Several (http://www.enworld.org/forum/5earchetypes/showentry.php?e=71&catid=1) others (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?367999-5e-Homebrew-The-Artificer-(of-Alancia)), including real-life actual Keith Baker (http://keith-baker.com/extra-life-hacking-the-artificer/), have already started work on their own interpretations of a 5e artificer. I see this as a good sign.

[Tenmujiin]

Didn't Keith Baker explain how you can do the copious amounts of low level magic items in eberron? Basically have them crafted in much the same way as non-magic items since they are mostly crafted from dragonshards or duplicate 1st or 2nd level spells. You can easily keep any balance effecting bonuses to the normal levels (and add powerful elemental binding and dragonshard items to the list of items) while having plenty of minor magic available. Remember that eberron was designed essentially as a world just emerging from the constraints of E6 (from memory the only NPCs with more than 8ish levels were basically deity figures, one of the deities was a lv16 half-dragon lich, and that one lv20 commoner) and so anything powerful is still going to be extremely rare.

[Madfellow]

Eberron kind of painted itself into a corner by being a campaign setting designed around a gaming system. Baker has admitted that he thought up the concept of Eberron by looking at the 3.5 rules for magic and thinking, "what if this were real, what would a world with this much magic look like?" Eberron was so insanely well suited for the 3.5 rules set it boggles the mind. Baker is one of my favorite designers/writers to date, and of course Eberron still works great with Pathfinder. :smallbiggrin:

That said, its not like it cant work, just that it won't work as well. Baker has said time and again that its only commonplace magic that's common; the things that would be available in the 18th-19th century on Earth but in magical form.

Yeah, this is what bugs me about the setting. Eberron does a few things well. I actually like the absent gods and the loosening of alignment rules, but everything else? :smallsigh:

If you want to make a modern setting for D&D, just do it. Don't go halfway with an "It's all magic!" handwave. The juxtaposition of modern trappings like the Lightning Rail passing through peasant farm villages with thatched roof huts just destroys any sense of immersion. Eberron doesn't feel real to me, because it's basically an officially published version of Tippyverse.

But I'm ranting. I should really stop.

[Knaight]

I'm outnumbered, but I still maintain that having all the trappings of gods - religions, clerics, temples, celestials, fiends, planes with alignments - and then saying "but the gods are distant and no one has heard from them in like forever" is just weird.

Avoiding the particulars of real world religion, I think we can all agree that the real world:
A) Has religions, religious buildings (temples), and religious practitioners (clerics). There are plenty of all of these.
B) Lacks the extremely interventionist gods of D&D. D&D cleric spells are fictional, and there are a bunch that pretty much consist of obvious direct contact with the cleric's god, which high level clerics can do several times daily if they want.

That leaves celestials, fields, and planes with alignments. The world already has tons and tons of non-human species (the MM pretty much covers this), and there are tons of planes, so this pretty much works out to:
A) A few classes of non-human species that are generally humanoid, and follow the benign part of the human pantheon, where each class has a loose alliance among each other.
B) A few classes of non-human species that are generally humanoid, and follow the malign part of the human pantheon, where the classes are defined by mutual antagonism between them.
C) A few planes that happen to be populated mostly by these creatures, where the environment and the population fit together well (which is also pretty standard).

I'm not seeing any issue here.


If you want to make a modern setting for D&D, just do it. Don't go halfway with an "It's all magic!" handwave. The juxtaposition of modern trappings like the Lightning Rail passing through peasant farm villages with thatched roof huts just destroys any sense of immersion. Eberron doesn't feel real to me, because it's basically an officially published version of Tippyverse.
The actual real world still has plenty of isolated villages built using extremely old techniques, often quite close to areas which use more modern stuff. For instance, the Thailand-Laos border is the Mekong river. There's a spot on it I remember seeing, where one side of the river (Thailand's) was a set of nice concrete stairs leading up to air conditioned steel and glass buildings. Laos's side was the river bank mud carved into the shape of stairs, leading up to a compound where the buildings were uninsulated bamboo, what electricity there was was run off of a generator, and there were way more structures that were cloth hangings on ramshackle walls than actual buildings. They were generally well crafted, but Laos is not a rich nation, and it shows. Now, this was ten years ago, and things could easily have changed since then, but the point stands.

Then there are plenty of areas with cell phone networks, but no real electrical grid, no plumbing, etc. Given that the real world can have all of this, a fantasy world having similar but using magic based technology seems entirely believable.

[Madfellow]

The actual real world still has plenty of isolated villages built using extremely old techniques, often quite close to areas which use more modern stuff. For instance, the Thailand-Laos border is the Mekong river. There's a spot on it I remember seeing, where one side of the river (Thailand's) was a set of nice concrete stairs leading up to air conditioned steel and glass buildings. Laos's side was the river bank mud carved into the shape of stairs, leading up to a compound where the buildings were uninsulated bamboo, what electricity there was was run off of a generator, and there were way more structures that were cloth hangings on ramshackle walls than actual buildings. They were generally well crafted, but Laos is not a rich nation, and it shows. Now, this was ten years ago, and things could easily have changed since then, but the point stands.

Then there are plenty of areas with cell phone networks, but no real electrical grid, no plumbing, etc. Given that the real world can have all of this, a fantasy world having similar but using magic based technology seems entirely believable.

Eberron isn't trying to model that though. Khorvaire at least is trying to model post-WWI Europe.

[Knaight]

Eberron isn't trying to model that though. Khorvaire at least is trying to model post-WWI Europe.

Post WWI Europe had plenty of rural areas which weren't exactly using the most advanced technology, particularly in eastern Europe. Just look at Russia. Train systems were being implemented at a wider scale, and had already existed to some extent for a good long while. There were also a bunch of people who were in the serf class prior to the overthrow of the Czar, who frequently lived pretty similar lives immediately afterwards, minus the parts directly dealing with the nobility.

In any case, while Khorvaire is clearly inspired by post-WWI Europe in various ways, there are other sources. Taken on its own, looking at how cohesive it is and not how much of a direct translation of post-WWI Europe to magitech, I don't see any particular issue. There are cities with developed infrastructure and high technology, including a rail system, as there was well before WWI. There are small villages without all that much in the way of modern technology, including a few fairly close to the rail system, which is much the way it was even after WWI. Being near rails does often correspond to some growth (look at the Western United states in the 1800's), but not always. This is particularly true if the village wasn't built in response to the railroad, and doesn't have anything that would warrant an actual railroad station and stop.

[Madfellow]

In any case, while Khorvaire is clearly inspired by post-WWI Europe in various ways, there are other sources. Taken on its own, looking at how cohesive it is and not how much of a direct translation of post-WWI Europe to magitech, I don't see any particular issue.

See, cohesive isn't a word I'd use to describe Eberron. If a person starts in a city and then walks out into the countryside, it's like they've suddenly traveled back in time by about a thousand years. The cities are living in 1900, the country is living in 900.

[Knaight]

See, cohesive isn't a word I'd use to describe Eberron. If a person starts in a city and then walks out into the countryside, it's like they've suddenly traveled back in time by about a thousand years. The cities are living in 1900, the country is living in 900.

Again, this wasn't always uncommon. Prior to a lot of the more modern industrial farming techniques, prior to common rural electrification, it was similar enough even in technologically advanced places in the real world. There were some substantial differences (e.g. commonality of building materials), but just look at what coexisted. There's the American homesteading movement, which involved a lot of sod houses, tools that wouldn't have been out of place in the 1200', dung and wood burning stoves for heat, etc. Meanwhile, at the very same time, cities were getting heavily industrialized with all of the machinery that entails.

Eberron meanwhile has a more dangerous wilderness, making the lines of communication and trade to isolated areas weaker. It retains a noble class, which siphons off the wealth from isolated rural areas that they might use to advance technologically. Even the cities aren't in 1900 in a lot of ways, the buildings remain distinctly medieval, the city layout remains distinctly medieval, the prevalence of magical technology is largely in major infrastructure places and in expensive devices for the upper class, whereas the industrial revolution involved mass production of tons and tons of goods. Then there's the matter of energy usage - the sophisticated networks of coal mining and transport that provided the basis for energy in the industrial period is gone, as is the drain on energy produced by lots of factories.

[RedMage125]

Not always, 2e Birthright they chose and worshiped deities and got benefits from god selection the same way clerics do.

It's been done both ways.


I'm sorry, I wasn't clear:

i meant in the core rules, "default" D&D, if you will. Because Forgotten Realms, like Birthright, required a deity. Those are setting-specific idiosyncrasies. Going by what's in the Player's Handbook for each (pre-4e) edition, paladins do not get their power from deities, religions, or anything like that. They are devoted to righteousness as an ideal.

[Forrestfire]

* In case you're curious, it's mainly because Eberron takes the idea of magic and turns it into something mundane, something that everyone can have access to. It takes the wonder out of it.

Out of curiosity, could you elaborate on this? I'm not quite understanding, probably because I've always seen it as the opposite. Eberron took D&D 3.5's magic (which is described as a science, at least in wizardry's case) and made some logical conclusions based on the stuff described... I've always found the implications of a world that reacts to having magic the way it feels like the real world would (i.e. exploiting the hell out of it, analyzing it, and improving it for widespread use) always held much more wonder than the alternative.

[Fwiffo86]

Out of curiosity, could you elaborate on this? I'm not quite understanding, probably because I've always seen it as the opposite. Eberron took D&D 3.5's magic (which is described as a science, at least in wizardry's case) and made some logical conclusions based on the stuff described... I've always found the implications of a world that reacts to having magic the way it feels like the real world would (i.e. exploiting the hell out of it, analyzing it, and improving it for widespread use) always held much more wonder than the alternative.

Exxon - Providing magical fuel for all your transportation needs.

[Shining Wrath]

Try saying that near the Vatican. Proof defeats the purpose of faith, does it not?

When the Vatican starts sending out priests in chainmail who can Cure Wounds you've got a point. When Solars start manifesting in my living room you've got a point. When NASA sends a satellite to the Astral Plane you've got a point.

Until then ALL the trappings means more than clergy and temples; it means fiends, celestials, planes, and granted spells. Eberron is very much not our world, the so-distant gods manifest their power in the aforementioned ways, and so faith takes an entirely different form there.

[Shining Wrath]

Yeah, the idea that "the gods are 100% real and we have all seen them" comes mainly from the Forgotten Realms Setting post Avatar Crisis. Before that, it was like any other world, but when the gods were forced to walk the planet in human form it became pretty obvious that they were 100% real.

The Forgotten Realms thing, however, is an exception, not the rule. The rule is that divine casters receive amazing powers and wondrous miracles. They all claim it comes from gods, and most people believe it, mainly because they have no reason not too. Something is granting those powers, why not call such a mighty being a god? In the Planes, most berks call them "the Powers" because out there close to the gods its more apparent that they aren't really "divine" in a sense but just really, really, really powerful spirit creatures.

Yeah, except that in every D&D universe since AD&D you've been able to visit the Outer Planes. And if you have the right connections, you can walk right into the Presence of Pelor, or Bahamut, or Asmodeus. People who do this are not common, but on most worlds of the Prime Material there's at least one living person who has, setting aside the worlds whose DM caps the max level.

Then there's Eberron, where the Outer Planes have inhabitants, but not the deities. And the dead don't go to the outer planes, they go to Dohlurr (spelling?). All the crunch of all the classes still works, but the very-much-assumed underlying powers ... aren't there.

[Knaight]

When the Vatican starts sending out priests in chainmail who can Cure Wounds you've got a point. When Solars start manifesting in my living room you've got a point. When NASA sends a satellite to the Astral Plane you've got a point.

Until then ALL the trappings means more than clergy and temples; it means fiends, celestials, planes, and granted spells. Eberron is very much not our world, the so-distant gods manifest their power in the aforementioned ways, and so faith takes an entirely different form there.

The thing is, these are all based on other non-divine things already in setting. There are already war mages. There are already tons of non-human intelligent life forms. There are already tons of planes, such as the elemental planes. The trappings are fit into an existing framework, where the one's that aren't clergy and temples already have obvious analogs.

[RedMage125]

Yeah, except that in every D&D universe since AD&D you've been able to visit the Outer Planes. And if you have the right connections, you can walk right into the Presence of Pelor, or Bahamut, or Asmodeus. People who do this are not common, but on most worlds of the Prime Material there's at least one living person who has, setting aside the worlds whose DM caps the max level.

Then there's Eberron, where the Outer Planes have inhabitants, but not the deities. And the dead don't go to the outer planes, they go to Dohlurr (spelling?). All the crunch of all the classes still works, but the very-much-assumed underlying powers ... aren't there.

Which makes Eberron unique, yes. That's part of the appeal, that things work the same way (clerics, divine magic), without necessarily adhering to the same underlying assumptions (the gods are basically powerful outsiders). Other underlying assumptions also do not apply. A Red Dragon in Eberron is just as likely to be Lawful Good as Chaotic Evil. People liked that Eberron took our normal assumptions about D&D and turned them on their ear.

Also, most inhabitants of Eberron are not very high level. Your major movers and shakers aren't any higher than level 12, most are much lower level. You've got one high level wizard in Droaam who's level 20, but most individuals aren't any higher than level 2 or 3.

[Shining Wrath]

Which makes Eberron unique, yes. That's part of the appeal, that things work the same way (clerics, divine magic), without necessarily adhering to the same underlying assumptions (the gods are basically powerful outsiders). Other underlying assumptions also do not apply. A Red Dragon in Eberron is just as likely to be Lawful Good as Chaotic Evil. People liked that Eberron took our normal assumptions about D&D and turned them on their ear.

Also, most inhabitants of Eberron are not very high level. Your major movers and shakers aren't any higher than level 12, most are much lower level. You've got one high level wizard in Droaam who's level 20, but most individuals aren't any higher than level 2 or 3.

I understand the appeal of the agnostic setting; I recall that most kings and what have you are level 8 at best.

I've been playing the game for 30+ years. There's always been some way to be a cleric or Paladin without worshiping a god; but it's never been the norm. The understanding was *always* that there were Entities out there granting spells and operating planes and doing deity stuff. I recall Gygax writing about a cleric falling and getting no spells granted until they returned with the Temple equipment from the High Priest of Isis, or some such. It's pretty hard to get a higher word of God on D&D than E.G.G. himself.

So along comes Eberron, and *poof* go the Entities, but all the crunch stays the same for all the classes that fluff (and sometimes crunch) wise relied upon them. It's just weird. If the deities go away, the crunch of the cleric class ought to change.

[silveralen]

I misremembered. A few 5E feats do have prerequisites, so there is precedent. However, the different warforged body types would have to be subraces anyway instead of feats as 3E had it since you don't get a feat at 1st level.

That's a pretty easy way to do it.

Or you could could decide warforged are semi modular, with the ability to change armor if taken to an artificer or possibly even in the field. Maybe the magic which binds them helps make such "transplants" go smoothly.

Considering things like the warforged juggernaut and the warforged magic items it isn't even putting too much strain on the setting.


I've been playing the game for 30+ years. There's always been some way to be a cleric or Paladin without worshiping a god; but it's never been the norm. The understanding was *always* that there were Entities out there granting spells and operating planes and doing deity stuff. I recall Gygax writing about a cleric falling and getting no spells granted until they returned with the Temple equipment from the High Priest of Isis, or some such. It's pretty hard to get a higher word of God on D&D than E.G.G. himself.

So along comes Eberron, and *poof* go the Entities, but all the crunch stays the same for all the classes that fluff (and sometimes crunch) wise relied upon them. It's just weird. If the deities go away, the crunch of the cleric class ought to change.

Again, the default for paladin was never to worship a god. I don't recall the third or 2nd edition PHB mentioning anything about a god granting their abilities.

[Madfellow]

Out of curiosity, could you elaborate on this? I'm not quite understanding, probably because I've always seen it as the opposite. Eberron took D&D 3.5's magic (which is described as a science, at least in wizardry's case) and made some logical conclusions based on the stuff described... I've always found the implications of a world that reacts to having magic the way it feels like the real world would (i.e. exploiting the hell out of it, analyzing it, and improving it for widespread use) always held much more wonder than the alternative.

That's how the modern world would react to it. If magic turned out to be some kind of force or energy that followed certain rules, then modern scientist would at least attempt to apply the Scientific Method to it and figure out all the cool ways it could be used.

But seriously, Eberron? Magic cars? Magic boats? Magic planes? Magic trains? Magic guns? Magic telegrams? Magic streetlamps? Magic newspapers?! Come on! Putting the word "magic" in front of something does not imbue it with a sense of wonder. In fact, it does the exact opposite; by putting the word "magic" in front of a mundane object, it turns magic into something mundane. If any random schmuck walking down the street will see a dozen magical items just on his way to work in the morning, then magic is no longer something special. For magic to be special it has to be rare. Mysterious. Dangerous.

Compare the Lord of the Rings trilogy to the Harry Potter books. Lord of the Rings has three wizards and one magical McGuffin. On the rare occasion that Gandalf whips out his magic, you know **** just got real. At the opposite end of the spectrum, most every character in the Harry Potter series is a wizard. The world is whimsical, yes, and comical at times, but there's no wonder to it. Hogwarts is one impressive piece of architecture, but that's because it's a bigass Medieval castle, not because of any inherent magical quality it might have. Dumbledore and Voldemort are impressive, yes, but only because they're the two strongest wizards in the world.

[MrSinister]

I am pretty sure if they give us an Eberron setting, they will just have a little ol' section explaining how to magic it up.

But man, this low magic focus thing... I wish they would quit name-dropping Strahd von Zarovich and give me my official 5e Ravenloft setting already!!!

ahem

[Ichneumon]

But man, this low magic focus thing... I wish they would quit name-dropping Strahd von Zarovich and give me my official 5e Ravenloft setting already!!!

I am 100% in favor of official 5e Ravenloft support. But what kind of support would you want? Ravenloft doesn't need much extra mechanical support, right?

[Forrestfire]

That's how the modern world would react to it. If magic turned out to be some kind of force or energy that followed certain rules, then modern scientist would at least attempt to apply the Scientific Method to it and figure out all the cool ways it could be used.

But seriously, Eberron? Magic cars? Magic boats? Magic planes? Magic trains? Magic guns? Magic telegrams? Magic streetlamps? Magic newspapers?! Come on! Putting the word "magic" in front of something does not imbue it with a sense of wonder. In fact, it does the exact opposite; by putting the word "magic" in front of a mundane object, it turns magic into something mundane. If any random schmuck walking down the street will see a dozen magical items just on his way to work in the morning, then magic is no longer something special. For magic to be special it has to be rare. Mysterious. Dangerous.

I never saw it that way, personally. Maybe it's just a difference in outlook. My first exposure to ttrpgs was D&D 3rd edition, which described (arcane) magic as basically a cooler version of science and technology. I internalized that bit of fluff from the wizard description and let it shape my perception of what's cool. Magic being incredibly mysterious, rare, and dangerous magic just doesn't feel "D&D" to me, given that it's a world where everyone becomes magical at some point (even if they're not technically "Magic" in the game rules). Magic is something that's pretty much everywhere in the default assumptions, at least (just look at the encounter tables).

The campaign settings have had thousands of in-universe years of mages smarter than anyone who has ever lived in reality existing, so unless some force is acting on Magic's development (like the gods in FR, or Vecna wrecking the rules system in Greyhawk and Planescape), it breaks my suspension of disbelief a tiny bit for magic to not be treated like that. Not much, but it's a little nagging feeling.

... Actually, thinking about it, I think the main difference in opinion is what constitutes "wonder" and "mundane." Magitech is wonderful and non-mundane to me, because it's (1) cool in my opinion, (2) increases the setting's verisimilitude, and (3) lets me extend the wonder I feel about real-world science to fantasy "science". Thought exercises on that topic (like, for example, how it's actually quite simple to figure out hit dice, ability scores, caster levels, saving throw bonus, BAB, and challenge ratings in-universe through the application of some magic and a statistical analysis) are incredibly fun for me, and it's fun to try to imagine how a world that runs on entirely different rules actually reacts to living in that world.


Compare the Lord of the Rings trilogy to the Harry Potter books. Lord of the Rings has three wizards and one magical McGuffin. On the rare occasion that Gandalf whips out his magic, you know **** just got real. At the opposite end of the spectrum, most every character in the Harry Potter series is a wizard. The world is whimsical, yes, and comical at times, but there's no wonder to it. Hogwarts is one impressive piece of architecture, but that's because it's a bigass Medieval castle, not because of any inherent magical quality it might have. Dumbledore and Voldemort are impressive, yes, but only because they're the two strongest wizards in the world.
I'll definitely agree with you there, although I don't think that's a fair comparison, given that Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter are entirely different genres of fiction with different expectations about empowerment of main characters (also, LotR had a lot of magic items (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=18413322&postcount=121), they just were mostly subtle or detailed in appendices).


... Back on-topic, I feel like a lot of Eberron's high-magic stuff can be replicated with cheap magic items that grant no real mechanical benefit. Sure, there's lots of access to magical healing and items and the like, but you can adjust the system's expectations so that everyone's assumed to have low-level magic, and the +1/2/etc items in the DMG are upgrades on top of that. Then add some dragonmarked race options or feats, a Siberys mark legendary item that doesn't require attunement (but has prerequisites), and fiddle with demographic numbers a bunch.

[Baptor]

OK first of all, that post on magic items in LOTR is awesome.

But back to Eberron. As far as magic trains and soaring cities transitioning to rustic rural zones being unrealistic, I quote my grandfather from a conversation we had not too long ago,

"I've seen amazing things. You know when I was a boy, I had to go out to a well we dug by hand and draw up water with a bucket. 1930 and it wasn't any different that it was in old Jacob's day. No electricity, no plumbing, and we used the bathroom in an outhouse. That don't mean they didn't have all that in the cities. You could go down to Hoptown and they had electricity, running water, automobiles, and everything. But out in the farms we weren't living any more modern than in the BC's. We had a few tractors here and there, but there was little else. By the time I was a young man in the late 40's everyone had electricity and running hot and cold water, and by the time I had your dad, everyone had a television."

Point is that in 1930 you had trains passing through agrarian societies that were little more advanced than houses hundreds of years earlier headed into advanced cities with skyscrapers, trolleys and radios.

[silveralen]

I am 100% in favor of official 5e Ravenloft support. But what kind of support would you want? Ravenloft doesn't need much extra mechanical support, right?

Oh, some rules for curses, how the plain interacts with not always lawful good paladins, stats for characters, and some options for ravenloft themed characters would all be nice. Honestly, just having a world overview for people new to the setting who don't want to track down an older setting guide would be nice.

More than any other setting, the adventure path+player handbook approach could work perfectly though.

[Safety Sword]

I am 100% in favor of official 5e Ravenloft support. But what kind of support would you want? Ravenloft doesn't need much extra mechanical support, right?

You do not need any "official" support. Making a truly horror based campaign is something of an art in itself however.

Filling the village with undead does not a Ravenloft campaign make.

Arriving at the village after a triumph hard fought and discovering that the villagers are all brain eating abominations who have just eaten your grandmother and are having your daughter as dessert might make it more hard hitting. Needing to make the choice between saving your daughter or your wife or slaying the vampire that sent the brain guzzlers to your home.

Ravenloft should be scary because of the inevitability of the evil forces being victorious, however strongly the few good people struggle. The art is in making it seem like there is just a glimmer of hope for the heroes. And then snuffing it out in a hundred unexpected ways.

Edit: And what silveralen said.

[Shining Wrath]

... SNIP ...

Again, the default for paladin was never to worship a god. I don't recall the third or 2nd edition PHB mentioning anything about a god granting their abilities.

Only if you're going to try to argue EG Gygax, who named the class, was unfamiliar with Le Chanson de Roland, which is the origin of the word Paladin. It is off-the-charts difficult to argue that those Paladins did not serve a deity.

Since EGG was pretty well read, I think you're on shaky ground.

[silveralen]

Only if you're going to try to argue EG Gygax, who named the class, was unfamiliar with Le Chanson de Roland, which is the origin of the word Paladin. It is off-the-charts difficult to argue that those Paladins did not serve a deity.

Since EGG was pretty well read, I think you're on shaky ground.

That is so irrelevant it hurts. Was he inspired by it? Sure. Does it show case knights who worship and serve a god? Yep.

Does that mean he incorporated dieties directly into paladin class design? Nope. He in fact specifically did not do so.

I mean, he was inspired by lotr, and we know how far off Gandalf is from a wizard in DnD.

Now, I'm trying to recall, but the orginal paladin was modeled heavily on the knightly orders. They were typically tied to institutions rather than directly to gods. This you had some who modled secular (well, as secular as things ever get in dnd) knightly orders, pledging loyalty to a country or monarch. Other did work for religious institutions, but the thing is they still didn't get their power explicitly from gods. It was odd, but that's how it was.

[obryn]

If any random schmuck walking down the street will see a dozen magical items just on his way to work in the morning, then magic is no longer something special. For magic to be special it has to be rare. Mysterious. Dangerous.
Magic in the D&D rules is (in every edition) about as rare, mysterious, and risky as a housecat. (It's plenty dangerous ... when you're on the receiving end of a very-precisely-targeted and perfectly-controlled fireball. It's just not risky, which is the sense in which I think you meant that word.)

Eberron acknowledges this, rather than trying to pretend that D&D magic is weird or spooky when every party has a wizard and a cleric, and is lugging around Bags of Holding, magic swords, and wands.

You can do grimdark magic in D&D, but the rules certainly aren't geared towards it, and it requires pretty extensive management and houseruling.

[JAL_1138]

and risky as a housecat

Housecats were death incarnate to first level characters until 3rd edition where you didn't roll for HP at lvl1 and got CON bonuses worth a dang. Bad example. :smalltongue:

[silveralen]

Magic in the D&D rules is (in every edition) about as rare, mysterious, and risky as a housecat. (It's plenty dangerous ... when you're on the receiving end of a very-precisely-targeted and perfectly-controlled fireball. It's just not risky, which is the sense in which I think you meant that word.)

Eberron acknowledges this, rather than trying to pretend that D&D magic is weird or spooky when every party has a wizard and a cleric, and is lugging around Bags of Holding, magic swords, and wands.

You can do grimdark magic in D&D, but the rules certainly aren't geared towards it, and it requires pretty extensive management and houseruling.

Actually, 5e lends itself to it decently, if you don't mind PCs being the exception to the rule.

Magic items are rare things taken from old ruins of forgotten civilizations. A fighter would rarely "trade up" magic weapons, he'd be lucky to see more than one in his life. Or maybe it isn't that uncommon for "basic" magic items to exist. The masterworks of the dwarfs, their runed carved silver steel weapons, might be equivalent to a +1 weapon, the mystical metal and runes allowing it to bite even those beings not of this world, with more powerful weapons being correspondingly more rare. Maybe items which cast spells are completely unknown, with most offering minor hard to quantify bonuses, and a few offering more obviously magical yet still limited abilities.

The party cleric would be the first person gifted with that gods power in the last 100 years. A Druid could be a literal avatar of the earth or nature, with a connection unknown to most. The sorcerer's inexplicable magical abilities could be terrifying and possibly never before seen.

Other casters might be more common, but still noteworthy. Holy warrior's who draw power from their faith and vows could be rare indeed, as could the number of people who manage to truly connect with nature in a meaningful way. In this way, people would know about paladins and rangers, and maybe see one if lucky, but they wouldn't be common. Monks would be actual monks, taking years for most to learn the basic abilities, spending their lives cloistered in monestaries. The player might be a prodigy, but one too wild for the monastic life (such a tired trope I know, but if it fits it fits). The party wizard probably numbers amongst the most powerful wizards in the world by the time he hits level 6-10, and most of those better than him are reclusive hermits or evil sorcerers. His ability to derive new powerful spells might make him seem a savant in a world where even the knowledge of 2nd level spells is rare and most are hedge wizards.

In fact, most magic users would be dabblers, like a arcane trickster whose magic is as much sleight of hand as spell, or a fighter who has learned minor magics to supplement his martial abilities. This doesn't represent magic being so common that everyone learns a bit, but rather that powerful magic is so rare and unknown that most who study it never find any way to progress beyond the basics, and thus supplement it with additional abilities. Same with totem barbarian, his ability to use even a couple rituals could set him apart in a world where powerful magic is all but unknown.

Other's might trade service for magic, warlocks, but the price is too high for most, and even this magic is limited by what the beings choose to impart.

That covers every magic class except bard, who I struggle to conceptualize in such a world. But yes, 5e can support a low magic world pretty well. You have to come at some concepts from the opposite angle as normal and set the players apart.

[Fwiffo86]

I think Eberron will hold up fine. Baker is constantly posting about what he has come up with to convert to 5th already.

In reference to the magic is technology and magic is rare and special discussion:

Player perceptions of the game are not representative of the world. More directly, the experiences of the characters (who are by nature rare and special) are not the experiences of the rest of the world. (You don't challenge Superman with Bank robbers, you challenge him with Darkseid) Just because players are used to seeing magic potions, arms, armor, and world altering spells, does not mean they are the standard. What the players see, is only a tiny aspect of a far larger world.

While Eberron takes a very different approach (magic is phenomenally common, even compared to FR), it is still just a viable. Magic is everywhere, and in everything (well just about). Magic as utilities, transportation, etc is viable, if not to everyone's liking.

[Xetheral]

Player perceptions of the game are not representative of the world. More directly, the experiences of the characters (who are by nature rare and special) are not the experiences of the rest of the world. (You don't challenge Superman with Bank robbers, you challenge him with Darkseid) Just because players are used to seeing magic potions, arms, armor, and world altering spells, does not mean they are the standard. What the players see, is only a tiny aspect of a far larger world.

As an interesting aside, the idea that character experiences are not representative of the world is something I've been trying to get away from in my games for awhile. Even on a save-the-world arc (which I use sparingly), the characters just happen to be ones at the right place and the right time, as opposed to being "by nature rare and special". I find it helps player immersion (and my own!) immensely to know that even at higher levels they aren't heroes of legend (although they might become so by the end of a campaign).

[JAL_1138]

Actually, 5e lends itself to it decently, if you don't mind PCs being the exception to the rule.

Magic items are rare things taken from old ruins of forgotten civilizations. A fighter would rarely "trade up" magic weapons, he'd be lucky to see more than one in his life. Or maybe it isn't that uncommon for "basic" magic items to exist. The masterworks of the dwarfs, their runed carved silver steel weapons, might be equivalent to a +1 weapon, the mystical metal and runes allowing it to bite even those beings not of this world, with more powerful weapons being correspondingly more rare. Maybe items which cast spells are completely unknown, with most offering minor hard to quantify bonuses, and a few offering more obviously magical yet still limited abilities.

The party cleric would be the first person gifted with that gods power in the last 100 years. A Druid could be a literal avatar of the earth or nature, with a connection unknown to most. The sorcerer's inexplicable magical abilities could be terrifying and possibly never before seen.

Other casters might be more common, but still noteworthy. Holy warrior's who draw power from their faith and vows could be rare indeed, as could the number of people who manage to truly connect with nature in a meaningful way. In this way, people would know about paladins and rangers, and maybe see one if lucky, but they wouldn't be common. Monks would be actual monks, taking years for most to learn the basic abilities, spending their lives cloistered in monestaries. The player might be a prodigy, but one too wild for the monastic life (such a tired trope I know, but if it fits it fits). The party wizard probably numbers amongst the most powerful wizards in the world by the time he hits level 6-10, and most of those better than him are reclusive hermits or evil sorcerers. His ability to derive new powerful spells might make him seem a savant in a world where even the knowledge of 2nd level spells is rare and most are hedge wizards.

In fact, most magic users would be dabblers, like a arcane trickster whose magic is as much sleight of hand as spell, or a fighter who has learned minor magics to supplement his martial abilities. This doesn't represent magic being so common that everyone learns a bit, but rather that powerful magic is so rare and unknown that most who study it never find any way to progress beyond the basics, and thus supplement it with additional abilities. Same with totem barbarian, his ability to use even a couple rituals could set him apart in a world where powerful magic is all but unknown.

Other's might trade service for magic, warlocks, but the price is too high for most, and even this magic is limited by what the beings choose to impart.

That covers every magic class except bard, who I struggle to conceptualize in such a world. But yes, 5e can support a low magic world pretty well. You have to come at some concepts from the opposite angle as normal and set the players apart.

Bards could be the last of those who know the songs of power sung before the gods set the sun in the sky, before magic was first written down and tamed by the wizards. Most wear their fingers to the very bones learning to play the songs just so--the precise intonation, the proper tone, to match their rhythms to silent heartbeats of the magics--practice the chants and hone their voices until they are hoarse and ragged for weeks at a time--until the PC, a prodigy beyond all reckoning, seems to innately understand and grasp the Old Ways, like a skald of the ancient world reborn. The first time they picked up an , they played a Song of Power [i]by ear that took a master half a decade to learn well enough to cause a magical effect instead of merely a pleasing sound. The PC now wanders the world to hone their craft, to find other practitioners of this ancient magic and amass greater knowledge of it before it is lost--or to craft new musics by making legends of their own.

[obryn]

Housecats were death incarnate to first level characters until 3rd edition where you didn't roll for HP at lvl1 and got CON bonuses worth a dang. Bad example. :smalltongue:
No, housecats were still deadly to wizards and commoners in 3e. :smallbiggrin:

In AD&D, they were pretty deadly, too!

[Forrestfire]

Nah, a housecat could do a maximum of 3 damage per charge unless it crit, and wizards have a minimum of 4 HP at level 1. Commoners are threatened because, as NPCs, they default to 2 at level 1 unless they have rolled HP

[Knaight]

As an interesting aside, the idea that character experiences are not representative of the world is something I've been trying to get away from in my games for awhile. Even on a save-the-world arc (which I use sparingly), the characters just happen to be ones at the right place and the right time, as opposed to being "by nature rare and special". I find it helps player immersion (and my own!) immensely to know that even at higher levels they aren't heroes of legend (although they might become so by the end of a campaign).

Characters being exceptional and characters being involved in exceptional things are two entirely different matters. Consider the number of stories out that that involve some fairly average people that get caught up in situations that are very much not average. Games can do that as well.

The way I see it, is that the characters aren't "by nature rare and special". Maybe they're unusually talented, maybe they aren't, it depends on the game. What they are is the focus of what is going on in the game. Think of it almost as them happening to be the people who have exceptional things happen to them and as such have narratives about them told, even though said narratives emerge through the game.

[silveralen]

Bards could be the last of those who know the songs of power sung before the gods set the sun in the sky, before magic was first written down and tamed by the wizards. Most wear their fingers to the very bones learning to play the songs just so--the precise intonation, the proper tone, to match their rhythms to silent heartbeats of the magics--practice the chants and hone their voices until they are hoarse and ragged for weeks at a time--until the PC, a prodigy beyond all reckoning, seems to innately understand and grasp the Old Ways, like a skald of the ancient world reborn. The first time they picked up an , they played a Song of Power [i]by ear that took a master half a decade to learn well enough to cause a magical effect instead of merely a pleasing sound. The PC now wanders the world to hone their craft, to find other practitioners of this ancient magic and amass greater knowledge of it before it is lost--or to craft new musics by making legends of their own.

Oh thanks I like this probably going to use it!

Oh and as far as it goes, I don't mind making certain classes rare in a setting without disallowing them to characters.

[D.U.P.A.]

Dragonmark is something that you live with, not something you learn, so feats are not the best method to attain dragonmarks. I would say these will be avalaible with themes, I know they are not yet, but I am sure they will come soon and Eberron could be one of rulebooks introducing them. How will they work, wotc decide.

[Shining Wrath]

That is so irrelevant it hurts. Was he inspired by it? Sure. Does it show case knights who worship and serve a god? Yep.

Does that mean he incorporated dieties directly into paladin class design? Nope. He in fact specifically did not do so.

I mean, he was inspired by lotr, and we know how far off Gandalf is from a wizard in DnD.

Now, I'm trying to recall, but the orginal paladin was modeled heavily on the knightly orders. They were typically tied to institutions rather than directly to gods. This you had some who modled secular (well, as secular as things ever get in dnd) knightly orders, pledging loyalty to a country or monarch. Other did work for religious institutions, but the thing is they still didn't get their power explicitly from gods. It was odd, but that's how it was.

I was just reading through my DMG, and there are so many magic items that are usable by Clerics or Paladins (or Clerics, Druids, and Paladins) it is not funny.

More to our point, though, there's this from "Oathbreaker Atonement" on page 97:

... Having done so, the paladin loses all Oathbreaker features and must choose a deity and a sacred oath ...

Perhaps RAW not every Paladin has a deity. But every atoned Oathbreaker does, and the magic item table suggests that RAI they all do, for they may use items otherwise restricted to clerics.

As to my irrelevant comment about Le Chanson de Roland, the word "wizard" was not invented to describe Gandalf. The word "Paladin" was, however, invented to describe the 12 knights of Charlemagne. The word has a meaning; that meaning is "holy warrior"; the word "wizard", conversely, does not mean "Vancian spellcaster". When Gygax chose to call that class "Paladin", the choice of word meant something. "Knight" was available, as one example; so claiming that the choice means nothing seems odd.

[rlc]

Dragonmark is something that you live with, not something you learn, so feats are not the best method to attain dragonmarks. I would say these will be avalaible with themes, I know they are not yet, but I am sure they will come soon and Eberron could be one of rulebooks introducing them. How will they work, wotc decide.

Or, you know, a template.

[SharkForce]

or, as noted, a subrace (or variant race for humans). the various dragonmarks are racially restricted, after all.

[T.G. Oskar]

As to my irrelevant comment about Le Chanson de Roland, the word "wizard" was not invented to describe Gandalf. The word "Paladin" was, however, invented to describe the 12 knights of Charlemagne. The word has a meaning; that meaning is "holy warrior"; the word "wizard", conversely, does not mean "Vancian spellcaster". When Gygax chose to call that class "Paladin", the choice of word meant something. "Knight" was available, as one example; so claiming that the choice means nothing seems odd.

Hunh? I thought it meant "palace guard"...

The 12 Peers (often called Paladins) never manifested magical powers at all. Roland, the best known out of them, only had a named sword (Durandal) and a magic item (the Oliphant), but the stories never really mentioned he could invoke miracles or resist the effects of pagan "magic". In fact, they most definitely did NOT represent holiness; they were servants of a king, that being Charlemagne. That Charlemagne was believed to have divine blood is something that's beyond discussion, but saying that "Paladin" has a definition is being kinda blind. I mean, if you want real "holy warriors", might as well go for the Crusaders, who actually WERE warriors of a religious-military order...except the religious-military orders were actually represented by Clerics, not Paladins. Paladins were represented as knights that followed Chivalry, and that's why they follow(ed) a Code; now, they follow an Oath.

However, back to topic: besides Dragonmarks and the lack of Psionics, Eberron isn't so difficult to handle. The preeminence of magic items does have its drawbacks: a good deal of them are made via Dragonshards. A Longsword +1 may not, but a Flametongue in Eberron most likely has a bound Fire Elemental within a Khyber Dragonshard, and thus requires attunement to that dragonshard. Attuning to Eberron (or Siberys) Dragonshards requires having a dragonmark, so while they're more common, their attunement is not as easy as you'd think, and thus you have a potential surplus of magic items (high supply) but a few people in the continent (and even on the WORLD) who can use it (low demand). Having a magic item that doesn't require a dragonmark to attune may make it rare; maybe a relic of the Dhakaani Empire, or a weapon from the ancestral human homeland of Sarlona, or an ancient Elven wondrous item, or even a legendary tool of the Giants. If anything, there's several civilizations that might leave items, but no longer exist so they still provide some degree of rarity.

Creating magic items is even MORE difficult, because all item creation formulas (the schemas) are either with House Cannith or very difficult to find. Those huge Lightning Rails and Airships? Well, there's a reason why Orien and Lyrandar control the travel routes; not even in 3.5 there was an artifact that allowed teleportation, and even Orien (who has powers related to teleportation) finds it difficult to have a dragonshard item that empowers their abilities.

I'd have to see how they handled Eberron in 4e, since it might provide some insight. That said, maybe some of the original important NPCs will have their levels boosted: Boranel may be a higher level Fighter than 11th level (and probably a Battlemaster), Kaius will stack Vampire (as if a template) with some class abilities... About the only ones who'll remain pretty much the same are Oelian (20th level Druid), Jaela (formerly a 3rd level Cleric, but 18th level while in presence of the Flame) and Erandis (a Lich with altered spellcasting and maybe one or two Epic Boons). Those five are the NPCs that come to mind (there's also the Lord of Blades, but its "avatar" was a multiclassed monstrosity), and none of them are really so difficult to translate.

From what I can figure: Artificers will be a class, Shifters will have subraces, Warforged are on the back-burner for the Unearthed Arcana upcoming column, Changelings and Kalashtar will most likely be worked similarly to Half-Elves and Half-Orcs, optional rules to reduce item rarity via dragonshards, Dragonmarks will most likely have their own set of rules (and return to be race-restricted, probably), new subclasses (difficult, but possible; the Artificer will have a bunch), new setting-specific backgrounds, new items. That will be on a single companion book to the campaign setting, and little else. Most likely there will be no change, since 5e can be worked to play similar to 3e (I mean, they even have Action Points...I mean, Hero Points!)

[RedMage125]

I was just reading through my DMG, and there are so many magic items that are usable by Clerics or Paladins (or Clerics, Druids, and Paladins) it is not funny.
Paladins are still divine spellcasters, yes. And whether or not they serve a deity, their spells are divine magic as opposed to arcane, this makes them have similar characteristics to clerics, and sometimes druids.

So what?


More to our point, though, there's this from "Oathbreaker Atonement" on page 97:
There's also this from the PHB, in reference to ALL Paladins:
"Although many paladins are devoted to the gods of good, a paladin's power comes as much from a commitment to justice itself as it does from a god"-5e PHB, page 82



Perhaps RAW not every Paladin has a deity. But every atoned Oathbreaker does, and the magic item table suggests that RAI they all do, for they may use items otherwise restricted to clerics.
Ok...but the "atoned Oathbreaker" is a specific case scenario, and it's not relevant to Paladins in general.

Furthermore, we got into this discussion because we were discussing paladins from all previous editions, too.


As to my irrelevant comment about Le Chanson de Roland, the word "wizard" was not invented to describe Gandalf. The word "Paladin" was, however, invented to describe the 12 knights of Charlemagne. The word has a meaning; that meaning is "holy warrior"; the word "wizard", conversely, does not mean "Vancian spellcaster". When Gygax chose to call that class "Paladin", the choice of word meant something. "Knight" was available, as one example; so claiming that the choice means nothing seems odd.

The meaning is not "holy warrior".

pal·a·din (păl′ə-dĭn)
n.
1. A paragon of chivalry; a heroic champion.
2. A strong supporter or defender of a cause: "the paladin of plain speaking" (Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.)
3. Any of the 12 peers of Charlemagne's court.
[French, from Italian paladino, from Late Latin palātīnus, palatine; see palatine1.]
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
paladin (ˈpælədɪn)
n
1. (Historical Terms) one of the legendary twelve peers of Charlemagne's court
2. (Historical Terms) a knightly champion
[C16: via French from Italian paladino, from Latin palātīnus imperial official, from PalātiumPalatine²]
Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003
pal•a•din (ˈp?l ə dɪn)

n.
1. any of the 12 legendary peers or knightly champions in attendance on Charlemagne.
2. any knightly or heroic champion.
3. a determined advocate or defender of a cause.
[1585–95; < French < Italian paladino < Late Latin palātīnus imperial functionary, n. use of adj.; see palatine]
Random House Kernerman Webster's College Dictionary, © 2010 K Dictionaries Ltd. Copyright 2005, 1997, 1991 by Random House, Inc. All rights reserved.

And then from Miriam Webster:

Definition of PALADIN

1
: a trusted military leader (as for a medieval prince)
2
: a leading champion of a cause
At no point is "holy" incorporated into the meaning of the word "paladin"

Paladins in all non-4e editions have not been required to choose a deity (specific campaign settings such as Forgotten Realms notwithstanding). Eberron was written for 3.5e, and if you re-read your 3.5e PHB under the paladin entry, you will note that, by RAW, paladins do not necessarily serve gods, "devotion to righteousness is enough". This is because "paladin", by the dictionary definition does not have any connection to deities or faiths.

Now, for 4th edition, WotC re-appropriated the word "paladin" within the confines of D&D to mean "warrior of a deity/faith", removing the connotations that insist that a paladin be "noble" or "righteous", and allowing for paladins that serve ALL deities, even Evil ones.

There's been a trend since 3rd edition that people have associated paladins with deities in the same manner as clerics. Personally, I blame the 3.0 supplement Defenders of the Faith, which lumped paladins and clerics together. Then, of course, all the 3.x artwork for paladins always depicted them with holy symbols, just like clerics. This has led a lot of people to draw the conclusion that paladins serve deities like clerics do, but for some reason, only Lawful and/or Good deities call such warriors to service and grant them powers. Hence why so many people complained about "why don't evil deities have paladins?". Well, given what the dictionary definition of "paladin" is, the answer is "because people who spend their lives to the service of Evil gods do not also dedicate themselves to Righteousness". It took 4th edition's re-defining "paladin" to make Evil Paladins happen.

[Gov. Sandwiches]

forgotten realms is high magic. eberron is more like... I dunno... wide magic.

I like to say industrialized magic. Magic-as-Industry.

people will call it steampunk and it's not. It's industrial magepunk.

[Tvtyrant]

If any random schmuck walking down the street will see a dozen magical items just on his way to work in the morning, then magic is no longer something special. For magic to be special it has to be rare. Mysterious. Dangerous.

Have you read the works of Jack Vance? Tales of a Dying Earth named a large number of magic items, spells and basically created the magic system used in D&D. Magic was also extremely scientific, with a known number of spells and most spells being crafted using known techniques in a laboratory. D&D isn't LotR, it has always been much more like Harry Potter. (Although early magic item creation was crazy involved.)

You can of course make the game different then that, and 5E does a better job than any other system of making that possible.

[silveralen]

Now, for 4th edition, WotC re-appropriated the word "paladin" within the confines of D&D to mean "warrior of a deity/faith", removing the connotations that insist that a paladin be "noble" or "righteous", and allowing for paladins that serve ALL deities, even Evil ones.

Which is interesting because historically clerics were the holy warriors of the faith.

In 2nd edition, clerics were considered a type of priest dedicated to a certain style god, roughly based on the more militant interpretation of Christianity popular during the crusades era, and were called out as being the militant arm of such churches. They also could coexist with less militant variations, called speciality priests in the setting books I'm familiar with (greyhawk, forgotten relams, legend and lore, monster mythology), the speciality priests usually but not always representing the normal clergy who looked after temples, performed services, etc, while clerics were the militant arm. There was more overlap in extremely militant religions, and forgotten realms actually treated druid, paladin and ranger as specialty priests of a god, but in general clerics were treated as holy warriors and ordained defenders of their faith, often charged with spreading the faith to dangerous areas or protecting pilgrims etc.

In 3.X, clerics are again mentioned as being different from normal members of the clergy, in this case I actually recall the adept NPC class being mentioned as a possible way to represent normal clergy and stay at home priests.

[RedMage125]

Which is interesting because historically clerics were the holy warriors of the faith.

In 2nd edition, clerics were considered a type of priest dedicated to a certain style god, roughly based on the more militant interpretation of Christianity popular during the crusades era, and were called out as being the militant arm of such churches. They also could coexist with less militant variations, called speciality priests in the setting books I'm familiar with (greyhawk, forgotten relams, legend and lore, monster mythology), the speciality priests usually but not always representing the normal clergy who looked after temples, performed services, etc, while clerics were the militant arm. There was more overlap in extremely militant religions, and forgotten realms actually treated druid, paladin and ranger as specialty priests of a god, but in general clerics were treated as holy warriors and ordained defenders of their faith, often charged with spreading the faith to dangerous areas or protecting pilgrims etc.

In 3.X, clerics are again mentioned as being different from normal members of the clergy, in this case I actually recall the adept NPC class being mentioned as a possible way to represent normal clergy and stay at home priests.
They're described that way in Eberron, too. Most local priests are Experts or maybe Adepts with ranks in Knowledge (Religion) and perhaps Heal. They tend to the spiritual needs of their flock, while Clerics are "warrior priests", and their spells are considered gifts of the faith.

The etymology of the word "cleric", however, refers to any clergyman. "Cleric" and "clergy" have their roots in the same word (the Latin "clericus" which is literally "cergyman"). So there's not been a whole lot of confusion as to what a Cleric is in D&D, unlike the Paladin.

[Knaight]

Have you read the works of Jack Vance? Tales of a Dying Earth named a large number of magic items, spells and basically created the magic system used in D&D. Magic was also extremely scientific, with a known number of spells and most spells being crafted using known techniques in a laboratory. D&D isn't LotR, it has always been much more like Harry Potter. (Although early magic item creation was crazy involved.)

You can of course make the game different then that, and 5E does a better job than any other system of making that possible.

Hardly. 5e does a better job than other editions of D&D do at making that possible, but it's far from the best system. It comes tailored to a specific style that is more Vance/Rowling than other magic systems, and is generally worse at the emulation of those others than games made more for them.

[Zweisteine]

5E feats don't use prerequisites.
Yes they do. Just not so much.


Warforged will be a problem because there will be players who want Mithral or Adamantium bodies. Giving the higher magic it may be ok to have platemail equivalent AC at 1st level.
That's not so bad. An adamantine-bodied Warforged doesn't have to have full plate. It could just be chainmail-level.

Eberron won't be so hard to port into 5e. Eberron is high-magic, not strong magic. Adding all the background magic isn't that tough, and the rules for creating it could be left as "trade secrets," as many of them already are, with DM-dependent rules that say big magic item crafting relies on special items (e.g. creation forges).