Dystopia Eberron (The Daelkyr won) thoughts, comments, advice?

[Wizard_Lizard]

The premise for this is the world of Eberron. Most of the lore remains the same, save for one key difference.

When the fractured remnants of what was once the Dhakaani empire retreated into their underground caverns and citadels in the wake of what seemed to be a victory for both them and the gatekeeper druids, they returned to a much different khorvaire than the one they’d left. The first Daelkyr invasion was fought back by the coalition of Gatekeeper druids and Dhakaani warriors, but through this invasion, the seeds of destruction and madness were sown. Four thousand years after the Daelkyr invasion began, the Dhakaani empire finally collapsed completely, with the few fractured remaining remnants retreating underground.


The gatekeeper seals were not enough, despite about two thousand years of peace, Xoriat once again became coterminous (8000 years after the first invasion). A new wave of Daelkyr, along with some of Xoriat’s more powerful denizens flooded through once more into khorvaire. Without the Dhakaani empire to help defend Khorvaire, the gatekeeper druids and the scattered remaining goblins stood no chance against this invasion. Around the same time as this, the first humans arrived at the eastmost Khorvaire from Sarlona, establishing what should have become the lhazaar principalities. The Daelkyr invasion started in westmost Khorvaire, and swept eastward, and as such, the more eastern races of Khorvaire managed up to a hundred years of peace before being drawn into this losing war. First the Orcs were crushed, their entire race all but wiped out, orcs were considered too hard to mentally control for most daelkyr, and so extermination was the primary option. From there the Daelkyr swept east, enslaving the remaining surface goblins, the halflings, the dwarves, and eventually the human settlements of the far east.

This was something not foreseen even by the draconic prophecy, and the dragons of Argonnessen were grossly unprepared to hold back any of this. Even the Overlords seemed to be taken by surprise.


The Khorvaire that the Heirs of Dhakaan returned to was a khorvaire stuck in dark times. The sun has been completely banished from the surface, shrouding the world in nonstop darkness, one moon shining brightly in the black sky, the moon of Xoriat, glowing in the darkness. All of Khorvaire is pretty much gone now, no contact has come from the other continents, they may still be thriving, they may have gone the same way as Khorvaire has.

There are several cities that have somehow taken root, however, cruel settings and backdrops from which the Daelkyr can run their social experiments, breeding programs, and farms.

The closest thing to a functioning industrially based city is the “city” Ich’tilir. What this is is essentially a supermassive food farm for Illithids and other aberrations with similar appetital habits.

That's just the write up I did, uh, so if you have ideas to expand this concept, they would be much appreciated, particularly if some eberron fans have ideas as to how the overlords/dragons/quori would act.

[thorr-kan]

This being Eberron, there are four factions you'll need to decide about. How you deal with them determines how your setting runs.

1. Lords of Dust? Since they're on the same continent, they and their followers are not going to take this lightly. Options include having the Lords' cults put down and the Lords still being trapped, some or all of the Lords' cults being corrupted by the daelkyr, or some or all of the Lords' cutting a deal.

2. What's up with Sarlona? The quori aren't going to take an extraplanar threat to *their* prime material playground likely.

3. The Undying Court has an opinion, too. They think they can take the dragons (the dragons let them think that); there's going to be a response from the Court, and I don't think it will go well for them.

4. Anything threatening the Prophecy is going to get a response from the dragons: overflights and mass attacks at least to a full-on repeat of their response to the giants.

[Dr.Samurai]

The gatekeeper seals were not enough, despite about two thousand years of peace, Xoriat once again became coterminous (8000 years after the first invasion). A new wave of Daelkyr, along with some of Xoriat’s more powerful denizens flooded through once more into khorvaire. Without the Dhakaani empire to help defend Khorvaire, the gatekeeper druids and the scattered remaining goblins stood no chance against this invasion. Around the same time as this, the first humans arrived at the eastmost Khorvaire from Sarlona, establishing what should have become the lhazaar principalities. The Daelkyr invasion started in westmost Khorvaire, and swept eastward, and as such, the more eastern races of Khorvaire managed up to a hundred years of peace before being drawn into this losing war. First the Orcs were crushed, their entire race all but wiped out, orcs were considered too hard to mentally control for most daelkyr, and so extermination was the primary option. From there the Daelkyr swept east, enslaving the remaining surface goblins, the halflings, the dwarves, and eventually the human settlements of the far east.

Hey Wizard Lizard! So, to be clear, the Daelkyr return at around the same time that Galifar would have been uniting his Kingdom, correct? But in this scenario humans have not arrived yet and are only now arriving when the Daelkyr begin taking over from the west.

If this is the case, has any race developed dragonmarks? If humans were still on Sarlona, I don't think they would have, as there are no dragonmarks on Sarlona. But what about dwarves/halflings/elves?

That's just the write up I did, uh, so if you have ideas to expand this concept, they would be much appreciated, particularly if some eberron fans have ideas as to how the overlords/dragons/quori would act.

With regards to overlords, they require prophecies to come true in order to be released (or bound, for that matter). They will be impacted insofar as the Daelkyr are impacting the prophecy. Meaning, can the Lords of Dust still read the prophecy and work to make them come true? If so, they will carry on as normal. If, however, let's say the Daelkyr have something like the Zerg Creep (just by way of example) that is slowly spreading across the landscape as they conquer, maybe this might obscure parts of the Prophecy. If the sky is replaced by an alien Xoriat sky, there are no longer prophecies to read in the stars. If there are dragonmarked people, but the Daelkyr are harvesting them, they can no longer be manipulated to fulfill prophecies. In this scenario, you may have agents of the Lords of Dust actively working to liberate the continent from the Daelkyr.

With regards to the dragons, as depicted in canon, they do not care about the fate of other creatures unless it directly threatens Argonnessen. So if the people of Khorvaire are suffering under the Daelkyr, the dragons are not perturbed unless it somehow poses a danger to them. In the event that they do feel threatened, they respond with armageddon. Total annihilation of their enemy in one form or another.

The quori are interested in preventing the Turning of the Age in Dal Quor and they believe they can do this by controlling the dreams of mortals. If the Dreaming Dark believes it requires more than the people of Sarlona to anchor the current Age in Dal Quor, then it will need to do something about the Daelkyr. Of course, this is right up their alley, as the MO of the Inspired is to come in as saviors of the people and usher in a new era of peace and prosperity.

[Wizard_Lizard]

This being Eberron, there are four factions you'll need to decide about. How you deal with them determines how your setting runs.

1. Lords of Dust? Since they're on the same continent, they and their followers are not going to take this lightly. Options include having the Lords' cults put down and the Lords still being trapped, some or all of the Lords' cults being corrupted by the daelkyr, or some or all of the Lords' cutting a deal.

Answering this from the other comment.

2. What's up with Sarlona? The quori aren't going to take an extraplanar threat to *their* prime material playground likely.

Yeah that's one thing I'm quite a bit unsure about. I think the Quori probably wouldn't like it that much, but one way I can see the Daelkyr deal with them is by cutting off the realm of dreams of Khorvarians with some kind of eldritch machine. Instead, whenever you dream, your spirit goes to Xoriat instead of Dal Quor. This would greatly weaken the Quori and make them less of a threat. I'm thinking Sarlona would have to be some kind of "safe haven" where the quori are holding out against the Daelkyr.

3. The Undying Court has an opinion, too. They think they can take the dragons (the dragons let them think that); there's going to be a response from the Court, and I don't think it will go well for them.

Yeah I think it's probably makes sense that they try to stop it.. and fail. While Aerenal is secluded and protected enough that the Daelkyr might have trouble invading, any attempts to attack them on Khorvaire would be bound to fail.

4. Anything threatening the Prophecy is going to get a response from the dragons: overflights and mass attacks at least to a full-on repeat of their response to the giants.

Yeah that's something I'm unsure of. The dragons are very powerful, and pretty much nuked the giants out of existance. I don't know how I would deal with that.

Hey Wizard Lizard! So, to be clear, the Daelkyr return at around the same time that Galifar would have been uniting his Kingdom, correct? But in this scenario humans have not arrived yet and are only now arriving when the Daelkyr begin taking over from the west.

I may have gotten my timeline wonky, so the dates like that could always be adjusted. I'm thinking the invasion is just as the Sarlonan settlers begin arriving and colonizing. So I might need to change the dates.

If this is the case, has any race developed dragonmarks? If humans were still on Sarlona, I don't think they would have, as there are no dragonmarks on Sarlona. But what about dwarves/halflings/elves?

From my understanding the dragonmarks are fairly new at this point, but I would definetly have the Daelkyr be experimenting on any individual with them. While I don't think Aberrant marks are normally caused by the Daelkyr, I feel like Daelkyr experimentation could turn the mark into a faux aberrant mark.

With regards to overlords, they require prophecies to come true in order to be released (or bound, for that matter). They will be impacted insofar as the Daelkyr are impacting the prophecy. Meaning, can the Lords of Dust still read the prophecy and work to make them come true? If so, they will carry on as normal. If, however, let's say the Daelkyr have something like the Zerg Creep (just by way of example) that is slowly spreading across the landscape as they conquer, maybe this might obscure parts of the Prophecy. If the sky is replaced by an alien Xoriat sky, there are no longer prophecies to read in the stars. If there are dragonmarked people, but the Daelkyr are harvesting them, they can no longer be manipulated to fulfill prophecies. In this scenario, you may have agents of the Lords of Dust actively working to liberate the continent from the Daelkyr.

yeah i think the Daelkyr would blot out the sky. If for nothing else than the aesthetic. I don't know how the prophecy would handle this, perhaps it would break all together, as this is an event that the prophecy did not predict (Or perhaps was predicted by aberrant marks, which the dragons and overlords both neglected to study in their hubris). My idea for this is that the prophecy no longer works. The world has been shunted into a new timeline where the prophecy is not reliable.

With regards to the dragons, as depicted in canon, they do not care about the fate of other creatures unless it directly threatens Argonnessen. So if the people of Khorvaire are suffering under the Daelkyr, the dragons are not perturbed unless it somehow poses a danger to them. In the event that they do feel threatened, they respond with armageddon. Total annihilation of their enemy in one form or another.

The quori are interested in preventing the Turning of the Age in Dal Quor and they believe they can do this by controlling the dreams of mortals. If the Dreaming Dark believes it requires more than the people of Sarlona to anchor the current Age in Dal Quor, then it will need to do something about the Daelkyr. Of course, this is right up their alley, as the MO of the Inspired is to come in as saviors of the people and usher in a new era of peace and prosperity.

I talked about the daelkyr in response to the earlier question. But yeah I think the dragons would probably see the Daelkyr as a threat, but with the prophecy no longer working, their upper hand may be lost. Although attempts at all out annihilation could be an interesting point.I think the way that the dragons were able to do so with the giants was because the giant civilisation was more localised? Perhaps the Daelkyr have weapons of their own, and the attempts at invasion may lead to things like illithidragons. I don't fully know how to deal with the dragons as of yet.