D&D 5E New Eberron Book Details From WotC

WotC’s Jeremy Crawford appeared on Twitch last night with Bart Carroll, discussing the upcoming D&D setting book Eberron: Rising from the Last War. Lots of details within!

- Overview of Eberron, emphasized potentials for adventure and post-WWI pulp style of setting.

- Dragonmarked Houses as fantasy Corporations, playable Dragonmarked characters as race rules in the book

- Rules and stories for playing, Warforged, Changlings, Kalsthar, Shifters, Goblins, Hobgoblins, Bugbears, Orcs. Playable Orc is different fro mthe Volo's Guide rules to reflect the different story (no intelligence malus, few other tweaks, still usable for other worlds, these are PC Orcs as opposed to Monster Manual Orcs like Volo's).

- Full rules for the Artificer, including a new feature in this book for making Common and Uncommon magic items

- Aberrant Dragonmark Feats are in the book

- Group patron rules for organizations the late 19th-early 20th century style: newspapers, criminal syndicates, universities, spy rings: fourth choice after Race-Class-Background that the party makes together, has new fluff background features to give characters and adventure hooks

- Possibility of the party becoming their own patron, example being creating your own Crime Syndicate

- All of the above is Chapter 1 material

- Chapter 2 is a Gazeeter of Korvaire and the world: delves into great nations, the religions, touches on otehr continents

- Chapter 3 is a zoom in on Sharn, a microcosm of the setting, great place for Noir intrigue

- Chapter 4 is a 100 page adventure creation toolkit comparable to Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica: wealth of adventure building tables, maps, organization information, first level adventure set in Sharn. Reveals brand new information about the Mournland, for instance, during the war they created not just regular Warforged and Warforged Titans but also Warforged Colossi the size of skyscrapers: one of the maps is of a fallen Warfored Colossi as a dungeon @doctorbadwolf

- Section in "massive" chapter for creating adventures about Eberron's cosmology, and how it relates to Great Wheel multiverse, left to DM to decide how sealed off Eberron is by the Progenitor Dragons

- There are extended magical item economy rules in chapter 5, Common magical items are plentiful: buying, selling, crafting rules and price lists.

- Eberron specific monsters and NPCs in the sixth and final chapter, covering things like Daelkyr, Living Spells (3 different Living Spells in the book including Living Cloud Kill, and a template for making more) and various specific NPCs

Twitch

Twitch is the world's leading video platform and community for gamers.

www.twitch.tv

 

[Urriak Uruk]

What's amusing about all of this is that Keith Baker would be the first person to assert that there is no such thing as a "canonical" Eberron and that every DM should make the decisions about the world they think best serves the stories they want to tell.

And I say that as someone who thinks Eberron elves originating from Correlon is absolute nonsense as is most of what MToF says about the setting.

But D&D is basically synonymous with FR for a significant subset of the D&D playing population at this point, so if it takes some Realmsification to turn people on to Eberron proper I'm not gonna complain about it. More people buying Eberron content means more Eberron content, even if parts of it are #NotMyEberron

I will say I listened to a Dragon Talk (can't remember which one, but it's got Jeremy Crawford, Keith Baker, and James Wyatt), where it is stated pretty clearly that Eberron fits into the D&D multiverse as one world out of many in the Prime Material Plane. What makes Eberron different is that the gods of that world decided they didn't want the Outer Planes meddling in their world, so they made a barrier (I can't remember it's name but it's made of crystal) that blocks interlopers from beyond meddling, like Asmodeus for example. Then the gods made their own cosmology that is separate and distinct only to Eberron.

It is then left open to the DM whether they want this barrier to hold, in which the broader multiverse and Outer Planes have no impact on Eberron at all, or whether they decide that this barrier has begun to crack, in which the influence of the Outer Planes (and travelers from other material worlds) start seeping in. It's up to the DM, but that is the closest "canon" thing Eberron has now (though canon is totally irrelevant to someone's home game).

Despite James Wyatt being on the podcast, there is no explanation for why the Magic settings are not impacted by the Outer Planes, despite them also being named as worlds in D&D's Material Plane. They probably haven't made an explanation for that yet, it may come if they make a D&D Magic Card set.

They'll also likely come up for a similar explanation for Dark Sun, as to why residents of that world have so much difficulty leaving and why there is no influence of the gods. Probably something like the Primordials/Gods decided to cut it off for whatever reason.

 

[JohnLynch]

What makes Eberron different is that the gods of that world decided they didn't want the Outer Planes meddling in their world, so they made a barrier (I can't remember it's name but it's made of crystal) that blocks interlopers from beyond meddling, like Asmodeus for example. Then the gods made their own cosmology that is separate and distinct only to Eberron.

One of the things that made Eberron notable is there was no knowledge if the gods existed. I see 5e is doing its classic “let’s ignore/rewrite canon”.

Like I said before: WotC doesn’t care about canon. So no one else should.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

One of the things that made Eberron notable is there was no knowledge if the gods existed. I see 5e is doing its classic “let’s ignore/rewrite canon”.

Well you could interpret the podcast as saying, "the gods of Eberron cut off their world from the greater multiverse, but then agreed to stop interfering directly in the affairs of mortals," or you could decide the gods were somehow destroyed somewhere between cutting off the world and the present day.

That maintains the mortals perception of not knowing whether gods exist, just as they shouldn't know a greater multiverse exists. Entirely up to the DM.

Like I said before: WotC doesn’t care about canon. So no one else should.

To the contrary I find Wizard's respects canon so much for 5e that they are working hard to leave options open for a DM to take any interpretation they need for the game they'd like to run, which is why so much of the language used is vague and imprecise.

EDIT: The passage from the Wayfinder's on Elves supports my view on Wizard's making "canon" as loose as possibly to support many different games;

Corellon and Lolth

The elves of Eberron weren’t created by the gods you may know from other settings. In Eberron, the Sulat Giants created the drow as a weapon to fight the rebellious elves: there is a lingering enmity between drow and elf, but it’s not driven by the influence of Lolth. Meanwhile, the elves revere their ancestors—many of whom still linger and guide them—as opposed to distant gods. This is an opportunity to explore these traditional races in a new light. However, if you want to incorporate Corellon and Lolth, there’s a few ways to do it. One possibility is that Eberron was created as a copy of the distant realms of the multiverse, hidden away to prevent the gods from influencing it. As such, while the drow of Eberron have no knowledge of Lolth, if she found her way through the Ring of Siberys and into Eberron, she might be able to poison their hearts and turn them to her service. Alternately, you could present both Corellon and Lolth as legendary champions from the past. Corellon could be one of the great heroes and patron ancestors of the Valenar, or one of the leaders of the Undying Court; while Lolth could be the legendary first commander of the drow, whose spirit lingers and hungers for revenge. Ultimately, it’s a question of the story you want to tell. Do you want to preserve the unique cultures of Eberron? Incorporate Corellon and Lolth into those cultures organically? Or explore the idea of these powers just discovering Eberron and awakening hidden memories in the blood of elf and drow?

They are literally leaving open-ended questions for you to form your own "version" of Eberron, that uses as much or as little of the multiverse as you'd like.

 

[PsyzhranV2]

One of the things that made Eberron notable is there was no knowledge if the gods existed. I see 5e is doing its classic “let’s ignore/rewrite canon”.

Like I said before: WotC doesn’t care about canon. So no one else should.

Well you could interpret the podcast as saying, "the gods of Eberron cut off their world from the greater multiverse, but then agreed to stop interfering directly in the affairs of mortals," or you could decide the gods were somehow destroyed somewhere between cutting off the world and the present day.

That maintains the mortals perception of not knowing whether gods exist, just as they shouldn't know a greater multiverse exists. Entirely up to the DM.

Were they at least talking about the Progenitor Dragons? That would make sense. Failing that, if they were referencing the Draconic Pantheon that's shared between Eberron and the other settings, that would also make sense. Not if it was the Sovereign Host and Dark Six.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

Were they at least talking about the Progenitor Dragons? That would make sense. Failing that, if they were referencing the Draconic Pantheon that's shared between Eberron and the other settings, that would also make sense. Not if it was the Sovereign Host and Dark Six.

It is left purposefully vague as to what the "gods," they're referring to are. Could be the Progenitor Dragons, could be the Sovereigns, could be the Dark Six. Hell, it could even be mortals, though it'd have to be very powerful ones, or even foreign setting's gods from outside cutting Eberron off for some reason only they know.

It could be something else entirely, it is up to you the DM to decide.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

The new cover art (full spread):

A pretty underwhelming cover to me, though it sets a good tone. I mostly don't really like the colors, and the warforged looks very Iron Man to me.

I can't really decide which one I like more. This one I think, but neither really excite me.

 

[JohnLynch]

Well you could interpret the podcast as saying, "the gods of Eberron cut off their world from the greater multiverse, but then agreed to stop interfering directly in the affairs of mortals," or you could decide the gods were somehow destroyed somewhere between cutting off the world and the present day.

That maintains the mortals perception of not knowing whether gods exist, just as they shouldn't know a greater multiverse exists. Entirely up to the DM.

Except that this posits the gods did objectively exist which again is something previous editions have avoided doing (at least, that was my interpretation of the material).

I guess it will depend what’s in the book vs Crawford (or whoever) spouting off stuff for podcasts off the top of their head.

To the contrary I find Wizard's respects canon so much for 5e

Meh. Agree to disagree. I don’t have a favourable opinion of 5e or WotC’s publishing strategy. I’m only here due to a genuine interest in Eberron

 

[Parmandur]

Interesting discussion of how they were fluctuating on the cover, and clarification on the Wayfinder's Guide to Eberron:

 

[Parmandur]

Wayfinder's Guide to Eberron will only get the Alchemist, only the UA stuff is being reprinted in RftLW.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

Except that this posits the gods did objectively exist which again is something previous editions have avoided doing (at least, that was my interpretation of the material).

I guess it will depend what’s in the book vs Crawford (or whoever) spouting off stuff for podcasts off the top of their head.

If you listen to the podcast, Crawford specifically mentions that he spoke with Keith Baker on this version of Eberron and came to agree on this together. So this is the creator of the world's view as well, and speaks himself on the podcast as well on other topics.

It's also something that is kept so vague it confirms almost nothing, as "the gods" could be interpreted as literally any powerful being, like the Progenitor Dragons. You could even interpret it as something like, "The Gods of Greyhawk found the world of Eberron backward and unfaithful, so built the Ring to cut it loose from the multiverse and their notice." Then there's literally no one god-like in Eberron at all.