Eberron: Creation Patterns & Schema's, what do we know?

[Kirin'Tor]

There's only a bit of information about the House Cannith (& Xen'drik) creation patterns & schemas presented in the main Eberron book. The other 3 hardcovers (5 Nations, Sharn, Explorers) don't touch them at all -though I'm told the adventures do slightly, but only in a 'deliver this to someone else' way.

I'm looking to collect all the information on them I can, because I hope to have my PCs encounter one, and I know our group Cannith Artificer will want to try to use it. I'm OK with that, I just want to get a grasp on what they do.

Here's what I've found so far (please add to and correct this list!!!):

• The Patterns & Schema originate in Xen'drik and with House Cannith.
• House Cannith guards there creation secrets with great care, very few ever get to use them.
• Creation Patterns ease in the creation of items, magical and otherwise, and shorten the process as well.
• Patterns are formed from a collection of Schema (or one pattern contains several schema).
• The patterns are intricately tied to the creation of Warforged, but they're uses are far broader.

(Hopefully Magic of Eberron will have more, but I looked through the art preview and saw nothing labeled as such)

For now, is there enough information out there for us to piece together exactly _what_ these patterns do, but more specifically, what game mechanics they might use?

 

[cmanos]

wait a couple days until MoE comes out. I believe there is info on them in there.

 

[Kirin'Tor]

I've checked out all I can on MoE, but I really don't know if it's going to have anything or not - besides, I'd really like to hear oter EbDM's (and players) thoughts on them.

 

[Aaron L]

Just as a guess, I'd say that they probably give a reduction to the gp/XP cost for creating magic items. From a purely mechanical perspective, that is. In game view I'd say they were like quasimagical blueprints, think normal blueprints with magic symbols.


thats just a guess and totally off the top of my head tho.

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

I view them as Foci for artifact creation...altho in Eberrons low character level setting, some DMG items could easily fit into artifact levels.

They are also tied to the Draconic Prophecy and the 'Words of Power' {ancient Draconic language upon which the arcane magic systems are built.. I got the idea from the new Thieves World book } Use of a Pattern requires utterance of the proper Word.
This in turn is why House Cannith keeps it as much a secret as possible, as knowledge of Words could turn a number of politcal nuetrals into enemies. They continue to seek out more Words and Schema's from the forgotten ruins in Xendrik, and some even venture into the darkness of Kyber for other sources of the power.


I am sure if I ever ran a game high enough for a player to be interested I would work up some rules that mesh with EoM:R rituals for the mechanics.. but since that won't be happening this century I am happy to leave them as a mysterious peice of Eberron... I have no desire to loose player designed artifacts into the world

My initial mechanic thoughts are combined mana batteries and permanent item that stores MP and spell lists. Major artifacts require multiple Schemas to make up the creation pattern, while minor artifacts may only require one.