How good are the various supplements to Eberron?

[mostholycerebus]

Eberron Campaign Setting is a great book.

I'm running Whispers of the Vampires Blade now. It's rather railroadish if your players try to do odd and unexpected things. Luckily my players have been following the adventure pretty closely, so I haven't had to force them back on track. As mentioned, it has some GREAT set action scenes that will remain memorable. It's setup as a chase though, and has several parts where if the players fail to do somethig, the bad guy gets away and the game ends. Noonan (author) try's to include fixes for if your party screws up something, but the fixes make no sense or are completely stupid. I'll probably do a review of it in a few months for my local 'zine, I may toss it at ENworld too.

 

[Nightfall]

*agrees with MMax as Five Nations looks to be very solidly written*

 

[Len]

I'm running Whispers of the Vampires Blade now. It's rather railroadish if your players try to do odd and unexpected things.

You mean if

Spoiler

the archer gets dominated by the vampire and kills the rest of the party, and the vampire heals them and dominates them and they spend the next several months running around Khorvaire assassinating various VIPs and developing a very negative reputation

?

Been there, done that, apologized to the rest of the party.

 

[Nightfall]

*remembers now why he doesn't use vampires as much at low levels and thus sticks with Liches...*

 

[VorpalBunny]

You mean if

Spoiler

the archer gets dominated by the vampire and kills the rest of the party, and the vampire heals them and dominates them and they spend the next several months running around Khorvaire assassinating various VIPs and developing a very negative reputation

?

Been there, done that, apologized to the rest of the party.

Priceless. Just priceless. Depending on how your players handled this it could have made (or make) an unforgettable campaign.

 

[Bront]

I realy like Races of Ebberon. I've not sifted through the Shifter or Kalashtar section as well as I should have, but the Warforged and Changeling sections are both excelent. There's a PrC or two for every race (Well, if I remember right, 2 for Changelings and Warforged, one for shifters and one for Kalashtar). In particular, the Reforged were a very good idea as a 3 level PrC and makes for an interesting break in the Warforged are closer to machines mentality. All the PrCs are well done, and interesting. Definately worth considering.

The Racial substitution levels are hit or miss. The Warforged fighter one makes for a powerfuly tough fighter, but takes away the uniqueness that each fighter can have by replacing their first 3 feats with specific abilities or feats. The artifacer is very good though, and fits with their manufactured for war theme. The changeling rogue and wizard ones are fun (i've used them both), and put a different spin on both classes (particularly the rogue). The Kalashtar substitution levels aren't too bad either, particularly the Soul Knife, which gives you a few different options and a bonus ability due to the inately psionic nature of the Kalashtar.

I would have liked a few more interesting ideas for warforged components, but otherwise the book has been an incredable tool. It even has ideas on using the regular races in Ebberon, and has a few halfling, elf, and drow only feats as well as a few usefull general feats (Master Linguist is a great idea)

 

[Glyfair]

While I've only browsed through my copy of "Five Nations," I will give this a tenative ****1/2. Excellent background, really creative prestige classes, nice flavor.

My favorite "crunch" is the Silver Pyrmomancer. A Silver Flame arcanist (with at least one level of cleric) who's fire spells become holy (start doing holy damage, can "smite evil" with spells, etc).

 

[Len]

Priceless. Just priceless. Depending on how your players handled this it could have made (or make) an unforgettable campaign.

Actually, I'm one of the players. The one who had to apologize to all the others.

We seem to have made a habit of derailing the adventures in that campaign. Doesn't seem to happen in our other game (with a different DM). But yeah, it's kind of nice to have a different campaign than everyone else who plays the same modules.