Keith Baker on Eberron's Theme

Keith Baker wrote:
**the size of the continent, which doesn't seem to match the cultures described for it.**

That's because it doesn't. In my opinion, the scale on the maps of Eberron is off by a factor of ten. In my mind, the Five Nations should be along the size of nations like France and England, not Russia and China. It throws off travel time for adventures, skews population, and makes it hard to imagine events in the Last War pushing deep beyond the borders. This wasn't somehow inherent in the design of the setting (in fact, quite the opposite); in my opinion it was just a miscommunication with the art department that is sadly now part of the core book. But personally, MY Khorvaire is a much smaller place.


Wow! I'm glad the author of the setting agrees with me. It's not a big point, and certainly doesn't hamper my enjoyment of Eberron, but I've always thought the size of the continent and the countries was way off. I just assumed it was Europe sized, at least as far as the Five Nations were concerned, until I actually started computing the distances and realized, whoa, this place is HUGE.
 

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Michael Dean said:
Wow! I'm glad the author of the setting agrees with me. It's not a big point, and certainly doesn't hamper my enjoyment of Eberron, but I've always thought the size of the continent and the countries was way off. I just assumed it was Europe sized, at least as far as the Five Nations were concerned, until I actually started computing the distances and realized, whoa, this place is HUGE.

I'm comfortable with this "change." A shame that correcting it with errata would create a big cascade of changes. Maybe an eventual new Eberron campaign setting when 4E is released (years from now) could fix it, like the 3E changes to the Forgotten Realms. I don't see a new campaign setting book for any other reason than a new edition.


I do think Xen'drik is appropriately sized. I haven't heard any complaints about Sarlona, but that's probably because it doesn't have any direct earthly analog for comparison.

Savage Wombat said:
I don't think you'd even need a whole sourcebook - you could probably do that with a well-written article.

If only there were a WotC-supported, fan-contributed magazine of some sort to publish one in.
Well, we have message boards that could take that role. I think Online Eberron might be willing to take the role if the official WotC forums don't seem appropriate.

Other than that, we'd have to hope that WotC's DI can fill that role.

blargney the second said:
I definitely go more for the pulp end of things, mostly because I'm not familiar enough with noir to pull it off. Pulp is hella fun though. :)

And this would be a great article. Have a "How to run a noir campaign" article (it wouldn't even have to be tied into Eberron). I bet Wolfgang would even consider writing one for Kobold Quarterly if asked.
 
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Glyfair said:
I do think Xen'drik is appropriately sized. I haven't heard any complaints about Sarlona, but that's probably because it doesn't have any direct earthly analog for comparison.
Just as Xendrik is Africa, the Dark Continent, Sarlona is the Orient. Riedra = China, Adar = Tibet.
 

Yeah, that Europe bit about the size of Khoirivare seems like a pretty big deal. Really makes me wonder about the QC process involved.

Anyway, I like it being big. I just add more people and make the towns bigger.

I tend to pulp it more than I noir it. Noir is a pretty foreign thing for most standard fantasy, I believe. So that's probably why it doesn't get much action in the sourcebooks.
 

blargney the second said:
I definitely go more for the pulp end of things, mostly because I'm not familiar enough with noir to pull it off. Pulp is hella fun though. :)

Funny cause I run my campaign more towards the Noir end of things :) Nice to have two different sides to the same world :)
 

Glyfair said:
Have a "How to run a noir campaign" article (it wouldn't even have to be tied into Eberron). I bet Wolfgang would even consider writing one for Kobold Quarterly if asked.

Yes, I'd be happy to publish such an article, if Keith wanted to write it. Kobold Quarterly #2 is already shaping up to have a lot of industry names in it, and I suspect Keith would do an awesome job on this topic.

Hmmmm. A commissioned article. A first for this magazine.
 

I'm certainly interested. I love me some noir. Things are a little nutty right now - I'm getting caught up on my current novel and balancing things with my newish day job (and my tendency to spend far too much time on message boards) - but I'll drop you an email and we can talk about length, deadines and the like.
 

That's funny. All the Eberron campaigns that i had in mind were all noir-based rather than pulp. Hmm....guess i wasnt born in the Indiana Jones era yet. ;)
 


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