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

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[R_J_K75]

That's not really my point. My point is even when the players don't care about the difference, the NPCs should be saying "Thank the Silver Flame!" instead of "Thank Mystra" or whatever, and when that demon crawls out of the Pit it should not be crawling out of the Nine Hells. The lore built into a world has value even if it is entirely tertiary to smashing monsters in the face and looting the corpses.

I agree when put in that perspective. I prefer to pick and choose my battles these days regarding when to when to roleplay/add certain details and when not to, if theres value added then I will.

 

[Umbran]

I would suggest that your "looking at" those things wasn't actually "reading and absorbing" those things.

In the future, please address the content of the post, rather than attack the person posting. This is making the discussion about the people, rather than about Eberron, and will tend to make this into an ego-clash, rather than a reasonable discussion.

Any questions, please take them to PM. Thanks.

 

[doctorhook]

So do we know who the big giant head on the cover is supposed to represent yet? In an earlier thread, some folks were chirping that he or she is an important NPC from the adventure, but (aside from a dominant NPC being inappropriate for Eberron) it’s clear now that the book only contains a tiny adventure anyway. Your move, head-worshippers.

I looked at Eberron cosmology and saw it as just a renaming of planes with a different metaphorical structure.

Some of the planes are similar to Great Wheel planes, but if you think it’s just a reskin of that then I think you missed an important point of the setting: there are exactly 13 planes, no more and no less. It’s an instance of Eberron’s “Baker’s dozen”, which is one of the hidden metaphysical frameworks upon which the setting is built.

 

[JohnLynch]

Elves being descended from Corellon doesn't harm anybody's individual game.

Well, like I said, that actually isn’t true according to any Eberron product I own. But you are right in that my game isn’t impacted by whatever you homebrew for your game.

 

[gyor]

There does seem to be a sharp contradiction between 4e lore and 5e. If you use 4e, Elves are the slave descendants of Eladrin captured by Giants. Unless Eladrin are also the emanation of Corellon. And IMO, I prefer the 3.5/4e story.

I'll admit, I don't see why MToF saw fit to try and create a unified lore across planes. Dark Sun is also pretty darn different, and ... I dunno, in the event I would even try to create a multi-planar campaign, I'd find the parallels between worlds an interesting but unexplained phenomenon. Like how every civilized race in Babylon 5 has their own equivalent to Swedish meatballs.

It make it easier for characters to hope from one setting to another, instead of having settings split their player base

 

[Bolares]

It make it easier for characters to hope from one setting to another, instead of having settings split their player base

I think that the way they are constructing their multiverse in 5e does that job. Hegemonising the lore on races and cultures is not, in my opinion. The most appealing thing about Eberron elves to me is their difference from elves from everywere else, and that includes their origin.

 

[Vael]

It make it easier for characters to hope from one setting to another, instead of having settings split their player base

Don't get me wrong, I like using common names. But I'd allow each setting to flavour them differently.
Sure, in the Forgotten Realms and I guess Grayhawk, Corellon Larethian is the patron God of the Elves. In Eberron, he's not a god, but a revered hero of the past, one of the first to rise up against the giants, a Spartacus figure. The Valenar, in particular, revere and attempt to emulate his deeds. In Dark Sun, he's more of a fable or mythological figure, a Robin Hood or Odysseus (or darker, maybe Rumpelstiltskin) like trickster from ancient tales.

In each, Corellon is a known name, but each spin the character to fit their own history and place in the world.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

It make it easier for characters to hope from one setting to another, instead of having settings split their player base

I’ve never seen any evidence at all that suggests that something like elves having different origins, and thus one part of one book not being applicable to a given setting, does anything at all to split the fan base to any degree whatsoever.

I think that the way they are constructing their multiverse in 5e does that job. Hegemonising the lore on races and cultures is not, in my opinion. The most appealing thing about Eberron elves to me is their difference from elves from everywere else, and that includes their origin.

Exactly. It dilutes the story of every race in a given setting if they all have the same multiversal origin.

Don't get me wrong, I like using common names. But I'd allow each setting to flavour them differently.
Sure, in the Forgotten Realms and I guess Grayhawk, Corellon Larethian is the patron God of the Elves. In Eberron, he's not a god, but a revered hero of the past, one of the first to rise up against the giants, a Spartacus figure. The Valenar, in particular, revere and attempt to emulate his deeds. In Dark Sun, he's more of a fable or mythological figure, a Robin Hood or Odysseus (or darker, maybe Rumpelstiltskin) like trickster from ancient tales.

In each, Corellon is a known name, but each spin the character to fit their own history and place in the world.

That’s much more interesting than “elves in Eberron just don’t know their own history.” The history obsessed elves of Eberron. The elves that are more obsessed with the past and preserving its heroes and stories than in any other world in dnd. Those elves...just don’t know their own past?

Okay, mordy. Sure thing.

 

[Bolares]

I’ve never seen any evidence at all that suggests that something like elves having different origins, and thus one part of one book not being applicable to a given setting, does anything at all to split the fan base to any degree whatsoever.
Exactly. It dilutes the story of every race in a given setting if they all have the same multiversal origin.


That’s much more interesting than “elves in Eberron just don’t know their own history.” The history obsessed elves of Eberron. The elves that are more obsessed with the past and preserving its heroes and stories than in any other world in dnd. Those elves...just don’t know their own past?

Okay, mordy. Sure thing.

Maybe every elven culture believes Corellon is their hero... The Thairnadal believe they are an ancient hero and try to emulate them... The Aereni have an undying the claims to be Corellon (or something similar), the vulkoori drow claim they were the first to really connect do vulkoor, the umbragen tell stories of the mighty hero that speraheaded the expedition to khyber... go nuts on it.

 

[Vael]

Maybe every elven culture believes Corellon is their hero... The Thairnadal believe they are an ancient hero and try to emulate them... The Aereni have an undying the claims to be Corellon (or something similar), the vulkoori drow claim they were the first to really connect do vulkoor, the umbragen tell stories of the mighty hero that speraheaded the expedition to khyber... go nuts on it.

Oooh, I like that. After all, even the Sovereign Host are all known by many names in different cultures. As I said, I like Swedish Meatballs.