Secrets of Xen'drik -- who has it?

[AdmundfortGeographer]

Stats for the Primoridal Giant Template please!

Choose either invisibility, invisibility purge, or levitate as an at will spell-like ability manifested at a caster level equal to giant's racial Hit Dice.

Str –4, Con –2, Int +4, Cha +4

Magical Knack (Ex): Use all spell-like abilities at +1 caster level.

Extra skill points based on higher intelligence. Also a +2 racial bonus to Spellcraft and Use Magical Device. Extra languages due to increased intelligence, chosen from those available to base creature.

Warlock added to favored class in addition to base creature's favored class.

LA and CR are the same as base creature.

 

[Hellcow]

The Shulassakar are the human followers of the Couatls... It does not say, but I would give the Trancendent wings and maybe change the Aversion ability to Attraction.

I could go either way on this; they are still defenders, and aversion is useful for that. However, darkness abilities should certainly be changed to their light-based counterparts... my bad there.

Also, yeah, Warforged were made by Quori

As I've clarified this elsewhere...
[sblock]The FIRST warforged were created by the Quori. However, in the thousand years following, various giant civilizations took the idea and created their OWN variations. And then you've had 37,000 years since then. The Quori created the first docents, but the docent described in the ECS is a giant docent, not a Quori one! As such, it's up to you to decide if the Quori origin is relevant in your campaign. Did Cannith develop the modern warforged from the Quorcraft warforged? Or is there another secret to them, of your own devising? The Quori origin is one more piece of the puzzle, but if you don't like it, there's still room to develop your own ideas.[/sblock]

 

[Vocenoctum]

[sblock]The FIRST warforged were created by the Quori. However, in the thousand years following, various giant civilizations took the idea and created their OWN variations. And then you've had 37,000 years since then. The Quori created the first docents, but the docent described in the ECS is a giant docent, not a Quori one! As such, it's up to you to decide if the Quori origin is relevant in your campaign. Did Cannith develop the modern warforged from the Quorcraft warforged? Or is there another secret to them, of your own devising? The Quori origin is one more piece of the puzzle, but if you don't like it, there's still room to develop your own ideas.[/sblock]

My preference is that the Quori started them, the giants made some also, furthering the work, but that modern warforged are different than either that came before, and Cannith actually did more than either of them in advancing the cause in a short time.

Same with the gnomes of Zilargo and elemental binding, I hate the idea that they simply ripped off the idea from XenDrik. (Especially the way it was just dropped in and presented as truth.) Warforged still have a sense of discovery about them, but diminishing the "current day" work on such things has gotten a little too rampant. Modern Khorvaire is full of brilliant folks, and Dragonmarks.

For myself, I like tying Warforged to Incarnum, and I sort of like the idea that Incarnum ebbs and flows over the millenia. Warforged may not still wander about from the ancient days, but that might be because they were asleep. They may not have been developed 200 years ago, simply because it wasn't possible.

 

[Hellcow]

Same with the gnomes of Zilargo and elemental binding, I hate the idea that they simply ripped off the idea from XenDrik.

Agreed. But I think the key here is that it's not "ripped off" as much as "were inspired by." It's like a group of cavemen finding an automobile and figuring out how to reverse-engineer it. They'd never be able to do it without having the automobile to work with. But even once they HAVE the automobile, figuring out how to make their own requires immense creativity and ingenuity. As a major supporter of the gnomes, I don't want to downplay their achievements in the field... that the fact that there aren't dozens of other elemental factories across Khorvaire shows that there's more to the science of binding than just duplication (though it also speaks to the ruthlessness of Trust enforcers determined to keep trade secrets!).

 

[Vocenoctum]

Agreed. But I think the key here is that it's not "ripped off" as much as "were inspired by." It's like a group of cavemen finding an automobile and figuring out how to reverse-engineer it. They'd never be able to do it without having the automobile to work with. But even once they HAVE the automobile, figuring out how to make their own requires immense creativity and ingenuity. As a major supporter of the gnomes, I don't want to downplay their achievements in the field... that the fact that there aren't dozens of other elemental factories across Khorvaire shows that there's more to the science of binding than just duplication (though it also speaks to the ruthlessness of Trust enforcers determined to keep trade secrets!).

That's what triggered my "irritation reflex" was in Magic of Eberron, it basically seemed phrased that gnomes found the instruction booklet, guarded the instruction booklet zealously, and knew nothing except how to follow instruction.

Whereas, finding some ancient giant's elemental bathtub, reverse engineering it, then broadening it's principles into airships and such, gives the gnomes credit, but still acknowledges the basis in ancient engineering.

 

[Plane Sailing]

I've just started going through it, and I've found a couple of things that I don't think are going into 'my' Eberron.

a) a race of elves (Qabalrin) who were better at magic than the giants? No thanks. Sounds like somebody wanted some "super elves" but they just don't fit into the overall mythos of the setting to my mind.

b) warforged originally designed by Quori? Just seems so far removed from their modus operandi. Maybe there is a brilliant rationalisation in the detail of the text, but it just feels very wrong at the moment.

 

[Sammael]

Sound like the locations might make the book worth considering if I am ever to run a Chult game.

 

[Staffan]

b) warforged originally designed by Quori? Just seems so far removed from their modus operandi. Maybe there is a brilliant rationalisation in the detail of the text, but it just feels very wrong at the moment.

I don't have Secrets of Xen'drik yet, but remember that the Quori that attacked 40,000 years ago are not the same Quori that rule Riedra. They've had at least one turning of the age since then.

 

[qstor]

Scorpion Wrath: Drow elite warrior

Dark Psion, could you say what the prereqs for this is?

thanks!!

Mike

 

[Gez]

New Monsters
<snip>
Scorrow (Scorpion Drow)

Yeah, that's really different from the Drider (Drow Spider) -- the portemanteau is reversed! :\

That's what triggered my "irritation reflex" was in Magic of Eberron, it basically seemed phrased that gnomes found the instruction booklet, guarded the instruction booklet zealously, and knew nothing except how to follow instruction.

Plus, Magic of Eberron also states that elemental binding is rightfully the monopoly of the Drow, who will one day send ninja assassins of doom to punish the Zils for their most blasphemous crime against Drow Kewlness. Sigh.