So..tell me about Eberron

[CronoDekar]

The original, best seller for me is the re-invention of the races. Dwarves are pretty much the same, but elves, halflings and gnomes have different cultures. Orcs are actually important to the setting. Various monsters get props, and appear to actually exist in the setting as entities, rather than 'the ogre in the basement'.

This is definitely my favorite thing from Eberron. I've always before hated elves, but Eberron gave some new culture options with the Aerenal and the Valenar to make them cool again. Especially the Valenar -- a culture that likes to fight to bring honor to their ancestors? Their culture and the art has just made me go "Ooooooo!"

And then there's gnomes (I love gnomes). Gnomes in standard D&D seem to have this half-culture, where they're like halflings, only more annoying. Gnomes in Eberron are underhanded, two-timing SOBs... and they enjoy their culture, and don't take offense when someone is just "playing the game" as long as there's no physical threats or harm. Plus rather than having things like "laws" and "fair trials", their country is kept in order by a secret police who might "take action" against someone who would bring harm to Zilargo or its citizens, whether that means death by an assassin or slipping some crazy drug into their drink and leaving them a note in the morning telling them to knock it off.

Outside of Zilargo they're ironically good as barristers, and their dragonmarked house is rather important in business affairs, as they're responsible for notary and sending messages (as per the spell).

I really wish Eberron did something with the dwarves though. All the other demihumans got a nice culture change (I also really love the halfling and orc cultures), but dwarves really don't have that much that's interesting about them.

 

[Hellcow]

I'd love to play a "misguided" CG cleric of the Dragon Below (an evil cult) but I can't quite see how to pull it off.

One thing to bear in mind is that the CotDB have a tremendously diverse range of beliefs. Few of them literally worship Khyber, or a daelkyr or rajah by its proper name. As has been discussed in a few places, while some cults seek to release powers from the depths, others simply see Khyber as a promised land... typically believing that passage to that paradise must be earned with blood. So on the one hand you have the creepy Marcher family who like to drug guests and feed their paralyzed bodies to the gibbering mouther in the basement in pursuit of this goal... not so good. But I could easily see a CG warlock or barbarian who engages in extreme violence in the belief that he's earning his passage to Khyber's gilded heart - but who only fights evil-doers and villains. He's a good guy; he just has a strange and irrational motivation underlying his noble actions (give him a moment and he'll happily tell you about the bone orchards and the chromatic orchestras of the city within the earth, and how he hopes to be reunited with his grandparents in the gallery of bloody memories), and a proclivity for violence.

Now I want to play him! Darn it!

 

[Darkwolf71]

He's a good guy; he just has a strange and irrational motivation underlying his noble actions (give him a moment and he'll happily tell you about the bone orchards and the chromatic orchestras of the city within the earth, and how he hopes to be reunited with his grandparents in the gallery of bloody memories), and a proclivity for violence.

Now I want to play him! Darn it!

Awesome. I may steal that as well.

 

[Wik]

y'know, I ran my first real Eberron adventure yesterday, and we all fell into a sort of "mixed morals" game quite fast. It was a lot of fun. The very first fight, in fact, wound up with the PCs fighting some revolutionaries who seemed to belong to the Church of the Silver Flame; the PCs were fighting to defend Blood of Vol cultists who were just trying to get safely into the city of Karlakton.

I thought that was pretty cool. I should throw in a cult of the Dragon Below, though - Karlakton is a city of doomsday cults, and I think a CotDB is almost necessary...

 

[Siberys]

While I am IN LOVE with the setting as a whole, and could be described as a fanboy (see my username ), I really have only three words.

Kalashtar. Are. Awesome.

 

[JeffB]

Got my books Thursday night

Skimmed around a tad, then dug in from page one and Got most of the way through the races in the ECS before falling asleep Hopefully I'll be able to dig in a bit more in the coming week.


So far it seems quite a bit different compared to traditional D&D worlds like Oerth and Faerun, so it will take me some time to get a a real "feel" for the setting. And I don't just mean cos it has warforged or lightning rails. Its different in theme....its reminds me very much of Barsaive....especially Orcs, Dwarves and Elves, as well as Airships and such. The Politics, etc..very similar to Barsaive.

 

[Hairfoot]

I've grown to like Eberron, but I'd have to tweak it a lot before I'd run or play a campaign with it.

The thing I like most is that magic is an integral part of the world, not just awkwardly laid over the top of a conventional mediaeval fantasy setting.

The main thing I love is that the PCs are going to be the heroes in Eberron.

That's one thing I particularly dislike. The PCs start as larger-than-life figures heading for godhood. If you like that sort of play, it's great, but if you prefer your characters to be more Indiana Jones than X-Men, the setting doesn't support it so much.

 

[Asmor]

Got my books Thursday night

Skimmed around a tad, then dug in from page one and Got most of the way through the races in the ECS before falling asleep Hopefully I'll be able to dig in a bit more in the coming week.


So far it seems quite a bit different compared to traditional D&D worlds like Oerth and Faerun, so it will take me some time to get a a real "feel" for the setting. And I don't just mean cos it has warforged or lightning rails. Its different in theme....its reminds me very much of Barsaive....especially Orcs, Dwarves and Elves, as well as Airships and such. The Politics, etc..very similar to Barsaive.

I really, really can't recommend Sharn: The City of Towers enough, then. Keep in mind, this is the novel, not the sourcebook.

It suffers a bit story wise because it has the onerous task of introducing an entirely new setting, but the story that's there is good, and the feeling you get for the setting is absolutely fantastic. It stands up perfectly well on its own, too, so you needn't worry about reading the next two books in the trilogy if you don't want to.

 

[Rechan]

That's one thing I particularly dislike. The PCs start as larger-than-life figures heading for godhood. If you like that sort of play, it's great, but if you prefer your characters to be more Indiana Jones than X-Men, the setting doesn't support it so much.

Not true. Neither Wolverine nor Indiana Jones has their level stamped on their forehead. And not every PC is going to be met with throngs of groupies throwing their panties at them.

There's nothing that really stops you from being the rogue with skill ranks in Knowledge (Archaeology) and Profession (Teacher) delving into Xen'drik or Q'Barra.

 

[messy]

Pulp influence

can someone please tell me what this means??

messy