Whirlwind tour of Khorvaire

[zalgar07]

Just wondering...I'm gonna be starting an Eberron campaign in September...it'll be my 1st time DMing outside my family. All the players are experienced and have at least passing familiarity with the D20 system as well as the setting.

My plan is to start the campaign with the PCs on the Lightning Rail eastbound...right on the Day of Mourning. They need to survive the runaway train and get out of the now mago-apocolyptic horror of the Mournland. When they escape (after getting the daylights scared outta them and acquiring some items and clues) they'll get sucked into a temporal anomaly two years into the future - to the campaign book's start date - on the Talenta Plains.

Following that, they'll essentially be taken on a whirlwind tour of the Eberron campaign setting, seeing all the major regions with a different kind of adventure in each...all with the eventual goal of finding out who caused the Day of Mourning.

I'm doing this because of my hope that someone else will eventually want to run the setting so that I can play...because although I'm supposed to be a great storyteller... I'm pretty nervous about all this.

The party is also a little understaffed in the Arcane destruction area...how can I work around that in adventure design?

Thanks for any advice!

 

[Bobitron]

That sounds like it could work pretty well! I would recommend asking for advice over at the Eberron boards at the WOTC site, plenty of people who think about Eberron as a religion. I'm sure they will have PLENTY of ideas for you.

 

[cmanos]

Sounds like a very cool idea! What is the party makeup? Just because they don't have a nuker (arcane destruction ....) doesn't mean it can't be fun. I see a HUGE potential for Eberron to be a very political world. Yes there is the swashbuckling and high adventure element, but with the history and richness of culture, there is potential for huge political machinations.

And if the party starts to realize they may need an arcane caster, someone may have to <***GASP***> multiclass. There are always Mystic Theurges and Spellswords for PrC's.

Am pretty huge into Eberron myself. Feel free to bounce ideas off of me if you like.

C

 

[Storminator]

When they escape (after getting the daylights scared outta them and acquiring some items and clues) they'll get sucked into a temporal anomaly two years into the future - to the campaign book's start date - on the Talenta Plains.

I would omit the temporal anomaly and just say two years pass without incident. Let them do one adventure in the Plains, then jump ahead two years, and let them be in any city of their choosing at that point. Maybe have them level once to reflect the things they've learned in the down time.

PS

 

[zalgar07]

Temporal anomaly...

Why would you say that, Storminator? The next two years are hardly going to pass without incident since it'll be the time when the Treaty of Thronehold gets hammered into place. I settled on this idea because I've got plenty on the Day of Mourning and the campaign start date...but very little in between. Since there's some pretty messy magic flying around the Mournland, why not temporal as well as dimensional anomalies?

Anyway, thanks for all the encouragement. I wouldn't be surprised if someone in the party decided to become a spellsword or mystic theurge...we'll see anyway.

As for political maneuvering...oh we'll have our fair share of that. I don't want too much though...I'm not mean/creative enough to come up with appropriately complex schemes and/or conspiracies...

 

[MavrickWeirdo]

That sounds like it could work pretty well! I would recommend asking for advice over at the Eberron boards at the WOTC site, plenty of people who think about Eberron as a religion. I'm sure they will have PLENTY of ideas for you.

At least it's a flexible alignment religion.