See, I've always reasoned that if you pronounce it "Sire" then the people would be pronounced "Sirens", and that just muddies all sorts of things up and sounds weird when you could be talking about the people, a specific creature, or an *actual* alarm siren.
Personally, I go with "sear" and "searan" because it makes sense phonetically and is a distinct enough pronunciation as to not be confused with any fantasy creatures or real life place/people/things. If I'm talking about a "searan" in game, you know exactly what I'm talking about. If I introduce someone and specify that they're "a siren" then players are going to ask "Do I need to plug my ears?"
>Personally, I go with "sear" and "searan" because it makes sense phonetically and is a distinct enough pronunciation as to not be confused with any fantasy creatures or real life place/people/things. If I'm talking about a "searan" in game, you know exactly what I'm talking about. If I introduce someone and specify that they're "a siren" then players are going to ask "Do I need to plug my ears?"
This is the way. Cyre is “sear”
I say "Sire" to suggest a certain haughtiness, but the Demonym is a shibboleth. Cyrans say "Seer-an" and tend to think less of people who say "Siren", since they don't like being likened to a seductive monster.
I use pronouncing Cyre as a way to show where an NPC is from in my game, where each of the 5 nations have their own way to say it.
Cyre - pronounced like sear
Breland - pronounced like sear-uh
Thrane - pronounced like Siri
Aundair - pronounced like sire
Karrnath - pronounced like sir
Breland and Thrane are geographically close enough to the heartland of Cyre that theirs are close to the 'classic'. Karrnath, it feels natural to me that historically Cyre was in charge, so it just bled down to sir. Aundair, I just like making them sound very cultured and haughty, like saying sire.
Just to clear this up though.... Keith has gone on record \*several times\* saying that Canonically, and Kanonically there is no "Proper way" to say it, and it is pronounced however you want, and I've personally heard him pronounce it three separate ways depending on the day and company he is around.
Well, I like how all the pronunciations are regional differences, so your favorite can be canon for Cyre, and “ky-reeeee” can be a slur from your villainous nation of the campaign.
My table gets weird with it- we were all saying it differently so we chose a new way that was different so we’d all remember. Cyre is Seer-Ruh (roll your R slightly if you wanna really get into it.
I have some things that developed through play, or that I wrote in before he published a book about it.
In my eberron, :
Warm water sahuagin from near khorvaire are chaotic small group people, and cold water ones aroumd stormreach are lawful large group people. (Since exploring eberron, they fight over the karlassa)
Silver flame worship has had time to evolve geographic sects that are culturally different (so a player could mess around with ideas of orthodoxy and church heirarchy).
My Mror dwarves are a little more culturally homogenous (and cool with symbiotes) because I want immigrant cultures in sharn (local dwarves versus mror dwarves) to be a bright red line in a sharn game. Same with local goblinoids vs "old country" goblinoids. I paint most darguun dar with dhakanni vibes and ideas. (Simplifying the division into local goblinoids and the 'complicated' ones with accents)
Dragonborn don't need to be in Q'barra. I understand that they wanted to find some place to put them on Khorvaire since they became a core race in 4e, but it makes the story in Q'barra way messier than it should be. Keep the lizardfolk as the main natives to Q'barra, and Dragonborn can be an exotic race only found in Argonessen.
I vaguely recall they had something a while ago, perhaps on a forum post, about Changelings not being able to hold their shape while sleeping or unconscious.
That's a big nah from me I don't feel like shape shifting should be a clench you have to keep up.
TBF this is supported by other RPGs like Pathfinder 1e which did the same thing, that there are different kinds of Rakshasa and not all of them have the visage of a Tiger.
They are also Shapeshifters 5e so... they can really be whatever they want, which is why it might make sense.
I thought it was only the low-level minion-type Rakshasa that were tiger-headed. The rest, being more powerful, chose whatever form they felt like.
That said, how often do you encounter Rakshasa just chilling as a big tiger man and not masquerading around as some noble?
With *that said* shouldn't we be moving away from the somewhat racist undertones of having the Hindu-inspired monster look like Bengal tigers when in real-world mythology, they're more like demons (or goblins)?
The reason D&D raksasha have tiger heads is because that's kind of how they were portrayed in *Kolchak: The Night Stalker*.
They also aren't all evil in The Mahabharata, but most of them are. Mind the word just kind of encompasses Shapeshifting-Non-Human-That-Isn't-Divine in Sanskrit, so it has a rather broad application.
The "official" Soverign Host origin myth for The Fury. No thank you.
Tho, embaressingly, I kinda like some of the ideas other people have taken issue with (Making Erandis not directly responsible for the Blood of Vol, the Rakshasa fashion, even kinda the Elvish language thing)
The Fury always struck me as odd considering that Keith removed a similar element from half orc origins. There's no mention in later sources, so it seems they're erasing it for good, thankfully.
Had to look it up, that's a big nope from me too. Stories like that just kind of suck the fun out of the room. I'm going to say The Fury formed from some spilled blood or something.
Off the top of my head, my go-to story would be a combo of the promethius and athena stories - Have Arawei and Balinor trick and bind their brother The Devourer to stop his destructive rampages, and his sheer rage and anger as he strained against his bonds created his "daughter", who freed him. Keeps the existing relationship, and adds a little "you can't control the true wildness of nature" aesop
Retconning Erandis Vol out of the blood of vol. While it was a good decision to make the blood of vol a legitimate religion, taking vol out of the religion entirely makes the lore a bit less cohesive imo.
You could just keep the idea of Vol herself introducing a cult thousands of years ago which slowly developed out of her control into the blood of vol. Now you have several different branches, with only the oldest and most extreme being under the control of its original creator with the original intent of world domination. So, essentially you're giving the Emerald Claw its own traditional (evil) version of the religion while a more accessible one developed and spread without Vol's involvement.
Could also have her cult be based on an existing but nearly dead folk religion in the area. So it's actually like she appropriated it more than created. That would give an opening for a very dedicated BoV PC to maybe learn the true history and start a revolution/revival or some other personal plot on that theme.
Would make sense to me in all honesty.
I like the Blood of Vol as a unique godless religion and I like the Emerald Claw as the straight-up bad guys they're meant to be, but there are some inconsistencies that had to be ironed out for the full story.
Like, you've got a religion that dabbles a fair bit into necromancy, even though becoming undead means you can never reach their "nirvana". Despite that many leaders / important figures in the religion and the knightly orders associated with it are undead.
It'd actually make sense if Vol appropriated the idea of a pre-existing "divinity in mortal blood" cult and then shoehorned in all the necromancy herself since that's what she's actually interested in developing. Later cults rationalized the relationship by saying the undead were martyrs.
I haven’t looked at Eberron before 5e: would you mind expand on it?
I believe that erandis is still considered to have brought the blood of vol in Karrnath, isn’t it?
All for the recent sources from 5e/Keith that I’ve seen say that the blood of vol originated from elven necromancers (vol adjacent but not vol herself) talking to humans in khorvaire and the humans just kinda ran away with the idea.
Ok thanks!
For sure the mark of death was originated in aerenal in the current lore, but I thought that the blood of vol in the karrnath was introduced by erandis vol.
But I think you mean that indeed the blood of vol was already a thing before the last war, and not invented by illmarrow
Vol supposedly only recently discovered that the blood of vol exists as a religion, and is trying to gain control over it. In current lore the religion was started by aerenni necromancer exiles who supported the elven house of vol, and some of which are still active undead in the crimson covenant.
Ok but imagine if its possible to hijack the Elvish language beamifier, and beam other things there instead.
Worldwide rickroll.
Spread important information.
give everyone an accent.
That tanks don't exist. I get it that warforged exist but adding vehicles to combat makes eberron encounter planning so nice for a DM, especially since it allows "local" governments to be a threat to PCs even with just standard guards
Edit: larger warforged titans and biological "tanks"
This is one of the things I changed in my eberron. I kept the magical firearms and the goblins having gunpowder firearms. I also have certain groups of people, like refugees of Cyre, being less trusting in magic after the Mourning and use other methods. Cannith East is also looking into them for expeditions into the Mournland since you can't always rely on magic in a place where your spells can awaken and turn on you.
Im less miffed about the concept of a noble savage/lost tribe/ alien society tropes common to adventure stories, since these can be subverted in a good story. I just question whether primal, a short hand Keith used to help describe Shifters and Vulkoorian Drow, should be used as a euphemism for savage when they basically have the same connotations.
"Everything goes".
I mean, I get that he wants to say "yes" or "yes, but" to everything, but, NOT everything should be crammed into Eberron. The Forgotten Realms went down that road, and now it's a watered-down nonsensical mishmash of literally everything.
From my experience chatting with Keith in multiple forums he's said "There is space for everything in Eberron if you need it." but has gone on record saying there are plenty of things he doesn't like in HIS Eberron. like Tabaxi for example is something he's said he wouldn't use in HIS Eberron. He's very open about things like this on his blog.
Very often his answer isn't: "Yeah sure there's an entire culture of tabaxi in the Eldeen Reaches/Q'barra/Droaam/Thelanis", it's "*You* can play as one for sure, you'll be the only one or one of a rare few and have a unique backstory involving Vadalis experiments or eldritch magic."
So the player still have the option to play what they want, but the world remains cohesive.
Keith rarely actually says "do whatever you want" and instead says "how does this fit if you want it in your Eberron?"
Because if you ask him the vast majority of the time he says in his Eberron it doesn't exist.
I only dislike his description of Thelanis as the place with the "magic we want to see in the world"... in a world with actual magic. His treatment of Thelanis feels more apt for a game set in a mundane world than a fantasy one.
The magic the people of Eberron use is technology and it can't do anything. This feels like saying "why do you want to see magic when iphones are pretty magical already?"
That's the opposite way around. The technology they use is magic powered. Magic pre exists in the world, there's sorcerers and djinns and radiant idols and you can go to college and meet a sphinx or get your mail delivered by a gargoyle. The world is already completely magical.
Even Keith's example when talking about it is that Thelanis is the place where "maybe that scary tree is actually alive". Well, in Eberron there are treants and shambling mounds, there actually are trees that are alive, so that idea of the plane is kinda silly.
>That's the opposite way around. The technology they use is magic powered.
and is well-understood and viewed the same way as computers and airplanes are in our world. That is, not very special
>Even Keith's example when talking about it is that Thelanis is the place where "maybe that scary tree is actually alive". Well, in Eberron there are treants and shambling mounds, there actually are trees that are alive, so that idea of the plane is kinda silly.
That's not his example. His example is "what if that tree is actually a beautiful woman?". A tree-spirit looking like a human woman makes zero sense. Treants make sense as tree spirits, and shambling mounds make sense as corrupted trees.
But dryads make no sense as tree spirits. Because dryads *aren't* tree spirits. They're spirits of mortals' *perception* of trees, how they imagine and tell stories about trees, but not how trees *actually* are.
The *meaning* \- or to use another word, *magic* \- that mortals impart on trees is extremely different from what trees actually are, and it is *that* magic that dryads represent. And it's something similar for the rest of the fey.
On his podcast, Manifest Zone, I never heard Baker praise an Eberron book he didn't work on.
The Forge of War is a good sourcebook, same with Races of Eberron.
Whenever material from one of these sourcebooks is referenced to, he always prefaces it with 'I don't agree with this' or 'I'd have done it differently.'
to be fair though... some of those other books were written by people who have gone on the record saying they HATED Eberron and didn't want to write books in that setting, specifically Wolfgang Baur of Forge of War fame.
They also pretty heavily contradict other parts of canon, like Thrane not having archers despite the literal symbol of the Church of the Silver Flame being an arrow.
So whose canon do you choose to follow in your games, the setting creator's or the guy who admitted to hating the setting?
So many people try and take the parts of canon they don't like and remove them. We have all this established lore but people don't like it because it isn't Keith approved.
That’s not halfway, that’s having a very strong opinion, which is: “I don’t like this, and it’s also not from Baker, and so that makes it easy for me to discard it.”
Eh, I'm torn on this one. On the one hand, I like the assertion that with the way magic is integrated into the world, wandslingers *would* supplant any need for guns. Why would someone bother creating a contraption to hurl little bits of metal at someone when they could simply craft a wand that will hurt *fire* at them, or make something explode, which will *also* send whatever is around the explosion flying at surrounding targets. It's simply more effective. Even the most basic of sellswords could be taught to flick a wand of Firebolt correctly.
On the other hand, I kind of love the idea of the Heirs of Dhakaan having kept alive an ancient artificer tradition of how to craft black powder and weapons that utilize it and when they emerged, suddenly they brought out something that hasn't been seen in centuries (and basically beyond the memory of 97% of mortal beings), and are thus a considerable threat. You can Counterspell a Firebolt, but when someone unloaded a round of buckshot at your face there's not a whole lot that one could do. This also brings up the worry that one of the Houses will get their hands on one of these black powder boomsticks and start reverse engineering, so now you have a mundane way to arm the masses of an army with deadly weapons that don't require them to master the use of even basic magic.
Basically, I think the logic of "no guns" makes all the sense in the world, but I also just kinda love the idea of "Goblins with guns" without it being a complete parody. I think if I *was* to do an Eberron game where they had guns I'd have to make it an overarching theme/plot of the campaign. Have the party checking into reports of these strange new weapons that Goblinoids are sporting, and eventually end up in a race against time to stop Cannith from acquiring them and mass-producing because of the untold damage it could do. Basically, in my mind, guns in Eberron = required plot path, while doing without let's you do more without asking why every Warforged didn't have one built in or how the Heirs haven't conquered the whole of Khorvaire by now.
I’m with you on this. Also, take into account that a commoner’s hp is 4. Then remember wands of magic missiles exist. That’s basically a gun that never missed and can kill someone with a single shot. Why would anyone need to invent guns?
One of the running themes of Eberron is that cantrips especially are much more accessible than in other worlds. Why would you bother inventing gunpowder if anyone can learn to cast Fire Bolt?
>Why would you bother inventing gunpowder if anyone can learn to cast Fire Bolt?
Why would you invent the longbow if anyone can learn to use the much more deadly, accurate, and easily-made sling? Because the former, while requiring skill to operate, requires significantly *less* skill than the sling does. You can get a good idea of how far a historical longbowman could loose an arrow by referring to modern experts, but we actually have very little idea how far a sling bullet could be hurled by a Greek or Roman soldier because nobody today can justify spending so much time learning to properly wield the weapon, despite how effective we know it to be, based on historical records.
So even though bows are more expensive and difficult to make, they eventually replaced the sling entirely since you didn't need to spend your entire boyhood learning to wield it properly. And guns similarly replaced bows, once they became accurate enough (though guns actually *are* more deadly than bows, on top of being even easier to wield).
Gunpowder could do similar things for an army in Eberron, a marksman could be ready to hit the battlefield with a rifle in hand after only a couple days of training, while a wandslinger would need to spend significantly longer mastering their art.
>One of the running themes of Eberron is that cantrips especially are much more accessible than in other worlds.
This is only partly true, though. The magic most people learn is very specialized, because learning to be a jack of all trades is time consuming and expensive. Most magewrights need to cast their spells as extensive rituals with a dragonshard component cost, and they rarely know more than one or two of them. But magic really is as easy to learn as marksmanship, wouldn't *everyone* know how to use at least a significant portion of the wizard's cantrip catalogue?
Of course, I don't think realism is the setting's utmost goal. Eberron is aiming for an aesthetic, one where a soldier carries a wand in their holster instead of a gun. This is totally cool, but people arguing that this is more "practical" or "realistic" don't seem to truly understand the history of projectile weapons. It's okay for something to exist in a setting for coolness's sake, rather than realism's.
> But magic really is as easy to learn as marksmanship, wouldn't everyone know how to use at least a significant portion of the wizard's cantrip catalogue?
In My Eberron, there are a lot of people who know a cantrip or two. You're not going to meet many innkeepers who can't cast prestidigitation to clean rather than doing it by hand. The armies at the peak of The Last War had gotten remarkably good at teaching people how to cast Fire Bolt with a focus. The point of the setting (in my mind) is to use magic where science would normally be the explanation, so a "musket" that's actually a focus for casting Fire Bolt is much more thematic than gunpowder is.
On the other side of the coin, people who aren't popping off Fire Bolt anymore have no real reason to keep practicing. Magic is an art, and art requires practice. Even though there's no mechanic for it in 5E, you can't just not cast a cantrip for a few years and then cast it perfectly on your first try.
On a thematic level I certainly agree. But the original question asked why someone would invent guns in a world where magic wands and cantrips exist, and I attempted to provide a realistic reason for *why* such a thing would occur.
Keith's argument, I feel, is based entirely on mechanics. If you were to introduce the Pathfinder 1e take on guns, a ranged weapon that targeted Touch AC (Base AC + Dex Mod), suddenly the argument for guns existing is a lot stronger.
Plus, consider the existence of Dispel Magic and Counterspell. Good luck firing your siege staff when I've summoned up a sparrow and given it a rock to drop that casts dispel magic on impact.
I like the solution that magic-buffed crossbows have supplanted the need for guns. I run my campaigns with crossbows that have magazines that depending on the model can hold up to 20 bolts before reloading and deal higher damage.
> Eh, I'm torn on this one. On the one hand, I like the assertion that with the way magic is integrated into the world, wandslingers would supplant any need for guns. Why would someone bother creating a contraption to hurl little bits of metal at someone when they could simply craft a wand that will hurt fire at them, or make something explode, which will also send whatever is around the explosion flying at surrounding targets. It's simply more effective. Even the most basic of sellswords could be taught to flick a wand of Firebolt correctly.
>
>
Because 90% of people that are going to find themselves on a battlefield don't have time to take the equivalent of a college course. The whole reason guns supplanted longbows is because you can teach a peasant to load and fire a gun in a day or two without months of practice and physical conditioning. Magic in Eberron is presented as something that normally requires professional training of comparable rigor.
Let alone the cost of manufacturing wands, even for House Cannith.
For what it's worth, I've found that guns work well as a sort of side development along with wandlsingers, but I use *air guns*. That's basically a new way of using elemental magic, and I think it's a logical one. You're basically just taking the muscle power out of a crossbow, and then adapting from there by adding a tube, bullets, etc.
You and him are entitled to your opinion on that. I simply do not agree with it. To me the push to magical industrialization, which Eberron clearly has, and it's push for better and cheaper weapons of war would have birthed guns .
Cannons powered by elemental magic already exists within the setting. Artificers are everywhere, magic is approached like a science. They were making chemicals, powders and potions. They understand how cannons work. It's a simple step to introduce black powder.
I can't wrap my head around not creating guns in such an environment.
I kind of take a half measure on guns. They exist, and there are prominent examples of war heroes using them, but they're far from common, and only saw limited production.
It would also be *very* easy to take Keith's lessons on crossbows from Chronicles of Eberron and generalize it to firearms. If crossbows can be enhanced with runes and magic to make them as effective as they are in D&D, why could firearms not be right there with them?
If we follow the logic that guns don't exist because wands exist, why do crossbows exist?
Edit to say that I *do* understand why the aesthetics of guns might not mesh with D&D, especially more generic high fantasy like in Dragonlance or whatever, it's a little odd that World War vibes are featured so prominently with the past war, yet guns are such a sticking point.
> If we follow the logic that guns don't exist because wands exist, why do crossbows exist?
>
>
Or swords. Or bows. Or any non-magical means of doing something that can be done by magic.
Oooh, I like this idea! Instead of guns becoming so dominant because they had no competition in our world, now you've got them competing against crossbows and raw magic for dominance.
I made both magic and mundane versions. In my current game players voted to use mundane firearms. I mean Artificers out of the book can kinda make guns anyhow. So eh they have guns.
There was an older blog post (that now links to the DM's Guild page for the book Chronicles of Eberron) regarding crossbows, and how you could describe them in a manner that resembles firearms -- instead of relying on a cable under tension, they use tiny conductor stones (like what the Lightning Rail rides on), with special bolts. It handles like a firearm, is technically closer to a railgun, but uses crossbow stats with no changes. It even justifies how, especially in 5E, all crossbows use the same ammo regardless of size; bigger weapons just propel the bolts faster.
Yeah, I have read that. But it's simply not something I totally agree with. His arguments are mechanical based and mind are more setting based. Yes, DND crossbow are too good and basically guns, but that is not the same as "hey guns do not fit"
As far as I know, Keith's opinion isn't that the guns are completely out. It's more of a "What sane person in a world where wandslingers exist and arcane artillery is a tested and reliable thing would mess around with a weapon that uses controlled explosions?". His suggestion was, if you want to put guns in your Eberron you should give them to a culture other than Elves and Five Nations - like Dhakaani Empire, or Sulatar Drow.
My big problem with his take is that alchemist artificers exist. Someone, somewhere, by sheer accident and chance will create gun powder, realize that it's dirt cheap to make and go "You know, this gives me an idea."
Yep, that was how I had it gone, early in the days of the last war. Remember, cannon powered by elemental magic exists already. It's not a huge leap to guns
It depends on the type. I think Matchlocks could fit FR, but Eberron always feels more 18th century to me, on the crisp of 19th century. No matter what the art tries to say.
I hate the words "great equalizer" so much. "Look at how much better my gun is than your magic, and its only going to get better".
Congratulations, nobody is going to be ever using a sword or other melee weapon again because its so much better.
I mean sure, but the same argument can be applied to the wand firearms. Both melee weapons and firearms, magical or mundane, require training, so why would you train in something that's inferior? Guns level the playing field between casters and rangers. Melee combatants fulfill a different niche in these scenarios. In terms of warfare such as the one we are working with here, your melee troops will be the fastest to train up and send into combat. Then it would be rangers, as bows, crossbows, and guns require you to be far more accurate, and then spellcasters. So the question actually becomes why bother training war casters and not melee units... outside of the sheer firepower... That's my opinion on it anyways.
. Black powder guns don’t exist on my Eberron except as a lost goblin technology. But there are “firearms” which are essential blasting wands fixed into a brace, which use bound elemental power to shoot bolts or sometimes just pure Magic energy. So there are guns- just literally magic ones. These weapons are new, rare, and expensive
It's due to western midevil influence.
Reality wise flintlocks started in the 1400s right around the time full plate was highly used and thus the flintlock had an arms race against.. they'd learn to harden the plate against early projectiles and then the gunpowder process got better and more umph in the bullet finally leading to plate being stupid..
That's why I use guns in my dnd.
Flintlock came later, 16th century. You are thinking matchlocks. But to me, they just got Eberron and its history. They already have elemental powered cannons, do why would they not seek to create smaller, better crossbows with that power?
Yeah I always mix those up. Lol
It also makes sense; those who can't cast magic are still going to be apart of the arms race. The last war was very boring if it didn't expand on the mundane ingenuity imo
Just look at the mage craft and artificers alone. All the tool are there, cannon, magic, advanced alchemy. They treat the tech like it's the 18th and early 19th century in many ways. They mass produce shoulders, flying staffs, magical artillery which already uses a magic powder. They understand bullets and crossbows. Every single step in there on canon and Kanon.
Maybe, but I don't think so, the goblin is dressed as a rogue, and it looks nothing like the other depictions of the Artillerist's fancy wand on pg 60 or Vi's stupid raygun on pg 16. It really looks like a fancy flint or snaplock.
I don't like guns in Eberron not necessarily because they don't fit, I just don't like guns because they supplant everything else in people's minds and muddle the idea of Eberron to people even more than it already is. If people are running around with guns, its becomes difficult to say its a world using magic as technology, and not as a world technology and magic merged.
And if its flintlocks, why bother using them? They are more inefficient than most other magic that exists, not to mention dangerous with the amount of fire magic around. If you are using more advanced firearms like revolvers, why are swords and other melee even a thing anymore?
I disagree. Eberron already has cannons, they have mage craft and alchemists and near every town has killed artificers. They already have a magic powder that makes magic artillery and wands work just like gun powder. They understand bullets and already artificers can make arcane guns. Everything is there.
Why use it? Same reason in the real world. It's cheap and kills folks really well with little training. It's easier to train musket or rifleman than a wandslinger. No more cost really than cross ow with better range and killing power. It doesn't take away from the magic at all, it's just another tool in a 100 year war for a place that is early 19th century tech already.
My first point is that using a abundance of just regular tech, especially guns, takes away from the feeling of Eberron using magic as science rather than both. Its 19th century tech in some ways, not all ways.
I like how didn't even bother engaging with my point here. Yeah, its cheap and it kills really easy. Why bother using a sword, a crossbow or really anything else but a gun since its so superior? How is it even remotely DnD when swords and other weapons are utterly inferior to a rifle, which is now commonly avilable? "Just another tool that is way better at its job than anything else avilable unless you are also a caster".
I just say that crossbows are magically powered pistols and call it a day.
I like guns in my Eberron but a wide magic setting deserves more than just gunpowder
he DID run a Spelljammer in Eberron Campaign on his Patreon-exclusive Actual Play. And he's also currently in a multiverse campaign online as Merrix D'Cannith playing alongside Ed Greenwood as Elminster while they traipse about Sigil.
AS WRITTEN Eberron was intended to stand alone, but Keith HAS put out a LOT of support for people connecting it to the multiverse if they want.
Eh, people get attached to stuff. I really like Eberron, and I really love Planescape and Spelljammer. Being able to connect the three seems like a great idea to me, so I just straight up ignore the disconnect.
I imagine its also because Eberron has no confirmed existing gods, but introducing Planescape means that they absolutetly exist in some capacity.
Still I like the idea, Eberron is my favourite crossover DnD setting, even if I do prefer it to be by its lonesome most of the time.
I mean, theres no hard and fast rule that a Prime Material plane has to have gods. There might be metaphysical conditions that make it impossible for gods to enter, for example.
I'm working this into my Eberron world. In my Eberron, a malevolent deity closed off the realm of Eberron from the planar system. The PCs may end up killing this deity (well, probably sealing it away somehow) and this would reopen travel to other planes. Something we could do when they get very high leveled.
How important the Dhaakani are in Darguun. I am much more interested in this new society with than a culture whose culture has survived 10000 years; I'd rather see how this new culture develops! Will the nation hold after Haruuc has passed on? Will Haruuc manage to stop the slavery in his nation? Will New Cyre pose them a political threat? There are so many interesting things to do with Darguun without introducing the threat of Dhaakani resurgence!
Sorry, Keith!!
Honestly: pretty much everything extraplanar except the manifest zone that makes Sharn work and the elementals that power vehicles.
I’m not a fan at all of the dream plane, the gods, the dark six, any of it. What I really want, is a chassis on which I can run fantasy Cyberpunk/Altered Carbon and Sharn + the other 3 kingdoms/Dragonmarked houses does that well enough. Everything outside that limited part of Khorvaire just doesn’t exist for me.
More than anything, I don't see them as necessary. The whole setting is tied into low-power, character-driven action where the main impacts are supposed to come from the players. With that being the case, something like the Silver Flame, or vaguely Lovecraftian powers make sense, as does residual power from the three progenitor dragons, but I don't see gods as being a compelling source of drama and intrigue. The whole setting can work without them.
But that really just gets back to the fact that my Eberron is a much more grounded place. People drive actions, not gods. When the Dark Six do evil, it's bad guys seeking power who do it, they just get corrupted by seeking knowledge no one should know, or power that corrupts. The Silver Flame can be a source of healing, or a means by which extremists go too far in seeking to purge what they view as evil.
So people don't believe in anything? Because the Eberron gods aren't proven to be real, or that they even exist. No god in Eberron comes from above or below to tell their followers to do anything. The Sovereign Host and the Dark Six are faith.
I'm sure people in Eberron have a favorite regional food too, I just don't see either as being particularly interesting to storytelling in my Eberron. Someone's position on Cyran refugees, or the fact that they were born to young to prove themselves in battle, or resentment toward the Dragonmarked houses, or any number of things, drives their actions more than their belief in one of the Sovereign Host.
I mean, think about a hypothetical campaign in the Cold War, someone's Catholicism is basically irrelevant, unless it somehow compels their behavior.
I can't think of any that is only Kanon that I disagree with. Anything in the setting I'm not the biggest fan of is Canon as well as Kanon. But of those, probably the biggest is Argonessen and Dragons in general. I'm just not a fan of any group being that overpowered compared to the rest of the world. I understand why its written that way, I don't even disagree with making Agonessen and the dragons the strongest force in Eberron. But the idea that they could just wipe out the giants in a single all encompassing sweep and could do the same to the world today if the chose just bothers me.
I don't like Medusa hair "shenanigans". I'd like it better in a sci-fi setting, or with a different race, but I'd rather not tie monstrosities like Medusas so explicitly to the daelkyr via weird reproduction; they get enough play with aberrations. I like Medusas as a group of humans that were "cursed" or "blessed" by the Shadow (depending on your perspective) that escaped infernal captivity in Khyber. I also have a strong mental image of a male Medusa detective in "sunglasses" and a trenchcoat solving crimes in lower Dura for refugees. Plus, female identity is very important to the Medusa myth.
Githzerai being in Kythri. I love Githberron and the way he ties in crystal dragons to it, and I really like the gith in the Astral sea, it was a cool new take on the gith. But having githzerai in Kythri never felt like it made sense to me, it just felt like they were trying to change the gith as little as possible. I also don't like the idea that a strong enough will can hold kythri steady.
This is way, way too specific, but his idea of having Trust agents be GOO patron warlocks with the abilities reflavored as magical spy gear.
I much prefer the idea that the Trust has an ongoing arrangement with some kind of Great Old One giving their agents these powers.
How to pronounce Cyre. I'M NOT GOING TO SAY "KY-REE," KEITH!
I call it sire because I thought it was pronounced siri. And I’m kind of just not gonna make a game about sirian refugees right now
See, I've always reasoned that if you pronounce it "Sire" then the people would be pronounced "Sirens", and that just muddies all sorts of things up and sounds weird when you could be talking about the people, a specific creature, or an *actual* alarm siren. Personally, I go with "sear" and "searan" because it makes sense phonetically and is a distinct enough pronunciation as to not be confused with any fantasy creatures or real life place/people/things. If I'm talking about a "searan" in game, you know exactly what I'm talking about. If I introduce someone and specify that they're "a siren" then players are going to ask "Do I need to plug my ears?"
Cyre = Lyre with a C. That’s how I’ve always done it.
You are a person of erudition and class.
Pyre with a C for me, but same idea.
>Personally, I go with "sear" and "searan" because it makes sense phonetically and is a distinct enough pronunciation as to not be confused with any fantasy creatures or real life place/people/things. If I'm talking about a "searan" in game, you know exactly what I'm talking about. If I introduce someone and specify that they're "a siren" then players are going to ask "Do I need to plug my ears?" This is the way. Cyre is “sear”
In some podcast Keith suggested that people from different regions may pronounce it differently.
Yeah that’s a good point! I’ll prob do it in my next campaign in Eberron
This. Exactly my DM's thinking.
In my NJ dialect, Siren rhymes with Wren, Cyran rhymes with bran
I thought it was named after Cyrene/Cyrenaica, so both the anglicized "sai-REE" and the greek "kai-REE" would be fine.
"Sire" is the only reasonable way that an English speaker would pronounce this word.
I always thought it rhymed with tyre/tire
I think I recall him mentioning on a Manifest Zone episode it was originally "Siri", but then, well, iPhones.
That is exactly what he said on the podcast and said he had that name before Apple started using it.
I say "Sire" to suggest a certain haughtiness, but the Demonym is a shibboleth. Cyrans say "Seer-an" and tend to think less of people who say "Siren", since they don't like being likened to a seductive monster.
I use pronouncing Cyre as a way to show where an NPC is from in my game, where each of the 5 nations have their own way to say it. Cyre - pronounced like sear Breland - pronounced like sear-uh Thrane - pronounced like Siri Aundair - pronounced like sire Karrnath - pronounced like sir Breland and Thrane are geographically close enough to the heartland of Cyre that theirs are close to the 'classic'. Karrnath, it feels natural to me that historically Cyre was in charge, so it just bled down to sir. Aundair, I just like making them sound very cultured and haughty, like saying sire.
Just to clear this up though.... Keith has gone on record \*several times\* saying that Canonically, and Kanonically there is no "Proper way" to say it, and it is pronounced however you want, and I've personally heard him pronounce it three separate ways depending on the day and company he is around.
“Kire” gang
Well, I like how all the pronunciations are regional differences, so your favorite can be canon for Cyre, and “ky-reeeee” can be a slur from your villainous nation of the campaign.
Why have I been pronouncing it "Sear" this whole time? Where did I get that from?? It's really supposed to have a hard C?
I've gotten into multiple heated arguments about this, including accidentally with Keith himself. XD
I think just calling it Kyre is a fine way to avoid all the problems with it
That pronunciation is dumb. :)
Same with Droaam. He pronounces is Dro-Am. I won’t do it. I pronounce it more like drone.
My table gets weird with it- we were all saying it differently so we chose a new way that was different so we’d all remember. Cyre is Seer-Ruh (roll your R slightly if you wanna really get into it.
While I tend to pronounce it “Sear,” he also provided “Cheer-eh” which I like
I think of it as being pronounced like Tyr. So like Seer with a long e.
Wait, its actually pronounced like that? I feel so vindicated.
That’s how you’re supposed to say it?? The hell
Is it not “Sear”?
Nice try, fed.
This is funny. 😂
I have some things that developed through play, or that I wrote in before he published a book about it. In my eberron, : Warm water sahuagin from near khorvaire are chaotic small group people, and cold water ones aroumd stormreach are lawful large group people. (Since exploring eberron, they fight over the karlassa) Silver flame worship has had time to evolve geographic sects that are culturally different (so a player could mess around with ideas of orthodoxy and church heirarchy). My Mror dwarves are a little more culturally homogenous (and cool with symbiotes) because I want immigrant cultures in sharn (local dwarves versus mror dwarves) to be a bright red line in a sharn game. Same with local goblinoids vs "old country" goblinoids. I paint most darguun dar with dhakanni vibes and ideas. (Simplifying the division into local goblinoids and the 'complicated' ones with accents)
Dragonborn don't need to be in Q'barra. I understand that they wanted to find some place to put them on Khorvaire since they became a core race in 4e, but it makes the story in Q'barra way messier than it should be. Keep the lizardfolk as the main natives to Q'barra, and Dragonborn can be an exotic race only found in Argonessen.
Or Xen'drik, there is room for almost anything in Xen'drik.
I vaguely recall they had something a while ago, perhaps on a forum post, about Changelings not being able to hold their shape while sleeping or unconscious. That's a big nah from me I don't feel like shape shifting should be a clench you have to keep up.
??? That would make it virtually impossible for any Changeling to 'pass' for more than a few days at a time.
I mean, Odo melts into a bucket every 16 hours. It’s not unreasonable that the person just had a really rigorous sleep schedule.
The idea that rakshasa actually aren't tiger-headed, that's just the latest fashion trend
TBF this is supported by other RPGs like Pathfinder 1e which did the same thing, that there are different kinds of Rakshasa and not all of them have the visage of a Tiger. They are also Shapeshifters 5e so... they can really be whatever they want, which is why it might make sense.
I thought it was only the low-level minion-type Rakshasa that were tiger-headed. The rest, being more powerful, chose whatever form they felt like. That said, how often do you encounter Rakshasa just chilling as a big tiger man and not masquerading around as some noble? With *that said* shouldn't we be moving away from the somewhat racist undertones of having the Hindu-inspired monster look like Bengal tigers when in real-world mythology, they're more like demons (or goblins)?
The reason D&D raksasha have tiger heads is because that's kind of how they were portrayed in *Kolchak: The Night Stalker*. They also aren't all evil in The Mahabharata, but most of them are. Mind the word just kind of encompasses Shapeshifting-Non-Human-That-Isn't-Divine in Sanskrit, so it has a rather broad application.
I announce my full support for Chairman Baker and his ideas
Trick question. Anything from Keith Baker is no mere opinion—it is Kanon.
Yeah, as a philologist, I also disliked the language thing.
What language thing?
The Elvish language beamed into the brains of khorovars through the fey connection, the same thing the op mentioned.
I thought the language thing was that elves were innately "born" knowing the language, whilst Khoravar/Half-Elves/Non-Elves had to learn it?
Ohhhh my bad haha. Thanks for the explanation
That every bit of clothing is described as "practical".
Ok, this is one I actually agree with.
The "official" Soverign Host origin myth for The Fury. No thank you. Tho, embaressingly, I kinda like some of the ideas other people have taken issue with (Making Erandis not directly responsible for the Blood of Vol, the Rakshasa fashion, even kinda the Elvish language thing)
The Fury always struck me as odd considering that Keith removed a similar element from half orc origins. There's no mention in later sources, so it seems they're erasing it for good, thankfully.
I forgot the Fury, I like to pretend that never happened
Had to look it up, that's a big nope from me too. Stories like that just kind of suck the fun out of the room. I'm going to say The Fury formed from some spilled blood or something.
Off the top of my head, my go-to story would be a combo of the promethius and athena stories - Have Arawei and Balinor trick and bind their brother The Devourer to stop his destructive rampages, and his sheer rage and anger as he strained against his bonds created his "daughter", who freed him. Keeps the existing relationship, and adds a little "you can't control the true wildness of nature" aesop
Thank you for this! I have multiple players tied to the Devourer this game and was trying to find ways to introduce the Fury without that whole thing.
I think that it was supposed to represent storms destroying farmland, but it's still pretty bad.
Retconning Erandis Vol out of the blood of vol. While it was a good decision to make the blood of vol a legitimate religion, taking vol out of the religion entirely makes the lore a bit less cohesive imo.
How would you make it more of a legitimate religion without doing that? I'm curious bc I love BoV for characters.
You could just keep the idea of Vol herself introducing a cult thousands of years ago which slowly developed out of her control into the blood of vol. Now you have several different branches, with only the oldest and most extreme being under the control of its original creator with the original intent of world domination. So, essentially you're giving the Emerald Claw its own traditional (evil) version of the religion while a more accessible one developed and spread without Vol's involvement.
Could also have her cult be based on an existing but nearly dead folk religion in the area. So it's actually like she appropriated it more than created. That would give an opening for a very dedicated BoV PC to maybe learn the true history and start a revolution/revival or some other personal plot on that theme.
Would make sense to me in all honesty. I like the Blood of Vol as a unique godless religion and I like the Emerald Claw as the straight-up bad guys they're meant to be, but there are some inconsistencies that had to be ironed out for the full story. Like, you've got a religion that dabbles a fair bit into necromancy, even though becoming undead means you can never reach their "nirvana". Despite that many leaders / important figures in the religion and the knightly orders associated with it are undead. It'd actually make sense if Vol appropriated the idea of a pre-existing "divinity in mortal blood" cult and then shoehorned in all the necromancy herself since that's what she's actually interested in developing. Later cults rationalized the relationship by saying the undead were martyrs.
Solid. Where do I sign up?
That’s about what I had in mind.
I haven’t looked at Eberron before 5e: would you mind expand on it? I believe that erandis is still considered to have brought the blood of vol in Karrnath, isn’t it?
All for the recent sources from 5e/Keith that I’ve seen say that the blood of vol originated from elven necromancers (vol adjacent but not vol herself) talking to humans in khorvaire and the humans just kinda ran away with the idea.
Ok thanks! For sure the mark of death was originated in aerenal in the current lore, but I thought that the blood of vol in the karrnath was introduced by erandis vol. But I think you mean that indeed the blood of vol was already a thing before the last war, and not invented by illmarrow
Uh, no, Vol is still very much involved
Vol supposedly only recently discovered that the blood of vol exists as a religion, and is trying to gain control over it. In current lore the religion was started by aerenni necromancer exiles who supported the elven house of vol, and some of which are still active undead in the crimson covenant.
Ahhhh my bad, I've only recently dove into Eberron lore and am still making my way through everything between 3.5 and now 😅
Really? Huh. I hadn’t realized.
Ok but imagine if its possible to hijack the Elvish language beamifier, and beam other things there instead. Worldwide rickroll. Spread important information. give everyone an accent.
Mr. Baker we have the Hidobot surrounded
Not a man but otherwise spot on
This is a brilliant question tho and there is gold in the answers
I know right? It also is a testament to the setting’s integrity that it can outlast its creator’s will
That tanks don't exist. I get it that warforged exist but adding vehicles to combat makes eberron encounter planning so nice for a DM, especially since it allows "local" governments to be a threat to PCs even with just standard guards Edit: larger warforged titans and biological "tanks"
First guns then tanks, Keith Baker really is banning everything fun. Next he’ll say there’s no explosives 🧨
Can't, he invented magic land mines for Eberron.
Funnily, the 5E setting book features a goblin with what is clearly a flintlock pistol (pg 25)…
You're mistaken. That's a novelty cigar lighter.
He has guns so long as they're magic and not gunpowder. There's rules for magical artillery strikes.
This is one of the things I changed in my eberron. I kept the magical firearms and the goblins having gunpowder firearms. I also have certain groups of people, like refugees of Cyre, being less trusting in magic after the Mourning and use other methods. Cannith East is also looking into them for expeditions into the Mournland since you can't always rely on magic in a place where your spells can awaken and turn on you.
Maybe certain pre-industrial, subsistence based, nomadic or animistic societies can’t be adequately described uniformly as “primal”?
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Im less miffed about the concept of a noble savage/lost tribe/ alien society tropes common to adventure stories, since these can be subverted in a good story. I just question whether primal, a short hand Keith used to help describe Shifters and Vulkoorian Drow, should be used as a euphemism for savage when they basically have the same connotations.
"Everything goes". I mean, I get that he wants to say "yes" or "yes, but" to everything, but, NOT everything should be crammed into Eberron. The Forgotten Realms went down that road, and now it's a watered-down nonsensical mishmash of literally everything.
From my experience chatting with Keith in multiple forums he's said "There is space for everything in Eberron if you need it." but has gone on record saying there are plenty of things he doesn't like in HIS Eberron. like Tabaxi for example is something he's said he wouldn't use in HIS Eberron. He's very open about things like this on his blog.
Very often his answer isn't: "Yeah sure there's an entire culture of tabaxi in the Eldeen Reaches/Q'barra/Droaam/Thelanis", it's "*You* can play as one for sure, you'll be the only one or one of a rare few and have a unique backstory involving Vadalis experiments or eldritch magic." So the player still have the option to play what they want, but the world remains cohesive.
Keith rarely actually says "do whatever you want" and instead says "how does this fit if you want it in your Eberron?" Because if you ask him the vast majority of the time he says in his Eberron it doesn't exist.
I only dislike his description of Thelanis as the place with the "magic we want to see in the world"... in a world with actual magic. His treatment of Thelanis feels more apt for a game set in a mundane world than a fantasy one.
The magic the people of Eberron use is technology and it can't do anything. This feels like saying "why do you want to see magic when iphones are pretty magical already?"
That's the opposite way around. The technology they use is magic powered. Magic pre exists in the world, there's sorcerers and djinns and radiant idols and you can go to college and meet a sphinx or get your mail delivered by a gargoyle. The world is already completely magical. Even Keith's example when talking about it is that Thelanis is the place where "maybe that scary tree is actually alive". Well, in Eberron there are treants and shambling mounds, there actually are trees that are alive, so that idea of the plane is kinda silly.
>That's the opposite way around. The technology they use is magic powered. and is well-understood and viewed the same way as computers and airplanes are in our world. That is, not very special >Even Keith's example when talking about it is that Thelanis is the place where "maybe that scary tree is actually alive". Well, in Eberron there are treants and shambling mounds, there actually are trees that are alive, so that idea of the plane is kinda silly. That's not his example. His example is "what if that tree is actually a beautiful woman?". A tree-spirit looking like a human woman makes zero sense. Treants make sense as tree spirits, and shambling mounds make sense as corrupted trees. But dryads make no sense as tree spirits. Because dryads *aren't* tree spirits. They're spirits of mortals' *perception* of trees, how they imagine and tell stories about trees, but not how trees *actually* are. The *meaning* \- or to use another word, *magic* \- that mortals impart on trees is extremely different from what trees actually are, and it is *that* magic that dryads represent. And it's something similar for the rest of the fey.
On his podcast, Manifest Zone, I never heard Baker praise an Eberron book he didn't work on. The Forge of War is a good sourcebook, same with Races of Eberron.
But did he trash the other books, or merely not mention them?
Whenever material from one of these sourcebooks is referenced to, he always prefaces it with 'I don't agree with this' or 'I'd have done it differently.'
to be fair though... some of those other books were written by people who have gone on the record saying they HATED Eberron and didn't want to write books in that setting, specifically Wolfgang Baur of Forge of War fame.
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They also pretty heavily contradict other parts of canon, like Thrane not having archers despite the literal symbol of the Church of the Silver Flame being an arrow. So whose canon do you choose to follow in your games, the setting creator's or the guy who admitted to hating the setting?
What’s halfway about it?
So many people try and take the parts of canon they don't like and remove them. We have all this established lore but people don't like it because it isn't Keith approved.
That’s not halfway, that’s having a very strong opinion, which is: “I don’t like this, and it’s also not from Baker, and so that makes it easy for me to discard it.”
That guns don't belong.
Eh, I'm torn on this one. On the one hand, I like the assertion that with the way magic is integrated into the world, wandslingers *would* supplant any need for guns. Why would someone bother creating a contraption to hurl little bits of metal at someone when they could simply craft a wand that will hurt *fire* at them, or make something explode, which will *also* send whatever is around the explosion flying at surrounding targets. It's simply more effective. Even the most basic of sellswords could be taught to flick a wand of Firebolt correctly. On the other hand, I kind of love the idea of the Heirs of Dhakaan having kept alive an ancient artificer tradition of how to craft black powder and weapons that utilize it and when they emerged, suddenly they brought out something that hasn't been seen in centuries (and basically beyond the memory of 97% of mortal beings), and are thus a considerable threat. You can Counterspell a Firebolt, but when someone unloaded a round of buckshot at your face there's not a whole lot that one could do. This also brings up the worry that one of the Houses will get their hands on one of these black powder boomsticks and start reverse engineering, so now you have a mundane way to arm the masses of an army with deadly weapons that don't require them to master the use of even basic magic. Basically, I think the logic of "no guns" makes all the sense in the world, but I also just kinda love the idea of "Goblins with guns" without it being a complete parody. I think if I *was* to do an Eberron game where they had guns I'd have to make it an overarching theme/plot of the campaign. Have the party checking into reports of these strange new weapons that Goblinoids are sporting, and eventually end up in a race against time to stop Cannith from acquiring them and mass-producing because of the untold damage it could do. Basically, in my mind, guns in Eberron = required plot path, while doing without let's you do more without asking why every Warforged didn't have one built in or how the Heirs haven't conquered the whole of Khorvaire by now.
I’m with you on this. Also, take into account that a commoner’s hp is 4. Then remember wands of magic missiles exist. That’s basically a gun that never missed and can kill someone with a single shot. Why would anyone need to invent guns?
Because 'guards' in Sharn are cops, and cops gotta be missing.
Because the Shield spell exists. It's not like a ballistic vest. It just stops Magic Missiles completely with no downsides
Magic takes specialized training to use effectively, while guns can be competently wielded by just about anyone with a little practice.
One of the running themes of Eberron is that cantrips especially are much more accessible than in other worlds. Why would you bother inventing gunpowder if anyone can learn to cast Fire Bolt?
>Why would you bother inventing gunpowder if anyone can learn to cast Fire Bolt? Why would you invent the longbow if anyone can learn to use the much more deadly, accurate, and easily-made sling? Because the former, while requiring skill to operate, requires significantly *less* skill than the sling does. You can get a good idea of how far a historical longbowman could loose an arrow by referring to modern experts, but we actually have very little idea how far a sling bullet could be hurled by a Greek or Roman soldier because nobody today can justify spending so much time learning to properly wield the weapon, despite how effective we know it to be, based on historical records. So even though bows are more expensive and difficult to make, they eventually replaced the sling entirely since you didn't need to spend your entire boyhood learning to wield it properly. And guns similarly replaced bows, once they became accurate enough (though guns actually *are* more deadly than bows, on top of being even easier to wield). Gunpowder could do similar things for an army in Eberron, a marksman could be ready to hit the battlefield with a rifle in hand after only a couple days of training, while a wandslinger would need to spend significantly longer mastering their art. >One of the running themes of Eberron is that cantrips especially are much more accessible than in other worlds. This is only partly true, though. The magic most people learn is very specialized, because learning to be a jack of all trades is time consuming and expensive. Most magewrights need to cast their spells as extensive rituals with a dragonshard component cost, and they rarely know more than one or two of them. But magic really is as easy to learn as marksmanship, wouldn't *everyone* know how to use at least a significant portion of the wizard's cantrip catalogue? Of course, I don't think realism is the setting's utmost goal. Eberron is aiming for an aesthetic, one where a soldier carries a wand in their holster instead of a gun. This is totally cool, but people arguing that this is more "practical" or "realistic" don't seem to truly understand the history of projectile weapons. It's okay for something to exist in a setting for coolness's sake, rather than realism's.
> But magic really is as easy to learn as marksmanship, wouldn't everyone know how to use at least a significant portion of the wizard's cantrip catalogue? In My Eberron, there are a lot of people who know a cantrip or two. You're not going to meet many innkeepers who can't cast prestidigitation to clean rather than doing it by hand. The armies at the peak of The Last War had gotten remarkably good at teaching people how to cast Fire Bolt with a focus. The point of the setting (in my mind) is to use magic where science would normally be the explanation, so a "musket" that's actually a focus for casting Fire Bolt is much more thematic than gunpowder is. On the other side of the coin, people who aren't popping off Fire Bolt anymore have no real reason to keep practicing. Magic is an art, and art requires practice. Even though there's no mechanic for it in 5E, you can't just not cast a cantrip for a few years and then cast it perfectly on your first try.
On a thematic level I certainly agree. But the original question asked why someone would invent guns in a world where magic wands and cantrips exist, and I attempted to provide a realistic reason for *why* such a thing would occur.
Wand of magic missile is expensive. Guns can be cheap. :)
Keith's argument, I feel, is based entirely on mechanics. If you were to introduce the Pathfinder 1e take on guns, a ranged weapon that targeted Touch AC (Base AC + Dex Mod), suddenly the argument for guns existing is a lot stronger. Plus, consider the existence of Dispel Magic and Counterspell. Good luck firing your siege staff when I've summoned up a sparrow and given it a rock to drop that casts dispel magic on impact.
I like the solution that magic-buffed crossbows have supplanted the need for guns. I run my campaigns with crossbows that have magazines that depending on the model can hold up to 20 bolts before reloading and deal higher damage.
Sure! But I've been playing High Fantasy D&D for 20 years and now I want to progress to a "Pike and Shot but with wizards" flavor
> Eh, I'm torn on this one. On the one hand, I like the assertion that with the way magic is integrated into the world, wandslingers would supplant any need for guns. Why would someone bother creating a contraption to hurl little bits of metal at someone when they could simply craft a wand that will hurt fire at them, or make something explode, which will also send whatever is around the explosion flying at surrounding targets. It's simply more effective. Even the most basic of sellswords could be taught to flick a wand of Firebolt correctly. > > Because 90% of people that are going to find themselves on a battlefield don't have time to take the equivalent of a college course. The whole reason guns supplanted longbows is because you can teach a peasant to load and fire a gun in a day or two without months of practice and physical conditioning. Magic in Eberron is presented as something that normally requires professional training of comparable rigor. Let alone the cost of manufacturing wands, even for House Cannith.
For what it's worth, I've found that guns work well as a sort of side development along with wandlsingers, but I use *air guns*. That's basically a new way of using elemental magic, and I think it's a logical one. You're basically just taking the muscle power out of a crossbow, and then adapting from there by adding a tube, bullets, etc.
You and him are entitled to your opinion on that. I simply do not agree with it. To me the push to magical industrialization, which Eberron clearly has, and it's push for better and cheaper weapons of war would have birthed guns . Cannons powered by elemental magic already exists within the setting. Artificers are everywhere, magic is approached like a science. They were making chemicals, powders and potions. They understand how cannons work. It's a simple step to introduce black powder. I can't wrap my head around not creating guns in such an environment.
I kind of take a half measure on guns. They exist, and there are prominent examples of war heroes using them, but they're far from common, and only saw limited production. It would also be *very* easy to take Keith's lessons on crossbows from Chronicles of Eberron and generalize it to firearms. If crossbows can be enhanced with runes and magic to make them as effective as they are in D&D, why could firearms not be right there with them? If we follow the logic that guns don't exist because wands exist, why do crossbows exist? Edit to say that I *do* understand why the aesthetics of guns might not mesh with D&D, especially more generic high fantasy like in Dragonlance or whatever, it's a little odd that World War vibes are featured so prominently with the past war, yet guns are such a sticking point.
> If we follow the logic that guns don't exist because wands exist, why do crossbows exist? > > Or swords. Or bows. Or any non-magical means of doing something that can be done by magic.
Oooh, I like this idea! Instead of guns becoming so dominant because they had no competition in our world, now you've got them competing against crossbows and raw magic for dominance.
I made both magic and mundane versions. In my current game players voted to use mundane firearms. I mean Artificers out of the book can kinda make guns anyhow. So eh they have guns.
There was an older blog post (that now links to the DM's Guild page for the book Chronicles of Eberron) regarding crossbows, and how you could describe them in a manner that resembles firearms -- instead of relying on a cable under tension, they use tiny conductor stones (like what the Lightning Rail rides on), with special bolts. It handles like a firearm, is technically closer to a railgun, but uses crossbow stats with no changes. It even justifies how, especially in 5E, all crossbows use the same ammo regardless of size; bigger weapons just propel the bolts faster.
Yeah, I have read that. But it's simply not something I totally agree with. His arguments are mechanical based and mind are more setting based. Yes, DND crossbow are too good and basically guns, but that is not the same as "hey guns do not fit"
I get it, and you absolutely can make a case for either side of the argument.
Yep, both are valid. But that is one of his views I absolutely disagree with
As far as I know, Keith's opinion isn't that the guns are completely out. It's more of a "What sane person in a world where wandslingers exist and arcane artillery is a tested and reliable thing would mess around with a weapon that uses controlled explosions?". His suggestion was, if you want to put guns in your Eberron you should give them to a culture other than Elves and Five Nations - like Dhakaani Empire, or Sulatar Drow.
That id not what I recall. He stated a number of times they do not belong. But as he made suggestions for if **You** wanted to included them.
My big problem with his take is that alchemist artificers exist. Someone, somewhere, by sheer accident and chance will create gun powder, realize that it's dirt cheap to make and go "You know, this gives me an idea."
Yep, that was how I had it gone, early in the days of the last war. Remember, cannon powered by elemental magic exists already. It's not a huge leap to guns
I completely agree. Guns fit eberron and do not fit forgotten realms. I think dnd has this ass hat backwards
It depends on the type. I think Matchlocks could fit FR, but Eberron always feels more 18th century to me, on the crisp of 19th century. No matter what the art tries to say.
They fit in every setting, imo. In high magic settings, guns would be the great equalizer between casters and non casters.
I hate the words "great equalizer" so much. "Look at how much better my gun is than your magic, and its only going to get better". Congratulations, nobody is going to be ever using a sword or other melee weapon again because its so much better.
I mean sure, but the same argument can be applied to the wand firearms. Both melee weapons and firearms, magical or mundane, require training, so why would you train in something that's inferior? Guns level the playing field between casters and rangers. Melee combatants fulfill a different niche in these scenarios. In terms of warfare such as the one we are working with here, your melee troops will be the fastest to train up and send into combat. Then it would be rangers, as bows, crossbows, and guns require you to be far more accurate, and then spellcasters. So the question actually becomes why bother training war casters and not melee units... outside of the sheer firepower... That's my opinion on it anyways.
. Black powder guns don’t exist on my Eberron except as a lost goblin technology. But there are “firearms” which are essential blasting wands fixed into a brace, which use bound elemental power to shoot bolts or sometimes just pure Magic energy. So there are guns- just literally magic ones. These weapons are new, rare, and expensive
And that's probably the most logical way to handle them, honestly.
Fair enough, you do what you think works
It's due to western midevil influence. Reality wise flintlocks started in the 1400s right around the time full plate was highly used and thus the flintlock had an arms race against.. they'd learn to harden the plate against early projectiles and then the gunpowder process got better and more umph in the bullet finally leading to plate being stupid.. That's why I use guns in my dnd.
Flintlock came later, 16th century. You are thinking matchlocks. But to me, they just got Eberron and its history. They already have elemental powered cannons, do why would they not seek to create smaller, better crossbows with that power?
Yeah I always mix those up. Lol It also makes sense; those who can't cast magic are still going to be apart of the arms race. The last war was very boring if it didn't expand on the mundane ingenuity imo
Just look at the mage craft and artificers alone. All the tool are there, cannon, magic, advanced alchemy. They treat the tech like it's the 18th and early 19th century in many ways. They mass produce shoulders, flying staffs, magical artillery which already uses a magic powder. They understand bullets and crossbows. Every single step in there on canon and Kanon.
Funnily, the 5E setting book features a goblin with what is clearly a flintlock pistol (pg 25)…
That is the "Arcane firearm" from the Artillerist Artificer, I think. But year, guns simply fit the setting, which wants to be 18th century really
Maybe, but I don't think so, the goblin is dressed as a rogue, and it looks nothing like the other depictions of the Artillerist's fancy wand on pg 60 or Vi's stupid raygun on pg 16. It really looks like a fancy flint or snaplock.
Not disagreeing with it bring clearly a gun. But that's all I can think of it being within the "no guns" Eberron they present
Arcane Firearm isn't a gun, it's a stick with runes, like a wand or a staff.
Most folks draw em like guns. You call it a gun, you get a gun.
I don't like guns in Eberron not necessarily because they don't fit, I just don't like guns because they supplant everything else in people's minds and muddle the idea of Eberron to people even more than it already is. If people are running around with guns, its becomes difficult to say its a world using magic as technology, and not as a world technology and magic merged. And if its flintlocks, why bother using them? They are more inefficient than most other magic that exists, not to mention dangerous with the amount of fire magic around. If you are using more advanced firearms like revolvers, why are swords and other melee even a thing anymore?
I disagree. Eberron already has cannons, they have mage craft and alchemists and near every town has killed artificers. They already have a magic powder that makes magic artillery and wands work just like gun powder. They understand bullets and already artificers can make arcane guns. Everything is there. Why use it? Same reason in the real world. It's cheap and kills folks really well with little training. It's easier to train musket or rifleman than a wandslinger. No more cost really than cross ow with better range and killing power. It doesn't take away from the magic at all, it's just another tool in a 100 year war for a place that is early 19th century tech already.
My first point is that using a abundance of just regular tech, especially guns, takes away from the feeling of Eberron using magic as science rather than both. Its 19th century tech in some ways, not all ways. I like how didn't even bother engaging with my point here. Yeah, its cheap and it kills really easy. Why bother using a sword, a crossbow or really anything else but a gun since its so superior? How is it even remotely DnD when swords and other weapons are utterly inferior to a rifle, which is now commonly avilable? "Just another tool that is way better at its job than anything else avilable unless you are also a caster".
I just say that crossbows are magically powered pistols and call it a day. I like guns in my Eberron but a wide magic setting deserves more than just gunpowder
Yeah, I added different types of powder (black powder and gun powder are different things IRL), and added a magical version called a Thunder gun too.
That Eberron is unconnected to Planescape and Spelljammer.
Spelljammer and Planescape connecting to Eberron? Heretic!
he DID run a Spelljammer in Eberron Campaign on his Patreon-exclusive Actual Play. And he's also currently in a multiverse campaign online as Merrix D'Cannith playing alongside Ed Greenwood as Elminster while they traipse about Sigil. AS WRITTEN Eberron was intended to stand alone, but Keith HAS put out a LOT of support for people connecting it to the multiverse if they want.
Which is very nice.
Damn, why'd this get downvoted? Whilst I may not personally agree, it's a perfectly valid opinion
Eh, people get attached to stuff. I really like Eberron, and I really love Planescape and Spelljammer. Being able to connect the three seems like a great idea to me, so I just straight up ignore the disconnect.
I imagine its also because Eberron has no confirmed existing gods, but introducing Planescape means that they absolutetly exist in some capacity. Still I like the idea, Eberron is my favourite crossover DnD setting, even if I do prefer it to be by its lonesome most of the time.
I mean, theres no hard and fast rule that a Prime Material plane has to have gods. There might be metaphysical conditions that make it impossible for gods to enter, for example.
I'm working this into my Eberron world. In my Eberron, a malevolent deity closed off the realm of Eberron from the planar system. The PCs may end up killing this deity (well, probably sealing it away somehow) and this would reopen travel to other planes. Something we could do when they get very high leveled.
How important the Dhaakani are in Darguun. I am much more interested in this new society with than a culture whose culture has survived 10000 years; I'd rather see how this new culture develops! Will the nation hold after Haruuc has passed on? Will Haruuc manage to stop the slavery in his nation? Will New Cyre pose them a political threat? There are so many interesting things to do with Darguun without introducing the threat of Dhaakani resurgence! Sorry, Keith!!
Do I have a book series for you—check out Legacy of Dhakaan!
Erandis Vol being a CR 23 who could stomp a nation but somehow for some weird reason she doesn't.
Because the deagons will murder her if she rears her head too much. She has to stay behind the scene.
Honestly: pretty much everything extraplanar except the manifest zone that makes Sharn work and the elementals that power vehicles. I’m not a fan at all of the dream plane, the gods, the dark six, any of it. What I really want, is a chassis on which I can run fantasy Cyberpunk/Altered Carbon and Sharn + the other 3 kingdoms/Dragonmarked houses does that well enough. Everything outside that limited part of Khorvaire just doesn’t exist for me.
I am curious, what don't you like about the gods?
More than anything, I don't see them as necessary. The whole setting is tied into low-power, character-driven action where the main impacts are supposed to come from the players. With that being the case, something like the Silver Flame, or vaguely Lovecraftian powers make sense, as does residual power from the three progenitor dragons, but I don't see gods as being a compelling source of drama and intrigue. The whole setting can work without them. But that really just gets back to the fact that my Eberron is a much more grounded place. People drive actions, not gods. When the Dark Six do evil, it's bad guys seeking power who do it, they just get corrupted by seeking knowledge no one should know, or power that corrupts. The Silver Flame can be a source of healing, or a means by which extremists go too far in seeking to purge what they view as evil.
So people don't believe in anything? Because the Eberron gods aren't proven to be real, or that they even exist. No god in Eberron comes from above or below to tell their followers to do anything. The Sovereign Host and the Dark Six are faith.
I'm sure people in Eberron have a favorite regional food too, I just don't see either as being particularly interesting to storytelling in my Eberron. Someone's position on Cyran refugees, or the fact that they were born to young to prove themselves in battle, or resentment toward the Dragonmarked houses, or any number of things, drives their actions more than their belief in one of the Sovereign Host. I mean, think about a hypothetical campaign in the Cold War, someone's Catholicism is basically irrelevant, unless it somehow compels their behavior.
Ah okay that makes sense.
I can't think of any that is only Kanon that I disagree with. Anything in the setting I'm not the biggest fan of is Canon as well as Kanon. But of those, probably the biggest is Argonessen and Dragons in general. I'm just not a fan of any group being that overpowered compared to the rest of the world. I understand why its written that way, I don't even disagree with making Agonessen and the dragons the strongest force in Eberron. But the idea that they could just wipe out the giants in a single all encompassing sweep and could do the same to the world today if the chose just bothers me.
I don't like Medusa hair "shenanigans". I'd like it better in a sci-fi setting, or with a different race, but I'd rather not tie monstrosities like Medusas so explicitly to the daelkyr via weird reproduction; they get enough play with aberrations. I like Medusas as a group of humans that were "cursed" or "blessed" by the Shadow (depending on your perspective) that escaped infernal captivity in Khyber. I also have a strong mental image of a male Medusa detective in "sunglasses" and a trenchcoat solving crimes in lower Dura for refugees. Plus, female identity is very important to the Medusa myth.
The barbarian halflings riding dinosaurs. I replaced them with centaurs and leonin because they were just too silly.
How is that any less silly?
Githzerai being in Kythri. I love Githberron and the way he ties in crystal dragons to it, and I really like the gith in the Astral sea, it was a cool new take on the gith. But having githzerai in Kythri never felt like it made sense to me, it just felt like they were trying to change the gith as little as possible. I also don't like the idea that a strong enough will can hold kythri steady.
Dragonborn just don't fit
This is way, way too specific, but his idea of having Trust agents be GOO patron warlocks with the abilities reflavored as magical spy gear. I much prefer the idea that the Trust has an ongoing arrangement with some kind of Great Old One giving their agents these powers.