IFAQ: Owlen, Wealthy PCs, Bahamut and the Plight of the Dragonborn

When time allows, I like to answer interesting questions posed by my Patreon supporters. Here’s a few that have come up this month…

With Strixhaven coming out, I have a player who wants to play an Owlen. How would you add the Owlen to Eberron?

I’ve discussed some basic principles about adding new species to Eberron in this article. The basic question is what your player is looking for in playing an Owlen. Do they just want the racial traits? Do they specifically there to be an Owlen nation with a significant role in the world? Or are they open to the idea that there could be just a handful of Owlen?

If you’re playing a Strixhaven style game at, say, Arcanix, one of the first things I’d consider would be that the PC Owlen could be ENTIRELY UNIQUE—that they could have been the owl familiar of some legendary faculty member, and when the wizard died, one of their last acts was to transform their familiar into this form. So some of the current staff might see them as a sort of mascot, and there could be an ongoing legacy tied to their late master that you could explore over the course of the campaign.

If I were to add Owlen to MY campaign, I’d personally say that there’s a community of Owlen in the Bazaar of Dura in Sharn, who assist the giant owls and support the Owl in the Race of Eight Winds. They’ve been doing this job for hundreds of years; they aren’t found anywhere else in Khorvaire; and at this point, NO ONE KNOWS where they came from. Some believe the first Owlen came from Thelanis. Others claim a crazy Vadalis race fan magebred them. It’s beyond the living memory of the current Owlen, and THEY don’t know the answer. But the key point is that they’re a small, tight-knit community based in the Bazaar, with connections to a lot of Bazaar businesses and a particular focus on the Race of Eight Winds. The owl councilor Hruitt definitely has a Owlen valet who helps him with things that require hands… and the Owlen PC could potentially have a patron in Hruitt.

For me personally, either of these options—both of which give the character an immediate tie to NPCs, plot hooks to explore, and a unique role in the world—are more interesting than just saying that there’s an Owlen nation in the Towering Woods or something similar.

PCs can often end up getting incredibly rich by the “normal” standards of the world, sometimes still wandering around as a bunch of itinerant eccentrics, hoarding incredible wealth. Avoiding the trope of punishing characters for getting rich, what suggestions would you have for interesting, “Eberonn-y” ways of encouraging them to spend or use that money if the PCs aren’t coming up with any themselves?

Personally, I tend to downgrade wealth rewards, using superior equipment, influence, and favors as rewards rather than wealth. We’re eight episodes into my Threshold campaign and I think the only monetary reward has been some old Dhakaani copper pieces! However, the question is certainly valid, and with that in mind…

What do people in OUR world spend vast sums of money on? Property is certainly one option, and owning property also gives people a stake to protect; would someone like a mansion? Consider Schitt’s Creek; perhaps they buy a Brelish title and discover that they’ve actually taken responsibility for a small town, which frankly could use a lot of work. If not through title, any way you can get the players attached to a community is an opportunity to soak up cash. The town needs a speaking stone! Wouldn’t the cleric like to fund a beautiful church? Wouldn’t the fighter like to shore up its defenses, or perhaps establish a martial academy?

Another possibilities are for the characters to be asked to fund an adventure. A Morgrave professor knows the secrets to enter a Cul’sir tomb—but he’s not going to travel with the adventurers unless the fund a fully staffed expedition. Or perhaps the players are asked to invest in mystical research; if successful, it could have a transformative effect on their nation or their world. While we’re at it, don’t forget social causes. Do they support Brelish democracy? Oppose elemental slavery? If they’re Cyran, would they like to support housing for Cyran refugees or general improvements to New Cyre? If they’re Thranes, why don’t the just donate some of that gold to the poor? If a PC picks a cause and supports it both with significant funding and with their reputation, you could decide that it actually helps drive change with in the world—that they help to make New Cyre a prosperous city, or shift public opinion (one way or the other) on the future of the Brelish monarchy.

Since the Daughter of Khyber seems to be the representative of Tiamat in the Eberron setting, is there an equivalent representative for Bahamut? And if so, would they be more affiliated with Eberron or with Siberys?

II’ve addressed this before in the context of “Is there an Angelic/Celestial equivalent to the Overlords?” Here’s that answer.

If you mean “Is there an incarnate force that’s called something like ‘The Cuteness of Kittens’?” No, there isn’t. If you mean “Is there any sort of native celestials on Eberron,” there WERE: the couatl. They were never as powerful as the Overlords, and were more on par with the rakshasa… and they sacrificed themselves to create the Silver Flame. On some level you could say that the Silver Flame is the good counterpart to the Overlords, which is why it can bind them; it’s simply less concrete and more abstract.

Why is this? Look to the progenitor myth. Khyber killed Siberys and was in turn imprisoned by Eberron. The Overlords are Khyber’s children, and like Khyber, are forces of evil that cannot be vanquished, only bound. Eberron doesn’t produce incarnate spirits like the Overlords: her children are mortal. So Eberron DID create a thing that embodies the cuteness of kittens: she created kittens. Meanwhile, Siberys would be the source of native celestials, and he did create some, like the couatl – but they were created from the blood of Siberys after his defeat, and thus lack the power of the victorious Khyber. From a purely practical worldbuilding standpoint, there’s a simple reason for this. Eberron is designed to be a world that needs heroes. All the powerful forces of good are limited. Jaela Daran is a child whose power is limited beyond Flamekeep. Oalian doesn’t leave the Greenheart. When evil rises, the world needs you; there is no ultimate good force that can step in and solve the problem for you. The Silver Flame can empower you to solve the problem, but it can’t solve the problem for you.

Looking to Bahamut specifically, I ‘m fine with the concept that Bahamut COULD have existed in the past. One fan theory from the Eberron Discord is that Bahamut—known in Eberron as The Last Breath of Siberys—was a powerful celestial who existed in the Age of Demons, who led the effort to create the Silver Flame and became its heart. Rakshasa are the most common fiends, but Khyber can produce others; likewise, just because couatls are the most common native celestials doesn’t mean that they were the only ones. With that said, even if the Last Breath had the same statistics as Bahamut, it could still be presented as a couatl-dragon with rainbow feathers or even as an incarnate being of silver flame. Regardless, the point is that while the Last Breath may once have walked the world, now it exists only as the Silver Flame—and as in the above quote, it affects the world by empowering mortals. The Discord theory suggests that this could be the basis for a Silver Flame path in Argonnessen, in which the Last Breath is revered in the same way that Tira Miron is honored in the church of Thrane.

What might an Argonessen-based dragon say to a Q’barra-based dragonborn character when asked “Why did you leave us to our fate? For thousands of years we have had to mop up what comes out of Hakatorvhak. We’ve been fighting this losing battle for generations. Why haven’t you come to help us?! We worshipped you, we died for you, and you left us!!!”

First comes the question of whether a dragon is going to even bother to answer such a question. It’s like a rat asking a scientist conducting cancer research “Why are you doing this?” The scientist doesn’t consider the rat an equal who’s either deserving of an answer or capable of understanding it. They are a resource and a tool, short-lived creatures incapable of experiencing or understanding the world as a dragon does. The dragon doesn’t owe the dragonborn an answer, and likely doesn’t think the dragonborn could understand the answer if they gave it. But let’s assume they choose to answer. The dragon might well say something like this…

What would you have us do, little one? We contain the greater threat. Rhashaak gave his very soul to contain Masvirik, and he continues to do his duty to this day. The Poison Dusk is the mold that grows around his grave. It can never be permanently destroyed, merely contained. We cannot do it for you; prolonged action would risk raising the Daughter of Khyber and unleashing a threat far, far greater than the Poison Dusk. This is why your ancestors pledged to fight this battle, to contain this evil.

You call this a losing battle. We have been fighting this war across the world for a hundred thousand years. It is a war that cannot BE won, little one; but by fighting you allow countless others to live their lives never knowing of the danger. This was the battle your ancestors swore to fight. It was their children who lost their way and led your people into disaster through their desire for glory. Now you have returned to your duty, but you fail to understand it. This is not a war that can be won. But it is a war that must be fought—and we cannot fight it, lest we release an even greater evil upon the world. This is your battle. Rhashaak still serves his purpose, though it cost him everything. We ask no less of you than we asked of him. Will you stand strong? Or are your needs and desires more important than the fate of the world?

I’m not saying the dragon is right or that the character’s anger is misplaced. But that’s what they’d say. The dragons can’t step in and wave a magic wand and win this battle. The Poison Dusk will always return. The dragons can’t exert force over time without risking the rise of the Daughter of Khyber; that is why they needed the Dragonborn in the first place, to fight the long term battle. The character’s ancestors agreed to fight this war KNOWING it was forever. So uphold that bargain.

Now, perhaps the character means “Give us more support! Give us magic weapons! Send MORE dragonborn!” These could be entirely reasonable requests, and if the character somehow actually managed to make this case to the Light of Siberys—to say that the dragonborn can’t continue to contain the Poison Dusk without some form of additional support (that’s not just “Send dragons to solve the problem”), perhaps the Light of Siberys WOULD send that support. This is exactly the sort of way in which the actions of a player character could have a greater impact. The dragons believe that Q’barra is stable, that it’s contained. If a PC can actually present a case that the dragonborn need some form of aid—not just “Why don’t you solve this problem for us?”—perhaps they could get that help.

The last answer is a decent way of escalating a Q’barra campaign, and bringing in Argonessen politics without risking blowing up the region. Would you say that the dragons empowering the lesser races like that; being hands-off but still powerful influences on the world; would still risk the DoK waking? To put it simply: “Would the dragons still be able to ‘rule the world’ remotely from Argonessen without causing the Daughter of Khyber to wake?”

The short answer is that if the dragons could rule the world in this way without risk they already would. The longer answer is they’ve tried it before and it didn’t end well. How do you think the dragons KNOW about the threat of the Daughter of Khyber? Notably, we know almost nothing about the history of Khorvaire before the Age of Monsters. Why is that? In my opinion, it’s because whatever civilizations flourished there in the past were destroyed by the Daughter of Khyber—that it was in Khorvaire that the dragons learned a harsh and deadly lesson. Looking to the modern world, the point is that what we see the dragons do is the extent of what they believe they can safely maintain—which is largely observing with critical nudges in the right direction. We know a dragon accompanied Lhazaar, but they didn’t command her, they advised her. The general idea is that the Daughter of Khyber amplifies the tyranny of dragons, their desire to rule over lesser creatures—that the more direct power they exert, the greater the risk of corruption. So they could send the Q’barran dragonborn a shipment of weapons without much risk. But if they began to actively direct Q’barra and to treat it like a client state, it runs the risk of those involved becoming hungry for greater power, seeking to reestablish the dragonborn as an empire (one which properly glorifies their draconic masters, of course) and eventually becoming puppets of Tiamat. The status quo—where Argonnessen trusts forces like the dragonborn and shulassakar to defend key sites with little or no draconic involvement—reflects the lessons they’ve learned over the last hundred thousand years about what they can do safely.

That’s all for now! Thanks again to my my Patreon supporters, who make these articles possible!