Tag Archives: Xoriat

IFAQ: Nilbogs in Eberron and the Solar of Xoriat

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Hey all! I’m currently in New York City. As you can see in the picture above, I just saw the musical Hadestown; I loved it, which is no particular surprise, given that Dolurrh basically exists to provide an opportunity for adventurers to venture to the underworld to try to rescue loved ones!

I am still working on my next Dragonmark article, but I wanted to answer a few of the interesting questions that have been raised by my Patreon supporters. I’ll also be running the next session of my Frontiers of Eberron campaign on Patreon soon, so if you’re interested in play in a session with me, check that out! In the meantime…

How might you fit Nilbogs into Eberron? Is there a way you would fit an immortal trickster spirit that possesses goblinoids into your eberron?

The nilbog was introduced in the original Fiend Folio as a sort of joke—a goblin who is healed when it should suffer damage, and who can only be hurt if you cast healing spells on it. It’s goblin backwards, get it? Monsters of the Multiverse brought a number of Fiend Folio classics into 5E, including the nilbog. The 5E nilbog isn’t quite as extreme as the original. It has a reaction—Reversal of Fortune—that allows it to reduce a source of damage to zero and to heal as a result, and this is the only way it can be hurt. But this is a reaction; once the nilbog has used up its reaction it can suffer damage normally. And it can’t benefit from healing magic, but you can’t KILL a 5E nilbog by casting cure wounds on it.

The 5E nilbog is presented as a trickster spirit that only possesses goblins, which an explanation tied to the deity Maglubiyet. My immediate reaction is that the core idea of the nilbog—a trickster who can’t easily be defeated by brute force—is a fun concept, but that in Eberron there’s no particular reason it would have to be a GOBLIN. Its key abilities—Reversal of Fortune, a sanctuary—like effect that charms creatures that try to attack it, a 2d4 mocking word and at-will use of hideous laughter—could easily be applied to other base statblocks. TSo with that in mind, there’s a few different ways I could imagine using the basic idea of the nilbog in my campaign.

  • Mocking Joy. In fifth edition, nilbogs are presented as fey. It’s easy to imaging an archfey—a cousin of Fortune’s Fool—who challenges tyrants and mocks the mighty, laughing at all threats; let’s call them Mocking Joy. This archfey has a strong connection to a manifest zone in Droaam, and historically nilbogs have almost exclusively been encountered among the oppressed kobolds and goblins of the Barrens. Many scholars BELIEVE that it’s a goblin-only condition, hence the use of the term “nilbog”—but this is inaccurate. Any humanoid Mocking Joy deems a worthy avatar—typically an oppressed underdog—could be granted the chaotic gifts of nilbogism; this would also cause them to become a fey creature for the duration of this possession.
  • Gift of the Traveler. A trickster who laughs in the face of danger and sows chaos? This sounds like an excellent option for a devotee of the Traveler, perhaps an agent of the Cabinet of Faces. In this case I wouldn’t make it external possession, but rather a sort of ecstatic communion; the devotion channels the Traveler and gains the abilities of a nilbog for the duration of that experience. While such nilbogs could be goblins, any humanoid would be an option; most often I’d be inclined to make these nilbogs changelings, which would add another trick to their mischievous arsenal. While I’ve suggested that this would be a case of the nilbog voluntarily invoking the Traveler, it could be switched to suggest that there’s a place at which anyone could be temporarily possessed, acting as a nilbog and not being able to remember anything that happens during the possession. However, because of the nature of faith in Eberron I’d personally say that this can only affect devout Vassals or followers of another Sovereign variant—that it’s not an external spirit like a quori, it’s still a manifestation of the victim’s own faith. They KNOW what the Traveler is like, and they are temporarily compelled to act as if they were the Traveler. If I went down THIS path, I might concievably create similar forms of ecstatic possession for other members of the Sovereigns and Six!
  • The Touch of Xoriat. The nilbog is typically presented as a hilarious, mischevious trickster. But what if it wasn’t? Consider its core abilities. When you try to attack the nilbog, it can break your mind, temporarily turning your aggression into blind adoration. It can inflict psychic damage and shake your confidence simply by speaking to you (Mocking Word). And it can twist reality, turning a deadly attack into a soothing balm. This CAN be wacky fun… but it could also be terrifying. Rather than a fey gift, I could see it as the result of a strange bond to Xoriat. I’d say that they first appeared in Eberron during the Xoriat incursion and the subsequent collapse of Dhakaan, and as such scholars THINK it’s a goblin-only condition… but again, that any creature could develop these abilities, and I’d make them aberrations instead of fey. They could be tied to a particular daelkyr, but I also kind of like it as a more general effect of Xoriat rather than daelkyr engineering. I’ll note that while these nilbogs wouldn’t be wacky fey tricksters, I’d be inclined to say that the connection to Xoriat shift their perception of reality, and that they would be amoral and inclined to cause chaos if not necessarily mischief.

Exploring Eberron says that Daanvi has a Solar assigned to observe each plane and to administer justice there. It specifically names Azazar as the Solar of Xoriat. What is Azazar like? Are they corrupted by forbidden knowledge, or are they a potential source for information on Xoriat that adventurers could have a normal conversation with?

Well, let’s start by looking at the actual kanon lore.

There are thirteen solars, each assigned to monitor and administer justice within one of Eberron’s planes (no solar holds dominion over the Material Plane). However, there are a host of restrictions on how and when they may act. Typically, a solar must be invoked by a legitimate authority within the plane in question—so while Hazariel, the Solar of Syrania, is usually called in to cast down radiant idols, Azazar, the Solar of Xoriat, has never yet been called on by that plane. Until called, they watch; while in the Panopticon, solars can observe anything that occurs in the plane of their dominion.

So one of the first important points here is that Azazar has never actually been to Xoriat, and likely never will; who would summon them? Having said that, Azazar has been monitoring Xoriat since the beginning of creation and in my mind is suited to that task; the Solars were created for this purpose and Azazar was made to be able to administer justice in Xoriat if it becomes necessary to do so.

So… Azazar is a Solar and uses the base attributes of a Solar. But they are also made to be able to observe and act within the Plane of Revelations. Solars already have truesight; I’d probably add some sort of mind blank affect to Azazar’s block, and further give them the Alien Mind trait of a daelkyr, on the basis that in order to be able to observe Xoriat, Azazar’s mind must process knowledge in ways that material mortals can’t; it’s not malevolent, but making contact with their thoughts will disrupt your normal thought process.

Moving further, I’d probably roleplay Azazar much like Doctor Manhattan: not malevolent, but as someone who perceives reality in a way you can’t understand. To be able to “observe” Xoriat and follow the progress of events there, Azazar would have to be unbound by the perception of linear time and might be actively aware of multiple possible timelines simultaneously. So I’d emphasize that Azazar CAN be a source of information about Xoriat, but that the information you receive will often be cryptic or inaccurate, because it will only make sense when you’re in the right time, place, or even the right timeline. Azazar isn’t in any way corrupted by Xoriat; Azazar understands Xoriat, but they can’t share that understanding with a creature with a limited, linear perception of reality.

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

IFAQ: Dreamspace and Flumphs

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Art by Julio Azevedo

Every month, I ask my Patreon supporters for interesting questions about Eberron. This is the first time I’ve been asked about flumphs! So let’s get to it!

What’s the role of Flumphs in Eberron, especially in Riedra or Adar?

As far as I know, flumphs have never been addressed in canon. I’ve personally never used a flumph in any campaign I’ve run, so I’m primarily familiar with them from their appearances in Order of the Stick. So, the following things are true about flumphs in 5E.

  • Flumphs are small aberrations.
  • Flumphs are telepathic. They feed on telepathic emanations and thus are thus found around other telepathic species. They can eavesdrop on telepathic communication in their vicinity and cannot be perceived by telepathy or divination.
  • Flumphs are wise and benevolent. They dislike holding on to evil thoughts, and thus when they overhear evil thoughts they will try and share them with good people—so they’re ideally suited to spilling the beans on illithid or aboleth schemes.
  • They’re traditionally found in the Underdark, and live in harmonious units known as cloisters.

So with all that in mind, here’s how I’ll use flumphs in Eberron…

Flumphs are natives of Xoriat, where they dwell in the Emocean—a tide of surging thoughts and emotions, deeper and more primal than Dal Quor’s Ocean of Dreams. Flumph cloisters drift along streams of consciousness, drawing sustenance from the pure psychic emanations surrounding them. This is a blissful experience, and most flumphs have no interest in traveling to the material plane. But occasionally manifest zones form maelstroms within the Emocean, especially when people within the manifest zone suffer intense emotions. Flumphs in the material plane are fish out of water, and need to quickly find a source of psychic emanations in order to survive. While flumphs can draw sustenance from any form of telepathic emanation, they are benevolent by nature. While they can survive on a diet of cruelty, it’s distressing and they will seek to expunge the evil thoughts in a psychic exchange with good creatures whenever possible.

Flumphs enter Eberron through manifest zones to Xoriat. Here’s a few places flumphs can be found in Eberron.

  • There are flumphs scattered across Sol Udar beneath the Mror Holds, pulled in by the fear and suffering of the dwarves battling Dyrrn the Corruptor. Most Mror flumphs are isolated and lost, struggling to survive. Sages of Clan Narathun have established a flumph sanctuary beneath Shadowspire and reunited a flumph cloister. A group of Narathun bards have been working with these flumphs to develop their thoughtsinging techniques, and flumphs are helping Narathun watch for Dyrrn’s forces.
  • Flumphs can be found in the swamps of the Shadow Marches. Some linger in the periphery of dangerous telepathic entities. Others have formed a symbiotic relationship with a sect known as the Uul’gaanu, the “Daughters of the Dream.” A benevolent variation of Kyrzin’s Whisperers, the Uul’gaanu build their communities around hidden flumphs. The flumphs help the Uul’gaanu develop basic telepathic abilities; an Uul’gaanu community has a very simple hive mind, with members of the community casually sharing emotions and thoughts. Community members gather together for psychic metaconcerts, generating shared emotions that feed their flumphs. Dealing with the Uul’gaanu can be unsettling for outsiders, as the Uul’gaanu respond to the thoughts and emotions of their companions without need for speech; while for their part, the peaceful Uul’gaanu are often distressed by the cruel or selfish thoughts of outsiders. As a result, the Uul’gaanu tend to remain isolated from other Marcher communities.
  • Flumphs have emerged in wild zones of Sarlona over the years. Because of their ability to eavesdrop on psychic communication, the Inspired consider them a security risk and exterminate them whenever they are found. However, a number of flumphs have found safe havens in the fortress monasteries of Adar. Adaran flumphs are valued members of their communities, engaging in thoughtsinging and presenting young Adarans with philosophical challenges. Some flumphs choose to work with Adaran security forces, watching for Inspired infiltrators and influences.

As denizens of Xoriat, flumphs perceive reality in very different ways from creatures of the material plane, and have different outlooks on the nature of time, space, matter, and individual identity. Those who can bend their brains to encompass these concepts can learn a great deal from flumphs, as shown by the nascent group mind of the Uul’gaanu and the thoughtsinging techniques of the Narathun. However, these concepts can be difficult to reconcile with everyday life in the material plane, and this can make conversations with flumphs confusing for people fully grounded in reality.

What is the Dreamspace, and how would you use it?

The Dreamspace is a concept introduced in Secrets of Sarlona, which has this to say:

Planar gateways that once linked Eberron and Dal Quor, the Region of Dreams, were sundered during the cataclysmic wars that destroyed Xen’drik and shattered the giant civilization. Since then, Dal Quor has been forever distant, and no stable manifest zones to Dal Quor exist anywhere on Eberron.

However, Dal Quor and Eberron remained inextricably linked by the state of dreaming—the process by which mortal minds travel to the Region of Dreams, and the subtle gateway through which the quori first began their conquest of Sarlona some fifteen centuries past. 

Discovered short years ago and still known only to a few, the dreamspace is an effect that appears related to this spiritual connection between planes, but one that as yet has no explanation. It appears as a kind of ripple of arcane and psionic energy—a border of sorts between the mortal world and the world of dreams… Regardless of its origin, different factions among both the kalashtar and Inspired distrust—some even say fear—the dreamspace. In particular, a good number of Inspired are said to be disturbed by the existence of a power connected to Dal Quor that they neither control nor understand.

Secrets of Sarlona, Page 18

Secrets of Sarlona includes a set of “Dreamtouched Feats” that allow people to attune themselves to the Dreamspace. Specific uses include the Dream of Contact, which allows long-distance telepathic communication (not unlike Sending) and Dream of Insight, which allows the dreamer to make a Intelligence-based skill check with a substantial bonus to the role—essentially, drawing knowledge from the collective unconscious. These techniques are crucial tools for the Unchained, a resistance movement within Riedra whose members engage un unsanctioned free dreaming.

That’s the extent of canon information. The Dreamspace was “discovered a few short years ago” and both the Inspired and kalashtar distrust it. So what IS it? A few possibilities that come to mind…

  • The Dreamspace is just part of the natural infrastructure of the planes. Think of it as the phone lines that connect mortal dreamers to Dal Quor. There’s nothing sinister about it; it’s just a (super)natural part of the world.
  • The Dreamspace is an artifact created by the quori of a previous age when they interacted with Eberron. Rather than tying this to the Giant-Quori conflict in Xen’drik, I’d tie this to an even older age of Dal Quor, potentially associated with long-forgotten civilizations in either Khorvaire or Sarlona… civilizations destroyed by the rising of the Daughter of Khyber or another Overlord. This allows for the discovery of ancient rituals or artifacts designed to manipulate the Dreamspace, and leaves the question open as to whether the quori of that past age were benevolent or if the Dreamspace itself was designed as some sort of weapon or tool of oppression.
  • People have only discovered the Dreamspace recently because it’s only recently come into existence. It’s the side effect of unforeseen damage the Inspired are inflicting on the psychosphere of Eberron through their use of the hanbalani monoliths. At the moment it’s a useful tool, but as the damage becomes more extensive it could connect unwilling minds, cause dreaming spirits to be lost in the Dreamspace instead of reaching Dal Quor, or far worse things.
  • The Dreamspace is a hoax. It’s a creation of the Dreaming Dark, a lure that’s being used to draw out rebels like the Unchained. Attuning the the Dreamspace and developing Dreamtouched techniques actually makes the user more vulnerable to quori possession.

These are all interesting possibilities. The point is that, like the Mourning, I wouldn’t WANT to present a single kanon or canon answer, because a central point of the Dreamspace is that the people using it don’t know what it is. It is a new tool that’s being latched onto by a desperate resistance—is it a blessing, or could it be a trap? Is it secretly a tool of the Dreaming Dark, or is it a the horrifying result of their messing with powers beyond even their control? Each of the four options above would form the foundation of very different stories. Using the first option, it could be a simple, reliable tool that has no other significant impact on the story. Using the second option could unveil a quori scheme from a previous age that dwarfs the ambitions of the Dreaming Dark—while the third option could end with the Dreaming Dark and the player characters working together to disassemble the hanbalani system before it tears reality apart.

So, the Dreamspace was always intended to be an idea that each DM could use in different ways; perhaps one of these ideas will inspire you!

That’s all for now! Thanks again to my Patreon supporters for posing interesting questions and for making these articles possible!

Dragonmarks 8-11-17: Xoriat

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I’m on the road for the next few weeks. I’ll be continuing to write on the road, and I have lots of things planned – including more Phoenix support. But… I’m part of a monthly Eberron podcast called Manifest Zone. Our most recent episode focused on Xoriat and the Daelkyr, and this question came out of that… and it crept into my mind like a worm that wouldn’t leave until I wrote down the answer.

In the spirit of “If it has stats we can kill it,” what would an adventure to Xoriat look like? While “you cannot comprehend the nature of it” is good for illustrating the whirling madness of it all, it’s hard to work with as a setting.

I can’t answer this in detail until it’s legal for me to create a planar handbook, but I can at least share some basic thoughts. This is based on the original design and 3.5 lore; 4E did some odd things to try to merge Eberron with core cosmology and ignoring that.

To begin with: The Far Realm can be a useful source of inspiration, because it’s a very alien realm that produces aberrations and madness. But bear in mind that Xoriat is not the Far Realm. It’s not beyond reality. It is one of the thirteen planes that define reality; it is part of the planar orrery, and it touches and influences Eberron and all its inhabitants. It is defined by being alien and unknowable, a source of madness and inspiration. But it is still part of the underlying machinery of reality.

So with THAT in mind, consider the role it plays. Kythri is the churning chaos – which means that Xoriat isn’t about chaos. Instead, I see Xoriat as being a parallel to Dal Quor. I think you have islands of stability — regions that have coalesced around particularly powerful spirits, much as il-Lashtavar creates a central core in Dal Quor. These islands are surrounded by a sea of shifting reality – not entirely chaotic, but inexorably changing.

The islands are relatively stable. It’s on these islands that the Daelkyr have their domains, and where the mortal inhabitants – like the Illithids – have cities and communities. These regions aren’t chaotic;  they are alien. Consider an island where everything — buildings, food, the air — is alive. Perhaps you tell time by the shifting gravity; if you’re walking on the ceiling, that means it’s midday, while by evening you’ll be back on the floor. Apply Escher logic. Consider that many aberrations don’t need traditional food or water to survive; instead, a farmer may tend a field of misery. However strange these places are, you can come to understand them and learn their ways.

Out in the sea of madness, you can find almost anything. But here the key is to differentiate it from Dal Quor and its shifting dreams. Dreams generally have an internal logic; you may be giving a musical recital in your underwear, but the musical recital is something that actually happened in your past and being in your underwear is about some sort of issue you’re dealing with. The fringes of Xoriat don’t have any internal logic and aren’t drawn from your memories. They might be things you never imagined — or they could be revelatory insights that could either drive you made or change the way you look at reality. Consider the following…

  • A house built from hate. What does incarnated hate look like? You’ll have to decide, but the PCs innately know that’s what it is. Mirrors reflect the things you hate. Books in the house chronicle hateful deeds and people. And the longer you stay in it, the more you begin to hate the people around you… or yourself.
  • An endless void of empty white space. There is no end to this bleak solitude, and you know that this is what mortal existence is. To proceed, you must simply act out your travel, just as you pretend that the events of your life actually mean something. Eventually, if you convince yourself, you’ll find yourself in the world you’ve imagined.
  • A lush orchard. The trees grow secrets, and secrets buzz around in the air like tiny birds. Some of them may be your secrets, or those of your enemies. Others may be secrets of strangers, or secrets about the nature of reality. Think carefully before you listen to their songs.
  • Your home – the ooze-creche you were grown in when Kyrzin first made you. What, you thought you were adventurers? No, you’re cerebral oozes created by Kyrzin and loosed upon the world in ages past. You crawl into the minds of mortals and consume them, assuming their identities for as long as it’s useful, then moving to a new host. You’ve been a Dhakaani champion. You ate the mind of Malleon the Reaver. And then each of you consumed one of these adventurers. You compelled them to come together, knowing that they would finally be able to return you to your home, to the pools of primal slime where you were made. At last you can abandon this singular existence and return to the unifying ichor. So dive into the pool and let it all go. Or what? Can you truly continue as you did in the past, knowing that this person you think you are is simply a collection of residual memories and that you’re a thought-eating ooze with who knows how many alien instincts programmed into you?  To be clear: In all likelihood this is a delusion, not actual fact. But if you’re in a room full of oozes and you have clear memories of BEING an ooze and suddenly remember other lives – how do you KNOW if it’s true or not?

The trick here is to consider that these are things that could drive you mad. In the garden of secrets, any secret you listen to should have the capacity to deeply shake what you thought to be true… something that could literally break a lesser person. Can you handle the truth? While this could be secrets of people, it could also be universal truths. As a wizard, one of these secrets might show you a way to cast all spells as if you’d used a higher level spell slot – with the absolute knowledge that you are going to die in thirty years, and each time you cast a spell in this way you are cutting a year off your life. Again, a lesser wizard might be driven mad either by the revelation that magic is slowly killing us or that the time of your death is set or simply by the science involved. Perhaps your PC isn’t troubled by that… but are you going to use this magic? Conversely, you might have to deal with physical changes. Passing through a portal might cause your gender or race to flip, or shift the minds of the PCs into the bodies of the PCs sitting to their right. Touching something might cause a strange fungus to start spreading on your arm, slowly and inexorably. You know is consuming you and feeding off your memories, and that most everyone in your life are themselves hollow fungus slaves. What will you do?

Aside from this, you could have currents of madness that simply run through the entire realm. If a rage-storm hits, people who fail will saves might be driving into a murderous frenzy. Streams of sorrow flow through the air, and one drop can render you catatonic. Watch out!

You’ve mentioned in the past that there are things more powerful than the Daelkyr in Xoriat. How do you envision these entities? Like primordial Lovecraftian beings? Or like Thelanis´ Archfeys, but with alien agendas and rivalries?

These entities are the geography of Xoriat. They are vast and alien, and even the daelkyr are like fleas to them. We know they exist because the islands of stability are the side effect of their presence, reality shaped by the gravity of their spirits. If the Daelkyr are like the Kalaraq Quori – mighty masterminds with armies of followers – these beings are like il-Lashtavar. Too vast for us to interact with, but we know them by their impact on the plane.

With that said, I expect there are other entities that are on the same power level and cosmic scale as the Daelkyr who simply have no interest in physically traveling to other worlds. Like most planar immortals, these would represent some aspect of their plane. So looking to my example of maddening secrets, you could easily have something like the Cthaeh from Wise Man’s Fear – a static entity who is a repository of maddening knowledge, who has no agenda but who could be both extremely valuable and tremendously dangerous for anyone who encounters it.

A second question is: how is Mordain the Fleshweaver different from the Daelkyr? Why you should choose him as an enemy instead of a Daelkyr?

It’s a good question. I’ve written a number of articles about Mordain; here’s one that’s online. The thing about Mordain is that he operates on a smaller scale on every level. He’s essentially a mad scientist. He’s not trying to topple civilizations or transform the world; he’s engaging in interesting local experiments. Here’s one example of something he might do. He is one of the most powerful wizards on Khorvaire, but he’s still mortal – not an immortal incarnation that drives people insane by looking at them. His projects are generally going to show results in the short term, while the Daelkyr may set things in motion that won’t fully develop for thousands of years. He has a small army of creatures he’s made, but not the legions of aberrations that the Daelkyr have at their disposal.

Beyond this: I generally wouldn’t use Mordain as an enemy. He doesn’t leave his tower and has little interest in the world beyond using it as a test ground for his creations. I use him as an enigmatic third party – someone who could be an ally or a threat depending on how an experiment plays out. Is there a player who wants a character of a strange race? Maybe they were created by Mordain. Is there a disease that can’t be cured? Maybe Mordain can cure it – assuming he didn’t create it! An alliance with Mordain could give the Daughters of Sora Kell access to powerful living weapons – can you disrupt the alliance? You’ve found a rare magical resource that Mordain undoubtedly wants – what would you want from him in exchange?

Conversely, the Daelkyr have plans that have been in motion for millennia. They have vast armies at their disposal. They have hidden cults and can create new ones on the spur of the moment. We’ve suggested that they may have created the Dragonmarks – which means that it’s something that’s been unfolding for over two thousand years. Their actions could be small-scale – a cult causing trouble in a small town – or they could threaten entire civilizations.

Would the inhabitants of Xoriat are mindless undead and constructs as an affront, since their madness can’t touch them?

Here’s the thing: calling Xoriat “The Realm of Madness” reflects a biased mortal view. I don’t think the DAELKYR consider themselves to be lords of “Madness”. They might call Xoriat “the Realm of Revelations.” It is a fact that exposure to Xoriat typically drives mortals mad – but that’s because WE CAN’T HANDLE IT, not because that’s its purpose. Kyrzin is the Prince of Slime, not the Lord of Schizophrenia. The fact that his attention temporarily drives you mad and that you’ll go completely insane if you try to read his thoughts is incidental to him, a sign of your small mind as opposed to his right to drive you mad. I think Belashyrra would be more annoyed by the fact that a skeleton has no eyes than the fact that it doesn’t go insane.

Related to this: The wizard spell confusion is an enchantment with the sole purpose of disrupting a creature’s ability to think. Meanwhile, a Daelkyr has the ability to cause confusion at will. But in my opinion that’s NOT a “I will disrupt your thoughts now” ability: it’s literally that if the Daelkyr focuses its full attention on you, it breaks your brain. Your mind can’t handle the Daelkyr’s presence. So if the Daelkyr encounters a thinking creature who’s immune to mind-altering effects, I think it’s more likely to find it a novelty than to be outraged.

That’s all I have time for at the moment, but hopefully it gives you some ideas to work with. It’s not chaos, and it’s not a dream; it is madness. This can carry lies or revelations. It is a place where there is no concept of the impossible. And it is a place that you should not go.

Dragonmarks: The Daelkyr and their Cults

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In days to come I’ll be talking about GenCon, Gloom, and Phoenix. But it’s been a few months since I wrote anything about Eberron. When I started the Dragonmarks I focused on specific topics, and I wanted to get back to that. So today I’m talking about the Daelkyr and the Cults of the Dragon Below. As always, everything here is just my opinion. It may contradict present or future canon sources and is not official in any way. With that said…

Eberron has its fair share of apocalyptic villains. The Lords of Dust serve fiendish Overlords who ruled the world in the dawn of time and wait to be released to rule it again. The Dreaming Dark uses our dreams as tools to enslave us. Then there are the Daelkyr. Eight thousand years ago, the Daelkyr came through from the plane of madness, and by the time they were bound in Khyber they’d brought down the Empire of Dhakaan. Unlike the Overlords, the Daelkyr are still active in Khyber. You could go down into the underworld and meet one. Their stats in the 3.5 ECG don’t even seem that impressive, really. So what’s up with the Daelkyr? Why bother with them when you have the more powerful and ancient Lords of Dust around? What do they bring to a story?

First of all, what are the Daelkyr?

The Daelkyr are powerful entities from Xoriat, the plane of Madness. They aren’t the most powerful denizens of Xoriat; they are simply the mightiest to have shown any interest in other planes. They are immortal outsiders, not creatures of flesh and blood. The slightest touch of a daelkyr can sicken or warp organic creatures, and its mere presence can cause temporary madness. Peering into the mind of a Daelkyr can cause permanent insanity. This speaks to the fundamental difference between the Daelkyr and all those other forces: we don’t understand them. The others make sense to us. The Dreaming Dark wants to control the world because that’s the only way they can secure the survival of their culture. The Lords of Dust want to free their masters and restore their primal dominion over the world. The Daelkyr… we just don’t know. At the end of the day we don’t know what they want or how they intend to achieve it. We know what’s keeping them at bay – the seals created by the Gatekeepers – but we don’t know why the Daelkyr haven’t already broken those seals or what would happen if they did. Unlike the Overlords, the Daelkyr are free to move about in Khyber. They have armies of aberrations and cults scattered across the world. Why haven’t they taken more active measures to secure their release? Are the mightiest Daelkyr working together, or are they working at cross purposes? Why is it that their cults often follow completely different creeds and are quite often entirely unaware of one another? Again, at the end of the day, we don’t know. We know they are down in Khyber. We know the power they possess. But we don’t know what they want or what they are doing.

A common theory is that the Daelkyr aren’t actually soldiers or conquerors: they are scientists and artists. They don’t actually have any interest in ruling the world or in destroying it; they are simply interested in changing it. They took the goblins of Dhakaan and created dolgaunts, dolgrims, and dolgarrs from them and then sent those creatures back against the empire. It could be that this conflict was all they wanted… they didn’t actually CARE about who won, they simply wanted to watch the goblins fight these twisted mockeries of their own kind and see what impact that had. And in the end, it wasn’t the military force of the Daelkyr that destroyed the empire; it was the seeds of madness, the rivalries created, the erosion of faith in tradition, the cults, and all the myriad other long-term effects that brought down Dhakaan. The Daelkyr wounded the empire with brute force, but it was the infection over time that killed it… which may have been their goal all along.

Meanwhile, they DIDN’T make any sort of dolgaunt equivalent from orcs; instead they just spawned a host of cults that linger to this day. Yet many of those cults don’t directly revere or serve the Daelkyr themselves. Again, it seems like change was more their goal than destruction.

Part of the point here is that the release of a Daelkyr is not likely to be anywhere near as apocalyptic as the release of an Overlord. It’s something that would have dramatic effects on a region – but it could conceivably go unnoticed by the world at large for years. Heck, there could be a free Daelkyr at large right now.

Let’s look at a few questions.

Was the daelkyr’s humanoid appearance always part of the concept?

The Daelkyr are often depicted as attractive, androgynous humanoids clad in organic armor. Some wonder “why do they look human, when they originally fought goblins?” In my opinion, this appearance doesn’t remotely reflect the true nature of the Daelkyr; it is simply something the human brain puts together to make some sort of sense of what it’s facing. As such, a goblin might see some sort of handsome goblinoid wearing the skins of its enemies, and a warforged might see an imposing construct clad in the rusting remnants of other warforged. I’m inspired by this image of Galactus from back in the day…

Bear in mind that a Daelkyr can cause confusion at will – which is to say, it can break your mind just by thinking about you. Given that, the idea that different people may see Daelkyr differently is a fairly minor thing.

With that said, I also believe that different named Daelkyr will have unique appearances. We’ve shown Kyrzin (Prince of Slime) as a vaguely humanoid slime with human limbs embedded in it. I’d expect Belashyrra (Lord of Eyes) to be associated with eyes. With that said, I WOULD be more inclined to make Belashyrra some sort of humanoid as opposed to, say, a giant beholder. Daelkyr do carry symbionts designed to be used by humanoids. They may not look HUMAN, but I think they manifest in a humanoid shape.

How high is the Daelkyr threat level compared to the overlords?

As described above, I don’t consider the Daelkyr to be as IMMEDIATE an apocalyptic threat as the Overlords. The release of the Daelkyr won’t mean instant devastation; the main thing is that once those seals are broken, you may never be able to fix them again. The conflict between the Dhakaani and the Daelkyr lasted for centuries, and I wouldn’t expect things to be different now. A released Daelkyr wouldn’t destroy the world… but it WOULD start changing the region around it, and might eventually fling an army of aberrations at the country next door, spread plagues or waves of madness, or otherwise do things that could harm tens of thousands of people or break the existing balance of power.

(The Daelkyr) are a little difficult to use in a campaign as the main villains because they are not as strong, manipulative, or great in number as the overlords…

I’ll touch on influence in a moment, but speaking to “strength”, there’s a few things. First, bear in mind that a Daelkyr should never be found alone. They create monsters, madness, and bizarre diseases as a hobby, and have had eight thousand years to indulge in this. Belashyrra has a battalion of beholders, not to mention dolgaunts, mind flayers, and anything else you care to create. And if you want to say that Belashyrra has bred an army of 100,000 beholders and has it sitting under Sharn right now… than he does.

Second: Don’t be limited by the stats that are presented. First of all, Daelkyr are like demon princes. All of the major ones – Belashyrra, Kyrzin, Dyrrn the Corruptor, Orlassk – should be unique individuals with their own powers. Second, more than any other creature in D&D, Daelkyr should break the rules. The fundamental rule of the Daelkyr is that we don’t understand them. As powerful as the Overlords are, they are part of Eberron. They are embodiments of concepts that shape our world. The Daelkyr are something else entirely. They don’t belong here. Having magic or other fundamental rules warp around them is entirely in keeping with them as a concept.

Aside from the fact that direct magical effects may not work as you expect, feel free to assign powers to Daelkyr that simply have no grounding in standard mechanics. For example, it’s said that Belashyrra can see through anyone’s eyes. Maybe that’s exaggerated; maybe it’s the literal truth. Maybe he can blind anyone he wants – anywhere, anytime – or swap your sight with someone else, so suddenly you’re seeing the world through the eyes of an orc shaman in the Shadow Marches. Meanwhile, the Marchers say that Kyrzin has influence over anyone who’s suffering from excessive mucus. Maybe a faerie tale… maybe not. Again, the key with the Daelkyr is that we DON’T KNOW. This is enhanced by their alien attitude and uncertain goals. If the Dreaming Dark could see through everyone’s eyes, they would use it to further their known agenda. Belashyrra COULD do lots of useful things with this gift, and simply chooses not to. Why?

How much day-to-day influence do the Daelkyr actually have, and why? As opposed to mere personal might?

This ties to the question above: We don’t know, because we don’t know what they want, and we don’t know what they are capable of. It’s possible that anyone who’s got a cold is an unwitting agent of Kyrzin, and that anyone who’s got eyes is an unwitting spy for Belashyrra. Beyond this, ANYONE WHO’S CRAZY MAY BE CRAZY BECAUSE OF THEM. And “crazy” is a very broad term, as I’ll discuss when we get to the cults.

Furthermore, the Daelkyr can always create new things we’ve never seen before. Someone asked if the Daelkyr could actually be responsible for Dragonmarks. Why not? The Daelkyr specialize in creating and modifying lifeforms. They get to break the rules. They could have created the dragonmarks as a weird living way of embodying the Prophecy that the dragons and fiends still can’t really understand… and the aberrant dragonmarks are a weird variant of that experiment. This could relate to the Cult project in my City of Towers novel… and could mean that they could create new dragonmarks, move them onto new races, etc.

So the short form is “How much influence do they have? Well, how much influence do you WANT them to have?” The key here is that a campaign in which the Daelkyr are the villains should feel entirely different from one dealing with the Dreaming Dark or the Lords of Dust. it doesn’t HAVE to revolve around the release of a Daelkyr; it could revolve around the emergence of a new sort of dragonmark, an attack by an army of previously unknown aberrations, the killing spree of a single bizarre serial killer, the spread of a horrible plague… or all of these things stitched together in a strange and unexpected tapestry.

I find that horror is difficult to pull off without visual aid.

This needs to be the subject of its own blog post, but the trick here is that the gooey symbionts are really the least frightening thing about the Daelkyr. What’s far more frightening is the fact that you don’t know what they are, what they want, or what they can do to you. Say you are looking in the mirror one morning, and just for a moment you see Belashyrra looking back at you. What does it mean? Perhaps a small eye-shaped dragonmark-like tattoo then appears on your hand. What does it mean? Perhaps you start having telepathic intuitions about the motives of people around you. They save you from an ambush, but… what does it mean? Then you hear about another fellow who had the same mark, and who ended up killing his friends and family and disappearing… and no one knows why. The fear here isn’t VISUAL at all; it’s the fact that you are touched by something you don’t understand, you don’t know why, you don’t know what to do about it, and you don’t know what’s going to happen next.

Similarly, when dealing with the powers of the Daelkyr, think about what they actually are and what can make them horrifying. A Daelkyr can use confusion at will. But what does it mean to be “confused”? Does it take you back to the most horrible time in your life when you were surrounded by enemies? Does it make you watch helplessly while your body blunders around on its own? When it uses Feeblemind, it is stripping away your ability to speak, to understand language, to do anything you once could do… the idea of that, of being conscious but unable to communicate, unable to remember how to use a sword or cast a spell… that’s more horrifying to me than any gooey monster. The horror of the Daelkyr is the things you CAN’T fight with a sword… and the fear of what might be coming next.

Why don’t the Daelkyr team up and free themselves, like, right now?

I’ve answered this above, but I’ll reiterate it here… THIS IS A QUESTION DAELKYR SCHOLARS HAVE BEEN ASKING FOR CENTURIES. It may be because they don’t care about being imprisoned. Perhaps it’s because they are immortal and know that the seals will all break in 999 YK when Xoriat finally becomes coterminous again, and they don’t mind waiting. Perhaps it’s because they can do everything they want to do WHILE being imprisoned. Or perhaps it’s because they are engaged in a series of feuds so esoteric and strange that we don’t even know they are going on!

Was the Undying Court ambivalent to the daelkyr invasion of the Dhakaani empire? Or busy with some other pressing business at the time?

Short answer: The power of the Undying Court is concentrated in Aerenal. They undoubtedly took action to defend Aerenal from the incursion. The Dhakaani had already fought the Tairnadal and driven them from Khorvaire, so there was no love between elf and goblin; even if the Court had the power to help Dhakaan, it’s not much of a surprise that they chose to focus on their own defense.

Is there any evidence to support the claim that the daelkyr were refugees seeking asylum in Eberron and that the Dhakaani empire was the one to initiate hostilities, forcing the daelkyr to respond in self defense?

None at all. You may be thinking of the theory that the Quori were refugees seeking asylum in Eberron when they were attacked by the Giants; there’s a fair amount of evidence suggesting that, and more important, neither culture survived to the present day, so there’s no way to verify it. Meanwhile, we have the Gatekeepers, Heirs of Dhakaan, and the Daelkyr themselves as multiple living threads attesting to the hostile intent and actions of the Daelkyr. With that said, it can be argued that the Daelkyr don’t consider collapsing civilizations and warping creatures into new forms to be a hostile act.

Are there Gatekeepers corrupted by the Daelkyr?

Certainly. “Gatekeepers corrupted by the Daelkyr” is an entirely valid foundation for a Cult of the Dragon Below. Consider the link above.

The question about the Undying Court’s reaction (or absence thereof) to the Daelkyr invasion of the Dhakaani Empire reminds me of one that’s been bugging me for some time. Did the Daelkyr only target Khorvaire for their invasion – and within Khorvaire, only the south-west in and around the Shadow Marches and some of the border areas? I’ve read that the chokers may have been formed from halflings, so strikes into the Talenta Plains may have happened – but what of Xen’drik, Argonessen, or Sarlona – who, in the absence of Gatekeepers, would have been defenseless?

As far as has been mentioned in canon, the Xoriat incursion was limited to Khorvaire; notably, there’s no mention of it having targeted Sarlona at all, and even the problems of the Umbragen came after the Daelkyr were trapped in Khyber. They struck across Khorvaire; in addition to the Talenta Plains example, they also wiped out the Dwarven civilization that once existed below the Ironroot Mountains. Looking to the question of why they’d do this when there were other, easier targets… the Shadow Marches has an unusually large number of manifest zones to Xoriat, and this is part of what made the incursion possible in the first place. Bear in mind that there were no Gatekeepers in Khrovaire when the Daelkyr attacked; they were formed in response to the incursion, and if the Daelkyr had attacked Sarlona Vvaraak would have gone there. But most of all, bear in mind that the Daelkyr weren’t looking for a defenseless place. They weren’t trying to claim territory; they were (as best as we can tell) interested in transforming the world. Today, Dhakaan has fallen, and we have dolgaunts and dolgrims, derro beneath the mountains, cults of the Dragon Below, chokers in the shadows… it’s not clear that they are unsatisfied with the outcome. As noted in the other Dragonmark, they don’t seem to be working very hard to break the seals. Having dropped seeds of madness into Eberron, they may simply be watching as those seeds spread, waiting until the time is right for the next phase.

 

Now let’s move from the Daelkyr to the Cults of the Dragon Below. A few people asked variations of the same question…

“Why would anyone find the Cults attractive, given their obviously ‘wrong’ nature?”

Because if you’re in the cult, it doesn’t seem “wrong.” Imagine that you wake up one morning with the sudden realization that you are the reincarnated soul of King Arthur, and that you have to save the world from the new Modred. You have the ability to see the auras of the other Knights of the Round Table, and so you start gathering them together – and they in turn see you as their king. You even find Merlin dwelling in the sewers, and he whispers to you of your missions. This is a perfect model for a Cult of the Dragon Below. The cultists don’t see that “Merlin” is a mind flayer, or that “Excalibur” is a bizarre sword formed from muscle and bone; they see it as the most perfect sword ever formed. Because they are insane. It may be a extremely subtle madness, and “King Arthur” may be a brilliant and charismatic leader. But he’s still convinced that he IS King Arthur, when in fact he’s just some random soldier holding a gooey sword and talking with a mind flayer. To you as an outsider it seems “wrong.” For him, it is his destiny and a quest that will determine the fate of the world.

This is why Cults rarely work together. They are driven by delusions and don’t necessarily share any sort of common creed. One cult embraces the aberration and sees symbionts as a way to improve on weak flesh; another doesn’t even see symbionts AS symbionts, instead seeing them as amazing glittering treasures.

The Cults seem to be an avenue for the desperate and insane, why would a rational person of means who join the Cults?

See above. “King Arthur” could be one of the greatest generals of the Five Nations, in charge of thousands of troops. He could also be an amazing strategist and extremely rational person… except for the part where he thinks he’s King Arthur. Just because you’re insane doesn’t mean you’re desperate, and “insane” can mean MANY different things. Poor and desperate people might turn to a cult willingly because they see it as a source of power or a means of survival. But madness can strike anyone, anywhere. And that’s not even getting into the fact that Kyrzin could technically spread a cult by using the common cold.

Why do people join the Cults? It seems like their core tenet is that everyone’s going to die, but the faithful die faster.

Game mechanics sort of imply all cults are some what uniform. How much variation is there? Can they hate each other?

Blood of Vol seems like a morally-ambiguous church (at least in terms of followers) -Why was Dragon Below not written similar?

I want to address these together. I’ve already talked about the fact that a Cult can appear anywhere, anytime, and that their creeds can vary dramatically. However, we also have the established, long-term cults that you find in places like the Shadow Marches. There’s a few sources on these:

“Touched By Madness” is an article in Dragon Magazine (back when it was a magazine) that discusses a variety of cults.

The Gibbering Cults are described in this article on the Daelkyr Kyrzin. Gibbering Cults cultivate gibbering beasts, and when a member of the cult grows sick or elderly, they feed them to the family beast. They believe that the soul lives on in the beast, and that they can hear its wisdom when they listen to the beast. Beyond this, they aren’t innately evil. They aren’t going to feed YOU to the family beast, because you don’t deserve it. Some gibbering families may be crazed killers; others might seem just like you and me – provided you stay out of the basement. Really, it’s not that different from the Undying Court.

The Inner Sun cults are mentioned in this Eye on Eberron article. Here’s a quote:

Collectively, the Cults of the Dragon Below are anything but monolithic. Creeds vary wildly from one group to another, and cults spring up spontaneously; sometimes a madman has a vision that infects the minds of those around him. A few common threads of thought, however, appear in similar forms across cult lines. One shared precept is that the world is an imperfect place. Khyber sought to perfect it—to eliminate pain, suffering, death and all other woes—but the other dragons turned on her, and when Eberron couldn’t defeat Khyber, she trapped her.

The second element of this credo concerns the realm of the Inner Sun. It is the belief that a paradise exists within Khyber, a place where people can escape the suffering of everyday life. Most of the cults that subscribe to this belief consider the Vale of the Inner Sun to be a place that can be reached only after death, often coupled with the requirement that one must earn passage to the vale by spilling the blood of worthy enemies. This perceived duty has been the motivation behind the acts of many murderers and vicious Marcher clans.

Many of these hereditary cults aren’t LOOKING for new members. You join one by being born into it, and it makes sense to you because that’s how life has always been. But you could certainly play a half-orc barbarian raised in an Inner Sun cult who’s joined the party looking to kill enough worthy foes to earn his way to the Vale… and he could end up being a great and noble hero, despite this belief.

How do cults operate in Sharn, and what arm of law enforcement rides herd on them?

The point of the Cults is that it’s hard to monitor them because a new one can pop up anywhere and the lack of a common creed makes it difficult to identify. So the Blackened Book is investigating the weird summonings going on in Ashblack, while the Citadel is looking into this whole King Arthur thing, and none of them have noticed the gibbering family living in Fallen.

How would you suggest using a Cult of the Dragon Below as allies to the PCs instead of antagonists?

Don’t make it obvious that they ARE a Cult of the Dragon Below. Again, that Gibbering family may be fine, decent, helpful people who just happen to be getting ready to feed grandma to the gibbering mouther in the basement. Or try this: there’s a cult that is convinced that they must steel their minds and souls to face a terrible threat. They believe that there are CREATURES LIVING IN OUR DREAMS and trying to control us. They are actually going around assassinating people because “Their minds have been consumed by dream-monsters”; they also have some awesome monk disciplines tied to this training. The leader of the cult is, in fact, a mind flayer, but he doesn’t eat anyone’s brains; instead, he “consumes their fears”, a process that does actually seem to strengthen will without harmful side effects; he also helps them operate without sleeping, to avoid the dream monsters, and it’s his training that helps them spot the “corrupted”. He tells the adventurers that he bears their kind no ill will and simply seeks to keep the dream-monsters from consuming the mind of the world. SO… is this all on the level? Is the mind flayer actually training people to oppose the Quori? Are they actually assassinating mind seeds? Or are they in fact just totally misled and crazy, assassinating entirely innocent people?

When did the cults start to take hold? Were there giants and elves/drow that venerated the Dragon Below or did worship of the horrors get footing only after the Xen’drik cataclysm?

Well, cults that literally worship KHYBER have existed long before the Xoriat Incursion. as for Xoriat-inspired cults, we haven’t mentioned any specifically, but there’s no reason some couldn’t have existed before the arrival of the Daelkyr; in fact, it would be logical for there to have been a cult in the Dhakaani era that laid the groundwork for the arrival of the Daelkyr in the first place.

If the Gatekeepers didn’t stop the Daelkyr invasion, how would it have changed Eberron as a game system? Would it have been akin to, say something like Dark Sun or Ravenloft?

Sure, or Gamma World. The ultimate goal of the Daelkyr is to reshape the world, and once they are done they’d likely move on to another world (as noted in the suggestion that the Gith are survivors from another world claimed by the Daelkyr). It would be a world filled with aberrations, madness, strange powers, and the like – both flora and fauna would definitely be affected.

Dolgrim, Dolgaunts, etc, are obviously the goblinoid aberrations – if I wanted to create other races’ aberrations, what is the guiding principle regarding a “corrupt” race? Dolgrims and Dolgaunts don’t seem much like goblins and hobgoblins except in size.

There is no “guiding principle”. It’s going to depend entirely on what daelkyr you’re dealing with. Kyrzin likes slimes and disease. Belashyrra has a fondness for eyes. Orlassk likes stone and petrification. Dyrrn just likes corruption in any form, mental or physical. As noted above, DRAGONMARKS could be the result of Daelkyr “corruption”. A Daelkyr may choose to create something designed to inspire fear or horror in others… or it may design something strange and bizarre that it simply finds pleasing or necessary for its goals. The Dols were created to serve as soldiers and unleashed on the Dhakaani. They were designed to horrify the Dhakaani and to be effective soldiers. Dragonmarked humans could have been engineered as a way to control the Prophecy (or they could have nothing to do with the Daelkyr – don’t get me wrong). Any form of manipulation is appropriate.

What part, if any, do the Lords Of Dust play in the formation of the cults?

What part do you want them to play? If it furthers the goals of their Overlord, a Lord of Dust might well set a cult in motion. The Daelkyr are weaker than the Overlords, and certain Overlords (such as the Voice in the Darkness) don’t see the Daelkyr’s actions as any sort of threat to their goals. Beyond this, of course, there are some “Cults of the Dragon Below” that are entirely dedicated to the Overlords as opposed to being influenced by the Daelkyr.

Why did Vvaraak teach the orcs to fight the daelkyr? Wasn’t Darguun militarily the more capable power? Will of the Prophecy?

It could have been driven by the Prophecy. it could be that the Daelkyr already had too much influence over the Dhakaani for Vvaraak to reach them. I’m inclined to say that the Dhakaani were simply too entrenched in their own cultural traditions to abandon them and embrace some bizarre tree-hugging dragon’s weird religion. The Dhakaani knew exactly how to handle the situation: steel, military discipline, and the magic of the Duur’kala. If some barbarian orc wants to go pray to moss or the “great earth dragon” – frankly, that sounds like the exact sort of madness our enemy is spreading.

Since the Silver Flame opposes supernatural threats, does the Church of the SF have alliances with gatekeepers against Daelkyr?

The Gatekeepers are almost entirely unknown outside of the Shadow Marches, and given some of the CotSF’s issues with Droaam aren’t entirely trusting of the Church; overzealous followers of the Pure Flame might well see orc mystics as a problem, not a solution. With that said, the Church of the Silver Flame seeks to protect the innocent from all supernatural threats, and the Daelkyr are certainly a supernatural threat. So I think that Jaela would find common ground with Maagrim’Torrn if they ever met, and I think most true followers of the Flame would help Gatekeepers if they faced aberrations together, but Thrane and the Shadow Marches are far away.

Can an exorcist of the SF repel the Daelkyr and Xoriat beings?

An exorcist’s Flame of Censure affects “outsiders with the evil subtype”. As a result, it WILL work against a Daelkyr – an evil outsider – but won’t work against a dolgaunt. Aberrations aren’t really the province of the Flame; it’s used to dealing with fiends, undead, and the like, and the point of aberrations is that they are fundamentally more alien than even a demon; aberrations are the things we don’t understand, things that don’t follow natural law.