Dragonmarks: Muskets in Eberron, 2024 Edition

Part of an image by Caio Monteiro from the 2024 Player’s Handbook

The Last War spurred constant innovation in weapons of war. While Aundair embraced the path of the wandslinger, the southern nations followed a different direction. Breland had long relied on the crossbows of Starilaskur Arms, but in the last decade a new tool emerged. Fernian ash is a byproduct of the elemental binding work of Zilargo. In its standard form it is perfectly safe, but a whispered word of power can unlock the elemental energy in the ash… readying it to be released in a flash of flame. In 994 YK Merrix d’Cannith and Haldon ir’Lashan of Starilaskur Arms worked together to produce the “Brass Dragon”—the first Brelish musket. Mere months later the Mourning shook the world, and the Treaty of Thronehold brought the war to an end before the dragons were produced in sufficient numbers to have an impact on the battlefield. But Cannith South is continuing to work with Brelish foundries to produce these weapons, and Brelish soldiers are training with them; should the Last War begin again, the face of battle may be quite different.

The 2024 Players Handbook includes the musket and the pistol on the standard list of ranged weapons. Where, then, do these fit into Eberron? While the Dhakaani of the Kech Hashraac developed firearms thousands of years ago, they’ve never played a significant role within the Five Nations. Weapons of war split between the use of pure arcane magic—as seen in the siege staff and the blast disk—and the improvement of traditional weapons, such as the Starilaskur Arms SAC-12 crossbow. During the Last War Karrnath and Breland favored the use of the crossbow, Thrane benefitted from a populace widely trained in the use of the longbow, and Aundair pushed toward greater integration of wandslingers; Cyre drew on all of these options. House Cannith worked with local arcanists and engineers to develop unique weapons, as seen with the floating fortresses and the warforged colossus. It’s just such a partnership that produced the brass dragon musket and the copper dragon pistol, often shortened by those who use them to brass and copper. The impact of these weapons on Brelish military tactics remains to be seen. The brass dragon musket hits harder than a SAC-15 crossbow, and it doesn’t require exceptional strength or dexterity to use. However, its effective range is far shorter than that of either the bow or crossbow—equivalent to that of the fire bolt cantrip, but the bolt is perfectly accurate up to its maximum range. Brelish gunsmiths are certain that they can improve this performance, finding a way to improve the range while maintaining the force of the shot. Breland fielded a few elite units of “dragoneers” during the war, and veterans have brought these weapons back home from the war. Beyond this—Breland being Breland—brass & copper have leaked out into the black market. A number of criminal organizations have taken to the use of these dragons. Short range may be an issue on a vast battlefield, but the typical Boromar enforcer rarely engages an enemy more than a hundred feet away.

Brelish muskets employ cartridges of Fernian ash, casually called ash. While safe and stable by default, the bearer of a weapon must activate the ash by focusing on the weapon and whispering a word of power, while envisioning fire. There are many words that work; Ixen in Draconic and Tashaar in Infernal are two common choices, but there are many other options. Ultimately it’s up to the gunner to find the word that works for them and their weapon. A second word calms the ash. This can be seen as a safety on the gun. It only needs to be spoken once to prepare the gun for battle, and it can only be done by the person holding the weapon; you can’t deactivate someone’s musket by shouting a calming word at them. The wielder of the weapon can speak loudly—a warning to the enemy that my gun is hot—or whisper it to the weapon. At the end of the day, this is a cosmetic aspect of the weapon. In theory you don’t want to walk around with a hot gun because the ash is unstable; but in practice, the rules don’t impose any danger of a gun exploding or misfiring. But the principle is that the ash is a supernatural substance that is charged through a very minor spell—though once activated, the action of the weapon is mundane and is unaffected by counterspell, antimagic fields, or anything similar.

Now here’s the crucial question: what do they fire? The standard musket as presented in the 2024 PHB launches a bullet, as one expects a musket to do. And that could be exactly what happens here. But embracing the idea of a weapon loaded with charges of Fernian ash, I would personally change the damage type to FIRE and say that a dragon launches a bolt of flame. This makes the weapon more unique to Eberron and makes it distinctly different from a bow or crossbow, as well as further justifying the name dragon.

The names brass and copper come from the fittings commonly used on the Cannith-Starilaskur models of these weapons. High quality weapons often have dragons inlaid along the barrel. However, a number of Brelish weaponsmiths have produced their own unique knock-offs of the Cannith design. If you use a musket or pistol, consider how you came by it. If you served in the Last War, were you trained in its use there? Did you come by it through the black market, and just take to the design? Is your gun a unique design made for you by an independent gunsmith? Or do you use one of the other options mentioned below?

Art by Cory Trego-Erdner from Eberron Rising From The Last War

Goblin Guns

The Kech Hashraac—the Dhakaani “Keepers of Thunder”—lacked the evocation techniques that led the Five Nations to develop the siege staff; instead, they focused on mundane explosives and all the things that come with them. Hashraac weapons are driven by a volatile substance they call sarvus, “little fire” and are entirely mundane in nature. The Hashraac have been honing their weapons and techniques for centuries, and their firearms are more effective that Brelish copper and brass; at the DM’s discretion, Hashraac could produce the “modern” firearms presented in the appendix of the 2014 Dungeon Master’s Guide. These are intentionally unbalanced when set against the standard weapons available to player characters, and furthermore, the Hashraac are extremely secretive and definitely aren’t selling their weapons to chaat’oor. However, over the course of countless generations, a few Hashraac have left their vault as exiles or explorers and settled among the other dar. Because of this firearms are occasionally found among the Darguuls and other dar. These aren’t the “modern” weapons produced in the Hashraac vault; each one is hand-crafted and unique. Most use the same statistics as the standard musket and pistol, but at the DM’s discretion a dar gun (get it?) could have one or more of the traits of a modern weapon—improved range, improved damage, or having the Reload trait instead of Loading. These are treasured weapons, but it’s always possible an outsider could have acquired one through battle or diplomacy; of course, ammunition could be an issue!

The Mother of Invention

The archfey known as the Forge Maiden is a brilliant artisan who creates something new in every story told about her. Her favored mortals can produce tools that work through a blending of vague science and fey magic. In Aundair, the ir’Smith family were ennobled long ago thanks to the Maiden’s favor and the wonders they produced. The current heir to the county, Adan ir’Smith, has taken a particular interest in firearms and produced an assortment of weaponry over the course of the last thirty years. His simplest weapons use the statistics of the musket or pistol, but his weapons could have one or more of the following quirks…

  • Ir’Smith firearms often deal force damage instead of piercing, firing bolts of energy. He has made a few pistols that deal psychic damage, similar to the Sentira lenses of Riedra.
  • Ir’Smith weapons may use unusual ammunition. Some of his weapons have to be loaded with a secret or a poem.
  • Tied to unusual ammunition, some ir’Smith weapons have the Reload trait instead of Loading.
  • There are a few ir’Smith weapons that are made to kill a specific individual or entity. These function as entirely mundane weapons most of the time, but when used against their destined target, each shot acts as an arrow of slaying.

Part of Adan’s pact with the Mother of Invention is that he never makes the same weapon twice; each one is a unique design. He produces around one weapon a year, and his creations are treasured among the nobles of Aundair. However, he could have gifted a weapon to an adventurer with ties to his family, or someone who earned a blessing from the Forge Maiden.

Adan ir’Smith isn’t the only artisan with ties to the Forge Maiden. There could well be a prince in the Lhazaar Principalities who’s earned the favor of the Mother of Invention and equipped their ships and sailors with cannons and muskets. The key is that if these are tied to the Mother of Invention they will on some level be magical and strange; nothing she touches is mundane.

The wandslinger Three Widow Jane by Matthew Johnson

What About Wandslingers?

The purpose of this article is to suggest a few ways to use the firearms that are now part of the 2024 Players Handbook. But just because I’m offering ideas for the people who want to use pistols and muskets doesn’t mean you have to! From the beginning, one of the core principles of Eberron was to consider the way magic could be used to find different solutions to problems than what we use in our world—the siege staff instead of the cannon, sending instead of the cell phone. As such, I’ve suggested places for muskets in the world. But I still personally prefer to dig into the wandslinger, and that’s just what we do in the upcoming Frontiers of Eberron: Quickstone. The book includes optional rules for differentiating arcane focuses, a Fighting Style feat for martial wandslingers, four general feats tied to different sorts of focus, two subclasses for wandslingers (the College of Wands Bard and the Nemesis Sorcerer) and more… along with special rules for running an arcane duel! In my campaign, Aundair made the most widespread use of wandslingers during the Last War, but as called out in Exploring Eberron, every nation fielded wandslingers and they can be found across the Five Nations. So if you’re looking to draw wands at high noon, check out Frontiers of Eberron! And I’ll point out that the PHB pistol deals 1d10 damage with a range of 30/90, while a wandslinger with fire bolt deals 1d10 damage with full accuracy to 120 feet, and never runs out of ammunition! Yes, the wandslinger needs training… but so does the gunslinger, given that the PHB pistol is a martial weapon. The point is that Eberron is a world of widespread magic where cantrip training isn’t especially remarkable. And I’m not saying that Frontiers has a Wandslinger background that grants Magic Initiate (Wizard)… but it might! So if you love the idea of a character with a pistol, use a copper dragon or a feytouched pistol from Aundair, with my blessing! But also consider if that same idea might be just as cool if you had a brace of dueling wands, like Three Widow Jane above…

Thanks as always to my Patreon supporters for asking interesting questions and for making these articles possible!

23 thoughts on “Dragonmarks: Muskets in Eberron, 2024 Edition

  1. Seems reasonable one could also just use the musket and pistol stats (maybe changing the damage type) for “martial wands”, simple arcane focuses that might have been used in the last war by soldiers who couldn’t otherwise cast any spells.

    • That reminds me I’ve once cobbled together a wandslinger figher subclass as a part of some forum discussion, based on battlemaster and 3.5 warlock’s eldritch blast invocations. It included “wandslinger implements”, basically cantrips wands/rods/staves usable as ranged weapons, doing d6 elemental damage.

  2. I suspect Kech Hashraac might of had a lot easier time keeping their tunnels clear of the nasties in Khyber with their particular specialty compared to other Dhakaan clans. Blunderbusses/shotguns & demo charges for closing tunnels would be quite useful.

  3. In your mind, would the Copper and Dragon use projectiles with the ash filling the place of gunpowder, or is the ash igniting and a fire bolt launching from the barrel of these guns?

    • Good question. I just added this note to the main article.

      Now here’s the crucial question: what do they fire? The standard musket as presented in the 2024 PHB launches a bullet, as one expects a musket to do. And that could be exactly what happens here. But embracing the idea of a weapon loaded with charges of Fernian ash, I would personally change the damage type to FIRE and say that a dragon launches a bolt of flame. This makes the weapon more unique to Eberron and makes it distinctly different from a bow or crossbow, as well as further justifying the name dragon.

  4. I’ve aloud flintlock pistol and muskets in my game for years. For some it kills the emersion but I’m a sucker for pirate adventures and the roar of cannons and a flintlock to saber combo has always been a kick. I do like the arcane firearms for their flavor, and I am going to spend some time looking into this mother of invention lady. She sounds like a good antagonist, not quite a villain not quite a hero

  5. Sorry for the nitpick, but how would Brelish troops feel about the names of a gun and a Jorasco healing potion both being shortened to “copper”? (As per Exploring Eberron pg. 226)

    (I don’t mean to be obnoxious, your work is great!)

    • It wouldn’t be the first time a slang word has had two distinct meanings! But at the moment, the healing potion is considerably more widespread than the gun. Still I could imagine a conversation…

      A: “One mo’, gotta grab my copper.”
      B: “Potion?”
      A: “Dragon.”

      • Haha! If I ever run a game where the Brelish military plays a part, I’ll make sure to write a skit about this sort of misunderstanding as entertainment for the troops 😀

      • this was a common problem in WW2 with US forces having the M1 Rifle, M1 Carbine, M1 Helmet, M1 155mm Artillery piece, M1 240mm Artillery, M1 bayonet, M1 frag grenade and a litany of other M1s

  6. Very interesting. So, the Ketch Haraask has modern firearms. Does that mean that the Empire had it too? And if yes there could be abandoned armories in ruined cities were you could find cannons and shotguns preserved by magic ( or even simply the blueprints) the players could retrieve as part of an adventure?

    • So, the Ketch Haraask has modern firearms. Does that mean that the Empire had it too?

      Not in my opinion. The Hashraac were specialists in siege weaponry and explosives. They might have had the equivalent of the standard musket or pistol at that time. But the point is that they were isolated in their vault for *thousands of years* and that in the course of that isolation developed superior techniques that give them the equivalent of “modern” weapons. So there may have been some firearms used by the Empire, but not widespread and not of “modern” quality.

  7. Funny thing is, 5e version of the Wand of Magic Missiles is better than a musket in almost all respects:

    Same or half price (uncommon item is 500gp, 250gp if you count is as a consumable thanks to the chance to lose magic powers if you expand the last charge. Also, even at the same price, magic items are crafted faster than mundane ones, and using XGtE rules, it’s even cheaper.)
    Better damage (3d4+3 > 1d12+Dex) and generally better damage type (force vs piercing)
    Better range (120′ vs 40’/120′ short/long range)
    Easier to use (no attunements or other limitations vs martial weapon)
    Perfect accuracy regardless of the user’s ability (though Shield spell is 100% defense)
    Versatile (may hit multiple targets or use more charges if you need more damage right now, at the cost of charges-to-damage efficiency)

    The disadvantages are limited uses (doesn’t need ammo, but you have 6 charges if you don’t want to risk losing it forever, and you get about 4.5 back every day), not working with fighting styles/feats (but those aren’t necessary anyway thanks to perfect accuracy, or have been nerfed in 2024) and not having mastery property (again, in 2024).

    Gunner feat isn’t in 2024 PHB, so firearms can’t get rid of the Loading property, but you can have multiple to draw, shoot and drop to get multiple attacks that way and the feat can be technically used as legacy content. Sharpshooter has been nerfed, and only does what Magic Missile can do already)

    For a specialist (a PC with extra attacks, 18+ Dex, either Gunner feat or multiple firearms and weapon mastery and other feaures improving weapon attacks), musket may be a better choice, but for everyone else, it’s Wands of Magic Missile all the way. The Progenitors made mortals, but Samuel d’Cannith made them equal.

  8. Really wish DND Beyond had options to add things like Reloading weapon feature, or additional homebrewed Fighting Styles. Just a pipedream I suppose, while they kick that can down the road…
    I’ve been allowing some firearms in my Eberron campaigns, but they are rare. Created by rogue artificers of Cyre and Breland after the day of Mourning, theirinstead of black powder, their black market firearms are using powdered dragonshard. And yeah, I couldn’t think of a valid reason why you would make a martial weapon that costs more but with nearly the same stats as a simple weapon with greater range, so I liked the idea of a Reloading feature, so you could hold multiple bullets in a firearm before you needed to reload. That would the edge that firearms provide but crossbows cannot. But I can’t make them work in DND Beyond.

    • I liked the idea of a Reloading feature, so you could hold multiple bullets in a firearm before you needed to reload. That would the edge that firearms provide but crossbows cannot…

      In Chronicles of Eberron, I suggested that Cannith crossbows could be designed with built-in clips to support the Reload featue. You can actually get one of those crossbows on Heroforge miniatures! But no way to add it to D&D Beyond, no.

      • Yeah, I know… one of my players is using a Cannith Thunderbolt for his warforged ranger. I had to customize to make it a SAC-15! … You can just change the notes under the item’s customization, or you can make a common magic item crossbow and add charges to represent the amount of bolts a clip can hold. (I did the same thing with healer’s kits, so you can keep track of how many of the 10 uses are expended.)

  9. So, you said that these are simply ways to incorporate firearms into Eberron. But would the base canon assumption be that firearms exist, but only in a limited capacity as described above? And would this be different from your own games?

    Second, if I’m correct, Mordakhesh taught the dhakaan to forge the first swords. Would Mordakhesh or other fiends (perhaps like Sul Khatesh giving the secret of using Fernian ash) have a similar role in the creation of firearms or adopt firearms as their own?

    Third, how common is Fernian ash to come by? You mention it’s a byproduct of elemental binding in Zilargo, which explains that it’s presence in Breland. But how easy or difficult would it be to come by Fernian ash in other nations, and how much would the price vary?

    • So, you said that these are simply ways to incorporate firearms into Eberron. But would the base canon assumption be that firearms exist, but only in a limited capacity as described above? And would this be different from your own games?

      “Canon” is what is printed by WotC in official books. So at the moment, there is no canon concerning firearms in Eberron. Jeremy Crawford has said that there is going to be some sort of update to the artificer, but I don’t know what form that will take. It’s possible that whatever that is will also address the role of firearms in the setting. Since muskets and pistols are part of the PHB, I feel there SHOULD be a canon approach, and I would personally advocate for an approach similar to what I’ve suggested here. But canon isn’t in my hands.

      Would Mordakhesh or other fiends have a similar role in the creation of firearms or adopt firearms as their own?

      The question here is what makes the most compelling story. Personally, I find it more interesting if mortal ingenuity is responsible; it’s not that fiends were just holding back guns for a few thousand years, it’s that mortals found ways to make weapons Mordakhesh hadn’t imagined. However, I could imagine Mordakhesh encouraging mortals to make ever deadlier weapons. So it’s not that Mordy had the blueprints for guns sitting on a shelf; it’s that he was just pushing paranoia and the arms race and humans came up with a new answer.

      With that being said, what I’ve said in the past is this sort of innovation is right up the alley of the Traveler—giving a gift that will ultimately cause widespread change.

      Third, how common is Fernian ash to come by? You mention it’s a byproduct of elemental binding in Zilargo, which explains that it’s presence in Breland. But how easy or difficult would it be to come by Fernian ash in other nations, and how much would the price vary?

      My intention is that it’s not very expensive. The point is to allow players to make use of the musket and pistol if they choose; there’s not much point to that if they have to pay 50 gp for every bullet. So my vision is that Fernian ash is a substance that is produced as a natural byproduct that no one had figured out a use for; it’s possible that Zilargo was stockpiling it just because we might use this some day and thus actually has a significant amount that Breland and Cannith have already acquired. The main point is that it’s logical to think you can’t get new ammo in, say, an Eldeen farm village, but it’s not something that’s intended to be a hardship.

  10. One of the biggest distinctions between crossbows and (post matchlock) firearms you didn’t touch on is that wheellock and onward can both be kept loaded in storage/march (the body of a crossbow isn’t really designed to bear 1000+ pounds of force long term, and the sear isn’t the most secure hold on the string), and fired at the press of a trigger (crossbow triggers are actually quite heavy, needing deliberate effort from the full hand to squeeze). You can’t keep a crossbow in a coat and take a hostage with it, and a Mexican standoff is a dubious proposition. I’d imagine a significant chunk of a firearm in Eberron is the ability to keep it ready in a coat or on a home wall for personal defense, or keep it concealed for roguish things.

    “improvement of traditional weapons, such as the Starilaskur Arms SAC-12 crossbow”

    Leonardo’s Crossbow from the Codex Atlanticus, with its integrated lever, always struck me as something that would be right at home in Eberron. It’s something that is visually fantastical and is only viable with a Cannith style mass production, but actually works (there’s a decent number of fully functioning modern production examples out there) and the manual of arms resemblance to a lever action or falling block system has an oddly early modern aesthetic without being cheesy/trying too hard to not be a firearm (see Thunder Junction for a failure on that front),

    • Have you read the section on crossbows in Chronicles of Eberron? The issue is whether you are considering the crossbow of fifth edition to resemble any sort of crossbow that’s ever existed in our world, or whether you instead look at how it performs in the game and consider a design that could justify that performance. Under the rules of fifth edition, an untrained user with 8 strength wielding a light crossbow can move thirty feet, load and fire all within the span of six seconds; and that crossbow has a potential range of 1600 feet. What I call out in Chronicles of Eberron is the idea that is due both to superior design but also because Eberron isn’t limited by our laws of physics. The spell Catapult adds velocity to a physical object; that is a principle of magic that exists in the world. From Chronicles:

      Consider the line of crossbows produced by House Cannith. Cannith’s crossbow barrel interior and quarrels are both engraved with arcane sigils. When the quarrel moves against the barrel, the symbols create an arcane interaction—a formula that adds kinetic energy to the bolt. With this in mind, the only force the bow itself has to provide is the initial push of the bolt down the barrel, a spark that triggers the arcane interaction. It’s much easier to reload a Cannith crossbow than a medieval one because Cannith’s bow itself is actually weaker; the weapon’s power needn’t depend on the tension of the bow.

      That’s a key concept, but there’s a lot more to the chapter, including the idea that a Cannith crossbow actually looks more like what we think of as a rifle, having a longer barrel for the arcane interaction and only needing a small bow because it’s not the primary source of force; Heroforge has a version of such a crossbow as an option for minis.

      My point is that I am not concerned with what is or isn’t possible in our world, because Eberron isn’t our world. I’m looking purely at the concrete mechanics of these weapons as they exist in the rules of fifth edition; nothing in the rules says that I can’t keep a hand crossbow loaded while it’s hidden under my jacket. I agree with you that this doesn’t make sense with a medieval crossbow, but my answer to that is that these aren’t medieval crossbows. And again, if we go purely by the mechanics of the game, a pistol or musket requires martial weapon proficiency while a light crossbow does not; so the light crossbow remains the logical home defense choice for the farmer with no formal training.

      Again, I’m not arguing with you about what’s realistic in our world. I’m saying that if the mechanics appear to be unrealistic — again, move 30 feet load and fire a crossbow at a target 2000 feet away within the span of 6 seconds — that this could be because the “crossbow” used in Eberron isn’t something that could exist in our world.

  11. I had a dream last night where Taskaan shifters were carrying WWI-era firearms and it definitively added to their aura of menace, so here’s another take on firearms for Eberron: Riedra arms its troops with mundane firearms rather than sentira lenses, designed to evoke terror with their sheer mechanical killing power.

Comments are closed.