Six Questions: James Ernest

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I know a lot of interesting people. Some I’ve worked with, some I’ve met while traveling the world, some just owe me money. My name may be on the website, but it seems kind of boring if I’m the only person whose voice is heard here. So I’m bringing some of my friends to the site, as time permits. I’m not a podcasty kind of guy, so I’m just keeping things simple: one guest, six questions.

Today I’m talking to JAMES ERNEST. James is best known as the brain behind Cheapass Games, and has brought all kinds of fun to the world in the form of dozens of games, including Kill Doctor Lucky, Lord of the Fries, and the recently re-released Unexploded Cow. He’s a juggler, an author, a short film director, and he likes to beat people up. 

You wake up and find that a major Hollywood studio has made a movie out of your life— CHEAPASS: The James Ernest Story. What’s the gist of it, and who plays you?

A brave game designer survives against all odds to make a living sitting in his basement answering emails and buying photography equipment. Starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet, both as me.

Speaking of movies, you’ve just started a Kickstarter campaign about making them. Tell me about Deadwood. Any hints about possible stretch goals?

Deadwood is a board game about making movies. Everyone plays a terrible actor on a Western movie backlot, and the goal is to get rich and famous enough to increase your status and get hired for better roles. Which will make you even richer and famouser.

My hope is to raise more money than I could possibly need and use the rest for (a) the betterment of all Mankind (b) to print some other Cheapass Games, and (c) for a weekend in Las Vegas that I am already looking forward to regretting. So far our only stretch goal is to make the game itself better by adding more scene cards (for more variety). But I can be creative if I have to.

This isn’t your first Kickstarter. What lessons have you learned from Unexploded Cow and the other projects you’ve been involved in?

What I’m trying this time is to “keep it simple.” The pledge awards are pretty straightforward, each contains all the goodies from the previous level, and there’s a reasonable upper limit on the higher level awards. I wouldn’t say that I’ve “learned” anything yet, but that’s what I’m trying this time around.

When it comes to game design, do you have a basic philosophy? What defines a James Ernest game?

I like to be entertained by games, and I’m not entertained by solving math problems better than my friends. So I like games where I can do a little roleplaying, tell a little story, be a little silly while I’m playing. Dry “Euro” games leave me cold, but overcomplicated “Ameritrash” games also don’t do it for me. I guess I like a game with a strong theme and simple rules. But doesn’t everyone? 🙂

You’re going to be trapped for eternity in a bar with a duck, a hammer, and three games. What three games do you take with you? Assume that the duck is actually a pretty good gamer.

Well, despite what I said about light games with good themes, if I only have three games to play forever, they are Poker, Button Men, and The Very Clever Pipe Game. Although I hear the duck loves Gloom… 🙂 Actually, if I get only one game, it would be Lou Zocchi’s amazing “Game-Sided Die,” which is a single gigantic die with one face for every tabletop game in the world.

What’s next after Deadwood?

Actually, I have no idea. We just released Unexploded Cow, and we are printing three games together before Deadwood actually ships: Veritas, Fish Cook, and Captain Treasure Boots. After Deadwood, I think I will spend the Fall promoting the games I have, and designing / testing the 2014 lineup.

There’s a good chance that Captain Park’s Imaginary Polar Expedition will get a deluxe upgrade, though I don’t know if it will be a true “Deluxe” requiring a Kickstarter, or just a game in the new Cheapass box. I’m also trying to get a remake of Girl Genius: The Works on the schedule, but that means a big art commitment from Studio Foglio.  And there are some other older games that I know I want to redo: Witch Trial, US Patent #1, and the Spy Game to name a few.

Did you notice we were on io9 this week? They listed US Patent #1 as the #10 top Science Fiction Board Game of all time. So we put up a free PDF of the thing, since it’s long out of print.

Gloomy News 2/28: TableTop Game Day and BGG!

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While I’ve done a lot of posts about Eberron, I’ve made another game you might be familiar with… a thing called Gloom. Over the next few weeks I’m going to write a little about Gloom, so if you have any questions on Gloomy subjects, now is the time (and this is the place) to ask!

First, the big news: March 30th is International TableTop Day. Geek & Sundry is encouraging gamers around the world to get out and play some games. To help with the festivities, Atlas Games and I put together a nine-card expansion… TableTop Gloom! Now you can share Anne’s agony when she Bumped The Board! TableTop Gloom includes two Stories and two Guests. Stories are one of my favorite elements of Cthulhu Gloom, and I’m glad to have a few to use with standard Gloom. So while you heap misfortune on your family, you’ll also have the chance to see who can claim the TableTop Trophy of Awesome and who will end up on The Loser’s Couch! TableTop Gloom won’t be for sale; it’s a promotional item that will be sent with other support to stores hosting TableTop Day events. So if you want a copy, find a place where you can play some games!

In other news, when I passed through Chicago a few weeks ago, I played a little Gloom at an excellent game store called Cat and Mouse Games. While I was there, I had an opportunity to talk to Beth Heile of Board Game Geek, and the interview has just been posted at BGG!

 

Dragonmarks 2/26: Teleportation, Warforged, Paladins and More!

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It’s a very busy time for me right now. I just got back from Portland Comic Con, Gamestorm is coming up, and I’ve got a lot of irons in the fire. I’m itching to start talking about Codex, and in the future Codex discussions will be interspersed with Dragonmarks. However, I’ve still got a few things I want to finish up first, so for this week, it’s more Eberron questions. As always, all answers are my personal opinion and may contradict canon sources!

This week we have a few different topics: warforged, paladins of Aerenal, Overlords of the Age of Demons, teleportation, and more. First up: WARFORGED AND HOUSE CANNITH.

How do you see Warforged evolving and where do you see their race going in the future?

First off, I’ll point out that warforged are capable of physically evolving. The Reforged and Warforged Juggernaut prestige classes both involve a physical transformation; the warforged juggernaut actually grows heavier armor and spikes. Warforged are fundamentally magical entities, and they are living constructs; there’s more to this than just being sentient. So I think it’s quite possible that if you jumped forward a hundred years, you’d find a vast range of unique warforged who have adapted to different environments and circumstances.

With that said, the greatest obstacle in their evolution as a race and their future is their inability to procreate. The Lord of Blades is trying to address this by seizing control of a creation forge and finding a way to make it work. In The Dreaming Dark novels, Lei’s parents explore a different solution to the issue of warforged procreation. Following the previous path, perhaps some warforged could evolve the ability to procreate. However, if any of these come to pass, how will the rest of the world react? The threat of the warforged is limited because of their numbers. If the Lord of Blades is found to be producing new warforged, will nations or houses band together to stop him?

If Cannith permanently split into West/East/South, can you see them becoming “Corporations”, or what would happen?

If they permanently split, I think they would logically seek to become separate houses individually recognized by the Twelve; after all, Thuranni and Phiarlan have paved the way for this. The only question I see is if one of them would instead choose to ally directly with a nation as opposed to becoming a smaller house… if Jorlanna would ally with Aundair, for example. There’s also the question if any would keep the Cannith name. In the case of Phiarlan, the larger house kept the original name, and I suspect the same would hold true here.

Next up: TELEPORTATION AND HOUSE ORIEN.

House Orien controls teleportation in Khorvaire, but it is unclear what you are actually paying for. The Campaign setting says that teleportation is 10 gp per mile.  But they left the service description out of the book.  From reading the rest of the Eberron Campaign Setting (ECS) and having a little knowledge about some of the novels I believe the mode of transportation is a teleportation circle.  Is that true?

It depends what you’re playing, and exposes the challenge of multisystem design.

Eberron was designed for the third edition of Dungeons & Dragons. The premise was that magic of up to third level was fairly well integrated into society. Higher-level magic – such as teleportation – was not. It’s possible to pay Orien for teleportation, but what you are paying for is to have an heir with the Siberys Mark of Passage transport you using the once-per-day power of his mark. Looking to random locations where I know this is discussed, it’s called out on page 11 of Secrets of Xen’drik—which includes the percentage chance of finding such an heir on any given day in Khorvaire’s largest cities—and page 67 of City of Stormreach, which suggests that a teleporter comes to Stormreach about once every three days. So it’s a service that exists, but it’s not reliable; per SoX you could be waiting in Korth ten days before a teleporter shows up. With this in mind, I’ll note that the idea of charging “by the mile” makes no sense at all. It doesn’t make that much difference to the teleporter whether you’re going five miles or a thousand, and you’re using his daily charge either way; so the idea that you could pay ten gp to teleport ten miles is just silly. Any sort of teleportation is going to cost thousands. It’s a service that only the very wealthy can afford, and even they can’t always get it.

By contrast, Secrets of Sarlona reveals that Riedra is a nation that does have institutionalized teleportation circles and goes into detail about them. This was always intended to be a concrete difference between Riedra and Khorvaire, a reflection of the supernatural power of the Inspired and a contributing factor to the unity of their culture.

Then Fourth Edition comes along.

In 4E, Linked Portal is a level 8 ritual that allows the user to access a network of circles, described in the ritual as being at “most major temples, important wizards’ guilds, and large cities.” We address this on page 45 of the 4E Eberron Campaign Guide, stating that House Orien maintains Khorvaire’s network of linked portals and heirs perform the ritual for travelers. I show this system at work in The Fading Dream.

With that said, I don’t particularly LIKE this system. It’s too institutional and advanced for 998 YK Khorvaire as presented in Eberron, and makes airships and lightning rail travel largely obsolete. As such, unless I’m running a 4E campaign, I would ignore it completely and keep teleportation as a rare and expensive service.

If it is a circle does it function just like the teleportation circle spell or did you have a few tweaks you were planning on? If they use circles, where are they? Which leads me to another question – how frequent would the guild houses be; every outpost or town? If that is true, how are they operated?  The way I understand the teleportation circle spell is that it can teleport you anywhere.  From reading the ECS I get the impression that the House of Orien uses a connected network of circles to jump from point to point.   Which is more correct?

By default 3.5 rules, there is no circle service at all: you hitch a ride with an individual teleporter with a Siberys mark. By 4E rules, it’s not using teleportation circle, it’s using linked portal. As such it only provides direct transportation between portals. The ECG says “House Orien maintains an extensive network of permanent teleportation circles in cities throughout the Five Nations. Outside the Five Nations, circles are less widespread, limited to the larger cities and national capitals.”

Again, while it’s there to accommodate 4E rules, this system doesn’t fit my personal vision of Eberron in 998 YK. It makes travel to remote locations too quick and casual; I’d rather that a trip to Stormreach be significant as opposed to a quick stop down at the Orien enclave.

Who operates the circle? Is it a high level mage or is any house member capable of operating them? The last teleport question, how does the house member know where the traveler wants to go?  If I understand the spell correctly the caster can travel anywhere as long as they are familiar with the location.

If we’re talking circles, then we’re talking 4E’s linked portals. Which means you tell the house member the destination city and they take you to the portal. It’s not as flexible as a 3.5 teleportation circle spell.

Next topic: PALADINS AND THE DEATHLESS.

One of the tasks that was trusted to me by the GM was creating a Paladin from Aerenal.   We felt that some of the standard Paladin abilities just didn’t fit.  So I changed a couple of things. We dropped turn undead.  We felt the undying and undead were too closely related for the purpose of what the ability did.  So we turned to Pathfinder and borrowed the Channel Positive Energy ability.  It allows the Paladin to heal injuries or deal damage to negative energy undead.   We both thought that fit the flavor of Aerenal much better.

While you didn’t ask this as a question, allow me to address it. if this is something you’re doing for ALL paladins in order to give paladins a more distinct role from clerics—which I’d argue is the goal of the Pathfinder shift—bravo. However, if you’re saying that you’d specifically change the ability for paladins of the Undying Court because they work closely with the Deathless, I have to disagree. The Deathguard—which most of the paladins of the Undying Court are part of—is specifically charged with seeking out and destroying negative energy undead, and Turn Undead is obviously a potent tool in that war. As for the deathless, it allows them to “rebuke” deathless. But what does this actually MEAN? When you rebuke undead, they are either awed (and leave you alone) or controlled. That’s the mechanical effect, but what’s the in-game explanation? To me, it’s a matter of the deathless voluntarily recognizing and respecting the authority of the paladin. It is no different from a police officer flashing his badge and demanding that people either stand aside (awed), or commandeering civilian resources to deal with a crime (controlled). If you portray the deathless as fighting against it and being forced to comply against its will, it seems highly inappropriate… so don’t. Portray the deathless as choosing to alter its behavior of its own free will because of the paladin/cleric’s display of divine authority. The Paladin is the agent of the entire Undying Court; if the paladin is high enough level, that gives them enough clout to ask a favor of an individual deathless.

With that said, if the power is abused for trivial purposes, it is just like a cop commandeering your car and then using it to buy donuts. He could DO it, but if you report it to his superiors, he’ll get in trouble for doing it. A paladin who abuses his authority—rebuking without good reason—should suffer the same sort of disciplinary action from the mortal authorities of the Court.

And bear in mind, any positively aligned cleric/paladin can rebuke deathless. A paladin of the Silver Flame or Path of Light can do it. If you follow my interpretation, this is because the Deathless recognizes them as agents of a benevolent divine force and chooses to work with them; it’s interagency cooperation in the name of greater good. If you take a forced-into-slavery approach and take the power away from Aereni paladins, you have the strange situation of Kalashtar paladins being able to command deathless when the Deathguard can’t.

Where I am struggling though is the spells.   With the background of all the arcana in Aerenal should the Aerenal paladin have access to arcane magic instead of divine?  

A lot of people focus on Aerenal’s arcane achievements. In 4E people sometimes ask if Aereni elves should have a bonus to Intelligence instead of Wisdom. But bear in mind that while Aerenal is relatively advanced in matters of arcane magic, its greatest achievement by far is divine. Aerenal has created a god. The Undying Court is the only active, sentient force in the setting that wields full divine power. It’s equivalent to the Silver Flame, but you can actually go and talk to the beings that are a part of it. And an Aereni paladin is a direct agent of than conscious, active divine force. Frankly, no one has a better justification for wielding divine magic than an Aereni paladin, called by the Court to act as its hand in the world. If you want to reflect the tradition of the arcane, multiclass as wizard. You could even use something like the Silver Pyromancer PrC from the Silver Flame. But I see no reason to take away an Aereni paladin’s divine spellcasting ability; if anything, I’d expand it.

Turning from the divine to the demonic, it’s time for OVERLORDS AND THE UNDEAD.

Is there a list of all the rajah already published somewhere? With the rajah’s theme, location and where to find the full writeup?

I’ve never done it. However, Lord Gore at the WotC forums put together this list, which may be the most comprehensive around.

  1. Bel Shalor the Shadow in the Flame (Tamor Hills, Khorvaire) ECG page 29
  2. Dral Khatuur the Heart of Winter (Frostfell) female overlord Druid 25/Sorcerer 15/Frost MageFb 10 Death, ColdFb, WinterFb unpublished
  3. Eldrantulku the Oathbreaker (unknown) NE male overlord rogue 15/sorcerer 15/mindbenderCAr 10 CorruptionBoVD, Trickery Dr 337 pages 63, 69-70
  4. Katashka the Gatekeeper (Lair of the Keeper, Khorvaire) LE male overlord cleric 8/wizard 8/true necromancerLM 14 Deathbound, UndeathECS DoE page 36, Dr 337 page 70, ECG page 30
  5. Rak Tulkhesh the Rage of War (Khorvaire) NE male overlord fighter 15/blackguard 10/cleric 15 Destruction, War Dr 337 pages 65, 70; ECG page 31
  6. Ran Iishiv the Unmaker (Korrandar, Sarlona) SoS page 12
  7. Sakinnirot the Scar that Abides (Stormreach, Xen’drik) CoS page 156
  8. Shudra the Fleshrender (Mel-Aqat, Xen’drik) PGtE page 155, TFoW page 127
  9. Sul Khatesh the Keeper of Secrets (Arcanix, Khorvaire) LE female overlord wizard 36/archmage 4 Knowledge, Magic CoS 89, Dr 337 pages 60, 68; ECG page 31
  10. Tiamat the Daughter of Khyber (Pit of Five Sorrows, Argonnessen) DoE page 9
  11. Tul Oreshka the Truth in the Darkness (unknown) CE female overlord bard 20/wizard 10/loremaster 10 Madness, ShadowECS Dr 337 pages 64, 70
  12. Unnamed (Krertok Peninsula, Sarlona) SoS page 12
  13. Unnamed (Sustrai Mor, Sarlona) SoS page 91
  14. Unnamed (Tempest’s Isle, Lhazaar Principalities) PGtE page 99 possibly a rajah
  15. Yad-Raghesh (The Vale of the Fallen Rajah, Argonnessen) colossal two-headed overlord DoE page 50 “dead”

I believe that Sul Khatesh is the only one that’s received a complete 3.5 writeup, in Dragon 337. I’ll also note that I prefer the term Overlord. “Rajah” tends to get subsumed into “rakshasa rajah”—and while the Overlords rule the rakshasa, they are not themselves rakshasa.

Is there any connection between Katashka the Gatekeeper and other prominent undead-themed entities (eg Vol and her followers).

Not according to canon. However, you could always decide that Katashka is connected to all negatively empowered undead, whether they know it or not… and that Vol, Kaius, and other influential undead are all secretly pawns in the Overlord’s plans. This certainly seems like a fine approach for starting with the Emerald Claw as a heroic tier threat, moving to Vol herself in paragon, and then bringing Katashka in as the true epic threat. For those wanting to know a little more about Katashka, check out Dragon 337 or this Eberron Expanded article.

I just read the original ECS and it gave the impression that the Blood of Vol worship/idolize undead, when I recall that this has been clarified as not true in later books; what is going on with the Blood of Vol?

I’m not sure exactly what the question is here. You are absolutely correct that I consider the depiction of the Blood of Vol in the original ECS to be flawed. They don’t idolize undead; however, many or their martyrs and champions ARE undead, which can cause others to think this. Later books give a more rounded view of the Seekers. Here’s a quick description I wrote a little while ago…

The Blood of Vol is based on the question “What just god would allow suffering and death?” – with the conclusion “None, so the gods must be our enemies.” It’s tied to the fact that the people of Eberron KNOW what the afterlife is like, and it’s not pretty. The Elven religions seek to avoid going to Dolurrh; the Silver Flame believes its people join with the Flame; and the Vassals say “Well, we go to Dolurrh, but you just don’t understand what it really is.” The Seekers say “You’re kidding yourself. Dolurrh is extinction. But we have the divine spark within us. We can become gods – and even if we can’t, we will spit in the face of death.”

What I really need to do is to get all these Q&As organized into a master list by subject. Until then, take a look at this Q&A – there’s a lot about the BoV there.

And finally, a little RANDOM STUFF.

I’m sorry if this has been asked before, but you said the scale of Khorvaire was incorrect. How so?

I feel that the Five Nations should be on the scale of France and England; by the original maps, they’re on the same scale as Russia and China. It’s a question of travel time between nations, the logical impact an army traveling on foot can have, and similar things.

Apart from some druids, are there people that consider magic as dangerous or evil? What if its use did caused the mourning?

If it caused the Mourning, then you might want to listen to the Ashbound and Children of Winter or there might be another Mourning soon. I don’t believe we’ve specifically described any antimagic groups in canon, but I’m sure there are some out there.

 

Six Questions Archive

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Back in October, I began picking a person each week to answer six questions. Here’s a roundup of the people who’ve taken part so far…

 

Portland Comic Con

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I’m going to be hanging out at Wizard World’s Portland Comic Con this weekend. I have a number of scheduled sessions, and I also have a table in the main hall. My talks are as follows:

EBERRON AND BEYOND

Saturday @ 2 PM, Room B119

It’s Eberron Q&A: The Live Edition. Anything you want to know about? Come ask. I’ll also be discussing Project Codex and other things that I’m working on.

DEVELOPING FANTASY WORLDS

Saturday @ 5 PM, Room B119

It’s what I do. Let’s talk about it.

BASICS OF GAME DESIGN

Sunday @ 2:30 PM, Room B119

I think I’m going to be joined by James Ernest, evil genius and founder of Cheapass Games. Between us we’ve made card games, board games, RPGs, MMORPGs, LARPs, pennywhistles… well, OK, no pennywhistles. Still, we’ve worked on a vast assortment of games, and this is a chance to talk about some of the underlying principles.

… AND THEN THERE’S THAT TABLE.

This isn’t a talk; I’ve just got a table assigned to me in the hall. I figured that I’ll hang out there most of the day on Saturday when I’m not giving a talk. I’ll probably be there Friday from 3 to 6, and Sunday morning. What will I do there? That depends on you. Talk about games? Play Gloom or Cthulhu Fluxx? I could do any of these things. If you think you’ll be there, let me know in the comments so I know if it’s worth hanging out!

AND THERE’S CONCERTS!

If you’re in Portland for cons and general geekery, I recommend going to the concert at Backspace at 8 PM on Friday night. Portland superstars The Doubleclicks will be joined by Kirby Krackle and Klopfenpop. It’s a nerdstravaganza!

Dragonmarks 2/20: Demons and Deathless!

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I’d planned on talking about Codex this week, but for a number of reasons I’m holding back on that for another week. However, if you’re going to be at Wizard World Portland Comic Con this weekend, I’ll be discussing it at my Eberron & Beyond talk, Saturday at 2 PM.

Today I’m just going to pull some questions out of the Eberron mailbag. As always, these are just my opinions, and some contradict canon material. So there!

Are the demons of the planes connected to the fiends of Khyber? Is a balor from Fernia Khyber-spawned?

Yes and no. The progenitor wyrms created all of the planes, and some show the influence of one progenitor over the others. So a balor from Fernia is Khyber-spawned in the sense that it was created by the progenitor wyrm Khyber… but it has no innate connection to the physical Khyber found in the material plane.

Tied to this is the fact that fiends embody specific concepts. Fernia is fire. Benevolent outsiders from Fernia embody the positive aspects of fire: its light drives away the darkness; its warmth keeps us alive; it purifies wounds and drives off dangerous predators; it gives the heat that fuels the forge. Fiends of Fernia embody the negative aspects of fire. Chaotic fiends embody the terrifying destructive force of it, the uncontrollable flames that consume homes and cities. Lawful fiends embody the terrible uses fire can be put to—fire as a weapon of war or torture, harnessed as an intentional engine of destruction.

A balor of Fernia and a balor of Khyber have the same game statistics. But they represent different things. They will have very different personalities and goals, and I would personally have them be physically distinct from one another. The balor of Fernia is an embodiment of wild fire, and should be flame incarnate. The fiends of Khyber are more generally spirits of terror and pure malevolent evil; a Khyberian balor will wield fire, but it will be less fiery in its appearance, and interested in a broader range of goals; it will also owe fealty to one of the overlords of the Age of Demons, which will further determine its theme and behavior.

I have a follow up. Say that the aforementioned Balor of Fernia found its way to Eberron. Through a portal or summoning ritual or whatever. Would said Balor fall in line with one of the Overlords and its agents, or would the fiery Balor have its own agenda.

A Fernian balor embodies the terrifying chaotic destructive power of fire. As such, it might be tricked into serving the ends of an Overlord, but its prime interest will be laying waste to cities and otherwise spreading fire and fear. The key point here is that extraplanar spirits embody ideas, and that determines their goals and purpose. If there is an Overlord that offers them the opportunity to pursue their ends or help them in other ways (protection or vengeance from enemies, for example) they might ally. But there’s no innate all-Balors-must-serve-Overlord-Bob thing going on.

One of the most detailed sources on the Lords of Dust is the article Eternal Evil, written back when Dragon was a print magazine. This includes bios of six members of the Council of Ashtakala. One is a Fernian pit fiend who serves the Truth in the Darkness, and another is a Mabaran succubus allied with the Oathbreaker.

It has been confirmed that dinosaurs roam the Talenta Plains, but in one of the adventure books I believe, there was a mention of a Swordtooth (Tyrannosaurus) in Khorvaire. Are dinosaurs present in Qbarra? If so, how are they different from their cousins in Xendrik?

I don’t think that it has ever been stated in any canon source. But my opinion is that Q’barra is a cradle for reptilian life on Khorvaire. The lizardfolk domesticated dinosaurs long before the Talentans did, and it may well have been the expansionist dragonborn who brought domesticated dinosaurs to the Talenta Plains. If you haven’t read it, I’d advise you to check out my Explore Q’barra article, which discusses the reptilian cultures of Q’barra in more detail.

At the core, I don’t think there are any fundamental differences between dinosaurs of Xen’drik and Q’barra. However, Q’barra was once the domain of the demon overlord known as Masvirik, AKA the Cold Sun. Masvirik has the power to corrupt and influence reptilian creatures, as seen in the Poison Dusk humanoids and the corrupted dragon Rhashaak. As reptilian creatures, dinosaurs could certainly be touched by the Cold Sun. I would expect such tainted dinosaurs to have half-fiend traits. If you refer to the Explore Q’Barra articles I wrote for DDI, I could also see dinosaurs being used as dusk shard vessels. So you might have a swordtooth possessed by an ancient demon!

Given the history of elves and giant magic, would giants have also had a number of Deathless or did the elves do that alone?

There’s a few conflicting versions of this in canon material. This is MY opinion on the matter.

The elves didn’t learn how to create deathless from the giants. On the contrary, Aeren’s death was the primary spark that led to all three of the elves’ traditions. Aeren led the elves out of Xen’drik and died in the process. The elves had lost their savior, and also had time to reflect on how many of their greatest heroes had been lost in battle against the giants. While no one can know with certainty the final fate of the dead, what is know is that souls go to Dolurrh and appear to fade away – that the dead are truly lost. The elves swore that their next heroes would not be lost so easily… but the settlers of Aerenal came from many different cultures, and they split along cultural lines.

  • The warrior progenitors of the Tairnadal tradition chose to preserve the spirits of their heroes by becoming their avatars in the world; the dead heroes live on through their descendants.
  • The founders of the Undying Court sought to ensure that their greatest heroes simply never died. However, their techniques rely on positive energy: the devotion freely given by those who worship the Court, and by the massive manifest zones to Irian that exist on Aerenal.
  • The flaw with both of the preceding approaches is that they depend on living elves. If no elves embody a Tairnadal ancestor, it will be lost. If no one worshipped the Undying Court, its power would fade. The line of Vol was determined to give their heroes the power to survive at any cost; even if the last living elf dies, Erandis Vol will still exist. They drew on the techniques of the Qabalrin elves and developed the foundation of modern necromancy.

We’ve never described the giants as having a religious culture like that of the Undying Court, which serves as a source of positive energy. It could be done with the existence of a powerful manifest zone, but I don’t really see it. Deathless is the most passive form of undeath, and the giants of Xen’drik were anything but passive. What I’ve suggested elsewhere is that the titans cheated death by becoming Vestiges… so an entirely different path.

Is there religious intrigue in Eberron? Factions of the SF attempting to split or vying for power? Jealousy of the SH?

In a word? Yes.

To go into more detail, there’s intrigue within and between all of the faiths of Eberron, from the Silver Flame to the Path of Light. The Sovereign Host is broken into more sects than you can shake an Octogram at. The Silver Flame already has defined intrigue between the core faith, the Pure Flame, the Whispering Flame, the Stormreach separatists, factions loyal to different cardinals and more… and that’s not even bringing the Ghaash’kala, Shulassakar, or Cold Sun Federation into the equation. The Blood of Vol has intrigue between those who believe in the core principles of the faith, and groups loyal to Erandis or who only see the faith as a path to power. Within the Path of Light you have the passive traditionalists of the Adaran path and those who advocate aggressive action. And that’s just what we’ve seen so far; there’s certainly room to add more intrigue if you want it.

Do you consider Khorvaire’s economy to be industrial or post-industrial?

I’d say it’s an industrial society moving towards a post-industrial economy. You have the magewright as the driving force of the magical economy, but the future lies in the new ideas of the Twelve and the Arcane Congress. Of course, Khorvaire has an economy unlike our world in that there are a great deal of monopolies. The Dragonmarked Houses have proprietary control of many vital tools; it doesn’t matter how smart you are, you can’t make a warforged without a creation forge. Of course, it could be that brilliant innovators—such as PC artificers or wizards—could find some way to break one or more of those monopolies.

What are the things hanging from the belt of the Lord of Blades on the 4E Eberron Campaign Guide?

Only Wayne Reynolds knows for sure. However, if I had to come up with an answer, I’d say that they are the schema-keys of Cannith artificers he’s killed.

What would an Eberron-inspired arcane lighthouse look like for you?

It entirely depends on who’s making it. Generally speaking, it would simply be a very large everburning lantern – a beacon of cold flame with amplifying lenses. The Aereni elves would be more likely to tap ambient positive energy, creating something more graceful and without any “flame”. Thrane might do something similar tapping the power of the Silver Flame, in which case it would have religious trappings, while one built during the war in Karrnath by Blood of Vol engineers might be empowered by bound ghosts.

Six Questions: Anne Wheaton

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You may know Anne from her appearance on TableTop. But you SHOULD know Anne from her work with #VandalEyes, which she created along with Bonnie Burton. VandalEyes is a crusade to bring googly eyes to things that need googly eyes. It’s been an inspiration to Jenn and I; here’s one of Jenn’s creations.

But let me let Anne speak for herself…

What’s your story?

At 23 years old, I had already been married, divorced and was living on my own as a single parent with two little boys. I put myself through cosmetology school at night while working as a waitress during the day. It was the hardest time of my life but I wouldn’t trade it for anything. It made me a motivated, hard working, independent person. When I was 26, I met a 23 year old named Wil at a New Year’s Eve party a mutual friend of ours was having. We started dating, eventually got married and spent several years working our asses off to keep our family above water while my ex-husband tried his hardest to pull us all under. It is unfortunate that he spent the boys’ childhood doing that but Wil and I raised two fantastic young men out of that situation.

What was the inspiration for #VandalEyes?

As a kid, I would put googly eyes on crafts. I loved how it seemed to bring things to life. I hadn’t done anything with googly eyes in years and was re-introduced to them by Bonnie Burton when she stayed with us while filming an episode of Table Top in December 2011. I was instantly reminded how much I loved them when she put them on a few things around my house so I got my own supply. I came up with #VandalEyes on Twitter before attending a convention in Anaheim in January 2012 because I thought it was a funny way to tag vandalizing things with googly eyes. People always tell me they didn’t get what it meant for a long time until actually saying it out loud. Did I mention I like puns?

What are a few of your favorite #VandalEyes achievements?

The one that made me laugh so hard I had tears down my face was putting quarter sized googly eyes on Levar Burton at San Diego Comicon in 2012. He was so funny about putting these ridiculous eyes on but having a very serious face. On a different note, I am really proud of creating (with the help of my husband because I am the opposite of technology savvy) VandalEyes.net along with Bonnie Burton. We were posting so many pictures of our own that it seemed to inspire others to do the same. Pictures were constantly being sent to us on Twitter so we decided having a website where all of these pictures could be shared needed to happen. I love clicking on the archive link on the site and seeing page after page of all the pictures posted from all over the world all together. It is hilarious!

If you could vandaleyes anything in the world, what would it be?

The Statue of Liberty with appropriate sized eyes. Now THAT would be a tourist attraction for sure.

You star in an episode of Tabletop, playing Ticket to Ride with Wil, Colin Ferguson, and Amy Dallen. What’s your favorite game?

I love Scrabble. I don’t care about the score, I just love word games. I always play Scrabble when I get together with my girlfriends. It’s our time to visit with each other, have some good food and wine and play a game at our own pace. I’m not a very competitive person. It’s more about spending the time together doing something we all enjoy. I was playing Words with Friends but I had too many games going at once and the pressure to play my turn was too much so I stopped. I’d rather wait and play face to face. Bananagrams and Boggle are fun ones too.

As a Scrabble aficionado, is Words With Friends: The Boardgame a logical way to bring the online audience to the boardgaming world, or a money-grabbing abomination?

It does seem weird to me to make a board game version of Words With Friends but it kind of makes sense. When I first started playing Words With Friends it was really hard to get used to the board because I was so used to the Scrabble board. The generation of people introduced to Scrabble because of playing Words With Friends first must feel the same way about the Scrabble board. I suspect the board game was created to appeal to them which is fine. Scrabble really helped me learn words and learn how to spell when I was a kid. If anything, this is just helping a new generation do the same!

What are you looking forward to in 2013?

In December 2012, I retired from my 17 year career as a hairdresser. Tendinitis in my shoulder and both wrists made it painful and not enjoyable anymore. Plus, I was feeling like I wanted to do something else with my life. We do a lot of fundraising for charities so we decided to start our own charity foundation to fund various projects we have wanted to do for a few years. Within a week of retiring as a hairdresser, I was already working on our first project. It is so fun and so fulfilling to be doing this. We’re keeping each project a secret until it’s completed so this first project will be ready to reveal this upcoming August.

Since our kids are grown and out of the house, this also gives me the opportunity to travel with Wil more. We kind of did things in reverse of most couples. We started out raising kids so we feel like we’re in that honeymoon stage people have when they first get married.Still being relatively young and having the time to spend with our friends and family and have vacations just the two of us has been unbelievably awesome. I always tell people to make your marriage a priority while you’re raising kids because someday those kids will be out of the house. The relationship with your spouse lasts a lifetime so put in the effort!

Groundpug Day & Gloom in Chicago!

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Mister Portlandawney Pants saw his shadow today, which means something, but sadly no one has fully documented the mysteries of Groundpug Day. I’m taking a short trip, and I’ll be stopping at CAT & MOUSE GAMES in Chicago this Tuesday evening to hang out and play Gloom. If you’re in the Chicago are, stop by and say hi – and please pass the news along to any Chicagoans you know!

 

Six Questions: Russell Morrissey

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Groundpug Day is nearly upon us! Will Mister Pants see his shadow tomorrow?

While we wait for the answer, here’s six questions with Russell Morrissey of EN WORLD. In all my years of forum-wandering, I’ve always found EN World to be my favorite source for news, reviews, and discussion, and I’m proud to have an ENnie award on my desk. Over the last few years, much of my forum time has been devoted to the official WotC Eberron forums, but as I start talking more about Codex, I expect to be spending considerably more time on EN World. Recently the site was attacked, and Russell is running a Kickstarter campaign to build a new and better EN World. Now, here’s the man himself!

What’s the story of EN World, and how did you end up as the man behind the curtain?

So, before there was an EN World, there was a website called Eric Noah’s Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News, run by Eric Noah.  In the lead-up to the release of D&D 3E, Eric reported all the scoops and rumours, and compiled all the information known about the game – his site was very popular.  EN World started compiling d20 news not long before Eric decided to stop maintaining his website, and the two sites merged to become the site you see today.  Over the years it’s changed of course – it’s no longer just a d20 and D&D site; it’s a site for all tabletop gaming (though D&D and Pathfinder are still the most popular topics on the site).

In an internet filled with fantasy forums, what makes EN World stand out from the crowd?

EN World’s one of the older RPG communities out there.  There are some older ones, and some bigger ones, and lots of newer, flashier ones, but I feel that EN World’s combination of age and size works well.  It means that the site is a treasure trove of information —  much of its traffic comes from specific Google searches about very focused questions, which lead folks to a particular thread or topic.

Additionally, EN World is one of the best, most generous communities around.  In fact, I’m constantly surprised by just how amazing this community is, and I’m very grateful for that.  The recent Kickstarter is a testament to the community.

I’m also proud of the news page, which is a daily updated news digest that’s been going strong for 12 years now, and is still the busiest area of the site to this day by an order of magnitude.  It’s changed format over the years, but it’s been diligently reporting RPG news for as long as anybody else in the industry, and longer than most – with an additional focus not just on large announcements, but community news, blogs, fan creations, and the like.

EN World also tries to keep busy and *do* stuff.  Some more successfully than others, but the site stays active: we’re responsible for the ENnies, we make adventure paths, we have spin-off communities, we’re even making cartoons these days!  I’ve never been content to just sit there and watch it bumble along, and I always like to try new things. Some of those things don’t work so well, while others work out very well indeed, and that’s down to that wonderful community of active, vibrant people.  I feel it’s important that EN World be more than just some messageboard software and a news page – it should be doing things.

What’s the strangest story that has come out of EN World?

Yikes. There are stories of generosity – just look at the current Kickstarter; of opportunity, like the day Peter Adkison contacted me and said “Hey, would you like to hold the ENnies at Gen Con?”; many stories of insanity (you should see some of the rants the moderators get in their inboxes!); stories of disaster; stories of wonderful friends I’ve made across an ocean who have welcomed me into their homes; bizarre stories of people who write lengthy blog posts calling me mean names because they don’t like how I run a little D&D website; odd legal threats with no grounding in reality; hacking attempts on the website. You name it, it’s happened!  Where do I start?

There’s more to EN World than forums and news. EN Publishing has produced a range of products, from the War of the Burning Sky campaign to Space Fight! What product are you proudest of, and what are you looking forward in the future?

Is this where I get to blow my own trumpet?  I honestly think that our ZEITGEIST adventure path is astonishing; right at the very top-tier of fantasy adventure-writing.  Of course, I’m going to be biased, but it’s so good (I can say that because I’m not writing it personally!)  It’s also very brave, and is very much targeted at the experienced GM, a group that I always feel could use more complex, challenging, rewarding material.  It’s consistently gotten glowing reviews and critical acclaim, and that makes me very proud indeed.  When we originally produced the War of the Burning Sky adventure path, we determined to do something different to what existed already; what WotC or Paizo was doing already so well in their own right.  Emulating them would be pointless.  So we started a journey of sorts with WotBS, and went even further with ZEITGEIST in a different kind of experience for a dedicated group of gamers looking for something new.  It’s more of a niche market than the stuff the bigger companies are producing, but for those within that niche it’s so rewarding.

In 2012 EN World began hosting video content. Where do you want to go with this?
I don’t know what the future holds for the internet, or for websites like mine. It has changed *massively* in the last decade, and it will change massively in the next decade.  One part of that is ensuring that you’re not left behind.  I got onto the social networking thing too slowly, and a bit too late.  The video aspect is another example of that – I don’t know for sure that video will be more, less, or equally important to the web in five years’ time, but I want to be in a position to handle it whichever.  So we’re essentially “training” ourselves to do it; it’s new to us, requires a very different skill-set, and has technical challenges, but it’s also the sort of thing a “grown up” news entity should be able to handle easily.  We did a trial run at Dragonmeet (a small convention in London) in December, which went well.  We put together a cartoon last year which was our way of starting to learn an entirely new skillset, and we’ll be doing that again this year. I hope to bring video coverage of Gen Con to EN World this year.  Essentially, right now, it’s about getting ducks in a row for the future. One area I wish I had covered is audio podcasts; and that’s another challenge again!
Currently you’re involved in a Kickstarter to help support EN World after the site was brought down by an attack. What happened? What will you do with the funds if the campaign exceeds expectations?

In December, EN World was attacked (and then a bit later my other site, Circvs Maximvs, was attacked). The hackers brought down both sites, and I was forced to rebuild EN World — the existing code clearly was no longer secure.  The Kickstarter is accomplishing that — in fact, it’s already exceeded expectation by a degree which is astonishing to me. So first of all, I’m rebuilding, securing, optimizing, and hardware-upgrading the site – that’s the primary goal.  Then I’m adding cool functionality or additional ways to conveniently access the site’s resources (mobile apps, for example – I’ve already put an Android app into place, and an iOS one is awaiting Apple approval).    I’m offering swag in the form of PDFs, apps, even exclusive dice.  The long-term result is going to be a fast, powerful EN World positioned for the next ten years with awesome functionality and resources.

Dragonmarks 1/30: Dreams, Werewolves, and DM Etiquette

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The last post generated quite a few interesting questions, so I decided to push ahead with another round. As always, these are purely my opinions and may contradict canon material.

In general, how much is it worth correcting players who, during play, misremember aspects of a setting?

This depends on a number of different factors.

  • Is the element directly important to the current adventure? Will the flawed recollection interfere with players’ ability to enjoy the story?
  • How will your players respond to being corrected? Will it be a welcome clarification, or cause irritation?
  • Is the misremembered element something that is especially important to you or your interpretation of Eberron? Is it something fundamental (the Last War was fought between the Five Nations, not between Galifar and Riedra) or a point of trivia that actual people in Eberron might not know (according to Faiths of Eberron, House Medani helped end the lycanthropic purge by creating a focus item that identified lycanthropes).

As someone who travels the world running Eberron games, I often have players who aren’t familiar with the setting. Perhaps I’ve got a player in a one-shot who is treating his warforged like a robot. I know that there’s lots of differences between warforged and robots. But his interpretation isn’t going to interfere with the one-shot adventure, and my explaining the differences will frustrate him rather than improve his enjoyment of things. On the other hand, if I had that same player in a campaign that was going to last for a year and involve interactions with other warforged, House Cannith, and the Lord of Blades, I probably would explain the differences so he’d have the proper context for his interactions with these forces. And if someone said “This ‘Last War’ was fought against the goblins, right?” I’d explain it right away.

Codex sounds very interesting. When will we be able to know more about it? I’d like to know if you’ll create it entirely on your own or if supporters will somehow participate, as happened with the Midgard campaign setting.

I will be writing a longer post about it sometime within the next week; I have a few deadlines I need to deal with first. I’ll address the design process in that post.

Concerning colonization… wasn’t Stormreach originally a colonial post of Galifar?

No. This is discussed in more detail in City of Stormreach. It was established as an outpost by pirates and legitimized by a compact with Galifar, but it was never subject to Galifar’s laws or authority, and it wasn’t settled according to any sort of royal plan.

Secondly, is there room for unknown continents in Eberron?

There’s room for anything in Eberron if you want to come up with a story for it. But a mystery continent is a big add, because Eberron has been well-explored. From dragons to gnomes to elves, you’ve had a host of intelligent, sophisticated races exploring the world. How did this continent go undiscovered? Was it hidden by magic? Has it just risen from the ocean floor? Or have people known about it but never gone there, and if so, why has that changed?

By contrast, Codex is set during a period of exploration, and the potential to discover new lands is one opportunity for people to add their own flavor to the setting.

Are there concepts or facets of Eberron that seem intrinsically influenced or tied to certain editions, such as 3E where it was debuted and 4E where it got its (arguably) first big makeover? As a DM I feel pretty confident in my ability to fit rules, story and player expectations into a package everyone will have fun with, but I’m curious if the issue’s ever come up with the mighty Hellcow.

Not big ones, but sure, there’s a lot of little things. A few examples:

  • Eberron was originally designed for D&D 3E, but by the time it was released D&D was up to 3.5. The changes might seem fairly minor, but they can still have an impact. Notably, in 3E, any lycanthrope can spread the curse; if you’re bitten by a werewolf and turned, you can bite me and turn me. This was the impetus for the Lycanthropic Purge: lycanthropy is a dangerous contagious curse that could easily spread out of control if not contained. But 3.5 changed this so that only natural-born lycanthropes could spread the curse; a true werewolf could bite you and turn you, but you couldn’t pass it to me. This completely changes the exponential threat potential and makes the Purge seem like overkill. Hence we shifted the story to say that back in the time of the Purge, the curse was stronger and all ‘thropes were infectious; the Purge weakened it, so it’s no longer the threat it once was.
  • The first Thorn of Breland novel was written during the 3.5 era. In 3.5, dragons possess blindsight, and this plays a role in the story. Likewise, Thorn is very much a 3.5 Assassin; if she gets a little while to watch you, she can do a sudden death strike, and she knows a handful of spells (disguise self, spider climb, etc). In 4E, dragons DON’T possess blindsight, and at the time of the second novel, there were no rules for assassins. I ended up simply ignoring most of these things… though I did address the Eladrin in the third Thorn novel.

Races would probably be the biggest change; with 4E, we wanted a place for the new core PHB races – dragonborn and eladrin. I feel we did a reasonably good job of fitting these in without dramatically changing the world, and I like the role of the Eladrin. But it did take some thought.

In general, Eberron was designed with 3E D&D in mind – but it can certainly be adapted to any system.

All this time I thought it was the Silver Flame Church who started the anti-Lycanthrope purge, not the Flame itself/Tira!

If you haven’t read it, I’d take a look at this Dragonshard article about the Purge. A lot of people have the wrong idea about the Purge, and think that the Keeper got up one day and said “You know what I feel like doing? Hunting down lycanthropes who are minding their own business.” In fact, the Purge began as a war of defense and containment after there was an exponential surge in lycanthropy in what is now the Eldeen Reaches. Waves of lycanthropes were raiding Aundair, and at that time the curse was highly contagious. I like to describe it as “28 Days Later with werewolves instead of zombies.” The first days of the “Purge” were much like the marines versus the xenomorphs in Aliens: brutal and terrifying. One to one, very few templars were a match for a lycanthrope, and one bite is all it takes to turn an ally into an enemy. After years of bloody conflict the tide turned in favor of the Silver Flame, but it was no easy battle. The decades of persecution that followed were fueled by a hunger for revenge, especially on the part of the Aundairians who had lost homes, friends, and family to the lycanthrope plague. This is why the Aundairian Pure Flame are the most zealous and aggressive followers of the Silver Flame; their branch of the faith was born in war and vengeance.

And lastly, it says in Faiths of Eberron that the Lycanthropic Purge ended shortly after House Medani invented a dragonshard focus that could detect lycanthropes. Do you have any thoughts on how this item would function?

I didn’t work on Faiths of Eberron, so I don’t know what the author had in mind. As a dragonshard focus item, it would require an heir of the house to operate it. Other than that, I’d have it function as best fits your story. It could be a tracker a la Aliens, which notes general position and distance, but not complete details; this would allow you to maintain some mystery. “There’s definitely a werewolf in this room… but which of us is it?” If you want to kill that mystery, it could be a monocle that reveals the lycanthrope’s true shape, but thus only works with line of sight.

It says in the Eberron Campaign Setting that “when mortals dream, they psychically project their minds to Dal Quor.” What about immortals? Could a bound rakshasa rajah in suspended animation find a way to project his mind to Dal Quor?

The basic idea is that mortal spirits are influenced by all of the planes, and pulled between them. We slip into Dal Quor when we dream. We’re pulled to Dolurrh when we die. Beyond this, we are creatures of body and soul; it’s the spirit that visits Dal Quor when you dream, leaving your body behind.

Meanwhile, immortals are physical embodiments of ideas. This has two aspects. First, the immortal doesn’t dream the way mortals do. Its body isn’t mere flesh: it’s a physical representation of its spirit. The two don’t separate. If it wants to go to Dal Quor, it goes there in one piece. So it doesn’t “dream”, but it could planar travel. This ties to the second point. The mortals of Eberron are touched by all planes. War and peace, light and darkness, madness and dream; all of these things shape mortal minds. An immortal is a creature of one shade. It is PURE war, unadulterated madness or dream. It is a physical embodiment of the core ideas of its plane. A rakshasa or a Fernian balor has no innate connection to Dal Quor; dreams aren’t part of their core identity.

Having said that, could a Khyberian Overlord find a way to project itself into Dal Quor? Sure. If that’s the story you want to have happen, make an explanation. Perhaps Bel Shalor’s connection to the Silver Flame lets it ride mortal spirits into Dal Quor. Perhaps the followers of the Voice In The Darkness have created an eldritch machine that lets her push into the realm of dreams. If you want it to happen, decide what it takes. But it’s not normal, and it would be a significant event.

Furthermore, it also states that “the only way to reach Dal Quor from the Material Plane is through the psychic projection of dreaming.” Does this mean that only mortals on the material plane dream? What about mortals on other planes? What about mortals from the material plane traveling to other planes?

As noted above, creatures of Eberron are inherently shaped by all of the planes, and it its this connection to Dal Quor that lets us go there when we dream. Many of the planes don’t HAVE mortal inhabitants… or their mortal inhabitants are immigrants (or descendants of immigrants) from the material plane. I would say that most native mortals don’t go to Dal Quor when they sleep; in this I’ll point to the Eladrin, who don’t dream. Do traveling mortals dream? I’d say it depends on the plane. In Fernia, you might dream in Dal Quor; however, planes such as Baator (well, demiplanes) or Dolurrh might have a spiritual gravity that prevents you from escaping through dreams.

Do some noble lords have their own armies, as in feudal societies?

Yes and no. If you look to Karrnath, while the army has a national command structure, individual forces are raised and maintained by the noble families; the leaders of each family are known as warlords. So while the army typically serves the coordinated vision of the king, every soldier is personally loyal to a specific warlord, and any warlord could choose to remove his support from the king – something Kaius has to keep in mind. While this has been specifically called out in Karrnath, I imagine it’s the basic model for most of the nations: nobles are charged to raise and maintain elements of the national armies. Beyond this, there’s nothing stopping nobles from having their own private forces. The only restriction that’s ever been mentioned is the Korth Edicts, which prevent Dragonmarked Houses from having armies. If a noble of Galifar wants an army and can afford to maintain it, that’s their business.