IFAQ: Adepts and Divine Artifice

Art by Julio Azevedo

I’m on my way to MegaCon where I’ll be talking about games and playing on the main stage! It’s been a busy month: I’ve relaunched my Frontiers of Eberron campaign on my Patreon and I’m writing for Wayfinder. I’m working on the next Dragonmark article, which will deal with Khorvaire in the Age of Giants. But when time allows I like to answer interesting questions from my patrons… so lets look at one of those.

Could you expand on the description of the Crucible artificers in Exploring Eberron, or more generally on how the overlap between adept magic and artifice/magecraft works & what it looks like? I’m assuming the faiths have followed technological progress, but I’m having a hard time coming up with more than mass-produced religious icons, scripture, and holy water.

One of the central aspects of Eberron’s idea of Everyday Magic is the existence of a widespread force of spellworkers who don’t have the flexibility or scope of player character spellcasters. An oracle can cast divination and augury, but they can’t perform healing magic. A locksmith can cast knock and arcane lock, but they can’t conjure illusions or fling fireballs. For most people in the world, mastering a particular set of spells is a life’s work, and you can’t just spend an evening reading a spellbook or a morning in prayer and completely change your spell list.

In the original ECS, adepts and magewrights were called out as entirely different classes. As the concept evolved this line was blurred. Eberron Rising From The Last War generally uses “magewright” as a blanket term for any professional spellcaster. The Magewright Specialty table on page 318 of Rising includes Oracles, Mediators, and Healers—all roles traditionally associated with adepts and divine magic. But the point is that from a purely mechanical perspective, it doesn’t matter how the magewright casts the ritual, only that they can; the rest is cosmetic detail. I discuss this in this article, looking at the difference between a divine oracle and an arcane oracle. Both can cast divination, but for the adept this is about communing with a divine force, while for the arcane magewright it’s based on some form of science, such as cartomancy. The short form is that “magewright” as defined in Rising From The Last War simply means someone who can cast a limited set of ritual spells or cantrips and doesn’t care whether that person is a traditional magewright, adept, gleaner, or wandslinger.

I expanded on this in Exploring Eberron:

Arcane magic is a science; magewrights master its techniques. However, there are other forms of magic which can likewise be adapted to everyday functions. An adept derives their magic from their faith, a more limited form of what a cleric can do; likewise, a gleaner masters the simplest forms of druidic magic. Especially with the adept, this is usually more of a calling than a job; you don’t decide to become an oracle of Aureon, you find that you are gifted with visions. The rituals of an adept will invoke divine forces, while a gleaner will draw on the world around them and often use an herbalism kit as a spellcasting focus.

Having said that in Exploring Eberron, I’m going to quantify it here. VASSALS don’t choose to become adepts; they believe they are called or blessed by one of the Sovereigns. You can’t demand that Aureon give you the gift of prophecy; either he chooses you to be an oracle or he doesn’t. But that’s because Vassals interact with the Sovereigns as if they were people. As a Vassal, you ask Aureon for guidance. By contrast, the Silver Flame is an impersonal force. It’s not an anthropomorphic entity that decides to do things. The Silver Flame was created to bind the overlords. That’s its primary function and we’re all very lucky that it continues to perform that function. The fact that people of great faith can draw on its power to defend the innocent is a side benefit. The Silver Flame binds the overlords. To do that, it must be omnipresent within the world; and therefore, the power is all around, available for a person of faith to use.

The people of Thrane are raised with that concept. While Thranish belief in the Flame isn’t universal or oppressive, for the faithful it’s part of everyday life. You know that the Flame is all around you, that it holds the ancient evils at bay, and that those with sufficient devotion can wield its power to serve the greater good. It’s a tool, like the bow… and where some Thranes master the bow and become templars or serve in the village militia, others turn to the tool of prayer and focus on harnessing the power of the Flame. Hence, as said in Rising From The Last War, moreso than in the other nations, “Faith is part of daily life in Thrane and divine adepts provide important services.” Specifically, they provide services that are typically provided by arcane magewrights in other nations. Healer and oracle are common roles for adepts in any nation. But in Thrane, you can find launderers using the power of the Flame to cleanse dirty clothes. You can find locksmiths who channel the power of the Flame to cast arcane lock—providing protection for the innocent. You can even find entertainers who draw on the Flame to amplify their voices or create music. This looks different from a Vassal adept, because the adept of the Silver Flame doesn’t have to ask for the power; the power is THERE, and they just need to know how to use it. But the Flame adept still needs faith to channel the power, and needs to believe they are using their gift for the good of the community. So the Thrane launderer doesn’t say “Oh Flame, I beseech you, cleanse these filthy clothes!” But they may sing a hymn to Tira or to the Flame while doing the laundry, and for them, doing laundry is an expression of their faith—they feel the power of the Flame flowing through them, and know that they are helping this community. A secondary point to this is that Flame adepts take money for their services, because they need to be able to thrive to continue to provide those services to their community, but as a rule they aren’t driven by greed. They need to believe they are providing a valuable service and it’s only just for those who can afford it to pay a fair price for that service. But they believe that they are doing a service for those in need, not simply chasing gold; and Thrane adepts are thus more likely to perform charitable work for those who truly are in need than the typical Brelish magewright.

SO WHAT ABOUT THE CRUCIBLE?

With all that in mind, let’s look back at the original question. Exploring Eberron has this to say about the Crucible of Thrane: Developed during the Last War, this small order of adepts and artificers crafts items drawing on the power of the Silver Flame. So what do they actually MAKE? Is it all mass-produced scripture and holy water?

These days the difference between adepts and magewrights is cosmetic. The same principle applies to artificers. Just as you can play a bard who isn’t a musician, a barbarian who never gets angry, and a warlock without a patron, you can play an artificer who draws on the power of the Silver Flame. And they can create anything any other artificer could create. You can be an artillerist carving wands or an alchemist making potions. The key is that you are enchanting these items by infusing them with the power of the Flame. Where a Cannith artillerist might craft a wand of fireballs inlaid with Fernian brass and fine draconic sigils, your wand will be traced in silver and an invocation of the Flame—and it may inflict fire damage, the flames will be silver. Note in particular that the Crucible was developed during the Last War. So what does it make? WEAPONS. Siege staffs. Blast disks. Long rods. Mechanically these are the same as their Brelish counterparts, but the Thrane force staff flings bolts of blinding silver energy and one of the three actions required to activate the staff is invoking the Flame. Exploring Eberron says that using arcane artillery “requires specialized training, similar to that of an artificer or magewright; someone trained to operate arcane artillery is generally called a bombardier.” Operating a Thranish Flame-powered siege staff would require an entirely different set of training. There ARE elements of science involved; the staff is still a tool that must be maintained. But the energy involved is divine in nature and only responds to faith. If you wanted to take this a step farther, Exploring Eberron presents dragon’s breath as the primary ammunition used by arcane artillery. I would imagine that divine artillery would use a different substance, possible just called Flame by the bombardiers—a powder that is literally infused with faith, produced in factory-temples.

Having said all that, it is important to note that there are arcane magewrights and artificers in Thrane and divine adepts elsewhere. It’s possible that Breland has a unit where Brelish templars operate a Thrane-made Flame cannon, and Thrane may have used traditional blast disks. Not that the Crucible was formed DURING the Last War. It is a reflection of wartime innovation and the industrialization of the faith—and just as there are many devotees of the Flame who don’t approve of the theocracy of Thrane, there are likely many who don’t approve of this industrialization.

So the short form is that ANY magic item could be presented as being a product of the Crucible powered by the Flame. Just consider how that’s reflected in its appearance. Potions produced by a Crucible artificer may shimmer with a silver radiance or seem to burn. The command word for a Crucible wand is an invocation to the Flame. And crucially, consider how the creator of the item could belief that in its creation they are serving their community and protecting the innocent. The Crucible created weapons and tools to protect the people of Thrane. It brewed potions to heal them. But it couldn’t produce pure luxury items or trivial goods, because the typical Crucible artificer would stumble in creation, questioning how it was a worthy use of the Flame’s power.

VASSAL ADEPTS

So how do these principles apply beyond Thrane? Can you have a divine artificer bound to Boldrei, and what does that look like? Certainly, you can have Vassal artificers and adepts. The key is that they are less industrialized. Because faith in the Flame is such a universal constant in Thrane, and because the Flame is perceived as an omnipresent force, it can be approached like learning to use a tool. Faith in the Sovereigns is more casual and more personal; each Vassal develops their own relationship with the Sovereigns. So again, as noted above, you don’t train to be an oracle of Aureon; you realize that you are an oracle of Aureon. The same principle applies to the artificer of Boldrei. It’s not a job with a clear entry path. You likely start by training for a mundane job and then realizing that Boldrei is guiding you, that she is infusing your work with magic, and over time, you learn how to effectively use her gifts. Which also means three Artificers of Boldrei could be very different based on their relationship with the Sovereign. The first thing I imagine is an Alchemist artificer who uses Chef’s Tools to produce enchanted food; their cure wounds is a strong cup of Tal that perks you right up and their enhance ability is a muffin whose flavor depends on the ability involved, but which channels the energy of Boldrei’s Hearth. On the other hand, a Battle Smith of Boldrei would be driven more by Boldrei’s role as defender of the community; their Steel Defender doesn’t follow any Cannith principles, but is animated by the artificer’s faith. This is also a good time to point out that the Sovereigns don’t stand alone. We often call someone out as an “Oracle of Aureon” to say that out of the Host, they feel the strongest connection to Aureon. But when the Oracle of Aureon gets in a fight, they may still offer a prayer to Dol Dorn–and likewise, the Battle Smith “of Boldrei” can also feel a connection to the rest of the Host. They identify with Boldrei because they feel they’ve been called to defend their community, but they can still thank Onatar while they repair the armor that was damaged in a battle.

Nonetheless, the key point here is that Thrane is the only one of the Five Nations where divine artifice has become an industry. Vassal adepts and artificers are usually more unique, and that means the things they create will be as well. So Boldrei’s Alchemist may use cooking tools and give you a muffin to enhance your strength; while Boldrei’s Battle Smith could use smith’s tools and give you a medallion engraved with Boldrei’s sigil.

That’s all for now; hopefully this gives you some interesting ideas. As I’ll be at MegaCon for the next few days I won’t be answering questions, but feel free to share your ideas and experiences with divine artifice in the comments. And thanks as always to my Patreon supporters for making these articles possible and for asking interesting questions!

IFAQ: Dunamancy, Fey Changelings, and Quori Dreams

The fairy engineer Chorus, by Matthew Johnson

It’s been a busy month. In addition to all of my usual work, I’ve been putting together a Spelljammer in Eberron campaign I’ll be running for my Threshold Patrons; that’s taken up most of my D&D energy. But I do try to answer questions from my patrons when I have time, and here’s a few that have come up this month.

In your Eberron, how would you introduce and incorporate the Dunamancy school of magic from Explorer’s Guide to Wildemount ?

There’s two approaches I’d consider. The Wildemount sourcebook says “Dunamis is the primal magical energy of potentiality and actuality, an anticipatory arcane force that helps shape the multiverse and might very well be what holds its elements together, like an infinite web of unseen tethers… Those who study to control and tap into this near-invisible power can subtly bend the flow of time and space by controlling the forces of localized gravity, peering into possible timelines to shift fate in their favor…” One possibility this brings to mind is the Draconic Prophecy, which is a power that shapes reality and the path of the future. On the other hand, it doesn’t really map well to the actual effects of Dunamancy. I don’t see why the Prophecy would allow you to specifically manipulate gravity, and while the Prophecy can allow you to anticipate the path of the future, it’s not generally associated with alternate timelines or, for that matter, time travel; it’s the force that establishes the future, not a force you use to travel between possibilities.

So with that in mind, I’d actually say that the source of Dunamancy in my campaign would be Xoriat. As I discuss in Exploring Eberron, Xoriat exists beyond time and is the vantage point from which you could travel through time or visit alternate realities (the other rats in the Maze of Reality). I could easily see a Dunamancer as drawing a duplicate or other aspects from one of these alternate Eberrons… and when it comes to gravity, Xoriat is all about bending natural law; the idea that you use the power of Xoriat to make gravity perform in illogical ways is entirely reasonable. With all this in mind, I could see there being a strong bias against the use of Dunamancy, on the fear that it has the potential to destabilize reality—if you keep reaching across and drawing power or elements from alternate Eberrons, one day you might trigger a cascading effect that shifts that an alternate with the prime material. Keep bending gravity and you might just break it! I wouldn’t make it something where a player character would be persecuted for practicing dunamancy, but I could see it being either forbidden or at least highly restricted in Arcanix; to learn it, you’d have to find a rare mentor or sneak into the restricted stacks in the library.

So, I’d tie Dunamancy to Xoriat. But there’s another point, which is that dunamancy doesn’t have to be dunamancy. Let’s take the Echo Knight archetype for fighter. The default lore is that they are “using dunamis to summon the fading shades of unrealized timelines to aid them in battle.” But the practical effect is that they summon an echo to fight alongside them… and there’s lots of interesting ways to explain that depending on the nature of the character.

  • Thuranni Shadowdancer. An Echo Knight with the Dragonmark of Shadow could tie their echo to their mark, literally calling their own shadow into battle. To give it more depth, I’d probably tie this tradition to a particular family—let’s say Thuranni—and say that they use it both for art and assassination; there’s a specialized form of performance that essentially involves dancing with yourself. Any elf with the Mark of Shadows could learn these techniques; it’s just that it’s a Thuranni tradition, and Thuranni is where you’d find the masters of the art.
  • Quori Nightmare. Previous editions presented the idea of the Quori Nightmare, a kalashtar tradition that manifested an ectoplasmic shroud resembling the kalashtar’s quori spirit. You could easily represent the same idea with a Kalashtar Echo Knight; it’s just that instead of the echo resembling YOU, it’s a shadowy depiction of your quori spirit. If I went this path, I’d say that there are Inspired who use a similar technique, just to have a fun Echo Knight vs Echo Knight fight at some point in the campaign.
  • Revenant Blade. Tairnadal champions seek to channel their heroic ancestors; perhaps a truly gifted Tairnadal can draw an echo of their ancestor to fight alongside them. With the player’s permission, I’d assert that the echo can’t be forced to perform an action that goes against their nature; if the patron was known for their mercy, the echo won’t strike a helpless foe. If the player was willing to accept this limitation, I might balance it by saying that the echo sometimes displays skills the player character doesn’t actually have; it’s not their echo; it’s their inspiration.

These are just a few possibilities. Perhaps the Knights Phantom of Aundair can conjure phantom echoes as well as phantom steeds. Maybe there’s a tradition among the Blood of Vol that allows a champion to manifest their Divinity Within. I wouldn’t personally add all of these concepts into the same campaign, just because it would end up with too many Echo Knights—I’d pick one or two options, focusing on the best story for the player who wants to play an Echo Knight. So you can add Dunamancy to Eberron—but you don’t have to work Dunamancy into a campaign if all you actually want is to play an Echo Knight.

How would the lore of Changelings change, if at all, if I wanted to use the new races from “Monsters of the Multiverse” (mostly about being a fey)?

Rues change, and I’m fine with using the new changeling rules from Monsters of the Multiverse—but in my campaign, I’m not changing anything about changeling history or culture because of it. If this is the path you want to take, one option is to use the new rules and simply to ignore the change that makes them fey. On the other hand, FEY AREN’T ALL FROM THELANIS. In the lore as described, changelings are literally defined by a mythical story—the tale of Jes and her bargain with the Traveler—and it’s entirely plausible to say that as a species they began as NATIVE FEY. I’d say they are super-grounded compared to most fey—that the Fey type is largely a legacy of their origin—but I don’t have a problem with it. On the other hand, I also have no trouble with the idea that changelings’ fluid nature causes magic to interact with them differently that it does for most humanoids—IE, they REACT TO MAGIC the same way as fey creatures, but they aren’t actually true fey. Essentially, the question is if you want changelings to be immune to Charm Person but vulnerable to Magic Circle. If so, use the MotM rules as written, with the idea that they’re distantly native fey or that it’s tied to their chaotic nature; if not, ignore that particular change. I don’t have an issue with the fact that MotM allows them to impersonate small creatures; now they can have fun in Zilargo and on the Talenta Plains.

On the other hand, I’m happy to say that there are ALSO changelings who DO come from Thelanis. These could be mortals of other species who were taken to Thelanis as children and altered by this supernatural sojourn, or they could be members of the supporting cast of Thelanis—spirits who by their nature change form to fit the needs of a story—who have somehow been cast out of Thelanis to find a story of their own. Such changelings would be extremely rare in Eberron—basically, they’re all player characters—and they would have no ties to the native changelings; with this in mind I’d give each one an entirely different natural form, based on their backstory. They aren’t a SPECIES as the native changelings are, they’re exotic individuals.

Quori are described as spirits of nightmares, but hashalaqs are spirits of pleasure and kalaraqs are spirits of pride; aren’t those usually associated with pleasant dreams?

It’s an oversimplification to say that quori are “nightmare spirits.” Quori are evil dream architects. A hashalaq quori isn’t an embodiment of pleasure; it knows how to use and manipulate pleasure. It has no interest in actually giving you a pleasant dream, unless it serves a malefic purpose; in this it’s like a succubus or incubus, a fiend that uses pleasure as its tool. Exploring Eberron describes hashalaq quori as “seducers and deceivers, feeding on doubt and desire.” Likewise with the kalaraq: pride is the tool they use to manipulate mortals. So a hashalaq may very well give you a pleasant dream, if that dream steers you down the path the Dreaming Dark wants you to follow. The kalaraq specialize in pride and ambition, and kalaraq dreams urge dreamers to seize power, to start revolutions, to kill a brother and claim their crown… because gosh darn it, you deserve it. Hashalaq weave dreams to tempt you to fall in love with the wrong person, to choose pleasure over duty, or to doubt yourself. Quori-inspired dreams don’t have to be what WE would consider nightmares; they can create whatever dream best suits their purposes.

What we’ve said about quori is that they excel at evoking particular emotions and that on some level they feed on those emotions. But any quori can create any dream. Quori have the ability to cast the dream spell, and there’s no limits on what they do with this. Tsucora specialize in fear, and I’ve suggested that they may have even more specific talents. Exploring Eberron describes a tsucora who “wove dreams of gothic horror, playing on her victims’ fears of death and the undead.” That’s what she LOVES—but if she wanted to, she COULD create a dream of evil clowns, she just LIKES gothic horror. It’s the same way that an amazing Jazz musician CAN play a piece of classical music straight as written; it’s just not going to take full advantage of their skills and won’t be as remarkable a performance as when they are playing what they love. Quori can create whatever dreams are required by the task at hand; but they’ll always be more effective when they’re doing what they love. If I was actually using the Dream spell mechanics for a particular quori dream, I might give the victim disadvantage on the saving throw if the quori they’re dealing with specializes in the subject of their dream—such as when Lurashtai weaves a dream of gothic horror. While on the other hand, if the quori is making a dream that’s the opposite of what it loves to do—a du’ulora create a dream about miserable apathy—I might give the victim advantage on that saving throw. Of course, keep in mind that most quori dreams don’t involve saving throws; it’s only if they’re trying to trigger a dramatic effect (blocking rest and/or inflicting psychic damage) that saving throws come into play.

That’s all for now! Feel free to discuss these in the comments, but I don’t answer questions on IFAQs; if you want to ask me questions like these ones, check out my Patreon!

Siberspace: Dragonhawk Begins!

The Frog Prince of the Dragonhawk Initiative, by Matthew Johnson

In my last article, I described how I’d combine Eberron and Spelljammer… and realized that I want to run that campaign! As a result, I’m putting my current Patreon Eberron campaign on hold, and for the rest of the year I’ll be running a Siberspace space race campaign. We’re currently wrapping up session zero, but I wanted to quickly explain how the campaign works in case you’d like to get on board.

I’ve had a Patreon for some time; this support determines how much time I can put into the articles I post on this blog. A few years I decided to expand this and added the Threshold Tier, giving patrons a chance to take part in an ongoing Eberron campaign. The story is ongoing, and the characters are consistent… but the players change each session. In the week before the session I hold a poll to choose the game time, since I have patrons in different time zones. The rules of Patreon won’t let me choose players at random, so once a time is set, I pose a creative challenge. For example, in this first Siberspace session I might say “Tell me which character you want to play, and tell me what they hate to leave behind as they head into space.” Does the Captain have an ailing sibling? A new love? A dog with separation issues? I look at the answers and pick my five favorites, and those five people play in the session… and their stories become hooks I can use in the adventure. I don’t stream the sessions live, but I record them and patrons have access to audio and video recordings of all sessions.

While only a few people get to play in each session, the story belongs to everyone. I used Patreon polls to create the characters and to establish key directions for the story. I have a Threshold Discord channel where people can discuss the campaign—and I occasionally do choose-your-own-adventure style story hours on Discord, where patrons can vote on things that happen between sessions. That’s going to be especially important in this Siberspace campaign, where months may pass between each session—and negotiations or decisions made by the leaders of the Dragonhawk Initiative could have a vital impact on the next mission. I’ll also be creating new content for the campaign—interstellar hazards, random encounters, navigational challenges—that I’ll be sharing with patrons.

A moment from a recent Threshold story hour.

So every patron gets to be part of the story, whether or not they play in it. This is especially true right now, as we’re building the foundation of the campaign. Over the course of the week, I’ve been running polls on Patreon and discussions on Discord. The patrons have chosen the Dragonhawk Initiative—Aundair’s feytouched explorers—as the focus of the campaign, and we’ve been working through the characters. I’ve pitched a variety of interesting concepts, but even I have been surprised by some of the outcomes; I never expected Dragonhawk’s captain to be an Aundairian noble cursed into the shape of a grung, but the patrons have spoken and we have our frog prince. Currently the final character poll is active on Patreon, determining the nature of the ship’s medic and chief scout; it runs until the morning of Saturday, August 20th, so if you want to help shape the Dragonhawk crew, now’s the time!

The first Siberspace session will happen in the next two weeks, and I expect it to run through the end of the year. If you’d like to join the journey, check out the Threshold tier on Patreon! To the Moons, and beyond!

Dragonmarks: Spelljammer in Eberron

The warforged captain stared at the great orange orb ahead of them. “This is it, my friends. We are about to be the first people to set foot on Olarune. Thanks to your courage and your tireless efforts, we will bring honor to Breland—and Sovereigns willing, profit.”

“Captain, ship ahead!”

“Impossible. “ The captain adjusted his ocular lenses. “We’re a day ahead of the Karrns—”

“It’s not the Blade. It’s an unknown design, sir. And it’s ascending from the surface.”

The deck crew ran to the rails. The approaching ship was like nothing they’d ever seen; it looked like a great oak uprooted and cast into the air, with tapestries of rainbows spun between its branches. In its own way, it was beautiful. But as it drew closer, the crew of Intrepid heard the sounds coming from it—the howls of hungry wolves.

Spelljammer intertwines fantasy and magic with spacefaring adventure. This dynamic setting has come to fifth edition, giving players the opportunity to set a course for Wildspace and distant stars. What does this mean for Eberron? What’s the best way to take your campaign to the skies and beyond?

Eberron: Rising From The Last War states that “Eberron is part of the Great Wheel of the multiverse… At the same time, it is fundamentally apart from the rest of the Great Wheel, sealed off from the other planes even while it’s encircled by its own wheeling cosmology. Eberron’s unique station in the multiverse is an important aspect of the world… it is sheltered from the influences and machinations of gods and other powers elsewhere in the Great Wheel.” Now, Rising also says that if you WANT to integrate Eberron with other settings you can; as a DM, you can say that whatever protections have hidden Eberron from the worlds beyond are failing. So there’s nothing stopping you from making a campaign where there’s regular commerce or even war between Realmspace and Eberron’s wildspace system—let’s call it Siberspace. But personally, I’m more interesting in combining the two concepts in a very different way—in finding an approach that adds depth to the moons, the Ring, and the existing cosmology of Eberron rather than leaving it behind.

EBERRON IN ISOLATION: THE SPACE RACE

One of the core principles of Eberron is that arcane magic is a form of science and that it evolves—that invention and innovation should play a role in the setting. With this in mind, in bringing Spelljammer into Eberron I’d emphasize that this isn’t a retcon, it’s a new development. The Five Nations have never had spelljammers until now. The adventurers aren’t the latest recruits in a vast, well-established spelljamming fleet; they are among the very first humanoids to venture into wildspace to try reach the moons of Eberron.

With this in mind, an important question is why no one’s gone into space. The Ring of Siberys is beyond the atmosphere, but what’s stopping me from putting on a ring of sustenance and pointing my broom of flying straight up? In my campaign, there are three major obstacles. The first is that the Ring and the moons are beyond Eberron’s atmosphere, so you need to be able to survive in wildspace. The second is that breaking free from Eberron’s gravity is a challenge, requiring a surge of energy a simple item like a broom of flying can’t produce. The third is that the Ring of Siberys radiates arcane energy. As discussed below, this specifically interferes with divination and teleportation, but it can overload any arcane system… and this seems to especially impact magic of flight. It’s almost like the Progenitors didn’t want people to leave the planet. But why take the hint? These are problems that can be overcome, and now they have; the people of Eberron have developed spelljammers that can reach the Ring and beyond. Still, the key is that this is all happening now, in 998 YK. And different nations are using very different techniques to overcome these obstacles—each of which could have unexpected problems.

Who’s Going To Space?

In developing a Spelljammer campaign based on the space race, a key question is who’s in the race? My preference is to focus on the Five Nations. No one won the Last War, and fear of the Mourning prevents anyone from restarting it; there’s still tension, resentment, and intrigue. So in addition to the excitement of going where no one has gone before, I’d emphasize the tension between nations and the impact triumphs in space could have back home. Just as in our world, the space race could become a proxy for this conflict, driven by national pride and the determination not to let another nation secure a tactical advantage in space. The Treaty of Thronehold still holds, and it would take intense provocation to cause an Aundairian ship to open fire on a Brelish ship—but the nations are bitterly competitive and will do anything short of war to get an edge over their rivals. Finding awesome space treasure is great, but forming alliances and establishing outposts could be the most important elements of an adventure.

So with this in my mind, I’d focus on three primary forces. The Dragonmarked Houses are willing to work with every nation, but this is also a chance to explore the growing division within House Cannith, suggesting that each of the three barons are backing a different nation and that the rivalry between these three is almost as strong as the cold war between the nations.  

Aundair: The Dragonhawk Initiative

Aundair dares, and that motto certainly applies to its spelljamming program. Rather than pursuing the established path of elemental binding, this branch of the Arcane Congress is blending cutting edge arcane science with Thelanian wonder. The Brelish say that Aundair traded an old cow for a spelljamming engine, and while that’s a mocking exaggeration, it’s not entirely untrue; the ir’Dalan line has a long association with the archfey known as the Mother of Invention, and the Archmagister Asta ir’Dalan has brought wizards and warlocks together in a unique alliance. The current Aundairian ships are the fastest and most maneuverable of the three main powers, and unquestionably the most beautiful. A few key notes about the Dragonhawk Initiative…

  • Romantic Explorers. The Dragonhawk Initiative is a branch of the Arcane Congress; it’s a scientific program rather than a military operation. While there’s a chain of command, discipline is far less intense than on a Karrnathi vessel. Dragonhawks love the story of being explorers into the unknown and embrace the romance of the adventure more than their counterparts—as befits a ship built in alliance with the fey. Dragonhawks are determined to prove Aundairian superiority and to seize strategic objectives, but they also are the most likely to be distracted by intriguing mysteries and shiny objects, and to embrace exploration for its own sake. Dragonhawk crew have relative freedom when it comes to personal expression, and Karrns often sneer that Dragonhawks are dressed for a gala rather than for space. As scientific vessels, Dragonhawks have the lightest armaments of the three powers but the greatest investment in divination magic and other research tools.
  • Arcane and Fey. Dragonhawk ships rely on a blend of concrete science and on improbable fey magic. A side effect of this is that each ship is unique. The tree-like Wayfinder uses a sail that catches “ethereal winds”, while the flagship Dragonhawk has actual wings of wood and gold that animate as it flies. Each ship has a fey spirit who’s part of the ship itself, much like a dryad is tied to a tree; this spirit can’t manifest independently as a dryad does, but it monitors the condition of the ship and its mood affects the vessel’s performance. Dragonhawk ships have a number of lesser fey that work directly with the spirit and maintain its systems; these are effectively chwinga with the mending and prestidigitation cantrips. As such, a Dragonhawk vessel has a Magister—the chief wizard and researcher, who maintains the arcane wards and other scientific systems, and an Arbiter—a warlock who has a pact with the spirit of the ship itself. The Arbiter is effectively an engineer, encouraging the ship when needed to boost performance and commanding the chwinga. However, Arbiters are also expected to mediate disputes within the crew and to serve as diplomats when required.  The explorers expect to face unknown dangers, and who better to handle first contact with alien beings than someone trained to negotiate with the fey?
  • Wondrous but Unpredictable. Each Dragonhawk vessel is unique. Their current ships are the fastest in the skies, but it’s possible the next ship they produce will be a clockwork dragon turtle that is slow but extremely durable. An unavoidable side effect of this is that each vessel can have its own unexpected problems. It’s just possible that Dragonhawk’s wings will melt if it gets too close to the sun, or that Wayfinder will run into an unexpected ethereal storm. Another way to look at this is that Dragonhawk vessels are ultimately stories. If the story of an expedition is exciting enough on its own, the ship will be fine… but if a tale starts to lag, something will happen to add drama to the story.  

As research vessels, the crew of a Dragonhawk ship focuses more on arcane sophistication and on skill than brute force. Every ship will have at least one wizard and one warlock. An eldritch knight could be appointed as security chief, but a battlemaster or barbarian would be an unlikely addition to the crew. Baron Jorlanna d’Cannith isn’t as closely involved with the Dragonhawk Initiative as her rival barons are with their nations, but Cannith West is manufacturing elements of the Aundairian spelljammers and could become more actively involved in the future.

Breland: The King’s Argosy

The Argosy is a branch of the King’s Citadel, formed in close alliance with Zilargo, Cannith South under Merrix d’Cannith, and House Lyrandar. Where the Dragonhawk Initiative is scientific and the Blade of Siberys is a branch of the military, the King’s Argosy is ultimately a commercial enterprise; its mission is to seek profit in the heavens, to secure unique resources and opportunities that can benefit Breland and its sponsors. Argosy ships rely on the established principles of the elemental binding; they are essentially bulkier, overpowered elemental airships, including the need for a Lyrandar pilot. Compared to the Dragonhawks, Argosy ships are ugly; but they are sturdy, and thanks to Breland’s industrial capacity the Argosy has the largest fleet of the Five Nations. A few core principles of the King’s Argosy…

  • Pragmatic. The Brelish aren’t here to enjoy beautiful alien sunsets or to get lost in the wonder of exploration. This is a job, and potentially a very lucrative one; every Argosy crewmember has a small stake in any whatever profits come from their voyage. An Argosy captain is empowered to negotiate for the Brelish crown, but each Argosy ship has an Optech—an opportunity technician—from the Twelve, whose job is to identify opportunities and exploitable resources others might overlook.
  • Industrial and Elemental. Brelish ships aren’t beautiful; they’re bulkier, chunky airships. The fact that they’re using an existing form of science has given Breland a head start, and the Argosy currently has the largest fleet. However, this quantity comes at the expense of quality; the drawback of using the existing tool is that it’s not necessarily the best tool, as it’s not designed specifically for the challenges of space. Due to the alliance with Merrix d’Cannith, Argosy ships also make liberal use of constructs. In addition to warforged and autognomes (see below), Argosy ships often have tiny prototype constructs that serve a similar role to the Dragonhawk chwinga.
  • Scrappy. Argosy ships may not be as elegant as their Dragonhawk counterparts, but the Brelish excel at coming up with creative solutions to problems, which is good because there’s almost always problems that need to be solved. Brelish ships share a common hull and basic design, but each has unique modifications implemented by the ship’s artificer. Think of an Observatory ship as the Millennium Falcon—it may seem like it’s constantly on the edge of breaking down, but you never know when it’s going to surprise you.

Argosy crews place a strong emphasis on skill expertise and versatility; there’s always a few jacks of all trades ready to step into the shoes of a fallen specialist. Brelish ships always have at least one warforged or autognome; a Lyrandar pilot; and an artificer, who could be Brelish, Cannith, or Zil. It’s worth noting that while the King’s Argosy is works closely with the Twelve, the two are still ultimately independent. By allowing an Optech on board, the Argosy maximizes the chances of forging profitable arrangements. But the Optech is an adviser who has no actual authority on the ship. And should Aundair or Karrnath come into possession of a valuable resource, the Twelve would negotiate with them. Breland is making business and industry the focus of its mission in space, and thus has encouraged a strong role for the Twelve, but it’s not an exclusive arrangement.

Karrnath: The Blade of Siberys

Where the King’s Argosy hopes to profit from the stars, the Blade of Siberys seeks only one thing: victory. An alliance between the Karrnathi crown and Cannith East (under Zorlan d’Cannith), the Blade is certain that there will eventually be a war in the stars—and when that comes to pass, Karrnath will hold the winning hand. Vital resources? Strategic positions? Alien weapons or allies? The Blade wants them all. A few details about the Blade of Siberys…

  • Aggressive. The Karrns aren’t here for gold or adventure; this is about the conquest of space. The Karrns are proud of their discipline and their martial skills; they consider the Aundairians to be soft and the Brelish decadent. Blade captains view anything unexpected as a potential threat, and Karrns are ready to fight any threat.   
  • Warships. The Blade of Siberys is a branch of the Karrnathi military. Martial discipline is enforced at all times and insubordination will not be tolerated. Blade vessels are armed with arcane artillery, mundane weaponry, and dedicated marines—usually supplemented by a squad of Karrnathi undead. Blade vessels aren’t fragile, but they rely on devastating offensive power over heavy armor. Argosy ships are more durable and Dragonhawks are faster, but were it to come to a sustained firefight neither could match the Blade of Siberys.
  • Necromancy. While the crown has officially broken its ties with the Blood of Vol, it hasn’t given up on the military potential of necromancy. Every Blade ship carries a squad of Karrnathi undead. Beyond this, Zorlan d’Cannith has devoted his life to finding new ways to harness the energies of Mabar and unexpected industrial applications of necromancy. Blade vessels are literal ghost ships, with moaning engines surrounded by a whirling morass of ectoplasm. Even the necromancers who maintain them don’t entirely understand the science involved; and the destruction of a Blade warship can unleash hungry shadows.

Every Blade vessel has a necromancer-engineer, and could have an oathbreaker paladin in charge of marines. While there are Karrn necromancers who aren’t part of the Blood of Vol, this could be a case where Seekers are given positions—a major opportunity to repair the relationship between the crown and the Blood of Vol. In general, the Karrns are more concerned with martial force than diplomacy, and strength over finesse. It’s important to keep in mind that the conflict between the Five Nations is still a cold war; with their heavy armament the Blade is prepared for that to change, but as things stand an attack on one of the other nations would be a political catastrophe. But the next war could start tomorrow, and even if it doesn’t, you never know what enemies might be waiting among the moons.

Other Forces

In this campaign, Aundair, Karrnath, and Breland are the three major powers in the space race; it takes the resources of a nation to get off the ground. However, over the course of the campaign other groups could make their way into space. Most of these would be operating on a smaller scale, with one or two ships rather than building up a fleet, but they could still pose unexpected challenges or become useful allies over time.

  • The Aurum can’t match the industrial capacity of the King’s Argosy, but a wealthy concordian could outfit a single ship to pursue their own pursuit of opportunities in space. This could be an excellent opportunity for a traditional rag-tag group of adventurers who aren’t bound to any one nation—essentially, Firefly.
  • Thrane isn’t part of the space race to begin with, but they could be a late entry. An engine powered by the Silver Flame could be maintained by the faith of its crew; it could be that they’re the only force the celestials of the Ring will deal with.
  • New Cyre doesn’t have the resources to support a space program. But what if Cyre and Eston were working on a spelljamming program BEFORE the Mourning? What if there’s a hidden underground facility that has two powerful spelljamming vessels—or possibly even a ship that can shift between the forms of a spelljammer and a warforged colossus? If such a thing exists, a team of Cyran adventurers could be sent into the Mournland to find this base and recover these ships for Cyre. Of course, the Lord of Blades will also be looking for these vessels…
  • Droaam is often underestimated, but given time they could have a unique entry into the space race. The core systems are developed by the Venomous Demesne, harnessing planar energies instead of elemental power; the first Droaamite spelljammer holds the essence of a pit fiend of Fernia. For the hull, the Demesne are working with the changelings of Lost to magebreed a unique, colossal facade—the massive mimics that serve as the buildings of Lost. In addition to being able to regenerate damage, this living ship could shift its appearance to mimic a ship of another nation!
  • Riedra may be content with its dominion over Sarlona. On the other hand, it’s possible there’s a fleet of crystal ships just waiting to be launched.
  • Aerenal hasn’t bothered with spelljammers and has instead focused directly on Pylas Var-Tolai and the colonization of the Astral Plane, as described in this article.

THE CANNITH AUTOGNOME

The Treaty of Thronehold specifically forbids the creation of warforged and the use of the creation forges, but it places no further restrictions on the creation of sentient construct. Over the last two years, Merrix d’Cannith has been working closely with the brilliant binder Dalia Hal Holinda to develop a new form of construct fused by an elemental heart. Over the last year this work has born fruit, but so far the bound heart can only sustain a small form; this is the origin of the autognome.

As of 998 YK, there are approximately 43 autognomes in existence. Each autognome is a hand-crafted prototype, and every one of them is unique; Merrix and Dalia are still experimenting, changing materials, designs, and technique. One autognome might have arcane sigils carved on every inch of its bronze skin. Another might be made with chunks of Riedran crysteel, which glow when the autognome is excited. What all autognome designs share is an elemental heart—a Khyber shard core inlaid with silver and infused with the essence of a minor elemental. This serves both as the heart and brain of an autognome, keeping it alive and also serving as the seat of its sentience. The minor elementals involved in this process aren’t sentient as humans understand the concept; but through the process of the binding, it evolves into something entirely new.

In creating an autognome character, begin by deciding the nature of your elemental heart. You may not remember your existence as a minor elemental, but the nature of your spark may be reflected by your personality. Are you fiery in spirit? A little airheaded? Do you have a heart of stone? What was the purpose you were made for, and how is this reflected in your design? Which of your class abilities are reflected by your physical design, and which are entirely learned skills? And most of all, what drives you? Are you devoted to your work, or are you driven by insatiable curiosity or a desire to more deeply explore your own identity?   

Autognomes aren’t widely recognized and may be mistaken for warforged scouts. If their existence becomes more widely known, will anyone will seek to amend the Code of Galifar to protect all constructs? Will the Lord of Blades see autognomes as allies in the struggle, or deny any kinship to these elemental constructs?

While I’m suggesting the Cannith autognome as the most common form of autognome, it’s not the only way to use this species. In my current campaign I’ve proposed an Autognome warlock as a crewmember on a Dragonhawk ship—a construct built with the ship, who serves as its Arbiter. But here again, this character is a unique construct who doesn’t resemble Cannith’s creations or feel any immediate kinship with them.

Siberspace: The Realm Above

In simplest terms, Khyber is the underworld, Eberron the surface, and Siberys the sky; as such, the crystal sphere containing Eberron and its moons is typically referred to as Siberspace. Korranberg scholars maintain that Berspace would be a more accurate term; “Ber” is thought to be an ancient word meaning “dragon” or “progenitor,” and as such Berspace could be seen as The Realm of the Progenitors. However, beyond Korranberg the idea was dismissed because people felt ridiculous saying “Brrr, space.”

So what awaits in the Realm Above? Compared to the endless expanse of the Multiverse, it may seem relatively limited, but there’s many opportunities for adventure.

The Ring of Siberys

The first step into the sky is the Ring of Siberys, the glittering belt of golden stones that’s wrapped around Eberron. The Ring has long been an enigma. It is a powerful source of arcane energy, and this ambient radiation—commonly referred to as the blood of Siberys—has a number of effects.

  • Mysterious. The Ring blocks divination magic, mirroring the effects of nondetection across the ring. This makes it difficult to locate Siberys shards or other valuable mineral deposits, and allows ships to hide in the cover of the ring’s field.
  • Anchoring. The Ring blocks all forms of long-distance teleportation. It’s impossible to teleport to Eberron or one of the moons from the Ring; this also prevents direct teleportation from a moon to Eberron. It doesn’t block short-range teleportation—such as misty step—within the Ring, and it also doesn’t block plane shift; however, plane shift is beyond the scope of the everyday magic of the Five Nations, and isn’t an alternative to spelljamming.
  • Difficult Approach. Gravity and the power of the Ring combine to make the approach difficult. It takes a surge of arcane power to push beyond the atmosphere. Most flying items can’t produce this power, or will burn out if they try. Spelljammers can—that’s what makes a spelljammer a spelljammer—but it still requires a supply of Siberys shards to generate the necessary energy.

The Blood of Siberys is an obstacle, but it can be overcome. Elemental airships couldn’t reach the Ring, so the Five Nations developed spelljammers. The Mysterious and Anchoring effects can surely also be overcome with research and development; this is an opportunity to reflect the evolution of arcane science. Most likely this would come in stages rather than all at once; the Dragonhawk Initiative learns to cast detect magic through the Mysterious interference, then any 1st level divination, then any 2nd level, and so on. The breakthrough could involve a rare resource, such as a previously unknown mineral only found in the Ring; deposits of this mineral would quickly become be important strategic objectives. Can House Orien create a focus item that allows them to teleport to the Ring? Who will penetrate the shrouding effect first—Aundair or House Medani?

So to this point, the people of Khorvaire haven’t been able to use divination to study the Ring, and they haven’t had ships that could reach it. What will the first spelljammers find? Legend has long held that the Ring of Siberys is comprised entirely of Siberys dragonshards; the King’s Argosy will be disappointed to learn that this is only a myth. There are Siberys shards spread throughout the Ring of Siberys, but the bulk of the ring is comprised of massive chunks of stone and ice surrounded by fields of smaller shards. The Ring is airless and cold—or so it first appears. The blood of Siberys doesn’t just shield the Ring; it makes the impossible possible. Some of the larger stone shards have some combination of gravity, breathable air, safe temperatures, or even fertile soil (though based on other conditions, it might be impossible to grow typical crops of the world below). Usually these features are only found on the interior of a sky island; it’s barren and airless on the surface, but if you find a passage there’s a hidden oasis within. Such an oasis will be an incredible discovery for exploring spelljammers, but there’s a complication: the Five Nations aren’t the first civilizations to explore the Ring. Some of the larger shards—shards the size of Lhazaar islands—contain ruins of civilizations that died long ago. Some hold stasis fields or extradimensional spaces, waiting for an explorer to deactivate the wards or unlock the space. These can contain powerful artifacts or priceless arcane secrets… or they could contain magebred beasts, ancient plagues, or even entire outposts held in stasis. Consider a few possible origins for such things…

  • Dragons. The dragons colonized the Ring back in their first great age of expansion following the Age of Demons. But even held tight by Siberys, they couldn’t escape the influence of the Daughter of Khyber. The colonies were destroyed or abandoned, but explorers could find a forgotten dracolich, or the degenerate remnants of those corrupted by the Daughter of Khyber.
  • Giants. Both the Cul’sir Dominion and the Group of Eleven established outposts in the Ring. These were crippled when Xen’drik was devastated by the dragons. Adventurers could find empty ruins; giants that collapsed into savagery but have built new (non-spelljamming) cultures in the ruins of their ancestors; or an outpost perfectly preserved in stasis—an outpost of ancient giants who remember the fall of Xen’drik as if it was yesterday, who hunger for revenge on Argonnessen, and who could still have access to the same magic that once destroyed a moon.
  • Celestials. It’s always been said that Khyber spawned native fiends and that native celestials were born from the blood of Siberys. The couatl are known as the children of Siberys, and sacrificed themselves to create the Silver Flame. But there could be other celestials that never descended from the sky to assist the mortals below. Perhaps the lilends dwell in hidden halls in the Ring, contemplating the struggle of the Progenitors and awaiting their Silent Hour. Whatever their nature, celestials of the Ring have remained aloof, disinterested in the mortal world. They might be incarnations of celestial ideals, but they could well see the people of Eberron as hopelessly corrupted, possibly even defiling the Ring with their presence. Breaking past this prejudice and forging an alliance with one or more native celestials would be quite a coup for explorers.
  • Humans. Perhaps the magi of Ohr Kaluun managed to teleport an entire war maze into the ring to escape the Sundering. Maybe there was a human civilization entirely unknown to the scholars of the present day, whose history can only be found in the ring.

Personally, I’d be inclined to say that native fiends have a minimal presence in the Ring of Siberys. The overlords are part of the architecture of Khyber. They might be able to influence people in the Ring, as with the Daughter of Khyber corrupting dragons; but there are no overlords bound in the ring itself.

Overall, the Ring of Siberys is the first frontier. It is vast—it stretches around the entire world, and has room for countless shards the size of cities or even islands. Mineral deposits and stasis caches are tempting treasures, and a habitable oasis would be an invaluable foothold in space. However, the block against divination limits the ability to swiftly locate these things… and that’s where adventurers come in.

The Mysterious Moons

The people of the Five Nations have never reached the moons of Eberron, and there are many theories about them. Some assert that the moons must be airless, arid chunks of rock. Others say that the moons aren’t actually physical objects, but rather massive planar gateways—that a ship that tries to land on Vult will actually find itself in Shavarath. In my campaign, the answer lies between these two options. The moons are essentially manifest worlds. Each moon is closely tied to a particular plane, and the entire moon has traits that are typically associated with manifest zones of that plane. All of Sypheros is blanketed in Eternal Shadows of Mabar, while Barrakas has the Pure Light trait of Irian. The moons have atmosphere and gravity. Vegetation varies—Sypheros and icy Dravago are quite barren, while Barrakas and Olarune and lush and overgrown. While each moon is suffused with planar energies, these are concentrated in specific spaces. All of Eyre has the Deadly Heat trait of Fernia, but there are only a few places regions with the Fires of Industry trait—and those spaces would be quite desirable as outposts. However, it’s quite possible that these valuable locations have already been claimed. The moons support life, and it’s up to the DM to decide exactly what’s already there. I don’t want to go into too much detail, because this is where the exploration comes in. Here’s a few general options…

Savage and Untamed. There’s no civilization on this moon, but there is life—powerful and dangerous life. Any nation that hopes to establish an outpost or to explore extensively will have to deal with any combination of deadly monsters, supernatural hazards, dramatic weather effects, and more. It’s quite possible that one or more of these effects are so dangerous that it’s essentially impossible to maintain an outpost or establish a colony on the moon. If Zarantyr has the Constant Change or Chaotic Time traits of Kythri it could be very dangerous to remain there for long, while Olarune could be like the Titan’s Folly layer of Lamannia—any attempt to impose order upon the natural world will be overcome.

Lunar Empires. A moon could be home to one or more powerful civilizations. Perhaps the Giff have an imperial civilization on Vult, with fortresses spread across the moon. The moons are smaller than Eberron, so even a powerful lunar civilization will be limited in scope; but this is still an important opportunity for first contact and ongoing diplomacy. These societies could have technology or magic unknown on Khorvaire. If the Giff are on Vult, they could have their faithful firearms! A crucial question is whether these lunar civilizations have spelljammers of their own, or if they are landbound. The fact that none of these nations have made contact with Eberron suggests that they don’t have space travel, but it’s always possible that they have limited spelljammers that can cross between moons but can’t get past the Ring. This would allow the Giff of Vult to be engaged in a bitter war against the Plasmoids of Zarantyr and for the spelljammers of Eberron to get caught up in this conflict and to engage in battles in space, but this conflict can’t reach Eberron… at least for now!

Small Civilizations. A moon could have one or more civilizations that could interact with explorers, but that aren’t so vast and advanced as to truly dominate their moon. Perhaps there’s a few clans of Hadozee on Olarune—each carrying a different form of lycanthropy! Each claims a region within Olarune, and explorers will need to negotiate with multiple clans… being careful to learn and respective their dramatically different cultures! This sort of division could also lead to the different nations finding different allies on the same moon. On Olarune, the Blade of Karrnath could forge a bond with the powerful Wolf clan, while the King’s Argosy negotiates with the Tigers and Bears.

Planar Extensions. Personally, I want the moons to be unique worlds that are influenced by their associated planes, but that are distinctly different from what you’d find in those planes. I’d rather have Vult have a Gith empire than to just make it another front in the war between the celestials and fiends of Shavarath. However, a moon could certainly have a region that is either a direct extension of a plane or that hosts the denizens of the plane. It could be that the Feyspires of Thelanis appear on Rhaan as well as on Eberron, and that explorers could find Pylas Pyrial waiting for them when they land. Or people could land on Aryth to discover a city inhabited by the ghost of their lost loved ones… but is it real, or some sort of deadly trick?

I don’t want to know all the answers; that’s why we have a journey of discovery. But there’s at least twelve moons to explore, and each one can present very different challenges and hold different rewards. Will the adventurers be drawn into intralunar wars? Will they engage in high stakes first contact with alien civilizations? Or will the greatest challenge be surviving an expedition?

Wroat, We Have A Problem…

The moons and the Ring are the main real estate, but the space race isn’t just about the destination—it’s all about the journey, and the many, many things that could go wrong in space. In my campaign, I’d want to emphasize that space travel is new. Every ship is a protoype, and the people of Khorvaire simply don’t know what threats are waiting for them in space. In addition to the hazards presented in Spelljammer content, adventurers could run across manifest zones, wild zones, or supernatural threats never encountered planetside. A Shavaran bloodstorm could induce homicidal aggression in humanoids that pass through it, while a Lamannian sargasso could bury its roots in any ship that draws too close. There’s a giant Khyber crystal floating in space… is it a valuable resource or does it contain an incredibly dangerous spirit? And just in general, what do the adventurers do when something goes wrong with their ship? And do they think it’s just a legitimate malfunction—a lesson artificers can learn from—or is it sabotage? Is there a spy among their crew… or has an alien threat come on board?

What Lies Beyond

As depicted in Spelljammer: Adventures in Space, Wildspace bleeds naturally into the Astral Sea; all you need to do is sail far enough. However, as called out in Rising From The Last War, Siberspace is isolated from the rest of the Multiverse. Exploring Eberron suggests that Eberron is the only planet in its material plane—that the stars are in fact glittering points on a crystal sphere, surrounded by the vast astral void. In my Space Race campaign, the first Spelljammers won’t be capable of reaching any form of the Astral; they’ll have to discover the limits of Siberspace and find out how to pass beyond it. This could be driven by encounters with Githyanki raiders, or require the adventurers’ patrons to bargain with Aerenal. But even when they pierce this veil, I wouldn’t take them to the full expanse of the Astral Sea. This article presents a version of the Astral Plane holding countless ruins, timelost hermitages, and outposts like Pylas Tar-Volai and Tu’narath. But it’s still an interpretation concretely tied to Eberron, home to the Githyanki survivors of a lost reality and the experiments of the Undying Court. Personally, I’d say that this version of the Astral Plane is still part of Siberspace—that just as there’s a barrier around Eberron’s material plane, its astral plane is also a shielded pocket within the greater Astral Sea.

Another point is that Siberspace can be larger that people thought. Exploring Eberron says that Eberron is the only true planet in its system. But if the twelve moons and the Astral plane aren’t enough for your adventures, there could always be one or more planets in the system that astrologers have somehow overlooked. Perhaps the Illithids of Thoon live on the dark side of a world that’s been completely blacked out, invisible and deadly.

Where is (New Monster)?

Where are the Giff in Eberron? Where could we find a megapede? In general, this is where exploration comes into play. Who knows what the adventurers will find on the moons? In my campaign, at least a few of the moons will have significant civilizations, who may well have intralunar travel and simply never have crossed the Ring of Siberys to reach Eberron. I’ve suggested the idea of the Giff as an imperialistic society on Vult—with the moon’s ties to Shavarath fueling their warlike nature—or the plasmoids being found on Zarantyr, with their fluid forms reflecting the chaos of Kythri—but those are just possibilities. There could be a single city of Mercanes on Therendor, with a gate connected to the Immeasurable Market of Syrania; they carry the goods of the Market to other moons. Neogi could have a civilization on Lharvion, or they could actually be the remnants of some long-forgotten civilization on Eberron itself, and dwell in outposts hidden in the Ring of Siberys. Space Hamsters could be found on Olarune, with other Lammania-influenced megafauna. A few other random ideas…

  • Aartuks are canonically come from a world destroyed by beholders. In Siberspace, they could be the survivors of a former Eberron destroyed by the daelkyr—an Eberron dominated by plant-based lifeforms. On the other hand, it’s just as reasonable to think that aartuks are creations of the daelkyr Avassh, spread into space like seeds on the wind.
  • Mind Flayers are typically associated with the daelkyr; why wouldn’t spacefaring illithids try to help their masters on Eberron? In my campaign I’d suggest that the Illithids found in space have broken away from the Overmind of Dyrrn and have formed an independent society in defiance of the Daelkyr; as noted above, this would be an excellent place to explore the concept of Thoon. These mind flayers may actively avoid Eberron for fear of falling prey to Dyrrn’s influence. On the other hand, it could be interesting if Xorchyllic—the mayor of Graywall in Droaam—is secretly from the stars. Did they crash, or do they still have their nautiloid hidden away?
  • Murder comets could be the remains of the Argosy’s first efforts to create elemental spelljammers; the ships were destroyed by the radiation of the Ring of Siberys, and the comet is a blend of the ships’ elementals and the restless ghosts of the dead crew.
  • Solar Dragons could dwell in Arrah itself, or one might lair in one of the largest shards of the Ring of Siberys. We know of the Daughter of Khyber down below; perhaps there’s a truly immense solar dragon in the Ring who calls itself the Son of Siberys!

Again, all of these are just possibilities; if you want space hamsters to have a mighty empire on Therendor, follow that story! Meanwhile, if you want to play a giff, hadozee, or any of the other new species, that’s what the Astral Drifter and Wildspacer backgrounds are for. I especially like Astral Drifter; your character was marooned in the Astral and lost for countless decades. You finally escaped into Eberron, where your stories of space may have inspired the current drive to reach space. But because you’ve been gone for so long, you don’t know what you’ll find when you return to your home moon. If could be that your Giff character remembers your great empire on Vult, but that since you’ve been gone it’s been entirely obliterated by illithids and neogi!

One last thing: people may say Do Giff have guns in Eberron? Why wouldn’t they? I’ve never had any issue with the existence of firearms; in a previous article I’ve suggested that the Dhakaani could use them on Eberron. I just prefer to focus the Five Nations on wandslingers and other arcane alternatives. With that said, I might still think about ways to make Giff firearms feel unique to the setting. If the Giff are based on Vult, perhaps their firearms use the powdered remnants of angels instead of gunpowder; the ashes of the eternal wars of Shavarath drift across the surface of the moon.

Playing With Time and Space

As I’ve said above, part of what I love about the Space Race campaign is the idea that it’s happening right now and that the action in space should have real consequences on the planet below. With this in mind, I’d personally play with the passage of time in a different way than in most of my campaigns.

  • When the campaign begins, spelljamming is in its infancy. I’ve suggested that the King’s Argosy has more ships than the other powers; but that may mean that as the campaign starts, Breland has three spelljammers, the Dragonhawk Initiative has two, and Karrnath only has a single powerful warship. The first session might be that nation’s first mission to successfully reach the Ring of Siberys!
  • While a particular mission might take more than one session to complete, between each mission I would establish a significant passage of time. I’d present the players with downtime options; these might just involve what their characters do on their time off, but they could also reflect what the adventurers’ organization does in that time. Do they focus on fortifying the outpost the adventurers established in the Ring, or do they devote their resources to building a new ship? Do they negotiate with one of the other spacefaring powers or attempt to sabotage their efforts?
  • The opening of each new mission would thus involve a recap of how things have evolved between sessions. What’s become of the joint Brelish-Aundairian outpost? What’s the challenge we face in the effort to reach Zarantyr, and what’s it going to take to overcome it? Has the Dragonhawk Initiative found a way to overcome the divination-blocking effects of the Ring of Siberys? This is also where we could see latecomers to the space race; it might be around the sixth or seventh sessions that the Aurum or Prince Oargev manage to get a ship in the air.
  • This could also lead to adventurers having a surprise land-bound adventure, as they’re called to participate in an international summit or sent on a mission to acquire a vital, rare resource! Depending on the outcomes of the missions, there could also be increasing tensions on the surface. How would the death of King Boranel affect the Argosy?
  • If I wanted things to be REALLY dramatic, the endgame could involve an existential threat to Eberron itself. Perhaps the Mourning begins to spread, or multiple Overlords break their bonds—Eberron can’t BE saved, and the goal now is to lead an exodus into space! But which moon could support the survivors?  

Another way to approach this would be to have each player make two characters—a member of the spelljammer crew and someone who’s involved in the diplomacy, administration, or research efforts on the ground. These planetbound characters might not be as combat-capable as the explorers, but they each have vital resources and influence; they’ll never actually get into a battle on a grid map, but they’ll be making the crucial decisions that determine the greater arc of the campaign. These could be people who are important but not the top decision makers, or they could actually be the central players; if you’re running an Argosy campaign, one of the players could be King Boranel, another Merrix d’Cannith, another the head of the Zil binders. Again, these characters wouldn’t actually have full stats and character sheets, but the players would have to play them in negotiations and decide what they commit to during downtime—does Merrix support the colony or does he devote his resources to building a better autognome?

Other Paths

As I said, this is the campaign I want to run. But Spelljammer is designed to allow adventures across the multiverse, and if that’s the story you want to tell, tell it! There’s nothing wrong with having your spelljammers crash land on Krynn. If you want to retrofit the two together, you could say that Galifar had a long-established spelljamming fleet with outposts in the Ring of Siberys; during the Last War, the Ring seceded and now exists as its own independent force that protects Siberspace from outside threats and continues to explore the multiverse. There are some cosmological questions you’ll have to resolve, but again, if that’s the story you want to tell, there’s always answers!

Would You Like To Know More?

I’m juggling many things, and I won’t be answering questions on this article. But if you’d like to see more of how I’d run such a campaign, you can—and you can even play in it! For the rest of the year, I’m shifting my Threshold Patreon to running a Siberspace campaign. Every month I run and record a session. The characters and the story are persistent, but the players change each session; every Threshold patron has a chance to get a seat at the table. Even if you never get a seat at the table, you have access to the recorded sessions and you have an opportunity to shape the story through polls, Discord discussions, and story hours. Currently I’m going through the Session Zero with the patrons; we’ve decided to base the campaign on the Dragonhawk Initiative, and we’re developing the player characters. If you’d like to be a part of it, become a patron!

Thanks as always to my patrons for making these articles possible, and good luck to all of you in your adventures in space!

IFAQ: Figurines of Wondrous Power

“What do we do, Lightbearer?”

“We’ve got to hold this position,” Drego said. “We can’t let the wolves through the pass. But the people at the Crossroads need to know what we’ve learned about the thrice-damned rats.” He unpinned the raven brooch from his cloak, and whispered to it. Silver flame licked around the edges, and the metal melted and expanded, reforming into a bird with glittering feathers. After a few more words, the bird took to the air and disappeared into the canopy of the Towering Wood, heading south.

As time permits, I like to answer interesting questions posed by my Patreon supporters. Questions like…

How do you see Figurines of Wondrous Power fitting into the Eberron setting?

A figurine of wondrous power is a magic item that can become a living creature for a particular duration or until the animal is killed. These are the mechanics, but it’s up to us to provide the flavor and the context. How common are they? Who makes them, and who uses them?

Starting with the first question, suggested rarity is a good place to start. What we’ve said before is that uncommon items can be found as part of everyday life in the Five Nations. Rare items are in fact rare; they exist, certainly, but aren’t part of everyday life. So it’s reasonable to think that a soldier in a special forces unit might be given a silver raven to help with communication, and one of Tharashk’s top bounty hunters might have an onyx dog to help with her hunts. But that onyx dog would be a remarkable tool… and the very rare obsidian steed would be almost unheard of in the Five Nations. Given both the material and the nature of the creature involved, I’d be likely to make obsidian steeds tools created by the Lords of Dust—perhaps by the Scribe Hektula, given to favored warlocks of Sul Khatesh.

So once again, figurines are mechanics. But there’s a lot of different ways that you could interpret those mechanics, based on the story you want to tell. So how do figurines fit into Eberron? I could imagine a few very different ways I’d use them.

Sovereign and Flame

The first figurines used by the people of the Five Nations were divine in nature, not arcane. Balinor is the Sovereign of Hunt and Hound, teaching people to work with beasts both as allies and as prey. Vassal figurines are engraved with Balinor’s symbol and imbued with faith. They function just like normal figurines, but they can only be recharged by devotion; such a figurine won’t regain its charge unless it’s in the possession of a devoted Vassal.

As noted in the quote that opens this article, the Church of the Silver Flame has also created such figurines. The most common of these is the silver raven, often used as a messenger by templars in the field; some of these take the form of small winged serpents, though they have no special abilities beyond flight. Like the Vassal figurines, these divine items can only be recharged by the faith of a follower of the Flame. I could also imagine Seekers of the Divinity Within crafting bone figurines of wondrous power; while one might expect such creatures to be skeletal, I’d be more inclined to make them vivid crimson beasts formed from the essence of the Seeker’s own blood.

Cannith Figurines

Over the last century, House Cannith has been experimenting with figurines that replicate the basic principles of a creation forge. Cannith figurines can only be used by people who bear the Dragonmark of Making. They’re made of metal and wood, embedded with small siberys dragonshards. When activated, they grow bodies of root and steel, and have the Constructed Resilience trait of warforged. When the beast is killed or reverted, the materials that comprise it dissolve.

Sentira Figurines

Both the Inspired and the kalashtar of Adar use figurines of wondrous power carved from sentira, a substance made from solidified emotion. The emotion used in the figure is reflected in the creature summoned; an onyx hound made from hatred will be cruel and aggressive, while one made from love will be gentle but protective of its summoner. The beasts summoned by sentira figurines have the statistics of the living creatures they resemble, but they’re formed from ectoplasm and often have dreamlike aspects—unnatural coloration, fur rippling in nonexistent wind, and a strong aura of the emotion that forms them. Activating a sentira figurine requires the user to feel the associated emotion intently; to use a figurine formed of hatred, the bearer will have to think of a creature they hate.

Spectral Figurines

The elves of Aerenal—both Aereni and Tairnadalcreate figurines of wondrous power. Both operate in a similar manner. When the figurine is activated, the translucent form of the summoned animal takes shape around the item. The summoned creature is solid and can be touched or ridden, and is in all ways treated as a living creature, but it is clearly ghostly and dissolves when its service is done. Aereni figurines are made using the spirits of beloved animals, while Tairnadal figurines are icons representing beasts of legend that fought alongside the patron ancestors. Both types of figurines are prized relics that typically have great emotional value to their owners, and are rarely sold; given this, Aereni or Tairnadal may be curious or angry if they see such items in the hands of others. Spectral figurines are often tied to the Valenar beasts presented in Eberron: Rising From The Last War; the equivalent of an onyx dog might summon a Valenar hound.

Daelkyr Figurines

A number of the daelkyr have created Figurines of Wondrous Power. While functional, they’re not very pleasant…

  • Dyrrn’s figurines are small, beating hearts. When activated, a figurine extrudes fleshy tendrils and chitinous plates, weaving them together to create a body out of strands of muscle; it has the general shape of an elephant or a goat, but most people will be horrified by its appearance. When the creature is killed or reverted, the fleshy form falls away and slowly decays, leaving only the heart intact.
  • Kyrzin’s figurines are vials of fluid. To activate the figurine, you unstopper the bottle and pour out its contents; the liquid expands into a gelatinous shape, again reminiscent of the creature but very clearly unnatural. When slain or reverted, the gelatinous form melts away. Meanwhile, the vial slowly refills itself until it’s ready to be used again.
  • Orlask’s figurines are stone statues, much like standard figurines of wondrous power. However, Orlassk’s figurines are living creatures that have been trapped in this stone form; holding the figurine, you can feel the misery of the trapped creature. When they are used, the bound creature is released, though it is forced to obey the person who freed it. When slain or reverted, they are returned to their prison of stone.

These are just a few examples of possible figurines of wondrous power, and I’m sure you can come up with many more. As rare items most figurines would be, well, rare; I’d use the uncommon bag of tricks if I was creating a version of Pokemon in Eberron.

I won’t be answering questions on this IFAQ, but share your thoughts and ideas below. And if you’d like pose questions that could inspire future articles or participate in my online Eberron campaign, check out my Patreon!

IFAQ: Cartomancy in Khorvaire

This is Caron Ellis’s work from Illimat, but it would certainly fit in an Aundairian oracle deck.

When time permits, I like to answer interesting questions posed by my Patreon supporters. This one has come up a few times…

Are there any cultures within Khorvaire that particularly utilize the Tarokka style deck? Is this associated with a dragonmarked house, magewrights, or something else?

Eberron: Rising From The Last War includes “oracle” as one of the possible specialties for magewrights; as presented, they can cast augury and divination as rituals. I expand on this in Exploring Eberron:

At DM discretion, a magewright’s spells may have expanded—or limited—effects. Consider what it takes to make a spell a viable commercial service. For example, augury only allows the caster to predict events 30 minutes in the future—useful for adventurers in the midst of a dungeon, but not for the farmer wanting an opinion on planting crops. A professional oracle might be able to predict woe or weal anywhere from a day to a week in advance—but such an oracle could have very specific limitations, such as only being able to make predictions related to to weather or agriculture. As a DM, use the existing spells as a model, but adjust them as necessary to create a viable business.

This is one place where I’d draw a sharper line than usual between magewrights (who employ arcane science) and adepts (who perform divine rituals). As a 2nd level spell, augury is in the range of everyday magic; as a 4th level spell divination is a little beyond it. With this in mind, I’d be inclined to either say that only the most exceptional magewright oracles can perform divination, or that they can only perform a narrow version of it, as described above. While for adepts I’d be inclined to say that they can cast augury at will but that divination is less predictable; they can pray on a thing, but sometimes answers come and sometimes they don’t… and sometimes, an adept oracle receives answers to questions without even asking them. It’s faith, not science.

So: Oracles can be found across Khorvaire, and they can cast augury and divination. But what does this LOOK like? The rules gives us the mechanics of spells, but flavor is something we have to add. Take fireball. Typically we think of a wizard raising a hand and calling out a word of power to produce a blast of fire from thin air. On the other hand, an artificer who employs alchemist’s supplies as their spellcasting focus could describe casting a fireball as hastily assembling a magical Molotov cocktail. It’s the same spell, but the flavor is completely different. The same definitely holds true here. An adept oracle might light incense and pray throughout their ritual time, seeking the answer within. A magewright oracle could employ bones, tea leaves, or unquestionably, cards—and I think there are oracular traditions that use all of those tools on Khorvaire.

We’ve never discussed cartomancy in any canon source that I’m aware of, but I’ve always assumed that it exists. A key question is how do people think the cards work? What power is guiding the cards? Let’s look at a few possibilities and where they’d fit.

The Draconic Prophecy. Eberron HAS the idea of a vast power that can be used to shape or predict the future, and it’s easy to imagine a deck of cards that’s seen as a lens for drawing guidance from the Draconic Prophecy. Personally I’d say that this is a very limited lens—peeking at the Prophecy through a hole in a piece of cardboard, no match for the vast observatories and tools employed by the Lords of Dust and the Chamber—but still useful as a tool for everyday life and a reliable way of casting divination. Personally, I would imagine this using a blend of the Sovereigns, Progenitors, and Planes as the arcana. To me, this would be the Rider-Waite of the Five Nations—a standard deck employed across the nations. Let’s call it the Golden Deck or the Dragon Deck (when it depicts the Sovereigns as dragons).

Sul Khatesh. The Keeper of Secrets loves esoteric rituals and people seeking forbidden knowledge. The Deck of Shadows is said to have been created by Hektula, and it uses overlords and archfiends as its arcana. It has a sinister reputation and is said to reveal painful secrets and things people don’t want known—all catering to Sul Khatesh’s love of people fearing magic. So this is found across Khorvaire, but it’s not a deck people will use in nice neighborhoods.

Thelanis. The spirits speak through the cards, and in this case the spirits are the archfey of Thelanis. The Deck of Stories is most commonly used in Aundair—where there’s long-standing traditions of dealing with the fey—but it can be found across the Five Nations.

Xoriat. It’s said the artist who drew the first tohiish dooval deck gouged out his eyes before sketching the cards. The images on the cards are unnerving, abstract designs; it’s not unlike a deck of Rorshach images, with different people seeing very different things as they stare at the cards. The tohiish dooval—”dangerous truth“—first appeared in the Shadow Marches and is rarely seen in the Five Nations, but there are rumors that Narathun oracles have started using a similar deck found in the Realm Below.

The Divinity Within. It’s not about the cards—it’s about the person reading them. Adept oracles of the Blood of Vol use cartomancy more than those of any other faith, but there’s no standardized deck associated with the faith. You could use Tarokka, Harrow, or any other deck. What’s important is what the reader sees in the cards, because the cards are the tool they use to reach their own Divinity Within.

These are just a few possible decks and traditions; an Aereni oracle might use a unique deck with cards representing their own personal ancestors. Aside from its use as a divinatory tool, I’d definitely allow a warlock to use a cartomancy deck as an arcane focus (and as their Book of Shadows, if they have Pact of the Tome); they could use the cards as a means to communicate with their patron, and could describe producing their spell effects by dramatically displaying and invoking specific cards.

I’ve got a Duergar Spirit Bard who uses a Harrow deck he found while in a labor camp in Ohr Kaluun; given that the whole vibe for Ohr Kaluun is “dark magic”, cartomancy felt like a natural fit.

This seems entirely reasonable, and such a tradition could have been carried over into the Venomous Demesne. But with that said, the question that immediately comes to my mind is what makes it “Dark Magic”? Is it a method of communicating with fiends? Are the cards printed using the blood of an innocent, and it’s their tormented spirit that speaks through the cards? Is the deck itself a bound imp? For those who aren’t familiar with it, Ohr Kaluun is a region in Sarlona which was in the past known for dangerous and sinister magical practices, including consorting with malevolent powers. When creating magic items from Ohr Kaluun, I love to try to hit this—to ask why would people be afraid of this place? I want players to say “I want to keep this item because it’s useful, but also, ewwww.”

That’s all for now! Feel free to discuss these ideas or to share what you’ve done with cartomancy in the comments, but as this is an IFAQ, I won’t be answering questions on the topic. Thanks to my Patreon supporters for asking interesting questions!

Dragonmarks: Familiars, Homunculi, and Animal Companions

A wizard walks into a tavern with a raven on his wrist. A Cannith heir is close behind, followed by her gleaming steel defender. The Eldeen ranger is waiting for them, with his wolf curled up under the table.

All three of these are plausible player characters in an Eberron campaign. But how do these things—familiars, animal companions, homunculi—fit into the world? How do people react to them, and what do people know about them? Would any of them actually be allowed in a tavern, and would a typical person actually be able to tell the difference between a familiar and an animal companion?

Familiars, homunculi, and animal companions play different roles in the game and in the world, and I want to explore each one of them. But to begin with, let’s answer the quick questions. In the Five Nations…

  • Familiars are most common in Aundair and (previously) Cyre, but they have been employed throughout the Five Nations for centuries. They are also found in Zilargo and the Eldeen Reaches.
  • Even beyond these four areas, people are familiar with the basic idea of familiars and most people know at least some of the following facts: Familiars can communicate with their companion; their companion can see through their eyes; familiars can potentially channel touch spells; they can be easily dismissed and resummoned; they can be resummoned if killed.
  • People generally assume that familiars are extensions of a spellcaster (discussed in more detail later in this article) and don’t consider them fully independent beings. Along with homunculi, they are seen as tools. In the eyes of the law, a character is responsible for the actions of their familiar/companion/homunculus, and you can’t get away with murder by casting the killing spell through your familiar.
  • While most people can’t tell the difference between a familiar and an animal companion, most know that familiars are usually limited to tiny forms. The common assumption is that a tiny animal companion is a familiar, and a small or larger animal companion is a beast.
  • If an establishment allows patrons to carry weapons, it will generally allow well-behaved familiars, homunculi, or animal companions, unless the creature seems especially unsanitary or aggressive. In part, this is a metagame conceit: we are still playing a game, and the Beast Master ranger or Battlesmith artificer shouldn’t be crippled every time the adventurers go indoors. But it also ties to the idea that people recognize these things as tools. So in my opinion, any place that will allow the barbarian to carry his greataxe will allow the battlesmith to bring her steel defender… And conversely, a fine restaurant like the Oaks in Sharn isn’t going to let you bring your axe or your steel defender to your table.
  • Most people know that a spellcaster can spy through the eyes of a familiar, just as they know that someone with the spell beast sense (druid, ranger, Vadalis heir) can see through the eyes of a mundane animal. People don’t assume that every rat is a spy, but they know it’s a POSSIBILITY… so tiny animals showing up in highly secured areas or behaving in a clearly unnatural manner may be dealt with as if they’re spies.
  • In major cities with a significant population of magewrights or arcane universities, you may find businesses that cater to characters with familiars—the bring-your-own-sassy-magical-cat cafe.
  • While most people assume familiars are extensions, they also recognize traditional imps and quasits as fiends. Having a quasit as a familiar isn’t ILLEGAL, but it definitely makes a statement; even if you’re not actively associating with fiends, you’re choosing one to represent you. Some people will see that as cool and edgy, some people will see it as a sign that you’re a scumbag, and some people will see it as pretentious— “LOOK AT ME! I CONSORT WITH DEEEEEMONS!” It will definitely be noticed, and it’s up to the DM to decide how people will react. But again, people see familiars as tools, so they aren’t going to burn you just for having an imp; but it’s similar to whether your fighter has a greatsword of plain steel or whether he’s carrying a rune-carved sword that moans softly. You can’t get arrested for it, but people will make judgements because of it.

So key takeaways: People are familiar with the idea of familiars and homunculi. They largely see them as tools and will treat them accordingly. If a tiny animal behaves in an unusual manner, people may assume that it’s a familiar or otherwise being manipulated by magic. With those general things settled, let’s take a quick look at the differences between these three categories of companion…

FAMILIARS

Mechanically, familiars have a common foundation—the find familiar spell. Warlocks, wizards, and druids all acquire their familiars by using this spell, and this establishes the core rules that all familiars follow—shared senses, telepathic communication, can be dismissed and resummoned, and so on. But while this provides a concrete baseline for the mechanics of a familiar, from a story perspective the familiars of a wizard, a warlock, and a druid may be very different. While this isn’t an exhaustive list, here’s three important categories of familiar.

Extensions

The most common form of familiar—the form used by most wizards and magewrights in the Five Nations—is an externally manifested aspect of the spellcaster’s personality. A few aspects of this…

  • As an extension of you, your familiar doesn’t know anything that you don’t know—but it’s drawn from your subconscious, and may know things you’ve forgotten or draw conclusions you haven’t consciously made.
  • All familiars must obey the spellcaster’s commands. An extension doesn’t resent this; they’re part of you. If they do have any personal goals, they’re likely things you actually want, even if you haven’t consciously realized it.
  • When an extension is dismissed or slain, it returns to your subconscious. This isn’t unpleasant for the familiar, and most extensions don’t resent being dismissed.
  • An extension is drawn from you. Most extensions have the fey creature type; in many ways, they are manifested stories. Extensions would only manifest as celestials or fiends if they are tied to remarkably virtuous or deeply vile people.
  • If you wish, you and your DM could decide that the familiar represents a specific aspect of your personality, which could in turn flavor its personality and demeanor. This could also be reflected by its shape, which you can change by casting the spell. It could be that as a cat it reflects your curiosity, while as a hawk it’s your courage and as a weasel it’s your cunning. A secondary question is whether each of these three would present themselves as having different names—if they essentially identify as three familiars—or whether they maintain a single identity even though their shape and personality changes.

In many ways, an extension is like a character in your dreams. They have distinct personalities, you can have interesting conversations with them, they FEEL real—but ultimately they’re a manifestation of your own mind. This doesn’t stop them from being fun and interesting individuals; it could be that your rat familiar embodies your sense of humor! But they can’t be killed because they’re a part of you; and conversely, if you die, they will die with you.

Extensions are the most common form of familiar in the Five Nations. They are a product of arcane science. On some levels (especially in Aundair), a familiar is both a tool and a status symbol for an accomplished spellcaster; wizards are rare, but some magewrights and demi-wizards manifest familiars for this reason. However, the most common users of familiars in the Five Nations are falconers. This is a magewright specialty that masters a narrow form of find familiar. A falconer can only summon a single shape of familiar—so if they can summon a hawk, they can’t turn it into a cat—but they can maintain telepathic communication and a sensory link with their familiar over a far greater distance than usual. The typical range of a falconer is one mile, but an exceptional falconer can go even farther. Falconers typically served as scouts and skirmishers in the Last War, and as the name suggests, most summon birds (typically hawks or falcons, though owls and ravens are also used). There are other magewrights who use this specialized form of find familiar in different ways—ratcatchers who conjure cats, even assassins who can conjure poisonous snakes. All of this ties to the basic point that people see extensions as tools—you learn to manifest an extension because you have a use for it.

Emissaries

When a warlock acquires a familiar, it’s generally not an extension of the warlock—it’s an emissary of the warlock’s patron, an independent entity whose services are granted to the warlock as a gift. However, this can also be an appropriate choice for a conjurer wizard or any other character who has made bargains with a powerful supernatural being. Important details about emissary familiars…

  • An emissary is an independent spirit with its own history and agenda. It’s up to the DM to decide exactly what that agenda is. It may be that the emissary is entirely benevolent and has been sent solely to assist you and protect you. But it could be that the emissary is sent to watch you—to see if you’re living up to expectations, to remind you of agreements you’ve made with your patron, or to serve as an intermediary for communication; the patron might temporarily possess the familiar when they want to communicate with you.
  • Tied to this: an emissary familiar has to follow your orders when it comes to taking physical actions, but it doesn’t have to share all of its information with you. Unlike an extension, an emissary may have knowledge you don’t have—but it’s only going to share that information with you if it serves the interests of the patron.
  • The creature type of the emissary will generally reflect the creature type of the patron. If you’re working for Sul Khatesh she’ll give you a fiend, while a celestial warlock channeling the power of the Silver Flame will have a celestial familiar. A DM may choose to tweak type and details to fit a particular patron. For example, an efreeti patron could give a warlock a familiar that’s mechanically an imp, but with the elemental type and knowledge of Primordial instead of Infernal; they might even say that its sting inflicts fire damage instead of poison damage, causing the victim to burn from within. An undead patron could likewise give an “imp” that’s got the undead type and inflicts necrotic damage with its sting.
  • Emissary familiars CAN assume a mundane animal form, but even those that take the form of animals may have a “natural” form that reflects their origins. A raven gifted by an efreeti could choose to appear as a tiny phoenix wreathed in cold flames, or just as a mundane bird.
  • It’s up to the DM to decide what happens to the emissary when it is dismissed/killed. It may be that it returns to the domain of its patron; if this is the case, it may actually WANT to be dismissed occasionally to go and take care of its own business. Or it may be that as long as it’s bound to you, it is bound to your spirit and retreats into you when dismissed. If this is the case, it may still be aware of what is going on around you, even if it can’t take any actions.

The basic question between having an extension or an emissary is whether you want your familiar to be entirely loyal and reliable, or if you LIKE the idea that your familiar may have secrets and agendas you don’t know about. An extension may have a semblance of personality, but at the end of the day it really is a puppet; an emissary is a truly independent entity who is only working with you for now, and who could have their own significant role to play at some point in the campaign.

Emissary familiars are rare. You can go to school to become a falconer, but there’s no common magewright paths that teach people to make bargains with overlords. As noted above, people generally assume that familiars are extensions, so having an imp as a familiar doesn’t automatically mean you’re making deals with demons, but to a common person what it means is that THE PROJECTION OF YOUR PERSONALITY IS A FIEND and people will judge you accordingly. And if people DO realize that no, this is an actual emissary of Sul Khatesh and you are getting advice from it, that’s not going to be great; so usually, you’re going to want your imp to be in an animal form.

Primal Spirits

Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything introduces the Wild Companion feature, allowing a druid to cast find familiar by using a charge of wild shape. Such a familiar has the fey creature type. It’s worth noting that beasts summoned with the conjure animals spell also have the fey creature type. This doesn’t mean that they are from Thelanis. If you’re a Greensinger, they might be; but typically, these are primal spirits. These can be seen as native fey, in the same way the Lords of Dust are native fiends. They are essentially stories made real—the idea of a beast given temporary form. A few details…

  • Primal spirits don’t have individual identities in the same way as emissaries or extensions. They are more iconic beings. Your raven embodies the idea of “raven” and will behave as you expect a raven to act in a fable or folktale. A cat may be curious, a raven may be wise. But the cat embodies the idea of CAT, not of your personal curious Graymalkin.
  • Primal spirits generally only remain for as long as they are needed; when they die or are dismissed they simply return to the transcendent essence of Eberron.
  • Primal spirits generally have no desires other than to help the summoner. They don’t NEED anything and generally look forward to returning to the heart of Eberron.
  • Druids and rangers typically employ primal spirits to avoid placing living animals in danger. They don’t feel any compunctions about sending summoned animals or familiars to their deaths because they aren’t really alive; you can’t kill an idea, and ultimately that’s what they are.

Primal spirits are typically only found in communities with strong primal roots—the Eldeen Reaches, the Qaltiar drow, the Lorghalen gnomes. In such places, you may find the equivalent of Falconer magewrights—gleaners who can conjure a specific familiar spirit, and who can maintain their bond with it over an unusually long distance. Primal communities often also involve animal companions, but people working with living beasts will generally be much more conscientious about placing their companions in dangerous situations—whereas primal spirits suffer no lasting harm from death.

In Conclusion…

Familiars are the most common class of companion, and extensions are the most common class of familiar. Falconers and similar magewrights use familiars as practical tools, while arcanists use often familiars as companions and assistants. Emissaries are rare and thus rarely recognized for what they are, but most people won’t be thrilled if you reveal that your companion is an actual fiend given to you because you made a bargain with a malefic power.

HOMUNCULI AND CONSTRUCT BEASTS

A homunculus is a construct, typically created by an artificer or wizard. They notably don’t follow the rules of find familiar; a homunculus can’t be simply dismissed and recalled at will. The most common form of homunculus player characters deal with is the homunculus servant, which is created using an artificer infusion. The servant is a tiny construct, and notably the shape of the homunculus is up to the artificer. The intention of this is that the appearance of the homunculus should reflect the techniques of the artificer. A Cannith Traditionalist may create a steel dragonfly with crystal wings—a creature similar to a warforged, perhaps with metal threads or gears instead of root-like tendrils. An artificer from Pylas Pyrial may use Thelanian logic to create a flying teapot. And an alchemist who’s experimenting with daelkyr fleshcrafting techniques could create a tiny platypus with one eye and three wings. A Battle Smith artificer gets to create a more powerful homunculus, a steel defender. Again, what’s specifically noted is that the shape and design of the defender is up to the artificer, including the choice as to whether it has two legs or four. This reflects the idea that all of these homunculi are extremely unique. The fact that the artificer can only have one of each type of homunculus at a time reflects the idea these creatures aren’t entirely stable—that the artificer has to continue to maintain their companion and to maintain the reserve of arcane energy that sustains it. As noted, homunculi can’t be dismissed and resummoned with the ease of a familiar, but if one is destroyed it can be rebuilt.

So a key point is that the homunculi of player characters aren’t supposed to be as familiar as a raven or even an imp. They’re supposed to stand out; they’re reflections of the unique genius of the artificer character. Unlike familiars and falconers, there isn’t a class of magewrights that creates homunculi; again, familiars ultimately come from a 1st level spell, while homunculi are derived from an artificer class feature. They’re more exotic than familiars. At the same time, people understand the CONCEPT of homunculi. Sentient magic items exist. Constructs exist. The Clockwork Menagerie of Eston was one of the wonders of Cyre centuries before House Cannith perfected the warforged. And with that said, the Last War involved a constant escalation in the development of constructs leading up to the Last War. Animated weapons have been developed, ranging from the tiny arbalester to the arcane ballista. Warforged titans stormed across the battlefield decades before their smaller cousins. And House Cannith does create construct beasts; the iron defenders of House Cannith can be produced as autonomous constructs (though they are typically considerably weaker than the steel defender of an accomplished Battle Smith). These creatures are still EXOTIC, but they aren’t unheard of and people generally won’t be frightened by them. They’ll draw attention, certainly, but attention isn’t always bad. With that said, the daelkyr-inspired fleshcrafted homunculus will generate the same sort of reaction as the imp familiar; people may not run you instantly out of town for having a creepy homunculus, but they will judge you by the company you keep.

I’ll be posting a table of random ideas for homunculus servants on my Patreon as an exclusive bonus for Inner Circle and Threshold patrons later in this week, so if you’re a supporter, keep an eye out for that!

ANIMAL COMPANIONS

What about the ranger and his wolf? Well, beasts are a part of everyday life in Eberron. From horses and tribex to the giant owls of Sharn or the Valenar hounds, there’s nothing strange about seeing someone with an animal companion. Magewright falconers conjure their companions, but Vadalis farriers can cast animal friendship, speak with animals, and beast sense, and gleaners (primal magewrights) in the Eldeen Reaches also develop these talents. Many gnomes cultivate the gift of speaking with small beasts. Exotic beasts are often rarer in major cities simply because of the difficulty of maintaining them, but people aren’t especially SURPRISED to see a ranger with a wolf companion; the fact that there are people who can befriend and speak with animals is a simple fact of life, and has been for centuries.

Animal companions aren’t exactly tools in the same way as familiars, because they’re independent living creatures. A Beast Master can replace an companion that dies, but an animal still died… while familiars and conjured beasts can be put in harm’s way with no lasting risk. Nonetheless, to the world at large they are still largely seen as tools and treated accordingly, so the same rule applies. If the ranger is allowed to bring his sword and his bow into a place of business, he’s probably allowed to bring his wolf; and if the wolf bites someone, the ranger will be held responsible, just as if he’d stabbed the victim with a sword.

Some might wonder if the existence of speak with animals would drive an overall greater wave of ethical behavior regarding the treatment of animals. Sadly, this is not the case in the Five Nations. Speak with animals exists, but MOST people can’t cast it. People will still take a tribex-drawn carriage down to a restaurant where they’ll eat a steak, without stopping to think “Was that tribex happy? Did the cow I’m eating live a good life?” The general attitude of House Vadalis is that they’ve been granted dominion over beasts, and it is their right to exploit that power. This is quite different in wide primal societies—such as the Eldeen Reaches and Lorghalen—but in the Five Nations beasts are still primarily treated as property and tools.

That’s all for now! Thanks to my Patreon supporters for helping to choose this topic and for making these articles possible.

Dragonmarks: Arcane Industry

Sora (Sahra Syrralan d’Sivis) by Julio Azevedo

Previous articles have discussed the basic principles of Arcane Science, delved into Arcane History and the evolution of the Arcane Arts, and discussed Wizard Circles. But we’re still building a picture of how magic is integrated into everyday life. What is a magewright, and how does someone become one? How widespread are factories in the Five Nations, and what are they like?

The first thing to understand is that Khorvaire is actively and rapidly evolving. My original draft of the setting imagined a world that was more industrial—a world where wands and rods had largely replaced bows, where there were analogues to cars and radio. In developing the setting we made an intentional choice to pull back from that, to ensure that at the end of the day it still felt like D&D. But that world is out there, and it’s not that far away. This is one of the main reasons we’ve never advanced the timeline. In the last century we’ve seen the development of warforged and blast disks, and the rise of the common wandslinger. Lyrandar launched its first airship eight years ago, and within eight years we have docking towers in most major cities. We’ve shown some examples of airship innovation, with double-ring vessels. But again, these are innovations we’ve seen in just eight years. What will we have in another ten years? Flying fortresses? Will we triple the speed of airships, or create skycoaches that don’t rely on manifest zones? Galifar may have been a peaceful, golden age; but stability and stagnation went hand in hand. The Last War forced the nations (and the Houses supplying them) to innovate, to use every resource, to develop new tools and techniques.

Now the war is over, that spirit is part of civilian life. The world is changing. It’s intentional that people in Khorvaire ride horses, that more soldiers use crossbows than do wands. There ARE factories in Breland, but there’s still a place in the world for the independent blacksmith working at their forge. Today Breland is ruled by a king; but who knows what tomorrow will bring. The Arcane Revolution is happening NOW, and it’s up to decide how that manifests in your campaign. So there are arcane factories, but they are still new and expanding. There are still artisans who don’t use magecraft or other cantrips in their work, especially in small communities. But factories are spreading and new magewrights are being trained every day. The world is changing.

As always, the ideas I present in this article are what I do at my table and in my Eberron. This is not canon and may contradict canon material. Where there are contradictions, it’s up to you to decide which path to follow or how best to integrate these ideas.

THE WIDER WORLD

In considering the development and impact of arcane industry, it’s important to understand that the maps we have of Khorvaire are very high level. In my opinion, they don’t show all the rivers or roads and they only call out the most important or especially interesting settlements. There are hundreds of villages in Breland; Sharn alone is surrounded by a dozen smaller communities which, among other things, produce food and other staples the City of Towers relies on. This absence isn’t an accident. While it may SEEM like a map of Breland should include every community in Breland, the practical fact is that dropping another 400 towns and villages onto the map won’t actually make it better; it would bury the existing locations in a wave of noise. Those locations that are called out are the places where things are most likely to HAPPEN. There’s always an adventure in Sharn—whereas in the Sharn-adjacent hamlet of Dane’s Rest, the most exciting thing to happen in the last century was that time Lyndimae’s sow gave birth to an aberrant-marked piglet (something those fancy Morgrave scholars still say is impossible, but they weren’t there when it burnt down the sty, now, were they?).

So where the existing maps of the Five Nations give the impression of a handful of cities spread across a largely empty landscape, I see the nations as more active and vibrant, with steady traffic on rivers, roads, and rails. There are definitely vast stretches of undeveloped land—regions such as the King’s Forest or the Dragonwood—but where you have a major city like Sharn, Wroat, Flamekeep, or Fairhaven, there’s an active community around it. Even a town like Ardev has some smaller outlying hamlets and thorps. One reason this is important is because it’s these communities that actually produce a lot of the raw materials industry relies on. The cities are where you have house enclaves, universities, and nobles hosting galas—but it’s the villages where you have the fields, quarries, and mines. If you look back to my Q’barra campaign, that was set in a small mining town that wasn’t in any canon material—because they aren’t mining dragonshards in Newthrone! So the main point is that there is more out there—there are fishing villages along the shore of Redcliff Bay and miners living in the foothills of the Blackcaps. If you need one, just call it out and add it to the map—as I’ve done with my current Threshold campaign. Threshold is a mining town that has been largely irrelevant for most of its existence and has now become important with the rise of Droaam; and so, I’ve added it to my map and my story.

So there’s a reason we don’t try to show every village. However, I do have an issue with the limited scope of the lightning rail as depicted on the current maps. While it’s easy to imagine that the rail system suffered a certain amount of damage during the war, the lightning rail has been operating for nearly two centuries; while it may have taken a century to really take root, I see it as being more widespread than is currently shown and a backbone of freight transportation. I’ll note that in my first draft of the adventure Shadows From The Last War the adventurers take the lightning rail from Sharn to Rukhaan Draal—and part of the plot rested on the idea that while Orien doesn’t currently operate other rails in Darguun, the network of conductor stones is still there and independent Orien heirs are running smaller coaches on them. Likewise, in Threshold I’ve established that the lightning rail runs through Ardev and out to Threshold… and Orien is actively negotiating to extend it into Droaam.

Part of the idea of the upcoming Frontiers of Eberron: Threshold book is to look at a smaller region in more detail. But the key point here is to understand that the economy of Khorvaire is more robust than what we’ve called out; that there is an industrial infrastructure that’s deeper than the handful of cities we’ve highlighted on the map. The focus of the existing material is always on adventure, not on establishing a clear model of the industrial economy. But the economy is supposed to be there underneath it.

LIMITATIONS AND INNOVATIONS

With that in mind, the next step is to understand the limitations of magic and a few of the key innovations that are driving the current arcane revolution. As the previous articles have established, arcane magic behaves in a scientific manner and it’s more complicated than it appears to be. It’s simplified in play because this is a game, and we don’t WANT it do be complicated for players to use. But player characters are remarkable. The fact that an artificer can potentially create ANY magic item they feel like is an expression of their remarkable talent, and also reflects unorthodox techniques; they’re the genius creating a prototype in their garage, but those same techniques don’t work on an industrial scale. Let’s quickly review some of the historic limitations on arcane magic.

  • Dragonmark Only. Long ago there were many effects that could only be produced by dragonmarked individuals and then, only a few times per day.
  • Exotic Components. Components are a limiting factor in both spellcasting and magic item creation, from the need to carry balls of sulphur and guano to cast fireball to the need to have the poison glands of a wyvern to create a dagger of venom. Looking to the latter example, a need for such exotic components made it unfeasible to produce such items on a large scale.
  • Narrow Skills. Arcane workers specialize in particular materials (cloth, wood, metal, paper) and specific schools of magic (Illusion, evocation). Except for player characters, the person who makes a hat of disguise can’t also create a wand of magic missiles, just as a gunsmith can’t assemble a television; the two items require a completely different subset of Arcana specializations.

Meanwhile, here’s a host of developments which (over a significant period of time) helped to usher in the modern age.

Spellcasting Focuses and V/S Components. The ability to use a wand to focus your fireball instead of having to carry a supply of guano-balls was a key development for the widespread wandslinger, and streamlined spellcasting overall. Likewise, verbal and somatic components are a tool that have evolved over time and allowed a more efficient use of arcane energy.

The Twelve and Dragonmark Focus Items. The Twelve created a forum in which the Dragonmarked Houses could combine their talents and create tools and techniques no single house could create alone. This accelerated the development of dragonmark focus items, which amplify the powers of a mark and can be used repeatedly. A Sivis heir being able to cast whispering wind (a 3.5 spell) once per day is a novelty; the development of the speaking stone is what transformed the communications industry. However, the cost of creating focus items was an early limitation, something that would be offset by…

Eberron Dragonshards. The most common form of dragonshard, Eberron dragonshards were found to be a universal source of arcane power—allowing early artificers to bypass the traditional limitations of rare components. However, even after this discovery was made, Eberron dragonshards weren’t available in significant quantities. When the young House Tharashk realized it could use its mark for prospecting as well as bounty hunting, Eberron dragonshards became available in significant quantities.

Access to larger quantities of Eberron dragonshards was a general boon to the development of magic items. But the match that lit the fuse of the arcane revolution was the development in the mid-ninth century of the techniques for refining Eberron dragonshards into residuum, a powdered form of the shards that concentrates their power, dramatically increasing the amount of energy people could work with. You know how there’s a base cost to creating a magic item? A significant portion of that is residuum, which can be acquired from House Tharashk—and this takes the place of the exotic components (Manticore spines! Irian crystals! Dragon’s blood!) that had been required in the past. Most magic items still do require some exotic components—you can’t make an airship without soarwood—but refined dragonshards provided a universal base material and general source of fuel that dramatically increased the ability to produce magic items and dragonmark focus items on a larger scale. Which in turn led to the following developments…

  • Agriculture. The widespread implementation of storm spires in agricultural regions allows House Lyrandar to ensure optimal weather, minimizing drought and other disasters. Cannith’s improved manufacturing allows the development and distribution of efficient tools, and they’re developing irrigation systems tied to the principles of create water. Combined with Vadalis’s enhanced livestock this created a surge in agricultural productivity in the late ninth century, contributing to the expansion of major cities and an increase in the industrial workforce.
  • Communication. While the first speaking stones were developed at the end of the eighth century, it was only with the discovery of residuum that they could be deployed on a wide scale. Improved communication helps facilitate collaboration in both research and business. The Arcane Congress developed sending stones in the early days of the Last War and continues to improve the tools of arcane communication. In turn, Tasker’s Dream—a think tank in House Sivis—is working to improve Sivis capabilities and services.
  • Manufacturing. House Cannith’s arcane forges (described in more detail below) allow more widespread production of mundane goods and tools. Combined with the development of the guild trade schools, this helped spread the used of both efficient techniques and tools that allow even independent artisans to produce goods more efficiently than in the past. These techniques include the magecraft cantrip, which allows arcane artisans work more efficiently than those using purely mundane techniques.
  • Transportation. As noted above, there are more roads and rivers in Khorvaire than we see on our maps. The elemental galleons of House Lyrandar are important for sea travel, but elemental-bound barges play an important role in river transport—and the development of residuum and improved binding techniques accelerated the production of these vessels. Likewise, it was the development of residuum that allowed the lightning rail to spread. According to canon, by 869 YK there were rail lines connecting the Five Nations all the way out to the Ironroot Mountains and the Talenta Plains, and the scope of the rail network continued to expand over the decades leading to the Last War. All of this aided in the transportation of both food and raw materials, further driving all other levels of the economy.

So the century leading up to the war saw an increase in the available labor force, while the development of cantrips and ritual magic—disseminated through guild trade schools—enable the rise of the modern magewright. Increasingly efficient techniques for finding and refining Eberron dragonshards made it possible to produce magical items and effects in larger quantities. Most professional magewrights rely on residuum to perform their rituals; it’s not just that people didn’t have the training, it’s that in the past it wouldn’t have been possible to sustain the modern magewright economy.

The Last War diverted much of the labor force, but it also created a burning need that didn’t exist under the unity of Galifar—both to supply the armies of each nation and for constant innovation, each nation eager to find some sort of edge. A century of war strained both resources and infrastructure, which is one reason that the dragonshard deposits of Q’barra and Xen’drik are of such great interest to House Tharashk. Now, in the wake of the war, the systems that evolved to feed that appetite are being turned to civilian needs—both repairing the damage that was done and finding ways to improve everyday life.

INDUSTRY IN THE WORLD

So we have a general sense of the forces that are driving the arcane revolution, but how does it actually manifest in the world? When you’re looking for general touchstones, what we’ve said is that Eberron has more in common with Earth in the nineteenth century than the twentieth or beyond. We are starting to see factories, but for the most part these are the sort of factories you’d see during the American Civil War, not modern automation. We have the point-to-point communication of the speaking stone—which fills much the same role as the telegraph—but in canon, we don’t yet have a wide-broadcast analogue to the radio. In general, magic is being used to produce better tools and techniques for artisans and farmers, but with a few notable exceptions work is still done by individuals. A typical smith may have trained at a Cannith trade school and may pay for the license that lets them display the Cannith seal; but such licensed independents still make up a significant part of the labor force. The greater industrial forces of the dragonmarked houses—Vadalis battery farms, Cannith’s creation forges—are expanding, and it’s easy to see have these could soon transform the economy in the days ahead. But again, that’s the point; the world is changing.

Having said that, the broadly-nineteenth-century model is just that—a general yardstick. Part of the point of Eberron is that it uses different tools than our world, and that means there are things that can be done in Eberron that are impossible even in the present day. While it’s not yet an economically viable service, House Orien can teleport you from Sharn to Korth in the blink of an eye. House Phiarlan may not have access to modern special effects, but they can do things with illusion we can only dream of. Prestidigitation can heat or chill food in seconds. This is especially true when we get into eldritch machines. Lyrandar’s storm spires can control the weather, and Cannith creation forges can create life. So the Five Nations don’t have analogues to television or cars, they don’t have the internet, and airships aren’t as advanced or widespread as our airplanes. But aside from the fact that arcane science advances with every day, always keep in mind the ways in which it does differ from our technology.

Let’s look at a few specific manifestations of arcane industry…

A Vadalis riding tribex, by Olie Boldador

Magebreeding

House Vadalis and those independents licensed by the Handler’s Guild cover a range of businesses: animal husbandry, teamster services, veterinary medicine. These are generally specialized, generational fields. Redleaf Harriers breeds hounds, raptors, and other hunting beasts, while the Willowhaven Ranch outside Varna is the largest dairy farm in the Five Nations. As with any dragonmarked house, most of the largest and well-supported businesses are run by house heirs, but the Handler’s Guild also licenses countless independent ranchers and breeders. The black hippogriff seal ensures that the people in charge have Vadalis training and that beasts are cared for and raised according to house standards. So there are a few massive ranches like Willowhaven, but there are countless small farms as well.

When most people hear “Vadalis,” they think of magebreeding. This is a term that has many meanings. Let’s start with the earliest description.

The widespread use of magic on Eberron has led to the development of magical enhancements to animal breeding, particularly within House Vadalis. Some experiments in that direction have created new creatures that are actually magical beasts, with unusual intelligence and supernatural or spell-like abilities. In general, however, the aim of these breeding programs is simply to create better animals—ones that are more suited for use in the work of daily life. These magically enhanced animals are called magebred.

Eberron Campaign Setting, page 295

Today, House Vadalis identifies three distinct forms of magebreeding.

Incremental magebreeding is similar to breeders in our world trying to produce a new breed of dog. The result is a slight variation in the standard beast well suited toward a particular role: a hen that lays larger eggs, a tiger that’s easier to train, a hound that thrives in colder climates or has a remarkable sense of smell. One concrete example of this is the riding tribex. For thousands of years, the plains tribex has been bred as a beast of burden and source of food. The riding tribex is smaller and faster—sturdier than a horse and capable of enduring long, sustained trips.

Enhanced magebreeding seeks to strengthen a creature, imbuing it with minor supernatural qualities. The Magebred Animal template in the 3.5 Eberron Campaign Setting suggests the following changes:

  • One of Strength, Dexterity, or Constitution is increased by 4; the other two ability scores are increased by 2.
  • Armor Class is increased by 2, reflecting increased overall durability.
  • Magebred animals are easier to train, can learn more tricks or maneuvers than purely mundane creatures, and the DC of Animal Handling checks involving the beast is reduced by 2.
  • The creature gains either a +10 bonus to one of its movement speeds, an additional +2 bonus to armor class, or a bonus to tracking checks.

These creatures are still considered beasts; in 3.5 D&D terms, they were limited to an Intelligence of 2. A few critical points about this template. It’s intended to reflect BREEDS of magebred animals. So Redleaf hounds all have +4 Dexterity and a bonus to tracking; it’s not as though two pups in the same litter each get to choose whether the +4 goes to Strength or Dexterity, or whether they get the boost to movement or tracking. House Vadalis created the first Redleaf hounds through active enhanced magebreeding; but ever since then, Redleaf Harriers has bred that enhanced line, while the house magebreeders have moved on to other things.

The second point is that this is a simple template that is intended to give a broad example of what can be done. The template only suggests a possible bonus to movement, armor class, or tracking checks. But I could see any of the following as being the sort of features that enhanced magebreeding could produce:

  • Increased fertility; increased laying for egg-laying creatures, along with potentially unusual egg characteristics.
  • Animals used to provide meat or dairy could be magebred to enhance these aspects, whether that’s simply increasing the quantity or adding an unusual quality (flavor, color). This is how you get the cow that produces chocolate milk.
  • Heightened senses; a magebred falcon might have a bonus to Perception instead of Survival.
  • Specific resistances: creating a creature that doesn’t just have thick fur, but that is actually resistant to cold damage.
  • Unnatural appearance. A horse with metallic, silvery fur; a hound with glowing eyes; cats that always have identical markings.

The key points here are that the general goal of enhanced magebreeding is to produce new breeds with hereditary traits and generally requires generations to produce results. They don’t take a horse and GIVE it metallic fur; they easily COULD with cosmetic transmutation, but it wouldn’t last. Instead they work to instill a trait over multiple generations, that will thereafter be passed down to offspring. Typically enhanced breeds are only available to house arms in the Handler’s Guild, and enhanced beasts are sterilized before they are sold to others. Stories say that there are all sorts of safeguards to deal with poachers—that enhanced animals will die if they aren’t feed special Vadalis supplements, that they will frenzy and turn on rustlers, that Vadalis has death squads that sneak around the world hunting for unauthorized breeders—but these are probably just rumors. Probably.

Innovative magebreeding involves the creation of either an entirely new species or imbuing an existing creature with dramatic supernatural characteristics. Popular legend holds that the house’s first act of innovative magebreeding was the production of the hippogriff; skeptics claim that Vadalis simply discovered the first hippogriff after it emerged from a manifest zone tied to Kythri. A more recent and dramatic example is the tressym, first produced just twenty-four years ago. The house is always working on innovative projects, but actual successes are far and few between; innovative creations are often sterile, stillborn, or mentally unstable. Many innovative creatures are monstrosities as opposed to beasts.

While it’s more colorful and exciting than, say, dairy farming, magebreeding is a tiny fraction of the work of House Vadalis. Ranches and kennels tied to the Handler’s Guild may perform iterative magebreeding, but enhanced and innovative magebreeding is performed almost entirely within house enclaves or in conjunction with the Twelve. The tressym was produced through collaboration with House Medani, and there are stories of Vadalis working with House Jorasco on ghastly experiments involving troll’s blood and medusa’s eyes.

So what does a magebreeding facility actually look like? What is the daily work that goes on within? The following tools are used in magebreeding.

  • Manifest Zones. Zones tied to Kythri and Lamannia are both highly prized by House Vadalis, though any zone can have value; a Risian manifest zone could be crucial when trying to breed a creature resistant to cold. Sometimes this is about creating a facility in a manifest zone, but often it involves using secondary materials, such as foodstuffs grown in the relevant manifest zones or harnesses formed from planar materials.
  • Focus Items and Eldritch Machines. Vadalis magebreeders use focus items that help them both to maintain control of beasts through the process of magebreeding, compel necessary behaviors, shape instincts, and monitor the state of their charges. Eldritch machines can serve more dramatic purposes; one that comes to mind is the spire of growth, a monolith that accelerates the aging of any beasts within its radius; these help with generational breeding, though these spires are expensive to create and dangerous to maintain (supposedly they don’t affect humanoids…). In general, eldritch machines that produce truly dramatic effects are likely to be either unique or experimental, and may become unstable or require a steady supply of dragonshards.
  • Rare Components. As noted before, Vadalis has been experimenting with troll’s blood. Innovative and enhanced magebreeding often uses transmutation techniques to imbue a creature with the qualities of another creature; this can require organs, blood, or other elements of the creature with the desired trait. Likewise, planar resources can be important in magebreeding.
  • Transmutation Magic. Magebreeding can involve a wide array of transmutation rituals, most of which have little practical application to adventuring: rituals to enhance fertility, highly specific polymorph effects, rituals that simply increase a beast’s chances of surviving the transfusions and other operations it’s going through. A side effect of this is that there is a corps of specialists within Vadalis who excel at cosmetic transmutation (as described in Exploring Eberron). This is rarely a service they perform for humanoids, but there is at least one Vadalis transmuter who runs a business altering the new pets of rich clients to match the appearance of a deceased pet. As a general rule, polymorph alone doesn’t allow successful breeding; polymorphed creatures are functionally sterile while under the effects of the spell, so while you can turn a cat into a dog for an hour, if it mates with another dog in that time it won’t end up producing either puppies or kittens. This is certainly something Vadalis has and continued to experiment with, but lasting change isn’t as simple as a single 4th level spell.

So the point is that magebreeding facilities often look like farms or vertinary hospitals, with special chambers for performing rituals or imbuing planar energies. But magebreeding is invariably a long-term process, involving both breeding and the careful study of multiple generations. Vadalis is always searching for ways to produce swifter and more dramatic results… And these efforts often end in disaster, or at least adventure!

What about plants? One question that’s frequently come up is whether House Vadalis also magebreeds plants. On consideration, my answer is that they do not. Their expertise is limited to fauna, not flora. We have specifically called out Riedran work magebreeding plants (such as dreamlily and the pommow). We’ve talked about the fact that soarwood is a vital limited resource, suggesting that Vadalis can’t replicate it. I also see magical manipulation of plantlife as something that may end up being a strength of the Eldeen Reaches. So there are lots of interesting possibilities for magebred plants, but it’s not a field monopolized by a dragonmarked house;this is an area of the economy that hasn’t currently been locked down, leaving opportunities for independent forces to fill that gap.

Magewrights

A magewright is someone who uses cantrips and arcane rituals to perform their job. It’s a generic term, like technician. “Magewright” isn’t a job; the job is lamplighter or locksmith or truthteller. A typical blacksmith is a magewright, using magecraft and mending to enhance their work; but if you ask their occupation, they’ll say “blacksmith.” The point is that in the modern age, arcane cantrips and rituals are becoming standard tools of industry. If you go to a small village, you may find a smith who doesn’t know how to cast mending; but they’ll have a hard time competing with the Cannith-trained smiths who can mend a broken object in seconds.

As has been discussed in earlier articles and Exploring Eberron, most magewrights are highly specialized and use cantrips or spells that are more limited than the spells used by player characters—though sometimes limitations are balanced by specific advantages. A magewright launderer may use a form of prestidigitation that can only clean or dry, and that only affects fabric or leather—but it may affect a larger area than the standard cantrip. As noted in Rising From The Last War, most magewrights can only cast leveled spells as rituals (even spells that normally don’t have the ritual tag); these often rituals take longer than usual; and they require an additional material cost of 20 gp x the spell’s level, typically refined Eberron dragonshards. Magewrights can produce their effects over and over, but there is a cost in time and gold. Likewise, Magewrights are often proficient with very narrow slices of Arcana. For a player character, Arcana represents broad knowledge; a magewright might be an expert with Arcana but ONLY regarding illusion effects, because that’s all that they mastered in their studies.

Like the wandslinger, the number of magewrights in the world has increased exponentially over the course of the last century. This is due both to the development of improved training techniques and to the need for more services. Magewrights also highlight a crucial difference between the arcane economy and our technological economy. Arcane magic can produce remarkable effects, but it often requires a living creature to guide it. At the moment, laundry is typically done by a magewright who casts their specialized prestidigitation, not by use of a machine anyone can use. Some of the most important tools are dragonmark focus items that can only be operated by someone who possesses a specific dragonmark. Magic items exist, and as noted below exist in ever-increasing numbers—but at the moment there is a vital human (well, living) component to the economy.

Most magewrights are trained by one of the guilds tied to the dragonmarked houses. These trade schools pass along specific techniques tied to the houses, and ultimately provide the student with the opportunity to work within the guild or to license an independent business. The Arcane Congress has its own training programs, and other nations are working on their own programs, but these are typically limited to a few specific fields that until recently were critical to the war effort; again, you don’t go to “magewright school”, you train to be a tinker or a lamplighter. Aside from having the greatest expertise and deep pockets, the trade schools of the guild have the public trust; everyone KNOWS that if you want to be the best smith you can be, you should get Cannith training, not study with some Morgrave outreach program. With that said, not all Magewrights learn from schools. Especially in smaller communities, a magewright may learn their trade through a local apprenticeship. It’s also possible that a magewright could stumble onto their own unique techniques (for example, an Aundairian shoemaker who learns fey techniques for mending shoes).

Manufacturing

House Cannith dominates industrial manufacturing, but isn’t particularly involved in the harvesting or development of raw materials. Likewise, House Cannith is known for two things: the development and maintenance of durable tools and weapons and the creation of magic items (common and otherwise). A key example of this is clothing. Cannith produces and sells looms and weaver’s tools, and it creates enchanted clothing—but it largely performs the latter function by purchasing clothing from weavers and then adding the enchantments. In the case of some of the new factories, Cannith is employing weavers to produce those clothes onsite—but it doesn’t dominate the production of clothing or the fashion industry in the same way that it dominates the creation of swords or constructs. Many expert artisans in all fields still receive Cannith magewright training, but Cannith on the whole is focused on function; fashion is another cottage industry, where independent forces like Clebdecher, Davandi, and a host of Aundairians can shine. 

This ties to the general point that a great deal of modern manufacturing is still the province of individuals or small businesses. The local blacksmith may be Cannith-trained, but you still go and deal with the local blacksmith.

With that said, that is changing. Eldritch machines like creation forges and the legendary genesis forge are amazing arcane factories that allow heirs to channel the forces of conjuration and transmutation and reshape matter through magic alone. However, most Cannith factories aren’t that advanced. They employ assembly lines, with workers having focused tasks that contribute to a greater whole. They use arcane principles—using forms of prestidigitation and mending to polish and shape elements, for example—but they are still more akin to nineteenth century factories than those of the modern day. The simple fact of the matter is that I’m not an expert on manufacturing techniques, and I can’t give you a precise breakdown of what goes on in a Cannith arms factory. But I can say that if that factory is producing swords, every sword in a particular model is nearly identical in quality and appearance—and that it’s produced by an assembly line as opposed to the work of a single smith. It is also the case that a Cannith workshop is generally tightly focused and uses tools that effectively provide advantage to the production of a specific type of thing. That Cannith arms factory is able to churn out swords and halberds, but they can’t suddenly turn around and start producing wagons tomorrow; they’re metalworks, and while they might be able to shift to producing maces by changing out molds, they can’t suddenly start producing leather armor.

Cannith is also the source of the bulk of the magic items that are found in the present day. As a general rule, even common items aren’t yet MASS produced, though Cannith is working on it. Let’s consider a cloak of many fashions. First they need the base, physical cloak, which has to be produced to certain specifications (a particular material, specific total mass; given the esoteric nature of arcane magic, it’s even possible that it has to be a specific color). Assembly line workers can perform preparatory work—imbuing the material with residuum and a certain elixir; attaching a brooch, itself specially prepared—but ultimately it is a specialized magewright who performs a lengthy ritual that draws on arcane forces and binds them to the cloth. The Cannith facility is designed to help this process; the chamber that magewright works in is engraved with arcane patterns that allow them to channel the energies involved in illusion-into-cloth rituals more efficiently. This ties to the basic difference between Cannith artisans and player characters creating magic items. Cannith facilities are geared to create specific items and they can do so quicker and more cheaply than an artificer. But that workshop is entirely geared toward binding illusion into clothes—producing a specific version of cloak of many fashions, perhaps a form of cloaks of elvenkind, maybe a specific type of glamoured armor. They can’t just decide to produce a wand of magic missiles tomorrow; their speed and efficiency is tied to following a clearly established pattern.

Cannith dominates manufacturing and sets the standards of the industry, but that doesn’t mean all goods are manufactured by Cannith. We’ve always called out that Breland has the greatest industrial capacity of the Five Nations, while through the Arcane Congress Aundair has the most sophisticated facilities for producing magic items. The Cogs of Sharn are an important center for metalworking. Cannith facilities are simply better, because dragonmark focus items are cheaper and more effective than other tools and because Cannith artisans have Artisan’s Intuition; but Brelish facilities are still effective and capable of producing mundane equipment on par with Cannith’s basic goods.

What About Automation?

Even before House Cannith created the fully sentient warforged, it developed the semi-sentient warforged titans. Homunculi have been around for quite some time, and I’ll talk about both homunculi and familiars in more detail in a future IFAQ. The principles of arcane automation are clearly on the table, and already one of the primary concerns meatbags—I mean, people—have raised about the warforged is that these tireless constructs might steal the jobs of honest folk. As it stands, the general concept is that the science just isn’t there yet. There may certainly be prototype factories where animated metal limbs perform the work that once required human hands, or where docents perform the work of enchantment. But again, this ties to the point that the world is changing. Currently, the magewright is a crucial living component of modern manufacturing; but perhaps the next decade will bring dramatic change.

WHY DOES THIS MATTER?

This is always the key question with this type of article. Ultimately, why does any of this matter? How does any of this actually affect your adventure or your adventurer? Here’s a few things to consider.

  • Independent artisans are still common. Most are trained or licensed by the dragonmarked houses, and people value a house license because it promises a standardized level of quality. If you have the Guild Artisan background, odds are good you’re tied to one of the house guilds… But if you’re proficient with Smith’s Tools, you could have been a soldier trained to maintain equipment in the Last War, you could have worked in the Cogs, or you could simply have learned the trade from the village smith.
  • Manifest zones are often an important aspect of industry. It’s Syrania that makes the City of Towers possible. As a DM developing an interesting industrial site, consider if there’s a manifest zone that could be relevant—and if so, what unforeseen consequences it could have. Sharn has its radiant idols. If Cannith has built a massive forgehold in a Fernian manifest zone to take advantage of its Fires of Industry trait, they might run into problems when an exiled dao decides to lay claim to the facility…
  • Consider the practical applications of cantrips. Within seconds, a magewright can heat, chill, clean, flavor, or mend. That’s a tool; prestidigitation lets you heat and flavor food, but unless you’re proficient with cook’s utensils there’s no assurance you’ll do it well.
  • Factories exist, and employ assembly lines and specialized facilities, but are not as advanced—or automated—as what we’re used to.
  • On the other hand, eldritch machines can produce effects that are beyond what we can do today. However, these often either require a dragonmarked heir (as with the storm spire or creation forge) or are either unique or prototype facilities that could easily have unexpected problems.
  • Tied to this, arcane science is constantly advancing. Both the houses and independent forces are trying to push the envelope. Risky experiments can have unsafe consequences or require questionable actions—whether that’s about Vadalis kidnapping trolls to harvest their blood, or Cannith making a new generation of warforged that channel the essence of fiends from Shavarath.

GENERALQ&A

As we start moving into the late Victorian period the first department stores begin showing up and textiles are by and large one of the most industrious industries… The smaller tailors will buy the newest patterns from France or Italy, then you’d go in and be fitted and pick out your fabrics. In larger department stores it is much the same, but instead of a dress made in your hometown it is shipped in from a more manufacture savvy city or country. I’m assuming that one could say that Cannith acts as these large department stores, and these dresses (still made to order and fit) are then brought in so that Cannith artificers can enchant them. Or would it be more of a service that Cannith does, that one can order a gown in a fine silk, and the tailor can have it sent off to Cannith to have a glamour put upon it?

There’s a few factors here. The first is that so far in canon I don’t believe we’ve discussed the existence of a classic department store in the model of Selfridge’s or Le Bon Marche. I believe that there’s a lot of room for just such a business to exist in Fairhaven or Sharn, but the point is that it doesn’t exist yet. MY inclination would be to highlight this as a key development of the world moving forward from the war—to tell a Selfridge-like story of the entrepreneur who’s trying to introduce the department store to the Five Nations. The question then comes as to whether that store would be Cannith, or whether it would be an independent—who could, therefore, be an Aurum member. Essentially, Cannith specializes in MAKING things; we’ve never said they specialize in SELLING them, and that could be a crucial distinction here.

This ties to the key question of where the dragonmarked monopolies lie. What businesses do you want to be utterly dominated by the houses, and where are the opportunities for independents and the Aurum to get a foothold? Just as I suggest above that Vadalis isn’t involved in magebreeding plants, I’m inclined to say that Cannith is focused on function over fashion. I DO think it’s reasonable to say that they enchant bolts of fabric with relevant enchantments (self-cleaning, simple glamerweave effects) and then sell them to tailors. But I don’t think that most dressmakers are Cannith. In Sharn: City of Towers, the two most celebrated tailors are Hellien Clamas Clebdecher and Thurik Davandi—both independent gnomes. In Threshold, the Cannith heir runs the smithy while Littlehand Haberdashers is independent. Personally, I like having those spaces in the world that fall in the cracks between houses. I think it IS reasonable to say that Cannith produces bolts of cloth—that tailors buy their materials from Cannith—but I’m OK with the idea that fashion is outside of Cannith, and that the department store could be a new development.

But also tied to that, in general I tend to think that fine glamerweave is often custom work. I think it’s reasonable to say that there are basic glamerweave effects that can be bound to bolts of cloth and that are seen in bulk—field of stars, flowing water, embers—but I tend to think that more dramatic glamerweave effects are usually custom work. So it could be that a tailor would make a dress and then you’d take it to a glamerweave artisan, but I don’t think that artisan would necessarily be Cannith.

Would it be House Cannith that has magewright plumbers?

Yes and no. Rather than “plumber,” I’d call this magewright trade custodian. Prestidigitation to clean; a form of mending that can be used to repair damaged masonry and wood; and potentially a speciality spell like create or destroy water, floating disk, or even some form of generating fire to dispose of refuse. Custodians could serve as plumbers in cities that have plumbing, but would also deal with general maintenance of infrastructure, remove refuse and graffiti, and so on. Again, I could definitely see that the Cannith Tinker’s Guild would TRAIN custodians, but I’m not sure that it would actually broker their services; I think custodians would probably work directly for the civic authority. However, the Tinker’s Guild might license itinerant custodians who travel between smaller villages.

What’s the role of the city of Making, which now resides on the Glass Plateau, in this? Were there any particular innovations or was it “just” a major industrial center? Was it the original home of one or more Cannith families?

The city of Making is a source of contradictory canon. In some places it’s described as “the birthplace of House Cannith.” Yet Rising From The Last War and earlier canon sources clearly establish Eston as the seat of House Cannith and the focus of its greatest works. Likewise, Rising says “A secret Cannith facility is supposed to hide in the city’s subterranean depths“—which implies that the city overall isn’t dominated by Cannith.

My answer lies in the final question—Was it the original home of one or more Cannith families? As this article notes, Cannith was formed from multiple families. The Vown family—which we’ve called out as one of the more powerful families today—was definitely associated with Eston. I’d say that the region around making was associated with both the Harn and Juran families (though the Jurans were always travelers and didn’t settle in one city). While Eston became the seat of the united house, Making remained a center of GENERAL industry within Cyre, both Cannith and other cottage industries. To tie it to the preceding questions, I’d take it a step further and say that Making might have been the center for Cannith’s textile production—so yes, Cannith had facilities in Making, but they largely produced bolts of cloth and other basic goods, whereas in Eston they have the clockwork menagerie and three creation forges. This ties to the statement that Cannith had a SECRET facility beneath Making; the point is that they had factories and facilities on the surface but that they were all devoted to peaceful production, while if there was some sort of weapons research going on in Making, it was in this hidden outpost.

As with all of these articles, there’s many more aspects of this I’d like to cover. Future IFAQs may deal with questions about the lightning rail, airships, and familiars. As always, thanks to by Patreon supporters, who chose this topic and who make these articles possible!

IFAQ: Wizard Circles

In my last three Dragonmark articles, I’ve discussed Arcane Science, The Arcane Arts, and Arcane History. This has raised a few questions, including…

In the last article you mentioned the Guild of Moonlight and Whispers. Could you provide the names of some of the other wizard circles and arcane orders that make up the Arcane Congress?

Certainly! Arcane orders have played an important role in the development of arcane science. and can provide both connections and rivals for spellcasting characters. Eberron: Rising From The Last War discusses the costs and benefits of arcane orders on page 158, while Sharn: City of Towers discusses them on page 146. In short, membership in an arcane order provides you with high-quality lodging, advantage on arcane research and benefits when creating magic items when you have access to the facilities of your order. But beyond that, it provides a degree of status: If you’re a member of the Esoteric Order of Aureon, you’re a REAL wizard. While these are tangible benefits, a second point is that in means that you have peers. As we’ve always said, true wizards are rare and remarkable. If you’re in an arcane order, you know other wizards and artificers. They could provide you with useful leads or insights for your adventures. You could learn spells from the order’s library; if a DM wants to limit spell access, it could be that certain orders are the only place to acquire a specific unusual spell, because Maximillian Hysian of the Esoteric Order created Maximilian’s Earthen Grasp. It can also be a fun source of rivals—whether establishing that you have a friendly rivalry with a member of your own order, or a more bitter feud with a member of another order. It is the case that not all arcane scholars use the wizard or artificer class; there could be a sage in your circle who knows 5th level spells even though they can’t cast them, or someone capable of creating magic items even though they don’t have the full abilities of an artificer.

The canon books specifically discuss the three orders known in Sharn and Breland: the Esoteric Order of Aureon, the Guild of Starlight and Shadows, and the now-shunned Closed Circle. Arcane orders are found across the Five Nations, but they began in ancient Thaliost and Aundair has more than any other nation.

As with anything I write, this is a foundation for DMs to build upon. Ignore what you don’t like, and add your own ideas to your Eberron!

THE ARCANE ORDER OF AUREON (Aundair, Thrane)

The Arcane Order of Aureon is the largest and most powerful circle in Aundair, wielding influence both within the Arcane Congress and among the nobility of the nation. For this reason it is often disparaged by the other circles, who assert that it has become a hollow shell choosing members based on pedigree rather than arcane talent… essentially, that its members are more likely to be nobles rather than sages. Members of the Arcane Order must swear to use “Aureon’s Gift” to preserve civilization and in the service of the law. While its diverse membership practice all forms of magic, the schools of evocation, abjuration, and divination have especially strong support in the order.

Though not the first wizard’s circle, this was the first circle to use the term arcane order. The Arcane Order was founded in ancient Daskara by monks devoted to Aureon, but quickly spread into Thaliost. Bound by the belief that magic should be a force for law and order, the circle were staunch supporters of Galifar I. They provided magical support during his conquest and helped enforce order across the united kingdom in the aftermath. They formed the solid foundation of the Arcane Congress and ensured the Congress served crown and kingdom. It’s worth noting that the Princess Aundair was originally a member of the Guild of Moonlight and Whispers—and that Aundair herself was instrumental in convincing the other circles to unite in the Arcane Congress, setting aside the feuds many of the lesser circles had with the Arcane Order. Those feuds continue to this day, but are conducted within the confines of the Congress.

Over the course of centuries, internal rivalries caused the Arcane Order to split along national lines. This resulted in Breland’s Esoteric Order of Aureon and the Erudite Order of eastern Cyre. The Arcane Order remained a force in central Cyre and in Thrane, though its support dropped significantly in Thrane following the depredations of Sarmondelaryx, the Year of Blood and Fire, and the rise of the Silver Flame. Today the Arcane Order maintains a single hall in Thrane, in the city of Sigilstar.

THE GILDED LABYRINTH (Thrane)

While small, the Gilded Labyrinth is the one truly respected arcane order in Thrane. Its members are more commonly known as Silver Pyromancers, and specialize in incorporating the divine energy of the Silver Flame into arcane spells. This requires a deep devotion to the Flame in addition to arcane knowledge. Mechanically, members of the Gilded Labyrinth might be Divine Soul sorcerers or Celestial warlocks, but their traditions are grounded in arcane science and members must be proficient in Arcana. The Labyrinth is an arm of the Church of the Silver Flame, operating under the broader umbrella of the Order of the Pure; more information can be found on page 152 of the Five Nations sourcebook.

THE GUILD OF MOONLIGHT AND WHISPERS (Aundair)

Said to be the first true wizard’s circle in Khorvaire, the Guild of Moonlight and Whispers was founded in ancient Thaliost by Margana Lain. The guild was dedicated to finding ways to replicating the mystical powers of the fey through arcane science. Members specialize in illusion, enchantment, divination, and magic related directly to the fey, and the Guild is an exceptional source of knowledge regarding fey and archfey.

Moonlight isn’t a large circle, in part because of its extremely high standards. However, it is the most widely respected circle in Aundair, in part because Princess Aundair was herself a member of Moonlight and Whispers. While its members are devoted to their nation, they believe that the Arcane Order of Aureon’s obsession with laws and political power undermines the pure pursuit of arcane knowledge. When someone challenges Aureon in the Arcane Congress, it usually takes the support of Moonlight to have a chance to succeed. Breland’s Guild of Starlight and Shadows was founded by members of Moonlight, and the two are generally friendly; while Starlight has less of an interest in the fey, both circles have a common interest in illusion and enchantment. Members of one of these circles will usually be admitted to the halls of the other, though not accorded the privileges of full members.

Mechanically, most members of the circle are wizards, but the guild does accept Archfey warlocks as long as they are proficient in Arcana; the circle is devoted to understanding fey magic, not simply using it.

THE ORDER OF THE ETHEREAL BLADE (Aundair)

The Order of the Ethereal Blade was founded in the fifth century (YK) as a duelist’s society, where members of other circles could test their skills and spells in battle with fellow mages. What began as a mystical fight club became the core of the original Knights Arcane, and also pioneered Aundair’s Bladesinger tradition (the Tairnadal, Greensingers, and others have their own forms of this path). Today, the Ethereal Blade focuses on the study and development of war magic, but it remains a dueling society whose members are always ready to prove their mettle in battle. Many of Aundair’s finest warmages are members of the Order, along with officers of the Knights Arcane and Knight Phantoms.

While it began as a wizard’s circle, today the Order of the Ethereal Blade welcomes Eldritch Knights, Arcane Tricksters and others who blend martial and mystical techniques. With that said, it’s still an arcane order. There are other societies that cater purely to duelists and wandslingers, including Fairhaven’s League of ir’Lain and the Darkwood Wands of Passage.

THE UNSPOKEN WORD (Aundair)

The Unspoken Word is devoted to the pursuit of ultimate arcane power. Members believe that laws and moral concerns should never stand in the way of knowledge. Just as the Guild of Moonlight and Whispers seeks to unlock the mysteries of the fey, the Unspoken Word strives to master the powers of dragons, overlords, and daelkyr. Its members are determined to unravel the secrets of the Du’raskha Tul, the moon-shattering magics of the giants, and more. What has allowed this order to survive when similar groups—such as the Closed Circle of Breland—were destroyed is the absolute insistence that such magic should never be USED: that these words will forever remain unspoken. Unspoken mages insist that fear cannot be allowed to stand in the way of progress. But an Unspoken wizard pursuing the moon-breaking magic of the giants will insist that they have no desire to shatter moons; it’s simply that if such powers can be understood, could we use them in positive ways?

Members of the Unspoken Word are often viewed with a trace of fear, and most enjoy this infamy. They like to imply that they have dreadful secrets locked away in their vaults, fell powers they could unleash if they choose to. But again, they continue to exist because they never have caused disasters… and because their members are mages of considerable skill. While most are wizards, they accept Fiend and Great Old One Warlocks, provided they are proficient in Arcana and devoted to the pursuit of arcane science.

Mordain the Fleshweaver is said to have been part of the Unspoken Word before his fall from grace, though other accounts say that he began as a member but ultimately severed ties with the order in part because he believed such knowledge should be USED. However, the order may still have relics from his time as a member, and it’s possible Mordain still sends them little “gifts” — some of which could be very dangerous.

Lesser Orders

The circles mentioned above have considerable prestige and significant resources. They have broad areas of study; while Moonlight may specialize in Illusion and Enchantment, you can still discuss evocation in the hall. But especially in Aundair, there are a host of lesser orders. Most have a narrow focus and more limited resources. Members of the Lodge of the Eternal Flame are acknowledged as some of the most accomplished pyromancers in Khorvaire, but they only accept Evokers and refuse to practice any form of frost-related magic, and they only have a single hall. Here’s a few of these lesser orders.

  • Dolurrh’s Gate. Based in Fairhaven in Aundair, this is one of the only respected orders of Necromancers in the Five Nations. Members of the order focus on the positive uses of necromancy, such as the practical value of speak with dead; they’re also experts on undead, studying how to contain and control undead threats.
  • The Golden Seal. This order of Abjurers is based in Fairhaven in Aundair. Originally part of the Arcane Order of Aureon, they were split from the main order in 312 YK and charged with maintaining the mystic defenses of the Arcane Congress—and in replicating the abilities of the Mark of Warding. It was wizards of the Golden Seal who first perfected the common glyph of warding spells used in the Five Nations. While small, this is an elite order whose members gained considerable prestige during the Last War.
  • The Guild of Endless Doors. Based in the city of Passage in Aundair, this guild of Conjurers catalogs manifest zones that can serve as planar portals, along with the circumstances that can open them. They are determined to unlock the secrets of teleportation, and to make this a part of everyday life. They have often feuded with the Guild of Moonlight and Whispers, and some believe that House Orien has sabotaged their research. It’s worth noting that the Guild of Endless Doors did develop the forms of teleport, teleportation circle, and misty step currently taught at Arcanix; it’s simply that those first two spells are largely useless because of how few people in the Five Nations can actually cast them, and they are working on developing more accessible forms of this magic. However, they are a lesser order and lack the resources of Orien.
  • The Keepers of Aureon’s Veil. The Keepers are a semi-monastic order, who maintain the Starpeaks Observatory in the mountains close to the village of Askelios. While reclusive, they are respected for their exceptional work with divination; when a Keeper addresses the arcane congress, people listen. This is an excellent option for a Diviner with the hermit background.
  • The Lodge of the Eternal Flame. Located in the city of Thaliost, this order of Evokers specializes in pyromancy. The Lodge is located on a small manifest zone tied to Fernia, and the “Eternal Flame” is a manifestation of that.
  • The Children of Siberys. One of the newest circles is based in Arcanix, and is notable in that it doesn’t actually involve wizards. This article discusses “Dragonblood sorcerers”—sorcerers who use the trappings and techniques of arcane magic to focus their gifts. Traditionally these sorcerers have been rare curiosities. Recently Arcanix Provost Iria ir’Rayne posited that there may be considerably more latent Dragonblood sorcerers in the world than we realize, simply waiting for their powers to be recognized and released. Iria founded the Children of Siberys in 989 YK, with the intention of both guiding Dragonblood students and in studying the nature of Dragonblood sorcery. At the moment it’s a small order that lacks resources or influence, but ir’Rayne is fighting to expand the circle. A player character who chooses to be a Dragonblood sorcerer could easily be an important member of the Children, even at low level.

Again, these are just a few of the lesser orders… and these are orders that are active today, not taking into account the many circles that have fallen over time, on their own or through hostile action (like the Closed Circle of Sharn).

Secret Societies

Arcane orders are exclusive, but generally not secret; part of the point of joining an arcane order is the prestige associated with it. While the Unspoken Word walks a dangerous line, it celebrates this and takes pride in its work. However, there are other cabals of mages that aren’t so open. The Court of Shadows is a league of warlocks and wizards inspired by Sul Khatesh. The Mosiac Committee is an Aundairian society that works to obscure the Draconic Prophecy. The College of Whispers is devoted to the Shadow, and counts both bards and wizards among its members. These are just a few examples; there are many more hidden below the surface of society.

Q&A

What is the relationship between wizard circles and the dragonmarked houses? They come across like smaller, yet non-negligible businesses and start-ups standing under the shadow of much vaster megacorporations.

While Sharn: City of Towers highlights the ability to sell spellcasting services as one of the benefits of an order, this is rendered somewhat obsolete by the current implementation of magewrights and notably isn’t mentioned as a benefit of circle membership in Rising From The Last War. Essentially, while your wizard may know how to cast knock, imagine our world: if you need someone to open your door, are you going to go to the Mason’s hall and ask if someone there can help, or are you just going to go to the professional locksmith who has a store on the corner and is licensed by House Kundarak? And while the orders allow members to create magic items at a lower cost, they don’t have the facilities to produce such items on an industrial scale. It is the case that if you’re looking for a magical service no magewright can provide or a magic item Cannith doesn’t sell, the Esoteric Order of Aureon might be able to help you — but precisely because that would be dealing with services the houses can’t provide, they aren’t direct rivals.

With that said, the circles are responsible for many of the developments that have brought services that were once solely tied to the dragonmarked houses to the public domain. I believe the Guild of Endless Doors has already cracked the basic mystery of teleportation, which is why an Arcanix-trained wizard can learn the teleport spell; it’s simply that as a 5th level spell it’s beyond the ability of any common magewright and hasn’t been able to be incorporated into everyday magic, and they’re still trying to develop a more accessible form of it. Likewise, while the guilds are not run to make a profit, some receive grants from the Arcane Congress while others sell their work to the Arcane Congress; these funds have been invested over centuries and ensure the solvency of the circles.

Would the Aurum count among its number many members of arcane orders?

Yes, it’s quite likely that the Aurum includes a number of influential members of arcane orders. And it may well be that there are Aurum concordians helping to fund the work of the Guild of Endless Doors and other circles that have the potential of undermining dragonmarked monopolies.

When you say the Guild of Moonlight and Whispers has high standards, what form might that take? Do you need to be able to cast second level spells, or have at least a +7 to Arcana, or pass a series of tests (or all of the above)?

Largely this is a plot device. It’s quite reasonable to say that they’d actually require someone to be able to cast a spell of the Third Circle (3rd level) or to hit a repeated set of high Arcana checks in an extended challenge. But if you WANT a PC to be part of an order at 1st level, you could say that an influential member of the circle has sponsored them because “They can see their exceptional promise” or simply as a mysterious favor—no one knows why Syla ir’Lain broke protocols to allow her in, but some say the request was made by the Lady in Shadow herself! The main point is to say that membership is exclusive and that members must be remarkable in some way — it’s not just magewrights and wandslingers.

Can you explain the relationship between the Wizard Circles and the Arcane Congress?

The formal structure of the Arcane Congress would need to be the topic of another article. The circles are part of the foundation of the Arcane Congress and have representatives in the Congress, along with the noble families, but the Congress is a formal institution that directly serves the crown (and is funded by it). The Arcane Order of Aureon was instrumental in building the foundation of the Congress, but the Order and the Congress are two separate entities (though many members of the Order serve in the Congress).

In a sense, the circles serve as research arms of the Congress. If the Guild of Endless Doors unlocks new secrets about teleportation, it will pass those along to the Congress. In some cases circles receive research grants from the Congress, while others operate independently and sell the fruits of their labor to the Congress.

Are there similar organizations for sorcerers and warlocks?

Part of the challenge here is that WE see the world through a mechanical lens. WE see all wizards as wizards, all sorcerers as sorcerers. But the WORLD doesn’t necessarily have such ironclad distinctions. Consider this: Wizards don’t choose their Arcane Tradition until 2nd level. They all start with the same basic foundation. They are all using the same arcane science; even if they debate the merits of Externalism versus Siberyan Theory, two wizards can trade spells. Arcane Tradition is a point where they diverge, but it’s a specialization rather than a completely different path. I may be an Evoker while you’re a Diviner, but we’re still both WIZARDS… And I can still cast divinations, and you can still cast fireballs. We still have a common frame of reference. And that’s part of what wizards circles are for: for wizards to learn from one another, to collaborate on research, and so on.

By contrast, WE see all sorcerers as sorcerers, but in practice they don’t have a lot in common. This is part of why THEY choose their archetype at 1st level: because sorcerers with different origins are extremely different. Consider three sorcerers: a human with red scales and an affinity for flame, who might grow wings if they become powerful enough; a Lyrandar half-elf who channels power through their Mark of Storm; and a kalashtar orphan who intuitively wields divine energies as a Divine Soul sorcerer. What do these three have in common? What can they teach one another? What would cause THEM to think that they should form a club?

Having said that, there are some organizations for sorcerers. The biggest are called “dragonmarked houses.” The previous article on Arcane History touches on “Dragonblood” sorcerers, who DO use the trappings of arcane science to master their abilities, and I’ve given them a lesser order in the list above… But that’s because they’re TRYING to approach their powers from a scientific perspective and learn from them.

Warlocks are in a similar position. They choose their patrons at 1st level, and again, an Archfey warlock devoted to the Forest Queen doesn’t feel some sort of kinship to a Great Old One warlock working for Dyrrn the Corruptor just because they are both arbitrarily classified as “warlocks.” Warlocks with an interest in arcane science can join circles, as described above. Other warlocks generally only ally with warlocks serving the same patron, and often these covens are highly secretive (such as the Court of Shadows). So there are definitely alliances of warlocks, but they are usually driven by allegiance to a common patron, not by a shared scholarly interest in the abstract experience of being a warlock.

Also are there any other circles outside of Aundair, like Cyre and Karrnath?

The question raised was specifically about the circles aligned with the Arcane Congress, so I wasn’t covering other nations; Thrane just snuck in (since admittedly the Gilded Labyrinth isn’t part of the Congress). Breland has the Esoteric Order of Aureon, the Guild of Moonlight and Shadows, and had the Closed Circle. Karrnath doesn’t support wizard’s circles; it focused on martial orders and chivalric societies. With that said, some of those martial orders include warmages and the like; the Order of the Blackened Sky is an example of this. but they are martial orders with a magical aspect, not wizard’s circles.

Would The Unspoken Word be trying to discover the cause of the Mourning? Given that discovering the cause of the Mourning might return the world to war, might the Aurum, the Houses, or peace-loving monarchs be trying to stop them?

In my opinion, there are MANY forces trying to discover the cause of the Mourning. The Unspoken Word, the Arcane Order of Aureon, the Royal Eyes, the King’s Dark Lanterns, Rekkenmark, the Order of the Emerald Claw, the Lord of Blades, the Shadow Cabinet, every branch of House Cannith, and many more. Yes, while we don’t know the cause of the Mourning, there will be peace because we are afraid to return to war. However…

  • It is entirely possible that the Mourning was caused by a manufactured weapon or ritual.
  • If that’s the case, someone already KNOWS the cause of the Mourning. They could be perfecting the ritual or building an improved, focused version of the weapon.
  • If someone does master such a weapon and we know nothing about it, we will have no defense. Whether we intend to build such a weapon ourselves or simply to discover how to protect ourselves from it, we must understand it.
  • We cannot take the risk of someone else discovering and mastering this power while we remain in ignorance. Even if every nation agreed not to pursue it, that would leave groups like the Lord of Blades and the Emerald Claw pursuing it, and imagine the horrors we would face if one of them mastered such power?
  • For a more idealistic approach, a certain queen might think with the power of the Mourning at my disposal, no nation could stand against me. I would be able to restore a peaceful, unified Galifar without even fighting a war, because who would dare challenge such power?
  • Given that: are you so certain that the Unspoken Word wasn’t actually behind the Mourning? If anyone could have produced such a horrific weapon, wouldn’t it be them—most likely working in the direct service of the crown? You can be sure the Voice of Breland has accused them of it…

So first of all, I think the Unspoken Word is one of the top suspects among those who believe the Mourning was a weapon. Within Aundair, I think it’s entirely possible that it’s actually caused their stock to rise, either because people believe they might have caused the Mourning or because people believe they might be the key to mastering its power and coming up with a viable defense against it. The question of which they want is up to you. Do they think the best way to defend Breland is to harness this power as a weapon? Or are they actually true to their stated principles, and are determined that no one should ever USE such a weapon? The answer could determine if they’re a dangerous enemy or a valuable ally for the adventurers…

That’s all for now! Thanks as always to my Patreon supporters for posing the question and making these articles possible.