How to Get Your Eberron Fix

Everyone wants more Eberron. Today marks the official release of the Eberron Campaign Guide. If you haven’t yet checked out Eberron in 4e then today is a great time to start. We’ve got reviews of the two core books as well as materials to get a new DM ready for an Eberron campaign. Here are five suggested ways to get your Eberron fix.

1. Eberron Player’s Guide (Review Part 1 | Review Part 2)

It provides a lot of great information that players both new and familiar with the world of Eberron will find useful. Three new races, the Artificer class, new paragon paths, new feats, and Dragonmarks should be enough to keep people reading. If you’re going to be a player in Eberron you should pick up the Eberron Player’s Guide.

2. Eberron Campaign Guide (Review)

As a companion to the Eberron Player’s Guide or a resource all on it own, this book is fantastic. If you’ve not familiar with Eberron and this is your introduction, then you’re in for a real treat. The world is fleshed out in tremendous detail. The art and the maps are also first rate. The entire continent of Khorvaire is described one country at a time. We get details on the important sites and the power players of each country. New monsters and important NPC appear in almost every country’s description. Much of the information is broken down and grouped by knowledge skill. This gives your PCs a chance to learn information about the places they’re visiting before they do something stupid. The Eberron Campaign Guide is a valuable pick-up and a great buy whether you have the 3e Eberron books or not.

3. The Mark of the Prophecy (An Adventure in Eberron)

The Appendix in the Eberron Campaign Guide contains an adventure called The Mark of the Prophecy. It’s for 1st level PCs and is designed to give new players an introduction to Eberron. The adventure provides enough XP for PCs to reach 2nd level by the time it’s over. There are also ten treasure parcels awarded throughout the course of the adventure. I don’t want to give too much away, but I will provide enough detail to get you interested.

The adventure begins four years ago, during the war, on what eventually was known as the Day of Mourning. There are four adventure hooks which provide excellent suggestions for bringing characters together regardless of their race or affiliated nation. After completing encounters one and two, the Mourning happens.

Encounter three takes place four years later. The PCs are reunited in Sharn where they stumble upon some loose ends from their encounters on the Day of Mourning. Three sample adventure hooks are provided to bring the characters to Sharn on the 4th anniversary of the Day or Mourning.

The rest of the adventure gives PCs a chance to see many aspects of Sharn. One of the encounters is a very interesting skill challenge. Due to the dangerous nature of some parts of Sharn, each failure during the skill challenge results in a minor combat encounter. The skill challenge doesn’t end until the PCs earn the correct number of successes. So if they are really unlucky, the PCs may wind up in a lot of fights before competing the skill challenge. A later encounter can be overcome through combat or a skill challenge. Of course if the PCs attempt the skill challenge and fail, they’ll end up fighting whether they wanted to or not.

After the adventure there is a four-page section in the Appendix called Encounter Sites. It describes two city-based scenes that are suitable for PCs of any level and can easily be dropped in to any campaign.

The Mark of the Prophecy showcases many of aspects of Eberron campaign world. The PCs encounter unique monsters, the draconic prophecy, flying airships and the intrigue that is Eberron.

4. Skill Challenges (Maintaining the Karrnathi Army | Fixing the Lightning Rail)

When the Eberron Player’s Guide came out last month we put together two Eberron-specific skill challenges. If you pick up the Eberron Campaign Guide this week and want to give you players a quick feel for this new setting, then these skill challenges should make your job a whole lot easier. We have many other skill challenges that you can easily adapt for any campaign setting, including Eberron, but there two are probably your best places to start.

5. Skill Aide (Dragonmarks)

With Dragonmark feats now available through the character builder more and more PCs will start to manifest these unique pieces of the draconic prophecy on their flesh (or plating in the case of Warforged). In Eberron, the Dragonmarked Houses carry tremendous political clout and influence. This skill aide provides DMs with some suggested circumstance bonuses that PC with a Dragonmark may receive.

These suggestions should give even the most thoroughly addicted Eberron junkie a suitable fix to hold them over for a little while. There are also numerous Eberron novels and a slew of materials from 3e available for anyone just discovering Eberron. If there’s something Eberron-specific that you’d like to see on Dungeon’s Master please let us know.