The Dragons of Eberron

So my current D&D game takes place in Eberron. I play with my group every 2nd, 4th, and 5th Tuesday of the month, and occasional additional Tuesdays when we are at a particularly thrilling portion.

Anyway, in the recent months, WotC has been releasing the Eberron 4th Edition books. Prior to this I had very little information on the setting beyond what I glanced at during sessions where I subbed in for whoever was absent if anyone was at all. It was the end of a very long running campaign (2+ years) and it was so close to being finished that they were fine with me just joining in when needed.

What I saw didn't really thrill me, but now in retrospect I realize I barely even read anything. Over the last few weeks I've been reading through the Eberron Campaign Guide for 4th Ed. Things which just make a lot of sense to me are the foundation of daily Eberron life, along with themes which just tickle me pink.

For example, magic in Eberron is not some amazing thing that people will go there entire lives without seeing. It's a part of everyday life. Crafters, even blacksmiths, can learn over the years a means to imbue their crafts with magic (a ritual), magewrights learn to create things such as magic streetlights that never burn out or storage boxes that allow food to keep through extremes of weather and long periods of time. I really like feel of "Magic for the masses". And it takes other forms that are more costly, but still not so impossible to acquire that you'll never see them except if you have a Wizard, Cleric or some other caster on your side. Like there are the Elemental Airships of House Lyrandar and the Lightning Rails of House Orien.

As for the themes, the one that stuck out the most to me is the themes of internal intrigue and drama. Sure, there's still the classic themes of high adventure and gritty exploration, but I've always felt that D&D focuses on going out and killing the bad things out there, with little focus on the evils (from the right point of view...) within. While there's nothing wrong with being focused on the enemy that is not "us", I like the other side as much if not more. Double crosses, secret agents, shades of gray, all that jazz!

Anyway, I digress from the point of my post. I'm not yet done with reading through the Eberron Campaign Guide, but I have one change that Eberron makes to the standard setup that bugs me.

Dragons.

In the normal setting (and I consider FR and Dragonlance to use the standard D&D template as well), Dragons are generally solitary creatures that amass hoards, influence the world around them for their own benefit. They are iconic in their nature... Chromatic are evil while Metallic are good. Also, Dragonlance was a staple of my teenage reading years and with the strong emphasis on the differences between the two archetypes dragon types, it really instilled in me what each type is like.

Dragons in Eberron (at least on Khorvaire) fill the roll normally done by the gods or agents of the gods in the normal setting. While Dragons still influence the world, it's on a much grander scale, using the Draconic Prophecy and manipulating the "lesser" races. Though all that would be okay, but the thing that really gets me is disconnecting alignment and "type" (Chromatic, Metallic and whatever else they decide to add later).

It may seem like a minor thing, but for some reason it really bugs me. If you remove that, what's the point of having the different types of dragons? Just make them all Chromatic (because I've always preferred the way most Chromatics look...) and alter their alignments as you see fit.

Really, I don't know what about it that bugs me, but it does. Not that it will matter since I'll probably not have Dragons showing up in any Eberron campaign I run (assuming I ever do run a full campaign). There's enough going on between the intrigue of the various nations, Dragonmarked houses, groups within each nation, and who knows what else to keep me going for a long fricken' time!

Time for another Blog

A little over a year ago, I got back into playing tabletop RPGs. It'd been a while... about 4 or so years from when I moved up to Washington D.C. after leaving the military. I gamed pretty steadily while I was in the Service, but D.C. ended up being a place where I had trouble finding a gaming group.

Then I moved out to Berkeley and this town has it's own gaming store. Yeah, I know not a huge deal, but after the nearest one being an hour+ by public transportation, having one be 10-15 minutes walking distance is grand!

Anyway, I'll be using this blog to post my thoughts on the game I'm currently taking part in, the new D&D world I'm going to try to flesh out to maybe some day run a game or games in, general thoughts on details of the Eberron world (which is the setting my current group plays in), and any additional thoughts I have on other tabletop games I play (for example, I'm trying to get into Warmachine).