I'm writing a low magic fork for Eberron. Basically, the history and lore is the same up to "The Mourning", this is where things split. In the setting/campaign im writing magic after the Mourning has stopped working like It should and in some cases, it no longer works at all. At the time of the Mourning all magic stopped working for about an hour. This was devastating. But since then, Magic items less them Very Rare have stopped working at all, at least as things seem. Most spells stopped working. Since then, arcane and divine magic research has restored the necessary formulas for most spells, but some spells work differently, have increases in resources needed to cast and some spells are still illuding research and possible forever lost. This effect on magic seems to have less effect the further away from the Mournland you get, All of Khorvaire and Xen’drik has felt its effects painfully, though its unknow if other continents have suffered the same. This has resulted in a dark age for much of Khorvaire, Many of Sharn’s towers have collapsed, Arcanix no longer exists, elemental ships were torn apart when the spells holding their bond elementals failed and few new ones have been rebuilt. Oddly enough the warforged never stopped working. Roughly 85% of the Dragonmarked house members died instantly during the Mourning, those that remain are looked at with suspicion as to why they survived and maybe it was their fault for the Mourning and its results. Due to the reliance of magic and the Dragonmarked houses and their now lack of ability to fill the void left due to the Mourning famine, poverty, suspicion and superstition have become staples of life in most parts of Khorvaire.
character-wise, there woundnt be much weirdness. I’m using it to curtail some higher level spells and other spells that I want to exclude, make more costly, or limit their effectiveness. But I also want to add a feeling of caution and wonder to the magic for caster characters.
It seems like a cool idea, you probably want to have a way for the characters to fix it though because assuming you are playing in 998, this only happened 4 years ago it it will be important for them to fix it’s it is devastating to the world. And you don’t want to disappoint them if they put a lot into these plans. You should also make sure this is cool with the players, Many might want to make a spell caster without any hindrances. I would also bring in some psionic stuff to take the place of magic where it is needed.
It’s taking place in 1001, so there is a bit more time but not a lot. If the players REALLY want to try and fix the world I’ll let them go down that path but one of the major plot hooks for the characters; npc’s and the world is that THIS is the world, this is the new status quo. Putting the world back the way that it was would be a kin to put it in the Roman empire back together after his fall. The first third to half of the game is going to be centered around a concept similar to hell on wheels. The building of the lightning rail from one end of the continent to the other the struggles and everything that goes on with that. Building the lightning rail to reunite the continent that was connected by magic and now is largely without. The primary spells that I intend to nerf and change our mass transit spells like teleportation, teleportation portal, Fly, etc. and wide area damage spells that tend to come later in the game anyway.
i'm personally not a fan of permanently breaking existing worlds. IMO, if you want that, maybe a mirror world of Eberron - maybe Norrebe or something. But the real Eberron would still exist, that way you're not saying 'okay all this official content is garbage and mine trumps all of that'. Can't find it at the moment but that's very much in-line with Ed Greenwood's own comments (understanding of course he's talking about his own world - and what world creator would want someone coming in and trashing everything they took 30 years to create)
The lore is all very cool, but I worry about balancing a campaign and keeping it fun for spellcasters. You should still keep most of the spells, but it’s fun to make a few select ones limited availability.
I play in a campaign where most spellcasters have lost their magic, but the party retains theirs for some reason. So you could go that angle, having all the effects of losing magic on your setting, but still let it be fun for your players.
The campaign I run has somewhat limited magic, but in terms of narrative, not mechanics. For example, there are airships, but they’re just baskets carried by rocs. Also wizards are sort of like scientists. The idea is that there are laws of nature, and those who understand them can create magic-like technology.
Low magic Ebberon sounds to me a bit like throwing the baby out with the bathwater. So much of the world is tied up in the "wide magic"/magitech anesthetic, getting rid of magic would nix the dragonmarked houses, Sharn would collapse, along with the floating towers of the Arcanix, lightning rails and airships wouldn't function, the economy would be magnitudes less diverse, Lady Illmarrow would be really no kind of threat at all, etc.
I'm just not convinced that what you'd have left over would be uniquely Ebberon enough to still justify it being Ebberon and not just a medieval fantasy setting that borrows from Ebberon.
Imma say introduce firearms, some steam tech to run them lightning rails and airships, and have warforged maybe, like, their bodies slowly rot away 'cuz magic isn't working?
It sounds like you could probably just homebrew your own world. I don't really see why you would take the most high magic campaign and then change literally every aspect off it, when you could just take everything you just wrote and make a different world. I guess the question is what are you using out of Eberron that is so specific that you can't use something else or create your own world?
I could home-brew it myself but I really dont have the time I would need to put together a home-brew world with the depth of lore that I personally would require to make it work. It's easier to modify an existing world and use its lore up to the point I need to make the shift
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I'm writing a low magic fork for Eberron. Basically, the history and lore is the same up to "The Mourning", this is where things split. In the setting/campaign im writing magic after the Mourning has stopped working like It should and in some cases, it no longer works at all. At the time of the Mourning all magic stopped working for about an hour. This was devastating. But since then, Magic items less them Very Rare have stopped working at all, at least as things seem. Most spells stopped working. Since then, arcane and divine magic research has restored the necessary formulas for most spells, but some spells work differently, have increases in resources needed to cast and some spells are still illuding research and possible forever lost. This effect on magic seems to have less effect the further away from the Mournland you get, All of Khorvaire and Xen’drik has felt its effects painfully, though its unknow if other continents have suffered the same. This has resulted in a dark age for much of Khorvaire, Many of Sharn’s towers have collapsed, Arcanix no longer exists, elemental ships were torn apart when the spells holding their bond elementals failed and few new ones have been rebuilt. Oddly enough the warforged never stopped working. Roughly 85% of the Dragonmarked house members died instantly during the Mourning, those that remain are looked at with suspicion as to why they survived and maybe it was their fault for the Mourning and its results. Due to the reliance of magic and the Dragonmarked houses and their now lack of ability to fill the void left due to the Mourning famine, poverty, suspicion and superstition have become staples of life in most parts of Khorvaire.
What do you guys think?
character-wise, there woundnt be much weirdness. I’m using it to curtail some higher level spells and other spells that I want to exclude, make more costly, or limit their effectiveness. But I also want to add a feeling of caution and wonder to the magic for caster characters.
It seems like a cool idea, you probably want to have a way for the characters to fix it though because assuming you are playing in 998, this only happened 4 years ago it it will be important for them to fix it’s it is devastating to the world. And you don’t want to disappoint them if they put a lot into these plans. You should also make sure this is cool with the players, Many might want to make a spell caster without any hindrances. I would also bring in some psionic stuff to take the place of magic where it is needed.
It’s taking place in 1001, so there is a bit more time but not a lot. If the players REALLY want to try and fix the world I’ll let them go down that path but one of the major plot hooks for the characters; npc’s and the world is that THIS is the world, this is the new status quo. Putting the world back the way that it was would be a kin to put it in the Roman empire back together after his fall.
The first third to half of the game is going to be centered around a concept similar to hell on wheels. The building of the lightning rail from one end of the continent to the other the struggles and everything that goes on with that. Building the lightning rail to reunite the continent that was connected by magic and now is largely without.
The primary spells that I intend to nerf and change our mass transit spells like teleportation, teleportation portal, Fly, etc. and wide area damage spells that tend to come later in the game anyway.
i'm personally not a fan of permanently breaking existing worlds. IMO, if you want that, maybe a mirror world of Eberron - maybe Norrebe or something. But the real Eberron would still exist, that way you're not saying 'okay all this official content is garbage and mine trumps all of that'. Can't find it at the moment but that's very much in-line with Ed Greenwood's own comments (understanding of course he's talking about his own world - and what world creator would want someone coming in and trashing everything they took 30 years to create)
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Deck of Decks
The lore is all very cool, but I worry about balancing a campaign and keeping it fun for spellcasters. You should still keep most of the spells, but it’s fun to make a few select ones limited availability.
I play in a campaign where most spellcasters have lost their magic, but the party retains theirs for some reason. So you could go that angle, having all the effects of losing magic on your setting, but still let it be fun for your players.
The campaign I run has somewhat limited magic, but in terms of narrative, not mechanics. For example, there are airships, but they’re just baskets carried by rocs. Also wizards are sort of like scientists. The idea is that there are laws of nature, and those who understand them can create magic-like technology.
Low magic Ebberon sounds to me a bit like throwing the baby out with the bathwater. So much of the world is tied up in the "wide magic"/magitech anesthetic, getting rid of magic would nix the dragonmarked houses, Sharn would collapse, along with the floating towers of the Arcanix, lightning rails and airships wouldn't function, the economy would be magnitudes less diverse, Lady Illmarrow would be really no kind of threat at all, etc.
I'm just not convinced that what you'd have left over would be uniquely Ebberon enough to still justify it being Ebberon and not just a medieval fantasy setting that borrows from Ebberon.
Imma say introduce firearms, some steam tech to run them lightning rails and airships, and have warforged maybe, like, their bodies slowly rot away 'cuz magic isn't working?
Just throwing a few ideas out there
Mystic v3 should be official, nuff said.
It sounds like you could probably just homebrew your own world. I don't really see why you would take the most high magic campaign and then change literally every aspect off it, when you could just take everything you just wrote and make a different world. I guess the question is what are you using out of Eberron that is so specific that you can't use something else or create your own world?
I could home-brew it myself but I really dont have the time I would need to put together a home-brew world with the depth of lore that I personally would require to make it work. It's easier to modify an existing world and use its lore up to the point I need to make the shift