| Media Type | Online Article |
| Source | Dungeons & Dragons Beyond |
| Date Published | Nov 18, 2019 |
| Author | James Haeck |
| Ruleset | Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition |
| Canonicity | Non-Canon |
Article
The next D&D campaign setting is Eberron: Rising from the Last War, and releases on November 19th, 2019 on D&D Beyond. This campaign setting describes the war-torn continent of Khorvaire, as well as other regions of the world of Eberron. Additionally, it contains monster statistics for dozens of new creatures unique to this world, as well as magic items, mystical Dragonmarks, and other supernatural elements that set Eberron apart from other D&D settings. Indeed, Eberron is a world where magic has been used to create technology somewhat analogous to the real-world era of the First World War—with some additional fantastical elements, like the living constructs known as warforged.
This encounter series, called Around Khorvaire in Fifty Days, is a whirlwind tour of Khorvaire, the thematic heart of the Eberron campaign setting. It’s a perfect place for new players to enter the campaign setting, as it introduces and highlights many of the elements that make Eberron stand apart from other campaign settings, like the Forgotten Realms. This series elaborates on all the immediate details you need to run this adventure.
The background of this encounter series is described in greater detail in the first encounter, Departure from Skydock Six. Captain Angelica Estrella d’Sivis, her dragonmark, and her purported mission are described there as well. More information about Angelica, her mission, and her true identity were revealed in Gathering at Gatherhold.
Progression
This is the seventh encounter along this journey, and a party of five characters should be 3rd level when they begin this encounter. The previous encounters are:
- Departure from Skydock Six
- Storm over the Howling Peaks
- Friendship in the Wilderness
- Espionage in Grellreach
- Sabotage over Lake Cyre
- Gathering at Gatherhold
Command of the Celeste Noir
At the end of the previous encounter, Gathering at Gatherhold, the characters and their allies had the opportunity to take over the Celeste Noir. Doing so while the characters are only 3rd level is a challenging task, especially since Angelica is a mage (challenge rating 6) and her first mate, Aubrey Galatea, is an assassin (challenge rating 8). The odds of overpowering them in a fair fight are slim to none, but using dirty tactics or taking them out one-by-one could be possible. This is especially true with the help of allies like Ziggy Arcingwind, Grixe Laddimoff, and Nerokhad.
All encounters in this series this point onward assume that the characters mutinied and took over the Celeste Noir. Altering this encounter if Angelica is still in command of the Celeste Noir is simple. If an element of the encounter requires the characters to pilot the vessel, such as finding Angelica’s diary and adjusting course to travel to the Mror Holds at the beginning of this encounter, Angelica does so of her own volition, instead. As usual, adjusting these encounters to fit with your campaign and with your players’ actions are left to your discretion.
Before the Encounter: Where to Next?
If the characters successfully mutinied, they now have the run of the ship. This includes Angelica’s cabin, which contains three items of note: a diary written in several complex codes, a ring of feather falling, and an adamantine lockbox.
- The diary is completely unreadable, as it’s in Angelica’s personal cipher. It contains information on future destinations, and a character can spend downtime deciphering the notes, or they can hand it over to Ziggy Arcingwind and request that he try to break the code. The encoded diary will come into play in later encounters in this series.
- Inserted into the front cover of this diary is a note written in uncoded Common. It reads: “Once the ship is up and running again, get Leir d’Kundarak to open the box.” The note also contains a set of coordinates.
- The adamantine lockbox contains a gauntlet of transposition (see “New Magic Item,” below). The box is sealed with an arcane lock made by a powerful dwarf possessing the Mark of Warding. It can only be opened by the being that created it.
Any character familiar with dragonmarks knows that House Kundarak is a dragonmarked house that possesses the Mark of Warding. Such a mark is only possessed by dwarves. A character that examines the coordinates and makes a successful DC 18 Intelligence check with navigator’s tools pinpoints the coordinates on the map, allowing them to navigate to a point in the western mountains of the Mror Holds. If none of the characters succeed on this check, they can also pass the coordinates to Demetrius d’Lyrandar (or the ship’s current navigator, if he was ousted), who is easily able to fly the Celeste Noir to its next destination.
Leir d’Kundarak
Leir is a dour dwarf with a soft spot for sweets, money, and wordplay. He lives an orderly life and prefers to be left alone whenever possible. However, he is more than happy to see Angelica—if it means getting even with her. Angelica (and her employers) owe Leir ten thousand gold pieces for services he performed for them. Angelica didn’t (and still doesn’t) have that kind of money, and House Cannith refused to pay up. He has no plans to hunt Angelica or House Cannith down, but he will do anything in his power to get what he’s owed if the opportunity presents itself.
Several months ago, Leir was promised an immense sum of money to safeguard a piece of secret technology for House Cannith. This magical technology, called a gauntlet of transposition, was the prototype “key” for the “sundial” that is now aboard the Celeste Noir. This gauntlet has some use in personal combat (see “New Magic Item,” below), but its true power is revealed when it’s used to activate a Planar Transpositor—the sundial—when properly placed aboard a Cannith-built airship. Four such airships exist in Khorvaire, though only two—the Celeste Noir and the Ciel Rouge—have ever been flown. The two other ships created as a part of this project are called the Lune d’Or and the Soleil d’Argent, and both are currently docked in the secret Cannith compound in which they were created.
As a bearer of the Mark of Warding, Leir created a box outfitted with a near-impenetrable lock to safeguard the prototype gauntlet. Angelica chose to visit him to retrieve the prototype, and use the gauntlet to test the Transpositor. Thus fully operational, the Celeste Noir would punch straight through the fabric of the Material Plane and travel through the Plane of Dreams to reach any point on Eberron at unthinkable speed.
Combat Encounter: Dragonmark of the Dwarves
This combat encounter is suitable for a party of 3rd-level characters.
The Celeste Noir has departed Gatherhold and is speeding towards the Mror Holds, the mountainous home of the dwarves. A week has passed since their departure from Gatherhold, and this encounter begins just as the vessel begins to dip below the clouds and descend to its destination. Read or paraphrase the following:
Clouds whip by the porthole of your cabin as the Celeste Noir punches through the clouds. The vessel lands unsteadily on its experimental landing gear, struggling to find its footing on the craggy, mountainous ground of the Mror Holds. A bell rings, signaling a safe landing.
The ship has landed in a clearing covered in vibrant green grass and pockmarked with huge sandstone boulders. The clearing is roughly circular and just over 200 feet wide. Towering cliffs border it on all sides. The Celeste Noir rests on the south end of the clearing. On the north end is a squat, stone-walled cottage. Sitting in a rocking chair in front of the cottage is a middle-aged dwarf with a a thick straw-yellow beard, streaked with gray.
This dwarf is Leir d’Kundarak, and he recognizes the Celeste Noir. He waits for the characters to disembark and approach him. He scans the crew for Angelica; if the characters speak to him without her present, he growls, “Where’s Angelica? She owes me.”
Negotiating with Leir
Leir is willing to negotiate with the captain of the Celeste Noir and their comrades. He is a dwarf of few words, and simply explains that he performed a task for Angelica and her employers by keeping an important device safe. He created an adamantine lockbox with an impenetrable arcane lock to safeguard it, and was promised ten thousand gold for his magical expertise, but they never paid up. He’s the only person who can unlock it, and he has been waiting for Angelica to return and beg for his help.
He is happy to tell the party what he knows about the device, since he no longer has a stake in it. “In short, it’s a magic gauntlet. I never saw it in use, but I overheard some gossip when those Cannith goons came and begged me for my help. The glove has two uses. One when a person is wearing it, which lets ‘em zip around while fighting. The thing is, it’s also the key to an extraplanar gizmo that Cannith has been putting on their airships. That’s all I know.”
Leir wants his money, but he’s also willing to strike a deal. If the characters promise to take down the House Cannith operation and squeeze what he’s owed out of their greedy hands, he’ll gladly open up the box and give them the gauntlet. Before he does so, he tells the characters that he doesn’t trust they can beat Cannith on their own, and needs to test their might. He challenges the party to a duel—all of them against him.
(If Angelica is still the captain of the Celeste Noir, she orders the characters to beat Leir into submission until he opens the box for them, claiming that he’s a villain. If the characters refuse Angelica’s orders here, Leir joins them in revolting against her.)
Duel with the Dwarf
Leir challenges the characters to combat in order to test their skill. If there are 6 or more characters in the party, Leir is joined in combat by a number of suits of animated armor equal to the number of characters minus five.
Leir is a mountain dwarf abjurer with the following changes, which reduce his challenge rating to 6 (2,300 XP):
- He wears half plate, increasing his AC to 17.
- He is a 7th-level wizard. As such, he has no spell slots higher than 4th level, and has only one spell slot of 4th-level. His spell save DC is 15 and his bonus to hit with spell attacks is +7.
- If Leir casts a spells that reduces a creature to 0 hit points, he can use his reaction to cause the creature to immediately become stable. He does this whenever possible to avoid killing the characters dueling him.
- His Strength score is 16 (+3). Instead of a quarterstaff, he wields a battleaxe. His bonus to hit is +6, and the attack deals 6 (1d6 + 3) slashing damage on a hit, or 7 (1d8 + 3) if used with two hands.
Conclusion
After Leir’s defeat, he smiles proudly at the characters and bows deeply, claiming that they’re more capable than he gave them credit for. He asks that they bring the lockbox to him, and unlocks it with a simple touch of his hand. When the characters return to the ship with the gauntlet of transposition, they feel it tug gently towards the “sundial,” as if the two were magnetically attracted.
One of the characters’ allies tells them that they need to find their way to the compound where House Cannith artificers constructed the Celeste Noir and any other experimental ships. The information might be contained within Angelica’s diary, but it will take time to decode it. Next week’s encounter involves the discovery of the Cannith compound’s secret location in an extraplanar pocket between the Material Plane and Dal Quor, the Plane of Dreams.
Treasure and Progression
If the characters didn’t mutiny, then in the week of travel between this encounter and next week’s encounter, the characters receive their weekly stipend of 2 gp each. If control the ship, they receive no additional treasure, other than the gauntlet of transposition. They also gain XP from their duel with Leir as normal. You can add the gauntlet of transposition to your campaign using this homebrew link.
New Magic Item: Gauntlet of Transposition
Wondrous item, rare (requires attunement)
As a bonus action, you can point with this silvery gauntlet to create a spectral double of yourself in an unoccupied space you can see within 60 feet. This double disappears at the end of your turn. Until the end of your turn, you can mentally command your double to make an attack or cast a spell instead of you. The double disappears at the end of your turn.
This gauntlet has three charges, and it regains all spent charges daily at dawn. At the end of your turn, you can spend one charge to warp to your double’s location, traveling at incredible speed to instantaneously reach that point. If there are any objects in the path between you and your double, you can smash through them by making a melee weapon attack against the object as you pass through, dealing an additional 2d6 damage on a hit. If the attack reduces the object to 0 hit points, you smash through and continue towards your double’s location. If the attack doesn’t destroy the object and the object is firmly secured, your movement immediately stops and you take 2d6 bludgeoning damage.
The AC and hit points of common objects are described in chapter 8 of the Dungeon Master’s Guide.
This adventure will continue next week in Encounter of the Week: Shortcut through Dal Quor. Where else do you want to visit along this journey? Let us know in the comments!
Eberron: Rising from the Last War releases on November 19th, 2019. Preorder it now on the Marketplace!