Dragons
The dragons of Eberron are much more than mere
monsters; adventurers will rarely barge into a dragon's
lair in search of its treasure horde. Dragons in the world
are either aloof and unapproachable, or they are curious
and manipulative, pulling strings behind the scenes or
trying to influence the world in arcane ways.
Most dragons live on the mystery-shrouded continent
of Argonnessen and avoid contact with those they see as
lesser creatures. They are obsessed with the Draconic
Prophecy, which is a map of possible futures rather
than a clear-cut prediction. Its paths are revealed in the
motion of planes and moons, in the actions of the drag
onmarked houses, and in dozens of other more subtle
manifestations. Most dragons that are active in Khor
vaire are part of a cabal known as the Chamber.
A dragon in Khorvaire that isn't part of the Chamber
could be an exile driven from Argonnessen for some
crime or a scholar pursuing independent research.
Some orphaned dragons grow up in Khorvaire without
contact with Argonnessen, and some dragons have
been twisted by the daelkyr or corrupted by fiends; any
of these could be an antagonist if the adventure you're
crafting calls for a cruel dragon.
The dragons of Eberron aren't restricted in align
ment-good red dragons and evil gold dragons are
equally common. Most dragons tend toward neutrality.
Even those with good alignments often don't consider
the impact of their actions on lesser beings; if a Cham
ber dragon must destroy a human village to foil the
plans of a demon, it will do so without hesitation.THE CHAMBER
Conspiracy theorists insist that a network of dragons
is hidden in Khorvaire, and these mighty creatures use
powerful magic and humanoid agents to work their will
across the continent and beyond. These claims are usu
ally dismissed as madness, but they are in fact correct.
The Chamber is a cabal of dragons that have monitored
Khorvaire for thousands of years, treating humanoids
as pawns in an ancient game.
First and foremost, the dragons of the Chamber are
observers, gathering information about new aspects
of the Prophecy and sharing it with their elders in Ar
gonnessen. They are also charged with stopping any
creature that seeks to use the Prophecy for its own ends.
This responsibility sets them against the Lords of Dust,
who must manipulate the Prophecy in order to release
their fiendish overlords. It also leads them to recruit
or eliminate any humanoid who learns too much about
the Prophecy.
The Chamber is loosely organized. Each dragon mon
itors its own small corner of the world and maintains a
network of humanoid agents. Although the mission of
the Chamber is one of observation, individual dragons
often have their own agendas. Some seek to manip
ulate the Prophecy personally, directing the future
along a particular path. Others conduct experiments
on dragonmarked humanoids, trying to understand the
connection between these creatures and the Prophecy.
Still others are obsessed with the Lords of Dust engage
in century-spanning games of cat-and-mouse with their
fiendish counterparts. In general, the Chamber seeks to
maintain the status quo and opposes demons, so agents
of the Chamber can often be useful allies or patrons.
But ultimately humanoids are just pawns in the dragons'
eyes, and they readily sacrifice any of those pawns to
ensure the sanctity of the Prophecy and the defeat of the
Lords of Dust.THE CHAMBER AND THE WA R
The lives of humanoids and the welfare of their nations
mean little to the ancient dragons. A member of the
Chamber who is friendly now might turn out to be little
more than a war criminal, responsible for horrible atroc
ities while directing critical events of the war to ensure
that a skirmish or an untimely assassination didn't de
rail some crucial stanza of the Prophecy. An even more
disturbing prospect is that the Mourning might have
been orchestrated by the Chamber, either as part of its
struggle against the Lords of Dust or even directly in
response to the dictates of the Prophecy.
Whatever the truth, the Last War's impact on the
Chamber was small in the grand scheme of things.
Planar observatories were damaged here and there,
humanoid servants died in droves, and the clash of
armies derailed short-term plans. But even the effects of
a hundred years of war are minor in the context of plans
that span continents and millennia.PLANAR OBSERVATORY
A planar observatory is a structure at the heart of the
Chamber's efforts to divine the meaning of the draconic
Prophecy. The observatory consists of great chambers
of crystal and metal, lined with huge orreries that track
and align with the planes and the Ring of Siberys.PLANAR OBSERVATORY FEATURES
Map 4.2 shows what a planar observatory might look
like. These immense locations are constructed by and
for dragons. The orreries that surround the central
space track the courses of the planes as they shift to
ward and away from Eberron. All about the observatory
are enormous dragonshards of all three kinds (Eberron,
Khyber, and Siberys).
Each observatory must be built in a location that is
balanced between Siberys and Khyber; finding such a
site might take years of careful study and surveying, and
these places are typically remote. Several are located
in Argonnessen; those in Khorvaire are usually found
in mountain ranges and hidden forest clearings. Many
have crystal roofs, or domes that open with the aid of
great mechanisms to allow an unobstructed view of
the night sky, since the movements of Eberron's moons
are thought to correspond to the shifting relationships
among the planes.PLANAR OBSERVATORY ADVENTURES
The characters might find their way to a planar obser
vatory as unwitting minions of a Chamber observer, as
a destination in their struggles against servants of the
Lords of Dust, or even accidentally. The Planar Obser
vatory Adventures table presents some possibilities.CHAPTER 4 I BUILDING EBERRON ADVENTURES
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