High Elemental Binder question [Archive] - Wizards Community

High Elemental Binder question [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Nightshade
08-01-07, 01:09 PM I have a player who is interested in this prestige class. The problem: he is not a Gnome. Worse, he's a Dragonmarked Human of House Cannith. The prestige class does not have a mechanical racial requirement of Gnome. But let's be realistic here, there is a huge campaign restriction in that only Gnome's have this magic.

I have a problem with PGtE where it says someone might learn this by trial and error. It is highly illogical that someone would learn the Elemental Binding feat and High Binder class simply by trial and error. For one, if that was possible, someone in House Cannith would have already done it and the Gnomes would not have the monopoly that they do have on Elemental Binding. After all, House Cannith has immense resources to place towards such an effort and there's also an entire magical facility / school called The Twelve, devoted to magical research for the Dragonmarked Houses. If they haven't been able to duplicate the efforts, there's no way one dinky character would be able to by trial and error alone. Two, even if it were possible, it would take years of research... research that cannot be done while adventuring and a character would effectively be out of the campaign.

Knowledge of this magic is strictly controlled. The Gnomes, and specifically the Trust and Inmost, would teach only a select few and enforce loyalty at the point of a wand. If anyone, anywhere were found to have learned Elemental Binding or worse, the High Binder prestige class, the Assassination attempts would occur non-stop until that person were dead! Zilargo will maintain it's monopoly at ALL costs!!! It's one of the few things that they've got that the Dragonmarked Houses do not and they want it to stay that way.

So, how likely is it that someone who is not a gnome and not a member of Inmost, and is a member of House Cannith to be able to learn, first, the Elemental Binding feat and, second, the High Elemental Binder prestige class?
naturax
08-01-07, 02:21 PM Sounds like the concept for an adventure if I ever heard of one! Instead of asking "how likely" why not ask "what would be ways to pull this off?" so that you can get your DM to run you through it?
Nightshade
08-01-07, 03:32 PM Sounds like the concept for an adventure if I ever heard of one! Instead of asking "how likely" why not ask "what would be ways to pull this off?" so that you can get your DM to run you through it?

No, I'm the DM for this one. First, while it's more of a long term goal, it kind of interferes with my campaign plans. Second, I told the character that there may be a way to acquire the Elemental Binding feat through a quest. But I have no idea how it could even be possible for a non-gnome to infiltrate the Inmost and obtain their secrets on Elemental High Binder. Third, it would take time to learn the magic, so that puts the character out of the campaign for awhile. Last, what's the motivation for the other characters in this group? There's are 0 ways for an artificer by himself to complete such a quest and the only thing this will likely do for them is get them all killed. Even House Cannith would be unlikely to fund such a thing because then the House could be retaliated against economically, financially, and militarily by Zilargo. Since the House is in tatters already, it would not be a prudent decision.
Vharuck
08-01-07, 04:40 PM He can learn from the binders the gnomes stole the techniques from: drow in Xen'drik.

And how hard is it to convince a party to explore lost giant ruins likely riddled with magical artifacts and piles upon piles of valuables screaming to be fenced to Morgrave?
ChristopherGroves
08-01-07, 09:41 PM Um ... you're the DM. It's as likely as you want it to be.
naturax
08-02-07, 09:17 AM No, I'm the DM for this one. First, while it's more of a long term goal, it kind of interferes with my campaign plans. Second, I told the character that there may be a way to acquire the Elemental Binding feat through a quest. But I have no idea how it could even be possible for a non-gnome to infiltrate the Inmost and obtain their secrets on Elemental High Binder. Third, it would take time to learn the magic, so that puts the character out of the campaign for awhile. Last, what's the motivation for the other characters in this group? There's are 0 ways for an artificer by himself to complete such a quest and the only thing this will likely do for them is get them all killed. Even House Cannith would be unlikely to fund such a thing because then the House could be retaliated against economically, financially, and militarily by Zilargo. Since the House is in tatters already, it would not be a prudent decision.

How about House Cannith is desperate for the technology so that they can start competing with the gnomes and put the pieces of the House back together? Or for one of the three factions to gain dominance over the others? How about THEY fund the rest of the party to go with the guy that wants to be an elemental binder and make a mission out of it? And they've got to have secret resources buried away to use in just such an occasion, so make sure that the top priority is that they stay secret. The PCs are the perfect disposable mercenaries in this case - some random, unaffiliated people that the House can disavow any knowledge of if the gnomes find out about it. And House Cannith can bribe the other PCs with cool gadgets and magic items and stuff that will also make passing among the gnomes easier.

If its super hard to infiltrate the Inmost and the Trust, etc. etc. then make a whole campaign out of it. Maybe they need a lot of little things to happen on the way in order to work towards it and there can be a lot of side benefits along the way.
Ravenstein
08-09-07, 01:35 PM Its not too farfetched for someone to take the personal effort to try and figure it out themselves. I mean, a mage can summon an elemental; would it be so hard for him to go, "Huh, I wonder if I could keep that thing here, maybe even bind it to something. Those gnomes can do it..." Personal research is what most mages are all about. The fact that they designed the class without a racial restriction shows that Wizards never really intended for the gnomes to have the sole monopoly on the binding effort.

Like someone mentioned before, the gnomes stole the technology in the first place. Heck, even warforged are a stolen technology. Pretty much every technology Khorevaire has was taken from a previous civilization. More so, look at the real world; we were on a nuclear bomb, as well as Russia, Germany, and others. We beat'em to it and pretty much had a monopoly on it till the technology get out and other nations reverse engineered out work.

If a player wants to be a High Elemental Binder, let'em; but make'em work for it. Perhaps the group infiltrates a gnome workshop. Maybe they go do a dungeon crawl in Xen'Drik in order to help their mate out. Having their friend learn how to bind elementals can only benefit them so they'll probably do everything they can in order to help their friend build some earth elemental plate.

It always bothers me to read on here about restrictive DMs. If a DM told me I couldn't do something and didn't have an open mind, I'd kick'em in the junk and find another group to play with. Make players work for they want. It'll be engaging and fun, and keeps you from having to think up an adventure; in this case your players have done most of the work for you.
Nightshade
08-09-07, 04:10 PM Clearly, you don't think that DM's have the right to control their own games and that Rule 0 should be removed. I think that's stupid.

But it doesn't matter. The problem solved itself. When the other players found out the artificer wanted to seek out this magic, they told him he can do this or adventure with them and not both. They were not willing to incur the wrath of the Trust or Inmost. A wise decision.
Ravenstein
08-10-07, 08:47 AM No, I think DM's retain the right to "run" games, not "control" them. I think there are far too many DM's out there who wanna control their players' fun rather than let them have fun.

I played a cleric/high elemental binder. It was great fun. I enjoyed having a group of lil' elemental minions. I was a one-man army with them. 4 Elementals and the spell "Cometfall" rocked my DM's world. It was great. The class basically boils down to just that; an elemental controller. Sure I could have bound all kinds of elementals to armor and stuff and given it to my friends or sold it. But why share that kinda power when I can have it all to my self?
RFrenchJr
08-10-07, 10:13 AM *mission impossible theme music*

*a slender stone with a magic mouth begins to speak*

Good afternoon High Artificer Phelps. It is no secret that House Cannith is in serious and irreperable financial distress. We, the unamed, have a plan. *small silent image projects from the stone* These are the members of the Trust, the highly secretive society of gnomes responsible for guarding the secrets of High Elemental Binding. They are the keepers of the magic technology and they guard this information with not only their lives, but with the lives of others around them. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to infiltrate the headquarters of the Trust and steal this technology for House Cannith. Should you, or any members of your party be caught, you will be exoriated and all knoweldge of your mission will officially be disavowed by the house. Good luck High Artificer Phelps. This message will self destruct.

*the slender stone shatters into nothing.*
Ravenstein
08-10-07, 10:56 AM *mission impossible theme music*

*a slender stone with a magic mouth begins to speak*

Good afternoon High Artificer Phelps. It is no secret that House Cannith is in serious and irreperable financial distress. We, the unamed, have a plan. *small silent image projects from the stone* These are the members of the Trust, the highly secretive society of gnomes responsible for guarding the secrets of High Elemental Binding. They are the keepers of the magic technology and they guard this information with not only their lives, but with the lives of others around them. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to infiltrate the headquarters of the Trust and steal this technology for House Cannith. Should you, or any members of your party be caught, you will be exoriated and all knoweldge of your mission will officially be disavowed by the house. Good luck High Artificer Phelps. This message will self destruct.

*the slender stone shatters into nothing.*

LOL That is totally rad! I gotta use something like that in a game. Now I wanna play a High Elemental Binder again...
Nightshade
08-10-07, 01:23 PM [QUOTE=Ravenstein;13366676]No, I think DM's retain the right to "run" games, not "control" them. I think there are far too many DM's out there who wanna control their players' fun rather than let them have fun. QUOTE]

See, your problem is that you don't realize that this game is supposed to be fun for DM's too. And it is not fun if players are controlling the campaign, not the DM. To that end, the DM is allowed to ban classes, feats, whole books, or whatever else they don't believe will be good for their campaign. It's their call and I hate it when players say it should be the players call. Start your own campaign if that's what you want.

In this instance, I still told the pc that he could do it. I also told him that he would have to inflitrate the Trust and Inmost and that his chances of success were low, that he'd have to convince the other players to go with him, and that if he succeeds he would likely be under attack by a Trust or Deneith hit squad at least once during every following adventure until they succeeded in killing him. The other players chose not to go along with it.
dfarnsworth
08-11-07, 01:08 PM I would have taken the Xen'drik route if a lil research was successful and maybe introduced a variant High Elemental Binder. Exploring Xen'drik and racing against an Inmost band of explorers to find the "lost" technology variant.

That could really be fun, especially if cannith provides some funding.
OgreBane99
08-14-07, 04:46 PM He can learn from the binders the gnomes stole the techniques from: drow in Xen'drik.
Didn't the gnomes learn elemental binding magic from the giants of Xen'drik, who were the first to master it? I believe the drow use it, but they weren't the original "creators" of binding magic. I could be wrong. Don't have my MoE book with me.

I'm actually planning on doing this in my campaign too. My group is soon to go to Xen'drik and I plan on giving the artificer a schema that will allow him to practice and take the elemental binding feat. I may also give it to him as a free "bonus feat." I haven't yet decided. He's a human artificer of House Cannith as well.
CannibalSmith
08-15-07, 07:07 AM I suggest an open ended approach. Tell the player that he can have the class if he get the binding knowledge IG. Allow him to make whatever steps he deems necessary to accomplish that goal. Give him complete freedom and make the world respond realistically.

If I was him, I'd first go on a treasure hunt or some other affair to gather resources I'd need for the task. I'd also find out the location of a manifest zone that allows travel to it's respective plane. Then I'd equip myself with scrolls of Dominate Person. Then I'd dominate a diviner and find a High Binder. Then I'd dominate my way to him and dominate himself. I'd then abduct him and leave a dominated changeling in his place. I'd then flee the material plane and spend some time (months or years) interrogating the binder and mastering his skills. I'd then kill the binder. By the time I'd return to Eberron, the gnomes would have given up on chasing me.
Vharuck
08-15-07, 06:09 PM Didn't the gnomes learn elemental binding magic from the giants of Xen'drik, who were the first to master it? I believe the drow use it, but they weren't the original "creators" of binding magic. I could be wrong. Don't have my MoE book with me.

I think the giants' civilization was utterly annihilated before the gnomes did much of anything, really. I forget the timeline too, and I know that's a space where I think of it being larger than it really is, but I'm pretty sure they only arrived in Xen'drik after the giants fell and the drow rose.
OgreBane99
08-15-07, 09:02 PM I think the giants' civilization was utterly annihilated before the gnomes did much of anything, really. I forget the timeline too, and I know that's a space where I think of it being larger than it really is, but I'm pretty sure they only arrived in Xen'drik after the giants fell and the drow rose.

You're right. Just checked MoE and on pg. 11, it gives the story of how the Zilargo Gnomes discovered binding magic... from the drow.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Nightshade 08-01-07, 01:09 PM	I have a player who is interested in this prestige class. The problem: he is not a Gnome. Worse, he's a Dragonmarked Human of House Cannith. The prestige class does not have a mechanical racial requirement of Gnome. But let's be realistic here, there is a huge campaign restriction in that only Gnome's have this magic. I have a problem with PGtE where it says someone might learn this by trial and error. It is highly illogical that someone would learn the Elemental Binding feat and High Binder class simply by trial and error. For one, if that was possible, someone in House Cannith would have already done it and the Gnomes would not have the monopoly that they do have on Elemental Binding. After all, House Cannith has immense resources to place towards such an effort and there's also an entire magical facility / school called The Twelve, devoted to magical research for the Dragonmarked Houses. If they haven't been able to duplicate the efforts, there's no way one dinky character would be able to by trial and error alone. Two, even if it were possible, it would take years of research... research that cannot be done while adventuring and a character would effectively be out of the campaign. Knowledge of this magic is strictly controlled. The Gnomes, and specifically the Trust and Inmost, would teach only a select few and enforce loyalty at the point of a wand. If anyone, anywhere were found to have learned Elemental Binding or worse, the High Binder prestige class, the Assassination attempts would occur non-stop until that person were dead! Zilargo will maintain it's monopoly at ALL costs!!! It's one of the few things that they've got that the Dragonmarked Houses do not and they want it to stay that way. So, how likely is it that someone who is not a gnome and not a member of Inmost, and is a member of House Cannith to be able to learn, first, the Elemental Binding feat and, second, the High Elemental Binder prestige class?
naturax 08-01-07, 02:21 PM	Sounds like the concept for an adventure if I ever heard of one! Instead of asking "how likely" why not ask "what would be ways to pull this off?" so that you can get your DM to run you through it?
Nightshade 08-01-07, 03:32 PM	Sounds like the concept for an adventure if I ever heard of one! Instead of asking "how likely" why not ask "what would be ways to pull this off?" so that you can get your DM to run you through it? No, I'm the DM for this one. First, while it's more of a long term goal, it kind of interferes with my campaign plans. Second, I told the character that there may be a way to acquire the Elemental Binding feat through a quest. But I have no idea how it could even be possible for a non-gnome to infiltrate the Inmost and obtain their secrets on Elemental High Binder. Third, it would take time to learn the magic, so that puts the character out of the campaign for awhile. Last, what's the motivation for the other characters in this group? There's are 0 ways for an artificer by himself to complete such a quest and the only thing this will likely do for them is get them all killed. Even House Cannith would be unlikely to fund such a thing because then the House could be retaliated against economically, financially, and militarily by Zilargo. Since the House is in tatters already, it would not be a prudent decision.
Vharuck 08-01-07, 04:40 PM	He can learn from the binders the gnomes stole the techniques from: drow in Xen'drik. And how hard is it to convince a party to explore lost giant ruins likely riddled with magical artifacts and piles upon piles of valuables screaming to be fenced to Morgrave?
ChristopherGroves 08-01-07, 09:41 PM	Um ... you're the DM. It's as likely as you want it to be.
naturax 08-02-07, 09:17 AM	No, I'm the DM for this one. First, while it's more of a long term goal, it kind of interferes with my campaign plans. Second, I told the character that there may be a way to acquire the Elemental Binding feat through a quest. But I have no idea how it could even be possible for a non-gnome to infiltrate the Inmost and obtain their secrets on Elemental High Binder. Third, it would take time to learn the magic, so that puts the character out of the campaign for awhile. Last, what's the motivation for the other characters in this group? There's are 0 ways for an artificer by himself to complete such a quest and the only thing this will likely do for them is get them all killed. Even House Cannith would be unlikely to fund such a thing because then the House could be retaliated against economically, financially, and militarily by Zilargo. Since the House is in tatters already, it would not be a prudent decision. How about House Cannith is desperate for the technology so that they can start competing with the gnomes and put the pieces of the House back together? Or for one of the three factions to gain dominance over the others? How about THEY fund the rest of the party to go with the guy that wants to be an elemental binder and make a mission out of it? And they've got to have secret resources buried away to use in just such an occasion, so make sure that the top priority is that they stay secret. The PCs are the perfect disposable mercenaries in this case - some random, unaffiliated people that the House can disavow any knowledge of if the gnomes find out about it. And House Cannith can bribe the other PCs with cool gadgets and magic items and stuff that will also make passing among the gnomes easier. If its super hard to infiltrate the Inmost and the Trust, etc. etc. then make a whole campaign out of it. Maybe they need a lot of little things to happen on the way in order to work towards it and there can be a lot of side benefits along the way.
Ravenstein 08-09-07, 01:35 PM	Its not too farfetched for someone to take the personal effort to try and figure it out themselves. I mean, a mage can summon an elemental; would it be so hard for him to go, "Huh, I wonder if I could keep that thing here, maybe even bind it to something. Those gnomes can do it..." Personal research is what most mages are all about. The fact that they designed the class without a racial restriction shows that Wizards never really intended for the gnomes to have the sole monopoly on the binding effort. Like someone mentioned before, the gnomes stole the technology in the first place. Heck, even warforged are a stolen technology. Pretty much every technology Khorevaire has was taken from a previous civilization. More so, look at the real world; we were on a nuclear bomb, as well as Russia, Germany, and others. We beat'em to it and pretty much had a monopoly on it till the technology get out and other nations reverse engineered out work. If a player wants to be a High Elemental Binder, let'em; but make'em work for it. Perhaps the group infiltrates a gnome workshop. Maybe they go do a dungeon crawl in Xen'Drik in order to help their mate out. Having their friend learn how to bind elementals can only benefit them so they'll probably do everything they can in order to help their friend build some earth elemental plate. It always bothers me to read on here about restrictive DMs. If a DM told me I couldn't do something and didn't have an open mind, I'd kick'em in the junk and find another group to play with. Make players work for they want. It'll be engaging and fun, and keeps you from having to think up an adventure; in this case your players have done most of the work for you.
Nightshade 08-09-07, 04:10 PM	Clearly, you don't think that DM's have the right to control their own games and that Rule 0 should be removed. I think that's stupid. But it doesn't matter. The problem solved itself. When the other players found out the artificer wanted to seek out this magic, they told him he can do this or adventure with them and not both. They were not willing to incur the wrath of the Trust or Inmost. A wise decision.
Ravenstein 08-10-07, 08:47 AM	No, I think DM's retain the right to "run" games, not "control" them. I think there are far too many DM's out there who wanna control their players' fun rather than let them have fun. I played a cleric/high elemental binder. It was great fun. I enjoyed having a group of lil' elemental minions. I was a one-man army with them. 4 Elementals and the spell "Cometfall" rocked my DM's world. It was great. The class basically boils down to just that; an elemental controller. Sure I could have bound all kinds of elementals to armor and stuff and given it to my friends or sold it. But why share that kinda power when I can have it all to my self?
RFrenchJr 08-10-07, 10:13 AM	mission impossible theme music a slender stone with a magic mouth begins to speak Good afternoon High Artificer Phelps. It is no secret that House Cannith is in serious and irreperable financial distress. We, the unamed, have a plan. small silent image projects from the stone These are the members of the Trust, the highly secretive society of gnomes responsible for guarding the secrets of High Elemental Binding. They are the keepers of the magic technology and they guard this information with not only their lives, but with the lives of others around them. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to infiltrate the headquarters of the Trust and steal this technology for House Cannith. Should you, or any members of your party be caught, you will be exoriated and all knoweldge of your mission will officially be disavowed by the house. Good luck High Artificer Phelps. This message will self destruct. the slender stone shatters into nothing.
Ravenstein 08-10-07, 10:56 AM	mission impossible theme music a slender stone with a magic mouth begins to speak Good afternoon High Artificer Phelps. It is no secret that House Cannith is in serious and irreperable financial distress. We, the unamed, have a plan. small silent image projects from the stone These are the members of the Trust, the highly secretive society of gnomes responsible for guarding the secrets of High Elemental Binding. They are the keepers of the magic technology and they guard this information with not only their lives, but with the lives of others around them. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to infiltrate the headquarters of the Trust and steal this technology for House Cannith. Should you, or any members of your party be caught, you will be exoriated and all knoweldge of your mission will officially be disavowed by the house. Good luck High Artificer Phelps. This message will self destruct. the slender stone shatters into nothing. LOL That is totally rad! I gotta use something like that in a game. Now I wanna play a High Elemental Binder again...
Nightshade 08-10-07, 01:23 PM	[QUOTE=Ravenstein;13366676]No, I think DM's retain the right to "run" games, not "control" them. I think there are far too many DM's out there who wanna control their players' fun rather than let them have fun. QUOTE] See, your problem is that you don't realize that this game is supposed to be fun for DM's too. And it is not fun if players are controlling the campaign, not the DM. To that end, the DM is allowed to ban classes, feats, whole books, or whatever else they don't believe will be good for their campaign. It's their call and I hate it when players say it should be the players call. Start your own campaign if that's what you want. In this instance, I still told the pc that he could do it. I also told him that he would have to inflitrate the Trust and Inmost and that his chances of success were low, that he'd have to convince the other players to go with him, and that if he succeeds he would likely be under attack by a Trust or Deneith hit squad at least once during every following adventure until they succeeded in killing him. The other players chose not to go along with it.
dfarnsworth 08-11-07, 01:08 PM	I would have taken the Xen'drik route if a lil research was successful and maybe introduced a variant High Elemental Binder. Exploring Xen'drik and racing against an Inmost band of explorers to find the "lost" technology variant. That could really be fun, especially if cannith provides some funding.
OgreBane99 08-14-07, 04:46 PM	He can learn from the binders the gnomes stole the techniques from: drow in Xen'drik. Didn't the gnomes learn elemental binding magic from the giants of Xen'drik, who were the first to master it? I believe the drow use it, but they weren't the original "creators" of binding magic. I could be wrong. Don't have my MoE book with me. I'm actually planning on doing this in my campaign too. My group is soon to go to Xen'drik and I plan on giving the artificer a schema that will allow him to practice and take the elemental binding feat. I may also give it to him as a free "bonus feat." I haven't yet decided. He's a human artificer of House Cannith as well.
CannibalSmith 08-15-07, 07:07 AM	I suggest an open ended approach. Tell the player that he can have the class if he get the binding knowledge IG. Allow him to make whatever steps he deems necessary to accomplish that goal. Give him complete freedom and make the world respond realistically. If I was him, I'd first go on a treasure hunt or some other affair to gather resources I'd need for the task. I'd also find out the location of a manifest zone that allows travel to it's respective plane. Then I'd equip myself with scrolls of Dominate Person. Then I'd dominate a diviner and find a High Binder. Then I'd dominate my way to him and dominate himself. I'd then abduct him and leave a dominated changeling in his place. I'd then flee the material plane and spend some time (months or years) interrogating the binder and mastering his skills. I'd then kill the binder. By the time I'd return to Eberron, the gnomes would have given up on chasing me.
Vharuck 08-15-07, 06:09 PM	Didn't the gnomes learn elemental binding magic from the giants of Xen'drik, who were the first to master it? I believe the drow use it, but they weren't the original "creators" of binding magic. I could be wrong. Don't have my MoE book with me. I think the giants' civilization was utterly annihilated before the gnomes did much of anything, really. I forget the timeline too, and I know that's a space where I think of it being larger than it really is, but I'm pretty sure they only arrived in Xen'drik after the giants fell and the drow rose.
OgreBane99 08-15-07, 09:02 PM	I think the giants' civilization was utterly annihilated before the gnomes did much of anything, really. I forget the timeline too, and I know that's a space where I think of it being larger than it really is, but I'm pretty sure they only arrived in Xen'drik after the giants fell and the drow rose. You're right. Just checked MoE and on pg. 11, it gives the story of how the Zilargo Gnomes discovered binding magic... from the drow.