Hi everyone 
Im trying to work out my campaign details for paragon and epic tiers, and I have some rough ideas (plus what happened in heroic tier) but I need help trying to string them together in a better way than the path I have in my head.. it feels off..
Anyway, here's what has happened so far. The party has been in Xen'drik under the hire of a House Cannith member seeking out schema pieces, rumored to be a giant made schema that would help with new 'forged component construction. The schema gave the Cannith member directions (more of a calling) a creation forge.
In reality the schema was a Quori made one and it was used to unlock a Quori creation forge. They are currently in Dal Quor (via dream sending eldrich machine cuz of the forge) trying to turn the forge on. What they don't know is that for a few levels, their contact in Cannith has been mind-seeded by an Inspired and has been sending them around. The Inspired has known where the creation forge was the whole time, and faked the sudden gift of directions.
While in dal Quor, I intend on having them fight apperations of the animals representing each House, the animals and count are supposed to be hints (if they can catch onto it) on where the Dreaming Dark has spies. When they finish this tier and kill the current agent of the Dark they know of (although, they don't know he's from the Dark), the Cannith member will die (havent figured out how yet, but probably have it happen in combat) but will direct the party to Sharn and Merrix to start cleaning out the corruption of the Houses...
Now, I'd like to be able to tie this whole thing together somehow to the Mournland (got a couple players OBSESSED with that place ever since Eberron came out). The easy way is to say the Mourning is something the Dark did to maintain their version of Dal Quor... of course, I could also do they were building more Monoliths (using House funds) but something went wrong, and the Mourning happened...
Ive got planned right now 2 in Sivis, 2 in Jorasco, 2 in Orien, 1 in Medani, 1 in Kundarak, 1 in Phiarlan, and 1 in Cannith (I couldnt figure out how to fit 12/13 into it... ideas from that?).
Ultimatly, I'd like to have a 'cause' for the Mourning, and allow my players to either discover it, or maybe under their Epic Destiny, repair the damage...
So.. any ideas kind people? :D
Hey. I really like your ideas so far, they sound really interesting.
Now, I don't have my campaign guide right in front of me so I'll be kind of vague with names, but I think I can help ya out.
For some reason the PCs can't get out of the Dreaming Dark the way they came and need to find another way out. The way they find actually has them exitting the Glowing Chasm in the Mournland. The downside? Whatever they did opened up the door for everything else to come through.
Also you can work in somehow that the agents in the Dragonmarked houses set up the Mourning to happen while the Feytower (don't remember exactly what it's called, but its a tower/spire that phases in and out of the realm and the Feywild, manned mostly by Eladrin.) is in Cyre. The Mourning caused it to get stuck, which perhaps weakened the dimensional boundries for more stuff to come through?
If the PCs can find the tower in the mournland and fix whatever stopped the tower from phasing out maybe they can fix the dimensional wall. This could also allow you to work a brief forray into the Feywild into the game.
While dealing with the Mournland perhaps one of the Quori forges is actively running and the Lord of Blades has been trying to convert the warforged as a diversion for his other-worldly masters, while also building an army for them to use once they arrive in the realm. You can even have the PCs fix the mournland by the end of Paragon tier because epic tier can be dealing with invading forces from Sarlona and invading forces from Dal Quor as the quori make their attempt to take over.
For your people invading the dragonmarked houses. They are using the PCs now, but what happens when the PCs have filled their purpose (which is what, by the way? if the Cannith guy knew where everything was why didn't he turn it all on himself? maybe for the barrier to break down people who are originally from that plane and not being controlled have to break it down? maybe there was a failsafe built into the dimensional lock to Dal Quor by the Gatekeepers that made it so?) they were supposed to die. But since the PCs are causing problems how can they deal with them without giving themselves away. USE their houses against the PCs. The Council of the Twelve can be a powerful enemy, especially if they beleive they are protecting Khorvaire. Have the agents leak a false bit of prophecy or information that points to the PCs as the cause of the Mournland. Or kill a high ranking member of the Council and blame it on the PCs, while one of your agents rises to a Council position, making him an even more dangerous enemy.
The important part is to make nothing an antagonist does be for only ONE reason. Part of the beauty of Eberron is that with all tragedies that have happened, they were all for more reasons that were visible on the surface. You have your antagonists already infiltrating ALL the dragonmarked houses!!! The houses rarely communicate intent to each other, yet ALL are capable of travelling between countries with diplomatic immunity. They have the power to bring about MAJOR events before anyone would be able to put the pieces together, and when someone does, they can have an accident. If you like anime, I would say watch some episodes of Full Metal Alchemist and see how the homunculi infiltrated the military. Lots of damage can be done with a fake order that passes through many hands, and lower downs will know better than to challenge higher ups. Most of all, if the PCs get back to Khorvaire make them wary of who they trust.When they find out that Dal Quor is the enemy and could be trying to break though, the PCs could tyr and enlist the help of The Gatekeepers, the druids who originally sealed them away.
I hope this helps. I was just brainstorming and wrote stream of conciousness so it may not be in the most coherent order. But if this sparks a few ideas for ya then I'm glad to help. Also if you wanna return the favor I have a thread I'm looking for help with ideas on that is also Eberron based: community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/758...
Good luck!
A small note:
I'm sure the gatekeepers would love to help in the fight against the Quori, however they were not the ones to seal Dal Quor away all those years ago. That honor goes to the Giants and their cataclysm device.
Ach so, I do apologize for the mistake. I was mixing up Xoriat and Dal Quor and quori and daelkyr in my head, woops. Anywhoo, finding old giants or trying to get the Gatekeepers to do whatever they did again... my intent was just to spark ideas, not give a solid plot, hopefully managed to do that. Thanks for the correction though.
Thanks for the ideas guys - will post more discussion when I have a chance, just work has been hell the last week or so -_-
Sharn City of Towers has the Head of House Deneith in Sharn as an Inspired. I have wrapped this up with House Deneith's internal struggle over whether they should attempt to consolidate the throne for themselves as a play by the The Dreaming Dark. In my Eberron, the Dreaming Dark sows the seeds of the next war, and strengthens the role of House Denieth so House Deneith can claim the throne (under the Dark's control of course) when it come time.
Secrets of Xen'drik has a docent (warforged component) that is actually the last remaining Dreaming Heart entitiy, sealed off from the Dream plane. I took that idea and expanded it so that a warforged finds a docent with a Dreaming Dark agent in it. The Dreaming Dark uses the warforged similar to the way they use the Inspired. Now this Warforged is crafting more docent/Dreaming Dark vessels. In my Eberron, this warforged is a member of the Iron Watch from Stormreach, and is slowly turning the Iron Watch into a Dreaming Dark police force. This could be changed slightly to a House Cannith/Inspired agent doing the crafting, making docent/vessels for Warforged.
Just a couple ideas from my campaign world....
In my game, the Dreaming Dark mind seeded the PCs' main patron and sends them off to battle against Daelkyr forces to make friends with the Gatekeepers. The DD needs knowledge about the planes that they suspect the Gatekeepers to have in order to bring Dal Quor in coterminous phase and open a gate between Eberron and the Dream plane.
I want the Mournlands to play an important role in their plan, and with the docent capable of hosting quoris, I'd make the Becoming God and the Lord of Blades warforged agents of the Dark, possessed or not. Maybe Merrix is building them some easy to possess warforged.
However, since I'm making some sort of Daelkyr vs Quori campaign, I might involve Vadalis magebreeding humans for quori possession, but Vadalis is looking for Daelkyr/Mordain magic to get faster results or something.
Also, if Deneith is possessed, maybe the Thronehold Watch is too, and quori have access to the Galifar treasure. In fact, quori are also in Q'barra, a kingdom that started out of people who stayed true to the Galifar kingdom instead of the Five Nations. For me, it is obvious they want to grasp the treasure for Q'barra, to later get it themselves, because Q'barra will have bought the services of Riedran soldiers or something.
Another thing is the Twelve, possession in this organisation is a huge control on R&D and technology. A lot of contacts and thus potential mind seed victims. Another organisation not to neglect is the Aurum.
Rekko