Hey! I'm hoping this is a fair place to post this.
My group is going to be starting an Eberron campaign after ours finishes up soon and I have been reading some of the Player's Guide. I just had a question about how my character idea would fit in the setting.
I'm going to be an eladrin Rogue, multiclass Bard with the Mark of Shadow.
My story is thus: I was born into a high-standing family of house Phiarlan and trained to be an entertainer but my parents were assassinated by members of the rival house Thuranni. My parents were able to fake my death as the assassin was attempting to kill me also. I trained to get my revenge for years after that.
This is where it gets sticky- After finding a member of the house I told him I had a dream that brought me to my great uncle's stash, where I discovered he was a member of the house and that I too am related. Would they let me in? Even as some low-rank member that I have to work up with? I am unsure whether this story fits Eberron as I am still new, or do the houses have some way to prove your lineage?
EDIT: My DM already said it was an okay concept. I just don't know whether this scenario is realistic for Eberron.
Have you read about the Shadow Schism? If not, the short summary goes as follows: The Phiarlan House was divided into five (iirc) family lines. In 972 YK the Thuranni line claimed to have uncovered evidence of a grand conspiracy by the Paelion line and killed them all. In response the Phiarlan baron called for the excoriation of all Thurannis. The Thurannis refused to except the judgment and left House Phiarlan to start their own Dragonmarked House. If your parents (and thus you too) were of the Paelion line the story would work perfectly.
As to proving you lineage, a dragonmark will do that just fine 
Have you read about the Shadow Schism? If not, the short summary goes as follows: The Phiarlan House was divided into five (iirc) family lines. In 972 YK the Thuranni line claimed to have uncovered evidence of a grand conspiracy by the Paelion line and killed them all. In response the Phiarlan baron called for the excoriation of all Thurannis. The Thurannis refused to except the judgment and left House Phiarlan to start their own Dragonmarked House. If your parents (and thus you too) were of the Paelion line the story would work perfectly.
As to proving you lineage, a dragonmark will do that just fine
The book mentioned the Shadow Schism as the reason for two houses with the Shadow Dragonmark but I haven't read up on it. If that happened in 972 YK how long ago was that? I know the DM gets to decide the year but as per the setting about what year is it?
The standard setting assumes your campaign starts in 998 YK (so, roughly 26 years later), best to check with your DM though.
if your dm starts the campaign as per the timeline, then the schism was 26 years ago.
The default campaign year is 998 YK, so ~23 years ago, assuming your DM doesn't decide to start earlier or later.
EDIT: Both wrong (should have taken a moment to do the math) and double-ninja'd. Bah!
no the campaign starts in 998 as per the timeline. The split happened in 972, that is 26 years not 23!
Thanks for the help! I got everything I needed. I'm very excited to run this game- Eberron seems to have a lot of intrigue and polotics involved and thats what my DM really likes. I'm pretty sure this is going to rock!
I don't have anything to back this up, but I don't think prophasy really expresses itself in dreams in Eberron. Except in Sarlona, the realm of dreams doesn't concern itself with the mortal world and any other entity (angel, spirit, dragon, what have you) doesn't have any real access to a person's dreams since they don't have any real measure of control of Dal Quor.
Perhaps your character sought out an oracle, or one read a newly discovered dragonmark on a tree or in a river and sought the character out, to reveal his destiny. maybe the character's own dragonmark hs some detail that drove the character to seek out a prophet.