#silver flame

Ambreloc, mostly known as Amber, is my Oath of Vengeance Paladin in an Eberron campaign. Team has leveled from one to three and had their first few sessions, made a bit of trouble, all the good stuff.

Jaela Daran is the Keeper of the Silver Flame, and leader of the Theocracy that governs the nation of Thrane. As the Keeper, she acts as the High Priestess of the Church of the Silver Flame, and she is the only known person currently able to consistently and directly hear the Voice of the Flame. The Voice is the immortalized spirit of Tira Miron, an ancient Paladin who re-sealed the Rakshasa Rajah Overlord, Bel Shalor, back into the essence of the Silver Flame, which acts as a prison keeping many such Overlords bound and unable to subjugate the Material world.

Around the year 991-993 YK, the Voice spoke out to a four-year-old girl living in the city of Flamekeep. Tira whispered warnings of catastrophes through the girl's dreams and nightmares, leading her Father to bring her to the Cardinals. When the Cardinals brought the girl before the flame, the Voice spoke through Jaela, revealing a cabal of disguised fiends under the umbrella of the Lords of Dust. Once the cult was destroyed by Thrane's knights, the Keeper at the time, Lavira Tagor, was replaced by Jaela Daran, a girl of only six years. By the time most Eberron campaigns and stories are set (998 YK), Jaela is eleven years old.

In my Eberron, Jaela proves a much stronger leader than most around her expected to be. Even when she was a child, she acted with more wisdom and foresight than the most experienced Cardinals, Generals, and Nobles. It is largely thanks to her efforts and outreach in the aftermath of The Last War that have ensured the war has not reignited.

The church has long been frought with problems, from corruption to zealotry to tribalism. Many officials such as High Cardinal Krozen, whose actions caused harm to many and went against the tenets of the Church, were either reined in or excommunicated. In Krozen's case, he concluded of his own volition that he would serve the flame better by simply adding his soul to the fire, and he submitted himself to be executed for the crimes he would then confess to.

Jaela observed that the Theocracy of Thrane brought with it incentives for the Cardinals and Bishops to serve their own interests, rather than to serve the values of the Church. Since Jaela became Keeper, the structure of Thrane's government has seen much reform, and whispers of abdication and a new form of government for the nation have been abounding.

For the groups such as the Servants of the Pure Flame, which have proven themselves to be violent fanatics espousing Machiavellian ideals to justify evil deeds, Jaela offered an ultimatum. Repent and look inward to see the corrupting evil that had festered in them, or be excommunicated and branded as heretical terrorists. The Puritans, as they called themselves, were split. By the words of the one who communicates directly with their god, some were convinced of their own wrong. But many, including a handful of Cardinals, doubled-down and were cut off from the Church. The removal of such violent zealots, whose hearts were corrupted by the Shadow in the Flame, was most felt in the city of Thaliost, a formerly-Aundarian city that changed hands between Aundair and Thrane multiple times during The Last War. Jaela has even begun negotiations with Queen Aurala of Aundair to discuss ceding the territory to put an end to the animosity between the two nations.

By 1020 YK, Jaela has grown into an extraordinarily powerful woman, and has been the cause of much growth in the Church of the Flame. She continues to lead, being seen by the people of Thrane more and more as she grows more able to see the will of the Flame done. As a high-level cleric in her own right, she is unmatched when within the Grand Cathedral in Flamekeep. Even if an assassin or other opponent could match her, they would be too distracted by her to see that she still keeps Skaravojen the Dragonhound by her side.

I completely forgot about that. I genuinely think you have solved where Yellowfang’s Persian ancestry came from.

And If that’s the case do you think Cassian does/ did flirt with her for the lols. Not in like a gross way but in that, “I have an obsessive need to be liked by everyone, especially my friends parents.” kind of way. 

I wonder if it’s an ongoing joke. Ya know whenever Helion invites Cassian to his bed, Cass just responds with a “What would your mother say?!” or a “Oh no I have a date with your mother tonight.” 

Also I can't stop thinking about how cool Helion’s mum would be. (With no description of this female whatsoever) imagine her being quite young when she had Helion so they’re more like best friends than mother and son. Such a vibe. 

Helion is such a mama’s boy, but he’s not ashamed about it at all. Other people try to insult him, “Little Helion has to run back to his mommy.” and he just responds with, “Bitch, we’re gonna have cookies and gossip about you losers.” 

You just know she’d be the baddest bitch, and she was so supportive when Helion came out, to the point where she's like “Don’t you ever apologise for being who you are. If people think it’s weird that you like males and females then they can deal with me.” 

She also would have seen just how distraught he was after the situation with Lady Autumn and would just sit with him and support him through it and get him to smile again. 

TEMPERAMENT AND LUPERCALIA

Shifters are the descendants of lycanthropes and humans. Not necessarily first-generationally either. Sometimes called “Weretouched,” shifters can display animalistic features even if neither of their parents showed any outward signs.

They are usually socially solitary and tend to be quiet in mixed group settings. Not so when gathering with other shifters. When with shifters of their own “species” (swiftstride, longtooth, beasthide, etc), they are more relaxed, apt to wax nostalgic or make a toast. When around other types of shifter, this gregarious nature tends to turn decidedly more rowdy.

This is fairly unnoteworthy in most situations; if said rowdy intersection takes place where other races outnumber the shifters present, we’re talking opposing sports fans in a bar, at worst. And even if shifters are the majority, 11/12 of the year, the absolute worst it will get is rock stars wrecking a hotel room.

But in the month of Olarune, it’s a different story. Whether it’s to do with a seasonal pheromonal shift, or some more likely connection to “Olarune’s Blessing” (as druids and Eldeen shifters refer to shifter powers), the second month of the year affects shifters heavily. Really heavily. Shifters purposefully avoid other types of shifter during Olarune. They purposefully avoid large groups of shifters of any kind that month. It’s a month for meditation or solo hunting/drinking/studying. Or it’s a month for spending time with non-shifters (although that is a much less common pastime). Because if a bunch of shifters were to get together in Olurane, it would result in a dangerous —and hyper-sexual— state called a Lupercalia: an unstable middle ground between an orgy and a bloodbath. There’s no clear number for how many shifters it would take to cause a Lupercalia, and any quantitative study of that sort of thing would require a truly evil research organization (Know any?).

THE SILVER CRUSADE

In the 800s YK, lycanthropy was, out of nowhere, a major concern for a large swath of the population of Khorvaire. Whether from a confluence of moons or some darker magic, the curse was suddenly able to be spread by anyone bitten by a lycanthrope. Were rats, werewolves, weredolphins, and more: all were proliferating at an alarming rate.

Simultaneously, the Keeper of the Flame at the time, Jolan Sol, The human speaker for the will of the Church of the Silver Flame, was attempting to expand the church’s reach into Aundair, where the lycanthropes were causing massive problems not just infecting people but also decimating their livestock. Keeper Sol saw an opportunity to maximize the Silver Flame’s marketability while making some of the more militaristic factions within the church’s current ranks happy. He declared that this lycanthropic surge would be met with an equal and opposite lycanthropic purge.

From 832-882 YK, the Church of the Silver Flame launched The Silver Crusade, a zero-tolerance campaign to stop the spread of a mutating lycanthropic curse. As part of that purge, many shifters were killed, not out of confusion, but out of bigotry. Eventually the Church decreed that its more overzealous (read: ‘violently racist’) knights were to leave shifters alone, but by then a lot of blood feud had built up on both sides. To this day, over 100 years later, there are knights of the Silver Flame out there who consider shifters to be one bad day away from a lycanthropic rampage. Also to this day, there are shifters who would just as soon rip out the throat of a Silver Flame paladin as look at them.

ARE YOU READY FOR SOME HRAZHAK?

One of the three most well-known/infamous spectator sports in Khorvaire (SEE ALSO: Six Stones, Skyblades), Hrazhak is primarily a shifter game, played like full-contact Capture The Flag. More than full-contact, actually, since most full-contact sports don’t allow claws and fangs to be employed quite so liberally. While (super)natural weapons are permitted, magic is prohibited (both spells and items), as are all other weapons and armor. Normally played with two teams of seven shifters, substitutions are possible. Tieflings have often been welcomed in because of their sizable horns, but most other races are not seen as able to hit the overlap between A) hearty B) savage, and C) likely to stop hitting other players before killing them.

Standard gameplay involves a bounded 100x50yd stadium field featuring outcroppings, structures, and various traversal methods. Design is up to the event coordinator, and a regular contest prize in Sharn is “Design The Next Hrazhak Field!” Teams place their respective Hrazhaks (usually stones the size of a large vase), and disperse around their half of the field. When play begins, players try to literally knock out the other team and be the first to have both hrazhaks touching on their half of the field. Healers are on hand to stabilize and keep players alive, but as soon as a player has been magically healed, they are out of the game until a winning team has been announced. Thus, training often involves on-the-fly non-magical first-aid techniques to bandage wounds and keep going as long as possible.

Current Campaign group all together, for our exploration into Eberron

Characters include

Titus Tak, kobold revived Rogue, former associate of the Tyrants.

Orion, elf rogue of Ir'Talan clan.

Theo, changeling, sea elf and artificer.

Leonard Vesper, Valet to the queen and Star Druid of the Silver Flame.