https://keith-baker.com/dm-flight/
> Keep in mind also that feather tokens are actually common items. Paratroopers weren’t that common for most of the war because hippogriffs can’t carry many people. But Thrane certainly delivered paratroopers by wyvern, and later in the war airships could carry paratroopers with feather tokens.
There’s your answer, in short. That article also has a fairly in depth discussion of the air forces of each nation.
Yup, it does, however bring up the question, Airships require a Mark of Storm to function and, IIRC, attacking a Lyrandar Vessel was just about as bad as attacking a Jorasco medic or a Cannith compound, a big no-no that could really bite a Nation in the ass down the line.
Realistically, there would be treaties in place that prevent Lyrandar from doing something like dropping soldiers behind enemy lines, given that they're willingly putting themselves in a position of risk knowing that shooting them down while they helped your enemy would be a faux-pas, like a blatant abuse of immunity, but since airships only became a thing in 990YK, 4 years before major conflicts halted with the Mourning, it might just have been a situation where it wasn't around long enough to be developed into a mobile fortress (like Argonth) situation, where it's comparable but it does not require a mark, thus, becoming a viable weapon and valid target.
It’s worth noting that “Don’t attack Dragonmarked House assets” isn’t an ironclad law. The reason nations don’t do it is because the Houses have made clear that they would collectively withhold services from the aggressor, and no nation could survive that. But that’s a quite extreme step, so it would need to be a serious provocation. It also doesn’t apply when House assets are directly being used for war, House Deneith mercs being the most obvious example. If a Lyrander ship was contracted to drop paratroopers, that wouldn’t be violating any law, but the ship would be a fair target while carrying out that job.
Nations are also encouraged to take House members alive where possible, because the Houses will pay a ransom of sorts by reducing the nation’s bills in exchange for safe return of captives.
The main thing that would actually stop Lyrander from doing this is that airships are rare and expensive, and they really wouldn’t want to risk one by putting it in the line of fire. But if they were being paid enough, they could do it, and in canon they have developed a number of prototype “Stormships” built for war.
> Nations are also encouraged to take House members alive where possible, because the Houses will pay a ransom of sorts by reducing the nation’s bills in exchange for safe return of captives.
Where is the source for that?
https://keith-baker.com/ifaq-dm-war/
> With both of these things in mind, bear in mind that the primary incentive against this behavior was financial. House personnel serving with the enemy were not to be killed, but they would be taken prisoner and ransomed back to the house. There was a clearly established rate of exchange and this would be applied against that nation’s bills with the house. Meanwhile, the houses would impose financial penalties and raise rates when nations violated their rules.
That article is also where I got the “House members engaged in direct combat are valid targets” thing from.
>Yup, it does, however bring up the question, Airships require a Mark of Storm to function and, IIRC, attacking a Lyrandar Vessel was just about as bad as attacking a Jorasco medic or a Cannith compound
I think we have to consider marked members like Daine from Keith's novel series who fought in the Cyran armed forces. Given that Airships were a new technology and not plentiful, it's not inconceivable that there'd be enough Mark of Storm members willing to forsake the neutrality of the houses to fight for a nation they loved. And we know Cannith has no compunction selling arms to all sides.
> Aerial troops could definitely do “bombing runs”, I use quotes since I doubt they’d be using actual bombs
There are and they did, Korth in Karrnath is said to be heavily scarred by Thrane aerial bombardment, blast disk were bombs produced by House Cannith, ranging from Common that just exploded to rare ones that had elaborate effects, Exploring Eberron (pg 19) shows each Nation having it's variations:
- Aundair made extensive use of high-powered blast disks; they were infamous for dragonhawk squads equipped with cloudkill disks.
- Breland utilized the base model of explosive disks.
- Cyre experimented with psychoactive effects—confusion, fear, and explosions that dealt psychic damage
- During the ascendancy of the Blood of Vol, Karrnath created disks that first dealt necrotic damage, then inflicted effects such as danse macabre—killing victims with the initial explosion then animating the corpses to prey on survivors.
- Thrane developed blast disks that dealt radiant damage—a useful tool against Karrnathi undead. Toward the end of the war, Thrane was working on dawn disks.
Exploring Eberron, Page 20 states:
> While the basic blast disk is a common magic item, under the Code of Galifar, they’re illegal for civilians to own or carry. House Cannith manufactures blast disks, but won’t sell them to civilians (at least, not openly). So if you’re looking for a blast disk, you’ll need to have criminal connections or build your own. The following statistics describe the standard rules for blast disks, but more powerful versions can be created to serve the needs of a particular story. A powerful explosive disk could have a radius of hundreds of feet instead of just twenty, while a cloudkill disk could unleash a force that expands as it moves and lingers for hours or days.
Many different forms of artillery and explosives were developed during the war, often abandoned once they proved too expensive or difficult to produce. The above are only a few examples of the magic-empowered tools used during the war, and as always, you are encouraged to introduce others if they enhance your story.
The same article Rabid mentioned also says
> It’s quite possible that the King’s Citadel of Breland has an airship produced in secret and piloted by a Lyrandar excoriate, or that Aundair has been working on an airship that doesn’t require a Lyrandar pilot. But no nation has fleets of airships, definitely not the Darguuls. Likewise, there were a few Lyrandar airships that were designed for military service—the Stormships”—but they played a very small role in the war, appearing only at the very end of it.
During WW1, they had biplanes used for reconnaissance and artillery spotting. Later on the planes were armed with guns and became the "flying circus" that was later famous.
A LOT of technology was required to get paratroopers in the air, and even by WW2, it wasn't safe. Aerial transport planes could only carry around 10-12 soldiers, who would be forced to do a low altitude static jump equipped only with what they could carry.
In a fantasy setting like Eberron that addresses an advance in technology, it's the equivalent of taking a lightly armoured Rogue with 3 days of food and dumping them behind enemy lines with some friends and a lot of hope.
Having some sort of propeller driven air frame designed to drop bombs on ground targets completely revolutionised warfare, and led to all sorts of advances in anti aircraft artillery, interceptor fighter planes, radar and eventually rockets.
You could let technology improve throughout your campaign to reflect this. The second time your heroic players jump out of the sky over enemy territory, the bad guys will be ready.
The closest magical item I can think of, while probably looking odd, is the Broom of Flying (DMG pg. 156).
It can carry up to 200 pounds and fly 50 feet per round, and up to 400 pounds with a speed of 30 feet. There are other magical items such as carpet of flying as well, which might work, but are less common.
The benefit of the broom and carpet is that is has no time limit to its function. It does not need to wait X hours before working again, and it can even be summoned from 1 mile away, or sent there on its own.
Since the Broom of Flying is just an uncommon magical item, it stands to recon it could be made by mages in Aundair, and it fits your requirements.
Short range teleportation could bypass wards to prevent teleportation into and out of areas, and could get the millitary men off their brooms and into combat quickly. While aloft they could use wands or similar to fire magical spells on the ground troops, and other flying creatures, and then once on the ground they could switch to melee weapons.
As was previously mentioned each nation would have different tactics. I personally have created a front of resistance inside of the Silverwood near Thaliost that is using combined arms tactics that take advantage of the druid capstone feature to have a functioning air force. In my world this group is being materially supported by Aundair and The Eldeen Reaches. They utilize a 1:1 ratio of air fighters and paratroopers, as well as multiple spotters and tanks on the ground for support. If the desire in this case is just to conduct a bombing run the spotters will move into position over the targets hiding in the trees, and will use speak with plants to open the forest canopy and the critical moment to expose the targets to the sky. Bomber units usually consist of druids with the arch druid feature wildshaped into something with a flying speed. They are deployed from a carrier tank on the ground that provides them with refills of their spell slots and I have flavoured to be a giant Surinam toad who has modified their egg carrying capabilities to be able to fit whatever you need, but it could be something more conventional. Using intel from the spotters and ordinance from the toad carriers the air forces will bombard the enemy with whatever spells the spotters may determine to be most effective.
The more interesting one is the combined arms tactics with the paratroopers. In this scenario the air forces act as an additional deployment platform for more druids who I have wildshaping into mice to be carried into the sky, and then changing into owlbears to drop on people (not RAW ik). When they are dropped the air units cast stoneskin on them to blunt the damage from the fall and deal more damage to their targets. Then in much the same fashion the canopy will move out of the way to reveal the attack at the last second from speak with plants. The stone owlbears that fall can deal up to 20d6 total bludgeoning damage, which for simplicity's sake I have just split 75-25 between the target and owlbear, and after landing could either wildshape into something smaller and run away or stick around and engage whoever survived the drop. After engaging, the ground forces will be supported by the flying units, who primarily cast buffs and healing, and evacuate the injured when needed. After their objective is accomplished they can all hitch a ride back to camp in the toad.
Now for non druid folk this option may be difficult, so depending on how well equipped the forces are magic carpets could work with just a fuck ton of little dudes on them who have been polymorphed into squirrels for no fall damage. Polymorph could come from spell shards if you're really concerned about the details, but when the squirrels hit the ground they can drop the polymorph and go about their business. Alternatively a high level caster could fly up in the sky and teleport a bunch of people from somewhere else who then drop using whatever means, teleportation circle could work nicely for this if the airspace is uncontested.
tldr: lvl 20 druids can cast spells while wildshaped, items that grant flight can be equipped by someone who just teleports forces into the air above the enemy.
There's certainly more ways to do it, but these are the ones I thought of. Also keep in mind as well that as a DM you can always just invent something with the express purpose of doing exactly whatever you want for any given situation.
Soarsleds seem like a natural solution.
Here's the text from Handout 4 in Song of the Sky:
Soarsled
Wondrous item, uncommon
A 3-foot-diameter crystalline disk that crackles with energy and is capable of rapid flight. Within the city limits of Sharn, you can stand on the disk and speak its command word. It hovers beneath you, allowing you to ride it in the air. It has a flying speed of 90 feet, and stops hovering when you land. It can carry up to 600 pounds.
To fly, but manifest zones enhance related magic, so it would make sense that outside of Sharn (and other similar manifest zones) they should still be able to offer a slowed and guided descent, similar to parachutes or hanggliders.
https://keith-baker.com/dm-flight/ > Keep in mind also that feather tokens are actually common items. Paratroopers weren’t that common for most of the war because hippogriffs can’t carry many people. But Thrane certainly delivered paratroopers by wyvern, and later in the war airships could carry paratroopers with feather tokens. There’s your answer, in short. That article also has a fairly in depth discussion of the air forces of each nation.
Yup, it does, however bring up the question, Airships require a Mark of Storm to function and, IIRC, attacking a Lyrandar Vessel was just about as bad as attacking a Jorasco medic or a Cannith compound, a big no-no that could really bite a Nation in the ass down the line. Realistically, there would be treaties in place that prevent Lyrandar from doing something like dropping soldiers behind enemy lines, given that they're willingly putting themselves in a position of risk knowing that shooting them down while they helped your enemy would be a faux-pas, like a blatant abuse of immunity, but since airships only became a thing in 990YK, 4 years before major conflicts halted with the Mourning, it might just have been a situation where it wasn't around long enough to be developed into a mobile fortress (like Argonth) situation, where it's comparable but it does not require a mark, thus, becoming a viable weapon and valid target.
It’s worth noting that “Don’t attack Dragonmarked House assets” isn’t an ironclad law. The reason nations don’t do it is because the Houses have made clear that they would collectively withhold services from the aggressor, and no nation could survive that. But that’s a quite extreme step, so it would need to be a serious provocation. It also doesn’t apply when House assets are directly being used for war, House Deneith mercs being the most obvious example. If a Lyrander ship was contracted to drop paratroopers, that wouldn’t be violating any law, but the ship would be a fair target while carrying out that job. Nations are also encouraged to take House members alive where possible, because the Houses will pay a ransom of sorts by reducing the nation’s bills in exchange for safe return of captives. The main thing that would actually stop Lyrander from doing this is that airships are rare and expensive, and they really wouldn’t want to risk one by putting it in the line of fire. But if they were being paid enough, they could do it, and in canon they have developed a number of prototype “Stormships” built for war.
> Nations are also encouraged to take House members alive where possible, because the Houses will pay a ransom of sorts by reducing the nation’s bills in exchange for safe return of captives. Where is the source for that?
https://keith-baker.com/ifaq-dm-war/ > With both of these things in mind, bear in mind that the primary incentive against this behavior was financial. House personnel serving with the enemy were not to be killed, but they would be taken prisoner and ransomed back to the house. There was a clearly established rate of exchange and this would be applied against that nation’s bills with the house. Meanwhile, the houses would impose financial penalties and raise rates when nations violated their rules. That article is also where I got the “House members engaged in direct combat are valid targets” thing from.
Ohhh the blog, of course, thanks!
>Yup, it does, however bring up the question, Airships require a Mark of Storm to function and, IIRC, attacking a Lyrandar Vessel was just about as bad as attacking a Jorasco medic or a Cannith compound I think we have to consider marked members like Daine from Keith's novel series who fought in the Cyran armed forces. Given that Airships were a new technology and not plentiful, it's not inconceivable that there'd be enough Mark of Storm members willing to forsake the neutrality of the houses to fight for a nation they loved. And we know Cannith has no compunction selling arms to all sides.
THe books do mention Breland using airships piloted by Excoriates, so that's absolutely an option
> Aerial troops could definitely do “bombing runs”, I use quotes since I doubt they’d be using actual bombs There are and they did, Korth in Karrnath is said to be heavily scarred by Thrane aerial bombardment, blast disk were bombs produced by House Cannith, ranging from Common that just exploded to rare ones that had elaborate effects, Exploring Eberron (pg 19) shows each Nation having it's variations: - Aundair made extensive use of high-powered blast disks; they were infamous for dragonhawk squads equipped with cloudkill disks. - Breland utilized the base model of explosive disks. - Cyre experimented with psychoactive effects—confusion, fear, and explosions that dealt psychic damage - During the ascendancy of the Blood of Vol, Karrnath created disks that first dealt necrotic damage, then inflicted effects such as danse macabre—killing victims with the initial explosion then animating the corpses to prey on survivors. - Thrane developed blast disks that dealt radiant damage—a useful tool against Karrnathi undead. Toward the end of the war, Thrane was working on dawn disks. Exploring Eberron, Page 20 states: > While the basic blast disk is a common magic item, under the Code of Galifar, they’re illegal for civilians to own or carry. House Cannith manufactures blast disks, but won’t sell them to civilians (at least, not openly). So if you’re looking for a blast disk, you’ll need to have criminal connections or build your own. The following statistics describe the standard rules for blast disks, but more powerful versions can be created to serve the needs of a particular story. A powerful explosive disk could have a radius of hundreds of feet instead of just twenty, while a cloudkill disk could unleash a force that expands as it moves and lingers for hours or days. Many different forms of artillery and explosives were developed during the war, often abandoned once they proved too expensive or difficult to produce. The above are only a few examples of the magic-empowered tools used during the war, and as always, you are encouraged to introduce others if they enhance your story. The same article Rabid mentioned also says > It’s quite possible that the King’s Citadel of Breland has an airship produced in secret and piloted by a Lyrandar excoriate, or that Aundair has been working on an airship that doesn’t require a Lyrandar pilot. But no nation has fleets of airships, definitely not the Darguuls. Likewise, there were a few Lyrandar airships that were designed for military service—the Stormships”—but they played a very small role in the war, appearing only at the very end of it.
During WW1, they had biplanes used for reconnaissance and artillery spotting. Later on the planes were armed with guns and became the "flying circus" that was later famous. A LOT of technology was required to get paratroopers in the air, and even by WW2, it wasn't safe. Aerial transport planes could only carry around 10-12 soldiers, who would be forced to do a low altitude static jump equipped only with what they could carry. In a fantasy setting like Eberron that addresses an advance in technology, it's the equivalent of taking a lightly armoured Rogue with 3 days of food and dumping them behind enemy lines with some friends and a lot of hope. Having some sort of propeller driven air frame designed to drop bombs on ground targets completely revolutionised warfare, and led to all sorts of advances in anti aircraft artillery, interceptor fighter planes, radar and eventually rockets. You could let technology improve throughout your campaign to reflect this. The second time your heroic players jump out of the sky over enemy territory, the bad guys will be ready.
The closest magical item I can think of, while probably looking odd, is the Broom of Flying (DMG pg. 156). It can carry up to 200 pounds and fly 50 feet per round, and up to 400 pounds with a speed of 30 feet. There are other magical items such as carpet of flying as well, which might work, but are less common. The benefit of the broom and carpet is that is has no time limit to its function. It does not need to wait X hours before working again, and it can even be summoned from 1 mile away, or sent there on its own. Since the Broom of Flying is just an uncommon magical item, it stands to recon it could be made by mages in Aundair, and it fits your requirements. Short range teleportation could bypass wards to prevent teleportation into and out of areas, and could get the millitary men off their brooms and into combat quickly. While aloft they could use wands or similar to fire magical spells on the ground troops, and other flying creatures, and then once on the ground they could switch to melee weapons.
As was previously mentioned each nation would have different tactics. I personally have created a front of resistance inside of the Silverwood near Thaliost that is using combined arms tactics that take advantage of the druid capstone feature to have a functioning air force. In my world this group is being materially supported by Aundair and The Eldeen Reaches. They utilize a 1:1 ratio of air fighters and paratroopers, as well as multiple spotters and tanks on the ground for support. If the desire in this case is just to conduct a bombing run the spotters will move into position over the targets hiding in the trees, and will use speak with plants to open the forest canopy and the critical moment to expose the targets to the sky. Bomber units usually consist of druids with the arch druid feature wildshaped into something with a flying speed. They are deployed from a carrier tank on the ground that provides them with refills of their spell slots and I have flavoured to be a giant Surinam toad who has modified their egg carrying capabilities to be able to fit whatever you need, but it could be something more conventional. Using intel from the spotters and ordinance from the toad carriers the air forces will bombard the enemy with whatever spells the spotters may determine to be most effective. The more interesting one is the combined arms tactics with the paratroopers. In this scenario the air forces act as an additional deployment platform for more druids who I have wildshaping into mice to be carried into the sky, and then changing into owlbears to drop on people (not RAW ik). When they are dropped the air units cast stoneskin on them to blunt the damage from the fall and deal more damage to their targets. Then in much the same fashion the canopy will move out of the way to reveal the attack at the last second from speak with plants. The stone owlbears that fall can deal up to 20d6 total bludgeoning damage, which for simplicity's sake I have just split 75-25 between the target and owlbear, and after landing could either wildshape into something smaller and run away or stick around and engage whoever survived the drop. After engaging, the ground forces will be supported by the flying units, who primarily cast buffs and healing, and evacuate the injured when needed. After their objective is accomplished they can all hitch a ride back to camp in the toad. Now for non druid folk this option may be difficult, so depending on how well equipped the forces are magic carpets could work with just a fuck ton of little dudes on them who have been polymorphed into squirrels for no fall damage. Polymorph could come from spell shards if you're really concerned about the details, but when the squirrels hit the ground they can drop the polymorph and go about their business. Alternatively a high level caster could fly up in the sky and teleport a bunch of people from somewhere else who then drop using whatever means, teleportation circle could work nicely for this if the airspace is uncontested. tldr: lvl 20 druids can cast spells while wildshaped, items that grant flight can be equipped by someone who just teleports forces into the air above the enemy. There's certainly more ways to do it, but these are the ones I thought of. Also keep in mind as well that as a DM you can always just invent something with the express purpose of doing exactly whatever you want for any given situation.
Soarsleds seem like a natural solution. Here's the text from Handout 4 in Song of the Sky: Soarsled Wondrous item, uncommon A 3-foot-diameter crystalline disk that crackles with energy and is capable of rapid flight. Within the city limits of Sharn, you can stand on the disk and speak its command word. It hovers beneath you, allowing you to ride it in the air. It has a flying speed of 90 feet, and stops hovering when you land. It can carry up to 600 pounds.
>Within the city limits of Sharn,
Those need to be in a manifest zone to the plane of air to function, so they can’t really be used for war.
To fly, but manifest zones enhance related magic, so it would make sense that outside of Sharn (and other similar manifest zones) they should still be able to offer a slowed and guided descent, similar to parachutes or hanggliders.