Arcanix
Wizard Academy; Temperate Plains
The Arcane Congress, one of Khorvaire’s greatest collections of arcane minds, operates out of the floating towers that hover above the village of Arcanix. Over
the centuries, the Arcane Congress has turned its Aundair headquarters into a showcase for the power of magic. Visiting the floating towers means seeing wonders undreamt of by most Aundairians—from baffling illusions to animated contrivances to captured creatures from other dimensions.
The floating towers are at once a college of wizardry and the personal laboratories of some of the most powerful wizards in the Five Nations. Many a would-be magewright or wizard comes to the village of Arcanix, below the towers, hoping to study hard and someday ascend to the lofty ranks of Aundair’s fi nest arcanists.
The Arcane Congress devotes two of the towers, Glarehold and Amberwall, to training the next gen- eration of magewrights and wizards. Nocturnas and Skyreach, the other two towers, are the residences, libraries, and laboratories of Arcane Congress mem- bers. From these two towers the Congress advises the Aundairian crown on magical matters and schemes against its rivals, the Twelve (described on page 245 of the E BERRON Campaign Setting).
Environment: Everburning torches light every corner of the floating towers, unless a member of the Con- gress has a specific reason to prefer darkness. Some everburning torches burst into fl ame only when someone enters the room, dousing themselves instantly when the room is vacant. Others burn with strangely colored fl ame, adding a bluish or reddish tint to everything they illuminate. The floating towers are a quiet place; distracting noise is conducive to neither study nor political machinations. The temperature is always mild within the floating towers, no matter what is hap- pening outside.
The Arcane Congress built the floating towers over eight hundred years, so their walls have known many architects, both mundane and magical. Within the floating towers, there’s always a strong aura of transmutation (the spells that keep the towers aloft) and at least one other aura.
Terrain: Arcane architects aren’t constrained by the square footage within the f loating towers’ walls; some rooms exist extradimensionally, and each tower has far more space on the inside than a conventionally made castle would. In general, the f loating towers have smooth stone f loors, superior masonry walls, and 15-foot-high wood-paneled ceil- ings (with 30-foot-high vaulted ceilings in particu- larly large chambers). There’s no consistency to the doors within the Towers. Consult Table 3–17 in the Dungeon Master’s Guide to determine the qualities of a particular door.
The f loating towers are too vast to completely map, and such map would be out of date by the time it was completed. Especially in Nocturnas and Sky- reach, the wizards are always making magic altera- tions to their demesnes. If characters are wandering through a f loating tower, use Tables 3–11 and 3–12 in the Dungeon Master’s Guide to determine each room’s features, then roll or choose a room type from the accompanying table.
Half of the hallways that connect rooms are normal. The other half possess some strange effect, rolled or chosen from the table.
Arcanix: This village of 800 people lies directly beneath the floating towers. The residents of Arcanix owe their livelihoods to the Arcane Congress, from the innkeeper who boards the parents of would-be wizards during the Autumn Entrance Examinations to the stablemaster responsible for exercising the steeds—both mundane and exotic—of some Arcane Congress spellcasters.
Most of the important wizards and sorcerers of the Arcane Congress live in the floating towers themselves, but a few reside in Arcanix. Raulo ir’Trannick (LN human male wizard 9), for example, is the lord mayor of Arcanix and a member of the Arcane Congress. His family has long had holdings on the southeastern banks of Lake Galifar, and his position as Trannick patriarch demands he live earthbound and board a hippogriff when he’s needed for the business of the Congress. Raulo and other members of the Trannick family are the proctors of the Autumn Entrance Exams, determining which of Aundair’s brightest will get a chance to become magewrights and wizards. Raulo also serves as a de facto ambassador between the Arcane Congress and any wizards who arrive at Arcanix unannounced.
The Trannick family offers trained hippogriffs that can ascend to the f loating towers for visitors unable to get there under their own power. The Trannicks collect a 25 gp per person transit fee, which they use to fund scholarships for deserving young mages.
Arcanix is also home to the Tower of Alchemy, one of the Five Nations’ premier colleges for the alchemical arts. Its senior mentor, Tzandro Kavalant, has created the alchemical golems that act as servants and guardians within the floating towers.
Arcanix’s unique position makes it one of the Five Nations’ most magically aware places. Many of the residents are downright blasé about powerful arcane magic, while others take great delight in the astonishment on visitors’ faces when a carpet of flying alights on the town square or an aged wizard turns into a glorious dragon and flies away.
The White Arch: Visitors to the floating towers often ascend (via magic or the Trannicks’ hippogriffs) to Glarehold Tower, where an outcropping of rock has a massive white marble arch that leads to a white marble courtyard. The White Arch is also the traditional gateway that new students use when they begin their studies; many an Aundairian youth dreams of walking under the white arch, clad in the brown robes of a first-year student.
The courtyard beyond the White Arch is the largest outdoor space on any of the four floating towers. Magically animated topiaries in the shape of boars (described on page 173 of Monster Manual III) stand at the corners of the courtyard.
Library of Robideur: Near the top of Skyreach is one of Khorvaire’s finest collections of arcane lore—although librarians in Korranberg would argue the point, and who knows what dark lore lurks in the libraries of Ashtakala?
The library takes up the top four floors of Skyreach’s tallest spire, with bookshelves running from floor to ceiling. Only the doors and the stained-glass windows interrupt the walls crammed with spellbooks, tomes, and grimoires. A unique spell not unlike unseen servant controls the books within the library. An arcanist of the Arcane Congress need only state the title and author of a book, and it slides from its shelf, opens wide, then slowly descends to the arcanist’s waiting hands, lazily fl apping its cover open and shut in imitation of a bird.
The half-elf sorcerer Robideur died more than 450 years ago, but his descendant Tanila (LG half-elf female sorcerer 8) is the head librarian. The library forbids checking out books even to the most powerful members of the Arcane Congress; examination of a book at one of the library’s oak desks is the only option. Tanila has an initial attitude of unfriendly toward anyone who even asks about checking out a book, and she won’t bend the rules unless her attitude is improved to helpful (as described on page 72 of the Player’s Handbook).
The Library of Robideur is a terrific research tool. A PC using the library to research a specific question gains a +4 circumstance bonus on Knowledge (arcana) checks and a +2 bonus on Knowledge (the planes) checks. The library has a few books on other topics—histories, gazetteers, and the like—but they aren’t comprehensive enough to provide a bonus on the skill check.
Adal’s Demesne: At the center of Nocturnas are a series of chambers that Adal ir’Wynarn, Royal Minister of Magic and brother to Queen Aurala, calls home. Adal (described on page 18) splits his time between the f loating towers and his palace at Fairhaven. He regards the floating towers as a place where he can be free of court intrigues and free to direct his staff as they conduct magical research and build weapons of arcane destruction to defend Aundair or extend its reach.
Adal is more politically connected than most of the Arcane Congress. He has the queen’s ear at a moment’s notice (although the trust between them is far from complete). Adal isn’t a great wizard in his own right, but he’s a consummate power broker and charismatic leader. Most of the researchers on his staff are higher-level wizards than he is, and the many agents in Adal’s employ are likewise among the most elite in Aundair.
At any one given time, Adal has three or four major research or weapon-development programs under way within his chambers. Each is kept separate from the others, and only Adal knows the extent and progress of all the programs. One team might be trying to reverse-engineer House Cannith’s creation pattern for warforged. Another team works on a system of weather control, and a third is breeding wyverns that shoot fiery rays from their tails.
Maze of Shadowy Terror: In the lowest level of Amberwall Tower is a maze intended to humble young apprentices confident of their ability to meet any threat with magic. The Maze of Shadowy Terror spontaneously generates monsters from the summon monster II and summon monster III lists with a shadow conjuration effect. The denizens of the Maze of Shadowy Terror thus have 20% of their normal hit points, and characters who succeed on DC 17 Will saves realize that a maze monster is only quasi-real and take only 20% of normal damage from it. Eachmaze monster also has a lower Armor Class, as described in the shadow conjuration spell on page 276 of the Player’s Handbook.
The Amberwall instructors intended that the maze, which looks like a typical set of twisting dungeon corridors, serve as a final test for wizards and sorcerers before they head out into the world or become members of the Arcane Congress. But brave and foolhardy students eager to prove themselves are always sneaking into the basement and entering the maze on their own.
Gate of Xabra: Near the top of Nocturnas is an astronomical observatory and one of the great artifacts of the Arcane Congress: the Gate of Xabra. This circle of menhirs, transplanted from a Q’barran ruin shortly before the start of the Last War, has graven glyphs that correspond to no known language or code. The glyphs hold overwhelmingly powerful conjuration magic sufficient to send everything within the circle to another plane of existence.
When a would-be traveler uses a fi nger to trace certain glyphs on the stones, they glow slightly. When all the correct glyphs are lit, everything within the Gate of Xabra disappears and a whoosh of air fills the void that remains.
Finding the correct sequence of glyphs is no easy task. Fortunately, failed attempts don’t have negative consequences—or at least they haven’t so far. The glyph sequence can’t be learned by rote, because the correct glyph sequence depends on both the destination plane and the alignment of the stars around Eberron.
In general, it takes a DC 25 Knowledge (the Planes) check to open the Gate of Xabra to a specific plane. Uli Blackthatch (NE male gnome wizard 7/ loremaster 2) studies the Gate of Xabra for the Arcane Congress. He has a Knowledge (the planes) modifier of +18 and will direct planar travelers in what he believes is the correct sequence.
The Gate of Xabra only opens for an instant, although in most cases it leaves a circular impression on the other plane that allows a return trip. Travelers appear within the circle at the moment they arrive; once they step back inside it, they reappear in the gate chamber in Nocturnas. On the plane of Irian, the return circle might be marked with crystals, while it might be a circular glade on the forest plane of Lamannia.
The floating towers are at once a college of wizardry and the personal laboratories of some of the most powerful wizards in the Five Nations. Many a would-be magewright or wizard comes to the village of Arcanix, below the towers, hoping to study hard and someday ascend to the lofty ranks of Aundair’s fi nest arcanists.
The Arcane Congress devotes two of the towers, Glarehold and Amberwall, to training the next gen- eration of magewrights and wizards. Nocturnas and Skyreach, the other two towers, are the residences, libraries, and laboratories of Arcane Congress mem- bers. From these two towers the Congress advises the Aundairian crown on magical matters and schemes against its rivals, the Twelve (described on page 245 of the E BERRON Campaign Setting).
Environment: Everburning torches light every corner of the floating towers, unless a member of the Con- gress has a specific reason to prefer darkness. Some everburning torches burst into fl ame only when someone enters the room, dousing themselves instantly when the room is vacant. Others burn with strangely colored fl ame, adding a bluish or reddish tint to everything they illuminate. The floating towers are a quiet place; distracting noise is conducive to neither study nor political machinations. The temperature is always mild within the floating towers, no matter what is hap- pening outside.
The Arcane Congress built the floating towers over eight hundred years, so their walls have known many architects, both mundane and magical. Within the floating towers, there’s always a strong aura of transmutation (the spells that keep the towers aloft) and at least one other aura.
Terrain: Arcane architects aren’t constrained by the square footage within the f loating towers’ walls; some rooms exist extradimensionally, and each tower has far more space on the inside than a conventionally made castle would. In general, the f loating towers have smooth stone f loors, superior masonry walls, and 15-foot-high wood-paneled ceil- ings (with 30-foot-high vaulted ceilings in particu- larly large chambers). There’s no consistency to the doors within the Towers. Consult Table 3–17 in the Dungeon Master’s Guide to determine the qualities of a particular door.
The f loating towers are too vast to completely map, and such map would be out of date by the time it was completed. Especially in Nocturnas and Sky- reach, the wizards are always making magic altera- tions to their demesnes. If characters are wandering through a f loating tower, use Tables 3–11 and 3–12 in the Dungeon Master’s Guide to determine each room’s features, then roll or choose a room type from the accompanying table.
Half of the hallways that connect rooms are normal. The other half possess some strange effect, rolled or chosen from the table.
Features
As a DM, you have four extradimensionally augmented castles to play with, so there’s plenty of room to put whatever features you like within the floating towers. The following features are those known to almost all Aundairian wizards, regardless of whether they’ve received schooling from the Arcane Congress.Arcanix: This village of 800 people lies directly beneath the floating towers. The residents of Arcanix owe their livelihoods to the Arcane Congress, from the innkeeper who boards the parents of would-be wizards during the Autumn Entrance Examinations to the stablemaster responsible for exercising the steeds—both mundane and exotic—of some Arcane Congress spellcasters.
Most of the important wizards and sorcerers of the Arcane Congress live in the floating towers themselves, but a few reside in Arcanix. Raulo ir’Trannick (LN human male wizard 9), for example, is the lord mayor of Arcanix and a member of the Arcane Congress. His family has long had holdings on the southeastern banks of Lake Galifar, and his position as Trannick patriarch demands he live earthbound and board a hippogriff when he’s needed for the business of the Congress. Raulo and other members of the Trannick family are the proctors of the Autumn Entrance Exams, determining which of Aundair’s brightest will get a chance to become magewrights and wizards. Raulo also serves as a de facto ambassador between the Arcane Congress and any wizards who arrive at Arcanix unannounced.
The Trannick family offers trained hippogriffs that can ascend to the f loating towers for visitors unable to get there under their own power. The Trannicks collect a 25 gp per person transit fee, which they use to fund scholarships for deserving young mages.
Arcanix is also home to the Tower of Alchemy, one of the Five Nations’ premier colleges for the alchemical arts. Its senior mentor, Tzandro Kavalant, has created the alchemical golems that act as servants and guardians within the floating towers.
Arcanix’s unique position makes it one of the Five Nations’ most magically aware places. Many of the residents are downright blasé about powerful arcane magic, while others take great delight in the astonishment on visitors’ faces when a carpet of flying alights on the town square or an aged wizard turns into a glorious dragon and flies away.
The White Arch: Visitors to the floating towers often ascend (via magic or the Trannicks’ hippogriffs) to Glarehold Tower, where an outcropping of rock has a massive white marble arch that leads to a white marble courtyard. The White Arch is also the traditional gateway that new students use when they begin their studies; many an Aundairian youth dreams of walking under the white arch, clad in the brown robes of a first-year student.
The courtyard beyond the White Arch is the largest outdoor space on any of the four floating towers. Magically animated topiaries in the shape of boars (described on page 173 of Monster Manual III) stand at the corners of the courtyard.
Library of Robideur: Near the top of Skyreach is one of Khorvaire’s finest collections of arcane lore—although librarians in Korranberg would argue the point, and who knows what dark lore lurks in the libraries of Ashtakala?
The library takes up the top four floors of Skyreach’s tallest spire, with bookshelves running from floor to ceiling. Only the doors and the stained-glass windows interrupt the walls crammed with spellbooks, tomes, and grimoires. A unique spell not unlike unseen servant controls the books within the library. An arcanist of the Arcane Congress need only state the title and author of a book, and it slides from its shelf, opens wide, then slowly descends to the arcanist’s waiting hands, lazily fl apping its cover open and shut in imitation of a bird.
The half-elf sorcerer Robideur died more than 450 years ago, but his descendant Tanila (LG half-elf female sorcerer 8) is the head librarian. The library forbids checking out books even to the most powerful members of the Arcane Congress; examination of a book at one of the library’s oak desks is the only option. Tanila has an initial attitude of unfriendly toward anyone who even asks about checking out a book, and she won’t bend the rules unless her attitude is improved to helpful (as described on page 72 of the Player’s Handbook).
The Library of Robideur is a terrific research tool. A PC using the library to research a specific question gains a +4 circumstance bonus on Knowledge (arcana) checks and a +2 bonus on Knowledge (the planes) checks. The library has a few books on other topics—histories, gazetteers, and the like—but they aren’t comprehensive enough to provide a bonus on the skill check.
Adal’s Demesne: At the center of Nocturnas are a series of chambers that Adal ir’Wynarn, Royal Minister of Magic and brother to Queen Aurala, calls home. Adal (described on page 18) splits his time between the f loating towers and his palace at Fairhaven. He regards the floating towers as a place where he can be free of court intrigues and free to direct his staff as they conduct magical research and build weapons of arcane destruction to defend Aundair or extend its reach.
Adal is more politically connected than most of the Arcane Congress. He has the queen’s ear at a moment’s notice (although the trust between them is far from complete). Adal isn’t a great wizard in his own right, but he’s a consummate power broker and charismatic leader. Most of the researchers on his staff are higher-level wizards than he is, and the many agents in Adal’s employ are likewise among the most elite in Aundair.
At any one given time, Adal has three or four major research or weapon-development programs under way within his chambers. Each is kept separate from the others, and only Adal knows the extent and progress of all the programs. One team might be trying to reverse-engineer House Cannith’s creation pattern for warforged. Another team works on a system of weather control, and a third is breeding wyverns that shoot fiery rays from their tails.
Maze of Shadowy Terror: In the lowest level of Amberwall Tower is a maze intended to humble young apprentices confident of their ability to meet any threat with magic. The Maze of Shadowy Terror spontaneously generates monsters from the summon monster II and summon monster III lists with a shadow conjuration effect. The denizens of the Maze of Shadowy Terror thus have 20% of their normal hit points, and characters who succeed on DC 17 Will saves realize that a maze monster is only quasi-real and take only 20% of normal damage from it. Eachmaze monster also has a lower Armor Class, as described in the shadow conjuration spell on page 276 of the Player’s Handbook.
The Amberwall instructors intended that the maze, which looks like a typical set of twisting dungeon corridors, serve as a final test for wizards and sorcerers before they head out into the world or become members of the Arcane Congress. But brave and foolhardy students eager to prove themselves are always sneaking into the basement and entering the maze on their own.
Gate of Xabra: Near the top of Nocturnas is an astronomical observatory and one of the great artifacts of the Arcane Congress: the Gate of Xabra. This circle of menhirs, transplanted from a Q’barran ruin shortly before the start of the Last War, has graven glyphs that correspond to no known language or code. The glyphs hold overwhelmingly powerful conjuration magic sufficient to send everything within the circle to another plane of existence.
When a would-be traveler uses a fi nger to trace certain glyphs on the stones, they glow slightly. When all the correct glyphs are lit, everything within the Gate of Xabra disappears and a whoosh of air fills the void that remains.
Finding the correct sequence of glyphs is no easy task. Fortunately, failed attempts don’t have negative consequences—or at least they haven’t so far. The glyph sequence can’t be learned by rote, because the correct glyph sequence depends on both the destination plane and the alignment of the stars around Eberron.
In general, it takes a DC 25 Knowledge (the Planes) check to open the Gate of Xabra to a specific plane. Uli Blackthatch (NE male gnome wizard 7/ loremaster 2) studies the Gate of Xabra for the Arcane Congress. He has a Knowledge (the planes) modifier of +18 and will direct planar travelers in what he believes is the correct sequence.
The Gate of Xabra only opens for an instant, although in most cases it leaves a circular impression on the other plane that allows a return trip. Travelers appear within the circle at the moment they arrive; once they step back inside it, they reappear in the gate chamber in Nocturnas. On the plane of Irian, the return circle might be marked with crystals, while it might be a circular glade on the forest plane of Lamannia.
As you soar upward, you see four castles, each floating on a rocky island thousands of feet above the verdant fields of Aundair. Each castle is a crazy-quilt of different architectural styles, each more outlandish than the last. Periodic flashes of light illuminate the windows, and every so often a gout of flame or eldritch energ y bursts forth from a door or chimney.
Knowledge (local) is the relevant skill for learning about Arcanix and its connection to the floating towers.
Floating Towers Lore
Characters with Knowledge (arcana) can research the floating towers to learn more about them.| DC 10 | The floating towers, on the southeastern shore of Lake Galifar, are an arcane academy that trains many wizards and magewrights. |
| DC 15 | The Arcane Congress runs the floating towers and many powerful wizards live there. |
| DC 20 | Two of the towers, Glarehold and Amberwall, are for students. The other two, Nocturnas and Skyreach, are for the powerful members of the Arcane Congress, including Adal ir’Wynarn, Aundair’s First Warlord and Minister of Magic. |
| DC 30 | Adal ir’Wynarn has top-secret laboratories in the Nocturnas tower where his staff develops weapons of arcane destruction. |
Knowledge (local) is the relevant skill for learning about Arcanix and its connection to the floating towers.
Encounters
Most encounters within the walls will be with students and arcane instructors (in Glarehold and Amberwall) or higher-level wizards and their assistants (in Nocturnas and Skyreach). But the hallways also have monstrous guardians, and out-of-control summoned creatures from conjurations gone awry happen at all four towers. In addition, the towers are plagued with gargoyles and arcane oozes that sometimes ambush weak-appearing prey. Sporadic attempts by one wizard or another to wipe out the pests haven’t been successful thus far.The Arcane Congress has a pragmatic attitude toward spellcasting, so it’s not uncommon to see both demons and celestials making pacts with the arcanists of the floating towers. While individual denizens of the towers might be paragons of good or evil, the Arcane Congress as a whole places no stigma on affiliation with either fiends or celestials.
Two encounter tables appear below, one for the towers devoted to education, Glarehold and Amberwall, and another for Nocturnas and Skyreach, the towers where the higher-level wizards of the Congress live and scheme. In either of these areas, the chance of a random encounter is 10% every 30 minutes.
Development
If characters trigger an alarm within the floating towers, they face an array of magic traps, summoned guardians—and wizard after wizard keen on defending Congress and home. The internal layout of each tower magically changes at the direction of senior wizards, so intruders may find that the hallways along their escape route don’t lead to the same places they used to.Treasure
Some of Khorvaire’s greatest magical treasures are found within the walls of the floating towers, mostly in secure vaults within Nocturnas and Skyreach. A typical vault is a lead-lined chamber with multiple magic traps, each CR 7 to CR 10, on its door. Beyond the door lies the treasure—and undoubtedly a guardian of at least CR 10. The vault guardians are often outsiders, constructs, or undead because the wizards of the floating towers can create or control them somehow. Alarm spells, contingent versions of the whispering wind spell, and other alarms typically guard the vault’s most precious contents.It’s a lot of trouble to get into a vault, but the effort can be worth it. A typical vault holds a CR 12 treasure with double items. Some vaults hold still greater treasures—and have commensurately more deadly guardians.
Type
College / Academy
Parent Location
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