Editing Eberron (section)

==[[Dragonmark|Dragonmarked]]==
The one thing that stands out above all other things in Eberron are the Dragonmarked, a dozen of the most powerful magically-gifted houses that effectively act as the aristocracy for all Khorvaire. Each of the houses are identified by their particular magical tattoo like marks on their skin and are the undisputed rulers of a particular trade. These marks also hold magical powers that permit their bearers to cast limited magic.

Because of their power, each House takes incredibly meticulous care to chronicle every single member of their bloodline, identifying their allegiances to the house, and how to best use them. In particular interest for these houses are the Siberys Dragonmarks: Those individuals who have massive dragonmarks that possess remarkable powers. Each house usually scrambles to ensure that they can count on these individuals. Occasionally house blood filters into the general popular through trysts, affairs, disowned members and other such occurrences. Those descended from these encounters can sometimes manifest the dragonmark and those that do are known as foundlings. Most Siberys marked individuals are foundlings, as the mark almost only appears on those without prior dragonmarks.

Not all members of a house are dragonmarked however. For most houses, non-dragonmarked members are primarily for or by marriage. Deneith allows any into its house, though only humans married into the bloodline can have hereditary membership. Medani (Humans and elves) and Orien (half-elfs, half-orcs, elves and orcs) have significant membership outside of their primary species, though Medani prefers to keep the human/elf ratio roughly even.

Keeping the Dragonmarked houses in check is the Korth Edicts, agreements made with Galifar a thousand years ago. These edicts prohibit members from owning land (they must rent), intermarrying with noble families, and (with the exception of Deneith) maintaining significant military forces beyond guards. Today the edicts are threatened by the fact that the nation these agreements were made with no longer exists and many likely violations were never addressed because of the war. 

In addition to the true marks, there are also aberrant marks said to be affiliated with Khyber, the Dragon Below. While true marks are linked to bloodline and can be reliably bred true, most aberrant marks occur seemingly at random outside of the mixed marks (identical to “normal” aberrant marks except they always have the color of true marks) spawned by mixing dragonmarked bloodlines. In 5e, this unpredictably is such that while 3E aberrant marks were limited to the races that could have true marks, 5E allows any humanoid to have them (Note: Warforged are considered humanoids in 5E). Aberrant Marks hold unique powers (3E picked from a varied list, 4E had three particular categories to pick from three categories, while 5E allows any 1st level sorcerer spell), but they are often unreliable while being dangerous to the user and those around them. This unsafe nature was especially true during the distant past when aberrants were also far more powerful than today, with powers that included creating plagues they had no way to control or stop. This gave rise to the early Twelve attempting to (and largely succeeding) exterminate aberrants, but the long disappearance of such marks and the weaker, less uncontrollable, nature of modern aberrants means the modern Twelve don’t really care about them. The Twelve still continue their agreement, separate from the Korth Edicits, to prohibit mixing of blood between the houses, so as to prevent the rise of mixed marks.

The Houses are the following:
* '''House Cannith (Mark of Making)''': Originating in Cyre, this house was the chief authority in all things artifice and manufacture. They made armor, wands, swords, and even Warforged, and everyone wanted it. After the Mourning eradicated all house leadership, the remaining members have been attempting to group together and find a way to re-establish themselves.
* '''House Deneith (Mark of Sentinel)''': Your militant house, Deneith focuses its business in the acquisition and contracting of various soldiers and is the only house allowed to maintain significant military forces. Since the Korth Edicts forbids them from owning land, they are more like a giant house of knights-errant.
* '''House Ghallanda (Mark of Hospitality)''': One of the two halfling-centric houses. These guys run all the inns and hotels as well as the variety of minor trades. This leads to them having plenty of friends.
* '''House Jorasco (Mark of Healing)''': The other halfling-centric house, made to be dedicated healers. They're renowned for their effectiveness to the point that they've sold their services to the highest bidder during the Last War. Since even if high level clerics weren't rare neither the [[The Sovereign Host]] or the [[Church of the Silver Flame]] is big on resurrection and going to [[The Dark Six]] to get raised is a bad idea, they are best route for returning the dead to life. Unfortunately the magic altars that let them do that only do the 10,000 GP Resurrection, so anyone looking for the half cost Raise Dead is out of luck.
* '''House Kundarak (Mark of Warding)''': The dwarf-owned house focuses on security. Their main trade is banking where they can use their special magical locks and wards to ensure the utmost safety of their clients' possessions. Their reliability has given them a friendship with Sivis.
* '''House Lyrandar (Mark of Storm)''': This half-elf run house once made a living ruling the seas, but with the introduction of manned flight, they began scouring the skies for opportunities. They've also been assisting the country of Valenar in the hopes of making it a home for the half-blooded.
* '''House Medani (Mark of Detection)''': Mainly run by Brelish half-elves, this house has the finest Inquisitives around by using their powers to detect things that usually go past others. They usually stay out of all the noble issues by working pro-bono.
* '''House Orien (Mark of Passage)''': This house's main gig is the Courier Guilds by mean of their incredible mobility. Before Lyrandar decided to shove elementals into ships, the Orien Courier's Guilds and Lightning Rails were the only way to transport goods, while teleportation remained a luxury reserved to the super-elite. Now they have contracts with Cannith in order to make more affordable teleportation.
* '''House Phiarlan (Mark of Shadow)''': The original elf-centric shady-house with a specialty in espionage with a front in entertainment. At some point near the end of the Last War, a chunk of this house seceded and decided to become their own House.
* '''House Sivis (Mark of Scribing)''': The only gnome-centric house, and they focus entirely on the spoken and written word. Their claim to fame is the speaking stone (magical telegraph), but their expertise stretches as far as guaranteeing the security of any messages they carry. They carry a particular alliance with Kundarak. Unlike the other houses, they rarely marry outside of the family and the only new blood is through introduction of foundlings.
* '''House Tarkanan''': While not an official Dragonmarked House, this house does represent the Aberrant Dragonmarks (Strange and possibly defective marks that have been known to cause madness and even death) and thus outcasts flock towards it. They have named themselves after Halas Tarkanan, a crazed warlord but organized resistance to the early Twelve's attempt to genocide Aberrants during the War of the Mark. Despite its namesake and styling, House Tarkanan is essentially a glorified crime family, though they would take the opportunity to challenge and disassemble the paradigms established by the main houses.
* '''House Tharashk (Mark of Finding)''': Humans and half-orcs make the majority of this house, and with their dragonmarks their senses sharpen to incredible levels to help identify whatever they hunt. While they may moonlight at monster hunting and tracking people, their main business is prospecting ore veins and dragonshard deposits. This house is actually the youngest of the Dragonmarked Nobility, so they act the least snooty.
* '''House Thuranni (Mark of Shadow)''': The other elf-centered stealthy house, though these guys specialize in being assassins. These guys aren't exactly bitter at Phiarlan and the two houses aren't hostile to each other, but they will get very competitive.
* '''House Vadalis (Mark of Handling)''': This human-led house specializes in the taming of animals of all sort, most notably their griffons (Examplified in a 4E [[Paragon Path]] that let you ride a damn Griffon around). That said, they are also in the business of breeding animals too, and some members even go so far as using magic to modify the brood in the pursuit of a better life form. Its members typically have arranged marriages and otherwise controlled lives, with the leaders breeding their human membership like they would animals.

There was originally 13 Dragonmarks, but the house resposible for it did some terrible things worth getting killed over and it eventually caused a terrible chain of events that led to it's destruction and it's only survivor becoming a Lich. More on that later