WHAT IS AN ABERRATION?
CHAPTER 1
ORIGINS OF THE ABERRATIONS Aberrations as a kind seem to cry out for explanation. Other monsters are part of the natural world, or come into being through the actions of natural beings, but aberrations have no place in the usual order of things. Their origins are unthinkably distant in time, space, or planar cosmology. While they are now natives of the Material Plane (they would be outsiders if they were not), aberrations share little or no kinship with the other living creatures of the world. As a DM, defining an origin for a major aberration race you intend to feature in your campaign will help you to create plots and schemes for that race. For example, a race older than the world itself might retain memories or lore of extremely ancient events. Heroes who find that they need to understand how a god died thousands of years ago, or where and when a very ancient artifact was last seen, might discover that the knowledge they seek exists only in the secret lorepools of the aboleths. Aberrations that came from distant worlds might have an insatiable appetite for human slaves and wealth to send back to their alien homelands through magical doorways. Races that exist through the intervention or corruption of a dark and terrible god might seek ways to fully wake their progenitor, or form insidious cults to capture the worship of “lesser beings,” such as humanoids, for their divine master.
OUT OF SPACE Most intelligent creatures live their lives on a single world in the Material Plane, and do not dream that the Material Plane includes anything other than the world they know. However, the Material Plane is indeed an infinite plane. It is filled with countless worlds, so inconceivably far removed from one another that only the most powerful of wizards can hope to travel from world to world. Each of these Material Plane worlds possesses its own unique conditions, and some of these distant worlds nourish strange and inimical forms of life. Aberrations
from the remote reaches of the Material Plane come from worlds such as these, places stranger and more menacing than all but the most fearsome of Outer Planes. Because these far worlds are still part of the Material Plane, it is possible to reach them via greater teleport, teleport circle, and similar magic. In fact, it is possible for vessels with the proper magic to voyage between the worlds without any sort of teleportation. Flying ships (sometimes known as spelljammers) can reach the moon(s), nearby planets, or possibly even the worlds of other stars altogether. Journeying to a nearby world, whether it is the moon of the characters’ own native world or a different planet in its own right, might require anything from a few hours to months or even years of star-sailing. The neogi are perhaps the best-known example of an extraterrestrial race. Descending from the dark night skies in their sinister, spiderlike flying ships, these rapacious slavers and oily merchants wander from world to world, trading with those strong enough to warrant caution and stealing from those who are not. Neogi merchants enjoy access to the resources and markets of many worlds, and few can follow them when they depart for their next destination. Slaves taken by the neogi rarely, if ever, see their homelands again. The tsochari also hail from a distant world, a cold and lightless place of terrible black ruins and endless, shrieking winds. Unlike the neogi, who move from world to world so easily that they themselves do not recall the world of their origin, the tsochari do not build starfaring vessels. They must labor long and hard to create the magical gates that allow them to venture between worlds.
OUT OF TIME Just as the origins of an alien race can be physically remote from the normal world, they can also be temporally removed from the world humans know. Some aberrations do not hail from places where the rules are different, but instead originate in times when the world is, was, or will be a very different place than it is now.
pqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqrs ABERRATIONS IN EBERRON Nearly everything in this book is perfectly usable if you are running a campaign in the world of the EBERRON campaign setting. After all, one of the guiding principles of the EBERRON setting is “If it exists in D&D, it exists in Eberron.” That said, aberrations have a unique role in Eberron that might change how you use some material in this book. Millennia ago, a bizarre and alien race called the daelkyr invaded Eberron through planar portals leading from their home plane of Xoriat, the Realm of Madness—a plane similar to the Far Realm discussed in this book. While on Eberron, the daelkyr created many of the known species of aberrations, including beholders and chokers. Mind flayers served as the lieutenants of the daelkyr, and originated with them on the plane of Xoriat, making them extraplanar aberrations when they appear on Eberron. New kinds of aberrations are found on Eberron as well, including dolgrims and dolgaunts.
Aberrations that venture near human habitation are frequently the focal point of degenerate cults loosely termed the Cults of the Dragon Below. Cultists of the Dragon Below are insane, believing that aberrations are beautiful and holy creatures that can lead them to a subterranean promised land or reward them with annihilation when they bring the daelkyr up from the depths to destroy the world. Most of this information amounts to background details about the various kinds of aberrations, and has little impact on their actual use in play. The vast majority of the information contained in Lords of Madness, including details about the anatomy, society, abilities, and tactics of various aberrations, is just as true in the EBERRON setting as in any other D&D campaign. Simply alter or ignore details about the origins of different aberrations presented in this book, placing them instead in the context of the ancient daelkyr invasion.
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