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MattStriker 01-03-05, 08:10 AM

Just read it and please comment :P. (Oh, and I'm using the 2nd-ed/Planescape cosmology, because the newer versions are an abomination.) Here's the story behind my Greyhawk/Forgotten Realms/Spelljammer/Planescape crossover campaign: Long ago, on the prime world of Toril, there was a loose coalition of barbarian tribes that banded together for mutual protection. They called their new realm 'Netheril'. Several of these tribes worshipped a god of balance whose name is now lost. The spiritual leaders of these tribes were druids rather than priests, and they strove to live in harmony with the natural balance. But Netheril grew, and it grew powerful. Over time, the druids lost their importance and were replaced by other gods' servants. Mystryl. Amaunator. Targus. The nameless god of balance faded into obscurity. As his power waned, he formed a plan. He would channel all his remaining power into a mighty artifact that his remaining followers could use to preserve the balance for all time, long after he was dead and drifting on the astral plane. In a last grand ritual, the Heartstone was created. It was an artifact that gave its wielders near-godlike control about the very balance of nature, so that they could intervene whenever the pendulum swung too far in one direction. And for centuries, all was good. The druids formed a secret society dedicated to protecting the balance, and with the help of the Heartstone, they gently steered the world towards a more balanced state. All that ended when the Phaerimm attacked. Their lifedrain spell, fueled by the monsters' hatred of all other life, proved too great for even the Heartstone. For years, the two powers struggled in an uneasy stalemate...but finally, the Heartstone shattered, and Anauroch was born. The Heartstone was broken into nine fragments. Four of them represented the elements of nature...for Fire, a ruby. For Air, a piece of pale blue quartz. For Water, a sapphire. For Earth, an emerald. Four more represented non-elemental powers. For Life, a shard of amber. For Order, a diamond. For Death, a piece of obsidian. And for Chaos, an opal. The final shard of the Heartstone kept the original artifact's rainbow hue. It represented balance, and it was the weakest of all the shards. When the Heartstone broke, it was thrown across the very planes, and it eventually came to rest on the distant prime world of Oerth. When Netheril fell, the remaining druids split up into eight seperate orders, each keeping one shard of the stone. For a while, they kept preserving what was left of the balance of nature, but eventually, the orders fell apart, and the resting places of the eight shards were forgotten. Centuries passed. Then, a man stepped through a portal and ended up in the city of Sigil. He was an unusual man even then...a psion. He studied his new surroundings and found that he liked them. He moved in and joined the Believers of the Source. He worked diligently to improve himself, and as he grew older, he rose through their ranks, becoming one of the highest-ranking factors of the Godsmen, just below the Factol. But in the end...he ran out of time. He grew obsessed with his own mortality. He believed he was mere inches away from ascension to immortal divinity, all he needed was a little more time... So he left Sigil behind and turned to the one place where time could not find him. The Astral Plane. For years he lived there alone, deep in his studies, and over time, obsession turned into raging madness. He built himself a lair on the drifting hulk of a dead god. It was there that he found his destiny, for deep inside the remains of the deity, he found an echo of a memory... His lair was built on the body of the forgotten netherese god of balance, and he learned its story. He gathered allies and minions and set them to work, searching for the shards of the Heartstone. However, he could find only one thing: He learned that the ninth shard, the rainbow-hued crystal of balance, could be used to find the others. And with all the shards in his possession, he could reunite the Heartstone, drain its powers, and fuel his ascent to divinity. And the ninth shard, he found, was somewhere on the world of Oerth... This is where the PCs come in. Early in their career, they helped an elven village against a hobgoblin invasion. During that invasion, another hobgoblin managed to sneak into the inner sanctum of the elves' temple and steal something that was kept there. The PCs pursued the hobgoblin and were surprised to find that he didn't deliver his loot to the army waiting before the gates...he ran to an old ruin instead. When they finally caught up with him, he opened an ancient portal and sent the item through before he was killed. The item was the ninth shard. The PCs had no idea of its importance at the time, and they continued their adventures on Oerth for a while...until they ran into another servant of the mad psion. They pursued and finally ended up on the dead god's body on the astral plane, where they were captured. A githyanki raid (and a githzerai spy) provided the distraction they needed to escape, and on the way out, they grabbed two items: The rainbow shard of balance, and the shard of Death which the psion had already found. They eventually got away by hijacking a githyanki astral galleon...which they promptly crash-landed on Toril, somewhere in the realm of Aglarond. For a while, the party was safe there, and they proceeded to learn the local language and continue their adventuring career in a new world. But the psion's servants were also on Toril, searching desperately for the other shards. When the PCs decided to search for the shard of Fire under Mt. Hotenow near Neverwinter, they ran into one of the psion's most loyal servants, a Blue psion named Ghanduk. They managed to escape him, but Ghanduk reported to his master what he had seen...and the hunt was on. Now the PCs and the psion race to claim the shards, So far, the PCs have three...Death, Fire and Air. They do not know how many the psion has, but they do know that his power is vast. Right now, they are on their way to the shard of Water... Eventually, the story will take the party beyond Toril, both into the strange depths of Wildspace (Spelljammer) and to other planes as they try to find the final shard (of Chaos...it gets around a lot).