Post/Author/DateTime	Post
ShadowDragon8685 10-01-07, 10:21 AM	Okay, first off I'd like to say that while I like the FRCS, my only real, depthy exposure to it has been the first two chapters of Neverwinter Nights, NWN: SoU, and the fun bits (pre-Underdark) of HotU. That, and a fairly large set of FR books gifted to me by someone who moved away, most of which I have not had a chance to read yet. Anyway, I've been badgered into running a game set in the FR, and I have an idea for a plot, and boy is a doozy. (And no, I don't particularly care what anyone says about the coming of 4th ed and it's changes; I'm running with what I know, not what might be coming.) Anyway, my plot involves a BBEG making a horrible abuse of Magics/Psionics transparancy, and attempting to use the Annulus (Major Psionic Artifact) to eradicate Mystra. (And yes, all of Mystra's many chosens and her favorite squeeze are powerless to stop him on their own. Otherwise it would be their story and not my player's.) I've started by writing from the endpoints - the ending battle and the start of the BBEG's dark quest - and I wrote the failure and success modes for good measure. Here are the steps I've come up with so far: Jael Khorne's Quest Complete: Mystra is destroyed forever, and nothing, not even Lord Ao, can bring her back. Jael Khorne ascends to become Shar's One Chosen, and Faerun becomes a Hell of Evil and Darkness as the Weave fails everyone; Arcanists and Clerics alike. Good-aligned Psions alone retain the power to battle evil, but are overwhelmed. In the end, the imbalance of power ends everything; Shar eradicates all light, love and life in the Prime Material Plane. Those who survive do so by fleeing to other Planes while they have the chance. (Que Forgotten Realms 4.0?) The Age of Mortals: The Age of Mortals cult wishes the destruction of all deities. The Annulus complies, and all deities, including Lord Ao and the Crystal Mind itself, are wiped away. All supernatural powers and supernatural creatures die instantly, leaving a world of nature and natural laws. In 5,000 years, roads are paved, automobiles and trains and aircraft ply the world, and magic is forgotten as mere myth and celebrated as legendary fiction. The Age of Psions: The Age of Psions cult wishes the destruction of both Mystra and Shar. Should they end up with the Annulus, they will use it to do so, and collapse both Weaves. All Arcanists and divine spellcasters lose their powers, whereas Psions do not. (Queue F.R. 4.0?) The Age of Gods: (SOMEHOW?!) one of the deities gets their hands on the Annulus. No matter the deity, for reasons fair or foul, they will use it to destroy Lord Ao. Without him to limit direct deific conflict, celestial warfare erupts. Although his final decrees remain in place; the Gods require the worship of their followers to exist, all-out warfare between deities is all but inevitable. Grab some pop-a-corn, because you're about to witness some Serious ****. Destruction of the Annulus: Destroying the Annulus in the heart of the Crystal Mind will enrage Shar beyond belief, but will have earned the respect and the protection of all other deities, even the Evil ones (who know damn well it could have been used on them just as easily as on Mystra.) Shar's agents will forever be forbidden from acting against those responsible for destroying it for any purpose or reason, even unrelated to the Annulus' destruction, on pain of instant destruction of the agent, for any such action will result in Shar's own destruction. The player characters involved will eventually become the lords and the shakers of their age, accomplishing whatever goals they intended. Eventually, their activities will have ushered in a temporary, but effective, age of prosperity for Goodness, at least until the next major shake-up. Destruction of Shar: Committing the act of deicide is not one taken lightly, though in the heat of the moment it may well be something done rashly. Shar's destruction will result in the eradication of the Shadow Weave (at least until some other Evil deity takes it up, which will be millenia from the end of the campaign, and thus beyond the player's worry). The person who held and activated the Annulus to destroy Shar will immediately ascend to Godhood. Everyone else will become a Chosen of Mystra unless they for some reason chose to forsake the status. They almost certainly have great things ahead of them, but it is unlikely they will ever know peace in their times, for they will always have the former agents of Shar nipping at their heels, the other Evil deities after them for vengeance (and out of fear that they might decide deicide is to their tastes and come after them), and the Good deities constantly assigning them work. The party is on to the plot, but are foiled in their attempt to get to the Crystal Mind for the final showdown. All is not lost! There are still some extant ways to foil Jael Khorne's plan! Karsus, God of Magic: The party settles on a dangerous and reckless course of action. With time running out, they seek to restore to life Karsus, possibly the greatest mage of Netheril. It's not a perfect solution, but if they do it, he can cast his Avatar again, and assume the powers of Mystra, including those over the Weave. After the last time, he can successfully keep the Weave under control. Unfortunately, keeping the Weave under control is a full-time job, and he is quickly elevated to a protected deityhood status by Lord Ao, and forbade to be messed with by anyone, including Shar, and neither grants powers nor needs worship, as he is much too busy wrestling with the Weave and repairing it. However, he does leave the party with some parting gifts: A complete set of Nether Scrolls, including an unlocked Ars Factum. To sweeten the deal, he also leaves them a Mythallar (preserved in his petrified person), his own Spellbook (with which they can, in time, access spells greater than 9th level) and instructions on how to raise a flying city. For a goodly time, the players will know Peace; Shar is being punished for orchestrating her sister's demise, and the other Evil gods are too busy playing “Who wants to Guess how the Weave will Work Tomorrow” to bring mischief upon them. There will be a time of wild magic (during which item enchantment – and even spellcasting – are not advised activities), then things will settle down. (May pick this up as a major Epic campaign – if the whole party reads the entire set of Nether Scrolls, they'll all have +50 levels in the arcane spellcasting class of their choice.) Destroy the Crystal Mind: The only place where one can conceivably pull off the use of the Annulus to destroy a deity (or multiple deities) is inside the Crystal Mind itself. It's the only place in the cosmology where one is considered 'close' enough to the gods to do it without being subject to their reprisal attacks, which would almost certainly finish anyone other than Pun-Pun before the necessary minute-long ritual is complete. Destroying the Crystal Mind is actually not as difficult as it sounds – it's rather disturbingly easy, in fact. If they can get to the Crystal Mind, they only need to cast Shatter – this will destroy the whole damn thing, and leave anyone that was on or inside the Crystal Mind plummeting towards Toril in a vacuum. Unfortunately, this will also end Psionics in the Forgotten Realms, causing all the powers of the Mind to fade from existence immediately. Furthermore, the Annulus will have survived, and owing to it's status as a Major Artifact, will not be affected, thus leaving open it's deicidal potential to be used at another time, another age. Endgame: Use (or destroy) the Annulus inside the Crystal Mind, to destroy (whatever deity or deities you choose, or the Annulus). End -1: Get to the Crystal Mind. End -2: Get the Annulus End -3: Search for the Annulus End -4: Discover you need to search for the Annulus, as a means to destroy (deity or deities) Jael Khorne, a Shadowmage, faithful of Shar, and Psion (Cerebremancer) naturally wants to destroy Mystra; it's what Shadowmages do, after all. Unlike most Shadowmage's half-baked schemes, he eventually comes upon a clue in an ancient, submerged ruin, ancient carvings in a deep, ruined temple of a forgotten god of the sea whisper to Jael of a an artifact, ancient even in the carving's times, that could be used to eradicate anything, even a Higher Being. It was nearly used to destroy a being referred to as the Overmind in the writings in times forgotten to the memory of all, and was split into two parts; a jade disk which was hidden somewhere vastly deep beneath the earth, imbued with the destructive power, and a crystalline eyeball which will in ages hence glitter in the sky. Only when one appears can the other be found. This is of course the Crystal Mind, which Jael is familiar with. All he needs to do is wait until it emerges again, which will happen shortly. What I've done with the outline above is to determine what will/may happen if the players don't intervene. And it may be a stretch to say the Annulus could null out Lord Ao, but I've never been fond of having an unstatted uberdeity in an RPG. For me, rule 1 is: If it has stats, you can kill it. Rule 2 has been: If it dosen't have stats, it dosen't belong in the game. Anyway, I'm planning to kick off my campaign in Neverwinter (the joking campaign 'working title' is actually Neverwinter Knights, just for lack of a better thing to call it at the moment), not unlike the beginning of the NWN campaign; something is going wrong, and Nasher predictably responds by putting the city under martial law. In this case, what's gone wrong is thronging undead in the sewers, attacking the exits and trying to get free. The reason for this is that I'm going to give everything in the game (PCs, NPCs, monsters, random rocks. Okay, I was joking about random rocks) the Hidden Talent feat from the XPH's section on introducing psionics to the campaign, as the Crystal Mind appears in the skies above Toril. (Also: it's strongly not advised to have a Charisma score of 10 or less, otherwise you'll get kind of shafted on this count.) I'm not sure where to go from there, but I can probably come up with five or six levels' worth of frenetic adventuing inside the city of Neverwinter. Who knows, I could conjure up another prisoners' revolt in the prison ward, and while I'm at it, Luskan spies in the harbor could shake things up for some nice intrigue.
ShadowDragon8685 10-02-07, 04:46 PM	43 views and not a single comment? :bump:
Crazygx34 10-04-07, 11:42 PM	Hello! I will respond to you because that appened to me to have my post with no reply and it really not happy.:( I found it funy because it look a little like the novels I read right now it Cyric the prince of lie no 4 of the avatar series. He try to make I book that will destroy all workshipper of the god and vanish the other god in forgothunless. But what I think of your idea it look good to play but the Gods will surely want to destroy this . It have to be some really great power beneath your plot to destroy god like Mystra it not an easy doing thing. What a BBeg. That some kind of Old forgotten demon or something like that.:confused: Ok if you could say your opinion about my post here I will be greatfull.:) http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=921195
ShadowDragon8685 10-05-07, 03:55 AM	Actually, the BBEG is just a follower of Shar who happened to find the right Major Artifact - the Annulus - at the right time. And the reason I'm saying the Gods don't just blast this thing is that they can't. Basically, the Annulus is more ancient and powerful than most of them, and furthermore, it represents the last vestige of an ancient covenant that gave Mortals of sufficient strength and heroism the power to erase deities. Naturally, that didn't last very long, but the Annulus itself can't be destroyed, nor can it pass into a deities' hands by that deity's deeds, or the ordered actions of her followers; nor can it be given by someone unknowning. The only way the Annulus could go to a deity would be if some mortal, not connected with the deity, and knowing full well what they have, gave it to one. Of course, you still have to be within 100 feet of a deity and concentrate for 10 rounds to snuff one out - that's only really possible inside the Crystal Mind, where the Gods are powerless to direct intervention, but are considered 'close'.
Crazygx34 10-05-07, 01:25 PM	It a little like the cryptonik for superman. It a cool thing this annulus is have a few deity I want to kill.:) You have decided where the bbeg will find this artifact ? I really don't play much rpg unless in cumputer gamrs and my knowledge of fr it limited. But It look possible, almost everything it possible. But maybe a lot of other guy in this forum could know much about of something are not possible like the disparition of the shadow weaves if you destroy shar. But for me I will play in campaign like this. But it maybe for it that you got no respond here the majority of people here are crack of fr and they almost know all the book by the hearth.. :P Just me I make a lot of grammar error and I was almost ridiculised just because I was saying Loth contrary to Lolth. Maybe they find it not worthing if it not writing by Ed Greenwood , Salvador. But it a great plot you not afraid to attack the god and goddess. If you want some idea you could always ask.:)
ShadowDragon8685 10-05-07, 02:05 PM	I didn't make the Annulus up, though. It's a Major Artifact from the XPH. I'm just horribly abusing Magics/Psionics transparancy to declare any deity to be a Psionic Creature. :)
syl_karagh 10-05-07, 07:02 PM	I was in shock...what a wonderful plot :eek: ...
ShadowDragon8685 10-06-07, 04:12 AM	Thanks, Syl.