The homebrew campaign I have been running has come to an important point in the story and I am at a bit of a loss. Here is some information on the background of the campaign and what the players have faced so far:
*Joined up with the King's Army to face a mutual threat
*Reclaimed a ruined fort that would be the setting of a large battle
*Rode south to recruit more aid for the war effort
*Defused a secret war and recruited the help of two warring tribes
*Returned to the fort and engaged in a huge battle
*Turned the tide of war by achieving a great victory
*Received news that an important sight to the north was under attack
*Rode to the north to discover the enemy and face it head on
*Followed the enemy into the Ethereal Plane
So, in my world there are ley lines of magical energy and physical manifestations of concentrated magical energy known as nodes. These nodes have been researched by magic users but as of yet no discovery of their origin or use has been made.
It seems the invading army has taken a great interest in the nodes and has been conquering and expanding their empire to hold power over more and more of them. The PCs have found out that the nodes themselves link the material plane with the ethereal plane and they serve some greater purpose.
Now here is my issue: What is their purpose?
I have thought that perhaps each node holds within it the shard of a powerful artifact that can grant the owner of all the shards immortality. So the PCs quest would turn to preventing the enemy from collecting the shards and attaining immortality.
I am not 100% sold on this plot, there are so many things left unanswered and so many holes to fill. Any advise on which direction to take the story would be greatly appreciated!
I kind of like the artifact shards idea. You could also twist that all up, so it's not exactly the kind of immortality the seeker had in mind. Rebirth/reincarnation instead of not aging, that sort of thing. Thinking back to 1st edition, artifacts always had side effects.
I suppose those who have control of the nodes could also achieve spell bonuses of some kind, representing more direct access to the lines of magical power? Could these nodes also be used as portals between one another, via the ethereal plane?
I kind of like the artifact shards idea. You could also twist that all up, so it's not exactly the kind of immortality the seeker had in mind. Rebirth/reincarnation instead of not aging, that sort of thing. Thinking back to 1st edition, artifacts always had side effects.
I suppose those who have control of the nodes could also achieve spell bonuses of some kind, representing more direct access to the lines of magical power? Could these nodes also be used as portals between one another, via the ethereal plane?
The seeker of the shards is the half-giant queen of the enemy nation. She has lived for a very long time and some have already begun to see her as immortal. In truth, my plan was to have her be a powerful intelligent undead and either be a lich or sustained by a lich. Perhaps she wants the shards to regain her human flesh and harness some incredible power.
My loose concept for the shards is as follows:
One day immortals ascended to heaven, leaving the mortal plane behind. One immortal, Thessa, did not ascend and instead decided to stay behind as a steward to her people. The immortals took pity on her and left behind an artifact that could one day help her to ascend to heaven should she choose to.
Sometime later an evil naga spirit known as Luzramul captured the mortal daughter of another immortal. Thessa rescued the daughter but the naga spirit had truly meant to steal the artifact from Thessa which it did. When it attempted to use the artifact, it shattered, releasing a terrible energy that created a massive crater, now know as the inner sea.
The shards of the artifact were then collected by the Kashindri, a race of angelic giants, who hide them all over the world to protect them from falling into the wrong hands.
Since these ancient times the Kashindri have long died out but their ghost remain bound to the nodes and try to guard against any who taking the shards.
There are alternates to the origin of the artifact and its splintering but I won't bore you with all of that.
The nodes themselves enhance magic energy and act as stable shifting points between the material and ethereal plane. As for being able to teleport between them, I feel that would make the adventure too easy as the PCs could just jump from node to node to protect them. Having them travel on foot to each site seems like a more complicated adventure.
I really appreciate the thoughts though and will for sure consider making the shards have an undesired effect.
Perhaps you could travel instantly between nodes for which you have already recovered the shard? But sounds like you don't want to go this direction.
Do the nodes move if you move the shards?
Does the shape of the power lines match up to the crack lines in the broken artifact? (Not sure I phrased that right...like if you cracked a coffee mug into several pieces and glued it back together but could still see the cracks...it could serve as a map, a way to deduce possible locations of additional shards).
Perhaps you could travel instantly between nodes for which you have already recovered the shard? But sounds like you don't want to go this direction.
Do the nodes move if you move the shards?
Does the shape of the power lines match up to the crack lines in the broken artifact? (Not sure I phrased that right...like if you cracked a coffee mug into several pieces and glued it back together but could still see the cracks...it could serve as a map, a way to deduce possible locations of additional shards).
I will hold off on the instant travel for now. Though I suppose limiting it to node locations of the shards you oppose would balance it a bit.
I would say the nodes do not move but perhaps go into a state of hibernation once the shard is removed from it.
I LOVE the idea of the shard cracks matching the pattern of the ley lines accross the globe. This being the method of finding hidden or unknown nodes could be really useful. Thanks so much for the good advise! :D
I don't really like the idea of physical shards within the nodes. It begs the question of why someone didn't discover them earlier, and raises all kinds of questions for when they get moved (Do the ley lines move too? What affect would dragging all the ley lines around have on everyone else? Why haven't they moved before?)
What I think might work better is to say that what seems to be the material plane is actually supposed to be just part of the ethereal plane (or vice versa), and the nodes were set up to keep the two separate. Think of a net bag - it's got strands and holes (which small things can slip through), but it keeps the things inside separate from what's outside. So the ley lines are a "net" keeping the ethereal away from the material, but the holes are big enough that smaller things (like people) can slip through. There might be physical anchors, but they're not mobile.
The evil queen might know what they are, and be seeking to let the material plane fall back into the ethereal (or vice versa) for some reason, or she might not realize this and have just discovered she can tap them for power, and she wants to drain them.
I don't really like the idea of physical shards within the nodes. It begs the question of why someone didn't discover them earlier, and raises all kinds of questions for when they get moved (Do the ley lines move too? What affect would dragging all the ley lines around have on everyone else? Why haven't they moved before?)
What I think might work better is to say that what seems to be the material plane is actually supposed to be just part of the ethereal plane (or vice versa), and the nodes were set up to keep the two separate. Think of a net bag - it's got strands and holes (which small things can slip through), but it keeps the things inside separate from what's outside. So the ley lines are a "net" keeping the ethereal away from the material, but the holes are big enough that smaller things (like people) can slip through. There might be physical anchors, but they're not mobile.
The evil queen might know what they are, and be seeking to let the material plane fall back into the ethereal (or vice versa) for some reason, or she might not realize this and have just discovered she can tap them for power, and she wants to drain them.
Very neat. I like this idea a lot. The shards would eventually give the PCs an excuse to go after the queen and reclaim the shards she has already collected, returning them to the immortal Thessa and setting things to rights. Perhaps as the PCs collect the shards, the separation between the ethereal and matieral planes begins to falter and strange events are happening as a result? Maybe the PCs and the queen don't realize that taking the shards would ultimately break the seal between planes and in turn cause the entire material world to be thrown into a form of purgatory?
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Yeah, I like this net idea as well. It holds everything in place and keeps each plane from bleeding into another. By draining power from a node, she weakens the net and causes a planar rupture to form.
Why does she do this? What does the power do for her?
Perhaps her immortal status requires regular infusions of power to sustain, and 'immortality ain't free.' As her delicate state of existence begins to unravel, she finds out that by draining a node, she can grant herself another century of 'life,' and, since she's got the army, and now is as good a time as any, she's going from node to node, stacking up more life for herself.
And now, all that node-energy bound up in her form, means that she's gonna have to die to fix the instability, releasing the energy to flow back into the 'safety net.'
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Another option, inspired by ye old Forgotten Realms, is that these ley lines and nodes are concentrations of all of the magical power in the world. As she drains them, wizards (other than herself) in the area lose power, and the world in that area gets a little 'less magical.' Fey begin losing their will to live, unicorns get sick, dragons find the climate 'a bit chilly' and move on (possibly seen as not a terrible thing by some of the non-magical races living in those lands...).
Kind of a mish-mash of 'The Magic Goes Away' with FR's 'Weave,' with a dash of ecological disaster-story, since, it will eventually be discovered, that the web of magical energy is connected to the web of life-energy, and that as the magic leaves an area, the plants, which have grown up in a world with X amount of background magical energy, can no longer thrive on just sunlight alone, and begin to falter, followed by the plant eaters, then the meat eaters, etc. until, in a few short generations, the land has become a desert, devoid of both magical power, and life.
So she's basically a Defiler. :)
Why does she do this? What does the power do for her?
Perhaps her immortal status requires regular infusions of power to sustain, and 'immortality ain't free.' As her delicate state of existence begins to unravel, she finds out that by draining a node, she can grant herself another century of 'life,' and, since she's got the army, and now is as good a time as any, she's going from node to node, stacking up more life for herself.
And now, all that node-energy bound up in her form, means that she's gonna have to die to fix the instability, releasing the energy to flow back into the 'safety net.'
I think this idea would work really well. As she drains more and more energy the holes get bigger and bigger until parts of the world begin to merge with the ethereal plane. How do you suppose she would harness the energy of the nodes? Is she using some agent or artifact to drain the power? Has pathfinder already listed important artifacts that I could possible retool for my story?