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When I ran that campaign many years ago, I felt that the joining of the Sihedron would have been a great conclusion to the campaign. Book 6 felt unnecessary and "tacked on" to the end of the story.
One option you can do it that the joining of the Sihedron is interrupted by the specified events. The power of that event prevents the reforging. The party would then have a better purpose to deal with that event so they can complete their primary task.
I must disclaim that I haven't played or run this AP, as so far I have only read it in order to maybe run it latter. But to me, it's clear that the Sihedron greatest power isn't the flat bonus it give to the one it currently support, but the "jump" it can do between people, both dishing out healing and a buff, and also increasing the team synergy.
let's look at what it does :
- It give two flat buff to the one it support (+2 insight AC and reflex bonus and fast healing 5)
- Depending on it's "ascendant" branch, it give another, bigger, flat buff , as well as a spell like ability.
- The person can use a standard action (pretty much using their whole turn) to turn the branch and use another one of the "big buff", provided it's not one of the opposite side (in which case they have to do two jump, and thus use two turns).
- It can be "thrown" to another person once per round, to support them, as an immediate action (using much less of your turn, and allowing you to use this ability if needed even outside your turn). When you do so, both the one that throw the star and the other person get a +2 to all saving throw for a round and get a burst of healing. Also, the one receiving the star can rotate it for free, to get any of the branch, even if it's opposite to the one you were using.
- It resurect the one it currently support, up to once per day. Coupled with the fact that throwing it is an immediate action, it can be used to save a party member right when they are about to die.
All this put together tell me that the artifact is really good when used by a single person, but far, far better when the party keep throwing it around once per turn to heal each other and get access to it's various buff at critical moments. So honestly, unless you think that a player is likely to want to "hog" the artifact and never throw it to the others, I don't think it's an issue. The artifact basically scream "team play", and all the player should get to use it pretty frequently.
As for the fact that the reforging will deprive all team member of their shard, I think it's fine, for the individual shard powers will be rather inconsequential by the time they get to craft the full Sihedron. Shards may be level 25 artifacts, but their effect, even including the Ioun stone embeded in them, is at most the equivalent of a level 12 item. I think that by that point, even if you players did end up relying on the shard buff, they can easily buy item that grant equivalent ones. Or you can give it to them in some way (like through the Lord Mayor as reward for gathering all the shard in the beggining of book 6) if you are concerned about them feeling deprived of power.
When I ran that campaign many years ago, I felt that the joining of the Sihedron would have been a great conclusion to the campaign. Book 6 felt unnecessary and "tacked on" to the end of the story.
I feel like the campaign can't end just after the forging, it would be too much of a tease if the players never got to actually use the Sihedron. Since the whole campaign is about forging it, having the story end the moment they do without letting the player use that awesome artifact would feel bad I think. But maybe a whole module was too long and felt drawn out, maybe a single chapter would have been enought. You actually ran this campaign and not me (yet), so you're probably right if you felt that the pacing of the last book was off.