Forgetting the old SK and city state for now, What if Dregoth and his undead city state were to catch the attention of the Dark Powers and be absorbed into Ravenloft making him one of the Lords of the Domain? This also started me thinking about an interesting 2E adventure (Die, Vecna, Die!) where the players started on Oerth and chased the god Iuz into ravenloft where he fought and died against Vecna, which was all part of Vecna's plan. Using the power relased by the death of a god Vecna is able to escape from Ravenloft into the city of Sigil, and a god is now where no god should be (Sigil is from the Planescape setting, the city at the crossroads of the Multiverse which by the unknown powers of the Lady of Pain keeps all gods outside it's realm) Here Vecna with his recent surge of powers plans to overthrow the lady of pain herself, letting himself loose in the Multiverse once more.
Now, the relevance to Dark Sun. Modifying this adventure somewhat, we replace Vecna with Rajaat and Iuz with Dregoth. Dregoth is taken into the Demi-Plane of Dread, somehow creating a hole for Rajaat to escape his prison(whether it be the Hollow or the Cerulean Storm though the Hollow would work better). Eventually he frees himself through this hole and winds up on Dark-Sun-in-Ravenloft. Rajaat seizes his opportunity and tries to kill Dregoth attempting to do something similar to what Vecna does in Die, Vecna, Die!(alternately Rajaat is the one taken to ravenloft and somehow he lures Dregoth via his search for godhood into chasing down Rajaat into raveloft where rajaat slays him to power his escape). The adventure ends as the players are sucked along with Rajaat into Sigil.
OK, now problems, what can the PCs do to correct the situation? Who are they against the might of Rajaat? In Die, Vecna, Die each player actually recieved a minor artifact similar to the hand or eye of vecna but of lesser strength that made them immune to his magic. This doesn't seem possible vs Rajaat. Secondly why would Rajaat want to escape Athas when his goals are so Athas-centric? Thirdly, the inclusion of ravenloft can make the whole Dark Sun experience a bit "Bleh" since it's probably the antithesis of Dark Sun. Anyway, I'm interested in hearing everyones comments about how this could work etc...
Was kind of hoping at the conclusion of the adventure that the players are now stranded. Athasian far from home and likely to begin their new (near epic)careers as Planeswalkers, maybe even settling down in Faerun since it would seem like a paradise to them. (Is that 5 campaign settings I've mentioned so far?) The other alternative is that Rajaat is banished to Faerun and the players are the only ones that know about this threat and thus beginning one of the whole Dark Sun vs Forgotten Realms wars I've read about in other post.
Anyway, it's been a while since I really read my Dark Sun material and some of this likely isn't realistic but I'm sure it would make a fun story arc for my PCs. Let me know what you think or if you have any suggestions.
Rajaat is to Vecna what mint-chocolate chip is to vanilla. Vecna was pretty powerful, but he didn't invent magic in a world where there was none.
Let's see... perhaps he needs a world's worth just to breach the barriers that surround Athas... so he begins building a worryingly large obsidian tower on Oerth. And meanwhile creates some Champions who scourge Oerth (and other worlds, even) for Non Humans to be brought to the Tower in their thousands...
And the only way for the PCs to stop him is to open the last gate to Athas (Dregoth's Planar Gate) and seal it forever - with them back on the Athas side. Tease them with the possibility of living in these lush, green, magic-rich worlds where Good is lauded and rewarded, then force them to throw all that away to save it, and themselves...
:D
Well, actually, I did scare them oh-so-slightly, as they had a chat with the undead guardian of someone's Dragon Transformation structure. Not that they know what it is, of course. All they know is this guy guards "The Truth That Killed The World".
this from the Temporal Chronology of the Primes, a site dedicated to showing the temporal relationship between all the second ed settings noting in particular times when they cross over, it seems like just about every setting has a cross over with Ravenloft. It is a great way to **** off PCs, trap them in the realm of the mists.
Additionaly I do not know if Rajaat would care about demi-humans on other crystal spheres, after all they came about naturally there. And side note it isn't non-humans it is non-halflings, humans are just the most useful tool to kill non-halflings...unless I am tragically mistaken >raises eyebrow<