Sweat of Danzar-Khâl

What happened after the Black Tide was defeated and sent fleeing back to Necrocrypt? 

Katrana and friends

That story is still unfolding, but here is a nugget of holy crusaders storming the palace of the Lich Empress - does she perish?  Well sort of, but a super bad ass does not take a dirt nap so easily, for in the end, all are just pawns of even greater powers.

One of the things that helped bring her down for a time is a magical pool called the Sweat of Danzar-Khâl.  This pool of holy water is sited in the area of the Monument of Šadullu.  The Last Saints of Gûn, former high dwarven priests of Maharâg, and the soldiers accompanying them coated their weapons with this stuff and then reapplied it many times, striking Katrana Dumu-loc 99 times.  The number of hits against her is testament of an extremely powerful foe.

The Sweat of Danzar-Khâl acted as a holy curse on Katrana, causing her evil essence to wander lost for almost a century.  The final outcome of what happened to her when she finally found her phylactery is covered in the Monument of Šadullu.

Clouds of the Broken Continent

An entire continent nearly swallowed by the Nine Tongued Worm.  Šadullu was ripped from the mantle of Bal-Kriav and drifted towards the churning rift of a primordial dreadnought.  The Nine

Monument of Šadullu

Tongued Worm had already destroyed one world, and now Bal-Kriav was on the menu.  Fortunately for those that call this world home, the gods arrived and drove the Nine Tongued Worm back to the Elemental Chaos.

Šadullu is often referred to as the Clouds of the Broken Continent.  This is because that is what it looks like from the sea or the air - an entire continent sheared from the surface, broken, and then scattered over a vast area, from a mile or so above the ocean to near airless heights into the clouds.

One of the peoples that dwell among the shattered continent is the Laupha. These storm archons once served the durkoth at the Spire of Rioch Tetrax.  When the durkoth grew flippers and gills, and crawled into the sea, the Laupha were the first to fly to freedom.  They went en-masse to Šadullu and now dwell there in the tens of thousands.

Rifts in the Web

Rifts - not the ones in the ground, but tears in the Web of Magic.  They come in two classes, inter-planar and intra-planar.  Some call them planar gates, but whichever name you pick, they are holes in the Web of Magic.  They come about from use of magic in an area for a prolonged time, like what happened in the Gulimbor Catacysm.  While others come about from the use of magic items or casters opening them.  In the Dawn War, the primordials used these rifts to cross great distances across the planes. or between worlds  Those that opposed the primoridals, the gods and angels of the Throndar and Bal-Kriav.  Sarseg used this gate to send his hordes against a region of Brucrumus known to hold a hospital and training ground for the angelic armies.  Sarseg was crafty when he created the Radullu Rift.  He knew quite a bit about the workings of the Web of Magic - thanks to once being an untainted weave spider.  When Sarseq built the Radullu Rift, he surrounded it with an area of  dead magic which made it irreparable. 

mane preparing to become one with a Manes Chimney

Dawn Era, actively sought to close them as soon as they were detected, or risk being overrun by a seemingly endless horde of primordial soldiers.

The Radullu Rift would lead to great changes in the topography of  Brucrumus's western fringe.  The area on Bal-Kriav's side became flooded from a lake on Throndar.  The water of this lake still feeds into this realm from high atop a plateau of the Northern Hordelands.  The tremendous flow of water created Radullu, Orukhan, and led to the creation of a vast swamp south of the area - a region of the realm now known as the Troll Bogs.   The Nature Protectorate Boglin says that the lake on Throndar would surely have drained by now, but for another gateway somewhere out their that itself acts like a drain from the Troll Bogs, or somewhere else, and forces water back into Throndar's lake.

One of the longest non-permanent gates to remain open was the Sôvuk Sea Gate.  In the Demon Spawn War, this gate was opened by the demon lord Gorag'theg.  He and his abyssal horde used it to cross the planes, leaving the Abyss and entering Bal-Kriav.  The weave spiders took so long to close this gate because Gorag'theg built the Manes Chimneys.  These ghastly towers burned soul energy and in turn provided a counter to the repairing being done by the weave spiders.

Dragon Wake

Dragon Wakes are periods when all the dragons of an area are simultaneously awoken from their slumbers.  Dragons are like cats in that tend to sleep a lot. 

In the earlier D&D editions, they had tables with a percent chance of a party wandering into a 
dragon's lair, finding a sleeping dragon and either threatening it with death or dispatching it outright.   TSR drifted away from that idea with later editions.

Time to score some loot!

There have been three Dragon Wakes on Bal-Kriav.  I put up a piece on the Third Dragon Wake.  The two things all Dragon Wakes have in common is that dragons are awoken from their sleeps abruptly and they are frenzied.  The outcome of dozens or even hundreds of enraged dragons flying around a continent are always devastating to life and property.  During this time, even good dragons are erratic and unpredictable.  

The Third Dragon Wake was started by the kobold sorcerers of Tinvaakin Kurtulmak.  This mage guild, along with Ashmerthoon, hastened the downfall of Arkhosia and Bael-Turath with their Dragon Wake. 

Arcana's Deal With Lúthil

Arcane and druidic spells have been around since the Dawn Era and possibly even before.  When the gods left Bal-Kriav and the Prime Material Plane for the Outer Planes, they left caches of magic items, tomes, scrolls and other relics in secret vaults or hidden away in some out of the way place.

As a result, mortals had to re-discover many of the spells that were in common use during the Dawn War.

start of the Verdigris Tsunami spell

The god Arcana helped this "re-disovery" along when he made a deal with the eladrin of Lúthil.  This deal led to the advancement of both arcane and drudic magic.   This agreement between Ioun and the people of Lúthil became known as the Lúthil Ioun Deal.

When at times they seemed to be on the brink of defeat, a break-through would occur in halls of Guinedhel, a new spell would be learned from some ancient text or created by one Guinedhel's researchers.  This new spell would either halt the advance or turn back the assault of their enemies.  The spells that came out of Guinedhel forestalled the advance of Saer Erkjorg for nearly three decades.  When the Thraedli turned to toxic gases and disease for breakthroughs, the arcane and druidic spells of Guinedhel were not what was needed.  The defenders of Lúthil needed potent healing magic.  The sort of healing spells they needed were not available to them because of a deal they made with Ioun. 

In exchange for hints of the whereabouts of ancient caches of magic from the Dawn Era and God Era, they would have to give up their most potent healing magic.  The things explorers found in the hidden caches were scrolls, tomes, and magic items left over from before the Lith-Crillion Era - magic that had not been forgotten, only kept out of mortal hands until it was found.  Ioun speeded up the access to such magic with the Lúthil Ioun Deal.  When the 20 year pact ended between Ioun and the people of Lúthil, the healing arts above the Fifth Echelon were returned, but by then the giant hordes of Saer Erkjorg were catapulting and hurling pots of foul ichor, disease-ridden corpses, and other toxic projectiles into the city.

Lúthil fell, the eladrin fled south, Saer Erkjorg were entering a decline, and arcane and druidic magic were greatly advanced, all because of this deal between mortals and the god Ioun.  We can only speculate as to what Ioun got out of this deal.

- Eingoth Ramdûr, of the Neetch Institute, - "Lúthil Ioun Deal"

The Idea for Necrocrypt

Magmin conjured to work on the Groarnfer Plan

I was looking at the map of Necrocrypt and saw how damn lame it was so I re-worked it a bit.  The concept of Necrocrypt came from my reading the Necromancers Handbook (2nd Edition).  In this book they mention an island called Sahu.  The main theme of the book, outside of class discussion, is a lich locked away in some ruin and a few other ancient ruins on the island.  I took that idea and expanded on it when I came up with my map of Necrocrypt.  The Necromancers Handbook was also the genesis of the Black Tide of Thasmudyan - where there was one lich in the book, I figured why not make a whole group of undead lords working together just like they did when they were party members of Black Banner.   The Horgon were introduced to the island as a way of bringing in a powerful source of necromancer lore.  

Necrocrypt is going about some design changes.  One of the things I've added involves Dax and his Groarnfer Plan.  I started taking Dax down the road of madness with his decision to send Black Tide forces against Black Forge Keep.  This enterprise was a failure and drew the ire of Raxcvillibus.

Dax is a hero who thinks up grand and often impossible schemes, his madness is thought to have started after he fought Raxcvillibus and was nearly psionically lobotomized.

The Groarnfer Plan was a grand project by Dax designed to change the flow of lava spilling into Hakân and then into Satheon.  After this plan was completed, Dax started an even grander project called the Gruggvein Plan.

Ring of Poseidon

The Ring of Poseidon has an ancient history, once dark, involving the durkoth running around enslaving others with their water archons - the Antipha.   The durkoth in these parts of the Buccaneer Achipelago were tasked with pushing the territory bounds and influence of Abâthigûr.  

Merfolk, Merwoman, Merlady, whatever

One group that refused to yield to Abâthigûr were the sub-sea folk of Mannâth-Katîr.  The merfolk of Mannâth-Katîr proved to be no match for the newcomers.  When the invaders were within sight of the the coral spiral walls of Nidibanâth, her people all stopped what they were doing, and together screamed for divine help.  This was answered by their deity, the Sea Titan, better known today as Poseidon.  Poseidon, though he denies any direct involvement (which lacks force given his record of meddling in in mortal affairs) brought together a hundred or so whales.  These whales produces a powerful sound wave, which seemed to magnify in force with each overlapping sound blast, which shattered the island in what became known as the Sundering of Ghol Markúl.