The Aberrant War

[Glade Riven]

So I'm working on a little bit of everything for my Ironbound: Chains of Phaetos campaign. Time to get into some "planar" hijynx.

[SBLOCK]Deep within the Realm of Dreams lies half forgotten eldritch gods. Most slumber, some never to wake. Others watch and wait, enacting plans with so long of a scope that few mortals would ever understand, let alone appreciate. Some are at best ambivalent toward mortals, while others bring madness and death. Power lies hidden deep with the dream, and where lies power there are plenty to strive to grasp it.

A long conflict exists between fey and aberration, of which the origin is lost to the mists of time. Bards claim that the conflict began with a falling out between Oberon, the Lord of the Fey and Zyminia, Lady of Dreams. Many bardic songs exist detailing a sensual relationship that ended poorly. Whether said tales are based off of fact is impossible to verify. Highly educated folk simply believe that it is an inherent conflict: aberrations are a corruption of nature, and the realm of dreams a mockery of the waking world.

Mortals who dream are protected from the worst hazards of the Realm of Dreams as their mental protrusion into it is hazy and insubstantial. Rituals and spells can project one's consciousness further into the Realm of Dreams, but this carries risks. By being projected further into the realm, one's mind can be damaged, and wounds taken may even appear in the real world on a person's body. Even death is possible. Those who walk the dreams are usually aware of the dangers. One exception is that occasionally a person who is dreaming is summoned, much like the Summon Monster spells. The spell protects those who are summoned from permanent damage, much as how summon monsters are never truly die when their manifestations are slain.[/SBLOCK]
There's more to add. Stuff like how Druids can be corrupted without losing their druid powers - their view of nature becomes skewed. How eldrich things can effect the mortal world and even manifest.
It's kinda a little bit of Eberron mixed with Lovecraft and a bit of Robert Jordan. Thoughts of Cthulu being from a dream realm?

 

[Whisper72]

Interesting stuff...

Some things that spring to mind. In most of my own homebrew campaigns, there is a strong connection between dreaming and prophesy, due to temporal influences, i.e. within the realm of dreams, time is fluid / can be manipulated. Those with the power can use the dreamworld to peek into the future (very hard to do), or peek into the past (easier to do, and fun stuff for research into what transpired).

Maybe the Lady of Dreams is also some sort of guardian / goalkeeper, who makes sure that the nasty entities that lie in slumber remain so... if she has some personal score to settle, maybe she is tempted to strike a deal with one of her 'captives'. Release, or at least more leeway to interact directly with the world, in exchange for aid against her opponent...

Also nice stuff to delve into are the books by Steven Erikson, the Tales of Malazan. The way he handles gods, their relationships, and the whole spiel around the Fallen God (some outsider summoned to the world who 'crashed and burned' and is now, after many, many aeons, finally growing strong enough to directly influence matters) may give you some neat ideas...