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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Nyeshet" data-source="post: 4647460" data-attributes="member: 18363">This is a very interesting arrangement. It raises some questions, however.How widespread is the worship of this worm? Does a deity's power depend upon their number of worshipers? If so, has the changeover in populations (both in number and in racial composition) before and after the hibernation resulted in a decrease (or increase) of worshipers? Are the deities that bring the snow antagonistic towards the worm deity? If so there could be religious strife - such that the worm followers must live as secretive cultists (at least among non-elven races). How much does the general population know about the cause of the warming? If they associate it with the worm or the (former) high priest (druid / wizard) of the worm, then that might cause some to look negatively upon it.  Why did the spice change? Did the worm purposely change the nature of the spice? If so, was this as a punishment, considering that tieflings are looked upon by most societies as accursed by the gods (or at least in league with the fiends)? Was the spice changed from old to new due to a corruption of the worm - perhaps as a backlash of the spell gone somewhat wrong? Did that alter more than the spice? Perhaps even the worm in some permanent or semi-permanent manner? Why did the new spice vanish? Did the worm deity will it out of existence? Could more of the 'new spice' come into existence somehow? Your statements are a bit ambiguous. Does the former spice - old spice - again exist now that the hibernation is over? If so, are there any elves that purposely use the spice and then go off it - allowing themselves to die - so as to arise as eladrin? (This almost reminds me of the elan in the Expanded Psionics Handbook of 3.5e.) If not, are the eladrin (and perhaps even tieflings) a dying race (as so few exist, and no more can be created via dying from the spice - and elves are not known for their high fertility rates). Are the deities that are seeking to return the land to its prior nature antagonistic towards worm deity or other deities? Now that that spell is finished, the caster dead, and the worm moved on to other things, is the spell fading (especially considering the deities likely working against it)? If so, how is that affecting the continent? If not, why not, and can something be done to cause it to fade? (That by itself could be the end result of a very long quest. The PCs might finish their near-epic level adventures having recently 'broken' whatever was holding the spell in place - leading to its gradual fading. They won't see the end result in their lifetimes, but their children or grandchildren will see the land fully restored to its prior bounty.) If the spell cannot be broken, is it perhaps still continuing - still increasing the warmth, such that eventually even the snows will not be enough to sustain the environment.If that latter is true - or even if it is a spell that cannot be broken - you may want to look into the Dark Sun campaign setting. While the books are all 2e, I think there are a few 3e conversions online somewhere. The general idea of Dark Sun, if I recall correctly, is a desert world that is ever slowly but surely moving closer to final death of all. Water is a precious commodity as the oceans are vanished or nearly so, and some forms of magic wither life near the caster - hastening an already terrible situation. Yet even if this is not so, Dark Sun may offer some ideas. Lastly, why did the wizard want more spice? I read the Dune novels a very long time ago, so I may be mis-recalling, but from what I understand there was a limit as to how much one could get from spice. Did the wizard wish to corner the market, so the speak? Or were their special spells that required vast amounts of spice as a component? Or was it a means of worship to spread spice to as many as possible? Or did he hope to become more powerful by consuming insane amounts of the spice? Or was he just insane? Also, what did the worm think of this? Or is the worm somewhat lacking in intellect - or so alien in thought process that it was unable to understand the wishes / intentions of the wizard / druid worshiper? You say the worm aided the wizard - is the worm associated with deserts (or heat) and so was expanding its domain? Or was it just mindlessly (or chaotically / capriciously / whimsically) granting its strength to the druid / wizard?The only other issue I have is with the river branching into three rivers. There is only one place on earth where something akin to that happens. A rapids region of a river in the Andean Mountains of South America falls upon a section of rock that is too tough to quickly erode away. The waters that fall down one side continues as one river, while the remaining waters continue as another river. Everywhere else on earth when a river is divided into more than one path, one path quickly dominates (within just a few years or decades), closing off the other branch and thus letting it dry out and die as a river. Sometimes a river can actually cut off and steal a branch of another river, just because the wiggles of one cause it to touch another - and its path is less readily covered in silt than the other - which is soon covered and thus cut off from its former branch. If magic were involved - especially divine magic - it could readily be explained, but otherwise I am unsure as to how to work it.</blockquote>

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