­­­­GAIA TODAY

The Convergence: Gaia’s Dream is a place where two worlds have collided; twenty-three years ago a mysterious cataclysmic event known commonly as the Convergence (or the Great Shifting), caused the planet Gaia on the Prime Material Plane to forcibly merge with its own parallel Dreaming plane.  Since only a relatively short time has passed since this cataclysm, a global society which was only starting to recover from an age of widespread war and extraplanar invasion has been uprooted and supplanted by chaos and strife.  Areas formerly thought to be safely under the control of civilized nations and their armies are dangerous to travel in, and there are numerous reports of increasingly bold incursions of creatures into civilized surface lands from the vast Underlands and other ancient ruins.

    The Convergence took the form of repeated carrier waves of probability fields which combined arcane, divine, and dreamstuff energies into a devastating cocktail of hallucinogenic destruction.  The waves began simultaneously at the north and south poles of Gaia and steadily increased in duration and strength over a span of two months (between Maia, 5-6264CG and Rhoslyn, 7-6264CG) until they covered the entire Planet in an overlapping pattern of violent planar upheaval.  It is widely believed that nearly 7% of the population of Gaia perished in the cataclysm, as buildings crumbled or simply absorbed their inhabitants into their walls, oceans rose, volcanoes spewed forth tons of magma, and magical storms raged across the globe.  Entire coastal regions were swallowed up by the rising seas in some areas – notably, the city of Ryjarlin, the Jewel of the South, on the Taliraen peninsula once held by the now defunct House Zirski.  Individuals of all races were deeply affected by the waves of energy, with those living along known aetheric ley lines reporting the most intense experiences – at least, those who did not perish outright or lose their sanity.  Even those who came through the Convergence with their minds and bodies intact almost uniformly reported massive sensory hallucinations and disturbing visions which in some cases affected all five (or six, in the case of aetheric or psionic sensitives) senses simultaneously. 

    Scholars, priests, arcanists and ordinary people have debated the nature of the Convergence and its possible origins since the event’s conclusion 23 years ago.  Some blame the incident on Shik’rael, the Savant of Khyraundros, whose meddling in the cross-dimensional “pocket plane” known as the Dreaming Web may have intentionally or inadvertently set off a chain reaction of planar shifting.  Others believe the deities of Gaia themselves caused the Convergence – choosing to become more directly involved in the affairs of mortals by assuming flesh shells and walking the face of Gaia amongst their worshippers.  Some scholars have concluded that the succession of wars between the native peoples of Gaia and the evil Hierarchy of Souls – led by the Devouring Overlord Khyraundros – weakened the seals between the planes and allowed a sudden and overwhelming influx of unstable dreamstuff to diffuse into the Prime Material Plane.

Arcane Artifice, Technology and Industry: The civilized peoples and nations of the world are still recovering from the effects of the Convergence 23 years after its conclusion.  While the major cities and other population centers have largely been rebuilt and repaired, the process will probably not be complete for at least another 25 years.  Further, sea travel has been severely disrupted by massive changes in ocean currents and the appearance of aggressive leviathans on the open seas.  Intercontinental trade and commerce has slowed to a trickle, and the only reliable means of communication between leaders of nations on different continents are expensive magic arrays such as sending stones.

  Complicating matters further is the rapidly increasing availability of arcane technologies built via the intersection of industry and magical artifice: among others, there are the aforementioned sending stones, wagons enchanted to keep meats and other perishables cold and frosty during overland journeys, lanterns of continual flame adorning street corners, and functioning clockwork effigies built to resemble animals or even humanoids.  Societies were struggling to integrate these new technologies and recover from the devastation of the Harbinger War even before the Convergence, and the transition has only been made more difficult by the recent cataclysm. 

The Zadonites: Another theory surrounding the onset of the Convergence involves the zadonites, a strange race of garnet-skinned, tattooed and scarified beings from a distant plane known as Zadythian. The zadonites’ home plane combined elements of the Dreaming and the Prime Material Plane, and the Convergence occurred less than ten years after the first zadonites plane shifted to Gaia and settled in the Tuhliss Freehold region on Talirae in 6255CG. 

The zadonites’ deep connection to the Dreaming and their coincidentally-timed arrival just nine years before the Convergence has led many to believe the race was somehow responsible.  Further implicating the zadonites is the fact that an immensely powerful being known only as “the Exile” – a zadonite himself – appeared in their wake and involved himself in the famous Battle of the Wall outside the gates of Aerendale, where Hathoraen forces were battling the gri’morg army of Shik’rael as the first waves of the Convergence hit. 

Dreambrands: The zadonite race is known to have perished in the Convergence, and General Ishak Al-Sayidd of Hathorae (among others) claims they knowingly and intentionally sacrificed themselves to prevent a worse cataclysm than actually occurred.  The effects of any such sacrifice, if true, are still being debated among scholars, arcanists and theologians.

  There are numerous theories on the nature of the zadonites and their sacrifice; some planar scholars believe they are an offshoot of the githyanki or githzerai, or perhaps a nomadic rebel race from the Abyss.  What is known for certain, though, is that Gaian adults and children conceived and born after the Convergence have begun to occasionally manifest dreambrands on their bodies similar in style to the tattoos and scars once worn by the zadonites.  These dreambrands grant powerful supernatural spell-like abilities to their bearers, so their appearance is of great interest to many.

Alignments: Gaia’s Dream is a complex and nuanced world, and as such, players should not expect every monster or NPC they encounter to adhere to standard alignment guidelines.  For example, adventurers may encounter a chaotic evil silver dragon or a lawful good ogre mage, or anything in between.

Campaign Gazetteer