Finding the Path: Zendikar's Origins

Zendikar is one of Magic's oldest planes, with the first Eldrazi invasion taking place just over a thousand years before the birth of Urza on the plane of Dominaria (an event generally used as year 0 in Magic chronology). However, Zendikar's great age is retroactive, as the plane was first referred to in The Purifying Fire, a novel only published in 2009.

While we know how far back the history goes, we know relatively little about that history. We know that the first Eldrazi invasion took place 6000 years before the present day. The Eldrazi are a mysterious extraplanar race, based partly on HP Lovecraft's Cthulu, that devour entire planes of existence by consuming the mana in the land, leaving behind nothing but lifeless wastes. The most dangerous of them are the three Eldrazi titans - the all-consuming Ulamog, the reality-warping Kozilek and the nigh-invincible time-bending Emrakul.

The invasion of Zendikar was actually a trap, cleverly orchestrated by three planeswalkers - the dragon Ugin, the kor Nahiri, and the vampire Sorin Markov. They amplified the mana of Zendikar - which was already far richer than that of most planes - essentially using the entire plane as bait. Once the Eldrazi titans appeared, they used an extensive network of magical stone devices called hedrons to turn Zendikar's leylines into a sort of net, trapping the forms of the three titans in a mountain range called the Teeth of Akoum. The Eldrazi tried to escape of course, but all the magical energy they used to try and break free was siphoned off by the hedron network and shunted out into Zendikar as a magical phenomenon now known as the Roil, which, not co-incidentally, tended to warp time and space in an area. The Roil could randomly accelerate plant growth, raise inexplicably hovering chunks of rocks, or just disintegrate whatever happened to be nearby.

It is fairly more complicated than the explanation I have given above. Ugin, rather condescendingly, explains to Jace that he is a fish in a fishpond, looking up at a hand thrust into the fishpond, thinking it an entire tentacle monster, when in fact it is only a part of something far, far larger, and way beyond the understanding of a simple fish. Neverthless, locking the 'hand' of an Eldrazi Titan in place means that the rest of them is also stuck, unable to move elsewhere.

Zendikar had mighty empires and civilizations, but after the explosive arrival of the Eldrazi, and the subsequent damage wrought by the Roil, they all fell. Zendikar turned into a wilderness world with few safe havens. Few cities exist in the present day -  Zulaport, the free city of Nimana, the vampire city of Malakir, and Sea Gate, home of the merfolk. Now described as 'adventure world', bands of roving adventurers seek the artifacts that the great civilizations of Zendikar had created. And with an unusual Priceless Treasures promotion that saw copies of really old magic cards from very early sets, it seemed that some of these treasures were powerful indeed. Cards like Lotus Cobra and Khalni Heart Expedition even hinted that the fabled Black Lotus, the most powerful artifact in Magic, could possibly be found on Zendikar.

These treasures were not easy to find, as Zendikar was now filled with deadly perils. Adventurers are slain by ingenious traps, the Roil's wild magic, dangerous monsters, even deadly plants, to the point that some say Zendikar itself is a sentient entity trying to kill you. The whole plane is a trap now - many planeswalkers have been lured there with (actually true) tales of the power and wealth that can be found there, only to fall victim to one of the many dangers. The fact that Garruk Wildspeaker - the toughest, most grizzled planeswalker around, who usually jumps at the chance to go hunting in the wilderness - refuses to go there, should tell you the level of danger you would be walking into.

If you think this description sounds like every roleplaying game ever, then you would be right, because that is the entire concept of Zendikar - or at least that was the idea. Wizards of the Coast has admitted they they made a mistake with the recent return to Zendikar, focusing entirely on the war between Gideon's forces and the Eldrazi, and therefore losing most of what people loved about Zendikar the first time - the adventure, exploring ancient tombs in search of cool loot.

For the most part, the Eldrazi have remained imprisoned, becoming only legends of the past, on Zendikar, with few having any idea of what exactly they are, aside from stories of mythical gods named Ula, Cosi and Emeria. The titans almost broke free, about 2000 years before, in the second Eldrazi invasion. The 'lesser' Eldrazi, who are still quite powerful, ran rampant across Zendikar, fighting large-scale battles with the angels. Nahiri returned to seal them away before the titans could also break free, and then left in search of the missing Ugin and Sorin - but ran foul of Avacyn instead, who seemingly imprisoned her in the Helvault for two thousand years. (She is, understandably, quite upset about this.)

In some ways it's a little annoying that so much of Zendikar's history and geography are blank slates - we know little beyond the Eldrazi wars, and while we have names of continents and islands, there is only vague directions to relate them to each other. On the other hand, this did give me a lot of license to use material from Pathfinder, like maps that already existed, as well as make stuff up, like the ruins of an ancient merian civilization that witnessed the arrival of the Eldrazi titans first-hand, or the disconcerting idea that the amphibian-like surrakar have some sort of malevolent intelligence driving their actions. The original 'priceless treasures' promotion let me throw in references to cool old artifacts, like the really fun Sword of Light and Shadow and the incredibly powerful why-did-I-ever-give-out-this-item Lightning Greaves.

Apparently I have managed to succeed at making my players feel like Zendikar is actively trying to kill them. The amount of times the poor town of Stoneforge has come under attack, and thus needeed rescue by the party, is probably a fairly accurate illustration of why there are only four cities on the entire plane. It is a bit unfortunate that after we started the campaign, it was revealed in the Magic storyline that most of what my players are currently fighting for is going to get annihilated in the third Eldrazi war. But, Wizards of the Coast tend to wreck entire planes to make their stories impactful at the time, and the later backtrack the scope of destruction so they can return to a plane that still has some things left on it. So if I'm careful, there is some room for me to allow the player's actions in my campaign to have a lasting impact, and make it feel like what they've done has been worthwhile.