Originally Posted by tshiggins
Nah. I'd go the other way. Should the party make it out of Middle Earth with the One Ring (campaign update, please!), it realizes it has made it to a place where there may not be any Valar.
At that point, it will do everything it can to get back to Sauron, with this knowledge -- or maybe draw him to it?
Should it do so, Sauron flees Middle Earth and sets up shop in a new world -- the PCs home world. There, he is free to do as he will, with the ring in his possession, with no fear of any interference from his ancient foes. In fact, Sauron may take the Nine with him -- and perhaps any of the Seven in his possession, too.
That means he has what remains of the Seven to tempt the rich and powerful into his service, and the unstoppable Nine to enforce compliance. Those who disobey get stripped of a ring, and then stabbed by a Morghul blade and become the shadow-wraith slaves of one of the Nine -- who then have access to all of the knowledge possessed by that slave.
Sauron, who is not at all a fool, initiates a long game to take over a vast new universe.
On Middle Earth, Sauron's disappearance may be seen as a blessing (at least in the short term). After all, the darkness has left, and the Three remain intact.
In reality, it means Middle Earth stagnates and the Fifth Age, the age of Man, never really gets started. Yeah, Aragorn marries Arwen and takes the thrones of Gondor and Arnor after a nasty political struggle, but he's a (more or less) willing puppet of a (more or less) benign Elrond.
Even more interestingly, have the departure of Sauron give the Elves the impression that they have finally won against all their enemies, in four ages of constant warfare. Now, they wish to settle down in Middle Earth, and transform it back into a garden. Have the two greatest remaining elvish families, that of Elrond and Thranduil, unite in the marriage of Legolas and Arwen (Arwen is already Galadriel's granddaughter. Elrond married Galadriel's only child, Celebrian, so Arwen, Elladan and Elrohir are Galadriel's grandchildren.)
In order to preserve the garden, the elves try to relegate mortals to specific regions. Mordor is a good choice for humans in the south, because it needs to be cleaned up, anyway, and it's good enough for them (plus, it's nicely fenced in). The Dwarves can stay in the Iron Hills and the Lonely Mountain (narrow places, but good enough for a dwarvish population that grows only slowly). Hobbits can remain in the Shire.
Any mortals who want live elsewhere may, but under the laws and rulership of the local elves, who treat them benignly enough (unless they rebel, which is not a wise choice).
Eventually, of course, Sauron plans to return to Middle Earth at the head of legions of unstoppable soldiers (like something out of Warhammer 40K, or whatever...) and initiate a war against the Valar -- a war for, basically, Heaven.
Anyway, that's how I'd do it. Not only do you have the Cabal and others who see the Ring as nothing more than a powerful prize, you have Sauron desperately trying to reach it, while the ring itself eventually suborns anyone who possesses it, and uses him or her to return to the master. Once successful, Sauron then sets up shop in a whole new universe which he'll use as a staging area for a new war for Middle Earth.
Why are the PCs keeping this awful thing, again? That's an insane choice.
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