Destruction of the Universe

[Passer-by]

If anybody ever elects to undo the universe and then recreate it either under their watchful eye or in their image, the adventuring party is contractually obligated to obliterate this somebody, regardless of the party's alignment or the perpetrator's alignment. It's just, like, a narrative law. In any case most people would probably be like "Yeah, YOU get to reshape the world in whatever image suits you best. We'll all just die. Real selfless. Right. Stabby time, yo!"

Yes, he must give them good reasons not to kill him ipso facto. This is the hard part of this: An extreme situation, but a moral choice too, for the players.

What you could do is a Scratch scenario, which is a specific variant of the "reset the universe" scenario. Basically, the world is wrong somehow, and it won't bear fruit. You can change what that means, but the basic idea is that it needs to be rebooted because everyone is provably boned otherwise.

I do like this: If this world is inherently flawed (it's already been hinted during a plot point that there are ancient deities older than this campaign world's gods, and they could easily be evil or simply too powerful not to fear), resetting it is the hard thing to do, but it is necessary. I would need to make clear that this world is inherently flawed, and make the players clearly see this. I'd appreciate more ideas in this direction.

Now, the PCs have options. They can either fight off this cleric, believing that this universe can still be fixed, reset the universe and bring their loved ones along, or try and save EVERYBODY and get the best ending. This last bit should be unbelievably difficult, and suitably heroic, calling upon the greatest heroes of the land. Maybe the cleric of time can stay behind as the last person needed to reboot the universe. Maybe?

That would require for the reveal of the Oracle's intentions to be not the ending of the campaign, and the last fight, but to be the start of a bigger quest. I can't use this one!

Develop the girl more, let's hear about the sacrifice.

Heck, have him being the subject of some crazy power that's convinced him its the best way.

If someone is that interested in what actually happened with the Oracle's girlfriend, here it is. Not that it matters that much for the discussion: She sacrificed to save the Temple. I know how tedious is to read every single detail in other DMs campaigns. But, if it helps, here it goes:

Spoiler

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She was an elven paladin, in charge of the soldiers of the temple where the Time travelling chamber is. 10,000 years before the campaign started, there was a terrible war between the forces of evil and the material plane. One of the first locations to fall was this Temple. Now the story repeats itself, but the drows are winning this time. During this fight, she was killed, and the cleric got to the chamber, so the Oracle had to cast the time stopping spell. 10,000 years later, the PCs got to the chamber and waited for the drow cleric to unfreeze, and utterly destroyed her in two rounds, by winning initiative and dealing crazy damage to her. The drow cleric was supposed to win that fight, and leave the chamber and become a recurring villain, but she was obliterated by my players. It was anticlimactic, but they felt awesome and heroic.

Everyone who died after the spell was cast (the spell froze the battle), and inside the spell radius, could be resurrected afterwards by the PC's allies. This includes the elven paladin's sister, and the New Oracle's current cohort, an Oracle of War. But the Old Oracle's girlfriend was outside of the temple, and so, no resurrection spell covers her 10,000 years being dead.

The Old Oracle recovered the armor from his girlfriend's skeleton by the Temple's entrance, and now he keeps it in his room.

Her current state I have not decided yet. Has she moved on, while in her afterlife, and the Oracle knows this? Is she trapped in time because of some magic whatever, and this is the motivation for the Oracle to undo everything?

And could I exploit her sister being alive? Some drama between the Oracle and his girlfriend's still alive sister? Guilt over getting her killed? Also, there's the fact that it was one of the PCs who killed the elven paladin's sister during the fight, so he could join the drows (he is a drow too) and lure them into a trap? No one knows this except him, and, of course, the players. But not the characters.

Yes, I think I could introduce an external force of evil that wants to benefit from the Time travelling machine so it can undo creation, but I want the Oracle to be the "mastermind", and his decisions to be his and his alone. If it's not done this way, my players will think of him as a peon, as someone controlled by the Actual Big Bad. Nope, this Oracle must be his own master, and so, the True enemy to everything that exists, even if he's got his own reasons to do so.

Honestly, if your best reason for destroying the universe is "boo hoo my girlfriend died", then you really have no business trying to destroy it.

This is a very good point. I can't let this guy be an angry idiot trying to get petty revenge over something that is pretty much his fault. There must be something else.

No more pain. No more suffering. An end to all injustices. An end to all that's evil.

And that which is good will live forever in the afterlife. That which is evil will suffer an eternity in the afterlife. The perfect justice.

I think the whole "destroying the multiverse" puts his reasoning beyond "good" and "evil" in the D&D sense. He's no longer considering those: Good and evil existing is a problem in itself.

Basically, he's claiming not to destroy the universe, but to reboot it. And it's not like the PCs will know the difference; they'll be wiped out either way.

I can't make him lie. If he is stopped, they will think that was his plan, so the truth will never be found, because the campaign ends there. If he persuades the PCs, they don't find the truth either, because, well, they're dead. I think I have to avoid outright lies. Make him as honest as I can, even if he turned like that because of the loss of his girlfriend. He must be morally justified from a weird point of view, so he can believe in what he's doing.

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I acknowledge it's increasingly boring to read each one of my posts, because they are full of details, and I apologize for it. The first post says pretty much everything, though, if you want to contribute more ideas.

Again, thanks everyone for your time and help.