Plaguer Hook 1

the plaguers have a long range plan of installing massive planar wards in an
intricate web around Sigil, believing that this could permanently seal the
city of doors off from the rest of the multiverse...a plan which has begun
with the placement of the cornerstones which will form the "keys" that
focus the nullifying power.  Potent prime mages are lending their efforts
to enable a rapid deployment that will lock the doors of the Cage forever.

and i have some grasslands in the grey waste i'd like to sell you...

the plaguers have been trying to do this FOREVER.  and the Cagers are always
talking about this "imminent threat" at least once a year or so...when nothing
else is really happening to capture people's interest.

of course, things are not always as they seem...

..but in this case, for once, they are.  the plaguers are COMPLETELY BARMY
if they think this plan is going to work...and many of them are.  the few 
high-ups who realize that this plan is never going to reach fruition
keep the others happy by authorizing the bare minimum resources to complete
their "projects".  conventional wisdom is that planar wards powerful enough
to shut down ALL of Sigil's portals would be too bulky, unstable and 
easily detectable to get into Sigil.  on top of this, NOBODY really has any
real plan for building even ONE planar ward of exceptional size/power...much
less a web.

this makes the workers on the Welder Project desperate...and desperate 
beings are as nasty as a pinned aeserpent.

the project leader is K'litchthk, a thri-kreen mage/psionicist from the
prime burg of Athas.  believing that the existence of Sigil and mortals in
the planes will create ecological imbalances that cannot be allowed. he is
a methodical, very alien researcher who undoubtably acts as the cool,
neutral center of his team-- in fact, he is secretly harboring notions
that his sect's ideas are possibly flawed.  (I recommend looking at
_Thri-Kreen of Athas_ for info on Thri-Kreen personallities).

his assistant is Tagashka, a cornugon baatezu.  the Plaguers feel all Outer
Planar creatures are worthy of deep honor, and thus K'litchthk defers to
the cornugon on many matters.  unfortunately, the cornugon is dying of a
strange blighting disease that is fragmenting his mind and shattering his
body.  Tagashka now believes that by consuming the life force of mortals
he can heal his body-- a practice that upsets the kreen.  Tagashka orders
larger and larger sacrifices of planars with soulknives so that he may
take their essences for healing.  some days he is fully lucid; frequently
he can not even remember who he is.

the final member of this triumvurate is Chillknife, an old white dragon.
Chillknife was recruited by the Plaguers when he was found drifting in
the Astral plane, the victim of a strange githyanki experiment; the young
wyrm had been fed entire brain of a dead god island.  treatments and 
injections over a hundred years led to the dragon uncementing from 
reality and becoming a spirit walker...he spends more of his time
drifting through the past and future in his mind than staying in the
present now.  His physical form has also been changed by the ordeals,
stunting his limbs and atrophying his legs until now he must be borne
wherever he needs to go in a giant litter carried by animated ogre
skeletons.  Chillknife (or Standing-In-Broken-Wind, as he now calls
himself) really is too dislocated to have any allegience in the normal
sense with the Plaguers, but some of his cryptic allusions tend to 
indicate that he believes or sees that the work they do will be/was
very important.  Standing has connections with many other factions and
sects as an erratic oracle-- many Plaguers worship him, to which he
says, "Time we have, enough, the dancing of prayer is not my dancing.
I am the silence in your breathing...you should hate this."

By design, the real go-getters and fanatics are the _underlings_ of the
Welder Project.  by making their (occasionally psychotic) plans subject
to the approval of this eclectic leadership, suicidal attempts to crush
Sigil are kept to a minimum.  Nevertheless, Cagers refer to outlandish
and excessive displays of force as "Welder jobs".