The Grand Design

It is clear to anyone who has felt the grace or displeasure of the gods, been in the presence of angels or demons, or witnessed the raw power of the primordial elements that there is more to the universe than the world of men. Since the very beginning, scholars and mystics and planar travelers have studied and explored the universe, seeking meaning and purpose, the truth of its nature. And they have yet to discover the answer to this existential mystery.

This is not to say that they have learned nothing. Though many details and particulars have been lost, rediscovered, and lost again, experts in planar studies comprehend the general form and function of the universe. They have even given the overarching cosmology a name, calling it the Grand Design, for there is indeed some process at work, with all the facets of reality parts of a greater whole, interacting and reacting with the stuff of the other planes like some sort of cosmic alchemy at work. But nobody is really sure what the point is, only the product.

The product is the world which mortals live in. Formed out of numerous ingredients, physical and spiritual, elemental and conceptual, planar essences refined and focused and molded together, with the ultimate result being the fabric of the Material Plane. Because of this, what goes on in the rest of the universe has a concrete effect on the lives of mortal beings. Changes in the formula change the final product. And so study continues, to better know how to balance, or imbalance, the mixture in ways that can be exploited, for good or for ill.

The Material Plane

Although most mortal beings would expect the reality that they hail from would be the best known of the planes to mortal scholars, this is actually not the case. The Material Plane holds just as many surprises and mysteries as any other layer of reality, if not even more so. This is partly due to scholars and mystics being more intrigued by the exotic nature of realities not their own, but also because of all the planes it may be the most varied and unpredictable, thanks to its composite nature. All the stuff of the other planes, matter and energy, concepts and ideas, all can be found together in the Material Plane, in a seemingly endless array of forms and combinations.

The greatest mystery of all that the Material Plane holds is the reason for its existence. While some posited that the mortal world was haphazardly congealed from the detritus cast off by the other planes, most creation mythologies point towards it being formed deliberately, though few can agree on who did it, and even fewer can guess why. Those who study the structure of the universe simply see that it is arranged in such a way that the essences of reality are filtered and processed and molded into the fabric of the mortal world, and suspect a great purpose for its existence, evidenced by the way extraplanar beings will often refer to the mortal world as the Prime when speaking of matters of great import.

Scholars are divided as to whether to say the mortal world is the center of the universe, or the pinnacle of the universe, or perhaps it could be considered the foundation. Whatever it's cosmological position, it is the focal point of reality, for reasons scholars throughout history have never truly understood. Compared to the grandeur and horror and potency of the planes which provide the mortal world with its fundamental essence, the Material Plane seems like an exercise in expending titanic amounts of effort for truly meager returns.

Because of this, scholars have devised a number of theories. Some believe the proliferation of souls is the purpose of the mortal world. Many outsiders have their origins in the ascension, corruption, or transmutation of human souls, and so they are needed to perpetuate their existence. More nihilistic suspicions suggest that the Material Plane is a fulcrum or a lynchpin of the Grand Design, required to keep it from collapsing in on itself, and mortal life is just an unintended side-effect. The most paranoid and apocalyptically-minded fear that the mortal world was crafted as the bait for a trap or the lock to a cage meant for some unfathomable horror.

Normal Gravity
Normal Time
Infinite Size: Despite it being the home of mortal life, most scholars are less certain of its true shape and extent than they are of more distant planes.
Alterable Morphic
No Elemental or Energy Traits: Specific locations may have these traits, however, whether from the influence of other planes or the actions of powerful entities, mortal or immortal.
Mildly Neutral-Aligned: Likewise, some places in the mortal world are infused spiritual forces whether through planar influence or deliberate effort.
Normal Magic

The Mirror Planes

When most people ponder the other planes of reality, they think of them as far-off, separated from the mortal world by vast gulfs or nigh-impenetrable barriers. But in truth, many planes are metaphysically close to the Material Plane, and two in particular are so close they overlap with the mortal world, and some do not consider them separate planes at all, merely alternate states of existence separated only by veils of perception and corporeality. The Mirror Planes are named so for this similarity in form to the Prime, imperfect and incomplete fascimiles distinguished by the unique peculiarities of their nature. Their function in the Grand Design is not certain. Some say the conflicting images the two planes project combine to give the Material Plane its shape, while others say that they are generated by the Material Plane, cast off from it like a shadow or a reflection. Whatever the case, these planes are layered closely over the fabric of Material Plane, and provide the basis for many spells which rely on extradimensional movement.

One particular element that both Mirror Planes share is the ability to percieve the Material Plane to some extent while within it. The topography of the Mirrors is closely connected to that of the mortal world, and things moving about across the veil can be seen, albeit as vague shadows or silhouettes, making details impossible to discern without some sort of magical enhancement.

The Clouded Mirror

Misty and insubstantial, the Clouded Mirror is also called the Ethereal Plane, and like the Warped Mirror it closely borders the Material Plane. Indeed, the two are so close that one can see the mortal world from the Clouded Mirror, though only just barely, as if through frosted glass. The only form that the Ethereal Plane has is that which the Material Plane reflects onto it, and indeed it of all the planes seems more like an alternate state of being on the mortal world than a distinctly separate reality. However, the echoes of the material plane are not limited to things which currently exist. The Ethereal Plane is like a foggy memory of the Prime, and so one will find buildings which no longer stand on the Material Plane, sometimes even intermingling with the form of the things which replaced it.

Scholars who have studied the Clouded Mirror have found that the structures most likely to persist in the Ethereal Plane are those which held great importance or left a strong impact on the people who once saw and used it. The gallows where many loved ones or hated criminals were hung or the statues of heroes torn down by conquering invaders can still be found as ghostly remnants in the Clouded Mirror, for they had such a strong hold on the minds of those who knew them.

Many creatures make use of the Clouded Mirror, able to shift into an ethereal form, becoming invisible and untouchable to all but specialized magics, and then returning to solidity to ambush prey. In addition to living beings, the spirits of the dead who linger in the mortal world have strong connections to the Clouded Mirror, as do primal spirits who watch over their charges from the Ethereal Plane.

No Gravity: With nothing to act upon but the strange, misty quasi-matter that suffuses it, movement in the Clouded Mirror is awkward. Creatures can move normally, and in any direction, but only at half speed. Most visitors stick to 'walking' on the semi-visible surface of the Material Plane.
Normal Time: While disconcerting and lacking anything to track it by, the Clouded Mirror functions on the same time scale as the Material Plane.
Infinite Size: The Clouded Mirror exists only as an element of the Material Plane, and so it likely has the same limits as it does.
Alterable Morphic: It's as susceptible to change as the mortal world is, but there's little to shape other than the everpresent shroud of fog.
No Elemental or Energy Traits.
Mildly Neutral-Aligned.
Normal Magic: While the Material Plane is partially visible from the Clouded Mirror, only effects specifically designed to reach across the planar boundaries will influence anything in the mortal world.

The Warped Mirror

Also known as the Plane of Shadow, the Warped Mirror is a twisted reflection of the Material Plane, a distorted reinterpretation of its true form. Its nature lends itself to deception and falsehood, and it is the Warped Mirror's half-real substance that magic-users draw from to work "shadow" spells, some of the most potent forms of illusion possible. While the plane itself is not evil, its nature draws many wicked beings to it, and so the Plane of Shadow is often a dangerous place.

Direction and distance within the Warped Mirror is just as inconsistent as its appearance, or perhaps it merely appears to be so, but that is just another illusion. Whatever the case, one can travel swiftly through the Warped Mirror, and to places one would not expect to be able to. Using appropriate magics such as shadow walk have allowed intrepid adventurers traveling in the Warped Mirror to reach lands across the ocean without ever seeing water, and step away from the material world entirely to enter other planes that border the mortal world such as the Aether, the Maelstrom, the Feywild and the Shadowfell. A few claim to have stepped out of the shadows into other realities entirely, strange alternate versions of the Material Plane, but proof of such odysseys has yet to come forth.

Normal Gravity: One of the few reliable truths of the Warped Mirror is that one's feet stay firmly on the ground.
Normal Time: Despite the impression of a sluggish, nightmare-like perception of time and motion, an hour on the Plane of Shadow corresponds to an hour of time on the Material Plane.
Infinite Size: Although it mirrors the mortal world, its broken interpretation of position and distance and pathways to other realities give it limitless size.
Magically Morphic: Spells with the shadow descriptor directly manipulate the substance of the plane and can have a lasting, tangible effect on it.
No Elemental or Energy Traits.
Mildly Neutral-Aligned: The Warped Mirror is devoid of judgement on morality or ethics.
Enhanced magic: Spells with the shadow descriptor are enhanced, as well as twice as 'real' as normal. For example, the spell shadow evocation does 40% real damage in the Warped Mirror instead of 20%. The percentage cannot exceed 100%, however.

The Refining Planes

While the Mirror Planes are often thought of as coterminous with the mortal world, their fabric intertwined with that of the Material Plane, the next 'closest' planes are more often described as 'adjacent' to the Prime. These are known as the Refining Planes among planar scholars, because they seem to exist in between the mortal world and the raw, untamed essences of the Physical and Spiritual Planes. Without these planes which separate the Material Plane from the planes beyond, the world which mortals live in would be a volatile mixture of opposing forces and irreconcilable concepts, if it could come together as a coherent whole at all. Or perhaps the energies would not be drawn together, leaving nothing a dead void in the center of the universe. The refining planes channel the raw essence of the physical and spiritual planes, remaking it into compatible, recognizable forms. Despite the familiar features and relative hospitality of these worlds, they still hold countless peculiarities and just as many dangers.

Of all the facets of reality beyond the mortal world, the refining planes are the cosmologically closest to the Material Plane, appropriate for their apparent purpose. The barriers separating the Prime from these border worlds are thin and porous, and anywhere their respective forces flourish in the mortal world, connections and portals are often made. Fortunately, these places occur most often in extreme environments, far from lands that most mortal races find hospitable. Still, the thoughts and actions of mortals can have a powerful influence on the planar fabric if pervasive and potent enough, and sometimes breaches occur within the heart of civilization.

The Feywild

Wild and vibrant, the realm of the fey flourishes with life and energy. However, the shape of the life that this plane is home to is not bound by the rules of the Material Plane, tempered by the other forces of the universe. They are not unnatural so much as exceeding the limits of nature, often mixing the traits of different varieties of living being and providing them with unusual size and vitality. Scholars suspect that many of the mortal world's 'monsters' are in fact natives of the Feywild that migrated and proliferated on the Material Plane. Unusually animate plants, hybrid creatures such as the chimera and the griffon, beasts with human-like intelligence, and dire animals dominate the Feywild's environment, which itself is more than equal to any of the mortal world's most breathtaking and primeval environments.

Equally common are fey creatures, who make up most of the plane's intelligent inhabitants. As a class of primal spirit, the fae are often found in the mortal world, and indeed many consider it as much their home as they do the Feywild. Their relationship with mortal races is less predictable, however. Many of them resent the intrusion and despoiling of nature mortals often represent, and others have natures which are simply anthithetical to the natives of the Material Plane.

Likely the most notable natives of the Feywild is the only known mortal race to spring from beyond the mortal world, the eladrin. The most civilized of all the plane's inhabitants, eladrin have grand settlements in every land the Feywild has to offer. Cities strung like webs between the boughs of mighty trees, crystal spires gleaming in the desert sun, and floating palaces drifting across the endless seas.

While the sights of the Feywild are the stuff of legends, most of the regions known to men are in fact quite close to the mortal world, for the places where connections are made are the places closest to the mortal world in character. Even so, only in the hearts of ancient forests, the waters of pristine lakes, and other regions where life is most abundant and unspoiled are strong enough to pierce the planar boundaries. The further one travels from the Material Plane in the Feywild, the wilder and more unreal life becomes, until it gives away altogether to the unbearable purity of the Positive Energy Plane.

Normal Gravity: The Feywild's connection to the material plane causes its gravity to function identically to the mortal world.
Normal Time: Tales of the fae taking people away to their kingdoms for what seemed like days but in actuality were years or even centuries stem from the powers of said creatures rather than the plane itself.
Infinite Size: While it is possible to find places where the Feywild physically borders the mortal world or the Positive Energy Plane, such places do not restrict the scope of the plane in any concrete fashion.
Alterable Morphic.
Sporadically Positive-Dominant: Pockets of positive energy occasionally can be found in the Feywild, usually only minor positive-dominant, but a few places hold dangerous major positive-dominant places where the Positive Energy Plane spills into the Feywild to be diluted. Even rarer and more dangerous are the wildstorms, when such powerful energies manifest as temporary, mobile waves of energy.
Mildly Neutral-Aligned: Though many of its denizens are freewheeling and chaotic, the plane itself has no moral or ethical leanings.
Normal Magic.

The Shadowfell

The only other world besides the Material Plane which all mortals are destined to see, the Shadowfell is in many ways the polar opposite of the Feywild. Where life springs into being in the Feywild, in the Shadowfell, the spirits of the living linger here, awaiting their ultimate fate. It is a bleak place of muted colors and fading light, and nothing grows here, it simply exists on after expending its life in the mortal world.

Naturally, the spirits of the dead are common in the Shadowfell. However, the majority of these souls are far more coherent than the obsessive ghosts who cling the mortal world. Most have largely accepted their fate and merely await the call of their deities, but some some listen hear the voices of their descendants asking for guidance, and find the strength and purpose to answer, becoming ancestor spirits that join the ranks of other primal outsiders.

That is not to say that there are no dangerous spirits in the Shadowfell. Indeed, there are at least as many malevolent undead who have succumbed to hatred and nihilism as there are in the Material Plane, if not more, and it is from here that they often cross over into the living world to torment and destroy. Most of these are incorporeal wraiths and spectres, as they have left their flesh behind, but some corporeal undead make their homes in the Shadowfell, finding respite from the weaknesses they experience in the mortal world.

Undead abominations do not go unchallenged here, however. Indeed, their most powerful opponent rules unquestioned in this plane. The Pale Shepherd holds court in the Shadowfell, and the race of outsiders known as psychopomps wander its bleak landscape, finding the souls who have been chosen to depart and sending them to their ultimate reward, for good or for ill. They also stamp out the restless dead who defy the natural cycle of life whenever possible.

Places where death holds sway are where the Shadowfell connects to the mortal world. Graveyards and battlefields may hold gateways to the realm of the dead, places dreary and foreboding enough to match the character of the Shadowfell where it is most like the mortal world. Beyond these places, entropy grows stronger and stronger, until it is little more than a blasted wasteland that crumbles into the horrid void of the Negative Energy Plane.

Normal Gravity: The Shadowfell maintains the same gravity as the mortal world, though this does not inhibit many of its incorporeal denizens.
Normal Time: The bleak timeless of the land of the dead is the result of the static nature of its lands and inhabitants, not any change in the flow of time itself.
Infinite Size: Only in the places where it meets the living world or falls away into the Negative Energy Plane does the Shadowfell end.
Alterable Morphic: While change rarely happens on its own in the Shadowfell, the efforts and powers of beings within it affect it normally.
Sporadically Negative-Dominant: While most of the Shadowfell is habitable to the living, some places exist where it gains a minor negative-dominance, and undead horrors often lair in these places. Additionally, the rare major negative-dominant place exists where the Negative Energy Plane bleeds into the Shadowfell, and may even creep across the landscape, bringing oblivion to those it engulfs.
Mildly Neutral-Aligned: Death is impartial, and welcomes all equally, regardless of ideology.
Normal Magic.

The Luminous Aether

Thought and spirit are the substance of the Luminous Aether. Also known as the astral plane, it draws down the concepts and ideals of the spiritual planes and uses them to give shape to the substance of the physical planes. This plane is an endless silver sky, shot through with softly glowing clouds and shimmering aurorae twisting into endless varieties of shapes. Occasionally one might spot a swirling disk of color can be found, a portal to one of the spiritual planes, or an iridescent bubble in which glimpses of strange visions unfold, the dreams of some slumbering being.

The most common connections the Luminous Aether with the Material Plane are not physical, but mental. Many scholars believe that when mortals sleep, they open their minds to the astral plane, allowing the spiritual planes to shape their dreams. However, sometimes portals to the Aether can form in places and moments of profound tranquility. The highest reaches of the sky, the glassy surface of a still sea beyond the sight of land, anywhere devoid of distractions can bring one closer to the spiritual essence of the universe, and thus, the astral plane.

Though its nature is rooted in the world of the mind and soul, the Luminous Aether is still a physical reality that planar travelers can travel to, and many do. Many even live within the astral plane, inhabiting drifting islands constructed from dream remnants and detritus from the mortal world or the spiritual planes. While some seek the astral plane for peace and solitude, there are dangers to be found, whether native predators, outsiders from the spiritual planes, or those who would use it as a haven through which to plunder other worlds. Of the latter, the most prolific are the githyanki, astral marauders who wield soul-cutting silver swords and the alien, mind-shattering powers of psionics.

Subjective Directional Gravity: As a realm of the mind and the soul, gravity is imparted only by the will of the individual.
Timeless: Time does not exist in the familiar sense within the Luminous Aether. Wounds still heal and spells still end as they should, and poison and disease will take their toll, but those within the astral plane never age and never starve, though they still instinctively crave the food and water their bodies think they still need.
Infinite Size: There are no boundaries within the Luminous Aether. It goes on for eternity, though the dream-logic that rules allows travellers to reach destinations within it without centuries of travel.
Alterable Morphic: The astral plane bends to the actions of others just as readily as the mortal world.
Elemental and Energy Traits: None.
Mildly Neutral-Aligned: The Luminous Aether has no character that is not imposed upon it by the minds and forces which come from beyond its borders.
Enhanced Magic: Within this realm of thought and dream, magic can be brought forth with great swiftness. All spells and spell-like abilities function as if they were enhanced by the Quicken Spell or Quicken Spell-Like Ability feats, without expending a higher-level spell slot.

The Primordial Maelstrom

The building blocks of the universe can be found here, a tumultuous storm of roiling elements colliding with one another. Despite this turmoil, the Maelstrom is much more hospitable than the Elemental Planes which spill into it at the far corners of its span. It has all of the physical components needed to sustain life, and provides opportunity to draw on the primordial essence for beings which cannot survive the environments that exist further beyond.

The Primordial Maelstrom takes the form of an endless void through which great masses of the elements drift. Floating islands of dirt and stone known as earthmotes are the first thing most notice, followed by the bands of water which snake through the gulfs from one mote to the next, wrapping around them and flowing in any possible direction, whether lengthwise like a river or spiraling around like a waterspout. The plane is lit by clouds of drifting flame which spring up and die out at random, and all of these are moved and shaped by the ever-blowing winds.

Natives of the elemental planes can often be found here, creating outposts and colonies for their kind. The janni consider the Maelstrom their true home, being composed of all four elements unlike most genies, and many mephit find the mixtures of elements found here to their liking as well. True elementals are somewhat rare, except for those who are formed from a fusion of two separate elements, as this is the only plane other than the borderlands where the elements meet that suit their character. Mortal beings also inhabit the Maelstrom, whether arcane hermits seeking to unravel the mysteries of the elements, or the semi-nomadic githzerai, who establish monasteries and study the chaos of the elements to better know how to tame it within themselves.

Objective directional gravity: While at first glance gravity appears to function normally when walking on the 'ground' of the Elemental Chaos, it soon becomes readily apparent that elemental masses of sufficient size and intensity can have their own gravity, and the ground that travelers initially believe to be the primary surface of the plane is actually just one of many huge, drifting earthmotes. Smaller earthmotes are often subject to the gravity of larger ones that they orbit, leaving only one surface of them to be habitable, but the larger ones easily allow inhabitants to walk on any of their sides, and if they should come into close enough proximity one can jump up off of one and land on the other, albeit headfirst if the traveller is not careful.
Normal Time: The primal forces of the Primordial Maelstrom do not influence the passage of time, and it flows normally in relation to the material plane.
Infinite Size: While many of the various segments of the Primordial Maelstrom end, the void that it exists in goes on forever or until a place is found where it connects to the material world or one of the Elemental Planes.
Highly Morphic: The Maelstrom is a tumultuous place, elemental forces erupting from the void, fusing and separating into new forms. It is almost impossible to predict the results of elemental forces colliding with one another.
Sporadically Element-Dominant: Each element has regions where its influence is dominant above the others, and in these places they are similar to their plane of origin.
Mildly Neutral-Aligned: The ideological forces of the Spiritual Planes have little power here, and so in that way it functions the same way as most of the mortal world.
Normal Magic: While on the elemental planes, the scarcity of some forces limits the power of elementally-based spells, in the Maelstrom there is sufficient essence that all magics function equally well.

The Physical Planes

The Material Plane, as its name implies, is a world derived of tangible forces and substances. The source of this matter stems from the Physical Planes, and is transmuted through the Refining Planes into the forms seen in the mortal world. Although life emerges from a mixture of these elements on the Material Plane, creatures emerge from the raw, untamed power of the Physical Planes as well, comprised of the essence of the plane itself and driven by its innate nature.

The Energy Planes

The Furnace of Creation

A limitless wellspring of light and vitality, the Positive Energy Plane is the spark which fuels all living things. Despite its connections to healing and growth, this endless domain of brilliance is paradoxically dangerous to most beings. The untamed power that suffuses the plane overwhelms the integrity of non-native beings even as it bolsters them. Without proper protection, the excessive lifeforce inundating visitors will eventually result in a catastrophic reaction.

Few travel to the Positive Energy Plane because of this, and even those safe from its overwhelming environment have little reason to go. Most forays into the Furnace of Creation have discovered little but an infinite expanse empty of everything but light stretching beyond the bounds of comprehension. Most signs of life or matter come from outside the plane, isolated pockets of extraplanar immigrants who have brought earthmotes or fortresses warded against positive energy to the plane, whether to conduct research on positive energy, meditate upon the source of life, or hide from terribly powerful undead foes and hope the sheer inhospitability of the plane will protect them. There are, however, rumored sightings of native creatures that drift within the endless sea of light. Contact with these creatures has found them to be evasive and inscrutable, and sometimes hostile for unknown reasons.

Subjective Directional Gravity: With little physical matter save what visitors bring with them, the effects of gravity are largely left up to the will of the individuals it exerts its influence on.
Normal Time: Time flows unhindered in the Furnace of Creation.
Infinite Size: As the limitless source of life energy for the universe, it's unsurprising that there are no boundaries to speak of.
Alterable Morphic: There is little to affect in the Furnace of Creation save the everpresent positive energy, but what is there responds to magic the same as it does in the mortal world.
Major Positive-Dominant: Some regions of the plane are only minor-positive dominant, providing sanctuary from the excessive life energies saturating the rest of the plane.
Mildly Neutral-Aligned: Though positive energy is often associated with the forces of good, there is no inherent morality to the Furnace of Creation.
Enhanced Magic: Spells and spell-like abilities that use positive energy are enhanced. Class abilities that use positive energy, such as channel positive energy, gain a +4 bonus to the save DC to resist the ability.
Impeded Magic: Spells and spell-like abilities that use negative energy (including inflict spells) are impeded.

The Mouth of Oblivion

In scholarly texts, it is most often simply called the Negative Energy Plane, but this dry appraisal of it as a mere force of nature belies the active hostility to life that this plane embodies. Many religious texts refer to it as a profane wellspring of death and evil. However, this too does not encapsulate the truth of its nature. Concepts like death and evil are far too personal to accurately prepare someone to face the Mouth of Oblivion.

It is not the absence of life, it is the antithesis of life. It is not the absence of growth, but its polar opposite. It does not passively wait for entropy to take its course, it actively seeks and destroys light and feeling. Even decay is a process of change and leaves behind remnants, far more beneficial than the stagnation and annihilation brought on by negative energy. It is a tangible nothingness, a void with substance, a purposeful force of non-existence. From it spring the malevolent forces which cause the bodies of dead to rise to spite and hunger for the living and corrupt and consume souls, leaving nothing of the will behind but hateful, destructive desires. Indeed, it is so contrary to the idea of the cosmos being an engine of creation that few can even begin to theorize why it is included in the Grand Design at all. It defies rational explanation, with the best guesses pointing to it being as a process to purge incompatible elements from reality, or a motivating force to keep living, thinking beings from becoming weary and indolent.

Subjective Directional Gravity: Visitors to the Maw of the Oblivion can generally exert their own personal gravity in whatever direction they wish.
Normal Time: Any time spent in the Maw of Oblivion should be kept as short as possible, but it flows on at a normal pace
Infinite Size: The Maw of Oblivion is an endless void of anti-life.
Alterable Morphic: Little survives long enough to be manipulated in the Maw, but it can be affected by magic just as it is on the material plane.
Major Negative-Dominant: Some regions of the plane are only minor-negative dominant, although this is often still enough to kill any living thing that lingers too long.
Mildly Neutral-Aligned: The Maw of Oblivion exists beyond morality. The evil associated with it stems from the creatures and places that it taints, not the plane itself.
Enhanced Magic: Spells and spell-like abilities that use negative energy are enhanced. Class abilities that use negative energy, such as channel negative energy, gain a +4 bonus to the save DC to resist the ability.
Impeded Magic: Spells and spell-like abilities that use positive energy (including inflict spells) are impeded.

The Elemental Planes

The Plane of Air

Consisting of nothing but an endless sky, the Elemental Plane of Air is considered the least immediately dangerous of the elemental planes. But while a visitor can exist in this realm without fear of burning, drowning or suffocating, it has its own perils. The Plane of Air is never still, and its weather is even more extreme and less predictable than that of the mortal world. In addition to the countless banks of clouds and corridors of wind, undying hurricanes and tornadoes twist through the plane, at times seeming to hunt down inhabitants and visitors alike. Such willful purpose is more believable when one considers the elemental beings born of the plane's substance, who build cities on and within the clouds and the rare motes of earth that tumble through the endless void.

Subjective Directional Gravity: With no distinct 'down' to speak of in the limitless sky, visitors are in control of their own gravity, though their choice of direction may be checked by the billowing winds of the plane.
Normal Time: The Plane of Air has no effect on the passage of time.
Infinite Size: The only places where the Plane of Air ends is where it connects with the Primordial Maelstrom.
Alterable Morphic: The substance of the Plane of Air responds to magic just as the material plane does.
Air-Dominant:
Mildly Neutral-Aligned:
Enhanced Magic: Air-element
Impeded Magic: Earth-element

The Plane of Earth

Because of its nature, even entering the Elemental Plane of Earth can be a challenge, if not an outright hazard. The vast majority of it, naturally, consists of and is occupied by earth, sand, and stone, and an incautious entry can open a portal up to a wall of stone, and a planar shift can entomb the traveller in a crushing prison of earth. With a modicum of caution, however, travelling in the Plane of Earth requires few extra protections. Other travellers have visited it in the past, and not all of its denizens can pass through stone as easily as they can air, and so there are endless pockets of caverns and tunnels that can be traversed or inhabited. Still, these tunnels are often just as alien and inhospitable as the deepest depths of the Nether, and with the planar connections and bizarre environments the deepest reaches of the mortal world have, it can be hard to know if one has crossed over from one to the other.

Objective directional gravity: Gravity is oriented towards the nearest solid earthen surface that is still connected to the planar whole. Creatures can walk on any surface and even jump from one to another, though they must be able to clear the distance at least halfway, and may still have to contend with falling damage.
Normal Time:
Infinite Size:
Alterable Morphic:
Earth-Dominant:
Mildly Neutral-Aligned:
Enhanced Magic: Earth-element
Impeded Magic: Air-element

The Plane of Fire

While the other elemental planes sometimes have their hazards underestimated, the Elemental Plane of Fire's inhospitable nature is often somewhat exaggerated. Indeed, it is lethally hot to the unprepared visitor without even blundering into some inferno, but it is not an inescapable sea of endless flame as many would imagine. Fire does not exist without other things to burn and consume, and so there is a surprising amount of substance that is not innately comprised of fire. Of course, lava plains, and rivers of molten iron, and torrential rains of brimstone are hardly welcoming forms for such matter to take, but it is the nature of fire to instill things with its essence and transform them so.

Normal Gravity: Heat rises, and therefore there must be a direction for it to rise towards. In this way the Plane of Fire establishes the directions of up and down, which function as they do on the material plane.
Normal Time:
Infinite Size: Infinite
Alterable Morphic:
Fire-Dominant:
Mildly Neutral-Aligned:
Enhanced Magic: Fire-element
Impeded Magic: Water-element

The Plane of Water

No Gravity:
Normal Time:
Infinite Size:
Alterable Morphic:
Water-Dominant:
Mildly Neutral-Aligned:
Enhanced Magic: Water-element
Impeded Magic: Fire-element

The Spiritual Planes

The Abyss, the Numberless Pits

A shattered black wasteland, lit by the flash of lightning and the glow of molten pools, is only the first of endless horrific vistas that wait the damned or foolhardy souls in the Abyss. This surface layer is riddled with chasms and sinkholes which plunge into darkness and emerge into an infinite variety of nightmarish worlds. Descending into the Abyss' depths could lead travelers to a forest of sharpened steel, a tundra wracked by poisonous blizzards, or the pulsating, fleshy interior of some demonic superorganism. The Numberless Pits of the Abyss and their inhabitants offer unlimited possibilities for sin and destruction, and few who find their way into this damned realm escape it unphased or unsullied.

The fate of souls consigned to the Abyss depends on the strength and depth of their wickedness. Weak and petty villains, and those souls taken unwillingly, are fated to become Abyssal larvae, squirming maggots with the faces they bore in life, used by the Abyss' greater denizens as currency, food, or fuel. None of these fates are merciful enough to bring a final end to the larva's existence, though. Only by growing sufficiently hateful and malicious from their torment to ascend to demonhood can they change their wretched fates. The truly wicked in life will also enter the Abyss as fully formed demons, the type depending on the character and severity of their sins. On fantastically rare occasions, the most heinous and vile of mortal sinners will have achieved so much death and destruction in life that they undergo an Abyssal apotheosis in death, reborn directly into the form of an Abyssal monarch, the undisputed masters of the Abyss, forming the beginnings of their Abyssal Demesne around them as they emerge. (Petitioners in the Abyss are always Tiny, and replace their slam with a bite attack with a base 1d4 damage)

The traits below only apply to the surface of the Abyss; the abyssal realms have their own individual traits as determined by the character of their ruler or the chaotic whims of the Abyss itself.

Main Article: The Numberless Pits of the Abyss

Gravity: Normal
Time: Normal
Shape and Size: Infinite
Morphic Traits: Alterable morphic; abyssal realms are divinely morphic.
Elemental and Energy Traits: None
Alignment Traits: Mildly chaos-aligned, mildly evil-aligned
Magic Traits: Enhanced magic(chaos and evil); impeded magic(law and good)

Accord, the Erudite Capital

When the gods must meet with their rivals, when angels must treat with demons, when any of the diametrically opposed forces are forced to put aside their differences for a time, the meeting place is almost always the plane of Accord. The ultimate neutral ground, Accord is a endless labyrinth of vast halls, sweeping arcades, and stairwells stretching up into infinity. Despite its complexity, it is uncannily easy to navigate, so perfectly designed that only deliberately obscured locations are difficult to find and reach. Here, one can find the highest courts of the utmost impartiality, and the grandest repositories of objective truths. Such treasures of knowledge are not necessarily free for the taking, however, and often require an equivalent exchange to access. Or outright thievery.

Those souls with a spiritual connection to the Erudite Capital are brought into the plane looking much as they did, but they are blind, deaf and mute. They have abandoned these misleading senses, and instead they percieve and communicate through pure knowledge, intuitively aware of their surroundings and of the thoughts others direct towards them. (Petitioners in Accord have blindsight 60 ft. and telepathy 100 ft.)

Gravity: Normal
Time: Normal
Shape and Size: Infinite
Morphic Traits: Divinely morphic
Elemental and Energy Traits: Normal
Alignment Traits: Strongly neutral-aligned
Magic Traits:

Acropolis, the City Upon the Hill

Acropolis is the grandest of cities, the pinnacle of form and function, the ideal of law and order. Everything in this city is tuned to mechanical precision, and those fortunate enough to ascend to this plane from the mortal world live afterlives of blissful certainty and stability, freed from the cruel whims of misfortune. This clockwork utopia boasts the finest crafts and most innovative technology in creation

Those who pass on to live in the City Upon the Hill are rebuilt into a mechanical mannequin form mimicing their old self. (Petitioners use the construct type instead of outsider)

Gravity: Normal
Time: Normal
Shape and Size: Finite. While incalculably vast, the city has its boundaries, though this does not constrain its inhabitants much as those outer limits are regularly expanded to accommodate new citizens.
Morphic Traits: Divinely morphic
Elemental and Energy Traits:
Alignment Traits: Strongly law-aligned
Magic Traits: Enhanced magic(law); impeded magic(chaos)

Arcady, the Unfettered Garden

Gravity: Normal
Time: Normal
Shape and Size: Infinite
Morphic Traits: Divinely morphic
Elemental and Energy Traits: None
Alignment Traits: Mildly chaos-aligned, mildly good-aligned
Magic Traits: Enhanced magic(chaos and good); impeded magic(law and evil)

Armageddon, the Eternal Warfront

Asgardr, the Fields of Glory

Gravity: Normal
Time: Normal
Shape and Size: Infinite
Morphic Traits: Divinely morphic
Elemental and Energy Traits: Minor positive-dominant
Alignment Traits: Mildly chaos-aligned
Magic Traits: Normal magic.

Baator, the Unforgiving Hell

Gravity: Normal
Time: Normal
Shape and Size: Infinite
Morphic Traits: Divinely morphic
Elemental and Energy Traits: Varies
Alignment Traits: Mildly law-aligned, mildly evil-aligned
Magic Traits: Enhanced magic(law and evil); impeded magic(chaos and good)

Tenebria, the Lightless Underworld

A maze of twisty passages, all alike. Shrouded in a pervasive darkness.

Gravity: Objective directional gravity. Gravity is oriented towards the nearest solid surface that is firmly connected to the planar whole. Creatures can walk on any surface and even jump from one to another, though they must be able to clear the distance at least halfway, and may still have to contend with falling damage.
Time: Normal
Shape and Size: Infinite
Morphic Traits: Divinely morphic
Elemental and Energy Traits:
Alignment Traits: Mildly evil-aligned
Magic Traits: Impeded magic; light-based spells require a DC(20 + spell level) concentration check to cast, and radius and duration are halved.

Empyreus, the Shining Paradise

An idyllic, pastoral afterlife, green fields and quiet towns, where the departed enjoy simple, joyous existence free of suffering

Gravity: Light gravity
Time: Normal time
Shape and Size: Infinite
Morphic Traits: Divinely morphic
Elemental and Energy Traits: None
Alignment Traits: Strongly good-aligned
Magic Traits: Enhanced magic(good); impeded magic(evil)

Omphalos, the Holy Mountain

Infinitely tall mountain, climbing it is a series of ever greater trials guarding ever greater enlightenments. It can be harsh, but is always fair, and all those who go through its trials benefit in the end and come out of them better off than they went in

Gravity: Normal
Time: Normal
Shape and Size: Infinite
Morphic Traits: Divinely morphic
Elemental and Energy Traits:
Alignment Traits: Mildly lawful-aligned, mildly good-aligned
Magic Traits: Enhanced magic(law and good); impeded magic(chaos and evil)

Pangaea, the Untamed Wilderness

A perfect wilderness, free of moral and ethical attachments. Afterlife is a series of lives lived out over and over again, different each time.

Sensorium, the Sea of Feeling

An endless ocean of riotous color, Sensorium is a plane formed from emotion and sensation, its nature shaped by the thoughts and desires of those who dwell here. Although the idea of a world which caters to one's every whim and wish sounds appealing, the results are untempered by constraint or reason, and few manage to keep control of these fantasies. Worse, unwanted thoughts and fears can manifest themselves as well, and visitors can sometimes find themselves battling their worst nightmares.

Gravity: Unpredictable gravity
Time: Erratic time
Shape and Size: Infinite
Morphic Traits: Highly morphic
Elemental and Energy Traits: None
Alignment Traits: Strongly chaos-aligned
Magic Traits: Wild magic

Xibalba, the Place of Fear

A realm of eternal torments, endless trials, and inescapable prisons

Gravity: Heavy Gravity
Time: Normal
Shape and Size: Infinite
Morphic Traits: Divinely morphic.
Elemental and Energy Traits:
Alignment Traits: Strongly evil-aligned
Magic Traits: Enhanced magic(evil); impeded magic(good)

Traveling the Planes

One thing which confuses novice planeswalkers are matters of location, speed, and distance. If the majority of planes are effectively infinite, how is it that locations of note are all within a distance of eachother that is conveniently traversable for mortals? Even more confusing is the application of finite concepts to the planes, such as the existance of peaks and foothills on the otherwise endless slopes of the Omphalos, or Narlohex's prison being impossibly located at the bottom of the Numberless Pits of the Abyss.

The fact of the matter is that travel in the realities beyond the Material Plane is rarely dependent on physical distance, but experiential distance. The origin, destination, and motives of the travelers have more effect on travel than physical laws of space and time. Only on local scales and in places where the boundaries have been specifically defined do feet and miles truly matter, and even then such spaces can remain separate when they should seemingly overlap. It is in this way that condradictions such as an infinite metropolis with a waterfront on an endless sea can exist.

For simple travel, traveling between places of significance that are not intrinsically defined as less accessible mirrors many of the expectations of visitors from the material plane. Travel between the two points can be measured in days, and faster methods of movement will shorten the journey. Even transportation spells with finite ranges measured in miles such as Teleport seem to function normally. The journey's length usually doesn't change, or does so very slowly, based on the nature of the plane or that particular location.

With planar locations which are made remote by their nature or through the deliberate actions of some entity, distance can become more abstract. If an 'endless' sea can only be crossed by sailing for forty days and forty nights, it will generally take that long no matter what kind of ship is used, or any other mode of transportation. This doesn't mean such journeys can be undertaken leisurely without any consequences, however. The narratively-influenced distances of most planes means a lack of haste will result in an abundance of distractions and challenges along the way. Potent spells such as Greater Teleport can circumvent these set travel times in many cases, but sometimes the metaphysical distance is so great that even mighty spells like Interplanetary Teleport may not be sufficient. In these cases, it is often turns out that the journey itself is more important than the destination.

The Twisted Void

Once, in the late days of the Last Empire, ambitious scholars looked at the Grand Design, and thought, "Is this all there is?" "Is there nothing to see beyond our cosmic alchemy?" "Have we glimpsed our last horizon?"

If only.

Beyond our universe, mercifully separated from us by natural law and concrete reality, the horror of an unbound infinity awaits. The Twisted Void is everything that the cosmos is not, roiling with forces beyond the limits of existence. To call it chaos is almost a slur upon the force of change which bears the same name in our universe. To call it evil mocks it with the pretense of being confined by morality. The Twisted Void can only be accurately described as Other. It is what the universe is not. And even that small a distinction is what makes it antithetical to our existence.

The Grand Design gives the Twisted Void a center, a boundary, an existence defined as 'that which we are not'. Reality bled into the Void when the Great Alchemy began, and it gave things which once reveled in nonexistence a reality that they recoil in disgust from. They cannot return to a true, blissful infinity while the Grand Design exists, and so the Twisted Void is forever a dire threat to our universe.

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