The Cosmos

Prima Materia

The world of Aeros, orbiting the sun. Lunus, the prime moon, carries the phases, while the second moon, Rusgar (the brown pinprick), orbits behind, cataloguing auspicious astrological events. Rumor abounds of a twin planet on the opposite side of Aeros’s orbit.

The Feywild 

    The three courts of the Fey (post coming later) war over the verdant landscapes and fairy masses that live in the beautiful and alluring Feywild. A spirit of dark mischief pervades the land, and those who oppose beauty seek to rip the Feywild apart from the inside, in the fourth court of Voidshred.

The Shadowfell

    A twisted and muted reflection of Prima Materia, suffused by the Sorrow, the inherent planar energies of this warped place. The Dark Powers used the Sorrow to imprison the Locked Travesties in isolated corners of the Shadowfell. Strahd, Lord Soth and Orcus all are part of the nightmare pantheon of the Locked Travesties, yearning to break free of their fog-bound panopticons. The Raven Queen, arbiter of souls, exists within and yet beyond the Shadowfell, unfolding in a mirrored and feathered dreamscape of fractal consciousness and eternal omniscience. From her seat of judgement, the psychopomp god Charon ferries the souls to their resting places.

Astral and Ethereal

    The Ethereal Plane is the plane of dreams. When you enter it, you can force it to operate any way you’d like, with enough willpower. Massive silver clouds of starstuff float through an ectoplasmic void of heavenly swirls of gold and blue and brilliant white. It gently washes onto the elemental planes like a warm ocean swell onto a brilliant beach, and you can see and feel through it to the adjacent planes like a frosted window reflecting out into a divine vista.

The Astral Plane is the plane of thought. When you enter it, your assumptions continue to shape how the reality works- fire burns, the air is breathable, you stay stuck to the ground. Rainbow nebula frame against the psyche-purple expanse, and crystal-coated of antediluvian stone and hunks from the corpses of the divine drift aimlessly through the void. The Astral plane connects to the Outer Planes, holes poked in the fabric of the mindscape.

Elemental Planes

Formed after the victories of the first four primordials in a war that preceded time, the Fire, Water, Earth and Air planes lie stacked, like a massive planar lasagna. Fire exists below, then Earth, then Water, then Air, then Fire, like a stacked ring. Ash and steam and ice intermingle in the elemental chaos around this flat lasagna ring of incomprehensible cosmic geometry. These are godless lands, the wrath of the slumbering primordials intimidates the courts of the divine.

Olympus

    The bottom layer, Oceania, the glittering sea of holy water. Swimming to shore is the first test of purity. You must cleanse your soul of selfishness before you can step onto the glittering beaches. Fortresses of those seeking ablution exist in the shallows, so close and yet so far from the sands.

    The next layer is Arborea. The trial is the clarity of the spirit. You must not get lost wandering the woods, let your faith in your philosophes guide you to the secluded trails to the foot of the mountain. Empires of elvish spirits reside in the capricious halls of Aarnatho, permanently stuck on this layer.

The third layer is Lunaria. The craggy slopes, rich with minerals and shining with beautiful marble and limestone, threatens to accost you and arrest you with the picturesque beauty of the landscape. The third trial is the blindness to deception. The mountain’s beauty will enchant you if you do not learn to look past appearances and deceptions and see things for what they are inside. Alloa’s followers, the pious of the goddess of battle, beauty, and art, have made this layer their afterlife.

The final layer is a mystery. Chronias is the home of Sol, god of the sun. Those few pure souls who have fully cleansed themselves through every trial ascend the peak of Olympus to make it to the top, greeted with… well, nobody knows. Is there a feast hall of the perfectly sacrosanct? Are the souls, freed from imperfection, leased back into the multiverse to keep the cosmic cycles going? Does Sol devour the faithful, our sun sustained by the extinguished light of purity? Is Chronias the forge in which the souls of gods are forged anew?

Valhalla

The middle is Asgard. Vast plains of grass grow into rolling hills and teeming forests, all exploding with life and vibrancy. Giants fight eternal wars, the Wyldeborn engage in eternal hunts of ethereal game, and the mettle of warriors is tested on this expansive and wild paradise.

The top is Ygdrassil. This massive tree, throne-seat of Odin the Wise, is where the greatest warriors and staunchest enemies of evil await the opening of Ragnarok and the final battles of the multiverse. The mead flows like water, and the glass looking-ports oversee the rest of the multiverse in vigilant watch for cataclysm.

The bottom is Svordheim. Warrens of wind-cut rock disguise atrocities in the darkness. Potent and volatile agents of chaos are sequestered in this nightmarish mass of darkened earth, and the atrocities of the multiverse are stored away in these lightless vaults. Who knows what artifacts and abominations lie in the howling darkness?

Outlands

Spokes on a wagon. Cogs in a machine. Angles on a Great Wheel. The Outlands is said to reflect the true nature of creation. The city of Sigil rests atop the Infinite Spire, in the center of the Outlands. The gate-towns encircle it, illuminating portals and gateways across the cosmos. Perhaps this is the center of creation, this maroon and blasted land.

Entropy

Cliffs of liquid collapse against crystal blotches of lightning. Color made manifest sublimates into mercury mist. Chaos made into a malevolent, murderous entity, overseen by the Slaads, wardens of madness. The Githzerai carve out fortresses from mind-quelled havens, the colliding matter and thought kept at bay by sheer force of will. Zeus (ZAY-oos) and Malestrom, gods of storm and war, are said to live on Entropy, but their cathedrals have never been found by mere exploration, only by invitation.

Ragnarok

    Prison plane of the demons. The mutated abominations who served the Bound One in the Godswars (demons and their kin) were sealed away onto Ragnarok to fester. They turned their hatred towards creation, and in their infinite prison they scheme to destroy the bands of the Iron Treaty and enter the wider cosmos once more. If Ragnarok were to open anew, creation would go to war for the last time. This hell is a boundless panoply of the most vile aspects of creation, woe betide all ye who find yourself in the land of the demon.

Hades

    The vast majority of dead souls are sent to Hades. The warrior souls go to Acheron, mounting massive iron cubes floating in the void and joining the Blood War, the largest battle in the multiverse. The common souls go to Asphodel, toiling endlessly under Shub-N’varoth, the Mother of Goat’s blazing watch. The souls of dead gods go to Pluton, a cold and lightning-scarred realm of black ice and obsidian. Charon’s barge of nail clippings floats through the stagnant waters of the three realms, silently acting as psychopomp and maintaining order in Pluton. After all, gods shouldn’t return from the dead very often.

Inferno

The devils are the appointed jailors of the demons, according to the Iron Treaty. Asmodeus was the last god to join to the side of the divine council against the Bound One, and as such, he and his followers got the worst deal. Under the sweltering sun, contracts and doublespeak rule, and diplomacy is as deadly as the touch of the bronze blade of an infernal.

Sopater, layer of dunes and wastes, is ruled by Mephistopheles. Dis, layer of the infernal city, is ruled by Dispater. Pyros, layer of liquid fire, is ruled by the twin lovers Fierna and Belial. Karmach, layer of iron gears and rusted cages, isrules by O37AR (Oetar). Gorallah, layer of infinite crags, is ruled by the Witch Countess. Mephystos, layer of sludge and vermin, is ruled by Mammon. Cania, layer of frostburn and darkness, is ruled (from frozen enthronement) by Geryon. Nessus, layer of rust and blood, is ruled by Asmodeus, the god-king of hell. The final layer, Abathom, contains the Pit. The layer is protected by the angel Zariel, who some claim has formally fallen and others mandate is still pure. The Iron Treatise states specifically that the Pit is never to be opened...

Order

Massive cogs orbit each other, occupied by fractal citadels of the modrons. This is said to be the beating heart that keeps the cosmos consistent and orderly. The Iron Treatise itself is written into the movement of the cogs and the program of the modron collective. Vithitar, goddess of justice and legal systems, lives among these creatures in an uneasy alliance.

Other Places

Metaphysacia. The elemental plane of time and dream and thought. Concepts are the pillars that hold up this nigh-inaccessible plane, and this is the cradle of the time elemental and the meme-made-flesh. Travel to Metaphysacia, and perhaps be granted powers over time, or perhaps the fragile minds of mortal beings, or (by far most likely) have your fragile mind dashed against the rocks which perhaps birthed them.

Bifrost. The Dwarves have a special place. The realm of color made manifest was long ago conquered by Dwarvish planar expeditioneers, and the keys to entering this final haven of the Dwarves are closely guarded, not to mention few and far between. If the Dwarves ever faced mass extinction, their leaders would rip new rainbows into the sky and lead them to this sacred place...

Far Realm. Outside of the cosmos, there is madness we cannot understand, by definition. The Far Realm encompasess this great eternity, existing on a scale we cannot imagine with laws we can never comprehend. One rule that seems to be a constant in this mind-shattering madness, there always seems to be well too many tentacles involved...

Demispace. Demiplanes are microcosms of planar energy, little pockets of planar stability, almost mini-planes. The space between them is demispace. Demispace is not often entered, but it is a warm darkness, in which dwells all manner of cosmic parasites and would-be invaders of worlds.

Widdershins. The place between the planes. The Void, the Darkness, the Elemental Plane of Nightmares, many scholars have many names for it. To end up in Widdershins is to have made a grave error, one that you will probably pay for with your life. After all, Widdershins is a void among voids, and not even the miracles of gods can save you from the celestial darkness!

Getting Around

    The rune-ships of the giants ferry cities on gem-encrusted leviathans of planar tech.

Lightning skiffs carry their crew by navigating planar currents of electromagnetic bands that align with the celestial ley lines. Prepare for a quick, but bumpy ride…

Spelljammers sail like galleons into a thousand sunsets in a thousand worlds.

The sheet-cities of the Gith flow like mud in a river through the planes. They can be steered, at a great price.

World-dirigibles carry crews at a snail’s pace across the planar borders.

Gates and permanent portals criss-cross the planes, and hopping from gate to gate, while the equivalent of planar hitchhiking, is a cheap-and-nasty option to get places fast.

The dragons can breathe in the planar void. The horses cannot.