1001 Plane Ideas

[Loren Pechtel]

A plane where everything is dimensionally locked other than consecrated (or the evil version, I forget what it's called) ground.

 

[Matthias]

A plane in which a unique blood-borne magical disease has ravaged many of the once-dominant nations on the main land mass for the last thirty or so years.

This disease, which has been called various names such as the mage plague and the sorcerer's curse, can cause an instantaneous mystical mutation in almost any humanoid or monstrous humanoid creature. Victims of this disease immediately gain one Sorcerer level in a random bloodline; thereafter all class levels gained by these individuals are restricted to Sorcerer using their mutant bloodline. Characters who had a Sorcerer level prior to infection can become carriers of the disease, but are otherwise unaffected and can gain levels in any other class.

Individuals cured of the mage plague retain their previously-earned Sorcerer levels, are able to gain levels in any class, and are immune to further infection.

A notable side-effect of this unique plague is that drow and kobolds have become quite powerful, having turned this ailment into a potent tool of war. They have in recent years even surpassed the orc and the goblin as the chief enemy of the civilized peoples of this world--the kobolds raiding the frontiers on the surface world, and the drow subverting and infiltrating from below. Their rising power has so far mostly been checked by adventuring companies who have organized sorcerer-armies of mainly gnomes, elves, half-elves, and the half-elemental races (ifrits, oreads, sylphs, undines) to combat these threats.

 

[Matthias]

A plane encompassing a seven-star solar system.

Stars A and B are yellow and orange dwarf stars in mutual orbit. Each has its own compact planetary system. Habitable planets are a hot jungle planet (Ab), a small cold desert moon of a gas giant (Acb), and a temperate water world with hundreds of archipelagos (Bc).

Stars C and D are a red giant-white dwarf binary, but they are not close enough for the white dwarf to accrete matter from its companion to go nova. The inhabitants of the AB planets know there is life on one of the remaining planets of the white dwarf, but their minds are so alien and cold-hearted that few dare attempt to contact them. There is a small cult following on the Ab planet which worships these alien beings; the cult leaders are mainly LE and NE.

The AB and CD systems orbit a common center, with two red dwarf stars E and F orbiting in classical elliptical orbits around this quartet. Magical divination have detected planetary systems around these red stars but it is not not common knowledge whether any of these worlds are inhabited. The E and F stars orbit in mostly the same orbital-plane as the AB-CD system.

Several advanced civilizations inhabit the planets A and B of this star system, who have developed gravships (interplanetary ships propelled by magically-generated gravity), which are fast enough to travel between the A and B stars within a single human generation. Two long-range gravships, one crewed by elves and the other by dwarves and gnomes, have departed for the CD system in a kind of "space race". It is thought that the alien-worshipping cultists have also dispatched a multi-generational ship of their own, but it is unlikely they will reach the white dwarf first.

The ABCDEF system is also gravitationally bound to a dark star whose mass is slightly greater of the combined mass of the other six stars on the plane. The orbits of the 'light' and 'dark' system are large enough, and the AB-CD-EF orbital-plane has such a high inclination to its orbit with the dark star, that none of the 'living star' outer planetary orbits are at risk of destabilization. The existence and influence of the dark star is well-known to most of the arcane stargazers of the different civilizations on this plane, as well as the nature of the dark star's cloak of impenetrable darkness, but the nature of this monstrous object also interferes with the proper functioning of magic as well as light, space, and gravity. No magic-user has ever been able to scry the surface of this dark star, though every school-trained high-level caster has attempted it at least once in their lives as part of their training, which is mainly to teach the concept that some things are impossible, even with magic. Strangely, some mages also report that whenever they have attempted to probe the dark star for signs of intelligent thought, they get the distinct impression that someone (or something) is doing the same thing right back...

The whole plane is finite; encased in a crystal sphere of embedded "starlets" of a different nature than the seven 'true' stars that dominate the center of the plane.