D&D 5E 5e/Next Cosmology

[Steely_Dan]

1) That's the thing, I don't want a demiplane - that was one of 4E's cosmology changes with the Feywild that I loked.

2) The two you mentioned - were they officially made into the Great Wheel, or in the case of the 3E MoP an option?

1) The Feywild and Shadowfell are similar demi-planes in a way, reflections and all.

2) An option (and the Plane of Mirrors), there was also Temporal Prime as an option in 2nd Ed.

And Mystara has the Dimension of Nightmares, which I always thought was cool.

 

[Tovec]

I've been thinking about this for the past few days and I'm still not sure I'm where I want to be when it comes to the planes.

My problem is that I have NPCs that are OLD. Gandalf in LotR old. The problem with this is that they generally don't live on the outer planes. They live on the material plane but for them to function it relies on the world usually being the only one in the sky. That isn't to say that they won't know about the outer planes, but it is to say that other planets by in large don't exist or aren't considered the main one.

All this becomes a problem for me when thinking about the planes. I love the variety and intricacy of the outer planes, chiefly interesting to me is mechanis and arcadia, but I can't reconcile material plane with outer planes.

I mean how old are the established cosmologies/worlds of most settings? I'm not an expert but most are within 10k years or so at max. That is a relatively short time when I think about creatures that have existed FAR beyond that. I'm thinking Asmodeus as a celestial/lawful at the beginning of the first wars ancient. That is far older but for me it never worked to go from the age of foundation of concepts like good, chaos, or even death, to almost immediately entering a time of mortals. And where those mortal souls go after death.

It works for some settings, namely ones based off real earth counter parts, but it really starts to fall apart for others. That is something I can't figure out but I think it explains what bothers me most about the 4e cosmology just tossing out so many lesser aspects of the planes and history of the planes.

Can anyone help me here? How do I describe multiple worlds, instead of just ages of one world, and without making it seem like the current world is just a random one that happens to be populated by the party/game/setting? THAT is all stuff I need a 5e toolkit to help me answer.

 

[Dungeonosophy]

Sample cosmologies for D&D NEXT

I'd like the NEXT Manual of the Planes to feature sample cosmologies:

• Nerath's cosmology, with the 4e cosmology translated into NEXT rules.
• Toril's tree cosmology
• Greyhawk's Great Rectangle cosmology
• Sigil's Great Wheel cosmology
• Eberron's orrery cosmology
• Krynn's unique cosmology
• Mystara's Five Spheres cosmology: a synthesis of the most singular features of the (somewhat contradictory) Gold Box cosmology and Wrath of the Immortals cosmology, plus the few planar tidbits which were added in 2e Mystara.
• Spelljammer offered as a "bolt-on" Crystal Spheres cosmology
• Pelinore's flat cosmology

As the default, the best planar features and planar rules from various editions might be conflated and streamlined for D&D NEXT. This default planar toolbox could then be used to build all these different cosmlogies.

 

[Shemeska]

I've been thinking about this for the past few days and I'm still not sure I'm where I want to be when it comes to the planes.

My problem is that I have NPCs that are OLD. Gandalf in LotR old. The problem with this is that they generally don't live on the outer planes. They live on the material plane but for them to function it relies on the world usually being the only one in the sky. That isn't to say that they won't know about the outer planes, but it is to say that other planets by in large don't exist or aren't considered the main one.

All this becomes a problem for me when thinking about the planes. I love the variety and intricacy of the outer planes, chiefly interesting to me is mechanis and arcadia, but I can't reconcile material plane with outer planes.

I mean how old are the established cosmologies/worlds of most settings? I'm not an expert but most are within 10k years or so at max. That is a relatively short time when I think about creatures that have existed FAR beyond that.

A timeline of outer planar history within the context of the Blood War and the lower planes was presented in 2e's Hellbound: The Blood War. All of the oldest events are presented as relative to one another and without distinct dates in years mentioned (presumably because of the unfathomably ancient epochs it's talking about).

Other products that built upon that make it obvious that the timeline on which mortal life and even the gods themselves have existed is only a drop in the bucket compared to the older creatures out there. I like the notion of truly deep history present in the Great Wheel and some other settings, because it aids in making the universe seem profoundly deep and mysterious.

 

[Tovec]

A timeline of outer planar history within the context of the Blood War and the lower planes was presented in 2e's Hellbound: The Blood War. All of the oldest events are presented as relative to one another and without distinct dates in years mentioned (presumably because of the unfathomably ancient epochs it's talking about).

Other products that built upon that make it obvious that the timeline on which mortal life and even the gods themselves have existed is only a drop in the bucket compared to the older creatures out there. I like the notion of truly deep history present in the Great Wheel and some other settings, because it aids in making the universe seem profoundly deep and mysterious.

I understand and agree with what you are saying. My problem is I have a 11306 year old elf in my game but I'm having a hard time explaining where he came from.

Either my game world is young and just the most recent of worlds, and probably one of MANY out there in the galaxy/universe/material plane or its ancient and I mean hugely ancient with gods once walking the world and coming from there. I don't find either very appealing.

For the first it makes the world seem very small, very insignificant. I have a hard time coming up with a reason for an 11000 year old to exist on the world in any form or to care about its goings on.

For the second it makes the world seem too important in the grand scheme. Especially when I have other worlds in my game and indeed other planets.

The only compromise I can set is that the campaign world I use is the only uniquely medieval one, but that still just strikes me as inexact.

It would be like watching Doctor Who and ONLY being allowed to travel in space OR time throughout the course of the show. It doesn't invalidate a good portion of the show but it also isn't conducive to having several galaxies worth of other races, creatures and worlds.
The star trek analogy is being confined to TOS level technology only throughout history, or being stuck in the Sol system only.

I mean how can elves be both mortal, and (relatively) fleeting on a cosmic sense, but then exist on every planet in the material world? I would like more guidelines on this.

For this reason I agree that a lot of campaign settings benefit from having the planes baked in. So they can all be unique and special in their own universe. On the other hand, if I did that and only had one heaven and one hell then I get rid of so much rich history and knowledge that I just don't want to lose and in fact have spent years developing for my games which is unique from the published material.

Oh, and if you're wondering why I quoted you - that history that I'm talking about.. I was mostly thinking about it in terms of a combined context like presented HERE:

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