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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Yaarel" data-source="post: 8339568" data-attributes="member: 58172">The Cleric is class that tends to refer to the cosmology of the setting. How a setting "works" can be important to the character concept.The following comes from a tangent in an other thread, but is more topical in this thread.It depends on which theology and when. The Renaissance speculative theology had an elementalist worldview comprising a Great Chain of Being, which transitioned fluidly from solid matter to ethereal spirit: Earth (solid), Water (liquid), Air (gas), Fire, and Spirit. In this sense, an angel that was made out of Spirit was perceived to take up some space even if their substance was more fine and less course. Similarly, a fairy was made out of Spirit thus was also able to shrink down its size − to about the size of a thumbnail. The fairy was fine, but not as fine as an angel who could shrink down even finer.For the D&D multiverse cosmology, I view the angels as constructs made out of aster, the mindstuff of the Astral Plane.The angel is pure thought, an "intellect" construct, and lacks substance. However the angel can manifest physically within the Material Plane as if solid. To do so, the angel physicalizes via the ether of the Ethereal Plane. The ether is the fifth element that potentially comprises any of the other four elements. The ether itself is "spirit" as an element. This element is the interface that mediates between the mindscape of the Astral Plane and the physicality of the Material Plane. Ether itself is pure force, including gravity. Force is energetic like fire, and fluid like water, and is physical but immaterial. Ether is the element that keeps the moon and the other "stars" in their orbits.The mind construct of the angel manifests via the ether to physicalize into a temporary force construct within the Material Plane.The Feywild and the Shadowfell are made out of ether. Fey is part of the Ethereal Plane that borders the Positive Plane, and Shadow borders the Negative Plane. The Elemental Planes are aspects within the Ethereal Plane, where ether is the fifth element.When mages "summon" spirits, such as an Elemental, Fey, Shadow, Celestial or Fiend, the body that manifests is a construct made out of force, aka ether.If a person kills a conjured Fey animal, the body that is a force construct vanishes but the mind of the animal is still safe and ok. The mind of the animal reverts to its planar source, wherever that is. Same goes for a Paladin steed, a Warlock familiar, and so on. Similarly an angel.</blockquote>

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