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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Libertad" data-source="post: 6197121" data-attributes="member: 6750502">Ethereal Plane <img src="http://i.imgur.com/dOKrPUV.jpg?1" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />    The immaterial counterpart to the Prime, the Ethereal Plane is home to ghosts, spirits, and terrain with resonance to the Material.  The presence of spirits and incorporeal entities cause many cultures to assume that the Ethereal’s the afterlife, but nothing could be further from the truth: it’s its own world, complete with living societies and a vibrant ecology.Shades of Memory    A significant portion of the Ethereal Plane is “copied” from the Material Plane: when a living creature perishes with strong ties to the Material Plane, its soul is fixed to an area in the Ethereal and Material.  We know these beings as ghosts.  Objects, buildings, and terrain with significant historical, religious, and emotional symbolism leave imprints in the Ethereal as well, shaped by the hopes, dreams, and memories of people.  It is not uncommon for planar travelers to find a fabled lost city from Material civilizations standing tall and proud in the Ethereal.    Some of the most notable bastions of civilizations in the Ethereal Plane were created through the sudden and violent destruction of a Material Plane city.  Whether through war or a natural disaster, the souls and memories of the inhabitants are reborn as ghosts and resonance in the Ethereal Plane.   These “Spirit Cities” are unwilling to face reality, and insist that their civilization still thrives, and many of these ghosts often take umbrage when Material inhabitants settle or excavate “their land.”  Such places often become known as haunted and desolate locales where few living souls feel welcome.The Ethergaunt Invasion    Long ago, a race of magical beings known as the Ken-Zai lived upon the Material Plane.  For reasons known only to them, a mass exodus of their people fled into the Ethereal Plane, building massive pyramids and menhirs to house their bodies in stasis.  After countless centuries, the Ethergaunts are finally awakening, and they want to reclaim the Material Plane.    The Ethergaunt have no love for the Material world’s current inhabitants, viewing them as little more than beasts.  However, they’re very aware that their numbers are very low, and a conventional invasion will not work.  To this end, Ethergaunts rely upon ancient magics to create natural disasters, mind-controlling influential political and religious figures, and black ops-style assassinations and guerilla tactics to foment strife and chaos among the nations.  They do this all to progress towards an ideal state which they refer to as The Great Work.  In order to achieve this goal, the culling of “irrational emotions” and dedication to the survival of the Ken-Zai are paramount.  Most Material Plane creatures stand in contrast to this, and thus must be eradicated to maximize the Ken-Zai’s chances of survival and attaining “rational purity.”    Thanks to powerful magic, intelligence, and technological knowledge, the Ethergaunts are rapidly spreading across key areas of the Ethereal Plane, building fortresses and laboratories to further the Great Work.  Their cities, known as enclaves, are small and bland; there are no expressions of art, entertainment, or leisurely activity to get in the way of labor and research.  Several “splinter cells” of independent enclaves are positioned near important Material Plane dungeons and locations of magical power.  This has the double-edged deal of accumulating locations of strategic importance for their invasion, but also increases their chances of running into conflict with traveling bands of adventurers.The Deep EtherealThere are areas of the Ethereal Plane which go “beyond” the Material world, where the planar coexistence fades until the terrain is replaced with a stretch of thick grayish-white fog forms a wall stretching as far as the eye can see.  The realms beyond are known as the Deep Ethereal.  Much like the Astral, the Deep Ethereal is a space of free-floating objects drifting along the planar currents and winds.  Despite being an empty and forlorn terrain, the region is famous for a highly sought-after material: protomatter.    Protomatter is a tangible form of ethereal mist which can a solid, liquid, or gas.  Protomatter is highly malleable, and can take on all shapes, sizes, colors, and densities.  With a significant expenditure of magical power or exposure to certain planar elements, protomatter can be used to create objects, living matter, and even whole new demiplanes!  The hard limits of protomatter are that it cannot replicate or create divinity, and it needs exposure to appropriate traits to mimic certain planes.  If you wanted to create a holy citadel, opening up a portal to an upper plane might be necessary.  Additionally, the size of the replicated object and the magical power it gives off is proportional to the volume of protomatter on hand.  Creating a minor potion of healing should is trivial, while creating an artifact while be an intensive labor of time and effort.    Adventurers going into the Deep Ethereal in search of easy wealth and power will be disappointed: nobody can easily predict how protomatter comes into being, or when and where the next site will arise.  The largest protomatter clusters within easy distance of planar portals have already been claimed by powerful entities with legions of minions to defend them.  The two easiest ways to get a big score are 1: taking it by force of arms from another faction; 2: years of painstaking travel on the Ethereal Plane; or 3: Getting hired by a patron to act as security for a cluster and keep it safe from bandits, monsters, and Ether Cyclones.  It’s like the US Gold Rush: a lot of desperate fortune-hunters with high risks and a slim chance of reward.Adventures within the Ethereal Plane:•    The ghosts of a war long past are materializing near a village, thinking that the battle continues.  They view the villagers as enemy soldiers and relentlessly torment the inhabitants with non-stop hauntings.  The party has to travel to the Ethereal Plane, brave the otherworldly battlefield, and convince or defeat the general in order to get the ghosts to “retreat” and lay them to rest.•    Ethergaunt spies are making raids into a holy temple: they suddenly materialize in the church, grab people, and transition back to the Ethereal to place them in prisons.  The kidnapped people are important religious figures and leaders; without them, the populace is cut off from a vital supply of divine magic, defense, and healing.  If the adventurers don’t take action, the Ethergaunts will overrun the town and kill everyone!•    A mad archwizard recently overtook a protomatter cluster by force, and he’s using his legions of undead forces to funnel all it all into building a massive portal to the Negative Energy Plane.  The adventurers must sabotage the project before the necromancer can use it to inflict untold devastation on the Ethereal and Material realms!And now the Planar Revision Project is finally complete!  Originally starting out as a way to “spice up” the Celestial Realms, the Project turned into a Multiverse-wide endeavor to make the Great Wheel a fun and exciting place for adventurers of all levels!  I hope that my writing provides years’ worth of ideas and inspiration for Dungeons & Dragons players of all Editions!So long, farewell, until we meet again!</blockquote>

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