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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Haldrik" data-source="post: 8079314" data-attributes="member: 6694221">Notes on the Organization of ThemesI have all of the 4e spells organized into moreorless the same themes. 4e is easier because the separation of flavor from mechanics allows one to reflavor the ambigious spells so that they clearly cohere to a specific theme.This is a first pass, at sorting 5e spells into themes.5e is more difficult, because the flavor itself can be ambiguous at times, while entangling the mechanics.The goal is for each theme to have a comparable number of spells per slot level. At times, this goal of game playability might encourage certain themes to lump together or split apart.Ambiguous Thematic RelationshipsGenerally, the three thematic "sectors" are MIND, LIFE, and ELEMENT. Mind and Element are essentially mind and matter. Here Life is a mysterious fusion of mind and matter, engendering living body and lifeforce soul. Each sector includes themes, like Mind includes Telepathy. And each theme includes tropes, like Telepathy includes charm.The "ANTI" forms a necromantic sector horizontally, where tropes like fear and disintegration might alternatively relate to the theme of Death.Some mechanics are thematically ambiguous.The Fire element is the plasma state of matter, relating to the sun and lightning. This the damage types radiant and lightning lump with fire.For example, here acid damage type is understood as an aspect of fire that can exist as a solid, liquid, or gas. Acid is Elemental, probably fire. Even acid in the sense of donating protons or bonding electrons connotes the state of fiery plasma. Finally as damage types, fire, lightning, radiant, and acid are medically patterns of burn injuries, thus all relate closely to fire. Tentatively, acid belongs to the theme of fire.Healing, in the sense of regenerating flesh, is an aspect relating closely to bodily shapeshifting.A "phantasm" refers to a subjective hallucination that only exists in the mind of a creature. It can include sensations of pain and disorientation, whence the psychic damage type. The Phantasm theme sometimes lumps in with the Telepathy theme in the sense of mind-affecting, and sometimes lumps in with the Illusion theme in the sense of reality distortion. Sometimes all three lump together, Telepathy-Phantasm-Illusion, such as Bard or Fey magic.Together, the triad metal-wood-leather represent any "object", corresponding thematically to Earth, Plant, and Animal, and by extension can be an item of crystal, paper, ivory, or so on.Cosmology and ThemesRegarding cosmology, the organization of planes can be thematically ambiguous.The Hellenistic elements are five elemental substances − Air, Water, Earth, Fire, and Ether − understood by medieval times as gas, liquid, solid, plasma, and force, respectively. The corresponding Daoist motions refer to elemental ways of moving: Tree=Air, Water, Metal=Earth, Fire, and Soil=Void=Ether, respectively.Air and Tree are the identical element, according to their same way of motion, outwardly, encompassing all within. Use the Plant theme to represent the Tree motion, sometimes called Wood. When visualizing the Plane of Air, combine Air and Plant themes. The Plane of Air perfuses with lush vegetation. For the moment, the Plant trope is part of the Nature theme, but possibly can relocate to join the Air theme instead.Meanwhile, Air-Water spells are presented together since D&D tends to combine them as "weather" effects, including gusty winds, watery clouds and icy cold.Consider Void an aspect of Ether. Both are motionless thus the same Daoist element as Soil. This Void is empty space, in other words the fabric of space-time. Deemphasize the earthy of aspect of "ground", and instead emphasize the motionless "place" in which all things happen within. Namely, Void is a roomy empty space. In the sense of space-time, Void relates to traveling, teleportation, planar travel, extradimensional space, and time travel. Teleportation jumps from one place to an other, or more precisely, clenches the distance between them together to simply step across. Elemental Void relates closely to mental Divination that can by divination peer thru space and time.In sum, the cosmic structure presents the Hellentist five elements, but easily accommodates the Daoist five elements.The Aster is the stuff of the Astral Plane, including Celestial and Infernal. Here, Aster is understood as a kind of Platonic realm of concepts, thus is a mindscape made out of thoughts. Functionally, it is language come to life. Philosophical concepts relate to the ethics of the alignment system. And alignment creatures such as angels and fiends are thought constructs. This nonphysical mental realm overlaps anywhere there are sapient creatures who have the capacity of speech. Angelic Telepathy is a cosmic language pervading the multiverse, relating to the capacity of speech itself. Despite the fact that thought is immaterial, Mystics suspect that the material world is created by means of the patterns of the language of thought itself. The material world was literally spoken into being, in a mathematically and linguistically comprehensible way.The spell Astral Projection, projects a thought construct, a kind of virtual body made out of thought.This thoughts of Aster relate to the Dream Plane, also called the Dreamscape, however differs in the sense that a Dream is more sensorial, thus relates moreso to sensations of creatures within the material world. There is a close affinity between Dream and Illusion. That said, to the extent that astral creatures also dream, their experiences too can sometimes influence the Dreamscape.With alignments being mental, and angels and fiends being creatures made out of thought, this aspect of Cleric seems surprisingly psionic as a mental phenomenon. In D&D 1e, angels and devils were innately psionic, so there is some traditional justification to assigning the celestials and infernals to the Mind sector.The Ether, namely the Ethereal Plane, is the realm of the fifth element, quintessence. By medieval times, ether is understood to be a physical force, albeit insubstantial and often subtle and perfusive.The Feywild is ambiguous. Here, the Fey creatures are moreorless identical with the "nature spirits" of the plants and beasts of this world. Also Elemental spirits are considered "nature spirits", the ones relating to the features of the land, sky, and waters. Where the presence of plants and animals are significant in the Material Plane, their spirits are vibrantly present in the overlapping Feywild Plane.Perhaps the Feywild is an aspect of the Ethereal Plane, being the influencing force of the minds of each nature spirit. If so, the Feywild is the aspect of Ether that associates more with Positivity, while the Shadowfell is the aspect of the Ether that associates more with Negativity.One way to look at it is, the Ether is elemental. But the Feywild and Shadowfell entangle this Element with Mind, bringing forth an aspect of Life, the lifeforce of soul.To some degree, as a nature spirit, even an elemental creature that pertains to a unique landscape feature, has a unique soul. The more significant this feature is, the more presence of mind this elemental has.</blockquote>

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