The Plane of Shadow: Dimly Lit?

[Shin Okada]

From SRD, emphasis added by me,

The Plane of Shadow is a dimly lit dimension that is both coterminous to and coexistent with the Material Plane. It overlaps the Material Plane much as the Ethereal Plane does, so a planar traveler can use the Plane of Shadow to cover great distances quickly.

The Plane of Shadow is also coterminous to other planes. With the right spell, a character can use the Plane of Shadow to visit other realities.

The Plane of Shadow is a world of black and white; color itself has been bleached from the environment. It is otherwise appears similar to the Material Plane.

Despite the lack of light sources, various plants, animals, and humanoids call the Plane of Shadow home.

So, the plane of shadow is a dimly lit dimension without light source like the sun and such. Does that mean everywhere is dimly lit 24 hours per day? Including inside the buildings and underground area?

That makes some sense as complete darkness does not make shadows. But I am not sure if this interpretation is correct.

 

[Greenfield]

It's as good as any.

While the rules make more than a few mentions of shadows (note the lower cas "s"), it never actually defines "shadow" in game terms. We actually had a thread on this a while back, regarding whether night time is one big shadow.

We ended up looking in <gasp> a dictionary. Websters said that a shadow is an area of relative darkness, or a "silhouette", meaning the outline of something that appears on a surface when an object partially blocks the light.

By those definitions, the Plane of Shadow has no shadows, in that there is no interplay of light and dark, no "area of relative darkness", no light source to project an image outline on a surface.

In my games, for story purposes, we've tended to play it as the land where nightmares come from, a twisted version of reality where what is and what isn't play out scenes of what might be. In some settings we've described it as "a walk by the River Styx", and so forth.

One reason we came up with that description (which is 100% NOT supported in the rules, by the way) was because of the way Shadow Walk works: It takes you the edge of the Plane of Shadows, where you can see a version of the real world, sort of, but any movement at all propels you at 50 miles per hour relative to that real world, so scenes shift suddenly, as they do in dreams. The place is also the home plane of a number of dark creatures, including Shadows, Shadow Mastiff, Darkwalkers and Nightmare.

Aside from all of that, we agreed to discourage the use of rapid transit spells in our campaign because they tend to eliminate an entire facet of play, the overland adventure. That was our campaign choice, and while I think it adds some grand color to the game world, it probably isn't for everyone.

 

[Dandu]

One does not simply Shadow Walk into Mordor!

 

[Greenfield]

I actually prefer something a little more boogie-woogie myself. I mean, if you have to go, goin style!

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

So there are no shadows on the Plane of Shadows? Mind. Blown.

 

[Greenfield]

Yeah, that's an odd one. Kind of like casting Darkness to let the PCs see at night. Counter intuitive, but it works.

If I was to asked to write up the Plane of Shadows it would be a world in black and white, where the actual light source can never be seen, but it's harsh and glaring and leaves shadows everywhere, shadows of objects in this world as well as of items in the real world. You can't actually *see* the real world from there, but you can sort of figure out the relationship by the shadows it casts.

But hey, that's just me.

You want a strangely correct rule? According to the Suffocation rules, if a person is under water and isn't holding their breat they need to make a CON check, DC 10. If it fails they go to zero hit points.

So, when your friend is negative and dying, shove his head in cold water or throw water in his face, enough to cause him to choke and cough. He intentionally fails his CON check and his hit points are *raised* to zero. He's now conscious, though in the walking-wounded category. Hey, it works for boxers, doesn't it?

 

[trancejeremy]

In the 1e Manual of Planes, it's only a Demi-Plane and gets all of one paragraph. But it's described as "murky".


I've always thought of it as like a night scene in a movie or TV show - it's dark, but you can somehow still see things. Diffuse lighting, there's no obvious source, but it's just there.

 

[Dandu]

Some sort of realm of shadows. A Shadow Realm, if you will.

 

[Grogg of the North]

Some sort of realm of shadows. A Shadow Realm, if you will.

Are the people that lose children's card games sent there?

OT: What if the PCs bring in light spells or other light sources? Does the area around them stay at dimly illuminated or can they raise it to bright illumination?

 

[Greenfield]

I'd guess that bringing light to the Plan of Shadows would work normally, though it would probably cause a condition unnatural to that plane: Shadows.