Where to put the land of Faeries in my altered Great Wheel?

[Lord Zack]

I'm working on a altered version of the Great Wheel cosmology for my campaigns. But I'm not sure where to put the land of the Faeries. There are three choices I'm thinking of, though I suppose they're not mutually exclusive since different kinds of Faeries might come from different places.

1. One or more demiplanes.

2. An alternate material plane with unusual traits.

3. A spiritual plane between the Outer Planes and the Material Planes, perhaps the Astral Plane it's self (the Astral Plane is basically the Spirit World and parts of it are coexist with the Material).

Again it certainly could vary. The otherworld (or worlds) of the Sidhe isn't necessarily the same place as Alfheim. Of course many Faeries live on the Material Plane.

 

[Set]

You could turn the Shadow plane into the realm of the Unseelie Court, and make a more colorful 'Spectral' plane or something for the Seelie Court.

You could even tie the whole of it more strongly into a realm of dreams and nightmares, and completely replace the shadow, astral and / or ethereal planes with the seelie and unseelie realms, and make them dangerous and unpredictable pathways to the upper and lower planes.

Random encounters in a psycho-reactive fey realm could be based on Will saves. The more powerfully you control your fears and desires, the less encounters you will have, and the weaker-willed will bring about the worst encounters, as their fears build up more terrible creations from the fickle stuff that makes up the fey realms.

Spells that have a connection to the astral, become tied to the fey realm instead (which might still be called the astral plane, or the plane of dreams, by scholars and philosophers), and with that establishment, perhaps fey will be more established with effects based on illusion (shadow) and spells that use teleportation effects (like blink).

 

[Stoat]

If I were going to do a "spirit world" in the Great Wheel, I'd be inclined to drop it into the Border Ethereal.

 

[Lord Zack]

I'm not sure if I'm going to have a border ethereal. But the "border astral" will take over many of it's functions, including being where ghosts exist.

 

[Shemeska]

Demiplane of unique properties, such as nobody knowing precisely where its exterior boundary is located, possibly appearing on the Ethereal and Astral at the same time despite that normally being impossible.

True plane of its own locked like a moon in orbit, metaphorically speaking, around the Material plane.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Pocket Dimensions.

Make 'em part of the natural world, but folded into it, like the wrinkles in your brain. When you cross a doorway, you cross an infinite space contained within that barrier, that, if you know the right words, can unfold in front of you. These folds are called "lay lines," and are known to be sources of magic and power, kingdoms in a thimble.

 

[TarionzCousin]

Is the Abyss full already?

 

[Ahnehnois]

I view the Plane of Faerie as being loosely coexistent with the Material Plane (not unlike the Plane of Shadow). This seems to fit my intuitive picture of fairy legends the best.

 

[Shemeska]

I view the Plane of Faerie as being loosely coexistent with the Material Plane (not unlike the Plane of Shadow). This seems to fit my intuitive picture of fairy legends the best.

That's actually how it's set up more or less for the fey First World in Paizo's Golarion setting.

 

[Stoat]

I view the Plane of Faerie as being loosely coexistent with the Material Plane (not unlike the Plane of Shadow). This seems to fit my intuitive picture of fairy legends the best.

This is why I suggested the Border Ethereal, it's already coexistent and ghosts are there. If Lord Zack is replacing it with a Border Astral, I'd move the fey there.

In general, I'd create a co-existent plane that acted as a warped reflection of the prime material. Basically 4E's Feywild. I like the idea of putting the Unseelie court into the plane of Shadow, but there really isn't an analogous place to put the Seelie court in the standard cosmology. Border Ethereal is already there and has a (tenuous) connection to the elemental planes through the Ethereal. I tend to associate elementals and fey, so it seems like a logical choice to me.