D&D General Which was your favourite Forgotten Realms Cosmology?

[Scars Unseen]

And, in the case of the Ethereal, it literally DOES only exist to be read about!

Well that's explicitly false. The 2E book on the inner planes goes into a fair bit of detail about what can be found in the border and deep ethereal, including the creation and discovery of demiplanes within it. The border ethereal is also utilized a lot in how it interacts with the prime material plane, which makes it possibly one of the most usable planes at lower levels.

As for the rest, I'm not going to go line by line, because I'd mostly just be repeating myself. There is tons of adventuring material for the 2E great wheel, and I'd venture to say that measured against any other D&D cosmology, it would come ahead in that respect by an order of magnitude if for no other reason than TSR put out more volume in those days than any other time in the game's history (rivaled only by WotC's player facing splat books in the 3E era). And for anything that doesn't have a published adventure, that's what DMs are for. Frankly, I can come up with an adventure for any setting at all, given even a rough description of the place. 2E's abstract spell research rules alone could justify going to any of the planes, inner or outer, and the fundamentally lethal nature of many of the inner planes just means that part of the adventure would revolve around research and problem solving instead of just combat.

Now, the thing is, none of this makes the great wheel the best cosmology. No such thing exists, and I'm not trying convince you of anything, really. You don't have to like the great wheel, and I don't need your approval for my own preferences. I'm just putting my own counter to what I feel is a somewhat and unnecessarily dismissive stance on something I enjoy.

 

[Yaarel]

I would use the more familiar cosmology map to represent the 4e World Axis. Essentially the Material Plane is the trunk of tree, the Astral is the branches, and the Elemental is the roots. The Feywild is the part of the trunk in the sunlight of Positivity and the Shadowfell in the shade of Negativity. Note that any Astral dominion might be anywhere within the Astral Sea. The distances are rather proximal conceptual similarities and affinities, versus distant dissimilarities and unrelated concepts.

The 4e Axis is a visualization of the completist 3e multiverse, where the Elemental Inner Planes orient downward and the Astral Outer Planes orient upward. The Material Planes are the Axis between them.

Meanwhile, the 5e Wheel is the same thing as the 4e Axis, looking down from above, where the Astral, Ethereal, and Material are separate layers, and each level nesting within the one above it, in concentric circles.

In sum, I prefer the 5e visualization of overlapping concentric circles and the fluidity of the 4e Astral Sea. I acknowledge both are continuations of formative 3e developments.

 

[Epic Meepo]

And, in the case of the Ethereal, it literally DOES only exist to be read about!

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure the Radiant Citadel, from the 5e adventure Journeys Through the Radiant Citidel, is a city on the Ethereal Plane.

To say nothing of A Guide to the Ethereal Plane for the Planescape setting, an entire sourcebook of adventure locations, monsters, and playable races from the Deep Ethereal. And the fact that the OG Ethereal Plane was the sea of proto-matter from which demiplanes were formed, making every demiplane in any AD&D adventure a location on the Ethereal Plane by default.

 

[Yaarel]

One tweak I would make to the World Axis cosmology is an Elemental Plane that is also an echo of the Prime. Imagine a world that is constantly beset by natural disasters (earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, tornadoes/hurricanes, etc.).

I visualize local Elemental regions.

Where the Ethereal Plane overlaps the oceans of the planet of Toril, there are within the ether: watery beings, including Water Elementals, but also Greekesque nereid and triton, Norsesque water jǫtnar, and so on. This local watery ether includes natural portals that directly access the remote Water Plane.

The same is true of the other elements, such as fiery volcanos and lightning, and especially where the Ethereal Plane overlaps the sun. The ether overlaps the landscapes with Earth spirits, and the atmosphere with Air spirits.

The Greekesque elemental spirits tend to shift Astral. By contrast, the Norsesque elemental nature beings are firmly the animism of the natural features in the Material Plane and their influences via the overlapping ether.

(In Dark Sun, on the planet of Athas, all Elemental planes are local demiplanes.)

In any case, the Ethereal Plane includes elemental regions where a particular elements prevails across a region of the planet.

 

[TiQuinn]

If you can go 20, 30 years without getting a single adventure, I think that's unequivocal proof that the plane only exists to be read about.

Or it inspires someone to set a homebrew adventure there.

 

[Demetrios1453]

Which great wheel, og or 5e modified ?

No one is sure.

It might be all wrong anyway. Or the Great Wheel, World Tree, and World Axis might all be right, but no one besides the gods themselves (and maybe not even them) can fully comprehend how it all fits together.

 

[Yaarel]

In the 5e Great Wheel map, the Elemental Planes look as if discrete demiplanes within the Elemental Chaos. However, in the textual descriptions, the 5e elemental "planes" are moreso a region in the Elemental Chaos, where a particular element happens to prevail. These regions always include the other elements as well. Their boundaries are always porous and intermingling, where the various elemental influences drift thru each other.

The Elemental Chaos proper appears visually as emanating directly from Astral thought. As such, the Elemental Planes are treated as if matter, but are actually the immaterial "concepts" of matter. The Elemental regions are the conceptual blueprints that the Material Plane materializes. The Elemental Planes are more precisely the "spirit" of elemental matter.

At the "edge" of the Elemental Chaos is where thought becomes ethereal force, then explodes as a kind of perpetual Big Bang within the Elemental Chaos. The randomness of elemental energies prevails: fiery (Fire, Radiant), airy (Lightning-Thunder), and watery (Cold). The fleeting instantaneous formation and disintegration of solid elemental Earth corresponds with the energy of Acid. Only within the Earth region does solidity gain some measure of persistence. D&D 5e has surprisingly many spells relating to energy flux of the Elemental Chaos, from Chromatic Orb, to Protection from Energy, to Prismatic Spray.

 

[Quickleaf]

Which was your favourite Forgotten Realms Cosmology?

I will always be a Planescape fan, but that said.... while I have verrrry little exposure to the FR novels, I've observed authors play around with the D&D cosmology as represented in the role-playing books... The one I'm thinking of is the Shadow Fringe described in the War of the Spider Queen books (multiple authors), which is very very cool, but doesn't really line up with any of the poll options.

 

[Yaarel]

4e merged the Shadow Plane and the Ethereal Plane together to then form the Feywild and the Shadowfell. Fey retains the teleportive aspects of the earlier Shadow, while the new Shadow acquires the overlapping ethereal aspects. Both Feywild and Shadowfell emphasize the illusory aspects of the earlier Shadow.

5e separated the Ethereal Plane back out, but kept the Shadowfell and Feywild.


The Feywild and Shadowfell are spirit realms, where Fey spirits and Shadow spirits inhabit. These creatures have immaterial bodies, beyond the Material Plane, but tend to be virtually like matter, albeit highly affected by the energy of Positivity or the gloom of Negativity.

Implicitly:

Fey = Ether + Positivity
Ether = Ether + Positivity + Negativity + Elemental
Shadow = Ether + Negative

These are frequencies of the Ethereal.


Officially, the Border Ether overlaps the Material Plane, as ethereal forces within the Material Plane, where ethereal and material can observe each other to some degree.

There are Fey Crossings and Shadow Crossings.

Inferably, the Fey Crossings are as the same thing as regions of the Border Ether that are actually a "Border Feywild" that the Positivity energizes, forming an area of the Feywild that closely matches the Material Plane. Oppositely, the Shadow Crossings are regions of the Border Ether that the Negativity dampens, forming an area of the Shadowfell that closely matches the Material Plane.

The Deep Fey distorts more and more and eventually disconnects completely from the Material Plane, then connects more closely via Positivity with the Celestial ideas of the Astral Plane. Likewise, the Deep Shadow distorts distorts until disconnect, then more via Negativity with the Fiend ideas. The domains of delight are in the Deep Fey, and the domains of dispair in the Deep Shadow.

There are also defacto Elemental Crossings that connect certain areas in the Material Plane via ether to the respective Elemental Planes.


The earlier concept of "Shadow Fringe" is in 5e the same thing as the Fey Crossings or the Shadow Crossings, depending on presence or absence of Positive energy, and where illusory quasi real phenomena prevail including vibrant Fey phemona or gloomy Shadow phenomona.

 

[aco175]

I cannot remember ever needing to know how things are organized in 40+ years of gaming. The few times in 2e that we left the material, it was only for a short time and/or where we were had no impact on how we got there or back to the material. Sime 3e started, the most my games have had with the planes was using teleport or the one time a PC put a bag of holding inside another one to blow things up, but he died so it still did not matter.

I do not recall much in published modules that include going to a plane, maybe hell or astral with the githyanki invasion once. I'm guessing other groups go there all the time or play Planescape where it seems common. Maybe the new Vecna book will need to know about this more.