Guide to the Great Wheel Cosmology

A Guide to the Planes

" No mortal can look out, or indeed down, upon the cosmos and see it as a well laid out plan or diagram. No one can truly, map it out or make sense of all the dimensions, planes, demiplanes, spheres and states of existence; and say that they truly understand it, or can even truly make sense of it. And yet, scholars try, after all what else could they, or indeed you my child, do? Could you really simply reside to the fact that, "well, there's stuff out there, somewhere and then somehow it got here and yeah, that creature can do strange things cos, well, it can". No, you cannot accept that can you. Well, that is why the greatest minds came up with the Great Wheel Cosmology, it's not exact, its not even close, but it is the best way that we can try to comprehend the multiverse around us.

What follows is made up of many articles and pieces of lore that have been gathered together as best as it can. This is important to understand, as their may be times that you find situations or information, that conflicts with what has been recorded and experienced in the past, but that is simply because what has been recorded is merely an interpretation of something so fantastical, so grand and huge in scope, that it cannot possibly be truly understood. Even more perplexing and troublesome, if not entirely frustrating and infuriating, is that at times, what we comprehend as the rules of the universe, change; or just flat out refuse to do as they should. Most perturbatory! Regardless, i'm afraid, what follows is the best that can be done, the closest that you will ever find on the subject of the planes, and what lies beyond your world. " - The Voice from The Void

The Great Wheel

The Great Wheel is a pictographic standardisation of the layout of the known planes. As i said, this is by no means accurate, but I shan't keep airing my frustrations on that matter. Also, please note that the Great Wheel is not a map, it is a representation that is used to understand the planes, their relationships to one another, and their approximate location in comparison to one another. As to whom can be credited for its current design, I cannot truly recollect, but I believe it suffice to say that they were a powerful Wizard from the Coast, on a world in the sphere known as Terran.

I suppose first off, I should really cover what we mean when we say a "Plane". A "Plane", or, a "Plane of existence", is the term that we use for a universe, or realm of existence. Each "Plane" has its own set of of physical and metaphysical rules, its own laws of reality. Each plane, save the demiplanes, are infinite in extent, they are quite literally, their own universes. Thus we commonly refer to the Great Wheel as the multiverse.

The cosmology is usually presented as a series of concentric circles, with alternating spatial and transitive planes; from the center outwards, they are ordered as follows: Inner, Ethereal, Material, Astral, Outer Planes, and the Far Realm. It is of course, not quite this simple, but those basics will suffice for now; one step at a time as they say. Let us now take a more in-depth look at these grouping of planes. Throughout what follows, you may find it useful to keep referring to the graphical representation of The Great Wheel, I know it certainly helps me.

So, for those paying attention, you are no doubt already confused, as the order of the list i gave of the planes does not quite coincide with the picto-graphical representation provided. As i said, its not quite as simple as being able to list or show an order. Trust me when I say, that as we proceed to look at the groupings of the planes, and the planes themselves, we shall find why that is the case.

Inner Planes

The Inner Planes are made up of elemental matter and physical forces, and consist of the Elemental Planes and the Energy Planes. The image below shows a more structured representation of the Inner Planes and their approximate positioning to one another, and also includes the Positive and Negative planes. Now when compared to the Great Wheel diagram, you can start to see how basic its representation is of the planes, and how astronomically, pun intended, hard it would be to show a "true" representation in a single diagram. For example, the Great Wheel only shows the 4 main Inner Planes surrounding the Material grouping and it has the Positive and Negative Planes around the edge, which incidentally on a 3D representation, seem to "orbit" the rest of the Great Wheel. Confused? Don't worry, it will get easier to grasp as we go, remember, little steps make for great progress.

From studying the diagram below, you can begin to see how the planes effect and relate to one another. For example, if you take a look at the plane of Earth and then Fire, you can see that the plane that has formed between them is the result of their relation to one another, if you take earth and super-heat it to the point of melting, you get......Magma. This is also true of the relationship between the Plane of Earth and the Energy Planes, the positive things that you get from it are minerals, the negative or less useful thing you get is Dust. The same philosophy applies right across the inner planes. Indeed, this philosophy and way of thinking applies right across all of the planes and so when you grasp it, you are well on the way to having a deeper understanding of the Planes, the cosmos and the Great Wheel. Well done, give yourself a pat on the back! No really, do; grasping an understanding of the cosmos is no small achievement. OK, OK, that's enough, there is still plenty more to learn. Please refer to supplemental documents for more details on the below groupings of planes and the individual planes themselves.

Material Plane

Ah, the Material Plane, home sweet home. This is of course where we are, well, actually I guess that is a bit of an assumption, you could be on another plane whilst you read this, perhaps you are a Djinn reading this upon your cloud in the Elemental Plane of Air, but alas, I digress. Let me please assume hence forth, and take no offence if you are not, that like me, you are from the Material Plane. A Plane which balances, sometimes precariously, between the philosophical forces of the Outer Planes and the physical forces of the Inner Planes.

It is on the Material Plane that worlds float, along with other astral bodies, within their crystal spheres, which in turn float within the substance known as Phlogiston, a highly flammable gaseous medium. It is actually easier for a powerful wizard to travel to another plane of existence than it is to get to another sphere. Indeed, the only way for someone to travel to another sphere within the Material Plane is aboard a Spelljammer ship. Some more commonly known spheres would be those containing worlds that some people have heard of, each of the following is in a different sphere within the Material Plane: Toril - upon which Faerun is a continent, Greyhawk and Eberron.

Parallel Planes

Whilst these Planes were not mentioned in the original list, they are so closely related to the Material Plane that I feel is is important to look at them now. There are two Parallel Planes, each of which is a reflection of the Material Plane but with a positive or negative slant, influenced by the Positive and Negative Planes. You see, once again, the planes influence one another, and thus your understanding of the Great Wheel diagram once again improves; the planes in the top half of the Wheel are positively attuned, and the planes on the bottom half are negatively attuned, an attunment that can sometimes be seen as Good and Evil. The two Planes are The Feywild, which is the home of the fey creatures, and The Shadowfell, which is a type of gloomy underworld and home of The Raven Queen.

Outer Planes

This is where we develop our understanding of how to read the Great Wheel even further, and indeed learn that it is something to be read and interpreted, that it allows us to tell what alignment any given Outer plane has to Good and Evil, Law and Chaos. The next leap of realisation for you should be that this also means that you can tell which Planes are opposed to one another, telling you what kind of relationship the denizens of one plane would have with another, a fact that is not exclusive to the Outer Planes. But, back to the case in point, the Outer Planes.

The Outer Planes are alignment based planes, in terms of Good Vs Evil, and Law Vs Chaos. It is the realm of gods, souls, philosophy and belief. It is home to The Nine Hells, the Abyss, Elysium and Arcadia. When talking about the Outer Planes, It is common for people to talk about the Upper, or the Lower planes. If you take a look at The Great Wheel, you will see that around the Outer planes there are labels denoting which planes are included in which. This distinction indicates that the upper half of the wheel comprises of those positively, or Good aligned, and the lower half is negatively, or Evil aligned. Similarly, the planes on the right of the Wheel are Chaotically aligned, and on the left they are Lawfully aligned. If it helps, think of The Great Wheel as a compass; With North being Good, South being Evil, East is Chaos, and West is Lawful. Thus, the 4 compass points are Planes of pure alignment and you can gauge the alignment of the other Outer Planes by how far they are in a particular compass direction. For example; The Nine Hells would be South-West, or, Evil-Lawful (although usually we state the Law-Chaos alignment first, so it is actually recorded as Lawful-Evil), and Arborea would be North-East, or Chaotic-Good. To help with this concept, I include a diagram below as further visual aid. Also, it allows me to show you the Plane that cannot be drawn on the Great Wheel as it would occupy the same space as the central planes. I am of course referring to the Plane of pure Neutrality, neither Good nor Evil, Lawful nor Chaotic; the Plane known as the Outlands. It is at the centre of the Outlands that the great mountain, known as The Spire, rises throughout the realms, above which floats the city Sigil.

Transitive Planes

The transitive planes connect the other planes and generally contain little, if any, solid matter or native life. The Astral Plane, sometimes referred to as the Astral Sea, connects the Outer Planes to the Inner and Material Plane, it is how the souls of the newly dead from the Material Plane pass through to the Outer Plane of their afterlife, as defined by their deity. The Ethereal Plane connects the Inner planes, although travelling through it is troublesomely tricky at best as you have to pass into what is known as the Deep Ethereal, a warren of Demiplanes and nothing can travel through either level of the Ethereal in physical form, only in Ethereal form. It is usually only used for short range transportation and the evading of, or hiding from, enemies and threats. Incidentally, it is also where the great guardians of the City of Waterdeep wait and keep watch for threats. There are also the Mirror Planes, but strongly warn against using them to travel as not only can you easily become lost in them, but you will most likely kill yourself before you manage to do even that, be warned. Once again, for more information on these transitive planes, please see the attached document.

Demiplanes

Now, I have mentioned demiplanes a number of times already, perhaps you have even jumped ahead to this part to see what exactly they are. Well little lady, let me elucidate here. Demiplanes are minor planes, most of which are artificial. They are commonly created by demigods and extremely powerful wizards and psions. Naturally-occurring demiplanes are rare; most such demiplanes are actually fragments of other planes that have somehow split off from their parent plane. Demiplanes are often constructed to resemble the Material Plane, though a few, mostly those created by non-humans, are quite alien. As usual, there are instances of the Cosmos breaking its own rules, or perhaps it was a crazy wizard of unfathomable power, or an evil and vindictive god, or perhaps just a curious one; whomever it was, somehow a sentient demiplane was created. Its name is Neth, and it is very, very curious; something that can be very bad for those that stray too close to it. Oh, and it moves......and creates humanoid versions of itself to explore the planes and increase its already unfathomable depths of knowledge. But some people claim to have traveled to Neth, and returned with incredible knowledge. Tempting, I must say, if not also terrifying to the core.

Other Planes

There are realms and planes that fall outside of the Great Wheel, and getting to these realms and planes can be almost impossible; and yet, at the same time, many people go to, and return from, one of them nearly every day of their lives. Here are two of the most widely known other planes, please see the Other Planes document for more information.

Far Realm

The Far Realm is an alien dimension of cosmic horror. It is the home plane for many aberrations and strange and terrifying monsters. It is a place of madness and strange geometries. It is known as the Far Realm because it is what lies far, far, far outside of the Great Wheel of Cosmology, it is the deep void from which almost nothing returns, nothing that anyone wants anyway. Only one human has ever been known to have returned from there with any degree of sanity remaining, and his peers declared him a raving madman, and his warnings of what he found have simply been put down to being works of fiction. Fiction which people read to scare themselves for enjoyment; if only they knew. If only they knew that the man from the world known as Terra, ironic I know, was actually speaking the truth; that what he saw had followed him back somehow. What was the mans name? H.P. Lovecraft I believe.

Plane of Dreams

The Plane of Dreams is a plane far outside the others and is often not included in the standard cosmology, and thus does not appear on the Great Wheel. As its name suggests, it is the Plane upon which all true dreams take place. Did you dream last night of ruling your own Kingdom, perhaps you dreamt of that beautiful women or man you saw the other day; well, that all happened upon the Plane of Dreams. You see, you're already a Planar traveler, and you didn't even know it.

Planar Travel

So, you have now expanded your minds and learnt about The Great Wheel Cosmology and it's planes, and you now wish to find out how the heck you can get to them. Well, first off, I would recommend that, if you haven't already, you read the associated documents on the Planes that go along with what you have already learnt. Not necessarily about ever Plane, but the extra details on the groupings at least. Then, when you have done that, and decided that the life of a Planar traveler is for you, then feel free to hop on over to my Guide to Planar Travel.

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Afterword

Still here? Decided your not quite ready to take the plunge into the outer, or indeed Inner, Cosmos? Fair enough, can't blame you, it can be a terrifying place and yet, at the same time, a place of beauty, possibility, adventure and reward. It can also lead to a horrifyingly gruesome death, just saying. But regardless, if you are still here then please allow me to thank you for taking the time to read this guide, it really does mean a lot to me that you have put aside the time to join me on this journey through the cosmos and indulge my ramblings. I certainly hope that you have enjoyed reading it as much as I have had writing it.