Building the great wheel

13th Age doesn't include information relating to planar adventures by default. It's easy enough to refer to other OGL sources for further information, but for my blog I will be putting my own spin on the planes that I hope would be in line with the design goals of 13th Age.

© Mongoose Publishing

I will be examining the planes from a holistic perspective, streamlining all the fiddly bits, and drawing from the wealth of 3pp OGC content that exists including Classic Play: The Book of the Planes, Legends & Lairs: Portals & Planes, Beyond Countless Doorways, and Dark Roads & Golden Hells. Speaking of which, the first thing I will do is layout the general cosmology of my setting. Other games portrayed the planes as alternately boring, hostile or unavailable until a certain level, but my cosmology presents the planes as colorful places available from level one if so desired.

My multiverse consists of about a dozen or so major planes arranged into a "descending stair" inspired by Kabbalah and Gnosticism (see picture inset left). The map traces the descent of energy through the cosmos from the immaterial upper planes, through the material middle planes, and finally into the aborted lower planes (burrowed from Book of the Planes).

Order and Chaos

13th Age doesn't place as much importance on alignment as other OGL games do. That said, from a cosmological perspective I am adopting the Order/Balance/Chaos conflict from the Stormbringer series by Michael Moorcock. Order and Chaos fight for control of the universe, which would be bad for life as we know it, while Balance ensures that the universe will support life. Each side has its own planes: the Halls of Order are self-explanatory, Chaos is represented by Tarassein, and Firmament represents Balance. Each side has its anthropomorphic personifications: the Archons of Order, the Achamoth of Chaos, and the Aeons of Balance (these names are drawn from Gnosticism and relate fairly closely to their function).

The cosmology is intended to be morality ambiguous. Good and evil are not cosmological forces. Order and Chaos are destructive at their extremes and creative when in harmony. The Archons and Achamoth think that restructuring reality into their insane private universe is doing everyone a favor and don't understand why anyone would object. Even the Aeons, dedicated to the preservation of life, enforce a status quo where all living things "must submit to supreme suffering in order to discover the completion of joy" (John Calvin).

With regard to the party of a typical campaign, no one considers themselves evil: everyone thinks that they're the heroes of the story. They have to jump through psychological hoops in order to justify committing atrocities. Loosely speaking, capitalist civilization is affiliated with Order and the communist humanoid tribes are affiliated with Chaos. Many adventures can be summed up as the party going on a horrific ethnic cleansing spree against the filthy commies, and while this doesn't need to be addressed in most campaigns I feel it would be a fascinating topic of exploration for parties bored of the typical "kill ten orcs" grind.

Elemental Plane

Plane of Fire

The planes Positive Energy and Material on the chart are renamed to Apodiction and Tellurian (burrowed from Castles & Crusades and Wayfarers), respectively. In my cosmology they, along with the elemental planes, are referred to collectively as the material planes because they're all equally physical. The planes of apodiction, air, earth, fire and water may be thought of as different layers or poles of a single Elemental Plane rather than as separate planes.

The elemental planes are dramatically different compared to their typical portrayals. All too often the elemental planes are boring expanses of a single substance. While I could go the Wayfarers route of dispensing with them entirely, instead I am adapting the model used by Dark Dungeons (and several MMORPGs) and giving the elemental planes geography loosely analogous to the tellurian. The areas where the elemental planes are identical to the tellurian are dispensed with and treated as areas where the planes overlap: the ocean is the plane of water, the underdark is the plane of earth, the sky is the plane of air, etc. This means that adventurers may simply walk from the Tellurian to the Elemental Planes without any magical aid. Furthermore, the elementals themselves are responsible for weather phenomena in the Tellurian (burrowed from Dark Roads & Golden Hells).

There are no paraplanes or quasiplanes, these concepts have been subsumed into the elemental planes. The elemental poles are platonic ideals situated in loose proximity to Order. At the center of the Elemental Plane where they all meet is the demiplane of Nexus (burrowed from Legends & Lairs: Elemental Lore by Fantasy Flight Games). Between and surrounding the elemental planes is the Elemental Chaos (from the 5e SRD), which is divided into an inner and outer zone as it leaves Order and approaches Chaos. Between the elemental planes is the inner zone, similar to the Elemental Chaos from 4e, where the elements mix and match to create a variety of fascinating environments. Further away and surrounding the elemental planes is the outer zone, similar to the Elemental Chaos from 5e, where the elements take on even more bizarre and impossible properties hostile to life as it bleeds into Tarassein.

Plane of Radiance

Apodiction has received the greatest revisions compared to its typical portrayal. Drawing from Blood & Treasure and Dark Roads & Golden Hells, it serves as the Elemental Plane of Wood and the Plane of Radiance that illuminates the mind, body and soul. It is divided into layers and demiplanes named after the Sephirot of Kabbalah and the Major Arcana of the Tarot representing the paths between them.

Other useful sources on the elemental planes and their inhabitants include Slayer's Guide to Elementals by Mongoose Publishing, The Traveler's Guide to the Elemental Plane of Fire by Necromancers of the Northwest, and the Tome of Horrors series by Frog God Games. The last introduces such planes as Acid, Obsidian, Time, Gravity and so forth which I will be integrating as well.

The Ether

To account for changes between their invention and third edition, the Astral and Ethereal planes now form a single plane based on a suggestion in Beyond Countless Doorways by Malhavoc Press. This plane has many different names, such as Ethereal Sea or Elemental Plane of Aether (see Pathfinder Bestiary 5 for information on elemental aether), but for simplicity I will call it the Ether (burrowed from Wayfarers). It is divided into a few layers based on distance from the material planes.

The layer that reflects the world is the Border Ether or Spirit World: it contains the spiritual reflections of living things, places, objects, emotions, memories and so forth. Little happens there that is not in some way connected to the physical world. (The spirit world concept is burrowed from Encyclopaedia Divine: Shamans by Mongoose Publishing and Relics & Rituals: Excalibur by Sword & Sorcery Studios.)

Ethereal Sea

The layer beyond is the Deep Ether, Astral or Faerieland, on which numerous preternatural planes and planets float. These planes are home to the fey and other bizarre entities, and also serve as a channel for travel between the material planes and the immaterial upper planes. (The fairyland concepts are burrowed from Faeries by Bastion Press, The Faerie Ring by Zombie Sky Press, and Finwicket's Bestiary: Along the Faerie Path by Clockwork Gnome Publishing.)

I will be giving the fey much greater attention than they have otherwise received. The Deep Ether and Apodiction, particularly where they meet and create material existence, is the closest analogue of the Feywild (see 5e SRD). I am not particularly fond of tying fey to the source of life because of my decision to define them: my version of fey are lost souls that have been given a second, last chance at life (burrowed from Complete Guide to Fey by Goodman Games). My conception of the Deep Ether and Apodiction make adding the Feywild more or less redundant.

Another layer is that of Dream, which touches on all planes of existence. It draws heavily from the fiction of H.P. Lovecraft, being inhabited by nightgaunts and the denizens of Leng (see the Pathfinder bestiaries for details). Useful sources for dream entities include the Creature Collection series by Sword & Sorcery Studios, Penumbra: Fantasy Bestiary by Atlas Games, and The Mind Unveiled by Dreamscarred Press.

The Traverse

Space travel exists and operates on fantasy physics (burrowed from Aether & Flux: Sailing the Traverse). "Aether" (the element) is an analogue of solar winds while "flux" is an analogue of electricity, and interaction between the two allows for ships to travel into space. Solar systems consist of Tellurian and Ether pairs, but outside the system this distinction ends.

There's no separate outer space full of planets and galaxies in the Tellurian: outside of solar systems is the Deep Ether, on which solar systems and other planes float. The outer space analogue between these planes is called the Traverse, and it is entirely possible to travel by spaceship to other planes of existence as though they were planets. (This concept burrowed from Blood & Treasure.)

Encompassing the Traverse and possibly all planes of existence is the black surface of the Vault of Stars, which is literally the night sky. Suns and stars are different things: suns are giant portals to Apodiction which give energy to power life, stars are silvery pools that dot the Vault and even have their own nymphs.

Aborted Planes

© Jonathan Brünner

While there isn't a good/evil dichotomy since Order and Chaos are hostile at their extremes, I am adopting the aborted planes as an analogue of the Qliphoth from Kabbalah or the Chthonic Darkness from Adventurer Conqueror King System. The aborted planes include Infernum and Shadowfell (see image inset). These lower planes are "aborted" because they were never intended to exist by either the powers of Order or Chaos. They are the relics of long dead universes, worlds that never were, should have been, should not be and yet here they are.

The Shadowfell (from the 5e SRD) is broadly divided into two major layers: the Shadowlands and the Void (analogous to the Shadow and Negative Energy planes of other games). The Shadowlands are a shadow of the Tellurian cast by the light of Apodiction, and may be entered through any shadow by those who know how. Also called the Vale of Shadows, its geography and inhabitants are an ever shifting reflection of the Tellurian. Further in the Vale begins to fall apart until one reaches the Void, an all-consuming remnant of a dead universe that never was. While it seems dead or dying, drops of color trickle down from Apodiction and allow a limited form of life to boom (inspired by video games Nihilumbra and Turgor).

Infernum is the most obvious battleground between the forces of Order and Chaos, as it represents imbalance and strife in opposition to Firmament. When intelligent life was created, Infernum arose as a reflection of their emotions a la the Warp in Warhammer (or maybe it always existed and mortal consciousness merely opened the way). It was naturally a magnet for Chaos and was immediately filled with refugees from Tarassein and demons born of mortal emotion. In turn, Balance and/or Order created the devils to compete with the demons and the angels to keep both in check.

More to come...