The descending stair

The "descending stair" is a cosmology model proposed in Classic Play: The Book of the Planes. It is based on historical cosmogonies including Kabbalah, Gnosticism, Alchemy, and Plato's Cave.

As the book explains:

"The Descending Stair cosmology traces the descent of energy through the cosmos (Games Masters with a religious bent could do well to research the tree of the Sephiroth). The highest plane is the Firmament, which then descends through the Questing Grounds (an engine for converting the pure energy of the divine into forms compatible with the lower cosmological regions) and the Afterworld. The next plane in the chain is the Vault of Stars, which traces the shapes of the energy’s intentions and destiny. The Astral and Dream planes form a bridge between the wholly immaterial upper planes and the more physical lower planes. The energy explodes into the lower regions in the form of the Positive Energy Plane, which then splits into the four Elemental Planes. These planes provide the raw ingredients to form the Material Plane. The Shadow Plane and evil planes are aborted regions beyond the stair."

The Descending Stair

I mentioned this cosmology years ago during earlier forays into plane building, but I lost focus and forgot about it for a while. I recently regained interest after reading the two-part article "Touched by the Otherworld." To that end, I would like to retread and revise my ideas for this cosmology.

The cosmology may be imagined initially as a series of supra-planes or "worlds", each of which gives rise to the next: Briah, Yetzirah, Assiah, and Gehenna. These worlds aren't just alien locations created by game convention, but energy channels that actively and constantly feed into sustaining their derivatives.

• Briah is the world of creation. It encompasses the upper planes, planes of order, and planes of discord. It is the abode of the aberrations, celestials, and similar. These planes give rise to souls, which descend into the following planes to make life. Sometimes, existing spirits may enter incarnation.
• Yetzirah is the world of formation. It encompasses the elemental and transitive planes. It is the abode of elementals, giants, and similar. This would include the Ethereal Sea from Beyond Countless Doorways by Malhavoc Press. The elemental planes interpenetrate the prime plane, giving rise to the weather and other natural phenomena.
• Assiah is the world of action. It encompasses the material plane and its echoes. It is the abode of beasts, humanoids, fey*, and similar. This would include the preternatural planes from The Faerie Ring books by Zombie Sky Press.
• Gehenna is an aborted world. It encompasses the lower planes. It is the abode of fiends, undead, and similar. These spirits are born from the wills and souls of the preceding planes.

*Fey in particular occupy something of a unique niche, inspired by The Complete Guide to Fey and Exalted: The Fair Folk. I said this before in ancient posts, but fey are reincarnated beings: spirits embodied in physical fleshy forms. Ancient aberrations became trapped in the material plane as it formed, becoming the nature spirits of the prime plane and the alien visitors of fairyland, and this process continues on other spirits including fiends and undead.

One of the reasons I like this model is that it provides a better context for the messy planar cosmology and monster taxonomy of D&D, which otherwise feels pretty arbitrary. I will incorporate it into my Indo-European cosmology as another way of looking at the creation and ordering of the universe.

Different models for fantasy space travel

After some thought, I decided to put together some ideas for space fantasy campaigns. To that end, I would present several different models for space travel physics as distinct campaign setting cosmologies.

Aristotelia, the setting of celestial spheres

This setting is based on Blood & Treasure, Dark Dungeons, and Voidspanners.

In Aristotelia, the physics of space travel are very different from reality. The night sky is actually the surface of a massive "celestial sphere" that encompasses the solar system. Outside of the sphere is the "luminiferous aether" and access to other celestial spheres in the universe.

Celestial spheres are not all made the same, but may have different local physics. One sphere might be heliocentric while another is geocentric. One sphere might be filled with an airless "void" (astronauts carry their own air supply without needing suits), while another is full of a breathable "ether." One sphere might have its inner and outer planes as inner and outer planets inside the sphere, while another has its inner planes inside the sphere and its outer planes outside the sphere.

Propulsion systems include:

• Sails of Skysailing are a magical effect that allow ships to fly through the air, void, and luminiferous aether. These are made from the silk of phase spiders and may be attached to conventional sailing ships.
• Void engines are magical items that propel vessels through the void. These need to be activated by a power source, such as a wand, a wizard, or a sacrificial victim.
• Ether sails are magical sails that ride the ether winds. These do not need a power source, but they are only effective in ether currents.
• Tree ships are rare vessels created by elfin druids.

Alhazenia, the setting of outer space

This setting is based on all those settings in which astronomy and outer space operates as it does in real life.

In Alhazenia, star systems and outer space functions as it does in reality. This makes it easy for a player familiar with modern astronomy to enter the setting. There are multiple competing methods for space travel, not one universal method used across the universe. These include fantasy magic, science fiction technology, and more based on a variety of different power sources.

Power sources harnessed for applications as propulsion systems include:

• Magic. Wizards can cast spells or create magic items that allow space travel.
• FTL drive. Seen in Dragonstar, Starfinder, and many other settings. These are taken straight out of scifi, so read scifi for details. I dislike this approach as I find it lazy and bland.
• Flux culler. Seen in Aether & Flux: Sailing the Traverse. These non-magical devices generate the electrical force known as "flux," which provides propulsion by interacting repulsively with the "aether" suffusing the universe.
• Aetherdrive. Seen in Aethera Campaign Setting. These are "magic-technology hybrids" powered by "highly toxic crystals" with "naturally telekinetic properties."

Fitting the planes of existence into Alhazenia requires more work. I should save that for a future post.

Celestial spheres cosmology, part 2

I previously mentioned the Aristotelian/Dantean cosmology of celestial spheres. The OD&D game took inspiration from the concept when it developed its Mystaraspace cosmology, which would go on to inform the cosmology of Spelljammer. This cosmology was also adopted (or adapted) by retroclones including Blood & Treasure, Dark Dungeons, and Voidspanners. The specifics and jargon vary between settings, so I'll be using Dark Dungeons as my primary reference here.

The basics

In contrast to the Aristotelian/Dantean cosmology, the celestial spheres are much simplified in this model and take further inspiration from the obsolete scientific theory of ether and modern astronomy; it is unique as far as cosmography models go. The solar system generally behaves much as its does in reality, with the planets orbiting the sun (although some systems may be geocentric or weirder). However, Aristotle's firmament of the fixed stars remains as the sole celestial sphere ("crystal sphere" in D&D jargon). The interplanetary space inside the sphere is an empty "void"; unlike real physics, living creatures have sufficient personal gravity to carry a small supply of air and aren't in any danger of a zero pressure environment. The space and planets within the celestial sphere is mirrored in each of the adjacent inner planes (air, earth, fire, water, ether), which are called "inner planes" because they all exist within the sphere. Outside of the sphere is the luminiferous aether, which is the equivalent of interstellar space. Other celestial spheres containing their own planetary systems exist throughout the luminiferous aether.

Space travel is generally accomplished using spacecraft that are powered by magitech or exploit quirks of the fantasy physics, such as through engines, sails, or other means of propulsion. These vessels are generally modeled after sailing ships, and may even be capable of doubling as sea ships and/or airships.

The OD&D and AD&D games differ greatly when it comes to depicting the outer planes. In the original celestial spheres cosmology, outer planes aka demiplanes were artificial spheres created by the immortals (mortals ascended to divinity) that were anchored to a celestial sphere. In AD&D's Manual of the Planes, the outer planes became independent of the celestial spheres cosmology entirely; when it was retrofitted later as Spelljammer, redundancies were introduced such as the distinction between the "phlogiston" (luminiferous aether) and the deep ethereal plane.

One wonders whether Disney's Treasure Planet was influenced by the game.

Simple variations

Blood & Treasure and Voidspanners put their own spins on this basic model. Both settings are closer to the original Aristotelian Universe in that their universe does not extend beyond the firmament, as opposed to having multiple such spheres emulating real star systems. Both settings diverge when it comes to the nature of the planets, however.

In Voidspanners, the system is heliocentric and the planets may be visited and traded with as per the Dark Dungeons model. Furthermore, the void is full of breathable ether; although prolonged exposure may still be harmful. Overall, the differences from the standard model are minor. As a supplement for Basic Fantasy, no rules for the other planes' geography are included.

In Blood & Treasure, the celestial sphere model is combined with the "orrery" or "solar system" model mentioned in the guides for designing your own planar cosmology. Here the planetary system ("Land of Nod") is geocentric and the transitive, inner and outer planes are presented as concentric spheres and associated planets: the ethereal plane corresponds to the lunar orbit, the astral plane corresponds to the space beyond, the inner planes correspond to the inner planets and the outer planes correspond to the outer planets. Taking a further page from Dante, Hell is located inside the earth and Heaven corresponds to the surface of the firmament.

Since these settings are limited to single systems, it is possible for them to be integrated into the basic model by presenting them simply as quirky spheres floating within the luminiferous aether. IIRC, the D&D canon cosmology uses similar logic to explain the cosmological differences between the different official campaign settings: each celestial sphere may have its own set of planes that aren't necessarily the same as those of other spheres.

On another note, the surface of the celestial sphere is comparable to the outer plane "The Vault of Stars" from 3pp Classic Play: The Book of the Planes. If you want to have adventures on the literal night sky, then I highly recommend using that book (not that I found any alternatives, mind you).

Variations of the great wheel

I haven't posted a planar post in a while so I thought I should get on that.

The "wheel" or "great wheel" cosmology is the default cosmology for the D&D status quo. Originally presented in the Manual of the Planes, it has since received a bunch of different variations. Years ago I tried my hand at reinventing the wheel (pun intended), but I don't recall ever giving a comparison of this cosmology with its several variations. So here we go!

Canonical

Below are the two generally accepted versions of the Great Wheel. The Great Wheel has generally remained the same across the various editions in which it appeared, with only minor changes. The most obvious between 2e and 5e would be the condensing of the lesser elemental planes into the elemental chaos and the addition of the shadowfell and feywild to the inner planes.

Great Wheel circa 2e

Great Wheel circa 5e

The Great Wheel is also called the Planescape cosmology. The prime material plane also has crystal spheres, but those are another can of worms also called the Spelljammer cosmology. When the two are used in tandem, the fandom jargon for the setting is "Planejammer."

Apocrypha

Plenty of GMs have adopted the Great Wheel wholesale with little or no change, such as Anethemalon.

Anethemalon Planes of Existence

The Planescape fans have since added tons of other planes to the wheel. These additions include extra elemental planes, extra outer planes, and extra transitive planes.

Elemental Planes by Sapiento

More inclusive Outlands

Other wheels

Since the Great Wheel isn't OGL, third-party publishers have resorted to creating their own wheels if necessary. For example, both Mongoose's Classic Play: The Book of the Planes and Paizo's Pathfinder present simplified wheels in which the outer planes have been reduced to nine (one for each alignment). Mongoose simply called this the "wheel" cosmology; Paizo called theirs the "Great Beyond."

A generic wheel cosmogram

The Great Beyond

Personally, I prefer simplified cosmologies like the omniverse or world axis because I think all the extra paraplanes and quasiplanes get silly and redundant after a while. But that's for other posts.

Celestial spheres cosmology

The “celestial spheres” are an outdated model of the solar system dating back to Aristotle.

The Aristotelian universe consisted of the world in the center (composed of the four elements air, earth, fire, and water), the celestial spheres above (composed of the fifth element ether), and the spherical firmament of the fixed stars surrounding all.

A modern interpretation of the Aristotelian Universe, with the earth in the center, the elements above, then the celestial spheres, and finally the firmament.

People actually believed this was how the universe worked. It supplanted earlier models in which the world was flat, the heavens or “firmament” was a literal dome which separated the world from the “waters” of primordial chaos, and the underworld was another dome under the flat Earth which complemented the heavens. (A model I mentioned in past posts. It roughly informs the omniverse and world axis cosmologies.)

This model influenced some retroclone writers. The Pathfinder cosmology (specifically the Golarion campaign setting) based the organization its elemental planes on Aristotle’s. The Blood & Treasure cosmology (specifically the Nod campaign setting) adopts Aristotle’s cosmology wholesale, and combines it with that of Dante’s Inferno too. As I mentioned in a previous post, Nod’s cosmology goes even further and makes each of the planets an outer plane. ADDEDUM 11/21/2019: The Voidspanners setting also uses a variation of the Aristotelian celestial spheres. Unlike Nod, these are mundane planets and not outer planes as planets.

Why is this remotely relevant? It occurred to me that I was going about campaign cosmology all wrong. This should be common sense! There is no reason why the multiverse cannot contain multiple universes with different cosmologies. A flat world, celestial spheres, solar systems, etc.

In future posts I should like to describe a multiverse consisting of multiple universes with different cosmologies.

Planes and planets

Although space travel seems fairly unpopular in OGL fantasy gaming, it has appeared in surprisingly diverse forms.

Portal travel only. By default, most fantasy campaign settings limit themselves to a single planet. If multiple planets are introduced, then they will generally be reachable only through portal or by traveling through one of the transitive planes. (WarCraft is a popular example.) Spacecraft either don't exist or are so rare that the PCs won't be expected to ride inside one. This model seems to be the most common for settings that involve multiple worlds, such as Golarion's Distant Worlds supplement, presumably because space travel occupies a lot more conceptual space.

Science fantasy. When space travel gets involved as a standard fixture of the setting, the most common manifestation is what some label the "science fantasy" subgenre. (Star Wars is a popular example.) What I don't like about this model is that tabletop settings, like Dragonstar, Starfinder, or Starjammer, typically sloppily throw scifi and fantasy conventions into a blender with only the clumsiest attempts to integrate them. Magic and technology exist side-by-side, operating on completely different rules.

Magitech space fantasy. However, some settings don't lazily throw scifi tech into a standard fantasy setting and pretend it works. Instead, they might devise magitech spacecraft to match the fantasy setting. Campaign settings like Shadow of the Spider Moon, Aether & Flux, Aethera, and Necropunk are examples. They rely on technology powered by magic or alternate physical laws, sometimes having multiple competing methods.

Retro space fantasy. The science fantasy and space fantasy subgenres still assume that space operates like it does in reality: explosive decompression, empty vacuum, etc. However, some settings go even further with the fantastical elements, jettisoning real physics entirely. Spelljammer introduces breathing in space, crystal spheres, phlogiston, geocentric systems, and so forth. This model is recycled by some OSR settings like Voidspanners and Dark Dungeons.

Planes as planets. The models I mentioned so far still assume that space travel is limited to the "material plane" (as D&D calls it) and that planar travel operates by an entirely separate subsystem. However, that doesn't have to be the case either. 3pp like Classic Play: The Book of the Planes and Blood & Treasure suggest that the planes could be arranged in the same way as planets and visited through fantastical means of space travel. At this point, there is no distinction between space travel and planar travel.


ADDENDUM 11/19/2019: Honorable mentions to Aetherial Adventures and Cabbages & Kings: The Steampunk Renaissance.

Indo-European planes

A Proto-Indo-European (PIE) campaign setting would have a much simpler cosmology compared to D&D’s typical bazillion planes. The PIE planes would consist of only a handful of planes, if they can even be called planes at all. We have the primordial cosmos that existed before the world, the world itself, and the underworld. There’s no heaven or hell, that’s a Christian thing. There’s no elemental planes, because it’s unnecessary.

The primordial cosmos has few to no details associated with it, but it’s probably where creatures of chaos come from.

The world consists of the sky, the earth, and the ocean. The earth is a flat disc bordered by the ocean. The sky is a dome upon which the celestial bodies travel. This is where the adventures happen.

The underworld exists below the earth. It’s inhabited by the shades of the dead and possibly by monsters of various stripes.

These cannot necessarily be said to be planes, since you can potentially travel between them by walking. Plane shifting spells or transitive planes aren’t needed.

Little known cosmology models: omniverse

There has been many different cosmological models devised for D&D settings. The "omniverse" model simplifies the D&D cosmology to its bare minimum. It was first described in the 3rd edition Manual of the Planes and probably informed the development of the "world axis" model of 4th edition.

Little known cosmology models: As Above, So Below

Named by Mongoose Publishing's Classic Play: The Book of the Planes. Similar to but distinct from the Great Wheel and World Axis models.

©2015 David Gonterman

Above the material plane, connected by the astral plane, the outer planes form the upper arc. Below the material plane, connected by the ethereal plane, the inner planes form the lower arc.

Revising the transitive planes

As the D&D rules and campaign settings have developed over their history, so too has the planar cosmology changed over time. This has left numerous irregularities, such the existence of several transitive planes with almost identical utility. More below the break...

An alternative great wheel

As a temporary break from my planar musings for 13th Age, I have decided to take a crack at building an alternative cosmology for 5th edition. The cosmology in the DM's guide is a bit more complicated than it needs to be in order to please Planescape partisans. I do not wish to insult that setting, but I think that many of the planes suffer from either being too hostile for adventuring or too similar to other planes. This post will explain where my cosmology departs from the canonical cosmology.

Worlds of Existence primer

The cosmology of 13th Age divides the universe into a few ages and a few worlds: the World or the Land, the Overworld, the Underworld, Hell, the Otherworld, the Aquatic Age, and others. Other worlds are alluded to in the sourcebooks, but we never received a map of the worlds so that GMs could detail it as they wished. This is my expansion of that cosmology.

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.

Rebuilding the great wheel

I feel that now is a good time to re-examine the planes from a holistic perspective. What is their purpose? What role do they serve in an ongoing campaign? Are they interesting places to visit? What would it take to run planar adventures starting from level one? Could the great wheel benefit from some streamlining?

On the Omniverse and the World in Balance

As I explained in the post on alignment, the cosmology elucidated in this blog draws on the original Moorcock model of law and chaos with the world in (and of) the balance. The world as we it know it is both in the balance, fought over by the forces of law and chaos, and of the balance, for it represents the harmony of law and chaos.

For the purposes of this dissertation, the planes are arranged in a model that the 3rd edition Manual of the Planes referred to as the "omniverse" and which formed the basis of the much maligned 4th edition. Fear not, there will be alterations to make it more friendly with with my fellow Planescape and Spelljammer partisans and I will not be lumping demons and devil together or elsewhere they don't belong. However, I will not be slavishly adhering to things like the patchwork terminology resulting from D&D's long line of writers.

The world with which we are most familiar is the Natural World, the Prime Material Plane, the world in (and of) the balance. It is the typical world for adventuring, full of many different planets and civilizations. However, it is merely one of many worlds floating within the Ethereal Sea, known collectively as the Preternatural Planes. Many of these worlds resemble the Material, and it is believed some of them may be reflections of it, that the Material is a reflection of them, or both. It here that the forces of balance reside, protecting and overseeing the natural world.

"Outside" the world are the Inner Planes or Inner Sphere, in loose accordance with the Aristotelian model of the planets. The Inner Sphere is another battle ground for the forces of law and chaos. The islands of stability are the work of law, with the greatest being the Elemental Planes or Elemental Poles. Each of the Elemental Poles represents a classical element like air, fire, earth and water. That is not to say that they are featureless expanses of that element, oh no. Each of the Elemental Poles has many varied landscapes just like the planets of the Material, with skies and lands and seas that reflect their element. However, between the poles exist the Elemental Chaos, where the elements mix and take forms that don't exist under the auspices of law and may be shaped by those with strong wills. Indeed, the Elemental Chaos predates the Elemental Poles. It is the Void from which the universe sprang, Ginnungagap, Tarassein and Limbo. It is home to the races of chaos: elementals, chaosiics, proteans, ogdoad and countless others.

"Above" the Inner Sphere (insofar as that direction makes sense) are the Upper Planes, ruled by the archons (a gnostic greek term for "ruler" and from which all "-arch" and "-archy" words originate) and their legions of celestials. The archons oversee the Celestial Bureaucracy that codifies and imposes the laws of physics that make a consistent existence possible (a concept burrowed from Chinese folk mythology). The upper planes are where you find angels, axiomites and the many other servants of law and goodness. That isn't to say that law is all good, as the more moderate celestials may disagree with the excesses of law.

"Below" are the Lower Planes. This is where the worst excesses of chaos have made their abode: qlippoth, bosch, demons and the souls of the damned. But it is also home to the worst excesses of law as well. During the conflicts between the gods and the demons, the demons devised new strategies on the fly to combat their enemies. The gods were forced to defy tradition and improvise as well: they sent the lawful devils to compete with the demons. It is unclear if the devils were created for this purpose, consigned to it to prevent them from turning against their moderate fellows, or fell from grace for perceived transgressions, but such distinction matters no longer. Ironically, this makes both the temptations of evil and all changes for the better into manifestations of chaos.