On Planar Cosmology
~Excerpt from Melniborne's Notes On Planar Cosmology
E3 430
I can confirm that the idea that the other planes exist geographically in the six cardinal directions, as seems to be the belief of the common folk in every city and town I've ever visited, is in fact false. Planar travel, sad to say, is not quite so simple as it looks. Sure there are many places where you can simply walk to some other existence, but what is actually taking place when one does so? And what are the implications of such actions? This chapter aims to answer those questions and more.
In order to understand travel between the planes, one must first understand the planes themselves. Or, more specifically, the way in which they overlap. It is difficult to explain due to the counter-intuitive nature of it all, but I shall try be as clear and concise as possible. Each plane of existence occupies much of the same space as all others, Material included. Yet they are shifted ever so slightly off from one another on a super-physical level that leaves all but one imperceptible to the observer at any given time: The one in the same super-physical state as he.
Indeed, the planar cosmology is vastly different from simple Material geography. The planes aren't laid out geographically relevant to one another as it seems at first glance, but are in fact laid out over top of each other like a stack of parchment. Take the pages in this book as an example. You can only see one pair of pages in a book at a time: the pair it is turned to. Turn the page, and you see different pages with different text. Go to a different plane, and you see a different element with different inhabitants. Unlike the pages in a book, however, the planes seem to have no order to how they are layered. As someone who has plane-shifted many times through magic, I can confirm this. A number of times I have specified "One plane up," or "One plane to the left," as I was plane-shifting (please be aware this is extremely dangerous to those who are unprepared and I don't recommend it be attempted by anyone.) I have concluded no discernible pattern from such experimentation, each time landing in one of the inner planes seemingly at random, though I never stayed on the same plane I shifted from, and never ended up on an outer plane, so at least there are some consistencies there. Exactly how and why the planes are set up in this peculiar, lack-of-structure manner is another matter altogether. It's still something of a mystery and not what this chapter is meant to be about, though I will go on a brief tangent to say this: In a nearly identical fashion to how you can move up or down, left or right, and forward or back, when changing planes, you also move in a similar, albeit completely different fashion. You can move water or fire, earth or air, positive or negative, et cetera. And in much the same way as you cannot move both left and right at the same time, so too can you not move in both directions of a planar axis at the same time (at least not without monumental effort and going against the direct laws of the universe. Most every plane seems to exist in this axial structure, with the exception of a few of the more exotic planes, such as Geth, the Living Plane, and the Plane of Mirrors, for example. Other such axes include Shadow and Spirit, Feywilds and Ethereal, and Material and Dream. The Plane of Wood strangely seems to be the only common inner plane which does not exist on such an axis, which begs many metaphysical inquiries. Is it the first inner plane? Is it somehow connected to all of them? And what would its opposite be if it were to have one? Normally I'm not one to think so philosophically, but this is a matter which has me uniquely intrigued. Enough tangent for now; moving swiftly on.
Back to the book analogy, when one wishes to travel to another plane, one must turn the page of his book, so to speak. He must shift his entire being to a different super-physical state, typically via magic. So, why then are there so many locations where one can simply walk from one plane to another? This is because these specific locations are areas where the two (or rarely more) planes overlap with one another. This makes it so that in those areas, the boundaries between the planes are weaker, or even torn entirely. Where they are weaker, base energies flow back and forth between the connected planes, but objects and creatures cannot; like how water can pass through a gold pan, but the sediment cannot. Using the book analogy, imagine the ink has bled through the previous page, or a flaw in the paper has left it unusually thin in one spot, allowing you to read the text underneath. In areas where the planes are torn through entirely, portals between the planes exist, allowing open passage to anything and anyone small enough to fit through it. But it is also not quite enough to simply say the boundaries are torn; it's something else as well. It's as if they're sewn together as well. Imagine, if you will, that you cut a hole in two sheets of cloth and then lay one over the other. Without something there to hold the cloths in place, you can easily drag one away and the holes are no longer over top of each other. But if you sew the cloths together around the perimeters of the holes, the two cloths are now joined, and become both two separate articles, but also one permanent structure, simultaneously. These permanent portals are very rare in comparison to the places where the barriers are merely thin, but there are 6 very major and noteworthy examples that many of you have heard of. The areas surrounding our 5 main continents are constantly and continuously overlapped with one specific inner plane in the following manner: Positive to the North, Negative to the South, Fire to the West, Water to the East, Air towards the sky, and Earth underground. This mystical overlapping is what creates the illusion that the inner planes exist geographically relevant to the Material plane, as well as to each other.
If one could travel beyond the six planar barriers around our five continents and stay on the Material plane, what wonders would we uncover? Are there other continents out there in the Unknown Beyond? Or perhaps there's something else entirely; something that isn't a continent. Maybe it's something that was intended to be left undiscovered and is better off as far from our realm as possible. Perhaps it is something our minds can't even comprehend. Or perhaps, simply nothingness.
E3 430
I can confirm that the idea that the other planes exist geographically in the six cardinal directions, as seems to be the belief of the common folk in every city and town I've ever visited, is in fact false. Planar travel, sad to say, is not quite so simple as it looks. Sure there are many places where you can simply walk to some other existence, but what is actually taking place when one does so? And what are the implications of such actions? This chapter aims to answer those questions and more.
In order to understand travel between the planes, one must first understand the planes themselves. Or, more specifically, the way in which they overlap. It is difficult to explain due to the counter-intuitive nature of it all, but I shall try be as clear and concise as possible. Each plane of existence occupies much of the same space as all others, Material included. Yet they are shifted ever so slightly off from one another on a super-physical level that leaves all but one imperceptible to the observer at any given time: The one in the same super-physical state as he.
Indeed, the planar cosmology is vastly different from simple Material geography. The planes aren't laid out geographically relevant to one another as it seems at first glance, but are in fact laid out over top of each other like a stack of parchment. Take the pages in this book as an example. You can only see one pair of pages in a book at a time: the pair it is turned to. Turn the page, and you see different pages with different text. Go to a different plane, and you see a different element with different inhabitants. Unlike the pages in a book, however, the planes seem to have no order to how they are layered. As someone who has plane-shifted many times through magic, I can confirm this. A number of times I have specified "One plane up," or "One plane to the left," as I was plane-shifting (please be aware this is extremely dangerous to those who are unprepared and I don't recommend it be attempted by anyone.) I have concluded no discernible pattern from such experimentation, each time landing in one of the inner planes seemingly at random, though I never stayed on the same plane I shifted from, and never ended up on an outer plane, so at least there are some consistencies there. Exactly how and why the planes are set up in this peculiar, lack-of-structure manner is another matter altogether. It's still something of a mystery and not what this chapter is meant to be about, though I will go on a brief tangent to say this: In a nearly identical fashion to how you can move up or down, left or right, and forward or back, when changing planes, you also move in a similar, albeit completely different fashion. You can move water or fire, earth or air, positive or negative, et cetera. And in much the same way as you cannot move both left and right at the same time, so too can you not move in both directions of a planar axis at the same time (at least not without monumental effort and going against the direct laws of the universe. Most every plane seems to exist in this axial structure, with the exception of a few of the more exotic planes, such as Geth, the Living Plane, and the Plane of Mirrors, for example. Other such axes include Shadow and Spirit, Feywilds and Ethereal, and Material and Dream. The Plane of Wood strangely seems to be the only common inner plane which does not exist on such an axis, which begs many metaphysical inquiries. Is it the first inner plane? Is it somehow connected to all of them? And what would its opposite be if it were to have one? Normally I'm not one to think so philosophically, but this is a matter which has me uniquely intrigued. Enough tangent for now; moving swiftly on.
Back to the book analogy, when one wishes to travel to another plane, one must turn the page of his book, so to speak. He must shift his entire being to a different super-physical state, typically via magic. So, why then are there so many locations where one can simply walk from one plane to another? This is because these specific locations are areas where the two (or rarely more) planes overlap with one another. This makes it so that in those areas, the boundaries between the planes are weaker, or even torn entirely. Where they are weaker, base energies flow back and forth between the connected planes, but objects and creatures cannot; like how water can pass through a gold pan, but the sediment cannot. Using the book analogy, imagine the ink has bled through the previous page, or a flaw in the paper has left it unusually thin in one spot, allowing you to read the text underneath. In areas where the planes are torn through entirely, portals between the planes exist, allowing open passage to anything and anyone small enough to fit through it. But it is also not quite enough to simply say the boundaries are torn; it's something else as well. It's as if they're sewn together as well. Imagine, if you will, that you cut a hole in two sheets of cloth and then lay one over the other. Without something there to hold the cloths in place, you can easily drag one away and the holes are no longer over top of each other. But if you sew the cloths together around the perimeters of the holes, the two cloths are now joined, and become both two separate articles, but also one permanent structure, simultaneously. These permanent portals are very rare in comparison to the places where the barriers are merely thin, but there are 6 very major and noteworthy examples that many of you have heard of. The areas surrounding our 5 main continents are constantly and continuously overlapped with one specific inner plane in the following manner: Positive to the North, Negative to the South, Fire to the West, Water to the East, Air towards the sky, and Earth underground. This mystical overlapping is what creates the illusion that the inner planes exist geographically relevant to the Material plane, as well as to each other.
If one could travel beyond the six planar barriers around our five continents and stay on the Material plane, what wonders would we uncover? Are there other continents out there in the Unknown Beyond? Or perhaps there's something else entirely; something that isn't a continent. Maybe it's something that was intended to be left undiscovered and is better off as far from our realm as possible. Perhaps it is something our minds can't even comprehend. Or perhaps, simply nothingness.
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