Limbo

There's some souls that insist on "a place for everything, and everything in its place." Well, that attitude may be fine for an inkeeper or other such homebody. But an adventurer has to be able to adapt to changing situations, to use whatever comes to hand. And a true cutter actually thrives on that sort of life.
The Givners like to point out that even chaotic Limbo is in its place on the Great Road, so it falls into a larger, ordered scheme of things. the plane of Limbo is a great testing ground for bashers to see if they're true cutters or not. Limbo tests a cutter's adaptability to the limit, because Limbo is change. Everything here is in a perpetual state of flux: even magic use is affected by the chaos. Adventurers who can survive and prosper under those conditions aren't the sort to retire to a cozy chair by the kitchen fire. No, they're the type that stay-at-home berks end up reciting legends about for ages to come.

Getting to Limbo

Of course the place looks different from last time, you berk! We're in Limbo!

- exasperated planar to one of the clueless

Finding a way into Limbo is much like finding a way onto any other plane. once they get here, most bashers are in for a bit of a shock. Even though Limbo's not one of the Lower Planes and doesn't have their malevolent touch of evil, it's still extremely hazardous. When berks enter Limbo unprepared, there's no telling what sort of terrain they'll arrive in. It can be nearly as dangerous as popping into an elemental plane, and it's even less predictable. For one thing, portals, vortices, and conduits into Limbo tend to open out in no particular place. Portals always fix on some sort of arch, of course, but Limbo's constantly changing bubbling up new arch shapes in it's primal soup and dissolving current ones. And other entryways tend to jump from place to place as well. But even those that have a fixed location are often fixed on just another spot in Limbo's roiling chaos, which means that the conditions there typically change between a berk's visit, even during them. And even those entryways with a fixed destination in a stable, inhabitated spot have a tendency to "misfire" from time to time and dump travelers far from their intended location - agin, usually into Limbo's chaos.
The one exception to all this unpredictability is the gate between Limbo and the Outlands, located at the town of Xaos. It's always there, and it always works. But as the town's ultra chotic nature indicates, the Limbo side of the gate is one of the most turbulent spots in the plane. A basher's gotta be really prepared before stepping through it.

Physical Conditions

Read main article under: Limbo's nasically a big, churning stew of creation, in which earth changes to air changes to water changes to fire, with no fixed duration, no apparent pattern. Most berks who haven't been there find it difficult to even imagine. that's because they're afraid of the concept of total chaos. they assume there has to be someplcae to stand, something to breathe, some way to see. Then they try to build up an image of the rest of the plane from those assumptions. Usually they end up picturing a sort of underwater universe with "chunks" of air, fire, and rock swirling around in it. Other sods imagine a vast airy space with pieces of rock, water and fire. Then they visuallize those bits changing to other elements now and again, and they think thatthey've got Limbo. As usual, they're completely wrong.
A better way to start is with a mental exercise. First, imagine being a free-floating mind, without physical needs. Now, in that free state, picture bing inside a good, thick stew. there's a dense sort of broth that's a mixture of meat and juices, potato starch, dissolved peas and carrots, and whatnot. As the mixture boils, bubbles of air pass through it, dissolving a bit into the surrounding broth, making it frothy. And chunks of partially dissolved meat and vegetables dance around inside the stew as well.
Limbo's like that. If a berk thinks of earth instead of meat, and fire instead of vegetables, and if he considers that there's no natural gravity, no universal up and down, he's beginning to get the idea. The basic nature of the plane is sort of a broth composed equally of all the elements, and there's chunks of purer form swirling around inside. Now add one more ingredient to the picture. Bits of the broth are constantly changing to make new chunks of purer elements, and those chunks are constantly dissolving back into broth. Sometimes they'll switch from element broth to another element to broth to another element so quickly it seems as if a fire turns directly to water, or earth directly to air.
How big are the chunks? Well, they're all sizes, from tiny as a grain of sand to huge as a continent. And in lots of places there are more chunks than broth. How pure are they? Some are nearly as pure as could be found on the Inner Planes. Others are combinations of things, often quite complex. Some are even like pieces of terrain from other planes. There's bits that look like they came from a prime world, complete with grass, bushes, trees, and other terrain, not to mention an envelope of breathable air and normal gravity to keep everything in place. And there's others that look like castles from the Elemental Plane of Fire, or undersea coral reefs, or lofty mountaintops, or whatever else a cutter can imagine.
That touches upon another important point about Limbo. While bits of terrain like things just described arise spontaneously, there is no permanency to them - they dissolve just as spontaniously. Sometimes they last a minute, sometimes a moth - sometimes more, sometimes less - but they always dissipate eventually. But Limbo's primal matter is extremely yielding to sentient thought. By focusing their thoughts, conscious beings can shape the matter around them into whatever terrain they will. And as long as they concentrate on it, it remains in that form, providing them with a safe spot to stand and breathe instead of floating, weightless and breathless in the primal soup. Old hands at planar travel are familiar with the dark of this and come prepared to deal with it. But the Clueless usually suffer from their ignorance. they step through a portal and land in Limbo's chaos, then panic and flounder about. Some poor sods actually die from chaos exposure before they can discover how to mold the local environment to something livable.
Now, most soulds wouldn't find it too surprising that the gods can shape Limbo to their will. after all, they're powers. They don't even have to concentrate to maintain it that way. What's more, their realms stay whole even when they leave for a while to go gallivanting through the Prime Material, or whatever.
But the powers aren't the only ones with permanent domains. there are mortals maintaining entire cities on the plane too. mainly they're githzerai, who have adopted Limbo as their native home. There are also a few town belonging to all other sorts of intelligent races. Some of them are maintained by special watchmen who take turns concentrating on their existence. But in others - usually the larger cities - there are some individuals who can maintain terrain without conciously thinking about it. They're known as the anarchs, and obviously they're highly prized by their neighbors.
For a cutter with the ability, then, Limbo can be shaped to something downright comfortable. So, if that's the case, why isn't the plane one huge resort area? Well, things are never quite as simple as they seem. Sure, a body can make a personal paradise in Limbo, but keeping it's a different matter. See, just like most every place in the universe, Limbo has its share of monsters and raiders. And given that they're native to the plane, they're highly adaptable, and consequently very difficult to stamp out. Nevertheless, berks come here all the time to try.

Magical Conditions

Read main article under: It doesn't take a bloody genius to foretell that as unpredictable as LImbo is, spellcasting there must be chaotic. This is especially true of spells cast within the primal soup where the environment is usually changing even, as a spell is being cast. Solid terrain maintained by a concious mind provides a somewhat more stable platform for magic use, but even there spells frequently break loose from a cutter's control.
As a result, there's a general rule that applies to all spellcasting by wizards and other casters on the plane. In order to cast a spell of any school anywhere within the plane of Limbo, a spellcaster first has to make a skill check with his spellcasting attribute, the DC of the check is 10 + level of the spell being cast. If the roll is failed, the spell slot is wasted and no spell is cast: the chaotic nature of the plane has prevented the spell's effect from taking place. The poor sod of a caster just stands there looking sheepish. In addition, if the failed spell was being cast within the primal soup of chaos, a wild magic surge (see wild magic sorcerers) automatically occurs. If, instead, it was being cast on stable terrain, roll a d20, the failed spell causes a wild surge only on a natural roll of 20: otherwise the spell simplay has no effect.

Limbo's Inhabitants

Read main article under: There are two primary races dwelling on Limbo, the slaadi and the githzerai. The slaadi have apparently been here forever. The githzerai adopted the plane as their own at some time in the distant past, so long ago that they are effectively natives. Primes have some knowledge of these two races, but they make the mistake of thinking them the only dwellers in Limbo. What they don't realize is that Linbo is surprisingly well populated by the sorts of beings they're used to thinking of as their neighbors: humans, elves, dwarves, halflings, gnomes, and such, as well as orcs, goblins, trolls, and their ilk. Limbo is as well populated, in fact, as any of the Outer Planes, inculding the Outlands. It's just that the nature of the environment tends to make the inhabitants a bit more insular than elsewhere. 'Course, a cutter traveling through Limbo is also fairly likely to encounter a Chaosman or two. They come here in droves to let the spirit of randomness soak into them.

Limbo's Layers

Read main article under: A lot of scholars like to talk about Limbo as having various layers, and they even name them, as if hiving them a tag will make them sit still and become a certainty. But the fact of the matter is, if Limbo does have layers, it doesn't respect scholar's boundaries at all. Sure, there are barriers a basher can encounter between one region of Limbo and the next, and there are paths through those barriers. But the barriers are never constant. Even if they were, the Limbo on one side of a barrier is much the same as the Limbo on the other, so there's not much point to them. Worse, the various realms and permanent cities generally ignore any barriers, being found one time on this side and the next time on the other.
So the pragmatist just treats Limbo as one vast layer, without worrying about why the barriers arise. And in that one vast layer lie all of Limbo's various realms, towns, and special features.

Map:
Limbo

Alternative Name(s)

The Neutral Chaotic Plane

Included Locations

• Barnstable
• Fennimar
• Shra'kt'lor
• The Floating City
• The Spawning Stone

Included Organizations

• The Anarch's Guild
• The Converts