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The Neoclassic
2009-01-06, 05:03 PM
Yes, we all know the four main ones. However, I'm curious what others have been homebrewed up or are in some obscure sourcebook out there. What makes something "OK" as an elemental plane or not? Strictly in D&D it appears just to be the "classical" elemenents, but an elemental plane of wood or acid doesn't seem all that far-fetched. And, of course, there are more far out ones, such as the Elemental Plane of Flesh I see someone's come up with. Heck, I'd think that most things you could make an elemental plane for.

So, end of the rambling: What other elemental planes can you imagine might be reasonable, or are you in favor of just the classical four? Know of any good ones to share?

kyoten
2009-01-06, 05:08 PM
How about an Elemental Plane of Sound? This could explain how some people feel like they're flying after a good musical performance. Or how some people can "see" sound.

phoerix
2009-01-06, 05:50 PM
Slime! (http://ah.indolents.com/comic/134)

"Where else would all the delicious gelatin treats come from?"

hiryuu
2009-01-06, 06:06 PM
There's the four classical, then positive and negative, then the para- and quasi-elemental planes of radiance, steam, lightning, mineral, ooze, magma, smoke, ice, vacuum, dust, salt, and ash.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/11/Innerplanes.jpg

...Then there's the para-quasi-demi-elemental plane of ruminants, which has portals running through the United States and whose portal keys are cars moving swiftly down a curved mountain road, which explains where all those deer that seem like they came out of nowhere in front of your car come from.

The Neoclassic
2009-01-06, 06:11 PM
There's the four classical, then positive and negative, then the para- and quasi-elemental planes of radiance, steam, lightning, mineral, ooze, magma, smoke, ice, vacuum, dust, salt, and ash.

Ah, yes. Positive and negative always bored me a bit. What is the distinction between para and quasi, if I may ask? Some of those I can't even imagine how exactly they'd work. Very intriguing though, and excellent picture!

hiryuu
2009-01-06, 06:13 PM
Para-elemental planes are where the elemental planes connect. Quasi-elemental planes form when the elemental planes touch the energy planes.

From Jenkins' Planescape site:

The Plane of Lightning, where Air and Positive Energy mix, is often called the plane of Storms or Lightning Mephit the Vengeful Land by poets. It's like the Plane of Air in every way, except that there is always an electrical storm crashing down upon a body's head. Metal automatically attracts lightning bolts, accompanied by terrible thunder. The mysterious Tower of Storms is the only known structure here, but nobody, even native creatures, knows who lives here.

Planewalkers sometimes refer to the Plane of Mineral (where Earth and Positive Energy meet) as the treasure-trove of the multiverse, but only to clueless who don't know the dark of it. The plane is filled with gems, gold silver and other treasures but it is also very dangerous and well guarded. Native creatures like xorn, pech and dao don't like bashers carting off the elemental stuff the plane comprises. Getting around presents the same challenges as does the Plane of Earth, the difference is that everything has sharp edges that cut like razors. Everything on this plane fossilizes at an incredible rate and berks remaining here too long turn to stone.

Fire and Positive Energy create the Plane of Radiance. Cascading light, brilliant color and mind-numbing illumination fill this plane. Without protection a traveler will go quickly blind. Radiance is as empty as the Plane of Air and as hot as the Plane of Fire; only radiant mephits live here. Near the edge of the Positive Energy Plane stands the blue-lit called Heart of Light, where great healings are possible.

Much cooler is the Quasielemental Plane of Steam (mix of Water and Positive Energy), a misty place so thick with clammy vapor that a berk runs the risk of drowning in it. On this plane there's little other than the mist and the steam mephits; the Tower of Ice has some sort of magical effect over potions and other mixtures blended here.

Air and Negative Energy create the Plane of Vacuum, a void of absolute nothingness; nothing to breathe, nothing to stand on, nothing to fly or swim through. At its edge there is the Doomguard's Citadel Exhalus, drifting anchored by a thread between Vacuum and Negative Energy. If a basher can come up with a way to stay warm and do without breath, he can travel by sheer force of will, using only his mind to move. Some graybeards say that beings of pure thought, without mass or energy, dwell here and possibly travel out onto the other planes.

Travelers on the Plane of Dust (mix of Earth and Negative Energy) find themselves slowly dintegrating, breaking up into the dust of this place. But this plane has a number of native inhabitants: dune stalkers, dust mephits, sandlings and sandmen. Here there's the most popular Doomguard's tower, Citadel Alluvius; its magic protects the bashers within from the harshest aspects of the plane.

The Plane of Ash, resultant from the meeting of Fire and Negative Energy, has fewer inhabitants than Dust and is bad as Fire. In fact a traveler can't breath here and the cinders drain a body's warmth at every turn. This place is an endless sea of cinder and ash. The Doomguard maintain the Crumbling Citadel. A powerful lich Vecna inhabits a huge stronghold here and it's said that once-living prisoners of Vecna are transformed into horrible undead monsters because the proximity of the fortress to the Negative Energy Plane.

The Plane of Salt (mix of Water and Negative Energy) is a forgotten place of dry, moisture-leeching crystalline crust. Some portions of the place are more liquid than others, but much of the plane is dry and parched. Nothing lives here, except salt mephits. A fortress carved of salt itself, the Doomguard Citadel Sealt, can be found in a place within the most solid part of the plane.

The Plane of Smoke is where Air and Fire meet. This plane's filled with foul smoke. A body can't breathe here without magical assistance; the hot atmosphere is completely saturated with choking clouds and noxious fumes. Like on the Plane of Air, down is relative and beings have to fly in order to get around. Few are Earth pockets. There's little native life here to do any building, except for a Place called the Chocking Palace, where Ehkahk the Smoldering Duke rules over smoke mephits and other fume-based creatures.

Fire and Earth combine to form a plane more inhospitable than the Plane of Fire, the Paraelemental Plane of Magma. The efreeti and dao meet here to trade and few other creatures of earth and fire dwell on this plane rather than their own. Otherwise, lava mephits are all a body's going to find here. A basher named Chilimba claims dominance over the entire plane and nobody seems to care enough to challenge him.

Earth and Water merge to form the Paraelemental Plane of Ooze. Mud and slime fill an ocean with no end and no direction. Conditions are like those on the Plane of Water, but the substance here is opaque and thick. Nothing can survive here except ooze mephits. No known cities or palaces exist, even in the few pockets of pure water of fresh air. Seems that the only use of this place comes from its function as a prison; banishments have lead to this plane's pseudonym, the House of Chambered Madness.

Water and Air form the Plane of Ice, wich has a navigable surface and breathable air, and nothing else but ice and snow. Immense glaciers, ice flows, snow fields and frozen seas make up the entire landscape. At the heart of the plane, Cyronax rules over all ice elementals and mephits, hoping to extend his influence eveb onto other planes. This plane produces a rare resources called eternal ice or unmelting crystal; it 's extremely hard and almost unbreakable.

Maldraugedhen
2009-01-07, 12:10 PM
The Elemental Plane of Elemental Planes

The elemental plane of elemental planes is a contradiction. It is an elemental plane composed of miniature versions of all of the elemental planes. This makes it function much like the material plane, only with highly compartmentalized blocks of elemental material. These sections of elemental material are entirely self-contained, and do not react to other bordering elemental chunks, to the point where pieces of the elemental plane of ice can be bordering on the elemental plane of lava and be unaffected.

Creatures from outside the elemental plane of elemental planes are not affected by the barriers separating the miniplanes, however, and so must exercise caution to avoid simultaneously drowning, burning, and freezing to death.

The elemental bubbles vary greatly in size, from pebble-sized to as large as entire cities, however they tend to be the same size in the same general region of the plane. They all share a few basic traits, as well. Gravity is always subjective, and there is no gravity for the elemental bubbles themselves. Time always flows at a constant standard rate, with one day on the elemental plane of elemental planes being equal to one day on the material plane.

Inhabitants of the elemental plane of elemental planes are as varied as inhabitants of all of the elemental planes. True native creatures to the elemental plane of elemental planes are affected by the planar barriers in precisely the same way as the planar essences. A few migrants have made their way here, however, and travel among the bubbles freely, taking what they need to survive from other elemental bubbles.

afroakuma
2009-01-07, 12:58 PM
Para-elemental planes arise from the mixture of two Elemental planes.

Quasi-elemental planes arise from the mixture of one Elemental plane with one Energy plane.

Somewhere on the Net I found the Para-quasi-elemental planes (logical extension) which I refer to as Semi-elemental planes.

They are:

Crystals, Frost
Obsidian, Pumice
Sparks, Fumes
Clay, Silt

Debihuman
2009-01-07, 02:28 PM
Could this be what you mean: http://www.mimir.net/mapinfinity/quasi.html.

Debby

afroakuma
2009-01-07, 02:30 PM
That one, yes.

Zeta Kai
2009-01-07, 05:23 PM
Yes, we all know the four main ones. However, I'm curious what others have been homebrewed up or are in some obscure sourcebook out there.

Know of any good ones to share?

Well, I made the Elemental Plane of Flesh, if you're interested. Homebrew planes are a bit rare.

DracoDei
2009-01-07, 06:07 PM
Regarding The Elemental Plane of Elements(or whatever it was called): That sounds like it COULD be a better way for Limbo to work than it currently is described... of course it would help if gravity was a random, but static directions in some zones, whose borders are totally independent of the borders between elemental zones... and similar goings on with time flow rates... most GMs probably wouldn't go so far as to import the non-euclidean geometry of Hell from "Operation Chaos" but if you are willing to skip the map-board for combats and rely entirely on narration then that could even work...

Icewalker
2009-01-07, 07:18 PM
Wow, that 3d cross-planar diagram of Earth/Fire/Air/Water + Positive/Negative is way more awesome then my simple 2d ring of the four standard elements. I'm definitely using it in my campaign setting, especially considering that I already have the standard 4, with the positive plane above and negative below...

Also, on a more related note, I believe someone started statting up an elemental plane of candy.

Erk
2009-01-08, 01:20 AM
What, no elemental plane of cheese? Home to the weirdest overpowered characters, and delicious havarti?

Seriously though and on a related note, I'd love to see the 3e planar structure revisited in 4e homebrew, looking at hiryuu's awesome figure. I doubt I'd use it but I'd still love to see it.

The Neoclassic
2009-01-08, 01:24 AM
What, no elemental plane of cheese? Home to the weirdest overpowered characters, and delicious havarti?

Seriously though and on a related note, I'd love to see the 3e planar structure revisited in 4e homebrew, looking at hiryuu's awesome figure. I doubt I'd use it but I'd still love to see it.

If only I knew the first thing about the planes in 4.0...

Sereg
2009-01-08, 02:58 AM
Para-elemental planes arise from the mixture of two Elemental planes.

Quasi-elemental planes arise from the mixture of one Elemental plane with one Energy plane.

Somewhere on the Net I found the Para-quasi-elemental planes (logical extension) which I refer to as Semi-elemental planes.

They are:

Crystals, Frost
Obsidian, Pumice
Sparks, Fumes
Clay, Silt

I theorised something simmilar a few years back with the borders between the quasi-planes done to as well as what would result from the mixing of opposite elemental planes. This is better though.

Also Cryonix wanted to convert the borders of the para-elemental plane of ice to the planes of slush and snow, maybe he succeeded.

Athaniar
2009-01-08, 05:57 AM
A plane of slush (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slush_(beverage))? That's a plane I'd want to visit.
Yes, I know what it really means.

The Neoclassic
2009-01-09, 05:31 PM
Thanks for all the responses! Now I am itching to run or play in a campaign to flesh out some of those other elemental planes...


Well, I made the Elemental Plane of Flesh, if you're interested. Homebrew planes are a bit rare.

I did in fact notice it, and I found it quite awesome!

Zeta Kai
2009-01-09, 07:42 PM
I did in fact notice it, and I found it quite awesome!

Good, I'm glad that you liked it. It's pretty well "fleshed out" for a homebrew plane. :smallwink: Someday soon, I will have pictures for it. :smallsigh: