The Planes: Astral Plane
Our next stop in The Planes series is the Astral Plane - the space between everything.
What is the Astral Plane
The Astral Plane, also known as the Astral Sea, is a space between everything. If you are ever nowhere in the multiverse, you are in the Astral Plane. This plane isn’t specifically a plane, but rather a nonspatial nonplane as it has no space and planes are specifically spaces. The Astral Plane has been described as a silvery horizon that extends all around you like you are inside a silver orb, to a dark plane with twinkling lights in the distance like stars and stretching out before you is a sea of silvery cloud-like mists.
History
The Astral Plane was first introduced in the 1e Fiend Folio (1981) and then detailed in the Manual of the Planes (1987). It is described as a barren of bleakness with small motes of matter broken off from the planes it connects. It is little more than a plane of transit to facilitate travel from Inner and Outer planes and most people that travel through the Astral Plane rarely notice it as spells like Plane Shift take them instantly through the Astral Plane.
Throughout the editions, the Astral Plane has remained largely unchanged, it is a silvery-grey all around with clouds of silvery material with motes of matter discarded throughout. In 4th edition, this was slightly changed and the name, Astral Sea, came into use. The Astral Sea became more of a starscape of purple-black with twinkling lights in the far distance, deep silvery-grey clouds that aren’t liquid or mist, and across the ‘horizontal’ of this plane, those clouds become separated so that ‘below’ are where the denser clouds congregate and above the line are the lighter clouds. Most will orientate themselves so that they travel with the denser clouds beneath them.
An Outsider’s Perspective
The Astral Plane is a strange locale for most adventures and, as it is a transitive plane, is rarely used for more than just getting from one location to the next. As the Astral Plane is the location between everything, you can easily travel from one domain to the next using it, and most travelers will never realize they were ever in the Astral Plane. Spells, like Plane Shift, immediately sweep you from your current plane, like the Material Plane, through the Astral Plane and then to your destination, like the Nine Hells or Hestavar.
For travelers in the Astral Plane, and not using it to take you elsewhere, you can find yourself adrift in the vastness of nothing. Depending on the edition, you may only see the silvery-greyness of nothing spanning infinitely all around you. Or you may see silvery clouds forming some sort of horizon that you slowly adjust yourself to with twinkling stars in the distance.
Travelers who find themselves in the Astral Plane are in a strange locale and they should be on constant guard. While there is no atmosphere to speak of and very little to impede your sight, your vision is limited in the Astral Plane. You can only see a few thousand yards out, which means that astral pirates could be just out of range of your vision and heading near your location quickly.
While you are in the Astral Plane though, you needn’t worry about breathing, food, or drink. Time behaves strangely on this plane and while you might spend 50 years here, your body will not age until you leave it. For an outsider, this plane is unlike any you might be traveling to, and it may be a plane you will never leave for fearsome creatures roam the nothingness.
A Native’s Perspective
The Astral Plane can’t be claimed by any creature as it is a place of nothingness, though many now make it their home. Before the arrival of Astral Dreadnoughts, Astral Whales, Couatls, Deities, Githyanki, and others the Astral Plane was only home to the bodies of dead gods. Here they sit, rotting slowly away and many of the now-inhabitants of the plane set up their cities, fortresses, and lairs on and inside them.
The inhabitants of the Astral Plane come in all shapes, sizes, and alignments. It may be solars on business for their gods or githyanki pirates that travelers may encounter. While the solar is not likely to bother you, the githyanki are quick to fall on anyone they think might have treasure or valuables on, or maybe you would just make a good slave.
Those who reside in the Astral Plane do it to take advantage of the fact that you don't age while on the Astral Plane, which isn't entirely true. What most editions agree is that time is relative on this plane, and for every 300 years you stay on the Astral Plane, you only age a day. Unless you leave, in which case 300 years will pass for your body in an instant and you may die of old age before you can stop it. If you plan on spending all eternity on the Astral Plane, make sure you never leave or all the time you've lived will catch up with you.
Atmosphere
Because there is no gravity or atmosphere in the Astral Plane, objects continue to move. This means that arrows fired from bows, rocks thrown, or matter ripped from a plane of existence drifts through the Astral Plane. It's not unheard of for an astral skiff to come under fire from arrows that had been traveling for hundreds of years from an ancient battle site.
But, organic creatures do not exhibit that. In fact, when a creature sleeps on the Astral Plane and they are traveling somewhere, momentum does not keep them moving forward and so they stop where they are until they reawaken and focus on where they wish to go. Non-organic matter is always moving forward because that's what the mind thinks should happen. The Astral Plane is about perception and not actual reality.
Traits
The Astral Plane is a transitive plane, meaning its easy to travel across it but hard to stay in it.
Travel to the Plane
To travel to the Astral Plane, the easiest way is to leave the Material Plane, or it’s reflections, and go to an outer plane or dominion. There, it is far easier to escape the boundaries of that plane and arrive on the Astral. Another way is through the use of spells like Astral Projection, though that requires a powerful spell caster.
Guide to the Astral Plane, (1996) TSR Inc
The best option for many is to find an Astral Color Pool, many of them are only one way, from the Astral Plane to whatever their destination is, though some allow creatures to travel back and forth between them. These Color Pools can be found throughout the Astral Plane and have different colors to reflect where they are going. A few examples are: The Abyss - Amethyst, Nine Hells - Ruby, Mechanus - Diamond Blue, and the Material Plane has a silver pool, though that is only if you are seeing a portal to your Material Plane. If you are looking at a different Material Plane’s portal, like Eberron or Oerth, it will appear as a different metallic color like copper or gold.
A final option of reaching the Astral Plane is by placing a bag of holding or similar magical items inside of another bag of holding or similar. When two extra-dimensional objects like that are put inside of each other, they cause a rift in the planes and are sucked into the Astral Plane tearing along with them anyone and anything near them. This is a bit of a last-resort effort as the items are destroyed in the process, you are randomly deposited in the Astral Plane, and it is a one-way trip.
Traversing the Plane
Traveling across the Astral Plane is far easier than actually getting to it. When you appear in the Astral Plane, one of the first things you will notice is that there is no gravity and no way to propel yourself forward until you concentrate on where you wish to go. Once you focus on a destination, your mind will propel you through the Astral Plane in the destination you wish to go.
The Plane Above - Secrets Of The Astral Sea, (2010) WotC
A faster method of traversing the plane is with Planar Dromonds or Astral Skiffs. They have special sails that can catch the Psychic Winds of the Astral Plane and will quickly take you across the plane to your desired location. These types of ships are rare, and many of them were created by the gods, and only to be used by those the gods have chosen. If you happen to get a hold of one of those god-created ships, the gods will simply drop their power to the astral ship, and it will just become a very nice ship floating forever in the Astral Plane. Though in some editions, you could take spelljammers through the Astral Plane.
Traveling and time in the Astral Plane vary widely and, depending on how familiar you are with where you wish to head to, you may arrive in a matter of hours to a matter of weeks. It is far faster on an Astral Skiff piloted by someone who has journeyed often across the Astral Plane and knows many of the locations and domains you wish to travel to.
Astral Projection
The Astral Projection spell allows you, and 8 friends, to journey into the Astral Plane and leave your physical bodies behind, hopefully in a safe place for your return. This is a safer way of traveling, for if your projected form dies in the Astral, your soul will transport back to your body and you will be perfectly fine. Unfortunately, projecting yourself to the Astral Plane comes with the hazard that you have a silver cord tethering you back to your body.
This silver cord extends behind you a few feet before blending into the Astral Plane and is quite resilient to all damage unless a Psychic Storm damages it, an Astral Dreadnought snips it, or the githyanki pirates have a special silver sword that allows them to sever such cords. If that happens, you die and your physical form dies.
Depending on whether you wish to physically manifest yourself on the Astral Plane or send a projection of yourself, there is always the risk of death and is something each traveler must decide what they are willing to risk.
Manipulating the Astral Plane
Because the Astral Plane is a place of thoughts, dreams, and desires, it reacts accordingly to any creature in it. Though most creatures are far too weak to manipulate the Astral Plane, and can only use it to propel themselves forward. , which ome creatures can manipulate it to a certain extent. The most powerful, the deities and primordials, can create their domains inside the Astral Plane.
In earlier editions, the domains are separate from the Astral Plane, but in 4e the domains are more-or-less located inside the Astral Plane. Travelers in the plane could circle the domains of gods and view into them. Astral Color Pools were used as a faster way of traversing the Astral Plane than traveling for weeks through this dangerous starscape.
Psychic Winds
Sweeping across the Astral Plane are powerful winds known as Psychic Winds, which helps push the astral skiffs across the plane. They are largely invisible and are no real threat until they form powerful Psychic Storms. Natives of the Astral Plane know that if they are caught in a Psychic Storm, they are in deep trouble and the only indicator of them coming is that the area around you begins darkening. If that happens, the only thing you can do is find a Color Portal or try to outrun it, though you will need to move more than 300 feet per round according to some editions. When the Psychic Storm hits, you can be thrown off course, take mental damage or, if you are astrally projected, your silver cord takes damage, which could kill you.
Luckily, these storms pass by very quickly and appear to be harmless to some inhabitants of the Astral Plane, like the Astral Dreadnoughts.
Locations
Because the Astral Plane is the space between everything, there are few set locations inside of it. Instead, there are domains, the lower and upper planes of deities, that you can reach from the Astral Plane using the Astral Color Pools, otherwise it requires traveling huge distances in the plane itself or by finding a conduit that connects two planes.
Domains/Dominions
The gods have created their domains in the outer planes and can be reached through Color Pools. A few of the most well-known domains are Mount Celestia, Elysium, Arborea, Pandemonium, the Abyss, The Nine Hells, Mechanus, and Arcadia. These domains of the gods may be only a few miles across, like Hestavar, to infinite in size, like the Abyss.
These domains are the main purposes of traveling across the Astral Plane and can be seen as safe havens from the denizens of the plane, though a few are just as dangerous if not more so.
Silvery Clouds of the Astral Plane
In 4th edition, before the Dawn War, the gods had plans of creating a silver lattice that would connect all the domains of gods into a single domain that would be known as the Lattice of Heaven. When the primordials attacked the gods in the Astral Plane, they destroyed that latticework and the domains of the gods were either destroyed or separated from each other. Many believe that the silvery clouds that drift in the Astral Plane are the remains of that lattice and that the gods have plans of reforming it.
Fallen Gods
Throughout the Astral Plane are the massive bodies of gods that are slowly decomposing, they are as small as several hundred feet to miles in size. Some have been dead for so long they are covered in mold and barely recognizable in their humanoid-like shapes. These gods are the grave markers of fallen deities, and it is said that where ever a god dies, its body appears somewhere in the Astral Plane, as such, there are a lot of bodies spread throughout the plane.
Many claim that gods can not die, and that these bodies are merely the empty husks that the gods will re-inhabit when they grow back to full strength, while others think that the gods retreated inside their bodies in a type of hibernation, waiting for the day when those who worship them has grown in size. Many religions dedicated to a dead god will build temples on the body and keep away any scavengers or those that would desecrate the holy body.
Tu’narath
The capital city of the githyanki is built atop, and inside, the husk of a six-armed god who has been dead for so long that it’s skin has calcified into a hard stone. The city houses over 100,000 souls and is located somewhere deep in the Astral Plane, its location is a secret and so well guarded that those who do know are so afraid to speak it for the githyanki will seek retribution.
Dragon Magazine #377, (2009) WotC
While this city is largely home to the githyanki, there is still a sizeable population of other races who have been taken as slaves, as well as a population of red dragons, and even renegade modrons who operate one of the only inns in the city.
The city is largely crumbling with plenty of abandoned homes for small groups to hide in from githyanki patrols, though it can be dangerous to go in certain areas as there are occasional shudders that rack the city as if the god they live on isn’t quite dead yet.
Factions & People
While few can say they originated with the plane, many have traveled here and consider themselves native. The few that originated with the plane may be the creation of gods, or an accident of the multiverse.
Astral Dreadnoughts
Massive titans of never-ending hunger move through the Astral Plane hunting down any living creatures. In earlier editions, they were drawn to any creature that was entering the Astral Plane via Astral Projection, and in later editions, they were created by Tharizdun, the Chained God in an attempt to keep any mortals from entering the upper planes and gazing upon the gods, or trying to gain godhood for themselves.
The Astral Dreadnoughts destroy anything in their path and, luckily, can not reproduce, though they are in no danger of going extinct as they are terrifying to behold and it is an incredibly hard task to take down one of them. When they destroy something, they will swallow whole creatures and objects, which get transported to a demiplane that acts as their stomach. The only way of escaping the demiplane is for the Astral Dreadnought to be killed, and all the contents will be spewed across the Astral Plane, which could include treasure and powerful magic items.
Couatls
In 4e, these feathered serpents are typically seen as paragons of virtue, but they just happen to be fighting the right creatures. They destroy the forces of evil, though it is not because they are trying to spread good into the world, it is so they can grow in rank among their society. They gain rank by destroying evil creatures, either by themselves or by their non-couatl designated agents. This causes many, many couatls to scour the Astral Plane looking for would-be adventurers.
They live in massive cloud citadels known as Cloudlands that are rosy-gold celestial matter. The higher the rank of a couatl, the higher their lodgings are in the cloudlands. Many couatls plot against the others at the cloud court in hopes of stealing kills against evil and being awarded higher ranks, though if it has been a while since a couatl's last conquest, they will be asked quietly to vacate their lodgings for another.
Githyanki
The best-known inhabitants of the Astral Plane are the githyanki, these astral pirates ride their astral skiffs looking for Color Pools to sweep into and perform raids, or looking for travelers journeying across the Astral Plane. While they are not natives of this plane, they fiercely claim as much territory in it as possible.
They were brought to this plane when they escaped the clutches of their slavers, the mind flayers. They soon found the body of a dead god and claimed it as their own and have built their city, Tu’narath on it. From their city, they continue to send ships out for their Eternal Crusade, which is to destroy all mind flayers.
The githyanki are powerful psions who practice the magic/sword techniques of gish. They are powerful martial fighters who also wield silver swords that allow them to cut the silver cords of astral travelers.
Quom
The quom were a group of healing-focused people before the time of the Dawn War. During it, the deity and domain they lived on, Lakal, was destroyed inadvertently by Bahamut when he was attacking a primordial. When Lakal was destroyed, she exploded out and the quom vowed to not help others with their healing but to gather every minute mote of Lakal and restore her to life. They then take these motes and add them to their ships which are massive pieces of Lakal that they have found, they hope that one day they can combine their fleet of ships into one and return Lakal to life.
To this end, they can be found scouring the Astral Plane and every other plane for these tiny motes of Lakal they can sense if they are close enough. The problem is that these motes can be ingested, in which case they end up killing people to get that mote, they are not interested in waiting for the person to die of natural causes. The quom resemble completely hairless dwarves but with the average size of a humanoid, and have green, blue, or purple skin with the strongest among them growing a secondary face on the back of their head.
Encounters
There are many dangers in this transitive plane of nothingness. Few can visit this place and escape without some danger to them.
Psychic Storms - A psychic storm is ripping through the Astral Plane, growing in such tremendous power, that it is pulling creatures from their planes and depositing them on the Astral Plane with no clear way for them to leave.
Githyanki Raiders - While traveling the Astral Sea, an astral skiff and red dragon have spotted your adventurers. The Githyanki provide an ultimatum, kill an infestation of mind flayers for them or die.
Lost Knowledge - Deep within the Astral Plane are hidden libraries of knowledge. A sage is hoping to pinpoint the location of one such library, but needs protection from the creatures within.
The Dead God - A long-dead god is floating through the Astral Plane, it’s corpse is, strangely, being worked on by lightning elementals. They believe that if they can reconstruct the electrical signals in the god’s brain, that it will revive the deity and restore it to life. They are unsure who the deity is or when they might restore it, but they are excited by the challenge nonetheless.
Resources & Further Reading
Manual of the Planes (2nd edition)
For a brief synopsis on the Planescape’s Astral Plane.
A Guide to the Astral Plane (2nd edition)
For more information on creatures and locales in the Astral Plane.
Manual of the Planes (4th edition)
For more information on the 4th edition’s Astral Sea.
The Plane Above: Secrets of the Astral Sea (4th edition)
For more information on creatures and locales in the Astral Sea.
Dragon #377
For more information on Tu’narath.
Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes (5th edition)
For more information on the Gith and Tu’narath.
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