The Plains of Existence

From arid deserts to icy mountains, massive forests to unfathomable depths, a world in Dungeons and Dragons offers a great myriad of locations to explore and plunder.

For many adventures, this world will be all they ever know, with no inkling of

anything beyond. But the truth is that the cosmology of D&D is expansive, encompassing numerous

alternative planes of existence. Places where elementals, aliens, demons, fairies, and even gods call home.

Places where an adventurer might find some new friends or allies, or places where they would be

quite unwelcome, or where it might be impossible to visit at all.

This video will only skim the surface of the extensive information that has been written about the various planes of existence over the years,

but it might spark some interesting ideas for some alternative adventures.

The specifics of cosmology for D&D were first presented in an article in Dragon Magazine No. 8, written by Gary Gygax in

1977.

The article, titled Plains, the concepts of spatial, temporal, and physical relationships in D&D,

outlines much of the same structure that we still use today, with the positive and negative, elemental,

astral, and outer planes all present.

The concept of the alternate planes would be greatly expanded upon ten years later in the

manual of the planes for first edition AD&D.

This book would provide much more info about the different elemental planes, the astral plane,

the different outer planes, and others.

Things would become further codified with the introduction of the Planescape setting in 1994

for second edition AD&D, a complete campaign setting that would bring the concept of alternate

planes of existence to the forefront. Planes that would bring the concept of alternate planes of existence to the forefront.

Plainscape would bring the general cosmology of D&D much closer in line with what we know today, and would rename a number of them.

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