The Planes: Negative Quasi-Elemental Planes
Our next stop in The Planes series are the Positive Quasi-Elemental Planes
- the elements of entropy and dispersion.
What are the Negative Quasi-Elemental Planes?
The Inner Planes, 1998 WotC
Between the major Inner Planes are the negative quasi-elemental planes that bridge the gap between them and the Negative Energy Plane. Four quasi-elemental planes blend the decaying energy of Negative with the elements, creating worlds of deteriorating elements that focus on the decay and dissolution of elements into nothing. The four planes are Ash, Dust, Salt, and Vacuum, each adjoins a different elemental plane of Air, Fire, Earth, and Water, respectively.
These planes are where elements go to decay and disappear into their final death, while the inhabitants of these planes might see the beauty in this death, it is often outside the minds of living mortals. For many travelers, these planes are almost as dangerous as the Negative Energy Plane and pose very real risks for those who visit them.
History
Much like the positive quasi-elemental planes, their negative versions are first introduced in the Manual of the Planes (1987) where their foundations are laid. It’s not until The Inner Planes (1998) that additional detail is provided on the inhabitants, specifics to the planes, and locations to visit.
An Outsider’s Perspective
Entropy and loss are the main forces of the Negative Energy Plane, and it's influence bleeds over into the neighboring planes. These quasi-elemental planes are deadly and dangerous, their natural element that unites them together attracts those who view death as just a barrier.
Ash
Transitioning from the Plane of Fire to the Negative Energy Plane, Ash is thought to be the cooling of the fire, as no warmth can be found here. Instead, only the remains of material long ago burned and destroyed by fire remains. The entire plane is covered in ash that hangs in the area, restricting vision and creating a poisonous atmosphere for those who inhale in the ash. The ground is thick, made up of millions of thick fluffy flakes of ash that are compressed to create a springy ground that is easy to dig through.
Dust
As the Plane of Earth extends towards the Negative Energy Plane, it begins crumbling, losing the cohesion of earth until it drifts like fine dust through the air. Eventually, these minute particles begin separating further apart as one travels closer to the Negative Energy Plane until it is simply an expanse of black. All material breaks down on this plane, given enough time and proximity to the ultimate plane of deterioration.
Salt
Bridging the gap between the Plane of Water and the deterioration of the Negative Energy Plane is salt. This plane is solely composed of great salt blocks and salt caverns that suck any moisture out of this plane. Even travelers are susceptible as they slowly become dehydrated on this plane, no matter how much water they bring with them. This plane is of an ever draining need, constantly looking to take and quench its never-ending thirst.
Vacuum
This empty expanse between the Plane of Air and the nothing of the Negative Every Plane is known as the Vacuum. As one moves further from the Plane of Air, the atmosphere thins until it is completely gone as you get to the Negative Energy Plane. While there is no atmosphere or anything, in this vacuum the pressure and temperature remain consistent, unchanging. Freezing or burning is not the threat of this plane, but rather the lack of anything. Spells that would transform elements into a breathable atmosphere do not function, like water breathing, and even wings on a bird have no use for this is nothing to flap against.
The Inner Planes, 1998 WotC
A Native’s Perspective
The beings of this plane are living, though many of them are undead. Many of them are rare and rarely see the benefit of leaving their home planes, simply because they are unable to live in places full of so many elements or life. Very few powers make their home on these planes, but it is often visited by those who value the powers of undeath.
Ash
Cold. Grey. Miles upon unlimited miles of ash that chokes all who enter this realm. The inhabitants of this realm are just as cold as the plane they reside on, having little care for others to the point of wanting to convert them into ash themselves. The inhabitants of this plane are largely the quasielementals, beings of ash themselves. They see anyone visiting their plane as intruders, only fit to be killed and turned into the ash. The ash quasielementals have a single large empire focused around a fortification known as the Citadel of Former Flame where they plan their attacks on the Plane of Fire. They hope to one day destroy the plane since once the fire dies out, all that remains is ash.
Rumors swirl that there is a substance on this plane known as mage powder and that it can drain the spells out of a spellcaster. This ash is highly prized and one of the few reasons outsiders intrude on the inhabitants, hoping to find some of this ash.
Dust
This plane is actually home to a large variety of creatures who have merged at least a portion of their essence into the plane. From the dust wolves who prowl this layer in vicious packs, to the sandsnakes, dao, xorn, silt weirds, dust mephits, and the dust quasielementals, this plane has more life in it than many of the other quasi-elemental planes. Of all the creatures on this plane, it is the dust quasielementals that make this plane more dangerous than the hazards. The dust elementals seek something, anything, to destroy and kill. Their relationship to the devastation of this plane is complete and they are difficult, if not impossible, to negotiate with.
For this reason, almost every other creature who calls this plane home either attack these elements on sight or flee. Sandlings, dune stalkers, sandmen, and others have created large settlements and fortifications to act as some defense against these savage elementals, and some can live here in relative peace.
Salt
This gasping, leeching plane can never be satisfied. The salt here drains the very atmosphere of moisture, causing outsiders to immediately feel a gnawing thirst that never goes away. Blood spilled is greedily consumed by the plane and once-living bodies soon wither away, becoming instantly mummified by this plane. The two dominant creatures of this plane are the salt quasielementals, though little is known of them, and the facets, though they stick along the border to the Plane of Water.
The elementals are similar to their plane, looking and searching for something to consume, to fill their salt bodies with something. While they can be negotiated with, it must be done quickly and offer something, like a large quantity of water, to slake their thirst. They can never be satisfied though, and so gifts and materials must be constantly supplied to them. The other group, the facets, reside in the caustic brine waters as they begin their plans. They are hoping to attack the Plane of Water, thus growing their empire across the planes.
Vacuum
Thought of as the prelude to death, this plane is of nothing. No light. No sound. No breath. All around is a vacuum, no materials exist at the closest borders to the Negative Energy Plane. Even the quasielementals of vacuum are beings of no body. Invisible force, that can never be seen, moves through the plane, striking any living creature it finds. These elementals are a vacuum in and of themselves, and if they happen to find themselves on another plane, they flee as quickly as they can as they fear the thick atmosphere. Those who are unable to escape fall into a hibernetic shock state, forming themselves into spheres of invisible force until they can return to their plane.
Beyond the elemental animals of this plane, the plane is also home to a large number of undead creatures like ghosts and other spectral creatures. While there are a few ghouls, most undead of this plane are simply the spirits of those who died long ago and hunt through this plane. The quasi-elementals hate these creatures, for they are still something unlike the pure vacuum that the elementals represent.
Atmosphere
While the atmosphere on these planes takes some influence from the major elemental plane that they bleed off from, they introduce their risks that are fueled by the Negative Energy Plane. Not every plane is breathable, the hazards of each plane are dangerous in their respects, and sometimes the danger of visiting such a plane outweighs the reward of visiting it. These planes can support some life, though it often feels anathema to their place in the multiverse.
Ash
This plane exists without light or heat with choking ash polluting what passes for an atmosphere. It isn’t uncommon to find frozen bodies covered in a layer of ash as any temperature above freezing is considered hot on this plane. Those who visit this plane can’t see further than 100 feet in the clearest sections of the plane and begin freezing immediately upon entering. Anyone who breathes the air, without first casting a breathing spell, immediately begins suffocating on the ash.
The Inner Planes, 1998 WotC
Dust
Much like Ash, this plane has no breathable atmosphere unless you can use magic to fix the air around you. Once you are no longer suffocating, you must then worry about the cohesiveness of your own body. Much like the plane, and how the closer it gets to the Negative Energy Plane, the more matter begins breaking apart, the same goes for visitors. Even magical items can begin deteriorating on this plane, the matter that makes up the item slowly begins separating further apart every hour they are on this plane. Those who spend too long here eventually disperse and their remains scattered across the plane. One of the few ways of surviving this transition is to transform your physical body into a gaseous form using spells and magic.
Salt
Unlike the other negative quasi-elemental planes, Salt does have a breathable atmosphere, though all that does is help dry out your lungs and make visitors thirsty. Salt tinges everything on this plane and there is no way to satisfy it. All visitors can do is go about their tasks quickly as their constitution is slowly drained out of them as they search for anything to quench this never-ending thirst. Those who are unable to escape this plane eventually have all moisture leached out of their skin and they begin growing salt crystals across their body until they die, gaining the appearance of mummification.
Vacuum
This grey-black void of nothing has no breathable air, but still has constant pressure and temperature, and travelers can see almost a thousand feet out, not that there is anything to see. Unprotected travelers will quickly die from asphyxiation, even those who can cast spells to change the elements, like water, into a breathable atmosphere as there is no atmosphere to change. Spells that protect from the elements can do nothing on this plane as there are no elements to protect from. Most visitors only stay as long as they can hold their breath, though some adventurers have devised special spells so that they no longer need to breathe, or don’t require breathing in the first place like undead.
For those that find a way to somehow survive on this plane, they must take care as Vacuum has a terrible effect on inanimate objects as well. Articulated mechanisms, like that found on armor joints, can suddenly freeze and become welded shut, as Vacuum is also devoid of energy. Any object that moves will freeze up in an act known as vacuum welding, and the more complicated the movement and mechanism, like on a clockwork automaton, the faster it happens.
Traits
Travel to the Plane
Traveling to these planes is not difficult, though the number of ways of arriving at these planes is much more limited than if you were trying to reach the major Inner Planes. Known portals connected these planes to Sigil, the Outlands, and many other places across the multiverse, but often these portals are only known by a few or are difficult to locate due to their chaotic and ever-changing nature.
Guides from the major planes can be hired, though they often will only take you to the border to the quasi-elemental plane and further. Many elementals that act as guides will immediately begin dissolving into the new plane as the Negative Energy Plane’s influence begins to dispersing the element that makes up the elemental. It’s quite deadly to bring elements from other planes onto another, meaning travelers and adventurers need to find a guide once they do cross over the planes.
Those dedicated to the Negative Energy Plane often have portals that they guard fanatically, with the Doomguard faction one of the only groups to have a portal to each of these planes. Their devotion to the entropic end of the multiverse, the slow decay of everything around them, has made it so that they have a vested interest in these planes and have fortresses on each one.
While vortices, quick and temporary portals that are often one way, still form at points of large gatherings of elements, these elements rarely exist in large enough quantities in a single spot for a vortex to link to another plane. A vortex to Salt may appear in salt flats, while dust could form inside of the swirling sands of a desert, ash could appear in a thoroughly burned down forest, while vacuum requires very specific conditions of pure nothingness before it can form. Even the space outside of the known world is not devoid of enough matter to be pure enough for such a vortex.
Traversing the Plane
Traversing these planes is difficult for those unprepared, and it isn’t solely because of the inhabitants or the elemental hazards of these planes. These planes are about the decay of all matter and energy, living creatures are anathema to the quasi-elemental plane’s major influence and so these planes are inherently dangerous.
Ash
Traveling across the plane can be easy, as if walking across a spongy ground of grey ash flakes, or very difficult, like digging your way through loose earth that threatens to collapse constantly. In locations closer to the Plane of Fire, the ash is far more compacted, similar to the super-compact fire that makes up the ‘ground’ of Fire. As you travel closer to the Negative Energy Plane, ash becomes more sparse and you can eventually ‘fall’ the same way a traveler would do on the Plane of Air, adjusting their subjective gravity with their mind.
Dust
No gravity exists on the Plane of Dust, making it so that the only way to move is by having some magical ability to propel yourself forward or push yourself off some large dust mote. Creatures with wings have little to nothing to push to fly around, and so ill-prepared adventurers may simply hang in the atmosphere, unable to continue their journey as they slowly fade into dust. Those who are closer to the Plane of Earth experience some gravity, and it gets stronger the closer they get to the border.
The Inner Planes, 1998 WotC
Salt
Much like the Plane of Earth, if adventurers wish to travel anywhere, they must dig through the soft salt that makes up this plane. The elementals of this plane can help expedite this process, as they know where there are safe places for adventurers on this plane, though they charge a high amount and must be constantly pacified. The closer travelers get to the Negative Energy Plane, the less salt they must dig through until it is so loose that they can simply fall in a direction of their choice, like on the Plane of Air.
Vacuum
Just like the Plane of Air, a traveler must simply decide on what their ‘down’ is and they begin falling in that direction. Magic items and spells that give the ability to fly can help travelers move faster across the plane, though any creature with wings can not use them as there is no atmosphere to push against.
Locations
While there are not many reasons to visit each of these planes, there are still a few reasons and so some settlements have formed up. Since these planes link the major Inner Planes to the Negative Energy Plane, they are often seen as a bridge for those hoping to travel in that direction.
Also, each plane has a tower controlled by the Doomguard, even after the Faction War, who value being so close to the entropic center of the multiverse, the Negative Energy Plane. These towers and castles are made by the materials of each plane and the Doomguard expends a lot of energy in ensuring that they don’t crumble away like every other structure on these quasi-elemental planes.
At the borderlines between the planes, it can be difficult to tell where one quasi-elemental plane ends and the other begins. These borders are split across the planes, each creating a realm influenced by their major element, the Negative Energy Plane, and each other, this is similar to the major Inner Planes and how at their borders they have created the para-elemental planes.
Ash
The Inner Planes, 1998 WotC
Ash shares borders with the Negative Energy Plane, Dust, Magma, the Plane of Flame, Smoke, and Vacuum, each creating a unique interaction with the choking ash. Dust and Ash blend together in an ambiguous realm known as the Wasting Place where the frigid cold of Ash and the gradual disintegration of Dust meet. This realm is mysterious, as little is known of this realm and few chose to visit it. Vacuum creates the Sparkling Vast, a realm undergoing the utter emptiness of a vacuum. Before it fully takes form, the ash becomes a gritty residue like splintered glass, gleaming brilliantly when exposed to light. Those who journey through here are subjected to sheer cold that the longer they stay here, the harder it becomes to move until they freeze solid, even those beings of ice have formed statues on this realm.
The space near the Plane of Fire is called the Sea of Frozen Flames, this place of chilling cold gradually gives way to the all-consuming flames of Fire. The sea itself is a place that produces no heat but still burns away flesh as quickly as hot coals, the crystalline fire purifying anything that enters it. As an opposite, where Ash adjoins the Negative Energy Plane, the realm is known as the Empty Winter of such cold that it drains a body’s heat, slowly freezing visitors as the diffused clouds of drifting flakes move across the plane.
Magma and Ash create the realm known as the Cinder Wells, marked by frigid patches of volcanic ash and rivers of glowing magma. Where Ash reaches Smoke, it creates Embers, a vast cloud of hot, stinging heat that still has not yet been cooled by this plane.
There are not many large sites on Ash, though dozens of tiny settlements dot the plane, it is difficult building structures out of the Ash.
Cavitius
Floating out near, and sometimes in, the Negative Energy Plane, this structure resembles that of a gruesome skull. It’s an ancient structure, and no one is quite sure when it was built. Some believe that even the Doomguard, who once held the structure eons ago, weren’t the first residents, that they simply took it over from another group who had stolen the structure from another. The Doomguard can no longer be found here since they were kicked out by a powerful, old lich known as Vecna. Vecna stayed here for some time, but he soon left and now the building lies empty, but its time under Vecna has changed it permanently. Haunted souls, evil specters, and other supernatural creatures reside in these halls, hunting down any living creature that’d try to live here.
The Citadel of Former Flame
Ruled over by Gazra, the Shifting Emperor of the ash quasielemental empire. This citadel was carved from solidified ash by the elementals. Gazra uses undead protectors, like ghouls, wraiths, ghosts, and more to protect himself and his citadel from prying eyes. Few know of Gazra, but those who do speak of a horrible ambition, he isn’t powerful enough to be an archomental, but he is working on it and working quickly.
The Crumbling Citadel
The Doomguard still want to have a holding on this plane, and so when their fortifications, Cavitius, was taken from them, they quickly began work on their next home. The Crumbling Citadel is their attempt to control the element of Ash, solidifying it into a structure, though it is constantly crumbling. Some believe the Doomguard actually like its deteriorating state, that it reflects the entropy in their hearts.
Ever since the end of the Faction War, the Crumbling Citadel has seen an uptick in traffic. Over four hundred Doomguards reside here, as well as hundreds more in the other towers of these planes. They are hoping to consolidate their strength and eventually begin setting up another headquarters at a major city in the not so distant future.
Dust
The Inner Planes, 1998 WotC
Dust shares borders with the Negative Energy Plane, Salt, Ooze, the Plane of Earth, Magma, and Ash, each creating a unique interaction with the obliterating dust. Dust and Ash blend indistinctly into the Wasting Place that forms a choking cloud that tears apart visitors by the natural abrasion of dust while frozen in place by the warmth-hungry ash. Salt creates the realm of Consumption, where any fluid is transformed into granules as it dries out and goes to the ever-thirst of Salt. Living creatures are quickly drained of moisture, their dried husks litter this realm.
The space near the Plane of Earth is known as the Tumbling Rocks where masses of stone crash and tumble into each other, slowly wearing each other down into tiny fragments that fill the plane with their dust. As an opposite, where Dust adjoins the Negative Energy Plane, the realm is known as the Storm of Annihilation. This dangerous and deadly realm whips up winds of elemental force that causes matter to decay and fall apart in an explosion. The battering winds kill in just moments, making it almost impossible for outsiders, and even inhabitants, to explore this area.
Magma and Dust create the realm of Sands, where flows of thick dust is interlaced with rivers of glowing magma. Where Dust reaches Ooze, it creates the Oasis of Filth, a bog of disgusting slime that is half-congealed and thick with disease that even those who are immune to normal diseases can not resist.
There are rarely any permanent sites on Dust as the destructive swirling of this plane quickly destroys anything unless it is protected from decay and entropy.
Citadel Alluvius
One of the only permanent locations on this plane, the Citadel stands on a rotating disc of elemental Earth that is shielded from the consuming nature of this plane by a very powerful wall of force spell. This citadel has the bulk of the Doomguard forces as well as the Doomlord, Pereid, who maintains the Doomguard faction despite the events of the Blood War. Of any place on this plane, the Doomguard are happy to welcome visitors of any kind, for this is their holy site and they believe all should be exposed to the entropy.
Salt
The Inner Planes, 1998 WotC
Salt shares borders with the Negative Energy Plane, Vacuum, Ice, the Plane of Water, Ooze, and Dust, each creating a unique interaction with the draining salt. Salt and Vacuum create the Flats, a vast plain of hard-packed salt. This plain is a dangerous realm of greed, constantly draining travelers of life and breath. Quasielementals find this location to be quite hospitable as they can ignore its effects. Dust creates the realm of Consumption, a realm of sandstorms of dust and salt, breaking explorers apart while leeching away their moisture. Of all the places in Salt, this is the least inhabited
The space near the Plane of Water is known as the Saline Sea, a vast ocean of brine waters. These waves are so salty that no living creature can reside within, that even touching this toxic water is enough to cause deadly blood poisoning, causing outsiders to collapse as the moisture in them escapes. As an opposite, where Salt adjoins the Negative Energy Plane, the realm is known as the Crystal Range. Barren mountains have formed in this realm, reaching to the black sky high above them. Dotted across these mountains are the salt statues of visitors as the negative energy accelerates the leeching property of Salt.
Ice and Salt create the blizzard of Stinging Storms, where frozen pellets strike flesh, forming welts and horrible white scars as the skin is leeched of any moisture. Where Salt reaches Ooze, it creates the Stagnant Sea of caustic sludge that can eat through metal in minutes.
Few structures reside on this plane, simply because the inhabitants don’t value such permanent settlements. Those who have made settlements must carve it from the salt around them, though much of it is quite soft and is prone to collapsing.
Citadel Sealt
Carved out of the barren salt mountains that reside in the Crystal Range, no one is sure if the Doomguard were the ones to accomplish such a masterpiece, and even they have forgotten if they found this structure or built it. To outsiders, they’ll confidently claim they did it, but this structure is such an architectural mystery, carved from salt with no other component to help support it, that it must have taken the most skilled artisans in all the planes to accomplish such a feat. Many of the Doomguard who reside here now after the Faction War are the ones who would like to see the entropic death of the universe happen much quicker, and are finding ways to go about that.
Vacuum
Vacuum shares borders with the Negative Energy Plane, Ash, Smoke, the Plane of Air, Ice, and Salt, none of them creating unique interactions with this endless void. The inhabitants all agree it would defeat the purpose of this plane if other elements were allowed in, corrupting their perfect plane of nothing.
Often called the Empty Reach, or more accurately, The End, this plane is a void. Elements from other Inner Planes that show up here are quickly dispersed into the nothingness, unable to maintain their shape or structure in a realm of emptiness.
Permanent sites in Vacuum are few and far between, with only a handful even approaching something like permanency. While two mysterious powers, Sun Sing and Zal the Destroyer, are said to have their citadels they reside, no one has been able to explore them or even get close enough and survive.
Citadel Exhalus
Also known as the Portal of the Last Breath, it is built around a special gate that allows the occupants to gaze upon the ultimate Destroyer - the Negative Energy Plane. Those who reside here believe that the multiverse is proceeding on schedule to its ultimate destruction, that any attempt to rush it along is foolhardy and a waste of energy. Those who reside in the Citadel are the most ardent supporters of the Doomguard and were the survivors of the Faction War. Rumors persist that they have a large collection of spheres of annihilation and that they are biding their time until they begin using their sphere once again.
Factions & People
The Powers
Like a mirror to the Positive Quasi-Elemental Planes, only one power claims a domain on these planes, and that is Sun Sing. This mysterious entity lives at the heart of a negative energy pocket on Vacuum, though no one knows how it survives such a place as not even the most powerful gods could accomplish that. No one knows what Sun Sing is, some believe it is the last void mephit, an ancient lich or demilich, or some other power of evil and destruction. Sun Sing even has agents and priests devoted to it, guiding them to bring entropy to the worlds.
Archomentals
While Gazra of Ash is not yet powerful enough to claim this title, it hasn’t stopped him from growing his forces and control over Ash. As far as anyone can tell, Gazra is hoping to first grow his power to that of a primordial and then begin an everlasting war against the Plane of Fire, the hope of extinguishing it and gaining even more territory.
Quasielmentals
These elementals are known as quasielementals by sages and researchers of the planes, though the elementals themselves don’t refer to themselves as such. They are thought to be the plane given sentience and are often summoned by the spellcasters looking to trap elemental energies or control elementals in battle. Most of these elementals that walk their plane are simply the animals of their planes, creating the birds, vermin, and natural beasts in varying displays of elements. From sand worms to dust rats, and from salt wolves to the invisible animals of Vacuum, these creatures have a natural place in their ecosystems.
Zal the Destroyer
One of the most powerful, known, entities of these planes, this beholder resides on Vacuum on a tumbling block of ice. This massive beholder is easily double or triple the size of a normal beholder and has over three dozen beholders that follow his orders and carry out his tasks. In addition to the beholders, he also has an army of quasielementals that follow his commands, and allow him to continue his wanton violence and annihilation of every living creature they come across. No one knows what his ultimate goals are except the destruction of all.
Encounters
Dust Quest - Certain magical items, like dust of sneezing and coughing as well as dust of disappearance can be formed from the special dust on its plane. Unfortunately, the inhabitants hate those who would mine out their precious dust and so guards must be called on to protect the miners who gather up these valuable resources.
The Elemental War - Much like how the Blood War is being waged across the Lower Planes between the devils and demons, a new war might start soon but will be against the elementals. Facets from Salt are planning to move against Water, and since they multiply when exposed to water, it could be a very dangerous war that only ends once all of Water has turned to brine. Gazra, of Ash, is also focused on taking over more territory so that he might become an archomental, also known as a primordial. No one is quite sure of his plans, but undead and elemental forces are moving quickly to the borders of Fire.
Rusting Rumors - Located in the Wasting Place, a Doomguard has claimed to have found a decaying city not yet destroyed. They claim of ancient constructs, of flying vehicles with wheels that do not roll against the ground. That, while the city appears abandoned, that entities still reside and that its original occupants never left.
Vecna’s Lost Experiment - On Ash is the old labs of Vecna in the fortress of Cavitius. Ancient power, lost relics, and more could be found in these haunted halls.
Zal’s Last Stand - The beholder has had troubling visions from the Great Mother, the deity of the beholders, that the Doomguard are planning a large assault on his castle. Zal is confident that he will survive, but his dreams keep showing him somehow being defeated. While Zal has never backed down from a challenge, these uneasy dreams keep pointing him to a group of adventurers, maybe they are his saviors or his killers.
Resources & Further Reading
Manual of the Planes (1st edition)
For more information on the introduction of the Negative Quasi-Elemental Planes.
The Inner Planes (2nd edition)
For more information on the locations and people in the Negative Quasi-Elemental Planes.
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