#Ocaelum

[niuttuc]

What is a Ghavalek?

Ghavaleks (Arnoss posing above as a reference) are an amphibious species based on Gharials, originating on the mostly-underwater plane of Ocaelum (you can find the planeswalker's guide here for more detail on that "mostly" or for other stuff in this write up, it's long enough already) They are cold-blooded and originated around the warm waters and caverns of the Core near submerged volcanic vents.

They have since allied with the World Family. It's a nomadic (for the most part) group of amphibious cultures traveling near the Surface of Ocaelum (staying close to the sea floor and in the upper caverns of the Core unless they have a purpose further above or below. They joined to have real power in the face of the growing power of the Arcane Spires and the refugees of the Old World some time after they fled to the waters of Ocaelum, with their giant bubble cities.

Ghavaleks are one of the rarer species of the World Family, most families (name of the individual caravans) don't have any Ghavaleks among their numbers, and none have more than a handful, even in the larger groups. Their numbers have been decreasing slowly; they're a rather long-lived species and don't reproduce that much, and the separation into the Family led to this.

They're rare enough that it's common for a Ghavalek to not know much about their own species. Common knowledge is that they live for a long time and are cold-blooded, with some legends that they keep growing bigger with age and may never die of age as long as they can keep safe and fed. Due to their inability to naturally regulate their temperature and warmer waters of origin, they usually live with a magical item to keep them warm and not too warm on them, traditionally a pendant or medallion.

Ghavaleks are mature after a few decades, though they keep growing at a slower rate for a long time after that. In the Family's cultures, they're often depicted as gentle giants and fierce protectors, a symbol of safety. Capable of fighting fiercely both in and out of the water, they make for quite the warriors. Outside the Family, their appearance and size tends to garner different reactions, ones of fear rather than safety.

[niuttuc]

Alright, let’s see...

Ocaelum

By faction, as far as sentient people, we got...

Mainly Elves, humans and corals in the spheres, plus the trees themselves and some rarer people.

Dwarves, a handful of elder dragons, humans, goblins and more in the core.

Merfolks, cephalids and associates in the upper depths. Plus all sorts of sea monsters, some of which are sapient and part of the Shiver of kings.

A smattering of anurans (frogs), lutrives (otters) and axlotians (maybe salamander by type?), alongside many, many others in the World Family. Ghavaleks (crocodile), Selkies (Seal, they don’t count as merfolk here), dolphins (probably whale type), all the spirit-folk that come in as varied creature types as the regular folks of the family, if not more, and a lot more.

Ferely

Humans, minotaurs, elf, sirens, trolls, all very mixed up thanks to demon blood making them fertile with each other. Most people on Ferely have heritage from all of those, and end up leaning more towards one than the others by chance and choice. And sometimes that demon blood itself manifests making the person outwardly more of an Azra.

A handful of those demons are still around. More angels are around, but they come in a few different kinds depending on the religion. The main continent we’ve focused on so far mostly has Angels of Infinite Reflections, that always appear to share the appearance of anyone observing them (plus wings and other angelic additions).

Moloni

Moloni has humans, elves, nagas, viashinos, dwarves, probably other types as well.

There are also Guardians, Angels, Sphinges, Demons, Dragons and Elementals spawned by a source of magic to protect and regulate it. They’re very varied in appearance and magical in constitution, and need to stay within the range of their source to live.

Geonne

Geonne only has humans (left) as base sapient species, though the magic of the plane lets them, under the right circumstances, merge together with any other animal species on the plane, making beastkin of literally any animal species possible on the plane.

Winrovah

Humans, goblins, elves, leonins, nagas, gnomes, djinns, elementals, demon(s), angels, hydras, sphinges, dragons, aetherborn versions of most of those, and maybe a few more species that are extinct or even closer to extinction than the rest, since the end of the world isn’t being kind on ecological preservation.

Fan Character Plane Friday

So I’ve seen some other fandoms have OC days where there is a fun prompt to talk about/develop your OCs every week, and I thought HEY the mtg community has a lot of people with a lot of OCs, maybe we can do it too!

Ok so you know the drill, I’ll give a prompt and you can respond to it by answering directly, doing a doodle, making a custom card, or a little flash fic.

Happy character developing!

Feeling like a fanplane kind of day! What kinds of creature types are on your plane? Do you have any unique types that you made just for your plane?

[niuttuc]

Now that the magic story has come out and we have gotten into spoiler season, I want to ask again how your Fan Plane would weather the Invasion of New Phyrexia?

Alright, in no particular order:

Ocaelum: Was deemed a worthless, dead plane by Gitaxian surveyors, since Realmbreaker emerged in the skies of various plane. As such, Ocaelum's inhabitants didn't even notice anything happen.

Moloni: The specifics of Moloni make defense of Sources orders of magnitude easier than attacking them, which worked out mostly good for the defense of the cities and castles... But not so great for the rest of the plane. Thankfully, the invasion was short enough that most of these bastions didn't run out of food or water or lose a siege, however, there might be upcoming issues from the logistic support of them taking such heavy hits. And maybe much worse if Realmbreaker dug deep enough into the ground to pierce the Nullstone layer and trigger another tectonic eruption.

Winrovah: Ah. Well, Winrovah didn't have much of a defense to put up in the first place, and Realmbreaker evolving in the Blind Eternities means it was protected from the effects of Aether and Void there. However, the same could not be said of Phyrexians it carried. Overall, a lot of death and devastation, and Winrovah didn't need that, particularly when things were looking not-as-grim for the first time in decades.

Geonne: Probably did the most averagely of all these, but it's mostly because I know the least about it. Probably more chimeras there than before, both compleated and not. The hybrids there leave room for a lot of peculiar compleations.

Ferely: Ferely had organized angels and really possessive archdemons that didn't want to lose their people to new masters. There were losses, but none of the archdemons fell or embraced compleation, so the worst was avoided. However, probably some compleated Saints and Apostates that created a bit of Havoc.

The Haven: Benefit of being aware of the threat well in advance, of having faced it before, and of having already prepared interplanar countermeasures in place. The actual structure of the Haven was mostly abandoned aside from one aisle before, but most of the population of the (small) plane was able to take refuge into it temporarily by occupying those parts of it. It held.

[niuttuc]

If you were to make a brand new plane, what cultures, time periods, myths, and folklore would you take inspiration from in order to make it?

Also, are there any underrated races that you would like to put more lore into?

Oh, I believe I have something for you.

I have a few planes. In this case, not one I made by myself but one I have... Some form of custody and most of the hands in the magic version of. There's a few others that I have, made by myself or with others, but they don't have written out planeswalker guides.

[niuttuc]

For your walkers, what was their first impression of the plane they first ‘walked to?

Vaalin (Dominaria -> Theros): He didn't often see the sight, be it by day or night, but he was pretty sure it didn't usually look like that. With that said, he was too disoriented by the previous experience to appreciate it too much at first. He was in stretched time during his very first planeswalk and just had taken a beating so plenty of pain lingering for minutes or hours while also experiencing the Blind Eternities for an extended period.

Ivegard (Lorwyn/Shadowmoor -> Zendikar): COLD.

Zarunpel (Eldraine -> Kaldheim): She was convinced for quite a while that the change of scenery was just some trickery of the Wilds, a fae or witch of some kind. The MIA knight there that talked to her about other worlds and other crazy stories didn't help.

Anedia (Ravnica -> Lorwyn/Shadowmoor): She spent her first month or so on Lorwyn in magical sleep by faeries feeding on her dreams, after having dodged sleeping for possibly over a year with her own magic. Waking up was quite rough but also refreshing. And pretty stressful once she realized how much time she'd missed.

Arnoss (Ocaelum -> Theros): Considering he'd just lost his family and failed to take avenge them, he had other things in mind. Theros was mighty confusing though, leaving water to swim into air, and with some kind of infinite empty space above to fall into.

Arega (Lorwyn/Shadowmoor -> Ravnica): Arega doesn't remember their first time planeswalking, it was before they were properly them. But one has to imagine they were lost and confused.

Dolores (Ferely -> Fiora): She didn't know where she got banished, but she initially assumed it was to a distant city on her own plane. It ended up being a city in Trest.

Dancing-Hands (Kamigawa -> Tarkir): It was even more disorienting for Dancing-Hands than most planeswalkers considering he lost some of his memories immediately before his first planeswalk. His best assumption was that he'd somehow broken reality and created a new world by accident, but he didn't know how.

Lhur (Fiora -> Ocaelum): Where am I, I need to get back. Though he was momentarily distracted and in awe of the sight of a lifetree and the inside of its lifesphere. Lights, ambience, smells, sounds, everything.

Nyrhen (Lorwyn -> Naya): The vegetation around him is wrong. Too big, inorderly.

Kinahel (Zendikar -> Eldraine): Similar situation as Arnoss, lost everything they'd ever known or loved, and now faced with an unfamiliar environment... One with some very inviting lights.

Sezashi (Kamigawa -> Lorwyn/Shadowmoor): (will wait until we know more about Lorwyn/Shadowmoor's current state in the return)

Yes, that's a lot of Lorwyn, but by coincidence my "main cast" of planeswalkers have ALL the representatives of people from or first planeswalking to Lorwyn. Statistically, Dominaria is more represented among the wider cast, but these are strangely focused on Lorwyn.

[niuttuc]

Now that March of the Machine story has been fully released I can ask, how did your ocs weather the Phyrexia invasion of the multiverse?

Arnoss: Was on Ocaelum prepared to defend it from an invasion that never came. Now feels bad he did "nothing to help" during it.

Zarunpel: Worked alongside her sisters to keep her home and land safe even after the courts fell. The Alernis territory has the advantage of being closer to the Wilds and their influence, which the Phyrexians had a very hard time dealing with. It doesn't always make sense to Phyrexians which tend to be very scientific about things. Also, with the help of a couple of her sisters and borrowing her mother's sword, she fought @socialpoison's Traenor in his compleated arm and armor, and subsequently cut.

Ysara: She defended the Kaladesh village her home was nearby from. She died in the process, and left to her apprentice/assistant to clean up her skull and bring it to where she was from.

Farell: Heard about the troubles in Paliano, and couldn't resist coming to help Celin, the woman he loves. She was fine, though there was a lot destroyed. Also them being in contact again has led to exchanges about Farell's brother's death that makes everybody involved very sad, because they're living a tragedy.

Dolores: Thankfully her home on New Capenna was in the Mezzio, not on Park Heights. Her partner, @astrisjanus's Inza, stayed back on Capenna to fight the Phyrexians while Dolores herself took advantage of the chaos to go back to her home plane of Ferely. She was aiming to enact a vengeance there unnoticed. She was noticed.

Lhur: Recently consolidated his position on power and prepared his troops when he heard of what may be coming. When it happened, he saw no choice but to climb on his father's throne of shadows to coordinate actions and defense all across his country while channeling his own magic to limit the appearance of branches and portals over it. He emerged from the invasion exhausted, and then came the weeks more of exhausting work to manage the aftermath.

Jaspar: He was on Ikoria, in Indatha, trying to both survive and learn what he could of Nethroi and the Whispers. He fought how he could during the invasion and capped it off by using his magic through his Elderfang and spread over Indatha by Nethroi's whispers to call upon the echoes of Indath and essentially end Phyrexian (and some non Phyrexian) life in the area. He came back to Kaldheim to news of the death of his deity, Koma, and of the very foundation of Kaldheim. He doesn't yet fully accept the truth of that.

Alamir and Nksdv: They had been on New Phyrexia for intel and action for months by the time of the Invasion. Their last contribution to hinder the phyrexians was to remove their anti-planeswalker defense that scattered the assault team, before the Invasion even begun. It turned out to be a compleated planeswalker linked to Realmbreaker, @socialpoison's Ellidus. Alamir removed them and carried them away from the Tree, trying to reason with them and break through Norn's programming. Alamir knew what it was to be made and treated as a weapon and empathized with them. Seeing the planar instability before the end of the planar swap, Nksdv took them back to the Haven, and left Alamir to choose for themselves if they wanted to see the end of their world.

Sezashi: The orochi was fighting on Kamigawa, grown to oppose a compleated mech, and got stabbed by a branch of Realmbreaker in the back. He survived, and Norn's death rendered the oil inert before he could be compleated, though he might have a more metallic scar in his back now. While he was out, he received visions and ideas from the Myojin of Cryptic Dreams, but the Myojin is aptly-named, and he hasn't fully understood them yet.

Nyrhen: Fighting on another plane, then as soon as he got wind of the fact the attack was on every plane, went back to Eldraine to defend his Sanctuary in the Wilds. He killed a lot of Phyrexians that "happened" to find their way towards it.

The Cursetamer: She lost a lot of her collection of Apostates from Ferely on Innistrad and most of her planeswalking agents to compleation, and even she and her wife had trouble getting things under control after that. Her people actually helped her for once instead of the other way around, even if their home gave to Realmbreaker. Her latest Mana Core prototype was also lost, but that one self-destroyed before it could be compleated. Due to its nature, it had more safety features and contingencies than actual functions.

Kinahel: She was on Winrovah, fighting in a corner more desolate than average, in case she needed to use the Worldslayer or lose it into Void and hope for the best. Anything better than letting Phyrexians get their hands on it, even if she had no idea of the potential consequences. She burned herself out fighting and died as soon as she stopped (this is fine, she's a phoenix).

There's more but that's already plenty and I don't want to pollute people's timelines any more than that. If people want to know more about any of those or other characters, either for this arc or in general, you can ask!

[niuttuc]

The Spirit Kindred

This is an exploration of the Spirit Kindred and some of its members, an important part of Ocaelum’s World Family. If you aren’t familiar with Ocaelum, I invite you to read the planeswalker’s guide. I will once again add the disclaimer that I didn’t create Ocaelum, merely love it very much and spinned off a version of it of my own, with its creator’s permission, @gentlesmolgruulgal​. With that out of the way...

The Spirit Kindred is a single name for a very eclectic ensemble of beings, unified by little other than their stories and names being told in all or part of the Family. Gods, heroes, monsters, elemental, concepts and creatures of all kinds fit under this umbrella, as varied as the Family they’re also a part of. They number in the hundreds at the least, possibly in the thousands, but each member of the Family will typically only know a few dozens to a hundred, some only by name. Elders learn about many in their studies, and oftentimes recount their stories to their family for both entertainment and teaching.

Many members of the Spirit Kindred see each other as belonging to a common family unit, just like a singular group or caravan would in the World Family. Some also see themselves as part of a specific caravan family. The majority of them see themselves as member of the World Family at large like any other member, seeing people who aren’t part of the Spirit Kindred as cousins or nephews or even children. Like any family, particularly one as large as this, the Spirit Kindred is full of complex relationships. Some closer familial relationships for beings of common origin, some grudges, some rivalries, and more.

But all of this is pretty confusing, so let’s look at some examples!

Luck is exactly what they sound like, the embodiment of Luck. They don’t stem from a particular culture, or rather, they exist in some form in most of them. In some they’re a god, in some just a common figure in stories, but in the Spirit Kindred, all of these are Luck. They say they're as old as the first person that left a decision to chance, though they aren't consistant as to who that was or what the decision was... Or the result of it. They are a physical being, though they aren’t necessarily always manifested. They appear as a wide range of different species, including some that wouldn’t make sense in the current context, like a human in deep waters or a merfolk in the core. According to them, they can’t manipulate chance or the odds of anything happening, as subject to the whims of fate as anyone else... But things tend to work out well for people in their favor, regardless of outcome. They accept the chaos of the world and believe that there’s a silver lining to anything that happens, even outside one’s control.

Va’ver is a selkie, and her story was told by them before they became a small part of the Family. According to her legend, she was only born in the dreams of her parents, her physical body dead in the womb, yet there she thrived. It is said that for years after that, her people made sure there would always be one asleep, to provide shelter and take care of the child. That was centuries ago, and Va’ver is now a valued member of the Spirit Kindred, keeping herself occupied and entertained by watching the dreams and nightmares of her current hosts, and sometimes helping them in their sleep. It is unknown how she moves from dream to dream, physical distance seems to be a factor, but so does familiarity and others. Despite living in dreams, she never sleeps herself.

The Grey Devourer is a widely-known figure in the World Family, but also is a mystery and recurring figures in stories. There are conflicting stories to both his origins and what he is. Some say he’s a physical monster, digging somewhere in the core or swimming somewhere in the depths. Some sources say he’s from the Old World, and he came to Winrovah along the humans and the elves. For some, he’s just a deity, or even hunger personified. There’s legends that he’s a very old Ghavalek who never stopped eating and growing. Attracting the attention of the Grey Devourer is something to be avoided. To avoid it, it is customary to leave parts of any creature killed for food behind for him to find and feast upon. He’s not picky, and generally the parts left for him are ones that aren’t considered edible by most species.

Galili was an Anuran witch, and the one that led the effort into her people joining the World Family, and the World Family being created as it is today. She weaved the pact, oral and magical, that bound together Lutrives, Anurans and Axoltians, and then others beyond. More than that, it is said she’s the one who convinced most of the Spirit Kindred, of the various pantheons and myths from the various cultures, to accept each other and not oppose their people coming together. Galili is long dead... But that doesn’t stop her from taking a look when something interesting happens, or sometimes finish stories about her when she doesn’t like how it is told.

The Flock Dancer is a goddess of lutrive origin, associated with herd animals, mostly fishes that form schools, but also keeps an eye on most animal life for some of her siblings in charge of other forms of life. Her followers address a short warning and prayer of sorts to her before they hunt or kill any animal with premeditation. She very rarely manifests in a physical shape, if ever. Generally benevolent, but there are stories of her cursing those who anger her to swim alone in the infinite expanse of water, the ground out of sight and never finding any other sign of life until they starve, never to be found again.

This is what I have for now, but it is but a sample of the infinite variety that exists within the World Family and its Spirit Kindred. Safe travels, cousins!

[niuttuc]

Planeswalker’s Guide to Ocaelum

(Ocaelum is a world originally created by @gentlesmolgruulgal​ and developed later by herself and I. She then kept on working on the world and turning it into a D&D setting as I, on my end, kept coming back to it regularly as Arnoss’s home plane and a very fun place. The two diverged on many points since into two versions of the same world, but most of the base concepts are from @gentlesmolgruulgal​, presented here within my version of the world with her permission. All art of the world presented here, within cards or on their own, are also by her skillful hand, and used with her permission. Without further ado, let’s jump into the proper guide. Be warned, it is fairly lengthy.)

Ocaelum is a rarer type of plane, one that mostly exists underwater. The most active place is on the floor, between the caverns of the Elder Smiths and the colder waters of the upper depths. There, people used to worlds with air and flying suns will feel most at home, living among elves and humans under the care of the Lifetrees. The currents between those are the paths of the Family, trading and exchanging with everyone who agrees to it. Above are the waters of the secretive merfolks known as the Vhigg'ithu, though most of them claim that their empire spans all of Ocaelum. Below the ground, you’ll find breathable air once again, if in an even more closed environment. The old dragons and their dwarven followers live in a vast network of caves and tunnels, according to them both their cradle and their creation. It is lit dimly by bioluminescent mushrooms and the occasional molten rock. Whether natural or artificial in origin, large parts of the system have definitely been carved and remade in service of the underground civilizations.

One cannot mention bioluminescence without explaining the peculiarity of Ocaelum’s waters. On most planes, water gets darker, colder and more oppressive the closer you get to the ocean floor. On Ocaelum, that process works in reverse, with water near the ground being relatively bright, warm and comfy compared to the somber waters above. It is hard to ask locals about this phenomenon since it’s the norm for them, but there’s mentions of a “sun below” which could explain the temperatures, and the Lifetrees themselves generate light from the water around them and the leylines they’re rooted on. It is hard not to wonder what's above, beyond all this water. But even if the merfolks didn’t pose a threat to anyone who would go look, the conditions quickly become unlivable for anyone but them. Attempts to planeswalk to Ocaelum on higher ground or waters have not proven successful yet.

The Arcane Spires

The first thing most ground-dwelling planeswalkers often notice upon arriving on Ocaelum are the branches above, and most likely soon after, the gigantic tree they belong to. While magical and giant trees aren’t all that uncommon a sight around the Multiverse, there’s something unique to one bereft of leaves, with something resembling a sun trapped right below its branches. Its light ebbs and flows as hours pass, giving the area around it an illusion of day and not-quite-night. Lifetrees like those exist all around the floor of Ocaelum, multiple dozens at least. The branches criss-cross over a sphere of air, all the way down to the ground, a passthrough membrane between them keeping the ever-present water of Ocaelum at bay, and extracting from it the life-giving air, warmth and light they provide. Most of them, except maybe for the youngest of sprouts, have a settlement established under their protection. 

From small town to city, the living spaces are generally kept closer to the trunk, while the agricultural space to feed that settlement is kept to the outskirts of the lifesphere, where there’s more surface and they’re closer to the root tunnels for trade. Those long roots are half-buried, connecting lifetrees to each other into four mostly separate networks, they call them councils, over the entire world. Over their length, small growth or fruits of sorts provides light for travelers. The waters around a lifespheres are often almost as animated as the spheres themselves with all sorts of work and leisure a marine environment allows, enchantments and equipments to live within the water for hours at a time being commonplace.

Life in the Spheres

The Coral

The Coral are simply named, but they’re one of the most unique species on Ocaelum. Made of flesh and plant alike, the closest analog is probably other planes’ dryads. They keep a close relationship with the tree they’re tied to, communing with it often in a way that isn’t as open to members of other people. They tend to be very protective of their home, tree and everyone in it, and as such are often found in the tree’s fighting force or more spiritual roles. The material that grows on their body is also occasionally used as building material, in place of wood that’s much harder to obtain. It is mostly used in homes of Coral themselves, or buildings closer to the base of the tree or along the trunk itself, but it’s not that unusual to see it elsewhere. The Coral are the only major fully-amphibious species living in the lifespheres, but generally stick close to their home, with a few wandering exceptions and diplomats sent above, below or to other spires.

People from the Old World

Other than the Coral, lifespheres are mostly populated by elves and humans, not too dissimilar from most other planes. In fact, their legends claim that they were brought to Ocaelum centuries ago to escape a cataclysm by their gods, who made the trees to protect and sustain their people in this new environment dominated by water. Of course, this raises as many questions as it answers, and if it is true, very little remains from that time. Even the oldest living elves seem to have very little information on the “other world”. It likely has some part of truth, they wouldn’t be the first civilization to be moved to another plane for their safety, but the choice of one like Ocaelum is peculiar, requiring incalculable efforts in the creation of the Spires to sustain those people and adaptation of those cultures when many other worlds would likely have been a better fit.

This shared origin and the isolated settlements they’ve lived together in for centuries made the elven and human cultures and populations mingle much more on Ocaelum than most other planes, enough that they can be discussed together, at least within the spheres. The vast majority of them show heavy respect and deference to the Spire protecting them, often similar to one that would be given to deities in other societies, though there’s also many that only see the tree as a distant but ever-present aspect of life.

Moreso than Elves, humans can also be found below ground, having made a life for themselves over the centuries alongside or among the dwarves and dragons residing in the tunnels. Those will be expanded upon later, but they appear to be from groups that split from the rest of the population when they arrived from the Old World.

Lifetrees and Lifewood

Also known as Arcane Spires, or just Spires, Lifetrees themselves have a consciousness, and are the origin of larger scale decisions. They seem to communicate amongst each other across the root network, organizing into four “Councils”. Trees from different councils have different traits, looks and seem to be constituted of slightly different wood. Organizations and policies within each lifesphere tend to be somewhat consistent between spires of the same council, though there’s plenty of variation. The four councils are known as Foji, Adun, Pylo and Nokel, which are usually appended before the name of the settlements they care for. 

Their decisions and thoughts, when they need to be, are usually communicated through Voices, clerics they can converse with, most often Coral. The number of Voices in each sphere depends on the size of it and the whims of the tree, who’s the one to choose them. Or to choose the process they’re designated by. There’s talk of some trees that are their own voices, creating avatars to interact directly within the sphere, but it’s not common nor something I was able to observe.

The Spires have more than voices, and they seem to keep very good attention to everything that happens under their care. It is said that they are able to see and hear everything and everyone their light touches. Some of that at the very least is true. A few planeswalkers recount being approached by a Voice soon after they arrived on Ocaelum for the first time inside of a lifesphere.

Lifetrees are the only trees found on Ocaelum, and as such all wood comes from them. Once dead and harvested from inert branches or roots, it acts much like any other wood, with different properties depending on the Council. Despite the size of the spires, it is still rarer than on most other planes, and is rarely used directly as building material. Though in some places, elves have devised a way to help the tree grow in ways that support buildings, making roots part of the architecture itself.

However, wood from Lifetrees doesn’t always die when separated from the rest of it. At the trees’ whims, wood cut from living parts of them can be Lifewood. Lifewood is one of the rarest resources on Ocaelum, but it is also one of the least valuable. It is more resistant than regular wood, but beyond that, it harnesses and produces its own magic, being able to sustain and activate indefinitely enchantments placed upon it, as long as they don’t need too much power. However, Lifewood can only ever be freely given. If stolen, sold or even just bartered with, it quickly dies, and becomes no different from any bit of wood across the Multiverse. How Lifewood divines when or in what context it changes hands is a mystery, but it seems no way to trick it has been found. Except maybe when it comes to the trees themselves, who seem to forego their own rules when it comes to the Family, their arrival sometimes celebrated by a “ceremonial gift exchange” which often involves Lifewood on the part of the Spire.

Tensions and the collapse

In the past few decades, tensions have been rising between the Spires and the Merfolk Empire above, as the Lifetrees have claimed more and more of Ocaelum’s grounds to house the growing populations within. The merfolks still perceive all waters on the plane to be theirs, and even if they seemed to tolerate the lifespheres as a separation between them and the dwarves, who they seem to share an ancient grudge with, they seem to dislike the possibility of losing direct access to the grounds of most of the plane. Those tensions have led to both more discussions, and more raids and excursions from “rogue merfolk agents”. 

While the lifespheres are well-protected, there’s been many people taken from the root tunnels and some caravans of the Family in this time. At one occasion, about fifteen years ago, things went beyond that, with a show of might and a coordinated assault on Adun Talandis, one of the larger Spires, that resulted in the death of the Lifetree and the subsequent flooding and destruction of the city. The few survivors were too far to know the means the Vhigg'ithu employed for killing the tree, but the empire claimed that assault, unlike the others. This massacre is remembered as the collapse of Adun Talandis, or simply the collapse, and even fifteen years later, it is still very present as a source of anger and fear in the population of the spheres. It is the only record of a Lifetree’s death so far.

The Core of the World

In and around the lifespheres, all over the world, are the glowing entrances to the expansive tunnels of the core. The glow comes from the mushrooms keeping the water out of most of the caves, by what seems like a similar process to the one used by the trees, on a smaller scale. From caverns big enough to house cities to tunnels that only serve as passage to small bugs, there’s most likely more space underground than in all of the lifespheres combined, an entire world of its own.

The lighting is dimmer than on most planes, and takes a bit of getting used to for some people, but is decent in the inhabited parts of the tunnels. The same kind of fungal life that seals the entrances was domesticated to do so, always glowing slightly, but a bit more when someone’s near. Temperatures are higher there than in most lifespheres, rising as you get down to the dwarves’ territory, deep down, to something akin to what’s found in tropical environments. But very dry. Most tunnels and caves that are regularly used have been carved and tamed, enough so that as long as you don’t veer too far off the path, you might just think you’re in a colossal, windowless building. The Core, as its inhabitants call it, is old, much older than any of the lifespheres above, and possibly older than the Vhigg’ithu empire itself.

The Elder Smiths and the Dwarves

The Elder Smiths is the name the dwarves gave the powerful dragons that oversee their people. According to their legends, the five Elder Smiths were born from the stone of Ocaelum and hatched from the sun at the center of the world, the sun below. They dug the core as they shed the fragments of the sun they took with them, leaving behind what would become all life in the caverns as they found each other and became what they now are. With the embers still clinging to them, the dragons, for the first time, created life with purpose.

Thus were made the first dwarves, the first-forged. The Smiths took their creations with them, each a few. The dragons taught, and the dragons learned. Learned to care, learned to love, learned to be loved. Learned that what they did was right, learned what they did wrong.

As time passed, the Smiths created more dwarves, each their own, and they offered the first-forged to be remade with the knowledge gained, into more perfect forms. Many accepted, a few remain to this day. That tradition stands. Every so often, by choice or by need, every dwarf is reforged by the dragon they follow. Into a new shape, into a new life. It is unclear if this is a form of reincarnation or just of renewal, but most of the newly reforged dwarves choose to keep the name from their previous life.

The dwarves see themselves as the cherished and perfect creations of the dragon who made them. They see themselves as belonging to the guild of their Smith, but occasionally one will change guilds during their life, and sometimes be reforged in the process. The dwarves, the guilds, and the dragons themselves, are fiercely competitive and will often have various contests at all levels, be them large annual celebrations or everyday individual rivalries. Though grudges and contests can carry on for decades or centuries, it seems like no open conflicts between the guilds has never occured over all of dwarven history.

The dwarves look similar to the ones on other planes, short and stout humanoids. Unlike the ones from most other planes, Ocaelian dwarves are significantly heavier and stronger than they look, which they attribute to the metal they were forged from, and their eyes tend to glow their color while in the dimly lit environment of the core. There’s relatively few dwarves on the plane, with them estimating their numbers in the few thousands at most over all of Ocaelum. They typically feed on the everpresent mushrooms and other plant or bug life from the core, but they eat little compared to other species.

While different guilds focus on different values, they all share the same overall set and they all function as individual societies that occasionally mix. Out of themselves and others, they value creativity, drive, perseverance, organisation and respect above all. While the dwarven society understands the concept of money, as it is used within other species’ trade, dwarves don’t want anything to do with it, preferring to barter goods, trade favors or services, or simply help and give to each other when needed. That policy extends to trades with the rest of the plane, the dwarves’ art and artifice being valued by both Spire-dwellers and the Family.

The Smiths and the Empire

The Smiths, and by extension the dwarves, are vocal in their opposition to the Vhigg’ithu empire, as well as the merfolks’ signature necromancy. The subject seems taboo, but this seems to be the result of more than differing ideologies, the merfolk empire having, far in the past, before the first seed of a Lifetree was planted, committed an act so heinous to the Smiths their hatred and disgust lasts unwavering to this day. What that act was is unclear, something to do with someone being stolen, or something being killed, or maybe the other way around. Dwarves seem either unsure or uncomfortable when asked, and given their reactions, asking an Elder Dragon directly seems more dangerous than the answer would be worth.

Their different environments and the Spires between them keep them out of armed conflicts for the most part, but the Empire is likely the main reason martial training is maintained and encouraged for dwarves, and not just to defend themselves against or hunt the larger beasts found within the Core. Occasionally the merfolks try to flood or attack through a tunnel, and there’s been more than one dwarf who felt like they ought to take revenge through a contraption and was lost into the vast ocean.

Humans of the Core

The Core is also home to many humans and a few elves, in fact, probably more than dwarves overall. Refugees from the Old World that didn’t trust the elves’ Lifetrees or wanted to go on their own, or more recent immigrants that didn’t find a home on the surface. A number of them live among dwarven society, either joining a guild or staying neutral and providing services for all. There’s even a few stories of humans being so respected as part of their guild they were reforged into a dwarf of their own.

The rest formed their own cities and societies in uninhabited parts of the Core, often closer to the surface. They tend to be hardier people than the ones living under the Spires, having to survive a harsher environment with more common and dangerous predators. Unlike the Guilds, the Empire, the Councils or even the Family, humans of the core aren’t organized in any one united structure. Each group works differently, sometimes completely, and the few laws are local at best. Their contacts with other factions on the plane is second only to the empire’s, and is generally more commercial than diplomatic. 

Humans underground tend to come in paler colorations and are much more accustomed to the core than ones from the surface, who know and expect the light of a Spire. A common tradition passed between them is to reduce the local mushrooms into a paste and apply it as paint, or even tattoos, as a way to notice and identify each other at a glance in the dark that the beasts of the core dismiss as just more of the mushrooms.

The Upper Depths

As one rises in the water, the ambient light fades, cold seeps in, and soon even the shining beacons of the lifespheres below disappear from view as the oppressing waters of the upper depths start, and continue seemingly without end. Few things live up here, or maybe many more than you can see. Those waters, all of them, all around the plane, are under the dominion and rule of the merfolks that were born in it, the Vhigg’ithu empire.

The Vhigg’Ithu

Ocealian merfolks value information and knowledge much higher than most people, and as such are very private and secretive people. Among them, just being told one’s name is a token of an established friendship. They’re generally quieter than most people, telling only as much as they need to. Between their secrecy and the darkness they live in, there might be much more about the empire than is written in these lines. The empire is old, over a millenia old, and possibly multiple times that.

The Vhigg’ithu -sometimes called Viggs outside of the empire- are tailed merfolks (or at least legless, there are a few that move through tentacles or other means) and predators of a wide range of subspecies, shapes and builds, the extent and limits of each being too nebulous to clearly define as more than an aggregate, though the merfolk society itself might have better distinctions. They’re for the most part very sensitive to light, or blind, relying on other senses to perceive their surroundings. The Lifetrees are luminous enough that they’re harmful for merfolks who can see to look at directly without protection, raiders and traders going to the ground will often wear specialized goggles to avoid being blinded, or include darkening spells in the ones that maintain a bubble of water around them when they do go inside lifespheres or the core. The spells they use come in as many variants as the water-breathing ones other species use, ranging from something that sticks to their body to a round bubble they can freely swim anywhere and effectively fly.

The Empire and the Shiver of Kings

The Empire isn’t a monolithic entity, far from it. It is ruled by five powerful monarchs, collectively referred to as the Shiver of Kings despite containing a couple queens. There is no emperor or central authority figure. What exactly fits under each king and queen’s rule is hard to say, they govern specific currents and people in a manner that changes as time passes, trades are arranged and wars are waged. The relationship between them is antagonistic to say the least, and even if they all look down more than literally on the other inhabitants of Ocaelum, the empire seldom present a united front. Should it, its military power would almost assuredly surpass that of any other faction on the plane by far. But whatever goal the monarchs pursue below is only second to protecting themselves from each other and organizing their attacks and counter-attacks.

This system does not sound sustainable, but the Empire has held under these conditions for over a thousand years, beyond what any Spire’s archives has records of. The same five rulers, or ones with the same names, keeping each other in check, at a virtual standstill, for centuries and centuries. Occasionally, alliances form or one is in a dominant position, but inevitably one betrays the other or the others band against the dominant one.

The rulers keep to their capitals, the only confirmed examples of merfolk cities, though others are assumed to likely exist within the depths. The capitals are built on the body of gargantuan creatures, wading through the waters, always moving, if slowly, taking with them an unfathomable mass of buildings and other living beings, creating currents sweeping bringing along everything close in their wake. These monsters and the cities upon them share a name with their ruler, though a more talkative merfolk stated that all of those are one and the same. That the Shiver are those colossal beasts, ruling through a small extension of themselves. That thought is chilling, but thankfully these beasts or kings have never been seen anywhere close to the ground.

The five monarchs are named Ihmir, Satena, Ysyn, Lowdos and Ulphion and the leviathans they live on are as different as they are, from Satena’s tentacled self to Ulphion’s shell harboring most of its population. They do not seem to eat, or ever stop moving. Merfolks simply swim along, on and off the currents it creates.

Life, Undeath and Unlife

Due to the size of the Empire and relatively low population in comparison to it, the Shiver’s rules tend to be relatively lax, and allow a lot of individual freedoms to their merfolk citizens. As long as the population obeys when the monarchs do issue orders.

That freedom isn’t afforded to everyone, though, slavery being a common punishment in Vhigg’ithu society. It is generally temporary for citizens, a result of debt or crime, but is often much more permanent when it comes to prisoners taken in a raid or from other rulers’ dominion. It is widespread enough that a large bulk of public tasks and menial private tasks are performed by slaves. However, slaves are kept out of simpler, more tedious or dangerous work, they’re too valuable for that, those are reserved to the undead workforce.

Necromancy is an integral part of Vhigg’ithu society. The next step after life ends is undeath or unlife, and this is an accepted truth. Leaving the dead to float away and get eaten would be wasteful when they could be of use. As such, any salvageable corpse is requisitioned, reanimated and put to work, at least if the person didn’t have prior necromantic arrangements. If a corpse is too damaged to be reanimated as such, it still will have its uses, though such an end is seen as more than death, it is called oblivion.

Not much effort is generally spent on common zombies, the ones made of the vast majority of the population, being little more than mindless drones useful for following simple commands and instructions. Being brought back in such a way is referred to as undeath, both undead and unliving are sometimes referred to as undead. A single Necromaster, which is the title given to the ones handling and organizing a group of undead towards a goal, is able to keep control over dozens of zombies at once. For the most powerful ones, that number could be in the hundreds or even thousands.

Besides those simple zombies, necromancy has other benefits to the empire. For some, it brings unlife, a new life after death in which the reanimated gets to keep more than their basic identity, but also their memories, personality and higher thought. Elite unliving troops are a tool each monarch has at their disposal, without the need to breathe in tunnels or lifespheres and with a clarity of purpose that only comes after death. Noble, powerful and rich merfolks prefer the eternal unlife of a lich to the cold undeath of service, but the right to undergo the process is reserved to the Shiver and its individual monarchs to grant... This simple act and its enforcement better than any show of force keeps many merfolk mostly subservient to the Shiver in life and in unlife, afraid of having their time ended abruptly by the oblivion that’s punishment for transgressing the law of unlife. Though not all of the affluent merfolks are keen on this balance of power.

The Free Exchange Society

An undercurrent of the Empire, the Free Exchange Society is a group of merfolks trying to reach out to each other under the monarchs’ rule and to other people of Ocaelum in opposition to the more aggressive stance their governments usually take towards diplomacy. Some are in it out of curiosity for the rest of the plane, others are searching for a profit, some want the Shiver dethroned out of spite or ambition, and some have more personal reasons. It’s hard to know when the Society was first established as such, but records of contacts with it in the Spires go back at least a century. Membership is generally kept a secret and anonymous meetings are the norm. While being a part of it is technically not illegal under most of the Shiver, most see it as both private and dangerous to talk about.

The Free Exchange Society has, over the years, exchanged, sold and at a few occasions even given information, slaves or help obtained from the Depths. They’ve been in contact with the Family, the Spires, humans of the core and they’ve even reached out to the dwarves, unsuccessfully so far.

The Family

From the ground waters to the core, from the Spires to the lower parts of the depths, the Family (sometimes called World Family to avoid confusion with the more mundane kind) is a disparate amphibian people who travel in caravans all around Ocaelum. How each species first joined the Family varies, but it formed after the Spires were already established, joining many smaller cultures. Some of them were formerly subjects of the Empire, but most were small, independent tribes living around specific entrances to the core, suddenly faced with a much larger world.

That variety translates to their caravans. Some have the bulk of it stay in the water at all time, using whales or other animals to transport their living and cargo that aren’t quite as adaptable as they are, unloading into lifespheres or the core as needed. Others use grounded animals and travel the core and the Spires. A decent number of caravans are a single, larger vessel the size of a small town, machines of Dwarven origin that were modified and appropriated so much by their users over decades that they are barely recognizable as such.  A number opt for chelonian beasts of burden, giant turtles that can swim and wade on the ground alike. Most of them have a small living space built atop their back, and cargo to their sides. Each caravan generally has a few spaces that are enchanted to always stay full of water, and the equivalent for air. Some of what they transport only lasts in one of the two environments, and some species of the Family aren’t fully amphibians until later in life.

The Family’s culture is rich and diverse, mostly kept as an oral tradition remembered by the elders of each caravan, who lead and take decisions for it. Elders are typically shamans and druids, not necessarily as old as the title would imply. Occasionally, an elder leaves their apprenticeship before their twentieth year of life, much younger than most adults in their caravan. Elders seem to keep each other informed regularly, able to communicate between each other through magical means from one side of Ocaelum to the other.

Caravans themselves act as family units, with children being raised communally, and adults in general seeing each other as close relatives, akin to siblings for most cultures. Each has a name that their members use as a family name. People from different caravans still see each other as part of the same extended family, and “cousin” is a term they often use to describe that relationship, or even when talking to strangers outside of the Family.

Ancient Alliance

The Family was first formed out of two tribes and species banding together, quickly joined by a third. The Lutrives, Axoltians and Anurans. Lutrives are small otter-like people, but unlike their beastly kin can survive and thrive perfectly well without ever breathing air should they need to. Axoltians are tailed people that show a stunning array of colors, their name derived from the Axolotls found on some other planes, but sharing much less characteristics with them than Lutrives with more common otters. Anurans is the Ocealian name for Burrogs found on some other plane, closer to frogs than to any other species. Those three species together represent a majority of the Family, but there’s much more, some rarer, some represented in small numbers in many caravans.

From the original alliance, axoltians were meant to be the voice of the Family, the ones that bargained and discussed, and Lutrives their shield and arm in those negotiations. When Anurans joined, they brought in their magical and spiritual traditions, strengthening the Family. While nowadays the Family moved from those restrictions and centuries of communal upbringing have made sure every traveler has access to the same education should they wish it, there are still remains of those trends passed down through tradition and pride in their heritage.

Among the other species of the Family, one can find Homarids, crustaceans with surprising dexterity considering their claws, Ghavaleks, crocodilian giants that tend to be at the forefront of the defense of the rare caravans they travel with, amphins, a species that share many traits with Axlotians but tend to be darker in colors and larger in build, even the occasional merfolk as some joined the Family or seeked asylum among them at points in time. Those are equipped with necessary knowledge and items to follow the caravan on land when need be. Similarly, exceedingly rarely, a human or elf is adopted into the Family. There's more, and the Family's traditions and tribes could certainly fill an entire other guide of its own, it's a subject as complex as navigating Vhigg'ithu society or avoiding to unknowingly enter a contest against a dwarf.

Many change caravans during the course of their life. From disagreement or for love found in another, from grief or from bonds. Babies and eggs are sometimes also exchanged or “sold” to another caravan to strengthen the bonds between the two or if the parent caravan think the other could take better care of the child. The transaction is more of a ritual custom than a sale. It is exceedingly rare that all the caravans meet, an event that can only be called in by agreement between elders from all of them and that has only occurred three times since the Family was founded, but it is very frequent that more than one caravan meet in a lifesphere, in the currents or in a tunnel of the core, which is where such exchanges typically occur. 

The Spirit Kindred

As an amalgam of so many traditions, the Family’s mythology is similarly fragmented. While most other factions defer to powerful entities that directly affect their world, the Family’s spiritualism is more personal and varied. There are hundreds of gods, elementals and concepts members of the Family worship, with overlapping domains, stories borrowing elements to each other, aliases for the same one and complex relationships with each other. They’re collectively known as Spirits, or as the Spirit Kindred. It is up to each member of the Family which few they dedicate themselves to, if any, though there tends to be some amount of consistency within the same caravan. 

If those spirits have any physical presence on Ocaelum is unknown, but their influence and the magic derived from them is undeniable. They’re the source of many superstitions in the Family, and some of those spread to other parts of Ocaelum. Most Spirits are loved but the respect towards some of them is also tinged with fear or apprehension. At the end of the day, though, the Spirit Kindred are called such because they’re understood to be members of the Family just like any other. They may oversee the entire wildlife of the plane, but they’re still a cousin or an aunt, and have as many responsibilities and bonds to people that worship them as anyone else travelling with them. 

The Family in the World

In just a few centuries, the Family has become an integral part of Ocaelum’s power structure. While they tend to stay neutral and don’t have any standing military other than the defense of each individual caravan, their services are invaluable enough that being excluded from them, or asked higher prices, is something even the Empire has learned to avoid. For the most part, they still occasionally try to enforce a “tax” on the Family, to disastrous results for both parties.

Collectively, their trade gives them better access to resources from the Core to the depths than any other faction, and that access is something they can provide to others. From selling unique oceanic materials to the Dwarves to being a supply of wood for the Empire, they can also easily travel between Spires from different Councils. Their most valuable service is probably in trading information, either carrying messages (physically or between elders) or speaking of what they’ve seen of the world. Much of the information gathered here is courtesy of their knowledge, cross-referenced with personal observations and discussions when possible.

A World to Explore

With that, the time to write this guide comes to an end. Hopefully, it should contain enough information for you to navigate your way through the many facets of Ocaelum, be you land-dweller or able to enjoy the expanse of Ocaelum’s waters. You’ll be able to discover more of this majestic and unique world by yourself, better than any of my words could do it justice. To close out, I’ll borrow a common blessing from the Family:

Safe travels and wonder!

[niuttuc]

Alright, I might be a bit late on the second week of fantober (by about one week), but I was busy, so let's see, which of my planes do people want to know more about?

[niuttuc]

So, there are hints that some of the land dwelling species of ocaelum might not have originated there, and that the life trees were possibly created to accommodate them. The PW guide doesn't actually know how this happened, but us there an answer?

There very much is an answer, and it involves more than just them. I'll keep the rest under a read more because it's definitely not common knowledge any planeswalker or even person on the plane would be able to glean.

The land-dwelling species of Ocaelum didn't use to live under Lifetrees, but the "Old World" they come from is misleading, it isn't another plane. They originate from the surface of Ocaelum, back when it was a thing. As far as how that happened, one would need to go back very far...

To the genesis of Ocaelum. The guide sometimes refers to the "sun below", the one at the center of the world that provides its warmth to the core and the lower waters, from which the Elder Smiths were born and draw their power from. Ocaelum also has a second sun, the sun above, that provides warmth and light to the surface world, much closer to what people are used to from other planes. The Depths were actually the part in-between, isolated from both suns' warmth and light.

Similarly to the sun below, Elder Dragons were born from the sun above, five of them, complementary to the Elder Smiths, their cousins. They cared for the surface world like the Smiths do for the core, and they might have grown the Elves of Ocaelum like the Smiths forged the dwarves. Back then, the Core extended through the land all the way up to the surface, and even though the Smiths themselves stuck closer to the sun below, they exchanged and had respectful relationship through elves and dwarves with their cousins of the air.

Until one died. Five powerful merfolks from the depths forged an uneasy alliance and managed to kill one of the Elder Dragons of the surface. Those five necromancers then raised the corpse under their thrall, and then, through it, started to steal power from the sun above and split it between each other. Those would use that power to become the Shiver of Kings, unifying all the Depths under their rule and forming an Empire. Despite their many differences over the centuries, they still need each other. One of them dying would release their part of the sun, and none of them know if they could hold to their part if that happened.

As the Shiver killed their brethren and stole the sun, the Elder Dragons felt it, of course. But not soon enough that they wouldn't be significantly weakened by the time they'd find and try to stop the Shiver. Or at least, that wouldn't be likely. So they did their best to save what they could of the surface, by entrusting it to their cousins and the sun below.

There was an exodus through the core and magic both, as the Elder Dragons created the first lifeseeds, and then poured the remainder of their life into them to grow them into the first Lifetrees in a timely manner. The four Councils, or types of Lifetrees are named after (part of the name of) the four living Elder Dragons that created them. The light of each lifetree contains, within it, a faint echo of the sun above.

The surface is now completely unlivable. Walled off by a few kilometers of ice at the end of the Depths and that cover any remainder there might have been of the world it once was. There's barely an atmosphere left, and it is definitely not a breathable one. The magic and leylines up there are long dead. Planeswalking there would trip the same kind of alarms and safety as planeswalking into a wall or in the middle of an active volcano, so as far as planeswalkers are concerned, there isn't a "surface".

Similarly, the upper tunnels of the core, the ones that go through the depths and formed the land above are flooded where they're not frozen and just part of the depths. Without enough warmth to keep alive the fungus, all the entrances let the water in. It is mostly stopped when you get deep enough that the sun below supports the fungal life, but what trickles down forms streams, waterfalls and river in the Core proper, and their sources of water. Spells to make ocean water drinkable are very, very, very common on Ocaelum, it's how all factions that need it get access to it.

The Shiver was too busy stealing the sun, reveling in their new power and conquering their empire to care much about the exodus, the ground waters were too bright and warm for merfolks to care about them anyway.

The Spires themselves know what happened, but elves, humans and coral alike are kept mostly in the dark. Their memories of the surface faded and that might be intentional, to avoid them going on a suicidal campaign against the Vhigg'ithu in vengeance. Some Voices might know the truth.

The Smiths are still very angry at the Shiver for killing one of their own, committing mass murder, stealing the sun and forcing their other cousins to kill themselves to save a little of the surface, and that sentiment is echoed among the dwarves, though very few dwarves know in detail what happened either. The Smiths don't confront the Shiver directly because they aren't sure they can win, with the Shiver having taken power equivalent to their own, and they don't want to risk them stealing the sun below as well should they fail.

The Viggs do as they do, the monarchs very much know what happened but getting information out of a Vhigg'ithu is already hard to begin with, to hell if they are gonna tell anyone how they gained their unmatched power.

The Family wasn't formed at the time, but some of their composing tribes had legends about the exodus and the Old World that were distorted and passed through the centuries.

[niuttuc]

I want to hear more about your fan-planes! Tell me about the creatures that can be found there, what are the staple creatures like? Most importantly what are the dragons like!

Let’s see, I’ll make non-comprehensive lists because that’s a lot of different species.

Winrovah: Humans, goblins, elves, leonins, nagas, gnomes, djinns, wurms, drakes, serpents, elementals, demon(s), angels, hydras, sphinges, dragons, aetherborn versions of most of those, and maybe a few more species that are extinct or even closer to extinction than the rest, since the end of the world isn’t being kind on ecological preservation.

Dragons on Winrovah were formerly a powerful force, and loosely organized too. Like most iconics, what happened to the plane wasn’t kind of them, and most were too proud to ask for any help. There aren’t really many large enough hunting grounds to sustain dragons anymore on the plane, so even the ones that didn’t die from the destruction or in fights mostly died from hunger, or raided settlements which further worsened conditions for people living there and only delayed the inevitable for the dragons. Like most iconics, there’s only a handful of Dragons left on the plane, exact numbers are incertain.

Moloni: Humans, elves, nagas, viashinos, dwarves, griffins, Guardians (Angel, Sphinges, Demons, Dragons and Elementals), probably others.

Dragons on Moloni are Guardians, born from, controlling and defending a Source of magic. Dragons tends to see their Source and magic as their treasure. While some do hoard it for themselves, most have understood that sharing it doesn’t remove it from their possessions, allows others to gaze upon their treasure, and can be negotiated for other kinds of things they might value... But not be able to obtain without leaving their source. Wild dragons can protect a Source fiercely, making sure nobody else lives in its surrounding, but most civilized ones have a more mercantile state of mind.

The Federation of Cyr’s capital, Ganara, has five Guardians, one for each color, leading it. The dragon is called Protacus, he’s in charge of Cyr’s diplomacy, and can temporarily possess his emissaries as long as they’re within range of a Source, allowing him to be one of the very few Guardian that can travel beyond their own source’s influence.

Geonne: Mostly undevelopped, but Geonne is mostly human... Kind of. Geonne’s magic allows humans to fuse with another creature in some situations (or rituals), which means the plane contains a lot of subspecies based on most types of animals and creatures.

Dragons on Geonne are more legends of the past than reality. If they exist still, they’re hiding well.

Ferely (not entirely mine): Ferely has humans, elves, minotaurs, azras, angels, (a handful of very powerful) demons, probably dragons but haven’t developed them yet... Probably more. Sapient species are way more intermixed on Ferely than on most planes, though, the demon blood that spawned the azras in the first place allows for reproduction between all sorts of species that would normally be incompatible, so belonging to a species is more a matter of choice than anything there.

Ocaelum (not entirely mine, but my version might be separate at this point): Humans, merfolks, elves, coralfolks, giant sentient Lifetrees, dwarves, dragons, and then the amphibious Family made up of many species, but the main two are Lutrives (otterfolks) and Axoltians (Axolotl-based species) with rarer ones like Ghavaleks like Arnoss. Add to that a thriving marine ecology ranging from plankton to giant sea monsters of all sorts.

Dragons on Ocaelum come in two kinds (well, three, but one is extinct and forgotten). The more bestial kind can be found swimming in the water, majestic but dangerous serpent-like beings. Other than those, there’s the Primordial dragons, born of the earth and residing within the air-filled tunnels and caves there, some legends claim they were the ones to dig them to emerge of the ground like one would from an egg. The primordial dragons are ancient beings of great power and wisdom, connected directly to the Sun at the center of the world, and generally benevolent. They created the Dwarves and see them as their children, and know more about the history of the world than most.

[niuttuc]

Starting the year, I think I’ll give new cards and some associated summaries for the few of my fanwalkers that I got art for, the next in alphabetical order is Arnoss! His art was commissioned a bit ago to @land-ofthebooty​.

Arnoss Beldrun is Naya-aligned and a Ghavalek. A gharial-inspired species from his plane of origin, albeit a relatively rare one.He's part of the Family, a nomadic group of allied amphibian species travelling air and mostly water in the underwater plane of Ocaelum.

He was bought as an egg, and raised as a protector for his caravan. His innate magic wasn't that strong to begin with, but he was enchanted to harness it by his family's elders. As such, he's a little stronger and tougher than he looks, but it becomes stronger as more people want and need his help around him, bolstering strength, speed and resistance to both regular and magical attacks.

However, it was of no help when the Beldruns (his caravan) was ambushed while he was sleeping by a group of merfolks. They captured him before he could intervene, intending to use him as a slave, and made him watch them kill his family. He probably would have remained in their hold if his spark hadn't ignited. Since then, Arnoss mourns his family and protects others in need of it, whether they hire him as a bodyguard or not. His "services" is mostly ensuring he's around to help. He's very gentle generally but can be very violent when fighting against something that threatens other. He's very big, think crocodile (I think about 9'6" standing on his hind legs) and much faster than his bulk would indicate when fighting in the air as he's used to fight underwater.

He has thwarted the plans of an ambitious Cabal Lieutenant on Dominaria a couple times and now resides when he wants a falling point somewhere on Ixalan, on one of the many remote islands, one partially submerged. He's cold-blooded, and his kind is usually found in volcanic waters, but the pendant depicted in the art above is a piece of magical wood enchanted to regulate his body temperature and keep his blood at a functioning temperature outside of extreme circumstances. He still enjoys sunbaths a lot. He recently started learning how to read.

[niuttuc]

Do you have a fan plane? If so how would you describe it's soul and avatar?

I have a few! I also have a decent memory!

Anyway, as far as the ones I consider "mine", let's see...

The Soul of Moloni is a brilliant thing trapped inside the plane. No known currently living being has seen it, and likely none ever will.

The Haven is a fragment of an artificial plane, but it does have a soul, that will sometimes emerge from the ground. Made of flowstone, she returns even settled one to its fluid state, and generally looks like a small moving hill that can extend appendages.

Geonne's soul is an ever-shifting chimera of the plane's many different species. It manifests very, very rarely.

Winrovah's soul, if it is still alive, would be as scarred and dying as the plane. An ever-crying strange child of the observer's species with a beautiful rose growing out of its shoulder or equivalent, its black roots planted into the child and visibly spreading under its skin. They're missing a limb or more.

Ocaelum is not mine, but I feel like my version and the main one have grown far enough apart that I can claim my own version of it anyway. Ocaelum's soul is sleeping, hidden within the core sun, protected by its children the primordial dragons. It currently looks like a cross between the smell of a breeze over a field that stretches across the horizon and the cold of snow.

[niuttuc]

what resources do the viggs rely on, and how do they secure these? How bad is competition over these resources, and are they easily maintained?

For food, there’s plenty of fish in the sea, as they say, and I don’t mean each other (the only occasional cannibalism is in specific circumstances in certain branches of the Family). There’s a relative lot of life in there, especially considering the Vhigg population is not very dense at all. Besides, some land come up through the depths, with its own flooded tunnels that are part of the Empire, no Dwarf or Lifetree would survive there. From those they can get various minerals, but bones from fishes once compacted and reformed also is one of their main building materials. Plant life from the depths is rare but exists on these bits of land, surviving through baffling means. For once, I feel like I can skip the explanation to how they have access to water. Their access to resources is relatively plentiful, though their mining efforts are admittedly not the best, and a good chunk of their metal is obtained through trade (or more violent methods).

Some more spoilery stuff below.

Besides mining outposts that are barely settlements and the capitals on the backs of the monarchs, there’s also cities built on, in and out of the wall of ice that englobes the planet, it’s just so deep up in the water nobody who’s not dead or a Vhigg’ithu has ever been there and come back to tell the tale. People being able to swim and move freely in a city that hangs from a “ceiling” definitely lands itself to very different architecture.

[niuttuc]

Arnoss 3, 6, 13, 15, 18, 20, 29

3. Ask them to describe their love interest.

He doesn't currently have one. Not in the present at least.

6. Who will they take advice from, no matter what it is? Who won’t they take advice from, no matter what it is.

He'll take advice from quite a few people. Advice will be strongly considered from his sister Oprena, from the Elders of his extended Family, from his little cousin Pipa, from Dr. Bilkardy,... Most people he's close to, including his... Islandmate ? Ganara. Also, and probably the most improbable to happen, but if one of the nature spirits he's devoted to were to advise him directly, he probably wouldn't turn that away.

As far as not taking advice, he won't listen to anything Lady Seric has to say, of course. He's very reluctant to listen to anything a Vhigg'ithu (the Merfolks of his home plane) has to say. He generally ignores his "friend" Shaw because he thinks Shaw has a very different view of the world than he does.

13. Name one thing their parents taught them.

Another one without biological parents... But his Elders taught him, with a lot of care, how to craft a heat pendant out of lifewood should his own be lost or damaged, and to always keep a spare piece of lifewood with him for that purpose. He, like other Ghavaleks, is cold-blooded, and outside of the volcanic waters their native villages are built around, he needs one of those to function properly for more than a few hours and avoid losing all of his body heat.

15. What would they consider a waste of time– other than school or work?

Administrative formalities. It doesn't help that until very recently, he didn't know how to read or write and that he's still currently learning how all of that works. He comes from a way of living without any of that, and it seems unnecessarily tedious, boring and pointless.

18. Kissing: tongue or no tongue?

No tongue. Biologically, his tongue doesn't leave his jaws and most people he's with don't reach very far there even when they try to find a way to kiss him.

20. What do they like that nobody else does?

Not everyone, but there's very few people in the Multiverse that like sunbathing quite as much as he does. Even other Ghavaleks don't get the full experience, since Ocaelum has no sun. The closest they get is Lifetrees, and as Arnoss noticed, it's not exactly the same.

29. What recurring dreams do they have?

Arnoss doesn't remember many of his dreams, but he does sometimes dream of the monster everyone sees him as, and the monster he thinks he'll become.

[niuttuc]

Lhur’s Sheet

Name: Lhur (Tolema the Third, don’t call him that)

Pronouns: He/Him

Species: Giant

Age: 19

Plane of Origin: Fiora

First Planeswalk: Ocaelum (underwater fan-plane)

Colors: Black, a splash of white secondary

Appearance: As a giant, Lhur stands a bit over twice as tall as most humans (Garruks notwithstanding), but otherwise looks like you'd expect of a young noble, maybe a little sharper a gaze and a little rarer a smile. Black hair, blue eyes, quite a few scars hidden by his clothes. While most people think of him as being richly dressed or in his ornamental armor, while on other planes or outside of ceremonies he's generally more comfortably and discretly draped.

Backstory: Lhur grew up under the harsh rule of his father, Tolema II, a conquering warlord who knew when to stop his expansion, and established his own small kingdom years before Lhur's birth. His father's rule was as tyrannical and violent as was necessary to keep control of the previously democratic cities he conquered, and Tolema used his magic over shadows to make sure his hold stayed strong on all three of those.

He was no kinder on his son and heir, having great plans for him and being as demanding and rough on him as his own father, the first Tolema, had with him. If not more. Aside from the early lessons in everything a ruler might need, from fighting to managing taxes, and a few demonstrations of “how a king should act and react”, Tolema obtained the help of a demon to teach his son the most powerful magic the young giant could handle. This is around the time of Lhur’s mother’s death, when he was not even in his teens.

As one would expect, Lhur grew resenting his father and most of what he preached. He saw how Tolema ruled, and how the rest of the population feared or hated the conquering king. When a teenage Lhur started looking for ways to sabotage his genitor’s reign, it was for nothing more than getting back at him. That teenage rebellion slowly morphed into more as he got more and more effective, enough to get the attention of the existing resistance to Tolema. Of course, once they figured out who exactly Lhur was, they were more than wary, but through words and actions, he managed to slowly get the trust of a cell and another.

A few years later, and Lhur was one of the major figures of the Resistance under an alias, a poorly guarded secret, and a “hero of the people”. Some in the Resistance were still cautious, but none could debate that his actions and plans had cost more to Tolema than any other individual. At least, ones that lived to keep fighting.

The Resistance effort culminated into a legend-worthy attack against Tolema in his own palace, Lhur channeling the desire of the entire capital in a singular battle against his father in the ruins of his throne room. After a harrowing fight, he managed to kill his father and free the country of his reign, handing over the reigns of the country back to its people.

Or so the official story goes. While Lhur did defeat his father, he isn’t so sure about the killing part. The grievly wounded Tolema revealed to his son that he was very aware of his “resistance” and that this was just what he had planned for Lhur, for him to take over in opposition, as a loved hero and ruler instead of the despised one that Tolema had himself been. The shift from pride, hate and righteousness from Lhur to doubt and consternation was stark enough to make him spark, taking him to the most beautiful place he’d ever seen... Until he figured out how to go back.

By then, there was no body to be found. To stop the fights within the city, Lhur claimed victory and the death of his father, taking control of his father’s soldiers and warriors who knew better than to question the orders of their “new king”.

Which brings us to the situation Lhur is currently in. He agreed with the remaining Resistance and council of leaders from the cities of his country to let them decide of the future of the country, and they aren’t too keen on letting the son of the Tyrant lead and establish an actual dynasty. On the other end, they know him and most of them trust him, which is particularly necessary because Tolema’s troops still obey him and they need him “on the throne” to avoid further issues there. The population, most of it anyway, love him for freeing them from the tyrant, and to keep control over the troops, he was officially declared ruler as well. He has great influence over the council and the affairs of the kingdom while they take decisions, as well as latitude to act by himself, but so far he only suggests and brings information to light. He’s legally the king of the country, and rules it de facto, but in practice he’s not seen as being permanently so by the council, who are the one making the decisions as far as they’re concerned.

With all of this as a background, Lhur tries to navigate his new reality of being a planeswalker, using other planes as ways to get breaks and decompress, staying there a few days at a time as he should be “traveling” between the different cities. He also has to worry about his father, and if he’s still alive, which he assumes but isn’t sure of, or of where he could have gone. He’d have thought he’d have manifested by now if he was still alive, but the last revelation he got from him made him unsure of his guesses as far as his father’s thoughts.

Lhur is loved, and he tries to make it stay that way. He saw the results of hatred of a ruler, and it’s much easier for him to hold onto his position with public support. On the other end, he’s not sure if his father was saying the truth, and if he want to play into his hand so blatantly.

Magic, gear and/or abilities: Lhur’s main magic is a demonic one over wants and wishes. He has the ability to perceive what people want the most, and in a certain measure, to magically realize it. There’s many limits to it and it’s never the most effective. And there may be consequences. But even with those, he’s very powerful. Beyond that, he’s a giant with access to an entire royal arsenal, training to use a good part of it, and able to manifest his own desires, so in the few occasions he has to result to fighting, he is one of the most dangerous opponents one could be tasked to face head-on. He’s charismatic and grew up in a court on Fiora, even if it was much less subtle than Paliano’s, and knowing what people want makes him a very adept politician and negotiator, which is generally the approach he prefers.