Hello everybody Jorphdan here the PH is silent.
It’s the last planar video!
Acheron and Mechanus.
I should do a video on Sigil though, and the outlands…
So that’ll probably be next.
Let’s jump in with the Infernal Battlefield of Acheron.
It is a place where ignorant armies clash by night.
A plane of enforced order, where conformity is more important that good.
Conflict, war, strife, struggle is all you’ll find on Acheron.
The entire plane is engulfed in the cry of battle.
It has four layers, each an island of continent sized iron cubes.
These cubes float in an airy void and occasionally collide with one another creating large clangs
that echo throughout the plane.
The orc god Grummsh lives here, as well as Maglubiyet, the goblin deity.
So naturally this plane is home to a variety of orcs and goblins but many other species
as well.
Renegade armies wander the faces of Acheron looking for an enemy to fight.
There is little organization in Acheron, the plane leads thoughts to mutiny or madness
which soon bring down even the strongest military leader.
Devils, imps, fomorians, rakshasas, dragons and yugoloths inhabit Acheron.
And clockwork creatures from Mechanus keep a few hidden mining colonies scattered through
the lowest layers of Acheron.
Also Acheron is home to enormous flocks of birds.
Ravens, vultures, gulls, and bloodhawks, thrive here living off the death and destruction
of the battlefield.
The souls that wind up in Acheron are those that killed often and killed happily.
Usually for a cause they did not believe in.
The cubes that make up Acheron are scarred and dented from their many collisions.
The plane is illuminated by a gray fluctuating light that varies between moonlight and a
dark, cloudy day.
The first layer of Acheron is called Avalas.
Also called the Battle plains, it contains the most cubes.
They vary from city sized to continent sized, the smaller ones being the oldest, having
been worn down by eons of collisions.
It is here in Avalas on the cube Clangor that the goblin deity Maglubiyet resides.
It’s carved and tunneled to house the great goblin nation that lives here.
Next to Clangor is Nishrek which is the cube that houses Gruumsh the one-eyed deity of
the orcs.
The goblins and orcs are in constant war with one another.
The barracks here are chaotically arranged with wandering tunnels.
Although Gruumsh cares not for this fight and has his eye against Corellon, the elven
deity that plucked out his left eye.
Thuldanin the second layer is much like the first but with a smaller populace.
The entire layer is riddled with broken machinery of war.
Siege towers, steam-driven weapons, flying devices and contraptions with obscure sources
of power and purpose.
The layer is home to salvagers and opportunists hoping to uncover items of fantastic power
which they can use or copy.
However they don’t stay long because this layer has an aura that will gradually turn
a creature to stone.
Tintibulus has the least “cubes” of the rest of the layers.
Home to shapes of various sides such as a 4 sided Tetrahedron, or 5 sided Pentahedron,
Hexahedron, dodecahedron etc.
Grab your dice set because there’s a large stone polyhedron shaped like them.
The floating solids are covered in a gray volcanic ash that is several inches deep.
When collisions occur the geometric solids fracture along its natural fault lines, splitting
into two smaller solids.
The constant collisions create a ringing that doesn’t stop, few creatures live here.
Finally Ocanthus the last layer, has no light and is filled with fast flying razor thin
shards.
It’s a constant blizzard of bladelike items that make this area truly inhospitable.
These shards are made from black ice that hit one another and become smaller and deadlier.
Ultimately turning into a fine dust.
They originate from a sheet of infinite, magically charged black ice that exists on this layer.
Nobody knows if the ice sheet is a boundary or a barrier between Ocanthus and some deeper
layer.
It is largely unexplored.
Mechanus is next which is law reflected in a realm of clockwork gears.
Known as the Clockwork Nirvana of Mechanus, it’s home to giant cogs and gears that are
in constant motion.
Engaged in a calculation so vast that no deity can fathom its purpose.
Mechanus embodies absolute order.
It is the plane of ultimate law, where premeditated plans are born.
It is the gear works for the multiverse.
Every kind of law can be found in Mechanus, from simple maxims to devilishly twisted rules
of decorum.
For the most part Mechanus contains no passion, illusion, or pain.
At the center of most cogs are free-standing portals that lead to other planes of existence,
and yet some lead to another cog within Mechanus.
Mechanus is a single infinite plane without defined layers.
The wheels or cogs are composed of stone, earth, and metal ores.
Many cogs are more than a thousand miles across and turn so slowly it’s mistaken for stillness.
There are creatures that inhabit mechanus that are not native to the plane of law.
Colonists from the material plane, the nine hells, and even celestia transform sections
of mechanus to better suit their style or needs.
But mainly Mechanus is inhabited by constructs.
The most famous inhabitants are the Modrons.
The Modorons themselves are a totally alien, regimented race.
It’s a hive like hierarchical structure depending on how many sides a Modron has.
The bottom of the barrel is the monodrones which are spherical and can take only one
order, which comes from their superiors the duodrones.
Which they can follow more order coming from their superiors the Tridrones… and up and
up all the way to the One, known as Primus.
His power over the modrons is absolute, all obey Primus and carry out his plans.
If ever a Modron is killed, their body disappears and the energy returns to Mechanus which then
spawns a new Modron.
If the balance between Monodrones and Duodrones is off a Monodrone will ascend and become
a Duodrone.
In this same way Primus, although godlike, can be killed.
If he ever is, then the highest ranking modron is then promoted to his position and becomes
a new Primus.
Modrons are capable of speech, except monodrones, but don’t understand certain concepts.
Like individual names for example, or disorderly behavior.
They are so tied to the plane of Law they have a hard time understanding chaotic concepts.
Because of this they end up ignoring lots of things, it’s easier to disregard then
it is to figure it out.
Every 300 years (or so) there is something known as the great Modron march.
An extremely large number of Modrons leave Mechanus traveling clockwise across the planes.
Through Arcadia and the Beastlands, down through the Abyss and the Nine Hells before returning
to Mechanus.
It is unclear why this happens and many have discovered it’s easier to stay out of their
way and let the Modrons pass.
You can read more about this in the Planescape adventure “The Great Modron March” which
is a classic.
Check it out.
And that’s it, we covered all the planes of existence.
Pretty sweet!
There is still the outlands and sigil which I’ll cover next week.
Thanks for going on this journey with me I hope you all enjoyed it.
Feel free to leave me a comment below detailing your upcoming modron game.
Give a like and consider subscribing for more videos.
I’ll see you all next Wednesday.