What lies 'outside' of the Great Wheel? [Archive] - Wizards Community

What lies 'outside' of the Great Wheel? [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Ryyam
10-26-07, 01:45 AM The way I understand it is the Far Realm is an alien universe that exists 'outside' of our own multiverse - the Great Wheel. Now I was reading the ecology of the Keeper - in a recent Dragon - and if I am correct they are from an alternate dimension 'outside' of our own Multiverse.

Now Keepers dont strike me as 'far realmy' beings - so I began to wonder are there any other alien universes 'outside' of the Great Wheel?
Bob the Efreet
10-26-07, 02:45 AM One interpretation is that there are many multiverses floating around in the Far Realms. This creates sort of a multimultivere, or maybe just a metaverse. Although, really, that would just be a song or poem about songs or poems. Verse about verse, you know. But I think "metaverse" sounds cooler than other things you might assign to the idea, like "omniverse" or "uberverse" or "hellaverse" (as in a whole lot of 'verse). Actually, that last one isn't too bad.
Zousha_Omenohu
10-26-07, 02:46 AM If I remember correctly, the Astral Plane completely surrounds the Great Wheel, which is why it acts as a transitory plane. Of course, I always imagined the Astral Plane to be like space and the planes like planets but that's beside the point.
CrimsonDeath
10-26-07, 03:43 AM Although, really, that would just be a song or poem about songs or poems.

I believe a song about songs would comprise metastanzas.
ZeroSD
10-26-07, 04:35 AM Perhaps floating way out there are the Eberron Planes, a set of realms created by beings unknown to the Great Wheel and it's primes.
EvilVegan
10-26-07, 08:31 AM Beyond the great wheel is real life. The Keeper is Gary Gygax after he finishes his interdimensional portal.
sciborg3
10-26-07, 11:55 AM The Far Realm for one. But there was mention of the Keepers, as well as a creature in the Elemental Planes that almost certainly came from another cosmology. There was also a plane beyond the Multiverse that could be accessed by the Forest of Thought or some such in Mount Celestia, populated by the mercurials.

While not a different cosmology, the possibility of a 5th mountain of Gehenna (at the time the only finite plane of 4 dual sided volcanoes) was guarded by Shargas (sp?) the orc god of assassins.
Return of the Flumph
10-26-07, 01:53 PM I second the "other cosmologies floating around in the far realms" theory.
Shemeska the Marauder
10-26-07, 06:37 PM The Great Wheel, the Far Realm, the nameless reality that spawned the Keepers, the native reality of the Chososian, and others can perhaps best be viewed as being individual, self-contained multiverses, all of them drifting like bubbles atop the raw probability of the deep ethereal.

That's the interpretation of meta-multiversal structure I went with for the Keeper ecology (though the idea wasn't new, and its an interpretation that you'll see elsewhere).
Shemeska the Marauder
10-26-07, 06:43 PM There's nothing "outside" the Great Wheel in the sense of the planes of the Wheel all floating in a surrounding 3d space. Conceptually that sort of model doesn't hold water, or ether, or whatever suits your taste.

The closest you'll get to any confirmed meta-structure to a multi-multiverse in D&D is the deep ethereal (and potentially the ether gaps) as the conceptual link between alien realities (not just alternate versions of the same reality, but more on the order of radically different things like the Wheel, the Far Realm, etc).
ArcTan
10-26-07, 11:58 PM Note that in 3e they changed this, retconning out the Deep Ethereal and instead casting the Shadow Plane (the new transitive plane) as the link between different cosmologies.

I myself wouldn't call the Far Realm a specific place. It's pretty obviously just the blanket name people in the D&D multiverse slap onto anything they run into that isn't the Great Wheel, much like people who lived on an island would think of the universe as composed of "Our Island" and "Elsewhere", and think of the whole rest of the world and universe as some sort of great big Other Island.
Shemeska the Marauder
10-27-07, 12:47 AM Note that in 3e they changed this, retconning out the Deep Ethereal and instead casting the Shadow Plane (the new transitive plane) as the link between different cosmologies.

Well, the 3e MotP had the deep ethereal as optional, but the use of the Shadow plane as a link between cosmologies (in the sense of different prime material worlds if you had them using different cosmologies) was likewise optional.

Stance of the 3e MotP or not, it didn't stop me from using the ethereal deep with the Keepers. ;)
ripvanwormer
10-27-07, 11:09 AM That's the interpretation of meta-multiversal structure I went with for the Keeper ecology (though the idea wasn't new, and its an interpretation that you'll see elsewhere).

Primarily, you see it in the climax of Dawn of the Overmind, where the illithids seek to exchange our reality with one they find on the other side of an ether gap, in which their empire never fell. Although that adventure implies the alternate multiverse only exists in potential, until the illithids activate it.
ArcTan
10-27-07, 11:44 PM Of course, those silly imaginary people from alternate universes all think our universe is the one that only exists "in potential". We know they're wrong, though.
mvincent
10-29-07, 05:19 PM I always imagined the Astral Plane to be like space and the planes like planets but that's beside the point.I believe that will be the paradigm for 4e.
mvincent
10-29-07, 05:24 PM Keepers dont strike me as 'far realmy' beings - so I began to wonder are there any other alien universes 'outside' of the Great Wheel?I was under the impression that there were theoretically lots of universes outside of the Great Wheel. We often call them "alternate primes", but many of them are likely entirely alien (possibly with connections to entirely different afterlifes).
tridiak
10-30-07, 04:14 AM Ask the Living Tribunal, "he" watches over all universes.
Millenia
10-30-07, 05:48 AM What lies 'outside' of the Great Wheel? Why, a big mishmash of timey wimey... ball... stuff.
Furryhowler
10-30-07, 02:59 PM What lies 'outside' of the Great Wheel? Why, a big mishmash of timey wimey... ball... stuff.

Back to Gallifrey with you :P

What lies outside the great wheel?

http://www.fotosearch.com/comp/SDC/SDC161/282526SDC.jpg

:D
Thanael
10-31-07, 04:30 AM "If the universe were like a goat's bladder, then all that is, was, and shall be is the goat's bladder," said the sage to her burgeoning apprentice.
"What's outside the bladder?" he asked. "Nothing?"
The sage frowned a bit and pedanticly said, "No, not even nothing. There is no 'outside the bladder.'"
"Ah," said the boy, "So its empty! Just lots of space!" He was happy he was catching on.
"No no," the sage retorted. "There simply is no such thing as 'outside the bladder.'"
The apprentice slumped in his seat. This was going to be a long excercise.

--from Maldin's Grand Unified Theory of Life, the Multiverse and Everything (http://melkot.com/mysteries/multiverse.html)
Rania
10-31-07, 02:31 PM What lies 'outside' of the Great Wheel? Why, a big mishmash of timey wimey... ball... stuff.You win this thread.
ArcTan
10-31-07, 07:34 PM Ask the Living Tribunal, "he" watches over all universes.

Nope. Only the Marvel multiverse. He got in a fight with the Spectre, who's the guardian of the entire DC multiverse/universe/thing when the Two Brothers (apparently the Marvel and DC multiverses personified) had that little argument/war/publicity stunt thing a few years back.
sciborg3
11-01-07, 11:31 AM By the Panda, did that Two Brothers thing verily sucketh...
Kain_Darkwind
11-01-07, 03:05 PM But was retconned...the two Brothers were fighting in the hand of the Living Tribunal...the version that was with the Spectre was an avatar of some sorts.
Thegans
11-01-07, 07:23 PM What lies 'outside' of the Great Wheel? Why, a big mishmash of timey wimey... ball... stuff.

You say timey wimet stuff I say E-space, whereever the timeship called Terminus came from, and the void.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Ryyam 10-26-07, 01:45 AM	The way I understand it is the Far Realm is an alien universe that exists 'outside' of our own multiverse - the Great Wheel. Now I was reading the ecology of the Keeper - in a recent Dragon - and if I am correct they are from an alternate dimension 'outside' of our own Multiverse. Now Keepers dont strike me as 'far realmy' beings - so I began to wonder are there any other alien universes 'outside' of the Great Wheel?
Bob the Efreet 10-26-07, 02:45 AM	One interpretation is that there are many multiverses floating around in the Far Realms. This creates sort of a multimultivere, or maybe just a metaverse. Although, really, that would just be a song or poem about songs or poems. Verse about verse, you know. But I think "metaverse" sounds cooler than other things you might assign to the idea, like "omniverse" or "uberverse" or "hellaverse" (as in a whole lot of 'verse). Actually, that last one isn't too bad.
Zousha_Omenohu 10-26-07, 02:46 AM	If I remember correctly, the Astral Plane completely surrounds the Great Wheel, which is why it acts as a transitory plane. Of course, I always imagined the Astral Plane to be like space and the planes like planets but that's beside the point.
CrimsonDeath 10-26-07, 03:43 AM	Although, really, that would just be a song or poem about songs or poems. I believe a song about songs would comprise metastanzas.
ZeroSD 10-26-07, 04:35 AM	Perhaps floating way out there are the Eberron Planes, a set of realms created by beings unknown to the Great Wheel and it's primes.
EvilVegan 10-26-07, 08:31 AM	Beyond the great wheel is real life. The Keeper is Gary Gygax after he finishes his interdimensional portal.
sciborg3 10-26-07, 11:55 AM	The Far Realm for one. But there was mention of the Keepers, as well as a creature in the Elemental Planes that almost certainly came from another cosmology. There was also a plane beyond the Multiverse that could be accessed by the Forest of Thought or some such in Mount Celestia, populated by the mercurials. While not a different cosmology, the possibility of a 5th mountain of Gehenna (at the time the only finite plane of 4 dual sided volcanoes) was guarded by Shargas (sp?) the orc god of assassins.
Return of the Flumph 10-26-07, 01:53 PM	I second the "other cosmologies floating around in the far realms" theory.
Shemeska the Marauder 10-26-07, 06:37 PM	The Great Wheel, the Far Realm, the nameless reality that spawned the Keepers, the native reality of the Chososian, and others can perhaps best be viewed as being individual, self-contained multiverses, all of them drifting like bubbles atop the raw probability of the deep ethereal. That's the interpretation of meta-multiversal structure I went with for the Keeper ecology (though the idea wasn't new, and its an interpretation that you'll see elsewhere).
Shemeska the Marauder 10-26-07, 06:43 PM	There's nothing "outside" the Great Wheel in the sense of the planes of the Wheel all floating in a surrounding 3d space. Conceptually that sort of model doesn't hold water, or ether, or whatever suits your taste. The closest you'll get to any confirmed meta-structure to a multi-multiverse in D&D is the deep ethereal (and potentially the ether gaps) as the conceptual link between alien realities (not just alternate versions of the same reality, but more on the order of radically different things like the Wheel, the Far Realm, etc).
ArcTan 10-26-07, 11:58 PM	Note that in 3e they changed this, retconning out the Deep Ethereal and instead casting the Shadow Plane (the new transitive plane) as the link between different cosmologies. I myself wouldn't call the Far Realm a specific place. It's pretty obviously just the blanket name people in the D&D multiverse slap onto anything they run into that isn't the Great Wheel, much like people who lived on an island would think of the universe as composed of "Our Island" and "Elsewhere", and think of the whole rest of the world and universe as some sort of great big Other Island.
Shemeska the Marauder 10-27-07, 12:47 AM	Note that in 3e they changed this, retconning out the Deep Ethereal and instead casting the Shadow Plane (the new transitive plane) as the link between different cosmologies. Well, the 3e MotP had the deep ethereal as optional, but the use of the Shadow plane as a link between cosmologies (in the sense of different prime material worlds if you had them using different cosmologies) was likewise optional. Stance of the 3e MotP or not, it didn't stop me from using the ethereal deep with the Keepers. ;)
ripvanwormer 10-27-07, 11:09 AM	That's the interpretation of meta-multiversal structure I went with for the Keeper ecology (though the idea wasn't new, and its an interpretation that you'll see elsewhere). Primarily, you see it in the climax of Dawn of the Overmind, where the illithids seek to exchange our reality with one they find on the other side of an ether gap, in which their empire never fell. Although that adventure implies the alternate multiverse only exists in potential, until the illithids activate it.
ArcTan 10-27-07, 11:44 PM	Of course, those silly imaginary people from alternate universes all think our universe is the one that only exists "in potential". We know they're wrong, though.
mvincent 10-29-07, 05:19 PM	I always imagined the Astral Plane to be like space and the planes like planets but that's beside the point.I believe that will be the paradigm for 4e.
mvincent 10-29-07, 05:24 PM	Keepers dont strike me as 'far realmy' beings - so I began to wonder are there any other alien universes 'outside' of the Great Wheel?I was under the impression that there were theoretically lots of universes outside of the Great Wheel. We often call them "alternate primes", but many of them are likely entirely alien (possibly with connections to entirely different afterlifes).
tridiak 10-30-07, 04:14 AM	Ask the Living Tribunal, "he" watches over all universes.
Millenia 10-30-07, 05:48 AM	What lies 'outside' of the Great Wheel? Why, a big mishmash of timey wimey... ball... stuff.
Furryhowler 10-30-07, 02:59 PM	What lies 'outside' of the Great Wheel? Why, a big mishmash of timey wimey... ball... stuff. Back to Gallifrey with you :P What lies outside the great wheel? http://www.fotosearch.com/comp/SDC/SDC161/282526SDC.jpg :D
Thanael 10-31-07, 04:30 AM	"If the universe were like a goat's bladder, then all that is, was, and shall be is the goat's bladder," said the sage to her burgeoning apprentice. "What's outside the bladder?" he asked. "Nothing?" The sage frowned a bit and pedanticly said, "No, not even nothing. There is no 'outside the bladder.'" "Ah," said the boy, "So its empty! Just lots of space!" He was happy he was catching on. "No no," the sage retorted. "There simply is no such thing as 'outside the bladder.'" The apprentice slumped in his seat. This was going to be a long excercise. --from Maldin's Grand Unified Theory of Life, the Multiverse and Everything (http://melkot.com/mysteries/multiverse.html)
Rania 10-31-07, 02:31 PM	What lies 'outside' of the Great Wheel? Why, a big mishmash of timey wimey... ball... stuff.You win this thread.
ArcTan 10-31-07, 07:34 PM	Ask the Living Tribunal, "he" watches over all universes. Nope. Only the Marvel multiverse. He got in a fight with the Spectre, who's the guardian of the entire DC multiverse/universe/thing when the Two Brothers (apparently the Marvel and DC multiverses personified) had that little argument/war/publicity stunt thing a few years back.
sciborg3 11-01-07, 11:31 AM	By the Panda, did that Two Brothers thing verily sucketh...
Kain_Darkwind 11-01-07, 03:05 PM	But was retconned...the two Brothers were fighting in the hand of the Living Tribunal...the version that was with the Spectre was an avatar of some sorts.
Thegans 11-01-07, 07:23 PM	What lies 'outside' of the Great Wheel? Why, a big mishmash of timey wimey... ball... stuff. You say timey wimet stuff I say E-space, whereever the timeship called Terminus came from, and the void.