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Mundane Cosmology

Source Planar Adventures pg. 88
What if there were no other planes at all, in any form whatsoever? What if the universe was all there was, with nothing beyond the prosaic existence of physical reality? No celestials, no fiends, no elementals, and no gods? In such a setting, life would be followed by death and the oblivion of nonexistence. What sort of world would exist in the absence of the celestial, infernal, and even the divine? Without the ever-present threat of divine justice and an eternal reward or punishment, what would such a world look like? Religion would most certainly still exist, but it would rely on pure faith rather than demonstrable divine intervention and direct contact with divine emissaries. Likewise, divine spellcasters would still exist, but their magic would be fueled solely by their internal beliefs (you may restrict choices to classes like clerics, who must select domains, or give players complete freedom as to which domains they wish to pursue for their own personal religions); they would no longer be direct servants of supernatural beings.

In such a setting, you would need to decide if resurrection is at all possible and whether there is any place in the setting for the undead. Both of these concepts presuppose something akin to a soul; what happens to a soul in a mundane cosmology? Are souls natural by-products of life, or is a soul some sort of stellar energy adrift in the cosmos? Maybe there is no such thing as a soul, and all who die become ghosts unless some other event transforms them into specific undead creatures. Where do these ghosts go? How many would remain behind to haunt the site of their death? Do ghosts simply remain invisible and unseen? Do they drift to the edge of the universe?

Would outsiders exist at all? Certainly not in the normal conceptualization. Outsiders in such a cosmology could represent mortal beliefs rather than being an intrinsic part of reality. Powerful spellcasters likely don’t summon them from somewhere else—such outsiders are instead created out of raw magical energy and infused with a specific alignment or characterizing belief. A wizard seeking bloody, destructive revenge might channel his power to create a balor and set the creature loose upon his enemies. A religious spellcaster might form an angel that embodies her beliefs, rather than believing in the creed of the angel’s divine patron, turning the standard paradigm on its head.

Archives of Nethys

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Mundane Cosmology