Paraelemental Plane of Ooze

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Greyhawk Plane
Paraelemental Plane of Ooze
Type Inner Plane
Layers n/a
Alignment No alignment traits
Native Inhabitants Ooze mephit, ooze sprite, ooze paraelemental, vitriolus
Greyhawk Powers Bwimb

The Paraelemental Plane of Ooze is one of the inner planes. It's an infinite ocean with no surface composed of ooze, muck, and slime.

The plane is also a place of torturous death and exile, often used by evil wizards and other powerful beings as a dumping ground for their enemies. On the plane of Ooze, victims are likely to drown, choking on sediment, without magical protection. This might be a kinder fate than that received by those protected from immediate death; those poor souls may be left to slowly starve, or they may go mad from the monotony of their prison. It is for this reason that the plane is sometimes known as the "House of Chambered Madness." The wizard Baltron is likely among those imprisoned in the plane since his experiment went awry in the 570s CY. It is not known if he since died or if he remains, preserved and suffering.

Although it is unpleasant to breathe the substance of the Plane of Ooze, it can be done by those capable of breathing water, whether due to magic or natural gills. Except in the region known as the Slag Marshes, the plane has no gravity.

Structure

The substance of the plane varies from clear, gelatinous goo to green sludge, brown mud, or anything in between, but it is generally transluscent and lit by a dim ambient glow. Bubbles of air, water, and earth help relieve the plane's monotony. Bubbles of acid, poison, and disease help increase the plane's danger.

The Paraelemental Plane of Ooze touches the border Ethereal Plane at all points. Toward the Elemental Plane of Earth, this mud grows drier and grittier, thickening to a syrupy consistency. This region is known as the Muckmire; the mud there has a distressing tendency to harden around living beings, trapping them as frequently is the plane's wont.

Toward the Elemental Plane of Water the mud turns to silt, functioning effectively as the "bottom" of the Plane of Water's vast ocean. In this region can be found the Bile Sea, a green, burning realm that effectively serves as a semi-plane of acid.

Toward the Positive Energy Plane, the plane borders both the Quasielemental Plane of Mineral and the Quasielemental Plane of Steam. In the border region between Ooze and Mineral is the Slag Marshes, a soup of mud and dissolved heavy metals and, unlike the majority of the plane, a "surface" with an airy atmosphere above it. These "marshes" are choked with the presence silvery, poisonous weeds. The border region between Ooze and Steam, known as the Choking Gale, is similar, but the airy region above the ooze is filled with strong winds that blow clouds of toxic gases. Even creatures normally immune to poison often find these clouds fatal.

Toward the Negative Energy Plane, the plane borders the Quasielemental Plane of Salt and the Quasielemental Plane of Dust. The border between Ooze and Salt is called the Stagnant Sea; there, the ooze is caustic enough to corrode even magical metal. The border between Ooze and Dust is known charmingly as the Oasis of Filth; the ooze is thicker there than in much of the plane, and filled with diseases that affect even those normally immune to such things. These two regions might be viewed as semi-planes of Rust and Plague.

Portals in the muck of Sigil's Hive Ward and deep in the city sewers lead to the Plane of Ooze, ready to grab at passerby. Another portal to the paraplane can be found in Shedaklah, the layer of the Abyss contended over by the demon lords Juiblex and Zuggtmoy. This portal resembles a gelatinous orb made of some viscous substance 30 feet across.

Rare vortices spiral through the Ethereal Plane to connect the Plane of Ooze with places of great concentrations of filth and debris, such as piles of plague victims, or to worlds where life has yet to fully emerge. A vortex to the Paraelemental Plane of Ooze seems to exist in Csipros Erd, as ooze paraelementals have moved into the area. Likely this vortex leads to the Choking Gale region, as steam quasielementals are common there as well, and this would explain the toxic gases that plague the valley.

Ecology

Fauna

The Plane of Ooze is full of life, teaming with worms, insects, grubs, leeches, maggots, eels, jellyfish, poisonous rays, slimes, jellies, puddings, and oozes. Many otyughs and neo-otyughs have found their way to the plane as well, treating it as some sort of great promised land or paradise. A few fish dwell on the border with the plane of Water, but not as many as on the Plane of Water itself.

A large number of animentals, resembling ordinary animals whose bodies are literally made of the gelatinous substance of the plane, inhabit the Paraelemental Plane of Ooze as well.

Flora

  • Ioungis is a silvery, toxic weed similar to pussy willow, endemic in the Slag Marshes.

Inhabitants

The most plentiful inhabitants of the Plane of Ooze are the ooze mephits, which roam the plane in nomadic packs. They loathe the somewhat rarer ooze "sprites," repulsive beings (not related to or remotely resembling any sort of fey) who are generally able to force the mephits to obey their will.

As disgusting as many find the ooze mephits and ooze sprites, though, the ooze paraelementals are worse, foul-tempered masses of slime who follow their baroness, Bwimb II. The paraelementals despise the mephits and ooze sprites, killing them on sight.

The vitriolus is a native of Paraelemental Ooze that can be summoned to the Prime Material Plane by means of a special liquid. On the Material Plane they resemble small faceless humanoids made of sand; their appearance in their native realm is unknown.

Hunting marids sometimes mistake travelers here for game, and dao come here to bathe. A mad human wizard known simply as the Warlock of Ooze dwells here, somehow infused with the essence of chaos after a magical war and become the go-to expert on the magic of ooze and slime.

Features and settlements

  • Gnome's Home is a haphazard raft-city constructed by a colony of gnomish miners who got sucked out of the Quasielemental Plane of Mineral into the Slag Marshes of the Paraplane of Ooze. (The Inner Planes, 85)
  • The Trash Heap is a massive, ever-growing region, countless miles in diameter, comprised of the garbage cast off by the city of Sigil. Scavengers dwell there, some of them from air-breathing races who have managed to find air pockets or magic items that allow them to survive. (The Inner Planes, 85)
  • Yuhnmoag is an illithid fortress considered to be a "safe haven" on the plane, with clear air, fresh water, and protection against the hostile surroundings (The Inner Planes, page 13).
  • Here and there, ooze sprites, mephits, or paraelementals may have built structures in the endless muck, but these are seldom of any importance.

Phenomena

  • Scattered throughout the plane are pockets of congealed matter known as cysts. Victims who have managed to get stuck inside them become perfectly preserved fossils; if a cyst is ruptured (which may happen accidentally or due to a traveler puncturing it), the victim will be freed and live again, even after thousands of years. (The Inner Planes, 85)

Bibliography

  • Cook, Monte. Dead Gods. Lake Geneva, WI: TSR, 1997.
  • -----. The Planewalker's Handbook. Lake Geneva, WI: TSR, 1996.
  • -----. Planescape Monstrous Compendium Appendix Three. Renton, WA: TSR, 1998.
  • Cook, Monte with William W. Connors. The Inner Planes. Renton, WA: TSR, 1998.
  • Holian, Gary. "Places of Mystery: Gateways to Adventure." Dragon #304. Bellevue, WA: Paizo Publishing, 2002.
  • Varney, Allen, ed. Planescape Monstrous Compendium Appendix. Lake Geneva, WI: TSR, 1994.
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