The Astral Sea
The Astral Plane
What it is. The Astral Plane—often called the Astral Sea—is the thought-stuff between worlds: an infinite, silvery void that links the Material to the divine Outer Planes (and, in some eras, almost everything else). It’s weightless, ageless, and eerily serene—until a psychic gale tears past or a dreadnought blots out the stars.
Nature & traits
Infinite & weightless. There’s no gravity. Objects keep mass and inertia, so travel is push-off, throw, or—most commonly—thought-propelled drift.
Timeless feel. Time flows but its effects are nearly halted: a thousand years of silver emptiness pass like a day on your body and gear. You don’t age or hunger here (mortal communities must leave to bear and raise children).
Magic. Generally “normal,” though editions/cosmologies tweak this (e.g., faster casting in the World Tree model). Teleportation and mind-affecting effects are common tools; planar travel magics are foundational.
Access. Reachable by spell, psionics, items, or portals from almost anywhere on the Material—and from the first layers of the Outer Planes.
Getting there (and back)
You enter in one of two ways:
Astral Projection. Your psyche steps out as an astral body trailing the iconic silver cord back to your physical form. Your magical gear comes along in astral duplicate; mundane stuff doesn’t. The body you left behind doesn’t eat, breathe, or age, but it can be moved, harmed, or killed.
If your astral body dies: you snap back into your physical shell (often comatose).
If your physical body dies: your projection perishes shortly after.
Cord severing (rare, catastrophic): only notorious forces can do it—githyanki silver swords, astral dreadnoughts, certain divine edicts, exceptional spells, or violent psychic winds.
Physical entry. Effects like plane shift bring you wholly into the Astral. There is no cord—safer from decapitation, but you’re really out there.
Color pools. Every traveler arrives near a shimmering, two-dimensional pool (your home “exit,” always silvery). Pools in other hues lead to specific planes. Concentrate to “window” the far side, then step through. Projections that pass a pool instantiate a fresh body of local matter on the destination plane (still tethered by your cord); the closer the destination to your origin’s nature, the more it resembles your original self.
Geography & landmarks of nothingness
The Silver Void. Mostly empty brilliance punctuated by islands of matter: shattered plane-chunks, god-corpses, fortresses, and demiplanes.
Dead gods. The Astral is the graveyard of deities. Their colossal, fossilized remains—“god-isles”—float in silence, sometimes riddled with temples, scavengers, or settlements drawing on fading residues of divinity.
Tu’narath. Capital of the githyanki, carved into (and atop) a dead god. It anchors a web of redoubts, docks, and war-routes that span the Sea.
Demiplanes-on-demand. In the World Axis era, powerful wills can scaffold a demiplane from thought. When forgotten, they unravel back into silver haze.
Cosmologies
Great Wheel.
The Astral is the transitive highway between the Material and the Outer Planes’ first layers. You enter, find a color pool to your target plane, and step through. (Inner Planes are not astrally linked in this model.)
World Tree.
The Astral becomes a tree-shaped surround touching nearly all planes (even the Inner). Travel between divine dominions usually funnels through the Material “trunk.” Faerûn actually interfaces with several Astrals—one per pantheon sphere (Faerûnian, Mulhorandi/Untheric, Maztican, Zakharan), while Kara-Turan deities route via the Spirit World.
World Axis.
The Astral is explicitly the Astral Sea: the luminous ocean where astral dominions (gods’ realms) float freely after the Spellplague shattered the World Tree. Access is via world-side passages or rituals; travel is by will like controlled flight. Demiplanes are artisan coves amid the Sea.
Spelljamming.
Wildspace systems sit in an overlap between Material and Astral. Sail to the edge of a system and pass the silvery haze into the full Astral Sea; from there, steer by thought toward other systems or astral sites—supplanting earlier crystal-sphere/phlogiston routes.
Inhabitants & hazards
Dominant powers.
Githyanki. The plane’s foremost culture: militant, mobile, silver-sword elites, fortress networks, and the metropolis Tu’narath.
Astral dreadnoughts. Titanic, one-eyed planivores with cord-shearing maws and tails that seem to trail forever. They’re either native emanations of the plane or ancient imports; either way, you are prey.
Maruts & inevitables, astral devas, shedu. Lawful enforcers and celestials patrol to keep fiendish traffic in check (never perfectly).
Others you’ll meet: astral dragons and whales; kodragons; berbalang; brain collectors; dhours; dreamslayers; foo creatures; ihagnim; star leviathans; thendar; spectral hounds (gith “dogs”); and transiting devils, demons, modrons, slaadi, and more using the Astral as a shortcut.
Environmental threats.
Psychic winds. Invisible storms that shove, scatter, stun, or shred silver cords.
Drift & isolation. With no up or down and no friction, lost focus can strand you in measureless space.
Predators & pirates. Dreadnought ambushes, gith raiders, cults on god-isles, and marooned fiends are common encounter seeds.
Deities & special cases
The dead drift here: famous examples include Karsus, Moander, Bhaal, Myrkul, Bane (during interregnums), Leira, Kalzareinad, Ibrandul, Ulutiu, Amaunator (in older eras), Gilgeam, and more—some temporary, some seemingly permanent.
Sardior’s Ruby Palace famously sojourns in the Astral between journeys.
Exceptions: Celestian (Oerth) wanders the Sea as patron of travelers, while Anubis has special stewardship roles regarding divine remains.