Planar stories

[Ripheus23]

I love the idea of setting a story in a universe with planes of existence. The Wheel of Time and the Cosmere stories feature limited but striking examples of this quasi-subgenre; D&D materials, maybe Magic materials, are probably the most expansive users of the trope. But, now, the two main rationales for multiple planes seem to be either (A) planes are based on elements/categories or (B) planes are based on cognitive rankings (e.g. the WoT world has the world, then dreams, then the superdreamworld, and also side-worlds, IIRC).

My first shot at trying to outline a planar story, then, turned on trying to come up a nifty set of elements/categories to go off. The best thing I came up with on that basis were (I think) Planes of Light, Darkness, Life, Death, Hope, and Despair. I don't remember the logic for these but I believe those are what I went with.

However, the muttering-philosopher in me had to call such a scheme into doubt, like, are those really the 6 broadest+highest categories, at least as per forms of planes? So now I have come up with two alternate models:

1. One plane per each "crystal system" as described on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crystal_system for a septaplanar world (at least if this world is 3D only). I've recently updated this concept by pairing the hexaverse notion (as described in another thread) with this one, where the hexaverse is hexaplanar (one plane per Divine Person) and the septaplanar reach is the result of a pantheistic function (that is, there are 6 transtheistically created worlds and 1 pantheistically created one). Next to the hexaverse and the septaverse is a region of sheer mathematical possibility, where anomalous forces can develop for insertion into the more carved-out worlds of the plot.
2. One plane per each category of amendment (so four planes, one for apologies, one for forgiveness, one for punishment, and one for redemption). A similar notion is to expand afterlife options from Christianity as much as possible, using CT/Conscious Torment, NS/Neutral State, A/Annihilation, and H/Heaven, as vectors, with finite/infinite divergences. So there'd be an afterlife that is pure CT, finite NS before infinite CT, alternating NS and CT, finite CT before A, pure A, finite CT before infinite H, and so on.

[Ixthos he/him]

I am very fond of the idea of other dimensions. The original half-life, and its expansion opposing force, and to a less extent blue-shift, had a very good approach to it. The idea of using another dimension to travel, and setting up equipment there or at the departure zone to use it, and it being a bridge to others, and not the only bridge, each world with its own alien ecosystem, physics altered.

But I will also add that the wheel of time also covered an interesting extension with the fourth book and the twisted doors - the idea of other realities with physical distances changing, with inhabitants that saw reality differently, distorted geometry. The third book likewise, Verin talking about not just possibilities from quantum decisions but also starting points. 

I am not a player of dungeons and dragons, I mainly know about its ideas through webcomics, but I understand the idea of layers on top of reality. Onions, and each layer a grid. You seem to be focusing on the idea of filling in a grid - is the grid naturally filled, or are they stable points a world can be balanced and form?

 

To be as generic as possible, consider the idea of membranes and surfaces in a hyperspace of complex additional angles - the removal of the need to fill in a grid but able to have complex interplay at intersections of surfaces, both with itself and with other, possibly more complex, surfaces. That is, a complex surface in a multidimensional grid, with each axis itself a plane of other traits, like a line bent across the waves.

[Edit] In short, are you going for an onion approach with a filled in grid, or amorphous flow?

Edited October 8, 2018 by Ixthos
Sorry! Left out the question!

[Ripheus23]

Both! Actually you have a better grasp of the geometry question in this case than I do

[Ixthos he/him]

@Ripheus23 Thanks :-) It is a topic that I find facinating - Maths is something which I have both a professional and personal appreciation for, though I have been up and down on maths test my whole life :-P particularly infinity paradoxes and non-euclidean geometry. And other universes too :-) The Magicians Nephew was one of my favourite books growing up!

I'd like to further elaborate on a few approaches I find helpful for thinking about the structure of possible multiversal arrangements :-) I think there are three main categories of things to think about with other dimensions, each with their own unique additions to multiverse, and each with its own possible ways of helping - and the best part is, each can work with the other if they are treated as abstract approaches, something which can be thought of one way to gain one type of insight, and another way to gain another!

The three categories are structure, travel, and life. Structure can itself be thought of - and this is something I find very helpful - with ideas from stellar mechanics, electron orbitals, and mathematical, focusing on non-euclidean geometry, higher order dimensions, and approaches to infinity. Travel can be thought of with its ties to structure, so in terms of folding, or a bubble, or a connected tunnel, or a mixture. Life can be thought of with internal life, external life, and the roles of life from other dimensions. Each approach can also help with connections between worlds, and if a world is of the same type as another or is in some form a foundation for a property of another, and vice versa.

I can elaborate on my understanding and approach on any of these you like, if you wish :-) this is something I am very fond of :-)

[Ripheus23]

I would like to distinguish between my use of the word "multiverse" and of the word "multiplanar." Structure/travel concepts would apply to my concept of a multiverse, whereas life/role concepts fit more to my concept of a multiplane. A planar cosmos, for me, or in my usage of the terms, is one with discontiguous regions that are not just inter-accessible but involve narrative synchronicity (a "true" multiverse, on my view of things, would be a set of discontiguous spaces simpliciter, inter-accessible or not, though not inter-accessible by "locomotion"). What happens on one plane is mirrored on another, so to say, whereas events in one universe might not have any such direct effect on events in another (or if they did, they would be "artificial" rather than the result of an automatic/natural higher-level principle mapping events from one realm to another). Thus while a stacked set of 3D spaces might correspond to a simple planar diagram, if the encompassing space is simply a fourth dimension of space, then the 3D spaces might be contiguous in this fourth dimension such that motion on the fourth axis of symmetry could land one in different such spaces, in which event we have neither a "true" multiverse nor a "true" planar system.

tl;dr version Planes are linked by story-like functions; universes are linked by geometry-like functions. (Of course, there can be geometrical stories and stories about geometry, so...)

[Ixthos he/him]

Ahhhh. If I understand you, T'A'R from the Wheel of Time, or at least the part of it used in the stories, would count as multiplanar due to the mirroring between them, with events in the physical world causing the corresponding region in the dream world to change, but the dream world's mutability serving as a buffer to any changes within it affecting the physical world, as the dream world would - like a spring - return to match its physical base after the effort to maintain the effect is released. Likewise the cognitive realm in the Cosmere, and various takes on ghostly worlds, as there is a connection between the two spaces, the areas of one mapping to the areas of another. T'A'R in the context of a world that touches other worlds, and the world with the snakes and foxes, on the other hand, would be examples of a multiverse, as those regions do not map to the physical space Rand and the other live, save only for the portals that connect those places, like the twisted door, etc.?

I do see some overlap, as a multiverse naturally could include a mutiplaner setup - either worlds having multiple planes, or each universe is forceably mapped to another, etc., and a multiplaner arrangement can be independent of a multiverse. The same principles used to describe one can be used for the others, but that is not necessarily the case. The space between two universes could function as planes, for example, as the two universes could be themselves be worlds that are distinct, but between them multiple layers slowly shift between properties, like the example you gave of an elemental world, with the closer levels to one world being physically mapped to that world, but the further along - moving from layer to layer - one sees the distances change and an element begins to become dominant, eventually reaching a world very different from the start. Likewise, a universe could be the source of a property, and its presence shapes the planes of another universe, causing them to separate into layers in the direction of the universe, but not actually touching it, like metal magnetised by a nearby magnet but not actually touching it. 

Life in one plane could be a force in another, or a force produced by one plane could be a form of life if the force can cross over a junction between planes. Life could also exist across multiple planes, being aware of them all. Some planes could be linked to others but those that it links to are not directly connected, or all planes could be adjacent.

Using an idea from electron orbitals there can be multiple planes that are coupled together but distinct - two worlds which occupy the same space, and are of the same type. At another energy level are other planes which are also paired, but together with the lower they reshape the structure of one another, while remaining distinct.

Lastly, the idea of planes which are fixed, but between them or in other regions are planes that are coupled loosely - that occupy the same general area but which could drift away or be destroyed, or merge, or only part of them touches the rest.

So, things like that?

[Ripheus23]

On 10/14/2018 at 8:33 AM, Ixthos said:

I do see some overlap, as a multiverse naturally could include a mutiplaner setup - either worlds having multiple planes, or each universe is forceably mapped to another, etc.

Indeed, the planar story I came up with works off this possibility. There are parallel universes, where each universe is multiplanar, but the basis for the differences between planes, per universe, varies (the universes are distinguished by the degree to which they are caused by free will, with the hexaverse coming from the pure will of God, the crystal-system universe being partly derivative of both free will and abstract mathematics, and the possibilities-universe being totally mathematically necessitated).

On 10/14/2018 at 8:33 AM, Ixthos said:

Using an idea from electron orbitals there can be multiple planes that are coupled together but distinct - two worlds which occupy the same space, and are of the same type. At another energy level are other planes which are also paired, but together with the lower they reshape the structure of one another, while remaining distinct.

I've been toying with this for the sake of a "triverse" (not sure if I like the term ) where matter, dark matter, and some x-matter constitute the different... intraplanes? Inplanes? Like they're in the same space but the force-carriers for them don't usually interact, and it takes magic/"magic" to switch from one matter-type to another...

EDIT:

Two other multiplanar/multiversal settings I've thought about:

One was jokingly called "the super-meta-trans-hyper-multiverse." The "serious" name was "the Cardinality." It was a dual Tegmarkian-theological cosmos, where "half" the Cardinality was determined by natural physical reasons, the other "half" was an infinity of universes forged by God (well, technically, forged by a servant of God, using a clever power God implanted in the original magical world, but that's too many stories for too many other times haha!). The plot was that one set of universes where evil dominated, coalesced when living universes raped each other and spawned an evil sub-multiverse known as the Dreadrealm, whose goal was to transform the entire Cardinality into a living being and then rape that from the inside, to spawn a trans-Cardinality of mathematical evil (the idea was that there was a form of reality, known as the Ordinality, that was perpendicular to the Cardinality (I will testify that I came up with this notion before I read Oathbringer!)).

The other depended on space being 3-dimensional, but time was infinite-dimensional. Every successive set of three temporal dimensions made up one plane, and each plane was synchronized with the others, up until the "alephequence" was "reached," which itself led to that cosmos' version of the Beyond (again, conceived of independently, though otherwise as such, well before I was either Cosmere- or Realmatically-aware).

Edited October 15, 2018 by Ripheus23

[Ixthos he/him]

Ideas can come from several different origins, and can be uniquely implemented - the number of ideas I have which I see having parallels in other stories is a good indicator that if someone else proposes an idea, it probably is something they came up with independently prior to reading about another similar idea. I don't assume you copied that from the Cosmere, and even if you did, your take on it would be different to Mr. Sanderson's, so don't worry!

 

I have ideas for multiverses and also (as you would call) multiplanes, though I do have a different term for them - we can use your terms to keep from confusing the issue with different terminology (I have a friend who I don't know what religion he is at the moment, but we discuss several topics, and we both use the same term for different things - when he says soul he means what I call the spirit, and what I call soul he calls mind, so when we talk we have to remember what the other means). 

 

Two ideas you might have considered but which might be helpful to consider if you haven't are toroidal or ring-like planes, going far enough in one direction brings you back to the start, so with multiple planes they aren't stacked on top of one another so much as they are part of a ring. Adding to that idea are multiple toroidal chains, so there isn't just one choice of moving (going around in a circle of one set) but several (so a hyper-ring).