Shadowfell

LYKA BRACER CHANGE

• Jordan Stuff - Lykalada'ath 
• If/when Lykalada'ath travels to certain planes of Existence linked to his past, the Bracer changes its properties while in that Plane. When he leaves that Plane, it returns to normal
• Bracer turns obsidian BLACK and extends to cover Lyka's full arm including his shoulder, and can be used for attacks, bludgeoning damage (unarmed attack, using STR modifer to add to ATTACK & DAMAGE)

The Shadowfell, also known as the Plane of Shadow, was one of the planes of existence in various cosmological models. Its purpose and characteristics evolved as new cosmologies were formulated. Other names for this plane included Shadowland, the Demiplane of Shadow,[4] the Shadow Deep, and simply Shadow. It existed as sort of a counterpart to the Feywild, in the sense that it was a reflection, or "echo", of the Prime Material Plane. Unlike the Feywild, it was a bleak, desolate place full of decay and death.  

“It is the toxic plane of darkness and power. It is the hidden place that hates the light. It is the frontier of worlds unknown.”

DESCRIPTION

The Shadowfell, also called the Plane of Shadow, is a dimension of black, gray, and white where most other color has been leached from everything. It is a place of darkness that hates the light, where the sky is a black vault with neither sun nor stars.

• The Shadowfell overlaps the Material Plane in much the same way as the Feywild. Aside from the colorless landscape, it appears similar to the Material Plane. Landmarks from the Material Plane are recognizable on the Shadowfell, but they are twisted and warped — distorted reflections of what exists on the Material Plane. Where a mountain stands on the Material Plane, the corresponding feature on the Shadowfell is a jagged rock outcropping with a resemblance to a skull, a heap of rubble, or perhaps the crumbling ruin of a once-great castle. A forest on the Shadowfell is dark and twisted, its branches reaching out to snare travelers’ cloaks, and its roots coiling and buckling to trip those who pass by.
• Shadow dragons and undead creatures haunt this bleak plane, as do other creatures that thrive in the gloom, including cloakers and darkmantles.

PORTAL TO SHADOWFELL

• Guarded by a Jabberwock CR 13

Soft light dapples the taut green hide of the giant creature before you. As you watch it rises from its reverie, terrible claws raking the ancient stone of the temple floor with a hideous screech. Bulbous eyes, like two waxing moons, blink open, and it yawns—revealing rows of jagged, hooked teeth. It stiffens, smelling the air before craning a sinewy neck in your direction and snarling hungrily.

 

DSCRYB Descriptions

Arrival to the Shadowfell (Plane)

The world here is as you remember it there, but wearing a fine, skin-tight shroud of grey. Color seems to be fighting to breathe. If so, it is losing, sinking back into drab shade. There is no discernible smell on the air, and your tongue lies dull and thick in your mouth. Leaves move on branches, but you don’t feel the breeze. Everything is partly itself, partly disappeared into an image of itself that drifts from its physical form, like a boat pulling at its dock line.

Shadowfell (Plane)

The world around you is as you know it, but twisted, shadowed—a dark reflection of the Prime Material. Familiar and unsettling in equal measure, the shadows of this world seem to drink in the light around them, and ash wafts on the air. It’s cold here, unnaturally so. The cold seeps past your cloak, into your flesh, and you feel the chill in your very bones. You cannot help but flinch at every sound, at each shadow that dislodges itself from your surroundings.

Maze of Paths

The shadowed paths wind their way up to the portal, a maddening maze of routes and stairs cutting through the darkness. They meet briefly before splitting off again, branching off before converging yet again at the threshold of the portal.

The Gray

Low fog stills around you, masking the dense surface of roots and vegetation beneath your feet. Silvery light pierces the bark of the trees, illuminating the twisted woods in a faint veil of twilight no matter the time of day. You hear others in the distance, their voices muffled and distorted as the wind flows through the leaves, but pinpointing their exact location proves fruitless.

Village in the Shadowfell (Plane)

The stout silhouettes of buildings stand huddled in the shadows, like travelers warming themselves by a fire. The cobbled streets are deserted, and in the windows you see only the reflection of your own visage. Something inhuman howls in the distance. Through the darkness, you spy the town square, a well at its heart. Something whispers from within that well, urging you forward.

Skeletal Tree

A lone tree, skeletal and wasting, rises from the heart of the ruins like a spear through a wound. The roots wind their way through the crumbling stone, clutching them to itself—entwined like lovers dead in each other’s arms.

 

Shadow Crossings

Similar to fey crossings, shadow crossings are locations where the veil between the Material Plane and the Shadowfell is so thin that creatures can walk from one plane to the other. A blot of shadow in the corner of a dusty crypt might be a shadow crossing, as might an open grave. Shadow crossings form in gloomy places where spirits or the stench of death lingers, such as battlefields, graveyards, and tombs. They manifest only in darkness, closing as soon as they feel light’s kiss.   EVERNIGHT

• The city of Neverwinter in the world of the Forgotten Realms has a dark reflection on the Shadowfell: the city of Evernight. Evernight is a city of cracked stone edifices and homes of rotten wood. Its roads are made mostly of trampled grave dust, and its few cobbled streets are missing enough stones that they appear pockmarked. The sky is corpse gray, and the breeze blows cold and humid, bringing a chill to the skin.
• The city’s living residents include mad necromancers, corrupt purveyors of human flesh, worshipers of evil deities, and others who are able to make themselves useful and crazy enough to want to live here. But the living are a minority in Evernight, for the bulk of the population consists of the shambling dead. Zombies, wights, vampires, and other undead make the city their home, all under the watchful eyes of the ruling caste: intelligent, flesh-eating ghouls.
• Rumors abound that this foul place mirrors one city on every world.

Domains of Dread

In remote corners of the Shadowfell, it is easy to reach horrific demiplanes ruled over by accursed beings of terrible evil. The best known of these is the valley of Barovia, overlooked by the towering spires of Castle Ravenloft and ruled by Count Strahd von Zarovich, the first vampire. Beings of the Shadowfell called the Dark Powers created these domains as prisons for these “darklords,” and through cruelty or carelessness trapped innocent mortals in these domains as well.

Notable Locations

Evernight

• The dismal reflection of Neverwinter. It was believed to be the dark version of least one city in every world in the Prime Material plane.

Shadow Swamp

• The Vast Swamp between Cormyr and Sembia had a Shadowfell counterpart, called the Shadow Swamp. Although the environment was similar in many ways, it was a great black swamp, where the water was dark and still and only moved sluggishly through the channels. Nevertheless, the landscape was different; there seemed to be more water than in the fast-growing Vast Swamp. Sites in the Vast Swamp had echoes here: the Lost Refuge in the material world had a counterpart in the so-called Shadow Citadel, which followed the same plan but was even more ruined. A portal called the Dusk Lord's Passage linked the two. On the other hand, a flooded fissure that formed an ordinary lakebed in the Vast Swamp was reflected in an empty canyon in the Shadow Swamp, known as the Black Rift. Swamp water flowed in on all sides, yet the water at the bottom never rose and never seemed to drain out, an entirely unexplained phenomena of the plane. The Black Rift was especially morphic—although it remained more-or-less the same shape overall, local changes in terrain were extreme and bizarre. The interplay between the magical Weave and the Shadow Weave was especially malleable, a trait which attracted the followers of Shar.

Sphur Upra

• Located nine miles (over fourteen kilometers) below the surface of east Faerûn, between the surface nations of Mulhorand and Murghôm,[56] this city was established on the Shadowfell in −2954 DR by five gloaming families seeking security and community. After almost 3,500 years, they expanded their city by creating portals to the Material Plane in the Year of the Spitting Viper, 534 DR, and became a major trading post for goods between the two planes.

Thultanthar (City of Shade)

• This floating enclave of Netherese origin entered the Plane of Shadow just before Karsus's Folly brought down the empire in Year of Sundered Webs, −339 DR. Over the centuries, its population acclimated to the new environment and became known as shades. In the Year of Wild Magic, 1372 DR, Thultanthar was brought back to the Material Plane and became known as the City of Shade. The inhabitants then began the rebuilding of the Netherese empire.

Realms

Only three deities were known to have claimed the Plane of Shadow as their home:

• Mask, the Master of all Thieves and Lord of Shadows had a realm on this plane called Shadow Keep. It was made out of shadowstuff and was extremely difficult to see even when standing right next to it.
• Shar, Mistress of the Night and Lady of Loss, once resided in a high tower called the Palace of Loss. It had no apparent means of entry or exit, but her followers had no trouble gaining access. She sometimes kept prisoners there so she could enjoy their suffering. After the Spellplague, she moved her abode to the Towers of Night and left behind a deep dark hole guarded by evil creatures. This Foundation of Loss exuded palpable grief and was reported to contain a portal to her home in the Towers of Night.
• Null, draconic god of death, had realms named the Mausoleum of Chronepsis and the Mausoleum of Pain in the Outlands and Carceri, respectively. Parts of these were thought to exist on the Plane of Shadow at the same time

 

Inhabitants

• The Shadowfell was home to a mysterious form of undead called shadows, other "shadow" creatures such as the shadow mastiff and shadow dragon, and a race of humanoids known as shades. In addition to those, there were numerous other inhabitants, such as communities of shadar-kai, Shadovar, and dark ones.
• Probably the most dominant race of beings on the Plane of Shadow were the shades—ancestors of ancient Netherese humans who resided on the plane in their floating city for centuries and acquired many abilities from immersion in shadow essence. Malaugryms may have been superior to shades, having the advantage of being shapeshifters and practically immortal unless killed in some fashion; but their small numbers, fierce independence, and difficulty in mastering interplanar travel made them much less organized and effective.
• Other creatures that were either native to the plane or attracted to it included bodaks, cloakers, darkweavers, ephemera of all kinds, veserabs, liches, nightshades, shadar-kai, shadurakul, spectres, and wraiths. Occasionally, animals and monsters would wander or fall into a vortex to the Shadowfell and become trapped there. Those that survived eventually took on shadow-given abilities, carved out a niche in the ecosystem, and preyed on whatever attracted their attention. Examples included apes, basilisks, bears, owlbears, rats, umber hulks, and wolves. Such creatures could give rise to dark creatures, shadowy counterparts of natural creatures.
• Shadow demons also inhabited this plane. These fiends were responsible for the creation of the race known as krinth, having interbred with Netherese slaves.
• Shadow sea serpents were not native to the Plane of Shadow but were bred there by the Shadovar, crossing warm-blooded carnivorous orcas with vile shadow creatures. These serpents hunted in packs both in the sea and on land.

Notable Inhabitants

• Dark Powers, vestiges of ancient dead evil gods that either dwell on the plane or were banished there, and feed on evil creatures that become trapped in the Shadowfell
• The Raven Queen had a divine realm known as the Fortress of Memories here