Arvandor

Arvandor stretches from the boundless mass of the Sparkling Sea to the great snow-capped mountains that frame its horizons. Its forests are vast and layered: high canopies of sun-loving trees soar above lower groves of shade-loving vines, while the deepest woods form tangled undergrowth where few dare tread. The realm’s meadows blaze with eternal blossoms, some bright with perennial flowers, others carpeted in blue blooms that pierce the snow at spring’s return.   The land is riddled with mysteries, giant ruins from before The Seldarine conquest, forgotten glades, and groves where vows carry divine weight. To mortals, especially non-elves, the beauty of Arvandor can overwhelm; many are seized by an irresistible desire to join in song and revelry, requiring steady guidance lest they lose themselves forever.  

Notable Locations

High Canopies

Triple-tier forests of titan oak, silver fir, and copper-barked beech rise like vaulted cathedrals. The overstory rides the sun and wind; the midstory carries rope-vines, living bridges, and lantern-lily bowers; the understory is a hush of ferns, moss, and mirror-pools. Natural “river-balconies” (roots grown into terraces) let streams spill from bough to bough in glittering veils.  

Meadow Belts and Flower-Seas

Where the woods open, vast prairies ripple with wheat-gold and poppy-red. Perennial wildflowers sketch migrating “color tides” across the year; blue snow-blossoms poke through spring frost. Wayfarers navigate by hue, the Rose Drift means south, the Saffron Band heralds the Symposion coast.  

Rivers, Falls, and Aether-Mist

Cold springs braid into glass-clear rivers that rarely muddy. Waterfalls punch through the canopy in silver tubes, their mist refracting at noon into faint aether-songs, melodies locals hum to steady the heart on long climbs. Cave-rivers run beneath hill-roots and emerge as fern-ringed pools sanctified for oaths.  

Sparkling Sea and The Sea of Myriads

Arvandor’s ocean wears an enamel sheen under moonlight. The Sea of Myriads is an archipelago of knife-backed isles, beach caves, tide-bloom grottoes, and cliff amphitheaters where midnight Symposia meet. Currents are story-takers, speak a true tale into the wind and it freshens toward your next audience.  

Mountain Uplands

Snow-glossed ridges and blue-shadow cirques crown the realm. Glacier lenses feed hanging lakes that spill like necklaces into the high forests. Iron here is patient, bronze brave; veins of wine-dark stone thread the passes, and old avalanche scars now host cedar groves thick with owlbloom and silver-thyme.  

Ruinlands of the Old High Folk

Giant-scale roads, pillared causeways, and amphitheaters lie softened by moss and ivy. Cyclopean stairs serve as terraced orchards; toppled colossi become cliff gardens of herbs and singing lichens. Many ruins hold “echoes”, architectural acoustics that answer a call-and-response with harmonics rather than words.  

Moon-Glades and Oath-Groves

Rings of pale-barked trees and standing stones collect moonlight like water. Here, art-as-oath is strongest: carved knotwork, epics scratched into bark-slate, frescoes on living rock. By night the air glows with a gentle hoarfrost of motes; by dawn, vows feel lighter to keep.  

Storm-Isles Fringe

Along the ocean’s rougher edge, black-basalt skerries catch thunderheads. Sky-knights hone storm-duels to first lightning, and coastal “tidewardens” read barometric “script” curling off the surf to warn villages inland.  

Portals

Arvandor connects freely with neighboring realms of beauty and freedom among all of their allies, for instance, Arvandor is threaded with thresholds that open under the right conditions. Toward Aquallor, sea caves and tidal chasms become gateways at the neap tide, leading into shallow sapphire waters, or, if one lingers at storm-peak, dropping into trench-roads toward the deep courts. The Outlands are reached through Sylvania, whose festival lanterns align after three nights without decree or curfew, sending a meadow boulevard outward toward the gate-town. Ysgard may be entered through wells and high springs that turn skyward on war-feast nights, their paths marked by drumlines rather than stars. To the westmost shoals, the realm frays into Limbo, and dream-sails of silk and promise skim the seam where opposing currents argue.   We should also mention, that even She'eros who is not an elven originating deity, has access here as a portal to the The House of the Trueheart.  

Travel

Travelers move as easily through branches as across earth. Root-ribs and woven boughs form canopy roads linking treetowns, their light-wells piercing down to the forest floor like falling starlight. Feyfoot tracks wind soft and narrow through meadows, revealed only to honest travelers; those who exploit or deceive find the paths vanish beneath their feet. Leaving bread and a story at their edge invites a guide. At the solstices, auroral curtains descend as walkable veils. Those who climb them while singing a promise find themselves stepping sky-to-sky toward distant isles they truly yearn for.  

Inhabitants

The most numerous of all here, are the Azatas who are the greatest servants of the Seladrine.   Arvandor is home to elves of every lineage, alongside great numbers of Celestial Eladrin. Native elves here are more passionate and mercurial than their kin elsewhere, their emotions heightened by the plane itself. Hunting is a sacred practice, performed during elven festivals; while the quarry is eaten as part of the feast, great hunts may be declared against monstrous intruders from neighboring planes or against rogue beasts. Failure to fell the chosen prey is read as a dire omen.   Petitioners who arrive in Arvandor take on a perfected, idealized elven form regardless of their mortal race. These souls spend eternity in beauty and tranquility, though many also serve the gods as scouts, wardens, or artisans. Angels are common envoys here, called upon when the Seldarine require powerful agents in other planes. Wildlife thrives in abundance, from giant squirrels and flocks of birds to stranger creatures in the shadowed undergrowth.

Magic, too, bends to the rhythm of the plane. Spells cast while singing, dancing, painting, or speaking truths come more smoothly, lending clarity of concentration and appearing to onlookers as harmless unless their effects are overtly hostile. When tied to sworn promises, spells such as sanctuary, protection from evil, shield other, heroism, tongues, and sending take on added strength, while vows that are shaped through art grant their bearers courage against fear. During the great revels of the plane, illusions wrought for delight grow stronger and more real, while bindings and contracts forged in cruelty or terror falter, for Arvador itself will not carry their weight.   The realm is not without its hazards. Flux squalls sweep across glades and valleys, reshaping terrain in moments; those caught within must balance or be tumbled along, though the creation of art or mantra lends steadiness. Idea leeches drift like swarms, feeding on the fresh memories of creation; they can be repelled only by offering them a new verse. In places where law momentarily crystallizes, a law-snap locks gravity and contracts bite harshly; lawful magics may surge with clarity, but shatter at the end, leaving their casters drained.  

Light, Sound, and Scen

Arvandor is navigated as much through the senses as by map or star. Meadows carry distinct belts of scent, lavender, resin, and apple-wood, that allow seasoned travelers to smell their way toward the sea. Certain ridgelines become natural sounding boards, carrying song or the call of horns across leagues, while others swallow sound entirely, creating perfect natural courts for quiet parley. By night, lichens bloom as constellations upon old stones, echoing the stars overhead; they shine more brightly near oath-sites and dim where grudges fester.

The skies of Arvandor shift with startling swiftness, as gentle breezes swell into squalls only to fall quiet moments later. Sunshafts break through passing clouds, painting the forest in shifting spotlights, and double rainbows are so common that travelers scarcely remark upon them. On rare occasions, a third rainbow band arcs across the sky, a sure omen that a festival is stirring on the wind. The air itself sometimes moves in harmony, gusts arriving as chords that can ease a journey if one hums along, yet twist the tongue into knots if one shouts against them. Even in winter the land shows kindness, as snow lays across branches in lace rather than breaking them, while blue blossoms bloom along the banks of frozen streams to mark safe crossings.

The timbers of the realm are alive with spirit. Serren-like heartwoods fall only when they will it, and their branches retain a grain that hums when planed, making them the favored material for bows, harps, and long-hafted weapons. Herbs grow in terraces of ancient ruins, silver-thyme to steady the hand, moon-mint to ease fevered dreams, and oath-sage to burn at reconciliations. The very stone is touched with wonder: bronze-rich rock that polishes to a mirror sheen, known as wine-dark stone, shapes spearheads, amphora lips, and ritual mirrors. In oath-halls, amphorae crafted from this stone refill themselves with wine during toasts made in honor of another’s victory.

Arvandor is of great importance to the Eldar, as the legends say that Corellon Larethien, Araushnee and Sehaine , met and helped the Stellar giant turn into the deity we all know today as Sehanine Moonbow.   The Seldarine seized Arvandor from the giant gods in the war; their abandoned citadels,doors fifty feet high and walls like hills, dot the meadows and deep woods.