The Great Wheel cosmology evolved over the course of multiple editions. These planes became central, though, to the Planescape setting, which was truly formalized in 1994 with the Planescape Campaign Setting box set for 2nd Edition, and had several subsequent releases that fleshed out the various planes.
In 2nd Edition, you had the Prime Material Plane, and then the seventeen Outer Planes (including The Outlands in the middle, home to, sort of, Sigil). You had the Astral Plane linking them, and then you also had the Inner Planes.
The Inner Planes were primarily the various elemental planes - the four standard ones, but then also various quasi-elemental and other mixtures, adding elements together for a plane of Mud for example, but then also introducing the idea of the Positive and Negative energy planes - and the way those interacted with other elemental planes.
There's... a lot of elemental planes in 2nd Edition.
But beyond the elements, there was really just the Ethereal Plane.
The Great Wheel, I believe, remained the standard through 3rd edition, but in 4th Edition, the structure of the multiverse was profoundly rewritten, creating the World Axis, with its concept of a Thousand Points of Light.
The World Axis broke the Great Wheel and instead presented the Material Plane as being between the Astral Sea and the Elemental Chaos. It created a dichotomy of Gods and Primordials, where the Gods were of the Astral Sea and the Primordials were from the Elemental Chaos, and some - but not all - of the old Great Wheel planes were found in one or the other.
One thing of note is that this created a very strong distinction between devils and demons. In this cosmology, devils were fallen angels, and the Nine Hells was in the Astral Sea. By contrast, demons were corrupted elementals, and the Abyss was basically a giant hole drilled into the Elemental Chaos.
The idea of this redesign was to remove what some designers felt was "needless symmetry." They felt the Great Wheel had gone overboard with all of its planes - did we really need a plane between the Neutral Good and Lawful Good planes?
And honestly, I actually get that. It just happens that some of those "in-between" planes are, I think, the coolest, conceptually. Acheron is a lot weirder than the Nine Hells, and I love that about it.
It was a bold move. And a lot of people didn't like it.
Now, granted, I think nerd culture (and D&D is no exception) has a tendency to have very knee-jerk hatred of anything that changes something they're already into. I think you can see that right now with the reactions to One D&D, where most of the changes are things that players have wanted in some form or another all along (I'll agree that I don't like the critical hit changes, but that's maybe the only thing I don't like).
However, 4th Edition also brought us two new planes - right next to the Prime Material, between the Astral Sea and Elemental Chaos, were the Feywild and the Shadowfell.
Regarding the Feywild, there had already been some ideas of the "realm of faerie" within the Outer Planes. Planescape described the Seelie Court of Queen Titania as existing primarily in Arborea (the chaotic good plane,) while the Unseelie Court (which feels more like a weird undead hive mind) has its home in Pandemonium (the chaotic neutral/chaotic evil plane).
But the Fey feel like they break all the rules on alignment, which makes the Outer Planes an odd home for them (though granted, the whole concept of Planescape is that alignment is only the beginning of a very nuanced range of complex philosophies). The fairy Otherworld is pretty central to the myth of fairies in the first place, so the Feywild fit quite well.
The Shadowfell, then, is a bit more unusual. In some ways, it allows the undead to have a plane of their own. But it also became a convenient new place to have the Ravenloft setting (in a demiplane within the Shadowfell, but certainly the most notable part of the plane). As I see it, the Feywild and Shadowfell are both kind of emotional planes - the Feywild is the manic, high-energy realm where feelings rage uncontrollably. The Shadowfell is the depressive, bleak realm where energy is drained by emotions of despair and ennui.
5th Edition restored the Great Wheel cosmology as the default, but it carried over the Feywild and Shadowfell from 5th Edition. There is, admittedly, some redundancy here. The Shadowfell and Hades (known in 2nd Edition as the Grey Wastes) are both realms of bleak despair, though one is an outer plane and thus the afterlife for neutral evil creatures and typically a realm for gods of death (such as Hades from Greek myth). The Shadowfell is different - it has something to do with the dead, but seems more like a place to pass through, especially given the prominence of the Raven Queen. But if you had any doubt that the two were similar, the optional rule suggested in the DMG for Hades is to simply use the "Shadowfell Despair" mechanic found earlier in that chapter.
Ok, so:
One D&D will be introducing a new concept of spell categories - distinct from school or from class list, but three broad categories that spells can exist within, which are Arcane, Divine, and Primal.
Primal spells are typically used by Druids and Rangers.
And, in the past, we've seen that these classes play a little with Fey stuff - spells that conjure fey beings are often available to Druids. The Feywild is often thought of as being linked to the natural world.
One of the ideas behind the spell categories is where the spellcaster draws their power from. Divine magic calls upon gods and the Outer Planes (even philosophy clerics are likely drawing from outer-planar power.) By contrast, Primal spells are calling on the power of the Inner Planes. And yes, that often means that they draw on the power of the Elemental Planes. But we've certainly got some Druid features that are linked with the Feywild - the Circle of Dreams, for instance, has a lot of explicit fey stuff.
So why not the Shadowfell?
I'd love to see Druid and Ranger subclasses delve into the Primal Shadow (which is actually a thing from my homebrew world that is kind of the essence of the Shadowfell and is actually sort of inspired by Armus from that one episode of Star Trek TNG where Tasha Yar dies).
But what if we already have?
The Monster Slayer Ranger, I've always thought, makes me think of gothic heroes like Solomon Kane or Abraham Van Helsing (Rudolph Van Richten, his not-so-subtle D&D equivalent, is considered a priest, but oh well). I could imagine that features like Slayer's Prey are tapping into the power of the Shadowfell to bring swift death to the foes they face.
The Circle of Wildfire, of course, is presented with a more benign interpretation, where the Wild Fire spirit is some benign dog or fox made out of flames, and it's all about the natural cycle of renewal. But I've always wanted to play one that is a bit more menacing - a pyromaniac pagan like something out of a Folk Horror story - indeed, my Wildfire Spirit would appear as an ever-burning wicker man. Indeed, you could even imagine that the Feywild and Shadowfell represent life and death, respectively, and in excess. For Druids that believe in the cycle, perhaps they need those shadow druids to keep things running properly.
I will say that my homebrewed Circle of Monsters subclass would fit quite well with the Shadowfell.
It'll be a while before we get more One D&D playtesting materials. I don't know if we'll be getting class stuff next, and if so, which classes we'll be looking at. But I think it would be cool to explore this side of the Druid.
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