Dungeons & Dragons Worlds & Realms

Introduction

I am Mordenkainen, Lord Mage of Greyhawk, architect of myriad spells and walker of worlds. You have in your hands a collection of observations and insights gleaned from my extensive travels throughout the multiverse.

As a scholar of the arcane and a wizard of renown, my fascination with magic at first compelled me to discover how magic works and whether its ultimate purpose can even be known. Although my love of magic has never waned, my path has expanded my view to encompass the workings of the natural world and the Great Cosmic Wheel: I have come to realize that despite the presence of gods and beings of immense power whom some may look to for salvation, there is no guarantee that the multiverse will continue to evolve and exist. There are powerful forces at play that believe their way—whether it be Law or Chaos—should be the way of all beings. This, I have seen, is sheer folly and would cause the Great Wheel of the multiverse to tip out of what I call the Balance and spin into catastrophe.

The Balance is something that I have come to understand as I watched the forces of Law and Chaos battle for supremacy on every world and within every heart and mind. I have seen that these polarities are like two sides of the same coin, and if either Law or Chaos is allowed to grow and dominate unchecked, it will inevitably and inexorably lead to its most extreme expression—stagnation or destruction—either of which is death to living, sentient beings.

There was a time when I thought my powers were sufficient to grapple with and ward off these forces that pulled the multiverse toward lopsided madness, and that these powers that caused major imbalances were relegated to several key worlds and a handful of misguided beings. But I now know that keeping Law and Chaos in equilibrium—maintaining the Balance—is a quest that I cannot by my own powers fulfill. I must reach out and inform other adventurers of this in the hope that they are inspired to drop their small-minded pursuits of glittering loot, carousing, and fame to join me on this greater quest of protecting the multiverse, to one day perhaps reach beyond the boundary of their own world, venture through Wildspace, and be wardens against all forces that would tip the Balance. As an archmage, I have no greater task than to snuff out these fires of doom, and as a scribbler of words, I hope this humble tome will ignite the heart of a hero or two who dreams of a life with a higher purpose—to create a world free from tyranny.

The Mysteries of the Multiverse

Though I have confounded archdevils, banished lich lords, thwarted tyrant kings, and refused many a stern command from the haughty hosts of Mount Celestia, some still fear and revile me, and many more think me mad. Despite all the wrath and indignation, I maintain my duty to the Balance. My guidance comes from the beacon of my curiosity, which pursues above all else the mystery of the multiverse. Gods have immense power, yet I feel their power pales in comparison to the magnificence of the multiverse. I have directly observed with my own arcane eye the organic geometry of how a flower grows, the spiral of a snail’s shell, the shapes of the modrons, how ice forms into crystalline patterns—all of these speaking to some magic-infused equation that is woven into the fabric of the multiverse. Are these the fingerprints of the greatest of all the gods? The signatures of the architects of the multiverse? Or are they artifacts of randomness and chance or the artifice of some infinite machine?

Without interference from a force such as a demon lord or mad demigod, this weaving of the multiverse continues in a seemingly perfect balance of Law and Chaos, creating a masterpiece of life in its wake that can be investigated, and perhaps even decoded and read like deciphering the most cryptic book in the greatest of all libraries. To this mysterious ordering principle of the multiverse, I as an archmage of some renown am its most devoted scholar.

Visualizing the Planes

Plenty of seers and visionaries have tried to explain how the planes are arranged in ways that our minds can comprehend. Some fashioned exquisite orreries, and others drew elaborate maps, but how the planes intersect and are organized is quite beyond our ability to visualize, at least in our present state of consciousness. The best maps are from the great elven mystics, who did their best to translate the inscrutable vastness and complexity into a two-dimensional representation that most minds can grasp, and from these source maps, the druids and wizards have created a workable representation that has become known as the Great Wheel.

But how did I learn about the multiverse? What put me on this path to encountering the cosmos?

Defending Oerth

I was first exposed to the mysteries of the arcane as a youth. On my home world of Oerth, I witnessed the various forms of tyranny and how they all led to bondage of mind and body. Had I not, I might have—like so many others—fallen into lockstep with any number of so-called authorities and saviors that professed to know, in their very loud and dogmatic manner of speech, that they and their ideals must be followed. The ascendance and defeat of these tyrants is a tedious, repetitive process, I must add, which has been happening for untold millennia without any qualitative change.

But some godlike power put a strange spark within me—a facility with magic, a desire for justice, and a keen, discerning mind that set me on the path of independence and epic adventure. The more I walked this path, the more I believed that I could bring peace and order to my troubled home world of Oerth. I sought a solution through increasing my own powers and gathering other wizards and adventurers to my side. Together we were known as the Circle of Eight. With my companions, I sought to save Oerth from all the catastrophes that were poised to devour it, and through studying magic, I felt we could win.

Awakening to the Multiverse

Driven by purpose, I increased my understanding of magic with such fervor that I pushed through the boundaries to ever larger realities in hopes of finding that one item, that one word of power, that could defeat evil and restore harmony. But this search for answers culminated in breaking through the boundary of Oerth to behold an interconnected cosmos of worlds spinning around one another in an endless dance, influenced by forces greater than the gods themselves—the multiverse.

As I beheld in awe this immense chaos of perfection, I also realized that each world was in danger of being corrupted. The forces of Law and Chaos were being manipulated in every corner of the multiverse, whether by leading the gullible, fearful masses into a deathly stasis of law-bound autocracy or dividing and provoking them into never-ending cycles of aggression and war. It was then I knew that my wizard’s work would not only be for Oerth, but for all other worlds as well. I would have to grapple with the foundations of reality, inspire companies of heroes, and invent new spells to help all sentient beings become champions of the Balance.

Do these words ring true or are they ravings of a madman? Find out! I can only hope that they light a fire in your heart, and that you join me in this heroic quest to maintain the Balance and defeat evil in all its guises.