Still prefer the "Elemental Chaos" cosmology introduced in 4E to the other models. Unstable mixtures of elemental types offer more interesting encounter options and don't require as much magic just to survive the environment as earlier D&D editions where fire and water were almost immediately lethal to Prime Material natives outside of specific areas made for visitors. Even earth and air weren't really navigable without gear and magic only a mid-to-high tier party would have access too. Elemental Chaos was still dangerous but less level/magic/gear restricted by far.
That's very interesting! I agree that the Elemental Planes in 5e feel insurmountable to a lower level group, but I also feel that there are methods whereby you can introduce the more dangerous planes. For example, I had a recent experience with "Descent into Avernus" where I had to play a level one character on the first level of hell. It was terrifying, but we made it! I'll have to do some more research on the Elemental Chaos.
@@TheCuriousOwlbear You can certainly send a low-level party to the elemental planes if you want in the "Great Wheel" cosmology but you need to have them go to specific "safe-ish" areas that they can't wander beyond (eg some cult stronghold that maintains sort-of-Earthlike conditions so their Prime Material members don't just drown or incinerate or whatever) or provide them with higher-level magic from a patron to move around easier and survive long enough to do their mission. 4E's Elemental Chaos was a single plane with all the elements mashed together in a sort of shifting primordial stew, but there weren't whole regions that were instantly deadly to Prime folks and you could generally find routes through or around the really dangerous patches - lava rivers, acid geyser fields, that sort of thing. It was deliberately designed to be a little more "newbie friendly" than the old planar model, in part because 4E's designers liked the idea of planar travel being a thing that just happens sometimes. Usually you'd wind up stumbling into the Feywild or the Shadowfell early on, but even low-level types weren't just plain doomed if they had to poke their noses into the EC through a portal or something. Getting around the planes under your own power was still more paragon/epic tier though, especially up in the Astral Sea with all its god realms or down into the Abyss (which is physically connected to the EC and is basically the Really Bad Part of Town for the plane).
