Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General D&D Lore questions.

I was hoping someone could help illuminate some D&D lore for me (and I suppose anyone else who decides to ask questions here too).

My question is this; in Baator (= the Nine Hells?) does time flow at the same rate as that of the Prime Material Plane (or indeed, any Plane at all?) or do they follow their own independent time streams. Also; where exactly does the Prime Material Plane 'finish', it is my understanding that it extends far beyond lets say the 'solar system' of Faerun (if that is the planet's name).

I have a bit of a headcanon for a warlock character in that he is his own patron, not that he knows this. The idea being that, born as a tiefling and have grown up being subjected to the prejudices against Tieflings all his life, he begins to believe that he is fated for Hell regardless, so he decides to embrace it. In a self-fulfilling prophecy, he comes in contact with a Devil (those are the lawful evil ones yes?) who makes him promises, and he willfully submits. When he becomes convinced that he would become a Lemure, he embraces his nature even more fully to try and 'work off' this fate and to be promoted, upon his death, to a higher level devil and skip the basic level.

I was wondering if this headcanon is at all possible.

Cheers for any assistance/guidance you can offer.

As far as I know, Time in the 9 Hells, Abyss, and Material Planes are all the same and consistent. And I am not sure how Time would affect that concept? Cause that actually sounds like a pretty standard Fiend Warlock, attempting to buy into the pyramid scheme that is Hell.

There is some old lore about how the prime material plane looks like, but that has not been touched on in several editions so it is unknown how much is valid.
Basically each solar system is an enclosed crystal sphere and it was possible to travel between those spheres with magical ships called spelljammer (the Mind Flayer ship you see in the beginning is one such spelljammer with the additional ability to shift between planes).
Each crystal sphere used to be one of the settings of D&D like Forgotten Realms or Dragonlance.

The official answer to this is "unclear". It can flow at the same rate, or at a different rate. The official books don't take position on this, to avoid hindering your creativity when you plan your own D&D game.


Toril is the name of the planet. Faerun is a continent on it.

As for where does the Prime Material Plane "finish", the answer to that has varied a lot as D&D evolved over the years. The current version (5E) has yet to take position on this. However, recent books and even the BG3 itself has been referencing a lot of lore from the AD&D 2nd edition campaign setting Spelljammer (basically D&D in space). Lae'zel straight up references elements from that old lore when she tells you about the time she and her kin successfully raided a "neogi spelljammer" (spelljammer being a type of D&D spaceship and neogi being a evil space-faring race). Crèche K'liir is also a location from old Spelljammer lore. So we know that 5E Material Plane has stars and planets and that at least some Spelljammer lore still applies. Beyond that, we can only speculate.

In Spelljammer lore, Toril's solar system (called Realmspace) encompasses several habitable planets that all orbit Toril's sun and an expanse of unexplored void called Wildspace. All of that is contained inside an astronomically large structure called a Crystal Sphere. Think dyson sphere of immense proportions. If you somehow manage to get outside of a Crystal Sphere (requiring artifacts or very high-level magic), you wind up in a silvery void filled with an iridescent substance called the Phlogiston. Within the Phlogiston are many different Crystal Spheres, each containing its own D&D setting with its own laws of magic and physics. So for example one Crystal Sphere might contain a solar system with planets orbiting a single star, another might have a central world with the sun and moon orbiting around it, while another still might contain a giant turtle carrying three elephants who hold a disk-shaped world on their backs.

The Phlogiston is infinite in size, which makes the Material Plane infinite as well. To reach other planes of existence from here, you need a spell like Plane Shift or a planar portal.

Again, this is old 2nd edition lore, and we don't know how much of it is still valid. But BG3 has referenced several elements from it, so that's something.


That's a great character concept, and there's actually precedent for this. In the recent 5E adventure Descent into Avernus, player character might end up striking various bargains with the rulers of the Nine Hells. One such bargain has the player character's agreeing to have their soul, should they die after achieving 17th level or higher, sucked into the 9th level of Baator and turned directly into a Pit Fiend (the highest level of devil) to serve as a general in Asmodeus's army. So definitely possible.

Oh, it is all clearly (/sarc) explained in the AD&D Manual of the Planes:

"Time is constant in the known planes of existence ... the length of a day in one plane is the same .. in another plane. This type of time is called "true time". While time and the perception of its passage do not vary ..., the effects of time on living objects do vary widely. The time that regulates the differing planar effects on living beings is called "subjective time". Subjective time governs long-term processes that affect the traveler's metabolism and natural functions. This includes poisons, potions, natural healing, the effects of paralysis or aging, the need for sleep and food.

TRUE TIME vs SUBJECTIVE TIME:
Prime Material: two times are the same
Ethereal: 10 true rounds pass for one subjective round
Astral: 365,000 true rounds pass for one subjective round
Outer Planes: two times are equal"

Do you understand any of that? I do not. We'd probably be better off with a Lorentz Transform basis.

That sounds dangerously close to gibberish.

To be fair, that was written several editions (and decades) ago, before Wizards of the Coast acquired D&D.

Outer Planes can get... weird.
One such oddity is extended exposure to a certain plane can actually affect one's alignment and change them physically (if I remember my lore correctly), or activate things in their blood. Hence why there are so many tieflings in BG3 because of Descent into Avernus in which an entire city was exposed to the 9 Hells. I want to say the phenomena is how you can sometimes get Lawful or even Good Demons and how you can get Chaotic Modrons, even though by their nature they should be always a certain alignment by their very existence.
Err, my point is that the rules/lore of the outer planes can sometimes be weird and even contradictory, like how Demons should always be Chaotic and Evil, but there are examples in canon D&D material of Lawful Neutral or even Chaotic Good demons. Though I did not know about subjective time, and kinda just considered true time the multiversal constant.

Poor Nordom and Fall-From-Grace. I still wonder if those crazy kids are still doing ok. I see a buddy cop movie- "Succubus Cubed!"

Big reveal, it was Anna-of-The-Shadows behind everything. She gets away after her monologue - which sets up the sequel "Succubus Cubed Squared".

So good.

The main ones I was thinking of. Planescape Torment I feel does a great job at showing the exceptions to the rules, rather, it does a great job showing the beings who go against the natural order of things. I'd definitely recommend it for anyone who wants to delve into the more outer edges of D&D lore made into a videogame.

Cheers for the kind words, to expand on the basic idea (and if I didn't explain it properly) is the Devil that the Tiefling contacts is himself, 'from the future.' Because as Raphael (correctly) points out it's better the Devil you know. But if time is basically constant (except for if it isn't? as Argyle attempts to explain?) that kinda nixes that idea. The tiefling's basic motivation then is to gain strength to be of 'service' and get his just reward. My minds eye paints him as a physically weak character, but ultimately very intelligent and charismatic (if not particularly wise) - with the ultimate irony being that he may not be all that different from any other warlock out there (except maybe a little more intelligent and a little more charismatic, but even less wise!)

So actually Wish is the one spell that comes to mind that can actually force Time Travel on the caster, since it is the spell for if one wants to (fail to) rewrite reality. Since your patron would ostensibly be high level Wizard or Warlock (which Warlock gets one Mystic Arcanum of the 9th level) and Wizard gets 9th level spells around 17th Level. That means, considering Wish, you patron totally could have traveled back in time for whatever reason, depending on the wish. And from there may be burned from using Wish ever again because of how much it actually drains and burns the caster.

Edit: Wish is not exactly on the warlock spell list, but you could still have the original be a Wizard thus starting the subtle changes to where your guy turns out completely different?

I got that, and there's nothing in current D&D lore that would contradict your idea. I don't think you should invalidate your character concept based on a blurb from a decades-old AD&D book that has since been superseded many times over.

It's a really fun idea for a warlock, reminds me a bit of the short story Other People by Neil Gaiman.

I also have a (sort of) DnD lore question. If Lolth is my warlock patron, what subclass of warlock would that most likely be?

So the easiest answer would be to say Cleric/Paladin as those who make pacts with Lolth end up more as Clerics and Paladins than Warlocks, but assuming your character does not become a Cleric or Paladin, there are a few that I could see working. The first one that makes sense to me lorewise is Celestial as Lolth is in fact a goddess and has divine power, this would make one's character closer to a Priest of Lolth (and for lore friendliness likely should be Female). Alternatively, the Arch Fey possibly could work because she is an Elven God, and that would be playing up drawing on her Elven Aspects, perhaps focusing on the Drow parts. The last 5e subclass that I could see working for Lolth as a warlock patron is actually Hexblade, slightly flavoring it to weapon and powers granted by her, and this would go pact of the blade.

However, none of these options are in BG3 currently, so if you wanted to RP as one right now, the closest is likely GOO for the manipulation aspects but even then that is a very large stretch.

thanks! that was really helpful.

Pact of the Fiend, probably. Considering how she's called the Demon-Queen of Spiders, and also rules a demonic realm full of demons called the Demonweb PIts...

She might be a demon.

what, the demonic demon-queen of demons, ruling over the demon-realm is a demon? preposterous!

I always forget that she resides in the abyss and is a demon, Fiend makes absolute sense lol. My brain seems to override it with Evil Goddess even though Asmodeus is a god and a devil soooo....