The Tartarian Depth of Carceri are easily one of my favorite campaign settings for Dungeons and Dragons. According to the Dungeon Master’s Guide, P.187:
The grim inspiration for all other prisons in existence, Carceri is a plane of desolation and despair. Its six layers hold vast bogs, fetid jungles, windswept deserts, jagged mountains, frigid oceans, and black ice. All form a miserable home for the traitors and backstabbers trapped on this prison plane.
Other than the DMG, the only other place you’ll find much official content in 5e is in Planescape: Adventures in the Multiverse (Amazon link). You get a little more insight, including stat blocks for demodands. Demodands are fiendish creatures that are trapped in Carceri and have appointed themselves guards over its denizens. They’re not the “nice” kind of prison guard either.
We also learn that one of the ways into Carceri is through the outland of Curst. The gate sits in the middle of the town of Curst. It is left unguarded because nobody wants to go in, and no one has ever come out.
Curst is not just a portal to Carceri, but a prison in and of itself. The elephantine fiends that guard its walls look inward to prevent escape. Teleportation and planar travel both fail automatically in Curst. The town in overseen by a demodand.
My Own Carceri Lore
Firstly, I assume that Modrons must be responsible for maintain the orderly operation of prisons in Carceri. Although there is a lot of disorder on the plane, there must also be well run prisons, not just chaos overseen by demodands. Likely other servants of Primus are involved as well, including maruts and kolyaruts. I’m looking to older editions for other Inevitables who might be able to play a part in adventures here as well.
I’m currently in the process of developing new Carceri adventures. I’ll be back here with links as soon as I start posting pages.
You can check out my previous Carceri Maps on my other blog. If you need some magical items to fortify your PCs for the trip down, check out our magical item price lists
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