Border Movement (GEP)

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Movement on the Border occurs much like it does on the Prime. All a body needs to do is use her legs (or wings, or whatever method of propulsion she prefers) and she can move about. What's more, a Border traveler can "fly" into the sky or "sink" into the earth of any bordering plane just by willing it. 
'Course, some planes leak too much of their base elements onto the Border. In these cases, a body might be happily traipsing along only to find herself forced to swim through water or stagger through mud (reducing her movement rate appropriately). What's worse, some of the Elemental Planes make it downright deadly for a body to travel on their Border. (See "The Inner Planes and the Border Ethereal" section on page 16 for more information on this phenomenon.) It's enough to make a blood nervous, that's for sure.
==Obstacles to Ethereal Movement==
Canny primes and others who live on planes bordered by the Ethereal learned long ago that the Border provides an ideal avenue for circumventing the tallest walls and the fiercest traps. Those who had the means eventually tumbled to ways of keeping Border Ethereal cutters out of places where they didn't belong. Three things on a bordering plane can hinder free movement on the Border Ethereal: certain specific spells, dense materials, and living tissue.
Spells that affect movement and creatures on the Border Ethereal include glyphs of warding and Mordenkainen 's faithful hound (which can both detect and attack ethereal creatures). Creatures not native to the Ethereal Plane should watch out for dispel magic, phase door, and null-magic areas-passing through these areas causes nonnatives to fall back onto a bordering plane. Finally, rumor speaks of an alchemical concoction containing the essence of fortitude and a pint of gorgon's blood that, when mixed with the mortar of a building, prevents ethereal (and astral) creatures from passing through treated walls. If this concoction actually exists, it's sure to cost a great deal.
Even though an ethereal body is essentially noncorporeal in relation to an adjoining plane, particularly heavy metals, crystals, and artificial alloys sometimes prove too difficult to bypass. For example, a lead- or gold-plated enclosure can make an area Ethereal-proof. Fact is, any material as dense or denser than lead or gold can stop ethereal berks from traveling to places where they don't belongthough this can be an expensive proposition. In the same way, crystals worth at least 100 gp also impede Border Ethereal movement, but proofing an enclosure or structure with diamond or crystal is often extremely expensive. 
Most bloods know that they can't penetrate living tissue while in an ethereal state. This fact keeps the more bloodthirsty bashers from materializing inside a poor sod's body or leaving a weapon inside an opponent. Thus, a living guard standing at the open door of a lead-lined enclosure acts as a seal, blocking ethereal travelers from moving through the doorway. This blocking phenomenon occurs in a I-foot radius from any living being.
==Into the Deep and Back Again==
Mere curiosity often makes adventurous bashers wonder what lies beyond the Border Ethereal shallows; they yearn to strike out into the Deep Ethereal, where tales speak of the infinities of matter, energy, and possibility. A body'd think that such a journey would be difficult, but it just ain't so. Leaving behind the Border Ethereal is as simple as willing it, so canny cutters need to limit any wayward thoughts. Those who understand planar "geography" know that only by accessing the Deep Ethereal is it possible to find the Inner Planes and the multitude of demiplanes.
A body on the Border who witnesses someone else leaving the Border for the Deep sees the traveler suddenly obscured in a roil of multicolored mists that finally boil away into nothingness, leaving no sign of the traveler.
A body in the Deep floats free of all features usually visible on the Border, save for a vast, undulating curtain of vaporous color. This Wall of Color represents the boundary between the Deep Ethereal and the Border. If a body immediately decides to leave the Deep Ethereal, she can will herself back though the curtain, traveling to the exact same spot on the Border from where she originated. If a traveler moves along the curtain a distance before reentering the Border, she'll find herself in a different part of the Border. 'Course, the distance a body moves in the Deep doesn't always correspond to the distance she moved when transferring back to the Border; that'd be too easy. In addition, a body can't access different planes by walking along the Wall of Color. In order to travel to an entirely different plane, a body has to move through the Deep until she encounters another area of the color curtain. Fact is, the Ethereal's a vast plane of matter and possibility, and it's all too easy for a body to get herself lost.
==Skirting the Curtain==
When a Border Ethereal traveler tries to move from one location to another upon the same bordering plane, she might be tempted to enter the Deep in order to skirt the curtain of vaporous color. Since distances within the Deep are not constant, the speed at which a body journeys becomes less important than the time she spends in transit ·within the mutable ethereal boil. Skirting the curtain allows a body to travel great distances in a short time.
It's difficult task to find the correct path along the outside edge of the curtain of vaporous color. The flashing, phosphorescent lights appearing throughout the curtain are complex and tough to interpret, but a canny blood can sometimes find specific locations on a bordering plane based on these almost-random light shows. Before a body can even begin to chart a journey along a curtain, she must first have either previously visited the location, viewed it by magical means, or received directions (such as a map) or a fully detailed description.
To chart the correct path, a body must succeed at a Wisdom and an Intelligence check (both with a -6 penalty; a 1 is always a success in this instance), or successfully use the curtain cognizance proficiency (see the chapter "Taming the Ether: Proficiencies"). Those who fail either method of determining the correct path don't realize their error, and they head off along the curtain, convinced that they are on the proper course.
Finding specific locations on the Prime Material Plane within different crystal spheres is much more difficult. In this instance, the cutter must either have previously visited the world, found a planar map, or viewed either the world or a corresponding area of the curtain magically.
Regardless of the route, a traveler journeys through the Deep Ethereal for Id IOx 10 hours along the curtain before arriving at the point that she believes to be the goal. If she is correct (as determined by the methods described above), she penetrates the curtain, passes through the Border, and materializes onto the bordering plane within IdIO miles of the location sought.
If a body charts the wrong location, she doesn't realize it until she reenters the Border. In fact, the traveler has traveled in a random direction for a distance of ldIO0xl0 miles. A lost sod could attempt to reenter the Deep Ethereal in order to skirt the curtain. However, a body might have more luck traveling on the Border, where she can at least see partway onto the adjoining plane she wishes to traverse.
==Border Materializations Gone Wrong==
When a cutter talks about "materializing," nine times out of ten he's talking about moving from the Border Ethereal to the plane it touches. If done purposefully, this is usually a safe procedure, but the multiverse is a surprising place and accidents can happen.
Just because a Border Ethereal traveler can't materialize into a living creature doesn't mean the poor sod can't mistakenly become physical inside a nonliving object This might occur if the traveler wasn't paying particular attention to his exit point, or if he passed through a null-magic field by accident. Liquids, gases, and flames part to allow the traveler entrance, but solid objects are not so accommodating.
A traveler materializing inside or partially inside a solid object must roll a saving throw vs. death magic. Failure results in the physical destruction of the traveler, as the poor berk's molecules fuse forevermore with the object in which he appeared. A successful saving throw pops the traveler out of both the target plane and the associated Border Ethereal like a pinched grape seed. Such trajectories plunge the traveler into the Deep. In addition, the sod is knocked unconscious for Id4 rounds by the experience and suffers 4d4 points of damage. Those who survive the trauma remain ethereal until they choose to reenter the Border Ethereal, at which point their bodies automatically materialize on the bordering plane.