"I won't kill you, but I don't have to save you." - Batman, Batman Begins "You either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain." - Harvey Dent, The Dark Knight "Yeah, I can fly." - Tony Stark, Iron Man
Inside my hands these petals browned;
dried up falling to the ground,
but it was already too late now.
I pushed my fingers through the earth,
returned this flower to the dirt;
so it could live, I walked away now."
Rise Against - "The Good Left Undone"
Essentially, that one post unraveled 30+ years of planar history, several of the best books of all editions (the Fiendish Codices, Faces of Evil), and basically lifted a large middle finger towards Planescape and Great Wheel fans.
"I won't kill you, but I don't have to save you." - Batman, Batman Begins "You either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain." - Harvey Dent, The Dark Knight "Yeah, I can fly." - Tony Stark, Iron Man
Inside my hands these petals browned;
dried up falling to the ground,
but it was already too late now.
I pushed my fingers through the earth,
returned this flower to the dirt;
so it could live, I walked away now."
Rise Against - "The Good Left Undone"
Essentially, that one post unraveled 30+ years of planar history, several of the best books of all editions (the Fiendish Codices, Faces of Evil), and basically lifted a large middle finger towards Planescape and Great Wheel fans.
Seems like that to me, too. I didn't mind most of the other changes, but this seems like another move toward breaking the settings apart, at least if they ever publish a Planescape CS. I barely played 3e and never played Planescape, but my 3e FR cosmology is the Great Wheel if my players ever advance far enough. I want a unified cosmology, gosh darn it!
Essentially, that one post unraveled 30+ years of planar history, several of the best books of all editions (the Fiendish Codices, Faces of Evil), and basically lifted a large middle finger towards Planescape and Great Wheel fans.
*shakes fist*
I own the 4 Planescape boxed sets from 2nd Edition, and I have adapted that cosmology to my 3rd Edition campaign. Unravel if they wish, but some of us are not going to change our views of the multiverse structure! We will...rebel! Or something...
__________________ "You're dead. Only the cleric can talk to you now."
Well, if you have money to spend now, here's the complete list of Planescape game products, by release date:
1994-04 Planescape Campaign Setting
1994-05 Eternal Boundary
1994-06 Planescape Monstrous Compendium Appendix
1994-07 Planes of Chaos
1994-08 Planescape Sketchbook*
1994-09 Well of Worlds
1994-10 In the Abyss
1994-11 Deva Spark
1995-01 Planes of Law
1995-02 Fires of Dis
1995-04 Player's Primer to the Outlands
1995-05 In the Cage: A Guide to Sigil
1995-06 Factol's Manifesto
1995-07 Harbinger House
1995-09 Planescape Monstrous Compendium Appendix II
1995-11 Planes of Conflict
1995-12 Planescape Conspectus**
1996-02 Something Wild
1996-03 Uncaged: Faces of Sigil
1996-06 Hellbound: The Blood War
1996-08 Planewalker's Handbook
1996-09 On Hallowed Ground
1996-10 Guide to the Astral Plane
1996-11 Doors to the Unknown
1997-08 Faces of Evil: The Fiends
1997-09 Great Modron March
1997-10 Dead Gods
1998-03 Planescape Monstrous Compendium Appendix III
1998-05 Tales from the Infinite Staircase
1998-08 Guide to the Ethereal Plane
1998-10 Faction War
1998-12 Inner Planes
* This is a very rare item, never released commercially and only produced in small quantities. I don't have a copy
** The Planescape conspectus is a free poster printed by TSR and included in some Dragon magazines and as freebies in some game stores. It has a so-so map of the great wheel, a product tree and a "Welcome to Sigil" blurb. Unless you are serious collector, you aren't missing anything if you don't have this. (But I think I have a spare one of these, which I'll happily post to you if you do want it.)
I agree with Shade. I'm all about new takes on old material. I'm all about better mechanics. I'm not about taking a leak all over the established back story to engage in something lame like 'devils are pretty, demons are ugly'
Here's a couple of links to the discussion as it stands at Dicefreaks and Wizards. At Wizards, Rip's saying what I'd say only better and less offensively. Dicefreaks seems divided between purism and gleeful continuity bashers, favoring purists.
__________________ Demogorgon and other Planar Rulers. Archomentals, Loth-lords, Dukes of Hell and more!
"I won't kill you, but I don't have to save you." - Batman, Batman Begins "You either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain." - Harvey Dent, The Dark Knight "Yeah, I can fly." - Tony Stark, Iron Man
Inside my hands these petals browned;
dried up falling to the ground,
but it was already too late now.
I pushed my fingers through the earth,
returned this flower to the dirt;
so it could live, I walked away now."
Rise Against - "The Good Left Undone"
I agree that this change is crap-tacular. Changing part of the game's history that's been around for 30+ years, purely for the sake of having a change, is a very bad idea.
That said, the fun from this will be trying to tie the new status of the planes back in to the old status. For example: suppose the reason that there are no more humanoid demons in the Abyss is because of the Savage Tide? After Demogorgon was defeated, the obyriths made a successful comeback, destroying many of the tanar'ri and routing the others. The devils, for their part, are now capitalizing on this. The Infernal Ministry quickly orders all erinyes to be biomantically modified, and are now called "succubi" - all the better to earn them additional summonings to the Material Plane.
This sort of retconning can be very enjoyable.
__________________ Need an informed review of a product? No problem! Check out my RPGnow Staff Reviews!
I'm holding out hope that we can find someone who is "tradition-friendly" in the new regime and begin slipping D&D's rich tradition back into the game via freelance channels. Surely this edition will have its Mona and Jacobs.
If not, we can await the inevitable new regime for 5th edition in a few years.
"I won't kill you, but I don't have to save you." - Batman, Batman Begins "You either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain." - Harvey Dent, The Dark Knight "Yeah, I can fly." - Tony Stark, Iron Man
Inside my hands these petals browned;
dried up falling to the ground,
but it was already too late now.
I pushed my fingers through the earth,
returned this flower to the dirt;
so it could live, I walked away now."
Rise Against - "The Good Left Undone"
"I won't kill you, but I don't have to save you." - Batman, Batman Begins "You either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain." - Harvey Dent, The Dark Knight "Yeah, I can fly." - Tony Stark, Iron Man
Inside my hands these petals browned;
dried up falling to the ground,
but it was already too late now.
I pushed my fingers through the earth,
returned this flower to the dirt;
so it could live, I walked away now."
Rise Against - "The Good Left Undone"
I haven't been keeping up with the rumor mill about 4e...
am I understanding correctly that the monsters are going to be more a chart/spreadsheet where we cross reference the level of the part vs the type of monster (ex. brute) to find out the appropriate stat/abilities range?
From that it sounds like the description of the monster is fluff...am I understanding the rumor correctly?
__________________ "The first human who hurled an insult instead of a stone was the founder of civilization." Sigmund Freud
"Meekness: Uncommon patience in planning a revenge that is worth while." Ambrose Bierce
"In heaven all the interesting people are missing." Friedrich Nietzsche
"Coming home from very lonely places, all of us go a little mad: whether from great personal success, or just an all-night drive, we are the sole survivors of a world no one else has ever seen." John le Carre
I honestly don't know at this point. My impression is that the base monster will have stats, but to increase it, you make it a "troll brute 1" or "troll archer 1" or "troll mastermind 1" rather than adding Hit Dice or class levels. This is pure speculation on my part.
"I won't kill you, but I don't have to save you." - Batman, Batman Begins "You either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain." - Harvey Dent, The Dark Knight "Yeah, I can fly." - Tony Stark, Iron Man
Inside my hands these petals browned;
dried up falling to the ground,
but it was already too late now.
I pushed my fingers through the earth,
returned this flower to the dirt;
so it could live, I walked away now."
Rise Against - "The Good Left Undone"
thanks....I was worried. I still am, but at least I know I'm not the only one in the dark.
For some reason I had images of the hordling table in mm2 1st edition....
Hard for me to envision races when using matrices.
__________________ "The first human who hurled an insult instead of a stone was the founder of civilization." Sigmund Freud
"Meekness: Uncommon patience in planning a revenge that is worth while." Ambrose Bierce
"In heaven all the interesting people are missing." Friedrich Nietzsche
"Coming home from very lonely places, all of us go a little mad: whether from great personal success, or just an all-night drive, we are the sole survivors of a world no one else has ever seen." John le Carre
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