[Planescape] Connecting the planes, Astral and/or Ethereal?

Rereading my Planescape books I noticed something for the first time.
[Long winded explanation]In the Planescape Cosmography the Inner Planes (Water, Fire, Earth, Air, etc.) are only connected to eachother and the Material Plane and only via the Ethereal Plane. The Outer Planes (The Abbys, Baator, Gehenna, etc.) are only connected to eachother and the material plane via the Astral Plane.

Now the Manual of the Planes states that (in the basic D&D 3.0/3.5 Cosmography) the Ethereal Plane is something connected only to the Prime Material plane and there it's also connected to the Astral plane. The Astral plane is the only way to travel the planes as it stands, since it's the only one connecting to all the planes (Inner, outer and material).[/Long winded explanation]

Does anyone know why they changed this? Was it to make sure that the inner and outer planes where connected or was it simply a whim from the writer to do it somewhat different?

I'm not entirely certain on this, but I think I remember reading that the reason for the change had to do with the changes in the Summon Monster spells- that being that, if (as was the new rule) the summoned monsters came from the Outer planes, then there needed to be a direct connection to them (via the Astral), rather than a roundabout link (Ethereal-Astral-Outer).

Seems a bit odd to me, but, like I said, I seem to remember reading that somewhere. Hopefully someone else around here should be able to clarify.

Allanon said:

Rereading my Planescape books I noticed something for the first time.
[Long winded explanation]In the Planescape Cosmography the Inner Planes (Water, Fire, Earth, Air, etc.) are only connected to eachother and the Material Plane and only via the Ethereal Plane. The Outer Planes (The Abbys, Baator, Gehenna, etc.) are only connected to eachother and the material plane via the Astral Plane.

Click to expand...

"The Old"

Now the Manual of the Planes states that (in the basic D&D 3.0/3.5 Cosmography) the Ethereal Plane is something connected only to the Prime Material plane and there it's also connected to the Astral plane. The Astral plane is the only way to travel the planes as it stands, since it's the only one connecting to all the planes (Inner, outer and material).[/Long winded explanation]

Click to expand...

Actually, you're mildly wrong about the Ethereal Plane. The way it works now is that the Ethereal Plne is just the Border Ethereal, the part of it that hugs another plane. As it is now, every place has their own. So every other plane has their own personal Ethereal Plane (the Deep Ethereal is gone).

This is "The New".

Does anyone know why they changed this? Was it to make sure that the inner and outer planes where connected or was it simply a whim from the writer to do it somewhat different?

Click to expand...

I'm guessing for the sake of simplicity. A lot of stuff about the planes was dismissed in 3E, such as magic weapons and armor that lost their plusses depending on how many planes from their plane of origin they were.

The New also appears to be in the same vein. This way, every plane your own has access to the Astral and to an Ethereal, so you don't need to wildly recalculate how the various extra-dimensional spells and items work in regards to those planes. It's a way to make things less of a headache for everyone involved.

That's my guess anyway.

I guess the "for the sake of simplicity" argument is probably right. The whole plusses thing was kinda a pain in the backside. I'll have to see if this provides any conversion difficulties for 2nd edition planescape or not.

Thanks for the 'insight' and the speedy responses.