D&D 5E The Multiverse is back....

[Hussar]

Heh heh. Shoe's now on the other foot it seems. Usually you're on the front line with me and the others saying to other folks that anything in any of the books can be changed or refluffed and that nothing is set in stone in your home game. Apparently we've found your one kryptonite where you're on the far side and can't go along with the idea of taking what you want and damning the rest.

Oh well... we all have that one thing I guess. LOL.

Well I guess someone had to be disappointed, and since we just had an entire edition that did away with planar canon, as a fan of Planescape I can honestly say I am glad they are catering to me this time around as opposed to you. IMO, it's not a shame it's a positive to get me to buy more books for this edition. Of course you could always get 4e books and mine those for an alternate cosmology...

You're both missing the point. I want both of us to get what we want. I want you to have an entire line of Planescape books, big, beautiful books and boxed sets and minis and whatnot. More stuff than you could possibly buy. I want you to have that.

I would just rather that there is also core books that deal with the planes that aren't Planescape. Same as everything else in D&D.

Of course I can refluff anything. I just want to buy books as well. Again, I just don't understand it. Why is it so terrible to put Planescape in the Planescape box and leave core alone? Why is it better for the game to make Planescape the default setting for all planar material? We don't do this for any other setting. No other setting gets this treatment and it continues to baffle me why Planescape gets the pass. What really baffles me is why people not only accept it, but encourage it.

If we did this with any other setting, we'd get crucified. Heck, look at the reactions to having Dragonborn in core. Or the complaints that Tieflings are not Planescape Tieflings. Imagine how freaked people would get if we forced Eberron orcs and goblins into core. Or all vampires MUST be Ravenloft vampires and follow Ravenloft canon in every core supplement. People would go ape. But, planar stuff? Oh, that has to be Planescape or nothing. Why isn't there a middle road where we all get something?

 

[Elderbrain]

If I might make an observation?

Campaign material bleeding into core rulebooks is nothing new. It's been that way since the beginning. In AD&D 1st edition, Greyhawk was mentioned repeatedly - artifacts in the DMG, and numerous references in the MMII (in the Cat Lord's entry, as well as Fraz-Urb'luu, Gra'zzt and the Valley Elf entries). 2nd edition mentioned the Blood War in the Baatezu/Tan'narri entries, and Kender in the Death Knight entry, mentioned Ravenloft in the Mummy Lord entry, as well as including several monsters/references to Spelljammer. For anyone who hated Greyhawk, 3e and 3.5 must have been a nightmare, as the Greyhawk deities were featured as the default pantheon in the PH and DMG, and there were other Greyhawk references as well. The Book of Vile Darkness mentioned Gra'zzt's imprisonment (which happened on Oerth), and the Epic Level Handbook featured several Greyhawk NPCs and numerous Forgotten Realms NPCs. 4e used a grab-bag pantheon that included several Greyhawk deities and one Forgotten Realms deity, abeit divorced from their original settings. And finally, the current 5e PHB references just about everything multiple times, with Sigil called out in the planar section and the deities of Greyhawk, Dragonlance, Forgotten Realms, and Ebberon given ample space in the appendix, along with classical pantheons like the Greek and Norse.

In short, having to "suffer" through a handful of Planscape references (especially when using planar material (!)) doesn't seem like it should be cause for as much bellyaching as I'm hearing. Where were the cries of "foul!" when 3e featured the Greyhawk pantheon? If just having ANY campaign-specific material in core rulebooks is bad, that ought to have irked people like Huzzar at least as much as the Planescape references - yet I heard not a peep from him on that account!

EVERY D&D player/dm has to put up with references and material that he/she doesn't like, every edition. None of us get to "opt out" of having to endure stuff we don't like. That's just life. I'm not that big a fan of the Forgotten Realms, yet every edition it gets preferencial treatment over other campaign settings, because it's popular. The 3.5 books had a Red Wizard prestige class right there in the core rulebooks, if I recall correctly. Should I have bitc- I mean, COMPLAINED, about that?

That's my two cents...

 

[jabelincoln]

Full disclosure: I've been a giant Planescape fan since it's inception, or even before as I was fascinated by 1e's Manual of the Planes and Deities and Demigods. So with that admitted, let me say I don't understand what the problem with references to an assumed cosmology in monster and other fluff is. I mean that sincerely; I don't understand it, I don't grasp it. Allow me elaborate upon my vexation.

Do we not run into the same problems if we say anything at all about monsters beyond pure stats? For instance, there are a lot of things various editions have had to say about goblins, hobgoblins, and kobolds. Yet I ran a campaign where goblins were a conquered, mongolianesque race that worked as dockworkers and wharf masters in giant labyrinthine dock complex, hobgoblins were a proud but cowed warrior race reduced to working for hire and very akin to samurai, and kobolds plied the seas as expert merchants, sailors, and riggers (you should see those little fellows scurry up those mast poles).

None of the fluff prevented me from using those monsters in any way I wanted, what's different for planes fluff? Is it that you (the generic "you") want published material suggesting alternate planar frameworks? If so is that not satisfied by the already pre-existing settings that have laid out plenty of alternate systems. Is it that there are some mechanical elements so built around the fluff that you can't easily handwave them? If so, someone please provide examples so I can better understand what makes this an issue.


Cheers

 

[Jishosan]

Not only am I a fan of Planescape, but I believe that the Planescape cosmology is INHERENTLY better from a roleplaying standpoint than the bland 4e cosmology. Planescape locations have flavor, character, incredibly detailed and rich story throughout the history of D&D, not including 4e. 4e "planes" never felt like PLACES, but like background flavor. Everything was simply inherently MATERIAL, and I felt like a significant amount of what makes the D&D universe unique was lost when the planes were dumbed down.

I can understand if you want to roll your own cosmology, with your own gods and your own structure. Perhaps you prefer an Egyptian or Norse inspired planar situation. But I honestly find myself unable to to understand how anyone interested in roleplaying and story would prefer the 4e planar landscape to the historical D&D cosmology.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Campaign material bleeding into core rulebooks is nothing new. It's been that way since the beginning.

Two points.

First, The Great Wheel of Greyhawk and The Planescape Setting are not the same thing. The latter uses the former, but the former also exists without the latter. And you can probably have the latter without the former. So they haven't been the same thing always.

In fact, the only e in which they were sort of the same thing was 2e, and that was only true after the Planescape setting got published. To a certain extent in 3e as well, though it was much more The Great Wheel and much less The Planescape Setting (aside from a few faction-based locations scattered around the Manual of the Planes and such).

Campaign material bled into the core rulebooks, but it was Greyhawk campaign material, which is not the same thing as Planescape.

The second point is that while campaign material has always bled into the core books, it has never actually been fully welcome there. D&D has never been about Greyhawk or FR or any one particular setting in practice, it's always been about multiple settings, and that should include multiple cosmologies.

I can understand if you want to roll your own cosmology, with your own gods and your own structure. Perhaps you prefer an Egyptian or Norse inspired planar situation. But I honestly find myself unable to to understand how anyone interested in roleplaying and story would prefer the 4e planar landscape to the historical D&D cosmology.

People got their own preferences. Not sharing them doesn't mean there's not good reasons for 'em.

 

[Jishosan]

Two points.

First, The Great Wheel of Greyhawk and The Planescape Setting are not the same thing. The latter uses the former, but the former also exists without the latter. And you can probably have the latter without the former. So they haven't been the same thing always.

In fact, the only e in which they were sort of the same thing was 2e, and that was only true after the Planescape setting got published. To a certain extent in 3e as well, though it was much more The Great Wheel and much less The Planescape Setting (aside from a few faction-based locations scattered around the Manual of the Planes and such).

Campaign material bled into the core rulebooks, but it was Greyhawk campaign material, which is not the same thing as Planescape.

The second point is that while campaign material has always bled into the core books, it has never actually been fully welcome there. D&D has never been about Greyhawk or FR or any one particular setting in practice, it's always been about multiple settings, and that should include multiple cosmologies.

My understanding is that since Planescape, D&D has largely been considered a "multiverse", and the only time this changed was during 4e. 5e has re-introduced this concept, connecting the various campaign settings via the Great Wheel (which can no longer be said to just be attached to Greyhawk). While the World Axis cosmology of 4e had extensive names, it lacked an articulated vision. I realize that there has to be some room for DM interpretation, but I much prefer a fleshed out world in which I can focus more on storytelling within that realm rather than having to build the various aspects from scratch before I can tell a rich story.

People got their own preferences. Not sharing them doesn't mean there's not good reasons for 'em.

I would genuinely be interested in knowing which cosmologies people prefer to play and why? I'm not being facetious or sarcastic, and despite how it sounded, I wasn't trying to be dismissive of the possibility of other cosmologies. However, aside from developing your own full-featured cosmology, or adapting and expanding on World Axis with your own rich detail, I am unable to determine why someone would ever choose a LESS developed cosmology over a more developed one?

I suppose I could see the possibility of running godless, for instance, where there IS no cosmology, where priests get powers but can never be sure from where or why because their gods never actually talk to them or show themselves. Or where priests are more "shinto"-esque, tied to earthbound spirits that represent concepts. But that sort of falls into the "build your own" category, which doesn't explain why they would prefer that the 4e cosmology be left as the default over the more developed Great Wheel.

 

[Hussar]

Full disclosure: I've been a giant Planescape fan since it's inception, or even before as I was fascinated by 1e's Manual of the Planes and Deities and Demigods. So with that admitted, let me say I don't understand what the problem with references to an assumed cosmology in monster and other fluff is. I mean that sincerely; I don't understand it, I don't grasp it. Allow me elaborate upon my vexation.

Do we not run into the same problems if we say anything at all about monsters beyond pure stats? For instance, there are a lot of things various editions have had to say about goblins, hobgoblins, and kobolds. Yet I ran a campaign where goblins were a conquered, mongolianesque race that worked as dockworkers and wharf masters in giant labyrinthine dock complex, hobgoblins were a proud but cowed warrior race reduced to working for hire and very akin to samurai, and kobolds plied the seas as expert merchants, sailors, and riggers (you should see those little fellows scurry up those mast poles).

None of the fluff prevented me from using those monsters in any way I wanted, what's different for planes fluff? Is it that you (the generic "you") want published material suggesting alternate planar frameworks? If so is that not satisfied by the already pre-existing settings that have laid out plenty of alternate systems. Is it that there are some mechanical elements so built around the fluff that you can't easily handwave them? If so, someone please provide examples so I can better understand what makes this an issue.


Cheers

Actually, the bolded part is exactly the point. Every edition has had various things to say about, say, orcs. Orcs have evolved through the editions (as have most humanoids, giants, and dragons) with varying degrees of background information. They've sometimes been Chaotic Evil, sometimes Lawful Evil. They've been fairly weak physically to darn near as strong as an ogre and certainly a lot stronger than a normal human. Some things have remained fairly the same, but, lots have changed. Do orcs live in small tribes in caves or do they have cities? Well, depends on the edition and the setting.

But, as we've seen with Planescape material, we are not allowed to make any changes. Every Planescape element must be preserved in its entirety throughout editions and every change is critiqued, not based on whether the change is interesting or not, but whether or not it follows what came before.

And i really don't understand why. Why is it perfectly fine for dragons to go from relatively small monsters with minor spell casting ability, if any spell casting ability at all, to virtual demi-gods equivalent to arch mages? But if we change a succubus from a demon to a devil, or futz about with Yugoloths, the pitchforks and torches start coming out.

See, no, there aren't alternative systems. Not in D&D. If I want different orcs, I have all sorts of inspirations I could draw on. If I want different halflings, I could use core D&D, Dragonlance, Eberron, whatever, and have everything from hobbits to cannibals to kleptomaniacs. But a Type 1 Vrock must always be a Type 1 Vrock in every single setting, in every single source book and can never, ever vary from the baseline. We must never have an adventure book featuring a demon and a devil conspiring together, because that would violate the flavour of the Blood War. Every Eladrin must be an Angel Elf and to vary from that is verboten.

THAT'S my beef here. If there were all sorts of options out there, and Planescape was one of them, I'd be a perfectly happy camper. But, if I buy a supplement about the planes, it will ALWAYS be a Planescape supplement. If I buy an adventure that features anything off the Prime Material, I know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that it will always follow Planescape flavour. Heck, The Savage Tide, a spin off of the Isle of Dread, followed, to the letter, Planescape elements. The last three or four modules might as well have had Planescape emblazoned across the banner. Why? These are Greyhawk (or rather Paizohawk) adventures. They certainly didn't start off as Planescape adventures. But they sure as heck ended as them.

Oh, that's right, anything to do with the planes that was published in Dungeon or Dragon in 3e HAD to follow Planescape flavour. No variation. No exceptions.

 

[pemerton]

I am unable to determine why someone would ever choose a LESS developed cosmology over a more developed one?

I honestly find myself unable to to understand how anyone interested in roleplaying and story would prefer the 4e planar landscape to the historical D&D cosmology.

In my case, because I want my group's roleplaying to generate our own content and story, rather than retelling a story that someone else already wrote.

I believe that the Planescape cosmology is INHERENTLY better from a roleplaying standpoint than the bland 4e cosmology. Planescape locations have flavor, character, incredibly detailed and rich story throughout the history of D&D, not including 4e. 4e "planes" never felt like PLACES, but like background flavor.

While the World Axis cosmology of 4e had extensive names, it lacked an articulated vision. I realize that there has to be some room for DM interpretation, but I much prefer a fleshed out world in which I can focus more on storytelling within that realm rather than having to build the various aspects from scratch before I can tell a rich story.

For some RPGers - including me - roleplaying is not about learning, via GM narration, the stories that someone else has written. It's about the game participants creating their own stories through play.
[MENTION=16586]Campbell[/MENTION] gave the best summary of the 4e cosmology that I've come across:

a visceral game about violently capable individuals who set out willingly or not to irrevocably enact change in their worlds who end up becoming mythic figures in their own right. This is highly reinforced in the assumed setting of the game with the backdrop of the Dawn War, tales of the fall of civilizations, and highly active Gods, Demon Princes, Primordials, etc. 4eC presents a world on fire in desperate need of heroes. Thematically it strikes the same currents that Greek Myth, the Diablo games, and Exalted does though tied to a more mortal perspective.

Planescape does not offer this, either at the level of fiction or at the level of play. Hence I prefer 4e to Planescape.

 

[I'm A Banana]

a visceral game about violently capable individuals who set out willingly or not to irrevocably enact change in their worlds who end up becoming mythic figures in their own right. This is highly reinforced in the assumed setting of the game with the backdrop of the Dawn War, tales of the fall of civilizations, and highly active Gods, Demon Princes, Primordials, etc. 4eC presents a world on fire in desperate need of heroes. Thematically it strikes the same currents that Greek Myth, the Diablo games, and Exalted does though tied to a more mortal perspective.

Planescape does not offer this, either at the level of fiction or at the level of play. Hence I prefer 4e to Planescape.

See, different preferences. The tone of PS is not one of a world on fire in desperate need of heroes, it is one of an ongoing war of competing ideologies, where heroism depends on what one thinks of the flag you're waving, where no hero is pure and no villain is monolithic, where the players enact change throughout reality and where the ideas they champion become more legendary than their own names.

It is totally fair to prefer a more heroic light-vs.-darkness / civilization-vs.-chaos kind of vibe for your D&D game, and you should be able to have a cosmology that supports that first and foremost rather than having to cleave to the Great Wheel or anything.

And i really don't understand why. Why is it perfectly fine for dragons to go from relatively small monsters with minor spell casting ability, if any spell casting ability at all, to virtual demi-gods equivalent to arch mages? But if we change a succubus from a demon to a devil, or futz about with Yugoloths, the pitchforks and torches start coming out.

Well, in the first place, it isn't perfectly fine for a lot of people, those people are just perhaps less numerous than PS fans.

But mostly because it's like taking Lord Soth and describing him as some sort of misunderstood antihero who had a talking badger animal companion that cracked wise about Takhisis.

Or like taking Drizz'zt and describing him as a heartless guerilla revolutionary who burns orphanages and raises schools in his effort of leading a revolution.

Or like taking Iggwiliv and imagining her as a comically idiotic character who succeeds despite her own incomptence.

In other words, it's inauthentic. Regardless of if the new story is good or not, it's not true to the stories that people love about the critter.

But all this can be avoided if the core books just imagine that yugoloths and succubi and whatever aren't The Definitive X, but rather that the story one tells about them is just one story. 5e doesn't seem to be following this track, but they do seem to be taking a light touch. Most of the story info in 5e is easy to ignore. Your Intellect Devourers don't have to be creations of the mind flayers, and it doesn't change much about 'em. Your succubi can be devils and it'll be fine.

My understanding is that since Planescape, D&D has largely been considered a "multiverse", and the only time this changed was during 4e. 5e has re-introduced this concept, connecting the various campaign settings via the Great Wheel (which can no longer be said to just be attached to Greyhawk). While the World Axis cosmology of 4e had extensive names, it lacked an articulated vision. I realize that there has to be some room for DM interpretation, but I much prefer a fleshed out world in which I can focus more on storytelling within that realm rather than having to build the various aspects from scratch before I can tell a rich story.

I think it'd be a mistake to conflate PS with the Great Wheel. These things are not the same things. The development that PS gave the Great Wheel might be welcome sometimes, but other times it might not be, because the setting has its own tone and style it brings into the game.

Right now, for instance, I'd say that 5e has the Great Wheel, but it's not very PS-y. It is bound to concepts like alignments though, and presents them as equal rather than having a clear hierarchy as in 4e, which might mean it's harder to run a 4e style "heroes of ordered light against the roiling destructive chaos" style game in core 5e. Or an Eberron-style "Xoriat is waxing and chaos is rising!" kind of game. Which is kind of a shame.

I would genuinely be interested in knowing which cosmologies people prefer to play and why? I'm not being facetious or sarcastic, and despite how it sounded, I wasn't trying to be dismissive of the possibility of other cosmologies. However, aside from developing your own full-featured cosmology, or adapting and expanding on World Axis with your own rich detail, I am unable to determine why someone would ever choose a LESS developed cosmology over a more developed one?

I suppose I could see the possibility of running godless, for instance, where there IS no cosmology, where priests get powers but can never be sure from where or why because their gods never actually talk to them or show themselves. Or where priests are more "shinto"-esque, tied to earthbound spirits that represent concepts. But that sort of falls into the "build your own" category, which doesn't explain why they would prefer that the 4e cosmology be left as the default over the more developed Great Wheel.

My case is more that I think there should be no truly default cosmology.

That way, someone who develops a shinto-esque setting, or someone who develops, say, a setting based on the path of the Sun like Egyptian myth, isn't someone who has to climb uphill against the default assumptions. Maybe Grazz'zt isn't a demon in the abyss, maybe he's an oni from the decadent south. Maybe he's a force of darkness in service to Set who seeks to stop the sun from rising.

Clearly, the devs didn't really want to explicitly support that assumption of "no assumptions" for PC's. And it doesn't seem like it'd be too hard to change, which is good. But I bet in most games, Grazz'zt is gonna be a demon from the Abyss on the Great Wheel, just 'cuz that's what the game already says about him. Which is less awesome than it could have been.

 

[pemerton]

The tone of PS is not one of a world on fire in desperate need of heroes, it is one of an ongoing war of competing ideologies, where heroism depends on what one thinks of the flag you're waving, where no hero is pure and no villain is monolithic

<snip>

It is totally fair to prefer a more heroic light-vs.-darkness / civilization-vs.-chaos kind of vibe for your D&D game

<snip>

5e has the Great Wheel, but it's not very PS-y. It is bound to concepts like alignments though, and presents them as equal rather than having a clear hierarchy as in 4e, which might mean it's harder to run a 4e style "heroes of ordered light against the roiling destructive chaos" style game in core 5e.

Just for the sake of clarity: the 4e cosmology esablishes clear stakes. It doesn't prescribe how the PCs address those stakes. Which is to say, the players are free to form their own conceptions of what counts as a heroic response to the world on fire.

For instance, in my own 4e game one PC is a deva servant of Erathis, Bane and several other gods who wields the Sceptre of Law; and another is a chaos sorcerer and Emergent Primordial, devoted to Corellon and to Chan, the Queen of Good Elemental Creatures. A third is a Marshall of Letherna and fanatical devotee of the Raven Queen.

These characters have different conceptions of how to respond to the stakes that the 4e background establishes: one wants to rebuild the Lattice of Heaven and establish divine order; another wants to overthrow Lolth, free the drow and allow the mortal world to continue in an equilibrium of order and chaos; the third wants to uphold and extend the Raven Queen's power over the fates of mortals.

I'm sure there are a lot of other feasible PC concepts and goals, too, that engage with the stakes of a world on fire.