D&D 5E Check Out Planescape's Table of Contents & More!

Brandes Stoddard has received a copy of Planescape: Adventures in the Multiverse (which come out in two weeks!) and is posting loads of photos over on Blue Sky. You can check out his feed for the whole treasure trove--here's a look at the table of contents.

 

[dave2008]

There were two gaming stores in the city my hometown was a suburb of when I was growing up, and the one with the better selection is still there to this day. If there was something I wanted, and I had the money, I could get it.

That is probably true of my situation too (the game store is still there, the hobby store is not); however, for some reason I only went to the game store twice during that time IIRC! I spent a lot more of my time at the hobby store. I probably had some subconscious loyalty to the store and the people.

 

[dave2008]

For the Outer Planes, a pretty huge amount of the material is public domain references. WotC cannot take action against someone making a book about Hell.

Yes, but Baator?

 

[Micah Sweet]

Interesting. I thought you would care more about the lore than the prose.

Ideally I want the lore, but the prose can be evocative for me far more than any art. I loved the $%#@ out of the Cant. It’s what made the setting feel like a real place to me, even with all its weirdness. That it also had among the very few art pieces of any kind that actually spoke to me was a delightful bonus. Not having it is a big loss in my book, no matter how many people disagree with me.

 

[Micah Sweet]

That is probably true of my situation too (the game store is still there, the hobby store is not); however, for some reason I only went to the game store twice during that time IIRC! I spent a lot more of my time at the hobby store. I probably had some subconscious loyalty to the store and the people.

I liked the atmosphere and the employees better at the smaller store (I had Gary Gygax sign my 1e PH there), but in the end I'm a practical guy, and the bigger store had more of the stuff I wanted.

 

[dave2008]

Ideally I want the lore, but the prose can be evocative for me far more than any art. I loved the $%#@ out of the Cant. It’s what made the setting feel like a real place to me, even with all its weirdness. That it also had among the very few art pieces of any kind that actually spoke to me was a delightful bonus. Not having it is a big loss in my book, no matter how many people disagree with me.

Yep, we are pretty opposite here. I much prefer good art* and technical writing. I disliked the original planescape art enough that I never got to the Cant! It would have taken my right out of the setting.

I do wonder now: what if I really liked the art, would I have suffered the Cant? I don't think so, but you never know!

*a picture is worth a thousand words and all.

 

[Parmandur]

Interesting. I thought you would care more about the lore than the prose.

TSR in the later 2E era was producing a lot of Setting material to be read as creative writing as much as to be used at the table as a game.

The notable exception, IMO, was actually the Forgotten Realms when Greenwood was writing: he is a DM and Librarian, so while he might get descriptive those 1E/2E FR books were definitely designed for play and to help DMs with information needs (information science for the win). I think that was a major factor in FR being popular in play.

 

[Parmandur]

Yes, but Baator?

True, but you can go a long way on public domain in a usable way. Further on the dMs Guild, since the Outer Planes are fair game entirely.

 

[MonsterEnvy]

The in-person speech. There is a planescape term for it, but I don't know what it is called. I like more sourcebooks to have more technical writing.

Ah yes, that will probably only be in quotes at most. No previews so far have shown it in text.

The Planescape slang is called Cant.

 

[Scribe]

Nor am I familiar with PF1. I thought they had their own setting, Glorian?

The do, but as its an SRD based product it shares a few of the Plane names and Alignments.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Yep, we are pretty opposite here. I much prefer good art* and technical writing. I disliked the original planescape art enough that I never got to the Cant! It would have taken my right out of the setting.

I do wonder now: what if I really liked the art, would I have suffered the Cant? I don't think so, but you never know!

*a picture is worth a thousand words and all.

The fact that so many people rave about RPG art like it's some big reason to buy the product it's attached to is a constant source of low-grade annoyance to me. I've never felt even close to that way about any RPG product outside of the 2e Planescape line (where it might matter enough to affect my purchasing decisions at all).