Planescape Best Planescape Book across editions and 3rd party publishers?

[paradisebunny]

Hi all, I am really interested in running a kind of planescape game and I am wondering what the best book is to set something like this up. I don’t particularly care about system specific mechanics, so feel free to list anything, this includes adjacent stuff like Monte Cook’s Planebreaker or @SlyFlourish ‘s City of Arches! The most recent wotc book got mixed reviews, which of the old ones stand out?

 

[BenjaminPey]

The new box set is a very good synthesis, it's better than the original one, though obviously less detailed than the four boxes combo. Of all the old supplements, I'd say the best source books are Faces of Sigil (one of the best rpg book I've ever read and used) and In the Cage for Sigil specifically. For planar adventures in general, I guess the old boxes (law, chaos and conflict) are hard to surpass.

 

[paradisebunny]

The new box set is a very good synthesis, it's better than the original one, though obviously less detailed than the four boxes combo. Of all the old supplements, I'd say the best source books are Faces of Sigil (one of the best rpg book I've ever read and used) and In the Cage for Sigil specifically. For planar adventures in general, I guess the old boxes (law, chaos and conflict) are hard to surpass.

So what would you recommend to get for an experienced GM that is running something like planescape the first time?

 

[BenjaminPey]

If you need a big city hub and like to play in a sand-boxy style, I'd advise for the new box-set + Faces of Sigil (pdf on DT). With that you'll have the city part covered, plus ton of things to do in the Outlands (more than with the original box set).

I have read Planebreaker but don't consider it to be very good, especially compared to something like Sigil. It's a bit too bog standard for my tastes. Other could differ.

I didn't read City of Arches, but I know Mike's work and I'm confident it's as good the rest, so there's a strong possibility here.

For the planar part, it's trickier. The old boxes are really expensive. There's always the DT possibility, but the maps will be butchered. Maybe it would be best to simply go with the quick abstracts of the planes in the DMG 24 + Tales from the Infinite Staircase (the old one — Tales, not Quest), a collection of small adventures from which to draw some interesting things. Well of the Worlds could work, too (but there's a map and the adventures are sub-par). And of course, because a planar adventure could literally take you anywhere, you could very well consider that everything you fancy is a planar adventure. So just take the worlds, settings and adventures you like and stuff them in there.

 

[paradisebunny]

If you need a big city hub and like to play in a sand-boxy style, I'd advise for the new box-set + Faces of Sigil (pdf on DT). With that you'll have the city part covered, plus ton of things to do in the Outlands (more than with the original box set).

I have read Planebreaker but don't consider it to be very good, especially compared to something like Sigil. It's a bit too bog standard for my tastes. Other could differ.

I didn't read City of Arches, but I know Mike's work and I'm confident it's as good the rest, so there's a strong possibility here.

For the planar part, it's trickier. The old boxes are really expensive. There's always the DT possibility, but the maps will be butchered. Maybe it would be best to simply go with the quick abstracts of the planes in the DMG 24 + Tales from the Infinite Staircase (the old one — Tales, not Quest), a collection of small adventures from which to draw some interesting things. Well of the Worlds could work, too (but there's a map and the adventures are sub-par). And of course, because a planar adventure could literally take you anywhere, you could very well consider that everything you fancy is a planar adventure. So just take the worlds, settings and adventures you like and stuff them in there.

this sounds really solid, thank you! the box set is going for very low prices these days, so I am tempted. Will check out faces of sigil as well!

 

[Enrico Poli1]

Personally, I love the 2e boxed set , Planes of Chaos, of Law, of Conflict, the first two Monstrous Compendiums, and the Guide to the Asrral Plane

 

[SlyFlourish]

Hi all, I am really interested in running a kind of planescape game and I am wondering what the best book is to set something like this up. I don’t particularly care about system specific mechanics, so feel free to list anything, this includes adjacent stuff like Monte Cook’s Planebreaker or @SlyFlourish ‘s City of Arches! The most recent wotc book got mixed reviews, which of the old ones stand out?

It’s not out yet but Kobold Press has a Planescape style book coming soon.

 

[humble minion]

My main reservation about the new WotC Planescape set is that it just doesn't do the planes very well. Which is a strange thing to say about a Planescape product, admittedly. But it really depends what you want out of your Planescape game. WotC 5e planescape is an excellent Sigil resource, and contains some solid stuff about the gate towns in the Outlands, but is very sparse on the actual planes themselves. If you want to run a Sigil game, it's gold. If you want to actually y'know ... go to the planes, it's lacking. You can pick up the Planescape 2e box set and the various planar supplements reasonably cheap from DMsGuild, that's probably your best bet for actual planar info from a Planescape point of view, although it's not going to help you much with 5e-compatible game mechanics.

 

[BenjaminPey]

My main reservation about the new WotC Planescape set is that it just doesn't do the planes very well. Which is a strange thing to say about a Planescape set, admittedly.

It's true, but the DM's Guide to the planes in the original box set was pretty slim in this regard and not really usable by itself (hence, the three other Planes of boxes). If you need it, the information you'll find in there are more or less exactly the same as in the DMG 24, minus the quasi-elemental planes which are frankly superfluous.

The new box set replaced this "Guide to the Plane" with detailed info on the Outlands (which had their own box, too, back in the days), both in the setting book and in the adventure (also a great plus, compared to the original box set).

So, adding the difference in price (for the original one) or quality (the DT's PoD comes with unusable maps and it is printed in four colours, the original box set is a 2-tone printing, the difference is noticeable), my advise is to go with the new one. YMMV, of course.

 

[humble minion]

So, adding the difference in price (for the original one) or quality (the DT's PoD comes with unusable maps and it is printed in four colours, the original box set is a 2-tone printing, the difference is noticeable), my advise is to go with the new one. YMMV, of course.

I wouldn’t be getting PoDs of the old box sets, agreed. The maps etc just don’t work - but how much do you need maps of the infinite planes anyway? I’d be sticking with the pdf versions of those. The maps etc are still a mess, but it’s the source material from the books that you want.