4e Cosmology Changes

[Snoweel]

Hmm? Of course it is. The old planes were tied to the old fluff, too.

Ja but the old fluff lacked a great deal of internal consistency to the same extent that the old planar set-up did.

'Goofy' is probably the best way to describe the Great Wheel cosmology. 'Cheese-d**k' is another.

They removed Dante's hell from D&D?! <checks DMG> Nope, still in there.

He never said it was gone, he bemoaned that it used to be literally 'next door' to somewhere else. I assume that with the revised Astral Plane that is no longer the case.

 

[Aldarc]

I'm sorry, but Great Wheel = 100% pure, cliche, simplistic, unadulterated crap. I never understood the appeal of the Great Wheel- dividing planes according to alignment and populating them with predominantly creatures of that alignment struck me as simplistic and supremely lazy. Then they added redundant planes, non-sensical planes (positive and negative energy for example), and then played make believe that every plane was pretty much a nation. Sorry, thats just boring to me.

I like the 4e cosmology MUCH more. There are fewer planes, but they have a unified theme or purpose, and make sense in the larger picture. Plus, the 4e cosmology is VERY close to the cosmology I came up with for my homebrew back in the 1e days, and still use today.

Material Plane= Terrestrial Empyrean
Shadowfell= Shadow Empyrean
Feywild= Spirit world/faerie
Far Realm= Unnamed place in my cosmology where elder beings were trapped
Elemental Chaos= Primal Vortex, the place where elements merge and creation began
Hell= well, Infernal Empyrean (Hell) in my game too, populated by demons AND devils
Astral Sea= no corresponding place in my cosmology, but I can see why they used it in 4e as a vast gulf between different god's domains

The 4e cosmology is more evocative to me because it fits themes and ideas that are familiar to us from legends, fairy tales, and stories. The Great Wheel is a gamist construct that tries to evenly represent every alignment, as well as some clunky/cumbersome ideas that fell flat on their face in the way they were executed. Plus, so many players got dogmatically attached to the "canon" of the Great Wheel- and anytime I see someone froth at the mouth about "canon", I intentionally change things to keep things fresh and fun (and to cause them an aneurysm). Yeah, I'm perverse that way. So RIP Great Wheel- you won't be missed here.

Definitely agreed. The planes have become far more suitable place for fantastical monsters that do not necessarily fit in the prime world, but are still relatively easily accessible for characters. The new cosmology has sparked my creativity far more than the Great Wheel did.

 

[Brennin Magalus]

'Goofy' is probably the best way to describe the Great Wheel cosmology. 'Cheese-d**k' is another.

That must be an Australian idiom. Anyway, I agree that the "Great Wheel" was goofy. As someone else wrote, the new cosmology is the only thing I like about 4e thus far.

 

[thatdarnedbob]

Everyone who is commenting on the new cosmology based on the tiny amount of info we have on it should be aware that it will get a more thorough treatment soon. This may change our hasty opinions either way.

 

[Snoweel]

That must be an Australian idiom.

Funnily enough we use it to describe that genre of big-budget movies where Americans save the world - Independence Day, Armageddon, etc.

But it's certainly evocative enough to describe the Great Wheel.

 

[Aldarc]

Everyone who is commenting on the new cosmology based on the tiny amount of info we have on it should be aware that it will get a more thorough treatment soon. This may change our hasty opinions either way.

True, but what little we have that is woven into the fluff, flavor, and mechanics of the current core rulebooks is more than sufficient for my needs.

 

[pukunui]

I like the new cosmology. It's simple, it's tidy, and it kind of makes sense. I love how the Feywild and Shadowfell bleed into the natural world so that PCs can wander into them without even necessarily realizing it ... there's lots of potential for playing out real world myths about getting lost in fairie land or going into the land of the dead to speak to someone or rescue a loved one or whatever.

I'm actually rather glad the Great Wheel is gone. I am sick of some of the old gods like Bahamut and Pelor, though, so I'm making my own pantheon. I really dig the Raven Queen, though, so she's still in. I'm also really emphasizing the whole gods = order and demons/primordials = chaos bit in my campaign setting.

 

[Spatula]

Ja but the old fluff lacked a great deal of internal consistency to the same extent that the old planar set-up did.

'Goofy' is probably the best way to describe the Great Wheel cosmology. 'Cheese-d**k' is another.

He never said it was gone, he bemoaned that it used to be literally 'next door' to somewhere else. I assume that with the revised Astral Plane that is no longer the case.

Right, it's now next door to Mount Celestia (derived from Dante's heaven, but occupied by Moradin and Bahamut in 4e-D&D-land), and the domains of a mishmash of gods from Greyhawk, the Forgotten Realms, and various racial pantheons.

I guess I am not really sure what "internally consistent" means here, or how it applies to the old cosmology but not to the new one. Any cosmology is consistent within itself, since it defines the rules of its own reality.

 

[A Passing Maniac]

I'm a huge Planescape fan, but unlike most others of my kind, I'm actually quite fond of the new cosmology. Not that I won't be making changes, of course--I prefer yugoloths as their own race to a subtype of demon, for instance, and my dominions of the Astral Sea will be different--but on the whole I find it quite pleasing.

I like fey, and I like Lovecraft even more, so the Feywild and the Far Realm both delight me. On the other hand, I generally dislike alignment, so I don't mind chucking the Great Wheel in favor of the Astral Sea, which I can populate with whatever Great Wheel locations I feel necessary. Nor do I mind the combination of Limbo and the Inner Planes into a single plane that uses the interesting bits of both (slaadi and githzerai, genies and the City of Brass) and dispenses with the more useless parts--the generally dull quasielemental planes, for instance. Although I will miss Ooze...

 

[Snoweel]

Right, it's now next door to Mount Celestia (derived from Dante's heaven, but occupied by Moradin and Bahamut in 4e-D&D-land), and the domains of a mishmash of gods from Greyhawk, the Forgotten Realms, and various racial pantheons.

Is it?

I thought it was as close to and far away from everything else as was necessary for the DM's particular story (since they all now float in the Astral Plane rather than taking up clearly defined places relative to each other on the Wheel).

I guess I am not really sure what "internally consistent" means here, or how it applies to the old cosmology but not to the new one. Any cosmology is consistent within itself, since it defines the rules of its own reality.

It's more a case of the old cosmology existing primarily to support the alignment mechanics while also trying to serve as a place for magickal thyngs to live.

I mean, I've got no problem with all this stuff existing in some kind of mish-mash (which is why I like the new version of the Astral Plane and the Elemental Chaos) but when aligned beings are thrown together yet at the same time separated from beings of differing alignments by vaste swathes of planar geography I don't see where all this implied cosmological conflict would have come from.