Can Planescape and Spelljamer be combined?

[herald]

I Have been thinking about theidea of redoing the concepts of Planescape and Spelljammer for my game settings.

I was thinking of dropping crystal spheres and Plogiston and replacing them with Shadow Plane gates. The idea being that the gate provide a portal, almost a "Wormhole" effect that takes ships from one game setting to another, kind of like Babylon 5. Travel through the gates might sumit the vessels to atacks by shadowlands creatures, but for some, the gains outweighs the risks.

Once a vessel made it's way into a shadowlands gate, It could follow chats and maps to portals that open into other game worlds or planes. Or perhaps it could connect to the etherial plane and have to find a gate to other planes there.

The idea of cant and Spelljammer terminology seem that they would blend together nicely. (Or could be done away with entirely.) Since exploration seems to be a reoccuring them with both games. I think that you can be true to both.

So I'm looking for people's opinions. Give me your ideas on what will work and what won't.

 

[Synicism]

Interesting that you should mention such a thing. My group recently wrapped up a Planescape game that had been heavily influenced by Spelljammer, thanks to one of the characters, who was a prime from the Spelljammer setting. The first time he got his ship out to the Outer Planes, it caused quite a stir.

A couple R/L years and one D&D edition later, we started a new campaign along the same Planescape continuity, but in the future. It was almost like the same campaign, but with a different party. By then, that first spelljammer had evolved into a concept called planeships, magical vessels capable of accessing planar portals on their own.

Then again, I think the adventure "Into the Abyss" features a large spelljammer-like ship (called the Ship of Chaos), so it's not hard to integrate conceptually.

As far as the cosmology of the Prime Material went, we more or less left it alone. We didn't see anything wrong with the notion that most of the Prime was simply inaccessible to extraplanar travel, with pockets around solar systems encased in crystal spheres.

 

[Crothian]

I think they'd work fine together. It would really add to one's vision of the cosmology of the plains and allow an alternate way from getting to plane to plane.

 

[BiggusGeekus]

I also think its a fine idea.

The only thing I would question would be the utility of a inter-stellar trade route when two worlds are connected via a portal.

 

[herald]

The way I view portals is the way I view ports or roads. They don't say in one location without someone trying to control it.

Given the amount of races that will want to use portals, linked with the fact that many races don't get on well, and the rarity in some worlds. It is likely that world bound gates not easy to use in most setings. I would also assume that some of these gate would not allow for a large transport to move through them. Even still, some gates may only allow for foot traffic, and might not allow for exdimentional storage to pass through them beyond a bag of holding. Not all gates link to all locations. There can be all kinds of limitations that adventures might face moving from one location to the next.

I believe Spelljamming Tech (for lack of a better term) is supposted to facilitate transport of goods, materials and peoples to locals that cannot be reached by gate and where teleportation is risky. Consider just what a adventuring party might want to keep with them if they move off world to another world.

Consider that some worlds might not have any gates at all.

Something have to be moving large quantities of good to Sigil. Wouldn't it make sense that some of it would be on spelljammers?

 

[herald]

bump

 

[Kobold Avenger]

In the PS product In the Cage, there's a mention of someone who tried to buy some squid from a company called S&J Transport in Sigil. It was worth thousands of gold pieces, and when it was delivered he ended up with a Squid Ship.

 

[drowdude]

I ran an FR campaign with heavy Spelljammer and Planescape influences for several years.

One of the coolest things that came of that was "Astral Helms".

Allowed the ship to "jump" through the Astral Plane to arrive at it's destination almost instaneously on the Prime.

Although they still had to roleplay through the relative time it took to travel through the Astral

 

[UniversalMonster]

It can. I've done it.

The players in my last game had a 'Planejammer'- a weird guppy-shaped ship that could fly, float, spelljam, and even go underwater.

A few years ago Monte Cook made a brief appearance on the Spelljammer list and offered some ideas for combingin the two. ( I think it was Monte, anyhow).

Someone should check the archives if they still exist. It would have been 1999 or so.

 

[Ashy]

Ol' Ashy has some tricks up his sleeve along these lines as well. So much to do, so little time...