Design and Development: Cosmology

[Relique du Madde]

Ravenloft killed Planescape and took all it's stuff then 4e killed Ravenlost and took all it's stuff!

 

[Plane Sailing]

The only true requirement for me is sigil. To me, sigil is iconic planescape, iconic dnd, the rest is just windowdressing. The planes can change, but sigil had better be there!!

Sigil? What is this sigil you speak of?

 

[WhatGravitas]

Sigil? What is this sigil you speak of?

The Iron Sigil, a wizardly order! *ducks*

Cheers, LT.

 

[Geron Raveneye]

To quote something TwinBahamut said on the thread about the Elemental Planes...

As a whole though, I am beginning to realize that this marks a radical change from earlier cosmology. In the Great Wheel, all the elements exist in a pure state held seperate, part of a greater system of pure elements, energies, and alignments, a cosmos of perfect balance and order. By nature, the Great Wheel is a system of absolute order. And irregularities or complexities arise through the actions of creatures which exist within that universe. In the new cosmolgy, the Elemental Tempest represents a bastion of celestial chaos and unpredictability, where impurity and random combination are the natural state. Order is achieved through deliberate action, and elemental order is always artificial. Can't say much about the Astral Sea, though... It is an interesting total reversal of overall assumptions.

I can't help myself, but it looks like the "points of light" assumption is brought to the planes as well...seething elemental chaos containing the Abyss at its core, and a few stable points of elemental matter inside. The Astral Sea...wouldn't surprise me by being a vast and wild plane, with the astral abodes being the most stable, and sometimes hospitable, areas. Feywyld as "natural state" copy of the Prime and Shadowfell as "here there be ghosts" parallel plane, both having a few areas that are friendly for Prime travelers. Looks like one of the ways to make high-level play similar to low-level play. Not sure what to think of it, though. Basically, the Great Wheel never figured in my campaigns, I usually use the old Mystara cosmology and Immortals...so it's not TOO big a change for me where the Outer Planes are considered. I just miss the Elemental Planes.

 

[Tharen the Damned]

Note that China is hundreds of miles across, and had more than 100 millions inhabitants, however.

Also, isn't a lot of China's population concentrated in about 15% of the country? I can't remember the reason why (inhospitable, the area unable to grow food, something like that).

Yeah, but the Chinese are not Demons and as far as I know do not try to destroy the multiverse.
I do not see Bill Balor and Vinnie Vrock sharing a 2 room Flat in a 1.000 floor Spire in Abyssia. A City growing so fast that even Zeus Inc. (the multiverse' foremost lightning company) will invest a substantial amount to build a branch office there.

 

[Lurks-no-More]

Better yet...again from Exalted

Shadowfell=Shadowlands

Well... no. Shadowfell = Underworld.

Elemental Chaos=Wyld lands
FeyWild=Borders of Creation
Astral Sea=Yu-shan( actually this one is a stretch, but everything else is spot on)

This with the demon and devil tid bits has got me kinda dissapointed. I've played this game before.

You know, the reason for why this reminds you of the Exalted cosmology (it's not "spot on", IMO, though) might just be that both games are tapping to similar mythological material... Feywild is the Faerie, Shadowfell is the Greek underworld, the gods are off living in their heavens. It's common ancestry and convergent evolution, I think, and it might do D&D some good.

 

[Aloïsius]

I do not see Bill Balor and Vinnie Vrock sharing a 2 room Flat in a 1.000 floor Spire in Abyssia.

However, I can envision the sea of flesh : an amalgation (is that even a word ?) of billions of dretchs moaning and groaning, while beeing slowly attracted toward the center of he abyss, where they are shred to bits. The soul energy released by their death and suffering forms dark bolts thousands of miles long, that corrupt the essence of the elemental creatures they strike.

 

[StarFyre]

hmm

some aspects of this i like..others I do not, or would need to see that planes i like, pandemonium, etc still exist in the current, 'hardcore' state as opposed to an easy area to adventure in (it's not meant to be easy!).

I will incorporate some of this into my cosmology for planescape.

(I am a strange one; I do not like the great wheel setup that much, but I love planescape...so I keep the outlands and the spire/sigil, but have changed where the planes are and how they interact).

Sanjay

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

I don't see anything about 'Astral Sea' that makes it a literal 'sea,' with dominions bobbing along in it.

I hope the Astral Sea is a "sea." Otherwise, how can you have Githyanki pirates?

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

Intriguing changes, but I'm a bit concerned -- these drastic changes will make it much more difficult to convert prior edition adventures to run in 4E. It's amazing how many prior elements depend on the cosmologies (whether ethereal spells, certain monsters, or entire adventures like Bastion of Broken Souls or the later parts of Paizo adventure paths).

The nice thing about the Great Wheel having been the generic cosmology for prior D&D (despite all its baggage) is that conversion from edition to edition of D&D products mostly only required mechanical changes, not reimaginings of the way the big pieces fit together which could invalidate entire adventures. You can pick up a 1E module, tweak some mechanics, and it fits just fine in 3.5 convention, for example.

Don't get me wrong -- the simplification of cosmology looks to be more interesting -- but I think WotC just made a big break with prior D&D history that will be tough to bridge without completely throwing out a big part of either the old or the new. I hate it when game companies create more work for me rather than less.