Elemental Planes Killed

[see]

As it says here

The D&D cosmology — largely unchanged since 1st Edition — is receiving its share of scrutiny as well. We're making revisions to the cosmology so that the planes work better as adventure sites. Case in point, the individual Elemental Planes (as decribed in 2E and 3E) aren't the most interesting adventure locations; their sheer inhospitability, vastness, and uniformity discourages exploration, and the creatures that dwell there are predictable and easy to thwart if you're packing the right spells. (Of course, these planes don't hold a candle to 2E's hilarious Plane of Vacuum, which is truly the antithesis of fun.) In the Wizards Presents: Worlds and Monsters book, we'll present in more detail 4th Edition's alternative to the Elemental Planes of Water, Fire, Earth, and Air. My hope is that the cosmological changes will excite players and actually encourage DMs to set adventures in these far-flung locales.

So, are we also going to see the elimination of deep water from D&D? I mean, the bottoms of oceans make pretty poor adventure locations. The skies, too; who adventures at 30,000 feet in the air? Why stop at getting rid of the Elemental Planes, if we're going to get rid of places that are "boring"?

It's not like we were exactly lacking places to have planar adventures, as any fan of Planescape can attest. And it's trivial to add new planes while leaving old ones intact; it's not like, say, the geography of Faerun, where the presence of Kara-Tur on the eastern end of the continent stops designers from putting something else there. These new planes could co-exist perfectly fine with the old ones. Why get rid of the old ones, unless your goal is to change things purely for the sake of change?

 

[Mouseferatu]

Um, why does "change" equal "killed," to you?

I have no problem with the planes being tweaked to be better adventure sites, as long as the core essence of said planes is retained. And it's not like they said those planes won't still be incredibly hazardous.

 

[Arnwyn]

Um, why does "change" equal "tweaked," to you?



Two posters = guilty as charged. ENWorld strikes again.

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

Why get rid of the old ones, unless your goal is to change things purely for the sake of change?

I am getting really tired of people saying this. Perhaps they are making change for the sake of a vision they have for how the 4e universe should be?

Deep water and the skies at 30,000 feet don't take up a lot of space in any of the books, and there aren't a whole lot of things adventurres might encounter that come from those places, so leaving there isn't anything to dump. The elemental planes on the other hand seem to come up frequently as adventurers encounter inhabitants of those planes upon their own, or harness powers from those planes. Makes sense to me to have them become interesting, dynamic places.

As for making new planes and leaving the old ones intact - I don't want even more clutter and confusion. I am certainly open to this change and hope they do a good job with it.

 

[marune]

The "boring" thing was said about the Plane of vaccuum. The idea behind the change is more "those planes weren't built as adventure sites, and if they are not fun to adventure into, they are useless".

Something like a monster in MM that isn't designed to be in a encounter with the PCs.

Sounds good to me.

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

The Plane of Vacuum: It Sucks!

 

[Masquerade]

see, I don't mean to belittle your argument, but I think you are definitely overreacting. That blog entry really gives us no idea how extreme these changes will be or what they will entail.

(BTW, I find your choice of the term "killed" ironic since this is the first confirmation we've had that the elemental planes still exist in 4e. )

edit - 3-way simulpost!

 

[Badkarmaboy]

Like 95% of the stuff put out by the Devs at this point, this is a bit unclear as to what as happened to the Elemental Planes. My gut reaction is that there are still Elemental Planes-but like Chris said, they're more open to "exploration". I'm not sure how they intend to accomplish this. Good thing I'm not a Dev.

Well, I have no emotional attachment to the elemental planes, color me full of "whatever's clever".

When I saw the blog post I thought to myself, "Wow, wonder what thread ENworld will have discussing this?". Lo and behold, ELEMENTAL PLANES KILLED was right at the top.

lol

 

[Treebore]

I've never followed canon cosmology anyways. If they make it something I want to use, I use it. If I don't like it, I don't use it and do my own thing. I've been that way through 4 versions of D&D now, it isn't like a 5th version is going to change how I handle cosmology, unless I find it so cool I have to use it.

 

[Geron Raveneye]

Boring? Predictable? Makes me wonder if he played in the same Elemental Planes as I did. Ah well...Elemental Plane of Water under the bridge, eh?