D&D 4E How would you re-envision Planescape with 4e?

[I'm A Banana]

Lots Of GREAT Stuff

Yes.

The idea of the Thrones is a little heavy-handed; I'd keep the portals in the Lady of Pain's control (e.g.: at DM's whim), but the idea of a literal seat of power coveted by the factions in each ward is great. The seat could give you control over the Dabus in the ward, allowing you to re-shape the city in the image of your personal pet philosophy.

The point system for beliefs might be a bit too much bookkeeping/too simulationist. I'd use a light touch based largely on DM advice and the types of quests and missions PC's go on. "Quick, go to this town, it's about to slide over to our enemy's side!" or "Because of your actions against the enemy faction, their people are defecting at a rapid pace." A specific point system would be kind of like a specific population -- kind of meaningless numbers. But this could work in combination with a political system.

I WOULD have a point system for the beliefs affecting the self (and thus improving the self's ability to affect the world). The Affiliations system works pretty okay for this, because you can advance within the faction by doing deeds and thinking thoughts that earn you points that reward you with direct powers. It could be improved on.

Some possible Core Setting Dillemas:

• Life After Death (you can go visit your dead uncle!)
• Moral Relativity vs. Absolute Alignments (what does Good really mean?)
• The Concept of Infinity and Nothingness (what is my place in the world?)
• Freedom vs. Safety (if everything is allowed, nothing is safe!)
• Pluralism vs. Dogmaticism (exposure makes you either a fanatic or apathetic)
• Awe vs. Familiarity (Are the Gods really so great?)

I'd maybe whittle it down to three....

 

[Quickleaf]

Planar gateways, keys and puzzles and Sigil Stigmata provide sustenance to Planescape universe. As such, Planescape relation to other worlds could be considered a parasitic one.

That's interesting - a city built of stolen materials by the godless, with the ability to reach any place in existence. I could see the Dabus reframed as lore-keeper thieves, ushering abandoned fortresses through magic gates etched in runes only they fully understand. Perhaps on the Prime, occasional stories are told of the Dread Queen's goblin servitors who steal from the sweat of honest men to build edifices to their mistress.

 

[EditorBFG]

The best answer is also the simplest. Every year, I would release an anthology of selected material from planewalker.com, the official Planescape website. Run by fans with WotC's blessing, it just so happens to be the greatest setting-affiliated rpg fansite on the net, with consistently high quality material and support. I have no affiliation with the site whatsoever, mind you, I'm just giving credit where it is due.

So, yeah, that's all. Package up some planewalker.com stuff every year and sell it. Those guys get the setting better than anyone at WotC ever did.

 

[Kobold Avenger]

I didn't like the idea of having to track belief points. As I think it should just be a rough guideline for the DM to run with. But if it needs to be tracked in game, then use something that's already there like Action Points, as the belief points.

 

[Stalker0]

I think you could alter some of the great wheel planes to fit the 4e mindset (such as turning all the elemental planes into the elemental chaos), but there's no reason to toss the great wheel wholesale.

Sigil and the Lady of Pain can stay as they are as far as I'm concerned, they are the centerpiece of planescape.

So I agree with many who have said leave the setting alone for the most part.

 

[szilard]

I agree with most of what Quickleaf said.

Moreover, I don't think alignment or the Great Wheel are really at the core of what Planescape is about. I think Sigil would work perfectly fine as the city (that claims to be?) at the center of the Astral Sea.

-Stuart

 

[I'm A Banana]

Moreover, I don't think alignment or the Great Wheel are really at the core of what Planescape is about. I think Sigil would work perfectly fine as the city (that claims to be?) at the center of the Astral Sea.

I agree.

Well, except for alignment. I think the tension between an absolute alignment and a particular philosophical code is pretty juicy. Angels of peace financing weapons of war, smiling fiends, the center at the extremes...

I would think alignment plays an interesting role in all that philosophy. It's kind of interesting to think of a fantasy world where you can tell right away what philosophy is "evil," but you still have to worry about it's practicality and the sense it really does make. Makes for strange bedfellows, and that's part of PS's feel to me -- the idea that a Greek god's priest and an Industrial-Revolution-inspired profiteer and a cave man from a backwater plane and King Aruthur could all find themselves espousing the same message in the Hall of Speakers, supporting each other, and fighting for each other....alignment helps facilitate that, because it's a way to form bonds accross differences.

 

[IanB]

I disagree. The Great Wheel, its ties to alignment, gate towns, the Blood War, and the exemplars of each alignment that inhabit the various planes are all part and parcel of the Planescape experience. Well over half of the published Planescape material deals with stuff outside of Sigil - I am leery of the idea of just junking all that good stuff.

 

[Kobold Avenger]

I would think alignment plays an interesting role in all that philosophy. It's kind of interesting to think of a fantasy world where you can tell right away what philosophy is "evil," but you still have to worry about it's practicality and the sense it really does make. Makes for strange bedfellows, and that's part of PS's feel to me -- the idea that a Greek god's priest and an Industrial-Revolution-inspired profiteer and a cave man from a backwater plane and King Aruthur could all find themselves espousing the same message in the Hall of Speakers, supporting each other, and fighting for each other....alignment helps facilitate that, because it's a way to form bonds accross differences.

None of the factions truly were evil or good, and it was those moral gray-areas I liked about PS. To some the Harmonium might seem like the best and most righteous faction, but to others they simply are just a bunch of fascists and fundamentalists. Similarly the Revolutionary League might seem to be bunch of noble champions of freedom and the truth, while to others they're a bunch of dangerous communists and terrorists.

Now those philosophies do have biases towards certain alignments, but I don't think they represent the core of what these philosophies are. They just might cast a philosophy in a certain light, but not be a really strict code on what they are.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Now those philosophies do have biases towards certain alignments, but I don't think they represent the core of what these philosophies are. They just might cast a philosophy in a certain light, but not be a really strict code on what they are.

That's exactly how I see it. I mean, if 4e is mostly unaligned anyway, I see a lot of PS fitting comfortably in that mode, but I do think the interplay between philosophical groups and the alignments of people within and around those groups is a very rich area to mine for adventure ideas that address one of the central elements of PS: "What does it really mean to be Good, or Evil, or Lawul, or Chaotic, or Neutral?"