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

[szilard]

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.

You can have alignment without Alignment.

Outside of D&D we have conceptions of, for example, Angels of Peace... or Angels of Justice... or a Demon of Falsehoods... or what-have-you: entities that are the embodiment of moral concepts. These things are in no way dependent upon the D&D alignment system.

Personally, I found alignment in Planescape to be a horribly clumsy tool for anything other than things from strongly-aligned planes. In a setting where subtle differences in belief system can have a profound effect, didn't do any useful work for me.

-Stuart

 

[szilard]

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.

A lot of it need not be junked. Much of it could be adapted - or even kept pretty much as-is.

How important to the setting is it that the Great Wheel is a circle? I can think of two ways this comes into play: (1) the Modron March (an adventure) and (2) the fact that Sigil is presumed to be at the center. The latter of these, in my mind, isn't really that important since you couldn't actually get to Sigil by going to the center... The important bit to me is that Sigil is perceived as the center of the planes.

Here's one way of dealing with it: Move the Gate Towns so that they are essentially 'suburbs' of Sigil: Say that some portals, particularly older and more stable ones, are more akin to hallways than doorways. They have demiplanar space inside them. A few of these have multiple doorways off of them, but such are rare. Others have stores or inns that have set up shop within them. Some are very, very large. The largest and most stable portals practically have small cities within them - these are commonly called Gate-towns. Have the Gate-towns be accessible via the perimeter of Sigil - and have one for each of the planes/planar-domains and you've effectively turned Sigil into the center of the Planes again.

-Stuart

 

[Lord Zack]

I don't see why 4e Planescape would have to adopt the new cosmology, which I don't like nor do I see the reason for. One thing I am doing is adding in the possibility of new layers and astral demiplanes that will allow for things that don't fit into the existing areas of the cosmology (i.e a Lawful deity that wouldn't fit in Mechanus). But in my campaign the Elemental Plane's structure is staying the same, but perhaps taking elements from the Elemental Chaos and I'm using the Ethereal and Plane of Shadow rather than the Feywild and Shadowfell (which is different from the Plane of Shadow). I'm making a few more changes, but that's all I think should be changed in 4e Planescape.

 

[szilard]

I don't see why 4e Planescape would have to adopt the new cosmology, which I don't like nor do I see the reason for. .

Obviously, you're entitled to your own opinion - but it isn't the only one out there. Personally, I like the new cosmology. I'm a huge fan of Planescape, but I dislike the D&D alignment system and the Great Wheel's reification of it never excited me. The idea of adapting Planescape into the new cosmology sounds like a great idea to me.

-Stuart

 

[ruemere]

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.

Good idea, though I would like the true nature of Planescape universe to remain subtle, effected through indirect result of character actions instead of conscious scavenging.

I am not a Planescape expert, merely an avid spectator, so my reinterpretation of the setting is rather different from the canon. However, since the new cosmology is supposed to be vastly different, I would like to allow Planescape to adapt to new worlds while providing similar experiences.

Regards,
Ruemere

 

[Lord Zack]

Obviously, you're entitled to your own opinion - but it isn't the only one out there. Personally, I like the new cosmology. I'm a huge fan of Planescape, but I dislike the D&D alignment system and the Great Wheel's reification of it never excited me. The idea of adapting Planescape into the new cosmology sounds like a great idea to me.

-Stuart

Why not make you're own planar campaign setting with the new cosmology?

 

[senna]

Why not make you're own planar campaign setting with the new cosmology?

Because it realy doesnt need a new one! The great Whell is but one possibility of planar organization, even on PS, the core of the setting is Sigil and its infinite portals, you can use that with the new planar organization, or with the old.

Heck, it would be even better if they started some book on the planes, or even the PS setting book itself, with some discussions about planar arangement, including in character talk between two planar reserchers of witch one is right, with rules to use one or the other at the end of the chapter.

 

[Lord Zack]

Because it realy doesnt need a new one! The great Whell is but one possibility of planar organization, even on PS, the core of the setting is Sigil and its infinite portals, you can use that with the new planar organization, or with the old.

Heck, it would be even better if they started some book on the planes, or even the PS setting book itself, with some discussions about planar arangement, including in character talk between two planar reserchers of witch one is right, with rules to use one or the other at the end of the chapter.

The new cosmology doesn't have the Ethereal Plane and the Plane of Shadow and has the Elemental Chaos, Feywild and Shadowfell. I don't like that.

 

[Lackhand]

The new cosmology doesn't have the Ethereal Plane and the Plane of Shadow and has the Elemental Chaos, Feywild and Shadowfell. I don't like that.

Planescape *does* need the Ethereal Plane to feel like Planescape for me.
Everything else would fit *right* in.

And the difference between the Shadwofell and the Plane of Shadow feels, from my limited information, like a shadows-breath.

 

[Lord Zack]

Planescape *does* need the Ethereal Plane to feel like Planescape for me.
Everything else would fit *right* in.

And the difference between the Shadwofell and the Plane of Shadow feels, from my limited information, like a shadows-breath.

It's the fact that it's the "realm of the dead" that I don't like.