OGC Outer Planes

[tbug]

I'm looking for some open content outer planes. I'm working on a shared campaign and I want to web publish the cosmology under the d20 license. This means, of course, that I can't use the outer planes from the Manual of the Planes. They'd suit me fine if they were open content, but they're not. Do any of you know of some alternates? I want to use maybe a paragraph on each of the outer planes; if gamemasters want more details I'm happy to point them toward purchasing the OGC source.

 

[DMScott]

I believe most d20 products just refer generically to higher or lower planes, or use names that suggest D&D's planes (for example, saying devils come from Hell).

Any reason why you couldn't make some fairly broad outer planes up? Perhaps one each for Good, Evil, Law, and Chaos. It sounds like the details of the cosmology aren't a big focus of your project, so keeping it vague may be the best way to go.

 

[tbug]

I believe most d20 products just refer generically to higher or lower planes, or use names that suggest D&D's planes (for example, saying devils come from Hell).

That's what I was afraid of. Thanks.

Any reason why you couldn't make some fairly broad outer planes up? Perhaps one each for Good, Evil, Law, and Chaos. It sounds like the details of the cosmology aren't a big focus of your project, so keeping it vague may be the best way to go.

I could do that, but it feels lazy. The problem with a shared campaign is that I don't have any way of knowing what might become important down the road, but I have to give at least some details now.

Maybe I'll do something basing each outer plane on a divine domain. That would at least be a little original.

Thanks for the response.

 

[Spatzimaus]

Personally, I'd just suggest making up your own cosmology altogether, instead of the whole Prime-elemental-aligned separations. Too much of the D&D cosmology is just left over from earlier editions anyway.

 

[tbug]

I was hoping someone had already done it.

So much else has already been done as open content that I was hoping to raid the d20 larder once again.

Thanks for the responses, nonetheless.

 

[Spatzimaus]

I was hoping someone had already done it.

They have; IMC we did this ourselves, tossing out the standard planes and making our own.

My point was that it's not too difficult; the key is quantity. The standard D&D has the Primes, the Positive and Negative energy planes, four Elemental planes, a bunch of Paraelemental planes, and at least 17 sets of aligned planes (and by "set" I'm counting the 666 layers of the Abyss as one set). The key to making your own is just to cut this down to a more manageable number. IMC we have a total of 10 planes, which means we could keep them all really different without making them direct copies of existing material.

 

[Ry]

I think there's a better way; keep the concept of plane vague, but detail the stuff you're really interested in. In my campaign, when mortals die on Staunwark Island, they either get carried off to the Rest Eternal (heaven) or get caught and dragged down to Beyogo's Indenture (hell). The point is, because I kept it local, I can just keep mapping and developing those realms, and be confident that they'll fit into almost any planar system whatsoever. I think for Planescape we're looking at Bytopia/Carceri, which lines up nicely, but that's not set in stone. To this I've added Shalanam (a sort of mountainous heaven for Arcana Unearthed giants) and The Tomb Beyond All Reach (where the dead gods lie...). Thus, there's somewhere important for plane-travelling heroes to go, but I don't commit to any particular cosmology. While I know that 'cosmology' is supposed to be something fully defined for a campaign (according to Ms. Manners' guide to setting design), focusing on what the PCs can experience has helped me make my campaign a lot richer.

 

[tbug]

Thanks for the suggestions. For now I'm just keeping the outer planes vague. I've started work on them and I'll have a detailed system before we need it, hopefully.

The problem with a shared campaign is that I can't always tell ahead of time what we'll need and what we won't. Fortunately we're all having a good time, and that's what matters.