Planescape 3E by WotC

[BOZ]

let me elaborate a bit on what i mean, something i was thinking about yesterday.

Planescape was designed using just about everything that was ever written about the planes (as much as it was feasable to do so), then adding it all together and amping it up to the nth degree. for the most part, if it was something that existed before the PSCS came out, you could still use it in planescape. this, i'm sure, was intentional.

the designers of 3E decided to change a great deal of how the way things worked in some fundamental ways - something that had never really been done in D&D before (which was probably part of their argument for why such changes were necessary). these changes ripped apart the fabric of what made planescape work the way it did.

i suppose PS could work in this here new millenium if some brave souls went and redesigned it *FROM SCRATCH*. trying to retrofit it will just make it ugly. a whole lot of things will disappear from it, and a whole lot of new things will appear in it - it will not be as smooth of a transition as some settings have gone through. it will be like giving birth to the same baby twice. ouch.

 

[Staffan]

Is Planescape a 'failed' setting?

From a commercial point of view, I think so - not a gross failure, but a failure nonetheless. After all, they didn't think it viable enough to continue when WOTC bought TSR.

From an "artistic" point of view, it was a smashing success, but unfortunately that doesn't count for all that much.

 

[Bran Blackbyrd]

I'm not sure how I could have possibly bought more Planescape products as an unemployed high-school student with no allowance.

I still managed to get most of the boxed sets, one of the large miniature boxed sets and a few of the single blisters, monster books I and II, Planewalker's book, Factol's Manifesto, Uncaged: Faces of Sigil, etc...



Financial failure... Whose eye do I spit in? Bring them to me!

 

[Desdichado]

I'm not sure how I could have possibly bought more Planescape products as an unemployed high-school student with no allowance.

I still managed to get most of the boxed sets, one of the large miniature boxed sets and a few of the single blisters, monster books I and II, Planewalker's book, Factol's Manifesto, Uncaged: Faces of Sigil, etc...



Financial failure... Whose eye do I spit in? Bring them to me!

I hate to point out the obvious; but one really satisfied customer is a financial failure. As, apparently, was whatever number they actually did sell the setting to.

 

[Zjelani]

Is Planescape a 'failed' setting?

From everything I have heard, it wasn't a 'failed' setting at all. The sense I have gotten from numerous interviews as well as directly talking with some of the old TSR staff is that with few notable exceptions, they figured most campaign settings had a 5(ish) year life cycle. With only 2 exceptions (Greyhawk and Forgotten Realms), I believe every single campaign setting they released only lasted about that long. At least in an RPG form, I know Dragonlance blew through that expectation in novel-form, but I'm not sure the RPG side had products released for much longer than 5 years. But Spelljammer, Dark Sun, Birthright, Planescape - all of them were around 5 years or less.

The final nail was put into the coffin during the big old shift to WotC more because of a different business strategy and the settings nearing the end of their life cycle than due to any failure on their part. A product line can be successful, but still have a limited life. They probably just figured it had run it's course.

The fact that these settings had loyal, but small fan bases didn't help. When WotC took over and ramped up for 3e, the focus became on products with a wider appeal. The company simply couldn't affordably produce products that only appealed to niche markets. Pretty much the same reason artsy/groundbreaking movies tend to come from small studios - big studios just can't operate cheap enough to afford to produce for niche markets.

At least that's what *I've* heard.

 

[johnsemlak]

From everything I have heard, it wasn't a 'failed' setting at all. The sense I have gotten from numerous interviews as well as directly talking with some of the old TSR staff is that with few notable exceptions, they figured most campaign settings had a 5(ish) year life cycle. With only 2 exceptions (Greyhawk and Forgotten Realms), I believe every single campaign setting they released only lasted about that long. At least in an RPG form, I know Dragonlance blew through that expectation in novel-form, but I'm not sure the RPG side had products released for much longer than 5 years. But Spelljammer, Dark Sun, Birthright, Planescape - all of them were around 5 years or less.

The final nail was put into the coffin during the big old shift to WotC more because of a different business strategy and the settings nearing the end of their life cycle than due to any failure on their part. A product line can be successful, but still have a limited life. They probably just figured it had run it's course.

The fact that these settings had loyal, but small fan bases didn't help. When WotC took over and ramped up for 3e, the focus became on products with a wider appeal. The company simply couldn't affordably produce products that only appealed to niche markets. Pretty much the same reason artsy/groundbreaking movies tend to come from small studios - big studios just can't operate cheap enough to afford to produce for niche markets.

At least that's whay *I've* heard.

That post seems to make a lot of sense. Thanks

BTW, what was the Planescape life cycle--i.e. when did the first and last products come out?

 

[kuje31]

BTW, what was the Planescape life cycle--i.e. when did the first and last products come out?

1994 to 1998

 

[Monte At Home]

Actually, Planescape continued for a year after WotC bought TSR. Dead Gods, Tales from the Infinite Staircase, Faction War, and other products came out with the WotC logo.

 

[Staffan]

Actually, Planescape continued for a year after WotC bought TSR. Dead Gods, Tales from the Infinite Staircase, Faction War, and other products came out with the WotC logo.

Point. It seemed to me that they were trying to distance themselves from Planescape and move planar stuff into the core as soon as possible - the products you list were pretty far gone already, and Dead Gods and Faction War were both "sequels" to other stuff (Dead Gods to the Great Modron March, and Faction War to basically everything). Pretty soon, we instead got the core books Guide to Hell and Warriors of Heaven (or whatever, the book about playing celestials anyway), rather than actual Planescape stuff.

 

[Desdichado]

Point. It seemed to me that they were trying to distance themselves from Planescape and move planar stuff into the core as soon as possible

I don't think that was the result of trying to distance themselves from Planescape, other than the somewhat arcane rules variations the setting brought to the table. Rather, I think that's a testimony to the enduring popularity of the setting.