Planescape and Spelljammer
- Thread starter VGmaster9
- Start date
Matt James
Game Developer
Some of the principles of both are in Manual of the Planes--one of my favorite 4e supplements.
I know, I mean how can they fit in with 4e rules.
Does it also cover the Domains of Dread?
To be honest, I think that the astral sea planar setting is a fusion of both settings-the sailing of spelljammer and the exotic planes of planescape. The metaphysics of 4e started to appeal to me once I realized that.
AbdulAlhazred
Legend
Domains of Dread are mentioned in MotP and there is IIRC some more mention of them in Open Grave. There aren't any codified rules like the old 2e Ravenloft setting provided, yet. As I understand it the boxed Gloomwrought and Beyond set will have something very similar though (coming in May). Basically the Shadowfell in a sense IS the Domains of Dread plus some.
MotP does have some basic rules for spelljamming. I'd say the way to work it in 4e would be to assume that you would be traversing the Astral Sea in your spelljammer. The various specific rules dealing with crystal spheres and whatnot don't exist, but you could easily reintroduce that stuff.
Planescape was a bit more dependent on the details of the Great Wheel, but MotP and DMG2 have a good bit of info on Sigil. You could certainly adapt most of the old stuff to the new cosmology, it has plenty of room for all the older stuff in it. Or just use 4e rules with the old cosmology, it will work perfectly well and the newer material should fit in easily.
Overall 4e is quite flexible that way, it really has little or no mechanics that rely on any specific cosmology.
Shemeska
Adventurer
Planescape could work fine with any ruleset, including 4e. However, a lot of the flavor and atmosphere of Planescape gets lost when the 4e rules come packaged hand-in-hand with the 4e PoL conceits and its retcons to a massive amount of planar material, cosmology, and other things highly developed in Planescape. When some of 4e's designers giggled about putting bullets in the head of certain concepts in the setting, you know it's not going to be a smooth transition. The Blood War, the identity, nature and history of a majority of the planar races, the nature of the planes themselves, the excision of multiple alignments when it's a setting where belief and concepts were made manifest... you've got your work cut out for you in attempting to make it retain the feel of Planescape, rather than just being a bit of planar adventure and a few PS notions added into a totally different game.
Planar games in 4e = perfectly easy to do.
Planescape games in 4e = a bit more complex to handle without either gutting things from PS, or gutting things from what 4e expects you to be using.
Planar games in 4e = perfectly easy to do.
Planescape games in 4e = a bit more complex to handle without either gutting things from PS, or gutting things from what 4e expects you to be using.
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Does it also cover the cosmologies of Forgotten Realms and Eberron?
Incenjucar
Legend
All you really need is to utilize the fluff from 2E Planescape, and maybe shuffle around a few monsters. Cosmologies, while a great guiding force, are almost entirely fluff, and fluff is the easiest thing to change.
Sounds interesting to me. However, there could also be a book that has more rules on spelljamming, with stuff on the Crystal Spheres and solar systems like Realmspace, the return of Greyspace and Krynnspace, and new ones like Eberronspace (Eberron) and Mystaraspace (Mystara). There could also be rules going to other worlds like Athas, Aebrynis, etc, as well as the Demiplane of Dread. I know the chances of such a thing are slim to none, but only one can dream.
