Planescape Setting

[Jupp]

Thinking about WotC doing a new PS book makes me shiver, in a very bad way. Seeing what they did with the last two planar books I think I really do not want to see any kind of Planescape books coming from the Wizards....except they manage to bring the old crew back for that project. Planescape was defined by the style it was written in and by the huge amount of background that one was able to get from the source books. But looking at the recent planar books from WotC...no thanks for a revival :\

 

[Desdichado]

I don't think it's particularly easy to convert from 2e to 3.5e. Fr'instance, I am not entirely happy with many of the planescape conversions I HAVE seen.

What needs to be converted, really? We've already got the classes, the races, and most of the creatures. The fluff doesn't need converting. Other than a few tweaks; such as factions and magic effects of various planes, there's not a whole lot to do.

And frankly, I was more annoyed by factions than not, and I think the 3e Manual of the Planes magic rules had enough flavor for me. I could very easily run Planescape with the old 2e material, the aforementioned Manual of the Planes and the various monster books and whatnot that I have.

Then again, I'm not a Planescape purist, though, so my perspective might be more relaxed than others.

 

[Psion]

What needs to be converted, really? We've already got the classes, the races, and most of the creatures.

Biggest thing that doesn't meet my expectation in any d20 iteration I have seen: factions.

Edit: I'm also none too pleased with the races as presented by the Planar Handbook, though you can have most of the PS races elsewhere... you just have to hunt through several books to get them.

 

[Desdichado]

Ah, see, and I had no expectations of the factions, hence my greater satisfaction with the "conversions" I've seen to date. I tend to vastly downplay the factions anyway.

 

[Zappo]

Because they are expensive and hard to find.

You can buy the PDFs easy and cheap.

At that point, you have all of the fluff. If I had a good, solid book containing all 3.5 crunch for the setting, I would be happy for eternity. Even in 2E, I really disliked PS' rules; faction abilities were seriously unbalanced and the alterations to magic by plane were a nightmare to keep track of. 3.5 would offer a much better framework to create much better rules.

 

[shadow]

[Puts on Flame-Retardent Armor]

To tell the truth, I never liked Planescape. I always envisioned the planes as some legendary, mystical places, not as some cosmic adventuring grounds. Plus the setting and all the inherent factions and philosophy never made much sense to me. For those reasons, I'm glad that Planescape has been expunged from core D&D.

However, I don't see exactly why Planescape should be that hard to run in 33 or 3.5e. From what I remember, most Planescape material, was mainly "fluff". The "crunch" (planar rules, races, feats, etc.) can be derived from Manual of the Planes and the Planar Handbook.

 

[Desdichado]

[I always envisioned the planes as some legendary, mystical places, not as some cosmic adventuring grounds. Plus the setting and all the inherent factions and philosophy never made much sense to me. For those reasons, I'm glad that Planescape has been expunged from core D&D.

Oddly enough, the planes were a cosmic adventuring ground, largely, before the advent of Planescape, which tried to return it to a legendary mystical place in a lot of ways.

And Planescape has hardly been expunged from core D&D; I think the reason we'll never see the setting reprinted is because it's been fairly fully integrated into core D&D.

 

[Pants]

You can buy the PDFs easy and cheap.

I don't like pdfs. They are nice to read (although I hate reading like that for any length of time on a PC), but a horror to reference at gametime. Sorry, they just don't cut it.

 

[Arbiter of Wyrms]

There's been talk here of converting the old 2e stuff to 3.5. I have to agree that with a few glaring exceptions (most notably factions), old material is easy to convert.

What I would like to see is a Sigil hardbound comparable to Sharn: City of Towers or City of Splendors: Waterdeep.

I just want enough of a revision that the setting can continue from where it left off without the gaping hole left by the ban on factions in the City of Doors. The Great Upheaval didn't spell the end of Sigil 400 years, ago. Monte's as much as said that the aftermath of Faction War was never meant to be a permanent condition.

The problem for me is that WotC's new material occasionally refers to Sigil and its factions in source material as though nothing ever happened, but then the rare sorjourn in the Cage in a WotC module never makes use of the factions, but likes to play up the devastation at the site of the old armory.

The continuing adventures section of Faction War was incomplete, and at this point, supplementing it means a complete revisitation of the setting.

 

[Arbiter of Wyrms]

Monte:

When I set up the poll, I didn't set it to show publically how each respondant voted, and I stand by the belief that secret ballots encourage turnout and honesty, but I have to admit, that Monte's post was both informative and tantalizingly evasive.

For Monte & Sue and Ray Vallese, Dori Hein, David Wise, Lester Smith, Rich Baker, Bill Slaviscek, Bill Connors, Bruce Nesmith, Skip Williams, Tim Beach, Miranda Horner, Bruce Cordell, Tony Diterlizzi and the whole Planescape/Beyond Countless Doorways design crew:

I'd really like to know if there's interest in working together again on something not just Planar, but Planescape - something to to put the pieces back in an official order for the setting to continue in something other than a confused shambles.

Is a one-shot even a consideration on the part of the design team that would be needed to make it happen?