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Rocket your D&D 5E and Level Up: Advanced 5E games into space! Alpha Star Magazine Is Launching... Right Now!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Quickleaf" data-source="post: 5616937" data-attributes="member: 20323">Now *that* is an accomplishment! <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" />Exactly. Backdrop, and the degree it plays in your adventures, influences the nature of conflicts and themes that players are likely to interact with. Having a high concept doesn't preclude players having freedom, it just means the backdrop exerts a strong pull on the game, presenting a bandwidth of themes/choices rather than a smorgasbord.I would say planescape has an extremely strong backdrop to the point that it is almost it's on character, as embodied by the lady of pain. You'd expect to see portals, Sigil, exploring the outer planes, competing philosophies, afterlife themes, and so forth in a planescape game. However the bandwidth of player choice within that context is quite vast IMO: the PCs could be heroes from the prime material world, they could be jaded planewalkers, or some mix of the two, they could be embroiled in faction politics, they could be mercenaries in the blood war, etc. Why is their quest important to them? Which portal do they step through? How do they restore their sense of wonder? Which side do they take in the kriegstanz? Is there such a thing as the lesser of two evils? What can change the nature of a man?Planescape is about these questions but it's up to the players to answer them (or to ask their own questions).For me, once (b) is the focus, and alignment/genre conventions are not governing the answer to it, you've started to move from high concept to narrativism.I'm a big fan of drifting! (Although I think the drifting required to run narrativist 4e is very very minimal.)</blockquote>[/QUOTE]

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