Wolfgang's "Demonweb Q&A"

[Jedi_Solo]

In Q1, Lolth lives in a giant mechanical spider that wanders around some desert dimension.

Oh... Ummmm... Okay...

I can see why they said to drop that.

 

[Dragonbait]

In Q1, Lolth lives in a giant mechanical spider that wanders around some desert dimension.

Oh... Ummmm... Okay...

I can see why they said to drop that.

seconded.

It's wacky, it's kookoo, and it's silly. Yeah, it must be 1ed.

 

[gizmo33]

It's wacky, it's kookoo, and it's silly. Yeah, it must be 1ed.

They could have given Lolth a mohawk and some piercings to make her more serious.

 

[Emirikol]

Can there be any decent adventure with Demons and without Orucs?

You should try Lost temple of Demogorgon (DUNGEON mag..check my sig).

That was fun.

I hear you though. The Orcus cliche is as overdone as the evil-cult theme.

jh

 

[Shemeska]

The gods, who are spiritual/moral beings involved in fate, life/death and all the rest, find themselves surrounded by this amoral, science-fiction environment. Somehow a typical DnD "Prime Material Plane" is more full of spiritual significance than the very dimensions that are suppose to have generated those symbols/ideas. With Planescape what was above certainly did not reflect what was below.

Then again, I suppose that the sacred manuscripts in some people's campaigns could have contained words like "berk", but I suspect for most people that's not the case. In a situation like Planescape where it was TSR/WotC's primary vision for the outer planes, I was really disappointed. I suspect that some people just find it easier to write science fiction.

If you've got a decent DM however, you're not going to encounter Sigilian cant outside of Sigil itself, the gatetowns in the Outlands, and a select few places scattered about the planes where the various factions are headquartered or have major influence. You're not going to find random tanar'ri on the 19th layer of the Abyss using that dialect, as much as how in FR you wouldn't expect to find people in Kara-Tur using Waterdhavian slang.

It was a major part of Planescape, but (for better or for worse) a lot of the PS line was based in or out of Sigil itself, so of course the local slang got pimped (perhaps to an unreasonable degree in one or two books).

And I really don't get the whole "science fiction" environment notion. The various PS books tried their best to insert a sense of wonder, awe and grandeur into the planes. They were landscapes of manifest belief where the warping effects of mortal belief and faith meshed with pre-existant qualia of alignment. Stressed above everything else was that belief = power. Gods and their followers warred over theology, fiends butchered one another over the clash of diametrically opposite conceptions of Evil, and the factions fought a war of words over the meaning of reality and the underlying nature of the multiverse.

Is that "science fiction", or a removal or watering down of "spiritual significance"? Or should we go back to Lolth's giant mechanical spider from Q1? Of maybe the chain-smoking solar with the texas accent from H4? The cant grated on some folks' nerves yes, and Sigil's style isn't for everyone, but that's only one facet of Planescape and I hate to see a gut reaction to it color people's opinions of the mass of other material it had to offer regarding the planes.

But backing off a bit rather than getting into an edition war, I also suspect that my perspective on the matter is different from others since I never played earlier editions, and I got to take in the various planar material across the editions all in one big lump sum, rather than going from one to another to another or only getting to initially see the Sigil-centered PS books and having to wait till later to see the various "Planes of..." boxes, or 'Faces of Evil', etc. If Sigil turned people off initially, I could see it turning them off of the rest of the line that came later, often with a very different feel from Sigil itself.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

Aww man, I was hoping the spider ship would remain. Nothing amuses me more than when pewling grognards whine about "robots" in Eberron.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

"Pewling?"

 

[gizmo33]

Aww man, I was hoping the spider ship would remain. Nothing amuses me more than when pewling grognards whine about "robots" in Eberron.

Don't be so hard on Eberron, I think it's more interesting than grognards whining about robots.

 

[painandgreed]

*whimper* ...I liked the giant mechanical spider...


...but I supose that it does make more sence that everything in the outer planes which is in contact and communication with untold planes of all types in the material world by sake of decending souls if nothing else, maintains a pusedo medieval look and feel.

 

[Rodrigo Istalindir]

Aww man, I was hoping the spider ship would remain. Nothing amuses me more than when pewling grognards whine about "robots" in Eberron.

Why? We thought it was stupid in Q1, too.