Manual of the Planes (3)

Type: SourcebookCompany: WizardsDesigner: Jeff Grubb, Bruce R. Cordell, David NoonanRelease: September 2001Outline: A sourcebook "detailing" the Planes of existance (Outer, Inner, Prime Material, Transitive) as well as new Character and Monster information pertaining to the Planes.Contents: One thing was abundantly clear to me from the moment I opened the new Manual of the Planes (MotP3); this was not a Planescape book. It's the "new old Manual of the Planes."

I own Jeff Grubb's ORIGINAL Manual of the Planes (MotP), and I found it about as stilmulating as a mathbook. When Planescape was released, they added several ingenious elements: Sigil, Planar Cant, The Factions, The Lady of Pain, and the Rules of the Multiverse. Most importantly, every Planescape product was absolutely smothered in big, beautiful artwork.

After Forgotten Realms' release, I heard they were working on MotP3 and my heart leapt. I was dreaming of Faction Feats, Planar character creation, lots of prestige classes, new skills, and of course, big color artwork (something they've decided to include even in the core rulebooks now). None of that did I find in MotP3. The only above mentioned feature that is in the book is a tiny handful of (rather un-inspired) Prestige classes. One thing you will find plenty of is charts, which I must admit are some of the prettiest charts I've yet seen in an RPG book.

No towering peaks of Mt. Celestia, no savage jungles of the Beastlands, no endless depravity in the Abyss. No Sigil. The Spire is vaguely illustrated once or twice, in a chart. If they had given this book the same treatment as Forgotten Realms (and they had more than enough material to do so) we would have witnessed the publishing of one of the greatest RPG books ever. The reason I call MotP3 "the New Old MotP" is because they seem to have omitted all of those elements that made Planescape so different. No artwork. No cant. No personality. Contrary to the spirit of the 3e Core Rulebooks, very little here is new. When I compare the MotP and MotP3, get about four pages worth of difference.Merits: MotP3 has some updated Planar monsters. Also, it makes an admirable attempt at making Planar Cosmology very customizable; at the expense of any useful game information.Flaws: Total lack of artwork, and the absence of everything that I liked about Planescape.

But as I said, this is cleary NOT a "Planescape" book any more than it's predecessor, the original MotP.