Back from a long, long hiatus.

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Dust-Jack's picture
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Joined: 2010-06-06
Back from a long, long hiatus.

G'day there.

It's been a long, long time since I've visited a planescape or D&D forum. Some of you who've been members at KoC's Pitsofevil for an aeon or so may remember me as Dust from way back when. (I believe it's getting near ten years ago now...)

I've had a quick poke around these boards and noticed that someone has my old user name, and that Fell even mentioned me when he signed up. Yes, I'm Dust from Australia, vague rambler and minimal contributor. One time player of the Magic Pudding and participant in the famous 'scene missing' night out. (Thanks Fitz, for all the street cred)

Short version of story is: Current group of mates occasionally play WHFRP. GM is leaving, and game will end soon. I'm thinking of GM'ing a Planescape game with old 3rd ed rules, and figured I should check in here for a start. I have some questions, and feel all new again. How are you all?

Now for the serious bizness:
1) Where should I look first? What forums are pleasant to be part of now?
2) Who's still around? I've noticed some posts from Rip, and saw Mechalich still chatting away elsewhere. How's Orroloth? Is that clever gentleman with the Dark Sun avatar whose name escapes me still around? Is the 'hound still writing RPG material as a professional?
3) I don't remember anything useful. I have the Planescape setting box, and I'm assuming I should try and get hold of Chaos, Law, Conflict, In the Cage, Uncaged, The Modron March and Dead Gods. What would you recommend?
4) I will need help as a GM. I've never done it before. This, however, will come later.

So hi again. Thanks for reading, and please get in touch. It will be good to chat about old times...

ripvanwormer's picture
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Factol
Joined: 2004-10-05
Re: Back from a long, long hiatus.

Heya, Dust.

I'm around, though I haven't checked the Pits lately. Orroloth seems fine, though he hasn't contributed to this forum in a while. Too busy, I think!

I just look for new messages, rather than frequenting any forum in particular.

As for which Planescape books you should look for, it depends on what parts of the planes you're interested in, and whether you want to spend a bunch of money or hunt for questionable PDFs. If you like Sigil and the factions, The Factol's Manifesto, In the Cage, and Uncaged are all pretty important. You can probably get away with skipping the boxed sets (even though I love them) if you have the main setting book. I'd recommend The Inner Planes and the Planescape Monstrous Compendium Appendix 3 if you're at all interested in the 2nd edition inner planar cosmology, and A Guide to the Astral Plane and A Guide to the Ethereal Plane for those planes. A Player's Guide to the Outlands is a good run-down of the gate-towns.

Gerzel's picture
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factotums
Joined: 2004-05-10
Re: Back from a long, long hiatus.

Welcome back

Hyena of Ice's picture
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factotums
Joined: 2009-09-25
Re: Back from a long, long hiatus.

""and whether you want to spend a bunch of money ""

Um... last I checked, practically every 2E PDF sells for 5-6 bucks a pop. Considering how much the hardbacks and paperbacks cost back in the 90's, that seems like a mighty fine deal, to me. Granted, that doesn't include the cost of the ink to print the stuff out (unless you want to keep it all on Laptop, but I do not recommend this because none of the Planescape PDFs are searchable, unlike the Forgotten Realms ones.)

And yeah, it basically comes down to this:

Basic: Planescape Boxed Set, Planewalker's Handbook

Sigil: In the Cage, Factol's Manifesto, Uncaged

Outer Planes: Guide to the Astral, Planes of Law, Planes of Chaos, Planes of Conflict, Monstrous Compendiums 1 and 2

Inner Planes: Guide to the Ethereal, Inner Planes, Monstrous Compendium 3

On Hallowed Ground is also a very good resource.

ripvanwormer's picture
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Factol
Joined: 2004-10-05
Re: Back from a long, long hiatus.

Quote:
Um... last I checked, practically every 2E PDF sells for 5-6 bucks a pop.

When did you last check? Wizards of the Coast pulled all the PDFs from online stores years ago. As far as I know, you can't get them legally anymore.

For whatever reason, On Hallowed Ground was never officially offered in PDF form, though bootleg copies exist. I have found that book to be very useful, though depending on how you feel about warping mythology for game purposes, a standard book on mythology (and the various RPG books on fantasy gods) might be more your speed.

Dust-Jack's picture
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Joined: 2010-06-06
Re: Back from a long, long hiatus.

Cheers guys, that pretty much confirms what I thought.

How about forum hopping though? Where are the bet places to be a member of these days? I've been reading reviews at rpg.net, but I'm finding their rating system to be a touch wonky...

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