Grrrr! 4e D&D

Tomorrow there is supposed to be an article on what they're doing to the cosmology, so I guess we'll find out.

Honestly, someone pointed out to me that the fiends revision is not so much anything new. "Blah, blah, blah, descriptions of stuff, devils like to trick people and demons like to eat people." But, he also pointed out to me, remember the way you had to run fiends in 2nd Edition? In our beloved and hallowed Planescape, even? Every adventurer, before stepping through the portal, would be sure to write down his cribnotes on his wrists, so as to not forget that this monster is immune to electricity, while this one takes half damage, and this one needs magic missiles forged out of cold iron, but then this other one takes half damage from normal fire so you have to use magic fire. It's no wonder everyone just started tossing acid damage. Monsters having good mechanics is what's important. The story can change from campaign to campaign. Devils are devils because of whatever your DM says.

Remember, we of Planescape are so bizarrely obsessed with our corner of the game that we constantly write story after story about how the fiends came to be, or about which plane is which. But this isn't the 4th Edition of Planescape. It's the 4th Edition of D&D. Which can be used to play Planescape. Hell, you could even (please don't kill me) play Planescape using the stuff that they're writing for the 4E "backstory." Really, Planescape is about attitude, NPCs, exploration, and philosophy more than it is about what the fiends did a million-bajillion yearses ago. Except for Shemeska's campaign, in which it is about that. But we can't all be Shemeska, as much as we wish we could be.
Can we really get so angry and demand that all D&D players play it our way? Honestly, the "Heart of Darkness" fiendish origin is cool, but it's way too involved and, frankly, planar to be stamped on every campaign in the game. If the gameworld-presence of the fiends cannot be explained to your campaign's players without involving all three major fiendish races, the Blood War, and the baernaloths, I would actually consider it inappropriate for the core game. Those things just can't be expected to be important for every D&D player. And maybe the "devils killed their god and now their Paradise is Lost and they turned all ugly-like" also doesn't work with every campaign, but the difference is that DMs who don't like this 4E story can just blot whiteout over that part and keep going. It seems like an easily swallowable, portable, light-on-creativity take on where the fiends have always come from, mostly accomplished merely by changing a few names. It's not even that wildly different in its fundamentals from the Planescape material. We've already got that stuff written, and a new edition of the game rules doesn't prevent you from playing that. Just use what you want and create the rest.

Rhys, I agree with you. 4e rules, if they are as refrenshingly simple as they are made out to be, will probably rock. Combat mechanics are meant to be easy, so that a couple of dice rolls and a +/- # will get you a result, without having to keep two handbooks open at all times just to figure out if the move was successful. That simplicity will probably be welcomed by many older players and keep the newer ones from wandering off.

And as much as I hate to admit it, I don't mind WotC ignoring the history, both official canon and fan created, of Planescape. Believe me, I realize how bloody confusing all of this is to the uninitiated. I've only become interested in Planescape just over a year ago (PS:T not included), and while I learned a lot because I am frighteningly obsessive, I still have trouble organizing it all in my head. I love the setting, but I never expect it to become the official one.

I like Planescape because of the emphasis on philosophy and character development. However, I also like it because of its storyline, and I would stick to it and develop it regardless of what combat rules I use.

My grief with WotC, and 4e in particular, is there attempts to steal rather large bits and pieces from the older storylines, change them around, and then pass them off as new. 3e greatly simplified the Great Wheel with the Manual of the Planes, but that was mostly a summary. Any more detailed bits could be added by a DM with access to the 2e sources. 3.5e added a lot of new material, some of it that I quite liked (Obyriths, for instance), to the planes with the Fiendish Codexes and, to a lesser extent, the Planar Handbook. However, 3.5e also tried to create major inconsistent retcons to the 'world' of Planescape. Sure, it wasn't called Planescape, but if it looks like a duck and floats like a duck, it's either a duck or a duck decoy. Suddenly, the duck had a mohawk, and Planescape fans became uneasy. We liked the new, more detailed feathers, but we tried to come up with a reason for why they were suddenly sticking straight up. 4e, from what I gathered, is still based off of the Planescape world, but with major retconning. The foundation, however, can still be seen. They say that they're inventing a whole new story, but they're building it out of the bloody shattered remains of the earlier one. The allegorical duck suddenly lost its beak and sprouted spikes, a new head out of its arse, and few extra eyes. You could tell that the poor thing was once a noble avian, but now you're not sure if you should be scared or pity the thing.

I reiterate - I would be pleased if the creators of 4e dropped all pretenses of the Great Wheel cosmology, forgot about all the famous NPC's, from Asmodeus to The Lady of Pain herself, and came up with a brand new world for their brand new rules. They could have all of the well known monsters, which are based off of real world mythology anyway, but with brand new myths behind them. Or, if they didn't care to write so much, no myths at all. A dragon comes at you, and you stick your sword down its throat instead of asking it what god it worships. Fair enough! Indeed, if they wanted to base the whole thing on the Christian bible, that would be alright by me. I don't know how the diehard Christians would feel about it, but then the Bible was never really a roleplaying book in the first place. Despite my love of Tolkien's work, for instance, I don't care how good or terrible Middle Earth Roleplaying Game is. It doesn't affect it because it is a different type of thing. Planescape, however, is a roleplaying setting just like 4e, and a direct ancestor of the 4e to boot. The designers took what somebody else already created, changed it around, and called it brand new. It's like writing R. Mutt on a urinal and passing it off as original art. Sure, impressionable people might think you sculpted the thing, but the rest of us know that there wasn't much thought involved.

That is what pisses me off about it.

Well, the Cosmology article is up. It's more different from the Great Wheel than was suggested by the Devil/Demon article, but it still has far too many similarities for my tastes, especially concerning the NPC's and interconnections.

I know I can just ignore it, which I will do, but I can't help but want to bitch about it for a bit first.

Here is my theory:

WotC plans to release a new campaign setting every year so they are systematically removing Planescape (Great Wheel) and Greyhawk (Oerth) from the core setting so they can release those campaign settings at a later date.

However, it seems they are changing some of the core mechanics of the demons/devils like their various resistances and that will probably effect any campaign settings that use fiends.

Just a thought but it seems like a reasonable explanation for the 4th edition core campaign overhaul.

-420

Where'd the Guardinals go?

The Five Companions probably took them away for a sexy party...Or were excuted under the Vorpal Ax of WoTC Dev Team!

Vancian casting is gone as far as can be allowed without delving into something as bookkeeping-intensive as spell points. You get at-will and per-encounter abilities, but you'll still have some stuff that's per-day. Things that have been said are that you'll never run out of your magic missiles, but you might run out of your Mordenkainen's magic sword.

But, in the first announcement of 4E ever, at GenCon, one of the first things that they said was that the syndrome of the adventure ending because the wizard ran out of his highest two levels of spells is gone. That was one of the first statements that I heard uttered about 4E, so Vancian spellcasting, in that sense, is not in any way staying.

I dont know Im still a Vancian fan...I think I like the idea of you can only have so much knowledge in your head (sorceror) or able to understand so much (wizard). I might be biased though hehe, 'cause, I like Rincewind in Discworld books...hes got a spell its just one big uber one and scares all other spells off...

I see they managed to shoehorn Tharizdun in there... will they be using other Greyhawk elements, like the named spells (Mordenkainen's Sword, Bigby's Crushing Fist, etc...) But I though they dumped Oerth as a campaign world, so then...?

Only problem is that it's not supposed to be just a new crystal sphere. This is supposed to be an entirely new multiverse, with its own amalgam of planes and powers. The fact that they just kept all the old names is precisely my point.

Oh the humanity!! Planescapes goin to shit isn't it? Say it isn't so!

Being written by clueless indeed! Does this mean all we really can do is just scoff at anyone for being clueless as to how the planes really work?
Or is there gonna have to be massive reform? Personally I think I'd rather the former.

Nowhere, since it's not out until next year. By all the fractious and petulant gods, are you going to do anything except demand things from us?