Nagging Questions

Some of these questions have been answered already in various interviews. Colin, Ray, Monte, and Wolf discussed post-Faction War in one of the ones that came out along with Beyond Countless Doorways.

I've got an old White Wolf magazine, whatever they were called, where Zeb Cook was talking about the process of choosing factions (he had to edit out the ones that were considered too weird).

A'kin is evil, and only pretending to be good. Note his alignment (NE), and the fact that he still has contacts with the other arcanaloths of the Tower (in Hellbound). And his representation in the comic. And Ray Vallese said so on the PS mailing list one time when I started a thread with too many exclaimation points called "A'kin is evil!!" back at the beginning of time. Maybe Ragboy or Xan remember.

But, of course, up to the individual DM.

I'd add that I'd be curious to know where, if anywhere they ever intended to go with the Prolongers and the rumors of the Chronosphere of Lagos. Also I'd love to know if they ever intended to bring up more on the Shadow Sorcelled Key.

And finally, I'd be curious about any details of the canned idea that IIRC, Monte, came up with involving the PCs travelling back so far in time that the planes were ordered very differently, with only a single evil, good, law, chaos, neutral plane and nothing in between, etc.

I read that interview, and I didn't see much beyond vague innuendo. They talked about how they were going to do stuff, but not exactly what. The plan, IIRC, was to patch the factions together again. Was there more?

Hmm, I don't have Hellbound, so I'm probably missing critical information, but from his appearance in the comic there is nothing to indicate he is evil, as opposed to just looking evil. He's a merchant and perhaps somewhat opportunistic, but that's not evil. All he does is sell and resell a ring. As for his stats, I always assumed that was part of the stigma associated with arcanaloths. People think he's NE, so his stats reflect that. I didn't see anything else that clearly indicates he's very evil and just pretending, but I suppose a definitive statement from Ray will do in a pinch.

Of course, there's still the interesting philosophical question of whether someone listed as being of evil alignment is still evil if they never do anything evil.

Sounds like my players for some time now

It seems to me that one of the racial traits of Arcanaloths is being unplaceably creepy, regardless of alignment. A'kin fits this too; whether or not he's actually good, there's something unnerving about his genteel manner... funny thing is that this politeness would not be at ALL worrisome if it came from a different source!

See what I mean?

But the question is, is it really possible for a lower planes creature to change its alignment?
For example, say by some weird twist of fate, You end up with a nice guy bataazu. He leaves Baator (or runs like hell from it, your choice) and goes to another plane.
If he dies, then in all liklyhood, he will still have his soul sent back to baator. As much as he tries to defy his nature, he is still a creature created of law, and of evil. And so, despite his actions, he is still a lawful evil creature.
He might save kittens from trees, and he may help small children get their ball off the roof, and he may donate to charity, but he is, and forever will be, a bataazu.
On this basis, how much stock in the NE alignment can we put?

One of my nagging questions about the setting is "WHat the heck is up with Estevan the Ogre Mage?"

Frankly, I'm dissatisfied with the Planewalker write-ups on ol' Est (wow, that sounded kind of rude and mean...). Doors to the Unknown makes it clear that he is not what he appears to be... he's doing lots of real weird stuff in that module. Like standing in a staircase much too small for him to even move on. How the heck did he get there? I don't know. But someone out there did, and I want to know the real skinny on Est.

Doors to the Unknown.... its the only adventure I've read in its entirety. But it hints strongly that Estevan is more than he appears.

I wrote two versions of his secret history on my website - the words "on my website" are a link.

1. He's a Krynnish ogre, dating back to before his kind degenerated.
2. He's an oni, serving the Japanese pantheon.

Well, that would imply a some sort of omniscience on A'kin's part. I interpret it as a manifestation of the universal force that is the Unity of Rings. Even gods and 'loths are subject to it, and A'kin was merely a pawn in the grand karmic cycle.

I understood this to be a little game played between the authors of Planescape and the readers (like the DM). By presenting such conflicting information, even a well-lanned reader like the DM would never be entirely certain. A bit of meta-chant, if you will. Just look at that whole Shemeska the Cross-Dressing 'Loth thing. That was teh funny.

Then again, I often don't take things at face value, and I like to have strange interpretations of the rpg material I use, so maybe that coloured my perceptions. A lawyer could argue the case either way in court.

"Be quiet you! Don't mention that or I'll sell you to Ly'Kritch!"

*looks vaguely uncomfortable*

"It was a typo! Don't make me insecure about my gender! Bah!"

That would be Duke Dyavin B'we, by the way: an almost skeletal arcanaloth who acts as A'kin's ally in the Tower Arcane. And there's just one of him.

I found the magazine (White Wolf Magazine #43) where David "Zeb" Cook talked about this, somewhat. It had fallen behind a bookshelf.

So where'd it all come from, those Berks, Bashers, Barmies, and Sods? Well, some Barmy gets the idea that we should have a campaign world set in the planes, and he drops it on me.

It shouldn't have been a problem. It just had to be a complete campaign world (not just a place to visit), survivable by low-level characters, as compatible as possible with the old Manual of the Planes, filled with a feeling of vastness without overwhelming the referee, distinct from all other TSR campaigns, free from the words "demon" and "devil" and explainable to Marketing in 25 words or less. Like I said, no problem.

So I sat around for a month or so, avoiding all real responsibility. [Wow, game design is the same at TSR as it is at White Wolf. - Ken] I put on my headphones and cued up Pere Ubu, Philip Glass and Alexander Nevsky. For inspiration, I read books: The Dictionary of the Khazars, Einstein's Dreams and The Narrow Road to the Deep North. For fun, there was always Bad Movie Nights where everything from The Naked Lunch to Wolf Devil Woman ran through the VCR. For some reason, all this started affecting my brain.

After a while, I came up with a theme: everything would revolve around factions, and those factions would be ideas taken to the extreme. I'm not a believer in blood and gore or gloom and doom. I do believe in strangeness - nobody's certain of the truth. Imagine a bunch of seminary students arguing philosophy in a bar. That's the factions.

Sigil came about because it was natural. The planes needed a crossroads, an excuse to sit deadly enemies at the same table. It's the campaign center, a place for adventure and a place to hide. Sigil's portals make it possible to get to and from it quickly.

And then there was the Manual of the Planes. After going through it, I decided to adapt. While there was a lot of good material in it, things had changed over the years, especially with the trend to less complex games. The old stuff just made it too difficult to survive on the planes, so I chose to ignore the stuff that complicated play. That left descriptions of twisted and strange creations.

It was at this early stage that I had my biggest idea - I needed an artist. I could think and write about these things, but the setting needed a look. I already had some images in mind - the gloomy prisons of Piranesi's Le Carceri etchings, Brian Froud's illustrations and surrealist art. Foolishly, people believed in me, and Dana Knutson was assigned to draw anything I wanted. I babbled, and he drew - buildings, streets, characters and landscapes. Before any of us knew it, he drew the Lady of Pain. I'm very fond of the Lady of Pain; she really locks up the Planescape look. We all liked her so much so that she became our logo.

When I started writing, the Voice showed up. Some people get it. Others don't have a clue. It's an unintended consequence, like the rabbi's golem or Frankenstein's handiwork. Midway through, I began to realize the whole Planescape thing was becoming something I hadn't foreseen. It wanted to be stranger, more unreal.

Did it get strange enough? Not as much as I wanted. Time, pressure, and the need to be playable reined me in. Therefore, I left out some factions, like the one that imagines we're all imagined by somebody else who might be imagined by us or somebody we haven't imagined, and if it's somebody we haven't imagined, then what happens when we do imagine them? (Huh?)

So get yourself in a Planescape mood. Read The Dictionary of the Khazars, watch movies like Chinese Ghost Story and Orphee, and crank up whatever makes your head hurt. Then go out and make your character search for the meaning of it all.