Towns and Cities of Urban Planescape

Joking or not, Lucasfilms wouldn't have a case. Using the same name falls under the Reasonable Use clause, a little known snippet of the law that prevents large companies from suing for reasonable references to their copyrighted material.

Just giving a heads up in case you actually were considering something like that.

I actually like the concept of Djinni politics always being on the edge of some big shakeup. Lots of nationalism, constant minor rebellions, occasional major rebellions... not exactly always a warzone, but enough of one that it would remind you of one.

Ulden, I refer to ALL of the elementals as Djinni. It's easier for me to remember.

They are Genies. The Djinni are the air Genies. Efreeti are fire Genies. Dao are earth Genies, and the Marid are water Genies. It ain't that hard to remember.

It could, perhaps, be less confusing if you used 'genie' for the generic group of them, as that's the term that already applies, and is in fact almost the term you're using.

I was seeing the Gate Towns filling this role. That may be too predictable, and of course I'm always open to alternatives. Basically, what ever burg is on the other side of Sigil's Highway-Portals and Mass-Transit portals become the Cage's suburbs.

And no, the burgs in question are not other big-name cities like Dis. Her Serenity wouldn't do something so unbalancing.

I almost see gatetowns as towns set on the highway they have alot of buisness but once you leave that there's very little to see.

'WithoutNationality' wrote:

Just as a suggestion, is there any way we can destroy Union?

Erased from History(tm). Never existed.

non-epic good,Epic=bad
union should be another astral trading post abliet a huge trading post but trading post nontheless.

If we keep the idea of the Elemental Express, and I do really like that concept, many if not all of the stations would have developed small little shopping areas where people could get little knick-knacks, really expensive crap food, and there would maybe even be some kind of police force like Urban Transit Cops. I imagine over time these little spots would begin to function as a kind of gate town. Call them Station Towns. Or Railstops. Maybe give some of them a kind of Planar Wild West feel.

I think there should be one of these for each elemental or quasi-elemental or para-elemental plane. The only planes without Elemental Express stops should be the Positive and Negative energy planes, because as I remember it, the Express doesn't go there.

Elemental - Water, Earth, Air, Fire
Para-Elemental - Ooze, Ice, Smoke, Magma
Quasi-Elemental - Mineral, Dust, Radiance, Ash, Lightning, Vacuum, Steam, Salt

Railstop Marinos:
Location: Elemental Plane of Water
The crystal tunnel that houses the Elemental Express as it travels through the Plane of Water opens up into a large crystal sphere as the train hisses to a stop at Railstop Marinos. Marinos began life as a simple station stop along the Express' route, but is now a small town largely constructed out of crystal of varying colors and opacities and the occasional piece of shipwreck or other waterlogged debris. There are some souvenir shops selling T-Shirts, Keychains, and Air Globes with a scale model of the Railstop inside it. The center of town has a large pool of water that leads out to the water outside the sphere. The water is kept level by keeping the air pressure constant. For this reason, many people's ears pop when they exit the train here. The air is warm and moist and smells salty and fishy all the time.

Railstop Marinos has a number of hotels and other amenities for travelers. The most famous of these hotels is called The Voyager and is made from what appears to be a human vessel called a submarine. The front half is inside the crystal sphere and houses the dining hall and the front office, as well as the owner's quarters, and the rear section sticks out into the deep blue sea and houses the 8 rooms that are available for rent. Nobody is quite sure how the vessel got there, nor how it retains a watertight seal, and the owner of the place, a water genasi named Rashad Doobloa, keeps that trade secret to himself

Railstop Fortuna
Location: Quasi-Elemental Plane of Mineral

In the Plane of Mineral the Elemental Express winds around giant mountains of rose quartz, purple amethyst, as well as vast white lakes of salt and seas of limestone. It eventually pulls up to a small wooden village built around the station stop here. The population here is made up of a large number of dwarves, including a high representation of the Urdunnir Dwarves. There is also a sizable population of humans who came here seeking a fortune.

All around the town are large working mines. Some of them find building materials such as iron ore, as well as heavy granite and other building stones. The Urdunnir Dwarves have quite a lucrative business running here as they can Stone Shape at will. Further out from that are the gold, silver, emerald, diamond, and other precious stone mines. Some of these are still in operation, but many have been abandoned as their owners found no precious stones or anything of value in the ground below their purchase. Some of the mines are said to be haunted by the ghosts of miners, as well as a large number elementals, para-elementals, and oozes and jellies that feed off the stone.

There is a road that leads out of town. It has many names, though residents of the town simply call it The Road. It is nearly 1000 miles long and leads to a vast maximum security prison where violent criminals work in chain gangs and spend the remainder of their lives working either in the mines or along the road itself. The name of the prison is Terminus. Occasionally prisoners break free. But once out of the prison walls they find themselves so far from civilization or shelter or food they either crawl back to the prison to survive, die of thirst in a jungle of crystal, or something or someone lurking out there gets them. Sometimes late at night the prison guards listen to the screams of an escapee to pass the time. Sometimes the Express is used to transport a prisoner into town, where a large, heavily armored bus waits for them. When this happens a crowd usually gathers at the station to gawk at them.

Some miners tell stories of venturing too far away from town and seeing terrible giant flying lizards that appeared to me made out of the very stone or crystal itself.

There are a number of small hotels, casinos, taverns, and brothels in town. Most businesses here prefer to be paid in gems, silver or gold, and the station itself has a money-changer in it that accepts most varieties of paper money from the different planes and cities across them.