World Axis vs. Great Wheel

>>52734182
I'm not sure I get the planar connections. Do you have a simpler picture that shows it clearer?

>>52734685
Unfortunately, this is the biggest, clearest copy of the damn file I've been able to find online, so this is all I've got.

Basically, you have the Prime Material Plane as the cosmological "center", the Shadowfell (World of the Dead) and Feywild (World of Faerie) as "neighboring" planes you can more readily access from the Prime, the Astral Sea (World of Spirit) as a higher plane that serves as the home to Gods and other "concept" based entities, and the Elemental Chaos (World of Matter) as a lower realm that serves as the base building blocks of the Prime Material, with the Abyss (World of Evil) as a corrupted region of the Elemental Chaos.

>>52734182
The saddest part is that you think it's actually a wheel.

It's not. IT NEVER WAS.

That was just the most basic way to draw it all on one page. the connections between then planes weren't even linear, they were merely representations. Everyopne ELSe understood this, you're just an ignorant idiot whose so stuck on WotC stupidity you didn't realize what was actually going on in the original great wheel cosmology, especially the part where they say "This is an imperfect diagram, and only representational."

All the "world axis" is is a poor representation of the World Tree of Norse myth.

>>52734748
Okay, so why is it an 'axis'? It seems like they're all just sort of...next to each other?
Are the connections in the diagram wormholes or are the planes actually touching?

>>52734799
Except that AD&D's Planescape EXPLICITLY uses the term "The Great Wheel" over and over and OVER again.

More importantly, I'm referring to the fact that most of the Great Wheel's planes were, for the most part, boring, one-dimensional and had fuck-all to do. The Elemental Planes were particularly bad about this - and don't talk to me about reading "The Inner Planes", because I own a copy and I've read it cover to cover and all it does is emphasize my problems with it.

>>52734867
Because any cosmological map puts the Prime Material Plane (more commonly known as "The World") in the center (the "axis" position), with the other planes to the side of it, above it, or below it.

As for the connections... it's a bit of both. In the World Axis, although Sigil is still THE hub for multiversial travel, the planes are a lot more interconnected than in the Great Wheel. It's very easy to find portals and interconnections from anywhere to almost anywhere else, whereas before it was extremely unlikely to find connections between very different planes.

>>52734882
The elemental planes are the inner planes.

For planes of energy they really are very interesting and have a lot of adventure locations.

The world axis just dumped a lot of planar locations down in a random was. There's nothing special about it and it has far less detail.

File: 119397.jpg (460KB, 640x913px) Image search: [Google]

460KB, 640x913px

>>52734748
Here's one without the shopped text.

>>52734969
"The Inner Planes" was the title of the sourcebook for AD&D focusing on the Elemental and Energy Planes.

And, technically, the Inner Planes as a whole refers to Elemental, Ethereal and Prime Material. The Astral and the 17 Aligned Planes make up the Outer Planes.

As for interesting... what's so interesting about an infinite sea of acid (the Bile Sea, border-region between Ooze and Water)? Or a plane of infinite metals & gemstones where you have to pass a high DC saving throw each day or irrecoverably turn to stone (Mineral)? A world where there's nothing but fire, fire, and more fire, ranging from a "sky" of combustible, toxic gases to a "ground" made of flames with the consistency of hot coals floating over molten metal (Fire)?

The World Axis lets you use EVERY possible interesting site or region from the Great Wheel, and sets it in a cosmology that's actually built from the ground up to be some place that you can explore and have fun doing so, rather than a convoluted origin story for monsters that you can't do anything without first jumping through a lot of hoops.

I'll take Gloamnull, the Brazen Bazaar, Irdoc Morda, Canuaghlin Bog, the Moteswarm and the Pillars of Creation over the Shimmering Drifts (infinite expanse of snowfields that steal sanity) or the Glowing Dunes (infinite expanse of radioactive desert, with it being explicit that there's no cure for the radiation sickness traveling there brings), any day.

>>52735114
Thanks. The version I got is from the Forgotten Realms wiki, because the original article on WoTC's website is gone now; I'm guessing it's a reworking from some 4e FR book, that's why it's so cluttered.

>>52735114
I see 5 planes, 4 demi-planes, one world, and two soup bowls.

>>52735160
Mineral has a lot of interesting locations, it's called the treasure trove of the multiverse so if that doesn't spark interest you're unimaginative. More of the inner planes are dangerous and mineral will slice you up by walking through it, and defenders will attack outsiders as if they're looters. There are several interesting locations the most interesting of which is the Tower of Lead which is the greatest forge in all of existence. However it's very mysterious and dwarven smiths have gone to do great work there and vanished mysteriously.

You're stupid if you don't think that's interesting.

Could someone try explaining the practical difference of one versus the other? I don't actually understand how regions that are not physically connected have a meaningful arrangement. Is the area between the planes traversable with something other than teleportation/portal stuff?

>>52734182
I do like the World Axis cosmology but I don't see the point of Sigil here. The Elemental Chaos is more like a primordial sea to me, like Limbo. The Abyss's placement is also rather strange but I can live with it.

The Great Wheel and Planescape was more philosophically interesting. The metaphysics and the relationships were really cool and the concepts they played with are fun to discuss and think about.

But... I think the world axis is generally better. Planescape had so much empty space, planes that only existed for pattern completions sake or places with no or very few interesting locations to actually visit. The world axis was a lot more focused on places you could actually go adventuring in, with built in plot hooks and things to do basically everywhere.

I'd read essays and discussions about planescape and the great wheel, but in terms of actual play give me the world axis.

>>52735252
Like I said, everything I think is interesting in Mineral, I can do without all the stupid "gotcha" aspects and with far more interesting terrain in the Chaos.

Why would I want to go with "you are buried in infinite expanse of ore & mineral-laden earth" when I can have the party exploring the depths of a forest of diamond trees that bear mithril fruit, where a river of liquid orium splashes playfully over a bed of rubies and the light comes from a giant sun of solid gold that slowly transforms into a moon of solid silver and back again?

>>52737010
Sigil hits the same role as it does in the Great Wheel; it's the ultimate multiversial hub, THE place to go if you want to get elsewhere in the multiverse.

Just because the Astral Sea and Elemental Chaos make spelljamming (planejamming?) to different regions more viable, it's still faster and more effective to go to Sigil as a stopping point.

Think of it as planejamming is the equivalent of taking a cruiser from the USA to China, whilst Sigil is like taking a plane from the USA to China; vastly cuts down the travel time and gives you greater control over where you get there.

>>52737044
Hell, it's not even like you can't redo the Great Wheel in the World Axis, whether it's just by bringing back all of the locations and putting them in the planes or reshaping it back into the Great Wheel - they actually tell you how to do the latter in the 4e Manual of Planes.

But, really, I find the World Axis so much better. The planes feel deeper, like they were made for something other than ticking off checkboxes, and they lack the sheer "gotcha!" fuel that was a big part of the old Great Wheel.

>>52739660

That might've been part of 2e's roots in what became the OSR. People enjoying those 'gotchas', actually liking the idea that the entire party could suffer or die entirely from forgetting a small detail or not planning appropriately. It just seems like an irritating headache to me, but some people really enjoy that stuff.

Great Wheel is Law. All alignments have their place, all elements have a thing to do, everything ticks as it should, everything is in order. Sure, you've got some chaotic realms like Limbo and shit, but even they are where they are because of real reasons. Most of it has been established, and a lot of it is cool and makes for fun adventures, even if a lot of other places are just there to fill the blanks instead of giving you something to adventure in: there are more reasons for things to be out there than for you to go in and break it.

World Axis is Chaos. Everything is all scrambled up, and anything can happen. Very little of it makes conventional sense, at least when compared to the rigidity of the Wheel. You can go anywhere and have basically any sorts of adventures you like. You can shape it to your whim, both as a DM and as a player. The few orderly and stationary places are just floating islands in an endless void of disorder and weirdness. There's so much space there for your own thing, to meld it as you will, and maybe make all manner of things that you think is better than any WotC hack could've come up with.

You may prefer World Axis, but you can't claim the Great Wheel didn't have its place. Some folks have a taste for it, including myself.