Planescape thread

>>53597982

For the amount of people that wank off to Planescape topic seems quite dead.

>>53597982
There's plenty of planes out there, berk. Try reading some of the old adventures for ideas on how to theme your campaign, and consider the strife between factions, beliefs, and the potential for exploration within the planes. The misty ethereal and all it's infinite demiplanes, the sea of dead gods in the astral, the city of brass, glass, or dis. Read more, it'll inspire you!

If you want specifics, Doors to the Unknown is a good start. It's got some low level intro stuff, faction interaction, plots, plane hopping, and plenty of room for weirdness. I'd read the Guide To series first, though. Another good one is Dead Gods.

>>53599205
That's something I was looking for. Thanks.

Was Planescape ported to anything lighter than 2nd ed. AD&D?

>>53599339
>>53599339
Uh, you can just use it for whatever. I think 2e is honestly the best system to use to run it but you can use whatever. It's just a setting, mechanics are easy enough to alter to suit a new system.

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>>53599382
Well, I hope to jump to Planescape after a Dark Sun campaign, so I will try with AD&D first. I hope that beside system being very fight centric it will play out well.

Thanks.

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>>53597982
Play it as a cross of D&D and Sliders.

>>53599489
>>53599489
The mechanics are about how to fight when you have to, but if you realize how deadly combat is, fighting should always be avoided or minimized as much as possible. It's no more fight centric than any other edition of d&d, there's just less mechanical non-combat auto 'i persuade him' nonsense.

>>53599573
It always seemed to me that's hard to represent characters that are defined by their non-magic, non-combat skills (apart form rouges) in D&D as they get only handfull points to represent their whole skillset- and that points do not change much.

Dark Suns trader is a good example. Poor sod is bombarded with bonuses that have little to do with needs of Athasian trader.

On the other hand, playing a good campaign with no chance to let the random number god decide about the pasions and decisions of the NPCs (unless they are Xaosite)... That's a challenge.

>>53599900
Ad&d post gygax in a nutshell. While tables exist for all kinds of shit it's mostly combat or survival. Non-combat shouldn't rely on a dice roll unless there's a chance of failure, and outside of specialized skills, like thief abilities or lore checks.. or nonweapon proficiencies, you should just do it. Describe what you're doing, and then try to do it. If there's a downside to failure, one that'd be no repeatable, then you roll. Having to ask 'can I do that' based on needing skill ranks or the like kills the flow of the game.

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>>53599900
>apart form rouges

>>53599900
In Birthright there's a Guilder class that's all about owning and running trade concerns while still able to, not THAT well, participate in adventures having thief nwp, full armor and weapons abilities, but thief saves and thac0.

>>53600164
That's like Dark Sun's Trader. Still little posibility of portraying truly non-combatant character. Maybe with higher lethality you mentioned (I have experience only with godlike field tanks of 3.5, never more) you can argue about it, but at this point no one would be ,,combat character" at all!

>>53600610
Explorers and adventurers can't always avoid combat, so some degree of ability is called for. Can't always talk the baatezu from ripping your arm off, for instance. That, or a cave bear, or a falling rock hitting your head... Need to be durable to travel the planes!

>>53600685
I think I should read some Gygax now, for this seems lot more reasonable.

I remember 3.5 DnD as "hp bloat game" for most characters shrouds lethal damage- from fall, for exaple- easily if it's not coup the grace. More lethal combat should make it less problematic.

I know that dehydration damage in the Dark Sun was handled by temporaly Con loss and works well.

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>>53598803

I have started the occasional Planescape General thread in the past, but I had gradually stopped due to the declining interest in the setting in /tg/.

The previous threads can be found here:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1EC4fQ7qW0dNveXRDD2UZsB2NXbyIpEm-jCtTjwBQH3I/edit

>>53599205

Well of Worlds is another good starter pack of assorted adventures, some of which are good introductions to the Great Wheel.

>>53599339
>>53599382
>>53599489

Planescape works well under a great variety of systems. I have been leaning towards PbtA hacks to run the Great Wheel, although I had also tried Fate and Strike! for it in the past.

>>53599502

I think that this is the wrong way to go about it. Contrary to popular belief, Planescape is *not* a multiversal, dimension-hopping setting in the traditional sense of Sliders, MtG, GURPS' Infinite Worlds, The Strange, or the OGL "Beyond Countless Doorways", all of which are multiverses where there are myriad planes floating around, waiting to be adventured within.

The Great Wheel has shades of that, particularly with the demiplanes of the Deep Ethereal and the crystal spheres of the Prime (the latter is more Spelljammer than Planescape though), but it is ultimately *not* that kind of multiverse.

Planescape's core boxed set and its supplements present a setting that is utterly alien in terms of the way the different components of the setting interact with each other, but they are actually structured somewhat akin to a "standard fantasy setting" and intended to be run like one to a degree. It is a setting where the major places are interconnected and interact with one another regularly, because planar travel is commonplace; many conflicts and plot hooks are shaped by this interplay of places and factions.

(Continued.)

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>>53600909

There are "nations" (e.g. Mount Celestia, Baator, the Abyss, the Elemental Plane of Fire), each with their own dominant races (archons, baatezu, tanar'ri, efreet) and rulers (the Hebdomad, the Lords of the Nine, various warring Abyssal lords, the sultan of the efreet), major cities (e.g. Empyrea, Dis, Broken Reach, the City of Brass), half-explored, half-uncharted wildernesses and dungeons (the Tower of Fire, the depths of Cania where the ancient Baatorians lie frozen, too many Abyssal layers to count, the Plain of Burnt Dreams), "guilds" (factions and sects), and religions (gods as usual, except in person). There is also a "global trade and transport city" (Sigil).

The underlying principle behind the setting is that "belief shapes the planes," but this principle is personified by these major "nations," races, rulers, "guilds," and religions conflicting with one another due to cosmic forces of belief, like law and chaos. Look at the Blood War.

Planescape was never meant to be run as a truly multiversal, infinite-planes setting, and is instead written to focus on a more standard fantasy setup with a very alien twist. Keep places and factions interconnected and constantly playing upon one another to generate conflicts and plot hooks. Do not make the mistake of having any one locale or faction operate in a metaphorical vacuum, unless it is supposed to be a completely isolated and backwater Ethereal demiplane or Prime crystal sphere or whatnot.

>>53600909
>>53600972

Though it can be ran in the multiversal dimension-hopping way as well, and I felt that the video game focused on this aspect at times. I like a combination of both, desu, with the aspect of newer planes not having established proper travel between the other planes.

>>53600909
>>53600972
I tend to suggest a Sliders style game under the assumption that "stuck on the planes don't know how to get back" is a good way to introduce a group to the setting without needing them to read a large amount of fluff. Let's you lead them around and get them involved with the politics of the various factions as they trade favors for leads and the like making enemies along the way without necessarily realizing it.

Planar travel and commerce is common but trying to find a particular prime world can potentially be hard enough to run a campaign on (or at least to run on long enough for the players to get completely sidetracked by dealing the consequences of their own actions along the way.)

>>53600972
Running it as a game, it's also better to center it in Sigil, and have adventures focus on just a few planes, to best get the most out of the planes while not hopping to a new universe every other session. It's not weird anymore if you're always encountering brand new things, after all.

>>53601639
There are an infinite number of prime material world's, so locating a specific portal or gate to your specific world is quiet a challenge, not to mention getting the key to it! And really, once they've done all that in the planes... Do they really WANT to go home anymore?

>>53600909
>but I had gradually stopped due to the declining interest in the setting in /tg/.

It's not declining interest in Planescape, it's declining interest in your fucking anime version of planescape that pisses off so many people.

>>53602190
I second that. Anime it up however you want in your own game, but don't expect it to be received well elsewhere.

>>53600909
>but I had gradually stopped due to the declining interest in the setting in /tg/.

>It's declining interest in your fucking anime version of planescape that pisses off so many people.

Thiiiiiiiiiiiis! So much this. I hate your furry futa loving ass and wish you would die.

>>53597982
Sigil and Beyond, 2E softback supplement. The Factol's Handbook is also a pretty quality supplement for 2E imo.

Hellbound: The Blood War is an excellent add-on set if you're into the infernal/diabolical, and Planes of Neutrality was pretty good imo of the three 'Planes of' sets. Finally, Dead Gods deserves an honorable mention.

>>53602223
Strange to see anyone on tg against that shit, but the fucking obsession with 'lewd' and degeneracy like that is the norm in every fucking general.
Changing the blood war to some fucking tsundere tiff was the fucking worst and enough to kill any interest folks might have in Planescape.

>>53599502
>Wizard
>Artificer
>Bard
>Rogue?

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>Possible Blasphemy

I ran a four session game of planescape running the Cypher/Numenera/Strange system
(used some modifications that are suggested on the Numenera board and one or two from here)

The four Player's were Numenera and Planescape newbies but varying degrees of other systems experience, seemed to LOVE it which gave me such a mental boner. But the group couldn't last due to life reasons.

>>53602385
It works fine there, those rulesets allow for a pretty good Planescape feel, cyphers being charms or potions it whatever, artifacts being more classic magic items, and folks are pretty baller (which isn't true in 2e until level 9 or so), good for a high action game if that's what you want out of the setting.

>>53602298
Furries? Whatever. Futa? Comes with the territory of 4chan sadly.
THAT man-child? Fuck him. Basically ruins any decent change I have with talking to fellow anon's about my favourite system.
>Sorry for the venom to everyone else, must be all kinds of pent up internet-rage. Promise I'll stop at this point.

>>53602425
>>53602385
Had plans to lift and modified a version of the Dresden Files/Fate "Social Hp" system too, but never got to that point. In hind sight it might have been too much.

Why does everyone in Sigil talk in what sounds like an American's bad impression of cockney?

Why is the Blood War called the Blood War? Why not the Battle War or the Kill War or the Violence War?

Why is the Lady of Pain such an edgy, DeviantArt OC-tier character?

>>53602438
Ran a party through Acheron recently, had the joy of their encounter with a swarm of rust monsters in Thuldain. They lost all their armor and half their weapons, then had to pay a toll to enter the nearest town, doubled because they sasses the guards. However, they had just had a big payout from saving a goblin general from assassin's sent by hobgoblin on an adjacent cube, and bought some greensteel armor from scavengers, barely escaping the scavengers that tried to murder them when they left town. Acheron is fun!

>>53602483
>Why is the Lady of Pain such an edgy, DeviantArt OC-tier character?

Because Planescape was intended to compete with White Wolf games.

>>53602483
Why not?

Why not? It's like a blood fued, but an infinite war, so a blood war.

She exists to keep Sigil independent from other settings, explaining why some level 40 fucko from Athas hasn't conquered it already, much less demons, dragons, liches, or gods.

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>>53602190
>>53602221
>>53602223
>>53602438
Same person, pathetic

>>53602530
Had some of the same writers at some points. Also for all the
>LoP is Unkillable!!! And Kills you!!!
There are three official adventures dedicated to her/sigil on the brink of something about to kill it/them, thus the PCs are roped in to save the day. Admittedly many don't like the Faction War, but it straight up says one of her weaknesses, and gives you a blurb if the PCs decide to destroy her.
>Probably another reason people don't like her.

>>53602577
Yeah it can't possibly be that people are fucking sick of your fucking garbage. Must just be 1 troll! Who doesn't love Loli demons having fucking concerts to solve an infinite ideological war? Surely everyone loved it, thus the drop in interest like a fucking brick.

>>53597982
Check out the Fire and Dust novel for an adventure set in Planescape, including keys and guild-characters as PC's. It's available online for free and not that long.

>>53602577
>Time codes say otherwise.

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>>53597982
I'm running a Planescape campaign IRL right now, we use 3.PF rules.

Player Characters:
Put-upon Fraternity of Order swordmage gold-dragonkin who tries (and fails) to get the party to do the right thing.
Pyromaniac Doomguard rogue whose mission is to destroy the Doomguard
Kleptomaniac Godsman catfolk rogue whose mission is to rob the Lady's Ward and Clerk's Ward to build orphanages in the Hive, so as to educate the orphans in pickpocketing
Megalomaniacal Godsman cleric whose mission is to expand his cult in the city, sparing captives only when they cut off one of their ears and join his cult.
And a rotating cast of people from our social circle who play an exasperated Mercykiller, an enthusiastic goblin inventor

Highlights:
Battle with gem smugglers in the Plane of Minerals where the wisest PC continually shifted gravity so as to rake the foes (and friends) over the razor-sharp minerals.
Rival Fraternity of Order Judge attempts to assassinate Fraternity PC. The Judge was a green dragon. After the battle, the catfolk rogue butchers the body and sells the parts.
Sigil establishes a trade post in the Astral Plane on a rogue disk from Mechanus. A githyanki raid sparks a war between Sigil, a githyanki tribe and a trade post built on the ruins of a Giff city by exiled yugoloth. During the war, a civil war breaks out in Sigil between the Law Factions and the Doomguard et al. After the destruction of the githyanki, the Fraternity dragonkin takes their princess as his concubine.
The PCs remove a curse from a lovelorn Void Dragon so he can wed his lover in the Demiplane of Dreams after he rescues them from the Far Realm.
The PCs are involved in a Blood War struggle over a hag bog in the Gray Waste. In the process of sneaking into a tanar'ri base they are caught by the demon lord Dagon, who places a nasty geas on several of the party and later uses it to force them into allowing demons into Sigil.

AMA

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>>53602699
Can I play?

>>53602483
>Why is the Lady of Pain such an edgy, DeviantArt OC-tier character?

Look at PS fans, that is your answer. PS was a mistake, the great wheel was fine without it. But now anyone with any interest in expanding the D&D planes in their games has to read through this joke of a setting to get anything useful.

>>53602699
Reading that makes me happier and happier that I never touch pf, but as long as your players are having fun you do you. Rescue from the Far Plane is effectively impossible, it's like an ant trying to rescue someone that's not only on another planet in another galaxy but also constantly on fire and dipped in acid and having their soul eaten by quintillions of microscopic hateful OTHER beings.
But you do you, as long as you don't bring it to my table!

>>53602610
Then why not make your own thread about it champ? Instead of bitching like a touhou bitch? Typical channer, rather rage about being triggered than fix things.

How does one deal with the inevitable situation of PCs joining opposing factions but still needing a common goal?

>>53602840
hehe do you live in Redmond, WA, USA?
>>53602874
Your table sounds autismal t.b.h.

>>53602483
>Why does everyone in Sigil talk in what sounds like an American's bad impression of cockney?
Because it was based on Victorian Cant? And is by no means a bad impression and is literally a pastiche of urban London

>Why is the Blood War called the Blood War? Why not the Battle War or the Kill War or the Violence War?
Why are ducks not called squats or crouches?

>Why is the Lady of Pain such an edgy, DeviantArt OC-tier character?
Because she is not a character in any meaningful sense, she is the a constant, possibly the only constant in a setting like Planescape. She is cliche and obvious because the majority of the setting is designed not to be.

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>>53602928
>Redmond, WA, USA?

YES!

>>53602904
Don't let them? That, or come up, as a group, why they work together. As an aside, fucking nobody works with an open anarchist, but a Guvner would work with a Xaositect, a Harmonium with an Indep... Given the right motivation. Collective profit being the easiest, it's when they're actually engaged in faction business that things might get tricky.

>>53602904
It worked out pretty well for me. The Doomguard PC turned stag for the Faction War because they hated her for doing too much to help Law Faction PCs

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>>53602957
I gambled and lost. I'm afraid we don't really wanna upset the equilibrium right now by bringing in another PC at this point in the campaign

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>>53602937

>>53600909
maybe stop shoving anime in it.
you double nigger

>>53602978
Entropy isn't inherently chaotic buddy! It's as lawful as any rule in the planes, thus no alignment restriction for the faction... Just a general desire to see the planes break down, perhaps favoring certain parts falling before others. A Doomguard is totally ok with doing things that, at first glance, are anti entropic... If they create greater entropy later. Repairing a bridge, for instance, that would let siege weapons later obliterate the land with ease. They do BUILD after all, their Chaos Ships. They even have created life, albeit life that exists to destroy the barriers of the inner planes.

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>>53602937
>She is cliche and obvious because the majority of the setting is designed not to be.
One thing PS is, is ... well I'm not sure the right word. It seems to take the piss out of other settings, and regularly breaks it's own rules or guidelines, and intentionally goes out of the way to break other settings rules. Always rattled-off-in-a-laughin'-Cant. But If you've ever met Mr. Zeb Cook in person you'd easily figure out why. He loves over complicating things just to end up with an over simplified pun at the end. One of the first professional trolls.
Probably why I always liked the setting: a deconstruction and Laughing at the rest of the system it existed in, but like it was playing they joke with a straight face the whole time.

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>>53603049
>Entropy isn't inherently chaotic buddy!

It is the breakdown of order you fucking tard. It is the undoing of all that stands, it is the rendering of all that would seek to defy time and age.

>>53603066
this guy gets it

>>53603066
Seems to be a fair assessment. Not the whole setting, but definitely aspects of it. Of all the campaign settings, PS does seem to be one of the more difficult to create a campaign within.

>>53603084
Yet entropy is also a law, all things must wear down and break that new can replace it. Stagnation is what you get in Limbo, for all it's roiling creative chaos. Progress is what you get in Mechanus!

>>53603045
Touhou is not a anime you stupid faggot.

>>53602937
>And is by no means a bad impression and is literally a pastiche of urban London
That doesn't mean it's not shit

>>53603189
>Not on /a/- or the rest of 4chan for that matter. You are on /tg/. The difference doesn't matter here.

>>53603219
Not everyone in /tg/ is a retard like you.

>>53603189
Oh I'm sorry, "weeabo fighting game"

>>53603243
Yes they are. We are on 4chan.

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>>53603246

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>>53603165
No, it is not. You confuse unity of purpose with law. Entropy is indiscriminate in how it accomplishes it's goal it is mindless in it's pursuit of it. It simply is.

I do not deny, nor intend to discuss how much order and how much chaos you need in a society/plane/etc for it to be balanced or successful, that is not what I am debating.

My point Entropy is disorder, to tear down law and to increase it's level and presence in all places and times.

>>53603297
Not liking what I like means you're retarded! Thus people DID like my shitty weebed up garbage, despite them dying! Therefore I win!

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>>53603297

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>>53603320

>>53601672
>There are an infinite number of prime material world's,
But only one Prime Material Plane, so it's fine. Hop a Spelljammer and go looking.

Could you fine folks please post the image that best describes Planescape to you?

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>>53603324

>>53602887
That stupid anime-planescape faggot infests every planescape thread that comes around, that's why.

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>>53603297
sure a amine cat girl really proves me wrong.

Tell me more about how "Project Shrine Maiden", is anything less than some Japanese nonsense.

you besotted moron

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One of the best character(s) I love trying to put into my PS game is the priest hood of Set (may he be praise and feared). I just like the weird yet evil, but trying to sometimes do good, but still very much and evil asshole that planescape portrays him as.

>>53603306
If that is true, then why does it exist on planes of law? Planes are composed of belief, and belief in law and order would naturally exclude chaos as a power, so thus entropy must be considered if not a law, a universal, neutral constant.

>>53603297
There actually is an official Touhou fighting game.

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>>53602577
Buddy, get it through your thick head that a LOT of people don't like your constant anime-spamming of Planescape. Just fucking quit it. You'd be doing yourself - and your favorite game - a big favour by leaving the anime/loli/weaboo shit out of it entirely. Keep it in your game, whatever, but don't push it here constantly.

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>>53603385

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Anime fans should be drafted and confronted with the same bullying that Russian conscripts are. Maybe then things will improve.

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>>53603010

I also live in Redmond. I don't want to join your game. But god damn that was unlucky.

>>53603417
Yeah, but that is more of a side thing. The main games are bullet hell.

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>>53597982
penis cannibal thread?

>>53603440
But anon, that entails rolling for anal circumference.

On the bright side, I hear Russians are issued socks now.

>>53603372
Please go back to tumblr.

>>53603045
>>53603246
>>53603385
>>53603440
Please go back to /v/ or reddit.

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>>53603010
>Was thinking what snacks/food to bring
>Was thinking up suitable concepts and ideas
>was thinking how to make a good impression
>Oh...o-okay, nevermind

I think a lot of people misunderstand the role of the Lady of Pain. She's not there to be the GM's invincible, gently ribbed penis extension. She's there to explain why none of the other super-powerful entities in DND take over such an incredibly valuable location. Sigil allows you to remake the entire rest of reality (look at Die Vecna Die), and the Lady is there to explain why Sigil is possible at all without being a warzone fought over by a million powers and demon lords.

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>>53603430

>>53603491
>the Lady is there to explain why Sigil is possible at all without being a warzone fought over by a million powers and demon lords.
Yeah, that sounds so boring.

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>>53603483

>>53603521
Then I guess it's not the setting for you, buddy! Here's your coat, don't let the door hit you on the way out.

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>>53603510

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>>53603474
>mfw they still have hilarious foot wraps that got changed weekly

>>53603521
Yeah, the giant melting pot of denizens from all across the planes plotting and conspiring against each other for personal/national gain could not be entertaining. The fact that it allows a cocky upstart Gnome to plot and scheme against the likes of tanar'ri without combat could not possibly be interesting.

>>53597982
I've been wondering this myself.
We're currently playing a cross between D&D and Star gate, and when this campaign ends

Planescape seems like the logical place to go next.
Not that I have anything pertinent to add, I'll just be lurking

>>53603428
>>53603297

>oh planescape thread
>wonder how berks 'r doin'
>by abyss, they surley 'av som' histry here!
>find ya a room, cutters?

>>53603596
Would strongly recommend it, anon.

This thread went downhill quickly.

>>53603647
This wouldn't have happened without the anime poster.

>>53603647
They all go downhill quickly around here.

>>53603659
The most reasoned and detailed replies in the thread ruined it because they had anime images, obviously.

>>53603596
Read up on the setting, see if it's what you want. The Boxed Set, at least, and if you like that, Sigil and Beyond, Faces of Sigil, the various Planes Of, the Guides to the Ethereal, Astral, and Inner planes.. or just run the game in the Cage, plenty to do without even leaving there. Or you could run it in the Outlands, centered around a single Gate town and it's adjacent plane.

>>53603659
Said the retard that got butthurt over images that are not even anime

>>53603491
So they created a Mary Sue to justify creating a fanfic tier city?

10/10 setting

>>53603939
>fanfic tier city?
How sigil really is one thing.

How sigil is written and talked about in it`s own setting is more in line with ankh morpork. So yeah this, but I guess that`s ok. I loved discworld.

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>>53601071

To be clear, there are definitely frontier areas in the Great Wheel. There are too many uncharted Ethereal demiplanes (and the odd demiplanes in another plane), Prime crystal spheres, and reaches of the infinite planes to count. One could most certainly run a campaign centering around these areas.

It is just that most of the published Planescape material concerns itself with the highly-developed, well-known locales of the planes. These places are what the setting, as presented, focuses on.

>>53601639

It is not going to be very Sliders-like for long the moment the PCs realize that there is an easily-accessible "hub city" of the multiverse, Sigil, from which they can access any other plane with ease. The PCs are also bound to realize that Sigil is one of the many signs that the planes' inhabitants are deeply interconnected, and that no plane exists in a metaphorical vacuum.

>>53601643

This is true. From my experience in running Planescape games and observing Planescape games, the ideal method of running adventures is to have each individual adventure arc take place in a single plane.

Hopping from plane to plane multiple times across just a couple of sessions has its appeal, but any dedicated adventure arc is best off focusing on a single plane and highlighting plenty of what that plane has to offer.

>>53602272

The single most concise summary of the 2e incarnation of the Great Wheel can be found in the Planewalker's Handbook. I would recommend it to anyone wishing to run or play in Planescape.

>>53602385

The Cypher System is... serviceable as a generic system, in my opinion. I would hesitate to call it "great" or even "good," since it has too many mechanical cracks and flaws for me to give it a seal of approval. That is a story for another thread though, and I will acknowledge that Cypher is fully serviceable for a Great Wheel campaign.

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>>53602594

I would not use the Faction War to begin with. It removes much of the intrigue of the setting and reduces it to a somewhat bland state with far less plot hooks and faction interplay.

Remember that the Faction War was supposed to be part of a trilogy of adventures. The two remaining adventures were supposed to bring the Great Wheel back into an interesting state with many new plot hooks and faction conflicts. However, those remaining two books never saw the light of day.

The Faction War alone was never meant to be used on its own.

Regarding the Doomguard, do remember that as per pages 40 and 45 of the Factol's Manifesto, the Doomguard is actually split into three subfactions: a mostly-lawful subfaction that wants to slow down entropy, a mostly-neutral subfaction that merely aims to balance entropy as needed, and a mostly-chaotic subfaction that wishes to accelerate entropy.

The Doomguard currently leans towards chaos simply because its factol belongs to the lattermost faction. That is why the dominant subfaction of the Doomguard has such an investment in the Ships of Chaos, and why that subfaction supports the tanar'ri in the Blood War, as per page 17 of Hellbound: The Blood War: The Chant of the War.

It is possible to be a lawful good Sinker, and once Pentar is no longer factol, it is also plausible that another subfaction of the Doomguard might become dominant.

Yes, the Doomguard is a highly fractious faction: you will note that two of the subfactions are at heavy odds with one another.

>>53603403

Set's greatest contribution to the planes, really, is the fact that his divine realm of Ankhwugaht grows Desert's Night, a flower that is one of the most reliable cures for Styx amnesia. This comes up over the course of the Dead Gods: Out of the Darkness adventure, and in the mini-adventure in pages 28-29 of Planes of Law: Baator. Even page 37 of Hellbound: The Blood War: The Dark of the War makes mention of Baatorian ships stocked with Desert's Night.

>>53606243
>play through Planescape adventure
>get Maeldur, tell it our names
>we can teleport without error just once
>power is gone, ohshit Yugoloths gonna come for us now too
>time passes
>plottin' n' schemin'
>one day suddenly HOLY SHIT TELEPORT WORKS AGAIN
>turns out the 'loths cut a deal with Set for Desert's Night on Maeldur after recovering him, and it remembered our names as well
Campaign ended soon after, but we all seriously wondered if that power was worth being on the yugoloth radar.

Probably not.

>>53603565
But... it wouldn't be like that. There'd be no functioning city of Sigil, just a blasted wasteland fought over by a million powers and demon lords. The plotting and scheming would almost certainly be done elsewhere.

If you want that, go play RIFTS.

>>53605992
>It is not going to be very Sliders-like for long the moment the PCs realize that there is an easily-accessible "hub city" of the multiverse, Sigil, from which they can access any other plane with ease. The PCs are also bound to realize that Sigil is one of the many signs that the planes' inhabitants are deeply interconnected, and that no plane exists in a metaphorical vacuum.

This seemed quite different from what I remembered of the Planescape boxed set, so I looked up Sigil's portals.

>A portal may be easy to reach, but to do that a sod’s got to find it, and that’s another matter entirely. Portals generally don’t advertise themselves. They don’t glow with strange colors, and a being can’t look through one and see the destination on the other side. They don’t detect as magical, but their presence can be discovered with a true seeing spell, though even this won’t reveal where they go. A basher can walk through a portal and have nothing at all happen, too, because each one takes a special gate key.
>This key isn’t like the one used for a normal lock and it isn’t a spell or power key, either. This key’s something particular to that portal - a word, an action, or an object carried across the threshold, for instance. Only when the key’s used will the portal come to life.

>Some portals are stable, some are temporary, and others seem to shift around in random patterns.

"With ease" doesn't sound accurate at all.

>>53606650
Reading comprehension.

>>53605992
>It is not going to be very Sliders-like for long the moment the PCs realize that there is an easily-accessible "hub city" of the multiverse, Sigil, from which they can access any other plane with ease. The PCs are also bound to realize that Sigil is one of the many signs that the planes' inhabitants are deeply interconnected, and that no plane exists in a metaphorical vacuum.

Getting to Sigil isn't trivial even if they know about it. And learning about it should be challenging in its own right, it's not as if by mere fact of being planars the people they meet are going to be immune to provincialism. Once they get there who's to say someone doesn't set out to haze the pack of irritating clueless who ask too many questions by getting paid to send them on a one way trip out of the city. Even if the way they got in was stable and they know the key they might have to travel halfway around the great wheel just to be on the right plane, ignoring potential issues of navigating once there.

By the time the characters have learned enough to confidently and accurately travel the planes your campaign should be shifting anyway.

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>>53606376

Our group had played through Dead Gods: Out of the Darkness before Squaring the Circle. Thus, we knew that simply depositing the Maeldur into the River Styx would be no solution, since the yugoloths could simply retrieve him.

That is why we teleported the Maeldur to a celestial stronghold in Elysium's layer of Thalasia instead. We and the guardinals there had to wage a massive battle against yugoloth forces coming to retrieve him, turning the seas red with fiendish blood, but we won in the end, and set Maeldur on the path to recovery at the meticulous hands of flesh-restoring silthilar. It helped that we had the Corrupter of Flesh artifact rod from earlier in the adventure, and had employed a purified version of it to help restore the Maeldur.

>>53606732

It is 100% true that you can access any other plane with ease in Sigil. If you want to head over to another reality, ask around for information on some of the more well-known portals with trivial gate keys, and then simply take that portal.

Examples of this can be found all over the premade adventures. Page 89 of Dead Gods, for example, lays out that if the PCs want to reach the Arborean city of Elshava, it is trivial for them to ask around and be led to a one-way portal leading there. The gate key is simply "any sea shell." Getting back is another problem, but the one-way portal is trivial to access and activate.

Later, in page 100 of Dead Gods, the PCs are in Nephythys's realm of Amun-thys and need to find a portal back to Sigil. All the party must do is ask around, and they find someone who can refer them to a convenient portal that leads back to the Cage, whose gate-key is simply a reed commonly found in the area.

If you are looking for an extremely specific place, however, then your quoted passage applies.

>>53601071
>I felt that the video game focused on this aspect at times.
True, but more as a consequence of the setting, I'd say. Also, we shouldn't forget that amazing as Planescape is, it was completely hacked to pieces. Tons upon tons of content had to be cut down to make release, most notably most of the factions and the questlines and themes relating to that (faction warfare, etc).

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>>53607013

Looking into the matter more, I can see that this varies on a case-by-case basis.

The example in page 100 of Dead Gods implies that you can simply ask around for a portal to Sigil in a middle-of-the-desert town, and be directed to one with a trivial gate-key.

On the other hand, in the To Baator and Back adventure in Well of Worlds, a very large deal is made on how difficult it is for Clueless to find a portal from Avernus to Sigil.

There are a number of factors here:
1. Different Planescape writers have different ideas on how difficult it should be to get to and from Sigil.
2. Different locations have different degrees of Sigil-related accessibility.
3. Clueless in another plane simply would not think to ask, "Hey, would you happen to know where the nearest portal to Sigil is?", whereas a more well-lanned planar traveler could simply put forth such an inquiry and receive a straightforward answer.

Anyone play Planescape?

>>53607095
>Later, in page 100 of Dead Gods, the PCs are in Nephythys's realm of Amun-thys and need to find a portal back to Sigil. All the party must do is ask around, and they find someone who can refer them to a convenient portal that leads back to the Cage, whose gate-key is simply a reed commonly found in the area.

Its almost as if the ease of finding portals to and from Sigil is intentionally left vague enough to work for whatever the campaign needs...

>>53609702
Oh, no one actually plays Planescape.