Post/Author/DateTime	Post
SilverFullmoon 03-29-07, 07:31 PM	So I'm new the boards, and been attempting to do a lot of catching up on the posts. But I do have two specific questions that I can find satisfactory answers too: 1) What is the Great Tree? As I knew, all D&D universes (unless the DM says otherwise) were based on the Great Wheel, i.e. the prime material is sorrounded by elmental and postive/negative planes and the etheral, and the outer planes were in the Wheel and connected to the prime by the astral plane. Did WOTC change that somewhere to the Great Tree and make it 'cannon'? 2) Whats everyone beef with the new Mystra? I know there have been tons of posts on this subject, so am looking for a general overview of why this appears to be so. I know there was a big deal around the time of the crynishad (spelling?) debacle with Cyric, but, as far I knew, Mystra got put in her place and has stayed there.
Stigger 03-29-07, 09:19 PM	Great Tree cosmology was introduced with 3.x and replaced the Great Ring/Wheel cosmology as far as the Faerunian cosmology was concerned. Seems that's the case with all the campaign settings now, moving towards their own seperate cosmologies rather than the unified whole the Great Ring/Wheel provided. Why, I don't know, and I'd be careful unless you unleash yet another debate on the merits and flaws of either system upon your unsuspecting thread... As to the whole Mystra thing... that's a little complicated. From what I've gathered the Anti-Mystra crowd comes down as she's too powerful, too goodly, and that the Chosen are overpowered and lame. Whereas the Pro-Mystra crowd generally thinks things are fine as they are. Both sides have their various nuances and intricacies to them, but for a very basic summary of it, that should work. I'll admit, I'm biased towards Mystra, so keep that in mind for that summary.
Shemeska the Marauder 03-29-07, 10:44 PM	So I'm new the boards, and been attempting to do a lot of catching up on the posts. But I do have two specific questions that I can find satisfactory answers too: 1) What is the Great Tree? As I knew, all D&D universes (unless the DM says otherwise) were based on the Great Wheel, i.e. the prime material is sorrounded by elmental and postive/negative planes and the etheral, and the outer planes were in the Wheel and connected to the prime by the astral plane. Did WOTC change that somewhere to the Great Tree and make it 'cannon'? In 3rd edition, FR is retroactively in its own cosmology and has never been part of the Great Wheel. Largely the brainchild of Sean K Reynolds as far as the design process went, the explanation was that "it has always been this way", and all of the previous Realms and non-Realms material that involved FR as part of the Great Wheel simply never happened. The original design team for 3e made a decision early on (reflected in the 3e Manual of the Planes) to not automatically include new worlds within the Great Wheel by default, however this was not meant to mean that only Greyhawk was part of the Wheel. But FR took that notion to something of an extreme and retroactively removed itself from its original cosmology, for reasons I don't entirely understand, though a few planes are more or less clones of Gehenna, the Gray Waste, Baator, and the Abyss, and many of the "planes" of 3e FR are former deific domains with the serial numbers filed off and dressed in different wrapping paper. Judge it as you will I suppose. Some people use the new cosmology, but many people still use the Great Wheel. I suspect people using the planes heavily fall into the latter camp, myself included, but I doubt anyone has any hard numbers (without sample bias) on the issue.
ripvanwormer 03-29-07, 11:20 PM	I think the common thread in most of the opinions and pet peeves I talk about on these boards is my dislike of redundancy. I want to keep the themes of the Far Realm and the Abyss clearly separated so that the two planes don't become redundant, for example. I want to make sure eladrins are very different from elves and fey, and not too entangled with them. And I don't see the point of a multiverse in which Toril and Oerth (or even Eberron) have nearly identical planes that are somehow separate. So really, that's my only criticism of the Great Tree; it's too much like the Great Wheel, and I don't think that benefits anyone. If you're going to assume both sets of planes exist, it seems to me you might as well combine them. That said, if you're just going to assume the Great Wheel cosmology doesn't exist at all in your campaign, there's no problem; my criticism doesn't apply. As long as the previous Mystra doesn't come back to life and gain the same alignment as the current Mystra, I don't have any problem with Mystra. I think the Time of Troubles was disastrously lame, but I don't really mind the new gods that came from it. It's a shame Leira's dead, though.
Lord Karsus 03-30-07, 01:06 AM	1) What is the Great Tree? As I knew, all D&D universes (unless the DM says otherwise) were based on the Great Wheel, i.e. the prime material is sorrounded by elmental and postive/negative planes and the etheral, and the outer planes were in the Wheel and connected to the prime by the astral plane. Did WOTC change that somewhere to the Great Tree and make it 'cannon'? -I wish the Great Tree were cannon. We could then shoot it into space somewhere... -Anyway, no the Great Wheel isn't canon anymore. As Shemmy mentioned, it was changed for no good reason. That, for the most part, is why so many of us have hostility towards it. 2) Whats everyone beef with the new Mystra? I know there have been tons of posts on this subject, so am looking for a general overview of why this appears to be so. I know there was a big deal around the time of the crynishad (spelling?) debacle with Cyric, but, as far I knew, Mystra got put in her place and has stayed there. -For the most part, as Stigger said, it's a small minority raising complains, and the majority telling them, "Shhh." ;)
miscellany 03-30-07, 01:21 AM	The Realms would have been removed from the Great Tree, regardless. This design concept was hardly radical, as the idea of dropping the excess baggage that was the Great Wheel was a natural outgrowth of the thinking of the larger Design Group responsible for re-thinking D&D, and not just the sub-group that worked on the FRCS or even the ‘mad’ imaginings of one particular game designer. The Great Wheel and by extension Planescape and its ability to connect events between Primes created a collective drag on the flagship setting (The Realms), both monetarily and creatively, which served to dilute the setting and turn fans away from it. In response the designers (that’s designers, plural) were operating from was not one of ‘don’t include new worlds in the Great Wheel’, as Shemeska claims. It was instead the idea that new worlds should be placed into their own Cosmology, separate from the Great Wheel, in order to avoid the same negative effects described above. This is why the claim that the Realms went to some sort of extreme in its revision is pure propaganda. As old school fans of the Realms know, a chief theme of the Realms is the idea that magical portals have connected it (intermittently/briefly, for some portals) to other realities. This hasn't changed. The Realms as it stands now still draws from and is connected to the Great Wheel peripherally (via the Plane of Shadow). This is why the idea put forth that the Realms assumes, “...all of the previous Realms and non-Realms material that involved FR as part of the Great Wheel simply never happened” is false. Most campaigns don’t focus on the planes; for them the planes are peripheral regions at best that are good for a few mid to high level adventures, until play naturally returns to Faerûn. Thus the notion of ‘what Cosmology to use’ is really one of esthetics and DM experience. Given the fact that as many or more Realms fans exist today than during 2E, it’s likely just as many or more fans use the Great Tree, but only to a limited degree. I dislike the Great Tree because the game designers have yet to ‘finish the thought’. This is where Shem’s description of the Great Tree rings true, as many of the planes have been renamed but not made properly unique to the Realms as they should have been. While the Realms Cosmology was originally set in the Great Wheel, it was certainly not created to pay homage to the Great Wheel; rather the Realms Cosmology was made to suit The Realms, both first and foremost (a mode of campaign design Deities and Demigods --that first and greatest of planar books-- encouraged, and that the creation of the Great Tree emulated). Too bad the designers of today haven’t seen fit to carry that idea through to the fullest. :D
Old Sage 03-30-07, 01:35 AM	If you're going to assume both sets of planes exist, it seems to me you might as well combine them.I'll note that Ed does have some preference toward using both 'cosmologies'... seeing them as fallible mortal maps of the same *place* - "The Great Wheel or any other cosmology doesn’t bother me, just as avatar stats and the endless “but this god came first, or can beat that god” arguments don’t: mortal PCs can’t know the truth about the gods anyway, because every in-game source (supreme priests, avatars of the gods themselves, holy writings) they could possibly learn all this stuff from is biased. Everything. So it really is all up to the DM."
Stigger 03-30-07, 02:12 AM	I'll note that Ed does have some preference toward using both 'cosmologies'... seeing them as fallible mortal maps of the same *place* - "The Great Wheel or any other cosmology doesn’t bother me, just as avatar stats and the endless “but this god came first, or can beat that god” arguments don’t: mortal PCs can’t know the truth about the gods anyway, because every in-game source (supreme priests, avatars of the gods themselves, holy writings) they could possibly learn all this stuff from is biased. Everything. So it really is all up to the DM." Which really is the most sensible approach to take, if one really looks at both. The sum parts combine to make a whole greater than either if you handle it properly and with a little bit of imagination.
SilverFullmoon 03-30-07, 11:22 AM	Wow. Thanks guy for the postings. My questions be answered! After reading these posts, I do have agree with you guys. The Great Tree does sound kinda lame (my apologies to those who like it). My group will probably keep the Great Wheal cosmology just for the simple sake that we know it. Plus, it very easy to use because we know where everything and everyone is located (even if the characters do not :D ) As for Mystra, I can understand why people think she is over-powerful. Weave IS a powerful source in the world. However, in our campaigns set after the cyrinshad incident, Mystra got changed to C/N and became more of the goddess she should have been from the start (not quite so meddlesome as she appears in the novels) by Ao. So now, she basically just manages the weave and promotes new magic (indirectly), and only directly inferes when there is a large threat to the weave. Silver
Stigger 03-30-07, 05:09 PM	If you have access to the Player's Guide to Faerun, I would strongly recommend reading the sections on godly domains actually. They're the one thing I really like from the Tree and aren't that difficult to incorporate into one, the other, or both... at least if you're planning on a campaign of that sort of scale. :)
ripvanwormer 03-30-07, 10:21 PM	They're the one thing I really like from the Tree Ironic, since they're mostly word-for-word from Planescape books.
GothicDan 03-30-07, 10:30 PM	I feel the mighty urge to scream GO PLANESCAPE! and go to bed now.
BrennonGoldeye 03-30-07, 10:49 PM	GO PLANESCAPE! ;)
Lord Karsus 03-30-07, 11:03 PM	-Yeah, I like Planescape. I stole the idea of factions, and applied it to one of my homebrew cities, and the sheer amount of information contained within pretty much any of the PS sourcebooks is amazing.
Gray Richardson 03-31-07, 12:51 AM	I love and use the Tree for my campaign. Although I have enjoyed playing in and running adventures in the Wheel during the heydey of Planescape, back before 3rd edition, I don't think the Wheel is the best cosmos for Faerun. Since the Great Tree came along with 3e, I have fallen fast in love with its arboreal splendor. I certainly understand why proponents of the Wheel want Faerun in their cosmos. But Faerun is treated like a piddly little backwater in the Planescape setting. The Wheel doesn't put Faerun on a pedestal, it dilutes and diminishes the importance of Toril and rather puts the spotlight on the Planes, which is just fine if that is the campaign you are interested in, but I prefer a cosmos that is a little more Realms-centric. My issues with the Wheel are roughly these: 1) The Wheel is alignment based, deities from the same pantheon are spread out wildly across the planes based on their alignment; the Tree divides its planes up based on pantheon and culture. The Realms has never been so concerned with alignment as other campaign settings have been and the Tree better reflects the importance of culture and history to the setting. 2) The Wheel has a lot of planes and sites named after Greek, Judeo-Christian and Norse mythology, cultures that have never had a presence in the Realms. That kind of thing takes me out of the setting. I don't particularly care for names like Hades, Gehenna, Nirvana, Ysgard, Bytopia, Tarterus, etc. in Faerun. Those names grate on my ear like fingernails on a chalkboard. I like it better if the Realms has a cosmology based around Faerunian myths and naming conventions. 3) I think modrons are cute and charming in a Saturday-morning cartoon kind of way, but I don't really want them in my Realms. Not a deal-breaker, but they don't really cut the mustard as exemplars. Too hokey for me. There are a lot of hokey things in the Great Wheel, and by using the Tree I can "weed" out a lot of the more silly baggage that the Wheel has picked up over the years. 4) When I run planar adventures as an extension of my Realms campaign, I don't want to include kender or space hamsters or psionic half-giants from Athas or Alice in Wonderland for that matter. I have little interest in running into all the wacky inhabitants of an infinite multiverse. I prefer a cosmos that is centered around Faerun and is filled with spirits, gods and representatives of all its varied cultures and lands. Faerun is my focus. So in conclusion, I think the Planescape Wheel is a charming setting that works great for a world-spanning, planes-based campaign that may include occasional, brief jaunts into terrestrial settings like Faerun and Greyhawk. While the Great Tree is a much better cosmology for a Faerun based campaign that will have jaunts and expeditions into the planes but will spend equal time or more in Faerun, which is the kind of campaign that I run. I much prefer the Tree as a cosmology that is tailored to and highlights the unique culture and history of Toril.
ripvanwormer 03-31-07, 01:35 AM	Modrons are neither cute nor charming. They are amoral, passionless, hulking Euclidean forms devoted to maintaining order at any cost. They're hideous agglomerations of flesh and metal. They couldn't charm you if they wanted to, and they assuredly don't. They make inevitables seem positively human in comparison.
Shemeska the Marauder 03-31-07, 02:30 AM	There are a lot of hokey things in the Great Wheel, and by using the Tree I can "weed" out a lot of the more silly baggage that the Wheel has picked up over the years. Exactly! Because a cosmos centered around Faerun won't have anything silly at all, and we'll be able to use outsiders that are specifically Faerunian, like Saint Sollars the Twice Martyred, the patron saint of the Bloodstone Pass in Vaasa. Faerunian material that talks about the planes would never be silly like the modrons: He magically conjures a table with a large pitcher of beer and enough mugs for everybody, and begins to pour. "I guess you've figgered out by now that that bad hombre you've been fighting is Orcus himself, the meanest dude this side of the Pecos," St. Sollars says, taking a deep swallow from his mug. He doesn't explain what, exactly, the Pecos is. "The big boss, ol' Bahamut, don't much like Orcus, and especially don't want him messin round this plane, you unnerstand. The only way to corral that there demon an git him off'n your backs once and for all is to corral that big skull stick o' his and bring it to me at my spread out Mercuria way, over in the Seven Heavens, and I'll tell yuh how to git rid o' it. Any questions?" You look at each other, then one of you finally says, "Are you talking about stealing the Wand of Orcus from the Abyss and bringing it to the Seven Heavens?" "Yup," says St. Sollars, scratching himself. "You got it." "Faerunian, planar, and not silly at all. Yup," the 'loth says having seen the light. "You got it." ;) Edit: I'm being whimsical, so do role with it in good humor. Though that was a direct quote from that thar module. I couldn't make that up if I tried. Yeesh.
Stigger 03-31-07, 04:25 AM	That was from Planescape? Wow, must have missed a book in there somewhere, as I don't recall it in the slightest. Oops... score one more for the Great Wheel/Ring I guess.
SilverFullmoon 03-31-07, 11:11 AM	Planescape ROCKED!!! :) Yes, the old Planescape setting did make Toril seem like a backwater berg, but that's pretty much how every world was viewed by the Berks on the planes. We did modify it a bit when we were playing on the Realms, and headed to the planes. We made the adventures centered more on the Realms specific deities and celestials/demons. But one more thing: since WOTC is basing everything on the Great Tree, is that how WOTSQ explained Lloth's realms budding off the Abyss? How has anyone explained it for the Great Wheel? Silver
Dr_Tough 03-31-07, 12:17 PM	Alright, my problem with this tree business is pretty basic. That is, it's still the Great Wheel. All that happened was that they were rearranged and given different names. It's not so much a completely different cosmology than Planescape as it is a Faerunian perspective on Planescape. When I read the DM's Guide to the Planes (or whatever it was called), I'm reading it as an omnipotent observer. However, if I'm viewing the matter from inside of it, like in Faerun, I'm not going to have a complete picture. As a result I'm going to view the matter with a skewed look. We're still looking at the same thing, it's just that we have different vantage points. Okay, let's give an example. Selune's realm is called the Gates of the Moon. It is located in Ysgard. But Faerunians don't care about that, they're concerned with just Selune's realm. So, they're going to just call the place Gates of the Moon, largely unconcerned about its location in the planes. They don't care about Muspelheim or Nidavellir, because those places don't have a whole lot to do with Faerun. Even if they did, they wouldn't consider them connected to the Gates of the Moon. I hope at least some of that made sense.
Shemeska the Marauder 03-31-07, 02:06 PM	But one more thing: since WOTC is basing everything on the Great Tree, is that how WOTSQ explained Lloth's realms budding off the Abyss? How has anyone explained it for the Great Wheel? Lolth obtained greater deity status for her Torillian aspect, but otherwise nothing happened much on the planes at large. There might have been a disruption to the astral conduits siphoning souls from Toril into her divine domain in the Abyss, and the local landscape there might have become altered, but otherwise nothing happened to layer 66 of the Abyss at large.
ripvanwormer 03-31-07, 03:19 PM	But one more thing: since WOTC is basing everything on the Great Tree, is that how WOTSQ explained Lloth's realms budding off the Abyss? How has anyone explained it for the Great Wheel? In the Great Wheel, Lolth's web is still the 66th layer of the Abyss. None of that has happened.
Valgard 03-31-07, 04:36 PM	About cosmologies: I was previously with the Great Tree, but after many observations in 2nd Ed material and what is discussed here, I reached a conclusion: THERE AREN'T ANY COSMOLOGIES That's an invention of mortals to classify them in some kind of order. It's like the periodic table of elements. The only one that exists is ordered by atomic number and by electronical layers, but there's no reason why someone could create his own table choosing another patron. With the planes the situation is kind similar. The concept of "plane" is a cientific concept that is used to separate "extraplanar places" from one another in some kind of order. For example: those who recorded the planes as the wheel considered that the three layers of Elysium were the same "plane" primarily because someone traveled to those layers, he saw that were of different nature, but with the same alignment trait, so they classified those layers as a single plane called Elysium. Then, those experts classified all the planes in a wheel by alignment and they "created" that cosmology. Then, outsiders and even deities use those same concepts when interacting with mortals to make theirselves understood (In a general way, details may be more specific, but that's the general idea). But, of course, that's not true. If alignments are infinite in three dimensions, how can you make a wheel who is limited in at least two dimensions and at most three dimensions?. I asked once why chaotic planes are well ordered from chaotic-good to chaotic-evil if they are chaotic, and Rip answered me that they are not ordered... if they are not ordered, that's even farther than a wheel shape... and the same with the tree. I think that the three-dimension living of mortals (and even outsiders) limits too much to understand how the planes really are. Maybe there's only a single infinite plane and, when plane shifting, you are instead teleporting. Maybe you can go from a point in the material plane to the Dragon Eyrie without plane shifting, but you'll need billions of billions of eons to arrive there... or maybe not. Maybe plane shifting is really the only way. Maybe there are only three outer planes: the good plane, the evil plane and the neutral plane, but some use plane shifting to go to one place to another rather than by foot. The "real truth" may be any one. Another example: A Torilian cosmologist considers a visited "extraplanar place" part of the Barrens of Doom and Despair, and then an Oerthian cosmologist considers a part of that place to belong to a cube in the Infernal Battlefield of Acheron and another part to belong to the Gray Waste of Hades. And just another one: It is possible that there is no plane in the Great Tree that features the clockwork gears of Mechanus because no plane traveler in Toril went to that specific part of the plane that experts of the Wheel quickly classified as an entire plane... or maybe no Torilian realized he was over a great cog. I think this theory solves problems such as "are there two Corellon Larethians, or is there only one with different aspects, or bla bla bla?" while not making one "cosmology" to be really the ONE cosmology (so, not making some material "better" than another).
HVulpes 03-31-07, 08:54 PM	I was wondering... If there had not been Planescape, would it have been easier to move from the wheel to the tree? Just a problem that was wondering my mind.
Lord Karsus 03-31-07, 09:12 PM	I was wondering... If there had not been Planescape, would it have been easier to move from the wheel to the tree? Just a problem that was wondering my mind. -Definitley. My problem with the whole thing is the massive amounts of information that were partially, somewhat or totally disgarded. If there wasn't very much information about the Multiverse, then who cares if it was in the shape of a tree or a wheel? It's still very ambiguous. That's my take on it, anyway.
Shemeska the Marauder 03-31-07, 09:19 PM	I was wondering... If there had not been Planescape, would it have been easier to move from the wheel to the tree? Just a problem that was wondering my mind. If I can paraphrase Rule-Of-Three: Yes, no, perhaps. A shared multiverse was already there in 1st edition, firmly established by the 1e Manual of the Planes, with FR one world of many within the same cosmology. So even if there hadn't been a Planescape or any of the other 2e material that connected FR with a common cosmology, we'd still have the problems introduced by any jarring, abrupt and unexplained cosmology shift. The sheer amount of material and detail that popped up in 2e Planescape however, and the fact that 2e FR referred to that cosmology, sometimes intimately, just makes the problem that much harder to swallow because the material is still there, and the invalidations and continuity errors abound. However the continuity issue faced by simply declaring editions worth of material invalid without explanation could have been avoided entirely if the 3e cosmology shift had been handled with an in-game explanation. It wouldn't have entirely removed the antipathy faced by the new cosmology, but it would have shown a good faith effort to provide reason and plot behind the shift as opposed to just invoking a magic television analogy. I might not have liked the way any putative in-game explanation was handled, but I'd have rolled with it and respected the effort certainly even if I didn't use it in my own games. And who knows, had an explanatory plot been developed I might have thought it really cool and felt inspired by it, and I might have even supported it. As it stands though, that wasn't a route that was taken, so we can only speculate about what might have been, as opposed to what currently is.
miscellany 03-31-07, 10:39 PM	Spoken like someone who not only wasn't around all that long before 3E came about, but also isn't interested in acccepting the reasoning behind the transition, where such reasoning has been public knowledge for years. More later. :rolleyes:
Lord Karsus 03-31-07, 11:02 PM	Spoken like someone who not only wasn't around all that long before 3E came about, but also isn't interested in acccepting the reasoning behind the transition, where such reasoning has been public knowledge for years. More later. :rolleyes: -The problem is that there is no reasoning for the change, in game terms. That the designers wanted to make Faerûn's cosmology more Realms-specific doesn't bother me too much. But, that no explanation as to why everything suddenly changed does. As Shemmy just said, "I might not have liked the way any putative in-game explanation was handled, but I'd have rolled with it and respected the effort..." -I also have the impression that Shemmy has been around for a while. Those who know too much about Shemeska the Arcanaloth usually disappear...:shifty:
Shemeska the Marauder 04-01-07, 01:08 AM	Spoken like someone who not only wasn't around all that long before 3E came about, but also isn't interested in acccepting the reasoning behind the transition, where such reasoning has been public knowledge for years. More later. :rolleyes: There has been an in-game explanation for years now? I must have missed it... Miscellany, you might go back and read what I wrote last post, because you really, really misunderstood all of it. And yes, I've been around since about mid 2000, which I suppose is a pejorative that earns me a sarcasm smiley. I feel loved and appreciated.
GothicDan 04-01-07, 03:01 AM	) The Wheel has a lot of planes and sites named after Greek, Judeo-Christian and Norse mythology, cultures that have never had a presence in the Realms. That kind of thing takes me out of the setting. I don't particularly care for names like Hades, Gehenna, Nirvana, Ysgard, Bytopia, Tarterus, etc. in Faerun. Those names grate on my ear like fingernails on a chalkboard. I like it better if the Realms has a cosmology based around Faerunian myths and naming conventions. Because Greek and Norse deities don't have any presence in the Realms. Oh, wait. They do.
miscellany 04-01-07, 04:47 AM	There has been an in-game explanation for years now? I must have missed it... No, but there's been an out of game explanation that you've been well aware of all this time. One wonders why you fail to mention these things... Miscellany, you might go back and read what I wrote last post, because you really, really misunderstood all of it. I thought I understood it pretty well. It basically had all the stock canards and tropes one would expect after 7 years of refining the same dead-horse argument over and over and over again, except this time you worded it probably better than you (or anyone else) ever has before. That college education is clearly paying off. :P
Zandilar 04-01-07, 05:02 AM	Heya, Because Greek and Norse deities don't have any presence in the Realms. Oh, wait. They do. There's an argument to be made that they don't. Tymora and Beshaba bear little resemblance to Tyche (there's TWO of them for a start!). Tyr is quite a good deal different to Tyr. Now while the inital article in Dragon (Down to Earth Divinities) basically said "we'll take this deity and change their name and plonk them in Faerun", those deities don't count as their Earthly counterparts. (ie: Sune, while inspired by Aphrodite, is not Aphrodite.) Anyway, I'm getting a distinct impression of deja vu. Weren't we all having this argument last time I was a regular here? This is a dead horse, lets not beat the poor beast any further.
The WarOverlord 04-01-07, 06:41 AM	So I'm new the boards, and been attempting to do a lot of catching up on the posts. But I do have two specific questions that I can find satisfactory answers too: 1) What is the Great Tree? As I knew, all D&D universes (unless the DM says otherwise) were based on the Great Wheel, i.e. the prime material is sorrounded by elmental and postive/negative planes and the etheral, and the outer planes were in the Wheel and connected to the prime by the astral plane. Did WOTC change that somewhere to the Great Tree and make it 'cannon'? 2) Whats everyone beef with the new Mystra? I know there have been tons of posts on this subject, so am looking for a general overview of why this appears to be so. I know there was a big deal around the time of the crynishad (spelling?) debacle with Cyric, but, as far I knew, Mystra got put in her place and has stayed there. 1) Er..no. The Forgotten Realms has always been a "closed System" via Overlord Ao's will and the "tree format" is just a theorical map of the the interrelated Cosmologal data. And, no, not all Primes are created equal in their dimesions or inter-plainiar connections in any case depending on the whims of there Overlords, goddlings, or whether or not they even have such controllers. 2) Too Human.
GothicDan 04-01-07, 01:37 PM	Anyway, I'm getting a distinct impression of deja vu. Weren't we all having this argument last time I was a regular here? This is a dead horse, lets not beat the poor beast any further. Ironic, considering you've just given him a few good whacks yourself!
SilverFullmoon 04-01-07, 04:23 PM	Ironic, considering you've just given him a few good whacks yourself! Sorry, GothicDan, this is my fault. I wanted some clarification on the thread topics. :lightbulb
Stigger 04-01-07, 04:30 PM	And you did indeed get some in microcosm. Though I really wouldn't call those good whacks there Dan, didn't get the impression she was even trying to swat them, much less beat them. At least presuming this is the Zandilar I'm thinking it is... been on the receiving end of her wit once or twice if it is, and she was barely even stretching there. :D
GothicDan 04-01-07, 04:36 PM	Bah humbug to you all! - Dan, in a cranky mood because he doesn't want to attend his ritual fraternity meeting tonight. Or work on that take home exam.
Stigger 04-01-07, 04:49 PM	Bah humbug indeed... Go listen to some Mark Almond, that might make you feel better. Or maybe look for his 'Ruby Red' or 'Melancholy Rose' videos... some very cute guys in... interesting display in those for you. :D
Zandilar 04-01-07, 06:46 PM	Heya, And you did indeed get some in microcosm. Though I really wouldn't call those good whacks there Dan, didn't get the impression she was even trying to swat them, much less beat them. At least presuming this is the Zandilar I'm thinking it is... been on the receiving end of her wit once or twice if it is, and she was barely even stretching there. :D Well, I wasn't really trying to whack them... I mean, Tyr and Tymora and Beshaba are only three "interlopers" out of a good deal of them. But I'll say no more, and let the poor pony lie. Also, it depends on "which" Zandilar you think I am. I only know of one, and that's been me since... oh EverQuest in 2001... Mind you, if you're the Stigger I think you are, then we probably met on the Bioware forums for Neverwinter Nights. ;) If so... Small world! :)
ripvanwormer 04-01-07, 07:34 PM	It basically had all the stock canards and tropes one would expect after 7 years of refining the same dead-horse argument over and over and over again "An out of game explanation?" Of course, but that's a straw man; the issue was an in-game explanation (which I personally would dread, but I don't care about my opinions right now). It's perfectly reasonable to believe the out-of-game explanation was insufficient in itself, that the xenophobia inherent in the decision was a poor motivation for something that could have been as easily "fixed" by citing the vagueness of mortal perception, as Valgard eloquently did (and as Ed Greenwood himself has), instead of the clumsy wholesale rejection of over a decade of resources. "Not interested in accepting the reasoning?" I suppose that's one way of putting it, but it rather nastily implies a decision-making process governed by pure obstinacy rather than objectively considering the pros and cons. Merely not agreeing that the reasoning is sufficient is a perfectly good reason not to accept it.
Shemeska the Marauder 04-01-07, 10:04 PM	One wonders why you fail to mention these things... Because I was specifically talking about how an in-game explanation could have served to address many of the negative feelings people have for the cosmology change. An out of game explanation has absolutely nothing with anything I was talking about or explaining, so of course I didn't mention it. I thought I understood it pretty well. It basically had all the stock canards and tropes one would expect after 7 years of refining the same dead-horse argument over and over and over again, except this time you worded it probably better than you (or anyone else) ever has before. That college education is clearly paying off. :P If you want to insult me, go right ahead. But that's more than a bit uncalled for Miscellany, especially when I was trying to be constructive. I expected something better. I didn't slam it or call it names, I was addressing how a different implimentation of the cosmology changes could have prevented much of it's negative perception within the community. Excuse me for explaining my perspective and suggesting ways that could have made the reception of the cosmology better from where I'm coming from.
GothicDan 04-01-07, 11:39 PM	If you want to insult me, go right ahead. But that's more than a bit uncalled for Miscellany, especially when I was trying to be constructive. I expected something better. Why would you? It's one of the things Miscellany and her significant other do best! Direct insults. ;)
GothicDan 04-01-07, 11:41 PM	Well, I wasn't really trying to whack them... I mean, Tyr and Tymora and Beshaba are only three "interlopers" out of a good deal of them. But I'll say no more, and let the poor pony lie. Also: Silvanus, Herne, Mielikki, Loviatar, Dionysus (referenced in the Bloodstone modules), and all of the Maztican, demihuman, monstrous, and Kara-Turan deities. :)
miscellany 04-02-07, 12:39 AM	I think I know who you are in RL, but if I'm wrong just roll past my first paragraph and work with the rest. I didn't slam it or call it names, I was addressing how a different implimentation of the cosmology changes could have prevented much of it's negative perception within the community. Excuse me for explaining my perspective and suggesting ways that could have made the reception of the cosmology better from where I'm coming from. C'mon Todd, you are establishing yourself as a published author and freelancer...it's way past time you got real. It comes down to this: Your suggestions were (are) predicated on assumptions that you already know aren't true, or otherwise involve exceptionally bad ideas, where those ideas were shot down by professional game designers and business managers all of whom were 100% interested in seeing D&D live on and prosper (ooh, Trek moment). However the continuity issue faced by simply declaring editions worth of material invalid without explanation could have been avoided entirely if the 3e cosmology shift had been handled with an in-game explanation Here again you get it only half right. "...simply declaring editions worth of material invalid" is quite literally not what happened. Names and places from old became incorrect names and places...but the participants and the events themselves still happened. You want to know why you aren’t treated with respect? It’s because -whether you intend to or not- you prevaricate each time you claim whole editions worth of material don’t ‘count’ anymore. Same goes for Rip. That's just dishonest and uncalled for. Look, an in-game explanation involves an RSE (that being a real RSE, and not the tiny ones that kids these days are convinced are RSE's), which is -as anyone who's been through the ToT knows- a super bad idea. Why would WotC want to repeat the Time of Troubles fiasco? In fact, they were going out of their way to not repeat any of TSR's numerous mistakes over the last decade (whether financially, business-wise or product-wise). One might claim it really would only need to be a ‘small’ event, but then we stretch credulity. Would Ao really one day decide to cut the Realms loose, just for the heck of it? I don’t think so. Short of Ao, you need major Deity involvement and that, as we know, is bad for the Realms. It wouldn't have entirely removed the antipathy faced by the new cosmology, but it would have shown a good faith effort to provide reason and plot behind the shift as opposed to just invoking a magic television analogy. Let me be the first to admit you should have gotten kudos for the first part of this sentence, because it's dead on and correct. An in-game fixit solution of any kind would not have pleased the 1/10th of 1% die-hards that complain online all day long, no matter what. The second part...well there's no good way to say it: Wizards of the Coast owes its fans nothing. There neither is (nor was) a good business reason and/or Campaign Setting reason to make "good faith" towards the fans a priority with regard to the Cosmology. As you well know, Planescape = polution so far as the Realms and other campaign settings were concerned. The more you focus on the former, the less you focus on the later. That's just bad for business (which, in his recent response, Ripvanwormer incorrectly terms "xenophobia") and bad for the product/game play. It's a fact that game designers across the previous two editions came to this conclusion as the build up to 3E was being made. I might not have liked the way any putative in-game explanation was handled, but I'd have rolled with it and respected the effort certainly even if I didn't use it in my own games. I doubt it. No pessimism there. Just straight up doubt. Given your discovery-come-attachment to all things Planescape, followed by the ‘jarring’ realization that FR wasn’t going to pay head to it anymore....nah, you’d still be where you’re at. And who knows, had an explanatory plot been developed I might have thought it really cool and felt inspired by it, and I might have even supported it. As it stands though, that wasn't a route that was taken, so we can only speculate about what might have been, as opposed to what currently is. This, I think, is a good example of the break point between generations. Here we have this massive opportunity to re-explore all the planar themes, histories, creation myths and stories of the Realms Cosmology, and the handful of up and comers not only aren't taking the opportunity for what it is, but are still spending time and energy criticizing the change over 6-7 years later. Would this change have happened in the same manner 20 years ago...well IMO players of that era would have been ticked, but they’d have also cottoned on to the opportunity and made the best of it, to all of our mutual benefit. ::::::::::::::::::: In closing, it becomes incumbent upon me to state in no uncertain terms that issues of (planar) continuity are simply not that important to the wide majority of Forgotten Realms games. The switch-over to the Great Tree did not in any way prohibit 2E and 1E games from continuing, nor did it prohibit 3E FR games that wanted to use the Wheel from doing so. Actual Game Play and the direct effects of rules changes on game play are simply more important. The cosmology change-over didn’t effect game play and it didn’t re-write the Realms proper, so frankly it’s not an issue. The issue of continuity is IMO overblown. It’s the paper tiger everyone keeps invoking but that dies away in an instant when confronted. :D
Stigger 04-02-07, 12:41 AM	Ah yes... you'd be the same Zandilar then. Long time no see. :) Though as to the whole in-game explanation issue, I'd agree, just one or two sentences about conflicts amongst sages about various competing cosmological theories and models would have gone a long, long way, and probably prevented quite a bit of confusion while giving tons of (canonical) freedom to DM's to construct their own personal interpretations of the Planes.
miscellany 04-02-07, 12:59 AM	"An out of game explanation?" Of course, but that's a straw man; the issue was an in-game explanation (which I personally would dread, but I don't care about my opinions right now). For it to be a strawman I would have had to claim Shemeska said something he didn't. The issue is and always has been about more than just an in-game explanation. It's perfectly reasonable to believe the out-of-game explanation was insufficient in itself, that the xenophobia inherent in the decision was a poor motivation for something that could have been as easily "fixed" by citing the vagueness of mortal perception, as Valgard eloquently did (and as Ed Greenwood himself has), instead of the clumsy wholesale rejection of over a decade of resources. I can see Todd doesn't care for the out-of-game reasoning behind the change over. That's fine. The problem starts when one ignores what has happened with the Realms as a product prior to 3E, while sharing ideas about how 3E FR Cosmology “could have been done better”. The problem gets worse when one starts assuming anything other than a wholesale RSE would be sufficient to justify the change. FYI you're reaching to the point of wishful thinking in your assumption that the vagaries of perception would be sufficient as a published sort of solution to explain away the transition. And speaking of vagaries in perception, the Magic Televisioon Analogy realies exactly on this concept, except it elevates the level of perception from fictional mortal Faerûnian inhabitants to real-life, rules-reading gamers, where the means of perception is our five senses and the medium is the rulebooks. :D
miscellany 04-02-07, 01:00 AM	Though as to the whole in-game explanation issue, I'd agree, just one or two sentences about conflicts amongst sages about various competing cosmological theories and models would have gone a long, long way, ...and would have been cited time and time again as the single most lame and weak explanation for a monstrous in-game change over to the Realms as separate from the Wheel. You'd have had newbs like Shemeska and old-schoolers applenty up in arms. ... and probably prevented quite a bit of confusion while giving tons of (canonical) freedom to DM's to construct their own personal interpretations of the Planes. Stigger, DM's don't need any sort of canonical freedom to do as they please. They never have. :)
Stigger 04-02-07, 01:27 AM	Well, it would have gone a long way with me. Something, anything to make it make sense. Such an explanation would have opened up a lot of possibilities for sage conflicts and the like. Not that it still can't, but there are some very odd people out there uncomfortable with deviation overly much from canon. I'm aware that DM's can do whatever they please, believe me, I take advantage of that particular caveat far more often than most considering the blendering of WoD and FR I've done and continue to do, but there are a lot of people who have a hard time thinking outside of the constraints that they feel the game puts on them. Besides, it could have done a lot to help ward off the rules-lawyer players who harp on canon being absolute... kinda like garlic for vampires. Anything that provides a weapon against that is good in my book. Besides, there's tons of story hooks that could have been presented if they had included that little sentence or two, a world of possibility that could have been so much fun to play with... ah well, probably too much to ask for really, but it would have been nice.
Gray Richardson 04-02-07, 03:26 AM	Here is the thing... I honestly don't see why an in-game explanation should be a sticking point. By WotC not putting forward an "in-game" explanation, that actually leaves DM's more freedom to deal with the change however they like. You can decide the planes have always been this way, or that they used to be part of the Wheel but there was a PSE (Plane-shaking event) that caused the change in cosmology, or those who prefer the Wheel can keep the Wheel. I mean, it's not like WotC stopped supporting the Wheel; there has been plenty of material written for the Great Wheel cosmology in 3e & 3.5e, so it is still a viable cosmology if you prefer to use it. If you really need an explanation for the change in cosmology, you can use the boundless limits of your imagination to make something up: A godswar. A planesquake. Plane-techtonic shifting. Overgods repairing a rent in the Great Wheel due to an incursion from the Far Realms. The hyperdimensional server running the Great Wheel ran out of hard-drive room and each crystal sphere got it's own server after the upgrade. Malicious hacking by overgods or pseudogods requiring each crystal sphere to get its own cosmos as a "firewall" to prevent implosion. Vecna attempting to ascend to overgod status and causing a massive realignment of the planes in the fallout. An Anti-Monitor destroying each successive crystal sphere, until all the heroes of the multiverse united and somehow "shattered" the Great Wheel, secreting each crystal sphere away in it's own separate cosmos safe from the depredations of the Anti-Monitor, who now lays bound within the empty detritus of the former Great Wheel. Whatever reason you come up with, I am sure you will be more happy with that than anything WotC could choose for you. The simple fact is that, for many of the Great Wheel proponents, even if WotC came up with an "in-game" explanation for the change, it would not really satisfy them. They would not change their prefered cosmology. It's really a red-herring to say that would make them happy. And those who use the Great Tree who feel they need an explanation for the change are free to craft an explanation that is suitable for their campaign. For My campaign, I assume that Realmspace used to be part of the Great Wheel, and then something mysterious happened around 1371 DR that caused it to be part of the Great Tree. I assume that Ao rebooted the cosmology for some unknown reason, and that this reboot altered the timeline back to the beginning of the (Realmspace) universe so that no one remembers the change; they believe the cosmology has always been this way, and for all intents and purposes it has for them. I have not come up with an in-game explanation for my own campaign because it has never impacted game play. My players have never once asked about the Wheel, they like adventuring in the Tree just fine. However, as an intellectual exercise, I think if I had to pin down an explanation, I think my explanation might have to do with the Sundering of the elves rippling both backward and forward in time and cracking the Crystal Sphere of Realmspace. Although, I kind of also like the idea of either an ethergaunt plot or an invasion from the Far Realms. I really enjoyed DC's Crisis on the Infinite Earths event that rebooted their cosmology in a similar fashion back in 1985. It altered DC continuity back to the beginning of time, and I thought that was a lot of fun how they had to rework everything to make it fit into their new chronology. So I am pretty comfortable with rebooting cosmologies every now and again. I understand that not everyone is as comfortable as I am with the concept of rebooting and retconning literary continuity, but I am just saying that if you really need an in-game explanation, then you are free to create one for your campaign.
Stigger 04-02-07, 04:22 AM	I was following you there until the Crisis on Infinite Earths thing... which is not to say the DCU wasn't in dire need of it, it just bothered me as a method. Too much chainsaw, not enough rapier I guess... mostly just a style issue for me really. I prefer the Wheel of course, but the tree has some interesting possibilities too, so ultimately my point is that it would have been nice had they said something, even if only in a sidebar for DM's as to the reasoning behind it, so if a player OOC asked, we had an answer, and why it makes sense for the current edition. They're doing it for magical items in stuff like the MIC, so why not for something as major as a cosmology shift in FRCS? Even a 'Because we felt like it' or 'We just wanted to individualize everything so we wouldn't have to keep up the cross-setting continuity' would have sufficed for me really. I'm probably in a vast minority with that though.
Zandilar 04-02-07, 07:49 AM	Heya, Also: Silvanus, Herne, Mielikki, Loviatar, Dionysus (referenced in the Bloodstone modules), and all of the Maztican, demihuman, monstrous, and Kara-Turan deities. :) Well, since you insist... ;) (Tell me to shut up if you need to Gothic Dan, I'm not really interested in debating the Tree vs the Wheel (they're both made of wood*, after all! :D), so I'll limit this to direct comparisons between Earth and Faerun deities that share the same name.) With a few exceptions, the Realms versions of Earth deties bear only passing and sometimes very little resemblance to their Earthly counterparts - Loviatar (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loviatar_(Mythology)) for example. (Yes, I know wikipedia is not the most reliable source, but still...) I also left out the Mulhorandi pantheon... I don't want to comment too much, since I'm not really that well versed in the Mulhorandi pantheon, and I don't have Faiths and Pantheons or Powers and Pantheons with me right now, as I'm cat sitting for my mother. While I do know the Egyptian pantheon better, I need to look at both together to properly compare them... The one thing I can comment on is that Bast (Sharess) is nothing like Bast of Egypt - partly due to the fact that she was a vague interperation to begin with (she was melded with some elements I might attribute to Sekhmet with regards to being a war deity and lieutenant to Anhur), and mostly due to the fact that she wandered around absorbing other deities (I'm still puzzled why she's not more powerful, maybe Shar has something to do with it). Of course the story of all these interlopers is that they are interlopers. They do, in fact, come from Earth (and other places in the cosmos). How or why this occurs, no one knows. No one even really knows if Tyr of Faerun is really still the same entity as Tyr of Earth, for example. (I've always thought that Tyr of Faerun bears more resemblance to the Norse god Forseti than Earth Tyr.) *Though there is an interesting thought!
Lord Karsus 04-02-07, 10:30 AM	I also left out the Mulhorandi pantheon... I don't want to comment too much, since I'm not really that well versed in the Mulhorandi pantheon, and I don't have Faiths and Pantheons or Powers and Pantheons with me right now, as I'm cat sitting for my mother. While I do know the Egyptian pantheon better, I need to look at both together to properly compare them... -The Mulhorandi pantheon is basically the Egyptian pantheon, but they've been changed, mushed, mixed and "Realmsified" a bit. Most of the similarities are going to be, you know, glaring, but the Mulhorandi have distanced themselves from the Egyptian somewhat. An acceptable level, I think.
GothicDan 04-02-07, 11:16 AM	Sharess in her original incarnation of Bast (before absorbing Zandilar) was very much like the Bast of Egyptian myth - and she's still worshipped as such in Mulhorand. :) And I think you do have some right in saying that the Faerunian Tyr is similar in some ways to Forsetti; but On Hallowed Grounds makes it clear that they are the same deity nonetheless. Remember, deities can project slightly different aspects of themselves into various Spheres (such as the Corellon of Faerun is a little less andrygynous than that of Greyhawk); this explains Tyr and Loviatar (remembering that ALL deities can appear however they want, of course!)
Red_Wizard 04-02-07, 12:10 PM	Why not simply think of it as Ao shutting the classroom door, to keep the noise in the halls from spilling in? To use an extremely diluted RW comparison. I mean pre ToT you had gods wandering in and out, the main Pantheon gods doing what they wanted, Ao basically letting them, and there was little governace of the Realmsian pantheon. Then, Ao said i've had enough, put his foot down, and with a little approval from the principal(s), pulled his class into a room they could better focus in, and since has had excellent results. You want something from the old editions there? Well if it makes sense, then it's in already, if it needs working, DM that's your job....Then, if by some chance you find something that can't be explained ( which I doubt) live with the loss, or break some things for your homebrew. Regardless, the Tree is here, it makes sense, and via the PoS you can still take that much needed vaction back into wheel wielding settings whenever you have the urge to walk down memory lane ;).
GothicDan 04-02-07, 02:32 PM	AO didn't shut his room up very well if you can just do everything via the PoS anyway, did he?
ripvanwormer 04-02-07, 02:51 PM	For it to be a strawman I would have had to claim Shemeska said something he didn't. You're right; technically it was more of a red herring. What you did was debate an argument that wasn't being made by the person you ostensibly responded to. Regardless, it was a profoundly dishonest argument, viciously made, full of crude bluster, sarcasm, and much sputtering, but with no substantive points. Your writing style lacks coherence, relying on overbroad strikes and vague allusions. Your debating style is poor, relying on ad hominem attacks and appeals to things other than logic, such as authority and common knowledge. "It's way past time you got real..." How can you use such an immature, openly sneering turn of phrase and expect to be taken seriously? Are we peers discussing gaming theory or are you an AM radio pundit dismissing a caller of a rival political affiliation? "Where those ideas were shot down by professional game designers and business managers..." This is simply not true; there's no evidence that the ideas in question were ever seriously proposed to "professional game designers and business managers" during the early days of 3rd edition, and those "ideas" have been manifestly not shot down in many subsequent products. From Beshaba and Umberlee appearing in the Fiendish Codex I to Limbo appearing in Serpent Kingdoms to Pandemonium in Underdark to Gehenna being mentioned in the FCII web enhancement to the church of Lathander appearing in the gate-town of Ecstasy in Dragon Magazine, these ideas have been accepted by professional game designers and business managers time and time again. If you're going for truthiness rather than truth, at least have the courtesy to invent something more credible. "When one has ignored what has happened..." You seem to assume it as a given that there was some kind of problem with the Realms prior to 3e, but this is far from a given. There's a lot of unsubstantiated talk about how "polluted" the Realms became because of all the icky nasty other settings with their cooties and Bird Flu existing in a vague conceptual proximity, but no one has ever been able to cite actual examples of this causing demonstrable harm either on the conceptual or practical levels. I suspect this is because there has been no harm, except to the delicate and somewhat paranoid sensibilities of those who like to imagine problems where there are none. What's more, and perhaps more to the point, this is a problem the new cosmology has done nothing to solve - the Realms are as exposed to other worlds as they've ever been. If, in your campaign, you decide the other worlds don't exist or are too far away to be of any substantial influence, the problem goes away, and the cosmological model you choose to adopt has nothing to do with this. "When one starts assuming anything less than a wholesale RSE..." That's the thing. The cosmological shift was a Realms-Shaking Event equivalent in scope and clumsy execution to the Time of Troubles, with the only difference being that this one has no explanation. Shemmy's (or Todd's, or Wes's) position is that he would rather see an explained RSE than an unexplained one. Leaving it unexplained doesn't make it less clumsy, less arbitrary, or less of a deus ex machina, it just means that any interesting plot hooks that might result from the implications of an in-game explanation go unused. Gray's example of the Crisis of Infinite Worlds is a very good one - while it was a retcon, it had an in-world explanation, and they were able to mine it later in the Crisis story arc for more story and plot ideas. Regardless of your opinion on Crisis's execution, it was a plot that couldn't exist without the background given in the Crisis of Infinite Worlds. Similarly, the 3e cosmological shift might lead to new adventures in the same way, perhaps better executed than DC did, but surely not worse than WotC did in creating the shift in the first place, explanation or no. As I said, I don't necessarily agree that an explanation is desirable, but I now think (shifting my opinions since I made the effort to play Bane's advocate a paragraph ago) there's a good argument that it would be. I agree with Gray that it's good to leave the individual DM the freedom to do this herself, but I also agree with Miscellany that the DM always has this freedom regardless of canon. "Wishful thinking..." How so? You seem to be wishing you had a point to make here, but not quite deciding on what this might be. The limitations of mortal perception are a perfectly adequate explanation, and if you disagree with this, it's incumbent on you to say why. Your reply, as it was, was basically "No, you're wrong!" or perhaps "Nuh-uh!" or "I know you are, but what am I?" It was an aggressively worded non-argument, an anti-intellectual Philistinism, a schoolyard bully's tactic. the Magic Televisioon Analogy realies exactly on this concept The "Magic Television Analogy" works great in cases like the question of whether Drizzt is a 16th level ranger or a fighter/barbarian/ranger; there's no question that the latter more ably describes the character as he exists in his novels, and I can believe it more ably describes the character's hypothetical Platonic form. With the question of cosmology, it manifestly fails. The plane of Dweomerheart is not a clearer portrait of the realm's fluff as it existed before, as in the case of Drizzt's statistics, nor is it credible as a clearer view of a hypothetical Platonic or "real" version of the realm - it's clearly a left turn rather than a progression, which is an obvious and important distinction. Trying to cite the "magic television" in cosmological matters would work if the new cosmology had been designed with previous lore in mind - a cosmology that merely emphasized the role of the Fugue Plain and other distinctively Faerûnian planar features, changed some or all of the names of the planes, and created a more obvious barrier separating the Faerûnian realms from those of other worlds would meet that test - but as it was we have to believe that the "magic television" was not only fuzzy before, but tuned to another channel entirely. When citing the level of perception "from fictional mortal Faerûnian inhabitants," things are more credible because it's easily imaginable that such beings might be flawed. Trying to elevate this to the level of "real-life, rules-reading gamers" in this particular situation is a doomed undertaking, because for it to be credible we have to believe rules written in a third-person omniscient style were not just insufficient mechanically to describe its material, but were describing an entirely different multiverse. Waving abstractly at the "magic television" canard won't save your argument from the ridicule it deserves, I'm afraid. "You prevaricate each time you claim whole editions worth of material don’t ‘count’ anymore..." No, that claim is entirely valid; what's dishonest is claiming that the 1st and 2nd edition planar material still "count" in any meaningful way. While it's clear that, for example, The Player's Guide to Faerun is heavily inspired by On Hallowed Ground, taking most of its realm descriptions almost word-for-word from the earlier text, it's also clear that it describes an entirely different cosmos, where some of the things that happened in the cosmos as it was described in 2e simply couldn't have happened as they were described (for example, much of the plot of Tymora's Luck). The retcon was presented as a clean break from previous material, and I think you know this perfectly well for all your prevarications. But trading accusations of dishonesty isn't going to get us anywhere; I do so mainly to show how easy and ultimately meaningless such crude machinations really are in the hopes of defusing attempts of that nature in the future, hopefully forcing you to think about your positions and seriously attempt to defend them rather than wildly firing off poorly considered insults.
GothicDan 04-02-07, 02:59 PM	Rip, you are an eminently good read. I do hope you're not disappointed if your words have little actual effect on Miscellany (or her husband, if that's the one that's been posting, which in this case I believe it is). But in any event, it served as a good mid-afternoon nap-time story for me. ;)
Lord Karsus 04-02-07, 04:20 PM	AO didn't shut his room up very well if you can just do everything via the PoS anyway, did he? -That's someone crawling out through the cold, dark, clammy air conditioning vent. ;) The "Magic Television Analogy" works great in cases... -Forgive my ignorance, but what exactly is the "Magic Television Analogy". I gave it a quick look up on Wikipedia, but the best result was the Magical Mystery Tour, which is most undoubtedly not the same thing.
ripvanwormer 04-02-07, 04:44 PM	-Forgive my ignorance, but what exactly is the "Magic Television Analogy". I gave it a quick look up on Wikipedia, but the best result was the Magical Mystery Tour, which is most undoubtedly not the same thing. The basic idea is that the 1st edition version of the Forgotten Realms was "translated" from its "true" form, but this translation was somewhat garbled, like the signal on a television might be garbled with static. So when a 1st edition source says a character was a cavalier or a thief/acrobat or another 1st edition class, or when it lists all the psionic abilities Elminster had or gives ridiculously weak stats for Chauntea or Oghma, it's because the signal was poor. 2nd edition gave us a somewhat clearer picture of the setting, but was still fuzzy in many ways that 3rd edition ostensibly fixed. So 2nd edition gave a more powerful presentation of the gods and removed Elminster's psionic powers (they were actually arcane powers all along, but the game designers misunderstood due to the game mechanics available to them at the time). 3rd edition had a still better reception; its prestige classes and multiclassing are a better fit for many characters than 2e kits and multiclassing were. So before we had to assume Elminster's earlier character class abilities merely disappeared, but now they're part of his stat block. Before we had to assume that Drizzt's new ranger abilities that he gained on the surface somehow overwrote his earlier drow training and his experience as a hunter in the wild Underdark, but now we can express him as a character where all the different kinds of training he had add up to a more complex current form. The planar rules better fit (according to this reasoning) the multiverse as it actually is than the rules given in 1st or 2nd edition did. The rule works when discussing changes in mechanical rules - the idea is that the rules are only an approximation of the characters and situations, so some approximations might be more accurate than others. Changes to the setting's fluff are another matter entirely, though, and the Magic Television can't be invoked in the same way. If they were to say in 4th edition that Cormyr is actually on the Sword Coast and Waterdeep is its capital, a lot of lore would be invalidated or reinterpreted so drastically that it's no longer the same lore. We'd no longer be discussing the game rules as the receiver through which the signal (the "true" Realms) are interpreted, so it wouldn't be the same thing at all, for all of Miscellany's attempts at conflating the two. And yet changes of equal magnitude have been made in the Outer Planes. This is, as I said in my previous post, not a "better reception" of the same signal but a completely new signal. Miscellany realizes this, I think, finally resorting to claiming, without citing any evidence, that most people don't care that much about the planes anyway. This is irrelevant; the planes are still part of the setting, regardless of their popularity, and rather than striving to capture a more coherent image of that part of the setting they've abandoned it entirely, grafting a new set of planes on the bloody stump where another set once grew. Whether you care is another matter, but Miscellany is pretending it didn't happen at all.
Lord Karsus 04-02-07, 04:56 PM	-Aha, thank you.
ripvanwormer 04-02-07, 05:58 PM	It might help if I give more examples of situations where the Magic Television analogy works and situations where it doesn't. In the Inner Planes, if they were to say that there are only six Inner Planes (four elemental and two energy), and that those regions thought in previous editions to be quasi-elemental or para-elemental planes in their own right are actually only border regions between the six, the Magic Television analogy works perfectly well, in exactly the way that Miscellany described. They would be saying that the eighteen-plane model was a problem of faulty rules making a poor approximation of the in-game "reality," and that the six-plane model is more accurate. If, on the other hand, they were to claim (as the FRCS does) that the four elemental and two energy planes don't touch one another at all and can only be crossed between using the Material Plane as an intermediary, this is a major change with ramifications all over the place. Where does Cryonax dwell, for example - on the Plane of Air, the Plane of Water, or somewhere else entirely? Where do the Doomguard keep their citadels? Where do the efreet battle with the djinn? Where does Ghaunadaur dwell if not on the Paraelemental Plane of Ooze? The last question has of course an official answer; he was relocated, extremely improbably, to the plane recently pulled by Lolth out of the Abyss, despite having no connections to the drow pantheon apart from a common worshiper base. Even if they had put him in the Abyss, this would still be a retcon (or, if you prefer, a Realms-Shaking Event) and not merely "better reception" - the Abyss is not by any stretch a "more coherent" version of the border plane between Water and Earth. Another example: if they were to say that the gate-town to the plane of Warrior's Rest, called Xaos, is located on the edge of the House of Knowledge (which has an infinite spire in its center) and that the slaadi have a Spawning Stone in Warrior's Rest where they mate every season, that could all be explained nicely by the "Magic Television" analogy. If they say, to the contrary, that the slaadi have their greatest strength on a plane called the Supreme Throne which is separate from and has no connections with the plane where the githzerai dwell (the Warrior's Rest), that there are no gate-towns and, furthermore, it's always been that way, the Magic Television will not suffice to explain the difference. The Supreme Throne is not a more coherent version of Limbo, and the House of Knowledge is not a more coherent version of the Outlands. They're different planes - some of the races and realms in them are obviously inspired by races in realms in the planes of the 2e cosmology, but while they allowed 2e to inspire them they did abandon two edition's worth of material, consigning them to the dump of the no-longer-canon rather than building from them along the lines of the Magical TV model, and it's not prevarication to say so.
Zandilar 04-02-07, 07:03 PM	Heya, Sharess in her original incarnation of Bast (before absorbing Zandilar) was very much like the Bast of Egyptian myth - and she's still worshipped as such in Mulhorand. :) And I think you do have some right in saying that the Faerunian Tyr is similar in some ways to Forsetti; but On Hallowed Grounds makes it clear that they are the same deity nonetheless. Remember, deities can project slightly different aspects of themselves into various Spheres (such as the Corellon of Faerun is a little less andrygynous than that of Greyhawk); this explains Tyr and Loviatar (remembering that ALL deities can appear however they want, of course!) On Sharess/Bast, I think I'm going to have to agree to disagree. There is a lot of confusion about Bast, stemming from the fact that there were several female feline deitites in the Egyptian pantheon (Mekhit and Sekhmet are the other two I'm thinking of, and several aspects of Faerun Bast seem to have come from Mekhit (ie: her link to Anhur* as sometime consort)). Absorbing Felidae and Zandilar only sealed the deal, as far as differences go. I would say that there would have to come a point at which the aspect in Faerun becomes it's own entity. Sharess bears so little resemblance to Bast that she may as well be a totally different deity. Tyr, on the other hand, I'm kind of willing to still see him as the same entity as Earth Tyr - don't ask me why, as I have no real idea... Just a vague feeling. It probably has something to do with my own interpretation of him for my original campaign setting, where while he was the LG god of Law, he still bore striking resemblance to Faerun Tyr (this was way back in 1985 or so, and I hadn't even heard of the Forgotten Realms (I don't think it became a campaign setting until 1988?). So he developed that way quite independantly). I had basically grabbed the entire Norse pantheon and co-opted it for myself. Forsetti was even there, but that didn't really make much of a difference... There must be something about Tyr that makes people think he's some kind of benevolent justice deity! (Later, after I had discovered the Forgotten Realms, I eventually tied it to my setting via some portals, and sure enough Tyr of the Realms and Tyr of Bandar were the same entity. ;) But that's another story for another time... Let me just say that I love how Faerun is connected to everything via portals**.) * Sekhmet/Hathor, too, has a link to Anhur, in that she is his mother. ** That could include the Great Wheel, you know. Also, I stand by my Wheel and Tree are both Wood comment in my previous post.
Old Sage 04-02-07, 08:13 PM	FR became an officially published TSR setting in 1987.
Zandilar 04-03-07, 04:13 AM	Heya, FR became an officially published TSR setting in 1987. So I was almost right! :) I actually bought the campaign setting when it was all shiney and new... And then... I'm ashamed to admit this... :embarrass I sold it. :( Gods I wish I had kept it!
GothicDan 04-03-07, 07:23 AM	Heya, On Sharess/Bast, I think I'm going to have to agree to disagree. There is a lot of confusion about Bast, stemming from the fact that there were several female feline deitites in the Egyptian pantheon (Mekhit and Sekhmet are the other two I'm thinking of, and several aspects of Faerun Bast seem to have come from Mekhit (ie: her link to Anhur* as sometime consort)). Absorbing Felidae and Zandilar only sealed the deal, as far as differences go. I would say that there would have to come a point at which the aspect in Faerun becomes it's own entity. Sharess bears so little resemblance to Bast that she may as well be a totally different deity. Tyr, on the other hand, I'm kind of willing to still see him as the same entity as Earth Tyr - don't ask me why, as I have no real idea... Just a vague feeling. It probably has something to do with my own interpretation of him for my original campaign setting, where while he was the LG god of Law, he still bore striking resemblance to Faerun Tyr (this was way back in 1985 or so, and I hadn't even heard of the Forgotten Realms (I don't think it became a campaign setting until 1988?). So he developed that way quite independantly). I had basically grabbed the entire Norse pantheon and co-opted it for myself. Forsetti was even there, but that didn't really make much of a difference... There must be something about Tyr that makes people think he's some kind of benevolent justice deity! (Later, after I had discovered the Forgotten Realms, I eventually tied it to my setting via some portals, and sure enough Tyr of the Realms and Tyr of Bandar were the same entity. ;) But that's another story for another time... Let me just say that I love how Faerun is connected to everything via portals**.) * Sekhmet/Hathor, too, has a link to Anhur, in that she is his mother. ** That could include the Great Wheel, you know. Also, I stand by my Wheel and Tree are both Wood comment in my previous post. Now, I'm not all THAT 'up' on my Bast mythology... But wasn't one of her primary jobs (if not the first and most primary) the protection of Re's grain houses against snakes and other forms of vermin? Wouldn't that give her a sort of martial aspect, and link her to the patronage of Re (much like Sekhmet)?
Zandilar 04-03-07, 08:25 AM	Heya, Now, I'm not all THAT 'up' on my Bast mythology... But wasn't one of her primary jobs (if not the first and most primary) the protection of Re's grain houses against snakes and other forms of vermin? Wouldn't that give her a sort of martial aspect, and link her to the patronage of Re (much like Sekhmet)? Not as martial as Sekhmet tearing up humanity at Re's request and getting so into it Re had to trick her into getting drunk... Not as martial as Menhet (Menhit/Mekhit) who lead the Pharaoh's troops into battle and was known as "the Slaughterer". (Both deities are associated with lions.) Bast was, by comparison (and excuse the pun), a kitty cat. (Literally and figuratively.) Bast is concidered to be a wild goddess, unpredictable. It's part of the reason the Greeks associated her strongly enough with Artemis, that Bast herself came to be associated with the moon, rather than the sun. She's more a hunter goddess than a martial one - if I can draw that distinction - more associated with hunting than with war.
Faraer 04-03-07, 10:34 AM	Rip, there certainly are inconsistencies that the DM has to resolve. But:If they say, to the contrary, that the slaadi have their greatest strength on a plane called the Supreme Throne which is separate from and has no connections with the plane where the githzerai dwell (the Warrior's Rest), that there are no gate-towns and, furthermore, it's always been that way, the Magic Television will not suffice to explain the difference.The sources make very few claims that there are 'no connections', so more often than not it's easy to assume that both sets of connections exist/are possible, except when it doesn't suit the campaign. Some of the imagined problems come from misinterpreting the 2001 planar map (planes and links) as complete.
GothicDan 04-03-07, 04:33 PM	Not as martial as Sekhmet tearing up humanity at Re's request and getting so into it Re had to trick her into getting drunk... Not as martial as Menhet (Menhit/Mekhit) who lead the Pharaoh's troops into battle and was known as "the Slaughterer". (Both deities are associated with lions.) Bast was, by comparison (and excuse the pun), a kitty cat. (Literally and figuratively.) Bast is concidered to be a wild goddess, unpredictable. It's part of the reason the Greeks associated her strongly enough with Artemis, that Bast herself came to be associated with the moon, rather than the sun. She's more a hunter goddess than a martial one - if I can draw that distinction - more associated with hunting than with war. True, not as martial, more 'predatory'... But still obviously aspects of the same 'archetype' of deity: an aggressive, hostile (in one form or another) feminine, feline deity that acted at the behest of a solar power (Re). Different branches of the same baseline, but still representative of a similar archetype, in my opinion. After all, as far as divine things go, remember that there's a LOT of little stigmas attached that one's portfolio alone wouldn't indicate (Athene being seen as a 'war goddess,' for example, even though her 'proper portfolio' was more about civilization; Ares being seen typically as a god of barbarism and failure in war, even though he was only 'war'.) So, in the Mulhorandi pantheon, which lacked both Sekhmet and Menhet, it would make sense that, to fill that gap, Bast would have expanded to include their natures in her own archetypal role. I think so, at least.
ShadezofDis 04-03-07, 06:27 PM	So, in the Mulhorandi pantheon, which lacked both Sekhmet and Menhet, it would make sense that, to fill that gap, Bast would have expanded to include their natures in her own archetypal role. I think so, at least. And who knows, perhaps Bast got her appetite for gods early on. Perhaps she did so at the behest of Re. . . an sorta "spiralled out of control" and he's had to reign her in (ah, history repeating itself is a true sign of a portfolio driving a diety :))
Gray Richardson 04-03-07, 07:18 PM	Rip, there certainly are inconsistencies that the DM has to resolve. But:The sources make very few claims that there are 'no connections', so more often than not it's easy to assume that both sets of connections exist/are possible, except when it doesn't suit the campaign. Some of the imagined problems come from misinterpreting the 2001 planar map (planes and links) as complete.I quite agree. The lore of the Tree that has been presented so far is not complete or exhaustive by any means, and should not be taken as the whole picture. There is a lot of blank canvas (or unadorned branches) that needs to be filled in. There is definitely room to elaborate on topics such as: how do the Slaadi relate to the Githzerai in the Realms? and Where is Shekinester's realm located? and How many types of guardinals are there exactly in the Realms? I enjoy that there are mysteries about the Tree that give us room to discuss and speculate. As well as let talented folks like Tom Costa write intriguing lore about the fading plane of Zigguraxas and new outsiders unique to the planes of Faerun. But just because there are not, as yet, official answers to some of these questions, it does not mean that answers won't come in time. Half the fun of the Forgotten Realms for me is to read new sourcebooks looking for hints and new lore to solve these mysteries and fill in the gaps.
Zandilar 04-03-07, 07:35 PM	Heya, True, not as martial, more 'predatory'... But still obviously aspects of the same 'archetype' of deity: an aggressive, hostile (in one form or another) feminine, feline deity that acted at the behest of a solar power (Re). Different branches of the same baseline, but still representative of a similar archetype, in my opinion. After all, as far as divine things go, remember that there's a LOT of little stigmas attached that one's portfolio alone wouldn't indicate (Athene being seen as a 'war goddess,' for example, even though her 'proper portfolio' was more about civilization; Ares being seen typically as a god of barbarism and failure in war, even though he was only 'war'.) You also need to take into account during what period of Egypt the gods existed in before they interloped to Faerun. After all, originally Bast was associated with the sun, but after the Greeks got done with her, she was associated with the moon. So if no one can agree on what Bast is about, we can only conclude that the Bast who interloped to Faerun was an interpretation of a more complicated/complex being. As such, she'd only have a passing resemblance to the original Earth Bast. So, in the Mulhorandi pantheon, which lacked both Sekhmet and Menhet, it would make sense that, to fill that gap, Bast would have expanded to include their natures in her own archetypal role. I think so, at least. Well, yes. I agree. That's a pretty good theory. :) In any event, it just proves how little Bast bore in common with her original if she had to take on some of Sekhmet(Hathor)'s and Mekhit's aspects to begin with. ;) However, the Mulhorandi pantheon does have Hathor, a Hathor who seems to have been stripped of her alternate personality, Sekhmet. (So no, ShadezofDis, Bast didn't absorb Sekhmet! :)) All this aside, Sharess bears little resemblance to Bast. ;) Every step she's taken since arriving in Faerun appears to have been steps away from her original self, and embracing a much more sexual/sexuality/sensuality/pleasure centered aspect... Bast had nothing to do with those things, except, perhaps, as it related to cats (being naturally hedonistic, but simply so). (I believe Bes may be the god I'm thinking of, but the Egyptian deity of sex/pleasure was basically an ugly little man of a god - who, ironically, probably began as a cat (lion) deity himself. In later periods he came to be seen as the god of the finer things in life, since he drove away misfortune... In fact, just on my short jaunt around the 'net looking for Bes, it seems his "portfolio" resembles Sharess's at least superficially - it certianly has about as much in common with her as Bast's does.) It's complex and convoluted, but I'll conceed that most of the Mulhorandi deities were simplfied versions of their originals when they arrived in Faerun. However, time and distance has changed them. This will only ever become a problem if one's players are going to be in the position to encounter the original versions (ie: players in the game might encounter the original Bast if they went to Heliopolis(?)/Ysgard(?)* in the Planes - confusing since Sharess lives in Brightwater (a plane to itself on the Tree, but a part of Aborea/Olympus on the Wheel)), otherwise it really is just a matter of curiosity. * I don't have my books, so that's my memory at work. I might have the wrong plane.
BrennonGoldeye 04-03-07, 08:35 PM	Prrr.rrr.rr.r.r.....
GothicDan 04-03-07, 09:08 PM	Now, Bes, a leonine deity? I was never aware of that.... I think I'd like him much more in his 'original' incarnation. I was always aware of the ugly midget version (often with a large phallus, I think?) who served as a guardian against misfortune for the aristocracy... Zandilar, I'd love to talk to you more about feline-esque deities sometimes. I'm a huge lion-lover, myself. ;) Mmmm, Nobanion. I'd really love to see his clergy and Sharess's get more comfy with each other. I really like the idea of a Chaotic and Lawful deity trying to 'get along.'
ripvanwormer 04-04-07, 12:13 AM	All this aside, Sharess bears little resemblance to Bast. ;) Every step she's taken since arriving in Faerun appears to have been steps away from her original self What makes you think she hasn't been doing the same thing on other worlds? If her aspect on the Outer Planes has been evolving along similar lines, then she may still be essentially the same goddess, even acknowledging the isolation forced upon her Torilian avatar due to the Imaskari barrier. Even her aspect on Earth may be different now that she was in ancient Egypt. The Bast of Mulhorand is closely based on the Bast from 1e Deities & Demigods and 2e Legends & Lore, and there really isn't much difference between them. While all of the above have differences from the historical Bast, that doesn't really affect D&D very much. Regardless, when the barrier was removed, her Torilian avatar merged with her Outer Planar self; probably both goddess and avatar changed a little with the reunion.
Stigger 04-04-07, 01:22 AM	I thought the clergy of Nobanion and Sharess were already pretty damned comfortable with each other as far as the wemics of the Shining Plains and the Shadi'ar of the Arnarden were concerned. Didn't gather there was tension between the two of them on a more divine level either...
Zandilar 04-04-07, 02:57 AM	Heya, What makes you think she hasn't been doing the same thing on other worlds? If her aspect on the Outer Planes has been evolving along similar lines, then she may still be essentially the same goddess, even acknowledging the isolation forced upon her Torilian avatar due to the Imaskari barrier. Even her aspect on Earth may be different now that she was in ancient Egypt. The Bast of Mulhorand is closely based on the Bast from 1e Deities & Demigods and 2e Legends & Lore, and there really isn't much difference between them. While all of the above have differences from the historical Bast, that doesn't really affect D&D very much. Regardless, when the barrier was removed, her Torilian avatar merged with her Outer Planar self; probably both goddess and avatar changed a little with the reunion. That's another interesting theory. We don't know what the Dungeons and Dragons Bast has been up to on the planes. There is no mention of Sharess in the more recent Deities and Demigods (I'd check to make sure, but I'm still away from my books), so I guess they're assuming they're seperate entities. Deities and Demigods (of both incarnations) and Legends and Lore have interpretations of real world mythologies (one person's mythology is another person's religion). In many cases they're pretty wildly wrong. For example - look up Sif some time. Compare what they write about her in the DnD books to some real Earth mythology about her. Sif was a rather unimportant fertility goddess, her golden hair symbolised grain, whose main claims to fame were being Thor's wife, and having her hair shorn and ultimately replaced by Loki (Who replaced it with hair made by dwarves from spin gold, lest he suffer Thor's wrath). Sif in Dungeons and Dragons is the goddess of swords and excellence in combat (or something similar to that), if I recall correctly. Quite a bit different, isn't it?
Shemeska the Marauder 04-04-07, 03:36 AM	That's another interesting theory. We don't know what the Dungeons and Dragons Bast has been up to on the planes. There is no mention of Sharess in the more recent Deities and Demigods (I'd check to make sure, but I'm still away from my books), so I guess they're assuming they're seperate entities. 3e D&DG's Bast isn't even the same Bast in the Great Wheel, much less her aspect as Sharess. 3e D&DG doesn't present the various historical pantheons in the context of their prior (and current) presence within the D&D multiverse. Likely owing to the creative restrictions in place at the time, or possibly designer quirk, or both, the book presents versions of the historical pantheons in one-off, standalone cosmologies with zero inclusion of their history within D&D (and at times bizarre deviation from their historical selves as well, like in the case of how 3e D&DG handles Set and Apep).
Zandilar 04-04-07, 04:01 AM	Heya, 3e D&DG's Bast isn't even the same Bast in the Great Wheel, much less her aspect as Sharess. 3e D&DG doesn't present the various historical pantheons in the context of their prior (and current) presence within the D&D multiverse. Likely owing to the creative restrictions in place at the time, or possibly designer quirk, or both, the book presents versions of the historical pantheons in one-off, standalone cosmologies with zero inclusion of their history within D&D (and at times bizarre deviation from their historical selves as well, like in the case of how 3e D&DG handles Set and Apep). As far as I understood, all the non-setting-specific god-books are like that. They all present stand alone versions of the pantheons, but gave no context beyond the pantheon. I think this might have something to do with presenting pre-made pantheons that people could just plug into their game worlds (which I happily did for my first home brewed world, but subsequently I've come up with my own). I do have some Planescape books*, and I do recall that there was more information about the various deities and their pantheons - but Planescape is obviously a setting to itself (even if it does have tentacles in every** other setting, bar Eberron). :) What I don't recall is if the Forgotten Realms version of Bast (Sharess) had any influence on her Planescape version (given the Time of Troubles occured at the start of 2nd Ed, which was well before the Realms Planar Retcon was a spark in anyone's eye). All in all, I'd expect that one would end up trumping the other, or else they'd split and become seperate entites. The other thing I'm thinking of in Planescape context is Tyche. She split into Beshaba and Tymora - but again I can't recall what happened to Planescape Tyche... If they were the same entity, wouldn't you expect her to have vanished from the Greek pantheon? All this god stuff is making my brain ache. :P * Not having access to my books is starting to become tiresome. *sigh* ** That was until they retconned the planar aspects of the Forgotten Realms.
Shemeska the Marauder 04-04-07, 04:24 AM	The other thing I'm thinking of in Planescape context is Tyche. She split into Beshaba and Tymora - but again I can't recall what happened to Planescape Tyche... If they were the same entity, wouldn't you expect her to have vanished from the Greek pantheon? 'On Hallowed Ground' made specific mention of the Greek Tyche vanishing, her former deific realm slowly falling apart, but tellingly that no godisle had formed on the Astral, and it linked it to the Torillian events. Several members of her former pantheon have tried looking for her, with Pan and Hermes trying to gain deific access to Toril in order to find out what happened to her. Whether she truly was split permenantly into Tymora and Beshaba, or if Tyche is only just manifesting in two clashing forms and Torillian mortals are confused about the truth of the matter is left up in the air, but the Greek gods are more in the dark than anyone else on the issue.
GothicDan 04-04-07, 10:10 AM	In other words... In 2E, there was no "Planescape" version and "FR version" of deities. :) I like this a lot. It actually allowed for a larger sphere of interaction.
ripvanwormer 04-04-07, 03:16 PM	Planescape is obviously a setting to itself Not in the way that you're implying. Planescape could be played on its own, but it didn't have a canon separate from that of other D&D worlds. As Shemmy said, Planescape's Tyche had explicitly split into Tymora and Beshaba - there was no difference between the goddess as she was worshiped in Toril and the goddess elsewhere. Deities and Demigods (of both incarnations) and Legends and Lore have interpretations of real world mythologies (one person's mythology is another person's religion). In many cases they're pretty wildly wrong. This is absolutely true, but doesn't support the argument that I think you were trying to make. The interloper gods of Faerun - Loviatar, Oghma, Silvanus, Tyr, and so on - are still the same gods known to the planes and other worlds for the most part. The problem you're identifying is that the gods on the planes aren't very much like those gods were in the real world; this doesn't mean they're not much like the same gods on other D&D worlds. As for Bast, yes - the planar Bast is identical to the Bast/Sharess of Mulhorand. They're the same sensuous predator, goddess of cats and physical pleasure. Zandilar the Dancer merged with Bast on whatever plane she might reside, not just on the Material Plane. There are gods whose aspect on Faerun is different - the only one that comes to mind right now is Horus-Re, who is just plain Horus on Arcadia - but Bast isn't one of them.
miscellany 04-05-07, 02:19 AM	Ahh...work is hard. But there you go. ::::::::::::::::::: Reading Rip’s multi-post response was a lot like reading the transcript of a well-behaved teenager who’s finally worked up the nerve to go off on his father. That is, the argument is filled with good points and the words ring true in as much as they are absolutely true from the point of view of the youth, but ultimately it’s that youthful perspective that’s lacking and simply can’t get better without age, experience and the benefit of outside wisdom.* Thus, me. ;) For all that Rip’s actually got me thinking outside of my usual read-and-respond routine, which is nice. It’s good to finally find someone worth tangling with. (Sorry Daniel, I’ve found another.) I hope to have a ‘proper’ response soon. If there’s enough time I can even try to hearken back to my college days and get all school-ish wordy with it. Good night everyone! :D *Not that I'm saying we're that far apart in age difference; it just reads that way
Stigger 04-05-07, 04:42 AM	Interestingly condescending there Miscellany... Not a clue as to what you're talking about in regards to Rip's apparent age showing in his words, I certainly didn't see any evidence of that. Those were valid points he raised by and large, and the demeaning attitude is only adding credence to his personal observations regarding yourself. You can't possibly expect to come into a debate with such a remarkably dismissive attitude and not expect to raise hackles and ire. If your intent is to put him on the defensive immediately, it's only proving his point. If not, then you might want to consider looking for more tactfully mature ways of putting things, lest you show yourself to be just as much a 'youth' as you're contending Rip is. Just consider this a piece of friendly advice. ;)
Zandilar 04-05-07, 07:32 AM	Heya, Not in the way that you're implying. Planescape could be played on its own, but it didn't have a canon separate from that of other D&D worlds. As Shemmy said, Planescape's Tyche had explicitly split into Tymora and Beshaba - there was no difference between the goddess as she was worshiped in Toril and the goddess elsewhere. Well by the first statement there, all the 2nd Ed settings were the same. They could be stand alone, or they could be linked to Planescape. ;) At any rate, I do believe Planescape did have a canon all to itself - it mostly revolved around Sigil and the Blood War. But thank you for clarifying the situation with Tyche (as much as it can be clarified)... It would make for an interesting story to see what happened when others of her pantheon went looking for her in the Realms. This is absolutely true, but doesn't support the argument that I think you were trying to make. The interloper gods of Faerun - Loviatar, Oghma, Silvanus, Tyr, and so on - are still the same gods known to the planes and other worlds for the most part. The problem you're identifying is that the gods on the planes aren't very much like those gods were in the real world; this doesn't mean they're not much like the same gods on other D&D worlds. Excellent point! :D I'm afraid to say that my mind keeps turning to the Real World (tm) versions of those deities, which does trip me up most of the time. :) What would be interesting would be to see the version of Earth that is just one of the many Prime Material planes connected to the Planescape setting. As for Bast, yes - the planar Bast is identical to the Bast/Sharess of Mulhorand. They're the same sensuous predator, goddess of cats and physical pleasure. Zandilar the Dancer merged with Bast on whatever plane she might reside, not just on the Material Plane. There are gods whose aspect on Faerun is different - the only one that comes to mind right now is Horus-Re, who is just plain Horus on Arcadia - but Bast isn't one of them. I'm confused. :confused: Why the double standard? I'd have thought merging with Re was definitely on a par with Bast merging with Felidae and Zandilar, given Re was very powerful...
Stigger 04-05-07, 07:36 AM	Re's avatar was cut off from the Planes at the time, so what happened to him wouldn't have affected his planar self when the two merged, which wasn't the case with Zandilar or Felidae, if I'm reading Rip correctly there.
ShadezofDis 04-05-07, 09:48 AM	Reading Rip’s multi-post response was a lot like reading the transcript of a well-behaved teenager who’s finally worked up the nerve to go off on his father. Starting off* with an insult, I'm not at all suprised. Since I don't have a good feel for the history of the board I can't comment on the "assuming a position of superiority" because it very well may be that several years ago you were teaching Rip everything he/she knew. That is, the argument is filled with good points and the words ring true in as much as they are absolutely true from the point of view of the youth, but ultimately it’s that youthful perspective that’s lacking and simply can’t get better without age, experience and the benefit of outside wisdom.* I'd call BS but I'll wait for an actual responce that is backed up, rather than another belittling "stealing a position of superiority without backing up the position" statement, before solidifying my opinion of this. Thus, me. ;) I'm going to assume that this is a more joking statement, but it continues along the lines of the "stealing a position of superiority without backing it up" I hope to have a ‘proper’ response soon. If there’s enough time I can even try to hearken back to my college days and get all school-ish wordy with it. Sometimes using "school-ish" words makes the statement clearer, it certainly seems to be the case with Rip's post though I'm not suprised to see the belittling of Rip continuing. *Not that I'm saying we're that far apart in age difference; it just reads that way To you. It reads quite the opposite to myself. *Well, sentence #3 anyhow
GothicDan 04-05-07, 11:58 AM	For all that Rip’s actually got me thinking outside of my usual read-and-respond routine, which is nice. It’s good to finally find someone worth tangling with. (Sorry Daniel, I’ve found another.) But I love to hate you. :( In any event, it's good to know that I'm not the only one who sees Miscellany's husband's (I believe) manner of debate as childish, condescending, dismissive, disrespectful, and hypocritical. I'm not quite insane yet, it seems. Ah well. It's back to studying differential equations for me. And then index of refraction labs. Mmm...
ShadezofDis 04-05-07, 12:33 PM	In any event, it's good to know that I'm not the only one who sees Miscellany's husband's (I believe) manner of debate as childish, condescending, dismissive, disrespectful, and hypocritical. I'm not quite insane yet, it seems. Nope :) Ah well. It's back to studying differential equations for me. And then index of refraction labs. Mmm... Though, if this is what you're doing for most of the day, it could happen any second. ;)
MaskedOne 04-05-07, 03:04 PM	But I love to hate you. :( In any event, it's good to know that I'm not the only one who sees Miscellany's husband's (I believe) snip Both GD. It doesn't matter whether Miscellany or her husband is the one typing at any given moment. If she chooses to let her husband have free access to her account after this long with full knowledge of his posting manner then she chooses to share responsibility for everything he posts. If she has a problem with that than one of the two needs a new account. It's not as if the accounts cost anything to the user. WotC provides them for free and they don't take long to make.
ripvanwormer 04-05-07, 06:57 PM	Well by the first statement there, all the 2nd Ed settings were the same. They could be stand alone, or they could be linked to Planescape. ;) At any rate, I do believe Planescape did have a canon all to itself - it mostly revolved around Sigil and the Blood War. The settings weren't the same, but they had a shared canon. The difference is that while they could indeed be played separately, their official backstories weren't generally incompatible. Sigil was seldom mentioned in non-Planescape books, but the Blood War was (as it predated Planescape by several years). It even has quite a significant role in some of the Greyhawk books written before Planescape came out. What would be interesting would be to see the version of Earth that is just one of the many Prime Material planes connected to the Planescape setting. Yes, I've been playing with that idea myself recently (http://www.canonfire.com/cfhtml/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=2507). Why the double standard? I think it's primarily related to different philosophies of different game designers. Colin McComb, in On Hallowed Ground, was very much trying for a "whole-D&D" metasetting, while Eric Boyd in Powers & Pantheons was more open to the idea of gods having distinctive aspects from sphere to sphere. In Eric Boyd's view, a god could be dead from the perspective of one world while still alive on others - Zinzerena is an example of this. On Hallowed Ground said that Kiputytto, slain by Talona, was dead on every world. I think if Eric Boyd had written that book, she would have only been definitively dead on Toril. Perhaps Eric is simply more conservative than Colin, less willing to tinker with the canon of other settings. So Tyche's role in the planes was defined in On Hallowed Ground, but Horus-Re's situation wasn't really defined until Powers & Pantheons later on. That's the double standard. Still, neither designer claimed that the aspects of the gods in the Realms had become entirely separate entities from their "parent" forms. I would characterize them instead as jewels with many facets. Of course, in the new cosmology things are different.
Shemeska the Marauder 04-05-07, 11:16 PM	Try thinking of it this way: now you get to play second-fiddle, psycophant-chearleader for whomever I'm talking to. He's hardly a sychophant. But that aside, do you think we can move past the name calling please. It would be appreciated.
BrennonGoldeye 04-06-07, 08:13 AM	Aw, check them out. They are just soooo cute. Welcome Mr.:ayyyy!:
ripvanwormer 04-06-07, 03:32 PM	He's hardly a sycophant. How disappointing. I was excited about finally getting sycophants of my own, too. The distinct lack of kowtowing and groveling should have tipped me off that it was too good to be true.
Lord Karsus 04-06-07, 06:21 PM	-In all seriousness, though, Rip's argument is very solid. I can't really see how Mr. M is going to refute it "in game", which is where the problem stems from.
ShadezofDis 04-06-07, 06:47 PM	-In all seriousness, though, Rip's argument is very solid. I can't really see how Mr. M is going to refute it "in game", which is where the problem stems from. Your not the only one. :) But then, someone who mistakes respect and admiration for sycophant tendencies isn't someone I expect much from. :) I am open to being suprised though
GothicDan 04-06-07, 09:14 PM	I'd prostrate myself before Rip, but he's a bit too Chaotic for my tastes. I'm distinctly Mechanitian.
Mr_Miscellany 04-08-07, 05:02 AM	So, if you read my post above you can see I've not had much time to put together a proper response. In liue of such, here's the source material I'm working from: 1997: Ryan Dancey's Secret Trip to TSR (http://web.archive.org/web/20040530094717/http://atlasofadventure.com/Archive/TSR1997Buyout.asp) Some good quotes from that document: We listened when customers told us that they didn't want the confusing, jargon filled world of Planescape. Our customers were telling us that we produced too many products, and that the stuff we produced was of inferior quality? We can fix that. We can cut back on the number of products we release, and work hard to make sure that each and every book we publish is useful, interesting, and of high quality. Our customers were telling us that we spent too much time on our own worlds, and not enough time on theirs? Ok - we can fix that. We can re-orient the business towards tools, towards examples, towards universal systems and rules that aren't dependent on owning a thousand dollars of unnecessary materials first. 1999: Breakdown of RPG Players, A 2-Axis Analysis of a Survey (http://www.seankreynolds.com/rpgfiles/gaming/BreakdownOfRPGPlayers.html) 2000: Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0 (http://www.seankreynolds.com/rpgfiles/gaming/WotCMarketResearchSummary.html) 2003: A Player's Guide to Faerûn Discussion Turns Into A Bit Of A Cosmology Discussion (http://p082.ezboard.com/fseankreynoldsboardsfrm2.showMessageRang e?topicID=780.topic&start=1&stop=20) and... 2003: A Proper Cosmology Discussion (http://p082.ezboard.com/fseankreynoldsboardsfrm20.showMessage?to picID=2.topic) It's lots of reading, but very informative. Amongst other things I hope to use it to show WotC did not and does not make product decisions willy nilly; on the contrary they are consistently methodical and reasoned in their approach. Thus Reynold's (Wizard's, really) choices regarding the Great Tree were a logical progression of the same factual data collecting WotC engaged in prior to 3E's release (where that data was used to inform their decisions on what kind of product 3E D&D should become). I've added quotes from Dancey to show how WotC learned from its customers that TSR produced too many redundant settings and gave to much of its attention to those settings instead of writing products to let customers interact with those settings, so it needed to whittle down that count to allow new (and old) customers alike to get into the (new) game. Rip claims, “...There's a lot of unsubstantiated talk about how "polluted" the Realms became because of all the icky nasty other settings with their cooties and Bird Flu existing in a vague conceptual proximity...” ...Silly words aside, his claim is still understandable. The sources above coupled with Dancey’s quotes show it to be false, however. :D This post, too, should get bigger (barring any more unexpected gifts) ;)
GothicDan 04-08-07, 02:23 PM	So, where's all of the information NOT directly from SKR's mouth? (It's truly interesting that Mr. Miscellany seems to love SKR as much as I dislike him... And did even before our little brawl on Candlekeep.)
Mr_Miscellany 04-08-07, 02:29 PM	Re-read the post, Dan. I linked to at least three documents penned by Ryan Dancey. The first set of quotes in my post above were written by him and not Reynolds. Regardless, Reynold's is under no compunction to lie or mislead. While he tends to none-to-delicately hammer people with the truth when he thinks they're behaving/thinking like idiots, truth is all he uses. Further, Reynold's echoing of Dancey's conclusions and factual data on the customer base shows how WotC took what it found out about its customers and spread that knowledge to its brand managers, editors, game designers and business managers. When the Great Tree was designed out of the Great Wheel, it was hardly an uninformed, biased conspiracy of one.
GothicDan 04-08-07, 02:32 PM	I do apologize for skimming. I did mouse-overs and noticed how almost all of the links went to SKR's personal pages. ;) That being said, at the very least I can respect him for not backing down with his opinion. That's something I'll never do. Of course, when the 'truth' is calibrated so differently on two different peoples' systems, it means that you could have a pistol fight and kill everyone in the town without actually ever striking each other in a meaningful way. I like to think that there's no 'truth' as far as RPG sort of stuff goes... So much as preference and theme.
Stigger 04-08-07, 05:52 PM	Looks more like opinion than it looks like truth if you ask me, at least as far as the cosmology discussion is concerned. The survey information was really interesting though... not sure what it has to do with this discussion really, beyond Planescape not being as popular as other stuff, but without knowing the specifics of the survey, there's no way to really use it meaningfully unless you intend to extrapolate conclusions from it wholecloth without being able to find out if the data actually supports your conclusions or not. As to the specific PS material referred to in that discussion thread you linked... I didn't really see much in they way of justification of why it was stuck in there beyond rebuttal to questions he (SKR) never really got around to answering the questions in a lot of ways, at least as far as I could tell. Its an interesting counter-offensive tactic to avoid actual answers as best I could tell. But that's just my take on it...
Mr_Miscellany 04-08-07, 07:23 PM	OK my turn on the computer. I do apologize for skimming. It's OK as you probably guessed I do that a lot. :embarrass That being said, at the very least I can respect him for not backing down with his opinion. Well FWIW he will back down, if someone shows him he's wrong. He'll also apologize if he misinterprets someone. He's just very exacting about it.
ripvanwormer 04-08-07, 11:22 PM	Amongst other things I hope to use it to show WotC did not and does not make product decisions willy nilly I didn't mean to imply that it did; however, there's still no evidence that the specific issue of cosmology was the subject of any substantial debate, which is what we were actually talking about. The "where those ideas were shot down by professional game designers and business managers..." claim remains something that Mr Miscellany made up. It may be a reasonable interpretation, but it's based more on Mister M's hopes and dreams than on the actual evidence we have. None of the research cited shows anything about preference vis a vis the planes or planar systems and it remains true that, with the substantial turnover in the company, the rigid "don't pollute my pristine Realms with your ickiness" paradigm has crumbled. Professional game designers and business managers don't care that much about cosmology anymore, if they ever did, and at least some of them are actively against the newer paradigm (Erik Mona is the only one I've seen speak against it actively; Ed Greenwood has his own distintive interpretation that he subtly promotes while being careful not to openly criticize WotC's policies, even as he contradicts them). As for the genesis of the "uni-cosmology," it was recounted by Roger E. Moore in his essay "Gates in the World of Greyhawk (http://www.holdfast.org/WoGgates.rtf)" (this isn't part of my argument, it's just FYI): When the Games division came up with the SPELLJAMMER® campaign in 1988 or so, Jeff Grubb decided that all mention of "alternate worlds" or "alternate Prime Material Planes" in the AD&D® game actually referred to planets in other Crystal Spheres (the gigantic solid shells containing solar system, according to SPELLJAMMER game cosmology). I thought this was a refreshingly unscientific invention that got rid of such troublesome modern concepts as galaxies, quasars, etc. The concept also got rid of a vexing proliferation of universes and planes that was undercutting the developing Big Picture of the multiverse. (Sample problem: Did each new alternate Prime Material Plane have its own Zeus? We decided not.) The PLANESCAPE™ setting has made use of this same idea to whittle down the "alternate planes" by turning them into worlds, and life has been much simpler. Note that both the Forgotten Realms and Dragonlance were firmly part of the "uni-cosmology" as early as 1987. By the way, I very much like Sean K. Reynolds on a personal level, from my few interactions with him. Yes, I've seen him arguing with D&D fans extremely heatedly, but I've never had a problem with him personally. Thus Reynold's (Wizard's, really) choices regarding the Great Tree were a logical progression of the same factual data There is no "thus" here; you've made a non sequitur. You're saying, "WotC did careful research regarding people's general gaming preferences, therefore they did so with regard to cosmology specifically," but that doesn't follow at all. In fact, we know almost certainly they did not, since if the surveys had covered those matters they would have said so. If you read SKR's actual recount of the decision-making process, he never cites or even alludes vaguely to any customer research on the subject. In fact, none of his arguments support the "Great Tree" at all. He argues that no meta-setting should "trump" the needs of the Forgotten Realms specifically, but there are many ways of establishing the Realms' sovereignty without rewriting previous material completely. They could have invoked the "magic television" and "adjusted the tuning" of the planes, keeping older ideas as they appeared in sourcebooks and novels but reinterpreted them through an FR-specific receptor. Instead, they threw out the sourcebooks and novels, created an entirely new skeleton, and cherry-picked previous-edition planar material as it suited their fancy. This went far beyond the mandate of even SKR's arguments. While WotC very much wanted to know what RPG fans wanted when they designing 3e, it's a ludicrous stretch to assume that every step in their game design was vetted through some complex screening process. Some things were done just because someone thought it was cool and no one objected terribly. Saying that certain ideas were "shot down" implies somebody raised their hands and timidly suggested, "Please, sir, why don't we try to make the FR cosmology as compatible as possible with other planar material?" and someone else looked at them sternly and said, "No, our market research suggests that customers would hate that." This is a fantasy. What really happened was recounted pretty clearly by Monte Cook on his website (http://www.montecook.com/cgi-bin/page.cgi?mc_diary_33): First off, let me say that there's nothing wrong with the Core Cosmology, or, what we used to call the Great Wheel. I mean, there are probably few people as familiar with the Great Wheel as I am -- I'm on a first-name basis with the planes of Dungeons & Dragons. Still, while working on Planescape, I would occasionally feel limited or confined by the nature of the D&D cosmology. In a way, the planes sometimes seemed too ordered, or too well defined. It might seem silly when talking about a number of infinite spaces, but every once in a while, I felt like there just wasn't enough room. In my home campaigns (when I wasn't playing Planescape), I didn't use the Great Wheel. I figured that a lot of other people didn't, either. So when it came time to talk about the planes during the development of 3rd Edition, I think I surprised everyone by being the first and primary proponent of the idea that not every campaign needed to exist within the same cosmological setup. (As a point in my favor in the discussions, I also knew first-hand how hard it was during my tenure on Planescape development to rationalize that the worlds of Dragonlance, the Forgotten Realms, Greyhawk, Mystara, and the rest all shared the same cosmology.) I remember that meeting well. I could tell by the looks on people's faces that, when I opened my mouth to speak, they thought I'd blather on about Planescape and Sigil and how it's at the heart of everything. I hope Planescape fans don't feel betrayed when I tell you that I didn't say that at all. The cosmology set up in the original Manual of the Planes, which was based on an appendix in the 1st Edition Player's Handbook (which itself had its roots in original D&D) is great. But it's not the only way to do planes. Not by a long shot. Thus, the 3rd Edition Manual of the Planes presents what's now called the Core Cosmology, but it also talks about creating your own cosmology. (This was one of the first 3rd Edition products in development, so the 3rd Edition team had a lot of influence over its design.) Nifty. In fact, the whole book is nifty, and -- if I do say so myself -- owes an awful lot to Planescape. In fact, about 95 percent of the details of the planes found in that book were actually taken right out of various Planescape products. But I digress. No surveys or customer research or stern marketing directors, no "shooting down" querulous naysayers, just Monte Cook and his idea. I'm willing to wager that the Great Tree was put together the same way. Sean K. didn't send surveys out asking people whether they would prefer if Cyric had his own plane or if he shared one with Diirinka, Talos, Garagos and Auril; he didn't even send a survey asking whether people prefered a cosmology grouped by alignment or theme. He just sat down and designed something. I don't fault him for this - designing stuff is his job, and part of me hates how designers are expected to be less about creativity and more about research the longer the game lasts. I sympathize with those who want to invent their own stuff, like the founding fathers and occasional mothers of old. The one planar-specific survey result I see cited is: But _most_ FR campaigns never leave FR (we've done surveys on this). And as I said in my previous post, that's really not a relevant issue. Popular or not, the planes are part of the setting (which is of course why they're mentioned in the 3e Campaign Setting book at all - because a setting's cosmology affects its flavor. With a drastically new cosmology [as opposed to a more subtly new one that they could as easily have provided], the Forgotten Realms have a somewhat different flavor.). My intention in this thread isn't to lambaste designers for the choices they made, but mostly to point out what should be obvious - of all the possible routes Sean K. could have taken in redesigning the planes, the "magic television" route wasn't the one he chose. He redesigned them entirely, and while this opened up new possibilities, it also closed a heck of a lot of them off. Some of us liked the specific features found in the Planescape cosmology, but they don't always fit so well in the Great Tree. While Dragonlance, Dark Sun, Birthright, and Mystara didn't always fit so well in Planescape, Forgotten Realms always did, even better than Greyhawk did - the two settings (FR and the Wheel) grew up together, and there was never a time prior to 3e that FR was assumed to be separate. Ryan Dancey noted that Planescape's cant wasn't so popular among many - this is true, but hardly evidence that FR fans demanded an end to the planes that had been part of AD&D in one form or another since The Strategic Review newsletter #6 in February 1976. The redesign went far beyond anything that could possibly be attributed to Planescape-hate, reaching with sharpened scalpels into the very pulsing heart of the game. The point isn't that this bothers me aesthetically, although it does - my point is that it was unnecessary, that it had nothing to do with fan demand or even the "problems" that Sean K. cited. As I said in my earlier post: You seem to assume it as a given that there was some kind of problem with the Realms prior to 3e, but this is far from a given. There's a lot of unsubstantiated talk about how "polluted" the Realms became because of all the icky nasty other settings with their cooties and Bird Flu existing in a vague conceptual proximity, but no one has ever been able to cite actual examples of this causing demonstrable harm either on the conceptual or practical levels. I stand by this statement. Of all the settings that could have been "fixed" by giving them separate cosmologies, the Realms needed such a "fix" the least. The question of PCs and gods being "small players on a larger stage" has only been exacerbated by the new shadow-linked metaverse, which makes the stage even larger and the PCs and gods even smaller. The Great Tree was unfortunately not "framed by the Realms" - a cosmology truly "framed by the Realms" would have been as faithful as possible to previous Realms material, including planar material, even if this material was reinterpreted within the limits of what a fuzzy television can explain. Name-changes and a new implied structure would have been fine as long as they were couched with "nobody really explains the planes" - and in fact, I vigorously defended the Tree when I first heard about it, on that basis (on the Planescape mailing list). But as it turns out, that wasn't the basis at all - this isn't just a new interpretation of the planes, but a different set of planes altogether. It was a Realms-shaking event without the event, just the shake, a new Time of Troubles of ambiguous nature.
ripvanwormer 04-08-07, 11:44 PM	Incidently, Sean K. Reynolds' opinions on cosmology jibe with mine in many respects that differ with the WotC position. I agree with him. It's really a question of, "Is your campaign intended to be a multiplanar, multi-Material Plane campaign?" If the answer is "yes," then the cosmology is flexible, planes with the same name/theme should be the same place, and you should be able to use a core D&D adventure set in the Abysse in your multiplanar FR campaign. Otherwise it makes no sense that you'd have two different sets of Abyssal planes, two different sets of the Nine Hells, etc., two different versions of the demon lords, archdevils, Lolth, Bahamut, Tiamat, etc. Because if there are two, then in all likelihood there are a thousand, which cheapens the coolness of those places and their inhabitants. "You killed Lolth? Big deal, three other groups of adventurers also killed three different versions of her last week, and they did it each in less time and at lower levels than you." If the answer is "no," then the cosmology should be rigid, and you don't have to worry about whether or not Sigil is Sigil, the Abyss is the Abyss, or there are other planes. This (both paragraphs) is my opinion as well, and there's not much more for me to add. WotC has said that there are multiple Abysses, multiple versions of Lolth, and so on, all tied together by the relatively quick-to-transverse Plane of Shadow, and this is principally what I object to in the new cosmos. It offends my desire for simplicity and my fanboyish affection for William of Occam. It's fair to note that these objectionable statements were all made by WotC long after SKR finished his work on the Campaign Setting book, and that SKR himself never made them - based purely on the Campaign Setting material, the Great Tree cosmology is just another way of looking at the Great Wheel, which suits me fine. Finally, I'll admit that when I first saw the Tree described, I thought it was pretty neat. It's a pretty little multiverse, and if it were more compatible with the the multiverse I gave my heart to when I first opened up the Planescape boxed set (after only flirting shamelessly with it when I bought the Manual of the Planes three or four years earlier), I'd like it even more.
Mr_Miscellany 04-08-07, 11:49 PM	And you've jumped the gun. You've taken one of my working ideas and critiized it, which is fine. Just understand it's not complete yet. It's amazing to find someone who can write more and write it faster than me. Talk about motiviation. :D
ORC_Paradox 04-09-07, 06:42 AM	A reminder that trolling and trying to derail a thread is against the COC. Play nice, kids.