| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| malchor7 |
Posted - 05 Mar 2009 : 15:44:57
Hi,
For an upcoming campaign I'm doing that will explore the various planes of existence, I am looking to inform myself about the cosmology of D&D (not the Realms specifically). It's a home-brewed setting, but I try to draw as much as possible from canon releases.
- What sources should I look to?
- What are your favorite aspects of the D&D cosmology? Least favorite? Which edition do you favor?
- What changes would you make to the cosmology, and why?
To make it clear, I am looking for both facts and opinions, though I would appreciate if "canon facts" about the cosmology (i.e., published things you admire/hate and why) are noted as such (and a source would be helpful to).
Sorry for the big general question. I guess to boil it down is: if you were building a home-brewed D&D cosmology, what would yours look like? Which system would you borrow, and what tweaks would you make?
I appreciate any and all observations. |
| 30 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| kysus |
Posted - 15 Apr 2009 : 07:38:39
just looking at the link markustay made and to answer his question i think i would call that "SOUP", maybe some crackers too. |
| Marc |
Posted - 14 Apr 2009 : 18:10:18
quote:
Originally posted by Quale
quote:
It's not just a cosmic dumping ground of everything published (like Quale's), but more interrelated.
why do you have all those books, and use nothing, shut up
that's for your own good, PC's knowledge isn't player's knowledge, but when the players know too much about the campaign world it can become boring, it's all there masked
agreed with MT about ''the meat'' |
| scererar |
Posted - 05 Apr 2009 : 23:18:57
quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
And exactly what purpose does it serve?
I could take ALL of the 4e lore (for better or worse, there's really NOT a lot of it) and shoe-horn it into the Great Wheel.
Exactly! and starting on page 13 of the manual of the planes, it gives good examples of doing exactly that.
Anyway, I don't want to argue perspectives  we all have our reasons for liking and disliking things,and the fact is.. the cosmology issue/ debate about which version is better, has been in existence since the creation of the tree theory, if not before.
For my games a wheel, tree, or axis method for describing the cosmos does not impact things much  |
| Markustay |
Posted - 05 Apr 2009 : 18:38:11
And exactly what purpose does it serve?
I could take ALL of the 4e lore (for better or worse, there's really NOT a lot of it) and shoe-horn it into the Great Wheel. Even the Tree fit into the Wheel (as a local representative visual model of the universe). It was changed simply because they had the power to do so.
That 'Cosmology' isn't a Cosmology at all - it is just a bunch of planes connected by squiggly lines! It looks like a Beholder!!!
Gary Gygax's Great Wheel was incredibly well-thought out, and next-gen designers all built upon it a great deal in 2e, and it became something wondeful and incredibly cohesive.
Then we got Eberron and it's "unique Cosmology", and suddenly the entire multiverse was shattered and went BACk to being a bunch of un-related and completely seperated universes. Because Eberron didn't fit the model, everything everywhere got changed (Toril, Oerth, Krynn, etc...)
Its a load of garbage. Every world can now be created in a vacuum so that the designers don't have to bother to do any research - thats the bottom line, and the new 'Cosmology' is NOT a Cosmology AT ALL. There is no design behind that - a six-year-old could have done better!
To be honest, my own cosmology is a modified version of the Great Wheel (I only wanted one plane for each alignment), but I still built upon Gary's model because it was so excellent. I also use a LOT of the same concepts that they have in 4e (Primordials, and my own Shadoworld was much like the Shadowfel, just as my Faerie was like the Feywild). I take whatever good I find in each edition and modify my world model - I think both Quale and Maraluthu do the same. You take what you like, and ignore the rest. The wondeful thing about Planescape is that it had SO MUCH LORE that we can ignore half of it and still have a great Cosmology! You simply cannot do that with this bare-bones design philosiphy.
Everything that ever existed in D&D I have somewhere in my multiverse, but I don't need to use it unless I want to. Ergo, it's not neccessarily a 'dumping ground', since I've only taken the main elements I wanted everything else to revolve around and focused on those. You can have everything (in the background) and still build a concise, custom model... I know I have.
My own cosmology had to fit a TALL order - I wanted it to not just work with all of D&D's cosmologies and pantheons, but also with all the RW ones as well. Planescape did a lot of that for me, so a good chunck of my work was done. I just had to make my 'Creation Story' fit not only every known Creation Myth, but also the Judaeo-Christian model as well.
You try fitting Cthulhu into THAT.
And my Cosmology is also ever-evolving... I've had to re-think a lot of my Fey lore because of 4e, which is not only effected by the Feywild, but the changes to the Elves as well. The other thing I insist on is both backwards and forwards compatibilty, which means anything that worked in one edition I need to explain in another (I'm anal like that).
When it comes to YOUR games at YOUR table, it is possible to have your cake and eat it too - in the past we were given enough lore to be able to customize our worlds around what we wanted to use. Unfortunately, that is no longer the case, and most folks now have to go through earlier editions to get any sort of basics to build-upon. The new cosmogy simply doesn't have enough 'meat' to allow one to 'pick & choose'. |
| scererar |
Posted - 05 Apr 2009 : 17:49:29
quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
I was just doing a little research, trying to find out more about 4e's cosmology, and I stumbled across this preview of the 4e Cosmology.
Thought some of you might find it interesting; it even includes an illustration.
So if 1e/2e was the Great Wheel, and 3e was the Great Tree, what do they call that? The Big Mess? 
It is the world Axis. I did not find it any more or less convoluted than past editions. I think it just comes down to preference.
Here is an excerpt from the Manual of the planes source book p.12.
Although various campaign settings may have their own arrangement of planes, the default planar structure of the D&D game is the World Axis cosmology.The World Axis cosmology is so named because the mortal world and its parallel planes form an axis or pivot point linking the two great infinite planes—the Astral Sea and the Elemental Chaos. The world is therefore the fulcrum where elemental forces and divine forces meet. This model provides a mix of benign, strange, wondrous, and sinister planes you can use in your game without the necessity of designing your own unique cosmology. |
| Wooly Rupert |
Posted - 05 Apr 2009 : 16:39:20
Enough of that.  |
| Quale |
Posted - 05 Apr 2009 : 16:18:21
quote:
It's not just a cosmic dumping ground of everything published (like Quale's), but more interrelated.
why do you have all those books, and use nothing, shut up |
| Marc |
Posted - 01 Apr 2009 : 21:32:56
it's called big, great axis or something
I find the new planar structure too dualistic and simple, many concepts from the old editions are superior to this
quote:
Originally posted by malchor7
- What changes would you make to the cosmology, and why?
When I created the cosmology for my home setting (not entirely but with the crucial parts), I read all D&D sources with the planes and included only things that were intriguing, and some that would be when properly changed. Similarly with the FR and other worlds, stealing their best ideas. It's not just a cosmic dumping ground of everything published (like Quale's), but more interrelated.
I wanted it to have a deep occult backround, it had to make sense numerologically and astrologically, I used psychological archetypes to make some races and cultures more unique. The setting is European-based and I had proto-indoeuropean as a linguistic base, that was the mythical planewalking race. Indoeuropean myths share many similarities, and that combined mythology reflects the planar structure. Never liked that every race of the every continent on every planet has a pantheon. I liked FR's divine meddling, Eberron's agnosticism and unique faiths, and even Birthright's bloodlines, all that had to be combined without contradictions. You need to have some basic principles, the Planescape's three rules are excellent and don't need replacement. History and the early development of the planes was an important part. I preferred less fantastic model of the universe, more like ours, without the crystal spheres. Symbolism was important, particularly shamanistic from where the most of the mythology comes. All kinds of new-agey pseudoscience and alternative science can be a great source of inspiration, there are many ideas there. Also the comics universes were useful. |
| Ashe Ravenheart |
Posted - 21 Mar 2009 : 04:38:07
Silly, MT! Don't you recognize the True Faith when you see it? |
| Markustay |
Posted - 21 Mar 2009 : 04:02:09
I was just doing a little research, trying to find out more about 4e's cosmology, and I stumbled across this preview of the 4e Cosmology.
Thought some of you might find it interesting; it even includes an illustration.
So if 1e/2e was the Great Wheel, and 3e was the Great Tree, what do they call that? The Big Mess? |
| Alisttair |
Posted - 10 Mar 2009 : 11:12:04
Is this the plane of music I have stumbled into? Never ending music of all sorts playing away, driving the denizens insane! |
| Markustay |
Posted - 10 Mar 2009 : 04:38:53
Needless to say I never listen to any of the Barbara Streisand stuff, or the 'big band' stuff, or lots of other things... but I've grown fond of the Jazz, Classical, and 'Mob Hits' styles of music (Mob Hits and Mob Hits II being two CDs I greatly disliked at first, but they grew on me, and I added quite a lot of Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennet, Dean Martin, etc...)
I added Christmas songs, or Love songs for Valentine's day, and was adjusting the mix about every six weeks or so - It was a lot of fun. I also had them all buy me two drives - one for use, and one I would keep at home for constant 'tinkering' (then I could just go and swap them out when I had a new song list).
I used to do that a lot - people would ask me "can you do such-and-such, and I'd say suuuure... if you buy me the stuff."
I own lots of stuff now - just about every tool I ever owned was gotten that way. |
| Wooly Rupert |
Posted - 10 Mar 2009 : 03:02:41
quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
One of the many hats I wore before I closed down my property management company was that I did custom music packages for businesses to be played during the store-hours. What I'd do is buy music Jukeboxes (basically portable Hardrives with MP3 hardware built-in), hook them to the busines's stereo system, and they'd have a custom mix (depending on clientelle, business-flavor, and time of the year) of music that would play for at least 24 hours, randomly, with no repeats.
ANYWAY... Part of the deal was that they had to purchase any CDs who's music they wanted to use (I do NOT use pirated recordings!), and provide me with anything else I needed (like the Hardrives, and any software).
I kept all the original CDs with me as 'back-up'.
Needless to say, I own a LOT of music, and I also own some of the best ripping and music-editting software available.
I did it as a 'free' service for my business-customers, but in the long-run I got a lot of cool stuff out of the deal.
I even kept the Greek Music CDs from that restaurant...
Nice! My music collection delves into musical areas most people never venture into, but I'm sure you've got me beat! |
| Markustay |
Posted - 10 Mar 2009 : 02:28:31
One of the many hats I wore before I closed down my property management company was that I did custom music packages for businesses to be played during the store-hours. What I'd do is buy music Jukeboxes (basically portable Hardrives with MP3 hardware built-in), hook them to the busines's stereo system, and they'd have a custom mix (depending on clientelle, business-flavor, and time of the year) of music that would play for at least 24 hours, randomly, with no repeats.
ANYWAY... Part of the deal was that they had to purchase any CDs who's music they wanted to use (I do NOT use pirated recordings!), and provide me with anything else I needed (like the Hardrives, and any software).
I kept all the original CDs with me as 'back-up'.
Needless to say, I own a LOT of music, and I also own some of the best ripping and music-editting software available.
I did it as a 'free' service for my business-customers, but in the long-run I got a lot of cool stuff out of the deal.
I even kept the Greek Music CDs from that restaurant... |
| The Sage |
Posted - 10 Mar 2009 : 00:21:32
Actually, it looks like there's a free download option for the second one as well. But I'd think it will probably have the same limitations as those free-ware programs that I was talking about earlier.
I've never seen nor tried the first converter though. |
| Kuje |
Posted - 09 Mar 2009 : 23:58:28
quote:
Originally posted by The Sage
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
There are various media conversion programs out there; perhaps a free one can flip .rm to .mp3.
There's a problem with that suggestion though. Most of the conversion programs that are available as shareware/freeware will only convert up to 30 seconds of the original Real Media files to MP3 format. If you want to convert them properly, you'll likely have to pay for the registered version of the software.
I've yet to encounter any freely available converter program that allows the full and proper conversion of audio files.
The only one I could find, atm, is:
http://www.rm-mp3.org/
And it looks like it's freeware.
But there's also:
http://www.rmconverter.com/rmtomp3.html
However, that one isn't freeware. Grumble. |
| The Sage |
Posted - 09 Mar 2009 : 23:09:57
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
There are various media conversion programs out there; perhaps a free one can flip .rm to .mp3.
There's a problem with that suggestion though. Most of the conversion programs that are available as shareware/freeware will only convert up to 30 seconds of the original Real Media files to MP3 format. If you want to convert them properly, you'll likely have to pay for the registered version of the software.
I've yet to encounter any freely available converter program that allows the full and proper conversion of audio files.
|
| Wooly Rupert |
Posted - 09 Mar 2009 : 17:59:04
There are various media conversion programs out there; perhaps a free one can flip .rm to .mp3. Another suggestion I've seen more than once (though not for .rm files) is to take the audio files, burn them as an audio CD, and then rip MP3s from that. |
| The Sage |
Posted - 09 Mar 2009 : 13:21:40
Since I'm not really sure about the legality of something like this, I'm going to temporarily remove the link Quale. I suggest you send it via PM or ethereal mail instead. D-brane can then access it that way.
I'll re-post the link if I learn that it's okay to do so. |
| Quale |
Posted - 09 Mar 2009 : 12:22:29
ok then, mods remove it if it's a problem
Mod Edit: Link temporarily removed.
|
| Markustay |
Posted - 07 Mar 2009 : 16:36:21
Although technically re-distrubuting someone else's property is illegal, the fact that it was already freely-given most likely means no-one is going to bother to come after you for it.
But yeah... its illegal... so we here at the keep are just going to assume you guys aren't doing that.  |
| D-brane |
Posted - 07 Mar 2009 : 14:12:10
So long as it isn't illegal, and doesn't cause any problems for this website, I'd greatly appreciate that Quale. Thanks.
|
| Quale |
Posted - 07 Mar 2009 : 12:17:38
if you want (and if it's not illegal) I can upload it in mp3 ... |
| D-brane |
Posted - 07 Mar 2009 : 06:10:43
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
quote:
Originally posted by The Sage
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
There's a FREE comic about Planescape (D&D's over-cosmology) over at the WotC's site.
I never knew about that... Of course, I'm not the Planescape fan some here are. Though I do now have all of the Planescape sourcebooks -- I got an awesome deal on those. 
Heh. I thought I told you about the comic during those private chats we had about PS sources. Or, at least, I'm pretty sure I did. 
...
Malchor, I'll add the "Player's Primer to the Outlands" CD [that originally came with the book of the same name], as it includes some wonderfully-crafted info on the Gatetowns around the Great Wheel and such, and all from the perspective of a mimir. [Note, 'tis available as a free download from WotC {the CD, not the book}]
I didn't know about the comic, and I didn't know that the CD was a free download, either... Ironically, I had the CD sitting around for over a year before I finally remembered to rip MP3s from it.
Why the hey did they make the files Real Media? I've not bothered with that in a long time...
Sir Hamster, forgive the intrusion, but your post relates to a question of mine.
I just downloaded the "Primer" CD and realised that they were REAL MEDIA recordings. So that means I can't load them into iTunes. Does anyone here know of a way to rectify this? I'm assuming I'd have to alter the format of the media files for the Primer, but I don't know how to do that.
Any help would be appreciated.
|
| Markustay |
Posted - 07 Mar 2009 : 02:09:42
Back in my early Greyhawk-running days, I had a god named Emanual of the Planes. Not that that has anything to do with the topic, but I just thought I'd share.
I may have invented Aoskar before TSR did.
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
I never knew about that... <snip>
Good.
Now we're even for that wonderful Newsletter you pointed me in the diection of.
I was going to point out the MP3 thing, but Sage already did, so I'll just add an 'I concur' to that. I think MP3's only became 'in vogue' during the Napster era (around 2000?) |
| Alisttair |
Posted - 06 Mar 2009 : 13:45:44
I recommmend you visit all the planes personally so as to get a true idea of what they are like  |
| Jorkens |
Posted - 06 Mar 2009 : 07:56:43
quote:
Originally posted by malchor7
Hi,
For an upcoming campaign I'm doing that will explore the various planes of existence, I am looking to inform myself about the cosmology of D&D (not the Realms specifically). It's a home-brewed setting, but I try to draw as much as possible from canon releases.
- What sources should I look to?
- What are your favorite aspects of the D&D cosmology? Least favorite? Which edition do you favor?
- What changes would you make to the cosmology, and why?
To make it clear, I am looking for both facts and opinions, though I would appreciate if "canon facts" about the cosmology (i.e., published things you admire/hate and why) are noted as such (and a source would be helpful to).
Sorry for the big general question. I guess to boil it down is: if you were building a home-brewed D&D cosmology, what would yours look like? Which system would you borrow, and what tweaks would you make?
I appreciate any and all observations.
It would, as others have mentioned, depend on what version of the cosmology interests you. I would personally go for the 1ed. Manual of the Planes,with additions from old Dragon magazines if you got them. The other versions I really didn't care for at all. Manual of the Planes gives you the possibility to flesh out the planes within the framework found in a single book. And subjectivity speaking I prefer the tone of the book which is far closer to the way I would use the planes.
As for changes. I generally made the whole thing a bit less predictable and random. No one should know to much of the planes. The same goes for demons and devils, I prefer these as more unique and mysterious and have never been really happy with any version used with the D&D systems. I use some loose inspiration from authors such as Moorcock, Farmer and others, but it is generally a feel of anything goes. From this you can understand why I really, really don't like Planescape. |
| The Sage |
Posted - 06 Mar 2009 : 04:10:33
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
I didn't know about the comic, and I didn't know that the CD was a free download, either... Ironically, I had the CD sitting around for over a year before I finally remembered to rip MP3s from it.
Why the hey did they make the files Real Media? I've not bothered with that in a long time...
Well, as I recall, Real Media was more prevalent than MP3s at the time [14 years ago], so it probably made sense to record them in that particular format. |
| Wooly Rupert |
Posted - 06 Mar 2009 : 02:50:55
quote:
Originally posted by The Sage
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
There's a FREE comic about Planescape (D&D's over-cosmology) over at the WotC's site.
I never knew about that... Of course, I'm not the Planescape fan some here are. Though I do now have all of the Planescape sourcebooks -- I got an awesome deal on those.
Heh. I thought I told you about the comic during those private chats we had about PS sources. Or, at least, I'm pretty sure I did.
...
Malchor, I'll add the "Player's Primer to the Outlands" CD [that originally came with the book of the same name], as it includes some wonderfully-crafted info on the Gatetowns around the Great Wheel and such, and all from the perspective of a mimir. [Note, 'tis available as a free download from WotC {the CD, not the book}]
I didn't know about the comic, and I didn't know that the CD was a free download, either... Ironically, I had the CD sitting around for over a year before I finally remembered to rip MP3s from it.
Why the hey did they make the files Real Media? I've not bothered with that in a long time... |
| The Sage |
Posted - 05 Mar 2009 : 23:29:42
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
There's a FREE comic about Planescape (D&D's over-cosmology) over at the WotC's site.
I never knew about that... Of course, I'm not the Planescape fan some here are. Though I do now have all of the Planescape sourcebooks -- I got an awesome deal on those.
Heh. I thought I told you about the comic during those private chats we had about PS sources. Or, at least, I'm pretty sure I did.
...
Malchor, I'll add the "Player's Primer to the Outlands" CD [that originally came with the book of the same name], as it includes some wonderfully-crafted info on the Gatetowns around the Great Wheel and such, and all from the perspective of a mimir. [Note, 'tis available as a free download from WotC {the CD, not the book}]
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