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View Full Version : Homebrewers: Direct My Wrath!!! (2) [Voting Closed]



afroakuma
2008-10-12, 02:40 PM
Alright, so my Slaad project is running down (I have very little left to do on it) and I'd like a bit of advance direction on my next project. It's very likely that it will be planar again, but I'm okay with seeing other ideas posted. Please vote for one or more planes (or other concepts) that you'd like to see me homebrew. The currently accepted limit is three distinct votes.

Past homebrews:
Mechanus (Inevitables)
Limbo (Slaadi)

Current Leader;Current Second;Current Third

Next Homebrew
{table=head]Plane|Votes|Other Request|Votes

Celestia|6|Ethereal Plane|9
Bytopia|0
Elysium|7
Beastlands|4
Arborea|1
Ysgard|0
Limbo|0
Pandemonium|11
Abyss|0
Carceri|0
Hades|1
Gehenna|1
Baator|1
Acheron|0
Mechanus|0
Arcadia|0
[/table]

AstralFire
2008-10-12, 02:44 PM
Celestiadamnable character minimum

wadledo
2008-10-12, 02:51 PM
Ethereal is a plane too!:smallmad:

afroakuma
2008-10-12, 02:57 PM
I will accept the vote for Ethereal.

Vadin
2008-10-12, 03:00 PM
Generic and Nameless Village (And Things That Fit Into Any Of Them)

afroakuma
2008-10-12, 03:01 PM
Vadin, that may be a little too vague...

Zeta Kai
2008-10-12, 03:06 PM
I've always found Pandemonium to be interesting. All those little pockets of air stuck within the solid stone, holding secrets that even the gods themselves want forgotten. The screaming winds, the enmaddened petitioners, the hidden treasures. It's always struck me as the most intriguing of the outer planes.

Vadin
2008-10-12, 03:07 PM
OK then...Plane of Nameless Villages.

afroakuma
2008-10-12, 03:11 PM
...I'll need to see something like "Rural Encounters," "Rural Animals" etc. to understand what you're driving at, because right now I just don't follow.

And yes, Zeta: Pandemonium is great. Screamers' Tor is just cool, and I'll never forget the Pandemonium segment of Dead Gods.

Dublock
2008-10-12, 03:23 PM
Celestia sounds cool.

Zuki
2008-10-12, 03:25 PM
Hmm...I'm thinking Elysium, actually. I've always been very fond of Guardinals. While I don't strongly feel that they need more examples and species, I'd love to see further elaboration on the diverse environments and themes of the plane.

(Lessee, Leonal, Ursinal, Lupinal, Equinal, Cervidal, and Musteval. Mustevals are supposed to be ferrets, not mice. And I know I've seen a Brahma bull Guardinal somewhere as well.)


Alternatively, the Beastlands, for basically the same reason, with the exception that a more unified set of gribblies and a few more Animal Lords would serve the Beastlands well.

afroakuma
2008-10-12, 03:25 PM
Votes acknowledged.

thegurullamen
2008-10-12, 03:35 PM
I vote Ethereal...in the year 2008.

arguskos
2008-10-12, 03:38 PM
I'll vote for Baator (but only the ancient Baatorians) and I'll second the call for Pandemonium.

-argus

Vadin
2008-10-12, 03:39 PM
Heh...sorry. Yeah, Rural Encounters works. I'll vote for Elysium, though, on the condition that you do some homebrewing for lower-leveled adventures in Elysium. Yes please?

afroakuma
2008-10-12, 03:40 PM
Votes acknowledged.

And yes, Vadin, I can easily cover low-level stuff. I made a CR 5 Inevitable. The planes need more low-level stuff; the Limbo project was an exception, as slaadi were already low to medium level.

Tar Palantir
2008-10-12, 03:53 PM
Gehenna. Let's face it, it could use the love.

Krimm_Blackleaf
2008-10-12, 04:11 PM
I would like to see some love for Hades.

afroakuma
2008-10-12, 04:13 PM
Votes recorded.

afroakuma
2008-10-12, 06:22 PM
Well, so far I have four contenders for first and four contenders for second, out of a total of 17. So nearly half (half if we exclude the Ethereal) have picked up at least one vote.

Not such a clear race as last time. Guess I'll be taking votes for a while yet.

DarknessLord
2008-10-12, 06:27 PM
Let's get some good aligned action going on, Celestia.

ForzaFiori
2008-10-12, 06:31 PM
Celestia. I'd like to see some good encounters with good creaturs

Kiren
2008-10-12, 06:42 PM
Elysium, is my vote

Kellus
2008-10-12, 06:54 PM
Pandemonium has always been one of my favourites. I think I even made a prestige class for rangers for it. :smallconfused:

Username
2008-10-12, 07:21 PM
Neutral good doesn't get enough love, Elysium here!

MisterSaturnine
2008-10-12, 07:23 PM
Another vote for Pandemonium.

afroakuma
2008-10-12, 07:24 PM
Good is really racking up the votes this time. I'm not seeing any of the voting trend from the last one.

All current votes tallied.

afroakuma
2008-10-12, 09:19 PM
I'll probably leave this running for another half day, then get cracking. Cast your votes, everyone!

Sereg
2008-10-12, 10:19 PM
I'm voting Beastlands or a plane close to it. I have a feeling that there is more to those planes than has been published so far.

afroakuma
2008-10-12, 10:21 PM
Should I take that as Elysium, Beastlands and Arborea?

Scaboroth
2008-10-13, 04:48 AM
The Ethereal always seemed so mysterious to me. The Deep Ethereal...
could have anything floating around down there.
...abandoned khen-zai cities...
...the corpse(?) of a god or an Old One...
...a single black box that no one has yet been able to open...

afroakuma
2008-10-13, 04:51 AM
The Deep Ethereal is indeed rife with possibilities. Demiplanar scavengers, etc.

I always envisioned planar tourists making a wide berth around a giant, foggy gray and black sphere containing Ravenloft.

Vote tallied.

DracoDei
2008-10-13, 04:55 AM
Well... I personally would like to see a bunch of creatures for the elemental planes of funk and squareness...
Yes, what creatures are native to The Groovy Beats of Gnarlopolopolis AND/OR The Sedate Streets of Drabsville (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/printthread.php?t=55828&pp=40)?

vegetalss4
2008-10-13, 05:25 AM
i vote for
etheral plane
and
Pandemonium

afroakuma
2008-10-13, 05:28 AM
Draco: I can guarantee it won't happen this time. If you want to file another vote, though...

DracoDei
2008-10-13, 06:25 AM
... very well, since this is drawing to a close, put me down for Pandemonium...

But consider those two planes (perhaps as a single project?) to be on my list of votes from now on.

afroakuma
2008-10-13, 06:28 AM
Duly noted.

Merlon
2008-10-13, 11:22 AM
Pandemonium

Username
2008-10-13, 11:23 AM
Actually, let me throw in a vote for the Ethereal too. It is a pretty cool plane when you consider how mysterious a lot of it is.

AstralFire
2008-10-13, 11:28 AM
I'll toss in another vote for Ethereal.

FoeHammer
2008-10-13, 11:40 AM
pandemonium. It just sounds cool, but could do to be fleshed out a bit alot.

Level20Commoner
2008-10-13, 12:38 PM
Pandemonium all the way! Make a worthy challenge for the Garngrath!

AstralFire
2008-10-13, 12:40 PM
Ugh... evil-aligned planes.

afroakuma
2008-10-13, 12:45 PM
Elysium's still pretty close there. I'm surprised at the popularity of the Ethereal plane.

Zeta Kai
2008-10-13, 12:53 PM
Ugh... evil-aligned planes.

D&D is pretty much all editions has encouraged players to have either Good (or at least Neutral) alignments. So, the implication is that the players should fight against the forces of Evil. Therefore, the Evil-aligned planes deserve all the attention that we can shower upon them, the homes of all that is Evil. QED.

Username
2008-10-13, 01:02 PM
The Ethereal can still make it, I have faith! And the Ethereal is home to, among many other things, the Ethergaunts. Who are damn scary if done right. Vote Ethereal, vote not-another-evil-plane! *Propaganda*

afroakuma
2008-10-13, 01:13 PM
Okay, I went through and updated the tally. Looks like we have three contenders with a fourth on the horizon. I'll keep this running until 1800 CST/0000 GMT

Username
2008-10-13, 01:14 PM
Err, I think you may have tallied me twice by accident. It was 6 last I saw, I had already voted for the Ethereal plane and was merely cheering for it in the last one. If not, then pay no mind to me.

AstralFire
2008-10-13, 01:16 PM
D&D is pretty much all editions has encouraged players to have either Good (or at least Neutral) alignments. So, the implication is that the players should fight against the forces of Evil. Therefore, the Evil-aligned planes deserve all the attention that we can shower upon them, the homes of all that is Evil. QED.

Yes, but players need places to explore too, not just to conquer.

afroakuma
2008-10-13, 01:21 PM
D'oi. You're right. I'll fix that. Sorry; I'm running on 3/36 hours of sleep.

Zeta, Astral, I very much want to jump into that debate, but I don't want to add any more bias to this thread than I already have. :smallbiggrin:

Zuki
2008-10-13, 01:24 PM
I know this is petty and spiteful, but I'd kind of rather see a send-up of the Ethereal Plane than Pandemonium. Ethereal's got foo lions, which are super-cool, and has the advantage of possibly being used in a non-Planescape campaign. Also, well-done Demiplanes can be pretty neat. I remember a few of them from the old Planescape books and they tended to be pretty surreal. Who doesn't love Neth?

So much like someone who's favorite candidate in the primaries didn't make it to the general election, can I swing my secondary vote from Beastlands to Ethereal?

Khane
2008-10-13, 01:28 PM
I vote for Ethereal. That's all.

afroakuma
2008-10-13, 01:30 PM
Zuki: I'm currently allowing up to three unique votes each, so I'll take Ethereal as your third for now.

And don't worry about petty or spiteful. People have their preferences; look at AstralFire up there. He actually said "ugh." Tsk tsk.

Voted acknowledged.

thegurullamen
2008-10-13, 02:41 PM
Just noticed the "more than one vote" clause. I'll throw in for Beastlands and Celestia on top of my original vote.

afroakuma
2008-10-13, 02:43 PM
Beastlands? Or should I give you another minute? :smallbiggrin:

Yes, I bolded it because I didn't thnk people were aware.

Zeta Kai
2008-10-13, 03:10 PM
Yes, but players need places to explore too, not just to conquer.

1) The Ethereal Plane's geography is very similar to the corresponding location on the Material Plane. Been there, done that.

2) Pandemonium, being unrelated to the Material Plane, offers (literally) infinitely more places to explore than the Ethereal.

3) I've only rarely heard of campaigns in which a PC party actually conquered an entire plane, & I've never heard of the implications of such an event being explored with any realism.

DM: Alright, you slew the Lord of the Plane. You are now masters of this dimention.
PCs: Cool. Now what?
DM: I dunno. What do you wanna do?
PCs: Let's go conquer another one! What's Asmodeus up to?
DM weeps softly as he closes his notebook.

4) Assuming one can even conquer an entire plane, that's an epic-level task. 99% of all campaigns would involve exploration, not conquest, regardless of which plane we're talking about.

5) The implication that Pandemonium is somehow easier to conquer than the Ethereal Plane is, IMO, severely flawed.

AstralFire
2008-10-13, 03:33 PM
Eh, what? I never made any sort of implication along those lines. Actually the opposite - given the tilt of D&D, you're not going to have much freedom to do much in Pandemonia except to fight or sneak.

There is a lot more, both in WotC sourcebooks and in popular literature, about demonic cities than anything like the Ethereal plane - which can differ in interesting, perhaps subtle, ways. I actually would have thrown up a vote for Astral and Shadow right up because transitive planes interest me more than... just about everything else in the Great Wheel but Sigil, but I didn't think that would garner serious interest or that akuma would do it, due to their wide-open, sort-of-real-but-not nature.

Username
2008-10-13, 03:38 PM
1) The Ethereal Plane's geography is very similar to the corresponding location on the Material Plane. Been there, done that.

2) Pandemonium, being unrelated to the Material Plane, offers (literally) infinitely more places to explore than the Ethereal.

3) I've only rarely heard of campaigns in which a PC party actually conquered an entire plane, & I've never heard of the implications of such an event being explored with any realism.

DM: Alright, you slew the Lord of the Plane. You are now masters of this dimention.
PCs: Cool. Now what?
DM: I dunno. What do you wanna do?
PCs: Let's go conquer another one! What's Asmodeus up to?
DM weeps softly as he closes his notebook.

4) Assuming one can even conquer an entire plane, that's an epic-level task. 99% of all campaigns would involve exploration, not conquest, regardless of which plane we're talking about.

5) The implication that Pandemonium is somehow easier to conquer than the Ethereal Plane is, IMO, severely flawed.




I don't think you've heard of the Deep Ethereal, which is entirely separate from any Prime. Also, there a a number of interesting denizens, amongst them the Ethergaunts from the fiend folio. The Ethereal is far more than an overlay of the Prime Material.

afroakuma
2008-10-13, 03:45 PM
The Border Ethereal is an exact overlap of the crystal sphere (to use spelljamming terminology) or Material Plane it borders. It also links to the Deep Ethereal, the vast ocean of demiplanes and other unique hidden planar whatnots, which serves to ferry travelers between Borders Ethereal.


I didn't think that would garner serious interest or that akuma would do it

I totally would. Slightly less inclined to do Plane of Shadow (there's just so much stuff there already) but I'm not opposed to anything.

CrazyMacGuy
2008-10-13, 04:05 PM
Celestia, Elysium, Ethereal for me...

Most useful when afroakuma comes up with something cool and I can use it in my campaign

Zuki
2008-10-13, 04:10 PM
Slightly less inclined to do Plane of Shadow (there's just so much stuff there already) but I'm not opposed to anything.

Really, there is? I always got the impression that the Shadow Plane was the least developed of the Transitive Planes. Astral's always been well-developed and has a great quasi-spelljamming feel. Feuding Githyanki and Mind Flayers, floating islands made of dead gods, big flying whale-things and astral dreadnoughts, sorts of fun...to say nothing of how beautiful the Astral Sea's described as being.

I've seen a fair handful of different things put out for Shadow over time, but they never seemed particularly unified or possibly even to all be running on slightly different conceptions of what the Plane of Shadow is and does. It was like the Ethereal in that it was a border or a mimic of the surrounding Prime Material, except if you went further in or farther out or got lost or used it to travel quickly in a spell...etc, etc. How the 'Except Not' part was always a little fuzzily defined....

It's definitely got more populating monsters because 'Shadow' is a fairly evocative concept. And I suppose there's Shadowcasting now, with 3.5's Tome of Magic.

AstralFire
2008-10-13, 04:15 PM
Yes, I think it's that "except not" that helps in the appeal. Trying to create a completely new plane is basically attempting to create a world's worth of peoples, histories, politics, which means that any exhaustive effort is also exhaustive to -read-.

With 'except not', you can more easily focus on the cool details without the DM feeling either lost in a wall of text or lost on the planet of the hats.

afroakuma
2008-10-13, 04:15 PM
Really, there is? I always got the impression that the Shadow Plane was the most sparsely populated

I should probably learn that most people haven't even heard of Birthright.


Astral's always been well-developed and has a great quasi-spelljamming feel

I've always found it to seem pretty empty apart from the githyanki and the occasional dreadnought (which I love). But yes, beautiful.


t was like the Ethereal in that it was a border or a mimic of the surrounding Prime Material, except if you went further in or farther out or got lost or used it to travel quickly in a spell...etc, etc. How the 'Except Not' part was always a little fuzzily defined...

It's clear from this thread that there's more than a bit of love for the Transitive Planes. I'll definetely add them to the next one. This is exactly the kind of stuff I like to cover.


It's definitely got more populating monsters because 'Shadow' is a fairly evocative concept. And I suppose there's Shadowcasting now, with 3.5's Tome of Magic.

That would have been what I was referring to.


Most useful when afroakuma comes up with something cool and I can use it in my campaign

Why thank you! Have you actually stolen any of my stuff, or are you waiting for a particular plane to show?

Pie Guy
2008-10-13, 04:21 PM
Pandemonium, FTW

afroakuma
2008-10-13, 04:27 PM
Still over an hour to go, it's not for the win yet.

Zuki
2008-10-13, 04:46 PM
I've always found it to seem pretty empty apart from the githyanki and the occasional dreadnought (which I love). But yes, beautiful.

Hmm...then again, isn't part of the point of the flavor for the Astral Plane that it's big and empty? Then again, it's big and empty and infinite, so there's a lot of different things you can smush into it without running out of room to be empty.


Yes, I think it's that "except not" that helps in the appeal. <some snipping>
With 'except not', you can more easily focus on the cool details without the DM feeling either lost in a wall of text or lost on the planet of the hats.

Hmm. Good point. Matches up nicely with what my ideas of what the Plane of Shadow was good for, thematically and conceptually.

Essentially, it's a nightmare realm, a double-edged blade of usefulness and danger. Surroundings start out familiar, gradually warping and melting away into lots of things that are unfamiliar, hostile, and highly interested in eating your face.

Its obvious use for PCs use in connecting Prime Material planes has shown up in a few unexpected places as well, such as the d20 Urban Arcana/Shadowchasers setting. If you really need to get an Eberronian warforged into the city of Waterdeep, or (god forbid), a Kender into Sharn, the Plane of Shadow is the way to go without spelljamming. (Hmm...a Prime Material hopping campaign with the Plane of Shadow as a reoccuring thematic element in monsters and antagonists and so on could be pretty neat.)

The Ethereal, on the other hand...

While the 'survival in a harsh environment' theme shows up in lots of other places in the Planescape setting and the Outer/Inner planes in general, it was particularly pronounced in the Ethereal Plane. Everyday living for native denizens was presented as a struggle for resources in a mostly barren environment--tremendously ironic given that everyone is constantly surrounded by protomatter, the unformed would-be building blocks of tangible existence.

Lots of the locals and natives were of a 'primitive' bent, raiding the Demiplanes (or perhaps the PCs!) for supplies and necessaries. Aided by the obscuring protomatter, deception and misdirection were popular tactics. Wasn't there a giant toothy anglerfish of doom? Or those various creatures that would pop their dangerous bits out of the Ethereal into the Prime or what-have-you to attack, and keep the rest safely concealed. There was a slight oceanic metaphor as I recall, but maybe a bit of journeying through a large and dangerous swamp.

Should I stop threadjacking, and start up a topic somewhere else just to jaw about the Transitive Planes?

afroakuma
2008-10-13, 05:07 PM
*shrug* there's a voting table up front and Post Reply buttons everywhere. Voters will figure it out. Go right ahead.

Lappy9000
2008-10-13, 05:22 PM
Pandemonium

celtois
2008-10-13, 05:25 PM
my vote is beastlands or elysium

afroakuma
2008-10-13, 05:45 PM
Current votes tallied.

We are down to the wire, folks!

afroakuma
2008-10-13, 06:02 PM
Alright, everybody, the votes are in and my next project will be:

Pandemonium

Good showing on several planes; glad there's interest. As a concession to all of you who voted for the Ethereal Plane, I'll be putting the Transitive Planes as options next time.

I hope the next project will be interesting/useful to you all!

Thanks for your contributions!

Zeta Kai
2008-10-13, 06:19 PM
As I said in the last Direct My Wrath thread, you could've just gone with my suggestion, & saved yourself 28 hours, Afro. :smallwink:

To be fair, though, I think there's enough interest in the transitive planes to skip the next Direct My Wrath thread & just work on the Ethereal. Consider your wrath sufficiently shunted.

afroakuma
2008-10-13, 07:08 PM
As I said in the last Direct My Wrath thread, you could've just gone with my suggestion, & saved yourself 28 hours, Afro.

Pssh. I had to be awake 28 hours anyway.


To be fair, though, I think there's enough interest in the transitive planes to skip the next Direct My Wrath thread & just work on the Ethereal.

But if I did that, you'd miss your hat trick on predictions! Not to mention, these things vary a lot. Neither Carceri nor Acheron got a single vote this round, though they were the runners-up last time.

We'll see.