Is the info on Book of Vile Darkness any good? I know there's info on the lords of the ninth and some tanar'ri princes but is it any good?
Is the Fiend Folio worth buying? What about other Monster books?
Is the Planar Handbook any good? I heard bad things about it. I'm aware of the thread on the "Deities and the Planes" forum but I'd like to hear the comments of actual PS fans.
Is Beyond Countless Doorways any good? If it's written by a part of the original PS crew I can't be bad!
Any other books that I'm not aware of?
Thanks in advance guys
Is the info on Book of Vile Darkness any good?
Is the Fiend Folio worth buying?
Is the Planar Handbook any good?
Is Beyond Countless Doorways any good?
BoVD isn't really all that plane-related ... yes it does describe the movers & shakers of the Lower Planes, but aside from stats (which suck anyway), the info is already present in 2E books. I found the book very interesting (although overhyped and somewhat lacking, but that's another story), but again, not really plane(scape)-related.
Fiend Folio is an excellent accessory. Strongly reccomended for PS games.
Planar Handbook. Meh. A standard mix of half-baked interesting ideas, forced crunch, bad artwork, and on occassion utter stupidity. Its 3.5.
Beyond Countless Doorways represents an alternate, non-Planescape cosmology, but it can be partially adapted to a PS game easily. An interesting read, overall, although not quite what I had expected.
BoVD was indeed lacking. Give me Faces of Evil: The Fiends over that screed any day.
Really, you can use all of the crunch you want from 3.X material, but there really isn't anything in 3.X that even comes close to doing justice to the planes the way that Planescape did.
Manual of the Planes should be your first buy. It is really wonderful. Highly recommended.
Assuming you are a DM then your next book should be Fiend Folio to populate the planes with all sorts of interesting beasties and races for your players to encounter. Monster Manual 3 also has some interesting planar encounters.
Book of Exalted Deeds is one of my favorite books. It has a wealth of info on the upper planes and their inhabitants. I really love this book.
Likewise the Book of Vile Darkness seems to be a really good supplement if your campaign will journey through the lower planes. Lots of interesting stuff about the various fiendish hierarchies, monsters, spells and such.
Next I am going to go out on a limb and suggest you get the Planar Handbook, I know that some old-timer planescapers have issues with the book, but there really is a lot of good info in there on things like the Githyanki and their capital city of Tun'arath on the Astral Plane, the City of Brass on the Elemental Plane of Fire, and of course Sigil. Also it has some good info on new planar races, spells, classes and optional rules. Additionally, I think the section on Planar touchstones might help you think up some adventure ideas and encounters. Lastly I think the list of encounter tables in the back are useful for any DM who is running a planar campaign.
PDFs are bad... I can't read much on the computer screen. My eyes start hurting after a while.
Print them out!
Print them out!
I don't have access to a decent printer (*ahem* laser) and a friend of mine tried to print some stuff and the result was quite ugly. He printed on a standard ink jet printer (standard = not an old crappy printer but not a new awesome printer).
The 3.X books are good for crunch and not much else. Crunch being items, stats, spells, etc., in this case.
If you are interested in 3E planes books then:
Manual of the Planes should be your first buy. It is really wonderful. Highly recommended.
Indeed, I give the book a 9/10 rating.
Assuming you are a DM then your next book should be Fiend Folio to populate the planes with all sorts of interesting beasties and races for your players to encounter. Monster Manual 3 also has some interesting planar encounters.
Again, agreed. 8/10 or so for both of them.
Book of Exalted Deeds is one of my favorite books. It has a wealth of info on the upper planes and their inhabitants. I really love this book.
The book takes a far too simplistic view of good and evil, and it seems too focused on 'good is teh coolest EVAR!' with overpowered feats and PrCs. The monster section was pretty well done, but the name changes for all but one of the guardinal lords was, and lets be honest, done for a stupid reason.
James Wyatt was lazy and couldn't be bothered to find the Planescape material on the guardinal lords, thus he wrote his own. I can and will find fault on him for that. I can dig up his quotation for that as well if needed [The transcript for the BoED chat is curiously missing from the WotC site, much like how portions of criticism were deleted from the PlHB chat transcript posted by WotC as well... not cool] 6/10 rating. Darin Drader saves the book from a lower rating.
Likewise the Book of Vile Darkness seems to be a really good supplement if your campaign will journey through the lower planes. Lots of interesting stuff about the various fiendish hierarchies, monsters, spells and such.
I thought the book was pretty good and Monte did a decent job on the book, though I do find the stats for the archfiends to be laughable at best. The PrCs for fiends and evil characters are pretty inspired, as are the feats. 8/10 on the book.
Next I am going to go out on a limb and suggest you get the Planar Handbook, I know that some old-timer planescapers have issues with the book, but there really is a lot of good info in there on things like the Githyanki and their capital city of Tun'arath on the Astral Plane, the City of Brass on the Elemental Plane of Fire, and of course Sigil. Also it has some good info on new planar races, spells, classes and optional rules. Additionally, I think the section on Planar touchstones might help you think up some adventure ideas and encounters. Lastly I think the list of encounter tables in the back are useful for any DM who is running a planar campaign.
The encounter tables could have been done better by a drunken 5 year old. Formians in pandemonium, no yugoloths in the gray waste, etc etc etc. Gwen Kestrel's writeup of Sigil was very faithful to the Planescape material and it was clear that she went out of her way in that section (though whoever snuck in the LN for Her Serenity needs to have their head examined). The details on the other planar locales are also well done if utterly bland compared to the 2e writeups.
The monsters are pretty good, the PrCs are pastiche at best, the LA+0 races are idiotic, and the mechanics underlying the Touchstones look like they were being aimed for the drunken 5 year old demographic of gamers. Go to Sigil, find the touchstone, beat up people in the area and 'become established and gain powerz'. Ignore the mechanics because they're stupid. 30+ pages of unwashed stupid. Adapt the locations as you will and attempt to redeem them, but I found them to be largely wasted space.
But hey, I got mentioned in the movers and shakers in Sigil. *preen and strut*
6/10, would have been 8/10 except for the LA+0 races, touchstones, LN LoP, and the fact that Mr Collins cheesed me off something fierce in the PlHB chat. I've given him enough grief over it however, but to be fair he wasn't the person behind making modrons persona non grata in 3e, but he still PO'd me in the chat in how he handled that question.
Mr Collins cheesed me off something fierce in the PlHB chat. I've given him enough grief over it however, but to be fair he wasn't the person behind making modrons persona non grata in 3e, but he still PO'd me in the chat in how he handled that question.
Care to remind us? I read the transcript, but don't recall that detail.
Care to remind us? I read the transcript, but don't recall that detail.
I suspect that was the 'modrons are silly' comment.
Any other books that I'm not aware of?
Since you mentioned Beyond Countless Doorways I assume you're interested in anything 3e, not only WotC products. From Green Ronin you can get 'Aasimar and Tiefling' and 'The Book of Fiends'. The first one, despite its name, works somewhat like a player's guide with planar PrCs, races, feats, etc. I don't particularly recommend the first if you're interested in flavor text, it's mostly a stat book and sometimes not even balanced enough when it comes to game mechanics. But there's still a few good ideas in it. The second has a few interesting concepts and descriptions (and others that aren't so interesting) but only get it if you're _really_ into fiends. On the other hand, Beyond Countless Doorways is a must buy. Just don't expect the "end all" of planar books and you should be very satisfied.
'Portals & Planes' by Fantasy Flight Games works like a basic GM manual of the planes. Rules for designing new planes and cosmologies, planar characters, etc. Since your intent seems to play in the Great Wheel this book doesn't represent an essential purchase but it's still a decent source of interesting planar ideas, new PrCs, etc. It bears repeating: it's not a must buy.
From Mongoose Publishing you can get 'Gehenna' and 'Zahhak - Ash Waste of the Abyss'. I don't own any of those two though, so I can't make any comments about their quality. All I know is that they're supposed to describe lower planes.
There's another book, it's not exactly a planar product, but it worked so well as a bizarre demiplane in my own campaign that I must recommend it: Grimm. I used it as a demiplane in the ethereal that caused the characters to become children and face twisted fairy tales in a dark fantasy land. It could also be used as a part of the nightmare demiplane.
As for WotC books, if you plan to use the classic planar denizens, you should get Fiend Folio for general planar creatures and the first two monster manuals for celestials and fiends. Since you have the Planescape Campaign Setting boxed set you can easily skip the Planar Handbook.
But really, in all honesty none of these books manage to capture the feel and the style of play of Planescape. I recommend buying the PDFs and reading through them until you get used to the computer screen. It's just a matter of practice, soon you'll be reading entire books. Or you can just pay someone to print them for you. It'd be expensive, but it's worth the price.
Edit: Oh, I forgot. 'Book of the Planes' by Mongoose is also available. It's in the same line of 'Portals & Planes' except that it's even more specific in drawing its own cosmology. It also has more flavor and less stats. I really like some of the planes and planar organizations presented in it, but if you're running the Great Wheel it shouldn't be that important.
James Wyatt was lazy and couldn't be bothered to find the Planescape material on the guardinal lords, thus he wrote his own.
I don't think that was the reason, if only because of this sentence:
"Manath is the newest member of the Five Companions, only recently replacing the curmudgeonly Duke Rhanok." [page 143]
Duke Rhanok is one of the guardianal paragons mentioned in Planes of Conflict, in the same paragraph the other four Companions are named. And, as far as I know, this [Liber Benevolentiae, page 51] is the only time the lesser guardinal rulers are named in Planescape. So someone must have done their research.
I know that Faerinaal and Gwynharwyf come from Warriors of Heaven (although Gwynharwyf's role was changed), so James Wyatt or whoever must have looked at that book, and may have gotten Duke Rhanok's name from there as well. Christopher Perkins probably did it, since he worked on both books. But I don't fault anyone for ignoring or changing things in Warriors of Heaven.
The Manual of the Planes
Epic Level Handbook
Beyond Countless Doorways (Malhavoc)
The Avatar's Handbook (Green Ronin)
Fiend Folio
Monster Manual II
Book of Fiends (Green Ronin)
Requiem For A God (Malhavoc)
Races of Renown: Aasimar & Tiefling (Green Ronin)
Bastion of Broken Souls
Book of Vile Darkness
Book of Exalted Deeds
Planar Handbook
The Slayer's Guide to Demons (Mongoose)
Dragon Magazine: #306, #285, #287, #315, #321, #322, #305
Dungeon Magazine: #100 (githyanki!)
As for which ones are best, they all have their flaws. Is everything I mentioned worth the price? Probably not, but I still end up looking at them pretty often.
I don't think that was the reason, if only because of this sentence:
Well it was the reason he gave when I asked him.
"One: The old Planescape ones were almost all male. (All but one?) Two: I had a heck of a time finding that old Planescape material. Three: I didn't like their names. Four: I liked the idea that there's a lot of turnaround in that organization."
But I don't fault anyone for ignoring or changing things in Warriors of Heaven.
I chuckled when they made Eladrin have mortal lifespans, and discounted most of the book's similar stuff. It was more a book to let PCs play watered down celestials in normal games than it was a decent ecology of the upper planes. I didn't hold a candle to the Planescape material, and I realize you really loathe it. You hate it, I'll sit here with my 'guide to hell' voodoo doll. :evillaugh
It was more a book to let PCs play watered down celestials in normal games than it was a decent ecology of the upper planes. I didn't hold a candle to the Planescape material, and I realize you really loathe it.
Oh, so it wasn't like a Faces of Evil for the celestials? I'll skip trying to find that one, then.
Oh, so it wasn't like a Faces of Evil for the celestials? I'll skip trying to find that one, then.
It does have some very nice artwork though...
I did, however, like the descriptions of the planar touchstones, though the rule mechanics are silly. With a bit of tweaking the concept could work well. The encounter tables are so wrong it's not funny.
Hey Shemmie, care to write an acid-etched review of the Planar Handbook for planewalker.com? ;)
Here, being a link to the place where the Planewalker material is ;)
At least, that's how I would've done it *g*
Gwen Kestrel's writeup of Sigil was very faithful to the Planescape material and it was clear that she went out of her way in that section (though whoever snuck in the LN for Her Serenity needs to have their head examined).
Yeah, I don't know. I could see the LoP as LN ... just so long as they are her laws. And in fact, they ARE her laws.
Yeah, I don't know. I could see the LoP as LN ... just so long as they are her laws. And in fact, they ARE her laws.
*shrug* By the same rationalization though, the Slaadi Lords are LN as well.
*shrug* By the same rationalization though, the Slaadi Lords are LN as well.
So are drow then.
They must obey Lloth's laws.