In other words, is it worth buying if you're an old-school Planescape player or GM?
The single best thing you could do to ensure more planar sourcebooks in the future is to guarantee this book sells well. Buy copies for all your friends and relatives.
To answer your questions the book is very much in line with previously published planescape material. There is a lot of information on Sigil in there. It has a ton of prestige classes that are based on the factions of Sigil. It does not really update all the old PS personalities, however it does give stats for Kylie the Tout from Sigil, and also Vlaakith the Githyanki Lich-Queen.
It doesn't throw any PS mythology out the window with the one minor caveat that they mention that the Lady of Pain in Sigil is LN and those two little letters have sent the whole Planescape boards into a tizzy.
Overall this is a fine addition to the rules, it makes the planes soooooo much more accessible to 3.5 players and DMs and it supports the old-school Planescape players just fine. I think this book will only help to bring more players and DMs to the planes which will be good for everyone.
I'm less in it for the stats than the atmosphere, and that has been missing in a lot of the new supplements. Frankly, I couldn't care less what nifty new feats the Dustmen will have. I want the whimsy and wonder of Planescape, not the rules.
If this book delivers that, then I'll be happy.
I especially loved the stuff at the back with the planar metropolises and all the planar sites and encounters at the back.
The book is heavy on the rules because the designers wanted to make the planes accessible for new players and DM's. Hopefully more flavor will appear in future books if this one sells well.
Providing WotC with profit that they might bring out more products is a weak selling point in my opinion.
Kilamar
But there is still a lot in the Planar Handbook for the long-time Planescapers. I am an old-school planescaper and I really love the book. Check it out! It's a very nifty book! :D
The Planar Handbook is more of a Player's Handbook to the planes. It contains rules for new races, classes, augmenting existing classess, new spells, new magic items and equipment, etc. A lot of the rules are geared toward adapting characters to be more effective on the planes and able to go up against outsiders, travel around, and generally add a lot of planar color to existing characters or help you to create new ones that are particularly suited for the planes.
The last quarter or so of the book contains info that will be extremely helpful to DM's including details about some major cities of the planes and a host of planar locations and encounters that will add greatly to your experience in exploring the multiverse.
If the book did not impress you at first blush, please give it another try, the information in there should prove really valuable to any player or DM trying to get a planar campaign going.
The list of encounters in the back should be particularly helpful to DM's to help keep a campaign fun and keep it going for a very long time.
Its a great book! Buy lots of them! Buy extras for your friends!
If only we could get 2e fluff with 3.5e crunch all in the same book.
(I had the same thoughts about Gray ;) )
What gives me faith you ask? Serpent Kingdoms is an example of a brand new book that is amazingly flavor intense. I was filled with much joy while reading it. I am still shocked that the Hasbro accountants let them get away with a book that was so crunch-light and fluff-heavy. Just a wonderful, wonderful book, I hope it does fantastic for them. I would like to see more books like that one.
The good folks at Wizards will sell us anything that we have high demand for and prove that we will buy.
If we as a community want more fluff we need to spend our hard earned dollars on the fluffy books that they publish. We can say we wan't anything but if we don't put our dollars or euros or yen where our mouths (or keyboards) are then we can't expect Wizards to keep publishing the books that we say we want when we don't actually purchase them when they put them out there.
The way you can ensure that the designers will make more wonderful planescape-oriented books is for everyone to go and buy the Planar Handbook. Buy them as gifts for your friends, spread the good word of mouth and interest others in buying it too. Start up a planar campaign and bring new players into the fold. If the book sells really well then you can bet that WOTC will put out more products like it.
Go here and spread the word, my friend:
http://forum.rpg.net/
http://www.enworld.org/forums/index.php
Originally posted by Gray Richardson
Nope, wish I did, that would be one of my dream jobs, but I'm just a fan.
What gives me faith you ask? Serpent Kingdoms is an example of a brand new book that is amazingly flavor intense. I was filled with much joy while reading it. I am still shocked that the Hasbro accountants let them get away with a book that was so crunch-light and fluff-heavy. Just a wonderful, wonderful book, I hope it does fantastic for them. I would like to see more books like that one.
The good folks at Wizards will sell us anything that we have high demand for and prove that we will buy.
If we as a community want more fluff we need to spend our hard earned dollars on the fluffy books that they publish. We can say we wan't anything but if we don't put our dollars or euros or yen where our mouths (or keyboards) are then we can't expect Wizards to keep publishing the books that we say we want when we don't actually purchase them when they put them out there.
The way you can ensure that the designers will make more wonderful planescape-oriented books is for everyone to go and buy the Planar Handbook. Buy them as gifts for your friends, spread the good word of mouth and interest others in buying it too. Start up a planar campaign and bring new players into the fold. If the book sells really well then you can bet that WOTC will put out more products like it.
Wonderful? Are you sure we have been reading the same book? I keep reading it over and wondering why I paid for it. The planar class substitution stuff is great, the rest of it is mediocre to lousy. They reprint a lot of infirmation (Asimar, bariaur, tieflings, axiomatic template, anarchic template) and most of the rest of the stuff is uninteresting or not that useful. The planar metropolis information would've been good if only there wasn't so little of it. Then they waste about 30 PAGES on the planar touchstone crap!
The smart thing to do would've been to print 2-3 examples of the touchstone concept and rules on making and using them and leave it at that. That way those DMs who like them can make more, those who don't can ignore it. At 30 or so odd pages it is a huge chunk of the book so you can't ignore it. You end up either liking or hating the book on that alone. That plus the torrent of reprinted material makes me mad every time I think about how much I paid for it.
I have been warning everyone I know who hasn't made the mistake of buying it not to and I run a Planescape campaign myself. WotC doesn't deserve to get rewarded for that book.
Tzarevitch
It sounds like you have really high standards and that money is really tight for you. I am sorry for you that the parts you don't care for seem to ruin the parts of the book that you do like.
I am glad for you that there are at least parts of the book that you are happy with. I happen to like most of the parts of the book very much, especially the planar touchstones.
Personally I don't find the book all that expensive. It's cheaper than most video games. It's about the price of 6 McDonald's extra-value meals, or 4 movie tickets, and the amount of fun and hours gaming that I will get out of the book will more than exceed the worth of a week of lunches at McD's or those 4 movies.
I hope after additional readings that you will find some things to use in your campaign so that the book is not a complete loss for you.
Awesome, I use the same economic line of reasoning for my purchased, though I've miscalculated often in that regard. The planar hb was tempting, but it just feels like its gotten to the point I'd just rather WotC doesn't touch the planes until a new set of designers comes on board.
Originally posted by Gray Richardson
Okay, what I am hearing from you is that there are several things in the book that you really like (The substitution levels and the planar metropolises) but a lot of the book is not your cup of tea and it makes you mad that you spent as much as you did on the parts you didn't want?
It sounds like you have really high standards and that money is really tight for you. I am sorry for you that the parts you don't care for seem to ruin the parts of the book that you do like.
I am glad for you that there are at least parts of the book that you are happy with. I happen to like most of the parts of the book very much, especially the planar touchstones.
Personally I don't find the book all that expensive. It's cheaper than most video games. It's about the price of 6 McDonald's extra-value meals, or 4 movie tickets, and the amount of fun and hours gaming that I will get out of the book will more than exceed the worth of a week of lunches at McD's or those 4 movies.
I hope after additional readings that you will find some things to use in your campaign so that the book is not a complete loss for you.
No, it is not a complete loss otherwise I would have been screaming from the top of buildings with what I paid for the book. It is just fairly close. I have bought worse books (although never from WotC), but I have also bought much, much better ones (like Unearthed Arcana).
By the way, if I had bought 6 McDonald's extra-value meals I would have at least been full 6 times. This book didn't leave me full even once. In fact, I think I got food poisoning.:D
Tzarevitch