High-level adventures that aren't planar

[Koumei]

The "Belief Matters" aspect is awesome. Firstly because I always loved the Discworld book "Small Gods". Secondly because "Kill this god by burning temples down, killing/converting followers and defacing scriptures" is a great quest.

And thirdly because in Planescape, we once changed the domains of a deity. I was playing a certain priestess of a certain Lawful Evil goddess, and we went to the Dark Sun setting. They were amazed by "Create Water". We turned quite a profit, despite the paladin's best efforts (we let him give a little away for free, to the poor, because we believed in compromise).

Eventually, people asked about it, and I managed to explain to the NPCs the concept of "Deities that aren't dragons/world-corrupting sorcerers".

They misunderstood a little, and Loviatar gained the Water domain.

[Judging__Eagle]

They misunderstood a little, and Loviatar gained the Water domain.

I like DMs who let their players write the story.

Mostly because I find that the best stories are the ones that aren't predictable at all. They tend to be the most engaging and the least boring.

I'd rather be given a random collection of characters or events and try to figure out how they are interacting or pulling off certain events, than trying to write up the story in advance, and then have the PCs change it just by existing and doing adventuring things.

[RandomCasualty2]

The point of Planescape was that there were infinite forces in eternal conflicts, but that individual critical events shifted the boundaries massively from time to time. Constant fighting and exploring was done by every side in an attempt to find where and when these critical junctures were going to come, and presumably the PCs were going to be at one of them before the end of the campaign.

But here's the thing. Even if therre are a few swings in the blood war here and there, they're not happening on the prime, they're happening on the planes. Which happen to be infinite, therefore no matter how big the swing happens to be, nobody cares.

I mean, none of the lords of the nine die, none of the demon princes die. Besides that it's just the demons and devils fighting over infinite terrain. The Blood war just isn't going to end any time soon, it's not going to end ever, at least not in a military victory.

So ultimately when you're fighting in a war of infinity versus infinity on an infinite battlefield, I just fail to see how anyone could care. Sure, if demons happened to overrun the first layer of the Nine Hells, overthrow the current lord and turn it into the Eight Hells, then sure, someone might care, but that shit doesn't happen. At least it hasn't happened in tens of thousads of years (perhaps hundreds of thousands) and honestly, I don't see why anyone would expect anything like that to happen within the lifetime of an average PC.

[virgil]

Actually, there has been a turn-over rate with the Dark Eight and the Lord of the Nine in the canon, even before the Tyrants of the Nine Hells book came out. Back in 2E, there was an adventure involving the ressurection of an Abyssal Lord, and not a small one.

There was another adventure (2e) where the players remove ALL fiends of their ability to teleport, which was significant. I like to think of it as something that stuck with 3E, because greater teleport isn't interplanar like it was in 2E. If that doesn't mean anything to the Blood War, I don't know what does.

As you can see, despite there being infinity and events being cyclical, just being a part of one of these more significant swings means something to the players. Or do you feel disappointed that the players can't/don't literally sunder the world in prime-only games?

[Voss]

Except planar layers did slip during the span of Planescape products. And yeah, it was the focus of an adventure or two. If you could, say, move the first layer of the Hells up to Acheron and one of Acheron's layers up to Mechanus, you've pretty much made the universe a better place.

And nailing a demon lord or archdevil is possible, and its a useful thing to do, because the new guy is going to have to spend decades, if not centuries securing his power base. Long term, you might not have achieved much, but short term, you've disrupted the forces of Evil and have them mucking about in their own house rather than coming out and bothering good folk. Thats as much a win as you're likely to get, but you've made the 'verse a better place for a lifetime or two.

[RandomCasualty2]

There was another adventure (2e) where the players remove ALL fiends of their ability to teleport, which was significant. I like to think of it as something that stuck with 3E, because greater teleport isn't interplanar like it was in 2E. If that doesn't mean anything to the Blood War, I don't know what does.

As you can see, despite there being infinity and events being cyclical, just being a part of one of these more significant swings means something to the players. Or do you feel disappointed that the players can't/don't literally sunder the world in prime-only games?

The 2E adventure doesn't sound like part of the blood war, it sounds like they were doing some plot device ritual or using a plot device artifact to hit all fiends, which is something different. That's not about fighting the war, that's about making use of some opportunity to hose both sides.

I'm talking about being on the front lines of the war, actually fighting. No plot device BS, you're just killing stuff and using your abilities. So you're killing balors or pit fiends or whatever the hell you want to kill, but in the end you're not going to make any big difference that you or anyone else will care about.

Even nailing an archdevil is probably not going to happen, because he can just get resurrected even if he does die and be no worse for wear. To soul trap him, you'd need a diamond bigger than the wish economy cna generate.

And even then, there's a question of why you're doing it. Killing devils will just strengthen the demons, and killing demons just strengthens the devils. Since it's infinity versus infinity and has been going on fro ages, there's really no reason to disrupt the balance of power at all, because you don't want a winner. You want it to continue in the same ineffective fashion that it's always been fought, with the same demon princes and devil lords remaining in power and nothing really happening.

I can see the blood war as a good reason why powerful characters don't go and off the rulers of the Abyss or the Nine Hells, but I honestly don't see it as a conflict that PCs can get involved in. Because it's just not a war you want to win. You're actually just trying to create a standoff, only a standoff is what's happened for millenia anyway.

[CatharzGodfoot]

I'm talking about being on the front lines of the war, actually fighting. No plot device BS, you're just killing stuff and using your abilities.

As far as I can tell you're the only one :!:

[Voss]

Thats because fighting on the front lines of the Blood War is actively stupid. Really, thats how its been presented since it was introduced. The demons and devils don't have any choice in the matter, and it doesn't really matter if you knock over a general or two.

But fighting in the Blood War can't change things- the fighting is more the point than actually achieving anything. You're participating in the status quo, not altering the planes.

[virgil]

I have to agree with CatharzGodfoot.

The 2E adventure was part of a collection about the Blood War, and is a part of a collection of events to both help major players and to hose both sides in the Blood War.

I like how you go on about being unable to kill archfiends. It can and does happen, and new archfiends are created, which causes disruption in the ranks as the replacement attempts to cement his position. And soul trapping hardly requires a giant diamond when there's thinaun floating about.

And as for being on the front lines and actually fighting, you aren't going to make a different even if it were finite. Why? Because that's a level of epic that isn't handled by the rules. Ultimately, no single player is going to be more powerful than a pit fiend, and even a finite count would limit them in the thousands. It's like saying level 2 warrior NPCs should make a difference in the Battle of Helms Deep when on the front lines. That wasn't a cyclical battle of infinity, yet I'd say say such individuals won't make a lick of difference.

You seem to think that it's impossible to make an adventure that matters in the Blood War. One can deal a great blow to one side or the other, and recent accomplishments are acknowledged, even if they're one of many in the annals of eternity; many aren't going to be or haven't been around for that eternity, so their memory will recognize it as significant in their lifetime.

There can be adventures that involve the sliding of a layer, the killing/ressurection of an archfiend (they actually tend to be harder to return than what 9th level magic offers), the removal of near-universal abilities for both sides, etc. You think that players would say no to this and feel powerless?

[RandomCasualty2]

There can be adventures that involve the sliding of a layer, the killing/ressurection of an archfiend (they actually tend to be harder to return than what 9th level magic offers), the removal of near-universal abilities for both sides, etc. You think that players would say no to this and feel powerless?

Pretty much, they'd probably say no to everything except killing the archfiend, and even then if they were hired by devils they'd find it questionable.

The removal of abilities from both sides, I'm still not sure how that's really about the blood war. While that's a good thing for everyone else, what does it really have to do with fighting the actual blood war?

As for sliding of layers, honestly, I'm sure the PCs would love to peel off one of the nine Hells, the Abyssal layers are infnite though and I don't think they'd really care all that much. My PCs would rather have something more tangible than esoteric conflicts where infinity battles infinity over infinity. It's more satisfying most of the time to save a village of peasants than it is to see that one layer of the abyss gets grafted onto the first layer of hell or something.

But pretty much there's not much glory in the Blood war, because you're not fighting to win, you're fighting to maintain a standstill. It's pretty much the Vietnam war of the D&D cosmology.

[K]

While the planes are infinite, they do have boundaries.

Control over the Abyssal planes changes hands between demon lords all the time and various gods kill or depose various other gods in their planes.

I personally think that "infinite" planes are dumb. They should just be various worlds where a specific type of magic permeates the whole place and particular people or creatures have set themselves up with crazy amounts of magic power in these worlds.

I mean, a world is big enough to basically be limitless as far as PCs are concerned. There could even be several worlds that are spatially connected because they are bound by similiar magic so that several fire worlds comprise the "Plane of Fire".

[virgil]

The Blood War has more than just two sides, it has a side that tries to keep the Baatezu & Tanar'ri fighting, and I don't see how fighting for those sides is bad.

As I said, front-line fighting is tantamount to being a mook in major war because of the power level involved, making its finite/infinite nature meaningless.

I've contemplated having the planes, while infinite, have a 'sphere' of connections that makes it comparatively finite when it comes to events that occur as far as news that occur. Similar in principle to K's spatially connected fire worlds on the 'plane of fire', but expand to include virtually every plane in this manner.

[zeruslord]

virgileso, could you specify what you mean?

One idea I've heard along those lines is that planes work in six dimensions, but to mortals, three of them look the same as the other three. The planes would be finite on one set and infinite on the other, but everything is still within a finite distance of some central point.

[virgil]

Imagine that whenever you are cast forth into a plane haphazardly, or any kind of portal, it just happens to form within a cluster about the size of Russia. Now imagine all portals/transportations, no matter how random, ending up in the same arrangement. Any portal on the Plane of Fire to the Plane of Magma will lead to this same territory. It's almost like a constellation of planes.

When all forms of travel bring you to an area on such a scale, then your awareness of who or what is on that plane is limited to the events there. Thusly, significant events actually have significance on the planar level.

[zeruslord]

So each plane is infinite, but only a relatively small area matters?

Russia is either a bit big or too small, depending on the plane. The aligned planes should probably be bigger, both actually and politically, while a fantasy world should probably look more like Europe west of Ukraine. Outside that planar region is where samurai and other alternate cultures come from.

[virgil]

Sure, why not. I was just using some random size for a point of reference. The gist of it is that you can still have infinite planes with infinite what-have-you, yet still have events matter because people have limited realms of exposure.

[Amra]

I don't think it's difficult to make the Blood War "matter". In fact, the argument that it doesn't because it has been going on forever and will always end in stalemate is more than faintly ludicrous: it's like saying that nobody should ever bother getting out of bed in the morning because eventually the heat death of the Universe will happen and nothing you do will make a difference in the long run.

When localised events in the Blood War affect what happens to player characters or people they give a damn about in the here-and-now, it matters. If they need to influence those events in order to minimise the suffering caused to those caught up in the collateral damage of the conflict, they're going to do it regardless of whether anybody's ever going to "win" the war.

Infinity vs. Infinity may well be a zero-sum game on average, but that still allows for a nigh-infinite variation in local conditions which could have a massive impact on the PC's goals.

Even fighting on the front lines could have a point if it means that the players can stop *this* planar portal from being overrun just long enough for Zabulon the Fabulous to complete his spell to close it and save *this* town.

I can totally see why player characters wouldn't care about the Blood War in and of itself, but there are many, many good reasons why they might care about the *effects* of the war and want to influence it at a local level. And that's without even resorting to big plane-shaking stuff like moving planar layers around.

[baduin]

To return to High-level non-planar adventures, I have a high-level setting suggestion, based in a general way on D&D.

There are three real, or ruling classes of NPC. Players can take those classes, but they gain levels by adventuring, not simply by the NPC methods. When they do gain a level, it should be understood and possibly roleplayed that their victories allowed them to make a breakthrough in research, that they gained wisdom allowing deeper meditation, or that their fame brought many converts, etc.

Wizards - they gain their power by research; in order to improve their research they need data, assistants, and experiment subjects, but most of all they need discussion with other Wizards; because of that they are always forming cabals, and always intriguing between themselves - no one likes to reveal his most important secrets.

Druids - they gain their power by meditation. The only thing high level druids need is peace and quiet. There are two problems: there can be only a limited number of high-level druids. If a new druid gains eg 15 level, the weakest 15 level druid loses his highest level spell. Second, druids must be neutral. In order to break the iron law of karma and escape the circle of samsara, they cannot be neither altruistic nor evil. Only when they lose any attachment to the world they gain enlightement. As a corollary, a druid cannot simply blast with fire anybody who tries to break their meditation, eg by offering them beautiful girls, food, music etc, although they can defend themselves from physical attack. As the result, druids are invariably hermits, but do need support of the society - to give them peace, and to distract their rivals from their meditation.

Priest-kings (called in D&D clerics) - they gain power by spreading belief in their gods or in themselves. The visible, acting rulers of all kingdoms are always clerics - their powers are very appropriate for rulers, and their need for and ability to generate belief makes ruling both easy and beneficial. Since people believe that clerics represent the higher powers, gods, the eternal law etc, they tend to obey them without the need for constant supervision. When people believe in clerics, eg because they are ruling efficiently, clerics gain additional power.

Each state, city etc is ultimately ruled by a level 20 character of a real class or by something of equivalent power. Such rulers can be known or hidden and can rule directly or by proxy. This is caused by the enormous power of high-level characters, which destroy cities and kingdoms. Cities and people that don't have protection of a high level characer can be destroyed or enslaved with impunity.

A given city can be controlled directly by a 20 level cleric, or indirectly, by a lower level cleric obeying a 20 level wizard cabal. If the ultimate rulers are wizards, they usually hide even their existence; druids usually pose and holy/mad hermits. Clerics must be visible, but even in that case it is easy to find the statues of a 20 level God-King cleric. The ruler himself is hidden deep in one of his palaces or somewhere underground. In other words, high level NPC very seldom act openly. The reason is simple - since in D&D offence is much stronger than defence, anyone can be killed in one round - but they must be found first, and they hide very well.

Some states can be ruled by dragons, undead, fiends or even angels (usually fallen). Fiends and angels are incarnations of supernatural immaterial beings; they can be killed as easily as anyone else, but this only destroys their power to incarnate and forces them to remain outside of the world for a long time. There is even an Earthly Paradise (not so pleasant when you get to know it better, since it was created by Morining Star in a fit of hubris), and earthly hells, areas, cities or caverns ruled by demons and devils. The greatest of such underground kingdoms are the Nine Hells.

Possible conflicts: between different states and their patrons, intrigues within a state, as existing high-level characters try to eliminate the new competitors and at the same time use them do defeat their foreign enemies; against cults obeying some particularly evil patrons, etc; finally against high level monsters ruling some land.

At low levels, you can meet lower level representatives either of your own or of other patrons. Later, you can reach the higher levels, and finally in the end you can fight a boss.

[JonSetanta]

So each plane is infinite, but only a relatively small area matters?

It varies for each individual plane.

And yet, I like to think of them as having grey areas and blurred boundaries rather than defined borders, so it would effectively be one giant connected existence.
However, only the "areas that matter" are of worth to sentient beings; most of it is raw, untapped potential, filled with monsters and hazards.