Hello Cagers
I'm wanting to get back into the spirit of things and I need to make a reading list. Perhaps some of you can help? I picked up Pages of Pain yesterday, and I'd like to get get a fine meal of Planescape material for a long session of mental digestion started. Do any of you have any recommendations in addition to the Pages of Pain? If so, is there any order I should read things in?
Planescape Reading Material?
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*Emanon
- Posts: 48
- Joined: Thu Jan 01, 1970 12:00 am
The best books to get...
*The Planeswalker's Handbook
This is basically the entire campaign condensed into one, slim book chock with some of the finest DiTerlizzi art he's made for the series.
*The Factol's Manifesto
This is my choice for THE BEST Planescape book ever made. Gorgeous. High-quality. Beautiful. And FULL of everything about the factions you could ever want to know.
*In the Cage: A Guide to Sigil
The art kind of sucks (DiTerlizzi, why hath thou forsaken us?), but it's still a useful book in terms of a lot of Sigilian culture as well as a lot of landmarks.
*On Hallowed Ground
This one is okay if you're really curious as to how gods actually do what they do or want to know what's going to happen to your PC when they die.
*Planes of ? (Boxed Sets)
Pretty much must-haves if you plan on going out onto the outer planes.
*Harbinger House
The best and most epic adventure.
Best Art Books
I'm a big DiTerlizzi fan and the best books in the line for art are:
Factol's Manifesto
Planeswalker's Handbook
Monstrous Compendiums I & II (III sucks though)
Uncaged: Faces of Sigil
Books to Avoid Like the Plague
*Faction War
Eh. It's not the world's worst adventure, but I just thought it was a bit lazy in the ending. The biggest reason to avoid it is that if you run it, you end up destroying everything that makes Planescape awesome because the ending is just that bad. Granted, you can (and should) just ignore all the faction-destroying/disbanding nonsense if you do choose to run it, but it still ruins too much imo...
*Die Vecna Die!
Technically NOT a Planescape product, but it does prominently feature Sigil and the Lady of Pain in it. I love Vecna, he's my favorite villain, and while this adventure is the explanation as to how 2nd edition becomes 3rd edition, I found the characterization of Sigil and The Lady of Pain in the last third of this adventure to be horribly uncharacteristic.
*The Blood Wars Trilogy
These are 3 novels. Every single one of them badly awful. The writer must have barely skimmed a summary he found on Wikipedia before forgetting half of it and writing a terrible trilogy. I'll put it like this: I bought each and every Planescape product and devoured it lovingly as it came out. I even kind of liked and kept "Faction War." When I bought and read these, I was so irritated and disgusted with them I burned them and have never looked back.
Planescape Lite (Best products to buy without buying everything):
*Planes of Law/Chaos/Conflict
*Primer to the Oulands
*Guide to the Astral Plane
*Monstrous Compendiums I and II
Need these your outer planar adventuring.
*Planeswalker's Handbook
Pretty much sums up everything in the core box and then some.
*Facol's Manifesto
For your faction stuff.
*In The Cage: A Guide to Sigil
If you don't want to make up dozens of landmarks and settings for the Cage.
If you want to do any inner planar stuff:
*Guide to the Ethereal Plane
*The Inner Planes
*Monstrous Compendium III
Adventures Worth Reading:
*Harbinger House
*Dead Gods
*Fires of Dis
*Something Wild
*Well of Worlds (Big book of many adventures)
*The Planeswalker's Handbook
This is basically the entire campaign condensed into one, slim book chock with some of the finest DiTerlizzi art he's made for the series.
*The Factol's Manifesto
This is my choice for THE BEST Planescape book ever made. Gorgeous. High-quality. Beautiful. And FULL of everything about the factions you could ever want to know.
*In the Cage: A Guide to Sigil
The art kind of sucks (DiTerlizzi, why hath thou forsaken us?), but it's still a useful book in terms of a lot of Sigilian culture as well as a lot of landmarks.
*On Hallowed Ground
This one is okay if you're really curious as to how gods actually do what they do or want to know what's going to happen to your PC when they die.
*Planes of ? (Boxed Sets)
Pretty much must-haves if you plan on going out onto the outer planes.
*Harbinger House
The best and most epic adventure.
Best Art Books
I'm a big DiTerlizzi fan and the best books in the line for art are:
Factol's Manifesto
Planeswalker's Handbook
Monstrous Compendiums I & II (III sucks though)
Uncaged: Faces of Sigil
Books to Avoid Like the Plague
*Faction War
Eh. It's not the world's worst adventure, but I just thought it was a bit lazy in the ending. The biggest reason to avoid it is that if you run it, you end up destroying everything that makes Planescape awesome because the ending is just that bad. Granted, you can (and should) just ignore all the faction-destroying/disbanding nonsense if you do choose to run it, but it still ruins too much imo...
*Die Vecna Die!
Technically NOT a Planescape product, but it does prominently feature Sigil and the Lady of Pain in it. I love Vecna, he's my favorite villain, and while this adventure is the explanation as to how 2nd edition becomes 3rd edition, I found the characterization of Sigil and The Lady of Pain in the last third of this adventure to be horribly uncharacteristic.
*The Blood Wars Trilogy
These are 3 novels. Every single one of them badly awful. The writer must have barely skimmed a summary he found on Wikipedia before forgetting half of it and writing a terrible trilogy. I'll put it like this: I bought each and every Planescape product and devoured it lovingly as it came out. I even kind of liked and kept "Faction War." When I bought and read these, I was so irritated and disgusted with them I burned them and have never looked back.
Planescape Lite (Best products to buy without buying everything):
*Planes of Law/Chaos/Conflict
*Primer to the Oulands
*Guide to the Astral Plane
*Monstrous Compendiums I and II
Need these your outer planar adventuring.
*Planeswalker's Handbook
Pretty much sums up everything in the core box and then some.
*Facol's Manifesto
For your faction stuff.
*In The Cage: A Guide to Sigil
If you don't want to make up dozens of landmarks and settings for the Cage.
If you want to do any inner planar stuff:
*Guide to the Ethereal Plane
*The Inner Planes
*Monstrous Compendium III
Adventures Worth Reading:
*Harbinger House
*Dead Gods
*Fires of Dis
*Something Wild
*Well of Worlds (Big book of many adventures)