Other Worlds: Planar Trappings

Almost as much as pantheon design, I’ve liked exploring other planes. The first edition Manual of the Planes was one of the most fascinating books of that era to me. It showed such alien worlds. There were many other campaign setting books/box sets, but they were relatively normal. At least, normal for someone accustomed to fantasy fiction of the time.

Planescape came along later in the AD&D 2e era, and built on Manual of the Planes.

Now I want more.

Starfinder’s Galaxy Exploration Manual and Deck of Many Worlds, and some older D&D 3.x products, give me a lot to work with. This prompted my Deck of Ages work… which is predicated on different ‘ages’ meaning that the world is different. That is, “different ages are other worlds”, even if they are within walking distance physically (if not temporally).

Trappings

Primary trappings from Starfinder include Accord, Morality (Good/Evil), Order (Law/Chaos), Magic, Religion, and Technology.

Expanded trappings include Civilization, Climate, Elemental Traits, Life/Death, Planar, and Xenoculture.

Each can have positive, negative, neutral, or absent/none/null values.

• Positive/High means the trapping is a defining feature in how it is present in the world.
• Negative/Low means the trapping is a defining feature in how it is absent, or it’s opposite present, in the world.
• Neutral means the trapping is a defining feature in how extremes are excluded from (or perhaps polarized in) the world.
• Absent means the trapping is not a particularly defining feature in the world.

For example:

• A ‘high Order’ (high Law, low Chaos) world is likely to be ordered and predictable.
• A ‘low Order’ (low Law, high Chaos) is likely disordered and unpredictable.
• A ‘neutral Order’ world can be described as rejecting strong influences of Law and Chaos. Or both are present and polarized.
  • In Michael Stackpole’s A Hero Born, ‘civilization’ is heavily ordered to protect against Chaos… and across the Ward Walls, Chaos is predominant. Both order and chaos are present and defining of the world, but neither is ascendant.
  • L.E. Modesitt’s Recluce books can fit this trapping value as well. There is a recurring theme of the rise of both Chaos and Order, in balance.
• An ‘absent Order’ world isn’t defined by this trapping or trait. Law and Chaos might or might not be present to a degree they register. Or perhaps they are, but it’s localized enough that it doesn’t define the world.

That’s a high-level look at what the various trappings are (or at least their names), and how they are graded. It doesn’t say what they do or look like in the setting or in the game.

Which will be my focus for the next few posts on this topic.