Quote:
Originally Posted by Astromancer
There has to be a point of transition between wildspace and astral space.
Without that limitation, why worry about air?
|
I agree. It is an important detail because the ramifications are (should be) important... like running out of air.
Everything I read about 5E Spelljammer in the reviews basically says that there are no details and it's up to the DM to hand-waive them...
- How far do you have to go? Up to you.
- How does one transition between the Material and Astral? up to you.
- How does ship combat work? up to you (but why not have your PC board the ships instead)
- How does food storage work and how much space does it take? Doesn't matter.
- Does ship size and number of crew/passengers affect how long your air lasts? that's not important.
- etc.
(caveat: going by what I read in reviews, not the actual product which I don't have)
Since all I wanted from the 5E Spelljammer was the answer to those type of questions so that I could adapt it to GURPS, it effectively defeats the purpose of me ever getting the 5E version. You had all of that information and more in Spelljammers 2E, and frankly, I'd probably use that for the "setting information" if I were to play again.
For example, even if I did decide to use the 5E Astral instead of the 2E Phlogiston/Crystal Spheres, I'd probably use the same 2x furthest planet distance before you could shift away. And to go from the Astral to the Material, you'd have to be at a "veil/portal" (or whatever it might be called now in 5E) and I'd have them look like giant spherical crystals....
I had a great 2E Spelljammer campaign long ago (using 2E rules at the time since I hadn't discovered GURPS back then) and we had a great time. In fact, it was the setting that let us do a "crossover" scenario where the characters of our Forgotten Realms campaign met the characters of our Mystara campaign (with the trope of fighting each other in misunderstanding at first until they realizes they were both teams of heroes). So Spelljammers will always be something good to me. And it's a setting I do recommend to anyone who hasn't tried it. However, it just sounds like this particular 5E rulebook isn't really needed. Lost opportunity for D&D, at least from my point of view.
(Hmm... am I turning into one of those people who simply doesn't like things because they aren't the way they used to be... nah....)