Do you think the planes in Starfinder are substantially the same as in Pathfinder?

[Steve Geddes]

It's always seemed to me that the other planes are almost universally 'timeless', at least socially/culturally, and that in that respect they have a much slower pace-of-change than the material plane (even if technically time is flowing at the same rate as in the material plane).

As such, it seems like (barring interaction with the gap and so forth) Pathfinder sourcebooks on the planes could eastily be reasonably up-to-date in the Starfinder universe.

Is that right? Wrong? Has there been any discussion about that somewhere?

[Nixitur]

I'd say probably not. Even Alien Archive has stuff like a devil that morphs into a spaceship and angels whose duty is specifically to hunt down and destroy dangerous technology. Triune has really shaken things up, so the Outer Planes seem to have changed quite substantially.
I'd love to know what happened to the Inner Planes, though. The Elementals at least are pretty much the same as in Pathfinder, though I wouldn't be surprised if the Mephit and especially Genies have adapted to technology.

[Ianesta]

When Pathfinder was going on there were also concurrent (and past) civilisations of high technology, like the Androffans. Post-Triune there may be a lot of high-tech cultures out there, but there are presumably as many with medieval-era tech like the old Golarion. The Divinity crashed probably 10k years before Starfinder meaning there has been 10k + years of laser guns and stuff going on, the new outsiders in Starfinder are cool, but they've probably been around for a while.

[Albatoonoe]

Adding on to Ianesta's post, these new tech oriented monsters probably olwould avoid places like Pathfinder era Golarion as it wouldn't have much for them to do.

Additionally, The planes are nigh-infinite. They almost certainly interacted with high-technology. In the same thought though, what use do they really have for it? Planar beings have inate and powerful magical abilities.

[Tacticslion]

..

[Steve Geddes]

My question was more about the society/cultures and power structures than bestiaries. I will be using different monsters for thematic reasons, if nothing else.

I was wondering things like: Are the four horseman still in power? Have the hierarchies of hell changed? Are the same demon lords still in existence as were in the Pathfinder era?

My impression is that things change incredibly slowly there, but I don’t think I’ve ever actually read that - I wondered if there’s a canonical discussion anywhere (or whether my impression is widely held or idiosyncratic).

I’m wondering if the upcoming Planar adventures could well be useful for both games.

[Xuldarinar]

Consider this: You are on Absalom Station, and you use a spell to go to the Shadow Plane, are you on Shadow Absalom Station or are you perhaps in a place like Shadow Absalom (The city) on Shadow Golarion?

What if you use it on the Sun?

...I NEED to see what the shadow plane is like in Starfinder.

[avr]

I'd think they're not the same for a different reason. There's a lot written for PF. Keeping it reasonably consistent must be a huge job. The Gap and the rest of the time between PF/SF is a great excuse for inconsistencies when they come up.

Like a milder version of Star Wars and the wipe of their expanded universe (EU).

[Metaphysician]

I would say, yes, they are substantially the same. This doesn't mean they might not look different to the random visitor, but this is because a random visitor from the Starfinder era has different knowledge and cultural expectations, and so reaches different *parts* of the Planes. There were *always* places ruled by alien cultures and filled with alien petitioners, for example. You just were vanishingly unlikely to run across them, because travel on the Outer Planes is based partly on intent. And even if you did stumble upon Kasatha Heaven, it'd just get put down as "one of those weird things".

The fundamental cosmological laws, and structures of planar society? Still the same, aside from a few shifts in divine politics and a new interstitial plane.