D&D 5E Darksun 3.0

TheHobgoblin said:

The problem with trying to completely genocide a group is not the issue of beating them in a war. In fact, most attempts to do genocide are done by a very powerful group against one that really has no power to fight back.

The problem is trying to track down and kill every last one of them. Orcs are really, really good at surviving in areas that other races would struggle to do. Furthermore, they breed far, FAR quicker than anyone else.

Compared to say Dwarves or Elves who can only really survive in a very comfortable range of climates (so much so that apparently Elves get all these subraces adapted to various climates that are insulated and don't ever cross-breed with any of the others for hundreds of thousands of years) and the fact that they take so very long to mature and even once they mature they don't make many babies or make babies very often....

Well, its a lot easier to wipe out the later than it is the former regardless of whether the former cannot possibly harm you.

No human has ever directly been killed by a Termite. Bears often kill people.

But if a group was determined to wipe out every last bear on earth, they would have no trouble doing it. If the group were to try to wipe out every last termite, they would fail.

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Athasian Elves are different. It was also hinted that the Elves survived because the started running.

Orcs also lack spellcasters or arcane ones anyway. The wars lasted 1500 years and wrecked the planet. They would just have to kill them faster.

Athasian Trolls were also different more like intelligent cultured Ogres. Similar to the ancient giants.

TheHobgoblin said:

The problem with trying to completely genocide a group is not the issue of beating them in a war. In fact, most attempts to do genocide are done by a very powerful group against one that really has no power to fight back.

The problem is trying to track down and kill every last one of them. Orcs are really, really good at surviving in areas that other races would struggle to do. Furthermore, they breed far, FAR quicker than anyone else.

Compared to say Dwarves or Elves who can only really survive in a very comfortable range of climates (so much so that apparently Elves get all these subraces adapted to various climates that are insulated and don't ever cross-breed with any of the others for hundreds of thousands of years) and the fact that they take so very long to mature and even once they mature they don't make many babies or make babies very often....

Well, its a lot easier to wipe out the later than it is the former regardless of whether the former cannot possibly harm you.

No human has ever directly been killed by a Termite. Bears often kill people.

But if a group was determined to wipe out every last bear on earth, they would have no trouble doing it. If the group were to try to wipe out every last termite, they would fail.

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The thing with Dark Sun is, it's a world without gods. All the races were created through evolution from halflings, not created by the gods of their respective races, so many were fundamentally different. Also, like I said, each sorcerer king was created to hunt down a specific race at a time when many of the races were still pretty young. They had the means to track them down and kill them all, after all they were at the minimum lvl 21 dragons. The other thing to remember was until Kalak died, no sorcerer king had ever been killed. They didn't even know how to kill each other. Hamanu was the only king created to kill the other kings.

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neogod22 said:

The thing with Dark Sun is, it's a world without gods. All the races were created through evolution from halflings, not created by the gods of their respective races, so many were fundamentally different. Also, like I said, each sorcerer king was created to hunt down a specific race at a time when many of the races were still pretty young. They had the means to track them down and kill them all, after all they were at the minimum lvl 21 dragons. The other thing to remember was until Kalak died, no sorcerer king had ever been killed. They didn't even know how to kill each other. Hamanu was the only king created to kill the other kings.

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Several kings had died before Kala. Sielba, Kalid-Ma.

Zardnaar said:

Several kings had died before Kala. Sielba, Kalid-Ma.

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2 of those are the floating heads right? It's been like 20 years since I read the books so I'm not 100% up to date with the facts. I do remember Humanu took the place of the Troll slayer and he actually died, but the other 2 are in an undead state which is I guess is technically not dead.

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neogod22 said:

2 of those are the floating heads right? It's been like 20 years since I read the books so I'm not 100% up to date with the facts. I do remember Humanu took the place of the Troll slayer and he actually died, but the other 2 are in an undead state which is I guess is technically not dead.

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No they were Sacha and Wyan IIRC.

Yes, that's right.

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Zardnaar said:

It was also impossible in the original rules without supplement material.

Epic rules for DS (Dragon Kings) can be done but I would not worry about it to much. There can be a series of feats like Dragonmarks that can give higher level psionic and magical powers. If you take 4 or 5 of them the epic boons can grant things like AC and dragon breath weapon to enable PCs to become advanced beings.

Epic rules have also been done on the DMG, adapt them I suppose.

Based on feedback I have been rewriting
Muls
Kreen

Weapon rules
Defiling
Armor rules
Bonus feat at level 1

Adding

Racial feats
Optional tags for other races (Aarakocra, Pterrans, Dragonborn, Goliaths)
Optional Tags for Monks, Sorcerers, Warlocks (generally only 1 archetype)
Optional rules for Templars, Elves, Dwarves adding fluff to roughly duplicate some 2E mechanics.
Fluff suggestions for incorporating new races and classes into Darksun in a logical manner (not the 4E approach)

Some races are still out though (Drow, Tritons, Lizardfolk, Half Orcs), hopefully I should not have to explain it.

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Dear [MENTION=6716779]Zardnaar[/MENTION], can you add a posting with those updates?

Coroc said:

Dear [MENTION=6716779]Zardnaar[/MENTION], can you add a posting with those updates?

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Well they are not finished yet.

Ok you vampires, jackals, harridans and vultures I have overhauled a lot of the OP.

Treated some of the borderline classes like the PHB and made classes and races optional. This includes the revised options from 2E Darksun and most of the important ones from 4E and Volos Guide to Monsters. There are still some exclusions that I can't really refluff or were really included in the 4E material (Drow, Tritons etc).

Ultimately you can do what you want in your home games but I will not be doing anything to support additional races, archetypes and classes beyond this list. I will hopefully be adding racial feats to the game and overhauling anything existing here based on feedback. Some of the races need a tidy up I just included the most important things. I think the Mul, Half Giant and Kreen are getting fairly close to a final form. Then if you want my notes you can do that or if anyone wants to edit it into a PDF or something you can do that.

Once I have a basic infrastructure set up for a Darksun game (you will probably want the PDFs or hard copy material) I will work on converting the Darksun monsters in the 1991 boxed set (Gaj, Dragon of Tyr etc) and some of the basic animal type monsters (Kanks, Kirre, Mekilots, Klaar etc).

Converting the 2 monster manuals is a lot of work though so will not be done anytime soon only perhaps the important ones.

I will eventually need another 2 sections so will probably recreate the thread with more sections added/reserved.

Generally I will be doing it as a reboot back to the 1991 original material with a few additions from later source books, the Revised Boxed Set, and 4E material. Those additions will mostly be options (new races, classes) that do not mess up the metaplot or do drastic changes to the setting (both Prism Pentad and 4E material). Basically if its a good idea (Air, Earth Wind Fire) I am open to adding it, if its a stupid idea (surfing Druids) its out.

Variant class abilities my also be added into the optional section.

An alternative rule for Defiling, based on the Blight spell:

Any arcane magic-user can choose to Defile when he casts another spell. If he does so, treat the Defiling as if he cast a Blight spell with a range of 30 feet, centered on himself. Every creature in the zone suffers the damage. Sum up all the HP taken by every victim of the Defiling. Add that total to the damage done by the other spell that was cast; this damage is necrotic.

Of course, the outside-the-game problem is that a Defiler falls into two categories:
(1) he doesn't hurt his allies (much) - and therefore the Defiling doesn't really have any effect on anything else. Why defile, or worry about it?
(2) Defiling is powerful, it affects both friend and foe, and his allies have to keep creating new characters because the Defiler keeps on killing them.