Spelljammer Dark Sun confirmed? Or, the mysterious case of the dissappearing Spelljammer article...

[overgeeked]

To steer things towards Dark
Sun...I think WotC really, really doesn’t have a good interest in going there, on a commercial level. They can't do the topic justice and market to 12 year olds at the same time.

Absolutely. It’s either, or.

Ravenloft.

I think the phrase “do it justice” is where we’ll disagree. That it exists in Ravenloft does not mean it was done well.

 

[Parmandur]

Absolutely. It’s either, or.

I think the phrase “do it justice” is where we’ll disagree. That it exists in Ravenloft does not mean it was done well.

They don't mind saying thst evil I'd occurring, but they leave stuff up to DMs imagination by and large. Which is fine, in my book.

 

[Mind of tempest]

They don't mind saying thst evil I'd occurring, but they leave stuff up to DMs imagination by and large. Which is fine, in my book.

I ain't asking for a graphic description merely diverse evil goals and a basic explanation of how something works so people can grasp how it interacts with the setting and why it is evil.

 

[Shardstone]

I would say that proves my point. I'm not saying thst the topic is utterly verboten, but they aren't going to dig into it either.

Do they need to? They already presented a dark setting filled with children murder, slavery, body horror and vivisection, and so on. I just think the argument that Dark Sun can't exist because of 12 year olds is so exhausting and frankly stupid. Dark Sun works as a pg-13 setting. D&D is most assuredly PG-13.

 

[Shardstone]

Radiant Citadel literally has children being killed and turned into life-sucking undead, masses of people being horrifically killed by volcanic cataclysms, people being snatched up into the Far Realm to be tortured, and so on. Like c'mon, just use any argument other than "Can't get dark for 12 year olds" when it is so blatantly not true.

 

[Mind of tempest]

Do they need to? They already presented a dark setting filled with children murder, slavery, body horror and vivisection, and so on. I just think the argument that Dark Sun can't exist because of 12 year olds is so exhausting and frankly stupid. Dark Sun works as a pg-13 setting. D&D is most assuredly PG-13.

Radiant Citadel literally has children being killed and turned into life-sucking undead, masses of people being horrifically killed by volcanic cataclysms, people being snatched up into the Far Realm to be tortured, and so on. Like c'mon, just use any argument other than "Can't get dark for 12 year olds" when it is so blatantly not true.

something something slavery is different, despite the fact that it has been in 5e since day one.

 

[pukunui]

something something slavery is different, despite the fact that it has been in 5e since day one.

I’d just like to point out to the room at large that the recent 5e adventure so many people dismiss as too whimsical and not real D&D because it doesn’t require combat (Wild Beyond the Witchlight) features a hag who kidnaps and enslaves children to use in her workshops. I don’t think the word “slave” or such is ever used but it’s right there in the bright and whimsical fairy tale adventure!

Conclusion: I don’t think slavery is a reason why WotC wouldn’t do a 5e version of Dark Sun.

 

[Mind of tempest]

I’d just like to point out to the room at large that the recent 5e adventure so many people dismiss as too whimsical and not real D&D because it doesn’t require combat (Wild Beyond the Witchlight) features a hag who kidnaps and enslaves children to use in her workshops. I don’t think the word “slave” or such is ever used but it’s right there in the bright and whimsical fairy tale adventure!

Conclusion: I don’t think slavery is a reason why WotC wouldn’t do a 5e version of Dark Sun.

I would put more money on the lack of ideas on what to do with psionics as to why they would not do it.

 

[Ondath]

@Ondath that actually gives me a great idea for a large scale campaign.

Start off low level fight the oppression, eventually realize you are fighting an uphill battle, discover an old spelljammer, go recruit help.

Would you end up making the situation worse (magic using invasion) or better (help change the world)?

I might just start a one off campaign with this idea, thanks.

If the discussion gave you a good idea, I'm happy for it! It does sound nice for a home campaign and I'd likely do something similar myself. But I think (as others pointed out in this thread far more succinctly) Athas's isolation is one of the key thematic points of the setting, and while you can tell the story of "We've travelled across universes to recruit help for our own", it's not the same thing as Mad Max Fury Road. I much prefer Dark Sun when it's Mad Max Fury Road.

 

[QuentinGeorge]

Oh I know, but WotC turned all the old Ravenloft lore upside down and inside out to bring it into 5e, in principle there's no reason they couldn't discard some fairly minor and peripheral lore linking Dark Sun to Spelljammer in the same way.

Sigh. WotC seem to be jumping decisively in the opposite creative direction to the one I would have chosen with every single one of their legacy setting reinventions. Ravenloft went hard on the concept of delirious nightmare realm where I would have taken it in a very much more grounded Gothic direction. Spelljammer is going big on the whimsy and the absurd where my favourite bits of the setting were the (admittedly minor, in the scheme of things) more gritty and horrific parts like the Inhuman Wars. Dragonlance's focus seems to be on war and mass combat, where for me the big thing of Dragonlance was the personal drama and interactions and destinies of these romantic epic heroes. And Dark Sun looks very much like it'll be introduced via a multiversal stopover from another setting, where my preference is for it to be as isolated as possible from the wider D&D multiverse.

None of this is a criticism mind you - these creative decisions aren't 'bad' or uncanonical or indefensible - it's just a matter of personal taste. All these settings always were big and diverse and widely thematically varied places. Dragonlance always was both a war setting AND a melodrama setting. It's just that WotC and I seem to be interested in completely different aspects of the settings every time, which is a bit frustrating.