A couple quick DS questions

[Perun]

I'll be going home for two weeks at the beginning of October, and it might just happen my gaming group will gather for the first time in a long while. We'll be giving the new, shiny Dark Sun a shot I'll only be "guest starring" for a session or two, but I'm really excited about playing D&D again

I've been reading through the DS material, and one thing in the Dragon #390 article,Psionics, magic, and metal, caught my attention -- Rich Baker says:

In Athas, steel (or bronze or any other metal) is a masterwork material with a minimum enhancement value of +3. In other words, if you find a steel longsword, it’s automatically a +3 steel longsword at the bare minimum.

This is the only place I've seen this rule mentioned. There is a similar line in the equipment sections of the Chapter 4 of the DSCS, p. 119, but it talks specifically about armour, not weapons.

So, was this a remnant of some previous version of the rule accidentally left in the article, or am I just blind and unable to find the relevant section in the book?

(I'm assuming it's the former, since some of the DS pregens (all 1st-level characters) had metal weapons, and those certainly weren't +3 weapons


Also, if anyone knows where in the old 2e Dark Sun material various human ethnicities were described, I'd be grateful. I know humans of Draj have the South American theme, Raam (?) is somewhat Egyptian in flavour, and Lalai-Puy's city-state has African flavour, but I can't remember where it's all detailed.

Thanks in advance.

Regards.

 

[Initiate]

I think it was left in the article by accident. I don't recall reading anything about trouble with metal weapons in the DSCS.

I could be mistaken however.

 

[bganon]

I don't know where the original ethnic info is, but the Wikipedia page actually lists them:

Balic - Greek (or I've seen some say Roman)
Draj - Aztec
Gulg - African
Nibenay - Angkor (1000 years ago was a huge urban sprawl in what is now Cambodia)
Raam - Egyptian
Tyr - Tyre (major trading city 3000 years ago in what is now Lebanon)
Urik - Babylonian