fine, there is little interest in high level stories in D&D
I sure hope WotC has a better way to gauge the market demand for this than a forum discussion. I am pretty sure that their lack of high level adventures is a reflection of a company following the market.
probably, it's one of those sacred cows they have decided cannot be killed
As mentioned earlier, Jeremy Crawford specifically explained why they design for high levels despite 90% of tables not playing them: aspirational material. Even if it doesn't get used, people can read and get an idea of the potential development arc.
I think the better question is "how usable" it is to someone that's already running a setting (whether homebrew or published)? How much work does it take to use Spelljammer in an existing campaign than strip out elements of Darksun?
If I get DS chances are I want to use it as a setting and not take bits and pieces and plop them into a large desert on my campaign world.
Historically, Dark Sun was bigger than Spelljammer...but that was a long time ago when WotC shared numbers on thst, and since then there has been actual Spelljammer material and no Dark Sun material, and most people who have played D&D ever have started in that era...ao I would think itpoasivle Wpelljammer might be more familiar to modern D&D audiences than Dark Sun. I am very curious what a modern Dark Sun would look like.
Neither one was familiar to them before WotC released SJ, so the modern audience being unfamiliar with DS is not more of a hurdle for DS than it was for SJ at the time. To me the question is what is considered the more interesting setting, my guess is it is DS but I obviously could be wrong
Thematically, with defiling, preserving, ubiquitous psionics, and the general tenor of the setting makes it harder to just plop down in an existing setting unless your DMlandia is as grim.
SJ has its own issues with thematics, but it's easy to plop down a side quest that has the character travel to the Rock of Braal (or elsewhere) before getting back to to the campaign's overarching plot (if there is one).
Personally, I'm undecided which one has more mass appeal, but as you rightly point out, we'd need real data (that we don't have) to draw any accurate conclusions. I'm just presenting things from my particular bias.
as I said, chances are you want to play the setting not rip pieces out. You mostly will have to ignore preserving and defiling, the rest should carry over pretty well however
