evilbob
Adventurer
After reading the Dark Sun campaign book, I was really interested. I loved the idea of the setting: a sort of Conan meets Fallout in a semi-low-magic campaign (my take, anyway). Only one problem: I'm not a big fan of psionics.
The reasons for my opinion are long and boring. And I don't mind if someone wants to play a psionic character: the PCs are the exceptional ones, after all. I just don't like psionics to flavor the campaign world. I don't like that it has replaced magic as the "technology" of the land; I don't like the idea of psionics being one of the dominate features of the landscape. So, I came up with another idea.
The following are my ideas on how to slightly reskin the Dark Sun campaign world to make it more interesting to me; that's all. If you plan on playing in a Dark Sun game, you may want to skip this thread, as there are slight spoilers. (And please forgive me if this trounces on anyone else's toes: it's not a terribly original idea so someone else may have beat me to the punch.)
Dark Sun Sans Psionics
On the practical side, it's easy to reskin the mechanics: most of the wild feats could be physical in nature anyway and the few psionic feats/themes could be redone without much issue (or PCs can keep them, but no NPCs will have them). The one place it doesn't work is the background of the world. If you remove psionics and both metal and magic are super-rare, what keeps the boat afloat, so to speak? What is the technology of the world where they don't have technology? What gives them power? What's the "oil" or "electricity" of this land?
Enter a new material: ahnk. (Feel free to change the name to whatever you like; I just liked it for the less-than-subtle tie-in to "ankh" and therefore "life".) Ahnk is a sort of yellow-colored powder that can be pressed into a solid shape that retains its form. Since metals are scarce - including gold, of course (another issue with the Dark Sun campaign: if metal is so scarce, how are you tossing around 2 million gold to purchase your epic weapons?) - ahnk is also used for currency. A specific amount is pressed into small circular pieces commonly called "chips". All prices are in chips (1:1 ratio with gold cost).
Chips also serve as power sources (sort of like a battery). For example, one practical item on this brutal world could be a slave collar that helpfully keeps one from being able to speak but doesn't impair eating/breathing. A single chip can keep it going for about a month. Nobles use chips to power common labor-saving devices. Large numbers of chips - or just pure ahnk - can power a small city for a time. They're used in lamps (whatever oil would cost, that's how much it costs in chips) and other items to create light. Also, you can burn ahnk: although this is not a particularly good method to release its energy, as it can be unpredictable, if you're freezing to death it can provide warmth (or fry you to a crisp). Adventurers are paid in chips and can use them to trade or consume them with devices. (Like gold, it's poisonous to eat.) Small stashes may be found, but no one really knows how to "make" more (like gold, it's a pipe dream: those who claim to know how to do it really don't).
Of course, it's not really that simple.
Ahnk can also be used to power rituals (1:1 cost). Optionally, you could include the rule that one can consume ahnk when gaining power from defiling and it doesn't defile (a high cost: maybe 1/5 a magic item of your level's worth?). And finally, when you enchant/disenchant a magical item (probably a good idea to keep this rare), perhaps you actually use/get ahnk. Now is about the time the players should start to figure out... Ahnk is really just pure magic, physically manifested. By another name it's residuum or arcanum ("ahnkanum"). So the world is still being run with magic: it just doesn't see the connection. It's hiding in plain sight.
The reason ahnk exists is because back when arcane magic was discovered, part of the original discovery was that ahnk could be made from any living thing. Similar to defiling, you could "mine" ahnk from the world around you. This made magic even more convenient; long, arduous studies in the arcane arts wasn't necessary if you had a chunk of ahnk with you. This led to the ancient wars not being about simple genocide (another idea that seemed less interesting to me) but about resources (more like Fallout). Entire countries, groups, and even single, powerful individuals waged war over the resource of ahnk, and because of the way it is created and because of the incredibly destructive nature of arcane magic, the wars laid waste to the land. The sorcerer kings were the only "victors" of this war - if indeed such an ending can be called a victory - and they jealously guard their huge caches of ahnk to this day in a sort of mutual armistice. Centuries have passed, the sorcerer kings are effectively immortal, and the rest of civilization has crumbled.
Of course, if the secret of ahnk is discovered and a small group of important people are able to act on that knowledge, they could use it to rally groups to their cause to cause some serious change in the world - maybe to bring down a sorcerer king. They might even be able to figure out a way to return the ahnk to the very world from which it was stolen, thus breathing life into a dead land. Or, they might learn the secret of mining ahnk for themselves and rule on high from their mountain of arcane power and become the next sorcerer king.
The reasons for my opinion are long and boring. And I don't mind if someone wants to play a psionic character: the PCs are the exceptional ones, after all. I just don't like psionics to flavor the campaign world. I don't like that it has replaced magic as the "technology" of the land; I don't like the idea of psionics being one of the dominate features of the landscape. So, I came up with another idea.
The following are my ideas on how to slightly reskin the Dark Sun campaign world to make it more interesting to me; that's all. If you plan on playing in a Dark Sun game, you may want to skip this thread, as there are slight spoilers. (And please forgive me if this trounces on anyone else's toes: it's not a terribly original idea so someone else may have beat me to the punch.)
Dark Sun Sans Psionics
On the practical side, it's easy to reskin the mechanics: most of the wild feats could be physical in nature anyway and the few psionic feats/themes could be redone without much issue (or PCs can keep them, but no NPCs will have them). The one place it doesn't work is the background of the world. If you remove psionics and both metal and magic are super-rare, what keeps the boat afloat, so to speak? What is the technology of the world where they don't have technology? What gives them power? What's the "oil" or "electricity" of this land?
Enter a new material: ahnk. (Feel free to change the name to whatever you like; I just liked it for the less-than-subtle tie-in to "ankh" and therefore "life".) Ahnk is a sort of yellow-colored powder that can be pressed into a solid shape that retains its form. Since metals are scarce - including gold, of course (another issue with the Dark Sun campaign: if metal is so scarce, how are you tossing around 2 million gold to purchase your epic weapons?) - ahnk is also used for currency. A specific amount is pressed into small circular pieces commonly called "chips". All prices are in chips (1:1 ratio with gold cost).
Chips also serve as power sources (sort of like a battery). For example, one practical item on this brutal world could be a slave collar that helpfully keeps one from being able to speak but doesn't impair eating/breathing. A single chip can keep it going for about a month. Nobles use chips to power common labor-saving devices. Large numbers of chips - or just pure ahnk - can power a small city for a time. They're used in lamps (whatever oil would cost, that's how much it costs in chips) and other items to create light. Also, you can burn ahnk: although this is not a particularly good method to release its energy, as it can be unpredictable, if you're freezing to death it can provide warmth (or fry you to a crisp). Adventurers are paid in chips and can use them to trade or consume them with devices. (Like gold, it's poisonous to eat.) Small stashes may be found, but no one really knows how to "make" more (like gold, it's a pipe dream: those who claim to know how to do it really don't).
Of course, it's not really that simple.
Ahnk can also be used to power rituals (1:1 cost). Optionally, you could include the rule that one can consume ahnk when gaining power from defiling and it doesn't defile (a high cost: maybe 1/5 a magic item of your level's worth?). And finally, when you enchant/disenchant a magical item (probably a good idea to keep this rare), perhaps you actually use/get ahnk. Now is about the time the players should start to figure out... Ahnk is really just pure magic, physically manifested. By another name it's residuum or arcanum ("ahnkanum"). So the world is still being run with magic: it just doesn't see the connection. It's hiding in plain sight.
The reason ahnk exists is because back when arcane magic was discovered, part of the original discovery was that ahnk could be made from any living thing. Similar to defiling, you could "mine" ahnk from the world around you. This made magic even more convenient; long, arduous studies in the arcane arts wasn't necessary if you had a chunk of ahnk with you. This led to the ancient wars not being about simple genocide (another idea that seemed less interesting to me) but about resources (more like Fallout). Entire countries, groups, and even single, powerful individuals waged war over the resource of ahnk, and because of the way it is created and because of the incredibly destructive nature of arcane magic, the wars laid waste to the land. The sorcerer kings were the only "victors" of this war - if indeed such an ending can be called a victory - and they jealously guard their huge caches of ahnk to this day in a sort of mutual armistice. Centuries have passed, the sorcerer kings are effectively immortal, and the rest of civilization has crumbled.
Of course, if the secret of ahnk is discovered and a small group of important people are able to act on that knowledge, they could use it to rally groups to their cause to cause some serious change in the world - maybe to bring down a sorcerer king. They might even be able to figure out a way to return the ahnk to the very world from which it was stolen, thus breathing life into a dead land. Or, they might learn the secret of mining ahnk for themselves and rule on high from their mountain of arcane power and become the next sorcerer king.
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