Calling all Darksun DMs!

[Najo]

Dark Sun Eras

I would have to agree with Henry on this one. The prism pentad ruined the dark sun setting by prematurely killing many of the Sorcerer Kings. Losing the Sorcerer KIngs is like Star Wars not having the empire. With Templars playing a similar role to Stormtroopers. The sorcerer kings and rajaat are responsible for why the planet is the way it is, I find it hard not to involve this creatures at least indirectly when they are old as they are, as manipulative as they are and as powerful as they are. Look at the original boxed set, all of the cities are ruled by one until Tyr overthrows theirs (i.e. the events of the freedom adventure and the first prism pentad novel). The fall of a Sorcerer King should be an exception and not the rule, like they became in the novels. When considering ignoring the sorcerer kings (altogether) ask yourself this, why haven't any no sorcerer kings risen to form a citystate?

Nate

 

[Staffan]

While I disagree with the clumsy way in which the SKs were killed off, I do think that the post-SK campaign setting was a better place in which to game than the pre-SK setting. First, three of the main city-states are still ruled by sorcerer-monarchs (Urik, Nibenay and Gulg). The other four provide greater variety: fledgling democracy, total anarchy, merchant-lords, and a sham SK - and variety is good for a setting, IMO.

 

[Najo]

City State Opinion

I would agree with you about the variety in a campaign being good. But key elements of Dark Suns setting were sacrficed wontonly in the prism pentad. By the time the revised Dark Sun setting was done, many of the forces that made Athas what it is were removed through scenarios that seemed very unlikely. The sorcerer kings are creatures in their youth that laid athas to waste and destroyed entire species of humanoids (such as orcs, pixies etc). Now thousands of years later, they are more powerful and they have dominated the world only to find themselves overthrown by slave revolts and silly combat scenarios that make no sense. Borys death was silly and impossible. The fall of Raam's and Draj (I think) on the battlefield against Sedira and the slave army is just dumb how quick it was. In the second book, Rikus took a more powerful army against a single and weaker Sorcerer King and lost against him. But in the fifth book, the battle against the two city states and how quickly their SK die is very unbelievable, even worse is it all happens at once. Typical hollywood ending. I found that to undermind the strengths of the Darksun setting. The only sorcerer king death that I found belivable was Kalyeks in the first book. He is attempt a dangerous ritual to power level himself essentially, and while he is occupied with that Rikus runs him through with a weapon made to kill the beast. But that doesn't kill Kalyek, kalyek slithers off into the Zigguraut and the party has to track him down and fight him in his weakened state. Once they kill him, the templars stil remain in power with one of their commanders becoming king. No real revolution takes place because the power structure won't allow it. Yet the other city states leaders di quickly (not that over half change), which I can buy 2 or 3, but 4!!! plus the dragon..come on. My two cents I like the end results that you like, but I thikn the path could have much more interesting and meaty is all. Dark sun got sold out in the revision.

Nate

 

[Golandrinel]

And didn't Dragotha the dragon lich thing get involved a bit too much in the books? I only read the first 2 of the Prism Pentad and gave up as it was destroying the visions my favourite setting. Did an avangion ever make an appearance?

 

[theT0rmented]

Dregoth never made an appearance in any of the PP books.

Two of the Sorcerer-Kings in the books were killed by Rajaat, the one who created magic. They weren't killed by silly adventurers; Rajaat is the closest thing Athas has to a god. Abalach-Re was killed when the tip of the Scourge was thrust into her; that is an artifact, created by Rajaat.

 

[Golandrinel]

Thanks tormented. Did Rajaat give the sorcerer kings the power to channel magic to their templars originally??? I remember reading about space creatures or the like bestowing this upon them long long ago.

 

[theT0rmented]

The Sorcerer-Kings have the ability to give spells to their templars because of extinct beings called elemental vortices (sp? the plural of vortex). These creatures were attracted by the huge magics involved when the Sorcerer-Kings were made Champions. The creatures are dead now, but when they attached themselves to the SKs, they gave them a direct link to the elemental planes, where the templars get their spells. Unfortunately, they're extinct, so no new connections can be created.

 

[Golandrinel]

Thanks again!!!! I really must re-read the Dragon Kings supplement again .. it's been so long that I've forgotten more than I knew!

 

[Panthanas]

I ran a DS campaign for close to three years starting with the Freedom adventure. Its a good introduction to Athas, although it does railroad the characters to get the plot moving. If you intend on starting the characters at 5th level, you may want to skip Freedom and use Road to Urik, which is the next adventure in that series, and a good adventure as well. Both of these adventures take place in Tyr, so if you wanted to begin in another City-State you may want to find something else

Good luck!

 

[Tzarevitch]

Dregoth never made an appearance in any of the PP books.

Two of the Sorcerer-Kings in the books were killed by Rajaat, the one who created magic. They weren't killed by silly adventurers; Rajaat is the closest thing Athas has to a god. Abalach-Re was killed when the tip of the Scourge was thrust into her; that is an artifact, created by Rajaat.

Bah. I finished my DS campaign about a year ago. In my campaign, all of the Sorcerer-Kings took the standard precautions that any other mage/psion would take to hedge against his own death. Almost every last one of the "dead" kings was alive and well and conducting plans for world domination in secret.

In my campaign, the status of the "dead" sorcerer-kings was as follows;

Tektuktitlay had protected against his death by implanting his personality via a psionic power (mind seed I think it was) into his "son" Atzetuk, (See the revised DS set.) and was busily ruling his kingdom in the guise of a teenager that the populace not just feared, but actually liked. (Think of an immortal and near all-powerful Prince William of England.) It was only at the end of the campaign that I think the PCs began to suspect what Atzetuk really was.

Abalach-Re simply activated a clone of herself. She was operating behind the scenes in Raam through her legion of shapechanger enforcers (mainly Rakshasas and doppleganger assassins) rooting out those disloyal to her in preparation for her return to power.

Andropinis' loyal templars were using obsidian mirrors to contact him in The Black. They mounted a rescue operation using obsidian golems and hired shadow mages to open a portal and form a bridge into the black and pull him out. The PCs actually (to my surprise) stumbled on this operation while they were on another mission. They were too slow finishing the other operation however and didn't make it back in time to stop Andropinis' rescue. Andropinis then went on a purge the likes of which had never been seen in Balic and publicly flayed alive fully 5,000 disloyal citizens of Balic and members of Houses Wavir, Rees and Tomblador for acts of treason.

On a mission in the ruins of Yaramuke, the PCs discovered that reports of Sorcerer-Queen Seilba's death were greatly exaggerated. She was in fact slowly rebuilding Yaramuke using her undead citizens under the protection of a HUGE and very powerful illusion.

The PCs also succeeded in in advertetly restoring King Kalid-Ma when one of them stumbled on one of the fabled Orbs of Kalid-Ma. The orbs then dragged them into Ravenloft where they confronted and killed Kalid-Ma's former high templar and disloged Kalidnay from the Realm of Mists. Unlike the other Sorcerer-Kings, Kalid-Ma went on a campaign of peaceful rebuilding and gracefully allowed the PCs the opportunity to grovel before him. As a reward, he then gave them exactly one day in his good graces. The PCs wisely used this day to put as much distance between themselves and Kalidnay as possible.

The PCs traveled to Giustenal (in the City by the Silt Sea set) and found King Dregoth was also not so dead as they had been led to believe.

They traveled north and found the one ray of hope they had yet seen in Athas in the form of King Oronis of Kurn.

Then they approached the city of Eldaarich on another trade mission and found out that the horrors they had seen in the other city-states were pale shadows of the horrors that the insane King Daskinor inflicted on his people on a daily basis.

By the end, as far as the PCs knew, the only sorcerer-king they were fairly sure was dead was Kalak. And even then, they were fairly sure only because they couldn't find any evidence that he was still alive.

I loved that campaign. I only ended it because 3e had just arrived and I couldn't properly convert an ongoing campaign to 3e and still keep its original feel.

My favorite part of the campaign was when the PCs went north, beyond the borders of any of their maps in search of a fabled city of bliss where water was plentiful and no one went hungry, that they found out how bad life could be. By the shores of the Last Sea they found an metropolis seemingly right out of the legends of the past, only where free will was a mere illusion and happiness was enforced by regular mind-wiping regimens. To top it all off, almost every drop of the water they found was undrinkable (salt water). It was then that one of my PCs stated the thing that all Dark Sun DMs want to hear from their players, "You know, this planet really sucks."

Tzarevitch