Dark Sun Adventures

[Erratic K]

I'm looking for a little help with Dark Sun's adventures. I looked at svgames list of PDF products, but I'm having a little problem getting a grip on the adventures available for Dark Sun.

I have Freedom, Road to Urik, Arcane Shadows, and Asticlian Gambit. Each of the modules can be played stand-alone or in a series (in order as I wrote them). There appears to be a second series that contains: Black Flames, Merchant House of Amketch, and Marauders of Nibenay, and Black Spine (I believe that is the order).

So I have a few questions:

What are your favorite Dark Sun Modules and why?

Are there any other adventure cycles? Did I get these two complete/correct? (links would help if what I'm showing isn't right because all this is according to SVGames and the 4 original modules I have)

Has anyone played through either of these cycles? How did you fare?

-E

 

[Alzrius]

There's a free official adventure, the Tyrian Conspiracy, over at www.athas.org

 

[Welverin]

I can help with the list of modules, not much else though.

There is one in the original boxed, the name of which exscapes me at the moment.

Freedom
Road to Urik
Arcane Shadows
Asticlian Gambit
Dragon's Crown

Black Flames
Merchant House of Amketch
Marauders of Nibenay
Black Spine

Forest Maker

They are arranged in order and grouped by series. Dragon's Crown and Black Spine are large capstone modules, probably about the size of boxed modules like Dragon Mountain and Night Below, but with the same style of package as the other DS modules.

Also all of these are pre-revised, there were no revised modules published, though there were some short adventures in other products.

Finally a large adventure named Dregoth's Ascent was being worked on before the line got killed and the good folks over at the aforementioned athas.org are working on finishing it up (now with the name Dregoth Ascending).

 

[Wycen]

My Dark Sun experience was very customized, but when I took over I used Black Spine, simply because the villain rocks so much. We didn't get to finish, can't remember why though.

 

[Staffan]

My favorite Dark Sun adventure - heck, my favorite adventure, period - is Dragon's Crown. It has everything: a bit of dungeoneering, epic plot, mad thri-kreen, halflings, psionics, infiltrating a Sorcerer-King's palace, you name it. I also think Freedom! is an excellent starting adventure - no dungeon crawl, and lots of threads you can use in later adventures. The only problem with Freedom! is that it does punish wizard players a lot, since they are rather dependent on one specific piece of equipment (their spellbook), and at the very start of the adventure all equipment is lost.

Speaking of starting adventures, Black Flames must be one of the suckiest adventures I've ever read. Railroading, incorporating a dragon in a starting adventure (and describing him as a "minor dragon in the scheme of things" - ain't no such thing on Athas), and a climax that leaves the PCs as spectators. Yuch.

 

[Simplicity]

It's been a while, but I still remember Freedom.
It's is an awesome adventure. I loved it.

It was always difficult to get people to play Dark Sun
though if only because players rapidly get annoyed at
the total lack of equipment. And the equipment you do
find is generally craptastic.

 

[Mach2.5]

I'll chime in with Steffan, Dragon's Crown was a massive adventure, well written (without the lame flip book style that hurt many of the other adventures). It truly was an epic campaign full of some of the most interesting NPCs in DS. Its definately a must have for any avid Dark Sun collector.

The first adventure string (Freedom, Road to Urik, etc) was very good. The second was . . . not quite up to par. The second adventure string was very stand alone in style although the final adventure, Black Flames was another mega adventure that had some very interesting ideas (skirmish wars, dungeon crawls, and githyanki in all their coolness).

And yes, Black Flames was lame, but still, its easily altered to be a cool adventure. I'd also stay well away from Forest Maker and Mauraders of Nibenay, as these two were also rather poorly written.

Anyhow, hope the DS campaign works out for you. Check out two (Tyrian Conspiracy and Whispers of the Storm) of the new adventures at Athas.org (the official Dark Sun website). Also, check out the Dark Sun message boards at the WOTC forums for some other tipbits of DS goodness.

 

[Erratic K]

Looks like I need to get dragons crown. I don't have the original (too bad), but I can get the pdf, then maybe pick up the original some time when I see it used.

Thanks very much for all the advice and comments. I'm surprised there are/were that many Dark Sun players. I remember Freedom, but the first capture was just too traumatic for the players... everybody had carefully made and equipped their characters. If I run it again, I'll warn everyone they start as slaves, and go from there.

I'm considering converting some of the material to 3 E (and using some of the Burnt World of Athas stuff ( http://www.athas.org/releases/ds3/ ). What I'm really considering , instead of ECL races, is making racial levels for the Athas races that are like Arcana Unearthed. I think that might help with starting as a Half-Giant and Thri-kreen, Muls, etc. I also will have to cobble together something different for Preservers and Defilers but I'm not sure what.

-E

 

[Mach2.5]

I'm surprised there are/were that many Dark Sun players

Dark Sun consistantly ranks in #2 or #3 in most polls about favorite 2e campaign settings, including one large online poll conducted by Wizard's shortly after the 3e release. Only FR and GH manage to beat out DS in popularity (and GH only about half that time). Granted, things have changed much since then and the popularity has dwindled considerably with the multitude of d20 settings and flood of new gamers who were not around before 3e. Still, its not dead yet nor does it show any signs of such. The mailing list is still quite active as well.