Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Charlaquin" data-source="post: 8094506" data-attributes="member: 6779196">You could replace arcane magic with any source of mass environmental destruction without affecting the tone of Dark Sun. You could not replace it without affecting the themes. Pretty much the opposite of psionics in that way.The tone of a work is the feeling that results from its tropes, genre conventions, and iconography. Dark Sun’s tone is defined by its harsh, dying world, its high-powered characters and deadly threats, its artwork, and yes, its prominent use of psionics.The theme of a work is the underlying messages its story conveys. Dark Sun’s themes are about class conflict, corruption, and environmentalism. Defiling magic is the thematic backbone of the setting, making magic an allegory for fossil fuels. Technically it wouldn’t have to be arcane magic. It could be any source of incredible power whose use directly harms the environment. But it is crucial to the game’s themes that the reason the world is in the devastated and dying state that it is, is because powerful people abused a resource that they knew was killing the world so they could become the kings of its desiccated husk. If you changed it so that the world was wrecked by a natural disaster, a conflict between the gods, or some other source beyond mortal control, the setting might not be much different tonally, but it would have drastically different themes.And I agree with OP that psionics really aren’t necessary to the themes of Darksun. They do arguably provide a thematic counterpoint to arcane magic, an alternative route to power that comes from within and requires discipline but doesn’t harm the world. But preserving magic does that too. You could lose either without harming the setting’s themes as long as you kept the other (and to be honest, I kinda think the existence of preserving magic harms the themes a little bit.) But, theme isn’t everything, and psionics do inform Dark Sun’s tone quite a bit. That’s why the strongest (IMO) arguments in favor of them point out that they serve to make the world weirder, and tie into tropes of super-powered mutants in similar post-apocalyptic fiction. They’re important to the feel of the setting, even if they don’t really matter to its message.</blockquote>

Verification