D&D 5E "Doom Sun" − reconstructing a 5e Dark Sun setting for the DMs Guild

[Maxperson]

Good point!

It's almost like I didn't say that directly to you in post #78!

 

[Charlaquin]

It's almost like I didn't say that directly to you in post #78!

Must have missed that. But, it was a good point then too!

 

[Maxperson]

The Dark Sun setting is nontheistic. Especially at its origin.

For example, the description of the Cleric class in the original 2e Dark Sun Campaign Setting, published in 1991, says:

"Athas is a world without deities. Powerful sorcerer-kings masquerade as gods, and though their worshipers many, they are not true gods. ... Clerics worship one of the four elemental planes."

The Clerics have a nontheistic sacred tradition, a kind of monism, where the planes themselves are sacred in an abstract fundamental sense. All material existence is made out of these planes. A connection to the elemental planes connects all things, infinitely.

From the 2e Dark Sun setting.

"On a local level, cities and villages have ancient lore about mysterious beings or demigods, but consistent mythic systems are never widespread."

The Dark Sun wiki also mentions the primordials overcoming the gods long ago. I assume that this was from 4e.

 

[darjr]

My group (including myself) are all new to D&D, compared to most people on this forum. We've only played 5e and never played Dark Sun, but we all know quite a bit about Athas and would absolutely play a campaign in Dark Sun if it were translated to 5e. We like the setting so much that we're considering buying the 4e books and learning the system just to play in the setting.

If they changed the setting to make the destruction of the world not the fault of the people of the planet or got rid of the importance of psionics, or made any other major like that, we would hate the changes and probably not play the 5e version.

I know there's a lot of other newer players that have never played but also would be pissed off by changes like that.

I think I’ve posted this before but if you do decide to do a 4e Darksun game check out Ashes of Athas.

 

[Monero]

I’m hoping that modern wotc leaves Dark Sun alone. They have no business touching that amazing setting.

If you’re going to try and recreate Dark Sun, do it Justice, please. Don’t sanitize it and astroturf it for “modern” audiences.

 

[pukunui]

From the 2e Dark Sun setting.

"On a local level, cities and villages have ancient lore about mysterious beings or demigods, but consistent mythic systems are never widespread."

The Dark Sun wiki also mentions the primordials overcoming the gods long ago. I assume that this was from 4e.

Yes, the gods vs primordials thing is from 4e.

I recall that The Verdant Passage (book 1 of the Prism Pentad) sees the protagonists visit an ancient temple beneath the city of Tyr. The temple is guarded by wraiths. I think it's referred to as the Crimson Shrine. There's definitely something mystical / supernatural about it. However, I don't think it ever identifies who or what the temple was dedicated to.

It's been decades since I played it, but I feel like there were also some references to lost gods / temples in the Dark Sun: Shattered Lands PC game.

 

[humble minion]

The Dark Sun setting is nontheistic. Especially at its origin.

For example, the description of the Cleric class in the original 2e Dark Sun Campaign Setting, published in 1991, says:

"Athas is a world without deities. Powerful sorcerer-kings masquerade as gods, and though their worshipers many, they are not true gods. ... Clerics worship one of the four elemental planes."

The bolded is the important word there of course.

In the era of the sorcerer-kings etc, Dark Sun is nontheistic. Many many ages ago in-world, Athas perhaps was theistic, though by the Athasian present day, that's unbelievably ancient and forgotten history. And the lore is mostly silent on whether these ancient gods of Athas were regular D&D-type gods who granted spells etc at all, or whether they were religions based purely around faith without magic etc being involved.

But yeah, in campaign-setting-era Athas, clerics are as broken as everything else in the place. You wanted to be a cleric, your choices were either to strike a deal with inhuman elemental spirits (query - could old-school DS elemental clerics be better represented in 5e by warlocks of some sort of elemental pacts?), or bind yourself to service to an evil sorcerous tyrant who can grant quasi-clerical powers due to a ritual performed on them by their even more evil tyrannical creator...

 

[Charlaquin]

My group (including myself) are all new to D&D, compared to most people on this forum. We've only played 5e and never played Dark Sun, but we all know quite a bit about Athas and would absolutely play a campaign in Dark Sun if it were translated to 5e. We like the setting so much that we're considering buying the 4e books and learning the system just to play in the setting.

If they changed the setting to make the destruction of the world not the fault of the people of the planet or got rid of the importance of psionics, or made any other major like that, we would hate the changes and probably not play the 5e version.

I know there's a lot of other newer players that have never played but also would be pissed off by changes like that.

I’d definitely recommend giving 4e a try. There are some ways in which it definitely shows its age, but it’s still a fantastic system, well worth your time in my opinion. Alternatively, there are a lot of fan-conversions of Dark Sun out there for 5e, you could always try one of those. I’m thinking about making one myself, now that I’ve resolved to not worry about whatever WotC will or won’t do with Dark Sun in 5e.

 

[Yaarel]

From the 2e Dark Sun setting.

"On a local level, cities and villages have ancient lore about mysterious beings or demigods, but consistent mythic systems are never widespread."

The Dark Sun wiki also mentions the primordials overcoming the gods long ago. I assume that this was from 4e.

There are two 2e Dark Sun settings, 1991 and 1995. I try to distinguish because they are nonidentical.

The original setting of 1991 is categorical. It presents as fact: "Athas is a world without deities."

The sorcerer kings can pretend to be deities, and in the sense of granting divine spells actually are "godlike". "But, they are not gods." The claims are false.

Regarding the obscure local traditions, the folkbelief uses terms like "mysterious beings" or "demigods". The terms themselves show clearly they are not "gods", but rather "godlike".

Examples of a "mysterious being" might be a powerful elemental, a "demigod" a magically transformed human; or whatever. Not gods.

 

[pukunui]

There are two 2e Dark Sun settings, 1991 and 1995. I try to distinguish because they are nonidentical.

Yes. IIRC the 1995 version takes into account the sweeping changes made to the 1991 version by the Prism Pentad novels.