Dungeons & Dragons Releases New Unearthed Arcana Subclasses, Strongly Hinting at Dark Sun

Wizards of the Coast has released four new D&D subclasses for playtesting, all of which have heavy thematic ties to the post-apocalyptic Dark Sun setting. The four subclasses, released as "Apocalyptic Subclasses," include the Circle of Preservation Druid, the Gladiator Fighter, the Defiled Sorcerer, and the Sorcerer-King Patron Warlock. Although not stated outright, the Gladiator and Sorcerer-King Patron are explicit nods to the Dark Sun setting, set in a ruined world ruled by Sorcerer-Kings where gladiatorial fights were common.

The Circle of Preservation Druid creates areas of preserved land that grants buffs to those who stand upon it. The Gladiator adds secondary Weapon Mastery properties to their attacks, with bonus abilities. Notably, the Gladiator uses Charisma as its secondary stat. The Defiled Sorcerer can expend its hit dice to amp up damage to its attacks and can also steal the life of its targets to deal additional damage. The Sorcerer-King Patron gains a number of abilities tying into tyranny and oppression, with the ability to cast Command as a Bonus Action without expending a spell slot, causing targets to gain the Frightened Condition, and forcing those who attack them to re-roll successful attacks.

The survey for the subclasses goes live on August 28th.

 

[pemerton]

but it works better as a game. Also, in world there is no distinction between the two, preserving is weaker than defiling, who can say which of the two is ‘normal’.

If everyone made $1000 a month for defiling or $800 with preserving, that is the same as $1250 and $1000 respectively. That $1000 is the norm on some other planet you never heard of changes nothing about the consequences / benefits / prices of goods of either option on yours

Yeah, this is what I posted upthread.

To be fair to @Charlaquin, I think she's imagining a baseline that is not set internally to the fiction and play of Dark Sun, but rather set relative to the default expectations of an experienced D&D player.

 

[Zardnaar]

If this is "strongly hinting" at Dark Sun, maybe I need to be less subtle when I'm flirting. Because if this were flirtation, it would be me running up to an attractive person and planting a big ol' kiss on the mouth, and then walking off to get a drink.

Sure, I didn't say I'm into them....but it doesn't take a rocket surgeon to figure this one out.

More like getting a room lol. Complete mystery to typical gamer though

 

[Zardnaar]

That just reinforces my long held belief that Dark Suns biggest draw was that it is a setting that isn't even morally gray, it's black vs pitch black and the winners are whoever can be the biggest bastards. It permitted, may encouraged, you to be a bunch of be selfish and cruel. If the settings incentivizes you to be evil and ruthless to get ahead, then you don't have hope. And I have enough of that just living in the real world right now, I don't want it in my elf game.

No one's forcing you to buy it.

 

[Zardnaar]

We tried playing Darksun somewhat recently. The original stuffs great buy it had some big issues.
1. AD&D rules. 2E hasn't aged well vs say B/X. If you don't have 2E veterans it's not easy.

2. Running it. I used the core rules. Then you need psionics. 2E psionics kinda suck. No one picked psionics for this reason. Then I printed off the players smd DM book from original boxed set. I wanted to keep it basic ignoring the revised set and prism pentad stuff. Used dune trader and earth, air, wind fire. That's 8 or 9 books players aren't familiar with using an older system they're not familiar with. House rules eg ascending ACs only go so far.

3. Old books. Paperbacks and print outs don't hold up well. Some of my 2E books are beat up. The nice ones I dont want to use.

4. Players weren't familiar with it and avoided most of the new mechanics except the races they loved. Psionics complicated. Defiling/preserving they don't like wizards much abd more complicated. Elemental clerics spell list to limited no one picked a Templar. Think we ended up with a Druid and martial characters eg fighter, Gladiator and a bard or trader (poison use appealed).

2E mechanics go on the way of the major new mechanics for the thene of the setting.

It arguably never fit 2E mechanics that well. Apart from that it's great to read. Even the revised and novel stuff is a fun read but I don't like the impact they had on the setting. The tie in adventures are also outright terrible.

 

[pukunui]

The tie in adventures are also outright terrible.

Indeed. Freedom is essentially "go on minor side quests to aid the rebellion while the novel heroes do all the hard work (like fighting the sorcerer-king) and get all the glory." IIRC the adventure even includes a bit where the PCs get to watch the novel heroes do their thing in the arena, but they don't get to help because that's not what happened in the novel.

 

[Chaltab]

Indeed. Freedom is essentially "go on minor side quests to aid the rebellion while the novel heroes do all the hard work (like fighting the sorcerer-king) and get all the glory." IIRC the adventure even includes a bit where the PCs get to watch the novel heroes do their thing in the arena, but they don't get to help because that's not what happened in the novel.

That's incredible. In a bad way.

 

[pukunui]

That's incredible. In a bad way.

Absolutely. That being said, it was certainly not the only adventure that TSR put out like that. Look at the FR Time of Troubles series of adventures (Shadowdale, Tantras, Waterdeep). They're pretty much the same thing - the PCs get to help the novel characters (Midnight, Kelemvor, Cyric, etc) but can't do anything to alter the plot that was laid out in the novels.

As for Dark Sun, I wish they'd made a tabletop version of Shattered Lands. It was a difficult game, but it was more sandboxy and had lots of little interesting bits and pieces.

It had a great premise, too. Your party of up to 4 PCs starts in the Draj gladiator arena. You fight some gladiator matches to learn how combat works. As enslaved people, your PCs are doomed to fight until they die, so naturally they are given the opportunity to escape through the city's sewers, aided by some rat people (can't remember if they're wererats or just anthropomorphic ratfolk). Once outside, they can wander around to various free settlements and explore ancient ruins containing hints about the lost gods, find ancient metal weapons and armor, meet friendly thri-kreen, fight baddies riding wyverns, and so on.

If/when you engage with the main plot, it's about building an alliance of the free settlements to oppose Draj's sorcerer-king, who is attempting to build a ziggurat in order to ascend to become the next dragon - a storyline similar to the first Prism Pentad novel / Freedom adventure (where the sorcerer-king of Tyr is doing the same thing), except that the PCs get to be the actual heroes and leaders of the rebellion, not just spectators and bit-players.

 

[Scribe]

Dying with moral superiority is still death.

Everyone dies. If you cannot go out with your own self respect, go out with your morality intact, you still die. A setting that doesnt reward you for being good explicitly, but YOU know you are good and you do it anyway?

Sounds like some great roleplay potential instead of yet another power fantasy.

 

[Chaltab]

Absolutely. That being said, it was certainly not the only adventure that TSR put out like that. Look at the FR Time of Troubles series of adventures. They're pretty much the same thing - the PCs get to help the novel characters (Midnight, Kelemvor, Cyric, etc) but can't do anything to alter the plot that was laid out in the novels.

As for Dark Sun, I wish they'd made a tabletop version of Shattered Lands. It was a difficult game, but it was more sandboxy and had lots of little interesting bits and pieces.

It had a great premise, too. Your party of up to 4 PCs starts in the Draj gladiator arena. You fight some gladiator matches to learn how combat works. As enslaved people, your PCs are doomed to fight until they die, so naturally they are given the opportunity to escape through the city's sewers, aided by some rat people (can't remember if they're wererats or just anthropomorphic ratfolk). Once outside, they can wander around to various free settlements and explore ancient ruins containing hints about the lost gods, find ancient metal weapons and armor, meet friendly thri-kreen, fight baddies riding wyverns, and so on.

If/when you engage with the main plot, it's about building an alliance of the free settlements to oppose Draj's sorcerer-king, who is attempting to build a ziggurat in order to ascend to become the next dragon - a storyline similar to the first Prism Pentad novel / Freedom adventure (where the sorcerer-king of Tyr is doing the same thing), except that the PCs get to be the actual heroes and leaders of the rebellion, not just spectators and bit-players.

That sounds amazing. I'm aware the game exists but I've a low tolerance for clunky old cRPGs so I've avoided it thus far.

Honestly an update of classic pre-BG D&D video games with modern conveniences sounds way more exciting to me than a WOTC attempt to make Baldur's Gate 4 without Larian.

 

[pukunui]

That sounds amazing. I'm aware the game exists but I've a low tolerance for clunky old cRPGs so I've avoided it thus far.

Honestly an update of classic pre-BG D&D video games with modern conveniences sounds way more exciting to me than a WOTC attempt to make Baldur's Gate 4 without Larian.

Yeah, while Shattered Lands is on Steam, I wouldn't recommend trying to play it now. I mean, this is what the game looks like:

Not pretty. And that font is super-hard to read!

But if they were to take the basic plot and layout and make a modern game out of it? That would be super-cool.