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.

 

[Parmandur]

Sorry but that's not accurate.

It was WotC's D&D team at the time, some of whom are still there.

The minimum people involved are the person who wrote the race details, the person who approved them, the person who did the minstrel art pieces and the art director, as well as whoever did the layout. That's five people, absolute minimum. Having worked in corporate environments where products were created I would say at a dead minimum double that had eyes on that part of the product. Every one of them should have been "uh oh monkey people ". But apparently none of them were. Or if they were, didn't feel they could raise the issue, which is itself major problem and corporate culture one.

I presume the approver was Crawford or Perkins is what you're saying (I can't find the credits page right now)? And the buck definitely stops with whoever was in charge but it's not just on them unless the issue was raised and ignored, which I just do not buy, especially not re the art.

Re: Darrington thankfully I don't see the team they have making a similar mistake, the worst they've done was the pith helm deal AFAIK. But I would laugh of it did happen again thanks to one of Crawford and Perkins. I have previously pointed out Perkins "brought the racism back" with Stradh, after 4E got rid of it (kinda lol) by reverting to 2E lore and l there are other problematic WotC D&D books in that era (Volos particularly).

It was Perkins: he wrote the art order and was the editor and product lead. I remember he did an interview in the previews era talking about how he had put a "fun reference to the Planet of the Apes" in at the last second. At that time at WotC, the editor singlehandedly decided if the manuscript needed a sensitivity reader pass. They changed that to every line of text needing two sensitivity readers approval after that fiasco.

Not saying it was entirely Perkins fault, or that he is a bad person: having a loose policy about sensitivity reading was the broader systematic problem. But he was the one who really did that individually within that loose system.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

That's the thing about censoring ideas.... It's a slippery slope! The logic begins to break as soon as the why-this-not-that / whataboutism begins. For every person who can make a case to censor one thing, someone else will make a similar case for another. Eventually, the never-ending appeasement leads to books that read like they were written by very cautious, very boring 8-year-olds.

Note: Censorship is not inherently political, BTW. It can be, but it's also sociological and often has nothing to do with political factions or directives.

Editorial decisions in fiction are not censorship, especially not when they run against the government of the era in the relevant country. On a simple factual level, with no judgement, the current US government doesn't disapprove of mentioning slavery. It disapproves of saying it is a very bad thing.

But it isn't as simple as that. Slavery is frequently used as a sort of cheap titillation by white authors in the US, so is rather sensitive from that perspective. And racialized chattel slavery was present and huge in the mainland US until the 1860s, where in mainland Europe it was never widespread so Europeans like to pretend they have clean-ish hands here and that it's a non-issue. WotC have shown they are generally cack-handed re sensitive issues, so do you really want them addressing that? That's not a rhetorical question. Do you?

In an ideal world a diverse team who love the original DS but understand the problems it has would update this. That's probably not viable at WotC so I think the best we can hope for is that slavery is replaced with different forms of oppression that are less sensitive in that particular culture.

It was Perkins: he wrote the art order and was the editor and product lead. I remember he did an interview in the previews era talking about how he had put a "fun reference to the Planet of the Apes" in at the last second. At that time at WotC, the editor singlehandedly decided if the manuscript needed a sensitivity reader pass. They changed that to every line of text needing two sensitivity readers approval after that fiasco.

Not saying it was entirely Perkins fault, or that he is a bad person: having a loose policy about sensitivity reading was the broader systematic problem. Bit he was the one who really did that individually within that loose system.

That still leaves multiple other people, but does make it clear where the problem was! Funny it was Perkins again!

 

[mamba]

The DM would make something up? I mean, you're talking about 2nd ed AD&D!

of course they could, but that is not the point. The 2e text actively discourages other races, the 5e text actively encourages it.

If we were to go by what a DM can do, then the actual text would be irrelevant and we would have no basis to judge anything on

 

[mamba]

Maybe, though Dark Sun is a far more...concise...Setting?

in FR they focus on what, 5 regions? The DS can capture the whole setting instead.

I still would prefer two books for the setting. Worst case you have one book with all the player and DM setting material and a full adventure in the second book.

 

[pemerton]

of course they could, but that is not the point. The 2e text actively discourages other races, the 5e text actively encourages it.

If we were to go by what a DM can do, then the actual text would be irrelevant and we would have no basis to judge anything on

I disagree.

The text is not dictating what RPGers can and cannot do in the setting. Rather, it is presenting a creative vision of a setting (and its tropes, themes, etc). And in this respect, the 4e and 5e text, as much as the AD&D text, does this.

 

[Parmandur]

In an ideal world a diverse team who love the original DS but understand the problems it has would update this. That's probably not viable at WotC so I think the best we can hope for is that slavery is replaced with different forms of oppression that are less sensitive in that particular culture.

I actually think if Mackenzie De Armas or Justice Armin were the product leads we could well see that.

That still leaves multiple other people, but does make it clear where the problem was! Funny it was Perkins again!

Yeah, I mean...I love Perkins work, personally, but he needs sensitivity readers real bad and was literally the product lead on every significant problematic 5E controversy...Curse of Strahd, Tomb of Annihlation, Spelljammer...

 

[SkidAce]

...Maybe a lot of them, to explore the kind of dustinct stories and locales of the Tablelands

I see what you did there...

 

[mamba]

text is not dictating what RPGers can and cannot do in the setting. Rather, it is presenting a creative vision of a setting (and its tropes, themes, etc). And in this respect, the 4e and 5e text, as much as the AD&D t

they both describe a creative vision of the setting sure. But one then says ‘but add whatever your player wants to it’ (“You might be the only one of your kind in the world, but there is no reason you can’t play the character you want to play.”) while the other says nothing.

If you do not see a difference in that, then I guess we simply disagree

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I actually think if Mackenzie De Armas or Justice Armin were the product leads we could well see that.

Yeah, I mean...I love Perkins work, personally, but he needs sensitivity readers real bad and was literally the product lead on every significant problematic 5E controversy...Curse of Strahd, Tomb of Annihlation, Spelljammer...

Tomb of Annihilation as well! What a menace lol!

It's not impossible with De Armas and Armin I agree. They might be able to handle it and even keep slavery (hopefully steering hard away from US South vibes more towards Roman vibes). But it is a bit believe it when I see it!

Edit - Ironically I think slavery is still a poor fit for Dark Sun because the scarcity-based society means slaves (especially big butch 5000 calorie a day types!) are less likely to be economically efficient as compared to a brutalized underclass or serfs or similar, who you don't have to feed, clothe, provide water and health care for and so on, and can just horrifically underpay or overtax because they're desperate.

 

[Parmandur]

in FR they focus on what, 5 regions? The DS can capture the whole setting instead.

Right, 5 huge regions that are subregions of a gigantic continent. Comparison:

• Tablelands of Athas: 100-120,000 square miles, like a large Western State of the U.S., the whole Setting in fact
• Calimshan: about 224,000 square miles, so approaching the size of Texas or the Ukraine
• The Moonshae Isles: about 100,000 square miles, somewhere between the size of Michigan and Iceland
• the Dalelands: about 258,000 square miles, the size of Texas or the Ukraine.
• Icewind Dale: sort of the exception here, being a 3,600 mile area, or about the size category of Delaware, Azerbaijan or Kosovo...though with undefined wilderness ess boundaries beyond.
• Baldur's Gate: depends on how they do this, the city is about a third of a mile squared, BG3 covers about 20 square miles (or about a San Marino), the original game is over 20,000 square miles (or about Bosnia, West Virginia, or Croatia)...but the Western Heartlands are really big.

So, point being, the FR covers at least 3 areas in-depth fairly similar to the entirety of Dark Sun in scope, let alone the rest of Faerûn which is also covered briefly. I would expect less Gazateer material than all of that for the Tablelands.

I still would prefer two books for the setting. Worst case you have one book with all the player and DM setting material and a full adventure in the second book.

Yeah, I get that. It would be nice: but with a much more concise Setting I could see an excellent single book rendition being very plausible.