Just discovered Dark Sun -- have questions!

[PJ-Mason]

You guys almost make it sound like Dark Sun is more appropriate as a setting for a different game than D&D.

Dark Sun OGL, eh?

......hmmm.......

 

[Christopher Lambert]

You guys almost make it sound like Dark Sun is more appropriate as a setting for a different game than D&D.

No kidding. D20 Modern handles the non-spellcasting classes better.

Dark Sun is supposed to be a low magic-item setting, yet fighters and other such characters still can't learn to defend themselves *rolleyes*

IMO the WotC re-write changed too many things and the Athas.org team didn't change things enough.

As for paladins, there are no deities on Athas. Period. Finally resolved in City by the Silt Sea. You could have paladins if you change their flavor a bit and throw out the alignment stuff, however, but you're better off with D20 Generic (to deal with the whole lack of armor thing).

 

[Nuclear Platypus]

Actually, since the other races are all descended from halflings, I think they could very well legitimately be called cannibals after all...

True. As the saying goes, "you are what you eat."

 

[Welverin]

Other posters have pretty much covered the plot elements that you asked about. One point that might be worth mentioning is that the halflings of the Blue Age weren't masters of psionics (which didn't arise until the Green Age), but were masters of lifeshaped technology (an organic technology that works similar to grafts and symbionts in 3e).

Hmm, was Monte the first one to introduce the grafts and symbionts in 3e? I know he wrote Windriders of the Jagged Cliffs for DS.

Any thoughts on original vs. revised vs. Dragon/Dungeon versions? What are all your preferences, and why?

I’m a Dark Sun whore, so I pretty much liked everything for the setting. Excepted those darned flip books, I hate reading those (and to this day haven’t read all of them, despite having read every other book from cover to cover).

I liked the original and revised boxed sets. Some complaints I’ve seen of the revised BS and subsequent books was that they made the setting less deadly (Mind Lords of the Last Sea and Windriders of the Jagged Cliffs, in particular), a sentiment I vehemently disagree with. I find they keep the setting just as much a challenge to your basic survival; they just changed how what the challenge was by throwing some variety at you. It’s because of this that I prefer the setting as detailed in the revised BS to the original.

Of course there’s also the basic issue of the people just rejecting change.

Example of why Mind Lords of the Last Sea isn’t warm and fuzzy:

Spoiler

The city is situated right next to a large body of water, which negates the harsh standard of living found in the tablelands due to the scarcity of food and water. This hardship however is replaced by the fact that the region is ruled by a trio of high level psionicists (25-30th level, 30th being the highest you could go at the time), which enforced proper behavior on their citizenry. If you didn’t behave properly, you would be forced too (i.e. brain washing/mind wipes for people who failed to comply with the law), this included legislated happiness, if you were happy (or at least acting like it), you would be!

p.s. What's the take for the spoiler button?

 

[AdmundfortGeographer]

Hmm, was Monte the first one to introduce the grafts and symbionts in 3e? I know he wrote Windriders of the Jagged Cliffs for DS.

Grafts and symbionts, I believe were first introduced in the 3e Fiend Folio... not authored by Monte. Monte is credited with many others under "Additional Design" in it though. But Monte did write Chaositech under his Malhavoc D20 label, and it has a bunch of lifeshaped-like tech in it.

Before Monte worked for TSR, he did some work for ICE. He wrote an accessory for ICE whose intellectual property rights recently returned to him. That product was revised and updated to become Chaositech. I always wondered if Monte's work on that ICE product, pre-TSR, influenced his authorship of life-shaped technology for Windriders of the Jagged Cliffs. There are some similarities that are more than coincidental.

Example of why Mind Lords of the Last Sea isn’t warm and fuzzy: <...>

Very true. I'm convinced that Saragar is heavily influenced on the old British Television show The Prisoner. Watch the show, read Mind Lords of the Last Sea, and you'll see the similarities leap out at you. A line that very succinctly sums up Saragar, "Mind wipes will continue until morale improves!" Heh, indeed.

But Mind Lords had other problems that some folks objected to. It gave Dark Sun surfers and dolphins. *cringe* I've heard that Mind Lords was freelancer Matt Forbeck's last product for TSR. Supposedly TSR so badly mangled his manuscript without alerting him what was going to happen that he refused to ever work for TSR (but not WotC, of course, as TSR died) again. I always wondered if it was true, and just how much ended up on the editing room floor, what was cut exactly, and what was put in that wasn't his.


Regards,
Eric Anondson

 

[reanjr]

The people at Athas.org are like that. No sorcerers, they say (there's nothing in the original literature against them).

See, now that's just reactionary. I fully understand and support the removal of Paladins from Dark Sun. Where the hell would they get their powers from? It would make no sense to have them. But sorcerers fit just fine. If I were to do the conversion, I'd make Wizards preservers and defilers, and all the other types of magic-users (ceruleans, necromancers, etc.) be sorcerers. Seems to make a lot of sense, keep flavor, and not remove a class just because there was nothing about it in the original boxed set. Hell, the original boxed set didn't have Pterrans or Aarokocra, either, does that mean the revised one shouldn't have them?

 

[reanjr]

Sadira, before she became a Sun Wizard, was definitely dependant on her spell book.

Which is one of the reasons I support putting sorcerers in the game as the Necromancers, Ceruleans, Sun Wizard(s), etc. It fits perfectly. The athas.org team just seemed too dense to realize they had the ability to make something fit even better than the original. The 3e Dragonlance designers have mentioned on several occasions that one of the things they love about 3e is that it allows them to better represent, in game, what they had been trying to do all along.

 

[reanjr]

But Mind Lords had other problems that some folks objected to. It gave Dark Sun surfers and dolphins. *cringe*

I think it is important to point out that they are druid surfers.

And I liked the Athasian dolphins.

And the squark.

Despite its silly name.

 

[Welverin]

I forgot to mention my thoughts on the Paizo interpretation of DS above, while it was interesting enough I disliked the attempt to reset things by reinstating DK’s to the cities who had lost theirs, which is the major issue that still stands out in my mind.

Grafts and symbionts, I believe were first introduced in the 3e Fiend Folio... not authored by Monte. Monte is credited with many others under "Additional Design" in it though. But Monte did write Chaositech under his Malhavoc D20 label, and it has a bunch of lifeshaped-like tech in it.

Before Monte worked for TSR, he did some work for ICE. He wrote an accessory for ICE whose intellectual property rights recently returned to him. That product was revised and updated to become Chaositech. I always wondered if Monte's work on that ICE product, pre-TSR, influenced his authorship of life-shaped technology for Windriders of the Jagged Cliffs. There are some similarities that are more than coincidental.

Hmm, lot of stuff I was unaware of, thanks for the info.

But Mind Lords had other problems that some folks objected to. It gave Dark Sun surfers and dolphins. *cringe*

That stuff doesn't bother me, dolphins are just aquatic animals and fit a large body of water, and is surfing so great when the evil overlords make you do it?

See, now that's just reactionary. I fully understand and support the removal of Paladins from Dark Sun. Where the hell would they get their powers from? It would make no sense to have them.

The ability for a cleric to gain their powers from an ideal has been around for some time, so there's no reason you couldn't have a paladin based on the same assumption. The paladin's unswerving devotion to good leads to the development of supernatural abilities, similar to how a monk develops his.

Alternatively you could have paladins receive their powers from an avangion, basically the equivalent to a templar (I after all never liked the limitation of only the original DK's being able to develop the elemental plane connection that allowed granting divine spells).

So there are definitely good reasons to justify the paladins abilities in my view, however they would have to be exceedingly rare because life is far to hard on Athas to allow for the devotion to upholding good above all else, after all who has the time when you have to spend so much of it on basic survival?

So I can easily see paladin in DS, they'd just be as rare, maybe even more so, than advanced beings.

In also have no problem with monks, because I don't see the eastern influence as having any relevance to the class. It's their focus on mental and physical improvement and enlightenment that's important, and you not need some derivative of Asian culture for that.

Sorcerers, eh, though there are some good reasons for justifying them above.

 

[Mark Hope]

Not totally. Arcane spellcasters are reviled by everyone. Hunted and put to death when found usually. Sorcerers can far more easily hide this fact. But if a DM removes this integral flavor of the setting that PCs won't ever be challenged with it, then yes, they are just like wizards, whether preserver or defiler. This is a role-playing issue, obviously, not a game balance one. It has no bearing on the game mechanical features and abilities of the class.

Well, I don't see that you need to throw out hatred for arcane magic to incorporate sorcerers. Mechanics notwithstanding, the absence of a spellbook is the only thing that visibly sets them apart from wizards so, as far as the average athasian is concerned, there is no obvious difference between a wizard or a sorcerer. Both cast spells in the same way and both draw upon plant energy in an obvious manner. A sorcerer preserver casting a spell will be seen to draw upon plant energy the same as a wizard does and a sorcerer defiler will create an ash radius just the same, so both wizards and sorcerers would be at risk from mob justice. Not having a visible spellbook will hardly do you any good, given that disguising one's spellbook is a common tactic amongst wizards. You could even rule that a sorcerer needs a spellbook to learn his spells in the first place (just not to prepare them). The Veiled Alliance continues to be a vital, underground organisation for arcane preservers as both wizards and preservers continue to run the risk of discovery and punishment every time they cast a spell.