D&D 5E WotC: Why Dark Sun Hasn't Been Revived

In an interview with YouTuber 'Bob the Worldbuilder', WotC's Kyle Brink explained why the classic Dark Sun setting has not yet seen light of day in the D&D 5E era.

I’ll be frank here, the Dark Sun setting is problematic in a lot of ways. And that’s the main reason we haven’t come back to it. We know it’s got a huge fan following and we have standards today that make it extraordinarily hard to be true to the source material and also meet our ethical and inclusion standards... We know there’s love out there for it and god we would love to make those people happy, and also we gotta be responsible.

You can listen to the clip here.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

As a setting about the perils and consequences of climate change, it feels extremely modern.

So here's the thing.

You identified the real issue.

Slavery is not the issue. Slavery could easily be X'd out and replaced with just indentured servitude or really unfair working conditions or whatever. Historically far more people were kept in serfdom than slavery, and there's really not a huge difference between slavery in 90% of humanity's history and serfdom (with US chattel slavery actually being one of the most bizarre and outré forms of slavery).

But if you remove the climate change and the small number of extremely wealthy and powerful individuals running everything, then it's truly not Dark Sun. And guess what? That's WotC are way too chicken for. They're scared of doing a setting that's relevant, meaningful, or has anything to say. They're terrified of being in even the slightest way controversial. It's not "extraordinarily hard" at all - it would be extremely straightforward. But making a Dark Sun that's uncontroversial? That's "inclusive" to climate change deniers and people who love billionaires? That's impossible.

 

[aco175]

I can why they are not making the world. A lot of people are looking to be offended over something, and they could find it there somewhere between the cannibalism, slavery, and destruction of nature for personal power.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Maybe the hinted at forced breeding?

I have this sword and those eugenicists have a face ...

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Slavery is not the issue. Slavery could easily be X'd out and replaced with just indentured servitude or really unfair working conditions or whatever. Historically far more people were kept in serfdom than slavery, and there's really not a huge difference between slavery in 90% of humanity's history and serfdom (with US chattel slavery actually being one of the most bizarre and outré forms of slavery).

But if you remove the climate change and the small number of extremely wealthy and powerful individuals running everything, then it's truly not Dark Sun. And guess what? That's WotC are way too chicken for. They're scared of doing a setting that's relevant, meaningful, or has anything to say. They're terrified of being in even the slightest way controversial. It's not "extraordinarily hard" at all - it would be extremely straightforward. But making a Dark Sun that's uncontroversial? That's "inclusive" to climate change deniers and people who love billionaires? That's impossible.

The way they chased Eat the Rich out of DMs Guild certainly suggests that may be the case.

 

[Scribe]

But if you remove the climate change and the small number of extremely wealthy and powerful individuals running everything, then it's truly not Dark Sun. And guess what? That's WotC are way too chicken for. They're scared of doing a setting that's relevant, meaningful, or has anything to say. They're terrified of being in even the slightest way controversial. It's not "extraordinarily hard" at all - it would be extremely straightforward. But making a Dark Sun that's uncontroversial? That's "inclusive" to climate change deniers and people who love billionaires? That's impossible.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

The way they chased Eat the Rich out of DMs Guild certainly suggests that may be the case.

Absolutely. They weren't even allowed to say "anti-capitalist", which is a fairly milquetoast phrase anyway (I've said worse at work - in a major corporate law firm lol and no-one batted an eyelid! One of the senior partners has Soviet propaganda posters on his office walls), and certainly less threatening than the average performance of Les Misérables.

 

[mamba]

I don't think that's what he meant by that. He's saying he doesn't want to turn people off by minimizing the seriousness of slavery.

yes, that is what I figured the ethical standards would be. I'd really like to see something like DS, so this is unfortunate

 

[Faolyn]

What a weird stance. The slavers are the bad guys. You are supposed to stab them in the face. That feels almost shockingly non-controversial.

I have a hard time imagining what else about Dark Sun might be an issue.

As a setting about the perils and consequences of climate change, it feels extremely modern.

It's been a while since I've read Dark Sun, so it could be I'm miss-remembering, but... I think it's because the slavery is institutionalized, which means that most people in-setting feel it's at least a little OK. If you stab the slavers in the face, they can call the guards and you're the one who's breaking the law. It's not like in normal D&D, where slavery is normally considered bad by almost everyone except for a few outliers (or slave-taking races, in the older days). In Dark Sun, slavery considered normal.

And there's a slave race (mul) which not only is regular chattel slavery, but sex slavery of their mothers as well.

Plus, well, I just did a search on "dark sun slavery" and the first hit I got was a reddit post from the Dark Sun sub for someone whose PC bought a slave, and how to DM that slave, even going so far as to ask if the slave would start to feel brotherly love for the PC that owed him. So they probably would have a hard time of figuring out how to include slavery without also including an official way of PCs become slavers. At least now, if a PC wants to buy a slave, the DM is the one that has to do the work for pricing and legality.

And you know if WotC said that the entirety of Athas decided to make slavery illegal, or even that muls were a species of their own and not a race bred to be slaves, that would anger a lot of fans who would see it as "woke" or some other nonsense like that. I saw people being angry that they changed "curse" to "torment" for Ravenloft's Dark Lords, despite that torment is a more active concept and a lot of the Dark Lord's curses were very passive in nature.

 

[Minigiant]

What a weird stance. The slavers are the bad guys. You are supposed to stab them in the face. That feels almost shockingly non-controversial.

I have a hard time imagining what else about Dark Sun might be an issue.

As a setting about the perils and consequences of climate change, it feels extremely modern.

The issue is... that in Dark Sun has a whole... can't be fixed.

The slavery and the climate change can't be fixed. And it isn't the Dark Powers keeping Dark Domains dark like in Ravenloft.

No, it's that Dark Sun is too far gone. It's like Warhammer Fantasy but worse. There's just too many icky parts you can't cut and can't reduce without just being a lame imitation that no fan would care for.

I mean it being dark, sad, screwed up, and power gained by screwing it up more is the point.

 

[lvl20dm]

I see what you guys are saying, but I'm pretty sure it's the slavery and its sequale (like muls) that are the problem. I don't agree with that stance, as the slavers are the bad guys, but they (WotC) have been beaten up for the inclusion of slavery even in that context.