# It's Dark Sun



## Shroomy

Read it here


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## catsclaw227

Images coming later. Andy promises heavy roll out previews starting soon.  Q&A Starting.  No answer whether Dark Sun will follow the same model as previous settings.


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## Rechan

Sure, but what's the 2011 setting?


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## JeffB

Good- nice to see something "new" and glad it's not Dragonlance (DS is basically new to me, did not ever buy an DS materials for 2E)

The Tomb Of Horrors mega set, Tiefling Ruins, and the Ravenloft based boardgame sounds very cool as well!  EDIT- and the Mearl's book on Demons


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## catsclaw227

Dark Sun: "We're going back to the original box set" as far as timeline goes."


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## Charwoman Gene

"We're going back to the original box set" as far as timeline goes."

HELL YEAH!!!!!


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## kitsune9

Shroomy said:


> Read it here




Rats! I had placed my 1 gold crown bet on Dragonlance. Oh well, go Dark Sun!


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## The_Fan

Damn your fast trigger fingers. Got beat to the punch at RPG.net too.

Oh well, at least I got the TVTropes page.


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## Turtlejay

Dragon 378: D&D Extravaganza Seminar


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## gtJormungand

Wizards' website has a spotlight interview:
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/4spot/2009August


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## Kez Darksun

Was hoping to hear about a ToEE mega adventure after they released the revised Hommlet.  Glad its Darksun for the next setting.

Love the cover for it.


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## catsclaw227

"We are going to try very hard not to shoehorn 4e conceits into Dark Sun" -Bill

Andy Collins says they're examining how d&d things would evolve in Dark Sun compared to elsewhere


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## Blizzardb

Hooray! It's not Dragonlance!

Hamster and rangers everywhere, rejoice!

Still, an original setting would've been better. Oh well, maybe next year...


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## Rechan

"We are going to try very hard not to shoehorn 4e conceits into Dark Sun" -Bill


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## Knightfall

catsclaw227 said:


> Dark Sun: "We're going back to the original box set" as far as timeline goes."



Now that is an interesting choice. It's going to be a rebooted setting... it seems.

I'm still wary of how WotC is going to handle revising Dark Sun. Will there be gods and primordials? Will it use the new cosmology?

And I'm assuming all the races and classes will be included. That will make 4e DS very different from 2e DS.


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## catsclaw227




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## Knightfall

catsclaw227 said:


> "We are going to try very hard not to shoehorn 4e conceits into Dark Sun" -Bill
> 
> Andy Collins says they're examining how d&d things would evolve in Dark Sun compared to elsewhere



Excellent news!

This might make me a 4e fan if they stay true to the setting. Still, it's too early to be sure of anything at the moment.

And that cover is sweet!!!


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## drothgery

Charwoman Gene said:


> "We're going back to the original box set" as far as timeline goes."




So they've done a 'Realms-shattering-event' for FR, basically retconned 4e changes for Eberron, and it looks like Dark Sun is getting a reboot back to its original setting (with 4e tweaks, presumably). Three very different models on how to handle things.


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## Henrix

Oooooh, yes!

Original campaign, not necessarily 4e tropes. I think I might reach nerdvana (or it could be my persistant fever, of course, but I'm a little bit light headed).


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## avin

/dance

"The gods of the setting are absent or dead, replaced by elemental spirits tied to the ancient primordials. "


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## Barcode

Happy happy joy joy.


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## Aloïsius

> Wizards of the Coast: And for the parties themselves, can you tell us what we might look forward to with Dark Sun character concepts and designs? How will, say, a Dark Sun fighter stand apart from a Forgotten Realms or Eberron fighter?
> 
> James Wyatt: One of the things I’m most excited about with the new setting addresses this question, but I don’t want to talk too much about it. Suffice it to say, at this point, that a Dark Sun fighter has a whole set of options available to him that aren’t (yet) available to other D&D characters. These options will add a whole new dimension to Dark Sun player characters, both in terms of what they can do within the rules of the game and in terms of fleshing them out as people in the world.



Hum...  Do you think it's something new&revolutionary or some kind of déjà-vu like Merits and Flaws (or the regional background of FR) ?


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## Obryn

Sounds awesome so far!!

And like I said, if I dislike the setting changes, I can always (and gladly) mine the 4e books for mechanics and use my original box for the setting info. 

-O


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## weem

Knightfall said:


> Now that is an interesting choice. It's going to be a rebooted setting... it seems.
> 
> I'm still wary of how WotC is going to handle revising Dark Sun. *Will there be gods and primordials?* Will it use the new cosmology?
> 
> And I'm assuming all the races and classes will be included. That will make 4e DS very different from 2e DS.




(bolding mine)

From the interview...



> The gods of the setting are absent or dead, replaced by elemental spirits tied to the ancient primordials. Shamans and other primal characters draw on the forces of sun, sand, wind, and precious rain. Wizards practice their magic in secret or openly serve the sorcerer-kings. And psionic power is more common than on other worlds -- which is handy, since this setting will come out a few months after Player’s Handbook 3, which introduces the psionic power source.


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## Mustrum_Ridcully

Aloïsius said:


> Hum...  Do you think it's something new&revolutionary or some kind of déjà-vu like Merits and Flaws (or the regional background of FR) ?



There has been some mention on the DMG 2, I think, about alternative rewards for magic items like training by a special master or such things. Possibly they mean that, or will be expanding on that. Or something entirely new.

I hope that it's not just something simple and often flawed appraoch like edges/merits and flaws/drawbacks.


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## catsclaw227

To me, all this sounds good.  I imagine that the tide swell of nerdrage won't occur until we get our first set of previews.

Looks like there's just enough information, at this point, to make it sound mostly promising.


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## DerekSTheRed

Perhaps they will expand on the gladiator mechanics and make it into core Dark Sun.


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## Drkfathr1

Rechan said:


> "We are going to try very hard not to shoehorn 4e conceits into Dark Sun" -Bill




"Do or do not. There is no try." 

It's at least somewhat reassuring that they're going to try. Gives me hope that Dark Sun may actually be true to the original and not be revised to Kitchen Sink.


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## Mustrum_Ridcully

catsclaw227 said:


> To me, all this sounds good.  I imagine that the tide swell of nerdrage won't occur until we get our first set of previews.
> 
> Looks like there's just enough information, at this point, to make it sound mostly promising.



Don't jinx it.


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## Knightfall

avin said:


> /dance
> 
> "The gods of the setting are absent or dead, replaced by elemental spirits tied to the ancient primordials. "



Interesting... so far so good.

Hmm... dead gods of the Green Age, perhaps?


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## ki11erDM

Rechan said:


> Sure, but what's the 2011 setting?




/agree 

But they are doing a good job of making me want to buy it still.


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## Shemeska

catsclaw227 said:


> "We are going to try very hard not to shoehorn 4e conceits into Dark Sun" -Bill




My first response to the news was to feel truly sorry for fans of Dark Sun. But if they honestly try to avoid the 4e FR treatment and cram default 4e into a setting as unique as Dark Sun, maybe, just maybe they'll have learned from their mistakes up to this point. One can only hope.


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## Nai_Calus

Meh, figured, still disappointing. Two years in a row with campaign settings I don't like at all, and Dark Sun doesn't strike me as even being something to mine classes/races from for other stuff, so I'm very meh on this. Here's hoping for something better in 2011.


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## Fallen Seraph

I am quite excited for Dark Sun, and also the comment that they want to show off the amount of different types of fantasy that can be done with 4e. Not only is this obvious with Dark Sun but could suggest stuff for future settings.

Also, what they have talked about so far is quite exciting. While I am perfectly fine with them introducing core-concepts to the game, after all it is your setting when you play. I am happy in that it means more crunch will be spent probably on just new stuff. I am really hoping there is some manner of non-class base psionics.

Also, that cover is kick ass. It is funny the sun itself is probably my favourite part of it.


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## CardinalXimenes

Shemeska said:


> My first response to the news was to feel truly sorry for fans of Dark Sun.



I suspect your pity may not be wholeheartedly welcomed by fans of Dark Sun who have been crying out for a 1st edition rollback since the days of 2e. Really, this announcement hits all the fan buttons. They're using the original boxed set setting, they're not trying to fit all of 4e into the setting, and they're promising setting-specific character options and mechanics. What possible offering could WotC make that would be better than this for DS grognards? The only reason I could see for a DS fan to not be excited about this is if they are grimly and unalterably opposed to 4e in all its ways and doings.


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## Dausuul

catsclaw227 said:


> dark sun: "we're going back to the original box set" as far as timeline goes."




HALLE-FREAKIN-LUJAH!

This is... bloody perfect.


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## avin

Shemeska said:


> My first response to the news was to feel truly sorry for fans of Dark Sun. But if they honestly try to avoid the 4e FR treatment and cram default 4e into a setting as unique as Dark Sun, maybe, just maybe they'll have learned from their mistakes up to this point. One can only hope.




Eberron 4E > Eberron 3E 

Maybe they have learned. There's no gods. DMG2 will have new mechanics for games with low or no magic items. 

I'm optimist.

*Character Build request:* include a checkbox that allow players to chose only items that could exist on setting. "Dark Sun legal" to show up on character.


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## Echohawk

drothgery said:


> So they've done a 'Realms-shattering-event' for FR, basically retconned 4e changes for Eberron, and it looks like Dark Sun is getting a reboot back to its original setting (with 4e tweaks, presumably). Three very different models on how to handle things.



Intriguing observation, thanks. I'm quite glad that WotC didn't feel obliged to stick to one update model for each setting. I like the variety of the three approaches.


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## Logan_Bonner

Dark Sun? So that's what I've been working on! So glad it's finally announced.

Anyway, I can't say much about it. I will mention that people who are looking for new, innovative crunch won't be disappointed!


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## Lurks-no-More

Has there ever been much reason to worry about WotC "kitchen-sinking" 4e elements into every setting? Both FR and Eberron are and were kitchen-sinks to begin with (although in different ways), after all.

And yes, that cover is awesome. I hope they can keep the quality for the rest of the artwork!


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## Obryn

Shemeska said:


> My first response to the news was to feel truly sorry for fans of Dark Sun. But if they honestly try to avoid the 4e FR treatment and cram default 4e into a setting as unique as Dark Sun, maybe, just maybe they'll have learned from their mistakes up to this point. One can only hope.



What?  As a Dark Sun fan, I'm thrilled to pieces.  Save your pity, because I rather resent it.

First, the setting already underwent major revisions that I didn't care for, only a short time after it was released.  I simply ignored those bits, and ripped the mechanics from them.

I can do the same here, but moreso if I don't like the setting changes. I can rip out the mechanical bits and use the flavor text and setting information found in my old, worn, 2e box set.  I figure it's a win-win situation, and I simply don't see a downside to it.  I'd far rather have something for Dark Sun which I only like half of, than nothing for Dark Sun whatsoever.

Besides, it's possible they'll take the setting elements and reimagine them in a fantastic way.  I might - perish the thought - love it even _more_ than the box set.

-O


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## Dausuul

Note to self: Step up pace on current campaign. Must wrap it up by next August.

Speculation time!

In keeping with the setting's tradition of bad-ass characters and crappy gear, and pursuant to these statements from James Wyatt:



> [SIZE=-2]Even the idea that characters might wear less armor or rely less on gear in general is easy to implement in the current rules set.
> 
> ...
> 
> These options will add a whole new dimension to _Dark Sun_ player characters, both in terms of what they can do within the rules of the game and in terms of fleshing them out as people in the world.[/SIZE]




Hypothesis: Dark Sun will eliminate +X and masterwork items (the main sources of item dependency), and replace them with special abilities granting inherent bonuses.

Anyone want to make some guesses about how defiling magic will be handled?


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## Umbran

catsclaw227 said:


> To me, all this sounds good.  I imagine that the tide swell of nerdrage won't occur until we get our first set of previews.





Perhaps not, but clearly the tide swell of insulting dismissal of others gets to start right now!  How cool is that?

It isn't cool at all, actually.  How about nobody here does that again.


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## coyote6

WotC_Logan said:


> Dark Sun? So that's what I've been working on!




Explains all the sand, and why all the plants in the office keep dying, eh?


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## Henrix

WotC_Logan said:


> Dark Sun? So that's what I've been working on! So glad it's finally announced.




What? They didn't tell you? Were you one of those who voted for Al Qadim?


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## Scott_Rouse

WotC_Logan said:


> Dark Sun? So that's what I've been working on! So glad it's finally announced.





Is this why it was 100+ degrees in Seattle a couple weeks ago? Well get back to work because this week of rain has sucked


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## Nebulous

I was hoping for Brom, naturally, but yes, that cover is still pretty sweet.


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## Hjorimir

Kez Darksun said:


> Was hoping to hear about a ToEE mega adventure after they released the revised Hommlet.  Glad its Darksun for the next setting.
> 
> Love the cover for it.



Reynolds is hit or miss with me. This is a total hit. A homerun even. Very evocative and striking.


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## Knightfall

Shemeska said:


> My first response to the news was to feel truly sorry for fans of Dark Sun. But if they honestly try to avoid the 4e FR treatment and cram default 4e into a setting as unique as Dark Sun, maybe, just maybe they'll have learned from their mistakes up to this point. One can only hope.



_~Fingers crossed~_



CardinalXimenes said:


> I suspect your pity may not be wholeheartedly welcomed by fans of Dark Sun who have been crying out for a 1st edition rollback since the days of 2e. Really, this announcement hits all the fan buttons. They're using the original boxed set setting, they're not trying to fit all of 4e into the setting, and they're promising setting-specific character options and mechanics. What possible offering could WotC make that would be better than this for DS grognards? The only reason I could see for a DS fan to not be excited about this is if they are grimly and unalterably opposed to 4e in all its ways and doings.



I like that WotC is using the original boxed set as the starting point. It gives DS fans the option of making the setting into whatever they want. Fans won't have to use the Revised boxed set's storyline if they don't want to but they can if they so choose.

Personally, I'm a fan of the both the original boxed set and the revised set. (I still have the Expanded and Revised boxed set and won't give it up, ever.) Dark Sun doesn't have the same number of official products as the Forgotten Realms or Eberron does, so there is some wiggle room for the development of Dark Sun as a 4e setting.

No gods is the most important decision so far. How the DS team handles the "planes" will also be vital.

Also...

They better be careful about how they include all the various 4e races.

Campaign crunch from the Forgotten Realms and Eberron settings must NOT be included in the setting. Period.

Paladins do not belong in Dark Sun; however, I have a feeling that the class will get shoe-horned into the setting.

Bards need to be assassin-like. Dark Sun bards are NOT happy lute-stumming minstrels.

Dune Trader should be a class and there must be an option for players who want to be a gladiator in the Dark Sun-style.


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## Shemeska

Obryn said:


> What?  As a Dark Sun fan, I'm thrilled to pieces.  Save your pity, because I rather resent it.




I'm a fan of Dark Sun too. However I liked the expanded setting as presented in the Revised DS campaign setting box set. So I'm coming for a different perspective on that there, and on top of that I'm more than a bit cynical about the stated desire to avoid pushing 4e default material into Dark Sun when other statements openly talk about the 4e primordials being part of 4e DS.

Maybe my worry is overstated, believe me, I would like nothing more than to be totally and completely off-base here and have 4e Dark Sun come off as ten flavors of awesome, just using 4e rules alongside well written flavor that's respectful to the original. We'll see. I want to be wrong here, but my inner FR fan keeps having flashbacks.


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## vagabundo

YEEEEEEEEEEEEYYYYYYY!!!

That is all


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## avin

WotC_Logan said:


> Anyway, I can't say much about it. I will mention that people who are looking for new, innovative crunch won't be disappointed!




What about fluff? Fluff must prevail!


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## Kez Darksun

Nebulous said:


> I was hoping for Brom, naturally, but yes, that cover is still pretty sweet.




From the Critacal-Hits tweets it seems that Brom is very busy but will try and do some work for the new 4E Dark Sun setting books.


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## Obryn

Knightfall said:


> No gods is the most important decision so far. How the DS team handles the "planes" will also be vital.



Well, the planes are kind of an odd duck IMO.  I don't remember the planes being very vital to DS at all, except for the elemental cosmology.  Still, those were more forces to worship than places to visit.

Now, I do remember a module with a planar invasion of Githyanki.  But that was just a weird one...



> They better be careful about how they include all the various 4e races.



I expect you'll see them, but I expect they'll be intensely modified, flavor-wise.  I don't think WotC is going to release a setting which says "YOU MAY NOT PLAY A GNOME" nowadays.  I think they _might_ say "Gnomes are intensely unusual on Athas.  You might be the only one.  Also, you eat people" or something like that.



> Campaign crunch from the Forgotten Realms and Eberron settings must NOT be included in the setting. Period.



I don't expect it will be referenced at all.  So I wouldn't expect to see stuff about Artificers or Dragonmarks.  But I also wouldn't expect to see something like, "You may not have a Dragonmarked character in your game."



> Paladins do not belong in Dark Sun; however, I have a feeling that the class will get shoe-horned into the setting.



I think 4e Paladins can fit very well into Dark Sun.  It wasn't the class that didn't work for 2e; it was the Lawful-Goodness of the class.  At least IMO.  An Unaligned paladin serving Primordials could work decently well.  So just because 2e DS had no Paladins doesn't mean 4e DS shouldn't; a 4e paladin is not a 2e paladin.



> Bards need to be assassin-like. Dark Sun bards are NOT happy lute-stumming minstrels.



I think the DS version of Bard is very well-served by both the new Assassin class (as previewed), and the existing 4e Rogue.  Whether or not there will be a place for the PHB2 arcane leader called the "Bard" remains to be seen.  Again, just because the poison/assasin/minstrel character was called a Bard under 2e doesn't mean a character filling the same niche in 4e must also be called a Bard.



> Dune Trader should be a class and there must be an option for players who want to be a gladiator in the Dark Sun-style.



I wouldn't hold my breath for a base Dune Trader class.  It'd be cool, but I dunno.  I think there should be a Dune Trader paragon path, though. 

-O


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## Dausuul

Shemeska said:


> I'm more than a bit cynical about the stated desire to avoid pushing 4e default material into Dark Sun when other statements openly talk about the 4e primordials being part of 4e DS.




The word used was "shoehorning." As in, trying to cram something in which doesn't fit. Primordials fit quite well in Dark Sun. They're basically just uber-elementals, after all.

(There will in fact be a lot of stuff shoehorned in - but the shoehorning took place in 1991. I mean, look at elves, dwarves, and halflings. They all had to get massive makeovers in order to have any kind of a place on Athas. Clerics make no sense in a world without gods, but 2E couldn't stomach a campaign setting that got rid of the primary healer class, so they cobbled together something about elemental powers. Et cetera.)


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## kitsune9

Kez Darksun said:


> Was hoping to hear about a ToEE mega adventure after they released the revised Hommlet.  Glad its Darksun for the next setting.
> 
> Love the cover for it.




That really is a nice cover!


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## Mircoles




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## filthgrinder

Shemeska said:


> I'm a fan of Dark Sun too. However I liked the expanded setting as presented in the Revised DS campaign setting box set.




The revised DS box set did more to ruin Dark Sun than 4e FR did to ruin the Realms. The fact that they recognize it and are retconing it out is fantastic.

I'm a Dark Sun fan, and I'm excited about this announcement.


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## malraux

As someone who has basically no exposure to the Dark Sun setting, what is the big deal with races?  How does it break the setting to have all the 4e races as playable?


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## Obryn

Shemeska said:


> Maybe my worry is overstated, believe me, I would like nothing more than to be totally and completely off-base here and have 4e Dark Sun come off as ten flavors of awesome, just using 4e rules alongside well written flavor that's respectful to the original. We'll see. I want to be wrong here, but my inner FR fan keeps having flashbacks.



I'm expecting a _reimagining_ of Dark Sun.  I'd be thrilled if it's similar in theme, and uses familiar elements, but adds stuff that just never existed in Dark Sun before in ways that attempt to be thematically appropriate.

I don't expect it to be 100% - or even 80% - faithful to the original set.  I expect it will be a great and flavorful setting of its own, much like New Battlestar Galactica was to Old Battlestar Galactica.

-O


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## Logan_Bonner

avin said:


> What about fluff? Fluff must prevail!




Hey, there will be great fluff, too! You just already know what most of it is!


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## DEFCON 1

Now here's the question I'd like to ask all the Dark Sun fans and DMs out there with regards to how best to address the races / classes issue.

If I remember correctly... because there were no gods to speak of, there were no clerics or paladins or divine characters of any sort in the original setting.  So which of these methods do you think WotC should use to address this issue:

1) Identify and list all the races and classes that are found within Dark Sun and _not mention_ the ones that aren't, or...

2) Identify and list all the races and classes that are found within Dark Sun and specifically say _'the following races and classes do not appear within the Dark Sun Campaign World and should not be used'_?

The first point is more confusing for new players or entrants into the setting, because you give no indication why these races and classes are not listed (and basically making DMs guess as to their potential use or non-use).  However, you _are_ leaving things open-ended so that a DM could include them if he wanted, and WotC doesn't have to run the risk of telling players 'hey, you're doing it wrong'.

The second point is more true to the setting that has been established, and more in line with focusing on the very specific fluff that has made the setting as successful and popular as its been.  However, it does basically say to the DMs 'tell your players NO' on these issues, and it strips away whole chunks of the game (along with the corresponding potential book sales and miniature sales of anything divine-related or non-DS race related for example).  Which might not be something WotC wants to get in the habit of doing.

***

Now if either of these two options doesn't seem like the way you'd want to go, there are the third and foruth options:

3) Mention that everything in D&D _could_ find a place within the setting, but that some parts should be exceedingly rare and would be an extremely big deal if they did appear (basically, the 'every race can have a dragonmark' concept).

4) Include everything that is in D&D into the Dark Sun setting, and just retcon and/or refluff things as necessary to make them stay somewhat within the realm of the original fluff (the Realms or Eberron methodology).

The third choice puts the onus onto the DM to decide whether or not to say 'no', as well as potentially having to steer his campaign into a direction where the 'obscure' bits that players want have to end up being a focus.  If tieflings are potentially unheard of in Dark Sun, and one of his players wants to play one, the DM now has to decide whether this million-to-one event has to be considered an important part of his game.

And as far as the fourth option... it solves pretty much everything as far as WotC's concerned, because it keeps everything they've created still in play, and means they have to spend less space in their books giving explanations for 'no', instead of space for all the 'yes's.  The downside of course is potentially alienating their long-time Dark Sun fans who feel like their setting got destroyed because of this continued WotC reasoning that 'everything in D&D should have a place in everything else connected to D&D'.

***

I myself have no good answers to this... but I'm curious what others feel about it.  This will be the first setting they'll produce in 4E where huge chunks of the game had originally been "written out" of the setting the first time, and where they'll really have to decide whether or not to do that again.  Should be interesting.


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## Knightfall

Obryn said:


> I expect you'll see them, but I expect they'll be intensely modified, flavor-wise.  I don't think WotC is going to release a setting which says "YOU MAY NOT PLAY A GNOME" nowadays.  I think they _might_ say "Gnomes are intensely unusual on Athas.  You might be the only one.  Also, you eat people" or something like that.



You're probably right.



Obryn said:


> I think 4e Paladins can fit very well into Dark Sun.  It wasn't the class that didn't work for 2e; it was the Lawful-Goodness of the class.  At least IMO.  An Unaligned paladin serving Primordials could work decently well.  So just because 2e DS had no Paladins doesn't mean 4e DS shouldn't; a 4e paladin is not a 2e paladin.



You know, this just goes to show I don't know much about 4e. I don't have any of the core books, so I'll have to take your word on it.



Obryn said:


> I think the DS version of Bard is very well-served by both the new Assassin class (as previewed), and the existing 4e Rogue.  Whether or not there will be a place for the PHB2 arcane leader called the "Bard" remains to be seen.  Again, just because the poison/assasin/minstrel character was called a Bard under 2e doesn't mean a character filling the same niche in 4e must also be called a Bard.



Well, I'm just going to have to agree to disagree with you on this point. 



Obryn said:


> I wouldn't hold my breath for a base Dune Trader class.  It'd be cool, but I dunno.  I think there should be a Dune Trader paragon path, though.
> 
> -O



I could live with a Paragon Path.

Note that I'm not a fan of 4e at all. I haven't seen anything that makes me think it's the kind of game I want to DM. I'm not I'd even want to play in a 4e campaign.

More than likely, I'd buy the campaign guide to use with an earlier edition or maybe another system completely. Hmm... Grim Tales Dark Sun.


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## Obryn

malraux said:


> As someone who has basically no exposure to the Dark Sun setting, what is the big deal with races?  How does it break the setting to have all the 4e races as playable?



I don't think 4e races would break the setting, if they are re-flavored in appropriate ways.

Basically, Dark Sun took the familiar D&D races (except for gnomes and half-orcs, which were all dead) and made them hardcore.  Elves were nomadic dune runners, sprinting across the sand in herds and preying upon travellers.  Dwarves were completely bald, very strong, and chose a focus to devote their lives towards.  Halflings lived across the mountains in cannibalistic tribes.  It added Muls, which are half-dwarves bred for slavery; Half-Giants, who had flexible alignments and were often guards; and thri-kreen, who were the perfect desert survivors.

Later revisions added pteranodon-people and "dray" - basically dragonborn.  I think maybe aarakocra, too.

Mainly, it was the wildlife that was weird and bizarre.  Everything was based on insects or lizards; everything that wasn't an insect or lizard was horrifyingly mutated and dangerous.  Kanks were the most regular riding animals - basically giant ants who secrete honey.  Caravan-beasts were huge "dinosaurs" - either big imixes or even bigger frog/turtle Mekillots.

Weird weapons abound, metal was nowhere, and wearing armor was a death sentence.  The world was concentrated in small cities ruled by magical/psionic sorcerer-kings.

Yeah, it's a neat setting.


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## fba827

I noticed the (visible) upcoming releases only mention a D.S. Campaign Guide and not a D.S. Player's Guide. I wonder if it simply hasn't been announced, was left out of the visible upcoming releases, or if they won't really have any players guide since all the options would have already been presented, and everything is presented in one book with both flavor, history, and class features/adjustments?


----------



## Nebulous

Obryn said:


> Yeah, it's a neat setting.




Word.  It was just so NOT typical fantasy.


----------



## Squizzle

Shemeska said:


> I'm a fan of Dark Sun too. However I liked the expanded setting as presented in the Revised DS campaign setting box set. So I'm coming for a different perspective on that there, and on top of that I'm more than a bit cynical about the stated desire to avoid pushing 4e default material into Dark Sun when other statements openly talk about the 4e primordials being part of 4e DS.
> 
> Maybe my worry is overstated, believe me, I would like nothing more than to be totally and completely off-base here and have 4e Dark Sun come off as ten flavors of awesome, just using 4e rules alongside well written flavor that's respectful to the original. We'll see. I want to be wrong here, but my inner FR fan keeps having flashbacks.



You know that nothing will ever take away the Dark Sun you love, right? They can publish a book making the Tablelands a lesser-known suburb of Waterdeep, and _you don't need to care._ If you have a setting that you love, just ignore anything that comes after that you don't. You don't need to pin it down under glass; others might want to see more options or exploration (and even expansion) of possibilities.

Heck, from your comments in other places, I was utterly convinced that you don't play current-edition D&D, so I'm not sure why you'd care, at all.


----------



## Dausuul

Funny thing, a lot of the 4E-original races fit Dark Sun much better than the races that are already in it.

Think about it for a minute. Set aside what you know about Dark Sun and imagine you're talking about a new setting: A desert world ravaged by magic and full of horrifying mutated monsters, nearly devoid of natural resources such as metal and water, without gods, where life is a daily struggle for survival.

So I put this question to you: Which fits better in this setting? A race of graceful, beautiful archers? Or a race of tough reptilian humanoids?

I submit that dragonborn are far more natural to DS than elves.


----------



## Nork

Dark Sun warforged would actually be pretty cool IMO.

Constructs of obsidian, stone, and bone plates affixed to a skeleton of living wood from beyond the mountains.  Animated by powerful defiling dragon magic, and made sentient by the unfathomable psionic powers of the Sorcerer Kings.

Obsidian souled enforcers bound to a Sorcerer King's iron will, the warforged do not tire, do not thirst, do not hunger, and do not question.  Whether standing guard upon the walls of the city state under the crushing mid day sun, or stalking the deserts for life to enslave, the Warforged obey the will of their Sorcerer King...

But what happens when their Sorcerer King dies?  What is their will then?

Being resistant to environmental effects in exchange for being about as lovable and trustworthy as a rogue T-800 seems like a fair trade.  Especially in a world as trustless as Dark Sun.


----------



## fanboy2000

fba827 said:


> I noticed the (visible) upcoming releases only mention a D.S. Campaign Guide and not a D.S. Player's Guide. I wonder if it simply hasn't been announced, was left out of the visible upcoming releases, or if they won't really have any players guide since all the options would have already been presented, and everything is presented in one book with both flavor, history, and class features/adjustments?



I noticed that too. I suspect that many DS races and classes will be in the PHB3. But I think they'll want to a player's guide to include DS specific feats and paragon paths.


----------



## Obryn

Squizzle said:


> Heck, from your comments in other places, I was utterly convinced that you don't play current-edition D&D, so I'm not sure why you'd care, at all.



That's awfully dismissive.

A well-made setting can persuade people to try new games or new editions.  Just because someone's not playing 4e now doesn't mean they never will, with something that captures their imagination.  It's not an exclusive club where you have to like 4e ahead of time to like a 4e setting.

-O


----------



## DarthMouth

filthgrinder said:


> The revised DS box set did more to ruin Dark Sun than 4e FR did to ruin the Realms. The fact that they recognize it and are retconing it out is fantastic.
> 
> I'm a Dark Sun fan, and I'm excited about this announcement.




_YAY.. The Mind Lords of the Last Sea was just a BAD DREAM!!_




Obryn said:


> I'm expecting a _reimagining_ of Dark Sun. I'd be thrilled if it's similar in theme, and uses familiar elements, but adds stuff that just never existed in Dark Sun before in ways that attempt to be thematically appropriate.
> 
> I don't expect it to be 100% - or even 80% - faithful to the original set. I expect it will be a great and flavorful setting of its own, much like New Battlestar Galactica was to Old Battlestar Galactica.
> 
> -O





man.. i soooooo second that!! gratz "


----------



## Dragonhelm

Pardon the mass-reply here...



kitsune9 said:


> Rats! I had placed my 1 gold crown bet on Dragonlance. Oh well, go Dark Sun!




Gold is worthless in Dragonlance anyway, so that's why you lost the bet.  Next time, bet steel!  



Blizzardb said:


> Hamster and rangers everywhere, rejoice!




I have no idea what this means, but it made me chuckle.  



drothgery said:


> So they've done a 'Realms-shattering-event' for FR, basically retconned 4e changes for Eberron, and it looks like Dark Sun is getting a reboot back to its original setting (with 4e tweaks, presumably). Three very different models on how to handle things.




Which gives me hope.  The biggest reason I was hoping it wasn't Dragonlance was because I was afraid that WotC might approach the setting in a way that isn't conducive to the setting.  So let's see how Dark Sun turns out.

And as much as I love Dragonlance, I'm excited to see Dark Sun!  Congrats to the folks at Athas.org for keeping the torch alive!  I hope you guys get some loving from WotC for your efforts!



> The gods of the setting are absent or dead, replaced by elemental spirits tied to the ancient primordials. Shamans and other primal characters draw on the forces of sun, sand, wind, and precious rain. Wizards practice their magic in secret or openly serve the sorcerer-kings. And psionic power is more common than on other worlds -- which is handy, since this setting will come out a few months after Player’s Handbook 3, which introduces the psionic power source.




Hells yeah!

Check out this other part of the interview:



> James Wyatt: Our goal with the setting was to cleave as close to the original boxed set as possible while still allowing as many D&D options as we could and making the setting ideal for 4th Edition play. We’re in the process of re-releasing Troy Denning’s excellent Prism Pentad series of novels, and we didn’t want readers to come away from those books and look at the campaign setting and not recognize it as the same world. So we tried to capture the essence of the original Dark Sun boxed set while ensuring that the Prism Pentad novels could be *one possible way* things turn out.




Emphasis mine.  So all the critics of the Prism Pentad don't have to worry.  

I would be interested to hear how the Dragon and Dungeon Dark Sun material from 3.5 would be utilized in the setting, if at all.



DerekSTheRed said:


> Perhaps they will expand on the gladiator mechanics and make it into core Dark Sun.




I suspect we won't see a gladiator class.  Rather, I could see it being a fighter build, or some sort of fighter paragon path.



malraux said:


> As someone who has basically no exposure to the Dark Sun setting, what is the big deal with races?  How does it break the setting to have all the 4e races as playable?




Dark Sun is a world that is so harsh, some of the races no longer exist.  Gnomes are now extinct (and I hope that prevails).  Some races, though, have adapted very nicely.  Halflings, for example, are now cannibals.  

I think most 4e races will work nicely.  The fey step of the eladrin might need some explaining, but a little fluff will work out.  Dragonborn would be an incredible visual, but you would have to explain their relationship to the dragon.  Goliaths would be a natural fit, though they may possibly take the place of half-giants (maybe they're one and the same?).  I'm not certain how deva or tieflings will work, but I'm willing to reserve judgment.  

I'm hoping we might see some of the XPH races for Dark Sun as we did in the Dragon article in 3.5.

Ooh!  Sorcerer-king epic destiny!

So if there's a new class, what might it be?  Templar?  Elemental-flavored divine class?

What paragon paths might we see?


----------



## kenmarable

Henrix said:


> What? They didn't tell you? Were you one of those who voted for Al Qadim?



That made me laugh out loud, heartily. Nice work. (Not sure my office mate appreciated the outburst as much, however.)



Obryn said:


> I'm expecting a _reimagining_ of Dark Sun.  I'd be thrilled if it's similar in theme, and uses familiar elements, but adds stuff that just never existed in Dark Sun before in ways that attempt to be thematically appropriate.
> 
> I don't expect it to be 100% - or even 80% - faithful to the original set.  I expect it will be a great and flavorful setting of its own, much like New Battlestar Galactica was to Old Battlestar Galactica.
> 
> -O



Same here. Ever since I first read the 4e rules, I thought Dark Sun would be a good fit. So I am very pleased to hear the announcement. But I agree entirely that it might best be a reimagining of the setting rather than straight conversion. I keep thinking of Battlestar Galatica as a good example of reimagining working out so much better than a "Let's reshoot it, but with more expensive special effects!" I think if done well, a reimagined 4e Dark Sun would be an incredible setting and big hit. A line by line conversion would just be kinda cool. 

But we'll have to wait and see how it pans out. I've been mixed on the 4e campaigns so far. FR was so dramatically changed, that I wasn't interested in picking it up since I prefer it as a nice default/baseline setting than a Roger Dean painting. Eberron stayed true to the old material, which I thought I would love, but then looking at all of the 3.5 region books I had, I realized there wasn't enough that I didn't already have. Thankfully, Dark Sun is old enough, and I'm personally not very tied to the existing canon, that I think I'll be happy with a 4e Dark Sun that is both awesome and stays true to the _spirit_ of the setting.


----------



## amysrevenge

Nork said:


> Dark Sun warforged would actually be pretty cool IMO.




I love you.



Dragonhelm said:


> I suspect we won't see a gladiator class.  Rather, I could see it being a fighter build, or some sort of fighter paragon path?




Well, there was that huge Gladiator article in Dragon #368 a while back.  Full of feats and equpment and paragon paths and multi-class weapon styles and such.


----------



## Fallen Seraph

The mechanical aspect I am most interested in seeing if they do something with is Psionic Wild Talents. I really do hope that Psionics for PCs goes beyond just the classes, and you can have some manner of Psionic abilities at Level 1 as just something you have.


----------



## Hellzon

fanboy2000 said:


> I noticed that too. I suspect that many DS races and classes will be in the PHB3. But I think they'll want to a player's guide to include DS specific feats and paragon paths.




We know the PHB3 has four races, and three are spoiled: Wilden, Githzerai, Minotaur and one other (we know it's not Githyanki). And I don't really expect the fourth to be Thri-Kreen.

Psionic classes are in, of course.


----------



## Henrix

Squizzle said:


> You know that nothing will ever take away the Dark Sun you love, right?




It's kinda funny that you're telling Shem this, really


----------



## Nebulous

I found this old pic online.  I didn't even know they released an AD&D brand of DS minis:







WotC is going have a field day with the new line of character models and monsters for DS.


----------



## kenmarable

Nork said:


> Dark Sun warforged would actually be pretty cool IMO.
> 
> Constructs of obsidian, stone, and bone plates affixed to a skeleton of living wood from beyond the mountains.  Animated by powerful defiling dragon magic, and made sentient by the unfathomable psionic powers of the Sorcerer Kings.
> 
> Obsidian souled enforcers bound to a Sorcerer King's iron will, the warforged do not tire, do not thirst, do not hunger, and do not question.  Whether standing guard upon the walls of the city state under the crushing mid day sun, or stalking the deserts for life to enslave, the Warforged obey the will of their Sorcerer King...
> 
> But what happens when their Sorcerer King dies?  What is their will then?
> 
> Being resistant to environmental effects in exchange for being about as lovable and trustworthy as a rogue T-800 seems like a fair trade.  Especially in a world as trustless as Dark Sun.



Uh... what's the word I'm looking for... oh yeah - NERDGASM!!!11!1!one!!


----------



## Squizzle

Obryn said:


> That's awfully dismissive.
> 
> A well-made setting can persuade people to try new games or new editions.  Just because someone's not playing 4e now doesn't mean they never will, with something that captures their imagination.  It's not an exclusive club where you have to like 4e ahead of time to like a 4e setting.
> 
> -O



That's not what I meant to imply at all; I should have phrased it more clearly. If he doesn't want the setting to change, as it's in a state that he likes, and is in that state in a fashion that is playable for a game (or game version) that he enjoys, why would it matter for his play/interest/existential wellbeing if it were changed in a fashion he didn't enjoy in its incarnation in a game (version) he didn't enjoy? It'd be like me being upset however many years ago when White Wolf changed the _Trinity_/_Aberrant_/_Adventure!_ timeline (albeit slightly, so not necessarily an apples:apples example) for the games' translation into d20. Sure, it changes things that I liked about the games in a system that I (in the horrible foolishness of my youth, I admit! [Seriously, _Aberrant_ had mechanical problems you could pass a men's big & tall clothing store through.]) preferred to accomodate a system that I did not enjoy, but...I still had the books on my shelf to play the game I wanted to play! It affected _literally nothing _of my gaming life.


----------



## amysrevenge

Speculating on the contents of a Dark Sun Player's Guide

1) Races:  Mul, Thri-Kreen, Half-Giant

2) Classes:  Templar, Defiler

3) Equipment:  Bone and obsidian gear.  Some way to get the attack/defense/skill math to work without magic items (inherent bonuses or something).

Anyone have any other stuff?  This was all just stuff I threw together as fast as I could type it...


----------



## Andalusian

DEFCON 1 said:


> If I remember correctly... because there were no gods to speak of, there were no clerics or paladins or divine characters of any sort in the original setting.



No paladins, but they did have clerics that worshipped one of the four main elements. They also had druids.

I wonder if the setting will still use weapon breakage rules and psionics. I like the low metal feel of the original setting, but weapon breakage was a real nuisance for everyone.


----------



## amysrevenge

Nebulous said:


> I found this old pic online.  I didn't even know they released an AD&D brand of DS minis:




There were more than this - I have a female half-giant mini that my wife used later as the _enlarge person_ version of her cleric.


----------



## Panthanas

Awesome!  I was hoping it would be Dark Sun!  I ran a DS game for about 4 years in the mid 90's and it ended abruptly.  I think my group would love to return to the setting.


----------



## Kez Darksun

amysrevenge said:


> Speculating on the contents of a Dark Sun Player's Guide
> 
> 1) Races:  Mul, Thri-Kreen, Half-Giant
> 
> 2) Classes:  Templar, Defiler
> 
> 3) Equipment:  Bone and obsidian gear.  Some way to get the attack/defense/skill math to work without magic items (inherent bonuses or something).
> 
> Anyone have any other stuff?  This was all just stuff I threw together as fast as I could type it...




How about the Dark Sun specific weaponry?  As far as the last half of #3, the DMG 2 has that covered I believe.


----------



## Silverblade The Ench

filthgrinder said:


> The revised DS box set did more to ruin Dark Sun than 4e FR did to ruin the Realms. The fact that they recognize it and are retconing it out is fantastic.
> 
> I'm a Dark Sun fan, and I'm excited about this announcement.




LOL, true  As frequently said, the way the setting was forced to follow the books...ick!!
Very glad it's Dark Sun for next year, especially as I'm running a 4th ed campaign in Athas at the moment! 
Makes me feel all ...Brom-like, and wanting to shout out _"WHO'S YER DADDY!"_ while dressed in torn clothing and fake tan 

By the way, paladins do make sense, as "templars": templar is a profession, as is a "gladiator".
Most templars are bureacrats with some spell casting, or officers (warlords) some werre defilers, some would be fanatic believers in the Sorceror Kings supposed godhood (thus they'd be paladins) etc.

IMHO, Templars should be "clerics", or _any_ other class the DM wants, it's what their _occupation _is that makes them a templar, ya know?

Gladiators are mostly "rangers". It' a from of fighting up close in an arena. Can be done with ANY class, really.

Dune Trader class would rock, or paragon class.

Athasian bards = rogues/assassins.



Dausuul said:


> HALLE-FREAKIN-LUJAH!
> 
> This is... bloody perfect.




_"Where are we going?"
"To get bigger guns!!"
"*HALLELUJAH!!"*_*
*

A quote most apropos for Dark Sun 



Blizzardb said:


> Hooray! It's not Dragonlance!
> 
> Hamster and rangers everywhere, rejoice!
> 
> Still, an original setting would've been better. Oh well, maybe next year...




Minsc and Boo do the Gopher Dance for Dark Sun fun! 







And Spelljammer for 2011!!

Mmm, I must do more Dark Sun art, yes indeedy!!


----------



## Somebloke

malraux said:


> As someone who has basically no exposure to the Dark Sun setting, what is the big deal with races? How does it break the setting to have all the 4e races as playable?




One of the main draws of the Dark Sun setting is that it was D&D that was not Tolkein- not even a little. All of the races were either dramatically altered (haflings as cannibal jungle dwellers) or supposedly wiped out centuries ago (Gnomes, orcs, goblinoids). Replacements included the Tri-Kreen and the Aarkroka- much more alien races meant to further draw the setting away from the generic feel.


----------



## amysrevenge

Thinking about it more, Defiler/Preserver might be options for the existing Arcane classes, rather than classes of their own.


----------



## AllisterH

I wonder if they would go with simply saying...

"In Dark Sun, there is no DIVINE power source thus classes who have "prayers" do not exist.

There has ALREADY been an article on how to do "gladiator" style combat which was well received (and there's the Pit Fighter paragon path)

Dragonborn can be easily flavoured as "drey" a la the changeling/shapeshifter flavouring done for Eberron.

The only big mechanic would be how "defiling" works with spells and the arcane classes.


----------



## Somebloke

Anyone thinking Paladins, clerics etc. might be folded into the Templar concept? It would be about the only way they would really fit.


----------



## avin

Dragonhelm said:


> I have no idea what this means, but it made me chuckle.




This is something that Minsc, a Fighter/Ranger from Baldur's Gate CRPG, keeps saying.

He has a miniature giant space hamster...


----------



## Nahat Anoj

amysrevenge said:


> Thinking about it more, Defiler/Preserver might be options for the existing Arcane classes, rather than classes of their own.



Paragon paths, perhaps?



AllisterH said:


> The only big mechanic would be how "defiling" works with spells and the arcane classes.



Well, there are already a few classes that have powers doing damage to allies.  Dark pact warlocks are probably the most well know example.



Somebloke said:


> Anyone thinking Paladins, clerics etc. might be folded into the Templar concept? It would be about the only way they would really fit.



I have a feeling that templars will pretty much be statted up as paladins.


----------



## Herschel

Knightfall said:


> Now that is an interesting choice. It's going to be a rebooted setting... it seems.
> 
> I'm still wary of how WotC is going to handle revising Dark Sun. Will there be gods and primordials? Will it use the new cosmology?
> 
> And I'm assuming all the races and classes will be included. That will make 4e DS very different from 2e DS.





Goliaths could sub for Half-Giants, Halflings are already coverted to skinny, feral bastages, it will be magic that will be most interesting to convert.


----------



## Askaval30

fantastic, absolutely fantastic news!!!!!


----------



## Somebloke

Herschel said:


> Goliaths could sub for Half-Giants, Halflings are already coverted to skinny, feral bastages, it will be magic that will be most interesting to convert.



 Cross the haflings with the 4e gnome mechanics, and watch your party spend the entire damn campaign watching over their backs. _Waiting._


----------



## Nai_Calus

The new version's focus will be on the 50,000 survivors of Athas after the Warforged nuked the planet, as they search desperately for a mythical planet named Htrae in their fleet of spelljammer ships, while fighting off more Warforged attacks.


----------



## Silverblade The Ench

Defiling is a mechanic best kept to evil NPCs, I think?
Problem with it is that defiling *IS* more powerful than normal wizardry, the defilers won (the sorceror kings), they wiped out the preservers almost entirely because...defilers are more powerful.

No one, bar the most scummy/despserate of folk will tolerate defilers, because they destory plants (food etc), and only high level defilers can use the "Create Tree Of Life" spell (Tree of Life is a magiclaly imbued tree that's pretty resistant to defiling...sorceror kings have hundreds of them).

So, it'd be hard to balance defiler PCs, and, hard to integrate them into most parties.
??


----------



## D&D

Obryn said:


> That's awfully dismissive.
> 
> A well-made setting can persuade people to try new games or new editions. Just because someone's not playing 4e now doesn't mean they never will, with something that captures their imagination. It's not an exclusive club where you have to like 4e ahead of time to like a 4e setting (just didn't sound like my bag).
> 
> -O




You are basically talking about me. If this setting ends up as good as I hope it does, next August I'll be marching out of my FLGS with an armload of 4e books...this coming from a guy who has never played or expressed an interest to play 4e.

One more note, this is a really *BIG* deal to me. So big in fact that it actually made me decide to stop lurking, register, and post.


----------



## coyote6

Nai_Calus said:


> The new version's focus will be on the 50,000 survivors of Athas after the Warforged nuked the planet, as they search desperately for a mythical planet named Htrae in their fleet of spelljammer ships, while fighting off more Warforged attacks.




You forgot the bit where changelings have been re-flavored as a kind of flesh-and-blood warforged, and have been infiltrating the fleet.


----------



## Fallen Seraph

Alrighty my own speculation:

*Races:*

Thri-Keen
Muls
I think we could see perhaps a variety of Feats, or switch-out templates for other races.

*Classes:*
I could see lots of Feats, new Powers, etc. to make classes feel more appropriate for Dark Sun. Primal getting stuff dealing with sand, Arcane the Defiler stuff and so forth. I really don't know what class they will bring in. 

*Other Stuff:*
Just like FR had Spell-Plague and Eberron Dragonmarks. Dark Sun will have some manner of Psionic Wild Talent.

As Dark Sun is shaping in my head right now. It is going to be a setting with lots of the crunch for PCs focused on feel, and while allowing lots of things from core showing how it would be done in Dark Sun. Such as Defilers, or Elementals and Divine Classes.


----------



## MrMyth

Shemeska said:


> My first response to the news was to feel truly sorry for fans of Dark Sun. But if they honestly try to avoid the 4e FR treatment and cram default 4e into a setting as unique as Dark Sun, maybe, just maybe they'll have learned from their mistakes up to this point. One can only hope.




Worry does seem natural, but this seems to pretty much ignore the existence of 4E Eberron, which keeps the setting entirely intact while incorporating 4E elements without any difficulties at all. 

Now, I think doing so with Dark Sun will be more difficult, but they seem aware of this, obviously willing to keep elements intact (gods are absent or dead), and thus far, I'm very excited about where this will go. 

The only setting that might have gotten more interest from more would have been Planescape - but given how incredible a job they've done incorporating the elements of that into the default setting itself, I'm fine letting it remain at that.


----------



## Obryn

D&D said:


> You are basically talking about me. If this setting ends up as good as I hope it does, next August I'll be marching out of my FLGS with an armload of 4e books...this coming from a guy who has never played or expressed an interest to play 4e.
> 
> One more note, this is a really *BIG* deal to me. So big in fact that it actually made me decide to stop lurking, register, and post.



Awesome!   And welcome to the site!

I am also hoping it rocks.  Although, truth be told, I'll buy it even if it doesn't.  Like I said before, I have no compunctions about ripping the mechanical heart out of a sourcebook and putting it in a dead setting's body.  It'll be like Zombie Dark Sun.  Or Frankensun.

-O


----------



## Nai_Calus

coyote6 said:


> You forgot the bit where changelings have been re-flavored as a kind of flesh-and-blood warforged, and have been infiltrating the fleet.




I didn't forget that, I just didn't mention it because it's supposed to be a huge shock to the players when they find out. Especially with the requirement that at least one party member is one unknowingly.


----------



## drothgery

Silverblade The Ench said:


> Defiling is a mechanic best kept to evil NPCs, I think?
> Problem with it is that defiling *IS* more powerful than normal wizardry, the defilers won (the sorceror kings), they wiped out the preservers almost entirely because...defilers are more powerful.
> 
> No one, bar the most scummy/despserate of folk will tolerate defilers, because they destory plants (food etc), and only high level defilers can use the "Create Tree Of Life" spell (Tree of Life is a magiclaly imbued tree that's pretty resistant to defiling...sorceror kings have hundreds of them).
> 
> So, it'd be hard to balance defiler PCs, and, hard to integrate them into most parties.
> ??




This. I'd imagine defiling is not a PC option; it's an NPC villian ability.


----------



## MrMyth

Silverblade The Ench said:


> Defiling is a mechanic best kept to evil NPCs, I think?
> Problem with it is that defiling *IS* more powerful than normal wizardry, the defilers won (the sorceror kings), they wiped out the preservers almost entirely because...defilers are more powerful.




At least one way to have Defiling as a balanced mechanic would be to make it a ritual - you destroy X life force in the area, and get to recharge a healing surge / daily power / etc. Still strong, thematically appropriate, but by removing its combat ability, it doesn't make you too powerful. Meanwhile, you could have a Defiler wizard build that simply has many powers based around absorbing life force and similar effects. 

Now, that's just some quick ideas thrown out there - but it does seem like some method would be doable, whether it is this or something else. I definitely agree it will be a tricky task, but I don't think it is an impossible one.


----------



## Obryn

MrMyth said:


> Now, that's just some quick ideas thrown out there - but it does seem like some method would be doable, whether it is this or something else. I definitely agree it will be a tricky task, but I don't think it is an impossible one.



I like the cut of your jib, sir!

-O


----------



## Roman

I haven't read the thread apart from the first post announcing this news, but as a huge Dark Sun fan, I cannot help but feel saddened it is being revived in 4E, which I am not a fan of at all. The reason I care one way or another with respect to what settings make it to 4E is that once 5E or 6E comes along and I might start playing the current edition again, these settings will have been ruined forever by Realms* Shattering Events (*replace 'Realms' by the appropriate setting name) and various retcons to fit the settings into the 4E mold, as was done with Forgotten Realms. With Realms it was hard to swallow, but it will be worse now, because now it is the turn of my favorite official campaign setting to be butchered.


----------



## vagabundo

Squizzle said:


> That's not what I meant to imply at all; I should have phrased it more clearly. If he doesn't want the setting to change, as it's in a state that he likes, and is in that state in a fashion that is playable for a game (or game version) that he enjoys, why would it matter for his play/interest/existential wellbeing if it were changed in a fashion he didn't enjoy in its incarnation in a game (version) he didn't enjoy? It'd be like me being upset however many years ago when White Wolf changed the _Trinity_/_Aberrant_/_Adventure!_ timeline (albeit slightly, so not necessarily an apples:apples example) for the games' translation into d20. Sure, it changes things that I liked about the games in a system that I (in the horrible foolishness of my youth, I admit! [Seriously, _Aberrant_ had mechanical problems you could pass a men's big & tall clothing store through.]) preferred to accomodate a system that I did not enjoy, but...I still had the books on my shelf to play the game I wanted to play! It affected _literally nothing _of my gaming life.




Exactly. If you likes what you see from the previews and impressions then buy the books - covert the stuff you like if you wish. If you dont like what you see then ignore it, your no worse off.

I'm not sure how fans of the setting could be disapointed in anyway by this announcement, becuase they can only gain, they lose nothing. Nothing!!


----------



## Aloïsius

Roman said:


> I haven't read the thread apart from the first post announcing this news, but as a huge Dark Sun fan, I cannot help but feel saddened it is being revived in 4E, which I am not a fan of at all. The reason I care one way or another with respect to what settings make it to 4E is that once 5E or 6E comes along and I might start playing the current edition again, these settings will have been ruined forever by Realms* Shattering Events (*replace 'Realms' by the appropriate setting name) and various retcons to fit the settings into the 4E mold, as was done with Forgotten Realms. With Realms it was hard to swallow, but it will be worse now, because now it is the turn of my favorite official campaign setting to be butchered.




If you had read the thread, you would know that the only Desert Shatering Event announced for Dark Sun 4e was... None. The timeline is reset to the original boxed set. Your complaint is misplaced. 
By the way, WotC's ability to cancel the revised Dark Sun setting background also "butchers" your other complaint : a setting is not "ruined*" *forever*. 

And one last thing : 6 or 7 more years without a new edition would have killed Dark Sun, as Mystara has been killed, and there would never have been a 5e Dark Sun. To stay alive and keep its traction, a setting needs some kind of support.


* I find this rhetoric offensive. Elminsterization "ruined" the FR more than the spellplague for me. To each his own...


----------



## Dausuul

Roman said:


> I haven't read the thread apart from the first post announcing this news, but as a huge Dark Sun fan, I cannot help but feel saddened it is being revived in 4E, which I am not a fan of at all. The reason I care one way or another with respect to what settings make it to 4E is that once 5E or 6E comes along and I might start playing the current edition again, these settings will have been ruined forever by Realms* Shattering Events (*replace 'Realms' by the appropriate setting name) and various retcons to fit the settings into the 4E mold, as was done with Forgotten Realms. With Realms it was hard to swallow, but it will be worse now, because now it is the turn of my favorite official campaign setting to be butchered.




Might want to read this before jumping to conclusions there, mate.


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## Roman

Having read the thread now, as well as the link (thanks Dausuul), it seems that my pessimism was rather hasty. If they really stay true to the original and won't try to shoehorn 4E concepts into the setting, than they won't ruin the setting. Heck, if they go back to the original boxed set as the baseline, they will even undo the damage done by the later 2E supplements and might have a _positive_ impact on the setting's future - an opposite outcome to what I had assumed when I read the announcement. 

Hopefully, the setting will attract more fans and then reappear in future editions (more amenable to my playstyle than 4E) when they come.


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## fba827

Fallen Seraph said:


> Alrighty my own speculation:
> (snip)
> *Classes:*
> I could see lots of Feats, new Powers, etc. to make classes feel more appropriate for Dark Sun. Primal getting stuff dealing with sand, Arcane the Defiler stuff and so forth. I really don't know what class they will bring in.




I'm imagining some alternate class features, where (some heavy) armor proficiency is lost in exchange for something else that grants an AC bonus.


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## outsider

Alot of my thoughts on how they'll impliment various classes and mechanics are already covered, but here's the overall philosophy I would take if I were them:

Don't tinker with individual classes unless absolutely necessary.  Instead, tinker with the power sources.

Eg.  Preserving/Defiling should be represented by things like feats and paragon paths.  That way everybody from sorcerors to swordmages to any random arcane class they come up with in the future can be either a defiler or preserver.

Divine classes as Templar variants.  The cleric matches most closely with a Dark Sun templar, but I could easily see the Sorceror Kings imbuing people with divine energy to serve as bodyguards(paladins) or assassins(avengers), or for many other purposes.

The former 'elemental cleric' role is taken over by the primal power source classes.  Why would an independant elemental worshiper be called a cleric anyways?  Never made much sense to me.  Shaman seems to be a much better fit.

The other big key is avoiding getting entangled with old school names.  Cleric is a good example of that.  Why bother totally remaking the class that happens to be named 'cleric' into the old school elemental cleric when the shaman is far closer to it already and the cleric class can be reflavored into templar, which it matches pretty closely?  The fighter is another good example.  Dark Sun fighters were leaders of armies, generals, and the like.  We've already got a class that does that: the Warlord.  Additionally, the fighter fills the Dark Sun gladiator role pretty well, so why bother making a gladiator class?  Just give the fighter some gladiator flavored stuff.  4e rogues can easily fill the Dark Sun bard role, so we shouldn't see the 4e bard class rebuilt to look like the Dark Sun bard either.


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## Vicar In A Tutu

Awesome. The cover is sweet as well. The fact that they are basing it (i.e. the timeline) on the first boxed set is an excellent choice. Overall, I'm very optimistic. The first campaign guide (FR) was lacklustre, IMHO. The Eberron campaign guide was very good. I'm hoping Darksun 4E will be even better. This is a good time to be a D&D fan. 

Now, if they only breathed a little life into the boring, soulless magic items in 4E, everything would be just hunky dory .


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## RangerWickett

So does the desert of Athas count as a 'sandbox' setting?


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## Greg K

This couldn't have been announced at a more opportune time.  Darksun is my favorite setting and, on Sunday,  I had asked one of my players that owns the PHB and Martial Power if I can borrow them this weekend.  I and my other players have been reluctant to play 4e (I walked out in the middle of a demo). However, based upon parts of PHB2, Arcane Power, Divine Power,  and Martial Power (along with some 3rd party products), I  thought I would give it a second look.


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## Obryn

Roman said:


> If they really stay true to the original and won't try to shoehorn 4E concepts into the setting, than they won't ruin the setting. Heck, if they go back to the original boxed set as the baseline, they will even undo the damage done by the later 2E supplements and might have a _positive_ impact on the setting's future - an opposite outcome to what I had assumed when I read the announcement.



Well, I can almost guarantee there will be stuff in it that's new to 4e that wasn't there in 2e.  The real question is whether or not it will be implemented *well*, IMO.  I can handle Eladrin in Dark Sun so long as they're _Dark Sun_ Eladrin.  I can handle Tieflings so long as they're _Dark Sun_ Tieflings.  Basically, I want them to do with the new races what the original Dark Sun boxed set did with the old races - twist them so they're recognizable, but make them suitable for a rugged, harsh desert world.

That's basically what Dark Sun was, to me - a reimagining of the familiar into a new and bizarre context.  If this continues, and if 4e Dark Sun is faithful in theme rather than detail, I'll be thrilled.  (If it doesn't, like I said, I can always just rip the mechanics out and use them in the old setting!)

-O


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## the8bitdeity

outsider said:


> The former 'elemental cleric' role is taken over by the primal power source classes.  Why would an independant elemental worshiper be called a cleric anyways?  Never made much sense to me.  Shaman seems to be a much better fit.




Let's not forget the elemental power source is probalby in PHB4


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## Peraion Graufalke

Wow, I'm floored. A reboot of Dark Sun is like a dream come true.


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## M.L. Martin

Peraion Graufalke said:


> Wow, I'm floored. A reboot of Dark Sun is like a dream come true.




  Enjoy. _My_ setting's becoming a board game. 

  I kid, I kid. I strongly expected that it would be Dark Sun for next year, and while it's not my style of setting--I prefer my settings more elegant and civilized (apologies to Obi-Wan Kenobi  )--I'm glad for the fans who'll get it back.

  And I'm looking forward to the _Castle Ravenloft_ board game too.


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## darjr

I'd said it was Dark Sun at one point as well. Then went all in for Dragonlance.

I'm very interested in this.


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## Henrix

RangerWickett said:


> So does the desert of Athas count as a 'sandbox' setting?




Well, seeing that the Athas sun itself is just a point of light, well, yes.


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## Silverblade The Ench

Matthew,
_"Count Strahd, in the Library, with the Rod of Azalin!"_

I keed! I keed! 

Other issues on Dark SUun:

Shamans I don't think really fit the idea of Athasian elemental priests at all, do they?
Elemental clerics revered a specific element and acted in all ways like normal clerics, just their spell selection was more specific and they coudl summon their element 1/day, plus they were oh, kind of rough and ready, they rarely had church heirarchies.

Shamans and druids are more like Athasian _druids _of 2nd ed, not clerics of the elements. But like I said, 4th ed druids need some more healing powers to be "secondary leaders" if you go down that path.
both would be sworn enemies of defilers and sorceror kings (and thus their templars), because defiling has caused the catastrophic state of Athas today...making defilers enemie sof the "Primal pwoers"
Hence another reason defiling is best left to NPCs or parties more evil in make up. Defiling is a serious issue in Dark Sun parties...almost anything else is forgivable  except defiling (survival is primary on Athas, not morals!)

As a poster noted, sure, having defiling as feats makes perfect senses and avoids the mess of making up a new class! 
Alas, 2nd ed didn't have feats so they didn't have so much leeway back then.
Bonuses to hit damage, recovering encounter/daily powers, based off a tree of feats, would be cool.
Defiling isn't wrong for the PHB, it's just wrong to let PCs have that power without consequence (which is damn near everyone will be out to kill you on sight of defiling, unless you find a patron or are VERY sneaky).

Gladiators wouldn't always be fighters. fighters are "defenders", gladiators are more likely to be "strikers", the crowd loves mayhem, i.e. high damage. "Marking" is not much used when it's about butchering your opponent in as entertainingly as possible and "team play" is less common? (but team matches do occur)
Defenders are much more likely to be soldiers and especially bodyguards!
Tempest, battlerager and 2handed weapon style are more likely for fighters in the arena and more defencive styles for bodyguards/soldiers.

I dont' think "boxing in" gladiators and templars to specific classes is a good idea at all.
Gladiator could well be a paragon path though.

The original boxed set did have fighters etc as "leaders", but, back then, you could have followers...but there was no mechanics etc for the "warlord" in those days. 
You can become a leader by politics/circumstance, or skill (warlord or leader class), they aren't the same thing exactly.

Templars are as likely to be a pencil pusher who can use defencive/parlayzing spells, as paladins, or avengers or..most anything their sorceror king sees as useful (example: Nibenay's templars are all female and are his "Harem" as well as their usual roles).

Since in 4th ed, an NPC can have whatever the heck powers a DM thinks is appropriate for an encounter (just limited by damage rules etc), you can have a hell of a lot of leeway with templar design. Note also this makes sense because only they have access ot huge libraries of spell and psionic information.
So, one templar could be a master psion, another a very weedy but deadly divine spell caster, another one just robust (high con or defences) with the demagoge template from the DMG (a mouthy politician with a knack for survival)..and so on.

Hammanu of Urik is known for being a war-hungry SOB. His templars would tend to be paladins, warlords and able spell casters, but less effcient bureaucrats I think so his city would be oh..less effcient...
And templars who're good bureaucrats would have lots of bodyguards because they _know _they can't fight good (which is ok! Their slaves protect them, the templars' job is to keep the city running, not slaughter folk)

In my game, one PC is an avenger imbued with the wrath of ancient spirits to destory the sorceror kings...so 4th ed classes are ok, really, and as I said elsewhere, the use of "mutation" as a "Deus Ex Machina" and "schtick" for the setting, lets me fit in damn near any race/class.


PS, 
Is Woolly Rupert the real leader of the Cylons, then?


----------



## Primal

Knightfall said:


> Excellent news!
> 
> This might make me a 4e fan if they stay true to the setting. Still, it's too early to be sure of anything at the moment.
> 
> And that cover is sweet!!!




That is a *killer* cover -- another hit for WR. I might almost buy the book just on the basis of that cover (and I'm not running or playing in 4E campaigns).


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## Jack99

I only have one thing to say regarding this news - \o/




Shemeska said:


> I'm a fan of Dark Sun too. However I liked the expanded setting as presented in the Revised DS campaign setting box set.



Congrats on being one in a million (billion)!


----------



## avin

Roman said:


> I haven't read the thread apart from the first post announcing this news, but as a huge Dark Sun fan, I cannot help but feel saddened it is being revived in 4E, which I am not a fan of at all. The reason I care one way or another with respect to what settings make it to 4E is that once 5E or 6E comes along and I might start playing the current edition again, these settings will have been ruined forever by Realms* Shattering Events (*replace 'Realms' by the appropriate setting name) and various retcons to fit the settings into the 4E mold, as was done with Forgotten Realms. With Realms it was hard to swallow, but it will be worse now, because now it is the turn of my favorite official campaign setting to be butchered.




Dark Sun worked better on GURPS than 3.5. 

3.5 is too much item dependant.


----------



## catsclaw227

catsclaw227 said:
			
		

> To me, all this sounds good. I imagine that the tide swell of nerdrage won't occur until we get our first set of previews.






Umbran said:


> Perhaps not, but clearly the tide swell of insulting dismissal of others gets to start right now!  How cool is that?
> 
> It isn't cool at all, actually.  How about nobody here does that again.



Sorry Umbran -- My Bad.  I suppose I was feeling cynical about the idea we can enjoy this release announcement without some negativity seeping in.


----------



## Nork

The expanded setting was actually not too bad from the POV of actually running a game in practical terms.

The city states in the original box were a little too much of draconian police states with absolute and total control over all life within their borders, right down to the water people drank.  Players like to rock the boat, they don't take well to backing down from *anything*.  A typical group of typical player characters in the setting wasn't believeable at all.  They would act like they act, and the crackdown that the setting would suggest should be forthcoming should be by all rights swift, brutal, and overwhelming.

In the expanded setting, the city states were feeling their grip on power slipping, and to some extent needed to maintain the guise of legitimacy instead of relying on raw power and absolute control.  People who pushed boundaries, and even mouthed off, but didn't represent a direct threat to the sorcerer king, would likely get some leeway, or at least more subtle countermeasures directed against them.  In cities like Tyr, players had free reign to act as players do.

I think the revised setting just went too far with the number of sorcerer kings it killed off.  Merely having free Tyr and Tyr's counter attack on the city of Urik should have been enough to shake the foundations of the setting enough to bring about enough chaos to let players get away with their typical behavior in a plausiable fashion.


----------



## I'm A Banana

Cautiously optimistic. The quote from Bill is almost more newsworthy than the setting announcement itself! If they're true to that, then DS4e has a very good chance of being _exceptionally awesome_. 

For me, it's kind of make-or-break. We'll see how willing they are to let the setting trump the 4e philosophies. If it's elegant, if it's smooth, if it's the same Dark Sun I love just with more awesome, it will rock, and I will want to play it the second week out! If it's "dragonborn are dimensional aliens!" and "we have to fix the 'no metal' thing!" and "high level character should be immune to starvation!" I will probably be TOTALLY disillusioned with 4e instead of my current status of "amused but critical." 



> No gods is the most important decision so far. How the DS team handles the "planes" will also be vital.




The no gods thing is solid. I kind of wonder what they're doing with the divine power source, but it's an encouraging sign.

The whole "Athas is disconnected from the multiverse" thing might be hard for 4e to deal with. Part of the philosophy of making Eberron World Axis seemed to be "we want people to be able to use the planar material we produce." I don't know how Dark Sun players will be able to use planar material without weakening the setting. In a normal DS game, I shouldn't have the option of just stepping through a portal and going to Mount Celestia.



> They better be careful about how they include all the various 4e races.




That has me a little less worried after Eberron. The dragonborn and the eladrin and the tieflings weren't too rudely thrown into the world. Eladrin were probably the most awkward, but because they're not of this world, I suppose that's oddly fitting.  

I can see the eladrin giving the setting some difficulties. The nature of the race, the rules of the race, and the fluff of the race, focuses on being from and stepping into another plane, and mastering arcane magic. Both things should be more or less absent from PC abilities. "Oh I stepped into a world of verdant green plants and arcane magic for a second but came back" does NOT WORK HERE.



> Campaign crunch from the Forgotten Realms and Eberron settings must NOT be included in the setting. Period.




Again, I think it could work OK. The races and classes are kind of inappropriate, but like with Eberron, there needn't be much mention of them, if any. The book doesn't have to mention Warforged. If you want warforged, you figure it out.  



> Paladins do not belong in Dark Sun; however, I have a feeling that the class will get shoe-horned into the setting.




Not too worried about that, either, since 4e paladins are a little more flexible. I am a bit curious about the divine power source, but they've already said "no gods," so we'll see where that goes (perhaps the sorcerer-kings are the divine power source in DS? That could make paladins good templars!)



> Bards need to be assassin-like. Dark Sun bards are NOT happy lute-stumming minstrels.




Keep assassins assassin-like.  Since arcane magic is defiling magic, I can see 4e bards as kind of a phychic leech: you are emotionally drained and deblitated, sucked dry of your _feelings_ around a DS bard. Or, if the bard is a preserver, perhaps the bard itself is deadened of emotion, rendered mute and dull except when giving the eerie keening noise...



> Dune Trader should be a class and there must be an option for players who want to be a gladiator in the Dark Sun-style.




The former I think is superfluous. The latter could work either as it's own class, or as a build for something like the barbarian or fighter. Gladiator rules already exist in 4e, so they certainly have done some thought about this.


----------



## D&D

outsider said:


> Alot of my thoughts on how they'll impliment various classes and mechanics are already covered, but here's the overall philosophy I would take if I were them:
> 
> Don't tinker with individual classes unless absolutely necessary.  Instead, tinker with the power sources.
> 
> Eg.  Preserving/Defiling should be represented by things like feats and paragon paths.  That way everybody from sorcerors to swordmages to any random arcane class they come up with in the future can be either a defiler or preserver.
> 
> Divine classes as Templar variants.  The cleric matches most closely with a Dark Sun templar, but I could easily see the Sorceror Kings imbuing people with divine energy to serve as bodyguards(paladins) or assassins(avengers), or for many other purposes.
> 
> The former 'elemental cleric' role is taken over by the primal power source classes.  Why would an independant elemental worshiper be called a cleric anyways?  Never made much sense to me.  Shaman seems to be a much better fit.
> 
> The other big key is avoiding getting entangled with old school names.  Cleric is a good example of that.  Why bother totally remaking the class that happens to be named 'cleric' into the old school elemental cleric when the shaman is far closer to it already and the cleric class can be reflavored into templar, which it matches pretty closely?  The fighter is another good example.  Dark Sun fighters were leaders of armies, generals, and the like.  We've already got a class that does that: the Warlord.  Additionally, the fighter fills the Dark Sun gladiator role pretty well, so why bother making a gladiator class?  Just give the fighter some gladiator flavored stuff.  4e rogues can easily fill the Dark Sun bard role, so we shouldn't see the 4e bard class rebuilt to look like the Dark Sun bard either.




A ton of good points as to how to think about the new setting.


----------



## Silverblade The Ench

Nork said:


> The expanded setting was actually not too bad from the POV of actually running a game in practical terms.
> 
> The city states in the original box were a little too much of draconian police states with absolute and total control over all life within their borders, right down to the water people drank.  Players like to rock the boat, they don't take well to backing down from *anything*.  A typical group of typical player characters in the setting wasn't believeable at all.  They would act like they act, and the crackdown that the setting would suggest should be forthcoming should be by all rights swift, brutal, and overwhelming.
> .





That's' exactly what I LIKE about Dark Sun!  As said before, party got driven off Athas after doing dumb stuff at lvl 7. I was nice enough to give them a chance TO find a portal to the Abyss.

Yes, they are "Police states" but they are very corrupt police states ad the Templars don't give a hoot if you commit every crime under the Sun EXCEPT: disrupt the city, don't pay the templars bribes/ego, or do anything that would upset the sorceror king (which is treason, disrupting the city a lot, too much knowledge, or arcane magic).

you can kill every dirt bag in town, long as it's done quietly and doens't disrupt things, the templars (as a group) don't care!
Adventuring must be done more circumspect, that's all


----------



## Aloïsius

Feywild, Gnomes and Eladrins in Dark Sun : they live in the Feywild, and either the Feywild is sealed, or it's NOT the standard feywild. 
It could be like this :
As the feywild is a reflection of the prime world... Let's say that the Formorians have won, Eladrins are fugitives nomads (like their elven cousins) trying to escape the Lords of the feywild and gnomes are just enslaved as usually. Passages to and from the feywild are nearly impossible (read PC only).
Another possibility for gnomes, as 4e gnomes have little resemblance with the 2e or 3e ones : they are just living among the halflings, being their shaman/druid or something like that. Invisible cannibal savage midget ? Yuk !

Deva, Tiefling :
Hum... I can imagine Tiefling being tainted by the sorcerers kings blood, or something like that. As for Deva, I have no idea.


----------



## Stogoe

Since the Divine Power Source is passed down from worshiper to worshiper in 4e, instead of directly granted every morning by the gods, they could describe Divine classes as rare in the setting and not have to completely rebuild them into what should be Elemental Power Source classes.


----------



## I'm A Banana

*Amoral Police State*
I'm on board with the "amoral police states aren't a bad thing" perspective. You don't need a free city. Having a free city gives you relief. You should not get relief. DEATH is your relief. Existence is suffering.

Just don't cause unrest, and you'll be fine.

Of course, causing unrest is fun, and suitable for a Dark Sun epic-level campaign, I'd think. Like you can end your campaign killing Orcus, you can end your campaign killing the sorcerer-king of Tyr.  But that's for you to do, in your game, not for the campaign to assume.

*Preserving/Defiling*

What's with this "feat" or "paragon path" nonsense?

Every user of the arcane power source on Dark Sun should only have the option to drain their own life, or the life of things around them.

Period.

It's not an option you turn on or off. It's not something you can do for more power. It's intrinsic to the nature of the world. Arcane magic is life-force. If you want to cast a fireball, you will kill things around you, or gradually kill yourself.

I can see this as being an HP-drain kind of system, where the arcane powers cost HP to use. That HP can come from you -- or from others. 

*The Feywild*
Athas should be isolated from the planes. Full. Effin'. Stop. You do not go frolicking in the lands of the fomorians, unless the fomorians are THERE, NOW, living in the same world, on the same world, with the same burning dark sphere overhead, as you are. There is no escape. There are no portals. There is no worldfall. (yes, individual campaigns can be exceptions, but as a rule, no). 

The planes are not your playground. Athas itself is.


----------



## Hawke

Aloïsius said:


> Feywild, Gnomes and Eladrins in Dark Sun : they live in the Feywild, and either the Feywild is sealed, or it's NOT the standard feywild.
> It could be like this :
> As the feywild is a reflection of the prime world... Let's say that the Formorians have won, Eladrins are fugitives nomads (like their elven cousins) trying to escape the Lords of the feywild and gnomes are just enslaved as usually. Passages to and from the feywild are nearly impossible (read PC only).




Holy crap that's a cool idea.

Also - what if the shadowfell and feywild were one? 

what if defiling destroyed the connections to the feywild, so there are none (or are there?)


----------



## Bold or Stupid

I don't know Darksun well, but I don't think the the Feywild is a bad fit. The Feywild is not a plain of verdent forests, it's wild unpredictable tricksy nature. The DS Feywild is a desert like the world but full of mirages and untrustworthy fey, it's a place of madness and lies.


----------



## ArmoredSaint

> Weird weapons abound, metal was nowhere, and wearing armor was a death sentence....





It makes me sad that these horrible things are _attractions_ for some fans.  Features like those in a setting will drive me away.  I could never enjoy a setting in which I can't play my beloved heavily-armoured knight characters.  The setting's appeal seems to revolve around "Whee!  It's not Tolkien!  It's _Different_!"  _Too_ different for me, I'm afraid...

I do not like Dark Sun, and for me, this is unwelcome news.  I hate to see WotC devoting resources to something like this when they ought to be cranking out more heavily-armoured awesomeness.  I still feel cheated that they have so far released very little in the way of new classes/features/feats/options in 4E for those of us who like the knight in shining armour character archetype.  I hold out some feeble hope that Martial Power II will finally bring the awesome that I crave for my heavy armour PCs, but if not, then I will abandon the D&D brand; WotC will have at last demonstrated to me that they want to leave my playing style behind.


----------



## Aloïsius

Bold or Stupid said:


> I don't know Darksun well, but I don't think the the Feywild is a bad fit. The Feywild is not a plain of verdent forests, it's wild unpredictable tricksy nature. The DS Feywild is a desert like the world but full of mirages and untrustworthy fey, it's a place of madness and lies.




Yes, something like that. The place were you "are" when you sleep in the desert and have nighmares. And when you awake, you realize it was not an ordinary  nightmare and that the things are eating you while laughing in the dark. 
The addition of the feywild (and the shadowfell) to darksun won't be a problem for me, as long as it's nicely done. Kamikaze Midget says "no escapes" : those are not escape, those are dangers and traps, and you can't decide do go (or interact) there, the DM do.


----------



## Fallen Seraph

Hmm, if there was some manner of Feywild type plane, or any kind of plane beside Athas. I would love to have mirages be the entrances and exits to it. Just imagine blindly following a mirage thinking it leads you to shelter, and you end up in a entirely different world. Perhaps a even harsher one (Feywild is nature extreme, so that would mean really harsh in Dark Sun).


----------



## aurance

Kamikaze Midget said:


> It's not an option you turn on or off. It's not something you can do for more power. It's intrinsic to the nature of the world. Arcane magic is life-force. If you want to cast a fireball, you will kill things around you, or gradually kill yourself.




What? This is incorrect.

There was no "kill yourself." There _was_ a "draw magic from things around you slowly and carefully so as not to harm them," which was what Preserver was, which was exactly equal to a standard wizard in D&D.


----------



## the8bitdeity

ArmoredSaint said:


> It makes me sad that these horrible things are _attractions_ for some fans.  Features like those in a setting will drive me away.  I could never enjoy a setting in which I can't play my beloved heavily-armoured knight characters.  The setting's appeal seems to revolve around "Whee!  It's not Tolkien!  It's _Different_!"  _Too_ different for me, I'm afraid...
> 
> I do not like Dark Sun, and for me, this is unwelcome news.  I hate to see WotC devoting resources to something like this when they ought to be cranking out more heavily-armoured awesomeness.  I still feel cheated that they have so far released very little in the way of new classes/features/feats/options in 4E for those of us who like the knight in shining armour character archetype.  I hold out some feeble hope that Martial Power II will finally bring the awesome that I crave for my heavy armour PCs, but if not, then I will abandon the D&D brand; WotC will have at last demonstrated to me that they want to leave my playing style behind.




I'm not trying to start a ruckous, but I've seen your posts on both here and the WotC boards. I respect that you greatly enjoy heavy armor but I'd ask that you perhaps watch some of your wording. 

For example: 


> It makes me sad that these horrible things are _attractions_ for some fans.




The emphasis and the use of the word "some" makes the statement feel  like an attack. It raises my neck hairs if you will. It makes me think you're marginalizing me as a freak because I like post apocalyptic settings (including fantasy). 

Again, I appreciate you like the big heavy armor stuff, I'm sorry the setting doesn't do anything for you, but please respect that I am extremely happy that it's Dark Sun, and don't want to feel like a freak for doing so.


----------



## outsider

Nork said:


> The city states in the original box were a little too much of draconian police states with absolute and total control over all life within their borders, right down to the water people drank.  Players like to rock the boat, they don't take well to backing down from *anything*.  A typical group of typical player characters in the setting wasn't believeable at all.  They would act like they act, and the crackdown that the setting would suggest should be forthcoming should be by all rights swift, brutal, and overwhelming.




I don't really agree with this.  Succeeding at standing up to the sorceror kings/changing the world/whatever was set up to be hard, but not impossible.  Which makes it more satisfying and impressive when you eventually accomplish it.

It's not like a sorceror king would go out of his way to chase down a group of level 5 characters or something.  He probably wouldn't even waste magic on it.  That kind of thing was the job for Templars, and player characters were perfectly capable of taking on Templars.  There were plenty of people working against the sorceror kings(eg the veiled alliance, other sorceror kings), and plenty of area beyond the reach of the sorceror kings.  Once you were outside of their cities, you were pretty safe from them.


----------



## I'm A Banana

(doublepost)


----------



## I'm A Banana

> What? This is incorrect.
> 
> There was no "kill yourself." There was a "draw magic from things around you slowly and carefully so as not to harm them," which was what Preserver was, which was exactly equal to a standard wizard in D&D.




You're right. In my bloodlust, I was imagining more the descriptions from the novels than the actual game. My bad. 

OK, revised stance. Defiling as an option you can turn on or off makes sense to me now. 



> The addition of the feywild (and the shadowfell) to darksun won't be a problem for me, as long as it's nicely done. Kamikaze Midget says "no escapes" : those are not escape, those are dangers and traps, and you can't decide do go (or interact) there, the DM do.




This I'm a little less flexible on. The alienation of the entire world was important, in my mind; the links to the elemental planes (and the deadliness of those planes in 2e) meant that, basically, Athas was the only place that you could exist in. That isolation helped my DM's mind focus on the world itself instead of where else these characters could go.

I'm okay with tricksy mirage desert fey in principle, but I don't see any need for there to be an entire plane of the stuff. Why can't creatures like that be a _part of the world itself_? Why do we need to kick them over to a whole parallel universe? Why can't those wandering in the desert actually go mad and die fooling themselves?


----------



## ppaladin123

ArmoredSaint said:


> It makes me sad that these horrible things are _attractions_ for some fans.  Features like those in a setting will drive me away.  I could never enjoy a setting in which I can't play my beloved heavily-armoured knight characters.  The setting's appeal seems to revolve around "Whee!  It's not Tolkien!  It's _Different_!"  _Too_ different for me, I'm afraid...
> 
> I do not like Dark Sun, and for me, this is unwelcome news.  I hate to see WotC devoting resources to something like this when they ought to be cranking out more heavily-armoured awesomeness.  I still feel cheated that they have so far released very little in the way of new classes/features/feats/options in 4E for those of us who like the knight in shining armour character archetype.  I hold out some feeble hope that Martial Power II will finally bring the awesome that I crave for my heavy armour PCs, but if not, then I will abandon the D&D brand; WotC will have at last demonstrated to me that they want to leave my playing style behind.





But the default setting ("points of light") is exactly what you like: heavily-armored knights questing to rid evil from the world. Also PHBI, martial power, and divine power are chock full of mechanical options for heavily armored warriors. You also have a bunch of articles in Dragon on gladiators and fighting styles and you just got, "fighter essentials." 

Mechanically 4e already handles heavily-armored high fantasy very well. In terms of setting and fluff you have plenty of support too.

But what about Dark Sun? 4e doesn't have rules for defiling or dealing with a world in which all the gods are dead. We don't have Thri-keen or Mul stats. We don't have balanced mechanics for characters forced to wear light or no armor and fight with glass/stone weaponry.

What is the harm in expanding the options? You have your mechanics....why not be happy that the system will soon have mechanics for an additional play-style?


----------



## the8bitdeity

I think it's also going to be VERY important to reaffirm the 4E philosophy that Player Characters are a major cut above the rest of the populace. A lot of the magic and resources that are in discussion for being "Dark Sun-esque" or not might very well ONLY lie in the hands of PCs. Perhaps the planes ARE there, but only a handful of people can open a portal to them. Ultimately I suspect we won't see wholesale NEGATION of D&D Core concepts (cosmology, magic, etc..) just the flavor and intention will reinforce that certain things in the PCs hands are a once in a generation / millennia resource.


----------



## Dausuul

I think the Feywild ought to look much like the standard Feywild, but existing only in small, isolated pockets - verdant oases, disconnected from one another, that can be reached only from certain places and at certain times, and only if you know how to look.

These pockets are rare, and becoming rarer, because high-level defilers are constantly searching for them; the amount of power a defiler can suck out of one boggles the imagination. Of course, the pocket is destroyed in the process.

And, naturally, no Feywild pocket is a safe place. Some are guarded by powerful druids, shamans, or wardens, who do not tolerate intruders lest those intruders turn out to be spies for the sorceror-kings. Others are inhabited by ancient primal creatures, denizens of a bygone world. Most of the rest are home to horrific monsters that wandered in out of the wastes a long time ago and never left.


----------



## aurance

ArmoredSaint said:


> It makes me sad that these horrible things are _attractions_ for some fans.  Features like those in a setting will drive me away.  I could never enjoy a setting in which I can't play my beloved heavily-armoured knight characters.  The setting's appeal seems to revolve around "Whee!  It's not Tolkien!  It's _Different_!"  _Too_ different for me, I'm afraid...
> 
> I do not like Dark Sun, and for me, this is unwelcome news.  I hate to see WotC devoting resources to something like this when they ought to be cranking out more heavily-armoured awesomeness.  I still feel cheated that they have so far released very little in the way of new classes/features/feats/options in 4E for those of us who like the knight in shining armour character archetype.  I hold out some feeble hope that Martial Power II will finally bring the awesome that I crave for my heavy armour PCs, but if not, then I will abandon the D&D brand; WotC will have at last demonstrated to me that they want to leave my playing style behind.




It makes you sad that people like themes in a D&D campaign other than the ones you do?


----------



## Aloïsius

Fallen Seraph said:


> Hmm, if there was some manner of Feywild type plane, or any kind of plane beside Athas. I would love to have mirages be the entrances and exits to it. Just imagine blindly following a mirage thinking it leads you to shelter, and you end up in a entirely different world. Perhaps a even harsher one (Feywild is nature extreme, so that would mean really harsh in Dark Sun).




Note that mirage as portal would give it some twisted Al-Quadim feel.... Oh, and it should not be "perhaps" but *"of course an even harsher one"*.



> I think the Feywild ought to look much like the standard Feywild, but existing only in small, isolated pockets - verdant oases, disconnected from one another, that can be reached only from certain places and only if you know how to look. All are hidden and most are guarded by powerful druids, shamans, or wardens.
> 
> These pockets are rare, and becoming rarer, because high-level defilers are constantly searching for them; the amount of power a defiler can suck out of one boggles the imagination. Of course, the pocket is destroyed in the process.



That's another possibility, somewhat akin to what Kamikaze midget described. The reason why I don't have much problem with the Feywild and the Shadowfell is because I don't see them as "another plane" or "parallel universes", but rather as a distorted version/perception of the prime reality. It's not parallel because it's "there" and you can more or less feel it in some places. It would remain Athas. So no verdant glades and frolicking nymphs in Dark Sun, of course. Hum, I wonder how the Dark Sun looks in the shadowfel. For a twist, maybe it  radiates some necrotic cold and shadows extends toward the greyish sphere... And the soul of dead peoples are collected/enrolled by the undead masters of the necropolis, always eager for new slaves or new food...Well, it's more probable that WotC does not say anything about the Shadowfell in Dark Sun...


----------



## carmachu

Rechan said:


> "We are going to try very hard not to shoehorn 4e conceits into Dark Sun" -Bill





\Its a great place to introiduce newish/old races from teh setting, and psonics.

But if they try and let anything goes there its ruined. Dark sun had specific items and races, its doesnt work importing everything from all the currently released books.


----------



## the8bitdeity

carmachu said:


> Its a great place to introiduce newish/old races from teh setting, and psonics.
> 
> But if they try and let anything goes there its ruined. Dark sun had specific items and races, its doesnt work importing everything from all the currently released books.




I think some clever ideas can work around the harsh requirements to make it fit the 4E design philosophies. For examples, perhaps mundane weapons are bone, early magic items are obsidian, mid-tier magic items are brass/weak metal, and only the highest level items (+5) are magical iron. 

I think going back to the old concepts of penalties would be counter productive. 

If a DM wants to reinforce how HARD it is to hit with a bone weapon, they can basically up the defenses of monsters by a point or two. (As a DM in 4E Dark Sun I won't have any Easy / Normal encounter levels. All encounters should be Hard / Insane)

The feel remains the same, but the book keeping involved has become significantly reduced.


----------



## I'm A Banana

*Equipment*
I actually think 4e handles this much more elegantly than 3e was wont to. You could make 3e fit, but 4e does it by default, with the option of "just give the PC's bonuses and don't worry about magic items" already a part of the system.

Where the challenge is sort of going to lie is in keeping the option of all those cool item abilities in there, without the items themselves, but I don't think that would be too hard. 

The idea of making "default weapons" bone and whatnot and "high bonus" weapons metal is a really good one. 



> . Perhaps a even harsher one (Feywild is nature extreme, so that would mean really harsh in Dark Sun).




That's kind of it though: Dark Sun is already a world with the harshness turned up to 11. If you have an idea for a region or adventure location that is EVEN HARSHER THAN NORMAL, you should be able to put that into standard Dark Sun. You shouldn't need to send it off to it's own little pocket dimension. Things suck. If things suck worse, that's OK. If there's an entire region that is on fire and spewing poisonous ash for miles around, why not just put that in Athas proper? Things can suck as bad as you want them to suck right there in Athas.


----------



## deadsmurf

I think the world axis cosmology can work, heavily altered, as suggested.  The Elemental chaos works just fine as is.  I like the idea of a feywild where the Formorians are winning, and a desert shadowfell... you thought having the sun beating down on you all day was bad... wait until thats gone too.
Having the Astral sea can be a bit of a problem - my inclination would be to blow it up...  The astral sea is gone.  Some of the denizens survived by making it to the world, or escaping to one of the other planes (so you can get your marut or devil etc when you need it) but across the board they are gone forever, bringing the gods with them.

Eladrin are mostly Formorian slaves, or escapees who have made it to the world, some have joined the bands of their kin, the elves, others are just trying to survive.
Dragonborn = dray. Pretty easy that.
Gnomes are extint... or thats what they want you to think.  There are small groups of gnomes underground and they have become extremely xenophobic and keep practising the magics that destroyed the world.  Others escaped back to the feywild only to be enslaved by the formorians.
Drow are twisted magical experiements on eladrin... see Eberron. Done by Formorians likely.
Genasi fit pretty well, they're elemental beings from the far too accessible elemental chaos.
Goliaths are Half-Giants, if they aren't I have no idea how to really dark-sunify them - they would just seem like tack-ons.
Shifters - aren't really nessesary, and likely won't be mentioned in the books.
Devas are the last vestiges of the old gods on Athas, a few angels made use of a ritual to become mortal in the last moments before the astral sea went kaboom.
Half-orcs - I'm not sure orcs and half-orcs are really nessesary to the world, and are likely going to be "thought to be extint, you are likely the last of your race"
Warforged - could be created by the sorceror kings, see the post a couple pages back with obsidian bodied 'forged. Rare.
Changelings - pretty much as is, works cool in any setting.
Kalashtar - not nessesary, psionic mutation if anything.

In any case, I doubt we'll see a 'Do not use these races or these classes in the setting' and it will be 'Other races don't exist unless you and DM can come up with an interesting story for them in this blasted world, and if you include them, they are likely to be extremely rare.'


----------



## ProfessorCirno

Put me down as cautiously cautious.  Not much can be said until details start to come out.  Their talk of keeping it the same as the old school Dark Sun moves me up from irate to cautious, for what it's worth ;p


----------



## Nork

Note, I didn't say that the amoral police state aspect of the setting was a bad thing.  It was more of 'way way too much of a good thing can be a bit of a bad thing'.

I was merely saying that moving the "amoral police state slider" from 11 out of 10 to 'only' 9 out of 10 would likely make it a somewhat easier setting to run in practice, as long as you don't turn the slider down to like 6 out of 10.

Which is what I found to be the problem with the original boxed setting, in practice it just felt over-tuned.  Especially since your average player character has serious pre-dispositions towards escalating a parking ticket into a 19 hour long running gun battle with the LAPD and the National Guard if left to their own devices.

I did feel that the revised setting was under-tuned.  They just over did it with toning things down, so the return to the 'original setting' is a good thing in my view.  That being said, the revised setting 'wasn't too bad', they just missed the mark a little (ok, missed it by a whole lot of 'a little').

If they had just left it with Tyr, and Tyr wasn't happy post Kalak either, then it would have been good IMO.  In a nasty world, you've got to run things in a nasty manner just to make ends meet, and Tyr now had to face the problem of 'there isn't enough to go around fairly, so whose mouth are we going to take the food out of...'.  Plus there is the whole Lord of the Flies aspect to explore as well.


----------



## Knightfall

Jack99 said:


> I only have one thing to say regarding this news - o/
> 
> 
> Congrats on being one in a million (billion)!



He's not the only one.


----------



## Stogoe

I'm pretty sure there will still be an Astral Sea, there just won't be any divine realms left standing.  The ruined wastes of the gods' strongholds are too tempting an epic challenge to ignore.


----------



## I'm A Banana

*The Planes*
I actually see Dark Sun as being a world adrift in the Elemental Chaos. 

There's no Astral Sea.

There's no Feywild, no Shadowfell.

There's just earth, fire, wind and water, all around. 

That kind of fits with the "primordials" angle mentioned in the interview. Elemental forces replace the divine. Psionic forces replace the arcane.


----------



## JVisgaitis

Greatest announcement EVER!!!!!!!!!!! I so can't wait...


----------



## SkidAce

Kamikaze Midget said:


> *The Planes*
> I actually see Dark Sun as being a world adrift in the Elemental Chaos.
> 
> There's no Astral Sea.
> 
> There's no Feywild, no Shadowfell.
> 
> There's just earth, fire, wind and water, all around.
> 
> That kind of fits with the "primordials" angle mentioned in the interview. Elemental forces replace the divine. Psionic forces replace the arcane.




This I like...


----------



## RandomCitizenX

If the feywilde and the shadowfell are anchored to the prime, then they would get dragged down into the Elemental Chaos as well... which would change them drastically I imagine.


----------



## Page

Awesome!


----------



## Kobold Avenger

I was really annoyed at what happened with the Prism Pentad novels, it effectively ruined the setting, and I just didn't like the fact there was a "good" sorcerer-king introduced in the revised set.  While I didn't find some of the revised books to be that bad, with the expansion on the Thri-Kreen and even something as weird as Windriders of the Jagged Cliffs, there was something definitely wrong with Lords of the Lost Sea.


----------



## WanderingMonster

I want to see power level of PCs be more in line with the 4e philosophy as mentioned up thread.  That said, the world should be a threat that only a fool PC would take lightly, but no character trees please.  

I want to see psionic feats that let you use psionic equivalent of rituals akin to what dragonmarks do in Eberron 4e.

Advanced beings as Epic Destinies.

Lastly, I'd like to see defilers as a separate class, but also have the option of preservers to defile as an encounter power that maybe reduces healing surges of nearby allies in proportion to the level spell cast.  I think defilers should remain controllers with really nasty debuff effects to nearby enemies.  Of course, obsidian orbs would be the preferred implement.


----------



## AdmundfortGeographer

I'm so, so pleased by this news. I've waited a long long time for this day, to see Dark Sun brought back to actively supported status. New novels. New minis (I own multiple cases of all the Ral Partha lead Dark Sun figures). New articles.

I hope WotC Logan or Scott Rouse is still lurking about . . . , can you tell us any author names who have been lined up for the new DS novels?

Is there a chance the revitalized DS novel line will last longer than the single year the RPG books will be in the spotlight, and continue many years afterwards like the FR and Eberron novels?


----------



## ProfessorCirno

I'm wondering how they're going to do the poisons and addictions.  Elf flesh is addictive to Thri-kreens.  The act of defiling itself is addictive.  And poisons were emphasised in part to help give non-combat methods of killing people.


----------



## AdmundfortGeographer

ProfessorCirno said:


> I'm wondering how they're going to do the poisons and addictions.



How about the active and ubiquitous slavery?

Quite a lot of brutal, non-PC themes central to Dark Sun.

Oh, and to head off another one. DS Halflings aren't _cannibals_. Halflings don't eat each other, they eat everyone *else*.  I loved that twist on traditional fantasy halfling appetites.


----------



## Fallen Seraph

ProfessorCirno said:


> I'm wondering how they're going to do the poisons and addictions.  Elf flesh is addictive to Thri-kreens.  The act of defiling itself is addictive.  And poisons were emphasised in part to help give non-combat methods of killing people.



Normal addictions can be covered using the Disease rules quite well I think, just need to tweak it a bit. Defiler addiction I dunno, that will depend on how they handle Defilers on a whole.

Poisons could be made using poison-based rituals (like alchemy brewing). Then delivered using whatever creative measures one can think of.


----------



## TwinBahamut

I've never played a Dark Sun campaign or even seen a Dark Sun book, so this is rather exciting for me. I'm looking forward to this one.

Still, I am of the camp that you shouldn't just isolate Dark Sun from the general 4E world axis cosmology. Things like the Athas Feywild or the Athas Shadowfell could be really interesting. Similarly, just ignoring the newer 4E races seems like it would be making the 4e version too subordinate to the older version, when you could do so many more interesting things simply by making the new races fit the setting.

For example... Give the Eladrin their scattered verdant Feywild oases and beautiful magic castles, except make it so they have to be magically maintained, and the Eladrin almost all use powerful Defiler magic. Thus the Eladrin are creatures who continually accelerate the demise of all living beings in order to create a false image of the green world that Athas once was. The Blood Elves of World of Warcraft and the figure of Yu Yevon from Final Fantasy X both come to mind for various reasons... With such a change, you could make it so the average Eladrin is totally evil, and most PC Eladrin are the good exceptions who stand against their own kind, making them a twisted mirror image of traditional Drow.


----------



## Hawke

I think Dark Sun always allowed for lots of freedom of _creatures_. I mean so many odd creatures exist there, trying to figure out a reason for RaceX to be there (even if you stick with the alien last of your kind schtick) is pretty easy and less offensive than perhaps other settings. I felt the bizarreness of the world creature-wise wasn't from disallowing things, but from 1) allowing strange things and 2) taking the traditional and making it strange. So, throwing in mentions of 4E races could easily fit that. 

The key restriction is ideology - those dark terrible things exist making it harder for your typical adventuring party to operate as in other games. Even benign things in other worlds - like magic - can be hostile and scary. 

That said, I was never on board with the idea Paladin's couldn't exist ever no way no how on Athas... sure, a world where open goodness would mean quick slaughter - but considering you can take a godless world and figure out a cool way to include Clerics, I always thought the right player (or designer) could include paladins in a neat way. Never ran into a player interested in playing on in my games, though.


----------



## Stormtalon

I saw the announcement whilst on break at work today -- one of the "break-time" pcs that's on its own DSL line and outside the corporate firewall showed me a picture of brutal desolation.

I felt a chill run down my spine as I stared, enraptured, at the two words in front of me.  I've been bouncing off the walls ever since.

Dark Sun has come back to me.

Come 2010, my players will learn to fear the endless heat of the wastes and even moreso the looming eyes of the Sorceror Kings.  

Their characters' deaths will not be easy, pleasant or painless.

But we all will have one hell of a lotta fun.


----------



## Andor

Roman said:


> Having read the thread now, as well as the link (thanks Dausuul), it seems that my pessimism was rather hasty. If they really stay true to the original and won't try to shoehorn 4E concepts into the setting, than they won't ruin the setting. Heck, if they go back to the original boxed set as the baseline, they will even undo the damage done by the later 2E supplements and might have a _positive_ impact on the setting's future - an opposite outcome to what I had assumed when I read the announcement.
> 
> Hopefully, the setting will attract more fans and then reappear in future editions (more amenable to my playstyle than 4E) when they come.




And what would a 'Realms changing disaster' look like in Dark Sun anyway? The Sorcerer Kings lay down sod? A Halfling population explosion? Elves invent running shoes? 

I think most of the races will work for Darksun, you just refluff them. Maybe Half-orcs are human nomads who worship scorpians and exposure to too much venom has given them great strength but also berserker tempers. Tieflings are from a line of oracles who forsaw the catastrophe coming and in ancient days imbued their line with devilish blood to protect them from the desert heat before the astral links went boom. Fire resistance is pretty damn handy on Athas after all.


----------



## Jack99

ArmoredSaint said:


> It makes me sad that these horrible things are _attractions_ for some fans.  Features like those in a setting will drive me away.  I could never enjoy a setting in which I can't play my beloved heavily-armoured knight characters.  The setting's appeal seems to revolve around "Whee!  It's not Tolkien!  It's _Different_!"  _Too_ different for me, I'm afraid...
> 
> I do not like Dark Sun, and for me, this is unwelcome news.  I hate to see WotC devoting resources to something like this when they ought to be cranking out more heavily-armoured awesomeness.  I still feel cheated that they have so far released very little in the way of new classes/features/feats/options in 4E for those of us who like the knight in shining armour character archetype.  I hold out some feeble hope that Martial Power II will finally bring the awesome that I crave for my heavy armour PCs, but if not, then I will abandon the D&D brand; WotC will have at last demonstrated to me that they want to leave my playing style behind.



Please do not let the door hit you on the way out. 



Bold or Stupid said:


> I don't know Darksun well, but I don't think the the Feywild is a bad fit. The Feywild is not a plain of verdent forests, it's wild unpredictable tricksy nature. The DS Feywild is a desert like the world but full of mirages and untrustworthy fey, it's a place of madness and lies.



I love this idea.



Fallen Seraph said:


> Hmm, if there was some manner of Feywild type plane, or any kind of plane beside Athas. I would love to have mirages be the entrances and exits to it. Just imagine blindly following a mirage thinking it leads you to shelter, and you end up in a entirely different world. Perhaps a even harsher one (Feywild is nature extreme, so that would mean really harsh in Dark Sun).



I love this too, and think it could work.



ProfessorCirno said:


> Put me down as cautiously cautious.  Not much can be said until details start to come out.  Their talk of keeping it the same as the old school Dark Sun moves me up from irate to cautious, for what it's worth ;p



Try not starting out irate over such things. For one, it's easier to get to *positive* and two, it's much better for your health.



Knightfall said:


> He's not the only one.



I said one in a million - with 6 million players that means there should be around 5-6 current D&D players that liked the revised box set. I guess you were one of the others. What are the odds


----------



## Center-of-All

So what does that make someone who prefers the "continuation"/reset that Paizo did for 3.5?


----------



## Jack99

Center-of-All said:


> So what does that make someone who prefers the "continuation"/reset that Paizo did for 3.5?




Just shows there is no accounting for taste 

Just kidding. To be honest, I do not recall the articles. But to be honest, the Paizo years have was the decade where I read the least issues, so maybe I have not read the article(s).


----------



## Korgoth

They're rebooting back to the first boxed set?

I'm impressed.


----------



## Vaeron

Korgoth said:


> They're rebooting back to the first boxed set?
> 
> I'm impressed.




Me too... A great decision.


----------



## Dausuul

Vaeron said:


> Me too... A great decision.




The obvious one really... everybody's happy. Those who like the material added in the Prism Pentad and the revised set can say it happens. And those of us who loathe that material can say it was all a bad dream. Rajaat? Cleansing Wars? No such animals.


----------



## vagabundo

We haven't seen the players handbook cover because it will spoil the races...


----------



## FireLance

Andor said:


> And what would a 'Realms changing disaster' look like in Dark Sun anyway?



Killing off the Dragon and half of the sorcerer-kings would be a good start. 

Oh, wait...


----------



## frankthedm

I now wonder if WAR owns a McFarlane's Dragons series 4 sorcerer clan dragon.






http://img269.imageshack.us/img269/346/borysofebesa5.jpg
img269.imageshack.us/img269/346/borysofebesa5.jpg


----------



## Roman

Obryn said:


> Well, I can almost guarantee there will be stuff in it that's new to 4e that wasn't there in 2e.  The real question is whether or not it will be implemented *well*, IMO.  I can handle Eladrin in Dark Sun so long as they're _Dark Sun_ Eladrin.  I can handle Tieflings so long as they're _Dark Sun_ Tieflings.  Basically, I want them to do with the new races what the original Dark Sun boxed set did with the old races - twist them so they're recognizable, but make them suitable for a rugged, harsh desert world.
> 
> That's basically what Dark Sun was, to me - a reimagining of the familiar into a new and bizarre context.  If this continues, and if 4e Dark Sun is faithful in theme rather than detail, I'll be thrilled.  (If it doesn't, like I said, I can always just rip the mechanics out and use them in the old setting!)




Well, sure there will be some new 4E stuff, but so long as it is stuff that fits relatively seamlessly, than it's all good. For example, I can imagine Dragonborn (perhaps with some modifications) being renamed as Pterrans in Dark Sun (or perhaps as offspring of the sorcerer kings) - that would be pretty seamless. Eladrin is a bit harder, but still doable. Tieflings, IMO, just don't fit. Sure, it may be possible to stretch and contort them somehow to make them fit, but it would be, IMO, no longer seamless. As to new classes, Warlords fit just fine - no modifications needed whatsoever. Warlocks are seamless, but may fit with some restrictions on who they can get their powers from - either the elemental princes, or perhaps they could fill the role of the Templar along with 'evil Paladins' (good Paladins don't fit)... 

In terms of Cosmology, the Elemental Chaos fits just fine, other planes vary in how much they fit.


----------



## Roman

FireLance said:


> Killing off the Dragon and half of the sorcerer-kings would be a good start.
> 
> Oh, wait...




Indeed... that's why going back to the original set is a good decision.


----------



## Silverblade The Ench

Kamikaze Midget,
as you remembered  preservers don't drain other life sources.
For my own self I never even liked this idea of "_oh they only take just enough..."_ so, that would still drain life..they still couldn't cast in deserts...so it makes *no sense* that Preservers drain life force at all!

No, much better to say:
Defilers are dirty sneaking cheats, lol, who came upon a method to suck the life energy out of other things to boost thier magic, where as ordinary arcane magic works just as normal (Preservers).
This makes it ALL much simpler: you are either a Preserver (and your magic works as normal regardless of arcane class) or you're a Defiler (in which case defiling rules come into play).

As for feats, I thingkyou didn't get what I and perhaps others meant 
Defilers *ARE* more powerful than Preservers, harsh fact of Athas. They "cheat", boosting their spells at the expense of others.
So, _any _arcane class, should be able to take "Defiling feats" and thus become a "defiler".

If you make defiling an "on/off" choice an effect they do TO their spells at will, this also makes the ability for PC or NPC defilers to hide amongst the population, easier
by this I mean, if a defiler caused defiling EVERY time he cast a spell or ritual...he would turn his immediate area to ash and be discovered damn near instantly, wouldn't he?
But if defiling is a "dirty trade secret", an "add on" to the normal routine of casting, which you chose to add strength to the effect by defiling life energy form around you...then everything works out neatly! 

You wouldn't know someone is a defiler until they use defiling abilities, hence even more reaosn why the average folk kill ALL arcane casters on sight, as you couldn't tell until a defiler was such, decided to abuse his power..and when he does..oh boy!!

Say, Joe the Defiler  is with an adventuring party, he casts his spells as normal, but during a climatic battle he uses his defiling powers to boost his spells, to help defeat a deadly enemy...well..his secret is out! But, his power is indeed, deadly.


You can imagine a base defiling feat "Defiler Apotheosis" or whatever you wish to call it, from that point on, there's NO going back to a Preserver, without a special ritual and atonement performed by a druid.
The effect is: you gain the ability to add +1 attack, +1 damage bonus with arcane attacks, at your choice, but in so doing, defile a close burst of 1 square per tier of caster, this does Int or Cha vs Fortitude, infliciting a -1 hit atack penalty until end of the defiler's next turn. killing simple plants etc automatically 
as noted in 2nd ed, defiling causes a lot of pain, it makes it truly scary and nasty when it even hurts allies.

Other feats and associated powers are then allowable with levels etc.

"Defiler Draw" lvl 7 requirement, daily, minor action, you regain the use of 1 encounter power of your choice, but trigger a close burst 3, Int or Cha vs Fortitude, does 1hp damage per tier of caster.

"Defiler Ravage", lvl 15 requirement, daily, minor action, you regain the use of 1 daily or encounter power of your choice, but trigger a close burst 6, Int or Cha vs Fortitude, does 5hp damage per tier of caster.

"Defiler Overcharge", lvl 21 requirment, daily, minor action, you empower an arcane attack power to do more damage, it does an extra 15 hp damage to all victims.
but trigger a close burst 9, Int or Cha vs Fortitude, does 15hp damage.

Another feat would let the defiler spare allies from the defiling power. etc etc 

Oh, templars as warlocks make perfect sense, by the way! they have a pact with their Sorceror king...

And as said if you make "Mutation" a schtick of Dark Sun, letting other races/classes exist is fine.


----------



## vagabundo

I believe Druids can spot a defiler and a defiler can get this taint purged by doing some quests for a druid - good luck finding one.

The veiled alliance can spot the taint too?


----------



## OchreJelly

This is a great announcement!  I actually didn't play much DS in the 2E era, but I do remember enjoying the few games we played.  The setting itself was very evocotive. 

For some reason, when I read the announcement, one of the first things that popped in my mind was "giant kruthiks"!!  Werid...


----------



## Shroomy

vagabundo said:


> We haven't seen the players handbook cover because it will spoil the races...




I can't imagine that it would be that suprising, its probably going to be the half-giant, mul, and thri-kreen.  I don't think there going to add the aarakocra or pterran (or maybe they figured out how to balance flying races, as I personally love the aarakocra).


----------



## Stogoe

Maybe Defiler will be a Multiclass like Spellscarred?  If that's the case I don't see any reason to restrict it to Arcane Only, since having it without an Arcane class would just mean that all the arcane spells you know are defiling spells.


----------



## Silverblade The Ench

I hope they can balance out the half-giants, because Medium sized half-giants simple do *not* cut it at all, they _have _to be Large.
*scratches head, usnure of balance on that*


----------



## I'm A Banana

> But if defiling is a "dirty trade secret", an "add on" to the normal routine of casting, which you chose to add strength to the effect by defiling life energy form around you...then everything works out neatly




Totally cool with that.  

I do think defiling should be an option for players. The allure and appeal of the "dark side" should be there. You don't have to use it...but it's always there, saying, "hey, wouldn't it be nice to kill these guys a little faster? and will the world really notice just one more little patch of grass?"

Most of the classes shouldn't be a tough fit once you determine what the power sources are drawing on. If all "divine" classes are in service to a sorcerer-king, and all "primal" classes are in service to the elements, and all "arcane" classes have the preserving/defiling option, the individual classes more or less run together.

The thing is, the disconnect from the planes is pretty important to me for the feel of the game. There can be no "fiendish blood," and any "outsider pacts" (even with elemental princes) would leave a pretty bad taste in my mouth. The idea of Athas as an isolated world where there are no angels or demons or outsiders, only _forces_, is key to the brutality of it. There's nothing to relate to, no mirror you can hold up, nothing alongside this world. There is this world -- this blasted hellscape -- and nothing else. Even death is just nothingness. Everything has to live under the same environmental devestation. The inter-connectedness of the ecosystem is kind of kicked in the junk if the ecosystem is made of magic like the Feywild. Defiling has *broken nature*; the desert environment isn't a natural desert, and seeing intact places of natural wildness is just dissonant (let alone the fact that mighty wizards like the Eladrin live there).

 Most of that is just a re-fluffing issue, though some of it is more difficult (teleportation, in DS, has to be explained as something other than "going to a nearby plane for a while"; any race that is naturally inclined to be a wizard, bard, or other arcane class, is a good target for the Fey Genocide). 

If, like Bill said, they're not going to shoehorn 4e aspects into DS, dropping the Feywild and ruling that all fey live on Athas itself goes a long way for it. Mentioning Eladrin and Gnomes only in passing as "races that have been killed" also goes a long way for it (and yes, you can still play one of the unique "survivors of the genocide," but the setting will not assume you can play it).


----------



## hailstop

Andor said:


> And what would a 'Realms changing disaster' look like in Dark Sun anyway? The Sorcerer Kings lay down sod? A Halfling population explosion? Elves invent running shoes?




Consider this stolen for my signature.


----------



## megamania

At last!


Maybe now we can get some more Darksun figures.


----------



## Kobold Avenger

The Paizo version of Dark Sun was an almost reboot of the setting, skipping a 100 years to the future where most of the stuff in the Prism Pentad and the Revised boxed set was undone.

A lot of it was the progression of things that happened, with Dregoth coming out as a sorcerer king.  And others were just to fit in 3.5isms, with all the members of the Order becoming Elan, and Andropinis returning with an army of Maenads.

As for 4eisms in Dark Sun, I think that Tieflings can fit in that there's plenty of "mutants" in Athas, and some of them would seem at home in the Elf Tribes.  The Villichi or whatever that secretive tribe of female humanoids could very well be Devas, and the Ruvkova of the Elemental planes are very clearly Genasi.


----------



## Scribble

I was never a Dark Sun fan back in the 2e erra... I was a Tolikienesque world or nothin sort of guy... I guess in my old age things have changed because I'm really excited about this.


----------



## PeterWeller

Wow!  At least a dozen posts about how the Shadowfell can fit in DS and no one has mentioned The Gray or The Black.  Is the Prism Pentad that hated?  The Gray and The Black were the Shadowfell before there was a Shadowfell.

Anyways, I am very excited about this announcement.  DS is one of my favorite settings, and I have a good feeling about this.


----------



## frankthedm

PeterWeller said:


> Is the Prism Pentad that hated?



ruined the setting in the eyes of many people.







PeterWeller said:


> The Gray and The Black were the Shadowfell before there was a Shadowfell.



yeah, that can work.


----------



## Stogoe

Silverblade The Ench said:


> I hope they can balance out the half-giants, because Medium sized half-giants simple do *not* cut it at all, they _have _to be Large.
> *scratches head, usnure of balance on that*



Wizards will never publish a Large PC race, because there's no way to balance the racial feature "Affects 150% more creatures with Close Bursts".

Half-Giants should just use the Goliath stats.


----------



## I'm A Banana

> Wizards will never publish a Large PC race, because there's no way to balance the racial feature "Affects 150% more creatures with Close Bursts".
> 
> Half-Giants should just use the Goliath stats.




There is a LOT of middle ground between these two extremes.


----------



## Aldarc

Huzzah! 

I do not really have anything to add other than sheer excitement. 

Now back to my excitement. 

Huzzah!


----------



## Rechan

Silverblade The Ench said:


> I hope they can balance out the half-giants, because Medium sized half-giants simple do *not* cut it at all, they _have _to be Large.
> *scratches head, usnure of balance on that*



Cough.


----------



## Rechan

The PHB3 doesn't need to have the DS races in it. For the simple fact that, if they were DS specific races, they'll likely be in the Player's Handbook. But easily portable (as before them the Genasi, Drow, Changelings, Warforged, etc).


----------



## I'm A Banana

> The PHB3 doesn't need to have the DS races in it. For the simple fact that, if they were DS specific races, they'll likely be in the Player's Handbook. But easily portable (as before them the Genasi, Drow, Changelings, Warforged, etc).




Very true.

Though I think the question that will generate more message board insanity is this:

Dragonborn have dragonboobs. _*Will thri-kreen have bugaboobs?*_

I kid.


----------



## Baron Opal

Kamikaze Midget said:


> The thing is, the disconnect from the planes is pretty important to me for the feel of the game... The idea of Athas as an isolated world where there are no angels or demons or outsiders, only _forces_, is key to the brutality of it. There's nothing to relate to, no mirror you can hold up, nothing alongside this world. There is this world -- this blasted hellscape -- and nothing else.




I agree on the disconnect and its importance. However, there were gods at one time, presumably good and evil ones. With the actions of the Sorceror Kings tearing the plane away from other influences, would a good "Dark Sunning" of those races be the decendants of trapped outsiders? A poiniant artifact of what has been lost?


----------



## Rechan

Kamikaze Midget said:


> Though I think the question that will generate more message board insanity is this:
> 
> Dragonborn have dragonboobs. _*Will thri-kreen have bugaboobs?*_
> 
> I kid.



They'll have a thorass.


----------



## Shroomy

I think that 4e DS will use the World Axis cosmology, the MotP says as much, but that it will be extremely difficult to get to the other planes (perhaps there's some sort of penalty to the related skill checks, etc.).  The dominions in the Astral Sea will probably be lifeless ruins.


----------



## Shroomy

Rechan said:


> They'll have a thorass.




Groan....


----------



## Baron Opal

Kamikaze Midget said:


> Dragonborn have dragonboobs. _*Will thri-kreen have bugaboobs?*_




Yes, but only the queen.


----------



## A Passing Maniac

Rechan said:


> They'll have a thorass.




As a wise man once said, "_I like bug butts and I cannot lie._.."


----------



## I'm A Banana

> I agree on the disconnect and its importance. However, there were gods at one time, presumably good and evil ones. With the actions of the Sorceror Kings tearing the plane away from other influences, would a good "Dark Sunning" of those races be the decendants of trapped outsiders? A poiniant artifact of what has been lost?




That's interesting and perhaps palatable as an explanation. I don't think it should be that important, though. Tieflings don't need to be mentioned in a big way anywhere in DS. There's precedence for this: Dragonborn and tieflings don't make a big splash in Eberron, either. They can be there if you want them, but the core books don't need to assume them. A paragraph in the campaign guide about how you might rationalize them works fine (and "descended from a time before time when the gods were still present" works pretty OK). 

There are still bigger problems, I think, the warlock and the teleportation stuff (such as with the Eladrin). The warlock might be solved with the arcane power source being a "defiling" power source, though: the pact isn't an inherent part of the mechanics, and warlock abilities that aren't Star-Pact or Infernal-Pact related make plenty of sense. 

Of course, you could just treat warlocks like the tieflings: assume they don't exist unless you make them exist.

Teleportation is wonky, but can probably be re-fluffed as sort of an "infinite shift" instead maybe? 

But a lot of those cause some cascading issues...I dunno.



			
				Shroomy said:
			
		

> it will be extremely difficult to get to the other planes (perhaps there's some sort of penalty to the related skill checks, etc.).




Does it have to be possible at all in anything more than a theoretical way? Like an out-of-race dragonmark, there doesn't have to be any rules prohibiting it, but the campaign doesn't need to assume that PC's are going to go on planar adventures, either.


----------



## andarilhor

*My thoughts about dark sun 4e:*

Let me say I am very happy for the choice! I always loved athas and will be a real test to 4e.

*First:* I agree there will need to be class features/ feats/ backgrounds/ paragon paths which refer to characteristics typical of Athas.

*Martial:* I hope to see rules of different materials for armor and weapons as the old rules of using pieces of armor.
Beside that, the martial classes will need new features to focused in light or no armor.

*Arcane:* Defiling magic should be default to all arcane classes, am give no just benefits, but some kind of penalty (affecting all creatures, allies and enemies, in a burst) so preserver magic should be acquired by feat or paragon paths.

*Divine:* To me, divine classes may exist in Athas, but will need one of following options:

1 - Use the reminescent power of the absent or dead gods
2 - Follow powerful creatures of individuals (the sorcerer-kings, elementals, immortals, etc) That option is the most likely to templars.
3 - Adhere to a phylosophy instead of a deity
4 - Any combination of the above options.

*Primal:* Back in 2E, druids was bonded to certain regions. Now, I hope that will not be the case, instead each primal will be bond to certain spirits like the sand, wind, rain, etc.

*Psionic:* A way to take the wild talent concept is to give all characters receive a power point which refresh daily (instead of encounterly like standard PsPs) and have some psionic feats which do not require psionic class, just power points.

*Elemental:* I remember someone in WoTC saying sometime ago than the elemental classes will be related to primordials like divine classes are related to deities, so the original athas cleric devoted to elements may be a new class of this power source.

*4e material in athas:* Just as some guys already said, would be good to see athas versions of some races, and I think in some cases we just don´t will have any references if somethings exist or not in athas (letting each DM decide). There is any reference to swordmages in Eberron or Artificers in Toril? Also there is not any reference they don't exist in there, right? (seriously, i am right? I don' know for sure. hehe) Same thing may happen to certain elements of 4e in DS4e.

*Cosmology:* Athas can be at the botton of the material plane. Closest to the Elemental Chaos than to any other plane.

*Last Thing:* It´s just me, or one prescience bard with multiclass to poisoner justs screams DARK SUN!?


----------



## Shroomy

Kamikaze Midget said:


> Does it have to be possible at all in anything more than a theoretical way? Like an out-of-race dragonmark, there doesn't have to be any rules prohibiting it, but the campaign doesn't need to assume that PC's are going to go on planar adventures, either.




I'm not sure, Athas was extremely isolated, but not cut-off completely.  I mean, there are examples like the ancient githyanki invasion, and weren't there Athasian characters in Ravenloft and Planescape?  I don't think I would make planehopping a major focus of DS (and I doubt that planar material will get more than a few pages in the CS), but I don't think I would make it completely impossible to do so.


----------



## Spatula

Baron Opal said:


> I agree on the disconnect and its importance. However, there were gods at one time, presumably good and evil ones.



I don't think this was the case in 2e.  The original box set left it (and other questions) unanswered.  And IIRC the Prism Pentad stated that there were never any gods at all on Athas.



Kamikaze Midget said:


> The thing is, the disconnect from the planes is pretty important to me for the feel of the game. There can be no "fiendish blood," and any "outsider pacts" (even with elemental princes)



Pacts with elementals are pretty much exactly how elemental clerics came to be in 2e...

I don't see any issue with teleportation and planes.  It "just works" in 4e - the definition of teleportation doesn't involve anything about stepping through other planes.


----------



## andarilhor

Hawke said:


> That said, I was never on board with the idea Paladin's couldn't exist ever no way no how on Athas... sure, a world where open goodness would mean quick slaughter - but considering you can take a godless world and figure out a cool way to include Clerics, I always thought the right player (or designer) could include paladins in a neat way. *Never ran into a player interested in playing on in my games, though.*




REALLY!?

I have knowed at least 3 "only paladin in Athas"... all followers of the good (not any deity) and all had short lives.


----------



## I'm A Banana

> I'm not sure, Athas was extremely isolated, but not cut-off completely. I mean, there are examples like the ancient githyanki invasion, and weren't there Athasian characters in Ravenloft and Planescape? I don't think I would make planehopping a major focus of DS (and I doubt that planar material will get more than a few pages in the CS), but I don't think I would make it completely impossible to do so.




"Ancient" as in "before the apocalypse" as in "has no effect on current game play," sure. And the unique instances of plane-hopping Athasians are pretty much exactly what I'm talking about: It might happen if the DM decides it can happen, but the book, I think, needs to assume it's NOT happening. Because if it was happening often enough to mention, it would essentially remove a chunk of the inescapable harshness that is part of the setting's appeal; saying "You have to endure this ecological apocalypse...unless you make some difficult skill checks" is an entirely different kind of feel than "You have to endure this ecological apocalypse." In the former, "Oh, it's tough, but I can get out." In the latter, it's just tough. You should not be able to get out.

Just like an out-of-race dragonmark. Sure, it can happen, if the DM decides it can happen, but the book assumes it's NOT happening. Because the established Houses already have history and flavor devoted to them, and it would ruin the dynamic to stick another one in there just because it's mechanically not prohibited.



> Pacts with elementals are pretty much exactly how elemental clerics came to be in 2e...




That's a fair point. I can see elemental-pact warlocks, I think...



> I don't see any issue with teleportation and planes. It "just works" in 4e - the definition of teleportation doesn't involve anything about stepping through other planes.




A lot of instances of the fluff would certainly disagree with you there.  But a re-fluffing could be in order, and might be fine...but then it changes things kind of a lot. Not that it's a huge problem, but it can hurt the cross-compatability that you'd be shooting for in the first place; being an Eladrin High Wizard is no longer the same kind of thing in DS as it is in 90% of other fantasy settings that have no problem with planes of verdant magic laying alongside the mortal realm. That's part of DS's appeal, but also part of the issue if you want to maintain a lot of cross-compatability.


----------



## Banshee16

Jack99 said:


> I only have one thing to say regarding this news - o/
> 
> 
> 
> Congrats on being one in a million (billion)!




Count me as #2 in a billion then.  I loved the original boxed set but I liked the new boxed set.....possibly even more.

Banshee


----------



## drothgery

andarilhor said:


> *4e material in athas:* Just as some guys already said, would be good to see athas versions of some races, and I think in some cases we just don´t will have any references if somethings exist or not in athas (letting each DM decide). There is any reference to swordmages in Eberron or Artificers in Toril? Also there is not any reference they don't exist in there, right? (seriously, i am right? I don' know for sure. hehe) Same thing may happen to certain elements of 4e in DS4e.




There aren't any explicit references to swordmages in Eberron (artificers in Toril would be kind of silly, as the FR books were out roughly a year before the Eberron books). However, it seems kind of crazy not to allow them; there are all sorts of strong warrior-mage traditions in Eberron (most notably the Knights Arcane in Aundair), and two of the Dragonmarked paragon paths (Deneith protector and Orien Swiftblade) seem to have been delibrately set up so swordmages could take them (with attack powers as Str or Int vs. AC)


----------



## Banshee16

Shroomy said:


> I'm not sure, Athas was extremely isolated, but not cut-off completely.  I mean, there are examples like the ancient githyanki invasion, and weren't there Athasian characters in Ravenloft and Planescape?  I don't think I would make planehopping a major focus of DS (and I doubt that planar material will get more than a few pages in the CS), but I don't think I would make it completely impossible to do so.




It was never impossible to get onto the planes from Athas.  Even in the original boxed set, clerics drew their spells from the elemental planes, and spellcasters could summon fiends from the planes.....who could then return to the planes when the spell ended.

In later products we learned that Dregoth traveled the planes, and that characters *could* get onto the planes....it was just difficult.  Athas was surrounded by the Grey, a plane where memories etc. Dissolved in time.  Characters could leave Athas and get stuck in the Grey, to eventually fade away, or, if they were skilled enough, they could leave the Grey and enter the Outer Planes.  So it wasn't impossible.....just difficult.

Banshee


----------



## Pour

So will the announcement of Dark Sun have any influence on the PHB3 classes or mystery race? I suppose it already has with the Psionic classes. But there's also Primal and Divine to consider. Could Templar be a new divine class or Defiler a new Primal? I guess I just can't wrap my head around new Divine or Primal classes in general.

Also, has there been an official confirmation on the Dark Sun Player Guide?


----------



## I'm A Banana

> So it wasn't impossible.....just difficult.




Right. And to make sure I'm being clear,the major issue is that treating star-pact warlocks and tieflings (assuming no re-fluffing) and Eladrin from the feywild who teleport by stepping in and out of this other plane as just fine means that it's not "difficult" any more.

If my powers and flavor and archetype depend on "otherworldly" influences, I'm going around channeling other planes in every adventure. Which does pretty much the opposite of signifying that Athas is isolated and functionally cut off from other planes. "Can't be that cut off! This bloke from beyond the stars who lives in a land of magic came through here just when I was a kid, gave me magical powers in exchange for my soul, and now loans them to me on a daily basis!" 

If it happens as an exception to the rule, that's pretty OK. I agree that there shouldn't be mechanics preventing it -- like out-of-race dragonmarks or swordmages in Eberron, they can be there, without being called out. 

If it happens as a rule, it hurts the feel of the setting IMO. 

And the elemental stuff is pretty OK, too, if it's not over-done (it's probably not the solution to everything, but it'll probably also work for a lot of things  ).


----------



## Banshee16

Roman said:


> Well, sure there will be some new 4E stuff, but so long as it is stuff that fits relatively seamlessly, than it's all good. For example, I can imagine Dragonborn (perhaps with some modifications) being renamed as Pterrans in Dark Sun (or perhaps as offspring of the sorcerer kings) - that would be pretty seamless. Eladrin is a bit harder, but still doable. Tieflings, IMO, just don't fit. Sure, it may be possible to stretch and contort them somehow to make them fit, but it would be, IMO, no longer seamless. As to new classes, Warlords fit just fine - no modifications needed whatsoever. Warlocks are seamless, but may fit with some restrictions on who they can get their powers from - either the elemental princes, or perhaps they could fill the role of the Templar along with 'evil Paladins' (good Paladins don't fit)...
> 
> In terms of Cosmology, the Elemental Chaos fits just fine, other planes vary in how much they fit.




The Dragonborn could be the Dray, could they not?  Conceivably they could reset the timeline to the original boxed set while retaining new areas introduced in the later products.....ie. The Jagged Cliffs region, Eldaritch, Ur Draxa, the Kreen Empire, etc....

Banshee


----------



## I'm A Banana

> The Dragonborn could be the Dray, could they not? Conceivably they could reset the timeline to the original boxed set while retaining new areas introduced in the later products.....ie. The Jagged Cliffs region, Eldaritch, Ur Draxa, the Kreen Empire, etc....




What mostly makes the DB's weird in my mind is the breath weapon. Dragons in Dark Sun aren't especially known for breathing fire, but are known for powerful mystical abilities, so re-fluffing dragon breath as "destructive magic burst" should be a nice solution.

But yeah, DB's as Dray makes a lot of sense.


----------



## frankthedm

A possible way to shoehorn the eladrin in are as "throwbacks" occasionally born to the normal elves, left behind much like half elves are.


----------



## AdmundfortGeographer

Kamikaze Midget said:


> But yeah, DB's as Dray makes a lot of sense.



From a certain perspective, it makes perfect sense. But the Dray were revealed with Dregoth's rising. Dregoth reappeared on the scene after the Prism Pentad was concluded . . . so if 4e Dark Sun is a *pure* "original boxed set" timeline reset, then we shouldn't have dray around. Dregoth created the dray, with The Dragon destroyed from events in the Prism Pentad novels Dregoth makes his play to conquer the Tablelands, sending the dray out to infiltrate neighboring city-states.

However, 4e Dark Sun primarily takes the original boxed set as a thematic/flavor point, then takes the best of the revised era creations (dray, life-shaping artifacts, shadowcasting) and blends them into the original timeline in an appropriate way, then we're not talking about a true-reset . . . but something altogether different.

Either the dray are no longer tied to Dregoth (interesting possibilities), or Dregoth is no longer in hiding from The Dragon and other Sorcerer Kings at the original timeline (I hope this is not the case), or Dregoth is still in hiding  but has sent his dray to the surface earlier than the 2e Dark Sun timeline risking the Dragon's premature discovery of his existence (not a good idea, IMO) . . . or something else?


----------



## Fallen Seraph

Well the said that while it takes place before the Prism Pentad that it is possible for that to be a eventual conclusion if you wish. Perhaps however they talk about minor races or whatever. They state that if you wish to introduce Dray that the plot of Prism Pentad could be going on as one possibility.


----------



## Andor

Kamikaze Midget said:


> If it happens as an exception to the rule, that's pretty OK. I agree that there shouldn't be mechanics preventing it -- like out-of-race dragonmarks or swordmages in Eberron, they can be there, without being called out.
> 
> If it happens as a rule, it hurts the feel of the setting IMO.
> 
> And the elemental stuff is pretty OK, too, if it's not over-done (it's probably not the solution to everything, but it'll probably also work for a lot of things  ).




I dunno. Personally I feel the ability of extremely high leveled and powerful creatures to leave doesn't reduce the impact of the setting, it just emphasises it's unfairness.

"Hey Jimmy, I hear that if you can learn 7th order rituals and spend 4 tons of (*whirrrr...Click* Um. What did they use for currency in Dark Sun again? Ceramics? Glass? Iron?) cash on components you can go to another plane of existence inhabited by pasty skinned, iron clad, devils where it _rains_/" 
"Sure. Or you can become a Sorcerer-King and have your own swimming pool." 
"Oh yeah. Man being a 0-level NPC sucks. Pass the fried lice."


----------



## AdmundfortGeographer

*Class speculations . . .*

Went back and reread the interview with James Wyatt.

Am I off in my interpretation that the Shaman seems to get the role of the old 2e DS cleric?

Could this be how some class role assignments fall out?

2e DS cleric = 4e shaman
2e DS templar = 4e cleric?


----------



## GMforPowergamers

Andor said:


> "Hey Jimmy, I hear that if you can learn 7th order rituals and spend 4 tons of (*whirrrr...Click* Um. What did they use for currency in Dark Sun again? Ceramics? Glass? Iron?) cash on components you can go to another plane of existence inhabited by pasty skinned, iron clad, devils where it _rains_/"
> "Sure. Or you can become a Sorcerer-King and have your own swimming pool."
> "Oh yeah. Man being a 0-level NPC sucks. Pass the fried lice."




that sounds alot like my friday afternoons...

me: you know if I had a million dollors I could build a whole room just for role-playing...
Best friend: You know you could als just buy a bigger house, you know with out all the problems...


----------



## fanboy2000

Andor said:


> "Oh yeah. Man being a 0-level NPC sucks. Pass the fried lice."





You know, it sucks to be a 0-level NPC in any setting. But you're right, it is particularly egregious in Dark Sun.


----------



## LordPsychodin

I'm a little bit confused onto why so many people get these ideas in their heads about that line from the designers that they're not messing with the flavor of the setting unless they have to. 4e ITSELF has a different design philosophy. and that overrides everything that dark sun could be. 4e, (and 3e was as well) Heroic fantasy, 24/7. You won't be worrying about heat, thirst, starvation, or being slaves, any more than you would be in regular D&D. because those are the guys who you SAVE from being so pathetic in the universe.


----------



## frankthedm

LordPsychodin said:


> I'm a little bit confused onto why so many people get these ideas in their heads about that line from the designers that they're not messing with the flavor of the setting unless they have to. 4e ITSELF has a different design philosophy. and that overrides everything that dark sun could be. 4e, (and 3e was as well) Heroic fantasy, 24/7. You won't be worrying about heat, thirst, starvation, or being slaves, any more than you would be in regular D&D. because those are the guys who you SAVE from being so pathetic in the universe.



I have worries along those lines, but I'm trying to give wotc the benefit of the doubt, at least for the moment. 

Plus this _might_ be wotc's attempt to get players for 4E who don't play it because those 4E conceits turn their stomachs. A harsher setting for those who waved goodbye because of all the _"Its fun!" _Handwaves in 4E.


----------



## GMforPowergamers

LordPsychodin said:


> I'm a little bit confused onto why so many people get these ideas in their heads about that line from the designers that they're not messing with the flavor of the setting unless they have to. 4e ITSELF has a different design philosophy. and that overrides everything that dark sun could be. 4e, (and 3e was as well) Heroic fantasy, 24/7. You won't be worrying about heat, thirst, starvation, or being slaves, any more than you would be in regular D&D. because those are the guys who you SAVE from being so pathetic in the universe.




if you already have the setting, any chance you could let us know what else it is like...


----------



## Korgoth

PeterWeller said:


> Is the Prism Pentad that hated? .




Basically.


----------



## AdmundfortGeographer

LordPsychodin said:


> You won't be worrying about heat, thirst, starvation, or being slaves, any more than you would be in regular D&D.



I've played Dark Sun for many years, including many years after the setting was retired. I've been a regular on Dark Sun mailing lists and forums for years.

I can tell you that _most_ long time Dark Sun fans _I am aware of_ used the given dehydration and heat rules for Dark Sun briefly, then gave up on those rules. Keeping track of thirst and heat in 2e Dark Sun was *the suck*. If only because low level spells obviated those rules. Just the same way _knock_ made rogue's open locks ability redundant, _create water_ took the harsh of Athas. Then there was the tedium of simply _tracking_ your PCs status.

After a while, most of us simply ditched those rules because spellcasters were *always* parking the requisite spells that neutralized the environment effects for the party . . . which made the casters just that less effective at the deadly low levels. It wasn't long until we figured this out and just turned off the environment rules so our spellcasters could get their spells back while we hand waved it all as "the party has taken all precautions against the environment".

As a longtime Dark Sun fan, I will not be tossing fits if there were no mechanics for thirst and heat to follow, leaving it all up to DMs setting the mood. No skin off my back. It got old back then.

*But* (!) if the designers can come up with interesting ways to challenge PCs at all levels with environmental effects, ways that didn't require tedious tracking of conditions, then I'll gladly take this "messing with the setting" with joy.


----------



## Dausuul

LordPsychodin said:


> I'm a little bit confused onto why so many people get these ideas in their heads about that line from the designers that they're not messing with the flavor of the setting unless they have to. 4e ITSELF has a different design philosophy. and that overrides everything that dark sun could be. 4e, (and 3e was as well) Heroic fantasy, 24/7. You won't be worrying about heat, thirst, starvation, or being slaves, any more than you would be in regular D&D. because those are the guys who you SAVE from being so pathetic in the universe.




Yup, 4E Dark Sun will be easy. All you have to do is prepare a couple of first-level spells like _create water_ and _endure elements_, and no more worries about dying of thirst or heat stroke...

...oh, wait, no, that was 2E Dark Sun. In 4E, those spells are rituals which will rapidly drain your cash reserves if you cast them daily. Nor can you simply _teleport_ across the wastelands once you hit 9th level.

I don't know if 4E Dark Sun will have rules for dehydration and starvation. But at least it has the potential for such things to be a serious concern, which 2E did not.



PeterWeller said:


> Is the Prism Pentad that hated?




Prism what? I don't know what you're talking about. There were never any novels published for Dark Sun. Nor were there any adventures, and they certainly never made a Revised boxed set. Nope, the original box was the only Dark Sun product ever.


----------



## Andor

I just thought of a cool 4e/Darksun synergy. Suppose in the ancient past of Athas, back when it was still a cool green world with gods, the head of the pantheon was a sun god. And he did the normal sort of good god thing and imbued some of his worshippers with some of his divine essence (IE Made them aasimars) to lead his people.

Unfortunately he was also the same nameless sun god whom Asmodeus slew. On Athas the sun turned black and hostile. The warping of his heaven into the 9 hells also warped the very flesh and blood of his aasimar into tieflings. And no lesser god of his pantheon has answered a prayer on Athas since that black and terrible day, a day which twisted the nature of magic itself...


----------



## Silverblade The Ench

Kamikaze Midget said:


> Totally cool with that.
> 
> I do think defiling should be an option for players. The allure and appeal of the "dark side" should be there. You don't have to use it...but it's always there, saying, "hey, wouldn't it be nice to kill these guys a little faster? and will the world really notice just one more little patch of grass?"
> 
> Most of the classes shouldn't be a tough fit once you determine what the power sources are drawing on. If all "divine" classes are in service to a sorcerer-king, and all "primal" classes are in service to the elements, and all "arcane" classes have the preserving/defiling option, the individual classes more or less run together.
> 
> The thing is, the disconnect from the planes is pretty important to me for the feel of the game. There can be no "fiendish blood," and any "outsider pacts" (even with elemental princes) would leave a pretty bad taste in my mouth. The idea of Athas as an isolated world where there are no angels or demons or outsiders, only _forces_, is key to the brutality of it. There's nothing to relate to, no mirror you can hold up, nothing alongside this world. There is this world -- this blasted hellscape -- and nothing else. Even death is just nothingness. Everything has to live under the same environmental devestation. The inter-connectedness of the ecosystem is kind of kicked in the junk if the ecosystem is made of magic like the Feywild. Defiling has *broken nature*;




oh agreed!  It's just that Players should think long and hard about being a defiler...bust it out to deal with that possibly-fatal-ecounter...and everyone would turn on you? or work with scumbags who'd sell you out? hehe all good 

Conenctions to the Abyss were hinted at storngly several times, so tieflings don't bother me, especially with having them just be "mutations" or some weird folk from far away (fire resistance = perfect sense for Athas!).

if you take Athas as being heavily tied to the elemental Planes, which it is, then having demonic issues is ok...but, the Grey gets in the way of planar travel so much as demons really admire defilers, lol, it's kind of hard for them to get _to _Athas and visa-versa

I wonder if they will also still have the Athasian "gith" as being relatives to the Githyanki as noted in the Black Spine adventure?



megamania said:


> At last!
> Maybe now we can get some more Darksun figures.



I saw some of the RAL PARTHA Dark Sun figures, in original boxes going for INSANE prices earlier this year on Ebay, sigh...*drool*

I don't have any of my own Dark Sun minis pics on my site, most though have been stripped and need re-painting!



Kobold Avenger said:


> As for 4eisms in Dark Sun, I think that Tieflings can fit in that there's plenty of "mutants" in Athas, and some of them would seem at home in the Elf Tribes.  The Villichi or whatever that secretive tribe of female humanoids could very well be Devas, and the Ruvkova of the Elemental planes are very clearly Genasi.



yeah as said, if you let Athas = world of mutation, it solves lot of issues!
I remember the Villichi! yes, Devas would do well for them! 
Can't recall the Ruvkova though name is familiar, but genasi would make sense as elementla planes are so important ot Athas, ie you can imagine an elemental cleric having half-elemental children



PeterWeller said:


> Wow!  At least a dozen posts about how the Shadowfell can fit in DS and no one has mentioned The Gray or The Black.  Is the Prism Pentad that hated?  The Gray and The Black were the Shadowfell before there was a Shadowfell.
> .



The grey isn't the Shadowfell, the Grey was...odd, Grey was more like the Negative Material Plane acting as a trap around Athas? it was far more like a sort of oh Hades, etc etc. But I know what you mean 

In my own version of Athas I said the Grey was caused when the gods were destroyed/banished trying to stop the Sun of Athas going nova...leaving a toxic horrible "break" around Athas, sealing it off with a sort of spiritual pollution as it were.

If you use it as the "Shadowfell", that would allow planar travel to be too easy, so it would need to be a special area of the Shadowfell, affected by Athas' issues. Which I'm sure would be easy to do.



Stogoe said:


> Wizards will never publish a Large PC race, because there's no way to balance the racial feature "Affects 150% more creatures with Close Bursts".
> Half-Giants should just use the Goliath stats.



they also get hit _by _more attackers at one time, though 

Aandor
hey that's a cool alternate backstory for Athas! 

Dausuul
lol yes, 4th ed won't make Dark Sun easy!  4th ed already has rules for heat exhaustion in the DMG, so I'm sure they'll add more, Athas is _much _worse than most deserts, 60 degrees celcius plus AND the silt?!

PeterWeller
like Dausuul says, sort of, "_The first rule of Dark Sun is..there were no novels, no revised boxed set!!!"_ 


other stuff:
Dargonborn could be dray..or they could just be mutants, lizards who've become intelligent etc, who knows, who cares it honeslty doesn't matter unless you wish a specific history for them. You don't always HAVE ot have a backstory for everything, folks 

Same with Eladrin (they could be psionic masters, rare births, or they coeem from the Feywild of Athas which is NOT like the normal Feywild! the Defiling has spread into it and boy would they be PO'd)

*sings*
_Fun, fun, fun! In the sun, sun, sun!!
Defilers have burnt the trees to ash,
And wearing loincloths has given me a rash!
Templars enslave PCs who are too brash
Escape attempts to evade the overseer's lash!
Halfling's are feral little sods who want to eat my a**!
Fun, fun, fun! In the sun, sun, sun!!_


----------



## catastrophic

Andor said:


> I just thought of a cool 4e/Darksun synergy. Suppose in the ancient past of Athas, back when it was still a cool green world with gods, the head of the pantheon was a sun god. And he did the normal sort of good god thing and imbued some of his worshippers with some of his divine essence (IE Made them aasimars) to lead his people.
> 
> Unfortunately he was also the same nameless sun god whom Asmodeus slew. On Athas the sun turned black and hostile. The warping of his heaven into the 9 hells also warped the very flesh and blood of his aasimar into tieflings. And no lesser god of his pantheon has answered a prayer on Athas since that black and terrible day, a day which twisted the nature of magic itself...



The dark sun could _be_ the nine hells.


----------



## Rechan

Andor said:


> Unfortunately he was also the same nameless sun god whom Asmodeus slew. On Athas the sun turned black and hostile. The warping of his heaven into the 9 hells



Not only that, but the SUN ITSELF is the 9 Hells. So that the very painful heat bleeding from the Black Sun of Betrayal is the heat of Hell itself.

Edit: Damnit, ninja'd.


----------



## I'm A Banana

LordPsychodin said:
			
		

> I'm a little bit confused onto why so many people get these ideas in their heads about that line from the designers that they're not messing with the flavor of the setting unless they have to. 4e ITSELF has a different design philosophy. and that overrides everything that dark sun could be. 4e, (and 3e was as well) Heroic fantasy, 24/7. You won't be worrying about heat, thirst, starvation, or being slaves, any more than you would be in regular D&D. because those are the guys who you SAVE from being so pathetic in the universe.




On this, I'm willing to give the 4e team the benefit of the doubt. These guys are generally pretty good at designing what they set out to design, and if they're making the land itself a challenge -- something that was mentioned in the interview -- I believe them. 

Most of the issues come in, for me, when they don't set out with a compatible philosophy for my playstyle in the first place.  Frex, they have great minis combat rules, but I am not a huge fan of minis combat, so the disconnect is more fundamental than that. 

Here, so far, they seem to be in agreement with the way I would want to play Dark Sun. I'm optimistic, but I am on the lookout for possible goofball moves (probably too much so, honestly  ). 

I don't think Dark Sun is entirely incompatible with "heroic," though I do think heroic takes on a different meaning in DS than in many other settings: a more mercenary, practical, "some things need to be done," kind of heroism.


----------



## Mircoles

Matthew L. Martin said:


> Enjoy. _My_ setting's becoming a board game.
> 
> I kid, I kid. I strongly expected that it would be Dark Sun for next year, and while it's not my style of setting--I prefer my settings more elegant and civilized (apologies to Obi-Wan Kenobi  )--I'm glad for the fans who'll get it back.
> 
> And I'm looking forward to the _Castle Ravenloft_ board game too.




There's elegance and civilization in Dark Sun. It just doesn't have much infuence beyond the cities walls.


On topic:

Defiling as an option to boost ones arcane abilites might be interesting.

Want a burst 3 fireburst  or one that does 2d6 damage? Defile to get it. Defiling could be used to extend its range also.

Being able to easily amplify ones abilities would be very tempting and rather addictive after you start giving in to the temptation.

No feat required, the temptation is there for all arcane characters to deal with.

Now, what kind of consequences would it have though, other than just killing the local flora?


----------



## Scribble

Mircoles said:


> Now, what kind of consequences would it have though, other than just killing the local flora?




I've been either wanting to mess around with creating (while hoping someone at wotc beats me too it) powers that are sort of "jerk" powers... You can amp you own abilities by sacrificing someone else's powers. Th bard has a little of it (whith its ability to move people's marks around) but I think a full fledged class (or group of classes) would be interesting.

I used a lot of parentheses in that paragraph.


----------



## Obryn

Eric Anondson said:


> I can tell you that _most_ long time Dark Sun fans _I am aware of_ used the given dehydration and heat rules for Dark Sun briefly, then gave up on those rules. Keeping track of thirst and heat in 2e Dark Sun was *the suck*.



Yep, I concur.  While I wouldn't mind optional rules for dehydration, it represents a level of long-term obsessive-compulsive tracking I stopped messing with 20 years ago.

-O


----------



## fba827

Scribble said:


> I've been either wanting to mess around with creating (while hoping someone at wotc beats me too it) powers that are sort of "jerk" powers... You can amp you own abilities by sacrificing someone else's powers. Th bard has a little of it (whith its ability to move people's marks around) but I think a full fledged class (or group of classes) would be interesting.




Doesn't the dark pact warlock (FRPG) kind of do this somewhat?  I just vaguely recall seeing some of it's daily powers would "injure an ally to do more damage" and "slow ally to immobile enemy" --- something like that (or am i just remembering wrong? I haven't looked at the class in a while)



			
				Eric Anondson said:
			
		

> I can tell you that most long time Dark Sun fans I am aware of used the given dehydration and heat rules for Dark Sun briefly, then gave up on those rules. Keeping track of thirst and heat in 2e Dark Sun was the suck.




Yeah, I'm hoping that the dehydration and heat rules do not bog down the game with tedious tracking -- there can be interesting tracking and then there is the extreme which becomes tedious and more trouble than it's worth...


----------



## Nork

I think tracking thirst and hunger in 4e would actually be very easy and mesh perfectly with the system.

Players: we want to take an extended rest.
GM: How much water do you have, and what was the last thing you ate?


----------



## I'm A Banana

> Yep, I concur. While I wouldn't mind optional rules for dehydration, it represents a level of long-term obsessive-compulsive tracking I stopped messing with 20 years ago.




On the one side, I think 4e can certainly make better rules for wilderness survival than the obsessive tracking of rations and water that we've mostly seen since 1e.  On the other side, 4e does not have these rules by default -- or at least doesn't have rules any better than the obsessive tracking of previous editions.

But I do believe them when they say that the environment will pose a threat. How they do this -- via tracking thirst or hunger or heat, or some other method -- is less important to me, I think, than the overall effect. If they make water important and make the environment a threat, I'll be happy, and it sounds like this was one of the big things they've been thinking about.


----------



## Henry

They just got me interested enough to buy into the next setting.


----------



## Dausuul

Here's one thought on how defiling could work, loosely based on the old Humanity system from Vampire.

As an arcane caster, you have a Corruption stat, which starts at 0. If you ever hit 20, you lose all human conscience and empathy and become an NPC defiler, totally evil and driven by a hunger to consume life.

At any time, when using an arcane power or performing an Arcana-based ritual, you can choose to defile. This grants a +5 bonus to your attack rolls and skill checks for that power or ritual. However, you must also make a Corruption check (roll 1d20 plus your Corruption) at DC 21. If you fail this check, your Corruption increases by 2.

As you become more corrupt, it becomes more and more difficult to use preserving magic without hurting yourself. Whenever you cast an arcane spell or perform an Arcana ritual and choose _not_ to defile, if the natural roll of the d20 is equal to or less than a certain threshold, you take damage equal to your bloodied value. This threshold is equal to one-fourth of your Corruption, rounded down; so zero from 1 to 3, one from 4 to 7, two from 8 to 11, three from 12 to 15, and four from 16 to 19.

Each time you gain a level, your Corruption declines by 1.

Obviously, the numbers would have to be tweaked for balance, but you can see the general idea. The further you go down the defiling path, the more tempting it becomes (the higher your Corruption is, the less likely any one act of defiling is to increase it), and the more it hurts to preserve.


----------



## Ainamacar

Dausuul said:


> Here's one thought on how defiling could work, loosely based on the old Humanity system from Vampire.
> 
> As an arcane caster, you have a Corruption stat, which starts at 0. If you ever hit 20, you lose all human conscience and empathy and become an NPC defiler, totally evil and driven by a hunger to consume life.
> 
> At any time, when using an arcane power or performing an Arcana-based ritual, you can choose to defile. This grants a +5 bonus to your attack rolls and skill checks for that power or ritual. However, you must also make a Corruption check (roll 1d20 plus your Corruption) at DC 21. If you fail this check, your Corruption increases by 2.
> 
> As you become more corrupt, it becomes more and more difficult to use preserving magic without hurting yourself. Whenever you cast an arcane spell or perform an Arcana ritual and choose _not_ to defile, if the natural roll of the d20 is below a certain threshold, you take damage equal to your bloodied value. This threshold is equal to one-fourth of your Corruption, rounded down; so zero from 1 to 3, one from 4 to 7, two from 8 to 11, three from 12 to 15, and four from 16 to 19.
> 
> Each time you gain a level, your Corruption declines by 1.
> 
> Obviously, the numbers would have to be tweaked for balance, but you can see the general idea. The further you go down the defiling path, the more tempting it becomes (the higher your Corruption is, the less likely any one act of defiling is to increase it), and the more it hurts to preserve.




I had some similar thoughts, but basing it on a disease-like condition track with Wisdom checks (or something similar).

Preserver: Preserves by default, but may defile if desired.
Tempted: Make a wisdom check the first time you use an arcane power during an encounter.  If successful, you can preserve this encounter.  If you fail, you defile this encounter unless you immediately lose a healing surge.
Struggling: Make a wisdom check the first time you use an arcane power during an encounter.  If successful you may spend a healing surge to preserve this encounter.  Otherwise, you defile.
Addicted: Always defiles except by a powerful act of will.  Make a wisdom check if you wish to preserve with a single arcane power.  If successful, lose a healing surge and preserve, otherwise you defile with the power.
Defiler: You always defile, and cannot improve your condition without exceptional means.

You track the progression by making a Wisdom check after each extended rest.  If you had defiled since your last extended rest and the check succeeds you are unchanged, and if it fails your conditions worsens.  If you have not defiled since your last extended rest and the check succeeds your condition improves, and if it fails you are unchanged.

Reaching the Preserver condition might only be possible with a feat, but it allows a character to opt-out of the condition tracking if they desire.  If the DCs are designed carefully it might allow a person to play a terribly conflicted character for an extended period of time, rather than inevitably falling to one extreme or the other in a single day.

I'm definitely interested to see how WotC handles defiling.


----------



## fba827

Nork said:


> I think tracking thirst and hunger in 4e would actually be very easy and mesh perfectly with the system.
> 
> Players: we want to take an extended rest.
> GM: How much water do you have, and what was the last thing you ate?




You know what (random thought) -- if they do it like the disease condition track then it would be very easy to incorporate....


----------



## I'm A Banana

I wouldn't necessarily use that kind of thing for defiling, but it's giving me great ideas about using them in a setting based off of monotheistic mysticism, where Good and Evil are dynamic forces, and Evil always should be tugging at the PC's...

Hmmm....


----------



## Silverblade The Ench

Obryn said:


> Yep, I concur.  While I wouldn't mind optional rules for dehydration, it represents a level of long-term obsessive-compulsive tracking I stopped messing with 20 years ago.
> 
> -O




Um, you all do know it's much easier and already in 4th ed rules to do this kind of thing? 
Page 159, environmental hazards, Endurance skill checks 1/8 hours or lose 1 healing surge
simple, effective, and dangerous wihtout being too complex or too deadly! (it's very hard to recover lost healign surges as few powers can do that, so, you need extended rest in a cooler area etc)  
I'm sure they could add more complex skill challenges if wished


----------



## crazy_cat

Ainamacar said:


> If the DCs are designed carefully it might allow a person to play a terribly conflicted character for an extended period of time.



I like this idea - I like it a lot. 

The internal and moral conflict an Athasian wizard faces between power and principles is something I don't think D&D game mechanics have yet modelled realistically under any edition. Very interested to see what WOTC do in this area.


----------



## TwinBahamut

Silverblade The Ench said:


> Um, you all do know it's much easier and already in 4th ed rules to do this kind of thing?
> Page 159, environmental hazards, Endurance skill checks 1/8 hours or lose 1 healing surge
> simple, effective, and dangerous wihtout being too complex or too deadly! (it's very hard to recover lost healign surges as few powers can do that, so, you need extended rest in a cooler area etc)
> I'm sure they could add more complex skill challenges if wished



This does seem to be one of the best ways to handle it with 4e. Simply turn all struggles against heat and dehydration into skill challenges that hold your healing surges ransom. Also, simply preventing you from taking an extended rest unless you are in a cool place and have water would work very efficiently.

Some kind of heat/thirst tracking minigame would be terrible, but 4e can easily get the desired result without something so clunky.


----------



## Aldarc

Silverblade The Ench said:


> Um, you all do know it's much easier and already in 4th ed rules to do this kind of thing?
> Page 159, environmental hazards, Endurance skill checks 1/8 hours or lose 1 healing surge
> simple, effective, and dangerous wihtout being too complex or too deadly! (it's very hard to recover lost healign surges as few powers can do that, so, you need extended rest in a cooler area etc)
> I'm sure they could add more complex skill challenges if wished



Well thanks then for pointing out what should have been obvious for us.


----------



## Mort_Q

Stogoe said:


> Wizards will never publish a Large PC race, because there's no way to balance the racial feature "Affects 150% more creatures with Close Bursts".
> 
> Half-Giants should just use the Goliath stats.




Simple solution, although the Paragon Races approach taken be Svalin Games works well, imho.  Of course, that means you either start at paragon or higher, or they could be replacement characters.



Eric Anondson said:


> *But* (!) if the designers can come up with interesting ways to challenge PCs at all levels with environmental effects, ways that didn't require tedious tracking of conditions, then I'll gladly take this "messing with the setting" with joy.




Not regaining all your healing surges is the easy enough...




TwinBahamut said:


> This does seem to be one of the best ways to handle it with 4e. Simply turn all struggles against heat and dehydration into skill challenges that hold your healing surges ransom. Also, simply preventing you from taking an extended rest unless you are in a cool place and have water would work very efficiently.
> 
> Some kind of heat/thirst tracking minigame would be terrible, but 4e can easily get the desired result without something so clunky.




We shall see.


----------



## Bumbles

Woot, nice news.

I haven't read the thread, but the cover looks nice and going back to OBS is for the good.

So I hope for the best.


----------



## Draloric

Eric Anondson said:


> Went back and reread the interview with James Wyatt.
> 
> Am I off in my interpretation that the Shaman seems to get the role of the old 2e DS cleric?
> 
> Could this be how some class role assignments fall out?
> 
> 2e DS cleric = 4e shaman
> 2e DS templar = 4e cleric?




I wondered about this myself when reading the interview. Perhaps this is to be taken even further? Consider that the 4th Edition Primal power source covers 2nd Edition clerics and druids, while the Divine power source represents the power of the sorcerer-kings as manifested through their templars? Thus templars of many different roles could exist: defenders (something akin to a paladin--in mecahnics only, I pray) strikers (avengers), leaders (clerics), and controllers (invokers).


----------



## I'm A Banana

Avengers as a sorcerer-king's sycophantic assassins, murdering "enemies of the state" in the streets, listening at the walls, waiting for your friends to rat you out for that hot-blooded complaint you made (or for you to miss a bribe so that your friend doesn't rat you out)....

There's a lot going for it by tying the divine power source to the sorcerer-kings, I think.

Primal = Elements; Divine = Sorcerer-Kings; Arcane = Defiling; Martial = Nothin' Special; Psionic = Nothin' too special...

I'm kind of a fan.


----------



## Holy Bovine

I'm very surprised that we are getting Dark Sun next year.  I would have bet nearly anything it would have been Dragonlance.  I am, however, delighted that it is Dark Sun as I have disliked DL for a very, very long time.  I am happily waiting for the previews and sneak peaks my DDI subscription will bring.  What is best is that fact that, although I do own the Revised box set of DS, I have never read through much of it so this setting will be completely new to me!  yay!


----------



## Wardook

Very happy with this.   It has been many years since I've Dark Sunned. I didn't like the revised boxed set much, and quit running it. 

Defiling will be easy to do. It drains HP from allies. My players HATE it when a fellow player hits them with area attack that damages them. You wouldn't last very long doing such. I have a feeling that defiling will be NPCs only.

I didn't  use the whole dehydration thing much, too easy to overcome in 1st ed. or even 2nd. If PC's did travel outside a city it was usually with a caravan, it was way too deadly otherwise, i.e. PC's looked to hire on as guards. 

Didn't Rodney say he was lead on DS? Lead, yet name not on book?


----------



## avin

I'm 100% satisfied.

Didn't spend money with FR4E.
Didn't spend money with Eberron4E.

But I'll be buying every DS book.

I hope they improve graphic layout to fit the setting.


----------



## GMforPowergamers

TwinBahamut said:


> simply preventing you from taking an extended rest unless you are in a cool place and have water would work very efficiently.




I might steal this for my home (non darksun) game as a new house rule...


----------



## Davinshe

Not sure if this is old news by now or not, but I was at the release announcement at Gen Con, and I asked the staff whether Dark Sun will have arcane and divine classes in it. The response, paraphrased, was:

"Arcane power users will continue to have a unique spin to them. Divine characters will be discouraged, but not outright prohibited. There is alot of story potential to being the only Paladin in Athas"


----------



## humble minion

Wondering if it'd make any sense to have Templars be 4e-implemented as warlocks with the 'Sorceror-king' pact?

I'm a 3.5e/pathfinder player, but am a big Dark Sun fan and I'm rapt to hear that it's getting a new lease on life (especially a pre-Prism-Pentad one!)  Will almost certainly buy the books, even if I never actually use them for their intended purpose...


----------



## I'm A Banana

The Staff (via Davinshi) said:
			
		

> "Arcane power users will continue to have a unique spin to them. Divine characters will be discouraged, but not outright prohibited. There is alot of story potential to being the only Paladin in Athas"




Interesting. If this is followed, then it shows that they *really* aren't afraid to cut cross-compatability. Slicing out a good chunk of the classes and splatbooks for the sake of the setting makes a whole lot of potential cuts much more likely -- it makes cutting out Eladrin or 90% of the cosmology totally viable theories, since those things have much, um, smaller reprocussions. 

If it's followed, it also means that the stranglehold "core compatability" has had on the rules might have been nearly abandoned by now. *Huzzah!* This would make me a very happy camper, since it would give 4e some real "take this in a new direction" possibility. It would be like telling DM's all over the world, through example: "You know, it's OK to say your world doesn't have dragonborn in it." It's something that after FR's RSE and Eberron's cosmology I would not have expected. It excites me that this is possible.

And they're absolutely right to practically prohibit it like this, to say "There's a reason we didn't put this in here. If you want to add it back in, knowing our reasons, that's fine. It could be a lot of fun. It's not going to cause any balance issues. But for our concerns, it's not in."

Optimism level rising!


----------



## Stogoe

Silverblade The Ench said:


> they also get hit _by _more attackers at one time, though



Even so, big bonuses aren't balanced by big flaws - not in the reckoning of the designers of 4e, anyways.


----------



## raptor112

GMforPowergamers said:


> I might steal this for my home (non darksun) game as a new house rule...




I don't think so, I will riot....or get very cranky with you....or just mumble to myself....or just ignore everything in game and play with my phone....um...er

YAH DARK SUN


----------



## Shroomy

Kamikaze Midget said:


> Interesting. If this is followed, then it shows that they *really* aren't afraid to cut cross-compatability. Slicing out a good chunk of the classes and splatbooks for the sake of the setting makes a whole lot of potential cuts much more likely -- it makes cutting out Eladrin or 90% of the cosmology totally viable theories, since those things have much, um, smaller reprocussions.
> 
> If it's followed, it also means that the stranglehold "core compatability" has had on the rules might have been nearly abandoned by now. *Huzzah!* This would make me a very happy camper, since it would give 4e some real "take this in a new direction" possibility. It would be like telling DM's all over the world, through example: "You know, it's OK to say your world doesn't have dragonborn in it." It's something that after FR's RSE and Eberron's cosmology I would not have expected. It excites me that this is possible.
> 
> And they're absolutely right to practically prohibit it like this, to say "There's a reason we didn't put this in here. If you want to add it back in, knowing our reasons, that's fine. It could be a lot of fun. It's not going to cause any balance issues. But for our concerns, it's not in."
> 
> Optimism level rising!




I always figured that their MO would mostly consist of not mentioning things that clash with the traditional DS flavor.


----------



## Dausuul

Shroomy said:


> I always figured that their MO would mostly consist of not mentioning things that clash with the traditional DS flavor.




They might go so far as to say, "Gnomes are virtually unknown in Dark Sun." What they won't do is say, "You can't play a gnome."


----------



## Shroomy

Dausuul said:


> They might go so far as to say, "Gnomes are virtually unknown in Dark Sun." What they won't do is say, "You can't play a gnome."




That would probably be the way to go.


----------



## Dice4Hire

I am very excited about DArk Sun coming. I had hoped it would be redone and did feel hat it had a very stron synergy with 4e. YAY

As for the idea they might not try to shoehorn every 4E race and class in, MORE POWER TO THEM!!!!!

Trying to fit in every class, race and such would be ridiculous, seriously ridiculous. Like changing Dragonborn to Peterrens (sp?) or having tiny enclaves of half-orcs, goliaths, gnomes, etc around? No thanks. I hope they introduce 3-4 new races and change the racial abilities of most of hte rest. That would make them differnet, and if they are no totally compatible withthe rest of 4E, who cares?

Though I suspect I might find out downthread.....


----------



## Banshee16

Eric Anondson said:


> I've played Dark Sun for many years, including many years after the setting was retired. I've been a regular on Dark Sun mailing lists and forums for years.
> 
> I can tell you that _most_ long time Dark Sun fans _I am aware of_ used the given dehydration and heat rules for Dark Sun briefly, then gave up on those rules. Keeping track of thirst and heat in 2e Dark Sun was *the suck*. If only because low level spells obviated those rules. Just the same way _knock_ made rogue's open locks ability redundant, _create water_ took the harsh of Athas. Then there was the tedium of simply _tracking_ your PCs status.
> 
> After a while, most of us simply ditched those rules because spellcasters were *always* parking the requisite spells that neutralized the environment effects for the party . . . which made the casters just that less effective at the deadly low levels. It wasn't long until we figured this out and just turned off the environment rules so our spellcasters could get their spells back while we hand waved it all as "the party has taken all precautions against the environment".
> 
> As a longtime Dark Sun fan, I will not be tossing fits if there were no mechanics for thirst and heat to follow, leaving it all up to DMs setting the mood. No skin off my back. It got old back then.
> 
> *But* (!) if the designers can come up with interesting ways to challenge PCs at all levels with environmental effects, ways that didn't require tedious tracking of conditions, then I'll gladly take this "messing with the setting" with joy.




Personally, when I ran Dark Sun, we *did* use the environmental rules.  I wanted the players to have to think of factors like how far could they get in the wilderness, were there oasis they could use, etc.  That kind of stuff also made them vulnerable to plot hooks etc......ie. in battle your waterskins were destroyed or lost, you're 80 miles from anywhere, you're thirsty, do you venture to that fort you see on the horizon where there will be water, but also slavers or whatever?d  And it definitely made the world harsher.  Yeah, some players made use of magic to minimize the problems, but IIRC, not everyone could create water...wasn't it only clerics of water?

Those rules really rooted the PCs in the world.  I've always liked that.  But then, I also don't like games where a PC is carrying 4 swords, a spare suit of armor, a backpack with 12,000 gp in it, and 13 magic items, but he doesn't have a bedroll or a single piece of food, even though he's 4 days walk from civilization.  To me, that's far, far too gamist, I guess.

Banshee


----------



## Banshee16

Kamikaze Midget said:


> What mostly makes the DB's weird in my mind is the breath weapon. Dragons in Dark Sun aren't especially known for breathing fire, but are known for powerful mystical abilities, so re-fluffing dragon breath as "destructive magic burst" should be a nice solution.
> 
> But yeah, DB's as Dray makes a lot of sense.




Didn't The Dragon have a breath weapon of superheated sand that scoured flesh from bone, and melted steel?  So it's not flame, but....

I think the Dray had a breath weapon, but I don't know what it was.

Banshee


----------



## Banshee16

Eric Anondson said:


> From a certain perspective, it makes perfect sense. But the Dray were revealed with Dregoth's rising. Dregoth reappeared on the scene after the Prism Pentad was concluded . . . so if 4e Dark Sun is a *pure* "original boxed set" timeline reset, then we shouldn't have dray around. Dregoth created the dray, with The Dragon destroyed from events in the Prism Pentad novels Dregoth makes his play to conquer the Tablelands, sending the dray out to infiltrate neighboring city-states.
> 
> However, 4e Dark Sun primarily takes the original boxed set as a thematic/flavor point, then takes the best of the revised era creations (dray, life-shaping artifacts, shadowcasting) and blends them into the original timeline in an appropriate way, then we're not talking about a true-reset . . . but something altogether different.
> 
> Either the dray are no longer tied to Dregoth (interesting possibilities), or Dregoth is no longer in hiding from The Dragon and other Sorcerer Kings at the original timeline (I hope this is not the case), or Dregoth is still in hiding  but has sent his dray to the surface earlier than the 2e Dark Sun timeline risking the Dragon's premature discovery of his existence (not a good idea, IMO) . . . or something else?




It could very easily be explained away similar to how Drow have been handled in the past.  Here are the rules for how to play XYZ character....but keep in mind that the character is basically a freak, an exception.....there aren't many of his kind openly revealing themselves in the campaign world.

Banshee


----------



## D.Shaffer

The feywild doesnt seem that horrible a fit to me, although your mileage may vary.  I've always seem the Feywild as Nature 'turned up to 11', an exageration of the natural world.  The Athasian Feywild would thus be even MORE dangerous to the unprepared individual and as the Athasian natural order is rather broken, the feywild is more so.  Carnivorous, desert plants bigger, and more savage then the norm, sandstorms that can scour iron in minutes, silt that actively seeks out others to aphixiate, all a brutal exageration of stuff PC's already deal with.  There are no verdant fields, no relief in the Athasian Feywild, just slow, agonising death for those unfortunate enough, or stupid enough to cross over.

And preciding over it all, murderous fey who've had to adapt to the changed land, been driven insane over it, and seek compensation in blood, often literally.  I rather like the idea of vampiric Eladrin who have developed a taste for blood as a outgrowth of the lands thirst for more water.


----------



## amysrevenge

D.Shaffer said:


> I rather like the idea of vampiric Eladrin who have developed a taste for blood as a outgrowth of the lands thirst for more water.




Now HERE's a guy who can re-fluff 4E stuff into Dark Sun.

For the record, I am a big fan of the notion of the Feywild having already been "used up" as a primo source for defiling magic (possibly with isolated pokets of green still existing here and there, fiercely guarded by fey protectors), and thus existing in a much worse state than even Athas itself.

Not as sure what to do about the Shadowfell though.


----------



## I'm A Banana

> I've always seem the Feywild as Nature 'turned up to 11', an exageration of the natural world.




Well, for me, a significant part of Dark Sun's appeal is that the "natural world," in effect, doesn't exist. Nature is broken. Nothing is natural. "Natural" would not have involved planet-wide defiling with arcane magic. There is nothing natural about any of Dark Sun's environments. There is nothing to turn up to 11. The dial, as it were, has blown up. It's just stuck on this weird distortion and fluctuates at it's own volume. 

What would a Feywild offer that Athas itself couldn't offer? Why can't you have whatever brutal hellscape you imagine being in the feywild, on Athas itself? Why do I need to go to a different world (in a setting that is cut off from different worlds) to experience the ravages of the environment (in a setting that has a ravaging environment)? 

As an example:


> I rather like the idea of vampiric Eladrin who have developed a taste for blood as a outgrowth of the lands thirst for more water.




Why can't that be _anyone_ in Dark Sun? Why do we need an adjacent world where there's a specific race of this (who also happen to be great wizards, and who step in between planes like crossing the road)? 

I mean, neat ideas, I just don't see why there's a need for the Feywild to realize these ideas, especially when the existence of some "nearby plane of nature" would fly in the face of two of Athas's most interesting setting elements (for me): it's unnatural, and it's not really connected to other planes.


----------



## Fallen Seraph

Hmm, my Fey would take a Dune approach to it. Have them be obsessed with body-water. Shedding a tear for instance during a agreement shows a sign of commitment, to give a random example. Takes the odd items fey obsess over and gives it a Dark Sun twist.

For Shadowfell, hmm... Well I always imagined in my own personal games that the sun is what caused everything, it is beginning to die so it is going through fantastical change. So it is gaining massive sun-spots to turn black, sending off solar flares, radiation (fantasy style, thus the cause of mutations, psionics and all that) increased heat and mass, etc.

The Shadowfell then is one where it finally went KABLAM! it is a burnt husk of a world, with a softly glowing white dwarf-esque star is what remains of the sun. The torn apart atmosphere keeps it hot thanks to less protection.

Speaking of which, perhaps in my one the Feywild is facing yet another different kind of star change *ponders*


----------



## Somebloke

Hang on.

Didn't the haflings live in some verdant, gorgeous rainforest area- nature turned up to 11- that was a) almost utterly inaccessable and b) horribly dangerous? 

Wouldn't this do as a Feywild substitute?


----------



## Andor

Aren't the races of Athas horrible prone to mutations and sports anyway? So why not just list the standard Dark Sun races and suggest anything else someone wants to play is a mutant?

Also I'm not sure how Eladrin are a problem anyway, just refluff their feywild teleportation as being a psionic talent. Done.


----------



## Nebulous

avin said:


> I'm 100% satisfied.
> 
> I hope they improve graphic layout to fit the setting.




Yeah!  I don't want a bland "textbook."  I want a cool-looking GAMEBOOK.


----------



## D.Shaffer

Kamikaze Midget said:


> There is nothing natural about any of Dark Sun's environments.  (Bunch of stuff edited out)
> 
> What would a Feywild offer that Athas itself couldn't offer? Why can't you have whatever brutal hellscape you imagine being in the feywild, on Athas itself?



Nature is always going to be there so long as life still exists. It might be a twisted mockery of what existed before hand, but you're still going to have ecosystems and cycles that happen in somewhat predictable cycles.  Nature still exists because of this and so the archetype of an exaggerated version of the land is still a valid one.  

As for the actual argument itself, how is this different from arguing against the Feywild in ANY setting?  There's just as valid a reason to have the Feywild in Athas as it is in any other setting. As is, one reason I can think of off the top of my head is that it offers you a way to have those really big, wierd bits of landscape/weather that would be odd even for Athas.  Sandstorms are not an uncommon occurence in Athas, but ones that blot out the sun for days, sucking all the moisture out of anything it encounters like some living terrible thing?  That's an exaggeration of 'normal' that would apply to the Feywild.  Do you NEED it? Probably not, but I think it would make an interesting and easilly placed addition to Dark Sun as is.



Somebloke said:


> Hang on.
> Didn't the haflings live in some verdant, gorgeous rainforest area- nature turned up to 11- that was a) almost utterly inaccessable and b) horribly dangerous?
> 
> Wouldn't this do as a Feywild substitute?



Eh, not really.  Remember that to some of us, the feywild is an exageration of what already exists.  The Athasian feywild is thus going to be an exagerated version of what's mostly desert.  There would be a feywild equivalent of the jungle too


----------



## TheFan

People keep picking on the Feywild, but can you imagine the Athasian Shadowfell?


----------



## The_Fan

Strange. I didn't know I had two accounts.


----------



## amysrevenge

Kamikaze Midget said:


> I mean, neat ideas, I just don't see why there's a need for the Feywild to realize these ideas, especially when the existence of some "nearby plane of nature" would fly in the face of two of Athas's most interesting setting elements (for me): it's unnatural, and it's not really connected to other planes.





I think the motivation for trying to make these things work is to be able to use as much of the standard 4E cosmology as possible in a way that doesn't compromise the "feel" of Dark Sun.  "Feel" is a pretty ephemeral thing, and short of simply reprinting the original 2E box set they WILL fail to entirely recapture the feel for some players.  The trick is to get it close enough to satisfy as many fans as possible.

I think that a desert-refluffed Feywild and Shadowfell attached to Athas will a) keep the setting more inline with established 4E cosmology, requiring less refluffing of other things and b) maintain much of the Athas "feel" for a large proportion of Dark Sun fans.

This would also make the setting a bit more accessible to new people.  You can describe the world sucinctly and capture most of what is different, without having to list all of the individual changes instead:  "Dark Sun is about a world that has been turned into an unnatural desert by the irresponsible use of arcane magic.  The Feywild and Shadowfell are now reflections of this sand-blasted land, with all the changes this would imply about their denizens."  An example of the kind of thing that you _wouldn't_ have to explain further with this setup, but _would_ have to explain otherwise:  Eladrin can still step into the Feywild to teleport.


----------



## Wolfwood2

humble minion said:


> Wondering if it'd make any sense to have Templars be 4e-implemented as warlocks with the 'Sorceror-king' pact?




Here's my take on Templars.  It's not a class; it's a job description.  Anyone who is a direct servant of the sorcerer-kings gets called a Templar, no matter what sorts of powers or skills they have.  Some draw power directly from prayers or pacts with the Sorcerer-Kings and some are just brutal thugs skilled with a sword.  The benefits of this are obvious.

It means that any PC, regardless of thier class, can have the cool ex-Templar or renegade Templar background.  It means that NPC Templars built as monsters can have any sort of powers.  And it means that "Templar" is a great generic term for someone serving the SK's.


----------



## darjr

Come, rest in the shade, out of the sun.

Set down your weary bones and breathe deep the cool air.

Rest, sleep, for eternity.

Welcome to the Shadowfell.


----------



## Mort_Q

darjr said:


> Come, rest in the shade, out of the sun.
> 
> Set down your weary bones and breathe deep the cool air.
> 
> Rest, sleep, for eternity.
> 
> Welcome to the Shadowfell.




Nice.


----------



## The_Fan

darjr said:


> Come, rest in the shade, out of the sun.
> 
> Set down your weary bones and breathe deep the cool air.
> 
> Rest, sleep, for eternity.
> 
> Welcome to the Shadowfell.



Very nice.

Most if it is probably already written, but still I wonder if they are mining us for ideas.


----------



## darjr

The_Fan said:


> ...still I wonder if they are mining us for ideas.




I hope so!


----------



## avin

Shadowfell and Feywild are an intrinsec part of 4E and will be in.

I see Feywild as a high magical place. Less desert storms, more desert illusions, fake oasis, genies in lamps, etc.

I'd rule that leave and enter Shadow/Faerie is more uncommon than on worlds like Faerun.


----------



## Mustrum_Ridcully

avin said:


> Shadowfell and Feywild are an intrinsec part of 4E and will be in.
> 
> I see Feywild as a high magical place. Less desert storms, more desert illusions, fake oasis, genies in lamps, etc.
> 
> I'd rule that leave and enter Shadow/Faerie is more uncommon than on worlds like Faerun.




That makes a lot of sense to me.

Of course there are regular Fata Morganas in the DarkSun deserts. But they are still working as they should work in the real word. But in the Feywild, you will actually reach a Fata Morgana, and drink the water it promises - while your friends will watch you in horror as you try to swim in sand and drink it. 

Of course,  if you ever encounter oasis, it might be a lush paradise - and you'll never want to leave. Or stop eating and drinking, until you die from overeating and overdrinking.

---

I am not sure yet what the Shadowfell would be like. It might be entirely without a sun or moon, perhaps? And bitter cold. But there is no snow - there is no water for it here, either.


----------



## AllisterH

TheFan said:


> People keep picking on the Feywild, but can you imagine the Athasian Shadowfell?




Doesn't Athas ALREADY have a Shadowfell in the form of the Grey?

True, that was a post-REVISED Darksun campaign setting but I don't see why elements can't be fused with the original boxset


----------



## vagabundo

AllisterH said:


> Doesn't Athas ALREADY have a Shadowfell in the form of the Grey?
> 
> True, that was a post-REVISED Darksun campaign setting but I don't see why elements can't be fused with the original boxset




And the Black.


----------



## Sir Brennen

Andor said:


> Aren't the races of Athas horrible prone to mutations and sports anyway?



"He was horrible! Three extra eyes, unnatural green skin, and a badminton racket!"


----------



## Mustrum_Ridcully

Sir Brennen said:


> "He was horrible! Three extra eyes, unnatural green skin, and a badminton racket!"


----------



## Budalic

> Originally Posted by Somebloke
> Hang on.
> Didn't the haflings live in some verdant, gorgeous rainforest area- nature turned up to 11- that was a) almost utterly inaccessable and b) horribly dangerous?
> 
> Wouldn't this do as a Feywild substitute?




Eladrin hunted by halflings!


----------



## hailstop

To me, the Athas Shadowfell would be...Venus.  Persistent cloud cover, but no respite from the heat.  No water.


----------



## ProfessorCirno

I think what Kamikaze is saying is, you're asking the wrong question.  You're asking "Why not put the feywild in?" when the question should be "Why should we put this in?"

Eh, maybe it's just me, but it smells of change for the sake of change.  "Well, our other settings have this, we better throw it into this one as well."  That's not really a good reason to force a change to the setting.

To borrow someone else's example, imagine if it was a common trope to put line dancing in every setting.  We'd think they're out of their minds.


----------



## Fallen Seraph

ProfessorCirno said:


> I think what Kamikaze is saying is, you're asking the wrong question.  You're asking "Why not put the feywild in?" when the question should be "Why should we put this in?"
> 
> Eh, maybe it's just me, but it smells of change for the sake of change.  "Well, our other settings have this, we better throw it into this one as well."  That's not really a good reason to force a change to the setting.
> 
> To borrow someone else's example, imagine if it was a common trope to put line dancing in every setting.  We'd think they're out of their minds.



For myself these are just fun thought experiments. We have no clue what there will be, so might as well discuss all different kinds of possibilities just to generate discussion and ideas. Hell, even after we do know it can still be thought experiments for each group's version of Dark Sun. So I view it less will they, won't they and more, "what if or if not"

Myself personally, the idea I thought of (on page 14), with different kinds of suns in Feywild/Shadowfell is really growing on me.


----------



## I'm A Banana

Somebloke said:
			
		

> Didn't the haflings live in some verdant, gorgeous rainforest area- nature turned up to 11- that was a) almost utterly inaccessable and b) horribly dangerous?
> 
> Wouldn't this do as a Feywild substitute?




I still don't know why Athas needs a Feywild substitute. That region works for what it is: a "Green Hell" version of the jungle.



			
				D.Shaffer said:
			
		

> Nature is always going to be there so long as life still exists. It might be a twisted mockery of what existed before hand, but you're still going to have ecosystems and cycles that happen in somewhat predictable cycles. Nature still exists because of this and so the archetype of an exaggerated version of the land is still a valid one.




It doesn't have to be that way, and I don't see any compelling reason why it SHOULD be that way. Life doesn't have to generate nature: Athas's schtick is that it's hostile to life: everyone's slowly dying, and the only people capable of even making it a little better are, of course, the PC's (the big fat heroes). There aren't ecosystems or predictable cycles, there is a slowly dying world. You're lucky to eke out a living. The world is in the long slow decay. It's been destabilized and only heroic action can restore it to any semblance of stability. Nature is broken, the world is dying, everything is going to hell in a handbasket, and it will not find stability, it will not find a stable cycle (unless the PC's intervene, of course). 

Without that, it's just "Oh, it's a desert." It's not just a desert, in my mind. It's a broken world, a shattered existence, one that is very unnatural, and one that does not have anything like regular cycles of life.



> Sandstorms are not an uncommon occurence in Athas, but ones that blot out the sun for days, sucking all the moisture out of anything it encounters like some living terrible thing?




Again, in a world where the natural order has been shattered and broken, what's wrong with that being IN THE WORLD? What's wrong with some straight-up summer-popcorn-blockbuster apocalyptic Day-After-Tomorrow OMG, everyone is boned *environmental event*, right there, in the same world as the bug-farmers and the nomadic elves. 

In other words, what ALREADY EXISTS is turned up to 11. Does this make it very difficult to survive as a normal person on Athas? Yes. Yes it does. That's part of the setting's appeal. That's part of what makes it brutal, post-apocalyptic fantasy. That's part of why characters need to be Big Fat Heroes to eke out survival. The population is declining, people are dying, the world is overrun with monsters. This isn't a setting in a dark age: this is a setting that is dying, a world that has lost the final battle of Good vs. Evil. There's nothing natural or normal about any of it. It's not like everything would be fine if everyone just left it alone: it requires active intervention to make better. 

I mean, Dark Sun was a product of the '80's postapocalyptica and the Cold War stuff, too. What kind of natural world exists in a region of nuclear Armageddon? The entire idea is that the world has been made unnatural by the acts of mortals. 



> As for the actual argument itself, how is this different from arguing against the Feywild in ANY setting? There's just as valid a reason to have the Feywild in Athas as it is in any other setting.




To a certain extent, it is.

The Feywild is not necessary for any setting.

In a lot of fantasy settings, though, it is appealing and great to have: otherworldy extreme nature and emotion with tricksy fey and capricious nature-beings is a wonderful fantasy archetype, and the Feywild does a nice job of doing that.

Athas does not need that. In fact, for reasons I've outlined, I think it would _detract_ from the appeal of the setting, from what makes the setting unique (the two big notes being: nature is broken, and the world is isolated from the planes). 



			
				TheFan said:
			
		

> People keep picking on the Feywild, but can you imagine the Athasian Shadowfell?




"The Grey" is fine, but even that doesn't need any more than a sidelong mention, because by and large it is not a place to go have adventures or meet friends and enemies or get treasure. 



			
				amysrevenge said:
			
		

> I think the motivation for trying to make these things work is to be able to use as much of the standard 4E cosmology as possible in a way that doesn't compromise the "feel" of Dark Sun.




Even if you keep the Feywild, if you change it to be some plane of extreme deserts and sandstorms, the Feywild as presented in the MotP is _already_ practically useless.

But the bigger puzzle in my mind is that anyone playing in Dark Sun needs the standard 4e cosmology. 

Why would they?

Isn't part of the appeal of a different world, you know, playing in _a different world_? One where the normal rules don't always apply? Isn't this especially true of a "weird" setting like Dark Sun? One where part of the concept of the world is that it is cut off from the planes, and that nature is broken?

I mean, I'd think the Divine power source would be more core to the game than the Feywild, but they even seem to be pretty OK with abandoning that, so why bother keeping the Feywild around?



> This would also make the setting a bit more accessible to new people. You can describe the world sucinctly and capture most of what is different, without having to list all of the individual changes instead: "Dark Sun is about a world that has been turned into an unnatural desert by the irresponsible use of arcane magic. The Feywild and Shadowfell are now reflections of this sand-blasted land, with all the changes this would imply about their denizens." An example of the kind of thing that you wouldn't have to explain further with this setup, but would have to explain otherwise: Eladrin can still step into the Feywild to teleport.




I think it would be more effective to say: "Dark Sun is a setting about survival in a dying world. Arcane magic ripped apart nature, making it a heroic effort simply to survive in the unforgiving environment. There are no gods, there are no angels, there are only the impersonal elemental forces to hear your cries, and stone has never cared about your feelings. Death is a release, but it is nothing more than oblivion. Nature is dead, reduced to oblivion, the Feywild is destroyed and the bones of gnomes and pixies and shee and eladrin are rotting beneath the dunes. On Dark Sun, arcane magic has destroyed nature, and only the efforts of heroes, your characters, might have a hope of restoring it."

Eladrin don't have to even _exist_. If they can abandon the entire Divine power source, they can abandon the Feywild, easy. 



			
				avin said:
			
		

> Shadowfell and Feywild are an intrinsec part of 4E and will be in.




I don't see them as more intrinsic than the Divine power source, which is apparently out. In fact, I'd say they were significantly LESS intrinsic. 

It's questions like this that make Dark Sun a make-it-or-break-it kind of setting, though. If WotC kow-tows to the cross-compatability dogma, it will showcase the limits of their imagination and courage, here. If they suck it up and make the setting truly different, it will show that they're willing to go in new directions.

I am not looking for a Dark Sun that is "D&D in the Desert." I'm looking for a different kind of game experience. It sounds like the team might be somewhat in line with that thinking, because they're kicking out the divine power source, and they're not shoehorning in 4eisms (according to the notes in this thread, anyway). That's good. That's excellent. If they go back on that, it will be not so good, not so excellent. Probably, in fact, for me, making me really disappointed with 4e as a whole, knowing that even when they're trying something new and courageous, they have to shoehorn the Feywild (or whatever) into it somehow.


----------



## Hussar

Really, at the end of the day, considering who is publishing this, it'll probably split the difference.  They will at the very least include options for including stock 4e'isms most likely.  However, I don't think they will be ramming them in willy nilly either.  I'm fairly trusting of what they will do, without going too far out on a limb anyway.


----------



## SkidAce

I like what I have heard from Wizards so far.  I believe that Dark Sun IS their chance to make a setting that doesn't have everything standard that the other settings have, and I think that's their goal.

They made FR core, Eberron is core, Dark Sun...not so core.

Having said that, my prophecy is there will be no "Feywild" and there will be a re-imagined "Shadowfell" i.e. the Grey.


----------



## I'm A Banana

Given the staff comments posted here, I'm fairly optimistic, too. I'm not sure it's all that possible for the people who originally designed the setting to not understand it that well.  But DS has, for better or worse, in my mind, grabbed the baton for 4e's potential to do things that are different. If it turns out, despite my optimism, being the same old drag with an orange coat of paint, it won't just be DS that disappoints me.


----------



## Stogoe

> I think what Kamikaze is saying is, you're asking the wrong question. You're asking "Why not put the feywild in?" when the question should be "Why should we put this in?"
> 
> Eh, maybe it's just me, but it smells of change for the sake of change.



They should keep the core cosmology because that way it's far easier to convince people new to Dark Sun to buy into the setting.  "Throw out everything you know about 4e and learn all this highly specific stuff that can't be used in other settings, and here's fifty pages of stuff that overwrites all the normal stuff that you'll now have to unlearn" is a terrible, terrible idea if you want people to buy and play your new setting.


----------



## Mort_Q

Stogoe said:


> They should keep the core cosmology because that way it's far easier to convince people new to Dark Sun to buy into the setting.  "Throw out everything you know about 4e and learn all this highly specific stuff that can't be used in other settings, and here's fifty pages of stuff that overwrites all the normal stuff that you'll now have to unlearn" is a terrible, terrible idea if you want people to buy and play your new setting.




I disagree.  For me, that would be a selling feature.  I want a far more limited cosmology.  I want fewer supported races.


----------



## I'm A Banana

> "Throw out everything you know about 4e and learn all this highly specific stuff that can't be used in other settings, and here's fifty pages of stuff that overwrites all the normal stuff that you'll now have to unlearn"




Man, you'd make a lousy copy writer. 

"Bored of old wizards in robes and dwarves in full plate and magical elves and the tired old fantasy cliches? Think that's all D&D is good for? Prepare to be shocked! Dark Sun takes the new edition in bold new directions, introducing a world unlike any other! Slowly wasting away after arcane magic broke the natural order, Athas is a brutal, dying world, abandoned by the gods where strange mutant monsters, tyrannical sorcerer-kings, and the wild, shattered, destructive environment itself threaten your character's survival more than any goblin or demon ever has before. Nothing is the same in this devastated world of secretive wizards and psychic savants, where each day is a heroic struggle against the elements, where the Fey have been destroyed and creatures like cannibal halflnigs, mantis-like Thri-Kreen, and gladiator-pit-bred half-dwarf "Muls" come together to fight for freedom and hope, and where your life is a constant struggle against the bloody red sphere in the sky: the Dark Sun. Dark Sun: 2010. Can you stand the heat?"

I mean, maybe a little verbose, but I think it gets the point across. 

You make these things a feature: no Feywild, no gods, arcane magic kills plants, elves are nomads...this stuff is why DS is appealing to me in the first place. It's not normal. It doesn't HAVE to be normal. Let FR be normal. Let Eberron include normal (along with other stuff). Let DS be exceptional. It's compatible in that there's no mechanical conflicts, so, as always, it's up to the DM what to put in and what to take out, but it doesn't have to be an assumed part of the setting.


----------



## Andor

Stogoe said:


> They should keep the core cosmology because that way it's far easier to convince people new to Dark Sun to buy into the setting.  "Throw out everything you know about 4e and learn all this highly specific stuff that can't be used in other settings, and here's fifty pages of stuff that overwrites all the normal stuff that you'll now have to unlearn" is a terrible, terrible idea if you want people to buy and play your new setting.




4e DarkSun: It's just like the Forgotten Realms but with a coat of _beige!_

Yeah .... No thanks, I'll stick with different.


----------



## Hussar

Yeah, I gotta go with KM and other on this one.  They already have vanilla settings for 4e - Forgotten Realms and Eberron are both pretty standard fantasy - one grounded in older traditions and one in newer - but both pretty much kitchen sink settings.  Having a new setting that is different won't hurt anything IMO.


----------



## Nai_Calus

You'd make a lousy copywriter too, K_M. 

Any time anything begins with going on about 'tired old fantasy cliches', I do the following things:

1. Stop reading
2. Figure the writers have no idea what they're doing because they feel the need to start with an attack rather than with why what they're trying to sell is supposedly so awesome
3. Frequently remove whatever it is from all further consideration, because I find traditional fantasy to be neither tired nor old, enjoy it quite a lot, and find that whatever it is that's smashing those tired old cliches frequently does so in a manner that is itself incredibly cliche(How many times have I heard 'I hate traditional elves, so mine are all feral and brutal'?) and also a turn-off to me.

Which, yes, we've already established that for reasons that include #3 above, I hate Dark Sun and consider it the pinnacle of 'fantasy things I hate'(Man Arrakis is a less  place to live than Athas). But it applies in general to things I'm not familiar with as well. I had no idea what Dark Sun was at one point, for that matter. It was introduced in threads as basically the 'smashing tired old cliches' thing, which immediately put me on my guard, and learning what the setting was actually about just confirmed it.

Number 2, though, is somewhat indicative of exactly what they need to not do to market it. There are people who like both 'tired old cliches' *and* 'this is different!' who would be put off by bashing of the one thing they like in an attempt to sell them something else they like. 

Planescape, which I do like, and which isn't as cliche as most people make it out to, I came across mentioned as a setting where one might find 'demons and angels sitting in a bar in Sigil talking about things over a mug of ale'. This is different, kills the standard operating procedure, but doesn't go on about how much a setting where this would never, ever happen is tired and old and cliched.

(Though I often think that the fans of a setting/game system/anything are often its worst enemy. Asking Eberron fans what there is in Eberron for someone who likes traditional fantasy once got me some snotty nasty replies that just served to put me off the setting further out of not wanting to ever associate with people like that. It's like why I read FR novels but you'd have a hell of a time getting me to actually play FR. Canon lawyers, fanboys, those who cry that you're doing it wrong and stupid for not loving something as much as they do. All these things are bad for what they're trying to support.)


----------



## TheWyrd

A while back, someone suggested the idea of a planeless world where in all of the planes more or less existed geographically only. So the feywild was when you found yourself in a particularly dark primordial forest, the shadowfell was when you hit that dark graveyard around midnight, the astral sea is where you ended up if you flew too high and when you go down through the underdark far enough, you'll eventually hit the elemental chaos. There are 'shortcuts' that summoners can take when calling creatures to aid them but there is just one world.

This might be an interesting take for DarkSun.


----------



## I'm A Banana

Nai_Calus said:
			
		

> I hate Dark Sun and consider it the pinnacle of 'fantasy things I hate'




And that's totally fine. Dark Sun, I take it, isn't for you. It doesn't have to be. You've got two perfectly good settings already, more on the way, and can homebrew to your hearts' content! FR wasn't for everybody (4e FR, I'm sure some would argue, was specifically NOT for FR fans ), Eberron isn't for everybody (Not everyone loves magitek and advanced technology in their fantasy!), and Planescape isn't for everybody (people who have an issue with alignment might not appreciate PS's nuanced take on metaphysics). 

For Dark Sun, it's difference is part of it's appeal. It isn't traditional fantasy. That's part of what makes it awesome in my eyes. 

And you can probably still yank parts of it, I'm sure. I mean, half-giants are pretty easily portable, so are many of the monsters, and even individual locations like Tyr or villainous Defilers might be interesting out-of-context in your own setting (perhaps the PC's can thwart the apocalypse before it happens!). Even if you don't like psionics, maybe you like the idea of elemental druids? Sure. Run with that. If all you want to do is dismantle it and port it into your world piece-by-piece, that should be fine and encouraged. 

But I think it's safe to say that Dark Sun's violation of traditional fantasy is very appealing to a lot of people, and allowing them to play *in Dark Sun* (and not in some 4e-style pseudo-Dark Sun with all the newest fads added on in some misguided pursuit of compatability) is going to be the main value here. 

DS is not going to appeal to traditionalists, even if the copy on the back of the book says so. Best bet is to sell it to the nontraditionalists, since not everyone is a fan of bog-standard fantasy. 

(and I am, but I also get bored of settings rather quickly)


----------



## DM_Fiery_Fist

I am really optimistic about the new setting.  I think this is an opportunity for Wizards to build upon some of the creativity we saw from TSR during second edition (Dark Sun and Planescape are two fantastic examples) and to distance themselves somewhat from the MMORPG market.  I will certainly be buying the fourth edition rulebooks after this.


----------



## Jack99

I must admit that I am going to throw my hat in with KM here. Dark Sun should be different from the rest - FR was straight by the book (read core), Eberron sligthly less so (different gods, slightly altered cosmology), so here is the chance to do something completely different that can truely blow our minds.I really liked 4e Eberron Campaign Guide as a book and as a setting, but it is still too much like what I can make myself. 

No more vanilla, I want Orange!


----------



## UngeheuerLich

I suppose DS will work quite well with most of 4e default assupmtions. It will be timed perfectly with psionic classes (And with this setting in mind, the monk as a psionic class work even better). Feywild and Shadowfell as alternate worlds are possible but not necessary.

I wonder what the default array for DS in 4e is... probably a bit higher...


----------



## Fallen Seraph

Yeah I am also throwing my hat in with KM. I want to see Dark Sun to really showcase how different it is, and hopefully become a standard for future settings, that each push their field of fantasy.

That won't stop me from going, "hmm... what if" for fun though


----------



## vagabundo

It looks like I'm in for the PH3 and all the dark sun stuff. I'd better start saving now.


----------



## Nai_Calus

Right, Dark Sun should stay just the way it is, lest we have a repeat of the godawfulness that was 4e FR. (Which is fit only to swipe the Swordmage class, Drow and Genasi from and not for using at all.) (Besides, if any kind of decent astral realm existed in the astral sea were it included, I can see a lot of characters saying screw it to the world and just settling down, heh. Not what the setting needs if it's going to keep its feel.)

But the difference can be marketed without pooh-poohing traditional fantasy in the ad copy, is what I'm saying, or in the forum posting. 

It's the 'traditional fantasy sucks and is boring, give me something different!' angle that annoys me. I might be otherwise irked that they're releasing two settings in a row I don't like, but I can deal with that and shrug it off. 

It's the 'if you don't like it what's wrong with you' and the 'traditional fantasy is a tired old cliche' that I see so often that really puts me off. It's a knee-jerk reaction. I probably would have been wary about Planescape if someone had gone on about how it was awesome because it was different than boring old lame trad. fantasy. 

Saying it's different is enough.


----------



## Danzauker

This is for me the greatest announcement since 4e PHB1.

Almost EVERYTHING the designers are saying they will do, is exactly wat I wanted for Dark Sun.

Reboot to pre-Free Tyr timeline? That's a dream come true!

I'm also very impressed by the different approaches they are taking in reissuing the settings. Different problems need different solutions,after all.

The Realms are a setting where almost everything has been said and done. It's been pratically alive through the previous 2 editions. The only pratical way to adapt it to 4ed, eqpecially if you want it to be a sort of "default" setting, is a good time shift. Think it as the Forgotten Realms: The Next Generation approach.

Ebeeron is another matter entirely. It's possibilities have just begun to be explored. Plus, it sort of was the "playground" for the developing of 4e, so transition is so easy that basically needs to shoehorn a little the new classes and races, and convert it's peculiarities to be ready to go.

Dark Sun, on the other way, has been out of print for all of 3ed. I'd not be surprised if it was a sort of urban legend for 3ed newcomers. Something everyone has heard from older gamers, but few ever actually saw or played. It's potential, expecially the initial implied setting, is still there. In this case, the remake approach, is fully justified.

I would not mind if the designers tried to shoehorn some of the new races and classes in the setting, as long as they keep the basic assumptions there (sorcerer-kings, desert land, veiled alliance, no gods, warped races etc.).

I hope they keep the remake approach for other classic settings, too, such as Spelljammer or, who knows  Mystara.


----------



## Dice4Hire

As someone posted upthread, I find myself buying nothing more from WOTC this year except maybe-possibly a few Miniatures from the next set in September/October. Next year all the Dark Sun stuff,, Players, Campaign and adventure... will be mine.....


----------



## Somebloke

When all is said and done, the GRIMDARK is perhaps the most important part of the Dark Sun feel- anything that messes with this needs to be lost.


----------



## I'm A Banana

Fallen Seraph said:
			
		

> Yeah I am also throwing my hat in with KM. I want to see Dark Sun to really showcase how different it is, and hopefully become a standard for future settings, that each push their field of fantasy.
> 
> That won't stop me from going, "hmm... what if" for fun though




Which is cool. There's a lot of neat ideas for desert-based feywild realms popping up here, even if I'd hate to see them in DS itself (unending standstorms, genies, mirage-lands....I like these!). The idea of ruined astral realms of the once-gods sounds like fun, too. A different sort of fun than Dark Sun's gritty survivalism, but really nice for a more traditional game. I don't want to put the kibosh on cool ideas, I just want to make sure that I relay my desire for core Dark Sun to be *Dark Sun*, and not to be 4e in a desert.  Like the man said, a lot of potential story opportunity for being the only paladin on Athas, even if we say you won't be by default. 



			
				Nai_Calus said:
			
		

> It's the 'if you don't like it what's wrong with you' and the 'traditional fantasy is a tired old cliche' that I see so often that really puts me off.




Ah, I see. Though to me, the "cliche" dig isn't very negative. I know basic Tolkeinesque fantasy is cliche. I still like it a lot!  

But yes, it's different. Not th at it doesn't have interesting possibilities for you to loot anyway (a corrupt city ruled by a powerful arcane caster? half-giant/niphilim? monsters? a villain who defiles? All basically cross-portable!).


----------



## Hussar

Fallen Seraph said:


> Yeah I am also throwing my hat in with KM. I want to see Dark Sun to really showcase how different it is, and hopefully become a standard for future settings, that each push their field of fantasy.
> 
> That won't stop me from going, "hmm... what if" for fun though




My hat of KM no know limit.


----------



## hexgrid

ProfessorCirno said:


> I think what Kamikaze is saying is, you're asking the wrong question.  You're asking "Why not put the feywild in?" when the question should be "Why should we put this in?"
> 
> Eh, maybe it's just me, but it smells of change for the sake of change.  "Well, our other settings have this, we better throw it into this one as well."  That's not really a good reason to force a change to the setting.




Part of the appeal of Dark Sun was that it took standard D&D assumptions, and either twisted them into something new, or them this out.

A 4e Darksun has a different set of starting assumptions than a 2e Darksun, and the Feywild is one of them. Twisting it into something new is just as valid an approach as throwing it out.


----------



## firesnakearies

_I live in a world of fire and sand. The crimson sun scorches the life from anything that crawls or flies, and storms of sand scour the foliage from the barren ground.  Lightning strikes from the cloudless sky, and peals of thunder roll unexplained across the vast tablelands. Even the wind, dry and searing as a kiln, can kill a man with thirst._

_This is a land of blood and dust, where tribes of feral elves sweep out of the salt plains to plunder lonely caravans, mysterious singing winds call men to slow suffocation in a Sea of Silt, and legions of slaves clash over a few bushels of moldering grain. The dragon despoils entire cities, while selfish kings squander their armies raising gaudy palaces and garish tombs._

_This is my home, Athas. It is an arid and bleak place, a wasteland with a handful of austere cities clinging precariously to a few scattered oases. It is a brutal and savage land, beset by political strife and monstrous abominations, where life is grim and short._






Hell yeah!  Dark Sun is BACK!

It's about time.



$


----------



## The_Fan

I agree, and I think it takes more creativity to find a way to fit something like the Feywild to a setting than it takes to throw it out. You can simply say "Eladrin don't exist, period." Or you can figure out how Eladrin, forced to stop using their magic would adapt to the situation.


----------



## SSquirrel

I believe the correct response for the new cover art is "SCHWING!!"

Very exciting news.  Dark Sun fan from way back.  I think I have most of the books leading up to the revised box set, which I thought was awful.  I even managed a couple of the rarity books like Will and the Way 



Silverblade The Ench said:


> _"Where are we going?"
> "To get bigger guns!!"
> "*HALLELUJAH!!"*_*
> *
> 
> A quote most apropos for Dark Sun




Quoting Split Second = awesome.  always


----------



## Fallen Seraph

Kamikaze Midget said:


> Which is cool. There's a lot of neat ideas for desert-based feywild realms popping up here, even if I'd hate to see them in DS itself (unending standstorms, genies, mirage-lands....I like these!). The idea of ruined astral realms of the once-gods sounds like fun, too. A different sort of fun than Dark Sun's gritty survivalism, but really nice for a more traditional game. I don't want to put the kibosh on cool ideas, I just want to make sure that I relay my desire for core Dark Sun to be *Dark Sun*, and not to be 4e in a desert.  Like the man said, a lot of potential story opportunity for being the only paladin on Athas, even if we say you won't be by default.



*Nods* Quite so, I am just going crazy with pondering for now. Since well, till we get our first true preview, all we are got is what the developers say they are doing. I so hope next month we get a preview, we got a Artificer playtest a whole year before Eberron, so come on something similar


----------



## GMforPowergamers

the truth is that we RPGers are a very resourcful and creative group. I used warforged as my example of 'wow well that can never fit in athas' and got not 1, not 2, but 3 diffrent way they could fit. 
I gurantee you *COULD** make DS a kitchen sink setting, and still keep the flavor...except it would requare major rewrites...having said that if we limit it to the few really cool new ideas...it will be the best 4e setting yet///


----------



## SSquirrel

Roman said:


> they could fill the role of the Templar along with 'evil Paladins' (good Paladins don't fit)...




From the 4E PHB: "Power Source: Divine. You are a divine warrior, a crusader
and protector of your faith."

Paladins are champions of a particular belief and thus can be found as good, neutral or evil.  They made Paladins more like the Champion in Monte's Arcana Unearthed/Evolved, which was an excellent move IMO.  So yes, Paladins could exist in DS, you would just have to have their power source figured out.  If there are no gods, what provides powers to Divine characters?




Andor said:


> And what would a 'Realms changing disaster' look like in Dark Sun anyway? The Sorcerer Kings lay down sod? A Halfling population explosion? Elves invent running shoes?




This is just hilarious.  Thank you.



Kamikaze Midget said:


> If my powers and flavor and archetype depend on "otherworldly" influences, I'm going around channeling other planes in every adventure. Which does pretty much the opposite of signifying that Athas is isolated and functionally cut off from other planes. "Can't be that cut off! This bloke from beyond the stars who lives in a land of magic came through here just when I was a kid, gave me magical powers in exchange for my soul, and now loans them to me on a daily basis!"




See I guess I just don't see the Feywild and Shadowfell as other planes per se.  More like they are parallel versions of the Prime Material plane that are hiding behind curtains.  It is less that you are jumping to a different plane and more like you step sideways into an alternate version of the normal world where you move a bit faster than normal, dart across and re-appear over here.  This isn't nearly the same as opening a portal and re-appearing in the Happy Hunting Grounds or the Abyss.  Normal Athas/Shadowfell Athas/Feywild Athas are all intimately tied together and don't allow you to go anywhere else any more easily than Athas normally makes it.  Wasn't the spelljammer story that Athas was surrounded by its own crystal shell and it was hard/impossible to penetrate?





			
				kamikaze midget said:
			
		

> If it's followed, it also means that the stranglehold "core compatability" has had on the rules might have been nearly abandoned by now. Huzzah! This would make me a very happy camper, since it would give 4e some real "take this in a new direction" possibility. It would be like telling DM's all over the world, through example: "You know, it's OK to say your world doesn't have dragonborn in it." It's something that after FR's RSE and Eberron's cosmology I would not have expected. It excites me that this is possible.
> 
> And they're absolutely right to practically prohibit it like this, to say "There's a reason we didn't put this in here. If you want to add it back in, knowing our reasons, that's fine. It could be a lot of fun. It's not going to cause any balance issues. But for our concerns, it's not in."





See I can see both sides of this issue.  In 2E they were creating 8 jillion differentsettings and supporting every one of them with regular updates, adventures, sourcebooks etc.  In that model having everything be different allowed for niches, but it also meant that niches usually produce less sales and you have to support everything somehow.  Cut forward to 4E and the design now calls for a Player's Guide, a core book and maybe a few adventures and then you are done.  You can afford a nichier product for an annual setting b/c there is less investment needed to produce the entire product line.

At the same time, I think the core of D&D is in much better shape in 4E than it was in 2E.  Much more flexible and better design all around.  So I think that just saying "well it wasn't in 2E so it shouldn't be in the 4E version" is a very knee jerk reaction and not very useful.  If they look at things like the Feywild and Shadowfell and conclude that they don't fit in any way, shape or form and having them in just to have them would detract from the product, by all means don't include them.  But if they look at them and find interesting things they can do with it and make it blend well with Athas, why would they not include it?




amysrevenge said:


> For the record, I am a big fan of the notion of the Feywild having already been "used up" as a primo source for defiling magic (possibly with isolated pokets of green still existing here and there, fiercely guarded by fey protectors), and thus existing in a much worse state than even Athas itself.
> 
> Not as sure what to do about the Shadowfell though.





The Shadowfell is Athas at night.  The sun is never seen, only the moons.  No sun means it is deathly cold, like a desert at night can be.  The Feywild and Shadowfell have both been corrupted by the defiling magic that devastated the natural world.  The Feywild may be a bit more verdant than Athas is now.  Maybe it is even the world as it would have been had the defiling magic never come to be.  The Eladrin may all have the ability to cross this area naturally, but it is a bittersweet gift to see the lush, verdant world that it could be only in passing, and then they return to the real world.  Never able to stay in what is a comparative paradise.

Yeah a few different ideas there, but all possible.  The decision the designers have to make is "Do all of these things add to the Dark Sun experience in a positive way?".  If they do, use them.  If not, discard them.  Worst case scenario, their campaign setting sales for a year are a bit lower and they move on and go to a new setting next year, which they already plan on anyway.


----------



## Thorkull

*Too many settings is bad, right?*

Wow, way too many posts to read 'em all, sorry if this has been mentioned before.

Is anyone else concerned that WotC is doing to 4e what TSR did to 2e?  Publishing a whole slew of settings and suffering from dilution of their customer base?


----------



## SSquirrel

No b/c they aren't continuing support on all of them.  In 2E you had FR, Spelljammer, Planescape, DL, Red Steel, Ravenloft, etc etc and products coming out on a regular basis for all of them.  If you only have 5 products for a line and then consider it complete, you don't have the ongoing support and throwing money at an increasinly niche product.


----------



## Mort_Q

Thorkull said:


> Wow, way too many posts to read 'em all, sorry if this has been mentioned before.
> 
> Is anyone else concerned that WotC is doing to 4e what TSR did to 2e?  Publishing a whole slew of settings and suffering from dilution of their customer base?




One setting a year isn't whole slew in my opinion, though I agree that they need to find a balance.  

That said, I've always hated the realms... not sure why.  I like much of Eberron, though I hate that they wanted it to have everything... like Drow.

Having a setting that is different it good.


----------



## Scribble

Thorkull said:


> Wow, way too many posts to read 'em all, sorry if this has been mentioned before.
> 
> Is anyone else concerned that WotC is doing to 4e what TSR did to 2e?  Publishing a whole slew of settings and suffering from dilution of their customer base?




The problem 2e ran into wasn't just that they had a lot of settings.  It was that they had a lot of settings and each one had a product line which most often contained products that duplicated material in other settings.

Now they create multiple campaign worlds, but the bulk of the material for ALL campaign worlds is found in the "generic" product line.


----------



## Mouseferatu

Thorkull said:


> Is anyone else concerned that WotC is doing to 4e what TSR did to 2e?  Publishing a whole slew of settings and suffering from dilution of their customer base?




Nope. Multiple settings are a problem only if the company attempts to support them all, because then a huge part of their catalog is occupied by books that only a smaller and smaller niche of the market is going to want to buy.

But the "three books and out" model prevents that. At worst, it means that three of the year's books risk appealing to only a niche, rather than an ongoing series.


----------



## catsclaw227

Jack99 said:


> I must admit that I am going to throw my hat in with KM here. Dark Sun should be different from the rest - FR was straight by the book (read core), Eberron sligthly less so (different gods, slightly altered cosmology), so here is the chance to do something completely different that can truely blow our minds.I really liked 4e Eberron Campaign Guide as a book and as a setting, but it is still too much like what I can make myself.
> 
> No more vanilla, I want Orange!



Do you mean.... ORANGE SHERBET?  Yummy!  

But, uh, yea.  Toss me in with KM and his followers.  I want a 4e DS that pushes the envelope in different ways, but not one that requires (or even assumes) that all the 4e-isms exist.  I want to see new 4e DarkSun-isms.


----------



## lvl20dm

I love speculating, and I love Dark Sun (the first campaign setting I purchased) - here we go:
1) Discussion at the Con mentioned that Divine Characters would be discouraged (though not prohibited). My guess is that they might operate as servants of the Sorcerer-Kings. On the other hand, they might get their powers from the faith alone. Either way, it is interesting to see an entire power source de-emphasized. This indicates to me that they are more willing with Dark Sun to depart from the assumed setting of the core books.

2) They are moving the setting back to the original boxed set. This _could_ mean that the history of the setting is substantially altered (no Cleansing Wars, no Blue Age/Green Age, no Halflings as the creator race, no Rajaat, etc.). Kalak would still be alive and ruling Tyr, assuming that the geography of the Tablelands is the same (though they ought to make it bigger - that place is very small). Many of the areas detailed in the revised box set could be altered or removed (Last Sea? Pterran cities? kreen empire?). On the other hand, they might adopt much of the background, and simply ignore the actions of Rikus & Co.

3)The flora & fauna of Athas was pretty unique - you could (and TSR did) fill two monster manuals with creatures for the setting. My guess is that MM3 might have more than few "Athasian" creatures. They could even make suggestions on re-skinning certain creatures from the previous MM's. I expect that Giants will be more like the elemental 4e incarnations, though obviously more savage (and hopefully still strolling around the Silt Sea). Athas was unique in that (at first at least) it only had 1 dragon - it will be interesting to see if that approach is maintained. The MM's spend lots of space on Dragons and we are fast seeing the approach of the second Draconomicon. They could make transformed defilers more common, make Chromatics and Metallics a created race of servants, or something even stranger.

4) Finding a place for the many races of 4e could be challenging. Dragonborn would be either creations of the Sorc-Kings or could simply be Dray (if they keep Dregoth around or not). Tieflings could be the scions of a cursed City-State. Eladrin could have a Persian or Arabian feel - the Feywild could be just as blighted as Athas, perhaps more so. Gnomes could be extemely reclusive cave-dwellers only rarely seen by the more common races. 
Ultimately, they might give many of the races an Athasian "make-over" - Elves, Halflings, and Dwarves all look quite different from their core counterparts, and the same might be true of Goliaths, Devas, and so forth. As an example, they might make Goliaths more elemental, framing them as a tribe of dwarves or humans that have become mystically bound to the mountains in which they dwell.


----------



## Andor

I still think the simplest thing to do with Eladrin is make them a subrace of Elves with a knack for psionic teleportation. It's DarkSun. Everyone is supposed to have a bit of psi. Man... It just now occurred to me that under 3e everyone in Athas would have access to psionic feat goodness. Yummm.....


----------



## I'm A Banana

Hussar said:
			
		

> My hat of KM no know limit.












			
				hexgrid said:
			
		

> A 4e Darksun has a different set of starting assumptions than a 2e Darksun, and the Feywild is one of them.




Doesn't have to be. If the divine power source -- more than four entire classes -- isn't part of the assumption, than I don't see why the Feywild is sacrosanct.



			
				The_Fan said:
			
		

> I think it takes more creativity to find a way to fit something like the Feywild to a setting than it takes to throw it out. You can simply say "Eladrin don't exist, period." Or you can figure out how Eladrin, forced to stop using their magic would adapt to the situation.




Two things.

Thing number one is that creativity is not very easily quantified, so whenever someone says "more" or "less" creative, I'm inclined to think of that more as meaning: "I like it more," or "I like it less." The quantity of creativity isn't what affects that like or dislike, since you can't accurately measure creativity, so I wonder what it is that does affect it. 

Thing number two is that throwing out Eladrin makes room for something more _native to the setting_. There's a limited pagecount, and a limited brainspace to think of things, and the less time spent trying to shoehorn in legacy creatures, the more time can be spent giving me new awesome things.

The Eladrin, the Feywild, the Divine Power Source, the Far Realm...none of these things are such pure greatness and good that they need to be pervasive throughout everything WotC puts out for the next decade. It's like trying to use the same set of tools to build a birdhouse or build a rocket ship. Why not use tools that are suited to each task, rather than trying to hammer nails into steel? Why not use things that are part of the setting, naturally and organically, rather than forcing entirely superfluous material on it just because it happened to also be in the first Player's Handbook?

If you really like 'em and want to put 'em back -- if you really want to build that rocket ship with your hammer -- I don't think anyone should stop you. But I think, in general, the tools should be suited to the task: the game elements you use for a setting should be part of that setting, not part of some other setting and forced in just to pursue some abstract goal of perfect unification of all disparate elements.


----------



## SSquirrel

Kamikaze Midget said:


> But I think, in general, the tools should be suited to the task: the game elements you use for a setting should be part of that setting, not part of some other setting and forced in just to pursue some abstract goal of perfect unification of all disparate elements.





And this is true, but if they are able to look at the things you don't think should be in there and find good uses for them that enhance the setting in a positive way, they would be stupid to rule them out just b/c they didn't originate in 2E DS.


----------



## I'm A Banana

> And this is true, but if they are able to look at the things you don't think should be in there and find good uses for them that enhance the setting in a positive way, they would be stupid to rule them out just b/c they didn't originate in 2E DS.




I'm not a purist about it. If the hammer makes sense, use it. There's no reason to give us new stats for Athasian elves if the basic 4e elf stats work fine (ditto halflnigs, dwarves, whatever). Maybe an alternate racial encounter power to re-enforce the different flavor, but whatever. 

But if there's no compelling reason to use it (like the Feywild, like the Far Realm, like the Divine power source, like Eladrin, like Tieflings), there's no point in trying to force the square peg through the round hole. Probably you'll only get it halfway through anyway, and then you'll have neither a peg nor a hole anymore, you'll just have some sort of half-stuck peghole mutant that nobody can use (as, some would argue, 4e FR turned out to be. ). 

With Athas enjoying the lizard/bug side of the critter palette, I see no reason that Dragonborn can't fit, for instance. Re-fluffed and maybe with a new racial power (and renamed, perhaps), they fit pretty well, and add a "lizard person" option for PC's that really would enhance Dark Sun, I think (since we've already got "bug people" with the Thri-Kreen). 

IMO, extremists are for religion and politics, not so much for RPG settings.  I'm a functionalist: if it works, use it, if it doesn't work, drop it. The time and effort spent trying to make something fit could instead be spent _making a friggin' round peg_.


----------



## Stogoe

Mort_Q said:


> I like much of Eberron, though I hate that they wanted it to have everything... like Drow.



Eberron was explicitly created to have everything in it.  That was the whole point of the setting search.


----------



## the8bitdeity

Stogoe said:


> Eberron was explicitly created to have everything in it.  That was the whole point of the setting search.




Plus Drow in Eberron are NOT your typical Drow from Faerun.


----------



## coyote6

Kamikaze Midget said:


> Doesn't have to be. If the divine power source -- more than four entire classes -- isn't part of the assumption, than I don't see why the Feywild is sacrosanct.




Speaking of divine classes -- couldn't they just reassign all the divine classes to other power sources, and keep the classes, powers, etc. intact? So, clerics and avengers get tossed in Primal, paladins become psionic (or whatever) -- something like that?

Or just reskin the whole divine power source -- perhaps make it something connected to the Sorcerer Kings, so that "Divine" in Dark Sun is actually "Templar" or whatever.

<insert standard disclaimer: I don't play 4e much>


----------



## Henry

Oh, I do have to say, I can REALLY SEE a cadre of "templar" paladins defending King Kalak from all threats, with his retinue of Warlocks with the Sorcerer-King pact ashing the local flora as they toss off bolts of hellish green fire...


----------



## I'm A Banana

Coyote6 said:
			
		

> Speaking of divine classes -- couldn't they just reassign all the divine classes to other power sources, and keep the classes, powers, etc. intact?




That's actually the route I THOUGHT they were going to go. They re-assign Primal to elements (makes total sense and works with the setting); they re-assign arcane to preserving/defiling (sure); they re-assign Divine to the sorcerer-kings ("Templars" are already pretty expressly divine).

They're maybe not doing that, though, at least according to the staff quote upthread.

It could be for a few reasons, aside from the "gods are dead" theory. One of the first that leaps to my head is that they don't want to encourage evil PC's, but any PC that got his power from a sorcerer-king would probably be pretty evil. And not the sort of distant "I'll get your soul someday" quasi-evil that is an infernal sorcerer, but expressly, obviously, in every city in the world, oppressively evil. It's _hard_ for a Templar to go on adventures alongside a freedom-fighting Mul. It's hard for them to hang out at a bar together. It's hard for them not to kill each other on sight. 

Though it excites me that they're willing to even consider dropping an entire power source like that, because it means their brains are thinking as far out of the box as they might go with 4e, and that's exactly what I've been waiting for since the limitations of the edition were first announced.


----------



## SSquirrel

Glad to see that if they come up with good reasons to keep them around that you won't still be against it.  I had to wonder there for a bit KM  

I could see someone not being pure evil and being a Templar.  They could be seeking revenge and on the inside is the best route for them.  They may have to do some things they find repellent, but in their mind it is serving the greater good to achieve their goals.  They could just be doing it b/c it's the only way for them to survive.  Maybe it eats them up at night and they try and keep their own goals, but it gets so hard when so many around you are cruel and vicious.

Henry>I so love that mental picture as well, sounds pretty darn cool to me.

4E and limitations>See I don't choose to look at the options I don't have from 3E and see limitations, I look at the things I can  do now or even just the things that are much easier to do now and go with that.  I have a friend that always has the exact character in her head that she wanst to play.  Many times she rolls poorly and then sulks b/c she doesn't have the stats to support her idea.  Most of the time I either have a few possibilities in mind or nothing and just start rolling stats.  An idea presents itself and as I start picking things like skills and gear a history and personality starts forming itself.

It may be that since I'm already used to filling in on what is needed and being a bit more easy going about my characters that I'm not bothered by some of the 4E simplifications.  Or maybe I'm just getting old


----------



## Andor

*Did we miss this bit?*

According to this link what they said was: 


			
				4E Extravaganza said:
			
		

> “We are going to try very hard not to shoehorn 4e conceits into Dark Sun” said Bill, to which Andy added that they’re going to examine how things have evolved on other D&D worlds, then seeing how that same thing would evolve on Dark Sun.




Andy's comment on looking at how things would evolve on Athas makes me think they are going to lean towards having an Athasian version of the Feywild, unless maybe I'm reading too much into that.

You know, the line about 4e conceits made me think... The 4e alignment bar is a poor fit for Athas. 4e goes LG-G-N-E-CE. Where as on Athas the primary line of conflict is closer to LE vs CG. Two alignments that no longer exist. O_O Frex who the heck is LG on Athas? What kind hearted person believes in reforming the system from within when the system consists of an immortal, evil God-Emperor and his henchmen? Conversely the sharp contrast between the chaotic perils of the desert like raiders and monters and the organized, regimented, civilized evil of the city-states is softened a bit by the loss of the LE vs CE axis. 

Not exactly a game killing problem of course, but irksome.


----------



## Fallen Seraph

Andor said:


> According to this link what they said was:
> 
> 
> Andy's comment on looking at how things would evolve on Athas makes me think they are going to lean towards having an Athasian version of the Feywild, unless maybe I'm reading too much into that.
> 
> You know, the line about 4e conceits made me think... The 4e alignment bar is a poor fit for Athas. 4e goes LG-G-N-E-CE. Where as on Athas the primary line of conflict is closer to LE vs CG. Two alignments that no longer exist. O_O Frex who the heck is LG on Athas? What kind hearted person believes in reforming the system from within when the system consists of an immortal, evil God-Emperor and his henchmen? Conversely the sharp contrast between the chaotic perils of the desert like raiders and monters and the organized, regimented, civilized evil of the city-states is softened a bit by the loss of the LE vs CE axis.
> 
> Not exactly a game killing problem of course, but irksome.



I dunno the feeling of doing what it takes to survive, keeping your head low to avoid the Sorcerer-Kings and what not is a perfect match for Unaligned. I think Unaligned vs. Evil could be the ballpark for 4e Dark Sun. 4e Evil can copy order quite well, given the text talks about:


> Evil characters don’t necessarily go out of their way to hurt people, but they’re perfectly willing to take  advantage of the weakness of others to acquire what they want.
> 
> Evil characters use rules and order to maximize personal gain. They don’t care whether laws hurt other people. They support institutional structures that give them power, even if that power comes at the expense of others’ freedom. Slavery and rigid caste structures are not only acceptable but desirable to evil characters, as long as they are in a position to benefit from them.


----------



## Silverblade The Ench

SSquirrel said:


> I believe the correct response for the new cover art is "SCHWING!!"
> 
> Very exciting news.  Dark Sun fan from way back.  I think I have most of the books leading up to the revised box set, which I thought was awful.  I even managed a couple of the rarity books like Will and the Way
> 
> Quoting Split Second = awesome.  always





Split Second = awesomely udnerrated film!  Even my mum quotes it...lol!!



> "We need big, _big _,*BIG ******* GUNS!!"



On Athas, that would require a 30mmm Vulcan Cannon, I believe... 

New cover art is indeed much better than most of what's been out so far for 4th ed cover art (IMHO) 

And most folk not surprisngly agree with ya on the way Dark Sun went according to TSR's tacked-on timeline.

Smokebloke
yes the halflings lived on the Forest Ridge, high mountains, a rainforest...with stuff that had evolved for Athas, and to keep the "scum from the Plains the hell out!"...so everything was poisonous, regenerating, camouflaged, psionic etc etc horrors, lol
oh and the halflings ate you and were masters of clerical magic and psionics...and poison..and everyone of them had a book _"How to Serve Humans_".


----------



## StarFyre

To the person mentioning that Dragonborn won't fit into 4E Dark Sun...

We use dragonborn as Draj, from Dregoth's city (forgot name right now...from the boxed set, City by the Silt Sea).

Just changed some powers, a few house rules for other things, etc..and voila 

You can always modify rules a bit to help whatever you don't like in any edition to fit your player's styles and to ensure they are having fun IF the rules as written is an issue 

Sanjay


----------



## Somebloke

Silverblade The Ench said:


> Split Second = awesomely udnerrated film!  Even my mum quotes it...lol!!
> 
> 
> On Athas, that would require a 30mmm Vulcan Cannon, I believe...
> 
> New cover art is indeed much better than most of what's been out so far for 4th ed cover art (IMHO)
> 
> And most folk not surprisngly agree with ya on the way Dark Sun went according to TSR's tacked-on timeline.
> 
> Smokebloke
> yes the halflings lived on the Forest Ridge, high mountains, a rainforest...with stuff that had evolved for Athas, and to keep the "scum from the Plains the hell out!"...so everything was poisonous, regenerating, camouflaged, psionic etc etc horrors, lol
> oh and the halflings ate you and were masters of clerical magic and psionics...and poison..and everyone of them had a book _"How to Serve Humans_".




Full of life. Unnatural and strange to others used to a desert wasteland. Filled of unknown and mysterious threats. So far away and dangerous to get to it might as well _be_ on another plane. 

Remind me again why would we _need_ the Feywild?


----------



## Danzauker

Somebloke said:


> Full of life. Unnatural and strange to others used to a desert wasteland. Filled of unknown and mysterious threats. So far away and dangerous to get to it might as well _be_ on another plane.
> 
> Remind me again why would we _need_ the Feywild?




Maybe, Athas *is* the Feywild.

Or, more precisely, the part of the Feywild overlapping a blasted desert in the Material World.

Let's say something akin to the Realms of Dread in the Shadowfell...


----------



## Kobold Avenger

Feywild could very much be the Grey, and the Shadowfell could very much the Black, rather than both of the Black and the Grey being Shadowfell.

That would make them very unwelcoming places.  Somehow I don't think they'll throw out all that stuff about the Blue and Green Ages, they probably still want a timeline associated with the setting.


----------



## AdmundfortGeographer

Kobold Avenger said:


> Feywild could very much be the Grey, and the Shadowfell could very much the Black, rather than both of the Black and the Grey being Shadowfell.



I don't think The Black fits as Shadowfell beyond the association with shadows cast from light. The Gray is associated with undeath, is accessible in magnitudes greater degrees than The Black, has countless beings that inhabit it (the souls of the departed). The Black in inhabited by nothing except by those Green Age halflings imprisoned there, there is no light there . . . not just shades of gray . . . NO light. Except for some wisps of filaments, there is no matter in The Black either.

Far better to reinterpret 4e Shadowfell as we know it in ways that can work as The Gray as we know it.

There are too numerous ways to slide Feywild into an Athas that can not violate the feel of Athas. For instance, while Lynn Abbey's novels have been decried as not pure canon, we have in her stories an example of a protected druid grove, where the protagonist walks deeper and deeper into the Athasian druid grove and find himself in a cooler, wetter locale with a different colored (yellow) sun. Could we say this was another plane? Feywild maybe? Maybe Feywild is there, tremendously cut off in every way but from a few hidden/protected druid groves.

Maybe Feywild's inhabitants are cutting all connections with the Athasian prime because the Athasian material world is a far harsher world than the Feywild inhabitants can tolerate. Except for druids, who protect the remaining entrances to the Feywild, all Athasian creatures who enter Feywild are attacked on sight to be pushed back into the material world. Druids use Feywild as an eternal "image" from which they reintroduce Green Age fertility to the blasted wastes of Athas slowly but surely.

I'm not sure if this is reasonable, because it would bring up all sorts of other cosmological problems, such as what was the Feywild always a mirror of Green Age Athasian life . . . even during the Blue Age Athas when halflings were the creator species on an ocean planet, living in floating cities shaped out of living coral?

Hopefully, the re-designers of Dark Sun have contemplated how the Athasian planes are affected as the entire planet and sun underwent climatological changes . . . hmm.


----------



## Wolfwood2

Kamikaze Midget said:


> probably be pretty evil. And not the sort of distant "I'll get your soul someday" quasi-evil that is an infernal sorcerer, but expressly, obviously, in every city in the world, oppressively evil. It's _hard_ for a Templar to go on adventures alongside a freedom-fighting Mul. It's hard for them to hang out at a bar together. It's hard for them not to kill each other on sight.




As I stated earlier in the thread, I don't think there will be much support for Templar PCs, but I think there will be a lot of support for *ex*-Templar PCs.  It's a fairly obvious background to make for someone in Dark Sun who wants to use the 'former bad boy trying to redeem himself' archetype.

Given that, I'd say that a Fighter who works for a Sorceror-King is a Templar, as is a wizard who works for a Sorceror-King or a Warlock who works for a Sorceror-King.


----------



## possum

I'd kind of like to see how they go with this.  I hate to admit it in this thread, but I'm not all that familiar with the setting, but it does sound interesting.


----------



## Mort_Q

possum said:


> I'd kind of like to see how they go with this.  I hate to admit it in this thread, but I'm not all that familiar with the setting, but it does sound interesting.




Dark Sun Wiki may, or may not, fill in some themes if not actual details.


----------



## Andor

I can't wait for the cries of "It's all about Global Warming and Climate Change! It's just an attempt to play off the flavor of the month!" Then they won't believe us when we tell them DS is 20 years old.


----------



## possum

Mort_Q said:


> Dark Sun Wiki may, or may not, fill in some themes if not actual details.




Thanks a lot, very helpful.


----------



## AllisterH

Here's a question though.

A lot of people are happy that DS is going back to the original boxed set since it invalidates the much despised Prism Pentad series but don't we lose also Aarakocra PCs?

Are there any other elements of the post Prism Pentad DS that you'd like to see?


----------



## Henry

AllisterH said:


> Here's a question though.
> 
> A lot of people are happy that DS is going back to the original boxed set since it invalidates the much despised Prism Pentad series but don't we lose also Aarakocra PCs?
> 
> Are there any other elements of the post Prism Pentad DS that you'd like to see?




Honestly, I found NOTHING of the Prism Pentad stuff that I liked. Not the Aarakocra, the Avangions, the Cerulean storm, the multiple dragons, that huge honking crack in the mountains, the Pterans, the general hopefulness of the future, the democracy of Tyr.... pretty much none of it. The only thing I did like was the first three-quarters of the first novel, and it went downhill right after they killed King Kalak in the space of about three pages.


----------



## Silverblade The Ench

Andor said:


> I can't wait for the cries of "It's all about Global Warming and Climate Change! It's just an attempt to play off the flavor of the month!" Then they won't believe us when we tell them DS is 20 years old.




Well, "GLobal Warming" (as in Man-made Climate Change and concerns there of) has been an issue for 40 odd years, actually.



Wolfwood2 said:


> As I stated earlier in the thread, I don't think there will be much support for Templar PCs, but I think there will be a lot of support for *ex*-Templar PCs.  It's a fairly obvious background to make for someone in Dark Sun who wants to use the 'former bad boy trying to redeem himself' archetype.
> 
> Given that, I'd say that a Fighter who works for a Sorceror-King is a Templar, as is a wizard who works for a Sorceror-King or a Warlock who works for a Sorceror-King.




Aye as I've said before, a templar is a JOB DESCRIPTION  Same with a "gladiator". They aren't "classes" per se 
Most templars are bureacrats who help run the city but are very much tied to their sorceror-king by far more than the usual boss-worker relationship, lol!! 

Why the heck would a bureacrat like that always have to be some super-fighting machine, hm? Of course they wouldn't!! Silly, isn't it when most of 'em hide out in that job to be safe and comfortable, hehe. 
it's their slaves and bodyguards who do the killing for 'em most of the itme.

However, a fairly important segment of templars would be military leaders, spell casters of great power, spy masters, assassins etc.
The rest would be spell casters with just enough power to quell the populace and slaves (the "street templars" as it were).

(and I'm right about gladiators, see the RL example of the Roman games, with many different styles of fighters. For 4th ed you can run 'em as "fighters" and "rangers", mostly, but on Athas, there'd also be psions, elemental clerics, etc.) 



Henry
haha, too true!! 
8th lvl mul gladiator and his incompetant group kills Kalak..._not bloody well likely_, is it?!!
Only Agis had any damn worth, sigh. 
And I have a very strong feeling that templars of high level can't pull stuff like that off, 'cause their Sorceror King would be keeping an eye on such servants _more than anyone else_.


----------



## Mouseferatu

Henry said:


> Honestly, I found NOTHING of the Prism Pentad stuff that I liked. Not the Aarakocra, the Avangions, the Cerulean storm, the multiple dragons, that huge honking crack in the mountains, the Pterans, the general hopefulness of the future, the democracy of Tyr.... pretty much none of it.




What the King said.


----------



## AdmundfortGeographer

AllisterH said:


> Are there any other elements of the post Prism Pentad DS that you'd like to see?



I'd like to see life-shaped artifacts strewn about to be found in ruins.


----------



## GMforPowergamers

AllisterH said:


> Are there any other elements of the post Prism Pentad DS that you'd like to see?




I think we can safely say that later DS stuff had some redeming qualities...but few and you need to mine them carefully.

I have no problem with the idea of an avengion...I DO have a problem with anyone as of yeet successeding in fully becoming one...I would love to see it be a epic destiny that states you are the only one around...

I like the idea of life shaped items

The prestin tower rocks...

I want the kreen empire...

I wouldn't mind seeing a free tyr...but more of the "It has been free for 3 days, what haapens now is up to the DM" not as a fully independant city state...


----------



## FallenAkriel

I'm cool with Oronis as the first Avangion, he create this Metamorphosis Spell, give him credit. Other ones have died. So a PC must be teach by him to pick the Epic Destiny. I found that very interesting.

Not the first one but the second one. 

I think Kalak will died one way or the other, in the Prism Pentad it's Rikus & Sadira, in game it will be PCs or maybe The Dragon if Kalak succeed with his full metamorphosis killing everybody in the arena (like near the complete Tyr Population).

My major problem with the Prism Pentad is the Cerulean Storm, i like Ur-Draxa.


----------



## FallenAkriel

Henry said:


> Honestly, I found NOTHING of the Prism Pentad stuff that I liked. Not the Aarakocra, the Avangions, the Cerulean storm, the multiple dragons, that huge honking crack in the mountains, the Pterans, the general hopefulness of the future, the democracy of Tyr.... pretty much none of it. The only thing I did like was the first three-quarters of the first novel, and it went downhill right after they killed King Kalak in the space of about three pages.




The Prism Pentad novels didn't bring everything of the Revised Box expensions.

I see Pterrans as one kind of reflavored Athasian Dragonborn (with another encounter power). Other tribes can be Ssuran and Dray.

I really like Dregoth and i want him to return in 4E.


----------



## Obryn

I'm fine with a free Tyr, more or less.  From a gaming standpoint, I see some utility in having a fairly free-ish City-State.  I think it can add a lot of interesting plots.

So I think it'd be fair to say that I like Dark Sun more or less through the module Freedom.  From there, I like to pick & choose what sorts of stuff to take from the supplements.

I like the idea of the avangions - but those were in the Dragon Kings hardcover before they made it anywhere else.  I don't want them fluttering about everywhere.  I also generally like to keep the game confined to the Tyr Region - but I love having a Kreen Empire out there, as a viciously expansionist adversary.

-O

-O


----------



## Phaezen

Andor said:


> I can't wait for the cries of "It's all about Global Warming and Climate Change! It's just an attempt to play off the flavor of the month!" Then they won't believe us when we tell them DS is 20 years old.




ZOMG post apocalypse desert, weapons rare they are sooo ripping off Fallout!!!11!1!!One!Eleven!

/sarcasm


----------



## Jhaelen

FallenAkriel said:


> I think Kalak will died one way or the other, in the Prism Pentad it's Rikus & Sadira, in game it will be PCs or maybe The Dragon if Kalak succeed with his full metamorphosis killing everybody in the arena (like near the complete Tyr Population).



Well, in my 2E Dark Sun campaign, Kalak survived and Rikus died. I still had the mortally wounded Kalak retreat from the public to later return as a Dracolich


----------



## synthapse

TheWyrd said:


> A while back, someone suggested the idea of a planeless world where in all of the planes more or less existed geographically only. So the feywild was when you found yourself in a particularly dark primordial forest, the shadowfell was when you hit that dark graveyard around midnight, the astral sea is where you ended up if you flew too high and when you go down through the underdark far enough, you'll eventually hit the elemental chaos. There are 'shortcuts' that summoners can take when calling creatures to aid them but there is just one world.
> 
> This might be an interesting take for DarkSun.





If memory serves, the area south of the Tyr region was supposed to be and endless field of black sand-fused glass populated by an endless supply of undead, including unique undead never seen before. Sounds like the perfect analog for a more "terrestrial" Shadowfell.

     I like the idea that defiling magic not only wrecked the environment, but also the planar connections to Athas.  I can get behind the idea of Sorcerer-Kings consuming the souls of an entire plane to fuel their wars against rival city states.


----------



## kenmarable

Silverblade The Ench said:


> yes the halflings lived on the Forest Ridge, high mountains, a rainforest...with stuff that had evolved for Athas, and to keep the "scum from the Plains the hell out!"...so everything was poisonous, regenerating, camouflaged, psionic etc etc horrors, lol
> oh and the halflings ate you and were masters of clerical magic and psionics...and poison..and everyone of them had a book _"How to Serve Humans_".



Wouldn't that be "To Serve Man"? 


IT'S A COOKBOOK!!!






It'll be interesting to see if they try to push the standard 4e "All the PC races get along" theme in Dark Sun. I hope they are willing to realize that PCs are different from standard populations and don't have junk like the dragonborn/tiefling "Yeah, they destroyed your kingdom, but modern day dragonborn don't blame tieflings at all."


----------



## I'm A Banana

> It'll be interesting to see if they try to push the standard 4e "All the PC races get along" theme in Dark Sun. I hope they are willing to realize that PCs are different from standard populations and don't have junk like the dragonborn/tiefling "Yeah, they destroyed your kingdom, but modern day dragonborn don't blame tieflings at all."




I'm a little torn. On the one hand, I can really see WHY they pushed that motif: playability. The PC's should not be in-fighting, so we avoid any hints that they might be fighting amongst themselves. LG paladin dwarf adventuring with unaligned rogue eladrin, totally OK! They're buddies! DON'T FIGHT EACH OTHER FIGHT THE MONSTERS YOU GUYS!

In that respect, I can understand that being in place, since Dark Sun hasn't had a whole lot of deep inter-racial rivalry. A lot of suspicion -- some predation -- but little all-out warfare. Halflings still might eat ya if the going gets tough, but it's not personal -- it's survival! Your dwarf might fight you if you stand in the way of his focus, but the dwarf doesn't automatically fight everyone around him. The elf is going to be very suspicious, but you can probably become part of his away-from-home "tribe." The rest of the elves might kill you on sight. Thri-kreen are kind of in the same boat: delicious elves, but it's not like they HAVE to eat you!

On the other hand, the DB/tiefling "peace" IS brain-numbing.  I'd hate to see halflings be all "we used to be cannibals, but we swore it off for the sake of Playability!" The PC races are all monstrous in Dark Sun in their own way.

I can envision more "necessary for survival" parties and less "we're all friends!" parties. Which, honestly, is some of what I like to see in D&D!


----------



## Wardook

It's been over ten years since I've run DS, so please give me a break here.

I can't remember the name of tower that mutates, but that would be an easy way out for the races that aren't typical for DS. You are a Dragonborn and the only of your kind that has been mutated, or you are from the one tribe of Dragonborn that has lived near the tower and mutated. Was the tower in the original boxed set or from the novels, Troy Denning took a lot of liberties with the setting?


----------



## Mort_Q

Stogoe said:


> Eberron was explicitly created to have everything in it.  That was the whole point of the setting search.






the8bitdeity said:


> Plus Drow in Eberron are NOT your typical Drow from Faerun.




Still doesn't mean I have to like it.


----------



## SSquirrel

Obryn said:


> I like the idea of the avangions - but those were in the Dragon Kings hardcover before they made it anywhere else.  I don't want them fluttering about everywhere.  I also generally like to keep the game confined to the Tyr Region - but I love having a Kreen Empire out there, as a viciously expansionist adversary.




I don't think there is any danger in that.  Avangions were preserver/psionicists who made it to level 20 in both and who then started making their way to 30 thru a very difficult process.  If you were in a campaign w/tons of avangions, something was wrong 

The entire Dragon Kings book was pretty awesome.  The things a PC was able to become later in their career were all pretty epic and gave you something to look forward to.  I dug the City Beyond the Sea of Silt and some of the other books like that.  I won't complain if they keep some of the interesting bits from the various books and even good bits from the Revised box set.  There had to be a few good things in that box right?


----------



## BluSponge

Spacekase said:


> I can't remember the name of tower that mutates, but that would be an easy way out for the races that aren't typical for DS. You are a Dragonborn and the only of your kind that has been mutated, or you are from the one tribe of Dragonborn that has lived near the tower and mutated. Was the tower in the original boxed set or from the novels, Troy Denning took a lot of liberties with the setting?




That would be the Pristine Tower, and yeah it makes a lot of sense.  You can pretty much have endless combination of mutations stemming from that.

I can foresee a few problems though.  Walking around and calling yourself "dragonborn" is a good way to get yourself killed on Athas, or at the very least thrown into the gladiator pits as a novelty.  Nothing "good" comes from the dragon.

Furthermore, if you are going to use the backstory created by Denning and Brown, the reason these other races no longer exist is because they've been wiped out through generations of genocide – not because they didn't exist in the first place.  Of course, if you ignore that tidbit, including everything is no problem.  But you won't catch me spending a dime for an Athas where orc hordes march alongside gith.  Sorry.

Tom


----------



## BluSponge

As a DS fan from way back, I'm somewhat excited about this news.  If anything could get me to swallow my pride and forsake my grognard attitudes towards 4e, it would be Dark Sun.  But reading the various posts here and elsewhere has me concerned about one important detail:

While it's certainly too early to tell, I'm getting the disturbing impression that in order to run a DS game, I'll not only need PHB II (if 2e "clerics" become 4e "shamans") and certainly PHB III (for psionics, and/or if 2e "bards" become 4e "assassins").  My basis for this comes from lots of talk about the 1 character class feature in the forthcoming DS PG.  Now, I'm not ready to get up in arms about all this (the book is a year away and we know nothing about it other than its coming and adheres to the original boxed set), but it does worry me for a number of obvious reasons.

Have I missed anything in the discussion that contradicts this?

edit: I know you needed the Psionics handbook to play DS back in second edition, so I'm alright with a limited additional investment, but I'm worried 4e is going to stack 2, 3, or even more books on top of that just to get started.

Tom


----------



## GMforPowergamers

SSquirrel said:


> The entire Dragon Kings book was pretty awesome.  The things a PC was able to become later in their career were all pretty epic and gave you something to look forward to.




ok, I never owned the book, but my friend (now in iraq) does...I only sw dragons and avengions...where there other 'transformations' in there???

How many epic destines can we milk DS for??


ALSO: as much as the dragonking/avengion are very much tied to athas...I could totaly see a modfied ED for everysetting. I can totaly see an epic wizard slowly transforming himself into an immortal dragon sage...with some minor refluffs of cource


----------



## darjr

BluSponge said:


> Have I missed anything in the discussion that contradicts this?




It has been suggested, and supported by WotC staff, though probably not 'officially', that you could get a DDI account for a given month and then cancel for the next month.

Back up that installed character builder and that installed monster builder.

You'd lose access to the compendium and updates. Not having access to the compendium is not an option for me.

For updates you could then subscribe for another month down the road.


----------



## the8bitdeity

darjr said:


> It has been suggested, and supported by WotC staff, though probably not 'officially', that you could get a DDI account for a given month and then cancel for the next month.
> 
> Back up that installed character builder and that installed monster builder.
> 
> You'd lose access to the compendium and updates. Not having access to the compendium is not an option for me.
> 
> For updates you could then subscribe for another month down the road.




This is true, and even currently (thought I expect THIS part to change eventually) you can even download every Dungeon and Dragon compilation that's been under D&DI. (That said the compendium will always be up to date).


----------



## Askaval30

GMforPowergamers said:


> ok, I never owned the book, but my friend (now in iraq) does...I only sw dragons and avengions...where there other 'transformations' in there???
> 
> How many epic destines can we milk DS for??




If memory serves, you had wizards advancing to either Avangion or Dragon form and Clerics could become "Elemental Clerics" (as in elemental beings), but those were the only three Advanced Being Transformation classes I can recall. Druids might have become Spirits of Nature but I'm fuzzy on that one.

Then you had things like the Psionicists becoming Beast Masters, Fighters became warleaders and Gladiators and thieves just got more "uber"


----------



## TheYeti1775

Glad to see Darksun make a comeback.

Fluff wise it might be worth a pickup.


----------



## Obryn

Askaval30 said:


> If memory serves, you had wizards advancing to either Avangion or Dragon form and Clerics could become "Elemental Clerics" (as in elemental beings), but those were the only three Advanced Being Transformation classes I can recall. Druids might have become Spirits of Nature but I'm fuzzy on that one.
> 
> Then you had things like the Psionicists becoming Beast Masters, Fighters became warleaders and Gladiators and thieves just got more "uber"



These are all true!

The dragons and avangions were the best-fleshed-out.  Elemental Clerics were one option - Clerics had other cool stuff they could do if they didn't do the Psionicist/Elemental Transformation.  Druids did, indeed, become Spirits of the Land, too.

The Psionic Beast Mastery always struck me as rather lame, but not as lame as the Fighters, Gladiators, and Thieves.  Thieves in particular got the shaft, because they got a few added abilities with % chances to succeed that they were probably doing for their whole career anyway.  I think, perhaps, digging a hole was one of them, and I only wish I was kidding.

-O


----------



## GMforPowergamers

Obryn said:


> Thieves in particular got the shaft, because they got a few added abilities with % chances to succeed that they were probably doing for their whole career anyway.  I think, perhaps, digging a hole was one of them, and I only wish I was kidding.
> 
> -O




I know DMs Option Highlevel campaigns introduced weird ones...like bribery...then again that also was the origin of eevasion (HLC) and true dewamers later became epic spells...


----------



## Novaseaker

Personaly I'm really excited for this. I started playing DnD in 2002, so I completely missed out on a lot of cool 2e things like Dark Sun and Planescape. My first exposure to Dark Sun was the Dragon/Dungeon feature on it, which got me intruiged (I like the focus on psionics, because I really liked the Expanded Psionic Handbook).

As for the whole feywild debate, I'd like to weight in the opinion of a relative young'un who doesn't have as much history of the setting and past experiences and lore coloring his opinions... You know, just for a fresh perspective.

The Feywild should be extinct. Not non-existant, extinct. Athas once had one, but Defiling magic drained the Feywild _first_. The Feywild is not only "nature" turned up to 11, but also _magic._ Arcane engery suffuses the Feywild. If Defiling magic drains energy, then it might be the case that the _original_ users of Defiler magic didn't even necessarily know they were defiling. They just tapped into this apparently limitless source of energy. Little did they know that they were destroying an entire plane of existance. And once the Feywild was siphoned off completely, with not even a dry husk to leave behind (because even a husk has inherent fey energy in the Feywild), the defilers were addicted to the practice and began using the only other source of energy available: Athas.

How's that sound?


----------



## Obryn

Yep, Bribery was another one.  Even in my younger days, I was still like, "Huh?  Aren't we role-playing that?"

OTOH, a few of the new thief skills were kind of cool.  Detect Magic was another possibility, I think.

-O


----------



## SkidAce

Novaseaker said:


> Personaly I'm really excited for this. I started playing DnD in 2002, so I completely missed out on a lot of cool 2e things like Dark Sun and Planescape. My first exposure to Dark Sun was the Dragon/Dungeon feature on it, which got me intruiged (I like the focus on psionics, because I really liked the Expanded Psionic Handbook).
> 
> As for the whole feywild debate, I'd like to weight in the opinion of a relative young'un who doesn't have as much history of the setting and past experiences and lore coloring his opinions... You know, just for a fresh perspective.
> 
> The Feywild should be extinct. Not non-existant, extinct. Athas once had one, but Defiling magic drained the Feywild _first_. The Feywild is not only "nature" turned up to 11, but also _magic._ Arcane engery suffuses the Feywild. If Defiling magic drains energy, then it might be the case that the _original_ users of Defiler magic didn't even necessarily know they were defiling. They just tapped into this apparently limitless source of energy. Little did they know that they were destroying an entire plane of existance. And once the Feywild was siphoned off completely, with not even a dry husk to leave behind (because even a husk has inherent fey energy in the Feywild), the defilers were addicted to the practice and began using the only other source of energy available: Athas.
> 
> How's that sound?




Brilliant.


----------



## Andor

Novaseaker said:


> As for the whole feywild debate, I'd like to weight in the opinion of a relative young'un who doesn't have as much history of the setting and past experiences and lore coloring his opinions... You know, just for a fresh perspective.
> 
> The Feywild should be extinct. Not non-existant, extinct. Athas once had one, but Defiling magic drained the Feywild _first_. The Feywild is not only "nature" turned up to 11, but also _magic._ Arcane engery suffuses the Feywild. If Defiling magic drains energy, then it might be the case that the _original_ users of Defiler magic didn't even necessarily know they were defiling. They just tapped into this apparently limitless source of energy. Little did they know that they were destroying an entire plane of existance. And once the Feywild was siphoned off completely, with not even a dry husk to leave behind (because even a husk has inherent fey energy in the Feywild), the defilers were addicted to the practice and began using the only other source of energy available: Athas.
> 
> How's that sound?




That sounds worthy of an XP. Here ya go.


----------



## Silverblade The Ench

kenmarable said:


> Wouldn't that be "To Serve Man"?
> 
> IT'S A COOKBOOK!!!
> ."




hehe glad someone got it


----------



## I'm A Banana

> How's that sound?




That sounds pretty much like I'd want it. 

And I like how it doesn't rule out an individual DM who maybe has a player who _really likes Eladrin_ saying: "OK. You survived. How?" and it being a really interesting opportunity.

But it doesn't assume that such a thing will happen, which meets my needs nicely.


----------



## Novaseaker

I'm glad you guys liked the idea! 

KM: That was my general intent, yeah. The existence of the Feywild in the past leave room for "the last survivor" type background. 

It would also let Athas have "fey origin" monsters with no special rules. It's just that while their species might have originated in the Feywild, they now call Athas home because their real home is _gone. 

_This coresponds to something in Dark Sun's past too, doesn't it? There was a genocide against gnomes, right? It might be that the denizens of the Feywild found out who was destroying their world. In the core setting, gnomes are sort of like guerilla freedom-fighters, so in Dark Sun, they might've sent gnome assassins to kill the defilers. Only it didn't work, and as a backlash, the defilers instituted a pogrom of clensing.

That might be getting into territory that's already covered, and contradicting it. But like I said, I'm fairly ignorant of the finer points of Athas's history.


----------



## Spatula

BluSponge said:


> As a DS fan from way back, I'm somewhat excited about this news.  If anything could get me to swallow my pride and forsake my grognard attitudes towards 4e, it would be Dark Sun.  But reading the various posts here and elsewhere has me concerned about one important detail:
> 
> While it's certainly too early to tell, I'm getting the disturbing impression that in order to run a DS game, I'll not only need PHB II (if 2e "clerics" become 4e "shamans") and certainly PHB III (for psionics, and/or if 2e "bards" become 4e "assassins").  My basis for this comes from lots of talk about the 1 character class feature in the forthcoming DS PG.  Now, I'm not ready to get up in arms about all this (the book is a year away and we know nothing about it other than its coming and adheres to the original boxed set), but it does worry me for a number of obvious reasons.
> 
> Have I missed anything in the discussion that contradicts this?



Well, there's the DDI, where a one time $10 gets you the rules from every book published to date, incorporated into a really cool character builder and a monster builder (plus a year+ worth of Dragon and Dungeon articles).

Otherwise, you just don't use classes or races that you don't have the books for. *shrug* Doesn't strike me as a big deal, really.


----------



## AdmundfortGeographer

Spatula said:


> Well, there's the DDI, where a one time $10 gets you the rules from every book published to date, incorporated into a really cool character builder and a monster builder (plus a year+ worth of Dragon and Dungeon articles).



Aren't the character builder and monster builder some of those things that one needs Windows for?







Spatula said:


> Otherwise, you just don't use classes or races that you don't have the books for. *shrug* Doesn't strike me as a big deal, really.



Not running Dark Sun with psionic classes (PHB3), or shamans (PHB2) as 2e clerics, is pretty a big deal though.


----------



## I'm A Banana

> This coresponds to something in Dark Sun's past too, doesn't it? There was a genocide against gnomes, right? It might be that the denizens of the Feywild found out who was destroying their world. In the core setting, gnomes are sort of like guerilla freedom-fighters, so in Dark Sun, they might've sent gnome assassins to kill the defilers. Only it didn't work, and as a backlash, the defilers instituted a pogrom of clensing.




Heh. Keen. That explanation jives with me, though I'm not sure much of an explanation needs to be given beyond the basic: "They died because of Rajaat's Cleansing Wars + the destruction of the Feywild"

PS: HERE is the official story for why gnomes, and a lot of other critters, died out. It's kind of a cool story, and basically why Athas is the heck-hole it is today. It's basically a story about a genocidal maniac who discovered Defiling magic, and thought Humans were the True Race of Destiny (when it was Halflings, which is hilarious). To me, the specifics of which races were actually successfully "cleansed" is kind of irrelevant, beyond the basics. It makes sense that inappropriate races like Eladrin or Gnomes or Pixies would be killed off, but other races were killed off too (lizardfolk, kobolds, whatever); some succeeded, some didin't. 

What's important to me was that Rajaat's Champions lead some successful genocidal campaigns against creatures on Athas. That there are multiple successful genocides in Athas's history is a huge change from most fantasy, and a big part of the whole "The Bad Guys Won" feel I get from the setting. 

The whole "some major PC races have been the victims of successful genocide" thing is pretty important for the feel of big-time evil, I feel. If just so that the answer to "Why can't I play a gnome?" is "Because they were all murdered hundreds of years ago." 

And that also raises the possibility of "Maybe it wasn't as successful as they thought!", which, for a unique PC, is OK, but it would be something I would not want to repeat more than once. 

But that's tangential. Your idea is keen, though I don't know if we need (much of) a reason for the death of gnomes beyond "Rajaat was a Very Bad Man who did Very Bad Things."


----------



## AdmundfortGeographer

Kamikaze Midget said:


> It's basically a story about a genocidal maniac who discovered Defiling magic, and thought Humans were the True Race of Destiny (when it was Halflings, which is hilarious).



No, Rajaat believed that Athas needed to be reset back to the Blue Age when the creator halflings hadn't yet triggered the brown tide. Rajaat just believed that humans could wipe out the other races better than what was left of the halflings could. So Rajaat found powerful humans, taught them defiling in secret, an unleashed them on the world to organize the rest of the humans to cleanse the planet of all other races. He wanted halflings of the Blue Age back in charge of things. But it is odd that Rajaat isn't a halfling.

Tangential point on whether Rajaat "discovered" arcane magic. There is a scene in the Prism Pentad when Sadira and her half sister are atop the Pristine Tower. There is a pool, with what is said to be the remnant of the Blue Age ocean. In the scene, someone began to draw energy to cast a defiling spell, drawing energy out of the pool of Blue Age ocean water, and a swirl of brown began to form.

I asked Troy Denning if this was meant to hint at the brown tide that precipitated the end of Athas' Blue Age. Troy smiled, and said "That sounds like something I'd do, doesn't it." In other words, there was someone/something millennia before Rajaat that used/did something with an arcane power source on an epic scale that caused the brown tide that threatened all Blue Age life. The actual end of the Blue Age, of course, was the creator halflings using the the Pristine Tower to draw upon the power of the blue sun to drain the ocean to stop the brown tide, which ended up changing the sun's color to yellow.


----------



## I'm A Banana

Yeah, you win.  My DS knowledge is not very encyclopedic, so I didn't know about the return of the Blue Age. But keener story now than it was before!


----------



## Andalusian

Eric Anondson said:


> No, Rajaat believed that Athas needed to be reset back to the Blue Age when the creator halflings hadn't yet triggered the brown tide. Rajaat just believed that humans could wipe out the other races better than what was left of the halflings could.



If memory serves correctly, Rajaat used humans to carry out the Cleansing Wars because halflings couldn't become trained as wizards (this being 2E, where many non-human races had class limitations).


Rajaat was born as a hideously malformed pyreen. I believe it was stated (or at least implied) that he blamed his physical appearance on the Rebirth, the event which caused the Blue Age halflings to transform into various different races. So his desire to return Athas to a world populated exclusively by halflings was essentially triggered by his self-loathing at being ugly.


----------



## The Little Raven

Andor said:


> The 4e alignment bar is a poor fit for Athas. 4e goes LG-G-N-E-CE. Where as on Athas the primary line of conflict is closer to LE vs CG. Two alignments that no longer exist.




Good: Freedom and kindness.
Evil: Tyranny and hatred.

That sounds perfect for Dark Sun's themes of slavery, struggles for freedom, genocide and the like, with LE (now Evil) being the alignment of tyrants and CG (now Good) being the alignment of freedom fighters.


----------



## Spatula

Eric Anondson said:


> Not running Dark Sun with psionic classes (PHB3), or shamans (PHB2) as 2e clerics, is pretty a big deal though.



Psionic classes, sure.  Shaman as 2e elemental clerics is conjecture - I'm going to hazard a guess that there will not be a direct translation of that class to 4e - and in any case Athas gets along just fine, if not better, without the concept (IMO).


----------



## AdmundfortGeographer

Andalusian said:


> If memory serves correctly, Rajaat used humans to carry out the Cleansing Wars because halflings couldn't become trained as wizards (this being 2E, where many non-human races had class limitations).



Your memory is correct. 2e Halflings couldn't be magic-users (preserver or defiler) and had level caps in most everything else, humans could be anything at any level. Humans could do it better than halflings.







Andalusian said:


> Rajaat was born as a hideously malformed pyreen. I believe it was stated (or at least implied) that he blamed his physical appearance on the Rebirth, the event which caused the Blue Age halflings to transform into various different races. So his desire to return Athas to a world populated exclusively by halflings was essentially triggered by his self-loathing at being ugly.



It may have been stated somewhere, but I don't recall where. But I agree that it has been strongly implied. I've never been satisfied with _just_ that as his reason.

Some find it either tragic on a Greek drama scale, or remarkably lame. There are days I go between the two.


----------



## I'm A Banana

> Good: Freedom and kindness.
> Evil: Tyranny and hatred.
> 
> That sounds perfect for Dark Sun's themes of slavery, struggles for freedom, genocide and the like, with LE (now Evil) being the alignment of tyrants and CG (now Good) being the alignment of freedom fighters.




I'm with this kid. CG is Good in 4e, and LE is Evil in 4e.


----------



## lvl20dm

I'll be interested to see how much of the history from the Prism Pentad is used in this edition. If memory serves, I don't believe the original box even told you what the Sorcerer-Kings were (nor did it tell you what The Dragon really was either). I expect we'll get more history than the original box (and hopefully more geography), but it is conceivable that much of the setting's background developed in novels will disappear or be drastically altered. 

They might inject more mystery into the setting in order to give the DM more creative control over his campaign. Eberron has never explained The Mourning, and I think that is a credit to the setting. 

We have been told that we will see an Elemental power source, and that it has a unique feel. I could see the first class of that source introduced for Dark Sun.


----------



## TheYeti1775

Novaseaker said:


> Personaly I'm really excited for this. I started playing DnD in 2002, so I completely missed out on a lot of cool 2e things like Dark Sun and Planescape. My first exposure to Dark Sun was the Dragon/Dungeon feature on it, which got me intruiged (I like the focus on psionics, because I really liked the Expanded Psionic Handbook).
> 
> As for the whole feywild debate, I'd like to weight in the opinion of a relative young'un who doesn't have as much history of the setting and past experiences and lore coloring his opinions... You know, just for a fresh perspective.
> 
> The Feywild should be extinct. Not non-existant, extinct. Athas once had one, but Defiling magic drained the Feywild _first_. The Feywild is not only "nature" turned up to 11, but also _magic._ Arcane engery suffuses the Feywild. If Defiling magic drains energy, then it might be the case that the _original_ users of Defiler magic didn't even necessarily know they were defiling. They just tapped into this apparently limitless source of energy. Little did they know that they were destroying an entire plane of existance. And once the Feywild was siphoned off completely, with not even a dry husk to leave behind (because even a husk has inherent fey energy in the Feywild), the defilers were addicted to the practice and began using the only other source of energy available: Athas.
> 
> How's that sound?




I like it a lot.  In a way that explanation can also be used in explaining how Athas is removed from the normal Planar Cosmos.  Magic the very fiber of the universe was unraveled with the loss of the Feywild.
Like when you break a cookie it isn't perfect little breaks.  That is why there might be a piece left around, why the connection to the Elemental Planes is there.  It ripped itself completly from the Outer Planes (hence no gods).


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## occam

Kamikaze Midget said:


> if it was happening often enough to mention, it would essentially remove a chunk of the inescapable harshness that is part of the setting's appeal; saying "You have to endure this ecological apocalypse...unless you make some difficult skill checks" is an entirely different kind of feel than "You have to endure this ecological apocalypse." In the former, "Oh, it's tough, but I can get out." In the latter, it's just tough. You should not be able to get out.




The Astral Sea, sure, you wouldn't want to make that easy to get to. But there's no reason the Athasian versions of the Feywild and Shadowfell have to be any nicer than the world itself; they are reflections of the world, after all. The Feywild exaggerates the natural aspects of the world, so the Athasian Feywild could be even harsher than Athas itself, while still retaining an eldritch beauty, like the depths of the Sahara. The Shadowfell isn't nice to begin with. I think those two planes, at least, wouldn't necessarily disturb the feel of Dark Sun too much.

Although I like Novaseaker's idea of an extinct Feywild, as well.

On a more general note... the return of Dark Sun. Wow. I really thought that would never happen.


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## Andor

occam said:


> On a more general note... the return of Dark Sun. Wow. I really thought that would never happen.




I know. It gives me hope that we may one day see the return of my beloved SpellJammer.


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## GMforPowergamers

Andor said:


> I know. It gives me hope that we may one day see the return of my beloved SpellJammer.




spell jamming has been somewhat fdolded in as planar jamming...how ever this does allow me to live in hope for Birthright


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## Scribble

occam said:


> The Astral Sea, sure, you wouldn't want to make that easy to get to. But there's no reason the Athasian versions of the Feywild and Shadowfell have to be any nicer than the world itself; they are reflections of the world, after all. The Feywild exaggerates the natural aspects of the world, so the Athasian Feywild could be even harsher than Athas itself, while still retaining an eldritch beauty, like the depths of the Sahara. The Shadowfell isn't nice to begin with. I think those two planes, at least, wouldn't necessarily disturb the feel of Dark Sun too much.
> 
> Although I like Novaseaker's idea of an extinct Feywild, as well.
> 
> On a more general note... the return of Dark Sun. Wow. I really thought that would never happen.




Maybe fold the two together?

Make the feywild an "extinct" plane but one that you can still get to, it's just like you said... Athas turned up a notch.

Maybe make the shadowfell's history one of it came about after they destroyed the feywild... a negative shadow sort of.


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## Holy Bovine

Andor said:


> I know. It gives me hope that we may one day see the return of my beloved SpellJammer.




I honestly think Spelljammer was better as a method of moving between different worlds.  having a toolkit that could quickly detail some of those worlds would be great and some rules for 'spelljamming' could easily fit into such a toolkit.  That would make a pretty cool book imo - worldbuilding with some rules for moving easily between them.


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## I'm A Banana

> I honestly think Spelljammer was better as a method of moving between different worlds. having a toolkit that could quickly detail some of those worlds would be great and some rules for 'spelljamming' could easily fit into such a toolkit. That would make a pretty cool book imo - worldbuilding with some rules for moving easily between them.




Seeing something like this along with a "Planescape lite" revival with rules for organizations and plane-design...

...would be kind of awesome.


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## Eldorian

Novaseaker said:


> The Feywild should be extinct. Not non-existant, extinct. Athas once had one, but Defiling magic drained the Feywild _first_. The Feywild is not only "nature" turned up to 11, but also _magic._ Arcane engery suffuses the Feywild. If Defiling magic drains energy, then it might be the case that the _original_ users of Defiler magic didn't even necessarily know they were defiling. They just tapped into this apparently limitless source of energy. Little did they know that they were destroying an entire plane of existance. And once the Feywild was siphoned off completely, with not even a dry husk to leave behind (because even a husk has inherent fey energy in the Feywild), the defilers were addicted to the practice and began using the only other source of energy available: Athas.
> 
> How's that sound?




This and another post inspired me to say this:

The feywild of Athas isn't extinct, it's dead.  You can go there, but it's empty.  Like, if you've read the Twins series from Dragonlance, the Abyss in those novels.  It's a gray, featureless plane, with a gray sky, and nothing in it.  This is enough to have powers that interact with the feywild still work, such as various teleportations.

However, the other idea is that Druid groves have a bit of the real feywild in them.  The better groves have a yellow sun if you get deep enough, and are cooler and wetter.  You get REALLY deep in an epic level druid's grove, and the sun is freaking blue.  Basically, the feywild is a windless, featureless plain of grey, still grit for ground, gray sky, with SUPER oasis's where powerful druid groves are.  In fact, the motivation of druids could be to resurrect the feywild.

And the Grey I think might be the Ur-shadowfell.


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## williamhm

Eldorian said:


> This and another post inspired me to say this:
> 
> The feywild of Athas isn't extinct, it's dead. You can go there, but it's empty. Like, if you've read the Twins series from Dragonlance, the Abyss in those novels. It's a gray, featureless plane, with a gray sky, and nothing in it. This is enough to have powers that interact with the feywild still work, such as various teleportations.
> 
> However, the other idea is that Druid groves have a bit of the real feywild in them. The better groves have a yellow sun if you get deep enough, and are cooler and wetter. You get REALLY deep in an epic level druid's grove, and the sun is freaking blue. Basically, the feywild is a windless, featureless plain of grey, still grit for ground, gray sky, with SUPER oasis's where powerful druid groves are. In fact, the motivation of druids could be to resurrect the feywild.
> 
> And the Grey I think might be the Ur-shadowfell.




I really like this idea.  A mostly dead plane with points of light in it.  I cannot wait for Darksun its so different than the usual dnd setting.


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## The_Fan

williamhm said:


> I really like this idea.  A mostly dead plane with points of light in it.  I cannot wait for Darksun its so different than the usual dnd setting.



I may disagree with your point, but I approve of your snark. Well played, will.


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## The_Fan

double post


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## Silverblade The Ench

Andor said:


> I know. It gives me hope that we may one day see the return of my beloved SpellJammer.




*agrees, big time!* 
_Spelljammer will live again!!!_


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## GMforPowergamers

in the last few months there have been alot of speculation on what will or will not fit in 4e DS, especialy since the announcment last week.

I have to wonder though if we had a fly in the room with the developers back on day 1 of talking 4e dark sun...what do you think they were talking about?

    Do you think they were (well those that worked for tsr 2e) patting themselves on the back about how there ideas had to come in?

   Do you think they were looking at this as a chance to 'fix' things they saw as problems?

   DO you think anyone brought up the idea of the 'cult of the internet' second guessing everything?

   Do you think they  had an adventure in mind first, or the setting??


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## Henry

GMforPowergamers said:


> I have to wonder though if we had a fly in the room with the developers back on day 1 of talking 4e dark sun...what do you think they were talking about?




_"So... Dark Sun, it is, then? All right! Let's do this!... so, anyway, my son, he actually pitched an honest-to-God NO-HITTER at his last little league game! Awesome, right?!?!"_



> Do you think they were (well those that worked for tsr 2e) patting themselves on the back about how there ideas had to come in?




_"All right, Bill, stop doing the victory dance! You won the vote! Now get over here with Rodney and help him figure out some approaches to this defiling mechanic!"_



> Do you think they were looking at this as a chance to 'fix' things they saw as problems?




_"All right, so it's agreed? We make EVERYONE cannibals, not just the halflings, which solves the whole complaint players have against starvation, and jawbones of asses are now simple weapons? OK, sounds good!"_


> DO you think anyone brought up the idea of the 'cult of the internet' second guessing everything?
> 
> Do you think they  had an adventure in mind first, or the setting??




Number of the Day off a Lotto site.


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## Wik

I'd just like to say that DS (and the DS thread I knew would be waiting for me) got me back to EN World.  It's been awhile!  (Like... a year?  Wow)

Second, I can't believe DARK SUN is almost twenty years old.  Wow.  I'm getting old.  I bought the setting when the revised set was released (because DRAGON magazine told me I should). I bought it with christmas money, on boxing day.  Along with the revised set, I bought the skills and powers book.  I was peeved to find that I couldn't use the one with the other.  But DARK SUN had the cloth map, so it won.

A reset is good.  As soon as I knew it was going to be released, I looked at it differently than a lot of people, though.  I said "I'll be running THIS sort of game.  And I'll mine from the book".  So, I have an idea of what sort of DARK SUN I'll run (But I'll be flexible, if the new book suggests something I haven't thought of before).  I have some rules figured out, back when I thought I'd convert DS on my own.  If the book contradicts what I want to do, I'll ignore it.  Even if it's a mess on a scale of the 4eFR book, It'll be okay - at least I can mine it for monsters, right?  

On Defiling - my mechanic in mind is pretty simple.  PCs are naturally preservers, but they can choose to defile to get bonuses.  The more they do it, the more they progress along a "defiling track" (Like disease).  Get to a certain point, and they can ONLY defile (and there's no turning back, or at least, it's hard).  Or something.  Plus, you can have feats that only work when defiling, and feats that only work when preserving.  

I have no problem with "Divine" classes.  But I do have a problem with "radiant" energy.  Guess I'm weird like that.  I can see Cleric/Avenger/Paladin servitors of the Sorcerer Kings.  And I can see Clerics that serve Fire, or Earth (imagine instead of channel divinity, you get channel element?).  Radiant energy bothers me because most powers that use it (and most creatures weak towards it) have a sort of "light=good, dark=bad" religious vibe to it, that doesn't mesh well with Dark Sun.  

I think I know how the races are going to go.  Half-Giant will be medium-sized, deal damage, and be pretty much awesome.  Mul will have a self-heal mechanic or damage resistance (some sort of "takes more damage" mechanic).  Thri-Kreen will have a bite attack that can paralyze, and a jump power (or maybe a shift power).  I imagine the bite will be a minor attack, akin to a Dragonborn's Breath.  

I hope wotc dials down the psionics of the original boxed set a bit.  Even the original designers admit to going a bit overboard with the psionics.  In a dream world, though, I'd like to see the random wild talents table.  That'd rock.


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## CapnZapp

Judging by how this thread has reached 21 pages without becoming a trainwreck; I'd say WotC took a pretty popular decision


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## Silverblade The Ench

CapnZapp,
hey!! lets have a lightning rail between the cities of the Sorceror Kings!!
think of the benefits to cutting adventuring costs!


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## qstor

I think its "funny" that the RPGA said no to a 4e Eberron Living campaign cause two campaigns, Living Forgotten Realms and a Living Eberron would "dilute play numbers" then rushed to say a Living Dark Sun would start.

Mike


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## Henry

qstor said:


> I think its "funny" that the RPGA said no to a 4e Eberron Living campaign cause two campaigns, Living Forgotten Realms and a Living Eberron would "dilute play numbers" then rushed to say a Living Dark Sun would start.
> 
> Mike




I don't mind it because, let's face it, FR and Eberron are a LOT more similar than FR and Dark Sun are.


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## Wik

Whoa... whoa.... 

Living Dark Sun?  

Holy.  Crap.


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## Thaumaturge

*Expectation Control*

To be fair, unless there is new info I haven't seen, the RPGA hasn't yet decided what level of support they will provide for Dark Sun.

See this thread for more info from a couple of RPGA personalities.  Post #11 is the most informative.

Thaumaturge.


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## AdmundfortGeographer

qstor said:


> I think its "funny" that the RPGA said no to a 4e Eberron Living campaign cause two campaigns, Living Forgotten Realms and a Living Eberron would "dilute play numbers" then rushed to say a Living Dark Sun would start.



Can you support this claim about a rush to crown a Living Dark Sun campaign? Maybe with a link?

Maybe you are under some confusion over what a "Living Campaign" really is, because all I have heard is that the RPGA will offer some kind of play opportunity.


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## qstor

Eric Anondson said:


> Maybe you are under some confusion over what a "Living Campaign" really is, because all I have heard is that the RPGA will offer some kind of play opportunity.




I understand what a Living campaign is  I guess I should clarify. The RPGA is going to give some support to Dark Sun. The link to the thread and the statement by Chris Tulach is above.

I still think FR and Eberron are different enough that Eberron fans deserve a supported campaign as much as Dark Sun fans. But then I don't work for WOTC.

Mike


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