Dark Sun

History

Back in '91 or so, TSR released a campaign world called Dark Sun.  I loved it.  It was more coherent then FR at that point and I really liked it.  In fact, FR was going to get even more convoluted in the next several years but Dark Sun seemed to get better as a game world.  

Athas, as the world was called, was definitely different.  It was a desert world that had been ravaged by sorcery.  Now, there were only seven city states and many villages in a desolate and dangerous world.  It's not that Athas had little life.  Far from it.  What survived was usually very strong and powerful!  This included the rulers of the City States, called Sorcerer Kings, and they were quite powerful.  Not only did the environment come into play as a harsh desert type terrain but most of the city states were dangerous to oppose the Sorcerer Kings.  While not all powerful, they certainly couldn't be taken by most characters without special help.  

In running the world, though, I was too young and inexperienced, at the time, to understand how to run it properly.  The players understood the environment quick and hated having to worry about supplies.  And they wanted to do good but couldn't because of the Sorcerer Kings.  Around '95, TSR came out with a revised Dark Sun setting, which included events from the novels.  In them, one of the Sorcerer Kings was killed and one city was now a free city.  The others had varying amount of changes but Tyr was still emphasized, imo, as the place to be.  This made it a little easier to run but by then, my players didn't like it and we didn't play as often.  So, I didn't use Dark Sun.  I missed it and would read some books from time to time but it didn't get used.  

I do think that the design of game worlds back then wasn't as good or polished as it is today.  While the setting contained conflict, in the environment and the Sorcerer Kings, they were too big of conflicts.  The design was almost more about running around in the bad environment, fighting random tough monsters that were wandering out there.  I think they have learned that lesson as setting now have more conflict available for a DM to base a campaign in their other settings.  I think that same conflict is available in Dark Sun but it takes a little looking for it.  

Now that 4E has been released, I am really jonesing for a Dark Sun campaign.  I have a much better idea of how to use it.  And the 4E rules make things a lot more clear on how things will play.  I have started getting some ideas on what to do for this, hoping it will be next and will be a long campaign.  That's the thought, anyway.  There are also rumors that WotC might be releasing a 4E version of Dark Sun.  Unfortunately, it's all rumors right now and I won't know for sure for a few months.  

Ideas on playing in Dark Sun

What has really inspired me with Dark Sun is Stargate SG-1.  The goau'ld are a perfect example of the Sorcerer Kings.  They are gods, in a way, able to give power to some followers and keep thousands enslaved.  It's a really good analogy that will help both players and me, the DM, in playing the game.  The tier of 4E will help as well, in that a Sorcerer King won't feel threatened by a Heroic Tier character and indeed will help them as the people need its heroes.  As they progress in the paragon tier, though, things will get more complicated.  By the time they get near the epic tier, part one of my campaign idea is for them to kill  Kalak and free Tyr.  Eventually, I would like to see multiple campaign spanning Athas and involve ideas on freeing as many people as possible, bringing back some life to the planet and making the world a better place.  It's a good long term goal, I think.  

I am involved on a few message boards to have discussions on some of the ideas.  I have started converting monsters and that is going mostly well.  There are some monsters that are tough to convert in some ways.  They have an idea behind them and usually 2E game mechanics would be invented for the ideas to work.  4E is a lot better in that regard, so it takes a bit more thought to convert the monsters.  

I am also using this as an excuse (once again) to dive into Campaign Cartographer 3 and use it to create maps.  I have started on one and am already happy with the results.  I still have lots to learn and do but it's coming along.  

I don't see this happening before the end of '09 or sometime in '10 but I wanted to get started now.  Hopefully I can bring my enthusiasm to the table and infect my players with it so they will be excited to play it too.  

The Death of Dark Sun - 5/2009

In a surprise choice to me, my group decided to go with d20 Future!  So, that's what we are doing!  Check out that page for more on the campaign.  

The Announcment! - 8/2009

WotC announced that they will be bringing back Dark Sun for 4E!

(They actually thought it was obvious this was the next game world, given that Rich Baker and Bill Slaviscek worked on it back in the day and they are the ones in charge now.  I think it was guessed, and many gave it greater than a 50% chance it would be it, with some going as high as 90%+, but I don't know if anyone was positive about it until it was announced.  Further, by that logic, why haven't these two brought back Alternity?  Or Modern games in general, with 4E rules?)  

I am very happy and excited about this!  

While I had some ideas on what I wanted to do, I find it nice that the experts can write up stuff and give me a basis of the framework that I want.  Then, I can modify that to suite my needs and the group's needs.  I don't know how much it will change things here but I am happy that I know what we will be doing next.  

Thoughts on Dark Sun - 8/2009

My original thought on Dark Sun was to set it in the Tyr region.  It's known and I was going to set it before the events of the novels, using the main boxed set as the basis for the history and ideas of the campaign.  I was going back and forth between using the second boxed set because I don't like many ideas of that set, including Raja'at.  In fact, I really don't like Raja'at.  I get the idea of a big, bad scary thing but I don't want it.  However, it does mean figuring out several things on my own, including the dragon levy and why it was done.  

After relooking at several aspects of the game, I then decided to create my own area and use the way back machine to go back in time and use a previously destroyed Sorcerer King.  To that end, I started making up the maps and some history for it all.  Also, like a good story, it needs a source of conflict and ways to involve the PCs and make them the stars of the show.  I stopped development of this area when it was decided to play d20 Future.  

Now, I don't know what I am going to do.  I have been using Masterplan and that has influenced me a lot.  It's ability, and our setup, to show players any pictures files as well as the battle map are very cool.  I think it would be more fun to keep some aspects undefined, such as I was doing in CC3, and define only what I need to do for a session.  Besides, I do think the player's imaginations are up to it!  

As we aren't going to be playing this for a while, probably not until after the books are out next year, I have time to decide. I hope to get both books and then make the campaign, instead of not having them when it starts.  As I said, I am happy when the expert (game designers) do their thing and I get the fruits of their labor.  Besides, how much more fan made stuff will there be the longer I have to plan for this?  

So, lots of possibilities and I am excited about them all.  

Jumping in with both feet - 9/2009

Aaaand . . . we are playing Dark Sun.  I couldn't get the momentum on wanted on the d20 Future game and it's my fault.  I think most of the players understood the rules of the game well but needed more information on the setting.  I have some but not tons and it's really dry to read.  Plus, it assumes nearly 25 years later, after the events I am trying to do are done.  So, blah blah blah, not playing it anymore. 

But we are playing Dark Sun!

I have converted some monsters.  I am using Masterplan and have my Dark Sun library of monsters set up.  I still need to do some tiles but that shouldn't be as bad.  Again, I have some, and a dungeon is a dungeon, but I won't to get some other things working.  

I found and am using Google SketchUp.  Oh, WOW!  This is a great program!  Really enjoying it!  Wish I had known about it a decade ago.  It would have made some things easier.  Maybe. 

Back to planning!

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