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Jarofmoldymayo posted:So. It's literally the best setting, it reads amazingly (up till the end where they shat the bed before 4th ed) and actually plays well too, which is a hard balance to find. It's also a really nice change from normal D&D where you're going "ANOTHER +2 sword? Throw it on the fighter's pile!", since if you have a metal sword chances are you're gonna get killed for it.
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Feb 6, 2010 21:21
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rantmo posted:That's not even a little true to my understanding. Keith Baker won the contest and worked with WotC to flesh out his entry but I've never heard anything to indicate that the other settings had any influence whatsoever on the development of Eberron. Fun fact though, one of the runners up was Rich Burlew of Order of the Stick fame. Jarofmoldymayo posted:So. In the podcast they summed it up pretty well. Athas is place where the bad guys won a long time ago. If you're looking for regular fantasy tropes then you aren't really going to find them there. If you're looking for a dark post-apocalyptic world where survival of the fiercest is the law of the land Dark Sun has you covered. The world is vicious that Gods have either abandoned it or died. Think Conan rather than Lord of the Rings.
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Feb 6, 2010 21:36
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Well. Conan is pretty awesome.
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Feb 6, 2010 22:07
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Gr3y posted:Epp. I reread the preface and somehow interperted "and developed that kernel into Eberron" into "used all three". Do we know what 2nd and 3rd place are? According to Rich Burlew, we won't know anything unless WotC decides to talk.
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Feb 6, 2010 22:10
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shotgunbadger posted:(up till the end where they shat the bed before 4th ed) People say this often, and it is true to some extent, but I want to let you guys who never got a chance to check out DS in 2E know that even though the revised boxed set hosed with the setting and wasn't nearly as cool as the original set, it was still pretty drat great. That is how good Dark Sun is. They burdened it with detailed history, killed off over half the major NPC antagonists, and tacked on regions that had little thematically to do with the core area. It remained one of D&D's best settings.
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Feb 6, 2010 23:08
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Mind Lords of the Last Sea was unforgivable, even if it sounds like the title of a Blue Oyster Cult album. Edit: "Dolphin, Athasian". Squizzle fucked around with this message at 01:58 on Feb 7, 2010 |
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Feb 7, 2010 01:34
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It was like some poo poo from an TOS Trek episode.
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Feb 7, 2010 01:57
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It was amazing. First round of the first encounter in the bundled adventure, it comes out and says 'You should have at least one dead PC on your hands' and spins from there. By the end of the adventure, at least one of the titular Mind Lords will be dead, seriously loving with everything that was written in the expansion material. City by the Silt Sea was a pretty neat idea with absolutely horrible execution too.
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Feb 7, 2010 02:07
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To be fair, there was a trend of detailing something in a source book and then totally loving it up in an adventure. "Here's Tyr, ruled by the mighty King Kalak. You will witness his assassination in our very first adventure."
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Feb 7, 2010 02:23
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Surfing lizardmen in the dolphin-heavy waters of Athas's secret Great Lakes goes a bit beyond killing a dude in terms of setting befucking.
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Feb 7, 2010 03:37
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No, I'm saying wiping out the government and totally upsetting the status quo of Athas's Secret Great Lakes in the first adventure to feature them is pretty much par for Dark Sun's course. Adding in that nonsense in the first place was pretty drat dumb. But we should remember that the revised box also gave us Eldaarich, the Bandit Wastes, and the Dead Lands. It wasn't all bad.
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Feb 7, 2010 03:51
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PeterWeller posted:No, I'm saying wiping out the government and totally upsetting the status quo of Athas's Secret Great Lakes in the first adventure to feature them is pretty much par for Dark Sun's course. Don't forget the Crimson Savannah and the Kreen Empire.
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Feb 7, 2010 04:03
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I liked a not-small amount of the setting expansion in the revised box, at least in concept. The Dead Lands always seemed like a bit of a fine misfire, though, because it was tied into the Rajaat genocide history. At least, it was tied into it insofar as the various angry corpses you'd find in it were exclusively(?) of races made extinct by the genocides. I just didn't like Athas having a known history, and didn't like it being attested by evidence in the "modern" setting. And the Bandit States seemed to defang the wasteland brigandry by giving them an organizational principle, instead of being part of the highly arbitrary dangers of Athas. Eldaarich was 100% awesome, though. Edit: And gently caress Kurn forever. Edit 2: Seriously, argh, Kurn enrages me so much. 
Squizzle fucked around with this message at 04:39 on Feb 7, 2010 |
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Feb 7, 2010 04:29
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I stopped buying DS stuff before the Revised box came out. Who or what was Kurn?
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Feb 7, 2010 04:56
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quote:Kurn 
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Feb 7, 2010 05:04
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Bieeardo posted:I stopped buying DS stuff before the Revised box came out. Who or what was Kurn? Kurn was a city-state run by a good, preserving sorcerer-king. Aboveground, it looked like an abandoned failureville; below, it was a secret utopia for its noble citizens. Dark Sun was originally a world at its lowest; the players could not make it worse, only improve it, or take advantage of it for personal gain. Any change would make it better. The revised set changed a lot of things, and--even if as an unintended consequence--made the setting more pleasant. It went from a savage world at its lowest and not going anywhere unless you, personally did something about it, to a dangerous world of mystery with hope for the future. Edit: And that's even before it added places like Kurn; I'm talking about changes in general, like the Cerulean Storm and those killings and that earthquake that shook loose a lot of entrenched power structures loose. Also, beaten.
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Feb 7, 2010 05:05
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Also, the addition of Oronis made the death Korgunard towards the end of the original adventure path suddenly a lot less significant. It was this: "Hey, your awesome buddy, the dude who you saved from King Hamanu and a host of other threats, the dude who was developing a wonderful new path that could bring life back to your dead world, your friend who was tragically betrayed and murdered by the cabal of psionicists who were conspiring to rule the world-- you know, the guy whose tragic death meant that your eventual victory against that evil cabal was Pyrrhic at best? Well, don't worry, the dude who trained him is still alive, and he has a secret utopia."
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Feb 7, 2010 05:16
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Jesus. I'm with Captain Picard on that one.
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Feb 7, 2010 05:17
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Squizzle posted:Dark Sun was originally a world at its lowest; the players could not make it worse, only improve it, or take advantage of it for personal gain. Any change would make it better. The revised set changed a lot of things, and--even if as an unintended consequence--made the setting more pleasant. It went from a savage world at its lowest and not going anywhere unless you, personally did something about it, to a dangerous world of mystery with hope for the future. Bullshit! The moment one of your PCs decided that they wanted to be a sorcerer king the world could get even worse. Yes you would have to kill one of the ancient evil SKs freeing their people from a despotic rule and the magical Templar gestapo. But your next step was to sacrifice a non-insignificant portion of sentient life just to begin your path to the throne.
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Feb 7, 2010 05:37
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Eh, not really. None of the sorcerer kings have completed the metamorphosis process. In 2E game terms, they are all around 21st to 24th level; full dragonhood is 30th level. Each step (level) requires even more sacrifice of sentient life than the last one, and all the sorcerer kings are actively pursuing the further steps in their evolution. Thousands of sentient beings are going to get their life sucked out via obsidian balls one way or the other. On top of that, you won't have your own templar gestapo, so if you wish to maintain your hold on power, you will have to compromise with other factions in a way the other rulers don't. The mere existence of a realistic check on your power will make you better than the previous despot who could rule with impunity.
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Feb 7, 2010 07:03
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Don't forget that, in 2E terms, even if a player did become a full dragon and managed to gather a templar organization, they wouldn't be able to imbue those templar with spell casting ability. That was a consequence of the sorcerer kings being connected to the Dark Lens by Rajaat. So your templar would have a hard time competing with other city state's templar, the Order, and the Vielded Alliance.
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Feb 7, 2010 07:08
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Every time you mention Rajaat, a child dies of leukemia.
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Feb 7, 2010 16:38
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What about Cleansing Wars and Dark Lens? What cancers do those cause?
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Feb 7, 2010 19:43
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PeterWeller posted:What about Cleansing Wars and Dark Lens? What cancers do those cause? None, they're cleansing wars. How could anything bad happen?
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Feb 7, 2010 20:26
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For those of you who don't know what the Cleansing Wars were, they were when an ultra-racist human gathered a crew of other ultra-racists together so they could wipe out all the other races. And give the world back to halflings.
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Feb 7, 2010 20:32
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PeterWeller posted:For those of you who don't know what the Cleansing Wars were, they were when an ultra-racist human gathered a crew of other ultra-racists together so they could wipe out all the other races. Yeah, but the halflings weren't down or even that knowledgeable of it, right? I thought it was like how evangelicals are all like, "Jews are the Chosen People! It says so in our Bible, too!" and the jews are kinda nodding and trying not to make too much eye contact.
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Feb 7, 2010 20:39
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You're right. But it gets even better. See, he wanted to return the world to the halflings so they can turn back to the clock to the Blue Age, a time when the world was covered in oceans that teamed with life. To facilitate this, he developed a form of magic that is powered by the very essence of life and taught it to an elite cadre of genocidal megalomaniacs. And he was surprised that when they learned of his real plan, they turned against him.
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Feb 7, 2010 21:06
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Was Rajaat even really human?
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Feb 7, 2010 21:07
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Nah, he was either a unique mutant or a Pyreen. I can't remember. Edit: Okay, I looked it up. He was a mutant Pyreen. Here is how he is described. The Wanderer's Chronicle posted:By all accounts, Rajaat was hideous. He had a huge head with a flat, grossly elongated face. His eyes were half-covered by flaps of skin. His long nose, lacking of a bridge, ended in three flaring nostrils. His small, slitlike mouth was marked with tiny teeth and a drooping chin. His body was contorted and weak, with humped shoulders and gangling arms. PeterWeller fucked around with this message at 21:20 on Feb 7, 2010 |
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Feb 7, 2010 21:14
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I thought he was a proto-halfling and was born at the very end of the blue age, just before most halflings lifeshaped themselves into other races to adapt or something.
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Feb 7, 2010 21:17
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The Pyreen may or may not have been made by the Life Shapers. For some reason, they chose to leave that part vague. I'm really bagging on this stuff right now, but when I was fourteen, I though this was the coolest poo poo. All my friends and I were loving amped when we finally learned the secret history of Athas.
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Feb 7, 2010 21:27
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I thought Halflings were loving heathen cannibals in Dark Sun?
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Feb 7, 2010 21:34
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The halflings of the Forest Ridge (and thus the most well know in the Tablelands) are primitive cannibals. Further North, the halflings of the Jagged Cliffs retain much of the halfling culture from the past, including the power of Life Shaping. This is more poo poo added in by the Prism Pentad and revised boxed set. I know. It's dumb. But don't worry, the 4E book almost certainly won't have this crap in it. It really looks like the only bit carrying over from the metaplot and expansions will be the death of Kalak.
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Feb 7, 2010 21:58
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I need to find a loving 4e group when dark sun comes out; I'll use craigs list if I have to.
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Feb 7, 2010 22:20
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Use it's supreme awesomeness as a way to get your other friends to finally play 4E DnD with you.
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Feb 7, 2010 22:24
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drgnvale posted:I need to find a loving 4e group when dark sun comes out; I'll use craigs list if I have to. Use meetup.com. I found a decent group to play 4e through there.
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Feb 8, 2010 01:43
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I always figured it'd be amusing if Rajaat was the first Avangion, it could explain his... unorthodox appearance, and he did develop preserving as well as defiling magic. Also wanting to turn back the world into the Blue Age.
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Feb 8, 2010 03:45
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Why do you hate children? Or love leukemia?
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Feb 8, 2010 03:55
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Tindalos posted:I always figured it'd be amusing if Rajaat was the first Avangion, it could explain his... unorthodox appearance, and he did develop preserving as well as defiling magic. Also wanting to turn back the world into the Blue Age. That would be tough to do since the only thing left of him is a semi-sentient skelton which was then locked in the Hollow, an infinte sub dimension within another infinite dimension the Black. Just in case.
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Feb 8, 2010 04:56
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and yet he still gets out
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Feb 8, 2010 05:03
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