Why do people like Dark Sun?

I find people most often overlook what Darksun actually was. Your characters were expected to be tough, capable motherfuckers that kicked asses, took names, and chewed post-apocalyptic bubblegum.

The PCs were given a better stat gen method than by default, they were higher level, basic necessities like water were actually pretty easy to afford past the lowest levels. You weren't expected to die of thirst; you were expected to fuck shit up.

>It's a tonal shift from the typical swords and sorcery world.

If anything, I'd say it's a tonal shift closer to a more typical swords and sorcery world.

Original Fallout, presumably. The one that had seas of ash and a gutted facility so radioactive that even with Power Armor people tended to die of radiation sickness before they could get too deep in the facility (or be left too weak to climb back out after they did).

Dark Sun's charm was, as said, in large part due to its unique-ness. Psychic mantis'. Cannibalistic halflings the fallen remnants of a once great society. Dragons were the creation of Man and other Great Sorcerers who sought to overcome the limits of their mortality. Life eked on despite the hostile environment, not in thanks to the world serving as an enormous cradle.

Even if you didn't like the setting at the time, you probably liked what it meant. This was not Al-Qadim, which was Faerun through a Not!Arabic instead of Not!European lens. This was not the various "DRAGONS!" settings wafting about how Dragons are awesome. This was not Spelljammer and its "Fantasy, in Spaaaace!" It was a setting that could just as well have been made from scrap. Had the names of various races changed around and still remained what it was at the core.

>The one that had seas of ash and a gutted facility so radioactive that even with Power Armor people tended to die of radiation sickness before they could get too deep in the facility (or be left too weak to climb back out after they did).

Take two rad-x you putz.

also the original was intended to be pretty grim with a weird twinge of dark humor, like the opening cut scene with an american soldier executing a canadian in the streets and then waving at the news camera after he noticed it. kinda funny, in a sad way.

Idk if Dark Sun has anything like that though

cuz that tolkien shit is for kidz

Abandon. Play 2e instead.

Look, i know this sounds like trolling, but look into it. There is something about the older rules that is more compatible with the harshness of Dark Sun that the extra-merciful modern rulesets are.
Like, it really puts your survival on a razor's edge instead of being on an extra-wide razor with at least a couple of second chances in your pocket.

This.

The modern ruleset is too forgiving. The old rules required you to make 3 characters because you would need them. You are supposed to die.

This guy, is an idiot. He missed the whole point. You are tough only because everyone who lives is tough. You are no more special then the 2 other characters you make. And the 2-3 you make after the first few die.

You want to understand Darksun and why people like it, play it in the original ruleset. Probably after watching the old Mad Max films, and listening to a bunch of old punk songs, after shaving your head and implanting a bone mohawk into your skull to really get into character.

Or just imagine the last couple things. But then you might need to actually do it. Modern kids have shit imaginations.

Does anyone have a character (or characters) that were memorable? I'm looking for some character inspiration, and my DM says to make 2 backup just in case.

>this guy is an idiot

You know what? Fuck you too, you ruptured pustule; your mom should have swallowed.

I'm not sure what it is about AD&D, but it seems to attract idiots that don't have any idea how it played more than even D&D 3.5. You were considerably more likely to die to random shit in basic AD&D than you were in Darksun by simple virtue of the fact you weren't expected to start at first level in Darksun.

There was a survey either Dragon or Dungeon did back in the first edition days, and the most common thing to kill PCs, by a long fucking stretch I might add, was goblins, with other low-level monsters taking the other top slots. Player-characters were at their most worthless and their most pathetic when they're stuck in the 3d6, start at first level and roll your HP mode that was default AD&D, which Darksun was not.

Darksun was meant to be something as written by Burroughs or Howard, not the fucking Road.

I wish people like you would just sit on something sharp.

I am old enough to remember those days.
But I don't think I'll live much longer.
Because reading your post about how haaaaaardcooooore your Second Edition campaign was and kids today and so forth gave me cancer.

Fucking this.

What port is it? Is it one he did himself?

>d honestly I don't get the appeal.
That is what people like about it. It's as if Mad Max and Conan the Barbarian had a baby, and that baby was raised by Gygax.

drive.google.com/file/d/0B4jZ_-uYQxf8XzFpX2x6VVlicEk/view

This one. No clue as to it's quality.

How the fuck do you play dark sun in a rule system without psionics?

Yeah. All metal swords are automatically +1 masterwork tier in Dark Sun. Stone and bone weapons are more common.

the system uses a port like the one my DM found.

Yeah we posted at around the same time. Been skimming it. That port would do the trick.

can you give me any advice? like any lore I should know that isn't covered?

Any character inspiration would be nice too

>Why do people like to read 1984?
>Why do people like postapo genre, not only in variation of "geheee society's down, i can do what i want", but also darker and grim visions of humanity devoid of hope
>Why do people enjoy movies/books/games without happy endings
>why do people enjoy lovecraftian cosmic horror
>Why do people enjoy experiencing like half of products of human culture, which mostly are about world sucking and people being dicks to the bigger or lesser extent
>Why do people like anything that isn't bright and colorful safe space where everyone is happy, or at least would be if some moustache twirling baddie wasn't threatening them (But the heroes will kick his ass for sure!)

Thanks, faggot, it is pussies like you who is reason why we can't get nice things in RPGs

this has to be bait, no one can possibly misconstrue the OP that badly and not be bait or legally handicapped

Sorta like what they said in this and this It's a swords and sandals post-apocalyptic setting. No seriously, the Sorcerer Kings fucked up the world because magic (which does exist) requires that you drain energy from the land to power.

Personally I loved it for the gladiatorial stuff (the 2e book presents a collection of unique arenas) and the fact that it made Bards into something cool, namely people who knew secret knowledge (and were often assassins and spies), instead of douche bags who sing and can talk to people real good.

>It's as if Mad Max and Conan the Barbarian had a baby, and that baby was raised by Gygax.
Oh, also this!

>everything is just fucking grim as hell
The very first low-level adventurer is about the overthrow of a tyrant and the creation of a free city. Not terribly grim.

Anyway, points I like about DS
>all the "core" races are present but altered enough to be novel
>Thri-kreen
>psionics
>the elemental vs paraelemental conflict
>the big paradigm shift of no gods
>the chance to interact with Green Age ghosts, etc.
>the very unique fauna
>still a huge amount of area to explore, including a possible Underdark equivalent
>being a wizard actually carries social consequences

If you can't grab the 2e campaign setting, 4e campaign setting, or the free downloadable 3e campaign setting,

I'd like at these

darksun.wikia.com/wiki/Dark_Sun_Wiki

They're very anti mage and anti literacy. Mages are the reason athas is a wasteland.

>Half-Giant
>'Your size is medium'

Blame 3.X

I think I get it now.
This really does seem a lot more interesting then I gave it credit for. I think I just got a bad explanation from my DM.

Thanks for the explanation. Can we get some stories of past campaigns?

The 3e books is just a conversion of the 2e seeing to 3e

I wish you the best of luck, but I have to note that the DM not being able to articulate why Dark Sun is appealing might be a bit of a warning sign.

Half giants seem quite de-powered, actually.

yeah, he's not a great DM desu.

This honestly

If all your GM could say was 'It's hardcore, everyone is a dick' it sounds more like an excuse to reveal his inner edgelord than run Dark Sun

It's Conan for people who don't understand Conan.

Yeah, a big reason we're starting a new campaign is because his vision of what the game should be and what we really want is too different imo.

Like, last time we played we spent an hour breaking into a goblin owned house that was occupied by 2 goblins. It took an hour because everything we tried failed (oh you can't just shoot at it, they have arrows, you can't set it on fire they have water, you can't go into melee, they will throw oil on you and set you on fire). by the time we broke in we discovered they had a an escape route, and we had to chase them down and kill them. It was hugely demoralizing

oh, come now. I love Conan and I think Dark Sun is very good sword and sorcery.

I've never read Conan, whats there to understand?

You're making it sound as thought you were prevented from taking action becasue of a possibility. Is that really how it went down?

>I attack the evil warrior!
>You can't. Has a shield, he'd just block it.

Youre a badass until you take any real damage or something happens to you that you need help.

The lack of easy magic and the limited infrastructure of much of the world meant that the extra starting power didnt a whole lot if you messed up and the DM played it as it was supposed to be.

It was mostly so you could keep up with the random encounter charts.

I enjoy setting if you don't try to edgelord the shit out of it, like people edgelord Warhammer, but 90% of the people I play Dark Sun with are people who've never actually read Conan and all their knowledge of Sword and Sorcery comes from the album covers of Amon Amarth. So you can imagine how those games went.

Philosophically? Basically Conan is the "Working Class warrior" were a man from the backwoods comes into the cities and sucker punches the academics and politicians who think themselves godlike. It's why Sword and Sorcery has been making a small recurrence recently.

Storewise? It's just a whole lot of fun if you're in the mood for a dude punching Cthulu in various exotic locals.

>dude punching Cthulu

Well let's be honest. Conan would flee from Cthulhu. He hates and fears magic and does not confront dangers he can avoid. Its one thing that sets him apart from many heroes that follow in his model.

For example, take the fear he has for the nameless thing in the maze in The Scarlet Citadel.

>'He backed away and fled up the tunnel, not trusting his sword. ... Conan felt vaguely that he had looked on blasphemy against the eternal laws of nature.'

>He hates and fears magic and does not confront dangers he can avoid.

That was shit that de Camp added. He actually uses magic in Red Nails, despite it just being super tech but whatever.

>Conan felt vaguely that he had looked on blasphemy against the eternal laws of nature

Given that they were experiments he's not wrong.

Dude comes into contact with Cthulhuloid shit all the time and kills it before fleeing. Also Tower of the Elephant has him talking with a Cthulhuoid creature.

Hmm.
It is missing some classes; Templars and Gladiators.
That's interesting. Is the fighter now broad enough to represent both of the major martial streaks?

I'm not sure about barbarian either. Mechanically, maybe it's got a niche but thematically their gimmick is already in use by -everyone-.

The appeal is the setting, if grim isn't your cup of tea then drop it. Easy as that

it was more we tried to do a thing, but as soon as we did it they had a counter. Those arrows were really tearing through us, though the oil ended up not being a huge deal though we found that out through trial and error as opposed to well conveyed messages

Those were some best prepered goblins in history of D&D

>conan tries to punch literally anyone worth the clothes on their back
>arena gets a new gladiator slave

>5e
>Lethal games

Only if you get rid of the fuckawful death save system.

it's kinda cosy despite everything

Dark Sun isn't nearly as grim as Ravenloft.

D&D never understands Conan as well as it claims to, since the magic of Conan is incompatible with the magic of Vance.

I think I vaguely recall something about stone and bone weapons getting MINUSES to attack and damage. Is that true?

Never heard of Tucker's Kobolds? It's kind of a dick thing to do to a low level party but hilarious to do to a party that should be able to handle some lowly minions.

It was fun, had an interesting take on D&D and flipped a lot of what we knew about several races on its head. Sure it was grim and "Hardcore" in violence and the dangers of magic, but it also had a bit of Planet Fantasy going on with the psychic powers taking a larger focus of story and setting.

Also, it could be a good venue to tell stories of empathy and community, those that survive in the wastes do have a better chance when together than when alone.

Heroism comes not just from facing monsters, but surviving the world and choosing to simply pursue one's own well being or do something worthwhile for others.

Does anyone have 2e Dark Sun pdfs available to download?

D&D magic is considered Vancian by people who have never read Vance.

Sadly no relevant stories, it wasn't a popular setting in my group.

And ironically my first introduction wasn't via pen and paper, but SSR's video game (for DOS!) Shattered Lands, which you can probably find free these days, and would give you a rough idea of what things are like in the world of Athas.

You'll also be happy to know that Goblins were one of the races that were genocided by the sorcerer-kings in the ancient past. Along with several other traditional races, they flat out don't exist.

To expand a bit on the background I gave here, the secret history of the world (which mostly isn't relevant to PC's) is that Halfings were the first race, they started experimenting with magical genetics and created everything else, including a super race, but also changed their blue star to a yellow one, completely altering the ecology of their world and destroying their civilization. One of the super race went mad and killed off his own species, and decided he was going to 'give the world' back to the Halflings.

He gathered a bunch of humans together and taught them magic and told them he wanted them to kill all non-humans so that humans could rule the world. Using their magical powers they exterminated a whole bunch of races common to the other major settings (like goblins), eventually caught on to his real plan, imprisoned him, turned the yellow star into a red giant, and became god-kings who are slowly transforming into dragons. They then went off on their own, founded cities, and started feuding, and things pretty much haven't changed since then.

Magic users are generally known as Defilers, and because really destructive rituals can let you soak up a lot of power arcane magic is generally highly controlled by the Sorcerer-Kings (and Queens, just to mention that there are some). There is also another kind of magic called Preserving, which draws life energy from the world, but also does it in a way that is safe/returns it back to the world, though most people are ignorant of the differences. It's also less powerful than Defiling.

For divine magic there are still Clerics, but because the plane that Athas is on doesn't have any 'conduits' to the divine planes, they devote themselves to the 4 elements instead. Water, Fire, Earth, and Air. There's also Sun, Silt, Magma, and Rain, which are considered perversions of the natural elements by the main group, Rain being bad because storms on Athas are especially violent.

Cont.

I don't know why people like it. I don't, I think it sucks. But I also dislike dark and edgy stuff like you.

People like it because they want their group to become the Prism Pentad.

For a comparable real life era think ancient Rome, with slaves from all over the world, gladiatorial arenas to please the masses. Though that's really as close as it gets, since the Sorcerer-Kings rule over everything in their city-states with their personal power as well as their ability to give specific followers (known as Templars) access to spells as well. This is important because aside from Psionics (which everyone has at least a minimum ability with, before specialized classes) the only this is the only source of magical power in the world, as the Elemental Clerics are only barely tolerated within the walls of their cities, if at all, giving them the power to hold the oppressed masses and the even larger number of slaves under their control with only their fellow Sorcerer-Kings being a true threat (that's where PC's can come in, though).

Because it was the 80's and it was fuckin' cool, gladiators featured rather prominently in the setting. Anyone could be a gladiator, because life is cruel on Athas and it's easy to piss off a noble of Templar and end up thrown in the pens to live out a short and brutal life in the arena. But there was also a specific class for it as well, not a specialty of Fighter, one a primary one with specialties of its own (from the flashy acrobatic gladiator, to the serious professional, to the glory hound who wants to become a legend, and more).

As I mentioned, the 2e book has all the details of the unique arenas that can be found throughout the major city-states, a few examples of which include an old obsidian mine that becomes hot as a sauna at high noon and is festooned with sharpened edges and several giant spikes of obisidian spaced randomly around it's irregular shape. While the largest in the world is a massive stone stadium with hexagonal blocks making up the floor, which can have sand piled underneath them to create a more varied combat surface.

Cont., one more post.

Outside the city-states it's pretty much what you'd expect from a desert wasteland. Though it's not entirely devoid of settlements, they are few and far between and almost always a village or smaller, and if they're close to a city-state they're probably subjugated by them, or about to be. Then there are trading caravans, and raiders (both of whom are likely to be elves, who's 'thing' is being able to run with super-endurance, and is why they are able to get by in the desert with relative ease). And slavers, who are also raiders, but tend to be very common since anyone who disappears out in the desert is just generally assumed to be dead.

Where the oceans once stood you'll instead have seas of silt, sand just about everywhere on land, and a giant angry red sun beating down on you most of the day. But it's not entirely dead, the Elemental Clerics and Preservers can both be considered to be fighting a (losing) battle to save the world and try and restore some balance to the natural order, and there are certainly places free of the Sorcerer-King's oppression, as well as areas of the world unspoiled by rampant use of magic. The latter are commonly guarded by Druids, the other-other Divine spellcaster that I forgot about earlier. They can still be PC's, but are often tied to a single location as protectors, since such places are considered precious, especially when most Defilers would happily suck them dry for power. An oasis being the most stereotypical option.

There are many ancient ruins scattered around the world that you can search for loot and magic items, the remnants of those races exterminated by the Sorcerer-Kings, or humans that opposed their rise to power for one reason or another. And while metal itself is a rarity that doesn't mean that people haven't found plenty of ways of enchanting other materials. Obsidian always struck me as a cool one.

Okay so 4 characters I've used in a 2e Dark Sun campaign:

>Sorrow-Tail - Mul Bard
Played him up as a wandering alchemist who'd tell these long rambling stories about being lost on the Silt Sea, out of water, only the floating corpse of a zombie wizard keeping him out of the silt, when a random mysterious figure came out of a storm, striding on the silt's surface like it was solid ground, and offered him a mysterious concoction that briefly give Sorrow amazing powers of perception and knowledge he taught Sorrow how to make on the condition that he provide for *anyone* who asks for it.

(entire story was bullshit, Sorrow was CE and had a grudge against Sorceror-Kings -so the concoction Sorrow made was always watered down poison that "gave anyone who drank it the spiciest shits a fixed amount of time later" (Hence the name "sorrow-TAIL", and which I asked for in lieu of the usual lethal Poison bards get in place of arcane spells), so Sorrow would give it out to as many templars as possible in cities and then try to murder the sorceror-king with his psionic abilities while everyone was shitting their souls out).

Then there was the much simpler character, Bashful Littlebottom - Dwarf Gladiator (TN). Played him as really rowdy and impudent and then if anyone asked why he was called "bashful" he hit them with a mace.

Then there was "Stabbo Stabbins" the Halfling Ranger, who is fairly self explanatory.

And Iron-Hand the Human Defiler, who had lost his right hand in a magic fight and replaced it with a metal hand with articulated fingers he had to position into place with his one good hand to do semantic components.

Then there was Thri-Keenan and his brother Thri-kel the Thri-Keen Psionists, who used ESP to communicate and telekinesis to throw rocks at people from afar because I kept fucking up the Psionic Ability rolls and getting boring utility abilities when I wanted to play a blaster caster.

>Thri-Keenan and his brother Thri-kel

See, I don't think many people get Dark Sun. They assume it's grim for the sake of grim, heroes don't exist and good means nothing.
But Athas isn't a world that despises heroes. It's a world that CRIES OUT For heroes. But not heroes like Frodo or Strider or King Arthur.
Dark sun DEMANDS heroes like Conan the Cimmerian, Odysseus, Scheherazade and Endkidu. Heroes toughhened by the cruel elements, made clever by the vicious machinations of powerful men, and made kind by that spark inside them. A hero of Athas must take into account his survival, yes, but also will have no tolerance for cruelty, excess, and the predations of "Civilization."

PLUS You can earn a happy ending in Dark Sun. If you can get your preserver mage to 20, you can go down the path of becoming an Avingion, a sort of slenderman/butterfly/angel thing that can just create green life from nothing.

Shut up pussy, get into leather pants and start pumping iron. There is a chance you will understand.
If you gaze at the picture related and feel nothing, then maybe your testosteron is low bro.

>Does anyone have a character (or characters) that were memorable? I'm looking for some character inspiration, and my DM says to make 2 backup

Kargan the ''Impaler'', Half-Giant Gladiator who raped his defeated opponents. Shit was cash.

Pure cringeposting kino here.

That's some next level shitposting bro.

Just google it, there are plenty online.

>academics and politicians
>worth the clothes on their back
HAHAHAHAHAHA.

I like it because I love desert settings, psionics, gladiators, elemental priests, and Mesopotamian-styled city states. In addition to all that the setting has a lot of fun creatures and shit that are really unique.

Good. Then perhaps the character after you will be smarter. Or at least played better. Either way, the rest of us benefit. Get to it.

And again, the point, flew right past and you didn't even blink an eye. Truly, completely, epicly, retarded. Honestly, how do you function? I am truly surprised you can read. Go talk to a doctor, I'm sure you have something neurological wrong with you.

But... then again maybe you are just a pussy. I guess complete cowardice, over even your imaginary self-inserts could lead you to believe the shit you are spouting. But, really, the level of pussy you would have to be to be scared of losing numbers and bit of imagination... Well I don't think we actually have numbers that could quantify it yet.

Either way, go get into children's theatre. It would be better then these types of games. Go play with ponies and shit like that. About your speed. No scary things there.

It's post-apocalypse mixed with fantasy. If you like both of those then it sounds cool.

This is a good point of view.

>It fantasy but also relatively unique
>fantasy but unique

It's sad that 'fantasy' has come to mean 'Elves and Dwaves and Orcs in a medieval setting'.

This guy gets it.