I'm thinking about doing a plot where the characters' ship is badly damaged, and they land on Athas to try and repair it, but their ship ends up being destroyed. Would this be a violation of canon? I'm not especially worried about violating canon, but if it is, I would like to know so I can devise an explination.
Nightdruid however created a crystal sphere (The crimson sphere) on Beyond The Moons
Spelljammer exploration is possible; a regular spelljamming trading certainly not (and if is not possible there should be a reason for it, which nightdruid accounts for in his description of the sphere)
Yes, but Dark Sun has a very special ecosytem (a lack of i would say) that could be destroyed without a careful planning ( the classical example is a spelljammer full of steel swords and mithral breastplates)
Spelljammer exploration is possible; a regular spelljamming trading certainly not (and if is not possible there should be a reason for it, which nightdruid accounts for in his description of the sphere)
Pretty much nailed it. SJ & athas can mix, just regular trade routes that can cause problems. :p
Are your heroes of 2nd level or higher!?!?!? If not, remember that old rule about AThas...heroes are SUPPOSED to be of higher levels there to survive the harshness of that world!!!
The reason i mention this is, because, i would do it anyway, Hell, maybe I would prefer doing that, just to put my players through the grinder.
HEHEHEHE!!!!
See, some of my pl;ayers, they're experts at RPing, thinking through the best DM planning, killing whatever baddy they are put against, and surviving with something new in their treasure trove, especially something i simply did not think about ahead of time that screws me over anally later on...YEESH!
Hmm...I think I'll do just that...mind if I steal your hook? It sounds like it would be a good, general simple way to get people on Athas. Hehehe, die, my pretties, die, die!!!
--perhaps defiling magic opens dead magic zones in wildspace? NB
i thought the Dragon task was to protect Athas from all foreign incursions (spelljammers)
No. His task was to act of the warden of Rajaat, and to keep the First Sorcerer imprisoned.
--I doubt Borys is even aware wildspace exists, assuming one uses the 2e cosmology NB
I understand you all wanting to keep 2e cosmology, but remember, even during 2e days, the Athasian set-up was more like 3.x cosmology than it was 2e cosmology.
--Athas, like Mystara, seemed to be in its own little multiverse even in 2e days NB
That's the motive of so much psickics!!!! The magical force was consumed... a spelljammer could destroi the entire planet, just by parking aroud!!!
A counter measure, is go to atahs by the astral plane... and let the ship in the astral plane (or the plane os shadows (a sunny world... lot of shadows :D)) and from there you could reach the material plane of Athas...
But... Athas is real fun to play...very bad weather... crazy elf/balds/psickics/maniacs/of doom wandering aroud... to not mention the hordes os Trii-Ken...
So if you want to play it... play it damed! To the crap with magical energy, jus parking around... kill some monsters... have a lot of fun... try to steal a Anulus!!!
AND THE BEST OF IT!!!!
GO RAID SOME MOTHER FU.... MIND FLAYERS AND THEYRS NAUTILUS... WITHA ANULUS IN HAND!!!!! AUHAUAHUHUHAUHAUHAUHAUHAU
Wooooo... I love this game!!!
bye felows!
But... u need to go to Toril... e go to mystara then... I don't know why but... Toril is the spet in multiverse to everywhere... but u got a problem... maybe three problens:
1 - Nautilus... Sure, you don't want to meet one of theese nasty things!
2 - Gods... Hey they're Gods... don't mess with them.
3 - Phraemin... "Every thing sleeps" words of my rogue assassin... so you do... and with phraemin... don't do that... they will enter you dreams man... and quest what... YOU'RE NOW A PUPPET O THE STRING.
....wooooot..... I LOVE SPELLJAMMING AROUD!!!!!
TO THE MULTIVERSE, AND BEYOND!!!!! *theme music*
No. His task was to act of the warden of Rajaat, and to keep the First Sorcerer imprisoned.
--I doubt Borys is even aware wildspace exists, assuming one uses the 2e cosmology NB
i don't remember anything about the 6 novels of Darksun. All i remember is that the water flow again on Athas at the end?
i don't remember anything about the 6 novels of Darksun. All i remember is that the water flow again on Athas at the end?
....if you consider Rise and Fall of a Dragon-king to be canonical, then yes, water does flow at the end of the Athasian saga, all thanks to Hamanu.
--it was 13 novels; 5 for "Prism Pentad", 3 for "Tribe of One", and 5 for "Chronicles of Athas" NB
There's no need to feel bound by canon. Instead, exploit canon and abuse it as much as you need to make it fun. ;)
Anywho, in my campaign, a very peculiar thing happens when a ship crashes on Athas. Even if it lands in the silt sea, the ship is nearly obliterated, and iron/mythral/adamantite/other weird metals besides crystals and crysteel from other spheres that has not been treated by the Mercane/Arcane ( i prefer Arcane myself), is eaten up during reentry. The atmosphere has a rusting effect on it. However, warforged (Shardspace is Ebberron, a very small sphere. The outer surface of the Lammania moon has a small town on it) for some reason are uneffected, probably due to certain things done during reation.
Arcane casters need not worry about defiling UNLESS using a metamagic feat. Divine casters and psionicists are fine. Incarnum is near useless, because the whole planet, and most of the sphere for that matter, is a wild-essentia zone. Poor totemists and incarnates.
Normal elfs are called midgets, and gnomes look like underfed dwarves. Dark elves are weirdoes, and Genasi are thought to be fanatical clerics.
That's how I do it. And expect crysteel to be stolen. Alot. Coins are uneffected by the atmosphere, for some reason... (I'm lazy, and they don't need to know that.) :D
Officially Athas is unreachable by spelljamming vessels
I wouldn't say that is exactly true. The Complete Spacefarer's Handbook says that Athas (and Ravenloft) "should be avoided in Spelljammer Campaigns", but then goes on to give a brief explanation of how those two settings might fit into a SJ campaign! I've typed in the two paragraphs to save you hunting out your old books:
Athas. The world of the Dark Sun campaign is not on the spacelanes where Realspace, Krynnspace and Greyspace can be found. No spelljammer travels its skys; no ancient tome tells of the routes to its crystal sphere. Whether it is unreachable by spelljammer or merely so far from these worlds that any journey would take lifetimes is unknown.
This first paragraph suggests that Athas is in an undiscovered crystal sphere (or possibly a forgotten crystal sphere).
At the moment phologiston rivers (i.e. SJ trade routes) have not been properly documented, but when they are The Crimson Sphere should be places somewhere where most spelljamming ships wouldn't want to go. If I was creating phlogiston rivers I would make the ones leading to Krynnspace, Realmspace and Greyspace wide powerful rivers (that are easy to find) and make the ones leading to The Crimson Sphere small weak rivers (that are hard to find). (Think motorway/freeway for the main rivers and dirt track for The Crimson Sphere's river.)
I've even thought about teaming The Crimson Sphere up with two other equally dangerous crystal spheres and creating an opposite group to the Radiant Triangle. I'd call it "The Ashen Triangle" (as Radiance is Fire + Positive Material and Ash is Fire + Negative Material). Darkspace (from the 'Crystal Spheres' adventure) might be suitable for one of them as it is another crystal sphere that was unknown. (If you stick The Crimson Sphere on the far side of Darkspace then that sphere would form another barrier that would keep most people away from The Crimson Sphere, itself.)
Anyway, the main thing that I get from 'The Complete Spacefarer's Handbook' is that Athas is 'officially unknown' not 'officially unreachable'. I'm sure that if the Spelljammer setting had been around for longer fan pressure for a SJ DS crossover campaign would have encouraged TSR to bring out a crystal sphere for Athas.
The current inhabitants of Athas have no knowledge of spelljamming. There is no way to know whether the closely guarded library of some sorcerer-king conceals an ancient tome revealing the basic concepts of wildspace. Even if such a tome were found, the defiling power of such powerful magic would certainly wreak havoc with on the fragile balance of life on Athas.
This second paragraph is interesting because it says the "current inhabitants of Athas have no knowledge of spelljamming". So it is possible that past inhabitants had knowledge of spelljamming.
The concept that a sorcerer-king might have a book explaining the basics of spelljamming makes an excellent game hook. Why give a game hook if you don't want DMs to use Athas for Spelljamming?
Athas is a problematic setting to join onto Spelljammer, but I believe it is possible to join any D&D (or even d20) fantasy setting to both Spelljammer and Planescape. That is what the crystal spheres are for. Within the Athas' crystal sphere all the rules of Dark Sun apply. Outside it only the rules of Spelljammer apply.
Nightdruid however created a crystal sphere (The crimson sphere) on Beyond The Moons
I'm a big fan of Adam's Crimson Sphere. Here is a direct link to The Crimson Sphere to help people surfing past find it.
I think that Night Druid came fairly close to how I think TSR would have done it, although they would almost certainly have expanded it at least to the size of the Greyspace, Krynnspace and Realmspace suppliments (and probably have reused a lot of Dark Sun and Spelljammer artwork that we had seen before). I would have especially liked to have seen rules for defilers using spelljamming helms.
Night Druid says that the rivers leading to this sphere are "well-explored and documented" but those rivers "remain unused". And that traders and travellers have chosen to forget the route because the sphere is said to be cursed. As someone who is interested in seeing phlogiston rivers documented I'd be interested in knowing what phlogiston rivers flow to The Crimson Sphere. Hopefully he will get a chance to revisit this sphere and add more information later on.
One thing I have often pondered is the ramifications of Athas's magical nature. Basically, Athas doesn't have any kind of ambient magical energy field equivalent to Toril's Weave or similar magical conduits on other worlds.
This is why wizards on Athas have to have a definite power source, rather than being able to simply pull magic out thin air. If that were even possible then surely a godlike intelligence like Rajaat's would have figured out how and defiling would never have been developed.
So therefore I've always felt that spellcasters from other worlds would be severely constrained in "Athaspace". Unless they learned the secrets of Athas's magic they would largely be powerless.
Spelljamming would be therefore be rather difficult in Athaspace because the person running the helm would need access to a power source. Wizards would therefore be largely unsuitable. Elemental clerics more suitable.
Regardless, visitors to Athas wouldn't do very well.
Just remember: If using Dark Sun from a Spelljammer perspective, then one must also realize the Cleansing Wars would have ravaged the entire crystal sphere. Thus, expect Sunspace to be as nasty and terrifyingly desolate as Athas itself!
--perhaps defiling magic opens dead magic zones in wildspace? NB
Night Druid has already implemented both of the ideas you mention in The Crimson Sphere. The Clensing War forms the start of his History section. And the Forlorn Sargasso (dead magic zone) is the site of a battle where defiling magic caused the very fabric of the ships to become so fragile that they crumble when touched.
......just remember, folks, 3.x uses a seperated cosmology, wherein each setting is distinct and apart from all others. Thus, in a totally canonical Dark Sun 3.x game, Athas isn't in a crystal sphere, it's Material Plane doesn't connect to the Great Wheel, and Sigil doesn't even exist. Athas, even in 2e days, had its own set of Inner Planes!
Do you have an actual WotC source for these 3.x facts? I've seen Spelljammer ignored, but have not seen anything that actually says that it doesn't exist in 3rd edition. There officially is no such thing as a canonical Dark Sun 3.x game as the setting, like Spelljammer, is an out of print one. Both of these settings (and Planescape) have been passed over to 'official' websites, but if WotC ever wants to reprint them they may well ignore anything produced by these websites. In fact, I believe that The Burnt World of Athas actually helped Night Druid to produce his 'The Crimson Sphere' product, which would make The Crimson Sphere as 'official' as any other Dark Sun 3.x download.
I understand you all wanting to keep 2e cosmology, but remember, even during 2e days, the Athasian set-up was more like 3.x cosmology than it was 2e cosmology.
--Athas, like Mystara, seemed to be in its own little multiverse even in 2e days NB
This idea of non-standard cosmology was also used in Spelljammer, itself. The Astromundi Cluster locked out certain outer planes and shifted the entire crystal sphere part way into one of the transitive planes (the etherial plane I think).
The new cosmologies are an interesting idea, but don't stop Spelljammer (or Planescape) from connecting to a crystal sphere. They just make it a little bit more difficult to join spheres onto external settings.
Elements of Spelljammer (and Planescape) have also been preserved in the settings that WotC have kept in print.
The 3.x Greyhawk campaign setting is the default setting of 3.x D&D, and it has an almost identical cosmology to Planescape (and the earlier edition of Manual of the Planes). There are some changes, but these are mostly to deal with differences between Planescape and earlier products. Spelljammer is not mentioned in the core rulebooks, but those books do not say that wildspace or Greyhawk's crystal sphere no longer exist. Without actual evidence to the contrary, I'd say that anything not mentioned would still be the same as earlier editions.
The 3e Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting hardback has a section called "The Sea of Night" which gives a short description of the wildspace of Realmspace. The book also mentions Realmspace's planets, but does not mention the crystal sphere. The outer planes of Realmspace have been altered, but I'm sure that the Planescape fans can come up with a way to deal with that. It would be relatively easy to make the FRCS outer planes alterative names for 3e MotP outer planes or make some of them demi-planes.
Spelljammer's crystal spheres actually solve a lot of the cosmology problems because under Spelljammer/Planescape cosmology there is one Prime Material Plane (Material Plane in 3e) that is divided into wildspace and the phlogiston by the crystal spheres. All the Planewalker people need to do is decide that each crystal sphere can have its own unique connections to the inner and outer planes and/or restrictions on travel between the Material Plane and the other planes. Even if an 'official product', like FRCS, doesn't mention a particular plane in its cosmology a planewalker can still get there by going via another plane that is mentioned in that product. 3.x doesn't separate the settings - it just turns Planescape into more of a maze than it was before.
The 3e Dragonlance Campaign Setting hardback is probably the most problematic one for Spelljammer as it says that Krynn and countless other worlds float in an 'Etherial Sea' and that Krynn is surrounded by the 'Dome of Creation'. However, page 120 of the DLCS shows the constellations (which Spelljammer products said appear on the inner side of Krynnspace's crystal sphere) and also lists all of the planets that appear in the Krynnspace crystal sphere. Reading between the lines it seems that The Gate of Souls prevents access to Krynnspace from any outer planes not mentioned in the DLCS. However as I already mentioned Planewalker.com can get around this easily by letting people do plane-to-plane hops outside Krynnspace. The hardest thing to deal with is Takhisis stealing the world. Dragonhelm says that this means that Krynn will no longer be found within Krynnspace, however if you check the dates in the 3.x DLCS you will see that it is many years further forward than FRCS and these events are ones that 'have not happened yet'.
I must admit I don't understand why some campaign setting authors are now so eager to isolate their campaign setting from other settings. Gaming products are supposed to be there to work for DMs. If a DM wants to use something with Spelljammer or Planescape saying "you are not allowed to do that" is almost the same as saying "please don't spend your cash on our products". Planescape and Spelljammer can be ignored (rather than banned) by the campaign setting designers so pose absolutely zero risk to campagn settings.
Lets face it players that are not Planescape fans are likely to have no interest in visiting DLCS's Dome of Creation or FRCS's Warrior's Rest and players that are Planescape fans are going to find the tiny descriptions of these 'new' outer planes do not give them enough information to actually run a game there. I think it would be far more useful to either use the default planes from the MotP or not bother to mention cosmology in a product.
In fact both Planescape and Spelljammer are friends to all 3.x campaign settings as both planewalkers and spacefarers travel to new places and DMs are more likely to want to buy different game worlds to add onto their existing game.
Night Druid has already implemented both of the ideas you mention in The Crimson Sphere. The Clensing War forms the start of his History section. And the Forlorn Sargasso (dead magic zone) is the site of a battle where defiling magic caused the very fabric of the ships to become so fragile that they crumble when touched.
Think you might have a few of my ideas mixed up there :P But basically, the Black Gulf surrounds Athas' planets (you might have been thinking of the Forlorn Shoals idea I posted to SJL a few weeks ago). The Black Gulf is not so much a magic dead zone, but a "strange" region where everything goes dark, and bizarre creatures attack you. In sort, it makes a trip to Athas far too dangerous for all but the most suicidal merchant, but mid-to-high level adventurers should be able to punch through
In fact, I believe that The Burnt World of Athas actually helped Night Druid to produce his 'The Crimson Sphere' product, which would make The Crimson Sphere as 'official' as any other Dark Sun 3.x download.
The Dark Sun board here were the primary "helpers" with the Crimson Sphere. I ran a survey of that board several months back to see why the topic of Darksun/SJ crossovers kept coming up. I took the information gleaned from that thread (except for the hokey armadas of living, life-bending super-jammers that kept coming up ;) ) and wrote the Crimson Sphere. Its not really reconnized as "official" in any meaningful way, but its probably as close to an official Dark Sun sphere as you'll get (at least until someone writes up something better! ;) ).
I must admit I don't understand why some campaign setting authors are now so eager to isolate their campaign setting from other settings.
I believe it probably has a lot to do with the novel lines. In the novel world of things, its better to have isolated worlds. Crossovers rarely work; they always come across as jarring. Too many worlds, such as DL, have always been presented as "all alone in the night", stand-alone worlds without connections to other worlds, in novels. And many novel readers are fans of one line of novels. They REALLY hate it when say Scarlet Brotherhood monks or Harper agents appear in Palanthus. It forces them to learn about a world outside of their chosen world to know what's going on. You get the same thing with RPG lines, although to a much lesser degree.
Also, don't forget that at the time 3e came out, they sold the rights to Ravenloft. They probably thought, at the time, that they were going to sell all of their settings, so there appears to have been an effort to "pack up" all the settings into nice, sellable units. Didn't pan out, though.
The outer planes of Realmspace have been altered, but I'm sure that the Planescape fans can come up with a way to deal with that.
Yep! It's called "stupid primes".
Spelljammer's crystal spheres actually solve a lot of the cosmology problems because under Spelljammer/Planescape cosmology there is one Prime Material Plane (Material Plane in 3e) that is divided into wildspace and the phlogiston by the crystal spheres. All the Planewalker people need to do is decide that each crystal sphere can have its own unique connections to the inner and outer planes and/or restrictions on travel between the Material Plane and the other planes. Even if an 'official product', like FRCS, doesn't mention a particular plane in its cosmology a planewalker can still get there by going via another plane that is mentioned in that product. 3.x doesn't separate the settings - it just turns Planescape into more of a maze than it was before.
That is a really neat idea. I think I'm going to go share that with some of my planewalking friends.
Think you might have a few of my ideas mixed up there :P But basically, the Black Gulf surrounds Athas' planets (you might have been thinking of the Forlorn Shoals idea I posted to SJL a few weeks ago).
Nope I'm referring to this article on BtM:
Forlorn Sargasso
Found not far from the edge of the Black Gulf is this strange collection of ancient ships. A terrible battle was fought here, one that left almost fifty ships smashed and ruined. Due to the defiling magic unleashed during the battle, nothing from the ships could be salvaged; all wood, metal, and weapons crumble to dust when touched.
That paragraph is in the Additional Astronomicals. The article is by a guy called Adam "Night Druid" Miller (Have you heard of him? He's very good! ;) ) It says "document last updated on the 4th of August, 2005" so I don't know if it the same version as in your PDF. You might want to surf there and check it out to see if it is an old version.
The Black Gulf is not so much a magic dead zone, but a "strange" region where everything goes dark, and bizarre creatures attack you. In sort, it makes a trip to Athas far too dangerous for all but the most suicidal merchant, but mid-to-high level adventurers should be able to punch through
I understood The Black Gulf was not the same thing as the Forlorn Sargasso. The Black Gulf is interesting as well. I'm not exactly sure how it works. If the stars can be seen from the centre of the sphere does that mean that the sun and planets can be seen from outside The Black Gulf?
I'd be interested to know more about how The Black Gulf works. I know that out-of-character it acts as a barrier between Athas and the rest of the crystal spheres, but what is the in-character reason for its existence? Was it always there or was it created at some time in the sphere's past?
As this area is light affecting is there some sort of connection with the Plane of Shadow? Are the mysterious attackers from that plane or are they something else? Whey do they have variations in strength? Are there different types of creatures in The Black Gulf? Are the creatures intellegent? Do they have a leader? Could one of the Sorcerer-Kings (including one thought to have died centuries ago) have moved onto the Plane of Shadow and become a dragon made of shadow stuff?
If the creatures can "rend metal and rip off and carry away whole sections of the ship" are they attracted to specific materials? I know that certain materials are rare in the Dark Sun setting and if the creatures were attracted specifically to those materials a ship should be able to slip through if it didn't have any of the 'illegal' material onboard.
What happens to the things that are ripped off of ships and the ships that are destroyed? Do they vanish (presumably onto the Plane of Shadow) or are the bits taken somewhere for some purpose? Could the creatures in The Black Gulf perhaps be creating a new planet by harvesting all material within the region that is in shadow?
An exact diameter isn't given in your description on BtM. All we know is that it takes 10 days travel for attacks to come on an hourly basis. Assuming that the description applies to people travelling in both directions I would guess that attacks would slow down over the next 10 days of travel (unless your plan was for the attacks to suddenly stop at some stage). Is the travel time down to The Black Gulf being wide or is it a thin area that ships travel through at tactical speed?
The Dark Sun board here were the primary "helpers" with the Crimson Sphere. I ran a survey of that board several months back to see why the topic of Darksun/SJ crossovers kept coming up. I took the information gleaned from that thread (except for the hokey armadas of living, life-bending super-jammers that kept coming up ;) ) and wrote the Crimson Sphere. Its not really reconnized as "official" in any meaningful way, but its probably as close to an official Dark Sun sphere as you'll get (at least until someone writes up something better! ;) ).
I don't think we can get anything better (in quality), but I'm sure that more details for each location would improve things.
I believe it probably has a lot to do with the novel lines. In the novel world of things, its better to have isolated worlds. Crossovers rarely work; they always come across as jarring. Too many worlds, such as DL, have always been presented as "all alone in the night", stand-alone worlds without connections to other worlds, in novels. And many novel readers are fans of one line of novels. They REALLY hate it when say Scarlet Brotherhood monks or Harper agents appear in Palanthus. It forces them to learn about a world outside of their chosen world to know what's going on. You get the same thing with RPG lines, although to a much lesser degree.
I think the big problem with crossover fiction is that they are usually done by people who are not experts in both settings. I've read a few comic-book crossovers (like Batman vs Judge Dredd) and they are usually an attemt to set up a big fight between two popular characters between the individual settings. The problem with doing this is that one of the two settings is often depicted as somehow less important than the other one.
Because they often seem to be low quality products that aim to cash in I quite often dislike crossover comic-books. I can see why novels might suffer from similar quality issues, however I think that a well made novel could be extremely interesting. The Forgotten Realms for example has built into its history the concept that many of its natives originally came from other places. A FR novel that involves travel to one of those places (like the Mullorandi homeworld) would be facinating to many fans.
I think the best way to deal with crossovers between two settings is to take a minor character or a new character from one world and throw them into the other world. If the character is a minor one then fans of the second setting will not need to know all about their back story to understand them. And fans of the first setting won't need to know about all the background of the second setting as it will seem natural for them to be as ignorant as the character they are following.
Spelljammer and Planescape are the kings of crossovers because they are all about transition. The Cloakmaster Cycle novels (at least the early ones) are the best crossover novels I can think of. If all crossover novels were done to that quality I think they would get more people to read them.
Also, don't forget that at the time 3e came out, they sold the rights to Ravenloft. They probably thought, at the time, that they were going to sell all of their settings, so there appears to have been an effort to "pack up" all the settings into nice, sellable units. Didn't pan out, though.
One of the daft things about 3e is that WotC decided to give away the SRD to encourage everyone to create compatible campagin settings and even let people use the d20 System logo.
I'm sure they did this to sell more copies of the core rulebooks, but I think they missed a trick with the cosmology aspects of the SRD. The SRD kept the concept of the Outer Planes but removed the actual names and descriptions. The Quasi-Elemental Planes (which are now options in the Manual of the Planes) have also been removed.
If the Great Wheel had been included in the SRD it would have allowed all the people selling d20 System products to create products that were 100 percent compatible with the 3e Manual of the Planes. At the moment system designers are creating their own variant cosmolgies, but if they were compatible with the MotP then DMs wanting more details would go out and buy that. And DMs that were very interested in travel to the planes could be hooked into a new Planescape line that could hoover up people from every d20 System fantasy setting.
The same goes for Spelljammer. If the basic elements (crystal spheres, planet design rules and common ships) were put into the SRD or another licenced product WotC could turn every d20 System game product into something that could feed DMs into a 3e Spelljammer campaign setting.
That paragraph is in the Additional Astronomicals. The article is by a guy called Adam "Night Druid" Miller (Have you heard of him? He's very good! ;) ) It says "document last updated on the 4th of August, 2005" so I don't know if it the same version as in your PDF. You might want to surf there and check it out to see if it is an old version.
My mistake
Been a while since I last read the thing ;)I understood The Black Gulf was not the same thing as the Forlorn Sargasso. The Black Gulf is interesting as well. I'm not exactly sure how it works. If the stars can be seen from the centre of the sphere does that mean that the sun and planets can be seen from outside The Black Gulf?
I sorta envision the Black Gulf as a twisting of the Gray, a bleeding of the planes and reality. That's why its so strange. Its exact boundaries are vague, as are its effects. Its ten days travel as being long enough to wear down even a powerful party, and overwhelming to lesser parties (and thus discourage merchants & low-level types from attempting the journey). As far as its origins, I think I had its creation as accidental, probably the result of an attempt by the wardens to build or use a super-weapon or spell against invading factions.
The reason for not stating out the creatures, or giving much more than a vague description, is that I wanted to give DMs the freedom to use whatever critters they want, to judge them to be challenging to their party but not overwhelmingly so. Plus I didn't want to try to envision a dozen or more critter types and stat them out...that'd take more space, time, & energy than the whole PDF! ;)
I don't think we can get anything better (in quality), but I'm sure that more details for each location would improve things.
If I could clone myself, I'd devote one clone to developing a full-born sphere guide. ;)
I think the big problem with crossover fiction is that they are usually done by people who are not experts in both settings. I've read a few comic-book crossovers (like Batman vs Judge Dredd) and they are usually an attemt to set up a big fight between two popular characters between the individual settings. The problem with doing this is that one of the two settings is often depicted as somehow less important than the other one.
Sadly enough, I think that is the case.
I think the best way to deal with crossovers between two settings is to take a minor character or a new character from one world and throw them into the other world. If the character is a minor one then fans of the second setting will not need to know all about their back story to understand them. And fans of the first setting won't need to know about all the background of the second setting as it will seem natural for them to be as ignorant as the character they are following.
With D&D crossovers, I think there is an implied meta-setting. One not of just FR/DL/GH/DS, but one of thousands of worlds. That implied setting is all but lost, save for Lords of Maddness, I think.
In a way, I think D&D has just so much *stuff* that really, trying to jam it all in one world is problematic. You almost need to create a whole group of worlds or one mega-world, joined via portals or somesuch means, to fit it all in.
Anyway, the main thing that I get from 'The Complete Spacefarer's Handbook' is that Athas is 'officially unknown' not 'officially unreachable'. I'm sure that if the Spelljammer setting had been around for longer fan pressure for a SJ DS crossover campaign would have encouraged TSR to bring out a crystal sphere for Athas.
This was written before Athas cosmological position was defined. The definition was published in later books (Dragon Kings, Defilers and Presevers of Athas) and it clearly states that Athas is on an alternate plane.
The problem ist that TSR employed different teams for their products at that time who had apparantly trouble communicating.
Kilamar
Make one wonder about the statut of Eberron.. It had been debated in Planescape, so... Would it be a closed off sphere also? What with the different cosmo;logy and all...
There are two problems with Eberron, however I think that both can be dealt with:
1) "Eberron is that it doesn't comply with the standard D&D cosmolgy."
As I've said before Spelljammer and Planescape can be used together to deal with this problem and bring incompatible settings together. (Which in my opinion is what they were both designed to do in the first place.) Planescape (I believe) changed from a multi-verse of Alternate Prime Material Planes to a single universe of one Prime Material Plane separated into individual planetary systems and the phlogiston by the crystal spheres.
3e D&D abandons the phrase Prime Material Plane in favor of Material Plane and I would argue that Spelljammer/Planescape can continue to be the interface between settings.
Although new 3e settings (apart from Greyhawk/Greyspace which is the default D&D setting of the PHB) use variant cosmology, the 2e Asromundi Cluster already established that an individual crystal sphere could have non-standard connections to other planes.
All we need to do is use Clusterspace logic to decide that within each individual crystal sphere some connections to inner, outer or transitive planes can be blocked (hence the groundlings think those planes don't exist) and new inner, outer or transitive planes can be formed (everyone from outside the crystal sphere would call these planes demi-planes).
2e Planescape already introduced the idea that non-planewalkers used the wrong names for outer planes so some planes in 3e products can be ruled to be regions within existing outer planes. To be honest that is the problem of Planescape fans and the Planewalker website. I so I don't think we should get too hung up on it, apart from using this basic logic to link up to any new 3e setting we want to.
2) Eberron is not Open Game Content.
Since the arrival of the Open Game Licence and the stern warnings on products saying the above, it looks like nobody can produce material for them. However, it seems to me that this was Wizards of the Coast trying to stop commercial organisations from profiting from the back of D&D.
I think that as long as a fan product is one that supports Eberron (and doesn't actually reproduce Eberron material) that WotC would be unlikely to view it as a threat to its revenue. You couldn't sell Eberronspace (I think someone called it something like Shardspace) but you could send material to Beyond the Moons, as they have a special relationship with Wizards of the Coast.
Anyhoo, this is a thread about Athas, so if you want to talk about Eberron I believe there is already another thread here that you should read and post in.
(Mixing the two settings up - except to say Eberron does this and I think that The Crimson Sphere can too - will make it harder for people to find facts in these forums.)
This was written before Athas cosmological position was defined. The definition was published in later books (Dragon Kings, Defilers and Presevers of Athas) and it clearly states that Athas is on an alternate plane.
Is that "alternate plane" as in "alternate prime material plane"? As I said above Spelljammer/Planescape cosmolgy replaced this into a single "Prime Material Plane" which under 3e rules is just called the Material Plane.
The problem ist that TSR employed different teams for their products at that time who had apparantly trouble communicating.
I think they didn't have trouble communicationg Kilamar. I think they had their own reasons for wanting to make their own product lines connect or not connect with other product lines.
Spelljammer and then Planescape are specifically there to try to make connections, but some designers of other product lines may want to sever those connections to illiminate the possibility of things coming in from outside the setting and "polluting their setting".
I think that setting designers do DMs and players a diservice when they try to ban DMs from combining their product with other produts. If you think about it logically there are going to be two types of Dark Sun DMs:
1) A Dark Sun purist who doesn't want to involve anything from any other campaigns. He doesn't need to be told any Spelljammer or Planescape rules as he won't be interested in moving the action into wildspace or onto the planes.
2) A cross over fan who wants to mix Dark Sun with another setting. He will want to either mix Dark Sun with Spelljammer or Planescape or use either of those settings to form a bridge between Dark Sun and another campaign world. He won't be interested in any rules that block connections between Dark Sun and the rest of the multi-verse because they just stand in his way.
Dark Sun is a special setting which needs equally special respect to connect it to another setting. I think that Night Druid gave it that respect when he created The Crimson Sphere, because the sphere has more in common with Athas than the rest of Spelljammer. I'm sure that the same thing could be done with Planescape and Athas. As I also said Clusterspace logic already implies that each crystal sphere can have its own special rules for connections with other planes and this fits in well with what some 3e products are doing.
As Dark Sun is a dead setting it needs conversion anyway, so it makes sense for the people at The Burnt World of Athas to fix the connections with the multi-verse at that point. Cross-over campaigns hurt nobody and create the possiblity of importing new PCs and the players that control those characters.
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in particular, the undead dragon (dregoth, i think?) has travelled to other planes and found some differences between athas and other worlds... specifically, that divine energy comes from the elemental planes on athas but not elsewhere, etc. it's where he gets the idea for becoming a god, and is kinda the basis for the whole adventure. and iirc, the whole project was handed off to the athas.org folks by WoTC, so it was going to be official at one point presumably.