Well I keep looking over the material and and all of it seems wonderful, I get images of the world and the feeling of it, but it feels like i'm missing something simple yet very important to it all. I do know that I can't come up with adventure ideas beyond forcing the group to survive the environment, and nothing but survival adventures would get boring quick. I'm also having trouble picking out what distinguishes each city state from the others, I get the real basics of it but I can't seem to form a lot of detail in them. The city state I get an image of best is Tyr, and that is because I bought the Freedom Adventure back when I was a kid thinking it was a simple board game or the like.
I wouldn't have any trouble running Freedom except Athas seems to go through some dramatic changes immediatly following the events of Freedom and I'm not sure if I'm ready to try and play with a world changing on that scale when I'm still missing what are probably simple concepts in Dark Sun.
So any advice on running a Dark SUn campaign would be welcome, also probably story of other peoples adventures in Athas might help me get the idea of what adventureing in Athas is like since I've never read any of the novels.
Thanks.
If you look around some in this forum, you will find numerous threads posted by athasian newcomers. Dig and you shall find the answers to your questions.
That said, my campaign is set just a little before Kalak attempts his transformation, but the events in the Prism Pentad (The first five novels) will never happen to Rikus, Sadira and the others, it'll be my PC's who do the deed (They've kind of figured this out, too, much to their horror :D ).
Adventures don't have to be an episode of Survivor: Athas every game but survival should at least be in the background, reminding the PC's what will happen if they become lost, lose their waterskins in a battle, so on, but it shouldn't dominate the game. Have your players hire on as Caravan Guards, protecting merchants as they travel between cities and villages, maybe investigating ruins they might see after they've stopped for the night or ones that the caravan master wants to check out. Feed them bits and pieces of news they would be likely to hear in the various stops about what's going on in the City-states, let them be harrassed by Templars in the cities, let the caravan be ambushed by gith or elves.
Athas isn't just about survival as in making it day by day against the climate, but the PCs should become movers and shakers in time, possibly looking for a way to restore Athas back to the Green Age, stop the Dragon himself (if you don't use the novels), or all of the above. No matter how different it was from other settings, Dark Sun is still D&D at heart, if a little bleaker, but the players are there to change things, right? :D
Highly reccomend them as well as a good source of the world and such.
I believe our game is set perhaps 10 years after all of that stuff happened.
[/me waits for the GM to correct him and punish accordingly.]
I'm reading the Prism Pentad series as aplayer in a campaign.
Highly reccomend them as well as a good source of the world and such.
I believe our game is set perhaps 10 years after all of that stuff happened.
[/me waits for the GM to correct him and punish accordingly.]
Actually our campaign began at the end of FY 13, in a short time we will be in FY 14. FY 1 began the year Kalak was killed (book 1) and at the end of FY 10 you have the events of book 5 happening (I do not want to ruin what happens in the books too much). So the events of my campaign occure slightly after those events take place, though some things in my game are a bit different, such as Urik being open again (though heavily guarded).
I began my campaign with a simular begining as the adventure from the original boxed set- elves attack and the PCs must make their way to a city- but it was Draj they had to go to. The encounters I made were really different then those in the boxed adventure, but served the same purpose as the original, to give the players a wake up call.
From there it has been mostly urban adventure (they had a small dungeon crawl in the treck out of the stoney barrens before getting to Draj). From Draj they went to Tyr and after the next session, they will have a bit of time traveling to Balic and some good wilderness adventure (I will be using the maps by Brian - so I am sure some of you will know what that means- those of you who do not - like freakboy- will find out the hard way :evillaugh ).
Make sure that you show them how cheap life is and the cruel indifference of the world- everything the get should be a blessing they had to pay for in blood and tears. The harshness of the world is, IMO, the key defining feature of the setting and without it - well you may just as well pick up Dragonlance or some other setting if you do not show this in the your game.
Here is my suggestion for running a DS campaign- do something the players will not expect and be sure to show them that Athas is not the type of world where "adventurers" gather in a bar, read a posting or get a notice of a job, and raid a monsters lair.
Make sure that you show them how cheap life is and the cruel indifference of the world- everything the get should be a blessing they had to pay for in blood and tears. The harshness of the world is, IMO, the key defining feature of the setting and without it - well you may just as well pick up Dragonlance or some other setting if you do not show this in the your game.
Oh, I'm well aware of all that, It's what really makes DS so interesting to me. I plan to run me games such that the PC's lives are thier most valueable possesion and hardest to keep. My real problem is I'm not sure what a typical adventure on Athas is like beyond the difficulty of survival and the cruelness of the world. I'm very experainced and knowledgable of Forgotten Realms and pretty much nothing I can think of I'd run as an adventure in FR fits the feel I get from DS. And the little that I can think of I can't really make a continuous story for a campaign from.
I guess I can see about getting my hands on a couple novels, but I didn't really want to go that route since with college and work I have little time to do personal reading.
Thanks everyone for all the advise.
If all else fails, you could play threw "Freedom". "Road to Urik" does great in following it. "Arcane Shadows" introduces a avangion (a hope for Athas). "Dragons Crown Mountain" follows that pretty well in killing the new hope! "Black Spine" is a nice adventure as well. The world doesnt have to change as it does in the revised campaign setting or on the Prism Pentad novel. Plus going threw these adventures brings up more NPC's that could lead to your own "side" adventures and campaign development. These pre-made adventures will help develope what your looking for and could spark some creative thought.
Just be careful. I played threw the above adventures and others before I read the Prism Pentad series or the revised campaign setting. The campaign that developed didnt fit with the novel or the revised campaign setting.
For now I'll look and see what I can find.
Social Intrigue: This type of game is set primarily in one of the City States with very few excursions outside the protective walls of the city. The players could be members of the Veiled Alliance or involved in hunting them down, they could be criminals attempting to get rich and avoid the templars retribution, and/or they could be working in the employ of a powerful merchant lord or noble, they might even be Templars or working for the Sorcerer King. The Gladiatorial arena could surprising figure quite large in such a game. Betting on gladiators meeting at the arena during the games to make deals buying selling slaves, fixing matches, etc. One specific idea for such a campaign involves running a sort of underground railroad to free slaves. Remember there are a huge number of slaves in the setting. The Undercity of Tyr can provide at lot of opportunities for a city based game set in that city. Another specific idea is for the characters to be spys for a rival city-state intent on uncovering the weaknesses of the city or sabotaging them in someway.
Types of City Encounters: Assassins, Thugs, Templars, Barfights, Veiled Alliance, Rampaging Animals (especially Mekillots! :D ), Thieves, Free Gladiators, Slave Riots, Giants attacking the city, Traps, Cistern Fiends, Guard animals
Explorations/Survival: At the opposite end of the spectrum, this type of game involves staying away from the city states almost entirely. Perhaps the characters are escaped slaves and have joined a slave tribe out in some niche of the wilderness or are starting their own. Maybe they have set out to explore the ruins of Athas in order to find ancient artifacts that they can sell, or to discover more about the past of the setting. Perhaps they are looking for something in particular, like the fabled city on the other side of the sea of silt or the rumored lost City States. Perhaps they have been sent on a mission to find a particular green age artifact, or to establish trade relations with a tribe of halfings in the forest ridge.
Types of Wilderness Encounters: Just about any sort of monster, Raiders (elves, gith, thri-kreen, slave tribes), Merchant Caravans, Desperate Travelers, Hidden Monestaries and/or Villages, Sacred Sites, Anicient Ruins, Rogue Defilers, Halfling Cannibals
Protection: In this type of game the characters are set to protect something of great importance to them. Perhaps they work for a struggling merchant house that is invovled in a trade war with another or several other merchant houses. Maybe they are trying to protect a City-State from the forces that seek to tear it apart, Raam is a good canadate for that one ;) . Or possibly they are trying to protect a druid's guarded lands from discover by the nearest SK, defilement at the hands of local raiding tribes, or even the encroaching Sea of Silt. Maybe they are protecting a client village from being overun by monsters. They could even be trying to protect a Presever that is attempting to undergo the Avangion transformation.
Things you need to know to run a good DS game:
Know your City-States: the Veiled Alliance book is a great resource (all city-states), as is the City-State of Tyr (Tyr), and the Ivory Triangle boxset (Gulg and Nibenay).
Know your Merchant Houses: Only one book gives you the low down on the merchant houses: Dune Trader.
Know your Tribes: Elves of Athas, Slave Tribes, and Thri-Kreen of Athas each give infomation on those groups.
Other Important Groups: The Order (the mysterious group of powerful Psions that seek to control the use of powers of the mind throughout the world to their own ends)- Information about the order and psionic schools/practices can be found in The Will and The Way. The Kreen Empire-partially detailed in The Thri-Kreen of Athas. The Ruhl-Thaun, the cliff dweeling remenents of acient Halfling Culture-Detailed in The Wind Rider of the Jagged Cliffs. The Mindlords of the Last Sea, I'll leave you to wonder about that one for now they are in the book of the same name. All of these things are pariferal however and a very good game can be run ignoring them entirely.
Important Themes:
The Struggle for Freedom/The Iron Chains of Slavery
Survival in a Dying World
Tyranny for the greater good
Rebirth and Renewal/Destruction and Decay
Mystery of the Previous Ages/Discovery of Forgotten Peoples, Places, and Artifacts
What other people are doing in their games
Another Thread about other people's games
Death and Burial Practices
There is a link to a second thread about the topic at the bottom of this one.
Food and Drink Sewage and Waste
City States and Sorcerer Kings Roots of City States
Reoccuring Villians
What Would Andropinus Do?
Favorite Modules and Why
How are kreen treated in town?
Military Style Campaign
Opinions on different types of spellcasters
Inix Toenail Filth's Take on Raam
Dungeon Crafting in DS
Lost Cities of Athas
The Price of Slaves
Lalai-Puy's Motives
Athas's Place in the Planes
Help Planning a DS Campaign
Zardnaar's Take on the Cleansing Wars
Dwarf Focus
Defiler PC and Not Getting Killed
Adventure Ideas
I've found a lot of material to look at, and just glancing at those lists of links they should prove to be a wealth of knowledge.
When I have time to look over all of it I should be able to come up with all sorts of ideas.
My players would get slain right now though- like in round one. I have to wait until I could at least let them live for 4 or 5 rounds before I kill them! :D