Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 zombiegleemax Apr 13, 2004 14:03:35	I am trying to sell my players on Dark Sun, but they are big Forgotten Realms and Spelljammer fans (I'm not trying to imply that one can't like two out of three or all three of those settings at once). Can y'all help me come up with a list of selling points?
#2 dawnstealer Apr 13, 2004 14:13:44	Brutality. A break from Tolkeinesque fantasy. A chance to make a difference in a dying world. Playing in a world where the bad guys have won. A chance to play races unseen anywhere else (thri-kreen that never sleep, half-giants the size of a small house, cannibal halflings, etc). Vast tracks of untouched wastelands to explore. Complex social interactions within the city-states. Powerful kings and powerful enemies and outsmarting them. Making the world a better place (the bad guys in the Realms do not have a strong foothold). That should get you started.
#3 Pennarin Apr 13, 2004 14:35:47	No planar travel to speak of (Hi Elminster, I'm your biggest fan in Greyhawk!). No strong good/evil or law/chaos axis in the world. But an omnipresent preserving/defiling axis. Lots of animals and vermins. Plenty of new monsters. The coolest undead you've ever seen.
#4 zombiegleemax Apr 13, 2004 14:46:23	Originally posted by Dawnstealer A break from Tolkeinesque fantasy. A chance to make a difference in a dying world. Vast tracks of untouched wastelands to explore. Complex social interactions within the city-states. Powerful kings and powerful enemies and outsmarting them. Making the world a better place (the bad guys in the Realms do not have a strong foothold). These would be particularly appealing to my group! Thanks!:D Edit: No strong good/evil or law/chaos axis in the world. But an omnipresent preserving/defiling axis. The coolest undead you've ever seen. My players would like these! One thing though.....all I have right now is the 1st edition box, and the Dungeon and Dragon articles that just came out....I don't have much information about undead , except for that in the magazines...which seems to conflict with the box set stuff. (esp. in relation to Athasian zombies).
#5 zombiegleemax Apr 13, 2004 14:56:51	Go to Athas.org and download their Undead accessory, titled Terrors of the Dark. THAT has all the Athasian undead info you could ever need. Oh, and the Dragon and Dungeon articles? Junk 'em, Athas.org's material is much better, IMO
#6 Agonar Apr 13, 2004 15:50:11	Oh yeah.. Free Willed undead. . . definitely a surprise to those groups that are used to the mindless shambling skeletons and zombies. Two words to live in fear of DUNE RUNNER! Now there is just a wicked undead. "Hey look, there's an Elf running across the sand. . . Hmm, I have this urge to follow him" Run yourself to death, then you become an undead Dune runner as well. vicious
#7 dawnstealer Apr 13, 2004 16:46:12	Some of the worst critters of Athas are the ones that appear mundane at first. Something like a sand cactus is truly horrible. The PC steps on one, breaks it off and pulls their bloody, soppy foot off of the barbed stem and then goes about on their merry way. Bam! A week later, the tip of that thorn hits their heart and they croak, turning into mulch for a brand, spanking-new sand cactus. There's others that are just as bad, if not worse. While the nightmare beast is truly awful, there are a number of smaller animals that are just as bad precisely because your players won't pay attention to them.
#8 irdeggman Apr 13, 2004 20:40:15	Psionics don't forget psionics. Athas is ripe with psionics, unlike other campaign settings were it is purely optional - on Athas it a part of every day life (or unlife as the case may be).
#9 dawnstealer Apr 13, 2004 21:28:56	The great thing is the fact that critters that are deadly at 1st level are still deadly at the higher levels. Take the Thrax, for instance. Don't be afraid to throw nasty intrigue at the players, either. SKs have been around for not just hundreds, but thousands of years. Don't underestimate that: someone, somewhere, has tried just what the PCs have tried in that time, and the SK likely knows how to deal with it.
#10 zombiegleemax Apr 14, 2004 9:13:36	Don't fall into the trap that the official adventures do and have your pcs interact with the sorcerer kings. That makes the world seem to small and the destroys the battle for survival that makes the setting.
#11 mjspawn Apr 14, 2004 10:12:06	One selling point for me is the low magic in the world. PCs have to rely on their wits and strategy more than their +4 armor and +5 weapons.
#12 dawnstealer Apr 14, 2004 14:11:04	Don't fall into the trap that the official adventures do and have your pcs interact with the sorcerer kings. That makes the world seem to small and the destroys the battle for survival that makes the setting. Not quite what I meant. Chances are real, real good the players will never personally meet an SK, but they will want to, no doubt. The problem is that the SKs are much better at the game than the PCs are. The PCs will certainly run into the mechanations of the SKs, though. Don't be afraid of PCs that attract the attention of an SK. It's likely been centuries since these guys have been challenged, they might keep the PCs around because they amuse them, or because they're bored, but when the PCs become too much, the SKs will kill them. The trick for the PCs is to be annoying without being too annoying.