Face the fire of the Dark Sun!

[Fabian]

So, based on the poll you rpg-ers are up for a bit of post-apocalyptic style swords and sorcery!

A few tid-bits about the world of Athas and the characters of said world:

It deosn't have:
dragons flapping around every mountain peak.
gnomes.
magic shops.
dungeons (at least not in the traditional sense).
kindly old wizards.
orcs.
much metal.
much water.

But it does have:

Psychic powers.
Mantis-men.
God-Kings.
Gladiatorial combat.
Ancient mysteries.
Desert wastes made barren by forgotten wars.
Mutated desert beasts.
Crazed shamans.

Who's up for it?

:geek:

[eyeolas]

arabian psyker, sounds good!!

[Fabian]

Ah, there I must correct you. There's no Arabian flavour to be found here, young feller me lad. More like Edgar Rice Burroughs' version of Mars meets D&D in a fight to the death with the ancient Near East city states as a vague influence.

[Bodhi]

"Crazed shamans" hmmm. I've allways wanted to play a "John the baptist" type character - a man BURNING with angry religious zeal.
Could be fun in such a setting and the GM is good I've heard  :icon_whistling:

[Balgin Stondraeg]

Sorry guys but the setting really doesn't appeal to me. If, by post apocalyptic you'd meant Argyle or even Midnight then you would've had my interest but the whole "Brom punks" thing really doesn't do a lot for me (that and having many gaming sessions ruined by people boasting about their level stupidly high "strength twenty something" psychic dragon characters in someone else's Dark Sun game .......).

[Fabian]

Fair enough, Balgin; I like Midnight as well as Dark Sun. That's a setting I would love to play a PC in.

@Alf - I still need to figure out in my head exactly what kind of religious characters will be allowed; it's a very unusual setting from that standpoint. Basically there are two forms of worship: the religion of a city-state (which varies from city to city) or the veneration of elemental forces (which takes various forms in the tribes and communities away from the cities and in pockets within the city walls).

Brom rules!  :icon_wink:

[Balgin Stondraeg]

If you're not familiar with Argyle then here's a link for you: http://www.silveroakstudios.com/products.html

It's hard to describe quickly but the (basic) premise is as follows: All the human kings were wizards. The enslaved the other races but then a great plague came upon the land and decimated the humans who suffered moreso than any other race enabling the nonhumans to throw off the shackles of human slavery and regain their freedom. Humans are still the dominant race but now they hate magic (they blame the fallen mage kings for the plague). The other nonhuman races also despise magic for they have suffered at it's hand. Humans are still the most populous race but nobody really likes them very much.

And then there's all the monsters, racism, mage hate and various other "isms" that make the world feel more like a giant social melting pot than the generic Greyhawk/Forgotten Rubbish worlds that can seema bit bland when anything and everything is socialy acceptable (if there's a bad gm running things).

Maybe I should run a game set in Argyle sometime in the future (when one or two of the other ones has finished).

[Bodhi]

I hadn't heard of Brom before the (AAAGH memory lapse! You know the game BASED on broms works?) came out.
I have seen some minis made for that game painted better then I thought Broms paintings where. I like his ideas but I'm not all to fond of his technique or something. There is something that keeps me from being a big fan even if I am quite a fan of his subject matter. I like Giger better. Similar themes.

OK. I seem to get it. The religion part isn't that important. The mad hermit part is. So perhaps a kind of crazed desert loner (I'm thinking about my favourite character from Mad Max 2 - the guy with the helicopter - but not as "funny") A type of "ranger" though mentally unstable.

Thanks for the link Balgin. Not to much free information though. Just a glance but enough to kind of get the general picture.

[Fabian]

Funny how different opinions can be - I love Brom's technique but often don't like his subject matter!

Oh, I'm not saying religion isn't important - in some ways it's VERY important, I just need to get a few clear ideas together for myself in my head before I lay them out for you to examine.

[Balgin Stondraeg]

Well Brom did all the Dark Sun artwork and it was very similar to his other stuff (but with less cybernetic stuff). So there were loads of punky barbarian elves and stuff like that. I think that was the first (and possibly only) TSR setting to be illustrated entirely by one artist (although the early Ravenloft stuff seemed to be almost entirely illustrated by that guy who did the Dragonlance Legends pictures).

[Bodhi]

Still wishing for a miniature game entirely based on the works of Moebius me  :icon_smile:
"Arzach" would be to bizarre a world to even start a game around though.

But he did make some lovely costume drawings for "Dune".

[Custom_Hobby]

Fabian if you need any darksun stuff I have that too. I am going to sit this one out. I was never crazy about all the psionic stuff. I might regret staying out down the line....

[Fabian]

Brom did most of the cover paintings and some interior work. Thomas Baxa did loads of interior work... and I hate his style and his subject matter. I think it's terrible. If you see any of his illos in conjunction with Dark Sun... that's not what I want it to be.

When the revised box set was issued in '95, they had a slew of different artists who were better than Baxa. Much better.

If you want an artist who defined a product line, that would be the amazing Tony DiTerlizzi for Planescape (his art sold the setting to me).

[Balgin Stondraeg]

If you want an artist who defined a product line, that would be the amazing Tony DiTerlizzi for Planescape (his art sold the setting to me).

Or Liz Danforth who did nearly all the Tunnels & Trolls art (with a little help from greg Bear and the occassional other few artists - Josh Kirby did all the artwork for the UK TnT corgi paperbacks and they were plagued with his godawful pictures).

[Fabian]

Oh gosh, yes, I can't stand Josh Kirby's art! Which made it even funnier when I had to write a magazine article saying that an amazing exhibition of his art was in the local art gallery in Birkenhead (where I lived at the time). Of course I was professional about it.  :icon_wink: