While serving i gave up a storage unit back in 98...I had approx 95% of everything printed for ad&d 2nd ed...whole looking thru the 5th ed books etc, i noticed a lot of the old words are gone...my 2 favorites were al-qadim and dark sun...are they going to bring them back?...and I see there isn't much for monstrous compendiums...I had all 16 of the ones you had to put in binders...do the new compendiums compare?...
It’s frustrating when you find yourself having to rebuild a collection you already had, I’m going through a similar thing with my collection of Doctor Who novels.
As for those two particular settings Wizards of the Coast seem hesitant to revisit some of the older settings that could be considered problematic to more modern readers, Dark Sun being one of the ones that comes up most often. However if you go to DM’s Guild you can buy pdf copies of most of the older books pretty cheaply
The lore or fluff of al-Qadim can be recycled for 5e, and if you want you can elements from Disney's Aladin TV show. The crunch may be a different thing. Al-Qadim, Maztica and Kara-Tur are Forgotten Realms spin-off and then they are technically unlocked in DM Guild.
Dark Sun is a special case. I can't be introduced like a family-friendly franchise, and if you can find NsfW content with characters of Baldurs Gate 3 with DS somebody could be create a "Saga of Gor" with superpowers. And WotC has to choose a lot of things about possible retcons or to start from zero with a spiritual succesor. For the 5e standars is not enoughly "modular" or flexible to add new crunch. What if players don't agree about new PC species, subclasses or classes? Would you allow shardminds, elans, maenads, dromites and xephs in your DS game? Or a crusader (martial adept class) like a member of the templars? Or a totemist shaman (incarnum soulmelder). The risk of possible controversy could reach the level of an edition war.
Any option? My suggestion is to create a "wildspace next to Athaspace" whose natives could visit or explore the Athasian Tablelands/region of Tyr.
The monsters from Athas can be updated to 5e, and some subclass, or even the defiler magic is possible, but in the best case a DS 5e would need a lot of work for possible redesigns.
To condense a lot of conversations i have had on this topic, because, yes, i miss some of the other worlds too, but i get why that are left out:
There is a lot of "Yikes bro" content that would have to be reworked, and for some settings like Dark-sun, they won't touch it because of some of the heavy subject matter, even if it its to turn the grim world into a "You can fix this, bit by bit, you can make this world a better place" kind of Hope-punk adventure. I could speculate all day on why, but that seems to be the sentiment, that it is a 'hands off that box' situation.
Al-Qadim, which takes place in Zakara, which is part of Toril where Faerun is, might be getting mentions and inclusion in the upcoming Faerun source-book. I believe Arabic and Farsi cultural consultants were mentioned, so they might be cleaning up some of the "yikes bro" content that some say were in Al-Qadim ( i never had it so i can't say what specifics ) and if that goes well, we might be seeing some of those other settings reintroduced into D&D in their respective worlds they are connected to. Or we might not, since Ravenloft as a setting is much bigger than just Barovia, and in Curse of Strahd, it takes place almost exclusively in Barovia, ( unless i missed something, been forever since i ran it. )
He/Him. Loooooooooong time Player. The Dark days of the THAC0 system are behind us.
"Hope is a fire that burns in us all If only an ember, awaiting your call To rise up in triumph should we all unite The spark for change is yours to ignite." Kalandra - The State of the World
As mentioned, some of the older settings and setting areas (unique areas within settings) haven't aged well in a world trying to better itself through political correctness, but at the same time, I do think these things can be seen as opportunities by WOTC rather than something to fear. Many of the older settings were based on unique and interesting crosses between historical human cultures and fantasy cultures, and I think that is something to celebrate and explore, not ignore out of fear of offending someone.
Some of my favorites include Maztica, Birthright, Kara-Tur and the already mentioned Dark Sun. Yes, these settings had some real-world "problematic content" and in some cases, adult content. I understand that D&D is for kids, so they are careful about these things, but I was a kid when we explored these worlds and we dealt and dove into this content, and I haven't become demon-worshiping psychopath... yet..
As mentioned, some of the older settings and setting areas (unique areas within settings) haven't aged well in a world trying to better itself through political correctness, but at the same time, I do think these things can be seen as opportunities by WOTC rather than something to fear. Many of the older settings were based on unique and interesting crosses between historical human cultures and fantasy cultures, and I think that is something to celebrate and explore, not ignore out of fear of offending someone.
Some of my favorites include Maztica, Birthright, Kara-Tur and the already mentioned Dark Sun. Yes, these settings had some real-world "problematic content" and in some cases, adult content. I understand that D&D is for kids, so they are careful about these things, but I was a kid when we explored these worlds and we dealt and dove into this content, and I haven't become demon-worshiping psychopath... yet..
Wotc is overthinking it.
It's not Satanic Panic nor are minors the ones bringing up things.
It's people who, once ragebait, dramafarms & people lashing out because they're in pain are filtered out, have legitimate concerns about the effects of metaphors on the untrained mind.
Perhaps try & listen to, for example, people who are from the cultures in question & whom don't simply say they have no problem with it.
Because much of Toril, and many of the less-represented non-Toril settings, have aged poorly in terms of accuracy and/or the people who wrote them.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
DM, player & homebrewer(Current homebrew project is an unofficial conversion of SBURB/SGRUB from Homestuck into DND 5e)
Once made Maxwell's Silver Hammer come down upon Strahd's head to make sure he was dead.
Always study & sharpen philosophical razors. They save a lot of trouble.
Additionally, there was an era where TSR went broke because they were trying to manufacture setting after setting, and WotC got over-extended taking over the business, because they were trying to keep all of these going.
It's largely why they've focused on a few key settings (primarily Forgotten Realms, Dragonlance, Eberron, though it looks like Greyhawk is coming back) and only provided a single setting book slowly over time for other locations. Ravnica/Theros because "cross promotion", Spelljammer is just 'out there', Planescape to tie them all together. So when they're light on putting effort into settings, the "controversial" ones that are seen as targetting a specific culture (Kara Tur for the Mongols, Al-Qadim for the Arabian history, and Dark Sun for the Middle East) are likely last on the queue because they're worried about blowback.
Honestly, while Dark Sun is a fan favourite from the past, it does have a lot of controversial stereotypes and themes that aren't suitable for a family friendly brand like Hasbro. It would be far better for a third party publisher to be given a tacit approval to create something that is a 'spiritual successor' to Dark Sun, without using official elements, and having Hasbro not lawyer them. That way they can have their cake and eat it too.
WotC doesn't need a lot of sourcebooks for each setting. Their intention is their sourcebooks could be useful for all settings.
If we only want an update of monsters and the crunch (defiler magic, feats, items..) and some pages about the geography of the region of Tyr/Athasian tablelands we shouldn't worry too much but my opinion is they are going to start from zero with a spiritual succesor. Maybe WotC has to choose if they are going to add space for future new PC species or classes with special game mechanics like the martial-adepts (crusader, swordsage and warblade) or the incarnum soulmelds (incarnate, soulborn and totemit).
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
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While serving i gave up a storage unit back in 98...I had approx 95% of everything printed for ad&d 2nd ed...whole looking thru the 5th ed books etc, i noticed a lot of the old words are gone...my 2 favorites were al-qadim and dark sun...are they going to bring them back?...and I see there isn't much for monstrous compendiums...I had all 16 of the ones you had to put in binders...do the new compendiums compare?...
It’s frustrating when you find yourself having to rebuild a collection you already had, I’m going through a similar thing with my collection of Doctor Who novels.
As for those two particular settings Wizards of the Coast seem hesitant to revisit some of the older settings that could be considered problematic to more modern readers, Dark Sun being one of the ones that comes up most often. However if you go to DM’s Guild you can buy pdf copies of most of the older books pretty cheaply
The lore or fluff of al-Qadim can be recycled for 5e, and if you want you can elements from Disney's Aladin TV show. The crunch may be a different thing. Al-Qadim, Maztica and Kara-Tur are Forgotten Realms spin-off and then they are technically unlocked in DM Guild.
Dark Sun is a special case. I can't be introduced like a family-friendly franchise, and if you can find NsfW content with characters of Baldurs Gate 3 with DS somebody could be create a "Saga of Gor" with superpowers. And WotC has to choose a lot of things about possible retcons or to start from zero with a spiritual succesor. For the 5e standars is not enoughly "modular" or flexible to add new crunch. What if players don't agree about new PC species, subclasses or classes? Would you allow shardminds, elans, maenads, dromites and xephs in your DS game? Or a crusader (martial adept class) like a member of the templars? Or a totemist shaman (incarnum soulmelder). The risk of possible controversy could reach the level of an edition war.
Any option? My suggestion is to create a "wildspace next to Athaspace" whose natives could visit or explore the Athasian Tablelands/region of Tyr.
The monsters from Athas can be updated to 5e, and some subclass, or even the defiler magic is possible, but in the best case a DS 5e would need a lot of work for possible redesigns.
To condense a lot of conversations i have had on this topic, because, yes, i miss some of the other worlds too, but i get why that are left out:
There is a lot of "Yikes bro" content that would have to be reworked, and for some settings like Dark-sun, they won't touch it because of some of the heavy subject matter, even if it its to turn the grim world into a "You can fix this, bit by bit, you can make this world a better place" kind of Hope-punk adventure. I could speculate all day on why, but that seems to be the sentiment, that it is a 'hands off that box' situation.
Al-Qadim, which takes place in Zakara, which is part of Toril where Faerun is, might be getting mentions and inclusion in the upcoming Faerun source-book. I believe Arabic and Farsi cultural consultants were mentioned, so they might be cleaning up some of the "yikes bro" content that some say were in Al-Qadim ( i never had it so i can't say what specifics ) and if that goes well, we might be seeing some of those other settings reintroduced into D&D in their respective worlds they are connected to.
Or we might not, since Ravenloft as a setting is much bigger than just Barovia, and in Curse of Strahd, it takes place almost exclusively in Barovia, ( unless i missed something, been forever since i ran it. )
He/Him. Loooooooooong time Player.
The Dark days of the THAC0 system are behind us.
"Hope is a fire that burns in us all If only an ember, awaiting your call
To rise up in triumph should we all unite
The spark for change is yours to ignite."
Kalandra - The State of the World
As mentioned, some of the older settings and setting areas (unique areas within settings) haven't aged well in a world trying to better itself through political correctness, but at the same time, I do think these things can be seen as opportunities by WOTC rather than something to fear. Many of the older settings were based on unique and interesting crosses between historical human cultures and fantasy cultures, and I think that is something to celebrate and explore, not ignore out of fear of offending someone.
Some of my favorites include Maztica, Birthright, Kara-Tur and the already mentioned Dark Sun. Yes, these settings had some real-world "problematic content" and in some cases, adult content. I understand that D&D is for kids, so they are careful about these things, but I was a kid when we explored these worlds and we dealt and dove into this content, and I haven't become demon-worshiping psychopath... yet..
Wotc is overthinking it.
It's not Satanic Panic nor are minors the ones bringing up things.
It's people who, once ragebait, dramafarms & people lashing out because they're in pain are filtered out, have legitimate concerns about the effects of metaphors on the untrained mind.
Perhaps try & listen to, for example, people who are from the cultures in question & whom don't simply say they have no problem with it.
Because much of Toril, and many of the less-represented non-Toril settings, have aged poorly in terms of accuracy and/or the people who wrote them.
DM, player & homebrewer(Current homebrew project is an unofficial conversion of SBURB/SGRUB from Homestuck into DND 5e)
Once made Maxwell's Silver Hammer come down upon Strahd's head to make sure he was dead.
Always study & sharpen philosophical razors. They save a lot of trouble.
Additionally, there was an era where TSR went broke because they were trying to manufacture setting after setting, and WotC got over-extended taking over the business, because they were trying to keep all of these going.
It's largely why they've focused on a few key settings (primarily Forgotten Realms, Dragonlance, Eberron, though it looks like Greyhawk is coming back) and only provided a single setting book slowly over time for other locations. Ravnica/Theros because "cross promotion", Spelljammer is just 'out there', Planescape to tie them all together. So when they're light on putting effort into settings, the "controversial" ones that are seen as targetting a specific culture (Kara Tur for the Mongols, Al-Qadim for the Arabian history, and Dark Sun for the Middle East) are likely last on the queue because they're worried about blowback.
Honestly, while Dark Sun is a fan favourite from the past, it does have a lot of controversial stereotypes and themes that aren't suitable for a family friendly brand like Hasbro. It would be far better for a third party publisher to be given a tacit approval to create something that is a 'spiritual successor' to Dark Sun, without using official elements, and having Hasbro not lawyer them. That way they can have their cake and eat it too.
WotC doesn't need a lot of sourcebooks for each setting. Their intention is their sourcebooks could be useful for all settings.
If we only want an update of monsters and the crunch (defiler magic, feats, items..) and some pages about the geography of the region of Tyr/Athasian tablelands we shouldn't worry too much but my opinion is they are going to start from zero with a spiritual succesor. Maybe WotC has to choose if they are going to add space for future new PC species or classes with special game mechanics like the martial-adepts (crusader, swordsage and warblade) or the incarnum soulmelds (incarnate, soulborn and totemit).