The Setting of the Dark Sun

I played Dark Sun when the setting first came out. I was the DM, running the brutality and oppressive heat of the slave pens, the players' dread of their characters being sent into the arena and not knowing if they would come out alive, and the stark hopelessness of the entire world. Very little metal existed, so the savage world fought with bone, wood, and stone. Bashing a monster's head in with a rock was a valid tactic and saved your weapons from wear and tear. The armor sucked and was whatever you found.

This was a mix of Mad Max, Gladiator, and Robert E. Howard's "savage fantasy" tropes turned up to eleven. The arenas were filled with savage monsters, and worst of all, other gladiators trying to kill you for the favor of the crowd and the dragon king's elites. If you managed to escape, where would you go? You would be hunted as an escaped slave, and fleeing into the desert to die was a terrible death.

Wizards announced Dark Sun for 5E with a mature content label, claiming it recaptures the original setting. What I saw was not Dark Sun. This felt like 5E's fantasy superheroes engaging in unhinged splatterpunk slasher violence. The original Dark Sun was a mature setting in theme and story, showing how the pursuit of power could devastate the world, not gratuitous over-the-top violence and nudity.

Shadowsun for Shadowdark is the spiritual successor to Dark Sun. We have the same savage setting with all the Dark Sun hallmarks, but laid on top of the brutal old-school experience of Shadowdark. Shadowsun does the pulp-adventure feeling of Dark Sun far better, in an easier rules chassis to grasp, without the power-gaming and superheroic power levels of D&D 5E. I don't need tables telling me someone ripped someone else's spine out; the fear and hopelessness are real in Shadowsun. The characters are not semi-godlike beings of power who can never die; they live close to the jagged edge of a sharpened bone blade that could shatter at any moment.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/chubbyfunster/shadowsun-campaign-setting

Shadowsun’s revised edition is scheduled for a mid-September Kickstarter. The books (both Player and GM) will be finished on launch day. The original edition is already one of DriveThruRPG’s long-running bestsellers, and the new version expands the setting into a more dynamic campaign world that changes with each playthrough.

This is a version of the game that does not need violence, nudity, or gore to communicate the brutality of the setting. It stays closer to the original foundation of Dark Sun: the slave pens, the arena, the empty desert, and the long chance of one day walking back through the gates. For anyone who watched the Gen Con trailer and felt it missed the point, the Revised Shadowsun is worth a look.