art by Alcatena |
The main action of the first Dark Sun material is set in the Tyr Region, also called the Tablelands. This is an area a bit bigger than the land area of Britain or a bit smaller than the land area of Colorado, for comparison. There are seven city-states, each (at least in the beginning) ruled by a Sorcerer-King.
Thinking about revising Dark Sun with the elements I mentioned before in mind, but also with any eye to the setting's inspirations, I find the Tyr region a little bland. Each of the city-states has a real world culture as inspiration (sometimes maybe a mashup of two), which gives you a bit more of a hook than just generic D&D Sword & sorcery city-states, true, but I think we can do better--at least in terms of my stated goals.
Here I would look to Planetary Romance, as it's a genre full of city-states separated by desert: Mars/Barsoom and Llarn (from two Gardner Fox novels) come to mind, but there are lot of others, and we don't need to limit ourselves to inspiration from only desert planet planetary romance. What these stories typically portray are cities at once more homogenous and more flavorful than Dark Sun's as presented.
Most Planetary Romance takes place in a cultural region sometimes covering a whole planet. The cities in that region mostly have the same political arrangements, speak the same language, and have a consistent material culture. In order to make then distinct (and interesting places for adventure), they tend to have one unusual thing about them. It could be one of the things I mentioned above is slightly different or it could be the pursuit of some exotic pastime, a cultural eccentricity, an exotic terrain/natural resource or something physically about its people. (Flash Gordon and Mad Max: Fury Road represent the extreme end of this, perhaps, with polities that are essentially themed.) The more flavorful unique elements, of course, tend to be on the fantastic side rather than the mundane. My post on the Sword & Planet setting of Zarthoon illustrates this, though it leans a little in the Flash Gordon direction. Still, it gives you the idea.
This game in Storm is one of those unique elements |
Dark Sun at once makes the cities a bit distinct in terms of mundane details, but they are mostly lacking that hook--a fantastic element to spur adventure. The Dark Sun cities in most cases don't have a high concept thumbnail description, unless you reference what real world culture inspired them.
The description of the Sorcerer-Kings themselves is part of the problem. A bit more "wizard from Thundarr" vibe would certainly help, I think. There is a transhuman aspect to what the what the Sorcerer-Kings are after, so I feel like they should, at least in some cases, feel like they are moving away from human a bit. maybe?
So from this perspective, I plan to take a look at the city-states in upcoming posts.