Okay, this might help us all not get all hyperventilated . . . or not ;). But for those of us who weren't at GenCon to hear all that was said, I dug out this quote from WotC's Chris Young in an interview posted on the blog of Charles Ryan about 4 days ago.
Chris: What was I asked? Um. I was asked a lot of stuff. The guy who asked about Gen Con: He had heard that Bill [Slavicsek] had said at Gen Con that Dark Sun would be built to be true to Dark Sun, not shoehorned to fit into 4E's design demands. And yes, that's true. But it's also fair to say that a lot of elements of Dark Sun are very easy to adapt into 4th edition.
Thanks man! I was digging around earlier for this quote, but it took too long to find - so I abandonned the expedition. Now I can just reference this forum.
I don't think things will be "shoehorned" into 4e - so I don't think there will be as much worry about the Gray, the Black or the Feywilds as some people have raised.
However, the 4e look and feel will be injected into the setting: multiple mingling races, races will no longer be defined by their attributes (no more +8 Str half-giants), power sources are more partitioned (no more dual classed fight/rogue/mage/theif, wild talents might also be gone), and a replacement for rules removed (armor will be gone... but something will have to replace the rule).
Of course... this is all conjecture.
This is great to hear from the point of view of a setting purist! I hate retcons and world-changing events to match edition changes in general though.
wild talents might also be gone
I'd hate to see Wild Talents go, despite their balance issues in 2e they always had uses from the DM's side of things.
It was nice in combat to surprise the players with: "It's just a little bunny rabbit!"
Out of combat it gave an extra dimension to NPCs, as well as marking them 'important' for the benefit of players keeping track of the plot: "The barkeep has a cool power, he must be important!"
You could also make up whatever power an NPC needed on the fly: "We need to hire an artisan to dig a trench fast!"
Wild Talent should be an easy feat for 4th ed! 
act as a multiclassing feat, like Dilettante for half-elves: gain an at will, or maybe encounter power, as an encounter or daily respectively. Simples, eh? ;)
I've been thinking a lot about that - the Eberon Player's Guide has dragonmarked feats that trigger when you hit with another power -
For wild talents, I was thinking of this for my upcoming prerelease 4th edition Dark Sun campaign
Wild Psychokinetics: When you hit with an encounter power, the target is pushed 1 square and knocked prone. If the power would have pushed the target already, it is pushed one more square.
Wild Psychometabolism: When you spend a Healing Surge, you gain +3 to all defenses and an immediate saving throw
Not sure about telepathy. Any Ideas?
telepathy?
bonuses to skill checks maybe? or in a combat situation a bonus to hit? like you can sense the enemy's thoughts and get a bonus because you sort of know what he's planning ahead of time or something? same with skill checks involving bluff or intimidate or what have you?
Those are WAY too powerful bonuses, fyi!!
I don't think having psionics in every thing is a defining feature of Dark Sun that it needs to be kept. Frankly I think diminishing the pervasiveness of psionics in the setting would improve approachability for those unfamiliar with Athas.
Heck, removing the need for psionics in every PC makes it even possible to play a DS campaign with just the PHB1. To me that's a "good thing"™. ;)
Wild Talent should be an easy feat for 4th ed!
Best option mentioned yet.
I think wild talents should be the background options for the setting... a whole bunch of minor benefits with a psionic flavor (granting telepathy as a language a la kalashtar, +2 to Endurance for body control, etc). That way you keep the sense of it without it becoming overly dominant.
The only thing I worry about is threkreen as a pc race ,every time you show weakness they start humping your leg to show dominance.
I think wild talents should be the background options for the setting... a whole bunch of minor benefits with a psionic flavor (granting telepathy as a language a la kalashtar, +2 to Endurance for body control, etc). That way you keep the sense of it without it becoming overly dominant.
This would be an interesting take on wild talents. I'll be interested to see if they leave in wild talents and how they do them.
Wow first post! If you read 30 Years of Adventure that came out a few years ago, Troy Denning says that if they had to do it over again, they would save psionic powers for bad-ass characters and monsters instead of having it permeate all levels of society. I can only imagine this is what they are doing with DS4, so I don't think we'll be seeing a proliferation of Wild Talents.
that being said, there no reason you, as DM, cannot give all your PC's Wild Talents.
The only thing I worry about is threkreen as a pc race ,every time you show weakness they start humping your leg to show dominance.
ROFL!! ;)
Wild Talent should be an easy feat for 4th ed!
Best option mentioned yet.
IIRC, it was originally mooted by someone on the ENWorld forums, I msut admit, but it does make good sense
Wow first post! If you read 30 Years of Adventure that came out a few years ago, Troy Denning says that if they had to do it over again, they would save psionic powers for bad-ass characters and monsters instead of having it permeate all levels of society. I can only imagine this is what they are doing with DS4, so I don't think we'll be seeing a proliferation of Wild Talents.
that being said, there no reason you, as DM, cannot give all your PC's Wild Talents.
LOL, welcome ot the baords!
well, I liek the idea of psioncis being common, it makes things far more edgy ;)
you know, that minion slave over there MAY just be able to make your head pop like a grape, muhaha!
I have it in my campaigns, that psionic crafting is a big issue that helps keep civilization from crumbling. Imagine folk with ability to say turn clay into steel-hard rings for chain mail...etc etc. these folk are too valuable ot mistreat, either as salves or free. makes the setting far more dynamic and less a deadzone...
PS.
sorry, multiquote function on forum isn't working, hence three replies 
In what way was Dark Sun with lots of psionics, in the end? Reading the novels there was very little or no wild talents, with accessory NPCs mostly having the wild talents.
It's not like the beggar in the street had psionics, or the king's manservant, ...
A lot of people read that every PC had a wild talent, and ended up extrapolating that out to everyone has a wild talent. Top that off with psionic cats and the occasional psionic familiar type thing, and you get the general impression that it's all over the place.