But more to the point, riding a flying ship through the dimensions to Athas should be no easy task. Let us not speak of midichlorianesque things like crystal spheres though.
hence I ignore the damn novel/cash grabbing metaplots that ruined Dark Sun, Planescape and Ravenloft in 2nd Ed, and stick purely to the original boxed sets.
So, if you want Spelljamemrs, plane travellers, go ahead, it is your game!
2) think of the consequences though.
a suit of metal chain mail would cook you if it's not fire resistant or you have such type of protection. it gets up to 60Celsius in the Wastelands of Athas eggs fry at about 42Celsius on metal in the desert in RL!!
And metal armour would be worth an absolute fortune
Sure you maybe high level, but when a thousand greedy bandits are after your metal, hell EVERYONE who knows about it would want it....hehe ;)
you could release the knowledge of Defiling on the rest of the Multiverse....I think most Gods would wipe such folk out toot sweet before the Realms, Greyhawk etc got turned into wastelands!
3) The official rule was that Athas was a "closed Sphere", so you couldn't enter with a Spelljammer, and it's closed off from almost all the Planes bar parts of the Elemental Planes and a few portals ot the Abyss.
I'm a huge Spelljammer fan but would never want it in Dark Sun, as a personal taste.
Also, the SUn of Athas is not normal at all, you read much of the lore it's not a mere red giant but some kind of warped sun and huge, probably making Spelljamming hazardous
What rule are you referring to?
I am referring to the rule that upon entering Athas there is a large chance that anything metal that the players have will change permanently into a different material such as Bone or Stone (Weapons), Carapace or Hide (Armor), and Ceramics (coins)
1- It would require you to go through alot: The only way to the Astral sea on Athas is through the Gray (Shadowfell) thus you would have to go through Alot of Astral sea, and then through the gray which appears to be incredibly more dangerous then in other settings.
2- You probably wouldn't get back: When Githyanki came to Athas via Spelljamer (See the entry on Gith) they crash landed and their spelljamer burst into millions of pieces, and soon afterwards, the Githyanki were affected by the defiling energy of Athas and became the primitive Gith, some Gith tribes still try to find pieces of their ship, however it doesn't look good for the future of the Gith (they probably would never be able to work it if they got it all together anyway.)
I am referring to the rule that upon entering Athas there is a large chance that anything metal that the players have will change permanently into a different material such as Bone or Stone (Weapons), Carapace or Hide (Armor), and Ceramics (coins)
Are you refferring to the fanmade Crimson Sphere? While the spelljammer community generally likes Night Druid's crystal sphere for Dark Sun, it wasn't official.
In a 4e context Athas might have been collateral damage from a gambit employed by the Gods during the Dawn War to trap certain (or random) Primordials.
Say for example they (the gods) wrapped the Astral Dominion around part of the Elemental Chaos. Creating a sort of microcosm.
Perhaps Athas was literally just "in the way" or perhaps they needed a material world to "bridge" their Astral Dominion wmd into the Elemental Chaos...
Possibly they used the Athas's Shadowfel as a conduit instead of destroying the mortal world itself, and it (the Shadowfel) is now merged with the Grey and whatever is left of it is "the Black", pinched off by the Grey so that only a very tentative connection to Athas remains (which Borys keeps sealed, lest Rajatt escape).
Perhaps the Feywild of Athas was only trapped in part (or perhaps it was trapped in full and the standard "defilers did it" explanation serves, and/or perhaps without access to the Astral it simply can't repair itself).
The Devils present in the grey are not interlopers, but were specifically left as sentries, which means there could be angels as well, but they simply "do their jobs" and don't go on holiday mucking around with the mortals on Athas.
In this way Athas can have access to it's own Elemental Chaos (and Abyssal Fragment) but would be segregated by the Grey from well known planar locations such as the City of Brass, Lolth's area of the abyss, etc.
You could even go so far as to explain away certain other traits of Athas by saying perhaps that no primordials related to iron or water were trapped by the grey, or alternatively they were and in the absence of Gods beating them up and forcing order on their mess they chose to withhold these elements rather than share them with the mortal world while they sleep waiting for their prison to open so they can resume their war upon the gods.
It would also explain why Athasian souls end up in the grey, as it is the only Astral Dominion they can reach, perhaps as they merge with the plane they serve to strengthen the wall from the inside, such that even if the gods remembered and wished to correct their "mistake" they would have serious problems gaining access.
Could also explain the Gith situation... perhaps hanging out in the elemental chaos with active and very pissed off Primordials wasn't working out for whatever handful of Githzerai happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, so they packed their bags and headed off back to the only available mortal world they could access, and Athas's very special ecology did the rest (or maybe they hid in the abyss for a few hundred years first).
I am referring to the rule that upon entering Athas there is a large chance that anything metal that the players have will change permanently into a different material such as Bone or Stone (Weapons), Carapace or Hide (Armor), and Ceramics (coins)
I don't recall this. Where did it originate? Was it in a Spelljamming supplement?
1. Athas' Crystal Sphere is sealed and reinforced by Sorcerer Kings.
2. You can reach in or out Athas vial Big Wheel, but the gates lead to and from Lower Planes .
One of the players in my game, who was my DM in another long-running campaign, is playing a character who survived and escaped Kalidnay, damaging his mind in the process. In his game, we players were each from a different campaign setting who were spirited away by Ravenloft's mists in some form. (ie my Eberron character was taken by the mists when Cyre was obliterated). Eventually, we managed to escape Ravenloft and into Planescape (Sigil).
I think it would be a kool backstory for a character to crash land their airship or spelljammer via Ravenloft. I mean, imagine the horror of finding yourself out of Ravenloft and into an even more inescapable realm like Athas. haha
By the way, the Vistani are the only ones known to be able to use the mists to travel between planes. I wonder if they have a presence on Athas? Maybe the elves have ties with them? oooo
EDIT: OMG! The Misty Border at the edge of the Athasian map can be a way Ravenloft connects to Athas. ooooooooo
I never thought I'd say this one day...
Here's an idea on how to bring spelljamming-like travel to Dark Sun.
The wonderful first novel Celestial Matters by Richard Garfinkle describes how you can carve a ship (a giant blimp- or egg-like shape) from stone from the Moon or Earth or whatever other planet and it will bring you away from the sun or towards it, depending on that stone's properties, according to ancient beliefs on the celstial spheres and its mechanics. Mixing proportions of these stones will allow you to control the direction of infalling.
It is an ingenious novel from which stems this idea: a piece of the Athasian moons fell to Athas, and people carved a boat out of it, allowing tavel to the moons, and once there they carved a boat from moon-rock to return to Athas. The PCs find such boats.
About the book (quotes):
Celestial Matters is a startling novel of hard SF in which the scientific beliefs of the ancient Greeks are literal fact. The empire of Alexander the Great has lasted a thousand years, and for a thousand years it has been at war with the empire of the Orient. Now a spaceship is traveling through the heavenly crystalline spheres to the sun to return with the ultimate weapon: a fiery piece of the sun itself.
Garfinkle deftly captures the Ptolemaic universe in his first novel, an alternative history built on the assumption that ancient Greek science is accurate. Aias, scientist of the Delian League, commands the first expedition to the sun on Chandra's Tear, a ship sculpted from the moon. He sets out to harness a piece of the sun, return it to Earth, and destroy the enemy Middle Kingdom's capital, 'AngXou. But aboard the ship, assassins and traitors try to thwart the expedition.
@angelus_obscura: Each Domain of Dread in 4e is setting-specific. People from Athas cannot be sucked in a Domain along with people from Oerth or Toril. Each Domain it's own setting, unless you don't make it that way for your campaign.
@angelus_obscura: Each Domain of Dread in 4e is setting-specific. People from Athas cannot be sucked in a Domain along with people from Oerth or Toril. Each Domain it's own setting, unless you don't make it that way for your campaign.
Not true. The Manual of the Planes says nothing of Domains of Dread being setting specific. And previous editions of D&D support this.
Ravenloft is a setting in itself I admit, the main (if not one of many) Domain of Dread but Lord Soth, a cursed death knight of Krynn (Dragonlance) has been known to have briefly stayed/ruled in Barovia.
And the Mists plucked away portion of Kalidnay with its dark lord being the former high templar of Kalid-Ma.
The Domains of Dread are collectively known as Ravenloft. And the Mists of Ravenloft reach everywhere, when, and campaign setting. Travel between Domains is possible, as the Vistani can attest. Domains of Dread make up Ravenloft, whose Mist touches every campaign setting imaginable. Therefore, it is all-inclusive. However, the DM can choose to ignore that.
Proof is in the pudding as they say, and in this case, it is in an actual excerpt from TSR's Domains of Dread, "The magical mists of Ravenloft could appear anywhere in the Dungeons & Dragons universe, drawing evil-doers (or player characters) into the Ravenloft setting. One exception is the 'phlogiston' of the Spelljammer setting.[2] The phlogiston blocks all planar travel, but the mists can appear in deep space inside crystal shells, according to the Complete Spacefarer's Handbook.[3] Another exception is in the Inner and Outer Planes, which for some reason they never appear in."
Saying that the books don't disallow it because they don't mention it is not the same as inferring it allows it. There's a fallacy in there somewhere.
It's an informal logical fallacy known as an argument from ignorance. If not mentioning it meant it was not disallowed, that would mean the contrapositive statement of "the books disallow it, because they mention it" would hold true, which is obviously not the case because you would need to know the context of the statement in order to know whether it was allowed or disallowed.
In other words, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
Basically, we'll just have to wait and see. As much of a Dark Sun purist as I am, I'm also a huge Ravenloft follower, and I prefer to still allow The Mist to snake into Athas. The Mist and the Darkpowers have never been statted or fully quantified, just like The Lady of Pain, which pretty much just leaves it up to the DM.