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Hi, all.
My name is Thomas M. Reid, and I am a long-time editor, designer, and author in the industry. I've spent a decade at TSR, Inc./Wizards of the Coast and another decade-plus as a freelancer. One of the new and exciting creative endeavors I'm thrilled to be associated with is Tim Brown's Dragon Kings Project.
In short, the Dragon Kings Project is a 'spiritual successor' to the Dark Sun campaign setting originally designed by Tim along with author Troy Denning and published by TSR, Inc. back in 1991. Tim has brought together a number of the original crew, including artists Gerald Brom and Tom Baxa, as well as quite a bit of new talent, and there are plans in the works for a full multimedia experience, including a progressive rock album, an art-intensive world book with maps, song lyrics, etc., and a hardcover game book.
You can check out the full scoop at the website and the Facebook page.
There will also be supplemental PDFs made available that present the world of Khitus in terms of various roleplaying game rules. That's where I come in; I am delighted to be leading the development of the Pathfinder rules for the Dragon Kings Project. I worked on the original Dark Sun line during my tenure at TSR, Inc., so getting the chance to work with Tim on this re-conceptualization is a big thrill for me.
The whole thing is coming together quickly, and the goal is to launch a Kickstarter fundraiser in September. For now, though, I just want to build up some awareness and find out what people think. If you have any comments or suggestions of features you'd love to see in the Dragon Kings Pathfinder supplement, this is the place to post them. I'll drop by here regularly to see what you have to say and will do my best to incorporate as much as possible into the final product.
Thanks, and keep watching for more updates!
Thomas
I was very excited to see this coming out and I can't wait until you start the kickstarter for this one!
Interesting! Will you be using Dreamscarred psionics?
Very cool!
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GIGGITY.
Getting Baxa and Brom? Now you know these guys mean business.
I had a lot of fun with Dark Sun, it was probably my favorite setting. I kept dying at 5th level, though. But character trees helped me to not be so sad when it happened. I would take the entire tree to each session, just in case. :) In one session I lost two characters.
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I would recommend using the Dreamscarred psionics.
I'm very interested to know how this turns out.
I don't think I'm alone in feeling like fans of old campaign settings were largely left high and dry. Dark Sun is one of my favorites which was abandoned with the 3.0 changeup. We've ended up kludging together a set of home rules from Athas.org, Pathfinder, Dreamscarred Press, Dragon Magazine articles, et al. While I'll be interested to see where this goes, I think at best we'll end up incorporating portions into our game.
This is the same phenomena with other campaign settings, notably Birthright: everyone has come up with their own way of doing things and it has been interesting to see how other people do it.
Glad to see the enthusiasm for the project!
As for the Dreamscarred psionics, it's too early to say. I'll definitely look at the legal requirements for adapting material from their book, but I haven't investigated it, yet.
Keep the good ideas coming, though; that's the kind of stuff I want to hear.
Thomas
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AFAIK their stuff is all OGL. It's up on d20pfsrd.com at least. And the company is basically just a couple of guys who are huge Dark Sun fans, and at least one of them is very active on these boards. You should definitely have a chat with those guys; they've helped keep Dark Sun alive for a lot of us.
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Glad to see the enthusiasm for the project!
As for the Dreamscarred psionics, it's too early to say. I'll definitely look at the legal requirements for adapting material from their book, but I haven't investigated it, yet.
Keep the good ideas coming, though; that's the kind of stuff I want to hear.
Thomas
I would very much agree with using Dreamscarred Press' psionic system. There is already a STRONG AND VOCAL fanbase who love it and several 3PP (including myself) that support them. Plus they are very easy to talk about this. Supporting Dreamscarred's system would save you a lot of time and development cost which in turn gives you more time to focus on the setting and other cool stuff for the kickstarter and setting.
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Interesting news! Another fan of Dark Sun (through all editions) and another fan of DSP's Psionics. I await further developments.
Ive always been intrigued to try dark sun, i guess this will be my chance.
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Using Dreamscarred might pry some of my rapidly dwindling gaming cash from my fingers.
Just saying...
aye
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+1 on using Dreamscarreds rules. Also get some of their talent on board!
Are you guys aware of athas.org? I'm not sure if those are the same guys as Dreamscarred Press but they did a lot to adapt Dark Sun to 3.5. Lots of quality stuff on their site... Maybe more talent to tap?
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Another +1 on the Dreamscarred psionics rules. Also love the idea of a Darksuns-esque campaign setting with new archetypes, prestige classes, feats, random psionic talents, mantis people and desert survival! Can't wait!
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Basically, do you want to use a Pathfinder-compatible version of the 3e psionics rules? That's Dreamscarred's approach. The reason Paizo hasn't embraced it themselves seems to be that they (or at least James Jacobs) have (has) fundamental mechanical oppositions to Power Points, the way psionics ran under 3e and runs in the Dreamscarred system, basically an update to the 2e/Dark Sun PSP system.
Every other system out there for psionics is either a bit too amateur in design or else not as fully developed as the Dreamscarred take, but your other option would be (I think) to try and re-invent the wheel, doing another adaptation of the 2e system(s). Seems like just going for the Dreamscarred approach would be the easy way.
My only caveat with regard Dreamscarred psionics is that - if you're building something that is compatible with Pathfinder but takes a 3rd party psionics approach - what do you do when Paizo bring out their own approach to psionics, based on a completely different mechanic? Will you tie your entire gameworld to a system that isn't the one used by the ruleset you're championing?
Just saying...
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Speaking only for myself, if Paizo ever does come out with psychic magic I'll probably stick with Dreamscarred. "Vancian Psionics" just flat out fails to make sense to me.
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Speaking only for myself, if Paizo ever does come out with psychic magic I'll probably stick with Dreamscarred. "Vancian Psionics" just flat out fails to make sense to me.
You're not the only one. At the most, A Paizo-published Vancian alternative would exist alongside points-based psionics, not replace it.
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Speaking only for myself, if Paizo ever does come out with psychic magic I'll probably stick with Dreamscarred. "Vancian Psionics" just flat out fails to make sense to me.You're not the only one. At the most, A Paizo-published Vancian alternative would exist alongside points-based psionics, not replace it.
I can see it as an attempt by conventional spellcasters to mimic "true" psionics, come to think.
These are all very good points/questions. I really won't know how I'm going to approach psionics until I get deeper into the actual design. But I'll keep all of this in the forefront of my thought process.
And to the person who asked if I was aware of athas.org; I knew about it, but I haven't looked at it in a long time. Keep in mind that what we are doing with Dragon Kings is NOT a remake of Dark Sun or Athas, but a new product inspired by that setting. But I will double-check with Tim to make sure he is aware of what they've done at that site.
Thomas
Hey ShadowcatX - what makes you think Psionic Magic will follow Iron Gods, the Numeria AP?
No, Vudra (fantasy India) is the one waiting on psionics.
Any updates on this? I don't want to miss the kickstarter.
Same. I need dis.
They just posted on FB that the projected has been submitted fir approval.
Dot for great interest.
Did you guys ever decide about what psionics you were going to use?
Hi everyone, the Dragon Kings Kickstarter has been approved and is set to go live in 3 days, that's Monday September 30th! Get ready.
Hi everyone, the Dragon Kings Kickstarter has been approved and is set to go live in 3 days, that's Monday September 30th! Get ready.
What is the page so we can throw money at it?
It's not quite live yet, we'll make sure to put a link here as soon as it is.
Dotting thing one for interest. Don't want to miss the kickstarter tomorrow.
The day has finally come! With your support we've launched the multi-media Dragon Kings Project crowdfunding effort on Kickstarter! Watch our Kickstarter video to learn more about this ambitious fantasy role-playing game project featuring; art, music, and fiction, then pledge your support to see our vision realized at
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1084491323/dragon-kings
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...BUT I noticed that they DON'T have a level where I can just get the World Book PDF ONLY. At $70 (the lowest level where I can the world book PDF) I can get a LOT of stuff, but I just want the world book PDF. PLEASE make a level for just the world book pdf. Thanks!
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Might I also request a digital-only level? Just the MP3s and the PDF(s), none of the physical content? That'd be awesome for those of us who can't have things shipped for whatever reason. =)
Looks like an awesome start otherwise! Counting down 'til payday.
...BUT I noticed that they DON'T have a level where I can just get the World Book PDF ONLY. At $70 (the lowest level where I can the world book PDF) I can get a LOT of stuff, but I just want the world book PDF. PLEASE make a level for just the world book pdf. Thanks!
Wow. . . That is disappointing.
I agree with LMPjr. Please make levels where I can pick up items without the music. And don't try and force people to get both savage worlds and pathfinder, let them choose one or the other.
Completely agree with shadowcat on his/her points.
Agreed, I really don't want to have to get the music to get the pdfs.
And don't try and force people to get both savage worlds and pathfinder, let them choose one or the other.
They're both being provided for free. You can choose one by not downloading the other.
This seems a very different kind of project to me. It feels like a music/art project with some RPG material rather than the other way around.