Fallout: Carcosa

Nine years have passed since I first started thinking of creating a "Dark Sun-ish" setting.

(Nine years. Whoa. That is quite a lot. And it was fast. I have to think about that. Anyway.).

At that time, I mentioned the Fallout series as one inspiration - besides Barsoom, Carcosa* and Dune.

A few things have changed since then - maybe one or two authors mentioned in that post turned out to be contemptible at best, so I'll avoid them - but, once again, I've been thinking of Fallout and Barsoom, and wishing to run a campaign in such setting.

It was probably the TV series that made me want to play Fallout again. I had only played Fallout 3, and now I'm playing New Vegas. 

It really makes me want to create my own post-apoc setting - "with blackjack and hookers", as the saying goes, but New Vegas already has some of those...

Carcosa* is one of these games that I always wanted to run but never quite got around to it. It is full of awesome ideas, but I think it stops just a bit short of being an amazing setting like Dark Sun. I hear that the author has other modules in the same setting, but these are not in DTRPG.

Here are a few elements from New Vegas I'd like to add to Carcosa in order to make the setting more interesting.

Vaults

Fallout vaults are a source of endless possibility and fun. 

First, each one is a dungeon to explore - but a dungeon with a real purpose and history. 

Second, vaults are created as different experiments, so each vault can be unique and even contain different creatures (including mutants, robots, etc.). Some experiments are social, so different forms of government are to be expected - you can check this post or Dark Fantasy Places for ideas.

Factions

New Vegas has several interesting factions. Some evil, some neutral, some trying to do 
good, with many shades of gray,

"Everyone wants to save the world, they just disagree on how" as the show mentions.

There are several factions that think that things will be a lot nicer when THEY are in power, even if they need to brutalize some folks to get there.

Carcosa doesn't have much of that - all groups are similar, and governed by a single individual. Add a few details and things start to get interesting.

In addition, Carcosa has "men" int he encounter table, but doesn't give you anything else - are these merchants? Explorers? Adventurers? We should probably add some ideas here.

Lost technology

This is another fun part of both Fallout and Carcosa - projectile weapons, power cells, power armor, robots and cyborgs are in both settings.

Maybe the system deserves some kind of "repair/tech" skill, allowing some PCs to try to access technology they cannot fully understand.

Mutated monsters

In Carcosa, "The spawn of Shub-Niggurath are the innumerable and typically unique monsters [...] These [...] are the most common type of monster on the planet of Carcosa". There are also numerous oozes, jellies, worms and dinosaurs.

Which is fun. But I think mutated/giant insects (or other beasts) might be an interesting addition to the setting. 

Unique monsters are cool, but not every monster needs to be unique - sometimes, fighting a bunch of giant cockroaches or giant scorpions can be fun.

Sandbox & Hexcrawl

I have been critical of hex-crawls for a while now. 

It doesn't make sense that an adult wouldn't know at least vague directions to nearby lands. The idea that you enter a new hex and suddenly see a new city (or the sea!) sounds absurd. There are exceptions - maybe when discovering a new continent, etc. Still, if there are intelligent people around, it should be easy to ask for directions.

Unless...

What if the PCs are vault dwellers? When they come out to the world, they have no idea where they are! They still can see a mountain at a distance, but not much more than that. It would be a nearly ideal setting for a hex-crawl.

Can we use Carcosa hexes?

Carcosa hexes are often interesting but sometimes very repetitive and terse ("Castle of 29 Black Men led by a neutral 5th-level Fighter"). 

Human groups are very small, somewhat similarly to Fallout.

Maybe we can combine existing hexes with some random tables to add detail.

Do we still need magic?

Fallout doesn't have magic spells. Carcosa has rituals, but they are very unique - unlike anything I've seen in other RPGs. Dark Sun has proper spells. But do we need them?

Maybe psionics would work better here. And, of course, technology that is "indistinguishable from magic".

But the rituals in Carcosa are so interesting and unique that I'm doubtful about getting rid of them.

---

Well, that is it. I hope I can actually do something with this before nine more years have passed!

* Affiliate links.

Diluting the dichotomy

Another random thought about races/species (such as elves, dwarves, etc.). Continued from my last post (see also "additional reading"). 

(I might get a bit repetitive, sorry.)

I have a feeling that having innumerable races (elves + hobbits +tabaxi + tieflings) just dilutes the whole concept on "demi-humans".

All demi-humans are created in comparison (and opposition) to humans.

Human/faerie is a strong dichotomy (e.g., in The Broken Sword).

A trichotomy becomes weaker, and again with each new element.

Of course, in TBS there is also an elf/troll dichotomy, but both are contrasted to humans as "aliens". They are, in a way, equidistant to humans, but closer to one another.

Notice that TBS is about characters that are right in the middle of this human/faerie dichotomy.

Likewise, in A Princess of Mars, the dichotomy is between the red and green Martians. The red are unmistakably more human, but in the end, our (human) protagonist is caught between the two.

[In the subsequent books, we get humans of different colors: white, black, yellow, but each with a different culture (cannibalistic, pirates, domed cities, primitive, etc.). This is an interesting distinction, but cultural differences do not a different species make. We also get a few additional interesting humanoids, but I don’t find them as interesting as green Martians. You can check them here].

What about Tolkien? He was able to create great stories with humans, hobbits, elves, orcs, dwarves, ents... Still, there is an obvious dichotomy here too: good and evil. Humans can align with both, but most orcs align with Sauron, and Elves against him.

In Moorcock's Elric, the dichotomy is between Law and Chaos, and Elric gets caught up in the middle. The "races" are not as important here, except for the fact that Melniboneans are traditionally aligned to Chaos.

[This Law/Chaos dichotomy would separate the many species of original D&D in a strong dichotomy, but it is worth noticing that Moorcock contains some additional nuance, as mentioned in the link; Law/Chaos are not exactly Good/Evil].

In The Witcher books, there are humans and "Elder Races" (dwarves, elves, etc.). Geralt is a human turned mutant, and he often finds himself in the middle of this dichotomy.

In addition to this dichotomy idea, the fact that other species are interesting in comparison to humans makes them more interesting if they are rare. 

A Green Martian is a strange sight for John Carter, but wouldn't stand out walking in Ravnica between the elephant-people, minotaurs, blue elves and goblins with jetpacks.

In Ravnica, these "demihumans" aren't strange. Instead, the world is strange.

Another (counter) example is the D&D Honor Among Thieves movie. Simon is a half-elf. What difference does it make? None. Doric is a tiefling, and this explain some of her motivations (she was shunned by humans and accepted by elves). She was shunned because of her “demonic heritage”. But that heritage does nothing. She has no business with demons or demonic powers and traits, and the only difference in her appearance are small horns. She might as well have been rejected for being a red-head or left-handed.

How does Star Wars movies manage to get a few non-humans to work? First, they are individuals. The “wookie” race is an afterthought for Chewbacca. Second, they are non-human every time they appear. Chewbacca and R2-D2 do not utter one word the audience can understand. C-3PO’s reminds us every minute he is an android with his actions, tone, etc.

Too create "my own Barsoom", I still have to decide:

- Can different peoples create viable offspring? Or at least have diverse communities?

- If positive, how are they different?

- Does your species affect your stats? Or customs?

- Is it common for different peoples to adventure together?

- How does appearance affect reaction rolls?

- Can the PCs discover "secret communities", like Carter often does, if they are part of the same people?

Once again, I have no solutions for now, just random thoughts.

Additional reading:

https://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com/2024/02/how-many-racesspecies.html

https://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com/2019/01/too-many-races-my-carcosa.html

https://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com/2024/01/a-princess-of-mars.html

https://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com/2023/05/all-elves-are-half-elves.html

https://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com/2015/03/on-alignment-part-i-alignment-origins.html

https://rpg.charliecapp.com/2020/07/24/carcosa-2020/#

How many races/species?

I've been obsessing over Barsoom and thinking of "my own Carcosa" setting again...

I dislike there are so many colors of men with so little detail about each one - they are "suspicious" of each other for no apparent reason. Well, maybe that is the point - similarly to John Carter, the PCs are destined to unify different people under a single banner.

I recently wrote a post about some "clans", which I might use as inspiration to distinguish different communities.

But how many races should I have in my own setting? I'm certainly tired of elves, dwarves, orcs and hobbits, but maybe we can replace them...

Let's try to get at least seven different concepts.

First, we have:

- Humans.

- Superior/magical/advanced humans (e.g., Atlantes, X-men, Witchers, John Carter in Barsoom, some Elves, etc.)

- Strong/big humans (e.g., dwarves or goliaths)

- Small/weak humans (e.g., hobbits).

So, humans, elves, dwarves, basically. We could add "evil" axis: orcs are strong and evil, goblins are short and evil, etc. But I don't think inherently evil creatures to be suited for PCs. And, if they aren't inherently evil, the difference is usually only cultural/aesthetic.

"Superior humans" are a problem for games where the PCs should be balanced. OD&D solves this by requiring elves more XP to level up, etc. Likewise, "inferior humans" (e.g., gully dwarves, kobolds) can be a problem for the same reason.

These four basic groups represent most common PC races. But there are also:

- Hybrids (including human-beast hybrids).

- Aliens.

- Artificial humans.

I wrote about hybrids here. One problem is that they are either so common as to feel human, or so uncommon to make role-playing harder. Usually, they behave like humans, or as "divided" people looking for their place.

Of course, for this "divided" angle to work, there must be a clear distinction between the two "halves".

Human-beast hybrids (e.g., Tabaxi) make me a bit uneasy in world that have actual beasts. Is a tiger-man a cross between a tiger and a human, or something else entirely? What are their relation to tigers? The more feline characteristics you add, the stranger it becomes. Which is why I might prefer blue tiger-people and wingless bird-people (e.g., kenku).

Alien PCs are doable. We often fall on the hybrid problem, but at least their physiology can be different enough to provide some role-playing challenges. For example, being unable to speak or use human weapons/armor.

Likewise for artificial humans (including robots, golems, clones, etc.). Like hybrids, they might have an interesting "find myself" quest, to prove they have souls and maybe can find a way to reproduce. Or just display some challenging non-human characteristics (e.g., no sense of self-preservation).

Finally, there are near humans: red martians, zabrak, etc. Except for the visuals, it is hard to make them interesting. Some cultural differences might help, but even non-"medieval european" customs feel unmistakably  human (e.g., Spartan or Aztec cultures).

I wonder if there are ever only three races: human-like, half-human, and mostly alien. In Barsoom, most humanoids races are indistinguishable from humans, and John Carter repeatedly disguises as one of them. The exception are the four-armed Green Martians. The only "inhuman" beings are apes, plant people, and similar creatures of lesser intelligence.

In "The Witcher", there are humans, elves (dwarves are of the same origin IIRC), Witchers and monsters. 

In Fallout, humans, mutants and androids. 

The Broken Sword has humans on one side, and elves/trolls in "fairyland". Howard and Lieber barely mention non-human humanoids (even Cimmerians are rare in Howard's stories).

In Star Wars, again, characters are mostly human, while different species are portrayed by single individuals (e.g., Chewbacca, Yoda, Darth Maul). There are no distinct "races".

Tolkien might be the only one who was able to create actual distinct "peoples" that are not human, and I am not sure this works in other settings (but it might - I am enticed by Ravnica, for example, although - again - most important characters are human).

Anyway, just a few random thoughts for now, will continue working on it.

Postapocalyptic Strahd

A long while ago, I've adapted Lost Mines of Phandelver to the Ravnica setting (before it was an official 5e setting). I really like this module, and I really like the Ravnica setting. It was a good fit and I enjoyed it thoroughly.

Was other modules - and settings - could generate something similar?

Well, Curse of Strahd has a decent structure, despite its bad organization. And I've spent so much time reading and running it that I know it quite well by now.

The gothic feel of CoS is nearly perfect. It nails all the appropriate tropes. But what if...

Well, my favorite D&D setting is Dark Sun. Now, think of Barovia as a desolate valley, where resources are scarce, and a handful of small villages survive in walled cities despite the violence outside of the walls.

All fear the local Warlord...

...who controls the main source of water from his castle...

Source.

...and has an army of "ghoul" cultists...

...and a bunch of captive brides.

Of course, there are other tribes (or biker gangs?) in the valley. They call themselves "nomads", "werewolves", "savages", "blood brothers", and so on. 

Most tribes bow to the Warlord, except for the mysterious Raven clan.

There are also those weird witches... Well, that's what the folks call them, although elsewhere they'd be called "psychics". There are universally feared and respected.

Of course, it's hard to run CoS without magic.

Fortunately, I like my Dark Sun in a "kitchen sink" setting that includes mutants, wizards, psionicists, demons, and maybe aliens. I might avoid guns but I'd still have forgotten technology.

So, Dark Sun, plus Mad Max, Talislanta, Carcosa... you know the drill.

Sounds crazy enough... it might even work!

Too many races (+My Carcosa)

Races available in my next Carcosa (Dark Sun/Tékumel) campaign:

- Choose any race available in any 5e book. Try to avoid the most boring ones (no ordinary humans). If you find something cool in another system, we will find a way to include it too.
- Tell the GM the main distinction of your race: habits, culture, etc. Be brief. You do not have to stick to WotC text.
- Races chosen by players substitute one of the thirteen types of men described in the book.
- Races not chosen are whatever the GM feels like. Some suggestions:

Black – Danuvian (Talislanta)
Blue – Vedalken (Ravnica)
Bone – These look cool the way they are, actually.
Brown – Goliath
Dolm – Thri-Kreen (Dark Sun)
Green – Genasi
Jale – Gnolls
Orange – Ahazu (Talislanta)
Purple – Kenku
Red – Red Martians
Ulfire – Shén (Tekumel)
White – Melniboneans
Yellow – Githyanki

Voilá! Now Carcosa is full of bizarre races, each with a distinct appearance and culture, if you need one (just google it!).

----
Explanation:

My current 5e campaign has four player characters: a gnoll, an aasimar, a goliath, and a tiefling. I play most old school modules and I'm currently running Curse of Strahd; so you can imagine that there is no place reserved for such races in most adventures. My players do not care much about their races beyond chargen, and as a result their races NEVER got mentioned again (except for the goliaths' size).

I don't care either - I want players to be free to create any characters they enjoy. However, it paints an irritating picture in my mind. They seems out of place - unlike my Dark Sun or Ravnica adventures, these "unusual races" just do not seem to fit (they would be a bad fit for "tolkienesque" settings too, but I hardly run those).

To be honest, Curse of Strahd should probably be human-only. Not onyl the PCs, but the NPCs add nothing by being half-elves etc (well, I can only remember a single case anyway).

My next campaign after CoD is probably a Carcosa hexcrawl, which gave me this idea.

As you know, Carcosa is inhabited by many types o men: orange men, blue men, bone men, etc. They are nearly identical expect for the colors of their skins, which many people find boring (although I think 13 different races with distinct appearances and cultures might be too much).

So I thought I'd inverted the usual "these races are available". Instead, let the players choose which races are available, and cut everything else. This will give the setting a distinct flavor and avoid race proliferation.

(And if you're asking yourself how many races should a setting have, the answer is probably seven).

Makes me wonder if it wouldn't be better to use the same reasoning for ALL settings...

Dark Sun - 10 house rules for 5e (part II)

Here is part I.

Last part was easy. Here come the hard choices. But hey, that is what role-playing is about!

No gods! No healing!

The fluff: the burned world of Athas is, quite literally, a godforsaken place. Did the gods abandon the people of Athas, or was it the other way around? Doesn't matter anymore. There is no one to hear your prayers, no one to bind your wounds, and no one save your soul.

The crunch: there are no active deities in Athas, but, traditionally, Dark Sun allows the sorcerer-kings and the elements to be worshiped instead of actual gods, so you still have cleric-like classes. The main difference is that healing magic is uncommon in Athas. The easiest way to do that is to ban healing magic from the spell lists (trade them for something appropriate), and disallow some features that restores hit points ("lay on hands", etc.). Using the "healing surges" option in the DMG (page 266) is a good idea to balance things out. Any optional rule to raise an stabilized characters to 1 HP after combat would also be useful (just make a DC 10 medicine check or use a healing kit, as long as you're not in combat).

No class!

The fluff: as you might have guessed, some classes don't make much sense in Dark Sun. Traditional clerics and paladins do not fit. Sorcerers, warlocks, and druids must also be adapted to the setting. Some races simply do not exist.

The crunch: personally, I don't like banning classes outright. Warlocks make decent templars, and clerics can worship the elements with the appropriate domains. Sorcerers feel a bit redundant to me, and wild magic is certainly too much if you're using random defilement rules (although you can certainly consolidate one single table and create a new "pure defiler" class from there). Monks make some sense thematically (unless you're using the mystic), although there were banned in 2e Dark Sun. Even paladins can be refluffed as templars, ascended champions of the sorcerers kings (I love the idea of a paladin of vengeance gaining dragon wings or causing necrotic damage whit lay on hands!), or even inspired zealots of forgotten gods. Druids must choose appropriate animals; bards might be assassins with an adequate background. There are enough choices an options to fill a whole book on the subject. Fortunately, there are already some good ideas online. Here is one example.

No races!

The fluff: the original version of Dark Sun forbids some of the traditional races and introduces new ones - some of which aren't available in 5e.

The crunch: you can always re-fluff the the races like you did with the classes, but some options will be inadequate, especially the ones that can cast spells by default. You have enough races in 5e to cover most of the races that are characteristic of Athas: Aarakocra are already oficial, you can use goliaths for half-giants, some variations of dwarf (or orcs!) for muls, etc. The Thri-kreen are trickier, but not much: natural armor, claws, reduced sleep, etc. already exist in the official races. As for the extra arms, my favorite option is saying they can do whatever they want with the extra armas, but no extra actions! A two-handed weapon with a shield and a crossbow? Sword and board AND torch AND knife? Sure, why not!

No metal!

The fluff: Dark Sun is the most metal of all D&D settings, but actual metal is scarce in Athas. This means most weapons are made of obsidian, bone and flint. It also means the may break.

The crunch: coming up with an elegant solution that doesn't penalize fighters with multiple attacks is not easy, but there are a few options. My favorite is that some weapons (slashing and piercing) can break if you roll a natural 20 AND deal maximum damage in the first two dice. This makes breakage rare, but creates some tension when you roll a natural 20.
For example, if you're attacking with a 1d8 weapon, a critical hit would let you roll 2d8; if you roll 8 on both dice (16 damage), the weapon breaks from the impact. Greatswords break if you roll 6 in the first two dice (ordinarily, you roll 4d6 when you crit with a greatsword).
Making metal coins 50 to 100 scarcer also creates interesting situations; now the "price" column in the weapons section finally means something, and you have good reason to use a greataxe or maul.
I also did "no armor" in the first post, but if you want armor just make it heavier and more expensive. Encumbrance becomes relevant again - specially when you notice you will die of thirst before reaching the next city.
High level warriors should get their hands on magical or iron weapons, but there should be other ways of fixing weapons (the mending cantrip, artisan’s tools, etc).

Metal!

No psionics! No psionics?!?

The fluff: psionics are extremely common in Dark Sun, across all races and classes.... and even in animals and plants! On the other hand, psionics are extremely uncommon in 5e.

The crunch: this is the toughest one. 5e's psionics system is unfinished; all we have are a few classes in the Unearthed Arcana (i.e., playtest material). Which isn't nearly enough for a setting where everybody can have psionic powers. The simplest solution here is spells. Not the most elegant or creative way out, but it is the one the Monster Manual officially uses. And 5e is full of magic by default. So, psionics is (mechanically) just magic with no components and no possibility of defiling. There are other subtle differences: psionics are probably invisible, for example. The "spell list" for psionics should be significantly shorter, and "full caster" classes should be reserved for actual magic. All characters start with a random (psionic) cantrip. Again, not the fanciest solution - but it will do until WotC releases official material for 5e.

No rules!

I admit - this is rule #11 in a top ten list, and feels out of place in a list of, well... rules. But it might be the most important one. I do not treat anything in Dark Sun as canon, mostly because not all Dark Sun canon is good. Back in the day, I used to think the characters in the books did all the cool stuff, so there was little left for the PCs to do. 4e did a decent reboot, but I am not a fan of eladrin in Athas, among other things.
Another reasons is that I like to add stuff from other sources: Tékumel, Carcosa, Zothique, etc. Talislanta is a cool source that I failed to mention (the thralls, pictured above, are more interesting than the muls in some aspects), but any source that works for you is fair game.
In short, my favorite version of 5e is the one I fix - and my favorite version of Dark Sun is the one I make.

Dark Sun - 10 house rules for 5e (part I)

It's that time of the year again! When I miss Dark Sun and start writing my own version of it! Anyway, here are some house rules you may use in your Dark Sun games if you're playing 5e D&D.

No armor!

The fluff: who would use armor in the scorching heat of the desert? Gladiators, templars and city guards wear armor, but since you cannot really travel, sleep of even fight in armor in the desert without being exhausted, most are able to fight without armor.

The crunch: anyone can trade their medium armor proficiency for the monk's Unarmored Defense or their heavy armor proficiency for the barbarian's Unarmored Defense. Unarmored Defense can also be taken as a feat (and you get +1 to Wisdom or Constitution if take it), but only by certain classes (as a general rule, you can take the first if you're proficient in light armor and the second if you're proficient in medium armor).

I am tempted to make a Charisma version for Chainmail bikinis and loincloths, but nobody wants that, right? Right?

No rest!

The fluff: the wastelands of Athas are no place for idleness. Days are hot and nights are cold (or warm, I dunno). Sure, you are familiar enough with the desert - otherwise you would be dead - but if you need rest, you better look for shelter.

The crunch: if you are in the desert or a similar wasteland (and that includes jungles, etc.), the grittier rules in the DMG for short/long rests apply (a whole day doing nothing may grant you a long rest if you can find a tent, food, etc). Look for a city or oasis if you want better healing (this actually solves a lot of problems). Those ruins are looking quite inviting, aren't they?

No food and no drink!

The fluff: food and water are scarce.

The crunch: we will use starvation and dehydration rules that actually make sense. Also, finding food and water is twice as hard. This applies to everything: spells, class features, backgrounds, etc. Interpretation is up to the GM.

No easy magic!

The fluff: magic is rare in Athas. There is no petty magic. You're either a defiler, a preserver or you're not a true spellcaster. Everything else gets re-fluffed as supernatural or psionic abilities.

The crunch: that thing in 5e where everyone has spells no longer apply. As a rule of thumb, if you actually have spell slots, you can be a defiler or preserver. Otherwise, your powers come from something else. Monks (if you allow those in Dark Sun) and barbarians, for example, create supernatural effects with inner strength, psionics or experience.

No balance!

The fluff: there are two types of spellcasters: defilers and preservers. The difference is that defilers destroy all around them in order to cast spells, while preservers don't. Common people cannot tell the difference and hate them all. Most spellcasters can use magic both ways, but choose one path over another. Also, defiling is plain better. That is the temptation.

The crunch: when you use defiling magic, you cast spells as if they were one level higher. You also need to roll on a random table to see what effects you cause. Here are some ideas. All negative effects can be avoided by a saving throw (damage and HP loss are halved, not avoided).

1 - Desolation - flora and small fauna wither and die around the spellcaster.
2 - Destruction - people around the spellcaster suffer necrotic damage equal to spell level.
3 - Confusion - spell gets out of control and affects another random target.
4 - Exhaustion - spellcaster gains exhaustion. Nobody said it was easy!
5 - Inspiration - the next time the spellcaster casts a spell, he can pick any result from this table (except for this one!).
6 - Mutation - the spellcaster becomes permanently warped (it can be cured... probably).
7 - Exsanguination - the spellcaster  loses 2 HP per spell level.
8 - Transfiguration - the spellcaster becomes something else for a while. It might be just cosmetic. Black eyes, etc. It is very unsettling and will draw ire from the superstitious.
9 - Provocation - sleeping creatures might wake, the half-dead may rise, or hungry monster will hear a calling.
10 - Demolition - objects break and structures fail around the spellcaster.
11 - Extortion - the spellcaster gains 2 HP per spell level. A amount of damage eqaul to the total is randomly distributed to nearby people.
12 - Putrefaction - food and water are ruined.

Coming up: No gods! No healing! No rules!

Mad Sun, Part I - Inspirations

I am a fan of post-apocalyptic settings, specially Dark Sun. Watching Mad Max: Fury Road made me want to revisit it, so I made a list with 50 things I would like to find in a fantasy desert wasteland. Since then, I have been meaning to expand on it.

So, here is the idea: creating my own scorched fantasy wasteland, mixing Dark Sun with different doses of its influences and some of my own favorites. I am leaning towards a more sci-fi version of the setting, but without guns, laser, automobiles or space ships. When I am finished, I might put everything together into a short PDF so you can use it as you will (with some notes on adapting it to old school games and 5e, with alternate classes, rules, etc, if there is enough interest).

This post is about the stuff I'll use for inspiration; I listed things that might have influenced Dark Sun itself to some degree to a couple of new things that I think would fit well. This is not a literary analysis of Dark Sun, but a list of cool things that might be useful for my fantasy post-apocalyptic campaign. If you like this list, you might like the rest of the series. Here we go.

Source.

1. Dark Sun and Mad Max are the main reasons I'm writing this. Always been a fan of both, and Fury Road, of course, was one of the best action flicks in recent memory, with lots of gameable material - warlords, preservers, warboys, etc. Most Dark Sun books are still available to buy in PDF, and you can always turn to the Dark Sun Wiki for easy access to information.

2. Tékumel by M. A. R. Barker is, in many ways, Dark Sun "avant la lettre". Empire of the Petal Throne was published, in 1975, in the same year as Greyhawk and Blackmoor, using non-european mythologies to create an unique and very detailed setting. Hot weather, iron scarcity, strange beasts and bizarre races were played using D&D rules decades before anyone ever heard of a Thri-kreen. The best introduction to Tékumel, according to a recent post by James Maliszewski on G+, is Empire of the Petal Throne, available here.

Source.

3. The Zothique Cycle, or anything else by Clark Ashton Smith is an important influence in early D&D and pivotal to the "Dying Earth" sub-genre in which Dark Sun takes place. Necromancers and their undead legions, cultists and evil gods, all wither under a dying sun. You can find the whole series online here. A great summary of each short story can be found here. Other than Zothique, you can find inspiration in tales such as The Vaults of Yoh-Vombis, which reads like a D&D adventure, and The Abominations of Yondo, which takes place in a desert full of bizarre monsters and starts like this:

The sand of the desert of Yondo is not as the sand of other deserts; for Yondo lies nearest of all to the world's rim; and strange winds, blowing from a pit no astronomer may hope to fathom, have sown its ruinous fields with the gray dust of corroding planets, the black ashes of extinguished suns. The dark, orblike mountains which rise from its wrinkled and pitted plain are not all its own, for some are fallen asteroids half-buried in that abysmal sand. Things have crept in from nether space, whose incursion is forbid by the gods of all proper and well-ordered lands; but there are no such gods in Yondo, where live the hoary genii of stars abolished and decrepit demons left homeless by the destruction of antiquated hells.

4. Frank Herbert's Dune is another favorite. With noble families vying for power, political intrigue, psychic abilities, teleportation and giant Sandworms instead of dragons, I think one could use even more inspiration from Herbert to create something that would be at the same time more novel and more palatable to audiences accustomed to Game of Thrones and House of Cards.

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5. Edgar Rice Burroughs' Barsoom is another obvious inspiration. Taking place in the red deserts of Mars, with six-limbed monsters that have been already been included in some version of D&D or other (such as the white apes and banths) and humanoid "races" that would feel at home in Dark Sun or Carcosa (see below), Burroughs' stories of planetary romance make a great fit for D&D adventures, specially the more "epic" ones, with idealistic heroes saving damsels in distress. While the notion of damsels in distress is antiquated, there is plenty of awesome in Burroughs that you can use. See this snippet from wikipedia, for example:

Upon reaching 1,000 years of age almost all Martians undertake a pilgrimage on the River Iss, expecting to find a valley of mystical paradise; what they find is in fact a deathtrap, populated by ferocious creatures and overseen by a race of cruel, cannibal priests known as Therns, who perpetuate the Martian religion through a network of spies across the planet.

His works are in the public domain in the U.S. and can be found here.

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6. Geoffrey McKinney's Carcosa deserves mention as a recent effort to create an interesting D&D wasteland, using Lovecraftian horrors instead of aliens or dragons, which is a great idea. Magic is evil, civilizations is ruled by "village states", races are separated by color (although with less interesting detail than Barsoom), and there are ruins of old, maleficent civilizations all around. Zak S has suggested using it a template for a new Dark Sun here. Although he doesn't sound like a fan of the original box setting in this post, the idea makes sense.

7. Brom is, of course, the quintessential Dark Sun artist, who created much of the look and feel of the setting, but you can look for inspiration in other artists, too. Here is a couple of ideas.
Richard Corben's comic book DEN is mentioned as an influence to Dark Sun by Steve Winter, according to Wikipedia - it looks somewhat like Barsoom with lots of nudity. Besides doing an adaptation of The Vaults of Yoh-Vombis, Corben apparently created the first graphic novel, Bloodstar, a Robert E. Howard adaptation that depicts the heroes fighting lovecraftian monsters in a post-apocalyptic land.
I am a fan of Moebius desert landscapes and weird vistas myself, and Moebius drawings for Dune can inspire a different vision from the more familiar one from David Lynch.

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8. The Fallout videogame series is too good to pass. Although the retofuturistic vibe has little to do with Dark Sun, the series has lots of useful ideas that could easily be adapted to such setting - most of them related to radiation, mutation, factions and hidden vaults, besides using a sandbox structure that is ideal to my favorite style of play.

9. Robert E. Howard and H. P. Lovecraft. Since they have been mentioned a few times already, I feel they deserve an entry. Lovecraft you can use for monsters and gods, and Howard for the Sword&Sorcery vibe. As you know, Conan is often fighting monsters from the Cthulhu Mythos.

10. And, why not, Tatooine, from Star Wars. That's what people have been talking about these days, right? Sarlaacs, sand raiders, banthas, shady taverns and powerful hermits with mind-controlling powers would all fit the bill.

Mad Max, Dark Sun and 50 random ideas

After watching Mad Max: Fury Road, I couldn't keep Dark Sun (maybe the most awesome D&D setting of all times) off my mind, and how cool it would be to create a new post-apocalyptic desert landscape to play D&D in, maybe with less elves and more mutants.

So here is a list of random ideas from Dark Sun, Mad Max, Dune, Fallout, and a bunch of different stuff. 1-10 are places, 11-20 are related to transportation, 21-30 are factions, 31-40 are visuals and apparel, 40-45 are dangers, and 46-50 objects.

Or, to sum up some ideas in the proverbial 25 words or less (almost):

Maniacs, mutants, and marauders, carrying obsidian and bone, ride oil-eating dragons through Endless Sands. Psionic monks battle radioactive sorcerers, dinosaurs and warlords in the apocalyptic heat. 

Places

1. Ziggurat city, ruled by the god-emperor and his templars. 

2. Endless “seas” of silt, salt, or glass (excessive Ss, sorry).

3. Sky-high monasteries where holy-people sharpen their martial skills. 

4. Underground vaults with the last surviving fragments of the Old World. 

5. A building with innumerable floors inside the tableland.

6. A hill labyrinth of colored sands. 

7. The Vermilion plains, where even the trees have red leaves. 

8. The moving metropolis. 

9. The green places, filed with cannibals and dangerous animals. 

10. Cursed pyramids, with the remains of alien humanoids. . .  and their destroyers. 

Creatures & Transportation

11. Petrol-eating, fire-spitting, many-legged drakes that run around like crazy after a good meal.

12. Velociraptors, tyrannosaurs, stampeding apatosaurs and, why not, pterosaurs. 

13. Flying ships and stingrays. 

14. Sandworms, purple-worms, or bulletes. 

15. Giant insects. 

16. Tree-hoping people. 

17. Relentless runners. 

18. Gigantic warmachines. 

19. Psionic teleportation. 

20. Caravans, controlled by merchant-princes. 

People

21. Bloodthirsty youngsters eager to die in epic ways. 

22. The genetically engineered, with perfect bodies and deranged minds. 

23. Scorpion-smoking religious assassins. 

24. Preservers of the last seeds. 

25. Mutant sand raiders. 

26. Psionic monks. 

27. Rabid cannibals. 

28. Woman-hating slavers. . . 

29. . . . and the Amazons who survive them. 

30. The great desperate mass.

Style

31. Leather, piercings and unusual hairstyles. 

32. Shaved heads, black and white paint, faces like skulls. 

33. S&M apparel. 

34. Demon masks and bizarre armor. 

35. Half naked with sunburns and unkempt hair. 

36. Heavy brown robes, kerchiefs and goggles. 

37. Silk robes with vivid colors. 

38. Ritual scarification. 

39. Bones and human ashes as accessories. 

40. War paint or lots of tatoos.

Hazards

41. Sandstorms and lightning.

42. No ozone layer, sunlight slowly kills you. 

43. Water is scarce, non-radioactive water is scarcer.

44. Sinkholes and the things that cause them. 

45. Desert monsters above and below the ground. 

46. Flowers as signs of extreme wealth. 

47. A spice that causes hallucinations, mutations and increases psychic abilities. 

48. Weapons made of obsidian, glass and bone. 

49. Spikes in armors, mounts and buildings. 

50. Sun-powered death-ray lenses.

(image credits: right-click and "copy image address" for sources)