Desert world

[Adamaro]

I am making a homebrew desert world (very low population) and have been familiarizing myself with Dark Sun setting, but I would very much appreciate a few guidelines regarding the main difference between desert continent and regular "lush, green" D&D setting.

I am aware water is a crucial element here, oasiss being guarded by strongest wizards/monsters, I think caravans are also a common appearance, there are heat danger (except maybe for reptiles) but as for other stuff ...

I'd really like for you guys to give me some examples how such lands/kingdoms/cities/every day life differs from standard, generic D&D setting. Also, some inspirational book titles are welcome :)

[Show]

One word:
sandstorm. (Well, as long as you're playing 3.5)
There, now you have rules and some flavor.

For everything else, just research ancient egypt.

You can hardly go wrong. :smalltongue:

[The Rose Dragon]

Alternately, depending on which desert culture you are going for, get Legend of the Burning Sands if you can. It's not an actual D&D book, but it is written by AEG, so it is likely good as reference material, and you can always play it rather than D&D.

[MickJay]

Egypt is a good example if you have a massive river flowing through a desert - it will be the single most important thing in the whole country, revered as a god, life-giver, etc. It will almost automatically mean that country will have incredible wealth compared to neighbors that lack such a source of water and fertile soil.

If, on the other hand, the area lacks such a river, the civilization will only develop in places with stable water sources, around large oases, or near springs. Technologies for reclaiming moisture and drinking water from seas and other normally undrinkable sources of water will be highly developed. Lots of people would lead nomadic lifestyles, and population in whatever cities there might be would be highly controlled, so that there is enough water for everyone. Water distribution would be controlled, or at least monitored, by the government, and water tokens may well serve as currency. For a very well done example of how a completely desert world could look like, Dune series (especially the first book) would be a good reading.

[RTGoodman]

In a desert world, you're not going to have large population centers for the most part. In Athas (the DS setting) it seems to me the major cities mainly hold together by the power of the sorcerer-kings. Most people, though, live in nomadic tribes, either having fled the cities or because that's just the natural way. Small villages do appear at important crossroads, at oases, and in other places where people might gather.

Scarcity might also apply to materials other than water. In Athas, iron is rarer than gold. Metal weapons are thus highly prized. Most peoples' weapons are made of bone, stone, obsidian, or some other similar material.

As far as actually RUNNING the game, make sure you and your players realize that SURVIVAL is the key, not winning loot. Yeah, there might be the potential for treasure, but you've got to cross a hundred miles of the Burning Sand to get there - is it worth it?

[Daftendirekt]

How has nobody mentioned the Dune book series yet?! It's THE desert world setting. Sandstorm borrowed a lot from it (stillhydration suits, anybody?)

[Adamaro]

I was always wondering why nomad-ish way of life is better in desert setting. What's so appealing regarding traveling hundreds of miles from oasis to oasis in comparison to camping around water source?

[Thinker]

I was always wondering why nomad-ish way of life is better in desert setting. What's so appealing regarding traveling hundreds of miles from oasis to oasis in comparison to camping around water source?

Water is very important, but so is food. You can't grow crops in the desert so you rely on livestock. A group of nomads can arrive at an oasis for a few days to have their herds graze and then move to the next one before they devour all of the plant life there. There's also a general lack of building materials or even cloth that's not made from skins/fur of animals, which come from the livestock. Rivers are important and if the nomads have the opportunity to settle in an area that can support their way of life, they will.

[MickJay]

How has nobody mentioned the Dune book series yet?! It's THE desert world setting. Sandstorm borrowed a lot from it (stillhydration suits, anybody?)

I have, two posts above yours. :smallbiggrin:

[Amphetryon]

The availability and role of divine magic in your world's setting can greatly change the default assumptions about population within a desert. Create Water and similar spells, easily available to low-level divine casters, can effectively sustain population pockets depending on how common those casters are. This would make the divine casters easily the most politically powerful force in your campaign, quite likely.

[Asheram]

You might want to research the formation of deserts as well as ancient agriculture, agriculture in desert areas and trade.

[Adamaro]

The availability and role of divine magic in your world's setting can greatly change the default assumptions about population within a desert. Create Water and similar spells, easily available to low-level divine casters, can effectively sustain population pockets depending on how common those casters are. This would make the divine casters easily the most politically powerful force in your campaign, quite likely.

Great suggestions. The thing is, tier 1 classess were eliminated. Knowledge of wizards got lost in the great arcane war, while clerics and druids became much more "narrow", meaning that druids MUST ALL THE TIME promote nature (no travelling around and looting tombs), while clerics must ALL THE TIME follow the queries of their gods. Problem is, good gods are dead, so clerics are either neutral or evil. Sorcerers are a few and far apart, so dragons rule the south, being the oldest creatures with most knowledge and fighting the threats from the north - abominations (epic monsters), pseudo-monsters and zounds of ghouls and other self-duplicating undead.

[Ravens_cry]

You probably don't want the entire planet be a sandy desert, unless you got some relatively well thought out way of producing oxygen without conventional plants, à la Dune. Maybe a large ocean with no islands? Most of our worlds oxygen is produced by algae. Of course, if you do, a primitive or magical form of desalination will be important.

[EccentricCircle]

Hello

Desert settings can be fascinating. it is a harsh environment, so as has been said several times survival is a definite issue. bear in mind that not all of the equipment that would normally be used in a D&D game will be practical. wearing heavy armour will be uncomfortable at best and lethal at worst, any amount of travel will be more exhausting and this will make transporting large amounts of goods difficult without pack animals. in a standard european fantasy setting a strong character can carry a heavy pack on their back full of dungeoneerign equipment, ten foot poles and such, in the desert they will want a camel or two.

the people who can create of control resources (primarily food and water,) will have power. even if spellcasters are rare and so create food and water is not an option for everyone the people with the oases or rivers will have influence over those who don't. the spice in Dune can be seen as a metaphore for water. if you have a good well then you have the most valuable commodity in your universe, and the never ending battle to defend it. the water must flow if you and those around you are to continue to live.

in my homebrew desert setting the shortcuts to survival presented by magic have given divine spellcasters dominion over the empire. they have the power to keep cities flourishing in the desert. while arcane casters form the upper echlons of the criminal underworld running a vibrant black market of magical commodities such as dekanters of endless water and cloaks of endurance, all of which are illegal as people using magic would challenge the primacy of the ruling elite.

as to a reading/ research list:

Sandstorm (3.5 D&D)
Dark Sun (2nd ed and 4th ed D&D)
are your primary sourcebooks

in fiction you should start with
Dune and Dune Messiah by Frank Herbert
this is the classic work on the desert setting, dune inspired everything from Star Wars to warhammer 40K and is a very interesting read.
the Last Storm lord by Glenda Lark is an interesting take on a water based economy and a good story.

Films such as Dune (either the classic film or the 6 part sci fi mini series that covers the plot of the first three books), Star Wars ( anything set of tatooine), Raiders of the Lost Arc (the definitive work on tomb raiding...) , Lawrence of Arabia and the Mummy are all well worth a watch. they are not all the same genera as a typical D&D game as none of them are actually high fantasy. I've not come across a good Fantasy desert film, if anyone can recomend any i'd be interested to see them myself.

Edit:

add to that the 1001 Nights and all tales from arabian Mythology. Egyptian myths have already been mentioned. the Holy texts of the abrahamic religions are also a good everyday lives of desert nomads.

[RTGoodman]

I've not come across a good Fantasy desert film, if anyone can recomend any i'd be interested to see them myself.

As always, I have to advise "Conan the Barbarian." Not high fantasy, and not specifically desert-y, but it's got the kind of flavor you want down to a T. Particularly with spellcasters being Evil and the ruling elite. Heck, your first BBEG could be a straight-up rip-off of Thulsa Doom, or you could even rip off the entire plot of the movie for an intro campaign.

In fact, if you can find it somewhere, maybe check out the Conan d20 rules. It's really close to basic 3.x. I managed to snag a free copy in a DriveThru RPG giveaway a few years back, but you should be able to get a PDF or physical copy for a relatively good price.

[Mistral]

You probably don't want the entire planet be a sandy desert, unless you got some relatively well thought out way of producing oxygen without conventional plants, à la Dune. Maybe a large ocean with no islands? Most of our worlds oxygen is produced by algae. Of course, if you do, a primitive or magical form of desalination will be important.

That's actually a rather interesting concept, along the lines of Pangaea and Panthalassia. I don't think it's really necessary to worry too much about it in exhaustive detail unless you're interested in doing so or your players are the sort to nitpick at it, though. It doesn't matter to us today that phytoplankton and cyanobacteria provide half of the oxygen produced by plant life in practical, day-to-day terms so long as the process continues to occur, and I can't see people living hand-to-mouth in a vast desert caring much more about it, or even knowing that it occurs. I must admit though that I've never read Dune, so I don't actually know this, but how did the author go about creating an oxygen cycle for the world in question?

Still, if you are interested in mining it for ideas, it's probably worth noting that the late Permian and Triassic periods corresponding to Pangaea were characterized by high average air and ocean temperatures, no glaciation at the poles, and extreme climate variation dominated by proximity to the outer coasts rather than latitudinal differences (and by extension, high seasonal variation). It is believed that coastal areas were subject to strong monsoon seasons due to the aforementioned high oceanic temperatures and seasonal variation of overland temperatures, but the interior would see very little weather even by our world's standards. Oxygen levels in the atmosphere are also believed to have been rather low during most of this era due to the desertification of Pangaea's interior, which both reduced oxygen production from plants and increased oxygen binding to minerals exposed due to a lack of topsoil formation, though these levels apparently persisted through the Jurassic and Cretaceous as well. Interesting geological formations in this era include characteristic red beds (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_beds), which could be noted for being relatively iron-rich, especially if you go with an iron-poor setting akin to Dark Suns.

In practice, a Pangaea setting could see two general types of populations emerging, very similar to the nomadic/settled split of our own history. In fact, one could largely lift settings like Ur wholesale if one wished. Along coastlines and major inland rivers, one would see established city-states and agricultural development, perhaps supplemented by animal husbandry, aquaculture, or fishing. These rivers, particularly larger navigable ones, would become major trade routes into what is generally an unsettled and unexplored interior. I would expect these city-states to be authoritarian, particularly if run by dragons, and they may frequently be at odds with each other as well over the usual gamut of reasons people fight, especially water rights, unless they're united politically under a single government or by diplomatic circumstance against the outside threat. Religion may well be a powerful watchword as well, either in division or unity, with notables including deities for storms, rivers, water (either generic or distinct from the first two), the sun, and so forth. In the desert, nomadic ways of life probably would be the primary watchword, absent other forces. Lasting oases would likely be rare and hard to come by, as the interior would be a desert to rival the Atacama and sources for underground aquifers would not be replenished often if at all, but where they exist, they would undoubtedly support small settlements of their own, with limited and carefully-rationed agriculture to supplement food stores, which would provide anchors for overland trade routes where rivers do not reach. Given that the primary threat in your campaign include the undead, which do not worry about food, water, or heat stroke, these would likely also be extremely tough nuts to crack militarily simply to survive in a land where the city-states probably and literally cannot logistically support just sending an army out to clean up and crush the undead, very much like the "points of light" setting concept propounded in D&D 4E and other sources. In fact, depending on how far this threat has progressed, nomadic ways of life may have died out simply because they can no longer survive out in the deserts against the undead and worse.

[ffone]

Create Water.

[Daftendirekt]

Create Water.

Takes away all the fun of having to fight for survival.

Seriously, the one time a party my character was in ventured into a desert, that spell and Endure Elements made it so easy. The fact that we were in a desert affected one thing -- the monsters we faced. Ashwyrm Dragoons = evil. Otherwise, no desert danger.

[Adamaro]

Create Water.
Well, ya, but it takes quite a few clerics to supply an entire caravan (they produce 2 galons per level per spell), so I really do not see how an entire city could be supplied this way unless say, half the population are clerics. Create water is not really all that great a solution.

Endure elements, however may be usefull, but again only to a very small amount of people.

[ffone]

Create Water could be a partial basis for the clerical proselytizing in the world - the percentage of the population which are divine casters (and the average level / 'willing capacity') is such that you have enough water from magic alone for some but not all, and it's used as a sort of religious recruitment / reward thing by various faiths. And perhaps for 'new' L1 divine casters, a typical awakening experience is realizing they can create water (their prayers and devotion have 'paid off' etc.) Evangelizing clerics often go around passing out water, using it to get people to listen to them, etc. Like RL missionary charity work.

Possibly a 'cynical' thing, like the selling of medieval indulgences but with a more tangible benefit, and/or more 'genuine' for the good faiths (like with other healing in this and most game worlds it's not that the good clerics don't care about most everyone; they just don't have the capacity, and so still expect 'donations' / quest-labor).

[FelixG]

Or as the good gods are dead the evil gods just do not supply that spell to their followers for the entertainment purposes of torturing mortals. :smallbiggrin:

If you are using 3.5 then just use the Side Winders from Sandstorm in the same capacity Dune uses sandworms. (IE they pump out Oxy but are deathly allergic to water.)

I have always loved the idea of a desert world RP but my local group is kind of...untalented...when it comes to survival RPs.

[MickJay]

As for oxygen on Dune, the planet had almost all of its water trapped by the "sandtrout", which, if the environment is dry enough, can move on to the next stage of their life cycle. They eventually become the massive Worms. It's the sandtrout and worm metabolisms that provide the oxygen.

[FelixG]

As for oxygen on Dune, the planet had almost all of its water trapped by the "sandtrout", which, if the environment is dry enough, can move on to the next stage of their life cycle. They eventually become the massive Worms. It's the sandtrout and worm metabolisms that provide the oxygen.

Your forgetting the sand plankton phase of the life cycle :smallbiggrin:

it is only mentioned once or twice but its in there, thats what the sandworms feed on normally! :smallwink:

[Dalek-K]

I don't know anything about dark sun but...

Underground cities would be more popular (drow, dwarfs)

I would think that Dragonborn would be the most populace race though due to their more reptilian nature. Maybe kobolds... Hmm

[FMArthur]

How about, the sun is too hot for plant life on the surface, and they instead grow underground. All of the vegetation. Maybe even like an inner-world sort of place exists like in Journey to the Center of the Earth or Terranigma.

[Wardog]

For a more unusual / less stereotypical, real-world desert society, consider this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bactria

In this case, the oasis seem to have been large enough to support wealthy city states, rather than just being stopping-off points for nomadic hearders.