This page details the beginnings of my “Somber Sands” Dark Sun campaign, and is designed to be a player aid for memory between sessions. This first session included character creation, and an adventure drawing on some elements of the “A Little Knowledge…” adventure in the base 2e Dark Sun box set.

Character creation yielded these four character tree groupings, and from them emerged Finnja the Human Beast Master Ranger, Thrak-Chul the Thri-Kreen Fire Cleric, Marquis the Human Diviner Wizard (Preserver), and Corin the Human Valor Bard.

Here are the initial backgrounds of the starting focus characters.

Feet of Clay: Finnja

You had realized it was all a lie when the Cleric was nowhere to be found, but the coffers were all emptied. You grew up in the relative safety of Fort Harbeth, where you were free to practice your skills as a druid. Then the Cleric came to the Fort. Most were skeptical, but a few of the youth—you included–started going to his weekly talks. In just two months you were living at a so-called “shrine” at the base of the Mellikot Mountains, nearly starving but somehow confident in the Cleric’s abilities. You sold almost everything and gave it to his fledgling mission. The others stopped attending, but you kept the faith. Even when the food ran out, and then the water. You kept the faith. But then he was gone, and with your money. All that remained was the odd idol set at the top of the altar. In a rage you smashed it. Inside was just a mass of oozing silt. Near dead with starvation and dehydration you stumbled out into the desert intending to let sun and sand take you. Like a sign, a large merchant caravan was rumbling past in the distance. You raced to them across the sands, and last you remember was one of their rough outrunners smirking as you passed out just as you reached the caravan.

DM ask list: Human culture, Fort Harbeth

Thri-Kreen: Thrak-Chul

Your hatch-egg was taken by Ptekwe, to a place called Fort Inix, in the foothills to the south of the Blackspine Mountains. Hatching there Ptekwe did their best to raise you in the ways of the tribe, a difficult task for a tribe of only two. Fort Inix was primarily Humans, many of whom owed allegiance to House Shom. Ptekwe was an adept poultice-maker, and he crafted a special scale-rot preventative that helped the House with their raising and sale of Inix, huge lizards that lent their name to the Fort. Unfortunately you never picked up the knack for making the poultice yourself. Tho you had many skills, the Fort’s dwindling water supply had Ptekwe worried that you could be cast out, or worse: killed. The last thing you remember was approaching a passing merchant caravan with a purse full of ceramic—nearly all of Ptekwe’s savings—hoping to get safe passage to the city of Nibenay.

DM ask list: Thri-Kreen culture, Fort Inix

Preserver: Marquis

You’ve been on the run since you could remember. Has it been sixteen or seventeen merchant caravans now? Some were good enough, where you could work for your berth and they didn’t mid if you used some magic to fight off desert tribes. Others it was clear that magic users would be killed on sight, so you had to be careful. Every time one would approach a city, it was time for you to move to the next. The cities, and their Sorcerer-Kings, were the reason for magic prohibitions. You could make money and power there, surely, but you need to be stronger, and have some allies to keep your magic hidden and survive. The last thing you remember was standing in the farmlands south of Urik, watching the next potential merchant caravan rumble your way.

DM ask list: Human culture, Merchant caravans, Arcane spellcasting (techniques and laws)

Wrong Place at the Wrong Time: Corin Fayeth

The City-State of Nibenay was a good place to grow up as the child of a sculptor. Your parents, and by extension you, were free-citizens. And there was always plenty of work for your mother. That meant a few more bits in your pocket when you journeyed out into the city for fun and seeking your own work. A few odd jobs passed, but it was the craft of being a bard that really drew your attention. Unfortunately, one night you were suddenly grabbed by two of the Wives, and a sword held to your throat. The last thing you remember was their conversation. “This one doesn’t look like the suspect,“ said one. The other replied “Eh, who cares? Sells all the same.”

DM ask list: Human culture, City-State of Nibenay

Adventure: In Search of Water

Finnja, Corin, Marquis, and Thrak-Chul all awoke at roughly the same time, their minds clouded with residual brain fog. They found themselves shackled inside of a rolling mellikot-driven merchant caravan, and their faces painted with henna to mark them as slaves. With them was chained a woman named Alma, who had been with them and helped them identify the drug used in their water rations to keep them in a trance. Attempting to escape they were thwarted by a brutal Mul jailer named Lorde (“with an -e”) and a talented psionicist with a long face and words that manipulate–now upset that they’re out of the drug for the last leg of the journey. The caravan will sell the PCs as slaves when they reach the City-State of Tyr.

The caravan is stopped the following day, and the PC’s take note of shouting. They use that to band together and yank the entire rigging of their shackles out of the walls–then use the bone rings that held them to saw through the bands of rope. They emerged onto the deck to a scene of chaos: a huge tribe of elves were menacing the caravan, and the caravan guards had returned fire in desperation.

The elves began using magic, which lit the caravan on fire. The PCs scrambled to find what they could before getting out. Corin rolled up a canvas hammock (thinking to throw it like a net in an emergency), while Marquis burst in on the psionicist–and immolated him (and subsequently the bedding he fell onto) with a spell. Thrak-Chul managed to find the kitchen, but in trying to roll the water barrel it shattered and spilled everywhere. He was at least able to get a good drink from it. Finally Finnja leveled her shoulders and broke down the door to the Caravan Captain’s office. Inside she found a map of the caravan’s progress, with a direction of an oasis and then further that same direction a town called Kled). She also found a small leather pouch that contained a single silverpiece–a veritable treasure!

The PCs and Alma dropped out of the now fully-ablaze caravan onto the sands, and found themselves surrounded by disdainful and indifferent elves. The elves offered no support nor care for them, and only when the other survivor–Lorde the jailor–was identified as a slaver did they take any action: filling Lorde with arrows. Not even a “good luck” and the elves dashed off into the desert.

Knowing they were slave-marked, and finding little in the caravan search once the fires had burned themselves out (just a few wooden weapons), the PCs dared not go back to the City-State of Urik. Thus they followed the map they had. They trudged through day after day of open desert dunes punctuated by rocky outcroppings, feeling the effects of dehydration. Efforts to find water were not turning up much. Marquis managed to find a cactus that held some water, and he scarfed it down before others could notice. Unfortunately his luck changed as a following day he found a plant with a long root system, which he also promptly ate–and got him promptly sick.

They found a thornbush that lured prey by looking like there was a pool of water it rooted in, but was actually sap. A few cuts of the thicket revealed a victim of the plant, decomposing into the ground. He at least had most of a serving of water in his waterskin, which relieved Finnja’s thirst. However more days of trudging took their toll, and Corin and Alma were in bad shape by the time of reaching the oasis marked on the map. They saw the two mellikots that had escaped from the caravan, but one seemed to be lying dead at the pool’s edge. The rush of excitement of water gave way to observing that the water was definitely poisoned–by a root that is hyper-deadly to most, but not to elves and their water-bearing insectoid beasts.

Foraging around the plant life of the oasis the PCs managed to find enough water to save the life of one of the two who had yet to drink anything: Corin and Alma. Without discussion, this last hope was consumed by Corin. The PCs then eyed the mellikot that was sadly standing guard over it’s lost mate. It was clear the beast knew the water was bad, but it seemed reluctant to leave the dead one’s side. The PCs decided to slay the beast and perhaps Alma could drink the blood and get some water from that. Finnaj calmed the beast a bit, then struck with a crude wooden glaive that they had looted. The blade sank deep, and the beast roared in pain, but the tough beast was not put down that easily. The whole group started attacking the beast–torching it with flaming strikes, and a psionic attack from Corin that was done in the tone of the worst scolding of an animal possible. Finally Finnaj managed to cleave off the head and finish the job. Exhausted, the group stood panting as the beast bled out, only to realize that Alma was face down in the water. The people she had traveled with and trusted were suddenly so shockingly violent that she started to doubt everything, including their warnings about drinking the water. Much to her peril as she collapsed after a single sip. Exhausted and now mourning, the group camped for the night.

They were awoken the next morning by the sounds of laughter. A war party of elves–at least 20 strong–along with two kanks: insectoid creatures with globes of wax on their back that the elves use to transport water. They gleefully filled up the poisoned water, knowing it would not affect them. Again, the PCs were seen by the elves and mostly ignored beyond a few nasty comments about the Thri-Kreen, and some jokes about taking a drink. The PCs kept their cool, and the elves soon left headed eastward. The PCs instead started toward the south, seeking the village of Kled.

It was four days beyond the oasis, with even the Thri-Kreen feeling the effects of thirst, that the PCs were wandering through the relative shade of some rock outcroppings that ran alongside the dunes. They heard laughing again, but this time just a single voice. A young dwarf named Cleodis was watching them, and informed them that they were indeed close to Kled. He led them there, and they found a small, half-deserted Dwarven town. Cleodis’ grandmother saw the state of the PCs and immediately shared her water with them. Without a question asked. Finally hydrated and able to rest a moment, the PCs told the tale of their bondage, escape, and journey. The poisoned oasis was clearly a problem for the dwarves too. It was their water source, and it killed a number of their townsfolk before the cause was sorted out. The druid that tended the grove had also disappeared, and none could find him. Many Dwarfs left, but some stubbornly remained behind because of their rooted obligations in the town.

Upon an ask whether the PCs would help bring the elves to justice and restore the oasis, the PCs enthusiastically agreed. The town equipped them best they could–they had wooden shields and some wooden weapons available. And the town elder offered them the town relic to use in their pursit of the elves. It was a bone spear with ornate carvings, and able to strike foes down with the blade but also heal allies by pressing the haft of the spear to them. And the offer that the PCs would be allowed to keep the spear if they could manage to make the oasis potable once again. Vowing vengeance on the mocking elves, and strapped with waterskins from the town for their journey, the PCs headed out to face foes unknown.

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