I would like a sunnier setting, where there is not only rubble and shadows of the past.

I’m looking for a setting where the world is new, where elves and dwarves aren’t growing yet, where elven wizards are doing great things, where industrious dwarves are still digging their amazing cities and forging magnificent objects out of gold, Mithril and Adamantium!

I want a setting where humans are still few, small, weak and ignorant.

Something like the tribe of the protagonist of 10000BC

I want a setting where the elves’ forests are immense and their trees as big as Vallen or redwoods, if not like Avatar’s Hometrees!

And the orcs, yes, they must be there too. Tempted by the whisper of evil because of their sheer physical power that makes the infrastructures of civilization less useful. Orcs with +2 STR, +2 CON, +1 DES but -2 INT, and -1 WIS. A society based on the absolute right of the strongest.

Is there such a setting?

This is a translation of the piece I wrote 4 years ago in Italian, before I got hooked in the Fediverse.

Circa 20000 anni fa in italia vi fu un picco molto freddo dovuto all’Ultima Glaciazione chiamata anche di Wurm. Questo peroiodo si estese da 110 000 anni fa fino a circa 12000 anni fa. Il picco minimo di freddo si raggiunse però 20000 anni fa. A quell’epoca l’Italia era più o meno come mostrato in figura. La Pianura Padana era una fredda steppa ricoperta da piccoli arbusti e vi pascolavano grandi mammiferi come i bisonti. La Sardegna e la Corsica formavano un’unica grande isola e le terre emerse erano molto piu estese rispetto a oggi. La Sicilia e la Calabria erano unite e l’isola d’Elba poteva essere raggiunta a piedi. Non esisteva il Mare Adriatico, la costa nord si trovava a circa 200 Km più a sud poichè il livello dei mari era più basso di circa 120 metri.

Source: Italia preistorica: come appariva 20000 anni fa

Ideally I would like to find a generic, class-less, level-less rule set, ideally using other dices than d6

Runic SRD – looks to be an SRD of a Runequest adaptation (OGL), could be a fairly good candidate

Reddit has a related discussion

Watabou’s Procgen Arcana is acollection of free map generators for tabletop role-playing games and worldbuilding.

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After reading it, I’m pretty sure we will never see a new edition of Dark Sun for any forseeable future

My beloved setting is far too problematic.

I wrote it in Dark Sun – Athas Facebook group; among people stating similar ideas I was struck by this one:

Knowing real world adults who have mixed heritage and had to grow up with the whole “half” idea, this is a good step forward to banishing the idea of race from the game. Sorry you’re all too busy being mad the kids are on your lawn playing their rock music and the world is changing.

I felt the urge to answer:

I was not judging that idea, I was stating that Dark Sun touches so many issues that are sorely problematic in the US of America that I think they will not make a new edition on Dark Sun. There’s a huge difference.

Even if I’m an Italian living near Monza I am devoted to St. Charles Lwanga (see Saint Charles Lwanga (see also a previous post on this blog ) and also Saint David Tanko (he hasn’t been officially declared saint but martyrs are saint by definition).

I haven’t visited the US of America since 2004 and I’m not well informed on its recent social evolution so I can’t really have a grounded opinion on it. As far I can say a too extreme Gini index ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gini_coefficient ) plays an important part of all social issues plaguing some parts of the US of America.

You actually can’t banish the concept of species in a game having elves, orcs, halfings and humans. Let’s use asectical, technical words: you can’t also banish the concept of hybrids. Read

“In biology, a hybrid is the offspring resulting from combining the qualities of two organisms of different breeds, varieties, species or genera through sexual reproduction.”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_(biology)

Even Muls’ name and concept (strength, sterility and so on) is patently taken from the equine mule ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mule )

The US of America is spiraling like the late roman empire, no pun intended. The analogies are far too many not to note it.

I’m saving this here because I fear this thread will be soon deleted.

Here’s some other interesing answer to my two lines post:

Who cares what Hasbro comes up with. Stop buying their garbage and make it your own game.

They can say whatever they want, you are the DM and have final say on anything that hits your table.

Jim Humpries

Ok. They write stories that talk about demons that drag an entite city in Hell and cannot talk about slavery? I think this cancel culture is a bit too much. Slavery does not disappear just because “you” do not say the word!

Even in really civized countries there is a form of slavery (i.e. underpaid jobs).

Carlo Tietz

I also felt the urge to add that «of course my appeal to St Charles and St David is a manifest case of “excusatio non petita”, or like we use to say in Italy “mettere le mani avanti”. Just in case»