Hi Flip:
Thank you for that information.
I’ll keep it locked down then, and only keep it on private share for the moment. I’ve deleted the fileshare above.
And the final official release will be through you guys.
Let me know what edition you’d like to see it for, and we’ll set it up for that.
PM me directly if you need anything else, or if you have an update on your colleague Daniel.
Jack
The status of Secrets of the Dead Lands is that it is down to the last 3 maps needed, and then it should be ready for release. So anyone with mapping skills are welcome volunteers.
I can try to get more information on the Emissary adventure, but have not seen what has been done on it for many years.
Meanwhile, if we have a number of people would like to volunteering to work on a project, Faces of the Dead Lands could use a lot of work. Even though Secrets is a 3E project there are no stats other than race and class for each NPC. All of the stats are intended to be included in Faces of the Dead Lands. I will create another topic and post a list of the NPCs and if the community wants to run with the project let’s see how far we can get.
I started a discussion with Austin Butcher. He asked me to bug him about this project on a regular basis so things move. I don’t know if you had any discussion lately with him. Just tell me if I need to stop bugging him 
I’m pretty sure there are some peoples around there and on the FB group that would be ready to throw a 5 bucks in order to get it done. Only 20 peoples willing to put his hand on the DeadLands stuff with nice maps could easily rise 100$ (and more).
As it happens, we’re already on the case with the map…
I had gotten quite far in finishing up and fixing up the Secrets of the Dead Lands book before I heard about the 3rd edition piece which was nearly finished. The work I was doing includes reconciling the Dead Lands of Athas netbook with SotDL, and making it all work geographically.
I’ve also been working with Jhonny to develop a map that works for both supplements and fits with the Athasian Cartographer’s guild work.
I’ll have a look at the 3e material, and see how the work I’ve done on the geography fits in with your guys’ existing development. Is that ok?
I am down to put in $5 for this community. Lets get this done.
I’d be willing to help on almost any Dark Sun project, though I don’t have any mapping skills worth noting.
Anyone ever consider asking Anna to to the maps? It wouldn’t be free to ask her to do the work I don’t think, but if you haven’t seen her Greyhawk maps, you’re missing out. And maybe she’ll take an interest in the project?
OMG, if I had the money I’d ask Anna to do a complete map of Athas. I love her work, especially the maps of the Flanaess.
It’s been 3 weeks. Any updates Flip?
Like many people here, the holidays are a time vacuum like no other. I imagine that’s the holdup more than anything. And I’m busy on a few other projects elsewhere.
I now have the 3rd edition manuscripts, and I’ll read them and compare them to what I had done as soon as I get free time.
I think there’s a relatively simple interpretation for why the dead lands aren’t breached. IMO. There are several reasons.
Geography. It’s pretty hard to leave. There’s a big slippery slope to traverse. Afterwards there appears to be not much of anything beyond for quite a ways. This isn’t so true for traversing the dust but that brings it’s own challenges, even got the dead. Not impossible, but difficult.
Politics. The rulers, groups and entities are all tied up their own concerns. You’d need to send someone pretty powerful to leave together with support. Is there someone capable that you trust that you can do without and risk for an unknown protracted length of time? Not none perhaps (or theirs a few independents who might qualify), but few.
Inertia. The classic undead mono tasking and lack of progression. So it was, so it is, so it shall ever be. Deeply psychological. This cuts down on those who can conceive and act upon the will to leave. Again, not none perhaps but few.
Fear. The SKs and Dragon are powerful and aggressive. So are some others. Let sleeping dragons slumber, don’t poke the beast in the testicles. Knowledge of its demise may be sparse or false anddoesn’t account for whatever killed it or other powers like there. Fear is the mind killer.
The gate. The grey gate projecting its powerful miasma of negative energy. IMO this empowers the undead and their magics but doesn’t directly prevent their leaving. Known as the grey veil (which is just the effective range of the gates sputum, not a hard barrier), most undead could pass past it … but there are consequences. Their empowered spells, abilities and corporealities are no longer so which for those ‘raised’ under its influence could be deeply unnerving or alarming. And dangerous. There’s also (relatively) copious damaging life energy to contend with. Also things killed outside the zone won’t respawn and things brought back in to respawn could have mixed consequences (depending upon circumstance and undead type). That’s a hellboy of a risk. Of note, this doesn’t apply to psionics… but with so much abundant grey energy, magic casters are relatively more common than Athas at large and much more politically powerful.
All together these are reasons the dead stay home, … but don’t have to, leafing to adventure possibilities.
Most of these apply on reverse to the living too. It’s hard to access or leave onde you do. The grey miasma must be contended with. Arcane magics have very little fuel available (generally). Divine magic is impeded as undead are empowered. Then you have to procure difficult to source sustenance… of which the locals even if they cooperate are generally unaware.
But if that emissary changes things or the silt trade opens up… it changes the dynamic quite plausibly whilst allowing changes or returns to the status quo.
I should point out I’ve not seen the unpublished drafts floating about and these are extrapolated opinions based upon what I’ve seen posted or know from elsewhere but I think it all makes sense…
Welcome to the Arena!
Some of these ideas could work. The problem is less coming up with an excuse, and more that the official explanation is nonsense, since it states that the undead are unaware that anything else is out there, which is ludicrous (For a start, it is pretty easy to walk to the edge of the obsidian and see that it doesn’t cover the entire world. Second, that entire groups of epic level wizards and wizard psionicists somehow have never bothered to use any of their supernatural powers to see if anything they knew of the outside world still exists defies belief, and thats before you get into the fact that travelers do occasionally venture into the deadlands, mostly dying shortly, but it should be a dead giveaway).
That’s the worst pun I’ve seen all week mate! lol
Has there been any thoughts as to breaking up the material and releasing it a chapter at a time? So those chapters that are complete are not held up by others that need major work or even a little work that holds up the whole project.
Perhaps gone are the days of releases of full 180 page supplements. And more managable sizes like 20 pages of material are released.
Thank you. I’ve not seen the reasons given in the SotDL itself, just thought I’d share my thoughts.
Perhaps that could hold true for the majority of the denizens, where they’re blissfully unaware, even if its not the case for their betters. Also only those near the borders can see over them (physically) which precludes at least some of the rulers. Or they’re just self-absorbed… 
Testing edits, wanted to include the below quote in the post. If they could be merged please (not hugely important mind…) 
Meant to include this in my above post, still navigating the software.
Bumping this to see if anyone is still working on this at the moment.
Ooh yes. Thanks for the head’s up!
As many of you know (and everyone should know), we have assembled a team of writers and artists who have been working hard since December to finish this entire series of books.
Counting Terrors of the Dead Lands (which is already published, but for which we’ll have a small addendum), there is actually enough content for 4 books:
Our current status on each of these books is this:
Secrets of the Dead Lands book: The writing is pretty much finished. It just needs more images and a final editorial pass to make it harmonise with the other books when they’re done.
Faces of the Dead Lands book: As of today, we’re 80% finished with the NPC and monster stats (that’s over 240+ entries!), but we still need to fill in some of the details such as writing descriptions, picking spells and magic weapons, etc. But that means we’re nearly 2/3 finished with this beast overall.
Adventures in the Dead Lands book: Just barely getting started. Emissary needs conversion to 3.5e from 3.0e, and that’s not as easy as it sounds. But it is in progress. And the additional adventures are there to be developed.
So there you have it. Our insane goal is to have this beast ready for the community to playtest by the new year, at which point I have a special surprise for the community to sweeten the pot.
Having said all this, you can now see why we need all the help we can get. These books are big monsters, and we are but a small but plucky adventuring party of necromants and psion seers.
So, if anyone is here who feels confident in 3.5e stat writing or illustration, you have a chance now to help us make history and finish TSR’s final book. Contact me or @Grummore and join us!
Come join the fight today! Service guarantees citizenship!