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General Info
1. About this Walkthrough 2. Keyboard Shortcuts
3. Party Consideration
3.1. Classes 3.2. Scrolls in the Game 3.3. Bracelets in the Game 4. Party Creation 5. Saving 6. A Note on XP 7. Grinding
Map of Athas 8. The Arena & Slave Pens
8.1. Leveling Up 8.2. Objective 8.3. Gilal & Dinos 8.4. Haunted House 8.5. Freeing Semyon 8.6. Merzol 8.7. King of the Pens 8.8. Mirlon & Pehtucl 8.9. The Great Escape
9. The Sewers
9.1. Churr and his Ratpack 9.2. Damsel in Distress 9.3. The Temple 9.4. Escape Routes
10. Return to the Slave Pens
10.1. Genocide 10.2. Loot 10.3. Freeing Trustee
11. Dagolar
11.1. The Inner Sanctum 11.2. Clean-up and Loot 11.3. Keldar: Old Dog, Old Tricks 11.4. The Big Reveal 11.5. The Man, The Myth 11.6. Rewards
12. Escape from the Sewers 13. Fields of Draj
13.1. Shops 13.2. Multiplying Items 13.3. Old One Eye 13.4. Fields of Draj Obelisk
14. White Sands
14.1. Laussa & Ssovan
15. Teaquetzl
15.1. Chahl 15.2. Equipment 15.3. The Visionary 15.4. Teaquetzl Obelisk
16. Nazca Lines
16.1. Feeling Salty 16.2. The Psionicist 16.3. A’Poss’s Heart
17. Red Sands Plateau
17.1. Red Sands Plateau Obelisk 17.2. Notaku 17.3. Master of Mastyrials
18. Wagon Train
18.1. First Allies
19. Sand Oasis
19.1. Tyrian Butterfly Wings 19.2. A Dish Served Cold
20. Elven Slavers
20.1. Getting Captured 20.2. Release 20.3. Second Allies 20.4. Retrieval
21. Elvish Caravan
21.1. Merchants 21.2. Elvish Caravan Obelisk 21.3. Ambush? 21.4. Drisana 21.5. Tidzio
22. Messenger Route
22.1. Messenger 22.2. Hototo & Dagger 23. Elven Slavers Redux 23.1. Metiklt
24. Hot Springs
24.1. Copper Mining 24.2. Patrol Duty
25. Gedron 26. Salt Oasis 27. Cedrilte
27.1. Cedrilte Obelisk 27.2. Terror Bloom
28. Undermountain
28.1. The Outcast 28.2. The Entity 28.3. The Queen 28.4. The Pact
29. Lower Castle
29.1. Serpent Boots 29.2. Initial Cleanup 29.3. Dark Flame 29.4. End of the Line
30. Upper Castle
30.1. The Good Druid 30.2. The Bad Master 30.3. The Ugly Tara 30.4. Return to Cedrilte 30.5. Third Allies
31. Temple Ruins
31.1. Tynan 31.2. Tristram 31.3. A’Poss 31.4. The Lovers
32. Lava Rift 33. Gem Fields
33.1. Hard Labor 33.2. Ylakez and Ketzia 33.3. We Axed For It 33.4. Makhlad 33.5. Hesutu
34. Silt Sea South 35. Silt Sea North
35.1. Jasmine 35.2. Wyrmias
36. Ssuran Ruins 37. Wyrm Belly 38. Wyrm Temple 39. Wyrm School
39.1. Draketooth 39.2. Balkazar 39.3. Terror Blade
40. Captured Gladiators
40.1. War Preparations
41. Korbnor
41.1. Cragg’s Body 41.2. Genie in a Bottle 41.3. The Wishes 41.4. Final Preparations
42. War
42.1. First Wave 42.2. Second Wave 42.3. Third Wave 42.4. Dragon’s Bane 42.5. Leader of the People
43. Preparations for Wake of the Ravager
43.1. Item Translation 43.2. My Selections 43.3. Special Notes
44. Cheats
44.1. Using Switches 44.2. Cheat Keys 44.3. Comprehensive Cheats

Dark Sun: Shattered Lands Walkthrough

1. About this Walkthrough

Authored and tested in March 2025, by gibberishh with inputs from Daniel D’Agostino.

This is a completionist walkthrough, which means we will do everything and get everything possible. I will point out areas or actions that are optional. As far as my knowledge of the game allows, I will also point out every way possible to achieve certain objectives and urge you to take the one that grants the most XP or material rewards. However, where options tangle into immense complexity, I will forego this and only take you through my preferred route. This walkthrough is written for Balanced difficulty.

There are two primary purposes to this walkthrough: to help you finish Dark Sun: Shattered Lands, and to maximize your XP and item finds while doing so. There are very few points at which I will sacrifice XP for more satisfactory gameplay, but I will point out how to get more XP in such cases. There are also a few tips provided to tackle certain situations, but most of the gameplay itself is fairly straightforward if you’ve read up on the controls in the manual. I will delve into all the exploits possible in the game, usually bugs or badly thought out implementation, that can be abused for your advantage.

This walkthrough will also impose my philosophy, likes, dislikes and certain tactics that are particular to this game and what I consider to be myths perpetuated on the internet. Feel free to ignore those and only use the walkthrough for directions or if you are stuck at certain points. There are many valid ways to structure your party and progress through the game—I do not disagree with those approaches, I only prefer mine. I may cover options at different points or I may leave them out if they are not too significant, but my choices and recommendations will usually be affected (infected?) by my biases and my understanding of the game mechanics.

2. Keyboard Shortcuts

I: Open your Inventory

O: Open the Overhead map

V: View character info (right-click portrait to drop, add or dual-class)

C: Cast spell

1, 2, 3, 4: Set party leader

5: Show full party (useful for casting party-wide buffs)

6: Show only leader (party-wide buffs like Bless and Haste will only affect the leader in this mode)

F1: Save game

F2: Load game

Esc: Close overlays/Exit game

Alt+X: Exit game

A: Animations on/off (turn off to quickly move through empty areas)

H: Pan view to party (while viewing other areas)

While in combat:

W: Wait turn

G: Guard (attack an enemy that passes by)

Q: Provides options to end turn, one of them being to end turn prematurely

While in dialogue:

1, 2, 3, 4, etc.: Select dialogue option

Spacebar: Progress dialogue when no response options are available

Next » Before we Begin