Drow-a-go-go

[Leopold]

Wouldn't it suck to be attacked by drow right now? Oh wait, wrong thread...

Seriously, it seems like drow and ninjas have a lot in common. They've got a certain coolness but suffer from overexposure and misuse.

Obviously, the correct way to use drow is to play loud rock & roll music whenever the drow strike, talk about how kewl they are all the time, and to make them unstoppable killing machines.

are you sure your not talking about the Teenage Mutant Ninja Drow??

 

[Erik Mona]

Regdar,

Dragon did an elves issue within the first five issues of the 3e launch. I can't recall which issue off hand, but someone here ought to know.

Second Edition Forgotten Realms was littered with elves stuff.

--Erik

 

[rounser]

Seriously, it seems like drow and ninjas have a lot in common. They've got a certain coolness but suffer from overexposure and misuse.

Obviously, the correct way to use drow is to play loud rock & roll music whenever the drow strike, talk about how kewl they are all the time, and to make them unstoppable killing machines.

Black skin, black leather, beauty, pointed ears, class, spiders, wickedness, slavery, magic, demons, sacrifices and life underground...

The drow are all about sex, drugs and rock and roll, just like the vampires from Vampire: the Masquerade. It all makes sense. D&D Drow fans and White Wolf vampire fans are like peas in a pod. Gah, no wonder they sell books.

 

[Olive]

Regdar,

Dragon did an elves issue within the first five issues of the 3e launch. I can't recall which issue off hand, but someone here ought to know.

Second Edition Forgotten Realms was littered with elves stuff.

--Erik

yeah, but didn't it have drizzet on the front cover?

 

[Leopold]

Black skin, black leather, beauty, pointed ears, class, spiders, wickedness, slavery, magic, demons, sacrifices and life underground...

and here i thought i bought the GDQ series for the adventures..sheesh...

 

[Kae'Yoss]

To our mind, Drow represent the perfect Platonic representation of my least favourite D&D convention: DM/Player conflict. The rules get broken just for them:

I don't think so.

they all run around with +3 this and +5 that, but can the characters use those items? No, sorry, they fall apart in the open air.

They only disperse in sunlight. So as long as you're in the Underdark (or hide the stuff in your pack at day and only use it nightly, altough moonlight isn't very good for that stuff either), you can continue to use the items

They go around dropping darkness everwhere, but only they can see in it. The Dwarf complains: but, but I can see in the dark, too! No, sorry, only Drow can see through the darkness.

No drow can see in the darkness he creates. But they're usually trained well to fight darkness (blindfight is a popular feat among the drow!)

Ooh!, says the Mage, I want a spell that blinds my enemies but not my friends! No, sorry, ancient Drow secret, no can divulge, no can reproduce.

Use daylight......

Even a simple "I magic missile it!" is met with a No, sorry, magic resistance.

Spell resistance can be overcome. In D&D3e, you have approx. 50% chance of hitting a drow with CR = your CL.

In summary, no other foe in the D&D game is as cheesy as the Drow, whether they rhyme with Cow or Throw.

It's like drown, only without the n.


All the things you described above aren't as you described them. Both in the rulebooks and in the novels I read where drow appeared they are as blind as anyone within their own darkness, aren't very fond of daylight (both natural and magic) and have weaponry that works for everyone as long as they're in the Underdark.

Of course, some DM's might disregard all that in order to really piss off their players.....

 

[Khan the Warlord]

IMC, I've replaced the drow's role in the underdark with several other races, including a race of blind, psionic albino halflings. They're cannibals, and they've adapted quite nicely to the underdark.

LOL!

Is your campaign titled "How to rip off old Dark Sun PC games by SSI"?

Seriously though, what you just described above is a perfect description of a race offered in the old DS Shattered Lands game.

 

[JoeCrow]

Anyone with any questions about how nasty drow ought to be would do well to pick up Dragon 298, which should be out in about two months. I'm editing the Living Greyhawk section right now, which features a nearly 20-page survey of the Vault of the Drow and the evil drow city of Erelhei-Cinlu.

Fun, fun, fun.

And also: evil.

--Erik

Well, since nobody else has said it, let me be the first to say "Rock ON!!" Erelhei-Cinlu has been one of my favorite places since I first got my greasy mitts on Vault of the Drow back in the day. As I put it on Greytalk a few years back:

"Personally, I've always thought that Erelhei-Cinlu was the Greyhawk of
the Underoerth. Y'know, the cosmopolitan center that defines the night
below, the center of a multi-national (hell, multi-planar) trade network.
Where else can you see an illithid diplomat, a tana'arri sex-tourist, a
duergar trading delegation and a bunch of derro migrant workers on the same
street? Street markets featuring merchandise from anywhere on Oerth, strange
drugs from the outer planes, slaves of every possible race (and several
impossible ones) cooked to your liking, Erelhei-Cinlu has everything! Where
do you think TSR swiped the look-and-feel of Sigil from? "

This is gonna rock. Thanks, Erik!

 

[Derulbaskul]

Re: The square root of "dr0w" is...

Perhaps you, as the DM, could make it so that there is no such thing as a good drow. Instead, you could inject a mystic element between the drow and the rest of the elven race by having drow that are good be accepted once again into the rest of the elven race, with "normal" elven features being restored after the character commits a truly good deed. (snip)

There is a High Magic ritual in Cormanthyr: Empire of the Elves that does exactly that. Check it out; it's a free download.

Cheers
NPP

 

[Davelozzi]

Is your campaign titled "How to rip off old Dark Sun PC games by SSI"?

Seriously though, what you just described above is a perfect description of a race offered in the old DS Shattered Lands game.

Those feral halflings were a part of the pen & paper Dark Sun campaign too, they weren't original to the PC game.