Duergar & Derro: Use them? How much?

[Ranes]

I used duergar in my campaign during the summer. It was the first time I'd used them and the players hated them, for all the right reasons. Now I'm making notes, designing derro NPCs and their underground outpost, for a different adventure with different players. I'm trying to fully exploit their racial madness in the design of their abode and their lifestyle. I'm hoping the players are really going to feel as though they've never come across anything like them before.

 

[LoneWolf23]

The way I'm planning on using Evil Sub-Races is to treat them as mutated, corrupted versions of the regular PC races, who were altered by Fiendlords (basically, the "Evil Gods") to gain both corrupted, insane worldviews as well as superior abilities. In short, a Mythos worldview of the concept.

 

[MerakSpielman]

I'm running an evil underdark campaign and one of the players is playing a Derro ranger (going for Foe Hunter). Derro rangers have a simple job. Find non-Derro in Derro territory and kill them. If you like, bring some of them alive to the city to be slowly tortured to death in a hideous sacrifice to their gods. He role-plays his character rather well, and only the blatent DM-arranged party set-up keeps him from going to town on his companions. See story hour if you're further interested in Strak.

 

[Hardhead]

Drueger are apparently going to feature prominently in the Expanded Psionic's Handbook.

 

[Nemry]

In Aquerra, where dwarves are proscribed against the use of arcane magic due to an ancient divine edict, those dwarves who do use arcane magic become twisted sterile increasingly insane shadows of their former selves: the derro. Thus, they are very rare - need to recruit other dwarves and corrupt them to increase or maintain their numbers, but don't really trust each other.

I have not used Duegar, but they exsist deep in the lowest tunnels of the Plutonic Realms (i.e. the underdark).

 

[Silver Moon]

I've only used Derro once. We were doing a pre-packaged dungeon-crawl type module (the standard free-the-prisoners-from-the-temple scenario). Two of my players had previously played the module before, so I had made changes to still have it be interesting for them. The Derro was the biggest change, as I had the run-in with them take place AFTER the climax of the main module, when they were in no shape for a follow-up battle. The spellcasters really threw them for a loop.

 

[Schmoe]

Exactly what you have to do. Then again, at the end of the day, how different really are drow, duergar and derro as antagonists?

I disagree. The difference is in the culture and personalities, not in the stats. Each of those three have vastly different societies.

At any rate, the Derro are big players in my campaign, though at the moment they are still mostly behind the scenes.

There are no duergar in my campaign, likewise there are no drow or mind flayers. I agree with the earlier poster that you can't have too many humanoids, unless you actually try to use them all. Choose the ones that fit or are interesting to you, and ignore the rest.

 

[AFGNCAAP]

Thanks for the replies! Keep `em coming!

For my homebrew campaign, I don't use subraces at all--have to agree with a few of the posters here on that matter.

However, I have been working on a FR campaign (where, of course, the subraces abound) where I've been comtemplating using a race other than drow or illithids for the big bad opponents from the Underdark. The duergar seem the most promising (esp. for an organized force that might work with non-duergar allies). And, the idea of using a durzagon half-fiend (from MM2) as the leader of a group of duergar made it more enticing.

I'm still trying to think of a way to use the derro (though they do seem to suggest a possible fate for any sort of half-dwarf race...). At the most, maybe a one-time encounter in the Underdark, but that's about it--many of the ideas I could use with them I could easily use with the duergar.

 

[adwyn]

IMC campaign Duergar have been one of the primary "Bad Guy" races since they first appeared (MM2? I know longer can remember). Their powers stood in mark contrast to the non magic using dwarves of 1st Edition, and thus they came to be the dwarves who had sold out and dared to tamper with the dark powers they shouldn't have. I continue to use and love them and even include the derro as the half human/duergar abominations they orignally were.

 

[Shoon]

I wonder why Nightfall hasn't yet appeared on this thread.

Charduni from S&S just plain rock.