D&D 5E New Drow cultures coming in Starlight Enclave, the Lorendrow and the Aevendrow

[Twiggly the Gnome]

I liked Lolth better when she was just a spider demon with 66 hit points.

 

[Yaarel]

Heh, the only way I can remember the city name, Menzoberranzan, is the following mnemonic:

"Men so bare, ran sand"

Kinda like a beach scene.

 

[Henadic Theologian]

Seems like the most likely answer: These three books are going to be the big shakers and movers in regards to the Drow and updating most of their lore/being. Probably has to come up with a reason WHY this new goddess only seems to give a jaack about the Aevendrow and had no probs with completely ignoring the rest. Heck it's possible the Chult branch of these new Drow worship the same goddess as the Aevendrow but in a different light OR its just another aspect.

We don't know of this Goddess or the Wind Gods also mentioned are new or not as they haven't been named yet.

And I think alot of stuff will be detailed in an upcoming TTRPG 5e hardcooķ, the FR revisit

 

[Yaarel]

Again, I'm not an expert on ancient Realms lore, but . . . . ages ago there was a series of terrible wars, the Crown Wars, where all the elven kingdoms were fighting each other. At some point, the elven goddess Araushnee convinced many elves to turn against her consort, Corellon. Most of these elves were dark-skinned and lived in the south, but not all. Araushnee's followers lost the wars, and Corellon was so pissed, he banished Araushnee to the Abyss where she became the demon-spider Lolth. Her followers were likewise banished, driven away and persecuted by the light-skinned elves. All of the dark-skinned elves, whether they followed Araushnee or not, were banished. It became a thing about race, rather than completely about religion.

So, why did all three drow cultures go into hiding? They were hiding from persecution from their light-skinned cousins. This could also explain not only their remoteness, but the hidden nature of their cities. The aevendrow and lorendrow either never followed Lolth, or turned away from her worship. The udadrow followed Lolth, but were not yet evil . . . but after settling in the underdark and being exposed to the magical faezress energy, they became easily corruptible and began to worship Lolth, the much darker version of their former goddess, Araushnee.

EDIT: There is also this bit in the canon about how ALL of Araushnee's followers were cursed with dark-skin. Many already were dark-skinned, but more like the dark-skin of folks in the real world. This is when the drow became jet black of skin . . . later to be retconned a bit to have grey skin with varying shades from light gray to jet black. I choose to ignore this bit of lore, as it reflects some real-world mythology that's pretty racist.

In the six-volume novel series War of the Spider Queen, the story ends with the death of the good drow goddess Eilistraee and the curse of the drow is broken. Some of the drow who are not lost to evil lose their cursed skin-tone, and revert to the skin-tones of their ancestors, a more natural dark brown, or even light-skin in some cases. Like the original curse-of-dark-skin, this bit of lore is pretty awful, and I haven't seen it referenced ever again in novels or game products, thankfully. A perfect example of older lore the current D&D game designers feel free to ignore, as they should!

That seems true to the traditional Realms lore.

But the aeven and loren additions are part of an attempt to remove racist memes from the traditional Realms lore.

If the aeven and loren have gone into hiding because elves are racists, that seems like a problem that future D&D gamers need to fix.

 

[Weiley31]

I bet it's Lolths split personality or something. Can't have an evil goddess be completely evil. Plus, WHAT A TWIST!

I'm legit somehow that possible. IIRC, Corellon's current wife is a fragment/aspect of three other goddesses that can combine together to create super goddess elf waifu.

 

[SkidAce]

...
If your race of shadow elves isn't necessarily evil, but does carry some sort of "shadow curse" that can be cleansed with a pilgrimage . . . . that could be cool . . . .

Thanks for the reply.

Yes, it's kinda a curse that can be cleansed. I will review the specifics and ensure that it comes across as society & curse = tends towards evil, but does not ensure all are evil.

 

[SkidAce]

We don't know of this Goddess or the Wind Gods also mentioned are new or not as they haven't been named yet.

And I think alot of stuff will be detailed in an upcoming TTRPG 5e hardcooķ, the FR revisit

Hope the "wind gods" aren't from Aaqa.

 

[Dire Bare]

Yeah its not like the Drow are evil because its in their genes, they are evil because they live in an evil society run by an evil god. I dont see how that compares to "the real world". Real world stuff is typically "the are genetically inferior" which isnt the case in D&D.

Many D&D fantasy races, including the drow, have been portrayed as inherently evil in D&D's past (and present), and D&D hasn't done a very good job of distinguishing between biological inheritance (genes) and cultural inheritance (learned behavior). Certainly, describing a sentient race of people as inherently evil from birth, regardless of how they are raised . . . is problematic. But describing an entire culture of people as evil, with a few good exceptions, is also problematic.

There's only two things I hate in this world, people who are intolerant of other people's cultures . . . and the Dutch. - Nigel Powers (from the movie Goldfinger)

A real world example would be Nazi Germany during WW2. During the conflict, was it that German culture was evil, as a whole? Of course not, but you'd think so based on some of the Allied propaganda of the time. The Nazi Party was certainly an evil organization that came to dominate German culture, but even within the Nazi Party . . . was everybody evil, down to the core of their beings?

The drow in D&D began as an inherently evil people, much like orcs, goblins, gnolls, etc. Over time, this shifted towards drow society being evil, pretty much from top to bottom. Salvatore has been working hard in his more recent novels to show that, actually, not only are the drow not an inherently evil people, but their culture isn't really evil either . . . it's the evil cult of Lolth that dominates society that makes life in Menzoberranzan so awful and the drow such a threat to their neighbors. This shift has been uneven in both novels and game books, and many D&D gamers aren't on board . . . they're fine with drow = evil.

 

[Dire Bare]

But the aeven and loren additions are part of an attempt to remove racist memes from the traditional Realms lore.

Kinda. The new drow cultures are an additive change, they aren't removing anything. I see it as rather an attempt to transform how we view drow culture through addition, rather than retcon or removal.

If the aeven and loren have gone into hiding because elves are racists, that seems like a problem that future D&D gamers need to fix.

Not really. The racism we are trying to transform is in world-building . . . writers/designers portraying a race of fantasy people in a racist manner, constructing these races using racist imagery and language.

A particular culture within our fantasy realm can have problems with racism, just as our cultures in the real world do. It's actually been long established that surface elves in the Realms are pretty racist towards drow, and vice versa. Granted, part of the problem was that . . . if drow are inherently evil, than the surface elves are justified in their racism, which is problematic world-building. But looking at the drow as more fully free-willed people, capable of both good and evil . . . there is no excuse for the racism of the surface elves. Just as there is no excuse for racism in the real world. But it's still there, and can be a part of our stories, just like it's been a part of Drizzt's story in Salvatore's novels.

In the modern Realms, drow walk openly in a handful of cities along the Sword Coast . . . but in the recent past, they could not do this safely. The peoples of the Sword Coast are slowly learning that their racist attitudes towards the drow are misplaced, and are leaving them behind. That's a great story! If you wanted to, you could incorporate something similar in your home games.

Suppose your PC hero is a surface elf, who learns that the descent of the drow was essentially racism and genocide on the part of your ancestors!?!? How responsible for that ancient atrocity are you? How do you feel about the drow you meet in the current day? How do you deal with your fellow surface elves who might hold onto those racist beliefs about the drow? What happens when you run across some evil, Lolth-sworn drow who embody the racist stereotypes you have fought to leave behind? All that can be good story material right there.

 

[Yaarel]

It's actually been long established that surface elves in the Realms are pretty racist towards drow, and vice versa.

And my response to this Forgotten Realms racism is, yuck. Because these racists are somehow "Good", which is also, yuck. And these racists are somehow Chaotic individualists too, yuck.

The whole FR obsession with racist themes and racist tropes is, yuck.

Is the biological essence, all elves are inherently racists? Yuck.



I am not interested in a setting about racism. Especially, if only one of the races is being demonized by the writers.