Suggestion to do what?

[Zad]

Can you negotiate?

Depends on the suggestion. Yours specifically said "Kill them" so it didn't leave any wiggle room.

From the SRD

The character influences the actions of the enchanted creature by suggesting a course of activity (limited to a sentence or two). The suggestion must be worded in such a manner as to make the activity sound reasonable.

The key here in my reading is the word "reasonable" and it goes to the above points. How reasonable was it that your party was drow?

Personally it sounds like your DM is giving a little more power to Suggestion than I would. But it's his game, you just live in it. So my suggestion for you is this: if he determines this is a reasonable use of the Suggestion spell, then just get it yourself and start casting it on monsters. Tell them their fellows are disguised drow and to kill them.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

Also, as I understand it, Suggestion does not normally actually last 1 hour/level in the way that you're thinking of it. The description of the spell in the PH seems to suggest that 1 hour/level is the maximum amount of time a suggestion can lie dormant. The examples given are, IIRC, a pool of acid (obviously some kind of acid that actually looks like water-- H2SO4 perhaps)is really water and a dip would be refreshing, hold back a red dragon for "just a few seconds", and that a knight should give his horse to the first peasant he comes across.

Now, in the first example, it doesn't seem reasonable that Suggestion would compel the subject to stay "taking a dip" in the pool of acid for 5+hours. Even Dominate person (a spell of the same school and subtype and two levels higher to boot) couldn't do that. I imagine that, if successful, the subject would wade in, immerse himself in acid, and then realize that it wasn't water (as he took 10d6 of damage or so) and get out as quickly as possible.

Similarly, holding back the red dragon for just a few seconds obviously won't take 5+ hours. Instead, it will last for a round or two and if the NPC still survives, he'll then be free of the compulsion since he has held back the dragon for just a few seconds.

The third instance of the knight specifically deals with the duration. Assuming he fails the save, he will give his warhorse to the first peasant he comes across in the next 5+ hours. If he manages to go 5+ hours without meeting a peasant, the suggestion will go away. If he meets a peasant in hour 2, he gives his warhorse away. However, as I understand it, now that the suggestion is fulfilled, he could buy another warhorse during hour 4 and wouldn't have to worry about giving it away to a peasant a half hour later.

Example: 20th level wizard casts Suggestion. The DC to break this is 31. Yet with Break Enchantment the max you can get is 35, and dispel magic won't work at all, and this is just for a 3rd level spell. I could understand if it was 1 round/level, but not 1 HOUR/level.

Anyways, rant off.

 

[Galfridus]

Well the situation that happened was that a sorceress cast Mass Suggestion on us and said that "Your party is polymorphed drow elves waiting to stab you in the back at the right moment. Kill them."

I wouldn't give a save penalty for this.

Now, if the drow had made it seem that someone was polymorphed (Polymorph Other, illusion, etc.), then I would give a penalty.