The gaming/fiction disparity, or "Why are dark elves cliche?"

[Orius]

What has come to annoy the hell out of me is Drizzt. I even used to think he was all right, but that Ranger is the definition of overused. All you have to do is look up "overused" in the dictionary and there's his shiny black mug. The thought of reading another Drizzt book is enough to make my brain try to climb down my spine just to get away from my eyes. And I haven't even read about the last four.

That reminds me of the time I created an evil drow character on Baldur's Gate, and tried to find a good portrait of a male drow fighter on the Internet. All I could find was Drizzt, Drizzt, Drizzt, and more Drizzt. Totally unacceptable, especially since I was planning on wasting Drizzt with this character anyway (one of the best features about BG is being able to kill Drizzt and take his stuff ). I ended up scanning the picture of the drow in the 3.0 DMG for the character.

 

[kirinke]

http://cassinus.free.fr/Hommes/page_01.htm this might help in finding good pictures for baldur's gate (males). Has some pretty good drow piccies

http://perso.wanadoo.fr/cassinus/Femmes/page_01.htm This is the female version of the baldur's gate pictures

http://nwvault.ign.com/Files/portraits/categories/FemaleElf.shtml. Here is the neverwinter night vault of potraits

 

[madelf]

I couldn't agree more with that statement. You should start a post your hot Dark Elf picture thread

I can work with that.

 

[Feathercircle]

Since Elfwood doesn't allow hotlinking....

Why let you males have all the fun? Drowboys can be hot, too.



(Disclaimer- this is not my art. It belongs to Jenny Dolfen, who draws better than I ever will. )

 

[Dark Jezter]

http://perso.wanadoo.fr/cassinus/Femmes/page_01.htm This is the female version of the baldur's gate pictures

 

[Orius]

http://cassinus.free.fr/Hommes/page_01.htm this might help in finding good pictures for baldur's gate (males). Has some pretty good drow piccies

Hmm, looks like there's a lot of portraits there, I'll bookmark it and skim through the site next time I start a new character.

Though come to think of it, I'm not sure how many pictures of drow males besides Drizzt there are. The reason I was finding mostly Drizzt pics, is because he seems to be the only drow male who gets painted.

 

[Feathercircle]

Hmm, looks like there's a lot of portraits there, I'll bookmark it and skim through the site next time I start a new character.

Though come to think of it, I'm not sure how many pictures of drow males besides Drizzt there are. The reason I was finding mostly Drizzt pics, is because he seems to be the only drow male who gets painted.

Check out the artist I linked above. She's got a fair amount of non-Drizzt drow.

 

[Drifter Bob]

Actually I think they do have a source in mythology... I think both Scandanavian and Babylonian mythology include light and dark elves which are fairly similar to D&D elves. At least in Scandanavian mythology the 'svart' elves are the bad ones.

It does have racist overtones but so does practically the whole monster mythology of D&D. Orcs are believed by many literary scholars to be thinly veiled turks.

Irregardless, if Drow are cliche then Orcs and similar generic bad guy races are very, very, very, very cliche!

I personally like the Drow, they are one of the best developed races in any RPG I've ever played, and I do think drow chicks look good no matter what they are wearing, and I don't care if it's a cliche.

The fact that other monster races aren't as well thought out and interesting in terms of their societies means that more effort should be made.

I do think D&D could use a good white european type villain race, it would certainly not be hard to find some examples in history.

DB

 

[Dark Jezter]

Irregardless, if Drow are cliche then Orcs and similar generic bad guy races are very, very, very, very cliche!

That's one reason I love the Warcraft setting. Warcraft orcs are unlike any other fantasy setting's orcs. Rather than being bloodthirsty brutes, Warcraft orcs are a noble, spiritual people with a strong sense of honor.

 

[RangerWickett]

I'm impressed with the dark elf art. Good stuff.

I think the closest D&D ever came to a bad guy white European race were the hippo-faced, English-esque Giffs. Then again, I have some very elitist, racist elves in my game, and they're certainly more European than anything else.

I'm a little frustrated that my blatant attempt to get people to read my story seems to have failed. Ah well. At least I got to find some new artists I like. I wonder if any of them want to do d20 work.