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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Faolyn" data-source="post: 8162689" data-attributes="member: 6915329">No, not every orc/raised by orcs PC from a "savage" culture has to be savage, in the same way that not every dwarf has to be a hard-working miner with a beard you could hide a goat in and not every halfling has to be an easy-going bucolic homebody who eats six meals a day. It's up to the DM to expand upon the cultures in their world, and up to the player to decide how they want their character from that culture to act.No. Because things like stat bonuses and physical appearance aren't what makes the game or a game world interesting.Chimps, who are usually pretty small in comparison to humans, but something like four times stronger. All you need to do is take a quick look through any collection of cute cat videos to find videos of cats falling off things and failing to jump. Elephants are huge, ungainly things, but they're fast and have remarkable dexterity with their trunks. Appearances can be deceiving, and there's plenty of real-world precedent to draw on for things like "I don't feel like this race should be good at this attribute."So basically, elves are, in general, delicate, graceful things. Your elf PC is a total klutz. Dwarfs are normally sturdy, solid things. Your dwarf PC is double-jointed and is allergic to everything. Ditto everything else. Your orc PC is a genius. Your tiefling is is dull and socially awkward. Your kobold has a genetic mutation that caused them to be a slab o' muscle. You can say that a race has X trait, but PCs are unusual and it's OK if they break the mold. After all, there has to be something unusual about your PC to make them go adventuring.The thing with drow is that, traditionally, they are both Always Evil and black. This is problematic, to say the least. So the options are:Get rid of the Always Evil. You can say that drow are just people like any other: some good, some bad, some neutral, some a little of everything depending on the circumstances. You can say that drow are, like other elves, mostly good--but their theocratic rulers fell in with demons and are now oppressing the culture in horrible ways and preventing drow from leaving. You can come up with something else.(While you're at it, get rid of Usually Evil as well. Honestly, one-alignment humanoids doesn't make sense and is pretty boring.)Get rid of the black. You can give them albinism, as is common for creatures that live underground (although that's it's own <a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AlbinosAreFreaks?from=Main.EvilAlbino" target="_blank">problematic trope</a>). You can make them another color. My personal take is, elves blend into their surroundings: wood elves are green or brown, desert elves are brown or gold, snow elves are white or pale gray. Underdark elves would, logically, be black or dark gray. After they live a long enough time in a different environment, their skin changes color again. Heck, if they can change gender now, practically on a whim, then why not skin color as well?The real question is, is it really important that your drow be black-skinned, red-eyed, and white-haired? Why is their coloration more important than their cultural mores?Not really. Drow are distinct because they went for black is evil, or possibly, black is evil and sexy (but mostly just because they're evil; I checked the 2e Complete Book of Elves and being black is a curse for being evil. hmmm.) Also in 2e, my go-to edition for non-5e things, high elves were described as being "pale in complexion," cream-white that never tans, and wood elves being "slightly darker." Their Dragonlance equivalents were the same, although the darker Qualinesti aren't as attractive as their paler kin (double hmmm). The elves in the 3e PH were described in much the same way: pale skin, dark hair, green eyes. I've only seen elves described with different colors in the 5e PH, although I admit I haven't read 4e.We don't know that the LU book won't have physical descriptions yet. We've only seen the playtest packets which didn't focus on physical appearances. But since it seems that what you think of as the default appearance of wood elves is actually a Forgotten Realms-specific thing (what with bronze-colored sun elves and copper-colored wood elves), it wouldn't actually end up being any different than the way it is now.</blockquote>

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