What's up with the ending to Vault of the Drow?

Nathan P. Mahney

First Post
So I've been reading the GDQ series, and I got to the end of Vault of the Drow, and I'm left scratching my head. The major antagonists of the campaign, Eclavdra and company, have turned away from Lolth and now serve the Elder Elemental God. So why is it that Vault of the Drow seems to have a conclusion involving a battle with Lolth? I realise that it's a very open-ended module, but to me it seems like it's done a complete 180. I'm quite sure that, as written, most of the people I've played with would do their best to wipe out Eclavdra and completely ignore the Fane and the entire Lolth confrontation.

While I'm at it, I'm wondering something about Shrine of the Kuo-Toa as well. It seems to me that if the party follows the proper procedure they can just waltz right through the place quite handily. Which is all well and good if you're one of the players, but has this happened to any DMs out there?
 

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Think about what the PCs would actually know about the situation and what's really going on. Eclavdra and her clan are heretics as far as the rest of the drow are concerned, but they're still advancing some drow agendas by being behind the giant plot. They're just being 'watched' under those circumstances by more loyal members of Lolth's faithful.

So what are most PCs going to do? They're not just going to stomp on Eclavdra, they probably don't even know the subtleties of the situation, they're going to get at the root of the drow issue and that means a trip to the Fane.
 

I have always thought that Eclavdra's worship of the EEG was constant throughout the modules (regardless if they say differently). It seemed to me that she was hedging her bets somewhat. If heroes foil her clan's manipulation of the giantish races, perhaps they are powerful enough to kill Lolth. Then, when the powers of the priestesses of the other houses fail she can move forward.
 

I've always thought that D3 wasn't so much a module, but a setting. Here's the most decadent city in the world, full of vile, nasty people who won't blink an eyelid to fireballs going off in the streets. Have at it, guys!
 

I sympathize with the OP more on the D2 issue, less on the D3 issue. It is pretty clearly possible to stroll right through the Shrine, and it does indeed seem odd as a DM (not even any necessary roleplay challenge there).

On the D3 issue I've actually always loved the fact that D3 is set up with a focus on the enemies of the original villains. I get a sense of versimilitude and "life's complicated and messy" out of it. If the PCs really want to hunt down Eclavdra they need to make a concerted effort to understand the place... if they just follow the widest path and hunt for the biggest BBEG they can find, then they wind up fighting somebody else and somebody worse... and in fact helping Eclavdra if they get in the dust-up so far as to eliminate Lolth.

Personally, I freaking love that (very natural) bait-and-switch. Players have to be really on their toes to avoid "unintended consequences" and collateral damage of the worst sort in 1E.
 

I just finished running a 3.5 conversion of G1-2-3 and D1-2-3 last Monday, so the OP is near and dear to my heart at the moment.

I love the modules, but they are better viewed and run as a campaign setting than as modules. And while the individual components are fantastic, the narrative thread that hangs these pieces together is fundamentally a pretty weak one. (And originally, the modules were designed separately for tournament play, so a coherent connective narrative wasn't that important.)

Sure, because the drow are super chaotic and super evil, and because there are plenty of other evil races down there in the underworld, one can hand-wave any number of illogical plot twists by claiming it is all "an intentional part of a devious master plan" or "an error stemming from the dark elves' innate chaotic nature."

But that still doesn't help that most games will begin D1 with the PCs intent on finding and destroying Eclavdra and her minions. And because the PCs are entering an extremely hostile, alien environment swarming with an intelligent, numerous, and powerful enemy, they should be trying to move as quickly and quietly as possible on their way to the Vault. Which means not only CAN they bypass the Shrine of the Kuo-Toa, they SHOULD try to bypass it.

And for that matter, the warrens of the troglodytes and the whole Vault beyond the Black Tower, Erelei-Cinlu, and the Nobles Plateau should also be avoided if the PCs are playing intelligently. That's probably 80% of the D series.

To put it another way, the structure of much of D1-2-3 -- site-based exploration -- is completely at odds with the framing narrative of infiltrate and destroy. A DM determined to have his players see "all the good parts" will need to introduce numerous extra plot hooks (or else ignore or radically alter the framing narrative) in order to entice players off the path. And even then, I think most intelligent players would be loath to forget the mission.

I believe Gary himself has reported that in his original playtest, his own players avoided most of the encounters and only peaked around the Vault before beating feet. So this certainly isn't a new problem with these adventures.

True to form, my own players avoided most of the warrens and the shrine. I was preparing for an assault on the Temple of the Elder Elemental God, but I also had Eclavdra herself approach the PCs with an offer of truce. She argued that, by destroying her giant scheme, the PCs has greatly weakened her once-great house, which was the only significant source of opposition to the Temple of Lolth. Destroy the Eilservs, she argued, and the Temple of Lolth would be strong enough to directly assault the surface world, which was still reeling from the giant attacks. And besides, the Fane was said to hold many great treasures and much magic.

So my players agreed, and infiltrated the Fane using veil spells (Eclavdra helpfully provided some intelligence on the layout and defenses.) The PCs slew High Priestess Charinidia, assumed her form, and then ordered the Temple and all its allied houses to launch an all-out assault on the rebellious house Eilserv. (My players really enjoyed playing political games with the various drow factions, and I thought this was a most worthy double-cross.)

The PCs then found the secret wharf cavern (Eclavdra told them they could use it as an escape route) and stole one of the ships, and are now making for the Sunless Sea with great haste while the Vault errupts in bloody civil war. Mission accomplished.
 

Nathan P. Mahney said:
While I'm at it, I'm wondering something about Shrine of the Kuo-Toa as well. It seems to me that if the party follows the proper procedure they can just waltz right through the place quite handily. Which is all well and good if you're one of the players, but has this happened to any DMs out there?

the fish men are evil.

waltzing thru an evil races temple while they are home doesn't sound all that pleasant. esp a race no one has seen before. doesn't speak the language. eats humanoid flesh for food or enslaves for menial tasks.

um...do you find it hard to come up with reasons the fish men wouldn't just kill or enslave the PCs for their invasion?

wandering encounters are patrols thru the complex. if you don't play them as intelligent. what is stopping their other enemies from destroying the temple? the deep gnomes? the drow? the dwarves? a wandering purple worm?

they are meant to be played as evil
 

Nathan P. Mahney said:
While I'm at it, I'm wondering something about Shrine of the Kuo-Toa as well. It seems to me that if the party follows the proper procedure they can just waltz right through the place quite handily.

I ran it back in the day, and the party performed admirably, and I thought they -were- going to just waltz through it... and then at the last moment, someone decides that they want to jump to the top of the altar...

(n.b. I wasn't exactly a softly - one PC had already been killed by the Kuo Toa boatman, and another had been finished off one night by a slithering tracker - the party just found his husk the next morning...)

Cheers
 

diaglo said:
the fish men are evil.

waltzing thru an evil races temple while they are home doesn't sound all that pleasant. esp a race no one has seen before. doesn't speak the language. eats humanoid flesh for food or enslaves for menial tasks.

um...do you find it hard to come up with reasons the fish men wouldn't just kill or enslave the PCs for their invasion?

wandering encounters are patrols thru the complex. if you don't play them as intelligent. what is stopping their other enemies from destroying the temple? the deep gnomes? the drow? the dwarves? a wandering purple worm?

they are meant to be played as evil

It just seems to me that, as the module is written, careful players can observe the correct ritual to the Sea Mother, get a pass and walk right past all the guards (who are explicitly stated to let all people carrying the correct pass through. This is assuming a hell of a lot I realise, but it's always a possibility that this whole module could be bypassed. That's not necessarily a bad thing, as clever players should always reap the rewards (or bypass the danger as it were). I could also think up a few hooks to get the players into the Shrine with little trouble. I was just wondering what some of the other folk around here had to say on the subject.

I should say now that I'm not trying to put this series down at all - it's eleven kinds of awesome. In a series of this magnitude these were the only things that concerned me, and that's pretty damn good. Always good to here what other DMs did with the situation.
 

Yeah, Q1 always seemed tacked on, if the goal is to accomplish anything other than killing progressively bigger things and taking progressively bigger stuff. To modern gamers, who often want something different, it's an issue. Back in the day, we all thought "great! A new challenge!"

It would be nice if there was a branch that allowed the players to go after the EEG instead.
 

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