Drows?!

[Talamascah28]

I have played Neverwinter Nights and Icewind Dale, but never have I played characters. Then when I read the suggestions for Neverwinter Nights II, someone said that no Drows should be allowed as player characters, while some do. So my obvious, and maybe stupid for some, question is....

What's so great/bad about Drows?

Personally I don't like the black skin, white hair thing, which is why I don't choose them. But maybe I could come to love it. That depends on your comments.

[Xandax]

I think many of the "opponents" (myself inclusive ) think that the whole drow-thingy is overdone, thanks in no small part to the Drizzt character.
Having countless of drow rangers duel wielding scimitars running around is just - well - boring

Also from my knowlegde - now I'm no real D&D buff, so I don't know the excat rules but... - the Drow race is also relative powerfull compared to many normally playable races, but somebody with handbooks and a better knowlegde of the ruleset can list this. But there could be balancing issues with this as well, which is a nasty thing if multiplaying.

So to me - it is a powergaming race, for people who want to play Drizzt (hehe - sterotyping I know, but it is my opinion ).
Now if the game was fully single player, I wouldn't really mind either way, because then I'd always be able to avoid powergamers and then people can do as they themselves wish, however - if I am to multiplay the game.

I'd like not to see drow or other powergaming races as a playable race in this game. I don't mind slaugthering drow NPCs - but I'd rather not see them as PCs.

[Ripe]

Drow abilities from FRCS (in adition to elven traits from PHB):
- +2 Dexterity, -2 Constitution, +2 Inteligence, +2 Charisma (replaces elven ability modifiers)
- Spell-like abilities: 1/day dancing lights, darkness, faerie fire cast as a sorcerer of the Drow's character level
- Darkvision 120' (this replace elven Low-light vision)
- Favored class - Wizard (male), Cleric (female)
- Light blindness (Ex): Abrupt exposure to bright light (such as daylight spell) blinds a drow for 1 round. In addition drow suffer a -1 circumstance penalty to all attack rolls, saves and checks while operating in bright light
- Spell resistance of 11+character level
- +2 racial bonus on Will saves against spells and spell-like abilities
- Level adjustment +2

So for a single player game they would be OK. But they are not suitable for multiplayer games because of their Spell resistance ability and bonus on Will saves - allow drows as PC and pretty soon you would have a bunch of drow characters runing around, not to mention that virtualy nobody would choose to play as any spellcasting class since most players playing drow characters would easily kill him.

[Ravager]

I agree with Xandax that the drow race is over-exposed and represented but I still think it is nice to have the choice to play drow or other rare (rarer than the usual human, halfling, elf etc.) races and level adjustment makes them fairer to play.
The game has to take all the abilities into account though so it doesn't become a farce.

Games that include drow just to appeal to more people without any true consideration are/would be among the most annoying.

In multi-playing, surely it is possible to make adjustments such as 'Effective Character Levels' in IWDII that make races equally playable without races dramatically outshooting each other.

[Magrus]

If they were to include them, I think they should put an XP cap on. That way, with the level adjustment, not only would the races advance slower, but they wouldn't be able to reach level 40 either. A human would be able to reach it, an elf or gnome or halfing or dwarf would, yet a character with a race that has a level adjustment would still be limited to the XP cap of a 40th level character without one. That would pull them down to a lower max level.

That, I think might balance out the "power-gaming" attitude of "OOH! GOODY!" when seeing a race with such benefits. Sure, you're stronger at first. Along the way, not only do you progress slower, but in the end you cannot progress as far as well. That I think might just balance it out so your human wizard of level 40 and you're drow wizard of level 38 to be about equal in the end.

[Brynn]

Ah, no one would choose to play a Drow then, who wants to be 5 levels behind?

[Ravager]

I think it would probably be 2 or 3 levels behind and all the other abilities equalises a drow with other higher level races.

[Xandax]

[QUOTE=Brynn]Ah, no one would choose to play a Drow then, who wants to be 5 levels behind?[/QUOTE]

Roleplayers would

[Fiberfar]

I would not mind if they included Drow as playable characters...And if I saw one on a multiplayer game I would just slaughter him....since I can't stand people running around with scimitars and calling themself " Drizz't something"

[Ripe]

If I were to play a drow fighter I'd call myself Jarlaxle something , he's so much more cooler character than Drizzt.

But I'm afraid that real problem with Drows as playable characters would come from their natural Spell resistance - if not handled good it could became very unbalancing.

[I Am Naga Sadow]

I had never even heard of Drizz't until The Order of the Stick ! I would like to play a Drow, but I agree that balancing would be needed. I would also like to see 'other' races, ie all the ones that D&D players now have, but NWN didn't.

[Psychohalfling]

Drow that are imitations of Drizzt are boring to rp with. In my opinion. The best drow RPers were 4 friends in RL who played drow, and every now and then they would raid a city or attack PCs quickly, then ran before the surfacers could raise any defence. sure, they killed the players but nobody complained because they fit the role of drow so well. also, on obsidian forums for the single player campaign for nwn2 i came across this great story for a non-drizzt style drow:

Mil'ton looked at the priestess and smiled, his teachings had some effect at least.
"You have been corrupting the faith of our youth, philosopher," The matron spat as she said it.
"Yes I have rather," Mil'ton smiled.
"You think this a game?" Her eyes, deadly regarded him.
"A silly one."
"You think me a joke?"
"Pretty much yes."
"You think me incapable of breaking you? Snapping your mind under the most hellish tortures ever divised?"
"My mind, can make a heaven of any hell you can create for me."
"We'll see about that."

The next day, the people were gathering in the square. Mil'ton's torture was to be a public event, his students shown just how weak his teachings really were. Mil'ton smiled peacefully.

The snake headed whip uncoiled, ripping off chunks of his flesh, but Mil'ton didn't scream, or even look pained. The crowd stirred, something here was unusual, disquieting, why didn't the drow scream?

The Yolchol, the priestess' decided to call the Yolchol, Lolth's handmaiden could make this fool scream for mercy. Long, thin tendrils reached out, grabbing the philosopher and pulling him towards its mouth.

He chuckled lightly as it lowered him in, laughed as it shook, this was out of the creature's field of experience, it had never faced such, unconcern.

It moved him out, thinking in its own primitive way, "Is this some kind of trick? Is he poisoned or something? Why doesn't he struggle, scream, do anything but laugh?" The Yolchol, confused, put the philosopher down and poked him, eliciting an affectionate pat.

Somehow being a big slimy boneless blob had left the creature without any experience of this sort of thing, and its first time facing it was giving it what aproximated to a headache. The Yolchol puffed in disgust and left.

The crowd fell silent. Murmurs ran through them, questions like "Is he chosen by Lolth," or "Is he a new god, to so dismiss a Yolchol?" The matron gulped. Well, she had tried the worst torture she could think of, tried feeding him to the Yolchol, maybe Lolth should handle it from here.

So the priestess summoned Lolth, who looked upon the philosopher with a lust filled smile and asked her first question, "Are you faithful to me Mil'ton, do you really follow in my path?"

"No I am not, and no I do not. I think you are actually pretty thick and walking a path that leads to your own destruction," Mil'ton answered calmly. The crowd fell silent, you just didn't speak to a goddess that way.

Lolth's voice fell icy, as the philosopher looked with mild, well, amusement at the changes coming over his body, "You might want to revise that statement, in the interest of avoiding extra limbs."

"Nah. A few extra legs might prove handy after a few drinks," Mil'ton shrugged, somehow not seeming to feel the wracking, wrecking pain of the change. The crowd, watched in horror, as the philosopher was turned into a drider before their eyes.

His eyes however, weren't drider eyes. While his body was bloated, his features distorted, those eyes remained, alive. The change reversed itself, and Mil'ton looked back at where the goddess' voice came from, "Anything else?"

Every other figure present flinched from the wrath filled scream, shaking the very foundations of the cavern, breaking loose huge huge blocks of stone from above. Mil'ton calmly dodged the stones, his earlier wounds still bleeding, bits of flesh slappling against their native body, but it didn't bothering him much.

The survivors, shocked, silent, looked at the philosopher. "A new god..." was the general murmur. Mil'ton's wounds healed themselves, scarrs simply vanished, and from way up above the sun, long forgotten, had broken through into the cavern and shone upon him.

Mil'ton just laughed.

Thats a great backstory for a drow character. It's also the kind of drow pc I would like to play, not a drow with purple eyes and two scimitars named Tt-Driz.

[PokeFluffy]

I want them to put drow in. They are, unequivacly, my favorite D&D race... and they are all different in each campaign setting...

But they would either have to take away their special abilities or make it much harder for them to level up. They will probably keep msot of their abilities off... and just have them as an underpowered drow as in the Player's Guide to Faerun. Otherwise, the game would have to give you the experience to create a 3rd level character. Otherwise, the ECL for the drow wouldn't have enough experience to give them a level at the beginning.

I do get tired of the Drizzts you see everywhere. I love Drizzt; don't get me wrong, but I love the traditional drow. Their malevolance was what originally made me interested in the race.

I think it would probably be 2 or 3 levels behind and all the other abilities equalises a drow with other higher level races.

No, you wouldn't be behind. The ECL is the level that shows up. Like... you could be a drow fighter 2/wizard 2 and have an ECL of 6 (That's oen of my NPCs in a real campaign right now)

To have real drow in it... would probably be too complicated. They'll probably make lesser drow if they want to add subraces. But if they add drow they should add tieflings, planetouched, and dwarven, gnome, and halfling subraces. And give regional feats...

Lesser Drow are as follows: (pretty close to drow anyhow...)

-+2 Dex/ -2 Con
-Darkvision of 60 feet
-Drow weapon proficiency (hand crossbow, rapier, and short sword)
-Spell like abilities: (charisma of at least 10 required) 1/day
-----dancing lights, daze, touch of fatigue

[Jaypee]

This two levels lower thing is really balancing I think. Maybe even too much. At lower levers and with fighter type characters, a Drow is always going to be worse character statistically than a human one. But maybe a price has to paid if someone wants to play with a Drow, it's probably more fun anyways.

[Aren Lu'Maric]

When fighting a Drow their magic resistance in a pain
but that is part of their charm

In one of the Baldur's Gates, I had an NPC drow in my party, and the magic resistance made her ("V" something) very hard to heal

So while Drow have many advantages the difficulty in using any type of spells to heal them would be a major disadvantage

[Kythras]

*shudder* The wrongness of the rulesness *Goes into convultions*

Sorry, I just *shudder*. I play D&D in RL, and whilst Drow are cool, they are exceptionally overused in FR. Drizzt was cool but there are supposed to be like one in a million good Drow, even Zaknafain was Neutral in my opinion and Jarlaxle is deffinately evil.

It seemed that R.A. Salvatore's excelent series of books have spawned legions of well aligned Drow which, fluff-wise, is just plain wrong. If people were to play evil, ruthless, malicious and totally calculating Drow, that would be fine, better than fine, exemplary examples of playing a character by-the-book, something, in my experience, many players have a problem doing.

Icewind Dale was a nice anomally, but I do not want my lovely NWN2 internet play tainted with more Drow than snowflakes in a blizzard.

Please, for Ao's sake, leave the Drow in their tunnels, enough people make black-skined white-haired elves without special rules for it

Again, Kythras' two copper pieces...

[smass]

I agree with Kythras. That being said I fully expect that NWN 2 will incorporate the Drow race for PCs. Why? Simple - Drow are very popular. The producers of the game are concerned only with profits and not with the integrity of the the D&D mythos.

For my part I could care less - I am looking forward to NWN2 for the multi-player persistent world and custom module potential. I will use the included campaign as a tutorial only - and probably won't get very far until I get bored with it. I only got to chapter 2 of the original NWNs before I moved on to the more dynamic possibilities of player created content and persistent worlds.

[Thief]

If they had, like, one or two NPC drows in the game--scattered and just like elves but with different colored hair and skin--it might be okay. I'm one that likes the drow being playable characters, but not for their annoying magic resist.

[JCDenton]

I don`t have any experience with internet play, but in my opinion certain races should be excluded, both from internet and singelplay. Demonic and elemental races like aasimars, tieflings and genasis. Denizens of the Underdark (like drows) and extraplanar beeings also. They are indeed very, if not extremely rare on the FR prime material surface/plane (with some exceptions).

IF - for instance - a renegade drow or deep gnome suddenly appears on the surface, if you account for how much drows hate the surface and all their races, AND how much the surface dwelling races hate the drows, AND how unlikely it is for a drow to anger both the Spider Queen and his\her matron mother by leaving the Underdark through the WELL guarded surface entrance.. then you know, that this drow has a Lolth-damn good reason for it.

Anyways, this drow is soon to be dead. Either by the angered mob of nearby towns that sure blame him for everything (Like Hitler blamed the jews) or by a hunting party sent by his matron mother from his own House. But the difference is that the drows` reputation is WELL earned.

People seem to forget, that Drizzt was NOT a cool and cunning magic scimitar-wielding dark drow ranger that everybody in Icewind Dale respect in the beginning (or they perhaps didn`t read the books). In fact this lad was incredibly lucky to to survive, and he got a lot of help.

Well, the point is that, the possibility for a Drow to suddenly emerge from the Underdark to be cool and start som fraggin` for no appearent reason, can be compared to the possibility of a Vampiric Illithid suddenly appear and take a drink at a local Waterdeep tavern (before giving the barkeeper a kiss with his tentacle-head and start blasting everybody with psionics)

My other point is, that to make a drow-driven singelplayer story believable, you have to make the game react realisticly to the drow`s unwanted presence. Most people are hostile to him, and no way that every barkeeper will offer him a room, and every smith will sell him a scimitar.

However it could be cool to make a game with drow as the only possbile starting race, and make the story unfold around him

[Jelaweb]

I think create a "lesser" drow, is quite frankly a bad idea. It goes against the D&D 3e rules - it is fine for a DM to create such a race for custom modules/online campaigns, but for a single player game, I think this is wrong.

Before I get a lot of angry hate mail, let me tell you why:
1) in daylight, a drow is effectively 3 levels behind, in terms of combat. Whether they add the "DayLight Adaptation" regional feat, which cancels this penalty, is another matter;
2) With an ECL (effective character level) of 2, a drow should start with 3000XP. To get to level 2, a drow has to get another 3000XP. For the same amount of XP, a "lesser" race (i.e. with no ECL - a "normal" elf, for example) would be at level 3 - gaining an extra feat. For another 3000XP, the elf would reach level 4. A drow would need 4000XP to reach level 3. This means a "weaker" character;
3) Extending the previous point, the ECL means that the drow gets fewer XP - at level 1, they get XP based on a level 3 character. In addition to the higher XP requirements, a drow would level up even slower;
4) The stat point buying system at character creation PREVENTS powergaming type characters - without cheating of course.

(these are based on D&D 3.5e rules - whether NWN2 strictly adheres to these is another matter)

True, they are very powerful for their racial traits, but it does almost even out. Their drawbacks make them difficult to play (especially as spellcasters - their favoured classes) at earlier levels. A lot of RPGs suddenly become easy once you reach a certain level for that certain spell (level 3 Fireball for most Inifinity Engine based games) - the drow do not reach this until later. This means their racial benefits give them no huge advantage over using any other race at "that" part of the game. It is only near the end that a drow's advantage becomes clear.

(apologies for all the brackets)

"I want Lizardfolk! (ECL = 3)"