Greetings!

I heard snippets about some awful thread on The Big Purple where the SJW crybabies are demanding that the Drow in D&D be removed from the game or whatever, because the Drow are "problematic" and cause the snowflakes to clutch their stuffed animals and cry for their "safe spaces." Now, I'm an old fan of Gygax's old school Drow of the "Descent" and "Demonweb" days personally--long before Drizzt ever showed up. Drizzt can be crucified. LOL. In my own campaigns, well--I make the Drow a totally ruthless and evil culture, with few redeeming qualities whatsoever. They are entirely "politically incorrect" and I am perfectly ok with that. My Drow are totally evil, racist, imperialist, and wicked villains that love to rape, torture and enslave just about everyone they get their hands on. LOL.

Do you think the Drow are "Problematic?" If so, in what ways?

If you like the Drow, why do you like them?

Do you use the Drow in your campaigns?

Have you done anything bizarre with the Drow, or somehow made them different?

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

Drow are awesome.
Apart from dual-wielding ranger drow. They're just annoying.

I have honestly only used them twice in game.  One was a single drow on a random encounter table, the other was a drow bounty hunter who was working on the surface with a drider companion.  

I see why some people like them, and I bear them no ill will.
They are just not to my taste.

The few times I used Drow I had them operate as cells of fanatics. They had goals from their priests that didn't make sense to the players, but weren't the backstabbing twerps they're portrayed as.

Drow are not problematic, drow are boring and their society makes no sense.
For an interesting elf underground race, see Mystara's shadow elves.

No - they're not Problematic.
They're a made up race for made up worlds.

No they are not problematic imo. They betrayed the Elven race and were marked on their skin for it. If the color was yellow they would be accused of being racist against those of Asian descent. There is no pleasing the regressive rpg element.

Quote from: Frey;1060270Drow are not problematic, drow are boring and their society makes no sense.
For an interesting elf underground race, see Mystara's shadow elves.

I came in here to say pretty much this (minus the Mystara part - I'll have to check that out).

Frankly, orc and/or goblin cities would almost be more refreshing to face in the Underdark at this point because it's been so long since the Drow replaced them in that Tolkien-based niche in EVERY SINGLE D&D (AND D&D ADJACENT) CAMPAIGN WORLD that it would actually feel like something different for once.

Hell, I'm pretty sure that they turned Orcs and Goblins into marauding surface barbarians/raiders (who therefore have zero need for actual darkvision) largely because they gave control of the Underdark (Orc/Goblins original habitat) completely over to the Drow (and to a lesser extent, Mind Flayers and Aboleths, but they're generally found only in the deeper layers).

At least Eberron did something interesting with them, taking away the innate evil and just making them the native once-enslaved elves from the continent of the former giant kingdoms... but at that point they're drow in name only.

Quote from: Chris24601;1060275I came in here to say pretty much this (minus the Mystara part - I'll have to check that out).

Frankly, orc and/or goblin cities would almost be more refreshing to face in the Underdark at this point because it's been so long since the Drow replaced them in that Tolkien-based niche in EVERY SINGLE D&D (AND D&D ADJACENT) CAMPAIGN WORLD that it would actually feel like something different for once.

Hell, I'm pretty sure that they turned Orcs and Goblins into marauding surface barbarians/raiders (who therefore have zero need for actual darkvision) largely because they gave control of the Underdark (Orc/Goblins original habitat) completely over to the Drow (and to a lesser extent, Mind Flayers and Aboleths, but they're generally found only in the deeper layers).

At least Eberron did something interesting with them, taking away the innate evil and just making them the native once-enslaved elves from the continent of the former giant kingdoms... but at that point they're drow in name only.

Yeah, Eberron Drow are just Wild Elves at their core. Until you get to one of the splats not overseen by Baker, where they're a shitty retcon back into FR Drow.

Eberron did a good thing in changing Drow around a bit. Given that surface elves are typically Chaotic Good. Drow should be Lawful Evil and have room for evil tyrants and the ones that while still very unhappy with their surface cousins, fit the role elf,lawful,

I love the Drow. I love the Underdark. I laugh at *anyone* running D&D, a makebelieve elf-game, that someone would call anything "problematic". Because, you know... it isn't real.

That said, Drow are generally a big part of my ongoing campaign I've run for years in the Realms. Lolth is dead, the drow culture has imploded, civil-war, genocide, all the good stuff has occurred. The problem with the Drow in D&D has largely been due to the weight of multiple writers (most bad) with different visions centered largely on Lolth-worship and the vague mythology of her relationship to the Seldarine, without much context for how civilization works.

Through my own campaign I've largely rectified all of that. They're still largely evil - not chaotically so, but arrogant, narcissistic, dangerous, and vendetta driven, but a cohereant culture seperate from the surface elves. Definitely not monolithic in traditional sense. They live in the Underdark, it's a bad place filled with largely bad things (including the Drow themselves). Any attempt at justifying large city-states of civilization down there requires a lot more thought than simply a bunch of decadent theocratic Dark-elves "living the life". Once you work out those details, it's pretty straight-forward.

Existential needs will drive people to do a lot of heinous stuff to survive. Drow in my games have no compunctions about it. It's part of their culture, but I don't pretend they do it out of pleasure (though some individuals might draw some perverse amusement from it, I don't make it a cultural norm). Likely the Big Purple fans would shit their pants in my games.

Of course, if you don't care about the Underdark or Drow in general, they're not really necessary at all.

Eh, I dislike that the race was white and turned black because of their sins. I seem to remember that being stated explicitly in the 2e elf book or a Dragon article.

That said, I loved and played to death D3 when it came out, and my players loved exploring and trying to survive and exploit their culture. They were one of the few monsters that not only gave players pause because they were powerful, had good loot, and were really smart however dysfunctional.

Following the Death of Elves in my campaign, there are a lot of ruins that have become inhabited by an albino humanoid race as well as the chagmat.

Maybe elves' skin is just photo-reactive? More photons, lighter skin. Less photons darker skin.

Quote from: tenbones;1060287I love the Drow. I love the Underdark. I laugh at *anyone* running D&D, a makebelieve elf-game, that someone would call anything "problematic". Because, you know... it isn't real.

That's the issue they refuse to see any context and refuse to even remotely accept their behavior is insane. If I was running a game back when I was younger and someone tried to convince me that Drow skin color=racist they would be told to stop. Failing that kicked out of the game while being told to seek the services of a mental health care provider. Another issue is the whole attitude of "let them be". It's okay to see evil everywhere and with anything. When people should be telling such individuals stop and act like adults.

A good example of a DM who allowed a Drow to be used as a race. The player was given repeated warning by myself and the DM that at most the player character would be the victim of racism at least until third or fifth level. Being set in the Forgotten Realms it may even take longer. Player nodded like he understood and then proceeded to ignore both of us by trying to bypass the racism with " Trust me I'm a good Drow like Drizzt". Which did not work and the player who himself was black dared to accuse the DM of being racist because of his skin color. When the DM was both gay and whose boyfriend at the time was black. A perfect example of being a jerk and imo not all there in the head.

Quote from: tenbones;1060294Maybe elves' skin is just photo-reactive? More photons, lighter skin. Less photons darker skin.

Which would have been a better explanation imo. Rather than Paizo who have changed their skin color to blue and they now look like evil elvish smurfs imo. I'm just waiting for a SJW out their to accuse Paizo of being against the color blue and/or against blues and Jazz.

Quote from: tenbones;1060294Maybe elves' skin is just photo-reactive? More photons, lighter skin. Less photons darker skin.

Ha! I actually had that for my elves for a while. "Yeah, they don't tan, they bleach."

Then I nuked the bastards from orbit. It was the only way to be sure.