Drow on the Surface World, A Lore Question

sado2020

As my wife is loving the game Im roped in.  Formerly a big AD&D player and 3rd edition player in my school days Im enjoying the game also.

 

But one thing kinda boggles my mind.  WIth the exception of Drizzt and Jarlaxle whats with the drow on the surface world? Is there a lore based reason for this?

 

Any insight would help a bunch

sunshadow21

I haven't really looked at the lore in detail, but with 4E and the associated time leap, they made a lot of changes to FR, and one of them was the apparent tolerance, if not full acceptance, of drow on the surface.

ABRaquel

Originally posted by sado2020

As my wife is loving the game Im roped in.  Formerly a big AD&D player and 3rd edition player in my school days Im enjoying the game also.

 

But one thing kinda boggles my mind.  WIth the exception of Drizzt and Jarlaxle whats with the drow on the surface world? Is there a lore based reason for this?

 

Any insight would help a bunch

It's all related to the spellplague.

"The region surrounding the Great Rift collapsed into the Underdark, creating an enormous cataract in the earth called the Underchasm."

Hence why the drow now roam the land.

Leethe

It always tickled me growing up reading those books that the only dark skinned main sequence race in the D&D world were made to be evil nearly down to every man, woman and child. Fantasy writers are a strange sort. 

Elikal

Originally posted by ABRaquel

Originally posted by sado2020

As my wife is loving the game Im roped in.  Formerly a big AD&D player and 3rd edition player in my school days Im enjoying the game also.

 

But one thing kinda boggles my mind.  WIth the exception of Drizzt and Jarlaxle whats with the drow on the surface world? Is there a lore based reason for this?

 

Any insight would help a bunch

It's all related to the spellplague.

"The region surrounding the Great Rift collapsed into the Underdark, creating an enormous cataract in the earth called the Underchasm."

Hence why the drow now roam the land.

This. You can imagine, when a portion of the size of Canada crashes into the Underdark, leaving a giant chasm, many Drow fled to the surface and are now... well not common, but way more common.

 

Originally posted by Leethe
It always tickled me growing up reading those books that the only dark skinned main sequence race in the D&D world were made to be evil nearly down to every man, woman and child. Fantasy writers are a strange sort. 

Yeah, pisses me off actually. From dark skinned Orc to dark skinned Drow... I hated that. The blond and fair are good and the dark skinned are evil. Not funny.

ABRaquel

Originally posted by Leethe
It always tickled me growing up reading those books that the only dark skinned main sequence race in the D&D world were made to be evil nearly down to every man, woman and child. Fantasy writers are a strange sort. 

Yeah, it's a shame that most worship Lolth, but not all, some (albeit a tiny minority) actually worship Eilistraee the Dark Maiden (she's a goodly Goddess)

sado2020

Thanks for the info all really cleared things up as I havent looked at anything 4th ed related

 

 

As to the evil dark skinned race it doesn't really bother me as the drow, from how I imagined them from the writings, as black as in the hue of a black widow spider or a black mamba snake not as in our color hues as humans. 

TheDarkrayne

Originally posted by Elikal

Yeah, pisses me off actually. From dark skinned Orc to dark skinned Drow... I hated that. The blond and fair are good and the dark skinned are evil. Not funny.

The dwarves (gnomes?) in the Underdark, I forget their name, are dark skinned but are good. I'm sure there's plenty more examples out there.

Some people ruin their fantasy by trying to bring real world issues into it... fantasy is fantasy, the same rules don't apply.... unless the writer is intentionally trying to represent real world issues in the story. I mean, come on, orcs are green and dark elves are blue/purple. You can't say dark skinned and mean every dark colour and shade when really you mean black... they aren't black.

If all black humans in the game/story were evil.. then, yeh, you've got something to complain about. These things aren't even meant to be the same species though....

David_Lopan

Originally posted by Vannor

Originally posted by Elikal

Yeah, pisses me off actually. From dark skinned Orc to dark skinned Drow... I hated that. The blond and fair are good and the dark skinned are evil. Not funny.

The dwarves (gnomes?) in the Underdark, I forget their name, are dark skinned but are good. I'm sure there's plenty more examples out there.

Some people ruin their fantasy by trying to bring real world issues into it... fantasy is fantasy, the same rules don't apply.... unless the writer is intentionally trying to represent real world issues in the story. I mean, come on, orcs are green and dark elves are blue/purple. You can't say dark skinned and mean every dark colour and shade when really you mean black... they aren't black.

If all black humans in the game/story were evil.. then, yeh, you've got something to complain about. These things aren't even meant to be the same species though....

    Svirfneblin - gnomes

    Duergar - dwarves

 

Teaurn

Even before RA Salvatore in the original FR boxed set the history of Shadowdale had dark elves ruling the area from the tower of Ashaba(?) which Elminster later took over after the good guys drove them out.

sado2020

Originally posted by Teaurn
Even before RA Salvatore in the original FR boxed set the history of Shadowdale had dark elves ruling the area from the tower of Ashaba(?) which Elminster later took over after the good guys drove them out.

Never knew that my first forray into FR was the first couple Drizzt books as I was more into Dragonlance, thanks for the insight!