Drow wins. Drow is most overpowered, nonlevel adjusted race is game hands down. If the GM throws 5 L1 adventurers against 3 L1 drow, then the drow should wipe the floor with the adventurers.
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Drow are not that powerful in Pathfinder; note that there's a major difference between drow and noble drow.
The difference between drow and goblins that I see are:
-Drow have -2 to AC and 1 less hp per hit die
-Drow have some minor spell resistance
-Drow have +0/+2 to their respective melee attack and damage, unless using weapon finesse; if using Weapon Finesse (as Drow frequently do), they have -2/+2. This is including their increased weapon size.
-Drow have -2/+1 to their respective ranged attack and damage; if using a composite longbow the damage discrepancy will be higher; however, that would preclude using the signature hand crossbow.
Drow make better sorcerers and have an advantage against enemies without darkvision. However, they are actually much weaker in terms of melee combat.
That is true, but they could have some theoretical advantages just based off of size. If you throw an enlarge person into the mix, the drow would be large sized, and the goblin would only be medium.
The reach granted by this shift could put things into the drow's favor. Not by much, but at that level? It could matter. Give the drow combat reflexes, a spear, and armor spikes, and suddenly the goblin would have to go through two different attacks just to reach the drow if it was using melee. With only one hit dice, that can be fatal. Even with range, the reach would allow the drow to catch its opponent more easily.
Plenty of the classes that grant enlarge person at that level could do decently in a melee. Summoner, alchemist, and magus stand out due to their access to light armor. Magus in particular can get some rather nice reach weapons from the martial list. But even a regular long spear would do 2d6 damage, plus 1.5x STR, which can be a lot at level 1.
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I'm confused. Why would a dexterity-based race rely on a tactic that involves enlarge person and a non-finessable weapon?
Secondly, movement only provokes a single attack of opportunity. Your example also precludes the option of relying on ranged attacks, upon which both a goblin and a drow are more likely to specialize.
Lastly, I would hardly call a race overpowered because it benefits from a buff spell. I think you're blowing things out of proportion. I could just as easily state that goblins make better throwers of alchemist's fire, especially with Burn Burn Burn!, from Goblins of Golarion.
I'm all for killing drow instead of goblins, but, SR at lv 1 may turn a character's trump card into a chump card.
SR7 at level 1. Bypassable on 6+ by most level 1 casters, 4+ for elves. bypassed by acid splash, and armed with less ranged DPR unless you wish to flood the PCs with slings or composite longbows. also has 2 less AC, 2 less touch AC and 1 less HP per level. but then, a drow's Dex bonus is less likely to become wasted excess than a goblin's is.
Looking to run howling horde in PF, all players seasoned gamers, two are normally DMs, think they are expecting a straight up run thru. Thinking of changing it up and adding a twist. Replacing half CR 1/3 goblins with CR 1/3 drow, changing other half into goblin skeletons and zombies, Hob wizard as drow necro and changing out CR 3 black dragon for CR drow noble cleric. Trying to make it look like original lair was taken over by drow invading party. Instead of initial goblin attack in beggining having three drow with ancestral regression spells up. Additional ideas or tips are greatly appreciated. And thoughts on change up in general.
IMHO, the drow would get slaughtered moving into a goblin lair. Assuming that the lair was built to goblin taste it's likely to be more cramped than the drow would be comfortable with (quite possibly with passages they must squeeze through) and plenty of places to hide (even if it's just briars, brambles, or heaps of moldy trash). On their home turf in tight quarters goblins or kobolds are a fearsome sight.
Goblins also have darkvision, and unless the drow can somehow get into areas inside the lair that are further away than 60 ft. from the nearest goblin with a perfectly clear line of sight, their darkvision's increased range isn't going to help, but their darkness SLA is pretty useless against the goblins due to the nerf in Pathfinder that requires deeper darkness to foil darkvision.
Goblins are arguably the stealthiest characters in the game. They are small sized (+4), possess a +4 racial, and have a +4 racial Dexterity modifier (which means a total of +10 to Stealth on top of whatever is the base statistics). This is bad for the drow because more than likely they will never find any goblin resistance until it is too late, and then the goblins can scurry around corners or into their narrow passages and hide again (all you need to hide is cover or concealment).
Since goblins are ambushers by nature, the drow will be flat-footed pretty frequently in any skirmish on the goblin turf. That means their Dexterity modifiers aren't doing them much good and the -2 Con is going to hurt them. It's also going to hurt their fortitude saves when the goblins are shooting dirty arrows at them (arrows covered in filth are likely contaminated with filth fever, which means that with a poor Fortitude save many of the surviving drow won't be surviving for long).
Goblins usually use shortbows (which can be fired while crouching for +2 AC) that deal 1d4 damage. They have a +2 to hit from Dex, +1 BAB (if warriors), and +1 from size, or +4 to hit with no buffs. That's pretty good. They also are as smart as humans and love fire, so goblins with alchemist fire are probably not far behind the archers (alchemist fire ignores drow SR and pretty much crushes and drow who dare wear heavier armors to protect against their arrows).
This is before any other hazards present on the home turf (such as traps, pet goblin dogs/wolves, etc)...
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The long story short is if the drow weren't extremely well prepared, the goblins would mop them up on their home turf. Even then it might come with extreme casualties.
Darkvision does not autosee someone sneaking. Drows have +2 perception and Faerie Fire. If any Drow sees a sneaking goblin, they all see the sneaking goblin. Drow have 120 darkvision. That poor goblin watch that only has 60 will get pelted with bolts from the initial invasion. The only way the goblins are going to have a chance is if they use torches before the Drow use their daily Darkness spell.
Drows have poison use. They always use poison. Drow Poison—injury; save Fort DC 13; frequency 1/minute for 2 minutes; initial effect unconsciousness for 1 minute; secondary effect unconsciousness for 2d4 hours; cure 1 save. If the goblin fails either save, they're going to get coup de graced. All of the bolts and weapons will be coated with the poison.
Against adventurers - Drow are going to have two rounds of pelting the adventuring group with arrows before they come into melee - due to the 120 range of darkvision. The drow would prioritize their attacks on any adventurer that has darkvision or everburning torches. They are likely to pick out a spot in the cave that is difficult to reach from the advancing side - like on a ridge or across an underground river. When the adventurers close in melee, they are going to be in melee against poison wielding drow. In addition the Drows will have cast Darkness on themselves prior to shooting the arrows/bolts. Darkness is now a lighting condition and would turn the cave to the lowest setting, which grants the drow 50% to be missed in melee from people without darkvision. This also makes casters without darkvision unable to target the drow. People without darkvision will have to 'guess a square' out of the 20 foot radius and then have a 50% misschance if they guess corrected.
The L0 Light spell does not work in darkness to raise the light level, nor does any non-magical light source. An everburning torch would raise the light level if the L1 adventurer spent 1/3rd + of their money on one.
In two rounds of 3 L1 drow shooting bolts against 5 L1 adventurers, how many of the bolts would hit the adventurers? Out of these hits, what are the statistics of the adventurers making the save? When they close in for combat, how many of the awake adventurers have darkvision? Would any of the awake adventurers have everburning torches?
Darkvision does not autosee someone sneaking. Drows have +2 perception and Faerie Fire. If any Drow sees a sneaking goblin, they all see the sneaking goblin. Drow have 120 darkvision. That poor goblin watch that only has 60 will get pelted with bolts from the initial invasion. The only way the goblins are going to have a chance is if they use torches before the Drow use their daily Darkness spell.
Drow darkvision is pretty useless in a dungeon situation unless the dungeon is both A) huge, B) unobstructed. A goblin lair? Pfft, drow darkvision would be useless. They'd be lucky if there were places that were greater than 60 ft. wide (honestly 60 ft. is huge, longer than most houses in fact), and we're talking about the lair of creatures that are small with 60ft. darkvision. The drow aren't sneaking up on the goblin in an open field but seizing their lair.
Drows have poison use. They always use poison. Drow Poison—injury; save Fort DC 13; frequency 1/minute for 2 minutes; initial effect unconsciousness for 1 minute; secondary effect unconsciousness for 2d4 hours; cure 1 save. If the goblin fails either save, they're going to get coup de graced. All of the bolts and weapons will be coated with the poison.
So what you're saying is that the drow will be relatively under geared because all their equipment values are spent on poison (admittedly one of the best poisons ever), but you have to actually hit the goblins and have them fail their save (average goblin warrior succeeds 55% of the time and the drow are likely to lose members during initial ambushes due to flat footed and only having 5 hp due to Con penalties).
Against adventurers - Drow are going to have two rounds of pelting the adventuring group with arrows before they come into melee - due to the 120 range of darkvision. The drow would prioritize their attacks on any adventurer that has darkvision or everburning torches. They are likely to pick out a spot in the cave that is difficult to reach from the advancing side - like on a ridge or across an underground river. When the adventurers close in melee, they are going to be in melee against poison wielding drow. In addition the Drows will have cast Darkness on themselves prior to shooting the arrows/bolts. Darkness is now a lighting condition and would turn the cave to the lowest setting, which grants the drow 50% to be missed in melee from people without darkvision. This also makes casters without darkvision unable to target the drow. People without darkvision will have to 'guess a square' out of the 20 foot radius and then have a 50% misschance if they guess corrected.
The L0 Light spell does not work in darkness to raise the light level, nor does any non-magical light source. An everburning torch would raise the light level if the L1 adventurer spent 1/3rd + of their money on one.
In two rounds of 3 L1 drow shooting bolts against 5 L1...
Long story short in ideal conditions drow are great. But a very un-ideal condition is trying to take over a lair of goblins. It's just not going to work very effectively. Nothing is in their favor, and everything is against them.
I'd be pretty interested in quick rolling 10 drow, 1 L2 drow necro and 1 L3 drow noble to have a mock adventure against a 20 HD goblin lair.
The standard drow is a warrior - meh.
The L2 drow necro would be an Undead Lord - Cleric archetype - with a skeleton companion (HD2) and 8-1 HD skeletons (he bought and used a scroll of Animate Dead, Lesser). He has cause fear as his domain spell.
The L3 drow noble would be a crowd control druid. Entangle would be a common spell. Animal Companion.
The group would bring alchemist fire if there was debris in the cave and acid for locks. The warriors would have tanglefoot bags.
I'd be pretty interested in quick rolling 10 drow, 1 L2 drow necro and 1 L3 drow noble to have a mock adventure against a 20 HD goblin lair.
The standard drow is a warrior - meh.
20HD goblin lair? That has a lot of variance, as the combined CR of the lair could be anything from 2,700 XP (between CR 6-7) to 16,000 XP (half-dragon PC classed goblins with the advanced template which still have 1 HD).
I presume perhaps you mean NPC classed goblins, or goblins with heroic levels but no more than 1 level? Or some mixture thereof?
The L2 drow necro would be an Undead Lord - Cleric archetype - with a skeleton companion (HD2) and 8-1 HD skeletons (he bought and used a scroll of Animate Dead, Lesser). He has cause fear as his domain spell.
Oddly specific. Also illegal. The NPC value for a heroic 2nd level cleric is only 780 gp. A scroll of lesser animate dead primed for 1HD worth of animation per scroll is 175 gp. That means it would cost you 1400 gp or almost double the wealth available to a 2nd level heroic classed NPC. You could fit as many as 4 scrolls worth of undead (4 1HD skeletons) and leaving you with less than 10 gp worth of equipment. So basically this would be a naked drow elf with an entourage of 6 HD of skeletons.
The L3 drow noble would be a crowd control druid. Entangle would be a common spell. Animal Companion.
I'm a little confused as to how you think entangle is going to be of much use in the tight spaces of a goblin lair. >.>
The group would bring alchemist fire if there was debris in the cave and acid for locks. The warriors would have tanglefoot bags.
Acid doesn't do anything to locks. Locks are made of iron and have a hardness of 10. A normal vial of acid cannot harm it. Tanglefoot bags can be nice though, but expensive. At 260 gp worth of gear per drow warrior, how would you size up their loadout? If we're doing this by the rules, the loadouts have to look like this.
Warriors = 260 gp worth of gear each.
Level 2 Cleric = 760 gp worth of gear.
Level 3 Noble = 1,650 gp worth of gear.
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At low levels, Burn Burn Burn! wins it for the goblins. For every dose of drow poison you give to a drow, I can give nearly four alchemist's fire to the troup of goblins.
A goblin warrior with a rank in Disable Device instead of Ride and this feat has an alchemist's fire attack at +4 for (1d6+1d4), and another 1d6 the next round. The best part is how cheap it is. Sure, you put one goblin to sleep, but the other three have fire! :)
Also, while darkvision doesn't auto-see someone sneaking...it kind of does. See, if the drow lack cover/concealment (such as approaching from a pathway) then being able to see them with darkvision means...no concealment. Which means you're seen. A creature with a +900 Stealth score can't actually hide without cover or concealment of some sort unless they have some ability to allow them to (like Hide in Plain Sight or a cloak of displacement).
At low levels, Burn Burn Burn! wins it for the goblins. For every dose of drow poison you give to a drow, I can give nearly four alchemist's fire to the troup of goblins.
A goblin warrior with a rank in Disable Device instead of Ride and this feat has an alchemist's fire attack at +4 for (1d6+1d4), and another 1d6 the next round. The best part is how cheap it is. Sure, you put one goblin to sleep, but the other three have fire! :)
Not to mention that in tight spaces medium creatures would have a -4 to hit and AC, goblins would be fine. And in tight spaces you're forced to bunch up, which means a few alchemist fires can deal a lot of splash damage quickly (I mean if you've got 5 drow warriors trying to flood into a room (say in a T or Y shape) then you can chuck a few bombs into their spaces. Each bomb deals 1d6 to the main guy and 1 to every guy around it. When you've only got 5 Hp, you are dead if you were hit once and then took splash damage from other bombs.
And heaven forbid the goblins have point blank shot! +1 to hit and damage with the alchemical weapons is nasty. On a surprise round that's an easy way to one-shot the druid.
Druid: "Herptiderpti...hmm, did you hear so--"
Goblins: "SKREEEEEIIIIII!" *five goblins hurl alchemist fire at the noble drow druid, hitting her flat footed AC near effortlessly. She suffers 5d6+5 fire damage on the surprise round, and then another 5d6 fire damage on the first round. GG Druid. GG.*
Assuming that the lair was built to goblin taste it's likely to be more cramped than the drow would be comfortable with (quite possibly with passages they must squeeze through) and plenty of places to hide (even if it's just briars, brambles, or heaps of moldy trash)
Also, while darkvision doesn't auto-see someone sneaking...it kind of does. See, if the drow lack cover/concealment (such as approaching from a pathway) then being able to see them with darkvision means...no concealment. Which means you're seen.
Nice contradiction.
Nice contradiction.
What contradiction? Drow on the move can't sit still in a heap of garbage or a briar. That's what the goblins are doing.
Stationary squares of concealment don't help much with an approach, they mostly only help ambushers.
No drow would take over a cave system they have to squeeze into.
Just to give a little clarification, the lair is not a goblin lair buy rather an old forgotten dwarven dungeon. The goblins have roughly 10 goblin warriors lvl1 two hobgoblin fighters lvl1 one hobgoblin wizard lvl two, one bug bear, one hobgoblin fighter lvl3 and on CR3 tiny black dragon wrymling. The drow have match for match on the goblins and hobgoblins and a drow noble cleric3 vs the dragon
the goblins can scurry around corners or into their narrow passages and hide again (all you need to hide is cover or concealment).
*the drow can scurry around corners or into the narrow passages and hide again
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Assuming that the lair was built to goblin taste it's likely to be more cramped than the drow would be comfortable with (quite possibly with passages they must squeeze through) and plenty of places to hide (even if it's just briars, brambles, or heaps of moldy trash)Also, while darkvision doesn't auto-see someone sneaking...it kind of does. See, if the drow lack cover/concealment (such as approaching from a pathway) then being able to see them with darkvision means...no concealment. Which means you're seen.Nice contradiction.
I don't see a contradiction. The scenario put forward is that the drow are attacking the goblins. If so, the goblins have fortifications and things to hide behind, while the drow are forced to approach.
On a Stealth vs. Perception battle, the goblins win. Drow have +2 to Perception, while goblins have +8 to Stealth. While goblins have no bonus to Perception, drow have no bonus to Stealth. The end result is the drow, on average, are seen first.
I'm done. This conversation is going around in circles.
I also think the point is being missed; I'm pretty sure the OP was wondering how well the drow could replace the gobbos as MONSTERS to fight, not playing as drow and attacking a goblin lair.
Well as interesting as the conversation has been, you are correct.
I also think the point is being missed; I'm pretty sure the OP was wondering how well the drow could replace the gobbos as MONSTERS to fight, not playing as drow and attacking a goblin lair.
They can both be a fine enemy. I think drow are less powerful than goblins in low level situations due to the impressive stealth modifiers goblins boast and their ability to take advantage of Small-sized tunnels.
If this is going to occur in a place with Medium or larger sized tunnels there wouldn't be much of a reason for the goblins to even be there. They'd dig their own tunnels where they aren't just sitting ducks without their advantage.
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As to the question at hand — apologies for the sidetrack; it seems most of us were responding to the claim that drow are overpowered for a humanoid race (they aren't) — there will only be minor differences in the difference between a drow encounter and a goblin encounter, because most of each race's strength come from taking class levels.
So change it up if you like, but the difference will be primarily cosmetic if you were going to keep the general class levels the same. If you're going to change a dragon to a cleric, expect some differences based on that, but not based on the difference between a goblin and a drow.
If we're talking PCs vs NPCs, they are entirely different animals so to speak.
Goblins-- Thrive in places where they can use their size to their advantage, gain concealment or cover, etc. Goblins are hellish to encounter in forests, thickets, or swamps (where lots of overgrowth, undergrowth, trees, weeds, and brush can provide concealment or better
).
Drow-- Drow benefit well from shock trooper style tactics. Disable your enemy then hit hard and hit fast during the confusion. Using their darkness SLA which doesn't affect creatures with darkvision (IE - them) allows them to shut the lights off on their foes, effectively blinding them. At this point they can plow the victims with poisoned drow arrows, bolts, or blades while they are flat footed and fumbling around (being blind imposes horrible penalties and 1/2 movement speed and grants the drow a 50% concealment against the targets). Dwarfs and Half-Orcs are welcome additions to a party in these situations.
The drow are arguably the worst of the lot in generic locations where you have a lot of open space where they can pepper an area with darkness bullets, bolts, or arrows before making their assault (each item they cast darkness on radiates said darkness for 10 rounds). However they are also have a fatal flaw. A single sunrod can bring ruin to large numbers of drow quickly as striking one creates a 60 ft radius (60 ft. in every direction) of bright light, which going from non-bright to bright in such a manner will blind every drow in the area with no saving throw and provide penalties after that.
EDIT: And since most drow wear light armor and have Constitution penalties, the last thing a drow wants is to get blinded for a round, since their enemies get bonuses to hit them, they lose Dex to AC, can't make AoOs, and basically are fish in a barrel that round.
Both races are likely to be dangerous in the environments you would expect to see them in (goblins typically roaming forests and grassy plains for example will have PLENTY of places to make use of their Stealth, and a goblin den is bad; while drow skulking about before combat are dangerous indeed, and in large cavernous areas can make use of their darkvision and darkness spells effectively). Since darkness is a touch SLA they can manifest it and hold the charge which can allow them to "mark" and object later with it (the charge is held indefinitely until they actually use it). This can be devastating if they mark someone's armor with darkness because then there will be no leaving the radius. Alternatively marking their own armor with the spell means the darkness follows them around and you're not going to escape easily moving blind while in the darkness.
Ashiel, I was under the impression that a sunrod would not penetrate a darkness spell.
It doesn't, but if you win initiative (common drow warriors aren't so hot at Stealth which means they either need to have a good sniping vantage point where they can see you coming despite any attempts of your own to be quiet or sneak up on you in melee) then drawing and striking a sunrod is a no-save blindness, allowing an easy win in the first round (or surprise round if your party's Stealth guy or familiar ambushes them).
It's true it doesn't work in a darkness spell. But it's still a good weapon to use. Darkness lasts 1 minute which means 10 rounds.
Honestly in a sense both drow and goblins do best in ambushes. They just go about them in wildly different ways. Common drow are also doomed when you have a heightened continual flame inside a lantern (lantern's glass blocks line of effect preventing it from being dispelled).