| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Shobhad, sadly, are a combination of things the devs seem allergic to, being both Large and four-armed. It's a real shame! I like them a lot, and the idea of being a hulking, wandering warrior is such a ready fantasy. At least we got their cool guns?
Unfortunately any of their cool guns you find are probably going to be large and slap you with the clumsy condition if you try and use them :/. Unless you can make friends with them and convince them to make a kid's size longrifle for you.
Formians would be really neat, as would Thriae (the bee people). I would really love some kind of crab people as well.
At this point it is feeling less and less likely that large/extra armed ancestries are going to happen (the longer they go without releasing anything that has those features the more likely it is that it is a rule they are following).
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I really would love to see Formians make their way into PF2E. The heritage system feels tailor-made for allowing for the different kinds of Formian hive-castes to be playable.
... I really just wanna be a Formian worker who is a monk or something, if I'm honest. I dunno what they look like, but the mental image I have paints them as being very cute.
I'd certainly love to play a mageslayer... or a friendly little diplomat! A charisma Psychic who wants to see peace on Castrovel, maybe?
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Shobhad, sadly, are a combination of things the devs seem allergic to, being both Large and four-armed. It's a real shame! I like them a lot, and the idea of being a hulking, wandering warrior is such a ready fantasy. At least we got their cool guns?Unfortunately any of their cool guns you find are probably going to be large and slap you with the clumsy condition if you try and use them :/. Unless you can make friends with them and convince them to make a kid's size longrifle for you.
Formians would be really neat, as would Thriae (the bee people). I would really love some kind of crab people as well.
At this point it is feeling less and less likely that large/extra armed ancestries are going to happen (the longer they go without releasing anything that has those features the more likely it is that it is a rule they are following).
I'm holding out hope for Kasatha... it would bum me out if we never got them in 2e.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
At this point it is feeling less and less likely that large/extra armed ancestries are going to happen (the longer they go without releasing anything that has those features the more likely it is that it is a rule they are following).
Also, the more and more mechanics we have that are based on not having natural reach and even more strongly not having more than 2 hands available to hold/wield things.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Yea idk how to reconcile 4 arms with balance. I loved shobad and kasatha from starfinder.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I could see it being made in a manner similar to how flight was done for the strix - only granting a minor bonus to start with (you might have four arms, but just how well can you juggle them in the heat of combat?), augmented with ancestry feats. And being rare, of course.
As for being Large...I got nothing.
| 10 people marked this as a favorite. |
4 arms are more balanced already than in P1 simply due to the change in Action Economy, you can hold more things yes, but you’re still limited in how much you can make use of it.
I would like to point out that Paizo is charging premium for any extra limb that can hold things. In fact, useless extra limbs that can barely open a door costs either a 5th level ancestry feat or a 10th level Psychic Feat with prerequisites.
I imagine that by this metric, anything with two extra arms that can hold items and wield weapons wouldn't be anything short of a capstone ancestry feat (17th level).
But, yes, I do 100% agree with your statement.
| 9 people marked this as a favorite. |
A Kasatha having 4 arms doesn't seem more essential to their being than a Strix having wings, and you still need to sink ancestry feats in "you can fly adequately".
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Shobhad, sadly, are a combination of things the devs seem allergic to, being both Large and four-armed. It's a real shame! I like them a lot, and the idea of being a hulking, wandering warrior is such a ready fantasy. At least we got their cool guns?Unfortunately any of their cool guns you find are probably going to be large and slap you with the clumsy condition if you try and use them :/. Unless you can make friends with them and convince them to make a kid's size longrifle for you.
Formians would be really neat, as would Thriae (the bee people). I would really love some kind of crab people as well.
At this point it is feeling less and less likely that large/extra armed ancestries are going to happen (the longer they go without releasing anything that has those features the more likely it is that it is a rule they are following).
Not necessarily, they very much appear to ration how many 'design challenges' they're taking at once. So it could just be that they haven't sat down and said "Ok, its time to figure out multi-arm ancestries" in the same way the ancestry guide 'figured out' flying ones, SoM figured out Class Archetypes, and Guns and Gears 'figured out' what mechanical niche guns should have. We even knew they had it in mind that each of those things were sort of going to be their own challenge.
You can see them flirting with large ancestries in the Ancestry Guide through things like Beastkin and Scion Transformation, and the Eidolon in Secrets of Magic, I wouldn't be shocked if the first 'large' ancestry or heritage is already in the pipeline of existing-but-unannounced content.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
You can see them flirting with large ancestries in the Ancestry Guide through things like Beastkin and Scion Transformation, and the Eidolon in Secrets of Magic, I wouldn't be shocked if the first 'large' ancestry or heritage is already in the pipeline of existing-but-unannounced content.
If they don't want to deal with that, they could still make some sort of flavor save by saying that adult Kasathra are all vital parts of their tribe and it is seen as selfish to abandon family and clan to go off adventuring, but that juvenile (merely Medium-sized, just as Human children are Small) Kasathra are expected to go walkabout for a time to acquire useful skills and experience to bring back to the clan.
And so, only size Medium Kasathra serve as adventurer 'PCs.'
(And they only mature to size L when they choose to enter a growth phase that takes some conscious action on their part, so no worry that a PC will 'age out' of being size Medium! They can stay 'juvenile' for decades!) :)
| 6 people marked this as a favorite. |
Is it strictly necessary to have an ancestry that starts out as Large, rather than an ancestry that is thematically at the very extreme end of medium?
Like if Dwarves can be medium I don't know why a 8'11" 450 lb character can't be medium as well.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I think Large without increased reach or increased damage would be quite palatable to Paizo.
4-armed would need a restriction at least of only 2 hands available to wield items, or even only 2 hands worth of items considered held or wielded, to be balanced with 2 handed Ancestries.
Those could then be improved with further Ancestry feats similar to the Tail feats.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
I feel like the basic problems with large are:
1) Free reach is potentially unbalancing.
2) Having to structure every adventure to accomodate people who take up more than a single 5' square is additional work for the GM/Adventure designer that has relatively little benefit.
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
You can see them flirting with large ancestries in the Ancestry Guide through things like Beastkin and Scion Transformation, and the Eidolon in Secrets of Magic, I wouldn't be shocked if the first 'large' ancestry or heritage is already in the pipeline of existing-but-unannounced content.If they don't want to deal with that, they could still make some sort of flavor save by saying that adult Kasathra are all vital parts of their tribe and it is seen as selfish to abandon family and clan to go off adventuring, but that juvenile (merely Medium-sized, just as Human children are Small) Kasathra are expected to go walkabout for a time to acquire useful skills and experience to bring back to the clan.
And so, only size Medium Kasathra serve as adventurer 'PCs.'
(And they only mature to size L when they choose to enter a growth phase that takes some conscious action on their part, so no worry that a PC will 'age out' of being size Medium! They can stay 'juvenile' for decades!) :)
Kasatha aren’t Large. Shobhad, who are their distant cousins, are Large, and the two share being four-armed.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I feel like if we see a 4-armed ancestry they'll probably start with the equivalent of the prehensile tail feats as their 'natural' ancestry bonus and have a feat chain that adds more options as they level up.
And maybe a capstone 'quad weapon fighting' feat that lets you attack four times with one activity.
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
I don't think additional arms will equal additional attacks - it wasn't the case in starfinder, which in many ways was influenced by and a prototype of how they handle things in PF2.
The main benefit (and balance issue) would be having additional free hands.
For example, if it isn't limited in some way, you could have a two-handed weapon, a shield, and still be able to shove or trip or do whatever else with the remaining hand. You could double slice with two weapons and still have a shield and a potion in your other hands, and so on.
*Note that dueling parry says "your other hand or hands free" so it seems to be future proofed against having more hands than normal.
The issues aren't insurmountable, but they would require a hefty amount of work to get 4 hands in there (maybe an initial restriction on being able to wield weapons or shields in the extra hands, with a later ancestry feat representing you training in how to effectively wield more than two things)
With large PCs, there are a lot of issues other than natural reach. You have your emanations being bigger, most of the weapons and equipment you find being incorrectly sized, even without reach you threaten more squares (12 instead of 8), you block more squares, dungeons have to be designed to account for your larger size, and so on. If you do get reach (from a weapon or an ancestry feat) you then compound the issue of you naturally threatening more squares and it gets pretty silly pretty quick.
Again, not necessarily insurmountable, but not as simple as just "don't give then extra reach"
Also, any restrictions they apply that don't apply to monster equivalents will run into people on the forums losing their mind again like they did with the Strix and Sprites having to grow into their flight abilities.
| 6 people marked this as a favorite. |
The biggest problem with a 4-armed ancestry is that "how many hands the weapon takes up" is an intentional balancing factor. A greataxe taking 2 hands means that you can't carry two of them and use double slice, a glaive taking 2 hands means you can't use one and a shield at the same time, a bow taking 2 hands and being a weapon you don't want to use at close range means you have to spend actions to draw a different weapon if you can't get clear, etc.
The "I am dual wielding d12 weapons or d10 reach weapons" probably isn't totally unbalancing, but it could be a bit of an issue.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
The biggest problem with a 4-armed ancestry is that "how many hands the weapon takes up" is an intentional balancing factor. A greataxe taking 2 hands means that you can't carry two of them and use double slice, a glaive taking 2 hands means you can't use one and a shield at the same time, a bow taking 2 hands and being a weapon you don't want to use at close range means you have to spend actions to draw a different weapon if you can't get clear, etc.
The "I am dual wielding d12 weapons or d10 reach weapons" probably isn't totally unbalancing, but it could be a bit of an issue.
Even without weapons, it allows you to do something like a magus that uses a Elven Branched Spear, a shield [with Shield Sconce] and a staff all at once.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
The biggest problem with a 4-armed ancestry is that "how many hands the weapon takes up" is an intentional balancing factor. A greataxe taking 2 hands means that you can't carry two of them and use double slice, a glaive taking 2 hands means you can't use one and a shield at the same time, a bow taking 2 hands and being a weapon you don't want to use at close range means you have to spend actions to draw a different weapon if you can't get clear, etc.
The "I am dual wielding d12 weapons or d10 reach weapons" probably isn't totally unbalancing, but it could be a bit of an issue.
One way to get around this factor at least is too say that the coordination required to wield two, 2-handed weapons effectively is too difficult and not allowed.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I haven't seen art of the potential ancestry so I don't know how applicable this is, but a good way to do it would be to have one pair of arms be physically weaker and have them only capable of being used for Interact actions without further feats. Still provides a powerful mechanical niche, but much closer to the benefits an ancestry should provide.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
All of them have the rare trait, so you're under no obligation to allow all of them in the same party. And if you're talking from a worldbuilding perspective, then it's still very unlikely to fond all of those in the same room.I am up for monstrous creatures rather than too strange ones.
Currently, the adventurers could open a dungeon door, finding a room with a puppy in his dog kennel playing with its toy.
But in realty:
- The dog kennel is instead a Conrasu
- The puppy is a shoony
- The toy is a poppetWe ( our group ) are finding hard to deal with this stuff ( a standard party with a weird race character would be ok, but I don't really know how people would react to a too strange mix ).
Or maybe, it's just me still not used to golarion diversity.
Its got to be a GM choice. Because it really is a story decision to allow such things into the world. It really can break the flavour.
I'd note that a dog kennel is a bit of a strech for a Conrasu, and Shoony are actually humanoids just dog like. On the other hand toys or automatons really have little in the way of limits. Probably just that they need to have obvious limbs for hands and movement.
But then again you can already play a mushroom character, or a squash and they are't even rare. Just as well I don't mind a really wild comedy game now and then.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
4 arms are more balanced already than in P1 simply due to the change in Action Economy, you can hold more things yes, but you’re still limited in how much you can make use of it.I would like to point out that Paizo is charging premium for any extra limb that can hold things. In fact, useless extra limbs that can barely open a door costs either a 5th level ancestry feat or a 10th level Psychic Feat with prerequisites.
I imagine that by this metric, anything with two extra arms that can hold items and wield weapons wouldn't be anything short of a capstone ancestry feat (17th level).
But, yes, I do 100% agree with your statement.
Well they have already broached quadrapeds. Its just extra speed.
To actualy allow extra limbs with say melee weapons then they do have to look at things like Clumsy and other such penalties to balance it.
I do think it is a possible to find something workable without being over balanced. Especailly with PF2 action system.
| 10 people marked this as a favorite. |
All of them have the rare trait, so you're under no obligation to allow all of them in the same party. And if you're talking from a worldbuilding perspective, then it's still very unlikely to fond all of those in the same room.I am up for monstrous creatures rather than too strange ones.
Currently, the adventurers could open a dungeon door, finding a room with a puppy in his dog kennel playing with its toy.
But in realty:
- The dog kennel is instead a Conrasu
- The puppy is a shoony
- The toy is a poppetWe ( our group ) are finding hard to deal with this stuff ( a standard party with a weird race character would be ok, but I don't really know how people would react to a too strange mix ).
Or maybe, it's just me still not used to golarion diversity.
Its got to be a GM choice. Because it really is a story decision to allow such things into the world. It really can break the flavour.
I'd note that a dog kennel is a bit of a strech for a Conrasu, and Shoony are actually humanoids just dog like. On the other hand toys or automatons really have little in the way of limits. Probably just that they need to have obvious limbs for hands and movement.
But then again you can already play a mushroom character, or a squash and they are't even rare. Just as well I don't mind a really wild comedy game now and then.
Yeah, mistaking a Shoony for a Pug is like mistaking a human for a chimpanzee. Shoony's are very clearly humanoid (and usually clothed).
I think most of the time when people complain about "verisimilitude" they are just having problems with their imagination. It's a fantasy world, one of the benefits of a fantasy world is not everyone has to look like us. That's a good thing. It makes for a greater variety of stories you can tell, you just need to build up your ability to imagine different things and to put yourself into the shoes of different people.
It is just that previously D&D/Pathfinder hasn't stretched people's imagination and empathy muscles as much as they could (and should) have. In the past, people made what I call "The Shia Labeouf assumption". In the live action transformers movies, they focused everything around a bunch of (very irritating) human characters, because they assumed that audiences couldn't relate to giant robots and needed humans to empathize with. Which is a bad assumption - the transformers cartoons did fine with most of their focus on the robot characters (they had two human characters, but they weren't present in all episodes and where mostly just squishy things for the transformers to rescue), which people had no problem relating to (if you can't relate to and enjoy G1 Starscream and Megatron and Optimus without the presence of pathetic human characters, you have problems).
TTRPGs have historically made a pretty similar assumption, keeping most character options within the "mostly humanoid and medium sized" category. Starfinder and PF2 are breaking that mold in a lot of ways, which is a good thing. (Note that TTRPGs have broken this mold before, but never on a large scale by a major TTRPG - see Mouseguard for a minor RPG doing it on a large scale, and d&d warforged for a major rpg doing it on a small scale).
I think that one of the best things about TTRPGs is that you get to inhabit the life of someone different to yourself for a while, which builds up your empathy and imagination. Having to figure out what life would be like as a plant person or a puppet or a giant spider is a great exercise for building up your ability to empathise and imagine.
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
Erik saying he'd also like Minotaurs is giving me the most distant gleam of hope for them one day.
I'd also love to see some kind of trollkin Ancestry, though this might end up being more of the Creature Echo Feat design space. I just thing being gross and regenerative sounds fun!
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
Erik saying he'd also like Minotaurs is giving me the most distant gleam of hope for them one day.
I'd also love to see some kind of trollkin Ancestry, though this might end up being more of the Creature Echo Feat design space. I just thing being gross and regenerative sounds fun!
Honestly given how varied and mutable trolls are, and the fact that they are already at least vaguely intelligent, I could easily see some kind of medium intelligent type of troll occurring without any icky crossbreeding stuff happening.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Honestly given how varied and mutable trolls are, and the fact that they are already at least vaguely intelligent, I could easily see some kind of medium intelligent type of troll occurring without any icky crossbreeding stuff happening.Erik saying he'd also like Minotaurs is giving me the most distant gleam of hope for them one day.
I'd also love to see some kind of trollkin Ancestry, though this might end up being more of the Creature Echo Feat design space. I just thing being gross and regenerative sounds fun!
There's already a couple of medium-sized variants, like flood and sewer trolls.
Many trolls also have limitations to their regeneration, so you could have PC trolls start with faster healing while resting and working up to faster and less conditional forms of regeneration with feats.| 7 people marked this as a favorite. |
Having just made a Svartalfar character, I have to say neither Drow nor Svartalfar feel very well covered by Elf. The feat selection doesn't feel right and there's no really appropriate heritage. Cavern Elf would need some drow-themed feat build-out to feel right.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Having just made a Svartalfar character, I have to say neither Drow nor Svartalfar feel very well covered by Elf. The feat selection doesn't feel right and there's no really appropriate heritage. Cavern Elf would need some drow-themed feat build-out to feel right.
I think I'm dumb, but it took me a long time to realize that "Cavern Elf" was supposed to be Drow. So I definitely understand where you're coming from and wholeheartedly agree.
|
| 8 people marked this as a favorite. |
Having just made a Svartalfar character, I have to say neither Drow nor Svartalfar feel very well covered by Elf. The feat selection doesn't feel right and there's no really appropriate heritage. Cavern Elf would need some drow-themed feat build-out to feel right.I think I'm dumb, but it took me a long time to realize that "Cavern Elf" was supposed to be Drow. So I definitely understand where you're coming from and wholeheartedly agree.
Actually the Designers have repeatedly said that Cavern Elves are explicitly not Drow.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Having just made a Svartalfar character, I have to say neither Drow nor Svartalfar feel very well covered by Elf. The feat selection doesn't feel right and there's no really appropriate heritage. Cavern Elf would need some drow-themed feat build-out to feel right.I think I'm dumb, but it took me a long time to realize that "Cavern Elf" was supposed to be Drow. So I definitely understand where you're coming from and wholeheartedly agree.
No, you weren't missing something- it is not supposed to be Drow, and the devs have commented towards that. We just haven't gotten a book with playable Drow yet.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Drow have issues due to their backstory and history (as related via AP and PF1 lore) as a coded dog-whistle for bigots.
If that could be overcome in some way to erase that stigma while acknowledging it, it could be interesting to see them as players.
The issues are not insurmountable, though. It'd require good writing, empathy, and understanding of how to make them NOT any of the problematic things while not reducing them to 'slightly off-color Cave Elf'.
The other one mentioned that is of interest is minotaur -- they have the Nuar in Starfinder, and Nuar Spiritskin is a named character in PF lore.
If the trade-off for 'minotaur' was 'increased movement speed' (because they aren't as large as their more savage counterparts) instead of Reach that might be an interesting compromise.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Actually the Designers have repeatedly said that Cavern Elves are explicitly not Drow.Having just made a Svartalfar character, I have to say neither Drow nor Svartalfar feel very well covered by Elf. The feat selection doesn't feel right and there's no really appropriate heritage. Cavern Elf would need some drow-themed feat build-out to feel right.I think I'm dumb, but it took me a long time to realize that "Cavern Elf" was supposed to be Drow. So I definitely understand where you're coming from and wholeheartedly agree.
Oh. I get it. I thought they rewrote the ancestry to avoid the old problems associated with it.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Oh. I get it. I thought they rewrote the ancestry to avoid the old problems associated with it.Actually the Designers have repeatedly said that Cavern Elves are explicitly not Drow.Having just made a Svartalfar character, I have to say neither Drow nor Svartalfar feel very well covered by Elf. The feat selection doesn't feel right and there's no really appropriate heritage. Cavern Elf would need some drow-themed feat build-out to feel right.I think I'm dumb, but it took me a long time to realize that "Cavern Elf" was supposed to be Drow. So I definitely understand where you're coming from and wholeheartedly agree.
No Drow still exist within the setting and are featured in an AP. They've decided to update things similar to what they've done in other areas. Ancestries are not monoliths where every single one is confined to a single alignment or set of behaviors, shifted the skin color, etc. I'm sure we will see them and darklands book eventually.
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
They've said they have a lot of hopes for the Darklands, but there are a huge amount of problematic areas they want to rethink. I could see that being a very difficult thing to create to the modern standards they hold their work to.
Personally, I'm keen on the Darklands ancestries, definitely. Including serpentfolk. Also I'm ready for minotaurs and a whole host of big brutes. Way to many dex-oriented ancestries out there. Give us some real big bodies already!
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
I probably said this before, but I want some sort of psionic ancestry. Something like githyanki in 5e that have invisible mage hand and/or invisible shield cantrip stock. Idk which playable races from 1e where psionic outside the ones that became starfinder races like lashunta. With dark archive coming, maybe they'll add a psychically adept ancestry.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
I probably said this before, but I want some sort of psionic ancestry. Something like githyanki in 5e that have invisible mage hand and/or invisible shield cantrip stock. Idk which playable races from 1e where psionic outside the ones that became starfinder races like lashunta. With dark archive coming, maybe they'll add a psychically adept ancestry.
Psychic coming as a class has me waaay too excited for 2e Lashunta. I want them SO bad.
Lashunta, Minotaurs, Serpentfolk, and Wyrwoods are the top of the list for me.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
I'd personally love to see minotaurs, the merfolk and the stheno — and while we're at it with the hellenistic-inspired ancestries, I'm very curious about harpies as ancestries as well, if doable. But harpies-harpies, not harpy-like non-harpies or the the secret descendant of the harpies. :B No shade of course, I really like what we've seen from the Stheno.
Also the whole Darklands bunch as well. Isn't it a little odd, to think that we still have no Drow despite two years of released content? Ideally, I'd love a Lost Omens on the Darklands with a bunch of Darklands ancestries and heritages, but I always thought that, I dunno... Drow would come sooner than later?
But I support them taking their time to reconsider what they are in Golarion, or just be careful with it. Still hoping for a Darklands LO release though, any time soon™.
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
Oh, a weird one; I want Adlets playable! Gimme the mysterious arctic wolf-folk.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Having just made a Svartalfar character, I have to say neither Drow nor Svartalfar feel very well covered by Elf. The feat selection doesn't feel right and there's no really appropriate heritage. Cavern Elf would need some drow-themed feat build-out to feel right.Another thing to keep in mind is that Svartalfar are also not elves ... even though that's what their name means. They are a kind of fey who happen to look like elves, and their abilities are pretty different from those that elves display.
I think you'd actually have an easier time making a Svartalfar, at least Pathfinder's version, if you were a Fetchling, to emulate their shadow abilities, and a magus to emulate their spell-strikiness.
That's what I ended up doing! At least the Fetchling part. I had expected that the closest thing would have been an elf, but it really didn't do much. Also the Stats for Fetchling fit my build much better XD
| 7 people marked this as a favorite. |
A Darklands book that releases in which drow aren't evil, xenophobic psychos and in which aboleth and other Darkland beings don't take slaves is a book that I'll likely pass on.
Golarion is not a safe place, much less the Darklands. There are evil, vile things in the dark. Take that away and many adventuring possibilities get totally gutted.
Compromising some things so as to avoid unnecessarily offending your consumer base is one thing, but a line needs to be drawn somewhere to avoid extremes like the Darklands becoming as sinister and dangerous as Disney World.
| 18 people marked this as a favorite. |
I mean there's a lot of grey area between "drow are homogenously evil and draw on weird notions about race" and "darklands completely lose their mystique and danger"
Trying to act like that's some kind of binary choice is incredibly off base and ... a little out of left field because literally no one has suggested that "extreme" to begin with.
| 17 people marked this as a favorite. |
A Darklands book that releases in which drow aren't evil, xenophobic psychos and in which aboleth and other Darkland beings don't take slaves is a book that I'll likely pass on.
Golarion is not a safe place, much less the Darklands. There are evil, vile things in the dark. Take that away and many adventuring possibilities get totally gutted.
Compromising some things so as to avoid unnecessarily offending your consumer base is one thing, but a line needs to be drawn somewhere to avoid extremes like the Darklands becoming as sinister and dangerous as Disney World.
Nobody is asking for the Darklands to become a theme park, and pretending that any alternative to “every Drow is a baby-eating lunatic” is doing so is pretty pointless alarmism. Giving the Drow some nuance is only a good thing - and as of Abomination Vaults, is already an ongoing effort.
Having an entire people be evil has and will always be silly.
Cheliax still has slaves, as does Geb and much of the Golden Road. The first AP of 2e was literally about fighting slavers. Extinction Curse showed us the Darklands being a terrifying hellhole. I’m convinced at this point that people who think 2e is making the setting utterly lack threats and bad things just isn’t reading the books.
| 8 people marked this as a favorite. |
I mean, Drow society should be made up of individual beings who have different perspectives and have the ability to make their own choices. Aboleths... not so much.
You can have a fully evil society with some members who aren't wholeheartedly into it or at least have serious questions, but what Aboleths have isn't precisely a society.