Eilistraee! The Benevolent Drow Goddess: D&D 5e Lore
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 7 ธ.ค. 2023
- Eilistraee is an amazing goddess in the lore of D&D! However, her story has a few holes that need to be updated if she's still to be made as an important figure within the overall worldbuilding in D&D. From history, to racism, to retconning, join me as I go over the lore of Eilistraee and what parts need to be improved upon more!
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you are entirely correct, as someone who loves eilistraee it angers me so god damn much that they made this push to revamp Drow but not so much as namedrop her ONCE
It's like, "hey guys, we're ONLY going to retcon the drow and not add anything else new or interesting to the pantheon"
WotC's wanted to erase her from existence ever since they acquired D&D from TSR
@@smilesschemes I wish you had allowed us a full-screen look at your art once it was done.
@@smilesschemes The problem is which version of Eilistraee are you coming from? She isn’t even close to what she was in her first appearance in AD&D 2nd. She was just the goddess of swordplay, moonlight and dance in her original lore. The 3e, 4e and 5e lore are nothing like the AD&D 2nd lore. She was never meant to be anything more than a minor demigoddess originally, certainly not the savior and redeemer of the Drow.
The best part of all the Drow deity debacle, is that the most prayed Drow god on the surface isn't Ellistrae.
It's Vaherun.
And no one even mentions him.
Fs in the chat for Vaherun... I feel like so many of the drow deities are really slept on when it comes to lore
@@smilesschemes Apparently, they got too popular.
"No options for you!!!" says WOC.
.... its almost as if Lloathe has them by the short & curlies.
Yeah - but he's evil, but up top.
Eilistraee is, by far, my favorite god in dnd! The tactful art was, as always, impressive, but the lore you covered was what really drew me in. In my home games, I rarely stick with canonical lore, but this goddess is beyond anything I could invent. Another wonderful video, Smiles! I look forward to seeing what comes next.
Thank you so much! I'm glad you liked the video
Even more than "saving" the drow, one of her main goals is for the drow to have the freedom and knowledge to choose and make an informed decision for themselves, which Lolth and her priestesses do everything they can to deny them
Eilistraee's portfolio is the top tier. I'm currently playing a swords bard who was brought up by a Drow half-elf. so when my character does pray it's typically to her
Nice. Has your DM had any cool scenes bringing her into the game yet?
I’m doing the same thing but with a swashbuckler rogue with a magic initiate feat
EIGHT MINUTES AGO??? I WAS LITERALLY JUST STARTING TO MAKE MY NEW DROW CHARACTER
Ayyyyyyyyy, glad I could help!
The thing about 'revamping the drow' is that it ignores 'where did they come from'. The drow of 'today' aren't the drow of 'yesterday' but those first drow weren't drow as they are 'today'. Before Lolth there were no drow. They were all the same elves as those who followed Corellon because of course they were, Lolth was Araushnee, Corellon's wife. When Araushnee betrayed Corellon and summarily exiled from the Seldarine, she and those who followed her were all cast from the light and branded so that all who saw them would know their sin. They were elves who chose to follow Araushnee, now Lolth, into that darkness. They chose their fate. This idea that there were drow who didn't chose Lolth doesn't make sense as there were no drow before Araushnee's fall from grace as Lolth. She, in her hubris, is what turned her elves into drow.
What would I do differently from Wizards? For one, I'd leave the above history alone. No, I have no problem with communities of good aligned drow, but I wouldn't have it shoehorned that there's 'always been good drow'. Instead, I'd use the lore and have them founded by those drow that have managed to band together under Eilistraee in mutual protection so that, should Lolth's hunters find them, they would be able to fend them off. Progress this over the centuries that's passed since Lolth's exile and you can have your cities of good drow celebrating Eilistraee's benevolence. In this way you preserve the lore and acknowledge Eilistraee's impact over centuries of reaching out to the drow.
The reason is R.A. Salvatore does not like Eilistraee. In my head canon Lloth purposely hid Drizzt from Eilistraee.
3:16 “Even places like the Underdark have joy and beauty” Yeah… it’s the Flumphs!
Flumphs, truly nature’s greatest creature
This is a really good video! Off topic, but one idea i had for Eilistraee design wise is that she uses her hair as armor, similar to Bayonetta.
I can see that
I really love drow as a race and have ever since I was a kid, my brother introduced me to drizzt as being a cool and powerful character, and not as being "one of the good ones" which looking back on I'm actually really thankful for because it's given me much more appreciation of the drow as a whole and their struggles just to be considered fine by anyone else. Personally I think that having drow being controlled by lolth and or willingly being servants to lolth and having eilistraee be the good (as in truly good, not just neutrally good) goddess for them is great. It gives evil drow the freedom to be evil (it's ok to have evil people), it gives tragic characters a great way to have depth and character growth, and it allows genuinely good drow to exist, which is still something that seems hard for other people to understand. She doesnt have to be diametrically opposed as a binary option for drow, she can be the (actually) good side with there being plenty of room in the middle for neutral or semi good/semi evil characters too, which is where I think the other gods can really fit in. it doesn't have to be lolth OR "the good ones".
For a long time I thought that good drow always existed like this and that they have just as much agency over their good and evil as any other race thanks to drizzt and my brother. But then I had to deal with the reality that other people vehemently disagree; many multiple times over many years, because people tend to stick to the idea that all or most drow are by nature evil. Most recently I was talking with a friend about how minthara in baldur's gate 3 couldve been such a good character but she's written as a racist caricature of a drow, and I kept getting told that drow are supposed to be evil. But they ignore the fact that she is a powerful and liberated person who should have control of her own destiny beyond just being evil. I know that your video is about eilistraee, but I think minthara is the perfect example of a character that is ok to be in between. She doesn't have to be aligned with lolth anymore, and she doesn't have to be aligned with eilistraee, she can choose to be evil for the sake of vengeance and retribution, and she can do it because she's ruthless and has little regard for anyone's life but her own, but she's not doing any of that because she's a drow importantly. She could also take the path of redemption logically because of her encounters with gods and the player character of that game. Her reasons for being evil are good, at least in act 1/2. But then that all falls apart in act 2.5-3 where she starts talking about how much she wants to burn an orphanage to the ground, something that has no basis in her character, and feels like a cruel joke about her being just evil "because she is" which is why I also think that she is emblematic of the problem with the fanbase and the drow. I don't think the fanbase is really ready to address the racism in the game, and I don't think they're ready to look at their own racism critically even if WotC is trying to show them that that's not ok, plenty of people try not to think about it and thats the whole problem, people say it's just a game, it's a fantasy world, but they ignore that theyre being very literally racist and even the people who make official content for the world have issues identifying their own problems, because we're all flawed humans and it has been normalized for so long, kind of similarly to real racism (only to a point). To be clear I'm not saying that racism against drow is just like real life racism or that it makes you a bad person, it's just I think that if it's so hard for people to address racism against a fantasy character, would it then also be hard for them to address it in real life? It bothers me as a whole.
Good characters are characters that have complexity, and eilistraee and lolth provide that to drow. The issue is that some, maybe even most of the people who participate in DnD don't know what to do with it. Great video though, love getting any perspective for drow that isn't "theyre just evil".
Thank you! I'm glad you enjoyed the video!
And I think you brought up an interesting perspective. Personally, I felt that a lot of the malevolent drow continued under lolth's reign because of a desire for power, or simply fear. It's weird to think that people would choose that for themselves. And I thought that with a majority of their circumstances, that they really didn't have as much of a choice overall. But looking back on the lore, they really do have their own agency
Agency is meaningless if you don't have any information to use to act on that agency...
Ty. My first char is devoted to her (11 y. o teal-haired anime rogue girl.... calling herself "Seamonster"). She... roleplays monsters for fun.
Dritzz wasn't a follower of Eilisttraee. So his lore doesn't necessarily change all drow lore.
I keep 99% of npc drow racist slavers in my games (some live on the surface and worship eilistraee or other gods, but seeing one is very rare). Underdark drow make convenient and competent villains for any DMs arsenal.
It also makes the pc drows feel more special and gives them a good built-in back story about escaping that society. Its also fun rp having the drow disguise themselves whenever they enter a town or having them roll with advantage on intimidating regular people just by letting them see they are drow.
I like this video, well done my friend
Thank ye very much
Apparently nobody has read Lolth's Warrior. R.A. Salvatore makes Eilistraee's followers important players in the book.
The again, mostly in response to evil Drow debacle blowing in his face along with Wizards.
Before that he have negative opinion of her as “only acted as someone to make Drow good” and WoTC had hard-on dislike of her…and not her nudity since Drizzt still had orgies, and conception of Draegloth.
Yes, without giving away spoilers, the plot of Lolth's Warrior has *enormous* ramifications for both the current status and the future of Eilistraee and her followers.
I recently made a drow twilight domain cleric and in doing some research decided to choose Eilistraee for her goddess. Also found some current lore that after a century long absence she has recently returned to the Realms and it somewhat coincided with Mystra's return. In fact Mystra, in an effort not to be targeted so much and not have the Realms suffer whenever something happens to her or the Weave has decided to share the Weave with both Azuth and Eilistraee.
I can see future lore maybe having these 3 gods be known as the magic 3 in opposition to the dead 3 (Bane, Bhaal, and Myrkul). But more importantly Eilistraee as both added to her domain by expanding how many things she is the goddess of... and having the Weave be shared with her... I feel she can be nothing less then one of the most powerful gods in existence, probably even rivaling Ao... or at least coming close, maybe even surpassing him or defeating him by making him no longer relevant, or necessary, maybe she even takes his place.
But the one thing I truly hope for is to have her ultimately and forever defeat Lloth and assume the head of the drow pantheon. She has already settled her old dispute with her brother Vhaeraun and with some epic storytelling getting rid of Lloth and reshuffling the pantheon to change or invent some good or neutral drow gods would be the most amazing and fun thing.
To my understanding of the metaphysics, it’s basically impossible for any of the gods to rival Ao in power within Realm Space. Such would be like some random poster on a forum “rivaling” the admin that both owns servers and pays for their upkeep. It doesn’t really matter how powerful or popular one of them gets, he can just perma ban them with a thought, and there’s nothing they can do about it. Being an Overgod isn’t a democracy.🤷♂️
I find this interesting as I’ve been working on a story that heavily features a drow MC.
One thing to keep in mind perhaps that Lolth’s power doesn’t just come from her followers, but also the strategic alliances she’s made with more powerful gods.
I see LS society as a fascist authoritarian cult (think Stalin’s Soviet Union meets Charles Manson meets bdsm lol). The high status Matron Mothers are the ones running the show bc as long as Lolth gets her prays she doesn’t gaf, from what I’ve seen.
I think it’s reasonable that Eilistraee is still focused on LS drows in part bc she wants to redeem her mother as much as she wants to free the drow.
I hc that a lot of Eilistraee’s power is used to shield drow from Lolth. And distributed between her followers. Eilistraee uses herself as a conduit for her followers to share power between them. (Which I hope to be able to play at the table - just randomly have a dm ask my wizard girlie how many spell slots she’s giving up for the day to help and I have to think strategically like that)
All this to say that more good aligned deities could be using the bulk of their power defensively against Lolth’s tactics (Lolth is a smart cookie unfortunately). So that could be some reasoning someone could use to avoid home brewing a whole new stat block lol
This is great! I once played a guest character in a long campaign, She was a drow cleric who worshipped Lolth. She was Lawful neutral and followed her own perception of fairness. which means equal returns, 'someone helps me, I help them, someone hurts me, I will make them suffer'. At some point she met a novice who loved music and dance, she tried to turn her to Lolths side properly but she was untamable. At some point she gets the instructions to kill her student for Lolth but she can't. She throws away the blade and runs away with her and some other unhappy folks from the city (male drow and some other outcasts). when she breaches the surface she dreams of Lolth and has to cut out her holy symbol from her outfit (which was located on her sternum) lots of saving throws later she's free of Lolth but no longer has any cleric magic (being level 16 ish at this point). In a dream later she meets Eilistraee who invites her to jump in a moonlit lake with her. She does and is embraced by Eilistraee for leaving Lolth and embracing her pupil as her daughter (her pupil being a chosen of Eilistraee for being a bard that loves too much) She wakes up changed (from trickery domain as Lolth cleric to now Twilight domain Eilistraee cleric) and is ready to face of against an evil lich that has cursed her people to die without the faerzress. in the campaign epilogue she has led many drow to the surface (especially the children) and become the headmistress of her own school. later she would leave the school to take on her own personal pupils who would become her daughters and sons. after years of adapting having left behind her preconceptions about other races and genders. She grieves for every short lived race that passes before her but sees the happiness that their lives were for her and the world. In short. this campaign gave time to highlight drow as they are, good and bad.
Love the vid and art! I want to include eli in my Exandria game but I felt a similar way about her lore. Some stuff I really like about it but some stuff I don't. The game is set in exandria, so I'm trying to figure out how to best work her into the lore/make changes to Lolth.
Thank you! I'm glad you liked the video!
And yeah, when it comes to making the lore changes, trust your gut, and good luck
I definitely agree with the idea that there should be more Good & Neutral aligned deities that Eilistraee would lead against Lolth as a counter to the evil dark seldarine. I think among them should be Lolth's grandson, Vhaeraun's son and Eilistraee's nephew Selvetarm. Selvetarm was guided and taught by his aunt to lean toward good, but that changed when Lolth convinced him that defeating one of Lolth's rivals over the spider domain would aid Eilistraee. Lolth's rival was the demon spider lord Zanassu. Selvetarm's absorption of Zanassu, and subsequently binding to Lolth's will turned him chaotic evil. After the Second Sundering, Selvetarm & Zanassu who were once dead, could resurrect as separate entities once more. Selvetarm could have other domains besides Warriors and Slaughter. Incorporating him into being deity that the Aevendrow or Lorendrow worship or something.
Good video. What drawing software do you use? Are you using a stylus pen or mouse to draw with?
I use clip studio paint and a wacom tablet for my drawing and then OBS for screen recording
Nah. Nothing wrong with Forgotten Realms original Lore. Everything WotC touches just goes bad by nature as weve seen the last few years. The Dark Elves made an active choice to help Lolth in trying to kill her husband Corellon. So cursed they became. Lolth just keeps her drow close by making sure they embrace evil.
Fair enough, i dont have any issue with forgotten realms lore. I just wish Eilistraee got more of a spotlight in dnd
Have you read the Drizzt books? He wasn't the only good drow. He was the good drow with the skill, will and luck to not be killed or endoctornayed by the evil society. His father was a good drow too. Drizzt himself laments that Lolth influence is more than likely the sole reason his race was evil. Lolth rewarding evil and killing good drow perpetuates this "evil drow" cycle.
I personally am a bit more forgiving of depicting certain fantasy populations as having a far greater tendency towards evil, but I would emphasize that it is more due to societal pressures that glamourize evil behaviour and punish good behaviour. If you were a slave in the Underdark who fled into an average Menzoberranzan drow's house while being hunted, the drow that live there will sell you out because of a combination of said drow being raised from birth to view slaves as subdrow to deserve to be punished and enslaved, and because if they don't sell you out, they will also be made an example of, and probably in worse ways.
Also, I like to imagine the Faerzress functions a lot like lead on the biological functions of drow. Like, the sort of thing that supposedly helped to screw over the Roman Empire with their lead-lined pipes, or how leaded gasoline was linked to higher rates of crime in the 1980s.
I am new to DnD and haven't read the drizzt books, but I am considering playing a half-drow ranger who's father escaped the underdark because he followed the sweet tones of Elistraee. I like the idea that Drow are perhaps culturally and genetically disposed to violence as a result of their society being the way it is for so long. I think it's compelling that someone who is different would feel trapped in their own society. Elistraee is the escape for some to then find their own path.
Perhaps the other good societies are an option for them, I don't know. Perhaps, a defector is treated differently than a citizen of those other societies?
I thought my ranger could have been raised on the surface by his father and instilled with a love of the stars. He would love the beauty of the sky but lives with a fear that he might have a darkness within himself that would come out if not controlled at all times.
I genuinely don't understand your criticism of current Elistraee, but maybe I'm missing something? Is it just that she should have gotten an update? Do the events of the books make it so that she would probably not just be doing the same thing as always?
Honestly I think Wizards was responding to a problem that didn't exist. The very existence of Eilistraee in the first place taught us that Drow were redeemable. Part of her allure was that she and her faction were huge underdogs in their struggle, reclaiming Drow for the (moon)light one by one. Now ... the good Drow are what, 10% of the population? It's no longer that good of an underdog story. "Drow" are no longer an adversary, just like "humans" aren't. It's the Menzobrktskts-whatever crowd, or the Red Wizards. It makes them a lot less scary. "Oh, Drow are just another faction, ho hum." Now I'm waiting for the good mind flayers to show up, and the good aboleths.
Oh, and for the record, it never hurt that Eilistraee has a fan-art contingent that would make Boris Vallejo himself knuckle away a proud tear. That never hurt.
Sadly, this is how D&D/FR lore is managed.
One retcon is made (for understandable reasons), but why would anyone expect WotC to cross-check with the rest of the lore to see what else needs changing as a result. Lore in multi-decades, multi-authors fictional universes/franchises is always a mixed bag, but it's even more so when the company doesn't care.
We do unfortunately have a lot of apathy in WoTC nowadays...
I don't understand the use of the 5e war god trinity of Tyr, Ilmater, and Torm. Tyr is underdeveloped from the Norse Mythology and the aside from Torm I'm not sure how Ilamter the broken even counts as a war god.
Idk, dnd lore gets kinda underdeveloped and weird sometimes as I have definitely said in the vid
I ... I though they were about justice, not war? Balancing each other out, as everyone has a different perception of justice. But I might have gotten that wrong or just headcanoned it to justice, because Ilmater really has nothing to do, with war, at all.
I love Eilastraee as a Goddess of Redemption and Goodness in Drow. My problem is that Drzzt Do'Urden doesn't acknowledge the Goddess and have several chances to bring it up. Let start with the 7 Chosen of Mystra and since the youngest Qilue is both Chosen of Mystra and Eilastraee would make sense to bring it up. Drzzt had met members of the Seven sisters on occasion and work with them. Otherwise that Drzzt Do'Urden will be killing every Drow regardless of alignment. I have not read the book that a poster mention. I did read the War of Spider Queen and Lady Pentinence.
The problem with Eilastraee early on was she was worship by female clerics. Thankfully it's not the case anymore. Mechanic wise I would put Eilsstraee at Intermediate level and not a lesser level. Meaning that Lolth is still more powerful than Eilastraee since she has majority of people worshipping her. The thing is Good or Neutral align Drow Gods are needed because since the drow are more diverse in the alignment wise. One of the things I did was to give Vhaerun an update. I made him to get a Chaotic Neutral alignment and drop the male and evil surface acts. Gave Vhaerun the portfolio of thieves and rogues in Drow. Which Vhaerun Rogues on the surface and the Underdark that are drow. Like Eilastraee I dropped the clergy gender requirement but kept for Lolth. I always considered that Lolth's hatred of men in general was part of her defining characteristics. Eilastraee problems stem from lack of people wanting to write her. Drzzt Do:Urden at the time when he was written Salvatore didn't know about Eilastraee. Which was part of the problem that Drzzt Do'Urden wasn't the only Good Drow but the most famous one. Ironically Eilastraee came before Drzzt as character publication wise. From the Character wise it really doesn't make sense for Drzzt to be a follower of Eilastraee. Drzzt Do Urden never ran into Eilastraeen Drow nor did he had an opportunity to as well in the Underdark
My understanding of Drow isn’t so much that they’re all evil but Drizzt, it’s pretty clear in his books they don’t want to be racist murder hobos.
The culture made around Lolth punished any who defected! Theybwere scared to be good and honest. That said, I do have a bone to pick with the way that Eilistraee’s depicted. They are not “the good drow god” they’re more like comically nice.
She’s sorta too nice if that makes any sense
Yeah, I usually portray Drow more on the side of being too afraid to oppose Lloth/leave, rather than being genuine followers. It makes for more nuance and better tragic figures. Eilistraee is sometimes too nice, I tend to think Vhaerun is more interesting, and having their followers work together would be better than either alone.
Actually I think that misses the point. She is actually based (intentionally or not) on the idea of return. If you knew a few people that had to leave thier homes they sometimes are very wistful for the “good old days of home” and everything was good. We all loved life and even the water is sweet kind of thing. Of course there is a lot more to her than this but that is why she should be very good. Also they should not all be evil. Eve of .01% of Drow escape loath thanks to the fact that Drow have no issues reproductively like other elves and they don’t kill each other for no reason there should be a fairly large population of them considering elves in dnd have a long reproductive period. So they should have a nice sized city of them someplace.
I could agree to some extent. Meet any Silverhair Knight and you would be able to pull out quite the level of shit before she takes lethal action against you. But get unlucky and steer sh*t in the face of Protectors of the Song, and you will get this nice bastard blade up your ass. Not to mention there is active group Eilistraee working undercover in many drow cities, Menzoberranzan included. They BLEND in as a merchants or even low position in Houses - if they are soft then most drows are soft as well.
Not to mention that DMs usually only portray only half of Eilistraee's teaching. If Darksong Knights see Lolth drow, they will give them the Message. But if the Lolth drow start steering sheets there is Eilistraee's commandment "repay violence with swift violence so that the fewest might be hurt". Have skilled enough DM and you may just meet unit of Darksong Knights that suffered some losses recently because of being too nice, so now they only give Message out of obligation(like Miranda warning) and you have 1 full round to back out or whole unit will show you how they hunt Lolth's demons. Oh and remember "Knight" doesn't constitute only of paladins, fighters or cleric, only the last one shouldn't use bows and poisons aren't exactly prohibited by any of Dark Dancer's teaching. I would even say some "hunting-poison" deepen arrows are to be even expected for all who carry bows or crossbows.
6:11 is where I quit.
It’s not BAD. It speaks to a lost culture. Drizzt coming out of and overcoming his history in a fanatical society that’s been held under the sway of Lolth worship doesn’t give me any racist vibes. Humanity has been host to cultures with dark traditions.
Writing it off as problematic, ignoring it, and retconning historical dynamics as if they didn’t happen is what’s bad.
But...drow as a "race" have never ever been inherently evil.
Their evil was due to the active influence of chaotic, capricious, vile gods which most of them never got the chance to choose. Nearly any drow that got a chance to taste something different - and truly believed that something different was possible, and not just a test of loyalty - showed their capacity for change.
Honestly I think you've wildly misinterpreted the "lore change" and broad handling of Drow. While I agree the Eilistraee needs updated, the big thing is that you're misrepresenting Drizzt's context, and the shifts following the ret-con. Not only had Drow been in places like Cormanthor on the surface prior to all this (thanks Sword Coast) but overall the "Drow all bad" dialogue occurred in reply to Drow Raiders, the fact is that those elves who carry the curse that causes the sun to hurt them is not only a huge part of Eilistraee's point and purpose, but the early Drow books constantly challenge bio-essentialism, and the fact is the books only ever addressed two cities as "evil". Other goodly Drow existed, most simply weren't as famous and prominent as Drizzt.
Like there isn't a need to change because the implication of millions of Drow living in Menzoberranzan and Ched Nassad was a significant part of the problem, as well as Lolthite Drow existing globally and working against them. But that's basically worth its own counter-video, which I have no interest of doing. Not much needs to change, because the fact is Eilistraee's numbers of drow and elven worshippers haven't really changed, they've just been given names, and new settlements emphasizing them have been established.
I agree that the point of the retcon wasn't about changing the old, but further establishing what was always there. However, I feel like we still didn't get to see anything new with her lore. Even if the surface drow didn't change her strength or portfolio, surely it had to change SOMETHING about her?
There was no reason for the lore update. The good drow city would not exist because they would have been destroyed by invading Lolth forces. And the notion that Drow are born evil is dumb, but Lolth has created a Society that has perfected kill out compassion and good. Drizzt only lives because Lolth wanted it to happen. Drizzt existing creates chaos and thats her middle name.
Yes they should talk about Eilistrae but this is just another obvious fail on their part. Just one part of the failure.
They failed because when it comes to the dark maiden they didn’t think inside the box. Loth had been loosing her war with her daughter to keep all the Drow in her power. Because you forget, if an elf does not worship a god then that god does not get that power and the more they worship other gods - those gods get more power.
Thus the revelation of the other societies (only a few cities as opposed to Loth’s far far more numerous ones) the secret Eilistraee had been keeping for a thousands of years. Loth is not on the way out but these societies have been preparing for a war when Loth will come out. It is not a focus of life but they know it is going to happen as have it on the list of things to be prepared for. (( Eilistraee’s people in large numbers have been around since AD&D and Elfmeet after all))
It is the kind of thing a smart company would make into a gaming event! The reason why they are not is because, Eilistraee is usually based on a girl that can be naked!
((And there is that thing that could in their mind be a link between her creation and the crown wars and how the Sun elves cursed the dark skinned drow - which brings back the Curse of Ham rl racist story … and they still have no solution to that even if I would have one))
The Drizzt novels seem to overwhelm the topic of the Drow. WotC seems lost on how to deal with this.
Elistraee has always been part of the lore. Always part of the foundation myths of the elves. Are they worried she is too sexualised? Are they after different types of good Drow culture? Maybe they are trying to fix this without resources & without writers? Just adding them in and hoping a future drizzt novel supports this.
The Drizzt novels seem to suggest a world we're only the Lolth Drow exists. Okay, well done on the storytelling, but bioescentialism is not right. The world building was convincing, but why does it overwrite 27000 years of Elven history? That's just bad math. There is always another enclave or lost civilization.
Why not update a good drow pantheon? Elistraee has to be there. Dead centre.
Why not give these new Drow stories?
It's worth doing properly.
The less work they do on stories, the less impact it has on players and DMs who proudly still repeat the Drizzt novels world building line. Even if a more knowledgeable lore fan would say: how would a civilization hidden in the underdark and excluded from knowing things even know if there are other Drow or not? What about the followers of Elistraee? The novels presented it that way because it made their story more compelling, but after 50 years theres more lore to consider.
To be honest the direction in lore that 5e. butchered should not have happened. The moment they inserted RL politics into old DnD lore as a whole destroyed the escapism and wonderous fantasy. They wanted to turn it into a mirrored parallel world of today. I hope you have looked around lately. The current state of the world is FUBAR'ed right now. What they should have done is start a new age. Leave all the old lore alone and leave it in myth and legend. So those of the old guard who know the old lore can use the new era as a point where things got distorted and lost to time. Just like in real mythology. Until wizards backtrack (which they won't) All Lore for 5e. and onward is just disgusting fanfiction.
I disagree, the changes on the Drow lore were not necesary.
Drow were never inherently evil, but their society, cultur and goddess were. And because of the tight grip Lolth has on the drow, only a tiny fraction of drow could escape her web and be free and good aligned.
Being told now, that there were good drow civilisation was not needed, since we already knew drow are not inherently evil and Elistrae and her followers are the perfect example of this.
But this was not prove enough for the woke people.