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Erikor
Seeker

Norway
60 Posts

Posted - 13 Aug 2021 :  02:32:27  Show Profile Send Erikor a Private Message  Reply with Quote  Delete Topic
SPOILERS from the ending of Starlight Enclave.

How did Catti-brie call Guen when she couldn't speak? I mean, maybe she called her before but even so how could Guen teleport and with another person? Did I miss something?

sno4wy
Senior Scribe

USA
466 Posts

Posted - 14 Aug 2021 :  23:44:12  Show Profile Send sno4wy a Private Message  Reply with Quote
This is one of the things that Bob changes at liberty and as needed to do what he wants to do. I don't know why if Guen could do all of that, that she didn't just teleport with Catti instead of Azzudonna. There really is no justification for it other than lazy writing tbh, this way the outside world meets an aevendrow and she gets to make the difficult choice between saving her new friends or preserving the secrecy of her home.
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jordanz
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553 Posts

Posted - 15 Aug 2021 :  04:41:12  Show Profile  Visit jordanz's Homepage Send jordanz a Private Message  Reply with Quote
She had the Geas spell placed on her preventing her from leaving the city...
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sno4wy
Senior Scribe

USA
466 Posts

Posted - 15 Aug 2021 :  05:28:59  Show Profile Send sno4wy a Private Message  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by jordanz

She had the Geas spell placed on her preventing her from leaving the city...



Leaving by her own will. It doesn't affect if Guen takes her by Guen's will.
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jordanz
Senior Scribe

553 Posts

Posted - 15 Aug 2021 :  07:18:39  Show Profile  Visit jordanz's Homepage Send jordanz a Private Message  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by sno4wy

quote:
Originally posted by jordanz

She had the Geas spell placed on her preventing her from leaving the city...



Leaving by her own will. It doesn't affect if Guen takes her by Guen's will.



It does if that was her intent...
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Erikor
Seeker

Norway
60 Posts

Posted - 21 Aug 2021 :  23:07:41  Show Profile Send Erikor a Private Message  Reply with Quote
There are a lot of questions in this book. At one point Jarlaxle and Zak can levitate and uses that ability. At another time when that would be useful they don't for some reason and then later they levitate again.
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Kentinal
Great Reader

4684 Posts

Posted - 22 Aug 2021 :  04:17:18  Show Profile Send Kentinal a Private Message  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by Erikor

There are a lot of questions in this book. At one point Jarlaxle and Zak can levitate and uses that ability. At another time when that would be useful they don't for some reason and then later they levitate again.



Once per day rule?

Or alas the author deciding for the characters of when they even know they have the ability.
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CorellonsDevout
Great Reader

USA
2708 Posts

Posted - 26 Aug 2021 :  03:14:51  Show Profile Send CorellonsDevout a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Haven't read the book yet (and don't plan to. Relentless and interviews I saw with Bob have left a sour taste in my mouth), but I'm going to follow this thread lol.

Sweet water and light laughter
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deserk
Learned Scribe

Norway
237 Posts

Posted - 26 Aug 2021 :  23:48:00  Show Profile Send deserk a Private Message  Reply with Quote
I've read it and truth be told I was disappointed. I found the new drow community to be extremely bland and uninteresting. I was extremely eager to find out what it was like, and when I was presented it, I was extremely eager to get out of there. Their society is essentially utopian and perfect, with no internal issues (which are always the main ingredients for a crappy and uninteresting setting imo), and they have "arktos oroks" (arctic orcs, get it folks? Could've just called them "snorks") and arctic dwarves living amongst them in peace and harmony, as orcs and dwarves are wont to do, although virtually no character of either groups have any significance in this book. And yeah apparently this city in the furthest ever North (apparently North of the Great Glacier) has a population of 80,000 which is like four times the size of Menzoberranzan (which would make it one of the largest drow city known) and is composed of five boroughs like NYC (one of the boroughs is destroyed though) because RAS always has to bring in the real world contemporary influences. And of course there is not one single mention of any gods being worshipped here, because of course RAS' ideal society in a medieval/fantasy setting is of course one composed of atheists in a world where the gods are obviously real. No reference to Eilistraee nor the Dark Seldarine either. Also, no explanation or word of the Crown Wars.

Also, the names and the "untainted" drow language sound so extremely "off" and un-Realmsian. Essentially these drow speak a form of the "original" drow language that is supposed to be untainted from the Lower Planes, unlike that version of the drow language the other "evil" drow speak. And a lot of these Callidae drow have vaguely Italian-esque/Romanesque names and words, even their word for friend is literally "amico" (Italian word for friend). RAS might be a good at making entertaining stories (though this book didn't entertain me much) but he is a pretty lazy world builder.

Edited by - deserk on 26 Aug 2021 23:55:46
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Baltas
Senior Scribe

Poland
955 Posts

Posted - 27 Aug 2021 :  00:55:33  Show Profile Send Baltas a Private Message  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by deserk

Also, the names and the "untainted" drow language sound so extremely "off" and un-Realmsian. Essentially these drow speak a form of the "original" drow language that is supposed to be untainted from the Lower Planes, unlike that version of the drow language the other "evil" drow speak. And a lot of these Callidae drow have vaguely Italian-esque/Romanesque names and words, even their word for friend is literally "amico" (Italian word for friend). RAS might be a good at making entertaining stories (though this book didn't entertain me much) but he is a pretty lazy world builder.



RAS earlier gave Drow Italian elements - basing drow society, to a degree on darker aspects of a life of Italian minioroty in US, and Itallian mob (if misogyny exchanged for misandry):
https://www.polygon.com/2018/9/4/17819182/ra-salvatore-timeless-new-drizzt-novel-interview

quote:
Look, I grew up in a sexist, racist society. I grew up in an Italian neighborhood. Have you ever watched The Sopranos? That was my neighborhood. Only without the mob, but that was my neighborhood. It had the same attitudes about life. I grew up with five older sisters, and I saw what they had to endure. And they’re also where I got the idea for the bad matriarchal society of Menzoberranzan, but that’s a different thing.


http://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/nonfiction/interview-r-a-salvatore/
quote:
I went to the library, and I pulled out one of my favorite books of all time, Mario Puzo’s The Godfather, and that’s where I came up with the super-structure, if you will, of Menzoberranzan, from the Five Families of New York.


Though with Menzoberranzan and the Underdark drow in RAS' writing, the the Italian influence was much more subtle.

The issue is, we do know some things on uncorrupted "drow" or rather Dark Elf/Ssri-tel-quessir societies - (pre-Lolth) Ilythiir and Miyeritar.

quote:
Originally posted by deserk
Their society is essentially utopian and perfect, with no internal issues (which are always the main ingredients for a crappy and uninteresting setting imo), and they have "arktos oroks" (arctic orcs, get it folks? Could've just called them "snorks") and arctic dwarves living amongst them in peace and harmony, as orcs and dwarves are wont to do, although virtually no character of either groups have any significance in this book. And yeah apparently this city in the furthest ever North (apparently North of the Great Glacier) has a population of 80,000 which is like four times the size of Menzoberranzan (which would make it one of the largest drow city known)



About that, I read before the population of Calidae is 40,000. So are maybe there 40,000 Aevendrow, and the other 40,000 are other races (oroks, arctic dwarves etc)?

Edited by - Baltas on 27 Aug 2021 01:04:08
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sno4wy
Senior Scribe

USA
466 Posts

Posted - 27 Aug 2021 :  01:02:16  Show Profile Send sno4wy a Private Message  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by deserk
No reference to Eilistraee nor the Dark Seldarine either. Also, no explanation or word of the Crown Wars.



It's worse than that, actually. He's erased all of the existing lore about the drow and rewrote it as something altogether different. He first presented it in Relentless with Kimmuriel uses talk no jutsu to get Quenthel and Yvonnel 2.0 to remember, and then "confirmed" that was actual history by having the aevendrow remember the same thing. In Bob's FR canon, there were no Crown Wars and Eilistraee only exists to be mocked and denigrated. In his version, the drow went to the Underdark to escape oppression from the surface while the aevendrow broke away.
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CorellonsDevout
Great Reader

USA
2708 Posts

Posted - 27 Aug 2021 :  01:49:01  Show Profile Send CorellonsDevout a Private Message  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by deserk

And of course there is not one single mention of any gods being worshipped here, because of course RAS' ideal society in a medieval/fantasy setting is of course one composed of atheists in a world where the gods are obviously real. No reference to Eilistraee nor the Dark Seldarine either. Also, no explanation or word of the Crown Wars.



This is one of the things that has really soured me towards RAS' books. He's writing in a shared world, yet continually projects his ex-Catholic bitterness to the point where he makes even the good gods (Mielikki) bad. I've had my suspicions of this for a while, and then after Relentless and an interview I saw of him shortly after its release, it only confirmed my long-held suspicions. RAS thinks all religion is inherently bad, and he'll use any opportunity he can to make it so, even in a world that isn't his and where there is a wide range of deities.

It does make me wonder about the line from the summary of Starlight Enclave...something about "saving all souls". At the time, I thought maybe this had to do with the errata of the Wall, as both that and the book summary were released around the same time. But I'm also not sure if Bob would even touch the Wall.

It at least seems like he still keeps an afterlife. I liked how in Relentless, Yovnnel did say that souls are energy, and thus can't be destroyed (even though that isn't entirely accurate lore wise). It does make me wonder how the afterlife works in "Bob's Realms", as he clearly wants to get rid of the gods, but also seems to have an idea of heaven and hell.

Sweet water and light laughter
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sno4wy
Senior Scribe

USA
466 Posts

Posted - 27 Aug 2021 :  02:05:38  Show Profile Send sno4wy a Private Message  Reply with Quote
I think the "saving all souls" thing will be a what comes of all the philosophizing that Drizzt does in Starlight Enclave. Drizzt has returned from true transcendence so Bob's trying to make it so that he can't be an unreliable narrator because he's been to the afterlife and seen it all for himself. So Drizzt knows that what happened to him post-transcendence is a possible route after death, and it's a decidedly non-religious one. My thought is that this is how Bob plans to "save all souls" - from religion. The thing is, Bob seems to think that religion is exclusively about worshipping a deity, and that if a deity is taken out of the picture, that it isn't religion. I suppose the definition by text is religion = worship of a god, however in practice it's about a lot more than the god, I'd even go so far as to argue that people fundamentally don't care about whichever god their religion worships but rather uses it as an excuse to conduct themselves in the way that they do. Bob got really defensive when someone observed to him that Sharon's cocoon isn't religion, but when it scared Entreri straight by showing him that he's going to hell unless he repents, yeah, sorry, that's religion.
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Kentinal
Great Reader

4684 Posts

Posted - 27 Aug 2021 :  02:20:12  Show Profile Send Kentinal a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Religion : a specific fundamental set of beliefs and practices generally agreed upon by a number of persons or sects:

A religion does not require a deity, it does not even require more then one believer.

There has been a family sect in the US that might have 25 members following their interpenetration of the Bible (Maybe other tests as well, they made news a few times a few years ago because of protests.)

There are many examples of small groups having belief in things that most consider "off the wall" . not making sense or clearly a group to avoid.

"Small beings can have small wisdom," the dragon said. "And small wise beings are better than small fools. Listen: Wisdom is caring for afterwards."
"Caring for afterwards ...? Ker repeated this without understanding.
"After action, afterwards," the dragon said. "Choose the afterwards first, then the action. Fools choose action first."
"Judgement" copyright 2003 by Elizabeth Moon
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Erikor
Seeker

Norway
60 Posts

Posted - 16 Sep 2021 :  00:30:39  Show Profile Send Erikor a Private Message  Reply with Quote
This is not what I wanted this thread to be about. I just wanted to ask how Guen could teleport.
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CorellonsDevout
Great Reader

USA
2708 Posts

Posted - 16 Sep 2021 :  01:15:25  Show Profile Send CorellonsDevout a Private Message  Reply with Quote
You'll find in these halls that asking a question will often (though not always) lead to a broader discussion about the topic, in this case, the contents of Starlight Enclave.

Sweet water and light laughter
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Erikor
Seeker

Norway
60 Posts

Posted - 16 Sep 2021 :  03:03:05  Show Profile Send Erikor a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Okey, thanks for the heads up :)
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sleyvas
Skilled Spell Strategist

USA
11686 Posts

Posted - 16 Sep 2021 :  12:49:16  Show Profile Send sleyvas a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Then it will turn into gods sticking their thumbs up their butts.

Alavairthae, may your skill prevail

Phillip aka Sleyvas
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Delnyn
Senior Scribe

USA
883 Posts

Posted - 16 Sep 2021 :  22:22:01  Show Profile Send Delnyn a Private Message  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by Erikor

This is not what I wanted this thread to be about. I just wanted to ask how Guen could teleport.



Because RAS likes plot conveniences.

As far as the other topics brought up in this thread are concerned, you can learn a whole lot of unexpected things from the other scribes. I certainly have.
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Erikor
Seeker

Norway
60 Posts

Posted - 11 Dec 2021 :  09:33:14  Show Profile Send Erikor a Private Message  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by sno4wy

quote:
Originally posted by deserk
No reference to Eilistraee nor the Dark Seldarine either. Also, no explanation or word of the Crown Wars.



It's worse than that, actually. He's erased all of the existing lore about the drow and rewrote it as something altogether different. He first presented it in Relentless with Kimmuriel uses talk no jutsu to get Quenthel and Yvonnel 2.0 to remember, and then "confirmed" that was actual history by having the aevendrow remember the same thing. In Bob's FR canon, there were no Crown Wars and Eilistraee only exists to be mocked and denigrated. In his version, the drow went to the Underdark to escape oppression from the surface while the aevendrow broke away.



So the ssri-tel-quessir basically doesn't exist, even after what happened with Q'arlynd Melarn?
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Irennan
Great Reader

Italy
3802 Posts

Posted - 11 Dec 2021 :  09:40:43  Show Profile Send Irennan a Private Message  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by Erikor

quote:
Originally posted by sno4wy

quote:
Originally posted by deserk
No reference to Eilistraee nor the Dark Seldarine either. Also, no explanation or word of the Crown Wars.



It's worse than that, actually. He's erased all of the existing lore about the drow and rewrote it as something altogether different. He first presented it in Relentless with Kimmuriel uses talk no jutsu to get Quenthel and Yvonnel 2.0 to remember, and then "confirmed" that was actual history by having the aevendrow remember the same thing. In Bob's FR canon, there were no Crown Wars and Eilistraee only exists to be mocked and denigrated. In his version, the drow went to the Underdark to escape oppression from the surface while the aevendrow broke away.



So the ssri-tel-quessir basically doesn't exist, even after what happened with Q'arlynd Melarn?



If you're referring to the handful of transformed drow, they (and most of Lady Penitent) had already been retconned when RAS started this thing.

For the better IMHO: you don't need race changes, curses, demons, and whatnots to have different cultures. All those things defeat the meaning behind having good drow in general, and Eilistraee in particular, because they tie race and inherited curses to choice&behavior. They're also narratively shallow: choices and how people change to reach a goal are at the core of narrative, if you start associating external magical stuff to that, said core goes out of the window. What RAS is doing isn't much better, though.

If you're referring to the ancient Ssri'Tel, the pre-drow ones, then yeah, they're retconned, but WotC did that far before RAS in this case too.

Mathematics is the art of giving the same name to different things.

Edited by - Irennan on 11 Dec 2021 10:18:29
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Erikor
Seeker

Norway
60 Posts

Posted - 11 Dec 2021 :  15:22:45  Show Profile Send Erikor a Private Message  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by Irennan

quote:
Originally posted by Erikor

quote:
Originally posted by sno4wy

quote:
Originally posted by deserk
No reference to Eilistraee nor the Dark Seldarine either. Also, no explanation or word of the Crown Wars.



It's worse than that, actually. He's erased all of the existing lore about the drow and rewrote it as something altogether different. He first presented it in Relentless with Kimmuriel uses talk no jutsu to get Quenthel and Yvonnel 2.0 to remember, and then "confirmed" that was actual history by having the aevendrow remember the same thing. In Bob's FR canon, there were no Crown Wars and Eilistraee only exists to be mocked and denigrated. In his version, the drow went to the Underdark to escape oppression from the surface while the aevendrow broke away.



So the ssri-tel-quessir basically doesn't exist, even after what happened with Q'arlynd Melarn?



If you're referring to the handful of transformed drow, they (and most of Lady Penitent) had already been retconned when RAS started this thing.

For the better IMHO: you don't need race changes, curses, demons, and whatnots to have different cultures. All those things defeat the meaning behind having good drow in general, and Eilistraee in particular, because they tie race and inherited curses to choice&behavior. They're also narratively shallow: choices and how people change to reach a goal are at the core of narrative, if you start associating external magical stuff to that, said core goes out of the window. What RAS is doing isn't much better, though.

If you're referring to the ancient Ssri'Tel, the pre-drow ones, then yeah, they're retconned, but WotC did that far before RAS in this case too.



Thanks, I didn't know that. And I completely agree with you. Eilistraee is, in the way I see it, the one thing that might bring a drow to do some good and start thinking of something other then his/her self. The option of something else than Lolth and the evil matriarchy. That's just how I look at it though.
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Wooly Rupert
Master of Mischief
Moderator

USA
36779 Posts

Posted - 11 Dec 2021 :  16:26:35  Show Profile Send Wooly Rupert a Private Message  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by Erikor

Thanks, I didn't know that. And I completely agree with you. Eilistraee is, in the way I see it, the one thing that might bring a drow to do some good and start thinking of something other then his/her self. The option of something else than Lolth and the evil matriarchy. That's just how I look at it though.



I wouldn't say she's the *one* thing that could reform an evil drow -- it's just that she's the one most actively interested in such.

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sno4wy
Senior Scribe

USA
466 Posts

Posted - 11 Dec 2021 :  16:57:56  Show Profile Send sno4wy a Private Message  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by Irennan
If you're referring to the handful of transformed drow, they (and most of Lady Penitent) had already been retconned when RAS started this thing.

For the better IMHO: you don't need race changes, curses, demons, and whatnots to have different cultures. All those things defeat the meaning behind having good drow in general, and Eilistraee in particular, because they tie race and inherited curses to choice&behavior. They're also narratively shallow: choices and how people change to reach a goal are at the core of narrative, if you start associating external magical stuff to that, said core goes out of the window. What RAS is doing isn't much better, though.

If you're referring to the ancient Ssri'Tel, the pre-drow ones, then yeah, they're retconned, but WotC did that far before RAS in this case too.



One thing I've always thought about that transformation is, despite how it was made to seem like this great and liberating thing, it's actually pretty horrible for some of the drow that it happened to. Sure, it's all well and good if you're on the surface and/or in a community with other like-minded individuals, but what about those Miyeritari drow who were still in Lolthite cities? Suddenly, without warning, they get transformed into a surface elf, unable to see because the transformation would take away their darkvision. Even worse, they've spent their entire life carefully cultivating an identity to keep themselves alive, and then it's just all suddenly stripped away from them. Even if they're not in a Lolthite city but just hiding out in the Underdark, suddenly their innate tools for survival down there is taken away from them. Just seems so terribly thought out because of how horribly those individuals will suffer and die, in exchange for something that fundamentally didn't change much.
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Irennan
Great Reader

Italy
3802 Posts

Posted - 11 Dec 2021 :  17:24:47  Show Profile Send Irennan a Private Message  Reply with Quote
It's crap even for the surface drow. "You're not good enough in the skin you were born with, so I will now force a physical transformation on you, regardless of what you want, because that will make you good enough". Whoever thought of that needs to stop writing, seriously (and knowing the names, I can only say it's a good thing they no longer work on anything FR-related).

It's also crap for Eilistraee, who strives to help the drow understand that they have intrisincal worth as individuals, for what they are, that they don't need to conform to arbitrary standards to be considered people (which is what Lolth makes them believe through abuse), and who chose to be drow precisely because of that reason.


@Wooly
quote:
I wouldn't say she's the *one* thing that could reform an evil drow -- it's just that she's the one most actively interested in such.


Thing is, she's not even about reforming drow, she's about helping the drow heal from lifelong abuse, find a sense of safety and belonging, move forward towards fulfilling themselves (which is pretty unique to Eilistraee). Generally speaking, a drow who has this will no longer do the evil Lolthite things, because that stuff is nothing but a learned survival system, and to let go of flawed survival systems, you need to be put in a position where they fail because they're no longer needed. Like, Eilistraee's teachings all focus on how to relearn to enjoy life and feel safe in a community, not on "redeem yourself!!!1!", and as a goddess, as we read in Demihuman Deities, and as Elaine illustrates in Starlights and Shadows, she wants the drow to find and pursue their path in life.

But seriously, if you take a look at Eilistraee's ritual, they're all focused on stuff that helps people heal from abuse, ranging from communal songs and dances to rebuild a sense of synchrony, to the evensong that helps former Lolthites integrate the memories of what they went through as something that it's over, no longer happening (unlike traumatized brains are wired to believe), thus contributing to teaching them that they're safe and that they can look for things that make them feel fulfilled, rather than just safe.

Mathematics is the art of giving the same name to different things.

Edited by - Irennan on 11 Dec 2021 17:25:16
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TKU
Learned Scribe

USA
158 Posts

Posted - 11 Dec 2021 :  18:06:15  Show Profile Send TKU a Private Message  Reply with Quote
I don't know the exact details since I never got around to reading this series after I got a bit burned out on the conclusion to the 'Silence of Lolth' stuff in WoTSQ & this series seemed like it was a continuation of the stuff that I didn't like about that series as it went on but ramped up to 11....so I'm not 100% sure on a lot of the details, but out of curiosity, the transformation hit Lolth-worshiping Miyeritari drow as well?

I mean, the whole thing already makes me a bit queasy, with what I have gathered about it, what with the transformation being non-consensual, and the association with 'blood purity' as being a requirement for redemption, and the hammering home of the uncomfortable 'Mark of Ham' stuff and linking redemption to skin lightening**...ugh. But the notion that Lolth-worshipping Miyeritari drow might also be converted adds another layer of ick. Forcibly claiming dominion over people who don't even worship you (and infact despise you) and changing them physically against their will is something her *mother* would do and if that's how it played out...feels very evil to me and out of character IMO.

**What really bugs me about this particular racial supremacist stuff being presented positively here is that a form of it was already present in the setting within the Vhaerunian church as part of their creepy quasi-quiverfull/eugenics movement. And it was unequivocally and unmistakably presented as an evil thing. So I find it incredibly hard to believe (particularly since Vhaeraun was a part of that series) that nobody in the entire process was unaware what was going into the novel series. Someone should have called a meeting or something, brought it up, and stamped it out long before it got printed, much less made it into a culminating part of a three-part novel series.

Edited by - TKU on 11 Dec 2021 18:07:07
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Irennan
Great Reader

Italy
3802 Posts

Posted - 11 Dec 2021 :  18:36:48  Show Profile Send Irennan a Private Message  Reply with Quote
quote:
changing them physically against their will is something her *mother* would do and if that's how it played out...feels very evil to me and out of character IMO.


It doesn't just feel out of character, it undeniably is. In Demihuman Deities it's explicitly said that Eilistraee strives to never force a choice on the drow. She works to empower them to find fulfilment and joy, and Ed said that she owes to the concepts of artist and mother, who teaches the drow how to thrive in an environment that has become hostile to them. We also know that Eilistraee chose to be drow herself and has never even thought about changing their race, so she could never believe that idiocy about race (and she would never condemn the vast majority of drow to be considered "unwilling and to be cast down" to force a skin color change on a handful of people).

Erik Scott de Bie also said that Wizards considered getting people to dislike Eilistraee a win back then, and we know that the series is chock full of stuff that snipes Eilistraee's lore to turn it upside down in the worst way possible (like having her followers execute defenseless drow for no reason). Finally, Perkins said that the series had the goal to make Drizzt more special. So yeah, it's plain as the sun that the series was meant to smear Eilistraee, and there's a reason why WotC refuses to even acknowledge that series--it would ruin their reputation.

Mathematics is the art of giving the same name to different things.

Edited by - Irennan on 11 Dec 2021 18:41:44
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Wooly Rupert
Master of Mischief
Moderator

USA
36779 Posts

Posted - 11 Dec 2021 :  18:41:17  Show Profile Send Wooly Rupert a Private Message  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by TKU

I don't know the exact details since I never got around to reading this series after I got a bit burned out on the conclusion to the 'Silence of Lolth' stuff in WoTSQ & this series seemed like it was a continuation of the stuff that I didn't like about that series as it went on but ramped up to 11....so I'm not 100% sure on a lot of the details, but out of curiosity, the transformation hit Lolth-worshiping Miyeritari drow as well?

I mean, the whole thing already makes me a bit queasy, with what I have gathered about it, what with the transformation being non-consensual, and the association with 'blood purity' as being a requirement for redemption, and the hammering home of the uncomfortable 'Mark of Ham' stuff and linking redemption to skin lightening**...ugh. But the notion that Lolth-worshipping Miyeritari drow might also be converted adds another layer of ick. Forcibly claiming dominion over people who don't even worship you (and infact despise you) and changing them physically against their will is something her *mother* would do and if that's how it played out...feels very evil to me and out of character IMO.

**What really bugs me about this particular racial supremacist stuff being presented positively here is that a form of it was already present in the setting within the Vhaerunian church as part of their creepy quasi-quiverfull/eugenics movement. And it was unequivocally and unmistakably presented as an evil thing. So I find it incredibly hard to believe (particularly since Vhaeraun was a part of that series) that nobody in the entire process was unaware what was going into the novel series. Someone should have called a meeting or something, brought it up, and stamped it out long before it got printed, much less made it into a culminating part of a three-part novel series.



I would say that no one at WotC cared. WotC -- and TSR before them -- has a long history of insensitive things. And I'm not saying that was deliberate; I think a lot of it was simple ignorance. When the bulk of the audience fits into one category, and the designers themselves fit into the same category, it becomes really easy to not only focus on just that one category but to forget other categories even exist.

WotC has also gotten out of the mindset of "let's make money by developing a setting" and into the mindset of "Whatever makes money, do it." And when the focus is heavily on the bottom line, that makes other considerations even less important.

Between these two things, you wind up with exactly the material that wound up in these books.

Personally, I think the entire point of the War of the Spider Queen and the Lady Penitent stuff was to just sell more books. Even changing the drow and their pantheon was just to make that one character even more special, so they could sell more of him, too.

Among other things, I think the rough edges between the War of the Spider Queen books (like character personalities changing from book to book) is a reflection of the "just get it out there and sell it" mentality. I firmly believe that no one at WotC even read all the books together before publishing them, because a good editor could have smoothed out a lot of those rough transitions and made the books flow into each other much better.

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Irennan
Great Reader

Italy
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Posted - 11 Dec 2021 :  18:45:29  Show Profile Send Irennan a Private Message  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
And I'm not saying that was deliberate; I think a lot of it was simple ignorance. When the bulk of the audience fits into one category, and the designers themselves fit into the same category, it becomes really easy to not only focus on just that one category but to forget other categories even exist.



If you're ignorant about this stuff in 2008, then you're making the choice of being ignorant. In that sense, it's indeed deliberate.

If you don't stop and think about the implications of what you're writing (because it's not only about minorities, it's about sending a sh*tty message to everyone), you're choosing to not care, so it's deliberate in the same sense. I'd also say that if you're a writer, knowing stuff is integral part of your job--unless you want to be a worthless writer and not know what you write. In that case, it's still a choice.

Ignorance (in this age) or lack of care are choices too. Making money at the expense of everything else is a deliberate stance as well.

Mathematics is the art of giving the same name to different things.

Edited by - Irennan on 11 Dec 2021 18:53:57
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TKU
Learned Scribe

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Posted - 11 Dec 2021 :  20:16:36  Show Profile Send TKU a Private Message  Reply with Quote
"Whatever makes money, do it" would explain a lot of my problems with WoTSQ. I seem to remember from one of those Ed Greenwood podcasts him mentioning that (not clear if it was for a specific book or as a general policy) they told him he had to kill someone off every X number of pages, because I guess they felt that D&D had to be near constant combat to keep the reader's attention. Which is rather stupid IMO but the sort of design-by-committee sort of attitude that I can see resulting in a lot of the 'rough edges' in WotSQ.

Though I have to agree with Irennan to an extent, some of that stuff I think can't be explained away with the assumption that whoever was in charge 'didn't understand. I think after a certain point it becomes clear that it becomes more complex than that. The personal preferences of various people in charge or of writers themselves can be pointed to or at least inferred. Someone at the end of the day had to be aware of what Smedman was putting into the series, if they weren't directly involved as the one to give her marching orders to begin with-and I do wonder about that, particularly with the 5th edition stuff starting to sound familiar with the idea of making visibly (mechanically?) distinct subraces of good and evil drow. (Baldur's Gate III and the Dark Alliance 2 both having separate ideas of accomplishing this concurrent with the whole Udadrow/Aevendrow/Lorendrow reveal)
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Irennan
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Posted - 11 Dec 2021 :  22:50:44  Show Profile Send Irennan a Private Message  Reply with Quote
I meant something further than that. If your line of thought is "Whatever makes money, do it", then the presence of "racial purity" bullcrap in your stuff is deliberate, in the sense that you made the choice of not giving a flying about what ends up in your material, including stuff that anyone with experience in publishing/writing that wasn't hit by a stroke at some point in their life, would immediately recognize as tone deaf (to use an euphemism, that is).

Like, even if your motivation is "eh, it makes money", an editor like Athans will certainly notice the implication of that stuff--it's his job, and he was dealing with a trivial case, and I really doubt that the money-making part consisted of the racial purity bit. So, why not remove it, other than lack of care (or--worse, but I doubt it--approval of that stuff)? That's as deliberate as you get.
Vice-versa, if your line of thought is "eh, it makes money, so put it in regardless", then it's obviously deliberate.

There's really no way around this being deliberate, because a choice was made in any case--either to not care/be ignorant, or to still put that stuff in because they thought it would make money.

-------------------

If I had to give my personal opinion, since we know that they wanted to make Drizzt (and the PCs) the only real, super special, good drow (to sell more, because of preference, or both--whatever you have), maybe removing the drow pantheon wasn't enough to them. They had to get rid of the followers of Eilistraee as good drow too, and they went like "hey, what if we make the followers of Eilistraee no longer drow?"
They then proceeded to discard everything about Eilistraee's goal and relationship with her people in favor of a quite disgusting asspull.

Even then, the racial purity tones were clear, as in the books we see the Kiira ancestor thingy being all "it sucks to be drow, so you'll all be turned into brown elves" to Q'arlynd. Also Corellon accepting followers of Eilistraee in Arvandor *only* after their race was forcefully changed (because "ew, drow"), and labeling all the remaining drow as "unwilling and to be cast down" a priori. It's not that they didn't realize it, because they even outright *said* it in the books. You don't get more deliberate than this--they had the obvious implications slammed into their faces, and they still went on with this kind of joke.

Another possibility that I can see, if rather farfetched, is that since they were trying very hard to make Eilistraee look like she isn't really good, they thought that attaching this racial stuff to her would be the surefire way to make people think that Drizzt had been the only *real* good drow all along, while Eilistraee is just a hypocrite. This would be deliberate too.

Mathematics is the art of giving the same name to different things.

Edited by - Irennan on 11 Dec 2021 23:04:46
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