Post/Author/DateTime	Post
yossarius 04-29-06, 06:41 PM	After watching a documentary on grave robbers, I started thinking about how to apply it to my game. I imagined a senario where a few tribes of drow in Xen'drik develop socially enough to realize that adventurers are stealing their legacy, and how that might play out. I started picturing drow who live in ruins scattered throughout the continent, actively protecting them rather than just seeing the ruins as just another part of their tribe's territory. This might be used to create treasure hunts with a Indiana Jones kind of feel, where the adventurers more or less sprint through a set of ruins, fighting running battles while trying to pick up what little treasure they can, rather than clearing out each room one at a time. Does anyone else run the drow in their game with this point in mind? I think I may allow my players to capture a drow who explains to them how they are stealing his culture, to see how they respond to it.
Charles Phipps 04-29-06, 07:29 PM	I tried this, utterly didn't work. "You know what. I don't care WHAT they think. These aren't Drow ruins, they're Giant Ruins and this is as much if not moreso my heritage than it is their own. So if they try and get themselves killed keeping me from showing the world where humans came from then I'm going to gun them down." Then he shot a few extra crossbow bolts into the corpses for emphasis.
nihility 04-29-06, 10:08 PM	I tried this, utterly didn't work. "You know what. I don't care WHAT they think. These aren't Drow ruins, they're Giant Ruins and this is as much if not moreso my heritage than it is their own. So if they try and get themselves killed keeping me from showing the world where humans came from then I'm going to gun them down." Then he shot a few extra crossbow bolts into the corpses for emphasis. :rofl:
ChimericalWolf 04-30-06, 01:03 AM	There is already a hint of this with Hobgobbos and old Dhakaani ruins. The Heirs of Dhakaan, as detailed in the last Dragonshard, take just this kind of offence to the raiding of old Dhakaani tombs. I used this as a reason why my players didn't have a day or two to prepare for an exploratory raid on a tomb in the depths of Sharn. If they waited too long, the Hobs would find out, and defend it from the scum gutting their heritage.
Flack Jack 04-30-06, 05:34 AM	I would just like to comment on your title rather than the drow situation. One thing that differs between real world and fantasy tombs is the air supply. At lower levels characters might come under the effect of high altitude complications as described in the DM's Guide or Frostburn do to a lack of oxygen. As for drow I could see them guarding the ruins if influenced by a giant who despite civilization get crunch them easily enough for dominance. But what if there is no giant? Many native peoples sell off the phisical remains of there history for wealth as they are tipically found in peripheral countries to the industrial ones. But drow are not in enough freindly contact with the people of Khorvaire in most situations for this to be probable.
DarkWarriorKarg 04-30-06, 11:18 AM	There is already a hint of this with Hobgobbos and old Dhakaani ruins. The Heirs of Dhakaan, as detailed in the last Dragonshard, take just this kind of offence to the raiding of old Dhakaani tombs. I used this as a reason why my players didn't have a day or two to prepare for an exploratory raid on a tomb in the depths of Sharn. If they waited too long, the Hobs would find out, and defend it from the scum gutting their heritage. It's not quite the same, though. The Goblinoids DID build those ruins. The see it as Egyptians saw the Brits: "Hey, that's our PAST you're taking away from us!" The Drow? Former slaves of the builders. They're squatters. Didn't belong to them in the first place. I'd be perfectly happy to leave all Drow ruins alone.
DoveArrow 04-30-06, 10:33 PM	It's funny that you should mention it, because I am fascinated with the civilization of the Etruscan Empire; a real world civilzation that existed in the Mediterranean some time before the Roman Empire. Unfortunately, we know very little about the civilization today because during the Napoleonic regime, many of France's upper class citizens would make outings of pilfering the tombs of the Etruscans; smashing clay pots and destroying old manuscripts in search of jewelry and other trinkets. Now, other than a few name inscriptions on walls and a handful of documents, almost nothing exists of Etruscan writing today, and as a result we must rely on secondhand accounts from Roman historians, such as Herodotus, and a sparse archaeological record to piece together what remains of this remarkable culture. In Eberron, it's very much the same way. Morgrave University hires adventurers all the time to explore ancient giant settlement in the lands of X'endrik. However, these adventurers, not being archaeologists, can do little more than plunder a site; destroying sealed chests, ancient tombs, religious and scholarly writings, in the search of magical artifacts and treasure. If these practices continue, before long there will be nothing left of these ancient sites. As a result, if I were to make an adventure around this concept, I would probably have Wynarn University hire the PCs to protect a recently excavated X'endrik site, not from the horrors below, but from unscrupulous adventurers in the employ Morgrave University who would stop at nothing to pilfer the tombs.
Gez 05-03-06, 06:00 PM	I tried this, utterly didn't work. "You know what. I don't care WHAT they think. These aren't Drow ruins, they're Giant Ruins and this is as much if not moreso my heritage than it is their own. So if they try and get themselves killed keeping me from showing the world where humans came from then I'm going to gun them down." Then he shot a few extra crossbow bolts into the corpses for emphasis. I can't buy him a drink, so give that player a freebie action point from me. :D
Roxlimn 05-03-06, 10:01 PM	Conversely, you could have Dhakaani explorers destroying Galifar records and relics in their quest to dredge out their ancient relics and sites, or even neo-Dhakaani goblins who claim that the kingdom of Galifar is egalitarian, so its relics are as much theirs as any other race. Then the adventurers have to figure out a way to stop Dhakaani raids from destroying culture-rich sites while their own governments are too busy thinking about new ways to make war to care.