Drow poison: not what I expected

[The Shadowdove]

Hey everyone, thanks for taking a look.

I have been considering throwing some drow at my 'very' confident players in an upcoming series of sessions.

Here's the DMG version of the drow sleep poison.

Drow Poison (Injury). This poison is typically made only by the draw, and only in a place far removed from sunlight. A creature subjected to this poison must succeed on a DC 13 Constitution saving throw or be poisoned for 1 hour. If the saving throw fails by 5 or more, the creature is also unconscious while poisoned in this way. The creature wakes up if it takes damage or if another creature takes an action to shake it awake.




This seems a lot less potent than the famously feared drown poison mentioned in the legends.

The poison in forgotten realms books is far more effective than the 5e version.

Powerful warriors are instantly put to sleep with one dart often.

I will no fail to also mention that crow often ambush with multiple darts due to numbers... Making this more potent with more attackers simultaneously applying the condition...

However, the drow sleep poison is supposed to be one of the most potent poisons commonly known; and considerably more expensive to make anywhere aside from the under dark.

So potent and vulnerable to the sun, that precautions must be made to keep it from losing its strength (due to exposure to the sun) by those above ground.


Perhaps I'm just biased..

I certainly am not the most learned or experienced in terms of d&d.

Yet I don't think a dc of 13 for a mere "poisoned " condition with a dc of 8 for sleep is quite as fearful as I'd imagined or experienced in previous editions.



What so you think? And please, keep it mature if you disagree with someone else's post. This is a mature discussion, not an invite to flame others who are kind enough to take the time to share their advice, concerns, opinions, or reason why they flat out think it's fine as it is and that I am wrong in my interpretation.


Thank you in advance. I look forward to see what you all think!

-Dove

[ZenBear]

I absolutely agree. A drow warrior is what, CR 1/4? They're supposed to be incredibly deadly fighters with decades of training and skill enough to survive and thrive in the Underdark, and yet the average warrior is no more deadly than a human town guard?

[KnightOfV]

A year or two back I ran a Pathfinder game with drow at low levels. The drow were level two Rangers i think, NPC stats. Party was level three and outnumbered the drow with better stats. With only a longbow, drow poison, and pathfinder's poison stacking rules, by the end of the fight, half of the party was unconscious, one was killed by a drow coup de grace, and the last two were fighting desperately knowing that if they ran the drow would just hunt them down. NPC had to come aid them to prevent a party wipe. Definitely put the fear of drow in them. Party didn't even loot the bodies after, just let the corpses and all their stuff be burned.



This poison is really, really scary


Type poison (injury); Save Fortitude DC 13

Frequency 1/minute for 2 minutes

Initial Effect unconsciousness for 1 minute; Secondary Effect unconsciousness for 2d4 hours; Cure 1 save

Miss one save and bam, out of the fight. Not asleep. Unconscious. Unconscious in PF means no way to be woken unless you have smelling salts or house rule an anti-venom. Miss that save twice, and you're done adventuring for the day while you take a 5 hour nap that again, has no way in the rules to be woken from.

And with pathfinder the DC is 13 for the first arrow, but the next is 15, then 17....

If you want the PCs to fear Drow. That is how you do it.

The 5th Ed poison is certainly more balanced, it makes it less likely that there is a party wipe, but i don't really like the idea that super rare drow poison can just be 'shaken off' by some slaps to the face now. I would want to keep the save at 13 at least, and make it impossible to awaken from until the poison runs its course. This will make players angry if they don't like being taken out of combat by bad rolls, be warned. But they will think twice before going after Drow again. :smallwink:

[Ziegander]

pathfinder's poison stacking rules

A link, pray tell? I've never heard of this until now, and I've done some amateur design work for PF.

[Ralanr]

If it's supposed to help showcase the difference between a normal person and an PC...then why the hell are drow making poison that's not very effective against people of PC level?

[KnightOfV]

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/afflictions/poison

Paragraph for "Multiple doses of poison"

Always thought it was a neat new rule.

[GiantOctopodes]

please, keep it mature if you disagree with someone else's post. This is a mature discussion, not an invite to flame others who are kind enough to take the time to share their advice, concerns, opinions, or reason why they flat out think it's fine as it is and that I am wrong in my interpretation.


Thank you in advance. I look forward to see what you all think!

-Dove

Thank you for that!

So, here's my take:

I think that it's fine as is, for its cost and everything. The massively upgraded AOE sleep poison Essence of Ether being available for 300 vs the Drow poison's 200GP doesn't make too much sense, but I will say that at low levels (1-5) I personally used it quite a bit and found it reasonably effective, though it failed far more often than I would have liked. Nonetheless, I would not want it to not be available at all, as it fills a useful role as a starter non-lethal poison. Here are my personal recommendations:

1) Rename it simply "Sleep Poison", generically, otherwise leave it the same.

2) Introduce a new poison, "Drow Sleep Poison", costing 1000GP, which loses its potency if it is exposed to the sun for more than a minute, it must thus be carefully handled. It is an injury poison, it requires a DC 18 Con check or the creature is poisoned for 4 hours. The poisoned creature is also unconscious. They cease being unconscious if they are injured.

3) -Alternately- Drop the DC, maybe as low as 13 (but probably higher than 8), and modify the price accordingly, while adding this rule which I think makes a lot of sense for poisons in general:
"When making a saving throw against a poison which does not inflict damage, the creature suffers a cumulative -1 penalty for each previous save made within X time (same day? Since short or long rest? An hour? Not sure), whether that save was successful or unsuccessful". This makes it so that as more and more poison gets loaded into a creature's system, they have less and less of a chance of passing the save, until it eventually just becomes impossible, which fits both reality and the literature.

[Knaight]

It seems pretty reasonable to me. It's a nasty weapon that could easily turn a fight, and while the drow are supposed to be dangerous and have a nasty poison, that's in comparison to normal people. A volley of darts from stealth followed by half the people hit falling unconscious is plenty terrifying. Each successful poisoning that is countered immediately effectively eats two enemy actions (one lost by the unconscious party, one by the person waking them up), and in a combat situation it could easily have a much larger effect when waking up a comrade pronto isn't particularly viable.

Even against higher level opponents, this is effective. The current saving throws will leave people with lower saves even at high level. Constitution tends to be a higher stat, but plenty of classes don't have it trained and will often have +2 or +3. Even a mid-level character with proficiency will often only be at +6.

Mathwise, at DC 8 to avoid being knocked asleep instantly (which is a very powerful poison effect), someone with +6 has a 95% chance to resist, someone with +3 an 80% chance to resist, and someone with +2 a 75% chance to resist. That's just for one dart though.

With two darts, those drop to a 90.25% chance, a 64% chance, and a 56.25% chance. With three, 85.74%, 51.20%, and 42.19%. Some powerful warrior met with ten successful dart hits in an ambush is probably going right down.

[GiantOctopodes]

Mathwise, at DC 8 to avoid being knocked asleep instantly (which is a very powerful poison effect), someone with +6 has a 95% chance to resist, someone with +3 an 80% chance to resist, and someone with +2 a 75% chance to resist. That's just for one dart though.

With two darts, those drop to a 90.25% chance, a 64% chance, and a 56.25% chance. With three, 85.74%, 51.20%, and 42.19%. Some powerful warrior met with ten successful dart hits in an ambush is probably going right down.

I'm fine with it taking 2, 6, or even 20 or more darts to take someone down. However a person with a total of +8 has a 100% chance to resist, and that's possible as low as level 5. Being hit by 40 darts and them having no effect strains credulity for me a bit, which is why I'd personally rather not have any creatures be immune to poison (by having a save bonus higher than the DC) unless they're actually immune to poison. Enough bee stings will kill you, and all that.

Thus my preference for a system that penalizes creatures the more they're exposed to it. Just my personal preference.

[SharkForce]

natural 1 always fails a save.

anyways, looks pretty nasty to me. poisoned is a pretty unpleasant condition to inflict, and once that goes through they're even more likely to drop unconscious.

[GiantOctopodes]

natural 1 always fails a save.

anyways, looks pretty nasty to me. poisoned is a pretty unpleasant condition to inflict, and once that goes through they're even more likely to drop unconscious.

Where do you get that from? As far as I can tell, nat 1 and nat 20 are only auto failure and auto success (respectively) on an attack rolls, not ability checks or saves. Have I missed something somewhere?

Also, fwiw poisoned causes disadvantage on ability checks and attack rolls, not saves. Not trying to jump all over your response or anything, just letting you know. And yes definitely, even still poisoned is certainly a nasty condition to have.

Edit: Though certainly making a 1 an auto fail on a save is a viable alternative to my stacking penalty system. It has the advantage of far less bookkeeping, too. It does have the disadvantage, however (in my mind) of having the expected number of hits before they go down even out at "only fails on a nat 1", which averages to about 14 rolls before it's statistically likely they'll fail, instead of the number of hits needed depending on how far above the save DC they are. I will point out that there are relatively few creatures in the MM who have a +8 or better con save, and many of them are immune to poison or sleep anyway, so this is really all about the PCs for me.

[Mellack]

natural 1 always fails a save.



Are you sure on that? I don't see it stated under Saving Throws in the PH. As far as I can see, only attacks have the automatic miss on a one. Skills and saves seem to be ok, if you have a big enough bonus.

[Naanomi]

When you put drow in the list of common PC races you sort of need to drop the 'every one of their warriors is an ancient, super-powered ninja warrior dripping in racial magic items' schtick or wonder why PC drow are the worst equipped, least trained, and generally pathetic members of their species

[Yagyujubei]

poison is nerfed HARD in this edition, the DCs should be a bit higher if you ask me. you can beat a 13 at level 1 reliably as a CON proficient character which is ridiculous. should be 15 at least, and should have a refine option to allow the DC to get high to a max of 18 imho.

[cobaltstarfire]

When you put drow in the list of common PC races you sort of need to drop the 'every one of their warriors is an ancient, super-powered ninja warrior dripping in racial magic items' schtick or wonder why PC drow are the worst equipped, least trained, and generally pathetic members of their species

I don't think that schtick really sticks anyway. Individually, most are just house cannon fodder that likely die before they even manage to reach level two. The super ninja drow are probably just a higher level on account of not dieing in their near constant raids on each other.


I think the part of the poison that causes sleep could use a higher DC (like a 10 maybe?). 13 is pretty decent for 1-5, longer against characters who aren't proficient? (this is more my feel of DC's through experience though, which isn't really the best metric out there)

[Rhaegar14]

I'm fine with it taking 2, 6, or even 20 or more darts to take someone down. However a person with a total of +8 has a 100% chance to resist, and that's possible as low as level 5. Being hit by 40 darts and them having no effect strains credulity for me a bit, which is why I'd personally rather not have any creatures be immune to poison (by having a save bonus higher than the DC) unless they're actually immune to poison. Enough bee stings will kill you, and all that.

Thus my preference for a system that penalizes creatures the more they're exposed to it. Just my personal preference.

Emphasis mine.

Okay, that might be theoretically possible, but in practice no character is going to have that at level 5. In order to have a +8 at level 5 you would need to have a +5 Constitution modifier and proficiency in Constitution saving throws. Which means that you probably had to have 18 Constitution at character creation, and have put your ASI in to Constitution to bring it to 20. So for starters, the possibility is right out if you're using point-buy. Even if you're rolling dice, very few characters are going to roll enough high ability scores that they'll sink a 16/17/18 into Constitution (depending on racial ability modifiers), and then even FEWER characters are going to prioritize Constitution over their attack stat and feats for their very first ASI.

I won't disagree that the DC is a little bit low, but you make it a bigger problem than it is. A typical Con-trained character is going to have +5 at 5th level, maybe +6.

@OP: as someone who has read the Forgotten Realms books, I'm gonna make a different argument here. Yes, the books describe it as very potent poison, but having to make a difficult-to-impossible saving throw ONE TIME to not be knocked unconscious is not fun for players. You want me to fear Drow, use some of the other stuff that makes Drow scary. Make your players fight them in the dark (and make the Drow target anybody they see casting Light), have the Drow use the ambush tactics and spellcasters they're so fond of. Harry the players again and again using terrain the Drow are familiar with, never allowing themselves to be drawn in to extended combat but never allowing the characters to rest either. Being completely knocked out of the encounter because they got hit by one crossbow bolt before they even knew they were under attack is not fun at all, and more importantly, it doesn't teach your players what you want them to learn; that they shouldn't always be confident. Instead, you'll end up teaching your players that the only way you can beat them is by being cheap. I don't think that's the message you want to send.

[Hawkstar]

If it's supposed to help showcase the difference between a normal person and an PC...then why the hell are drow making poison that's not very effective against people of PC level?

Because all their test subjects are NPCs, and thus they can't properly calibrate the potency of the poison. And most tests against bona fide PCs end in disaster for the drow and inconclusive results.

Seriously - there are a lot of problems with trying to formulate anti-PC poisons.
First of them is sample size - there are rarely more than 5 of them in any given world, and they're all together. They also tend to have wild discrepencies in stats and poison-resistant capabilities that are not always obvious at first glance (Is that a dwarf, or a very angry hobbit or short angry human?. Do they have Con 10 or Con 18? What about proficiency?) So, you need to find a way to get a large number of samples from this small pool. But the problem with this is that, if you arrange an environment controlled enough to get conclusive results, more often than not you deprive the PCs of agency enough to turn them into either NPCs (And not governed by the rules that protect PCs), or Player Characters, which have probability results skewed by excessive use of DM Fiat and dice fudging.

And then... you also have your research teams. Encounters with PCs tend to be extremely traumatic, and the survivors of such tests may have their data corrupted by the harrowing experiences of dealing with PCs. And, most encounters with PCs don't last long enough to generate enough points of data that they can't all be dismissed as noise.


Oh yeah... and then the payoff. If you do manage to, after centuries of careful research and a horrific number of casualties in the research/security departments, you do manage to create an ability that's extremely effective against PCs of a certain level range... you earn yourself a CR boost, moving the goddamn goalposts again.

The smart thing to do is to try to not factor PCs into your plans, because nothing can survive an encounter with the PCs. Just be on really good terms with your god when the PCs roll up, because you're going to be seeing it very soon.

[Knaight]

I'm fine with it taking 2, 6, or even 20 or more darts to take someone down. However a person with a total of +8 has a 100% chance to resist, and that's possible as low as level 5. Being hit by 40 darts and them having no effect strains credulity for me a bit, which is why I'd personally rather not have any creatures be immune to poison (by having a save bonus higher than the DC) unless they're actually immune to poison. Enough bee stings will kill you, and all that.

Yes, but this isn't a problem with the poison so much as with the system as a whole. Other than damage there's not much that can do the whole death by a thousand cuts thing; status effects are either a simple Boolean or a short list of states. A fundamentally different die system, or save system, or something like that would do a better job here. If poison is really fundamental and deserving of its own mechanics, something like another HP system where the poison has an attack and damage roll could do the trick; as is that's too much work for too little gain.

With that said, a quick patch would be to remove the poison damage, and have the 8 be instantly asleep, with 8-13 imposing some sort of tired condition.

[PoeticDwarf]

I absolutely agree. A drow warrior is what, CR 1/4? They're supposed to be incredibly deadly fighters with decades of training and skill enough to survive and thrive in the Underdark, and yet the average warrior is no more deadly than a human town guard?

A normal Drow is CR 1/4, a warrior is way more powerful than a knight...

[ImSAMazing]

A long, long, very long, time ago(3 months), me and my party were chased by Drow. They were with like 25, and if you get 25 arrows at you and 16 hit, you will never ever make all the saving throws unless you are at lvl 9+. It's not strong on it's own, but when used by multiple warriors at a time...

[1Forge]

Yeah just have the drow coat arrows in this stuff and bombard the party from 100 ft away, if they dont die they will be poisoned, and if they survive both the drow warriors will come and mop up. Also just rule if your DM that those stats are for surface made-equivilants actual drow poison is twice as effective (so basically drop the 5 to a 2 and raise the DC to 15, then they have to exeed a DC 13 check to not fall asleep and 15 to not be poisoned)