Concealing an Aberration

[Ninja Chocobo]

In an upcoming campaign, I plan to play a Drider. However, my DM informs me that NPCs will, by default, be aggressive to me. (Note: I don't view this as him discriminating against me, just roleplaying the NPCs well.) My question is this: How would I go about hiding the fact I'm a Drider from others. Alter Self would be the obvious answer, but the duration could become a problem if I hang out in cities.

[Jasdoif]

Off the top of my head, a hat of disguise with magic aura should prevent problems in casual situations.

Remember that an elan is an aberration despite its humanoid appearance, so alter self (and thus the hat of disguise) can work despite the restriction on appearing to be a creature of the same type.

[Zincorium]

In an upcoming campaign, I plan to play a Drider. However, my DM informs me that NPCs will, by default, be aggressive to me. (Note: I don't view this as him discriminating against me, just roleplaying the NPCs well.) My question is this: How would I go about hiding the fact I'm a Drider from others. Alter Self would be the obvious answer, but the duration could become a problem if I hang out in cities.

Alter self wouldn't really do much in a core campaign, as you could only turn into something of the same creature type, and most aberrations are just as discriminated against as you will be anyway. The disguise use could theoretically work, as it's a bonus of +10 and the check to be a different race is, by the book, only -2, but most DMs will at the very least assign a much, much higher penalty if not ban this outright.

Also, you're large. This is hard to hide.

Best things to do are to see about either a polymorph or invisibility spell when in civilized areas. Nothing of lesser stature is going to work consistently enough for a normal game.

Best solution:
See about becoming an Elan (expanded psionics handbook or SRD) with alter self, and look into extend spell and persistent spell when you get high enough level, and just stay away from people most of the time. Elans look human enough that you're not going to get a lot of suspicion, but remember than anyone who uses true seeing will probably freak out.

Edit: a hat of disguise won't do much for you, as it replicates the spell disguise self, which is simply not going to cut it in this instance.

[Jasdoif]

Edit: a hat of disguise won't do much for you, as it replicates the spell disguise self, which is simply not going to cut it in this instance.

Gah! Saw the wrong "... self" spell.

My suggestion is now "yeah, what Zincorium said".

[Fizban]

See about having a magic item similar to the hat of disguise that instead uses alter self. There's a number of ways you could limit it, but if you really want to be specific just go with what it's meant to do: a means of disguising aberrations into looking more like humans to hide in society. Probably made by mind flayers. A belt that when activated transforms a wearer of the aberration type into an elan until the command is given to change back. Such a specific use should be able to cut the cost by at least 50%, down to maybe 6,000gp.

[Ninja Chocobo]

Zincorium: I don't know what book Persistent Spell is in, but I don't have it.
Fizban: Sounds good. That custom magic item would solve my problems well.

[daggaz]

Hide? Why hide? Be proud of your troubled, yet splendant racial heritage. Go to drider-power parades and marches. Fight the chains of a racist and overbearing society. Hunt and kill the drow, hanging them from your webs and sucking the delicious juices from their still twitching bodies. Fear nobody.

[Ninja Chocobo]

Generally speaking, daggaz, I would agree with you. However, everyone trying to kill you on sight makes it slightly more difficult.

[Caduceus]

In the first session I ever played of DnD, there was an orc in the party. To avoid this very situation, the DM gave the orc a special cloak that made him appear to any given individual as their own race.

Granted, that wasn't 3.5 (or even 3E), so that won't work in this case. I'd say listen to the above suggestions.