Drow and surface elves

[RandomNPC]

so, when the dark elves go out slave hunting and they catch themselves some pale skinned surface elves, intended for slavery, not slaughter, how do they treat them?

now i know they hate surface elves the most, therefore worst treatment, but my wife is bugging me enough to um... make your own comparison for bugging lots.

so human slaves in Salvatores novels are blinded and deafened, usually violently. probably silenced too. other books i've read just have general hate and whatnot.

so if there is an elf slave, is it just a target of violence and weapons practice? test subject? (this product not tested on animals) what kinda long term service and a surface elf slave provide to drow?

[Sornjss Lichdom]

I always infered that they killed them on the spot, their haterd running so deep that blind rage took them and they merely slaughtered them on the spot. It was the greatest betrayal to converse at all with the surface elves.

[Fax Celestis]

How vile are you looking to get? Really, it depends on the comfort level of those in the game, not what makes actual sense.

Realistically, it could go all the way up to sex-slavery, forced labor in unsafe conditions, sacrifice to appease the darker forces of Underdark--you know, the ones the drow are scared of--target practice, being food, or mindless slaughter for the hell of it.

Most gamers would probably be uncomfortable with all of those if they were on more than a passing level. If that is indeed the case, I would say send the surfacedwellers into the mines and have them be simple chained laborers. If not, the drow should treat them like objects to be possessed and used as they see fit. "Brothels", if you will, of attractive surfacers may even be an accepted form of entertainment--as might putting a surfacer in a pit with, say, a drider or three.

But the question really is: how comfortable are your players with the Spanish Inquisition or the Roman persecution of the Christians?

[JackMage666]

Not a fan of drow, myself, but my understanding is instant death.

Oh, and a Blinded/Deafned slave wouldn't be all that useful... How're you supposed to tell them what to do? And, they'd more than likely lose the desire to live, making them horrible slaves. There has to be some hope to breed productivity.

[RandomNPC]

from what i understand about the blinded and deafened, they are either made to stay in an area and given one job to do, then blinded and deafened, or some kind of telepaty spell is employed.

my wife is trying to get an idea of what they would do, not neccisarily in game, its more one of those "if they were real, and really met, with no DM to stop them, what would happen?" the only string attatched is the slavery not slaughter one.

i keep saying sacrifice, slaughter, or test subject for new potentially turning you inside out spells. but apparently i didn't understand when i read the part about drow and surface elves trying to slaughter eachother on sight, unless under some extreme circumstance.

to put it bluntly, yes, they would do all the things to them that gamers aren't comfortable with, and then kill them by doing it untill thier poor elf bodies cant take it anymore, then after they die do it some more just to show how much they hate elves, right? (and if doing that doesn't please Lolth they pass the blame to the surface elf as well)

[Citizen Joe]

Surface elves get whacked before they can open their mouths... period.

As to the slaves... I can't imagine what a magic intense, racial supremicist race would do with deaf/blind slaves... other than sacrifice. Blind makes sense since they can't see underground anyway. Deafening just makes it more difficult for the slave drivers. Sex slaves for the drow themselves is unlikely, they would consider it bestiality. However, keeping sex slaves to be rewards to obedient slaves may be possible. Breeding stock may also be possible to renew the slave pool, although capturing more may be easier. They may also be used to demonstrate vital weaknesses in opponents, living combat dummies. Possibly hosts to grow certain symbiotes.

[LongVin]

Surface Elves- Would either be killed outright or if they were captured would be sent to the Temples of Lolth ot be sacrificed to the Spider Queen.

As for other slaves such as Humans, they are normally kept performing craftsman tasks but according to the original Drow of the Underdark(2nd edition) they do not last long in the environment since they can't see and are not used to the hardships placed upon them by Drow.

Dwarves(and I also believe Deep Gnomes) are normally killed outright since they are considered too hard to control and a danger to those around them.

And some races are just considered below servitiude. Kobolds are too hard to control, too small, too numerous and too free willed to be of much use to most houses. Only the Psionic House(who name leaves me) in Menzoberrenzan employed Kobolds, but they had THOUSANDS of them.

[Stormcrow]

I read one of the Best of the Realms books recently that said they are prized for the "Coming of Age" ceremonies of the Drow. Where the young drow is sent out into the underdark near their home city to hunt some specific quarry. Apparently surface elves who are out of their depth are a real treat.

[de-trick]

I'd say tortured like cutting off a limb then letting him live once they healed cut off another limb, or cutting a deep wound multiply times

[TheOOB]

Drow are fairly sadistic to start with, so their slave masters and torturers would be especially horrible. Like Fax said, it's really how creepy you want to get, at the light end expendable labor, at the dark end many things I shouldn't mention here. The book of vile darkness has some things on such subjects.

[Hawriel]

I dont really see the mistery about how a drow would treat an inslaved moon elf. Seeing about how drow generaly regared them I see two simple posibilities. Brutaly and gleefully killing them. Or well Just look up what the Nazies and Japanies did to thoughs they saw as inferior during WW2. Foced slave labor, then death, experimentations often resulting in death, killing for sport, vile sex acts, sacrafise to lolth. Seeing as how the drow have been portrayed in just about every book they are in, I dont see mutch difference between them and hard core SS or Japanies soldier in unit 317 or any whare els in main land china. Studdying history can give you a grim veiw of what peaple are capable of. oh and you could also read afew books on slavery in the US.

Again the Drow are ment to be depraved as a species, it is a black and white fantacy game after all.

[TheOOB]

Drow are worse then WWII Germany, Russia, or Japan. Unlike humans, who have a few horribly sadistic people who pervert others, your average drow is quite sadistic already, so a particularly sadistic drow goes well beyond human capacity. Also, drow have magic, and are frantically loyal to a goddess who encourages them to do horrible things, add this to the fact that they have hundreds of years to think of horrible things to do, and that their society has been like this for thousands of years and you got some sick stuff going on that we couldn't even imagine.

[Paragon Badger]

If Drow are keeping anyone for slavery, ESPECCIALLY surface elves... it's not because they want any labor or work done, it's because they want them to suffer. (Edit: I wrote surface again. <_<)

Imagine, a surface elf could live for hundreds of years... And I bet Drow would like nothing less for every one of those years to be filled with torment.

At the very tamest, they could be locked up in a lightless room, fastened immovably to a wall via chains with a ring of sustenence, never to see another living being ever again.

People would be traumatized after days of that, a little crazy in weeks, and downright mega insane after months.

...Years? Decades? Centuries?

[Guy_Whozevl]

I figure that the general animosity between both drow and surface elves results in a kill-on-sight policy for both sides. In rare circumstances, surface elves may be take to drow cities for sacrifices. On the other side, surface elves may take a drow prisoner to extract information, but probably killing him afterwards.
Drows enslave the more animalistic humanoids, such as goblins and such; dwarves, humans, gnomes, etc. are probably killed on sight or sacrificed. I do remember that in Menzoberranzan (sp?) there were duegar traders, but it seemed relations were bad between the races aside from that.

[TheThan]

I can easily imagine that surface elf slaves could be used as “live practice” for their warriors. Imagine that they are given a weapon and set in a pit, then a door opens and a drow warrior enters intent on testing his mettle against this slave (regardless of the slaves skill with said weapon). Naturally the Drow would have all the advantages, such as lack of light (darkvision 120 ft), magical arms and armor, and probably beneficial enchantments pre-cast on him.