I mod for Morrowind and I see a lot of requests for Drow Mods and Drow Mod WIP's. A Drow is basically a Dark Elf, right? If the Dunmer are Dark Elves, the should be same or similar to the Drow, right?

I was just curious,

Lady Galadriel

They don't have anything in common.

Edit: Gloominess, dark skin, and backstabby house politics. But the same could be said of a power struggle among depressed Nigerians.

Unlike Darkfall Dark Elves, Dunmer are not a rip-off of DnD Drow. They might have a very slight influence, like Prints said, but they are for the most part orginal.

Minus the over bearing femenazi dom complex subliminally implemented in the DnD version, sure.

And both worship a goddess that is into spiders, six and murders.

Get your facts right, that's the Morag Tong, not Dunmer in general, only a minority worship Mephala, and even then not really any more than other races.

Lots of physical differences. Drow live underground, are slight of frame, and are blinded by sunlight. Dunmer are hardy and rugged, suited to nomadic life in the wilderness (well, maybe not those ponces over the mountains in Cyrodiil).

Socially, they're only superficially similar: Drow are vicious scheming backstabbers, and, well, so are certain prominent Dunmer. Drow believe survival is a sign of strength, and, well, Telvanni Dunmer believe survival grants right of possession. However, Drow society is matriarchal, ruled by priestesses of Lolth, but hardly any female Dunmer hold any kind of high office: even the wise women of the Velothi are just advisors to the ashkhans, and hardly any women rise even to the rank of councilor or steward among the House and Temple Dunmer.

They also don't live underground like Dark Elves of other fantasies. Also they aren't really an "evil" race as other fantasies sometimes portray them, as good and evil in TES don't really exist. Native Dunmer are quite foreign and in many cases extreme to what some might consider the norm, but it doesn't equate to some general "evilness".

Ninja'd
Edit: I wouldn't say hardly any, there are plenty of examples of females in high positions in Dunmer society, and they are far more accepted than women typically were in most of past history. Males do hold positions of power, but it certainly isn't a strict patriarchal society, especially since one of the Tribunal is a female. There are female Telvanni Councilors, Temple Masters, and I can't say at this moment, but I'm sure there are some in the other Houses as well.

I admit, "hardly any" is an exaggeration, but still the head count of female Dunmer in positions of rank is thin (and more than half are in House Hlaalu), and except for Almalexia (who isn't exactly Dunmer, and started out as Nerevar's consort, before she attained divinity by foul means), there are none in positions of command. The Ahemmusa are seen as weak in part because they have no ashkhan and are led by their wise woman. The two female Telvanni councilors are batty, the two female Hlaalu councilors are puppets of Orvas Dren, and the one female Redoran councilor has her title by being the recent widow of a councilor. Barenziah, popular as she may be, holds power as Queen Mother through her influence on her son, rather than in her own right.

This is a large number in comparison with early real-world societies, but it is nothing at all like the matriarchal Drow, and that is the important point.

Mostly. Add that I killed Orvas Dren. Oops - umm, the Nerevarine killed Orvas Dren, I of course would not harm a fly ... And that the Redoran Councillors were puppets of the other guy I ... umm, the Nerevarine killed. Seems everyone needed to be liberated.

When you say matriarchal that needs a bit of qualification. The Matriarchs of the Drow are totalitarian dictators - they have a lot worse than leather whips to enforce their will and their 'Goddess' is very, very intrusive. Basically what the big spider says goes - or you are spider-fodder. munch munch

The dunmer might have become like the Drow if Dagoth Ur had prevailed ...

There is an RP currently running in the fan fic section that is based on what might have been had the Nerevarine arrived in Morrowind too late ...

I would not underestimate Bahrenziah - it's more that her son holds power because he is her son. When she started out everyone made use of her because she was naive - but that changed. Her first husband Symmachus is merely a memory now, but when Symmachus died Bahrenziah actually had to state that she had no desire to hold power in her own right in order to avoid inheriting the throne - she never really desired power in the first place, she just wanted to be naughty and have fun. :twirl: Eadwyre is passed on too. There have been female Emperors in Cyrodiil so there is no impediment to Queens - see Bretony - Bahrenziah's son was shown the door there by his older half-sister. It is just circumstance that the ladies of Morrowind were not in their prime when the Nerevarine arrived. It is possible that the Nerevarine was actually a woman

The Dunmer are Chimer with a Daedric sun tan - same people - Almalexia was a Chimer-colored Dunmer - she was a murderous ..., as were the other two members of the Tribunal, but I believe that her insanity was as much to do with the consequences of holding power that she was unsuited to. Same went for Dagoth Ur.

Good and Evil do exist in ES - it is just that they are not locked into unalterable absolutes, and they exist as a consequence of the deeds that people do rather than as a fundamental of an individual's nature. Same with the 'Gods' and Daedra - granted it appears that the Gods are more inclined to represent the benificent side of things (from a human or mer's pov) and the Daedra the 'not-so-benificent' yet there are so many exceptions that are by no means trivial. In ES it's all in a point of view - and the same situation seen by several different societies or individuals can be said to have good or bad consequences - just a bit real, eh?

You might look into what Mer (elves) are in Elderscrolls - their origins are debated in some detail and are very different from those of AD&D chars. There was another thread recently about this topic you might search for. But mostly you need to start readig the in-game books at the Imperial Library and the UESP wiki. One post or one small thread cannot cover it all. Play as much ES as you can too ... that should help.

People mod stuff that they want. Drow are popular for reasons that have been parodied quite often, so there are drow mods. There are also moggle mods. Moggles don't exist in TES lore either.

That, and I'm fairly certain Drow are known to use slave labor too, and both are elves.

But the apparent similarity seems to stop there. In the end, Drow are an evil race of elves in D&D settings, Dunmer are a race of elves that is not necessarily evil (though certainly not the nicest of races in Tamriel) in the Elder Scrolls world. Sure, some Dunmer are the kind of people that deserve to be strangled with their own intestines and then given to the alchemist in Skingrad for her perverse desires, but most of them are just people trying to get by, just like most of everyone else, a few of them even have some characteristics a sane society might consider commendable. Granted, there may be a few rare Drow that are considered good, but these are the exceptions rather than the norm, and the idea was probably only popularized by a certain character we probably all know. I don't doubt that Dunmer may have taken some influence from Drow, or maybe "dark elves" from other fantasy settings, but just like the Elder Scrolls "Dwarves", who weren't even all that short, the designers of the series have done a lot to set them apart from their parallels in other fantasy worlds.

Unlike the Nords who are completely Not-Vikings.

Epic post! Replies like these remind me while I still frequent these forums.

If I had to compare the Dunmer with an IRL "race" I would pick dark-skinned Indians over Nigerians. (because as far as I know a far higher level of civilization was reached in the Indian subcontinent well before anything of note was ever accomplished in Nigeria (or Western Europe for that matter)).

Back to the OP:

The Dunmer breed netches and wear adamantium armor and are xenophobic.

The Drow probably don’t breed flumphs, but do wear adamantite armor and are xenophobic.

As you can probably guess by now from the replies, saying that Drow are basically Dark Elves is quite an overgeneralization.

A real life example of such an overgeneralization would be saying:
The French are basically the Germans (or the other way round), because they're both europeans, have a common currency, statistics say that the majority of them have white skin colour and christian faith and they eat bread and butter.

What I mean to say: the difference - and what makes things fun and interesting - lies in the detail.

They live in Giant Crab shells and Mushroom houses. They have blueish / greyish skin. I'm not a big Drow fan, so first thing Dunmer reminded me of was Smurfs. The bearded Dwemer reminded me of Papa Smurf. :shakehead:

I take it you played OB first? The Dunmer looking like smurfs thing majorly svcked for me too.

I think someone's computer got frost-bit and a dev confused the DUNmer with Snow Elves :rolleyes:

Vive la difference

I am not too sure that Dunmer were all originally generally xenophobic - they started out dealing with ill-treatment by the Altmer and did a runner - just like the ancient Isrealites - and then they got into a dispute with the Dwemer. That might simply have been territorial. Bu tthen they also had problems with invading Nords, Akaviri and Imperial occupation and that's a totally different kettle of fish. No one invited the Imperials in, they invited themswelves and they have been fairly consistent in their intention to oblitereate Dunmer culture and loot Dunmer resources despite the Armistice agreement.

Then look at the Telvanni. They are isolationist and independant-minded rather than xenophobic. As they say they have always accepted other races as citizens and jusge all on actual performance and loyalty. Likewise the Redoran have a problem with Imperials because they are an invasive force who are using the Hlaalu to obliterate the Redoran economic base.

Dagoth Ur is another matter - but then he was, is and likely always be totally insane.

Alsa note that the Dunmer worship certain Daedra - a very different race of beings.

A couple of years, I did read some books of R.A Salvatore, intresting books about Drow Antroprology, It comes to this, the Drow except small similarities have nothing to do with the Dunmer ... In the big book of Fantasy Races, Dunmer are just another Branche of Dark Elves ...

Oh yes ofcourse they might aswell been inspired on D&D's Drow, but what's not a now-a-days just read the average fantasy book, like the ones of R.E Feists atleast Beth is a bit more orginal with there races than R.E Feist with his races ... (Yes well I really enjoy books of R.E Feist hench my nick, I still have my critics about him, more than enough) ....

Oh Pug! - so now you actually admit Macros

Nah, I played Morrowind first. I was never a D&D fan, so the Dunmer / Drow thing wasn't an immediate with me. I knew a lot more about Smurfs then Drow at the time.



Low quality TV when I first played on XBox. Snow elves are something else all together depending on which scholar you're going to believe. .

The main difference between drow and Dunmer? The Dunmer are interesting. Drow stink.

What? They do. Even as a DND player I say this. I mean, Dunmer actually have a culture. Drow are just evil for the sake of being evil. I mean, look. They have white hair and red eyes. Is it because their years of living in a subterranean home has left them without pigments? No, it's to make them look evil. They're xenophobic. Is it because they've had bad relations with other peoples in the past? No, it's so they're full of hate to make them evil. They're in to spiders. Is it because they relate to the underground-dwelling spiders and have grown a bond to them? No, it's because spiders are creepy so they like them because they're evil. Give me a break!

Why doesn't anyone talk about, no less make mods of, the Shadowelves? Or anything from Mystara for that matter? Mystara's the interesting setting, not that Forgotten Realms drivel.

The biggest difference for me is that most dunmer are normal people. The thing about drows is that they are the opposite of normal.

Eh? What's your definition of "normal"?

Well, drow are http://img17.imageshack.us/img17/7407/94689208.jpg persons (made from the first result I got with a GIS on "black and white portrait). Their name is "word" backward, too (not a coincidence, that's really how they were named...). The oppressive matriarchy is also just a reversal of the oppressive patriarchy more commonly found in evil D&D societies; and so on.

"Word" backwards? Huh? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drow Gary Gygax, rest his soul, outright said that's where the name comes from. Unless you somehow know if the Scots named them like that, (and they didn't, because it's derived from "trow", meaning "troll") it really is a coincidence, but I digress.