22nd of Kythorn, 1492
Sleep eludes me; instead, I scribble these lines in the dim light of my flickering lantern. The creature’s relentless pursuit has driven me to the brink of madness. Its venomous gaze haunts my every waking moment, and its nightmarish visage invades my dreams. I dare not close my eyes, for fear of the grotesque limbs that might ensnare me should I falter. I have taken refuge in a hollowed zurkwood mushroom, its ancient bark offering scant protection against my tireless hunter. The cavern itself seems to conspire against me, each rumble and groan a sinister reminder of my plight. My provisions dwindle, and the weight of despair grows heavier with each passing hour. What cruel fate has decreed that I should meet my end in this forsaken place, ensnared by a horror so vile?
23rd of Kythorn, 1492
Desperation drives me to action, and with trembling hands, I prepare a meager defense against the inevitable. The cavern is eerily silent, as if the very air is thick with anticipation. My mind conjures images of the creature's approach, its fangs dripping with a venom that promises a slow and excruciating demise. Yet, amidst the encroaching darkness, a glimmer of resolve ignites within me. I shall not go quietly into the abyss. If this night is to be my last, I shall face the abomination with the courage befitting an adventurer. The quill quivers in my grip as I pen these final words, a testament to my defiance. The chittering grows louder, and the shadows deepen. My hand rests on the hilt of my sword. I am ready.
The hunt ends here.
Overview
Down in the Underdark, far outside of the Drow cities and outposts, nestled comfortably in spiderwebs you will find Driders, the cursed abomination of Lloth’s will. The Drider is a fun creature to throw at your players to introduce them into the wildness of the Underdark.
Being part spider, the Drider is another ambush hunter in the vein of the Ettercap and the Umber Hulk, which can both be used in conjunction with the Drider.1 They have the skill, mental capacity, and cunning to make excellent ambushes and traps. Now, what do we need to know about the Drider.
The first thing you need to know is that they are extra-special Drow that have failed to meets Lloth’s expectations and failed her tests. These Drow are then subject to a horrific transformation where they become the wretched reminder of Lloth’s power and malevolence. Once the transformation is complete they return to the Material Plane2 and disappear into the depths of the Underdark, driven mad from the process, only finding companionship with other Driders or packs of giant spiders.
Finally one last note, it should be obvious but WotC thought it was important to say it, but only Drow can become Driders, you know, the Drow/Spider hybrid. Look sometimes, you have to spell things out for people, but this may be a bit much if you ask me.
Stats
Now, lets take a look at what our little beastie can do.
Here we have a creature with a high armor class and high Hit Points for a CR 6. We have an interesting creature here, we can use them both as a Boss and a Bruiser, depending if you decide to use the spellcasting variant.
With a +9 to Stealth means we may get to have our Drider ambush the adventurers, which will be fun for all.
Now Fey Ancestry tends to be a better player feature than creature feature, charm spells tend to be used in more social encounters than combat, and the Sleep spell —if the Drider wasn’t already immune to it— has tremendous fall off of effectiveness against creatures beyond CR 1.3
All Drider’s get Innate Spellcasting,
Spider Climb, to quote myself from the Vampire Spawn4.
USE.
THIS.
ABILITY.
Keep your creepy crawly Spider-Ladies out of line of sight until it is too late. Dark corners should be the home of Driders since they are part spider, it’s on a sliver platter for us.Sunlight Sensitivity probably won’t come up. Unless you rule otherwise the spell Daylight5 does not actually create Sunlight, so we are at a weird position in game design. We have a weakness on a creature that the players will not be able to exploit until the creature becomes trivial. I encourage you to not let this be an issue and make it that the Daylight spell does create day light.
Now Web Walker is an ability that spiders get, so its natural that Spider-Ladies don’t get stuck on spiderwebs.
Finally, the Multiattack and subsequent attacks aren’t anything special. The Bite and Longbow attacks have additional poison damage, but there isn’t enough damage to make a large difference nor does it add a condition effect.
Combat Example
Alrighty, let’s make a combat encounter revolving around a Drider, and considering everything above we are going to make an ambush in the Underdark. We will be pitting 1 Drider and 4 Giant Wolf Spiders (You can add more as the fight progresses to keep it interesting) against 4 sixth level adventurers in the lair of the Drider. However, we will not be giving the Drider any lair actions for this combat as the adventurers are being caught up in a sticky6 situation during travel.
Our adventurers have been traveling for two days in the Underdark, embarking from Uul’vol, a Kobold run bazaar, and headed towards the ruined dwarven stronghold of Torinngrad. During their travel the route, mapped out for them by a friendly Kobold named Bucket, takes them through a cavern infested with spiders. Keeping low and covering their lights the party does their best to not disturb any of the spiderwebs and alert the crawling menaces that live amongst them. However, little do they know a sinister set of eyes has been tracking them since they entered the cavern.
Alright, this is a prebuilt ambush, go ahead and check the adventurers passive perception and insight scores, if either of them are 17 or higher they will not be surprised by the attack. You may be asking yourself, “Why 17?”, well because I wanted it to be high but not impossible for sixth level characters.
Depending on who goes first between the Drider and the Giant Wolf Spiders we can play this out in one of two ways.
Option the first:
The Giant Wolf Spiders descend around the party from the webbings above them. Each spider takes a Bite attack at the character closest to them before the players get a chance to assess the whole situation.
Option the second:
The Drider waits for the party to get into an area dense with spiders and then casts Darkness on them, they then ready their Longbow and wait for the party to inevitably split up as they panic.
Either option can go first, but if the Drider goes first then the Giant Wolf Spiders will just descend and ready attacks for if an adventurer emerges from the darkness within their Bite range. For the rest of the fight, if the party brings out a light source, congrats your Drider now has perfect sight on whomever is holding the light source. That adventurer will get a surprise from the Drider, adnthe surprise is…3 Longbow attacks per turn.
The players themselves should be informed, that two options exist for them as well. Fight or Flight. If you have an NPC with the party, this would be the opportune time to channel your inner Corporal Dwayne Hicks (Caution: it may be loud).
Non-Player Character
Let’s make a Drider that can assist adventurers in the Underdark.
Sabrae the Mad.
A collector of trinkets and baubles, Sabrae has spent the better part of the past century in the upper most levels of the Underdark scavenging odds and ends from dead adventurers. Her lair has become a defecto trading hub for caravans and adventurers alike before they descend into the depths of the Underdark, all manner of goods can be bought, sold, or traded in Sabrae’s lair.
Use Sabrae and her curios as an opportunity to display the strange items your players can obtain in the Undardark as well as sell off their gear for extra coin if they need it. I would restrain yourself from making Sabrae a magic item vendor, but if you do have only one item in her posession that is of Rare or higher rarity7.
Final Thoughts
Driders are often forgotten about unless directly put into a module for DMs to rediscover, ultimately I feel that is an issue with not many campaigns taking place in the Underdark, but I digress. We as DM’s can set up a Drider to be more than just a random encounter in the Underdark, we can even move them closer to the surface if we want, giving them more of an NPC role instead of just a bag of Hit Points for the players to chew through. I feel that the Drider is so under used by most tables that introducing one may spark some interest in your players to delve deep into the Underdark to find out what other horrors await them…but those horrors will have to wait for another entry.
You gotta love that synergy, Yeah!
I haven’t found where they go to be transformed or takes Lloth’s tests, So you have fun deciding where that happens.
There’s a lot of math behind this one, You will just have to trust me and I’ll break it down in the future on my dice math post which is in the works still. Trust me that one will address a fair few topics.
Which your players should have access by the time they are facing a Drider
Eh? Geddit? Sticky…like a spiderweb? I am very clever /s
Just to keep in line with Sabrae picking items off dead adventurers.
Very cool! I needed some ideas for monsters to put in my arena to test their skills.
Loving the Drider!