Editing D1-2-3: Drow Trilogy (section)

==Novelization==
[[Paul Kidd]] wrote a ''Descent Into the Depths of the Earth'' novel in June 2000, part of a series of crawls through "[[Greyhawk Classics]]" - dungeons for the nostalgia-market. This one is a sequel to his own novelization of ''[[White Plume Mountain]]'' here; also featuring the Justicar, Cinders, Polt, Escalla, and to an extent Enid the Sphinx. Because there isn't much plot behind any of this beyond GUH SMASH SPIDAH, on the way to SPIDAH the book concentrates on banter between the lead character and his feisty faerie sidekick. 

Also, because ''Against the Giants'' was getting its own novelization with its own set-up in an entirely disconnected book, ''Descent'' comes up with its own plot hooks to get the cast descending into the depths.  First, as part of her shitty faerie family's politicking, Escalla has been accused of murdering her arranged husband, and they need to track the ''real'' culprit, who is plotting with the drow to empower Lolth and free an ancient and evil faerie queen, into the Underdark to clear her name, and second, trogolodytes've been raiding and kidnapping huge numbers of innocent people and herding them into the Underdark as human sacrifices for said empowering. Unlike ''White Plume Mountain'', it's more a retread than a sequel to the original modules, though all the experienced adventuring characters already know about the Underdark and drow so clearly they've had a ''bit'' of first contact.

Since it's got three times as many modules to adapt in the same timeframe, the cuts're pretty ruthless compared to ''White Plume Mountain''. This usually takes the form of one or more characters pointing out adventures that would've showed up in the original (such as the mindflayer segment in D1 or most of the drow city in D3) and "NOPE!"ing their way around them, while other party members grumble about it. There are still a few fun easter eggs, like the corpses of the poor svirfneblin from D2 chained to the wall in the kuo-toa temple because the party skipped their encounter and they tried to raid the shrine alone. The massive troglodyte warren that's the major centerpiece of D1 is also reimagined as a huge boss fight, and the incredibly random lich that's just there as a screw-you to overconfident tourney players is now the dark master of the blent monster colony and an ally of the drow. Ironically, despite being technically optional, D2 is one of the more completely adapted modules, right down to Escalla accidentally triggering the portal in the statue of [[Blibdoolpoolp]] in the middle of a huge fight they started because they didn't want to watch the kuo-toa carve up a buncha human sacrifices, but also because Escalla tries to pose as the evil fairy, only for the one kuo-toa who has met said fairy to call her male, because she's flat.  Hee. 

Speaking of which, Paul Kidd continues to not only flex his sense of humor and wit, but shows off a real talent for horror and gruesome imagery.  It's a weird thing to type out, but the man writes some of the best human sacrifice scenes in the business. He also does a good job of writing about dimly-lit caves and an adventuring party having to survive off water-drip and monster carcass along the way. And the major new character of Henry, a young soldier who accidentally gets teleported along on their adventure but resolves to be as useful as possible and mostly-succeeds through luck, pluck, smarts, and judicious use of his crossbow and a willingness to steal a sick svirfneblin repeater when they happen across it.  Benelux, the other, spoiler-y new character, retreads a lot of the same ground as Polt, though she has her own twists on things, mostly by being a lot more bloodthirsty than he is. Escalla gets most of the development of the existing characters, mostly regarding her growing up a bit and obliquely admitting, to herself and others, that she wouldn't mind sampling some of the Justicar's "steely justice," though Polt continues to prove bizarrely-indestructible and weirdly useful, right up until the spoiler-y end, and beyond.

Also, unlike ''White Plume Mountain'', where more than half the novel was over before they even started on the trip to ''White Plume Mountain'', the gang's descending into the depths of the earth by the one-third mark. 

That said, it's not perfect.  Enid the Sphinx, despite being awesome and doing useful things, is more or less repeatedly told "Enid!  Go hang out over there far away from the action and do absolutely nothing while we go have an adventure!" and does it.  For no reason.  Seriously, this happens like twice, and constitutes maybe 90% of the book.  Escalla, though she has a ''bit'' of character development and a ''few'' excuses (desperately wanting to believe the Justicar has been secretly leaving gifts for her because she's fallen in love with him gets her a bit of a pass for failing to spot the warning signs that her shitty family is on her tail), is also even more split between her funny and annoying sides than before, and the author lets her get away with murder far too often.  Special mention for that time her pride and lack of discipline gets the Justicar's beloved signature black sword eaten by a rust monster, leaving him unarmed going into the troglodyte warren boss fight, only for the ''literal next scene'' to be the DM relenting and having a buncha ghouls show up with an even-better sword they throw down a hole where only she can retrieve it so she can use it to go save the day semi-single-handed.  (Henry helps out.) And the finale takes an effective and epic horror setpiece and... has the heroes succeed through literally getting Lolth drunk. Complete with psychic fields emanating off her and getting all her ''followers'' also drunk. It's a weird choice to end the boss fight with slapstick, is what I'm getting at, though it leads into the next novel, which is ''[[Queen of the Demonweb Pits]]''.

All in all, a pretty-good novel, and a good sequel to its predecessor. Those who bought it generally liked it, based on Amazon and Thrift Books user reviews.