The basic idea is a world in which the drow have been exiling pretty much everybody considered too weak to thrive in their society. This includes almost all good or neutral aligned drow. However, over time (as in, several centuries) these exiles have been grouping together and forming their own society. They've also been having children, like any community tends to enjoy doing. The combination of an influx of exiles and sexual population growth has made this non-evil drow society large enough that it's now considered a threat to traditional drow.
I really want to whip this community out in a campaign. However, this brings up a question. Does having so many good and neutral drow in one setting pretty much erode what the drow are supposed to be? If I introduce it into a campaign, will the majority of players get mad at me for screwing with drow society?
I've already gotten into deep shit for screwing with orc society by making orcs aligned along the same lines as humans. My players were pissed. Am I likely to get a similar reaction for messing with the drow? Or will the story of a war between drow who wish to cast off the brutality, misery, and paranoia of their past society and traditionalists who want to continue a society where only the strong survive actually be somewhat interesting?
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snarky answer: as long as you include a College of Grey Necromancers, it's kopacetic.
Serious answer: I think if your players didn't like the orc alterations, then this might annoy them as well.
Personally, I'd rather have a "chaotic neutral society" with 1-2 lawful good guys somewhere walking around helping old drow grandmothers across the road, but the rest of them, though they wouldn't immediately sacrifice a group of adventurers to Lolth, still tend to miss choir practice and stay out all night at sex clubs with bugbear peep shows and whatnot.
Some might call that "Diet Drow" and assume it's a copout; YMMV.....
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My personal opinion: Non-evil Drow are an abomination and must never be allowed to survive.
Regarding your players: It sounds like they enjoy their traditional monsters, tread with caution. Maybe you could slip the question into non-campaign specific gaming conversation. Talk about the Drizzt novels. That should give you a good indication of how they would feel about it.
I'm not RPing with that group anymore. I moved out of state. I'm asking about players in general. Is the view that orcs and drow NEED to be evil widely held? How many of you would play in a campaign with a war between drow reformers and traditionalists (a war that the traditionalists started) as a major story hook?
The basic idea is a world in which the drow have been exiling pretty much everybody considered too weak to thrive in their society. This includes almost all good or neutral aligned drow. However, over time (as in, several centuries) these exiles have been grouping together and forming their own society. They've also been having children, like any community tends to enjoy doing. The combination of an influx of exiles and sexual population growth has made this non-evil drow society large enough that it's now considered a threat to traditional drow.
I really want to whip this community out in a campaign. However, this brings up a question. Does having so many good and neutral drow in one setting pretty much erode what the drow are supposed to be? If I introduce it into a campaign, will the majority of players get mad at me for screwing with drow society?
I've already gotten into deep s$$# for screwing with orc society by making orcs aligned along the same lines as humans. My players were pissed. Am I likely to get a similar reaction for messing with the drow? Or will the story of a war between drow who wish to cast off the brutality, misery, and paranoia of their past society and traditionalists who want to continue a society where only the strong survive actually be somewhat interesting?
Some players want their monsters in black and while. It makes it easy to tell the bad guys from the good guys. I like to stay with the norm for the most part, but have the occasional good/neutral drow or orc. I also like the occasional evil gold dragon.
If you rock the boat have a good reason for it. I would write how the drow came about into the campaign setting, and change it from anything that might make them evil.
I'd personally go with making the Drow solidly CN, Still fittingly hostile to outsiders and all that without being overly evil.
The basic idea is a world in which the drow have been exiling pretty much everybody considered too weak to thrive in their society. This includes almost all good or neutral aligned drow. However, over time (as in, several centuries) these exiles have been grouping together and forming their own society. They've also been having children, like any community tends to enjoy doing. The combination of an influx of exiles and sexual population growth has made this non-evil drow society large enough that it's now considered a threat to traditional drow.
I really want to whip this community out in a campaign. However, this brings up a question. Does having so many good and neutral drow in one setting pretty much erode what the drow are supposed to be? If I introduce it into a campaign, will the majority of players get mad at me for screwing with drow society?
I've already gotten into deep s$$# for screwing with orc society by making orcs aligned along the same lines as humans. My players were pissed. Am I likely to get a similar reaction for messing with the drow? Or will the story of a war between drow who wish to cast off the brutality, misery, and paranoia of their past society and traditionalists who want to continue a society where only the strong survive actually be somewhat interesting?
Some players want their monsters in black and while. It makes it easy to tell the bad guys from the good guys. I like to stay with the norm for the most part, but have the occasional good/neutral drow or orc. I also like the occasional evil gold dragon.
If you rock the boat have a good reason for it. I would write how the drow came about into the campaign setting, and change it from anything that might make them evil.
A lot are evil. The issue is that they've been exile happy when it comes to those seen as unworthy, and now those exiles have their own community. Essentially, there are bad drow (traditionalists) and not bad drow (exiles), and the traditionalists are beginning to see the large exile community as a threat and attacked, forcing the exiles to fight for their lives and futures.
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As wraithstrike says, it really depends upon the setting. Take Eberron for example not all Drow are evil nor do they live underground or worship and evil spider goddess. They were made to be assassins and elite killers by giant overlords and then abandoned to die by the "normal" elves.
They are harsh, brutal and no nonsense but not automatically evil.
FR also has groups of "good" drow. They happen to worship a good drow goddess and like to dance naked with swords under a full moon.
Edit: You also have to look at the underdark tends to breed evil. When you have to be brutal and uncareing to make it from day to day you tend not to raise "nice" children.
I would have very little interest in such a campaign, but for a rather idiosyncratic reason. I believe that the more common stuff becomes, the less mystique it retains. I've used drow one-and-a-half* times in the last 10 years of GMing, simply because I feel that they lose their glamor very easily if they are overused. (Same applies to a few other monsters, such as dragons.)
*That's not a miscount. One of the NPCs in question was a drow/human hybrid.
I've only used drow a couple times before. I don't really want to overuse them, either. I just feel that if most people won't loathe a storyline like this, it'd be a nice adventure (it will certainly not take up the whole campaign).
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I've already gotten into deep s*%@ for screwing with orc society by making orcs aligned along the same lines as humans. My players were pissed. Am I likely to get a similar reaction for messing with the drow?
Check with your potential players first.
Some will be cool with humanoids being *people* and having complex motivations, and being as able to be good or evil (or nature-loving or cannibalistic or egalitarian or supremacist) as humans, elves, dwarves or halflings.
Others prefer a more video-gamist setting where 'mobs' are just humanoid-shaped blobs of pixels that one kills to get XP and lewt, with no boring complications or ethical / moral quandaries.
Neither is badwrongfun. Give the players what they want.
If you, as GM, would prefer to avoid a 'kill alla darkies' game, use monsters and encounters that are unequivocably okay to go all genocide on, like flesh-eating zombies or an infestation of fiendish giant ants or a form of unseelie fey 'goblins' that use normal goblins stats, but dissolve into black smoke when killed, sent back to the 'shadowfey,' making it explicit that, even if they aren't made out of otherworldly black malevolence, they aren't even *really* being killed, so much as 'deported with extreme prejudice.'
Just, don't cross the streams. Tossing in a morally ambiguous member of a 'monster' race, and some sort of moral dilemna, after five levels of rewarding good, clean genocide, is just confusing. :)
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Is the view that orcs and drow NEED to be evil widely held? How many of you would play in a campaign with a war between drow reformers and traditionalists (a war that the traditionalists started) as a major story hook?
Drow needing to be evil is kind of a backlash from the goodie-two-shoeness of Drizzt. As for the actual question, I would say for my own opinion, no. Some people like their D&D black and white, but I personally don't think it works that way. However, drow who aren't evil should very rarely be good (someone needs to set up a VERY good example for them, or maybe they were orphans?) while orcs have the same problem, though I can imagine a chaotic neutral orc mercenary of some sort more readily than a non-evil drow that isn't chaotic neutral (or chaotic good, though that would still leave a bad taste in my mouth).
I actually like how Eberron worked out this deal in most cases, what with it being perfectly normal story-wise to play, for example, a goblinoid (or a kobold) without getting killed on sight. I LOVE the concept of Droaam (the nation of monsters), even though it leans more towards evil which kinda reinforces the stereo-types.
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A lot are evil. The issue is that they've been exile happy when it comes to those seen as unworthy, and now those exiles have their own community. Essentially, there are bad drow (traditionalists) and not bad drow (exiles), and the...
My reasoning(disclaimer):
The evil drow have no reason to attack the non-evil drow. Drow are not inherently evil like outsiders are so it is not like they have an obligation to be evil. I can see them looking down on the more merciful ones, but an attack that waste lives is pointless. If anything they would probably use them to spy on the surface folk or as the focal point of some evil plan. The CN drow get blamed for stuff they did not even do, while the evil drow continue their plans unabated. By the time the truth is found out it is too late.
I can't speak for golarion, but traditionally random travelers to a drow city (with the noted exception of surface elves) were not killed on sight or sacrificed. They might get hired or pulled into the warring houses, but Menzzoberanzan had an enormous market place famous on the surface and other planes of existence. A city of (probably neutral) drow is not out of the question, just go to lengths to show how actual drow are, and then the unusual ones.
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If anything they would probably use them to spy on the surface folk or as the focal point of some evil plan. The CN drow get blamed for stuff they did not even do, while the evil drow continue their plans unabated. By the time the truth is found out it is too late.
Indeed, they might even encourage non-evil drow to live openly on the surface with two possible outcomes;
A) the non-evil drow are killed by people who hate drow (which will likely kill off some drow-haters and / or use up some of their resources, and, conveniently, get rid of the non-evil drow anyway)
B) local communities begin hesitantly trading with and working alongside the 'nice drow' and get a false sense that 'they aren't that bad!' which will prove fatal when the *real* drow come strolling into town one evening and butcher everyone ruthlessly.
It's a win-win!
Being arrogant schmucks, they won't consider option C) non-evil drow and local peoples *working together to foil drow plots* until it's too late...
A lot are evil. The issue is that they've been exile happy when it comes to those seen as unworthy, and now those exiles have their own community. Essentially, there are bad drow (traditionalists) and not bad drow (exiles), and the...My reasoning(disclaimer):
The evil drow have no reason to attack the non-evil drow. Drow are not inherently evil like outsiders are so it is not like they have an obligation to be evil. I can see them looking down on the more merciful ones, but an attack that waste lives is pointless. If anything they would probably use them to spy on the surface folk or as the focal point of some evil plan. The CN drow get blamed for stuff they did not even do, while the evil drow continue their plans unabated. By the time the truth is found out it is too late.
The reason the evil drow attacked is paranoia. They view the exiled drow as a military threat. A large society of people you don't like can seem threatening to a race as paranoid as the drow. They feel that they will want revenge over all the exiling. This isn't universally true about the exiles (though sometimes it is), but then again paranoia doesn't always reflect fact.
The exiles aren't CN. They are around 80% neutral and 20% good.
If anything they would probably use them to spy on the surface folk or as the focal point of some evil plan. The CN drow get blamed for stuff they did not even do, while the evil drow continue their plans unabated. By the time the truth is found out it is too late.Indeed, they might even encourage non-evil drow to live openly on the surface with two possible outcomes;
A) the non-evil drow are killed by people who hate drow (which will likely kill off some drow-haters and / or use up some of their resources, and, conveniently, get rid of the non-evil drow anyway)
B) local communities begin hesitantly trading with and working alongside the 'nice drow' and get a false sense that 'they aren't that bad!' which will prove fatal when the *real* drow come strolling into town one evening and butcher everyone ruthlessly.
It's a win-win!
Being arrogant schmucks, they won't consider option C) non-evil drow and local peoples *working together to foil drow plots* until it's too late...
Paranoia can lead to less than smart decisions. Leaving them along may indeed have been the better choice, but bad guys don't always do the smart thing.
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We have night elves in our own homebrew setting, and drows.
Night/dark elves are neutral, their weird, aride floating island living in the perpetual shadow of the elven one.
Drows are psychotic elves, living in the underground of the night elves, which they tolerate because of the similarity of their fate. Each race dislikes the other, but not enough to fight or be petty enough to ruin their relations. So basically drows live in the darkness, where people already live in darkness.
There is no real way to discern night elves from drows without common sense, a good Knowledge check and sometimes even a perception check. Night elves are elves with light blindess and Dancing Lights 1/day.
The other players loved this idea my DM and I put together to get some ambiguity on drows. Even people liking their drows to be evil didn't see it as a bad thing, since these aren't technically drows. But they are drows. But they aren't. :p
Seeing from your experience, your players probably won't like it, if what they want is 100% chaotic evil orcs in their games...
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I've already gotten into deep s~&& for screwing with orc society by making orcs aligned along the same lines as humans. My players were pissed.
If that's the kind of game you would really like to run, it might be best to find new players.
Personally I'd love to find more games where those orcs are the norm.
Non-evil drow societies are perfectly fine. Just develop 'em, show how they came to be the way they are, how they fit into the larger world, etc.
The basic idea is a world in which the drow have been exiling pretty much everybody considered too weak to thrive in their society. This includes almost all good or neutral aligned drow. However, over time (as in, several centuries) these exiles have been grouping together and forming their own society. They've also been having children, like any community tends to enjoy doing. The combination of an influx of exiles and sexual population growth has made this non-evil drow society large enough that it's now considered a threat to traditional drow.
I really want to whip this community out in a campaign. However, this brings up a question. Does having so many good and neutral drow in one setting pretty much erode what the drow are supposed to be? If I introduce it into a campaign, will the majority of players get mad at me for screwing with drow society?
I've already gotten into deep s$*# for screwing with orc society by making orcs aligned along the same lines as humans. My players were pissed. Am I likely to get a similar reaction for messing with the drow? Or will the story of a war between drow who wish to cast off the brutality, misery, and paranoia of their past society and traditionalists who want to continue a society where only the strong survive actually be somewhat interesting?
I don't think it's a bad thing at all. Honestly, after many years, you get very bored with one-dimensional races. My home campaign setting has different cultural differences which make people dislike each other, but stuff like good and evil tend to be less than 100%.
We have orcs who are tribal warriors and shamans, who are actually more like Neutral or Chaotic Good, along with several tribes that are primarily Neutral and warrior-cultured, and then there's a group of orcs who worship demons, and they tend to be pretty Chaotic Evil most of the time.
Meanwhile, Hobgoblins are a nomadic race of warriors who steal up people and induct them into their tribes. That's totally bad from an outsider's perspective, though frequently their slaves end up becoming part of their tribe and then preferring to stay (which outsiders consider an act of brainwashing).
3E said it best. Anything with an Intelligence of 3 or higher is capable of moral action and can have an alignment. If it can, then it can change alignment. That's all there is too it. It might not be easy, and it might not be common, but it can happen. Even evil outsiders can change alignment (but due to their subtypes will always be treated as evil mechanically).
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I'm asking about players in general. Is the view that orcs and drow NEED to be evil widely held? How many of you would play in a campaign with a war between drow reformers and traditionalists (a war that the traditionalists started) as a major story hook?
Missed this.
I've always hated the notion of the Always Chaotic Evil trope being applied to mortal races. And I seriously don't think the view that those races absolutely have to be evil is the majority view, especially in a post-WoW world.
I'd be perfectly fine with such a story hook.
I just want to toss this out there. If orcs and drow NEED to be evil for players, then why do people play WoW? When it comes to the alignment of "monsters" I go by how the people of different nations view them. I also keep the traditional view of the monsters. I don't think its a bad thing to have a community of non-evil drow. You would have to introduce half drow if you do this.
I don´t see a problem here personally...
If anything it´s just another set-up for intra-Drow conflict,
just with a different rationale than intra-Evil conflicts...
Basically, one that good PCs could potentially sympathize with one side.
But if players don´t like Orcs with ranges of motivations and cultural development,
or presented as on-par with Humans of similar civilizational organization, they probably won´t like this either... That said, it sounds like that you´ve moved on from that group of players.
To throw out something totally random: what if the ´light:good, dark:bad´ paradigm was reversed, and the surface world was largely taken over by evil forces, and good humanoids only had some refuge in the Underdark. Maybe good Drow would be an ally there?
I do not have problem with the idea of a (small) comunity of non evil drows, but
The basic idea is a world in which the drow have been exiling pretty much everybody considered too weak to thrive in their society.exiling the weak? a renegade drow should be strong and/or cunning or he will not survive. I think you should work a bit more in the history of that non evil drow society.
Considered to be weak doesn't necessarily mean actually weak. I could see drow viewing anybody who isn't evil as inherently weak. Plus, they've had centuries to brood over their treatment and sire children who never lived in a traditional drow society.
Lolth could send them a child to show them the way back to the fold.
MWAHAHAHAHAAAA!!!
Lolth could send them a child to show them the way back to the fold.
MWAHAHAHAHAAAA!!!
An inverse of Dritz Do'urden!
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I think its a great idea.
I am not a fan of black and white entire societies. (in fact half the time i dislike alignment all together)
As the GM the world works the way you say it works. adding little twists like alignment changes, social changes or the like can be fun and are a great foil to metagamers.
I for example play games where there are no female elves (because elf females are essentially dryads and they stay in the heart of the forest)
or
goblinoids are a magically constructed race and the different types of goblins are different stages of the goblins life (like the Koloss in the Mistborn series)
or even
troll regeneration is not stopped by fire or acid but instead by cold and cold iron
I dont change everything but only because it would be harder to keep track of. but just enough to keep the metagamers guessing.
Instead of changing the alignment I'd rather make the drow less aggresive for whatever (selfish) reason they might have, this will just make them an interesting shade of evil though. They might be perfectly willing to kill, pillage and enslave but they have good reasons for not doing so.
I despise the idea of lovable and huggable drow though, the occassional drow might be sympathetic or willing to ally or aid the party but dont mess around too much with alignment, try to work within that alignment to make them more interesting. Just my opinion ofcourse..
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Im begginning to find this conversation very interesting.
Do people believe the races must follow a given alignment because that just the way fantasy is (drow, goblins, orcs = evil, Elves = good etc.)
or do we as humans simply find it easier to classify groups as good or evil?
why can humans be good or evil? even dwarvs can be good or evil, but the idea of a good drow or orc is offensive.
Im not trying to call any one here racist or closeminded. just trying to understand why people could so strongly feel uncomfortable about the idea of a non standard 'pick your race'
I don't see a non-evil drow society as a problem. I prefer my monsters to be 'people' too as another poster said. In one world I run orcs dominate the world's greatest civilization, while in another they are a pure chaotic race like the Broo from 'Runequest'. I do remember reading the 'Crystal Shard' when it first came out (I was about 14 at the time) and initially thinking that Drizzt as a great character. This, of course, was before the whole angsty drow thing became a massive massive cliche marginally less annoying than 'Twilight'.
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Im begginning to find this conversation very interesting.
Do people believe the races must follow a given alignment because that just the way fantasy is (drow, goblins, orcs = evil, Elves = good etc.)
or do we as humans simply find it easier to classify groups as good or evil?
why can humans be good or evil? even dwarvs can be good or evil, but the idea of a good drow or orc is offensive.
Im not trying to call any one here racist or closeminded. just trying to understand why people could so strongly feel uncomfortable about the idea of a non standard 'pick your race'
Unfortunately there's a strong undercurrent of thought that "typically good things turning evil = fine and classic" and "typically evil things turning good = badwrong (insert tired sparkly vampire reference here)". "Corruption and evil are cool. Redemption and actual good are lame."
I don't get it either. But then I've been called a "moral nihilist" on these boards for having non-evil orcs and undead and for considering genocide to always be evil. Go figure.
I'm not RPing with that group anymore. I moved out of state. I'm asking about players in general. Is the view that orcs and drow NEED to be evil widely held? How many of you would play in a campaign with a war between drow reformers and traditionalists (a war that the traditionalists started) as a major story hook?
To me... Yes, Drow and Orc should be considered Evil. The rare exception is allowed for story purpose... but half the fun of playing a monstrous race... is being treated like a monster.
If everybody treats you the same as they treat everyone else... then what's the point?
Likewise... if there is no predjudicial difference between playing an orc or a human... then why EVER choose Human??
In my opinion taking away the 'evil' out of characters, seriously waters down the campaign...
I also scoff at the idea that any good society is actually a 'threat' to an admittedly 'evil' one... The good guys won't infiltrate and kill you in your sleep... just for existing.
Standard Drow are FINE with that ;)
If everybody treats you the same as they treat everyone else... then what's the point?Likewise... if there is no predjudicial difference between playing an orc or a human... then why EVER choose Human??
by that token why EVER play a dwarf or an elf?
to me its just a little simple that all of one race behave one way.
I am not trying to make a political correctness speech here please dont take it that way but I think its ok to consider a race "evil" because the race has opposing goals in the same way that settlers considered indians evil... or Americans considered Russians evil.
But I think its a little simple to then believe that individuals could not be as diverse within their society as we are in our own. thus the occational pacifist Orc, groups of drow that dont believe in slaughter and hatred and elves who feel its their moral obligation to enslave lesser races for their own good, make total sense to me.
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but half the fun of playing a monstrous race... is being treated like a monster.
If everybody treats you the same as they treat everyone else... then what's the point?
None of that requires Always Chaotic Evil though. There are any number of creative reasons or excuses for prejudices to exist that don't hinge on entire races being evil down to the last child. Historical grudges, values dissonance between cultures, being on the outs in the current political climate, ethical conflicts rather than moral, etc.
Im begginning to find this conversation very interesting.
Do people believe the races must follow a given alignment because that just the way fantasy is (drow, goblins, orcs = evil, Elves = good etc.)
or do we as humans simply find it easier to classify groups as good or evil?
why can humans be good or evil? even dwarvs can be good or evil, but the idea of a good drow or orc is offensive.
Im not trying to call any one here racist or closeminded. just trying to understand why people could so strongly feel uncomfortable about the idea of a non standard 'pick your race'
It is just that I think my campaign is more interesting to keep the basics simple, since good and evil in PF is already muddy enough and rather look at motivations beyond alignment.
For instance I did like the Dragonlance stories much,, at it's base it was a very simple set up; good gods, evil gods, neutral gods, but the way those of different moral values interacted in the setting was interesting and the evil guys were so much more than just evil villains. It made villainss interesting without changing, the basic nature of the bad guys, if you change drow alignment they aren't really much like drow at all, then they instantly lose much appeal to me. oh yay.. cave elves..
In the case of drows I think you should get them right and explore their dark personality further rather than making them neutral or good aligned.
A lot are evil. The issue is that they've been exile happy when it comes to those seen as unworthy, and now those exiles have their own community. Essentially, there are bad drow (traditionalists) and not bad drow (exiles), and the...My reasoning(disclaimer):
The evil drow have no reason to attack the non-evil drow. Drow are not inherently evil like outsiders are so it is not like they have an obligation to be evil. I can see them looking down on the more merciful ones, but an attack that waste lives is pointless. If anything they would probably use them to spy on the surface folk or as the focal point of some evil plan. The CN drow get blamed for stuff they did not even do, while the evil drow continue their plans unabated. By the time the truth is found out it is too late.The reason the evil drow attacked is paranoia. They view the exiled drow as a military threat. A large society of people you don't like can seem threatening to a race as paranoid as the drow. They feel that they will want revenge over all the exiling. This isn't universally true about the exiles (though sometimes it is), but then again paranoia doesn't always reflect fact.
The exiles aren't CN. They are around 80% neutral and 20% good.
I see we just run our drow differently then. My drow would try to get someone else to kill the CN drow if they were a threat. Why fight my own war if someone else can do it for me?
PS:If I ever get to GM for any of you here know that my bad guys are evil, and will wrap you up in politics and/or multiple misdirections if they feel it is easier than using their own swords. Slimy bastards I tell you, those NPC's of mine.
PS2:Back to the OP-->I guess to answer your question, it depends on how the players think of drow. If they are physically violent and like to kill I can see them attacking the CN group. If they are underhanded sneaky types then a confrontation that forces them to lose their own members is not first on the list if they can help it. I would ask the group what their general perception of drow is, or I would do a homebrew write-up of several races and present it to them.
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Im begginning to find this conversation very interesting.
Do people believe the races must follow a given alignment because that just the way fantasy is (drow, goblins, orcs = evil, Elves = good etc.)
or do we as humans simply find it easier to classify groups as good or evil?
why can humans be good or evil? even dwarvs can be good or evil, but the idea of a good drow or orc is offensive.
Im not trying to call any one here racist or closeminded. just trying to understand why people could so strongly feel uncomfortable about the idea of a non standard 'pick your race'
I think people are so use to certain races always being evil that it is a shock to see otherwise. It took my players a while to accept that not all goblins were XP bait, and had people rights when I ran Eberron. The paladin was about to kill one, and I had to remind him they had rights like people. They wanted things in B&W. I don't run like that though.
Maybe look at Norse mythology, where drow originally came from. Or at least dark elves came from. Drow might be Scottish, right? Are they related to trow at all?
Also, there's chaotic evil and there's chaotic evil. Some chaotic evil folk are psychotic cannibalistic mass murderers, others just talk bad about you behind your back and steal the silverware from Dennys. Maybe your chaotic evil drow are just extremely ruthless merchants or perverse scholars or something.
Perhaps you could have the society as LE, or even LN.
I imagine that sepratists who are differently evil, but still evil, might strike a balance you are looking for. LE drow would be against the normal power struggles and lolth sacrifices of normal drow society, but be disciplined and harsh enough to eke out an existance in the harshness of the underdark.
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For what it's worth I did something like this in our FR game. It didn't change the way the drow were perceived on whole as the community, Silverglade, was both small and well hidden in the old forest of Cormathor. They hid for a couple of different reasons, the most important being safety from their kin, bot drow and elf, and so as not to give the impression that drow could be trusted. After all there were only about 2300 of the "good", mostly neutral, drow, and hundreds of thousand of the "spider lovers".
My players seemed to like the way it was worked out, this way they could interact with them, but still not be saturated with Do'Urden clones... we hated the first one, why would we want to see his bloody clones. :P
EDIT: One more thing, there were some differences between the two, the drow of Silverglade didn't suffer from the light blindness, but they lost their spell like abilities being so far removed from the source of those powers.
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Aren't drows just a pandering stereotype that we find in games in general that blacks are the bad guys? And if so wouldn't having the race of exiled elves having good findings in their new land be fine? Heck, the origin of drows and Australia are very similar; criminals outcast from society forced to band together to survive. Modern Australians turned out to be one of the most friendly, accepting societies; why not drow?
Aren't drows just a pandering stereotype that we find in games in general that blacks are the bad guys? And if so wouldn't having the race of exiled elves having good findings in their new land be fine? Heck, the origin of drows and Australia are very similar; criminals outcast from society forced to band together to survive. Modern Australians turned out to be one of the most friendly, accepting societies; why not drow?
The drow in Faerun followed a dark goddess of chaos int exile, In golarion, they worship demons.