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I am thinking up a campaign set in the Darklands, with Darklands races such as Drow, Duergar, pretty much any race with darkvision. I know Half-Drow don't exist in Golarion, but I would allow them too. Anyway, I wanted to know if there was anything that people would recommend for me about the Darklands that Paizo has made besides:
Into The Darklands
Second Darkness AP
The idea is that the PCs would start out entering a Drow city that has grown decadent(I was thinking Far Parathra from what I saw on PFWiki), and the Queen (title pending) wants them to help her clean it up, by eliminating heretical houses, protecting the city from outside threats, etc. The PCs would eventually get the chance to take over the city themselves, if they wish.
Anyway, I have some questions about the Darklands and Golarion. 1st, I read somewhere (PFWiki, I think) that the Drow are almost unknown to anyone but elves on Golarion. Is this true?
Second, How much information on the Darklands and Far Parathra, specifically, is there on books besides those listed above?
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First, Half-Drow do "exist" per se. The Advanced Race Guide gives half-elves the option of switching out some of their abilities to gain drow darkvision and their spell-like abilities, and they are said to have a drow ancestry rather than normal elves.
But on to your actual questions. The first part is, as far as I know, indeed true. Drow are "unknown" to surfacers, as in they are either considered to be a hoax or misunderstanding, or they are literally not common knowledge, since elves aren't exactly comfortable sharing the corrupt history of their race with outsiders, and those who don't go deep into the Darklands never directly interact with drow that appear as drow, so, yes, knowledge of drow on the surface is rare and muddled, since they don't conduct surface raids like they do in Forgotten Realms (as far as i know, again).
As for Darklands info...let's see. Dungeons of Golarion has info on Candlestone Caverns, which is technically part of the Darklands. Lost Cities of Golarion has details on Ilvarandin and the surrounding area (also in great detail). There are also a couple of Darklands modules that might exist. Classic Horrors Revisited touches upon Derro and Ghoul societies in the Darkland. Cities of Golarion touches on the Darklands influence of Cassomir.
In a gist, though, there are bits and pieces of Darklands lore hidden all over the place (the Kaer Maga book, in a tiny, tiny bit I think in Land of the Linnorm Kings, Orcs of Golarion, etc.), but the only concrete places other than the ones you mentioned would definitely be Lost Cities of Golarion.
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First, Half-Drow do "exist" per se. The Advanced Race Guide gives half-elves the option of switching out some of their abilities to gain drow darkvision and their spell-like abilities, and they are said to have a drow ancestry rather than normal elves.
I mentioned them because the ARG has them, but Mark Moreland says they don't exist at large. As in, maybe one or two, that deserve to be the focus of an AP.
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First, Half-Drow do "exist" per se. The Advanced Race Guide gives half-elves the option of switching out some of their abilities to gain drow darkvision and their spell-like abilities, and they are said to have a drow ancestry rather than normal elves.I mentioned them because the ARG has them, but Mark Moreland says they don't exist at large. As in, maybe one or two, that deserve to be the focus of an AP.
I believe he meant for PFS. I swear I remember bits here and there on the matter of half-drow half-elves in Golarion specific products.
(before it comes up, non-evil drow also exist though they are rare, with one CN NPC so far living in a drow city who wasn't treated like a glaring aberration, so there's more range to work with)
I don't think there's much more on Far Parathra, but I really second the recommendation of Lost Cities of Golarion's Ilvarandin, which can serve as a great place for drow to get entangled with and actually presents something that would scare them if the truth of the place was more widely known.
On how widely known the drow are throughout the Inner Sea Region, I think the default assumption was that the elves of Kyonin managed to keep it mostly quiet, but from the sound of things in the lead-up to Shattered Star it seems the lid has been blown off on that secret in a post-Second Darkness Golarion. We don't have the full details on that yet though.
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Also, there are some Umbral dragons in Orv, right? I want to have an early encounter where the PCs have to work with one preying on Nemret Noktoria. And then, at the end of the campaign, an Umbral Ravener. How prominent is worship of non-demons in Drow society? I also wanted to have one house that was ruled by a male, who was LE as opposed to the usual CE, who used devils extensively.
By the way, on the PFWiki, it lists Far Parathra's alignment as LE, even though it is a Drow city, and Zirnakaynin, the capital, is CE.
Basically the ARG is writen to be a generic system for anyone wether they play Golarion or not the Half-drow stuff is in there for them. The thing is in Golarion there isnt really any diference between drow and elves really.
Elf does something so aweful as to be recognized by the unverse at large BAM they are a drow. How this works on a gentic level i havent a clue.
But the impression i got was that IF they did theyd basically be a special nowflake character with whole stories written about them. Basically they would be special.
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Basically the ARG is writen to be a generic system for anyone wether they play Golarion or not the Half-drow stuff is in there for them. The thing is in Golarion there isnt really any diference between drow and elves really.
Elf does something so aweful as to be recognized by the unverse at large BAM they are a drow. How this works on a gentic level i havent a clue.
But the impression i got was that IF they did theyd basically be a special nowflake character with whole stories written about them. Basically they would be special.
The Drow would still treat him as an abomination, of course. The 'special snowflake' character would be the normal Drow taking noble feats, because I know there will be.
I still have two questions: how can Drow cities besides Zirnakaynin have LE alignments, and how the house system works in Golarion Drow society. Is it race wide, or does each city have its own houses? The PFWiki was a little vague.
i think each city has their own houses. Im afraid we just got to that part of second darkness when the Dm called the game. But you will likely find some of the information you are looking for there. I cannot remmeber which book of the AP it was though.
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Well...it could either be a type (the boring but probable answer) or it could be because the city has discarded the demon-worship of other drow, and have instead taken up alliances with Hell (as Cheliax). Or perhaps they wanted structure, one house attempting to secure its position irrevocably, and being far enough away allowed that psychotic plan to actually succeed...I dunno honestly, but that feels to me like something you could create an entire super-awesome backstory from.
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Well...it could either be a type (the boring but probable answer) or it could be because the city has discarded the demon-worship of other drow, and have instead taken up alliances with Hell (as Cheliax). Or perhaps they wanted structure, one house attempting to secure its position irrevocably, and being far enough away allowed that psychotic plan to actually succeed...I dunno honestly, but that feels to me like something you could create an entire super-awesome backstory from.
I have an idea for one house that does that, but it is not in power. Eh, I'll just ignore the alignment.