
Ruzza |
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Archpaladin Zousha wrote:On the contrary, aren't they explicitly saying that it was always empty, rather than just that it has come to be empty now?But they're NOT purging them, they're just not saying anything about them going forward.
The big thing is Zirnakaynin, and all they're saying is it's now empty and the Sekmin fear it. They're very pointedly not saying HOW it got empty or what the Sekmin are so scared of.
Much more accurately - "If we want to continue to tell stories about Zirnakayin, we cannot mention drow - legally. Since that's not something we feel is interesting, we leave the interpretation up to your table and will instead write new stories going forward, rather than abandoning the Darklands because of legal adversity."

Lord Fyre RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32 |
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Archpaladin Zousha wrote:On the contrary, aren't they explicitly saying that it was always empty, rather than just that it has come to be empty now?But they're NOT purging them, they're just not saying anything about them going forward.
The big thing is Zirnakaynin, and all they're saying is it's now empty and the Sekmin fear it. They're very pointedly not saying HOW it got empty or what the Sekmin are so scared of.
Because then Paizo would have to mention that drow used to exist. Any mention of drow appears to be what Paizo is trying to avoid.
Yes, WotC's claim on Dark Elves as IP is dubious (Dökkálfar and Ljósálfar), but Hasbro has sent out the Pinkertons for less.

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Unicore wrote:ThePuppyTurtle wrote:James Jacobs told us he has plans for overwriting some setting locations that have been written about previously, probably in some up coming adventure paths.Rysky wrote:Yes. I would. My beef is not with The removal of the drow has such, It is with the explicit and retroactive nature of that removal. I would have preferred that the matter just not be acknowledged rather than acknowledged in a way that explicitly purges 7% of existing material from continuity.If you remove everything about the Drow that makes them recognizable as Drow would the people in here fighting over them even want them?
This, right here, is the specific thing I do not like. Everyone on your side of the debate has been arguing that the drow always a minor element of the setting. If that's true, why is it necessary to explicitly purge them--and with them, everyone's Second Darkness & Shattered Star playthroughs--from continuity rather than just leaving them unmentioned from now on?
Shattered star was the first a p I ever ran, and the fact that acknowledging its events in other adventures at my table now creates an explicit continuity error is what bothers me.
Replacing the drow with something else would not cause the same problem because it merely alters the events of Shattered Star rather than deleting them.
I have not read Shattered Star. If the drows there were replaced by Cavern Elves, how bad would it be ? What would be missing ?
Maybe there were some Cavern Elves demon cultists with delusions of grandeur about having a whole empire of matriarchal houses and who called themselves drows.
This can perfectly happen in a home game.
It's just that Paizo cannot write it in one of their future products.

Lord Fyre RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32 |
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ThePuppyTurtle wrote:I have not read Shattered Star. If the drows there were replaced by Cavern Elves, how bad would it be? What would be missing?Unicore wrote:ThePuppyTurtle wrote:James Jacobs told us he has plans for overwriting some setting locations that have been written about previously, probably in some up coming adventure paths.Rysky wrote:Yes. I would. My beef is not with The removal of the drow has such, It is with the explicit and retroactive nature of that removal. I would have preferred that the matter just not be acknowledged rather than acknowledged in a way that explicitly purges 7% of existing material from continuity.If you remove everything about the Drow that makes them recognizable as Drow would the people in here fighting over them even want them?
This, right here, is the specific thing I do not like. Everyone on your side of the debate has been arguing that the drow always a minor element of the setting. If that's true, why is it necessary to explicitly purge them--and with them, everyone's Second Darkness & Shattered Star playthroughs--from continuity rather than just leaving them unmentioned from now on?
Shattered star was the first a p I ever ran, and the fact that acknowledging its events in other adventures at my table now creates an explicit continuity error is what bothers me.
Replacing the drow with something else would not cause the same problem because it merely alters the events of Shattered Star rather than deleting them.
Game Balance would actually improve.
(And since it's a home game, who says that they are or were delusional?)
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Rysky wrote:Please elaborate on the contradiction you perceive.ThePuppyTurtle wrote:… so which is it?Rysky wrote:Yes. I would. My beef is not with The removal of the drow has such, It is with the explicit and retroactive nature of that removal. I would have preferred that the matter just not be acknowledged rather than acknowledged in a way that explicitly purges 7% of existing material from continuity.If you remove everything about the Drow that makes them recognizable as Drow would the people in here fighting over them even want them?
If they’re never acknowledged again and the areas they are in are given to new creatures without comment when those areas are touched upon, what’s the difference?
“Never existed in the first place” and “we’re never going to mention or acknowledge them again”, what’s the difference?
Paizo isn’t abandoning the Darklands, they still want to tell stories there.

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ThePuppyTurtle wrote:Unicore wrote:ThePuppyTurtle wrote:James Jacobs told us he has plans for overwriting some setting locations that have been written about previously, probably in some up coming adventure paths.Rysky wrote:Yes. I would. My beef is not with The removal of the drow has such, It is with the explicit and retroactive nature of that removal. I would have preferred that the matter just not be acknowledged rather than acknowledged in a way that explicitly purges 7% of existing material from continuity.If you remove everything about the Drow that makes them recognizable as Drow would the people in here fighting over them even want them?
This, right here, is the specific thing I do not like. Everyone on your side of the debate has been arguing that the drow always a minor element of the setting. If that's true, why is it necessary to explicitly purge them--and with them, everyone's Second Darkness & Shattered Star playthroughs--from continuity rather than just leaving them unmentioned from now on?
Shattered star was the first a p I ever ran, and the fact that acknowledging its events in other adventures at my table now creates an explicit continuity error is what bothers me.
Replacing the drow with something else would not cause the same problem because it merely alters the events of Shattered Star rather than deleting them.
I have not read Shattered Star. If the drows there were replaced by Cavern Elves, how bad would it be ? What would be missing ?
Maybe there were some Cavern Elves demon cultists with delusions of grandeur about having a whole empire of matriarchal houses and who called themselves drows.
This can perfectly happen in a home game.
It's just that Paizo cannot write it in one of their future products.
This would be fine. This is the exact thing I'm saying they should have done.

Lord Fyre RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32 |
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ThePuppyTurtle wrote:Rysky wrote:Please elaborate on the contradiction you perceive.ThePuppyTurtle wrote:… so which is it?Rysky wrote:Yes. I would. My beef is not with The removal of the drow has such, It is with the explicit and retroactive nature of that removal. I would have preferred that the matter just not be acknowledged rather than acknowledged in a way that explicitly purges 7% of existing material from continuity.If you remove everything about the Drow that makes them recognizable as Drow would the people in here fighting over them even want them?
If they’re never acknowledged again and the areas they are in are given to new creatures without comment when those areas are touched upon, what’s the difference?
“Never existed in the first place” and “we’re never going to mention or acknowledge them again”, what’s the difference?
I see one minor difference. The second case allows a GM with an existing history to fill in the blanks (i.e., the dark elves losing a major, genocidal, subterranean war.)

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ThePuppyTurtle wrote:Rysky wrote:Please elaborate on the contradiction you perceive.ThePuppyTurtle wrote:… so which is it?Rysky wrote:Yes. I would. My beef is not with The removal of the drow has such, It is with the explicit and retroactive nature of that removal. I would have preferred that the matter just not be acknowledged rather than acknowledged in a way that explicitly purges 7% of existing material from continuity.If you remove everything about the Drow that makes them recognizable as Drow would the people in here fighting over them even want them?
If they’re never acknowledged again and the areas they are in are given to new creatures without comment when those areas are touched upon, what’s the difference?
“Never existed in the first place” and “we’re never going to mention or acknowledge them again”, what’s the difference?
Paizo isn’t abandoning the Darklands, they still want to tell stories there.
You don't have to abandon the entire darklands to talk around the specific locations that should definitely have drow in them. If for some reason you had to revisit those locations, just insinuate that something about them recently changed rather than canonizing a new, mutually exclusive version of them that overtly denies what was once there.

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Rysky wrote:I see one minor difference. The second case allows a GM with an existing history to fill in the blanks (i.e., the dark elves losing a major, genocidal, subterranean war.)ThePuppyTurtle wrote:Rysky wrote:Please elaborate on the contradiction you perceive.ThePuppyTurtle wrote:… so which is it?Rysky wrote:Yes. I would. My beef is not with The removal of the drow has such, It is with the explicit and retroactive nature of that removal. I would have preferred that the matter just not be acknowledged rather than acknowledged in a way that explicitly purges 7% of existing material from continuity.If you remove everything about the Drow that makes them recognizable as Drow would the people in here fighting over them even want them?
If they’re never acknowledged again and the areas they are in are given to new creatures without comment when those areas are touched upon, what’s the difference?
“Never existed in the first place” and “we’re never going to mention or acknowledge them again”, what’s the difference?
This here is the thing that I am saying they should have done.

Lord Fyre RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32 |
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Lord Fyre wrote:This here is the thing that I am saying they should have done.Rysky wrote:I see one minor difference. The second case allows a GM with an existing history to fill in the blanks (i.e., the dark elves losing a major, genocidal, subterranean war.)ThePuppyTurtle wrote:Rysky wrote:Please elaborate on the contradiction you perceive.ThePuppyTurtle wrote:… so which is it?Rysky wrote:Yes. I would. My beef is not with The removal of the drow has such, It is with the explicit and retroactive nature of that removal. I would have preferred that the matter just not be acknowledged rather than acknowledged in a way that explicitly purges 7% of existing material from continuity.If you remove everything about the Drow that makes them recognizable as Drow would the people in here fighting over them even want them?
If they’re never acknowledged again and the areas they are in are given to new creatures without comment when those areas are touched upon, what’s the difference?
“Never existed in the first place” and “we’re never going to mention or acknowledge them again”, what’s the difference?
Add to this a major effort of the victors to erase any trace of the previous owners from the sites… This creates some interesting storylines that Paizo can't follow up, but a GM could. (i.e., the non-evil "cavern elves" from the Abomination Vaults being the last surviving refugees.)
The would likely even reject using the name, not wanting to create more troubles for themselves.

Ruzza |
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The continuity and lore that many are saying should be maintained and respected is a problem that some are overlooking. If you want to continue to use a portion of the Darklands or anything that used the drow in any respect, you would legally need to not give mention to them in any way. Two of the major options thus became:
1. Drop several Darklands locations and stories entirely, never to be revisted.
2. State that drow did not exist there.
Like, absolutely it sucks. James Jacobs himself had said that. But if you're looking for a justification, they cannot give it in the text of ORC products or you make a connection between OGL Golarion and ORC Golarion that puts you at risk legally.

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The continuity and lore that many are saying should be maintained and respected is a problem that some are overlooking. If you want to continue to use a portion of the Darklands or anything that used the drow in any respect, you would legally need to not give mention to them in any way. Two of the major options thus became:
1. Drop several Darklands locations and stories entirely, never to be revisted.
2. State that drow did not exist there.
Like, absolutely it sucks. James Jacobs himself had said that. But if you're looking for a justification, they cannot give it in the text of ORC products or you make a connection between OGL Golarion and ORC Golarion that puts you at risk legally.
You don't have to say they were never there. You can just not say they were ever there. There is also no published material explicitly stating that the daevites do not exist on Golarion. This does not In any way leave the door open for someone to claim in a court of law that they're somehow canon in a way that is legally dangerous.

Ruzza |
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Ruzza wrote:You don't have to say they were never there. You can just not say they were ever there.The continuity and lore that many are saying should be maintained and respected is a problem that some are overlooking. If you want to continue to use a portion of the Darklands or anything that used the drow in any respect, you would legally need to not give mention to them in any way. Two of the major options thus became:
1. Drop several Darklands locations and stories entirely, never to be revisted.
2. State that drow did not exist there.
Like, absolutely it sucks. James Jacobs himself had said that. But if you're looking for a justification, they cannot give it in the text of ORC products or you make a connection between OGL Golarion and ORC Golarion that puts you at risk legally.
Not if you want to use those locations in the future. Again, this is to protect Paizo legally.

Unicore |
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Ruzza wrote:You don't have to say they were never there. You can just not say they were ever there.The continuity and lore that many are saying should be maintained and respected is a problem that some are overlooking. If you want to continue to use a portion of the Darklands or anything that used the drow in any respect, you would legally need to not give mention to them in any way. Two of the major options thus became:
1. Drop several Darklands locations and stories entirely, never to be revisted.
2. State that drow did not exist there.
Like, absolutely it sucks. James Jacobs himself had said that. But if you're looking for a justification, they cannot give it in the text of ORC products or you make a connection between OGL Golarion and ORC Golarion that puts you at risk legally.
In official ORC published material, they never will say "The Drow were never here." They might write new stories about some old locations with lore that clashes with OGL material, but that doesn't say "you are not allowed to keep anything else you want to be happening here."

Darksol the Painbringer |
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ThePuppyTurtle wrote:Rysky wrote:Yes. I would. My beef is not with The removal of the drow has such, It is with the explicit and retroactive nature of that removal. I would have preferred that the matter just not be acknowledged rather than acknowledged in a way that explicitly purges 7% of existing material from continuity.If you remove everything about the Drow that makes them recognizable as Drow would the people in here fighting over them even want them?
Paizo is not actually "removing" any content though. James Jacobs told us he has plans for overwriting some setting locations that have been written about previously, probably in some up coming adventure paths. He is just letting fans know that those settings won't have the drow anymore that they were maybe expecting there, and there isn't going to be anything written about why not. I take that as a sign of respect for my maturity and ability to understand the situation as a fan of the setting and the adventures James Jacobs writes. I guess we have one vote for "just don't tell us this in advance and let us get mad when it happens." But I for one appreciate being told not to expect anything more said on the topic than, "because we legally can't tell the story in a way that includes drow, but we have stories that we want to set in that location, that we think are worth telling."
James isn't just making up stuff about these settings because he wants to upset some members of his audience, but because he has exciting ideas for some of these locations and doesn't want to have to completely disregard everything to keep telling the stories he wants to tell. I for one am excited because this probably means that we have some more underdark stories in the works over the next couple of years and I look forward toward seeing what is going on there. Never writing about the underdark again, just to avoid letting the sekmin out of the bag that drow are gone would have been a real shame.
Not sure how "overwriting some setting locations" does not count as "removing content," though. This is literally a retcon, and a retcon usually changes things that were once one thing, but are now instead another thing. Such as, for example, replacing the Drow with the Snekmin. (Yes, it's Sekmin, but again, I prefer the Snekmin analogue.)
I mean, yes, you can say that X AP and Y AP are still products that people can purchase and use for their games by nature of being published under the OGL, and in that vein, sure, they aren't removing content. But no, you can't say that those products are part of the setting that Paizo is establishing for themselves in PF2, because those can't be a part of the Golarion setting moving forward, meaning it breaks continuity between tables that were using X and Y APs, but then move on to Z AP, and instead of it being Drow, it's Snekmin. Now, if I was GM at this table, I have to either A. Explain away the Drow from the previous APs in some stupid fashion that probably makes no sense, or B. Change the Snekmin to Drow (or the Apostae, depending on circumstance) and completely change the tone/direction of the narrative (since I imagine Snekmin and Drow have different motivations).

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ThePuppyTurtle wrote:In official ORC published material, they never will say "The Drow were never here."Ruzza wrote:You don't have to say they were never there. You can just not say they were ever there.The continuity and lore that many are saying should be maintained and respected is a problem that some are overlooking. If you want to continue to use a portion of the Darklands or anything that used the drow in any respect, you would legally need to not give mention to them in any way. Two of the major options thus became:
1. Drop several Darklands locations and stories entirely, never to be revisted.
2. State that drow did not exist there.
Like, absolutely it sucks. James Jacobs himself had said that. But if you're looking for a justification, they cannot give it in the text of ORC products or you make a connection between OGL Golarion and ORC Golarion that puts you at risk legally.
On the contrary, isn't this exactly what they said they would do by reframing the idea of drow as an in-universe lie? In fact, isn't that more legally dangerous than just never mentioning them again at all?

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Unicore wrote:ThePuppyTurtle wrote:James Jacobs told us he has plans for overwriting some setting locations that have been written about previously, probably in some up coming adventure paths.Rysky wrote:Yes. I would. My beef is not with The removal of the drow has such, It is with the explicit and retroactive nature of that removal. I would have preferred that the matter just not be acknowledged rather than acknowledged in a way that explicitly purges 7% of existing material from continuity.If you remove everything about the Drow that makes them recognizable as Drow would the people in here fighting over them even want them?
This, right here, is the specific thing I do not like. Everyone on your side of the debate has been arguing that the drow always a minor element of the setting. If that's true, why is it necessary to explicitly purge them--and with them, everyone's Second Darkness & Shattered Star playthroughs--from continuity rather than just leaving them unmentioned from now on?
Shattered star was the first a p I ever ran, and the fact that acknowledging its events in other adventures at my table now creates an explicit continuity error is what bothers me.
Replacing the drow with something else would not cause the same problem because it merely alters the events of Shattered Star rather than deleting them.
It does not invalidate your table's continuity. Your table already has different continuity than Paizo. You start from the same place, but the first time a player makes a choice it diverges. That's how TTRPGs work.

Ruzza |
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Unicore wrote:On the contrary, isn't this exactly what they said they would do by reframing the idea of drow as an in-universe lie?ThePuppyTurtle wrote:In official ORC published material, they never will say "The Drow were never here."Ruzza wrote:You don't have to say they were never there. You can just not say they were ever there.The continuity and lore that many are saying should be maintained and respected is a problem that some are overlooking. If you want to continue to use a portion of the Darklands or anything that used the drow in any respect, you would legally need to not give mention to them in any way. Two of the major options thus became:
1. Drop several Darklands locations and stories entirely, never to be revisted.
2. State that drow did not exist there.
Like, absolutely it sucks. James Jacobs himself had said that. But if you're looking for a justification, they cannot give it in the text of ORC products or you make a connection between OGL Golarion and ORC Golarion that puts you at risk legally.
To the best of my knowledge,this explanation will not be appearing in published material.
Out of curiosity, what would you like the outcome to be? Many people, Paizo include, have stated that they cannot overtly state the reason for what will become of drow for legal reasons. I understand wanting to voice your displeasure, but many are disappointed while still seeing that this is a necessary precaution.

Ruzza |
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Unicore wrote:Not sure how...ThePuppyTurtle wrote:Rysky wrote:Yes. I would. My beef is not with The removal of the drow has such, It is with the explicit and retroactive nature of that removal. I would have preferred that the matter just not be acknowledged rather than acknowledged in a way that explicitly purges 7% of existing material from continuity.If you remove everything about the Drow that makes them recognizable as Drow would the people in here fighting over them even want them?
Paizo is not actually "removing" any content though. James Jacobs told us he has plans for overwriting some setting locations that have been written about previously, probably in some up coming adventure paths. He is just letting fans know that those settings won't have the drow anymore that they were maybe expecting there, and there isn't going to be anything written about why not. I take that as a sign of respect for my maturity and ability to understand the situation as a fan of the setting and the adventures James Jacobs writes. I guess we have one vote for "just don't tell us this in advance and let us get mad when it happens." But I for one appreciate being told not to expect anything more said on the topic than, "because we legally can't tell the story in a way that includes drow, but we have stories that we want to set in that location, that we think are worth telling."
James isn't just making up stuff about these settings because he wants to upset some members of his audience, but because he has exciting ideas for some of these locations and doesn't want to have to completely disregard everything to keep telling the stories he wants to tell. I for one am excited because this probably means that we have some more underdark stories in the works over the next couple of years and I look forward toward seeing what is going on there. Never writing about the underdark again, just to avoid letting the sekmin out of the bag that drow are gone would have been a real shame.
Yes, this sucks, but what can you do? The options in which Paizo is not open to litigation are limited when it comes to the drow.

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Unicore wrote:Not sure how...ThePuppyTurtle wrote:Rysky wrote:Yes. I would. My beef is not with The removal of the drow has such, It is with the explicit and retroactive nature of that removal. I would have preferred that the matter just not be acknowledged rather than acknowledged in a way that explicitly purges 7% of existing material from continuity.If you remove everything about the Drow that makes them recognizable as Drow would the people in here fighting over them even want them?
Paizo is not actually "removing" any content though. James Jacobs told us he has plans for overwriting some setting locations that have been written about previously, probably in some up coming adventure paths. He is just letting fans know that those settings won't have the drow anymore that they were maybe expecting there, and there isn't going to be anything written about why not. I take that as a sign of respect for my maturity and ability to understand the situation as a fan of the setting and the adventures James Jacobs writes. I guess we have one vote for "just don't tell us this in advance and let us get mad when it happens." But I for one appreciate being told not to expect anything more said on the topic than, "because we legally can't tell the story in a way that includes drow, but we have stories that we want to set in that location, that we think are worth telling."
James isn't just making up stuff about these settings because he wants to upset some members of his audience, but because he has exciting ideas for some of these locations and doesn't want to have to completely disregard everything to keep telling the stories he wants to tell. I for one am excited because this probably means that we have some more underdark stories in the works over the next couple of years and I look forward toward seeing what is going on there. Never writing about the underdark again, just to avoid letting the sekmin out of the bag that drow are gone would have been a real shame.
Or third option, just use them as written and your version of Golarion still has drow. Again, this is how personal tables work. If your table didn't change the story, it's no different than reading a book and that's not why we play the game.

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ThePuppyTurtle wrote:Unicore wrote:On the contrary, isn't this exactly what they said they would do by reframing the idea of drow as an in-universe lie?ThePuppyTurtle wrote:In official ORC published material, they never will say "The Drow were never here."Ruzza wrote:You don't have to say they were never there. You can just not say they were ever there.The continuity and lore that many are saying should be maintained and respected is a problem that some are overlooking. If you want to continue to use a portion of the Darklands or anything that used the drow in any respect, you would legally need to not give mention to them in any way. Two of the major options thus became:
1. Drop several Darklands locations and stories entirely, never to be revisted.
2. State that drow did not exist there.
Like, absolutely it sucks. James Jacobs himself had said that. But if you're looking for a justification, they cannot give it in the text of ORC products or you make a connection between OGL Golarion and ORC Golarion that puts you at risk legally.
To the best of my knowledge,this explanation will not be appearing in published material.
Out of curiosity, what would you like the outcome to be? Many people, Paizo include, have stated that they cannot overtly state the reason for what will become of drow for legal reasons. I understand wanting to voice your displeasure, but many are disappointed while still seeing that this is a necessary precaution.
A few options:
1: Covertly state what became of the drow by noting the occurrence of a large disaster that wink may have eliminated entire species from the Darklands wink.
2: Avoid stating anything that fully precludes the hypothetical possibility of drow having once existed as described. Is there any published material explicitly stating that beholders never existed in the Darklands? Is there any Starfinder material explicitly stating that there's no such thing as a jedi? Not that I know of. No one thinks this creates a legal problem.

Ruzza |
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A few options:
1: Covertly state what became of the drow by noting the occurrence of a large disaster that wink may have eliminated entire species from the Darklands wink.
2: Avoid stating anything that fully precludes the hypothetical possibility of drow having once existed as described. Is there any published material explicitly stating that beholders never existed in the Darklands? Is there any Starfinder material explicitly stating that there's no such thing as a jedi?...
Well, let's look at these!
1. I think this could potentially and totally work! ...But I'm not a lawyer. Nor do I have a legal team advising me, which Paizo (I assume) does. Here's the thing, even if this a battle that Paizo could win legally, just having the possibility that Hasbro could come in and bury them in legal fees is daunting. Then we can tack on the "do we want to address in lore this catacylsm/disaster that was apparently only based on ancestry?" It soon becomes a problem of "we have created a new piece of lore/history, but one we cannot elaborate much on." Could it work? Probably. Did Paizo feel like that was safe to do? Looks like they do not.
2. This is what is being done, in essence. The problem that you're seeing is that the spaces that were occupied by drow are now going to be occupied by something else. We go back to the "we can't flesh out/use/write stories with that area if we obliquelty talk around drow." Drow are not being written about going forward, but other things are and those are the stories that are going to be told - not the absence of a story.

Darksol the Painbringer |
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Yes, this sucks, but what can you do? The options in which Paizo is not open to litigation are limited when it comes to the drow.
Taking the safe route is one thing, but they aren't doing that wholesale, given that they're open to litigation with numerous things, not just the Drow. They are willing to put in the work to change things like Dragons and Otyughs and Ankhegs and...you name it, to make it still function in the setting (and it still be legally distinct enough to not warrant lawsuits). But not the Drow. And the only explanation we got, really, is "We don't have time for it." So, we had the time to fix all these other things to be legally distinct in the timeframe they were given, whatever timeframe that might have been, but not enough time to adjust for the Drow? I can understand why people feel that's not much of an answer, since it feels counterintuitive to what's been going on for everything else. Is changing the Drow (which shouldn't be called that anymore anyway) really that impossible or that complex of a task that they cannot do so at all? Apparently. But I personally don't feel convinced, and I imagine others don't, either.
Even though I don't have a horse in this race, I can't blame the people feeling betrayed by being the odd ones out with that consideration in mind. It explains why there is infinitely more posts on this thread compared to the other ones.

Ruzza |
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Taking the safe route is one thing, but they aren't doing that wholesale, given that they're open to litigation with numerous things, not just the Drow. They are willing to put in the work to change things like Dragons and Otyughs and Ankhegs and...you name it, to make it still function in the setting (and it still be legally distinct enough to not warrant lawsuits). But not the Drow.
I mean the thing is - I am not a lawyer. You want the talking bag for that. And we do know that more changes are coming down the pipe and that we'll be seeing several name changes and facelifts - really due to the OGL/ORC problem. I feel like (and likely the legal team of Pazio agrees) underground dark elves who worship demons are much harder to disentangle from their IP than, say, a quadraped brain creature that burrows into skulls.
I also understand why people are upset, but many, many reasons have been given as to why this change is being made.
EDIT: To say nothing of how popular drow are being a double-edged sword. It's easier and more profitable to go after a well-known IP like the drow which is firmly established in D&D lore than it would be an ankheg or otyugh.

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ThePuppyTurtle wrote:A few options:
1: Covertly state what became of the drow by noting the occurrence of a large disaster that wink may have eliminated entire species from the Darklands wink.
2: Avoid stating anything that fully precludes the hypothetical possibility of drow having once existed as described. Is there any published material explicitly stating that beholders never existed in the Darklands? Is there any Starfinder material explicitly stating that there's no such thing as a jedi?...
Well, let's look at these!
1. I think this could potentially and totally work! ...But I'm not a lawyer. Nor do I have a legal team advising me, which Paizo (I assume) does. Here's the thing, even if this a battle that Paizo could win legally, just having the possibility that Hasbro could come in and bury them in legal fees is daunting. Then we can tack on the "do we want to address in lore this catacylsm/disaster that was apparently only based on ancestry?" It soon becomes a problem of "we have created a new piece of lore/history, but one we cannot elaborate much on." Could it work? Probably. Did Paizo feel like that was safe to do? Looks like they do not.
2. This is what is being done, in essence. The problem that you're seeing is that the spaces that were occupied by drow are now going to be occupied by something else. We go back to the "we can't flesh out/use/write stories with that area if we obliquelty talk around drow." Drow are not being written about going forward, but other things are and those are the stories that are going to be told - not the absence of a story.
1: I guess I'm more of a cynic than you, but I don't take it for granted that paizo thought of and consciously rejected every alternative to what they did, nor do I take it for granted that, If they did think of and reject it, they did so exclusively for sympathetic reasons. I don't consider it noble or sympathetic for them to make themselves 100% litigation proof with an annoying retcon if they had the option to make themselves 99% litigation proof without one. I regard that as a predictable-from-a-corporation but still objectively bad compromise of artistic integrity.
2: There are ways of occupying those spaces without precluding the idea that drow occupied them ten years prior. This would place a minor restriction on what stories they could tell, but I think preserving the pretense that this is all one cohesive universe would be worth that cost.

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Ruzza wrote:Yes, this sucks, but what can you do? The options in which Paizo is not open to litigation are limited when it comes to the drow.Taking the safe route is one thing, but they aren't doing that wholesale, given that they're open to litigation with numerous things, not just the Drow. They are willing to put in the work to change things like Dragons and Otyughs and Ankhegs and...you name it, to make it still function in the setting (and it still be legally distinct enough to not warrant lawsuits). But not the Drow. And the only explanation we got, really, is "We don't have time for it." So, we had the time to fix all these other things to be legally distinct in the timeframe they were given, whatever timeframe that might have been, but not enough time to adjust for the Drow? I can understand why people feel that's not much of an answer, since it feels counterintuitive to what's been going on for everything else. Is changing the Drow (which shouldn't be called that anymore anyway) really that impossible or that complex of a task that they cannot do so at all? Apparently. But I personally don't feel convinced, and I imagine others don't, either.
Even though I don't have a horse in this race, I can't blame the people feeling betrayed by being the odd ones out with that consideration in mind. It explains why there is infinitely more posts on this thread compared to the other ones.
I could be wrong, but I believe they are "replacing" every original OGL monster, like Otyugh, Ankheg, Mimic etc., any creature that has no Mythologic or Folkloric antecedent, with something new that will fill a similar ecological niche. Drow are an extraordinary case in that they kept the D&D version mostly intact, including, thankfully, the "Sensually dressed" trait. Now they can't publish this stuff under ORC. I, for one, am looking forward to the new beasties, which are always fun!

Ruzza |
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snip
And I think this is why you're seeing pushback on your opinion - James Jacobs himself has stated why it needs to be done and has been very detailed about how tough the decision was to make. If you don't feel that is sincere, then there's very little that can be said to dissuade you. But it's also a case of, what would you like Paizo or the community do to help?
A difficult decision was reached, many disagreed, reasons were given for the change. The split seems to happen here - you don't believe those reasons. Outside of sitting down with Paizo staff and lawyers themselves, what outcome do you want?

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Ruzza wrote:Yes, this sucks, but what can you do? The options in which Paizo is not open to litigation are limited when it comes to the drow.Taking the safe route is one thing, but they aren't doing that wholesale, given that they're open to litigation with numerous things, not just the Drow. They are willing to put in the work to change things like Dragons and Otyughs and Ankhegs and...you name it, to make it still function in the setting (and it still be legally distinct enough to not warrant lawsuits). But not the Drow. And the only explanation we got, really, is "We don't have time for it." So, we had the time to fix all these other things to be legally distinct in the timeframe they were given, whatever timeframe that might have been, but not enough time to adjust for the Drow? I can understand why people feel that's not much of an answer, since it feels counterintuitive to what's been going on for everything else. Is changing the Drow (which shouldn't be called that anymore anyway) really that impossible or that complex of a task that they cannot do so at all? Apparently. But I personally don't feel convinced, and I imagine others don't, either.
Even though I don't have a horse in this race, I can't blame the people feeling betrayed by being the odd ones out with that consideration in mind. It explains why there is infinitely more posts on this thread compared to the other ones.
They aren't open to that though. Otyughs are gone. Replaced wholesale with a new sewer monster like the drow are getting replaced with sekmin. Chromatic and Metallic dragons are getting sidelined for the new dragons while Paizo figures out how to bring them back. That one is easier than drow because Hasbro has less of a claim of intellectual property on the concept of a dragon than they can on dark skinned underground elves that are evil and live in a matriarchal society. But even still they're not putting them out in Monster Core, so I don't know where you're getting that this is only a drow specific thing. Lots of classic D&D monsters are gone.

Ezekieru |
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For those who are upset about the loss of Drow, I feel for you. I was really looking forward to seeing how they could be different from regular Elves as an ancestry or archetype option, and what stories could be told about them in the future. Up to this point, I'm behind y'all 100%.
But once we're getting into those of y'all would think that this decision is unnecessary, that the new stories with Sekmin will be uninteresting, or that Paizo or JJ are being disingenuous about this process... yeah, no.
Paizo made a choice between two things: 1) completely reworking the Drow to something completely new, but then having to deal with people getting mad that the new Drow would be nothing like the old Drow, or 2) choosing to write off the Drow and replace them with the Sekmin in terms of antagonists, and replace them with Cavern Elves for the elvish population underground.
It's a lose-lose situation, and Paizo/JJ decided to go with the latter option. It sucks to those people who wanted to see Second Darkness/Abomination Vaults referenced in future books, but it's a legal precedent that the company doesn't want to mess with. It's also probably more of a headache to maneuver the theoretical new Drow around the old lore without pissing fans off. And I don't blame them for just throwing it all out.
And don't get me started of those fans who want the Drow to get "genocided" away in lore. Said fans probably don't want to consider how the many marginalized writers over at Paizo probably wouldn't like to see that applied in the setting. But those writers' discomfort mean nothing compared to the inconvenience of simply pretending Drow don't exist anymore in Pathfinder anymore (and likely won't be in Starfinder anymore once the SF team runs out of OGL material in a year's time).

Darksol the Painbringer |
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Darksol the Painbringer wrote:Taking the safe route is one thing, but they aren't doing that wholesale, given that they're open to litigation with numerous things, not just the Drow. They are willing to put in the work to change things like Dragons and Otyughs and Ankhegs and...you name it, to make it still function in the setting (and it still be legally distinct enough to not warrant lawsuits). But not the Drow.I mean the thing is - I am not a lawyer. You want the talking bag for that. And we do know that more changes are coming down the pipe and that we'll be seeing several name changes and facelifts - really due to the OGL/ORC problem. I feel like (and likely the legal team of Pazio agrees) underground dark elves who worship demons are much harder to disentangle from their IP than, say, a quadraped brain creature that burrows into skulls.
I also understand why people are upset, but many, many reasons have been given as to why this change is being made.
EDIT: To say nothing of how popular drow are being a double-edged sword. It's easier and more profitable to go after a well-known IP like the drow which is firmly established in D&D lore than it would be an ankheg or otyugh.
And that's just it; changes are coming, we knew that was going to happen to everything from the OGL. What we didn't know was going to happen was that certain things were simply going to be axed instead of changed, which is a significant difference. Even if it's understandable, saying "We're changing things from the setting to still fill X niche" is not the same thing as saying "We're axing/cutting things from the setting entirely," even if the axing from the setting is the change itself.
I'm not sure if many reasons were given. There was a long history piece on the subject matter, but it ultimately boiled down to "We don't have time to fix/change them." It is certainly more complex than that, but again, that's basically what the linked post is saying. To quote JJ from another post in the thread to paint a picture:
We didn't have time for that [changing the Drow]. BUT
Intellect Devourers are still there; we're doubling down on them being aliens and part of the Dominion of the Black, but the city of Ilvarandin is still in the setting, and thus these "corpse thieves" or "body snatchers" are still there. They get a new name too that's not a "humans call them this": Xoarian. (Implying that they come from a distant planet in the Dark Tapestry called Xoar.)
Neothelids are 100% ogl, and kinda sketchy ones at that since they snuck in through a crack into the Psionics SRD. Going forward, we'll be recontextualizing the "Giant psychic worm monsters" of Denebrum and the Darklands as a more powerful variant of the seugathi.
Put into perspective, we have 3 OGL-based creatures here that JJ has stated the fates of (while not definitive currently, it does present a general idea for the Remaster's guidelines).
Drow are getting axed because there isn't time for it. But we are told that Intellect Devourers are being essentially rebranded as Xoarians, part of the Dominion of the Black, while still being a part of the setting, and that Neothelids are being rebranded as "greater Seugathi" (whatever that is, looks like I'll need to brush up on a Beastiary to figure them out), while also still being a part of the setting, even though JJ outright confirms they are specific OGL creations. It's entirely possible that there was already work to make these things different from before, and they trampolined from there, but that's merely speculation, since it's also entirely possible that they came up with this at the drop of a hat and the lawyers just said "That's good enough."
It was argued that because the Drow weren't featured in as many published works as the likes of Dragons and Fiends and other creature types, as well as having mixed/negative reception to their inclusion/implementation, that they shouldn't be that popular of a creature type to write about. At best, I would expect that, because of their lack of sales/popularity that axing them would be the better decision, and I could agree with that prospect from a business perspective, since spending money to lose money on a bad product is just bad business.
It's plausible that all this is, is a vocal minority speaking out for being axed due to it simply being a lose-lose situation. But I'm not fully convinced that is true, given that again, other OGL creatures are given reworks to function within the setting while still maintaining a good amount of identity that people can point to them and treat them as the same creature as before. (Granted, I would think that would still come with legal allegations, but if the Paizo lawyers are giving it the green light, then obviously I would be wrong on this matter.)

PossibleCabbage |
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On the contrary, aren't they explicitly saying that it was always empty, rather than just that it has come to be empty now?
I believe what they're saying is "according to darklands natives who are available to comment Zirnakaynin has been empty for as long as they can remember."
Obviously, it can't have always been empty because someone built it. But since the Sekmin avoid it, they probably aren't the ones who built it.
Pathfinder 2nd edition prefers to avoid the authoritative voice whenever possible for these sorts of things, preferring to put the words in the mouths of people in the diagesis. No mortal on Golarion knows the entire history of Zirnakaynin, or at least if there is one then they haven't had the ability to document it or give this documentation to someone who would spread this information.
The normal source for "what things are like in this place" are the journals published by the Pathfinder Society so the Darklands have never been authoritatively mapped because the Pathfinders don't go there much since the locals are hostile to uncooperative. Also the Darklands are big, Paizo could publish nothing but Darklands adventures from now until the end of the product line and there would still be a lot of unexplored corners (I would really like a high level "pirate" AP on the Sightless Sea.)

Ruzza |
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Yes, and that's all a shame, but... yeah, drow would require a much bigger change that would take much longer to firmly establish as different in lore. And likely, so much so that the idea of "drow" would be diluded enough to the point that we would circle back to a new group of displeased folks - the "these aren't the drow we wanted" crowd. To quote a wiser poster than I:
Paizo made a choice between two things: 1) completely reworking the Drow to something completely new, but then having to deal with people getting mad that the new Drow would be nothing like the old Drow, or 2) choosing to write off the Drow and replace them with the Sekmin in terms of antagonists, and replace them with Cavern Elves for the elvish population underground.
It's not a winning choice for anyone. I suppose there is option 3, but I imagine that would go over so much worse with marketing and design - push back the Remaster, delay the move, give us a year to catch up with AP content, release adventures and material under OGL that are drow-centric to explain them as entirely different creatures, then push forward with the Remaster and the ORC license.
I suppose you could be upset at the creative team for not getting to redefining drow earlier, but that does seem to be a bit sour grapes for me.

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Do you think they are going to implement this change in older PF 1st Edition material? I.e., they've already decanonized Second Darkness.
Will Paizo do anything more drastic with the existing PDFs?
Unlikely, Paizo has maintained that changing existing PDFs is costly. I could see them putting a disclaimer on the product page, maybe.
1: I guess I'm more of a cynic than you, but I don't take it for granted that paizo thought of and consciously rejected every alternative to what they did, nor do I take it for granted that, If they did think of and reject it, they did so exclusively for sympathetic reasons. I don't consider it noble or sympathetic for them to make themselves 100% litigation proof with an annoying retcon if they had the option to make themselves 99% litigation proof without one. I regard that as a predictable-from-a-corporation but still objectively bad compromise of artistic integrity.
99% litigation proof vs Hasbro is like the cleaners that kill 99.99% of germs, when there are hundreds of thousands, and it only takes one to kill you. It's like intentionally leaving an Achilles heel. Hasbro lawyers can read Paizo's public messages, you know.
Also, how would you even measure 99% litigation proof?

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Drow are getting axed because there isn't time for it.
I think this is a misrepresentation of what James Jacobs said. He was closer to "they didn't spend the time between 2009 and Jan 2023 to make the Drow into something they could save." This issue was not on Paizo's Radar. If they had known there would be a deadline, maybe the drow could have been changed into something salvageable.

Terevalis Unctio of House Mysti |
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From my understanding, the Remaster was something that was being planned but the OGL debacle caused the necessity to amp up the project. This is why the books are being released so soon after the announcement when other projects have taken a year or so after announcements were made. So, in a way, Paizo could have developed the drow a different way,like they did other monsters.

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How would you like your frustrations to be addressed? A lot of people are coming in to give the explanation of why things are happening, but there's very little that can we or Paizo can do.
Personally, I'll be fine. I've been reasonably placated since James Jacob's long post behind the spoiler tag. Plus the addition that Shraen might survive in a recognizable form.
I just think some of the responses to responses end up doing more to incite further frustrations than anything else.
IMO, once the discussion devolves into arguments it's often best to just stop saying things, even if the other side ends up with the last word. Hard to continue an argument if the opposition stops talking.

Darksol the Painbringer |
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They aren't open to that though. Otyughs are gone. Replaced wholesale with a new sewer monster like the drow are getting replaced with sekmin. Chromatic and Metallic dragons are getting sidelined for the new dragons while Paizo figures out how to bring them back. That one is easier than drow because Hasbro has less of a claim of intellectual property on the concept of a dragon than they can on dark skinned underground elves that are evil and live in a matriarchal society. But even still they're not putting them out in Monster Core, so I don't know where you're getting that this is only a drow specific thing. Lots of classic D&D monsters are gone.
Replacing "sewer monster" with "sewer monster" is fine because people can still use the new one in place of the old and basically get the same result, because they still serve the same story function. Snekmin do not fulfill the same story function as the Drow (which is done on purpose, both to differentiate them as well as to tell a separate story), meaning they idea that it's "fine" to replace them like that doesn't really have the same jive.
Technically speaking, Chromatic/Metallic Dragons should likewise be getting axed, since I imagine they are just as if not even more popular than the Drow, especially if we take the Rulebook/AP sales metric and reviews into consideration, and I'm sure Hasbro/WotC will fight just as hard, if not harder, than if Paizo was going to attempt to reinvent the Drow into generic Dark Elves. It's quite literally in the name, "D&D." In fact, I would argue that D&D now translates to the two things you shouldn't bring up in a setting: Drow and Dragons.
I'm bringing it up as being (relatively) specific because it's been stated by JJ that several OGL monsters are being merely rebranded instead of axed. Ogres, Intellect Devourers, Neothelids, Dragons; these are all things that are still essentially existing under the ORC, but are merely getting a new coat of paint (because, assumedly, according to the lawyers, that's all they really need to be distinct from the OGL).

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I'm bringing it up as being (relatively) specific because it's been stated by JJ that several OGL monsters are being merely rebranded instead of axed. Ogres, Intellect Devourers, Neothelids, Dragons; these are all things that are still essentially existing under the ORC, but are merely getting a new coat of paint (because, assumedly, according to the lawyers, that's all they really need to be distinct from the OGL).
It's further than Tattooine is from Arrakis.

PossibleCabbage |
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Yeah, one of the things you do when you're trying to head off a legal fight against a much bigger corporation whose IP you are adjacent to, is you make a good faith effort to respect their copyrights and make an effort to differentiate your stuff from theirs. You especially want to avoid stepping on whatever part of their IP they consider the most valuable/marketable.
Wizards is very unlikely to sell "Ultimate Otyughs" in my lifetime, so a different sewer monster that doesn't look like theirs it just fills the same ecological niche isn't going to cost them money so they're less likely to care.
But things like True Metallic and Chromatic Dragons, Mind Flayers, and Drow are genuinely marketable arrows in their quiver, so those are copyrights they're inclined to protect aggressively.
Eagle-Eyed observers might observe that Paizo is doing with the Duergar precisely what some hoped they would do with the Drow. But putting aside the fact that it's hard for anybody to own "Dwarves live underground, Dwarves are greedy, Dwarves aren't very nice" it's also meaningful that R.A. Salvatore did not write a series of bestselling fantasy novels about an iconoclastic Duergar.

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Cori Marie wrote:They aren't open to that though. Otyughs are gone. Replaced wholesale with a new sewer monster like the drow are getting replaced with sekmin. Chromatic and Metallic dragons are getting sidelined for the new dragons while Paizo figures out how to bring them back. That one is easier than drow because Hasbro has less of a claim of intellectual property on the concept of a dragon than they can on dark skinned underground elves that are evil and live in a matriarchal society. But even still they're not putting them out in Monster Core, so I don't know where you're getting that this is only a drow specific thing. Lots of classic D&D monsters are gone.Replacing "sewer monster" with "sewer monster" is fine because people can still use the new one in place of the old and basically get the same result, because they still serve the same story function. Snekmin do not fulfill the same story function as the Drow (which is done on purpose, both to differentiate them as well as to tell a separate story), meaning they idea that it's "fine" to replace them like that doesn't really have the same jive.
Technically speaking, Chromatic/Metallic Dragons should likewise be getting axed, since I imagine they are just as if not even more popular than the Drow, especially if we take the Rulebook/AP sales metric and reviews into consideration, and I'm sure Hasbro/WotC will fight just as hard, if not harder, than if Paizo was going to attempt to reinvent the Drow into generic Dark Elves. It's quite literally in the name, "D&D." In fact, I would argue that D&D now translates to the two things you shouldn't bring up in a setting: Drow and Dragons.
I'm bringing it up as being (relatively) specific because it's been stated by JJ that several OGL monsters are being merely rebranded instead of axed. Ogres, Intellect Devourers, Neothelids, Dragons; these are all things that are still essentially existing under the ORC, but are merely getting a new coat of paint (because, assumedly, according to the...
Again, it's a lot harder for Hasbro to claim they own a firebreathing red dragon when those exist long before D&D was a thing. They also can't claim to own dark elves. They CAN claim to own DROW and specifically dark elves that live in evil, underground, matriarchal, demon worshiping societies. Do you see the specifics here that differentieate the two?

PossibleCabbage |
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There's also the fact that you can effectively get around the fact that D&D owns the idea of "Chromatic Dragons" you can still effectively justify that "Choral the Conqueror is a Dragon who is red, and breathes fire."
Because the number of Dragons you need to get a group of adventurers to sit up and take notice is "1", you can do things like "assert there are some unique dragons, like Choral and Mengkare, who don't fit into any normal category."
The Drow aren't really like that, you can have a single evil cavern elf who is into S&M Gear and Demon Worship and Poison and Hand Crossbows, call him Steve or whatever, but the existence of such a creature doesn't tell you much about anybody except Steve. Specifically, Steve is not an empire and Steve does not have plans that can cause a bad time for large swaths of the surface world.

Darksol the Painbringer |
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Yes, and that's all a shame, but... yeah, drow would require a much bigger change that would take much longer to firmly establish as different in lore. And likely, so much so that the idea of "drow" would be diluded enough to the point that we would circle back to a new group of displeased folks - the "these aren't the drow we wanted" crowd. To quote a wiser poster than I:
Ezekieru wrote:Paizo made a choice between two things: 1) completely reworking the Drow to something completely new, but then having to deal with people getting mad that the new Drow would be nothing like the old Drow, or 2) choosing to write off the Drow and replace them with the Sekmin in terms of antagonists, and replace them with Cavern Elves for the elvish population underground.It's not a winning choice for anyone. I suppose there is option 3, but I imagine that would go over so much worse with marketing and design - push back the Remaster, delay the move, give us a year to catch up with AP content, release adventures and material under OGL that are drow-centric to explain them as entirely different creatures, then push forward with the Remaster and the ORC license.
I suppose you could be upset at the creative team for not getting to redefining drow earlier, but that does seem to be a bit sour grapes for me.
Like I said before, I can accept that being the case from a business perspective, because again, if all the Drow content wasn't really selling or providing good reviews for their work, then it's simply a failed product that shouldn't be repeated if they expect to stay afloat, meaning axing them is just one of the costs of doing business. But I'm not convinced that the decision was done because of that, since that wasn't the reason we were given. The reason we were given boils down to "We didn't have time to change them." Whether they needed more compared to other OGL creatures and simply didn't have it, or that they simply didn't prioritize them enough, is all speculation, but either of these could be true in regards to why that is.
It does make me question why they couldn't just put them on the backburner (i.e. not make content with them as they originally planned to do anyway), and then introduce something like the Apostae (which I find more interesting than the Drow and more in-tune to their current political tastes) into the setting to replace/retcon them at a later date, but given that there was talks of a "deadline," I suspect that wasn't an option either, meaning a hypothetical Option 3 wasn't even on the table for them to take. (Because if it was, I imagine they would have preferred that by a longshot.)