For various reasons, drow won't be appearing in any of my homebrew settings going forward. (Partly because the classical depiction of drow is genuinely one of the most problematic elements in D&D lore; and largely because they've been done to death.) Obviously, for those published campaign settings that feature them, they will still be available.
And before I proceed, by way of a quick summary, here's how things stand in the published settings I'm likely to use:
Forgotten Realms and Eberron: These settings feature drow in one form or another, so will continue to use them. (The same would apply to Greyhawk, though I'm highly unlikely ever to use it.)
Dragonlance: This setting has dark elves, but they're not drow. Instead, they're just elves that have been declared outcast.
Dark Sun: This setting's elves are radically different from the norm, and there are no drow or dark elves in the established lore.
Ravenloft: PCs who enter the realm from another setting may be drow. There won't be any native drow encountered, but may be some dark elves as below.
Spelljammer: As with Ravenloft, drow PCs will be permitted, but drow NPCs won't generally be encountered (except if visiting the Realms or Eberron). Some dark elves may be encountered, as below. (The same would apply to Planescape, though I'm highly unlikely ever to use it.)
Anyway...
Although I'm very much disenchented with drow, I very much like the concept of the dark elf - the dark mirror to the elven people. In particular, although the story of Terafa's elves indicates that those few that remain are all drawn from the ranks of the outcasts from the ancient wars, it does occur that there's a place for a dark mirror there too - those who started down the path towards darkness but then stepped away, and so were outcast from the Sirroth.
For that reason, I will be introducing the ælves (or älves). They will be the dark elves that I use in my homebrew settings, and also for Ravenloft and/or Spelljammer.
The story associated with the ælves is fairly standard: they're the dark cousins of the elves, who waged war on their kin in ages past. Or, alternately, if the elves were once creatures of faerie who stepped into the mortal world, the ælves are the unseelie cousins of their seelie kin.
In terms of depiction, there's nothing between elves and ælves - they're all humanoids slightly shorter than humans, lithe and graceful, with sharply pointed ears. Likewise, there's a full range of skin tones, but definitely without the association of alignment with tone! Finally, as discussed previously, almost all elven and ælven societies are matriarchal in nature.
With regard to game statistics, I'm inclined to allow players to choose any subrace they want, whether for their elves or ælves. I'm inclined to work up a couple of sets of stats for variant 'drow' - one keeping the spellcasting as-is but replacing the weapon proficiencies, representing a subset of ælves; and one that is very similar but grants different spells for the corresponding elven kin.
Of course, if ælves are just a dark mirror of elves, and statistically identical, there's an obvious question to ask: why bother? Why not just have elves, and go from there? The answer is... there's no good answer. Indeed, it may well just be that ælves are elves, and vice versa. Both of these kin would deny that, but...
