Is there a way to include a tribal society in a non-hostile way in a setting...

Is there a way to include a tribal society in a non-hostile way in a setting, without going with the noble savage shtick that's long since been burned out?

Yeah, by making them realistically tribal.
Wtf. What's the stigma here?

Include them like any normal society but tribal.
Tribal people are people they create the same society that rest of people do, but they live in tribes.

Plus note what tribes?
Amazonian forest? Aborigine? Germanic? Celt?

Stigma's mainly in that it seems that 'good' tribals are often used as a bad 'ha ha you were expecting evil orc tribes but they're not.'

I've been looking a lot at Neolithic cultures in France and Britain - I guess they're Celtic - and some African tribes, and would want to include them in different climates of my setting.

>good/evil dichotomy in worldbuilding
>applied to whole organizations and extended families
>essentializes organizational/national character while de-emphasizing individuals and their circumstances

Here's your problem.

Don't use "Good" and "Evil" on entire societies and cultures; it's both lazy and stupid. Maybe give them BROADLY good or BROADLY evil traits, but none of that "everyone is CE" crap unless it's an active plot point.

Alignments are for individuals.

>Is there a way to include a tribal society in a non-hostile way in a setting, without going with the noble savage shtick that's long since been burned out?
They're just there.

The more civilized peoples don't go into their territory too much because they don't want to rile them up and the tribals are fearful of outsiders so stay mostly hidden.

If I understand it right, the whole "noble savage" deal is about a backwards society not being decadent and being more in tune with the land/nature?

Hm, let's tweak it a bit. How about a travelling hunter-gatherers who specialize in barter? They know where (insert obscure valuable thing) can be found and supply it. In fact, they prefer to talk or trade their way out of throuble and while they live off the land, they sell their trademark resource to other societies and try to make a profit.

Alternatively, have a tribal society that for some reason disregards the typical taboos or morality codes of the "civilized" groups and occasionally fulfills those jobs, probably again travelling but this time between civilized settlements. They would do jobs considered impure but occasionally valued, anything from chimney sweeping to working with leather to prostitution.

Why wouldn't a hunter-gatherer society, if they could trade (insert obscure valuable thing), settle around the thing and make a living by selling it?

It is possible that the land near it is not suited for long-term habiation or that thing is a valuable herb that only grows in certain places and small amounts, so they have to travel around them,

Or they could be settled, it does not change things that much.

Make them exiles from normal civilisation that congregated in the woods nearby(and they can't further away, because natural obstacles, or something).
Or they are forbidden to live in a village, for some reason, so tribalism is all they have.
In any case use the whole "fringes of kingdom" thing

>No Noble Savages
Don't give them a "we are honored warriors" mentality. Have them fight dirty when they have to fight, but all-in-all give them a "if it ain't broke, why fix it?" mentality.

They have small numbers, they move around, they are able to deal with the threats to their village while also letting it be known to other tribes and greater civilizations that they won't be pacified. They know their lands well and they know how to fight in them, but they also know how to cultivate them, gather things in them, cook said things so they won't poison you, and are smart enough to realize the flaws in "take these shekels and be the bottom rung of our feudal society" pitch that will surely come there way.

To deal with the issue of "what about the ambitious one who gets a gun or a fancy weapon and wants to take over?" Have him be exiled for doing so, but not exiled into the wastes or whatever; have him be escorted to civilization because he's one of them now. He's tried to enforce rule of law over people at their most natural, and that isn't done.

They can still trade too, but they're entirely based around bartering. No gold standard. It is entirely "what we need lately" with "what we need for winter" and "what the people of the city will trade for this amount." They are savvy but they will not rob you, and they expect the same in turn. A merchant who is known for cheating them is blacklisted by the tribe as a whole and denounced publicly as being a thief--which can certainly cause a scene in the middle of town, especially when the tribal shouts "This man is a thief! I will deal only with honest merchants, who among you is such?" Because the tribe is known for shooting straight and getting accused can cause some strife.

Make ceremony important, but living a fulfilling life more-so. Tradition is good, but what really matters is the cohesion of the community and the protection of a way of life that allows for living well and not under anyone's boot heel.

There is a useful trade route that passes through a large stretch of land inhabited by tribes. The route is potentially useful enough that a few small merchant guilds have been trying to get in on it.

The guilds don't like having to work around tribal politics but they like dying in the wilderness even less.
The tribes don't like strangers marching through their lands but they do like tools and medicine the strangers trade in exchange for guides.
Most of the drama in the region stems from these conflicting desires.
Violence breaks out here and there but is consistently detrimental to both sides. The more genocidal guilds don't have the funds to fights tribals, survive the land and deliver the cargo. The more xenophobic tribes have also fallen significantly behind their more cooperative neighbours.

What you get is a tenuous alliance with (some) tribes and (some) traders. In the broadest strokes neither side likes or even respects the other but they have to work together. There are constant tests of the relationship as well as bright spots of incredible cooperation and humanity. Out of the moments of cooperation a small pocket of culture has begun to grow that is a mix of both sides. Neither trader nor tribal exist in a vacuum and you can see it in they way the dress, speak and fight.

If there is one realisation by both sides it is that this is no different than any other national/tribal deal. One side my look strange and exotic but they have boarders,rulers, laws and need of resources just like anyone else.

Why would a tribal social be hostile in the first place?

In one of my campaigns the GM had us "accidentally" paradrop into an amazon controlled jungle long story short we had to fucking run since most of them were actually true to the "NO MEN ALLOWED" meet the queen find them to be pretty sophisticated for being in the middle of the jungle. Only they wanted to sacrifice us so we decided to go Apocalypse now killed the main oppressors to us and became kings to the surviving amazons who didnt fight us

By not making them psychotic murder machines?

(sniff) dats butiful mang..

Make them fairly pragmatic instead of hostile. Capable of violence, but in most cases would rather find a different way or avoid contact all together because they have limited numbers and limited medical means to fix their wounded. They live in a hostile world and know it, but get by via resourcefulness and common sense rather than brute force.

You must not actually know anything about real tribal cultures.
There are no such thing as savages, tribal people get by just fine if there are enough local resources. Some are more violent than others out of necessity.
People only become warlike when their environments become limited and their resources scarce. Australian aborigines have been successful hunter/gatherers for 40,000 with none of the tribes becoming warlike. Among all the gods of Australia, there is not one god of war.
As long as there is plenty to hunt and gather without being encroached upon by other groups, they're more likely to trade resources to their neighbors than attack them.
Civilizations that expand their territory through conquest are much more violent than nomads or a random isolated village full of subsistence farmers.
Island cultures tend to be the most violent because islands can only handle so many people even with some kind of agriculture. Eventually there are too many people and you either kill your neighbors, sacrifice people or colonize aka banish people to new islands.
Did you know that the Easter Islanders have a God of Starvation?
But with magic involved, I could see tribal people becoming like peaceful hippies who use druidic magic to feed their people while focusing on creating art or telling stories.
If they could also use their magic to evade those that might harm them, you could end up with a mostly pacifistic culture who only engage in ritualistic mock-combat or martial arts when need be.

...

Try to use something other than mediocre fiction as a source.

For example, Tacitus' Germania is for free on the web and full of tribes.

Just put tribals in it and don't gp for noble savage?
It's really that simple

It's also really simple to have tribals driven out without much fight for their lands. Check Australia. Or early phase of American expansion. Or colonisation of Africa. It's not that hard, really.
I'm not saying those were peaceful, but up until military got involved, it couldn't even be called skirmishes, just systematic drive of "settlers" into tribal lands

OR, if you really feel like researching, check tribes in India and how they were/are handled. As long as those poeple are at least semi-nomadic it's not big problem to avoid hostilities - they will simply move out.