How would you defend your subterranean kingdom?

[mmadsen]

Double Pit Gate

Invaders come to a closed portcullis, with a large hole in the ceiling just before it. There is a room above with archers who will shoot anyone attempting to open the portcullis. A low wall around the opening provides some cover from spells. Directly below the opening is a covered pit, opening into a similar room down below; directly below THAT is a 20 ft spike filled pit. The room below has goblins with bows and spears. Escape tunnels from these two rooms are optional.

You mention that escape tunnels are optional. How else would the goblin defenders use these set-ups? Are unwilling goblins shoved into the room above the portcullis before the rest of the defenders run behind the portcullis for safety? And how is the room below the portcullis (but above the pit) filled with defenders?

If there are escape tunnels, this creates one more way for attackers to side-step the portcullis. Not that goblin-sized escape passages are an ideal point through which to attack...

 

[mmadsen]

Burn fields, eat babies, and make them suffer. Build a reputation for vicious evil and shocking cruelty. Make them fear. When they can't catch you, and every attempt brings pain, sooner or later even the stupidest men will give up and leave you alone.

Does that intimidate the cowardly humans, or does it fill them with the resolve to hunt you down and exterminate you?

 

[mmadsen]

Goblins are good miners, right? And most D&D worlds have an abundance of natural underground spaces. First order of business is to make sure you have a good DOZEN escape tunnels which lead to exits at least 10 miles away from the main lair.

I like the idea, but how many man/goblin-hours does it take to mine a 5'x5' corridor miles long? Granted, this is a fantasy game, but does anyone have any real-life estimates? I wouldn't think that a single goblin at a time -- all that can fit, swinging a pickaxe in such a narrow passage -- could mine much of a corridor in a few months to a year.

 

[Agback]

Does that intimidate the cowardly humans, or does it fill them with the resolve to hunt you down and exterminate you?

Good point. I think you do better to stage limited (but frightful) reprisals against those who attack you or who aid and comfort your attackers, and leave everyone else alone. A reputation as "spiteful and surprisingly nasty, but no problem if you leave them alone" is far better than a reputation for seething evil.

"Let them hate me, so long as they fear me."

Regards,


Agback

 

[Agback]

I like the idea, but how many man/goblin-hours does it take to mine a 5'x5' corridor miles long? Granted, this is a fantasy game, but does anyone have any real-life estimates? I wouldn't think that a single goblin at a time -- all that can fit, swinging a pickaxe in such a narrow passage -- could mine much of a corridor in a few months to a year.

Depending on rock type, a miner with hand tools can make a passage wide enough for a person his size to walk through about one foot long per day of work. So figure a mile of 5'x5' tunnel as thirty-goblin-years labour invested in the digging alone, plus the cost of removing and disposing of nine thousand tonnes of spoil.

The maximum rate of tunneling is with two goblins side-by-side, three shifts per day. That will take five years to dig a mile of 5'x5' tunnel through moderately hard rock.

Mind you, a wondrous item that casts 'stone to flesh' every now and again, teamed up with a large group of people who don't mind a diet of spam, can really cut down the cost.

Regards,


Agback

 

[mmadsen]

A reputation as "spiteful and surprisingly nasty, but no problem if you leave them alone" is far better than a reputation for seething evil.

As long as you leave out cookies for the Goblins, they'll mend fences and help out around the house. If you don't though...

 

[mmadsen]

Anyone have good rules for low ceilings and narrow passages? I'm still shocked that I can't find any in the DMG.

The new Book of Challenges has a side-bar of rules for narrow passages. I'm still surprised the DMG didn't cover this at all; it seems like such a D&D staple.

 

[mmadsen]

Depending on rock type, a miner with hand tools can make a passage wide enough for a person his size to walk through about one foot long per day of work. So figure a mile of 5'x5' tunnel as thirty-goblin-years labour invested in the digging alone, plus the cost of removing and disposing of nine thousand tonnes of spoil.

So we should expect Goblins to rely on natural caverns, I guess. Or abandoned mines. Or once-great Dwarf kingdoms, struck by some cataclysm in ages past.

 

[jasper]

Greeting to The Great Goblin King George Gnashing the V
From Mayor Folmar of Montgomery

I salute you and your tribe. While maintaining the peace between us has always been a high priority with us, it has been broken.

Two nights ago some of your young goblin guys raided. After stealing most of animals from the Nobles’ barn, they set fire to it. Boys will be boys and summer time with its heat and lazy time will lead to minor trouble. The barn was not the major problem.

However after the barn burning, the goblin guys wrote their symbol George Boys all over Laura Ingall’s cows and ate her dog “Paw”. As some of neighbor dogs have littered, so getting her a replace is no problem.

While leaving town, the goblin guys George boys stopped over and crashed Hugh Hefner’s party. They took a dip in the secretary pool. And kidnapped my wife, and mother in law. And acquired three kegs of beer, two kegs of brandy and four fifths of Jack.

This has great disturbed Hef and he is threatening to throw no more parties until 100 gp is paid to recover his loses and pay for the pool cleaning. Can we say one your boys had slight accident while swimming.

Please return my wife and 100 gold pieces.

Or .

Well our two top poodles, Scooby and Rin Tin Ten track the boys to entrance two. Just to show our displeasure, we have cut down some of the trees around the area and shoved the trees into the tunnels. With the remaining branches Willow the weaver wove a screen to cover the entrance.

Also Scooby and Rin tin ten have discover a second entrance. The towns people want me to order closed. And to seek out all your entrances and close them in the same fashion.

So please return Marge and the pay the fine. Tell the boys to enjoy the booze but don’t let Maude have any as she is a mean drunk.

Signed your neighborly mayor.


Fred Folmor….

P.S. Hef’s asks if you could steal his current wife because he has eye on a new young thing.

 

[mmadsen]

I would hire dwarven mercs to actually invade a goblin kingdom myself.

An esteemed advisor to a powerful human noble had this to say on the subject of Dwarven mercenaries:

Mercenaries and auxiliaries are useless and dangerous; and if one holds his state based on these arms, he will stand neither firm nor safe; for they are disunited, ambitious and without discipline, unfaithful, valiant before friends, cowardly before enemies; they have neither the fear of Pelor nor fidelity to Men, and destruction is deferred only so long as the attack is; for in peace one is robbed by them, and in war by the enemy. The fact is, they have no other attraction or reason for keeping the field than a trifle of stipend, which is not sufficient to make them willing to die for you.

(Edit: That quote, of course, comes from Niccolo Machiavelli's The Prince, Chapter XII: How Many Kinds Of Soldiery There Are, And Concerning Mercenaries -- except that I changed "fear of God nor fidelity to men" to "fear of Pelor nor fidelity to Men".)