I think that the Hobgoblins are distinguished from the other evil humanoids by their status as the intelligent evil race. What I mean by this is that, while Orcs form hordes and Gnolls devastate villages, the Hobgoblins are guys that you can imagine
succeeding at their world domination plans. They’re clever, organised, and expert at combining the various Goblinoid races into a more powerful whole. This gives you a few really interesting options - for example, having the Hobgoblins being a neutral party who the players are forced to work with - and gives them a theme all of their own in a campaign. The
Hobgoblin Iron Fist is a perfect example of the Hobgoblin genius for evil; powerful and stealthy assassins and spies trained to keep order. In short, these are the Stazi of the Goblinoids.
The image in the book is pretty cool, with a rare female Goblinoid poised to throw a dart, her face hidden by the devil mask of the order. It’s a picture that allows the pose and face to tell a story.
The flavour text for the Iron Shadows focuses on their training and origin, with a story that Maglubiyet (toughest deity name to spell in the game) stole their techniques from an Archdevil originally. That’s really nice - I like it when we get hints of how the various races interact with each other, not just adventurers. The training sounds difficult, focused mainly on loyalty, with the result that we get a group as fanatical as the Feydakin from Dune, and about as good at killing. I think that this fanaticism - towards Maglubiyet, controlled by the priesthood thereof - might be an excellent element to bring into any roleplaying situation with Hobgoblins. The players could meet a Warlord, and do well in a negotiation with him - but lurking in the corner is the Iron Shadow, part political officer and part executioner. The general will work with the players, but they’ll need to keep him alive long enough to do so! The opportunity to let your players interact with the internal politics of an evil humanoid race is rare, and I’d definitely try and make use of that if you could.
The Iron Shadow is another player character style creature, with abilities taken straight from the Way of Shadows Monk, plus some Wizard spells to let them infiltrate (
charm person,
disguise self, etc). I tend to think of these spells as plot spells - ways to explain how the Iron Shadow got into the King’s bedchamber, just prior to the players bursting in to save the day - rather than as things directly useful in combat, but that doesn’t make them any less important or interesting for the statblock. They can do the typical infiltrator thing and lead the players astray easily enough, for example.
When the players come to fight the Iron Shadow, they’ll be glad that it cannot use a monk’s stunning strike; however, what it can do is use one of my favourite movement&attack routines in the game. The Iron Shadow has
Shadow Jaunt, just like a Way of Shadows monk, and it can use that before or after one of the four attacks a turn that it can make, which themselves can be ranged or melee. This means that you’ll have Iron Shadows running around the place, teleporting to the back ranks, escaping to the rafters and whatnot, without action economy concerns. Glorious! I can see a team of these guys being a super interesting challenge if fought in a large, cluttered, dark hall; I’m thinking of the Assassins from
Half Life, who constantly attacked you from different angles with weak but very persistent attacks. I’m really glad that they didn’t complicate this attack style with restrictions, and instead just let you do it easily and quickly.
The Iron Shadows combine an interesting political background, which makes it very easy to justify using them in all kinds of contexts, with a fun and easy way to get a nimble teleporting combat. It’s worth stealing this profile for other ninjas in your games, and definitely worth thinking of how the Iron Shadows will impact any adventure that deals with the Hobgoblins.
