What goes well with Goblins?

[diaglo]

goblins are in fact as smart as humans. the problem for normal goblins is their rank on the pecking order. they are self-serving (evil) cowards mostly.

as likely to slit your throat in the night as help you.

they respond to being bullied. and thus why hobgoblins tend to take charge of them. hobgoblins are natural bullies.

and bugbears are even more nasty. they are sneaky, big, and greedy.

structure wise i'd have many of the houses with barred doors and few windows. fewer ways for their neighbors to steal from their homes. traps everywhere.

maybe a central altar to sacrifice the weak...ala Sparta (leaving the malformed young to die) or the Native Americans (sacrificing captured enemies or the elderly to usurp power)

also slaves. tons and tons of slaves. there is no reason a goblin wouldn't want to have some thrall doing his dirty work for him.

 

[diaglo]

go urban neutral evil druid with one of the goblins.

have a swarm of rats or a murder of crows around for her to command.

plenty of low brush around her house. you know the one all the kids fear to go near.

 

[Mercule]

Well I ran this last night. It was fun to see the PCs talking about the goblins as they started their trek, then the change on their faces when I told them the town they were approaching was larger than the last human outpost they'd passed through. And of brick construction. They were a bit unnerved by the patrol riding out on wolves and really thrown for a loop when the patrol leader asked his wolf what he thought -- and the wolf answered. In fact, they were continuously creeped out by the wolves all around the city and the predatory nature of their surroundings. Especially disturbing seemed to be the occasional wolf that looked upon them with more than animal intelligence.

The large number of armed goblins made the PCs quite nervous, as did the fact that one of the few buildings that could accomodate human-height creatures was the fighting pit, where they were surrounded by all sorts of odd critters in cages while they waited for an audience with the town elders.

Then came dinner, where the actual negotiation of terms came in. I reminded the PCs about the good-aligned hobgoblin that had traveled with them for a while, and how even he was a bit paranoid and did things like carry his own semi-cerimonial eating ware. This is, of course, after they'd already realized that goblins would recognize how much easier it would be to poison them than to attack them. The elves picked at their coarse bread, while the human noble, ranger, and gnomish shaman choked down the boiled weasel, and the human fighter stood as a bodyguard to the noble.

The goblins negotiated a steep price for their help -- the first 15,000 gp value of stuff removed from the workshop. But the party managed to dodge such stipulations as letting the goblins examine and catalog all their equipment "to make sure they held to their end of the deal".

I'd intended to throw in a couple of constructs, but the atmosphere came off well enough without. Very fun, overall. Thanks all for the help.

 

[bolen]

The big problem with goblins are that they are chewy. You need to cook them a long time and have some good sauce (I perfer a light cream) I would serve them with a good elven wine (like 501 or 503) avoid 502 like the plauge however.

I think that solves your problem

 

[Nightfall]

*thinks either were-bat goblins or were-rat goblins would be very cool*

 

[The Mephit]

How about monkeys. Think of the horror of the party, when they see the goblins on war ape mounts. The monkeys or other animals could be left over lab animals, liberated by the goblins. You could add augmented normal or dire.

 

[pawsplay]

Githzerai. A small band of githzerai is trying to cement a relationship with the goblins in their never-ending war against the githyanki and the illithid. Perhaps they've even trained one or two psionic goblin monks.

 

[Nightfall]

paws,

Now THAT would be cool, especially if a couple Githzerai were LN and thus felt creating a tribe of psionic monk goblins MIGHT help against hordes of their gith cousins as well as deal with a few mindflayer incursions.

GOOD idea! *thumbs up*

 

[diaglo]

Githzerai. A small band of githzerai is trying to cement a relationship with the goblins in their never-ending war against the githyanki and the illithid. Perhaps they've even trained one or two psionic goblin monks.

that's true.

don't forget to include some Blue somewhere in town too.

 

[Mercule]

Githzerai. A small band of githzerai is trying to cement a relationship with the goblins in their never-ending war against the githyanki and the illithid. Perhaps they've even trained one or two psionic goblin monks.

Very cool idea. If I didn't have enough mechanations already, I'd definitely snag that.

Considering that my tolerance level for convoluted politics is an order of magnitude (or two) higher than even my most political player, and I'm starting to get that giddy, "wow, this is such a cool and twisted set-up", as it is, I'm probably at the point of causing brain cramps, already. More machinations would probably cause an actual hemorage in my players.