Tanis's Best Character Ever: Goblins!
Tuesday, July 7, 2015
Yeah, that's right, I picked two characters. Like goblins, I am greedy and cheaty. Deal with it, humans! Below you'll find an overheard conversation between Ekkie the cutpurse and Ranzak the raider.
Ranzak sits on a rock, nibbling shreds of meat off what appears to be a thighbone. He occasionally feeds a morsel to the Magic Bird sitting on his shoulder.
Ranzak (humming): ...come on pirates, do your duty. Ranzak's ready for some booty!
Ranzak snickers. Ekkie enters, skipping and swinging a dogslicer in a wide circle as she moves. Ekkie's brother's skull, Plarg, is wedged under one of her arms.
Ekkie: Hiya, Ranzak! Whatchu' eatin'?
Ranzak: Bits of tiny flapping demon. Longshanks say "imp." Imp imp imp. Good with sauce.
Ekkie: Everything better with sauce!
Ranzak: What we do today, Ekkie?
Ekkie: Ekkie think we talk about how great goblins is.
Ranzak: Good way to start most days.
Plarg: ...
Ekkie: Good point, Plarg. Whole world should know why goblins is best adventurer party.
Ranzak: Especially when goblins find big dumb longshanks to stand near! 'Specially with big longshanks to stand behind!
Ekkie: Yes, is best for longshanks—I calls 'em shields of meat or "pre-dinners"—to think they is in charge and is being nice to goblins, protecting goblins from mean old monsters. Best longshanks for this is called pal-a-dims. Meat shield stand in front while goblins sneak around back, taking all the stuff.
Ranzak: When adventurer party is ALL goblins, sometimes things can be slow, because all goblins want stuff, but not all goblins want to stand in front. Better with paladims.
Ekkie: Ekkie see how Ranzak steals stuff real good then sneaks ahead to steal more stuff when he find good stuff. This good plan, but Ranzak gots to stay sorta close to the paladims in case a bigbad comes.
Ranzak (looking around frantically, prepared to hide): Reta? Where?!
Ekkie (sighing and bopping Ranzak on the head): She not here, dummy. Ekkie means big, nasty ol' monster.
Magic Bird: SQUAWK!
Ekkie: Exactly.
Ranzak: Ranzak see how Ekkie fight rats and cats and snakes real good by herself and scares bigbads away so they goes and fights at other places. That smart!
Ekkie: So together, Ekkie and Ranzak make bigbads run away to other places, and take all the stuff. Ekkie's pretty sure that's what it say in longshanks book under picture of "adventurer."
Ranzak: Eww, books!
Ekkie: Sometimes books are mixed in with stuff to steal. Longshanks trade books for meat; Ekkie learn this when she in Big-Time Thief Guild. That also where she learn to speak with semicolons.
Plarg: ...
Ekkie: Good point, Plarg.
Magic Bird: SQUAWK!
Ranzak (laughing): Truth, Magic Bird.
Ekkie: Hmm, with Ekkie and Ranzak, you get four adventurers for price of two!
Ranzak: That good bargain!
Ekkie and Ranzak stare out into space for a beat.
Ekkie: World should also know that because of stuff-stealing and bigbad-scaring, goblins search places really fast. Fastest of all adventurers!
Ranzak: And goblins maybe not good at clearing out all places, like temples or magic places, but good at most.
Ekkie: And when time comes to fight biggest bad, Ekkie turns to devoted paladim friend and cheers. While going through pockets for loose stuff.
Ranzak: So, in end, is clear that goblins is best characters ever. Accept no substitutes.
Ekkie: What's a character?
Plarg: ...
Magic Bird: SQUAWK!
Want to being these goblins into your Adventure Card Game? You can pick up Ranzak right now. Ekkie will be available for purchase from paizo.com on the first day of Gen Con, July 30. You can also get their playmats by UltraPro for the full goblin ACG experience!
Tanis O'Connor
Adventure Card Game Designer
More Paizo Blog.
Tags:
Goblins
Pathfinder Adventure Card Game
So, we have Poog, Mogmurch and Chuffy Lickwound as goblin promo allies - hoping Reta Bigbad makes an appearance too.
Ranzak seems to be created for the ACG (is that right) but Ekkie is from PFS. Nice to see that there's a lot of other material crossover :)
Oh, I pray Ekkie arrives before we start Wrath. I'm becoming more and more obsessed with the idea. She's going to shred everything. By which I mean, hide everything I don't want to deal with.
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Great blog post Tanis!
I want ALL the GOBLINS!
...
...
...
And Plarg!
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Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
Okay, this choice of Best Character(s) Evar unexpected, but in hindsight I really shouldn't be surprised.
The blog really makes me want to go back and replay RotR with my fiance playing as Ranzak and Ekkie. Except we've still got half of S&S, half of SotS, and oh yeah WotR... We'll get to it all someday, I'm sure.
Great post, indeed! I love playing Ranzak, but he better not go off by himself in Wrath or he'll become plant food!
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Ranzak is wonderful, and Ekkie can do some super interesting things. Soooooo you know you want to let us play them in Organized Play, riiiiight? That Ranzak teaser in the guide nearly killed me.
Since you said you were cheaty, your argument is invalid. Still one wrong designer left to go.
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Illeist wrote: Ranzak is wonderful, and Ekkie can do some super interesting things. Soooooo you know you want to let us play them in Organized Play, riiiiight? That Ranzak teaser in the guide nearly killed me. Goblin class Deck!
(well, possibly that would be a race deck, but either way...)
MightyJim wrote: Goblin class Deck!
(well, possibly that would be a race deck, but either way...)
The Goblin Class Deck should be entirely made up of miscut or misprinted cards from other decks. Each Goblin Class Deck would be totally random. Some copies wouldn't even be playable.
Pathfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
Clearly the goblin deck has all the cards translated into Race for the Galaxy-style pictographs. There couldn't be any text. Writing steals the words out of your head!
This argument makes as much sense as any goblin argument. As they say, the only good goblin is a...
Well, I suppose Plarg is a good goblin.
P.S. Can I change my "best character in Wrath" to Lini-Lem-Enora-Alain?
Keith Richmond wrote: This argument makes as much sense as any goblin argument. As they say, the only good goblin is a...
Well, I suppose Plarg is a good goblin.
P.S. Can I change my "best character in Wrath" to Lini-Lem-Enora-Alain?
Only if you can thematically explain why they are all Cheaty McCheatersons
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nondeskript wrote: MightyJim wrote: Goblin class Deck!
(well, possibly that would be a race deck, but either way...)
The Goblin Class Deck should be entirely made up of miscut or misprinted cards from other decks. Each Goblin Class Deck would be totally random. Some copies wouldn't even be playable. Random card distribution sounds like a bad idea - the forum would collapse under the weight of all the posts from people who decided they were a new form of promo and wanted a way to get all of them...
I think they could create a deck's worth of goblin-style boons though - high power with drawbacks, penalising you for trying to use it properly (horsechopper I'm looking at you) etc
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Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
Keith Richmond wrote:
P.S. Can I change my "best character in Wrath" to Lini-Lem-Enora-Alain?
At first i was going to say that Alain was too tall to hang out with the short folk, and you should replace him with Balazar. Mike didn't *really* pick Balazar, he picked Darago and showed how the mancery evolved into Balazar. If that was his backdoor way to include Acquamancer Lini and Balazar into his singular Best Character Ever, he is also cheaty.
Then I thought back to Ranzak and Ekkie talking about shields of meat and paladims in this blog post and decided Alain is close enough to a "meat shield paladim", so it'd be okay.
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MightyJim wrote:
Goblin class Deck!
Long ago I asked Mike for race decks... and he admitted that part (races) was less worked-on than the class part (pretty much like in the RPG)...
I remember asking for a Kobold deck ;-)
Anyway, in a Goblin deck you should have a bunch of pigs allies.
Pig
Type : Ally
Traits : Zis is a piglet, Zis is an animal two, Zis is no Basic
Check to acquire : Dexterity 10
Powers :
If your character has the goblin trait, add 1d8 to your check to acquire.
If you fail to acquire the pig, shuffle it a random location, then draw the first card of that location and shuffle it in another random location.
Shuffle this card in a random location to draw the first card of that location and shuffle it in another random location. Then explore that last location.
Banish this card and a card with the fire trait to shuffle your discard deck into your deck.
Agreed, Goblins are awesome. And so annoying.
I never noticed Ranzak’s potential hand size. Crazy, I wonder how that plays out. Guess armor is your friend.
I dream of Ranzak-level hand sizes. Only regret was Damiel not getting TWO Shapeshifts, so he could be a d12+2, 10 card-slinging Alchemy Mutant Monster Man.
I took Ranzak to an 11 card hand in S&S! It was glorious!
At the end, I was never in really in danger, with Ring of Rat Fangs, Ring of Regeneration and Impossible Bottle in a pinch. I may have also stocked up on a couple of Heavy Armors as well.
I was also a Combat force to behold when I wanted to be...
I may just have to try out my PaizoCon Ranzak again since I was the only one who died in our Goblen game. Too bad I didn't get an Ekkie too! :(
First World Bard wrote: If that was his backdoor way to include Acquamancer Lini and Balazar into his singular Best Character Ever, he is also cheaty.
BEHOLD THE WISDOM OF CROWDS
Tanis O'Connor wrote: First World Bard wrote: If that was his backdoor way to include Aquamancer Lini and Balazar into his singular Best Character Ever, he is also cheaty.
BEHOLD THE WISDOM OF CROWDS Hey, you just let me know whether you want to play Darago in Mummy's Mask, where everything is a rotting tatterdemalion. I'll keep the phone lines open.
Mike Selinker wrote: First World Bard wrote: If that was his backdoor way to include Aquamancer Lini and Balazar into his singular Best Character Ever, he is also cheaty.
Hey, you just let me know whether you want to play Darago in Mummy's Mask, where everything is a rotting tatterdemalion. I'll keep the phone lines open.
Now this is an exciting idea; can't wait to try this one out.
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nondeskript wrote: The Goblin Class Deck should be entirely made up of miscut or misprinted cards from other decks. Each Goblin Class Deck would be totally random. Some copies wouldn't even be playable. FYI: The last Magic set I worked on was Unhinged. So you might not want to tempt me.
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Pathfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
Mike Selinker wrote: nondeskript wrote: The Goblin Class Deck should be entirely made up of miscut or misprinted cards from other decks. Each Goblin Class Deck would be totally random. Some copies wouldn't even be playable. FYI: The last Magic set I worked on was Unhinged. So you might not want to tempt me. No - now I totally want to tempt you.
A Temptation of Temptations you might say.
Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
Mike Selinker wrote: Hey, you just let me know whether you want to play Darago in Mummy's Mask, where everything is a rotting tatterdemalion. I'll keep the phone lines open. Tatterdemalion is my new word for the day.
Tanis O'Connor wrote: Ekkie: Hiya, Ranzak! Whatchu' eatin'?
Ranzak: Bits of tiny flapping demon...
After this, I was really hoping that the entire post would be in goblin-style rhyming verse.
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Joe Homes wrote: Tanis O'Connor wrote: Ekkie: Hiya, Ranzak! Whatchu' eatin'?
Ranzak: Bits of tiny flapping demon...
After this, I was really hoping that the entire post would be in goblin-style rhyming verse. I did make a few efforts in that direction, but I figured a blog now was better than a blog in October.
Pathfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
Iammars wrote: A Temptation of Temptations you might say. I couldn't stop thinking about this.
Temptation of Temptations
Barrier P
Temptation
Check to Defeat - none
Display this card next to your deck; the barrier is defeated.
Whenever a barrier with the Temptation trait is defeated, you may draw 3 random blessings from the box; if the scenario's adventure deck number is 3 or higher, draw 3 non-Basic blessings instead. You may choose to display 1; banish any not chosen. The displayed blessing may be played as if it was in your hand. If you displayed 1, summon and encounter a random monster from the box.
Tanis O'Connor wrote: I did make a few efforts in that direction, but I figured a blog now was better than a blog in October. Rhyming dictionaries (free, online) wonderfully speed up poetic processes.
Calthaer wrote: Rhyming dictionaries (free, online) wonderfully speed up poetic processes. True; it was more about attempting to convert play style thoughts into doggerel that followed the rules of scansion than rhymes per se. </nerd>
Calthaer wrote: Tanis O'Connor wrote: I did make a few efforts in that direction, but I figured a blog now was better than a blog in October. Rhyming dictionaries (free, online) wonderfully speed up poetic processes. Hum you need a Goblin Rhyming Dico... Not so easy to find...
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In my team's lunch games, we just discovered the wonder and power that is Ekkie...at the abattoir...with a Ring of Climbing...in a 5 player team, proving life is better with a goblin at your side!
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Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
Sorry, was just catching up on this thread and following certain links... just had to call out "It puts the 'vortex' in 'flavortext'." :D
Melemkor wrote: Sorry, was just catching up on this thread and following certain links... just had to call out "It puts the 'vortex' in 'flavortext'." :D Well, I have one useful skill, and that is it.
Wow, Mike with the threadomancy!
I saved that piece of flavortext for at least seven years at Wizards, until there was a suitable card for it.
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