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A few weeks ago my players finished Assault on Longshadow, the 3rd module of the Ironfang Invasion adventure path. I have been converting that adventure path to Pathfinder 2nd Edition. They stopped the invasion of the city of Longshadow in Nirmathas. A heavily rewritten enemy commander, Repral, contacted the party to negotiate a short truce. Repral suggested that they set a temporary border at the Marideth River. The Ironfang Legion would withdraw from the small villagers and farms that they had conquered north of the river, and the defenders of Longshadow would not attack them as they departed, and the Ironfang Legion could hold the Valley of Aloi and the villages of Ecru and Phaendar south of the river as places where they could retreat to. The party insisted that the Ironfang Legion would have to free all the villagers that they had captured and enslaved, as a necessary condition for the truce.
The Ironfang Legion did not agree. No truce was made, but the withdrawal took place regardless. And the party attacked Phaendar, killed half the Ironfang Legion troops garrisoned there, and freed all the villagers in forced labor there. No truce meant they could attack in good conscience.
I realized that I would have to end slavery among the hobgoblins of the Ironfang Legion for the war to end in a peace treaty. Unfortunately, slavery is part of General Azaersi's invasion plan.
With her armies and the Onyx Key, Azaersi is prepared to launch her campaign of lightning-quick assaults to carry her across Nirmathas, and eventually Molthune and Lastwall. She intends to carve out a homeland for the monsters humans fear, with Phaendar as the beating heart that will deliver her Nirmathi food, mines, and lumber. Her people need only land to settle and enslaved hands to raise their empire.
...
As of yet, though, no one knows the Ironfang Legion is a threat, or that it even still exists. Azaersi intends to keep it that way, and she has instructed her troops to enslave those they can, slaughter those they must, and ensure no one escapes to warn the rest of humanity that the Ironfangs march for war!
Slavery is also part of the hobgoblin culture
Slavery is as ingrained in hobgoblin society as much as war, yet hobgoblins are not known for participating in the slave trade in the same way as duergar, gnolls, or even evil humans. Hobgoblins take slaves to impose their order on others, assert their dominance, and spread suffering. Most hobgoblin armies leave dangerous or menial tasks to these prisoners, allowing the hobgoblins to more efficiently focus on martial endeavors.
and of the hobgoblin religion.
As the foremost of the barghest hero-gods, Hadregash promotes the importance of proving one’s strength through conquest and following the orders of those rightfully in charge. Such victories need not be won fairly. In fact, followers of the Supreme Chieftain believe that ambushes and dirty fighting are the best ways to win without suffering too many casualties. Hadregash also encourages his worshipers to take other races as slaves, as that is the only role non-goblinoids are fit to play.
We are only halfway through the adventure path, so I figured on waiting until the players themselves had some ideas on eliminating slavery among the Ironfang Legion. However, the decision by Paizo to remove slavery from Paizo publications made me decide to fit a drastic redirection of hobgoblin culture into my plot.
I have seen such a transition in my campaigns before. When the Pathfinder 1st Edition Advanced Race Guide was published, one player created a goblin alchemist for my Jade Regent campaign. That alchemist became the new chief of the Licktoad goblin tribe, turned them away from raiding caravans, and gave them a new opportunity selling supplies and Goblin Gulp coffee to those caravans. At the beginning of the Pathfinder 2nd Edition playtest, my wife created a goblin paladin of Alseta. Alseta, the god of doorways and transitions, was transitioning the goblins to a civilized people. Thus, my campaign world was ready for goblins as a core ancestry in Pathfinder 2nd Edition.
Though this is about an Ironfang Invasion campaign, the Lost Omens Campaign Setting General Discussion subforum seemed the best place of discussion of the transition of the hobgoblins. It is about the new Lost Omens themes of Pathfinder more than it is about one particular adventure path. Especially because I reached back to our previous adventure path to get the ball rolling.
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General Azaersi's founding the nation of Oprak has a major flaw. The Hadregash religion declares, "Hadregash also encourages his worshipers to take other races as slaves, as that is the only role non-goblinoids are fit to play." But Azaersi's army included centaurs, gnolls, trolls, minotaurs, morlocks, harpies, a spriggan, an elemental, a fey, and a dragon along with the goblinoid hobgoblins, goblins, and bugbears and goblin-like barghests. She wants her non-goblinoid monstrous citizens to be as free as the goblinoids. Nevertheless, Hadregash preaches that hobgoblins, goblins, bugbears, and barghest are supposed to rule above the others.
She hopes to limit slavery to humans, elves, and dwarves. Centuries of war with wizardly elves gave hobgoblins a cultural hatred of both elves and arcane magic. General Azaersi personally despises humans. She viewed the dwarves as guilty by association with those two enemies. For Azaersi welcomes other ancestires, including halflings and gnomes. The Ironfang Legion tries to recruit the halfling and gnomes in the party when encountered in a neutral situation. And the goblin champion in the party once fooled an Ironfang patrol into thinking she was in the legion herself.
One option for eliminating slavery is the non-goblinoid soldiers learning that the Hadregash view of hobgoblin superiority is not compatible with equality among monstrous humanoids. The Ironfang Legion will replace the dead soldiers at Phaendar with stronger soldiers, but I don't think they will risk sending over more slaves as laborers. Instead, members of the legion will have to build walls and buildings, tend the livestock, and coduct the spring planting in the fields. Real-world armies have lots of menial labor for their soldiers, but the Hadregash-worshipping hobgoblin soldiers shun that. Will Azaersi stir up dissent by forcing the Hadregashites into drudge work or will she incite the opposite dissent by assigning only non-goblinoids to that work? One of her advisors is a high priest of Hadregash.
Many of the Ironfang Legion soldiers follow other gods. Goblins and gnolls mostly follow Lamashtu. Minotaurs worship Lamashtu or Baphomet. The morlocks in the Ironfang Legion worship the dark naga Zanathura, another of Azaersi's advisors. Trolls are associated with the demon lord Urxehl, who is mentioned in the Troll in the Archives of Nethys but lacks his own entry. I don't know the religion of centaurs.
Like Urxehl, the barghest hero gods lack their own entry in the Core Rulebook, Gods & Magic, and Archives of Nethys. Either they are very minor gods, or they are marginalized in Pathfinder 2nd Edition. They are mentioned in the Barghest entry of the first Bestiary in a sidebar on page 36:
BARGHEST HERO-GODS
The four barghests stolen from Hell’s kennels by the deity Lamashtu were not the originals of their kind, but they were then and remain today the most powerful. Now they are denizens of the Abyss, dwelling in their own realm adjacent to Lamashtu’s domain, and are heavily worshipped by goblins across multiple worlds as “hero-gods.” These four barghests include Hadregash the slaver, Venkelvore the torturer, Zarongel the dog slayer, and Zogmugot the scavenger.
Are the barghest hero-gods so minor that another god could displace them as the primary religion of the Ironfang Legion? Any suggestions?
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I have already started changing the plot via a crossover with a previous campaign.
My Iron Gods campaign had an unusual ending. My players had derailed the 6th module, The Divinity Drive, by persuading the villain Unity to hire them as repair crew. I don't want to give spoilers, but one well-known result of Iron Gods is that instead of villainous Unity becoming the Iron God, friendly Casandalee became the Iron God. In my campaign, no-one became the Iron God. Casandalee, who was a former android reduced to a software artificial intelligence, chose to return to life as an android. The pocket dimension of divine energy that could let a machine intelligence achieve godhood is managed by the party's cohort Dwalin, an intelligent robot cleric of Brigh. For spice in the 4th Iron Gods module, Valley of the Brain Collectors, I told the party that an invading space fleet from the Domionion of the Black was flying toward Golarion and would reach them in 300 years. Dwalin has become known as the Iron Prophet and advocates preparation for the upcoming invasion.
My Ironfang Legion's campaign to free the captive villagers in Phaendar went well, but it had one loose end. When the party destroyed Phaendar's Onyx portal to prevent General Azaersi from sending reinforcements, a Consonite Choir from the Elemental Plane of Earth fell through. (I wanted to demonstrate that the portal went through the Plane of Earth.) The party and the elemental had no language in common, but they sang at each other to show peaceful intentions. The hobgoblins wasted time chasing the Consonite Choir, thinking it was an enemy, but at the end, it left to explore its new surroundings.
In this week's game session, the Consonite Choir returned. It arrived in a spaceship along with Casandalee. I had built the android Casandalee as a 15th-level cleric of, er, Casandalee. Technically, she is a freelance cleric drawing power from Dwalin's pool of divine energy and running errands for Dwalin and Brigh. The Consonite Choir had prayed to the elemental god Ranginori for help in returning home, Ranginori had passed the request to Desna, a powerful goddess of travel. Desna passed the request to Brigh and Dwalin. Dwalin sent Casandalee who had prepared several Tongues spells and Plane Shift spells to facilitate the return. But she could not understand the Consonite Choir's description of its home region in the Plane of Earth, so they sought out the party in hope of learning exactly where the Consonite Choir had come from.
When Casandalee mentioned the future Dominion invasion to the Ironfang Invasion party, the halfling rogue Sam exclaimed, "Another invasion? We are busy with the one we have now." He explained the Ironfang Invasion and that the party was sympathetic to the hobgoblins and other monstrous humanoids' desire for a land where they weren't second-class citizens, but they could not abide the invasion taking slaves. Casandalee explained that the Iron Prophet's plan required a free society. Industry seldom advances in slave-holding societies. And she thought that the iron-smelting city of Longshadow was a good site for industrial advancement with aid from Numeria.
With information, Casandalee returned the Consonite Choir to the Onyx Vault on the Plane of Earth and the party tagged along for a glimpse of the setting of the 6th module (they almost remained there to jump ahead to the end of the adventure path).
I have new pieces in place: a powerful anti-slavery ally and the attention of anti-slavery gods. Some gods likely to get involved are the ones worshiped by the player characters. The goblin liberator champion is devoted to Grandmother Spider, the elf ranger worships Cayden Cailean, and the halfling rogue/sorcerer worships Chaldira Zuzaristan. The gnome stormborn druid took the Cleric Dedication for the Green Faith but that is more a philosophy than a deity. What other gods might step up and start meddling?
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Well, the 2e material on hobgoblins only mentions slavery twice in the bestiary, and not at all in the LOWG and LOCG - keep in mind that 2nd edition isn't necessarily beholden to what is written about hobgoblin culture in old editions. The APs are canon in the sense that the events in them happened and are part of the setting's history, but certain setting/lore details published in them aren't necessarily how things are in 2nd edition.
Additionally, the LOWG mentions that the leader of Oprak (after getting convinced that being all warlike was bad at the end of ironfang invasion) does transition to a bigger focus on strengthening the economy instead of war.
Slavery is incredibly damaging to economies - it only benefits a small group of individuals who own slaves, and only in the short term. In the wider context of an economy, it prevents huge portions of the population from participating in the economy, as slaves can't purchase things or pay taxes or start businesses. Economies are healthier the more people are able to fully participate. Additionally, slavery general leads to a lot of civil unrest (see Rome and the Servile Wars and various other slave revolts) which is also very disruptive to the economy.
Finally, the transition away from war regarding Oprak would also lead to wanting to form diplomatic ties to other nations, which would be very much served by not owning people from the ancestries that live in those nations as property. Like most newly formed nations, Oprak very much needs to be recognized by other nations as legitimate, and getting rid of practices that associate hobgoblins with being "monsters" is an important step towards that. This would also strengthen the ability of Oprak to participate in trade with other nations, especially given that in medieval settings open trade isn't a given, often requiring agreements and treaties with other nations.
The fact that General Azaersi does these things post ironfang invasion and was able to be convinced by adventurers to make this shift means that these things where probably in the back of her mind in the first place, or at least confirms that it is possible for her to come around to this way of thinking.
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Additionally, the LOWG mentions that the leader of Oprak (after getting convinced that being all warlike was bad at the end of ironfang invasion) does transition to a bigger focus on strengthening the economy instead of war.
I note that the Lost Omens World Guide entry on Oprak has no mention of slavery. It also does not mention the former inhabitants of Oprak territory except to say the territory had been "sparsely inhabited."
Azaersi is currently avoiding military conflict in order to fully develop her new homeland’s resources and tactical advantages. Hobgoblins and other creatures willing to serve as explorers, miners, smiths, and alchemists have been flocking to the fledgling nation.
Post-invasion Azaersi apparently overcame the hobgoblin cultural aversion to non-military careers.
Slavery is incredibly damaging to economies - it only benefits a small group of individuals who own slaves, and only in the short term. In the wider context of an economy, it prevents huge portions of the population from participating in the economy, as slaves can't purchase things or pay taxes or start businesses. Economies are healthier the more people are able to fully participate. Additionally, slavery general leads to a lot of civil unrest (see Rome and the Servile Wars and various other slave revolts) which is also very disruptive to the economy.
Casandalee has access to the history of her home planet Androffa, so she knows this.
Finally, the transition away from war regarding Oprak would also lead to wanting to form diplomatic ties to other nations, which would be very much served by not owning people from the ancestries that live in those nations as property. Like most newly formed nations, Oprak very much needs to be recognized by other nations as legitimate, and getting rid of practices that associate hobgoblins with being "monsters" is an important step towards that. This would also strengthen the ability of Oprak to participate in trade with other nations, especially given that in medieval settings open trade isn't a given, often requiring agreements and treaties with other nations.
Two of Oprak's neighbors are the pro-slavery nations of Cheliax and Nidal. Molthune has legal slavery, but in my campaign I played up that slaves can gain freedom through military and government service, so slavery is rare there. Nirmathas is strongly anti-slavery. Though Varisa and the Belkzen don't share a border with Oprak, they are close enough to trade. Belkzen allows slavery and Varisia is largely unorganized. Lastwall hoped for recruits for its defense against Belkzen, so it would prefer Oprak freeing its slaves but was too distracted to care. Oprak has a lot of bad neighbors.
In the long run, Azaersi will have to abandon the hobgoblin slave culture. How can the party and their allies convince her of this in the short run?
I haven't read this adventure, but these are the solutions I can think of:
Azaersi has a moment of incredible spiritual redemption.
Azaersi is killed and replaced with someone more reasonable.
Azaersi is defeated (in war, or some kind of battle of champions) and forced to accept the abolition of slavery as part of a peace treaty.
Azaersi is bribed to free all the slaves with a legendary artefact or vast amount of gold.
Azaersi makes false promises for the sake of a truce, kicking the problem down the road.
Azaersi offers an economic compromise solution, involving indentured workers who can earn their freedom, wage slavery, feudal serfdom, or a similar exploitative relationship that falls short of actually owning people.
Azaersi gets a replacement for slaves, such as undead laborers or golems.
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Azaersi gets a replacement for slaves, such as undead laborers or golems.
Honestly the moment she stops fighting everyone (which is what is supposed to happen between ironfang invasion and PF2s part of the timeline) she would end up with most of her massive army not having much else to do than public works and agriculture (historically most nations tended to massively scale back their armies during peacetime anyway).
All of those soldiers are going to need jobs other than fighting to keep them occupied, so they can probably fill most of the void created by repatriating slaves.
Keep in mind that every hobgoblin is part of the military - civilian tasks are just carried out by different parts of the army. It is just a matter of re-assigning surplus parts of the fighting arm of the military to the engineering/logistics/etc parts of the military (Ancient Romes famous system of roads was almost entirely built by the Roman Legions, which kept them busy and out of trouble when not on campaign and prepared the empire to better mobilize the legions in times of crisis, in addition to all of the nice economic benefits of building roads)
Additionally, many slaves would probably stay, having no place to go and as such being available as paid laborers - the economic cost of suddenly having to pay former slave laborers actually isn't that bad and is very short term, as they immediately start boosting the economy by buying things that slave owners generally didn't purchase for their slaves, and unskilled laborers in medieval times where not paid much anyway.
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There's probably a big enough difference between "the systematic enslavement of a bunch of people" or "a slave based economy" and "forced labor by prisoners of war".
Like the Geneva Convention does not prohibit forced labor by POWs, it just puts limits on what is permissible. So I would consider recontextualizing things as "during the campaign, prisoners are forced to labor, but their hours are tracked and their theoretical compensation so earned will be put towards their status as hostages to be freed or traded back to enemies after the campaign."
Hobgoblins are a lawful people so it's entirely in character for them to have a considerable bureaucracy and rules that are theoretically fair.
There's probably a big enough difference between "the systematic enslavement of a bunch of people" or "a slave based economy" and "forced labor by prisoners of war".
The quote in my first post here from page 74 of Fangs of War is from an article, "Born of Battle." about hobgoblin culture, and the quote is from a section called "The Iron Ring." The Iron Ring faction, unlike other hobgoblin society, sells slaves for cash. Most hobgoblin tribes raid nearby non-goblinoid tribes for captives to work for the hobgoblin tribe. Technically these slaves are prisoners of war, but not in the modern sense because they are spoils of war. I will call them war captives. In Earth history war captives were treated as a bottom-rung social class rather than as property, though the Aztecs often used them as human sacrifices. The war captives could earn a higher status in the tribe.
Like the Geneva Convention does not prohibit forced labor by POWs, it just puts limits on what is permissible. So I would consider recontextualizing things as "during the campaign, prisoners are forced to labor, but their hours are tracked and their theoretical compensation so earned will be put towards their status as hostages to be freed or traded back to enemies after the campaign."
Hobgoblins are a lawful people so it's entirely in character for them to have a considerable bureaucracy and rules that are theoretically fair.
General Azaersi needs labor to build her fortifications and tend the fields and livestock. She does not have the wealth to pay for it, because exploiting the mineral wealth of the Onyx Vault would require years of investment. Her captains have been working war captives to death. One gave a few war captives to a nuckelavee to pay for its services, and the captives did not survive. But I could retroactively claim that she intends to free and exile the human, elven, and dwarven war captives when she no longer needs their labor. She might not want the humans around permanently, not even as slaves.
Another source of information on General Azaersi is Lost Omens Legends. Her 4-page chapter begins on page 26. Her attitude toward humans is revealed by the following statement about her nation-building after the invasion:
Although Azaersi’s personal animosity toward humankind still burns fiercely, she has willed herself to set that aside for the time being and has ordered her underlings to do the same. If Oprak is to last, it must have more friends and fewer enemies than it does now, and at least some of those friends will likely have to be humans. Therefore, she has negotiated non-aggression pacts with Nirmathas and Nidal, as well as entertained the presence of diplomats from the desperate Knights of Lastwall.
The Legends entry largely skips over the Ironfang Invasion itself, since that varies from campaign to campaign, and does not mention the war captives.
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Honestly, I wouldn't remove it. The Ironfang is really, really evil, and this is just another one of their many crimes. It kinda HAS to happen in any event, as they are going to displace the locals and force them to work for them. That's slavery.
The alternatives aren't better: if the Ironfang eat everybody or kill them all, but that's not what hobgoblins do - they want others to work for them.
OR they are committed to simply displacing the locals, that would result in the death of most of Nirmathas from privation; another really awful outcome.
The 'redemption arc' of this incredibly evil woman is one of way too many that Paizo does in the APs. I would recommend making her super evil and the players wanting to do away with all of the Ironfang for their many, many, many crimes.
Honestly, I wouldn't remove it. The Ironfang is really, really evil, and this is just another one of their many crimes. It kinda HAS to happen in any event, as they are going to displace the locals and force them to work for them. That's slavery.
The alternatives aren't better: if the Ironfang eat everybody or kill them all, but that's not what hobgoblins do - they want others to work for them.
OR they are committed to simply displacing the locals, that would result in the death of most of Nirmathas from privation; another really awful outcome.
The 'redemption arc' of this incredibly evil woman is one of way too many that Paizo does in the APs. I would recommend making her super evil and the players wanting to do away with all of the Ironfang for their many, many, many crimes.
I don't view General Azaersi and her Ironfang Legion as really, really evil. They are plausibly evil. For a simliar villain from Earth history, she resembles Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés, a ruthless butcher who destroyed the Aztec empire.
My players have a reputation for compromising with the bad guys. In the Jade Regent adventure path, they spared the Jade Regent Soto Takahiro when he promised to support the new Amatatsu empress. In the Iron Gods adventure path the PCs became employees of the villain Unity, in order to learn its secrets before defeating it. In Rise of the Runelords, the villainess Xanesha became a double agent aiding both the good guys and the bad guys for her own gain, and as her final reward the good guys appointed her as regent of the city Xin-Shalast. And the history in the Lost Omens World Guide assumes that the player characters made a treaty with Azaersi and left her in control of Oprak.
Azaersi does not need a redemption arc in which she turns away from villainy. Such an arc wouldn't fit her character. But either she has to be willing to eliminate slavery from Oprak when necessary for survival or I must provide a substitute who will eliminate slavery from Oprak after Azaersi's death. I rewrote both Lieutenant Repral and Brigadier General Kosseruk as commanders with no love for slavery, but the PCs killed Kosseruk in battle. The PCs would be willing to absorb the Ironfang soldiers into Nirmathas so long as they abide by the anti-slavery creed of Nirmathas, but the Ironfang hobgoblins have been written as dedicated to the pro-slavery ideas of their fiend lord Hadregash.
The alternative is genocide against the hobgoblins to wipe out the followers of Hadregash. That is too bloody for my campaign and would not be fun.
The Lost Omen's character Guide for 2nd Ed has established a shift (I think) in religion among them, or at the least clarified the level of importance of faith to hobgoblins...
" Faith has little place in hobgoblin society, as many feel it is impractical, though religious hobgoblins can gain a begrudging modicum of acceptance due to their useful healing magic"
I haven't played OR run Ironfang, though I hear great things, but perhaps a certain Hobgoblin leader has decided it's time for gods that serve the modern hobgoblins needs better. If nothing else, it's possible that due to Molthune influence, they're familiar with Abadar and are seeing if he can do more for the Hobgoblins than Hadregash has done. Mind you, "What have you done for us lately" is a dangerous attitude to take towards divine beings, it might explain how the Hobgoblins won't think it's the end of the world if they give up their slaves.
And, there's another possible pragmatic reason. The hobgoblins might realize every non hobgoblin they enslave is not just a mouth to feed, but also a potential spy. All you need is some whacky adventurers to liberate the right perceptive slave, and suddenly a lot of your secrets (possibly military secrets) are exposed.
Not sure if any of the above works for you or not
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Azaersi is trying to build a nation. She knows that she's trying for a result (a nation of "the monsters humans fear" that will be powerful enough to be respected by other nations) which no hobgoblin has been able to do in the past. But fear alone would only cause those other nations to band against her.
So give her an academic bent. She's not just trying to conquer, she's trying to create a nation at the end of it all, one that won't fall apart the moment she stops conquering or the moment her own life ends. For that, she needs to research what makes other nations work. What made Taldor so successful, and why are they in decline? What's up with all those Andoran ideals of anti-slavery? Why is Ravounel suddenly a thing (assuming that's happened on your world)? What sorts of writings might she be able to collect from philosophers employed by the Magaambya? Why don't Cheliax's daughter colonies in Varisia tend to use slavery?
She may have a very pragmatic idealism about what her future nation needs to look like, for it to get along with its future neighbors.
In other words, don't wonder how the PCs can convince her; wonder how she's already planning to make the transition herself, because she's smart enough to already realize this will be a necessary step. And then what hints you can start to put into place.
The Lost Omen's character Guide for 2nd Ed has established a shift (I think) in religion among them, or at the least clarified the level of importance of faith to hobgoblins...
" Faith has little place in hobgoblin society, as many feel it is impractical, though religious hobgoblins can gain a begrudging modicum of acceptance due to their useful healing magic"
...
My literary search went back to PF1 material, Pathfinder Campaign Setting: Inner Sea Gods, published in 2014. The summary of the four barghest hero-gods on page 189 showed that each one had a theme that reminds me of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse: Hadregash is war, Venkelvore is hunger, Zarongel is fire, and Zogmugot is looting. Okay, it is far from a perfect match to war, famine, pestilence, and death, but the resemblance provides a direction by which I can reduce them from revered gods down to symbolic figures representing goblin mania. (Please ignore that the Horsemen themselves are in the Outer Sphere Plane of Abaddon.)
At the moment, war is the major part of hobgoblins' life. They are conquering a corner of Nirmathas. That makes Hadregath top dog in the eyes of the Ironfangs. But the Ironfang Legion no longer can draw from the supply lines of Molthune's Monster Divisions. Food will soon become very important. And the mineral wealth of the Onyx Vault could shift their leadership from solving their needs through conquest to solving their needs through looting the vault. Making fire important is tougher. The Nesmian Plains, their next area of conquest, could have prairie fires, but I need them to celebrate fire rather than fear it. With the four symbolic roles of the hero-gods vying for attention, I can take Hadregash down a few pegs.
The step after that will be up to Brigh and Dwalin and the party will hate it. Numeria will offer the Ironfang Legion firearms in exchange for minerals. That will boost Zarongel, god of fire and hunting, and Zogmugot, goddess of scavenging.
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Another deity you could consider being interested in Azaersi & her followers is Sarenrae.
I seem to recall lore saying that many goblinoids that turn away from Lamashtu & their barghest hero-gods are welcomed into her faith - unless they find themselves drawn to other deities that speak to them on a more personal level.
Edit: The faith of Sarenrae could be used as an intermediary to smooth out relations between Azaersi's nation & Lastwall in the long term (or at least convince the knights to give it a chance - provided that Azaersi is at least sincere in moving away from the influence of the barghest hero-gods...)
Also, General Susumu is the main god worshipped by the hobgoblins in Tian Xia. He might be an alternate deity for those hobgoblins who don't want to abandon their militant ways completely, particularly if Azaersi goes looking for allies for her fledgling nation by way of the Stone Roads of the Onyx Vault.
Just some thoughts...
Good luck with your campaign!
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Even Gorum is a great choice for hobgoblins who want to keep going with the martial traditions without worshipping a deity that is expressly evil - Gorum is pretty indifferent to why or who or how you fight, so long as you fight and don't "cheat" by negotiating or using tricksy magic, and hobgoblins don't care that much about whether they get granted spells by a deity (as they don't care much for magic), so the follower alignments for Gorum being CN/CE doesn't really matter that much for hobgoblins.
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To diminish the role of Hadregash, goblin hero-god of slavery, I will group Hadregash, Venkelvore, Zarongel, and Zogmugot into a pantheon always worshipped together. Thus, any hobgoblin devoted to Hadregash for conquest and tyranny will also have the hunger of Venlelvore, the dog-hating of Zarongel, and the seashore scavenging of Zogmugot. This baggage should make the believer more flexible when slavery is outlawed.
The PF1 material on the four hero-gods gives the following areas of concern:
Hadregash (LE) cared about goblin supremacy, slavery, and territory and offered Evil, Law, Strength, and War domains.
Venkelvore (NE() cared about famine, graves, torture and offered Death, Destruction, Earth, and Evil domains.
Zarongel (NE) cared about dog killing, fire, and mounted combat and offered Animal, Evil, Fire, and Travel domains.
Zogmugot (CE) cared about drowning, flotsam, and scavenging and offered Chaos, Evil, Trickery, and Water domains.
PF2 does not have the same domains; for example, it lacks alignment domains such as Chaos, Evil, and Law. Some domains changed names, such as Might for Strength and others merged such as Nature for Plant and Animal. This gives me an excuse to not match the PF1 domains even when I could.
Half of the text below is copied from PF1 sources, such as Pathfinder Campaign Setting: Inner Sea Gods,
GOBLIN HERO-GODS
The goblin hero-gods are not goblins; instead they are fiendish greater barghests named Hadregash, Venkelvore, Zarongel, and Zogmugot. They served as ferocious guardians of Asmodeus' Hell until Lamashtu lured them to the Abyss to energize her monsters. The goblins call them hero-gods because their embellished tales formed the mythology of goblins and their greedy, violent natures reflect the lives of goblins. Most priests of the hero-gods select one of the four as their primary diety and prefer that barghest's holy symbol or its favored weapon, but they serve all four hero-gods and gain all options.
Hadregash the Greatest Supreme Chieftain Boss (LE) bullies the other barghest hero-gods. The other three once banded together against him, but he defeated them with his great strength and claimed dominance over the pantheon. The militant hobgoblins admire his conquests and the violent bugbears admire his strength. His holy symbol is the chain and manacle and his weapon is the flail. He adds Zeal to their domains.
Venkelvore the Most Glorious Neverfull (NE) is the fattest and most beautiful of the barghest hero-gods. Her ceaseless hunger leads her to constantly steal food, so her holy symbol is a half-eaten piece of food, represented by a bite out of a biscuit by civilized goblins and a gnawed bone with meat on it by uncouth goblins.
Her favored weapon is the spear. She adds Indulgence to their domains.
Zarongel the Dog Slayer (NE) boasts a magnificent pelt of living fire that was a gift from Lamashtu for his loyalty. Zarongels love of stalking and destroying brought him into conflict with dogs and horses, so his holy symbol is a severed dog's paw and his favored weapon was dubbed the dogslicer. He adds Fire to their domains.
Zogmugot, called Lady Lastbreath, (CE) fearlessly scavenges for wealth in inhospitable, deadly places due to her insatiable greed. She loves flotsam from the sea, though goblins who mimic her risk drowning. Her holy symbol is a seaweed-draped chest and her favored weapon is a sickle. She adds Change to their domains.
Edicts boast about your accomplishments, gather power, hunt or fight
Anathema admit a weakness, betray your tribe, resist easy pickings
Areas of concern Goblinoid supremacy, hunger, combat, scavenging
Follower Alignments LE, NE, CE
Divine Ability Strength
Divine Font harm
Divine Skill Intimidation
Favored Weapons Dogslicer, flail, sickle, and spear
Domains Change, Fire, Indulgence, Zeal
Cleric Spells 1st: goblin pox, 2nd: hideous laughter, 4th: wall of fire
If Azaersi is too evil to end slavery and war, what about a very convincing imposter? Azaersi secretly ends up dead, and one of the PCs becomes the new Azaersi, who then does the necessary work, backed up by some very persuasive agents (the other PCs, who may themselves have taken up guises as Hobgoblins or allies thereof).
If Azaersi is too evil to end slavery and war, what about a very convincing imposter? Azaersi secretly ends up dead, and one of the PCs becomes the new Azaersi, who then does the necessary work, backed up by some very persuasive agents (the other PCs, who may themselves have taken up guises as Hobgoblins or allies thereof).
My wife points out that most of the party is too short to pull off disguises as hobgoblins. The only two Medium characters in the party are the elf and the catfolk, neither whom is trained or inclined toward Deception. The other five party members are two gnomes, a draconic-bloodline halfling, a vine leshy, and a tailed goblin.
And they might be able to pull off influencing the Ironfang Legion without disguises. The party had been an unseen thorn in the Ironfangs plans, leaving no survivors who saw the entire party. General Azaersi was furious that appparently a team of elite Chernasardo Rangers had been taking conquered territory back from her. She finally recieved complete spy reports when the party entered Longshadow. She was bewildered that the party had no humans in it. And the elf, the only party member of a hated race, was a known Chernasardo trainee from Phaendar, who likely joined the elites merely to finish his training.
I have been amused by that paradox that General Azarersi, in her crusade to punish humans for abuse of non-humans, finds these humans protected by non-humans. More important is that the non-human party can often have friendly discussions with their enemies. They made a new alliance with the black dragon Izbariak, the final boss of Fangs of War, rather than fighting him. I rewrote Lietenaunt Repral, commander of the War Beast Camp, from an 11th-level hunter dedicated to training monsters for war to a 10th-level warpriest of Lamashtu who managed the camp out of her love for monsters. Repral had a long discussion with the party, partly because she was stalling while Brigadier General Kosseruk secretly moved her troops into place. AFter Kosseruk died in the failed assault of Longshadow, Repral sent the minotaur Ekhinos, a student of Kosseruk in the way of the war maze, to negotiate a truce, because she knew Ekhinos would be safer with the party than with Ironfang Legion soldiers seeking someone to blame for their defeat at Longshadow.
Putting the hobgoblin Repral or minotaur Ekhinos or orc Arkus in charge of the Ironfang Legion would allow peace.
I have been altering the adventure path to enable a social roleplaying solution, because my players have the skill to pull that off. The religious pro-slavery creed held by the rank and file of the hobgoblins is the main stumbling block.
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Would-be slaves (war spoils and prisoners) can be traded back in exchange for what the hobgoblin future state needs right now (food, for example).
If the PCs show Azaersi that the choice is slavery = death, not slavery = a chance at gaining/surviving through trade, she should be able to steer her followers away from slavery.
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Idk 3 small creatures disguised as a medium creature is a time honored fantasy tradition.
Hmm, three of the small PCs are experts in Deception.
I read this to my wife. She said, "We thought of that. It's a classic."
In the actual game, the tailed goblin liberator champion has twice deceived Ironfang soldiers into thinking she was in the Ironfang Legion, once to slip some slaves past a patrol by pretending to be the overseer of a work gang. Her deity Grandmother Spider has no objections to her champions cleverly lying.
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Would-be slaves (war spoils and prisoners) can be traded back in exchange for what the hobgoblin future state needs right now (food, for example).
If the PCs show Azaersi that the choice is slavery = death, not slavery = a chance at gaining/surviving through trade, she should be able to steer her followers away from slavery.
This seems like it reinforces slavery in the hobgoblins more than it already is.
Going from "making war prisoners work" to "we trade people for goods" is 5 steps back from the goal. For the simple fact it encourages hobgoblins to capture more people to trade them.
Ransom was an accepted part of war in the Middle Ages. And it did not promote slavery. Doubly so as those concerned then were the nobles.
It could be a temporary state before creating real conventions of war negotiated between Azaersi's people and their neighbours.
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Yeah, in a broad sense the medieval custom of ransom served a larger societal goal by incentivizing medieval armies to keep captives taken in battle alive, by giving a financial incentive to return them to their families.
Of course, this didn't apply to peasant soldiers, only nobility, who could actually pay a ransom.
Not to say that the practice was great, just that it had its role and definitely isn't comparable to slavery. It is more comparable to say, paying bail to get out of prison.
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Not to say that the practice was great, just that it had its role and definitely isn't comparable to slavery. It is more comparable to say, paying bail to get out of prison.
Hell, we do war-prisoner exchanges now. This is something you want to leave to states, though - having player parties do it runs up against the squicky idea of buying a slave for the purpose of freeing them later.
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Yeah, in a broad sense the medieval custom of ransom served a larger societal goal by incentivizing medieval armies to keep captives taken in battle alive, by giving a financial incentive to return them to their families.
Of course, this didn't apply to peasant soldiers, only nobility, who could actually pay a ransom.
Not to say that the practice was great, just that it had its role and definitely isn't comparable to slavery. It is more comparable to say, paying bail to get out of prison.
Quite right. the nobility was ransomed.
The common soldiers of the defeated army - most of whom were serfs, and therefore functionally slaves - were either massacred or, if they were lucky enough to run home, did just that. Or drifted into the winning army. Or starved.
But again, that's the army. The locals were generally merely looted from as the traditional feudal order was generally maintained. You could argue that the Ironfang might do the same... except the Nirmathi peasantry is one of small freeholders [which is why Molthune hates them so much].
Again, as written, this is a really terrible AP for the locals, and you are free to amp that up or just kinda write it off with a few pithy sentences as you want.
... The common soldiers of the defeated army - most of whom were serfs, and therefore functionally slaves - were either massacred or, if they were lucky enough to run home, did just that. Or drifted into the winning army. Or starved.
But again, that's the army. The locals were generally merely looted from as the traditional feudal order was generally maintained. You could argue that the Ironfang might do the same... except the Nirmathi peasantry is one of small freeholders [which is why Molthune hates them so much].
Again, as written, this is a really terrible AP for the locals, and you are free to amp that up or just kinda write it off with a few pithy sentences as you want.
Yes, the Ironfang Invasion is brutal on the locals. I have data on Phaendar. Its population was 398, consisting of 305 humans, 32 half-orcs, 21 dwarves, 17 half-elves, and 28 other. Three of the seven party members were part of the "28 other. The other party members came from elsewhere. The party rescued 40 villagers from the invasion, later encountered another group of 20 refugee villagers, and they recently rescued 100 enslaved villagers from Phaendar. That leaves about 240 villagers not accounted for. Many would have been sent to other Ironfang Invasion camps as slaves, a few might have escaped, but I figure that at least 120 villagers are dead, 30% of the population.
The module Trail of the Hunted had had the Phaendar villagers confused by the invasion and in need of guidance from the 1st-level party. I changed that: the village organized a defense almost immediately, and the party's assignment was to guard the elderly and children and hide them in the Fangwood Forest. The freeholder defenders would have been willing to fight to the death. Word from the conquest of the village of Ecru warned Phaendar that the Ironfang Legion were conquerers not raiders.
In Fangs of War the party visited the three forts of the Chernasardo Rangers, the people who were supposed to protect that region. The Ironfang Legion had taken them out first. Fort Ristin had 1 survivor out of about 50. Fort Nunder has zero survivors out of about 20. Fort Trevalay had 18 survivors out of about 100. That is 89% dead. Clerics of Hadregash were trying to break the spirit of the 18 prisoners in Fort Trevalay and train them as slaves.
In Assault on Longshadow the party discovered that the hamlet of Redburrow was totally destroyed. The party encountered 3 survivors who had fled. The Ironfang Legion was supposed to have sent the inhabitants of Radya's Hollow down to its abandoned mine to work. Alas, the mine was haunted and deadly, so only 2 survived. I actually sent the party to Radya's Hollow ahead of schedule before it was conquered. They stopped the conquest. They also visited the conquered village of Ecru, converted into a camp for the Ironfang Legion. It had no inhabitants left in it, but enslaved villagers were likely sent to the nearby main camp at the Valley of Aloi. The party found about 25 refugees from Ecru in Longshadow.
The city of Longshadow, population 4,000 (3,223 humans, 615 halflings, 138 dwarves, 24 other), had zero losses during the attempted invasion. The party was very effective at improving its defenses. Some leaders inside the city had been assassinated before the invasion, until the party caught the assassins.
The Ironfang Legion deserted their posts in Molthune. They have no home to retreat to. Technically, the Nesmian Plans and Hollow Hills of Nirmathas have room for both the original population and the Ironfang invaders, but the Ironfangs want to rule and chose conquest.
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General Azaersi's founding the nation of Oprak has a major flaw. The Hadregash religion declares...
Player-characters ignore certain parts of their religion's doctrines and dogma for their own ends on a regular basis, why would a major named-NPC be any different? I don't necessarily think you need to justify changes to the RAW. So much of what is happening behind the scenes players never see anyway.
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General Azaersi's founding the nation of Oprak has a major flaw. The Hadregash religion declares...Player-characters ignore certain parts of their religion's doctrines and dogma for their own ends on a regular basis, why would a major named-NPC be any different? I don't necessarily think you need to justify changes to the RAW. So much of what is happening behind the scenes players never see anyway.
I talked to two of my players and they say that their characters know what is happening behind the scenes. They talk to their enemies. And the rogue/sorcerer Sam is a living lie detector with Lie to Me and Biographical Eye. People have never fooled them, though uncovering the enemy agents in Longshadow took a few days.
An easy literary technique is to treat the leader of a kingdom as an accurate representation of a kingdom. For example, the king wants war so the nation wants war, or the king was convinced to try an alliance by marriage so the nation now rejoices in the royal marriage. My players like dealing with the common people, so they see the Ironfang Legion from a different angle than General Azaersi's dreams. They talked to enslaved human villagers and learned how the clerics of Hadregash told them that their place was to be slaves. The troll leader Nashgra described how the Ironfang Legion abandoned the trolls. The black dragon Ibzairiak had no loyalty to his Ironfang allies and broke the alliance when the party made a better offer. They captured a morlock and spoke to him in Undercommon. He described how the dark naga Zanathura is a goddess and Azaersi was her minion. They deciphered Kosseruk's war journal and learned of political infighting for status and resources between the mid-level commanders of the Ironfang Legion (due to level-appropriate encounters across 10 levels, the PCs could see that the earlier encounters were starved of resources that the later encounter had available).
Their roleplaying experience has been too rich for me to offer an easy solution where I say, "General Azaersi is willing to compromise." They already detected signs of disloyalty among her sub-commanders. They suspect that Azaersi is holding her alliance together with lies and breakable promises. They want to earn the hard solution of winning the hearts of the Ironfang Legion to hope of peace. My wife said that that has been Sam's goal all along, as soon as she figures out how.
I started this thread to figure out how the players can have their solution, because slavery is a obstacle to that solution. The adventure path has too many examples of slavery for me to sweep it under the rug.
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I think it would be a mistake to conflate wartime slavery with general 'consumer' slavery, but that depends a lot on your willingness to consider nuance and to what historical period army you associate the Ironfang with conceptually. It could be slaves are only used as part of the war machine. Idle captives will plot their own escape, so use them for labor so they don't have the time nor the energy to do so. Maybe think of them more like P.O.W.s from the 20th century. They were generally only 'enslaved' during the war and released thereafter.
As far as the subservient races under Azaersi, part of her rhetoric might be that if they capture and enslave "lesser" races (from their perspective) then it will elevate their own position in the goblinoid society. A centaur on their own is just a potential asset to be exploited, but one with rank and possessing numerous slaves (of an ever lesser sort) would begin to obtain some level of power within the goblinoid hierarchy. Whether or not this is actually true is not important, at least not initially, it only matters that they believe it. You could even have them start to move away from this ideology as it becomes clear that no matter what they do, they will never be accepted as equals to the goblinoids.
That being said, in general, I think it wold be challenging (not impossible) to rewrite Ironfang excluding slavery entirely. To some extent it is integral to the storyline. I am currently running a 2E converted campaign though they have not yet progressed to really facing these issues (just reached Fort Nunder). The captives they found at Fort Ristin were not enslaved, just locked up. When they arrive to Fort Trevelay, they will find that the rangers held there have been and are being used for labor. Mostly cleaning and repairing damage to the facility.
I am interested to see how they react to it when it is clearly present in a more sinister way; when they see civilians not POWs being used as slaves. They surprise me sometimes with what things they want to focus on. They are aware that most of Faendar has been enslaved, but they have been more focused on keeping the refugees safe than the overall issue of what is happening to the population they are not yet in a position to help.
For context, my players are not necessarily looking for an intense socio-political game. We are friends who met through org play and most of them are more interested in relaxing and winding down from work or other of life's challenges and rolling some dice. We play online (roll20) due to not living in the same city. Online also allows me to more easily bring in visual aids so they don't have to think too hard about "seeing" what is going on. I try not to "force" them into making too many heavy decisions. 'Destroy the bad guy' and 'free the slaves' are fairly easy tropes they can get behind.
BTW - wouldn't this topic be more appropriate in the Ironfang Invasion AP forum since it is specific to that campaign? I flagged it for the moderators to look at, but I dunno
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Maybe it's just me, but if the BAD GUYS are doing a BAD THING, how is that a problem? As a DM, you don't have to get into excessive details. And when your PCs are fighting against the BAD GUYS doing the BAD THING then your PCs are GOOD GUYS [which is the point of the story].
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BTW - wouldn't this topic be more appropriate in the Ironfang Invasion AP forum since it is specific to that campaign? I flagged it for the moderators to look at, but I dunno
If I were asking, "How do I run this section of Ironfang Invasion, which appears to have an internal contradiction?" then the Ironfang Invasion subforum would be the proper place for my question. But my question is, "How do I alter Ironfang Invasion to follow the Lost Omens philosophy?" Since Ironfang Invasion was created as a PF1 adventure path, most people responding in the Ironfang Invasion subforum are working off PF1 philosophy. I want to talk to people who have experience with the PF2 Lost Omens philosophy.
The Pathfinder modules are written differently from the Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition modules I played before Pathfinder. In Burnt Offerings, the 1st module of Rise of the Runelords, I was introduced to the zany, toothy little pyromaniacs that are Pathfinder goblins, singing their war chants. They were not simply bottom-level opponents to be defeated by 1st-level PCs. They had a culture of their own different from any human culture. In the backstory a girl Nualla grew up with too many expectations on her, a basic human tale, except the story ups it to fantasy levels because Nualla is an aasimer, so the expectations are that she would be not just good but outright holy.
I read a lot of fantasy and science fiction. That genre explores the human condition in exceptional settings. In Disney's Aladdin movie, we see Aladdin as a street rat long enough to identify his ambitions before he is diverted into the story about the genie and we never see his street-rat life again. I prefer the greater detail in Tamora Pierce's Briar's Book, Circle of Magic #4. The street rat Briar was taken from capture by the local constable and sent to a magic academy due to his plant magic. Yet he still had his street attitude and had to reconcile that with his new status as an apprentice mage. The story investigates the conflict of cultures. Paizo's writing is strongly story based, where my players and I can experience the cultures and attitudes of the NPCs. We carve a strong story out of it.
Paizo's writings have evolved over the years, and the boundary between PF1 and PF2 makes a good waypoint to stop and examine the changes. PF1 Golarion was assembled as a patchwork of marketable settings. We have generic RPG adventure land in Varisia, we have fight the orcs in Belkzen, we have gothic horror in Ustalav, we have Robin Hood versus the Sheriff of Nottingham in Nirmathas and Molthune, we have Viking land in the Land of the Linnorm Kings, etc. The PF2 Lost Omens material took a second glance and asked, "What about the NPCs? Shouldn't they have full lives of their own rather than merely serving as a backdrop?" Thus, we find material that is more people-centered than adventure-centered in Lost Omens Mwangi Expanse and Lost Omens Grand Bazaar.
My players love to talk to the people. I regularly generate a few extra NPCs for them to simply talk to. The character Rhyna (N female human adept 2), assitant to cleric Noelan and described as "an irritatingly optimistic Chelish woman with bronze skin, wavy blond hair, and pale green eyes" in Trail of the Hunted first showed up in my campaign handing out blankets to refugees from Ecru. I rebuilt her as a playtest fire oracle and she had a grandmother in town and her parents had sent her to live with her grandmother because the local priest of Asmodeus in Cheliax was exploiting her oracle powers for personal prestige. Her grandmother became important to the story, too, when she fell under the influence of the underhanded bard Edran. My players weave a story and I add new people for more weaving material.
My wife says that if Golarion were a new setting, then she wouldn't care as much about the existing culture. But she has played in Golarion since Pathfinder came out and is invested in seeing the world develop and improve. Removing slavery from hobgoblin culture is a side of goblins and other goblinoids becoming playable (characterized by the ability to play well with others, AKA civilization) people. She said that Trail of the Hunted established the Ironfang Legion as slave-takers. They are not simply holding prisoners with plans for release later. They want slaves to work for the rest of their lives. If they didn't mind the original inhabitants of Phaendar going free, then they wouldn't have been hunting the refugees from Phaendar.
I am jumping ahead by adding Lost Omens sensibility to a PF1 adventure path, but the effort fits with converting the adventure path to PF2 rules.
I am interested to see how they react to it when it is clearly present in a more sinister way; when they see civilians not POWs being used as slaves. They surprise me sometimes with what things they want to focus on. They are aware that most of Faendar has been enslaved, but they have been more focused on keeping the refugees safe than the overall issue of what is happening to the population they are not yet in a position to help.
Liberating Phaendar is a mission in the 6th module, Vault of the Onyx Citadel. Nevertheless, after Assault on Longshadow my players declared, "Okay, our PCs are proven strong enough to take on the Ironfang forces in Phaendar. Let's free our former neighbors from slavery." Fortunately, I could borrow the maps from Vault of the Onyx Citadel. 15th-level Commander Stabvistan was a more interesting battle against a 12th-level party than against the expected 16th-level party.
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Maybe it's just me, but if the BAD GUYS are doing a BAD THING, how is that a problem? As a DM, you don't have to get into excessive details. And when your PCs are fighting against the BAD GUYS doing the BAD THING then your PCs are GOOD GUYS [which is the point of the story].
IF a landlord is going to kick out a family because he wants to sell the rental house to a wealthy merchant, then the landlord is a bud guy. Yet he is not so bad that he deserves to die. Many bad guys are in moral shades of gray rather than the black hat of true villainy.
A gnoll moved from Cheliax to Molthune because of a promise that by joining the Monster Division of the Molthune army he could become a full citizen. After serving a full tour in the Monster Division, he tried to live as a civilian in Molthune and could not get hired nor buy land. He re-enlisted in the army again to survive. Then General Azaersi told the soldiers in her division that they would desert Molthune and conquer a homeland where they could be full citizens for real. The gnoll went along with the plan, because he wanted to be treated fairly and because he didn't have an alternative. Is the gnoll a bad guy who deserves death?
A worse bad guy is a hobgoblin whose parents fought in the Goblinblood War in Isger and escaped to become bandits in Azaersi's Ironfang Bandits. He grew up in the Ironfangs and joined the Monster Division of Molthune when Azaersi was given an offer for the Ironfang Bandits to join the Monster Division. The hobgoblin clerics preached that the only respectable role for a hobgoblin was as a soldier. Farming or driving merchant carts was beneath him, even forging weapons of war was barely acceptable. Then General Azaersi told the soldiers in her division that they would desert Molthune and conquer a homeland where they could be full citizens and humans would perform all the drudge labor. He looked forward to a lifetime career as a soldier, served by the humans who. like the ones in Molthune, looked down on hobgoblins as a lesser species. Is the hobgoblin a bad guy who deserves death?
The bugbear Sergeant Scarvinious was the son of Colonel Scabvistin of the Ironfang Legion. When Colonel Scabvistin lead the conquest of the village Phaendar, he assigned his son Scarvinious to capture the refugees who had fled into the Fangwood Forest. The first people Scabvistin encountered in Fangwood were dwarven lumberjacks who had no idea that Phaendar had been invaded. Scabvistin, angry that they had not surrendered, tortured most of them to death. Scabvistin was definitely a bad guy who deserved death.
The minotaur Kosseruk was a student of the war maze, Rather than violently protect territory like most minotaurs, she researched the twists and turn of military tactics to become an effective leader. And she joined the Molthune Monster Division as a career where she could put her tactical expertise to good use. She met fellow commander Azaersi fighting beside her on the battlefield and learned to respect her. Yet Kosseruk's fellow minotaurs were often used as expendable heavy troops by the human Molthune leaders, and their only civilian jobs were as porters carrying heavy loads. When General Azaersi asked her to join the Ironfang Legion in deserting Molthune and conquering a homeland where they could be full citizens, she saw that Azaersi had a workable plan and agreed. Whether Brigadier General Kosseruk deserved to die is irrelevant. She died bravely leading the assault on Longshadow. (Kosseruk as written in the module was cruel, but I had more fun developing her calculating tactical side. She was trying to intimidate Longshadow into evacuating the city.)
The so-called monstrous humanoids of Molthune were maktreated. Given the cultural development of the Eye of Dread region, their only chance for fair treatment was to grab power for themselves through war. They chose war against the backwoods bumpkins of Nirmathas rather than against the war-trained segregationists of Molthune, because that was their best hope for victory. Are they bad guys who deserve to die? How about if they enslave the Nirmathi humans? Does that make them hypocritical bad guys who deserve to die?
One reason Paizo decided to stop writing modules about slavery was the gray morality where slave owners were bad guys but not bad enough to deserve death. Perhaps the slave owner treated his slaves well. Perhaps the only way to run his plantation without going bankrupt was with slave labor, and if the plantation went bankrupt, then the slaves would be sold down the river and families broken apart as their members were sold to different places.
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Maybe it's just me, but if the BAD GUYS are doing a BAD THING, how is that a problem? As a DM, you don't have to get into excessive details. And when your PCs are fighting against the BAD GUYS doing the BAD THING then your PCs are GOOD GUYS [which is the point of the story]....
again, don't make it gray. It's clearly not presented in that way in the AP. The Ironfang is ruinously awful. It's only on the last page of the AP where there's this longshot redemption arc for a woman who ordered the massacre and enslavement of half a country.
Like... why? Just stab her.
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Maybe it's just me, but if the BAD GUYS are doing a BAD THING, how is that a problem? As a DM, you don't have to get into excessive details. And when your PCs are fighting against the BAD GUYS doing the BAD THING then your PCs are GOOD GUYS [which is the point of the story]....again, don't make it gray. It's clearly not presented in that way in the AP. The Ironfang is ruinously awful. It's only on the last page of the AP where there's this longshot redemption arc for a woman who ordered the massacre and enslavement of half a country.
Like... why? Just stab her.
Why not make it grey and nuanced if that is what Mathmuse and their players enjoy ?
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again, don't make it gray. It's clearly not presented in that way in the AP. The Ironfang is ruinously awful. It's only on the last page of the AP where there's this longshot redemption arc for a woman who ordered the massacre and enslavement of half a country.
Like... why? Just stab her.
Killing off General Azaersi would be justice.
Killing off 10,000 Ironfang soldiers would be genocide.
The adventure path does not say how many soldiers are in the Ironfang Legion, but they were called a "Monster Division" of the Molthune army. A division contains 10,000 to 15,000 soldiers.
I also figure that the size of the Ironfang Legion can be estimated by the amount of territory they wanted to claim and the amount of territory they did claim. Oprak is about 200 miles long and 50 miles wide. That is 10,000 square miles. Mountainous territory on average supports one person every square miles, so 10,000 people. Originally, they invaded a more fertile area 100 miles long and 50 miles wide. Those 5,000 square miles could support at least 25 people per square mile, a place with room for growth.
The Ironfang camp in the assault on Longshadow is described as "defended by minotaurs, monsters, and a thousand hobgoblin soldiers, with the approach monitored by ballistae and archers." That was only part of the Ironfang Legion. If it were at least half of the army, a top-rank commander Kraelos would have been there.
If the party defeats the Ironfang Legion, what do they do with the soldiers? They cannot send them back to Molthune. They could exile them to the Vault of the Onyx Citadel where the hobgoblins would die trying to grow crops in the poisonous soil. They could execute them in cold blood. Some of the soldiers are evil, some were following orders, others wanted to fight for a fair shake.
If the Ironfang Legion expects the Nirmathi defenders to execute or enslave them, then they will fight to the death. That would feel like a very unheroic conclusion to the adventure path. Compromise is the only peaceful solution.
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Given the general culture in Nirmathas "you go live over there and don't bother us anymore, okay" would seem to be the way they would prefer to resolve more or less any armed conflict.
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If this is the story the OP wants to tell, I don't think it's on-topic to post criticizing the central premise.
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The adventure path does not say how many soldiers are in the Ironfang Legion, but they were called a "Monster Division" of the Molthune army. A division contains 10,000 to 15,000 soldiers.I also figure that the size of the Ironfang Legion can be estimated by the amount of territory they wanted to claim and the amount of territory they did claim.
While everything you say is reasonable the fact is that things like population numbers, army sizes etc are pretty much just pulled out of the authors posterior with absolutely no rhyme or reason. They'll vary by an order of magnitude or two either way from what logic would indicate.
The ecology of Golarion makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. There are never ending armies of giants in a few hills in Varisia, for example.
If this is the story the OP wants to tell, I don't think it's on-topic to post criticizing the central premise.
Yakman's reminders that the Ironfang Legion has committed atrocities are helpful. (We are halfway through the adventure path, so I cannot retroactively make them less awful. I can only shift the blame internally.)
And I am a tough audience for advice. I let my players take narrative control of the game. To me, the fun of gamemastering is watching the story unfold better than I expected. Thus, I veto ideas that I can predict my players won't follow.
However, their narrative can be quite twisted. In my Jade Regent campaign, the players pretended to be good guys. The party was mostly neutral with regards to Good and Evil, but they were deliberately creating a reputation as folk heroes. Yet they made alliances with two of the nasty deserve-to-die bad guys. And then after the bad guys helped the party, my wife's ninja character and a few other shady party members secretly assassinated the bad guys.
In my Ironfang Invasion campaign, the party is pretending to be Chernasardo Rangers, the legendary protectors of Nirmathas, for better cooperation from the common people. Except that they are Chernasardo Rangers, because the rangers officially accepted them into their organization. But many of the PCs still feel like they are pretending.
{. . .}
I talked to two of my players and they say that their characters know what is happening behind the scenes. They talk to their enemies. And the rogue/sorcerer Sam is a living lie detector with Lie to Me and Biographical Eye. People have never fooled them, though uncovering the enemy agents in Longshadow took a few days.
{. . .}
Their roleplaying experience has been too rich for me to offer an easy solution where I say, "General Azaersi is willing to compromise." They already detected signs of disloyalty among her sub-commanders. They suspect that Azaersi is holding her alliance together with lies and breakable promises. They want to earn the hard solution of winning the hearts of the Ironfang Legion to hope of peace.
AND
{. . .}
A gnoll moved from Cheliax to Molthune because of a promise that by joining the Monster Division of the Molthune army he could become a full citizen. After serving a full tour in the Monster Division, he tried to live as a civilian in Molthune and could not get hired nor buy land. He re-enlisted in the army again to survive. Then General Azaersi told the soldiers in her division that they would desert Molthune and conquer a homeland where they could be full citizens for real. {. . .}A worse bad guy is a hobgoblin whose parents fought in the Goblinblood War in Isger and escaped to become bandits in Azaersi's Ironfang Bandits. He grew up in the Ironfangs and joined the Monster Division of Molthune when Azaersi was given an offer for the Ironfang Bandits to join the Monster Division. The hobgoblin clerics preached that the only respectable role for a hobgoblin was as a soldier. {. . .}
This would seem to lend itself to a scenario in which some of Azaersi's lieutenants get disillusioned with her promises. In particular, if they are themselves more observant than average, they might notice that some of the Humans/etc. that they have taken prisoner actually are not like the Humans that oppressed them, and might start to question the morality of what they are doing. Small chance, but it's worth a shot, and just might be made possible by their noticing that Azaersi's promises are just as breakable as the promises made by Molthune. The PCs just might be able to spot this and then help them organize a coup. Then if one of these lieutenants just happens to look and sound enough like Azaersi for a modest application of Disguise/Deception could let her pass herself off as Azaersi, then said organized coup might be able to get rid of the irredeemable general AND end slavery in the incipient Oprak (the PCs could help the Nirmathi forces make that a condition of the peace treaty). Only the coup leaders and the PCs know that Oprak is led by somebody other than the original Azaersi, so the Lost Omens timeline remains intact.
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If slavery obviously creates more problems for the goal of Azaersi and her army than it helps, likely due to the PCs, the hobgoblins should likely decide to get rid of it. Just put the accent on the pragmatism of the soldiers over their religious leanings.
Offer them a deal they cannot refuse.
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Given the general culture in Nirmathas "you go live over there and don't bother us anymore, okay" would seem to be the way they would prefer to resolve more or less any armed conflict.however, this is not the hobgoblin means of conflict resolution.
General Azaersi could pull it off. I imagine her speech:
"Some of you have been with me from the beginning, survivors of the battle of the Valley of Iron Fangs. I said we need to leave Isger and take up banditry. You replied that we are soldiers not bandits. I said to bide our time. Before the time is right, we needed to feed ourselves and practice our scouting and ambushes."When the generals of the Molthune army asked us to join their Monster Division, I agreed. You replied that we would not give up our freedom and work for humans. I said to bide our time. Before the time is right, we needed to clothe ourselves and practice our discipline and regimentation.
"Our time came. The Nirmathi humans were weak, fleeing to the hills and relying on their Chenasardo Rangers to protect them. Humans are creatures of cities not forests. We defeated their human rangers. But the time was not right. A second wave of Chernasardo Rangers appeared, non-humans as strong and clever as us because they are like us.
"Now the Nirmathis offer us a treaty. Go live over there and don't bother us anymore. I agreed, we will go live over there. We will bide our time. We need to shelter ourselves and practice our maneuvers and tactics.
"And when the time is right and we can defeat the non-human rangers, we will rise again!"