Why Making Goblins a Core Race is a Bad Idea: An Essay


Prerelease Discussion

51 to 100 of 484 << first < prev | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | next > last >>

I figure we have 8 years worth of data to test the hypothesis that goblin PCs are disruptive, so I made a poll in this thread. If you've ever played a game that included a goblin PC, please vote!

Second Seekers (Roheas)

2 people marked this as a favorite.

I think SteelGuts presents the most sensible solution to this.

A Core Ancestry isn't the same thing as an Optional Ancestry.


3 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

HOWEVER, before that happened they went for an undisclosed length of time with nothing in particular happening. Could have been years and years of minor irritation and kids watching them pick through the trash heap at the bottom of the cliff. It took a major plot point to rile them up into actual violence.


7 people marked this as a favorite.

Toss in my vote for removing Goblins from the core. I don't want to deal with that crap at my home table, where I can just ban them, but I absolutely don't want to have to deal with that crap in PFS where I won't be able to stop it.


4 people marked this as a favorite.

I've only had one game with Goblin PCs, but they weren't disruptive at all. They were hilarious. They didn't set fire, kill horses, or eat babies. They did go around stealing stuff, but that was the worst thing they did. In fact, there was an entire tribe of goblins living in the sewers of the town for years and no one ever knew. And they weren't fire obsessed, they were treasure obsessed.

Dark Archive

4 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

You guys are focusing too much on calling players or GM crappy, getting into badwrongfun arguments never goes anywhere <_<

Like, issue here is that Paizo Published adventures and campaign setting often takes the "You can't play as evil race because this isn't evil campaign! You'd be attacked on sight everywhere otherwise" stance, so it is immersion breaking if that stance remains unchanged but goblins are exception to it.


3 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

I had a goblin pyrokinetic in my game recently. I let the player be neutral evil and gave him the ten things to know about goblins as a guide.

He was a fantastic goblin and while the party had to be wary and careful of him, he wasn't a disruption to the game and didn't ruin anybody else's fun.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
ThePuppyTurtle wrote:

The two most disruptive characters I’ve ever encountered were both halflings, played by different people, both of whom are in no way disruptive when they play other characters. One is openly and deliberately behaving like a kinder, which means he will risk angering plot-critical NPCs and ruining the mission for everyone in order to pick-pocket or shoplift for his own amusement. The other plays a deliberately unintelligent halfling who regularly splits from the party to press random buttons and otherwise engage in disruptive antics, which have put the party in danger of TPKs.

Neither of these people showed up to the game to sabotage it. Neither of them thought that they were doing anything wrong. Both thought that they were simply playing their characters faithfully.

In that situation I would say, "The way you are playing your character is disruptive. Either play your character differently, or play a different character."

ThePuppyTurtle wrote:
While the goblin might not have been obligated to take that specific action, they are, if they wish to faithfully play a goblin who is not a very strange outlier among their species, obligated to generally show an affinity for setting things on fire, killing valuable domesticated animals and display disrespect for the lives, wellbeing and property of others.

Nope. You're using an understanding of goblins based on PF1. Spellcasting works differently now. Skills work differently now. PF2 goblins are different too. Some of them are bad (as are some humans), and some of them aren't. If civilized goblin were inclined to go about killing domesticated animals, they wouldn't be allowed to wander about towns, join Pathfinder Society, etc.

ThePuppyTurtle wrote:

Let us suppose that they are a genuine defector from broader goblin culture, down to only mildly enjoying fire, being rendered merely uncomfortable by dogs and horses, and displaying ample empathy for other living things. Let us now suppose that that character walks undisguised in the town square.

The idea that the guard would not immediately descend upon and kill them is ludicrous.

Again, that's old Golarion and old Pathfinder. (At least, old Pathfinder as you knew it; plenty of other people's Pathfinder games had socially acceptable goblins already.)

If a goblin walks into town, the guards will make a judgement call. Is the goblin smartly dressed? Does he nod politely as he passes? Then there's no reason to think there's a problem.


Quote:
Including goblins in the core rulebook is a bad idea because it encourages and tacitly endorses problem behavior while disempowering GMs to police it properly.

But aren't PFS scenarios played with more than core rulebooks?

I mean - goblin was introduced as playable race some time ago - was there a reason non-evil goblin was not able to play in PFS before?
Now IIRC PFS scenarios do not allow evil players.


4 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

People complain a lot about goblins in PFS, but doesn't PFS have a "no evil PCs" rule? It seems like the overlap between '"disruptive goblin behavior" and "evil acts" would be pretty high. Assuming PFS GMs have the ability to enforce the no evil rule, this seems like kind of a non-issue. Or at the very least an issue that already exists with telling a player that CN doesn't mean free reign to do evil.

Color me excited. Goblins are rad.

Silver Crusade

10 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

Here is more relevant information from 1st edition goblins, for those people who are citing the holy "lore" reason for no goblins in core:

"Inner Sea Races, 141 wrote:


Some goblins do become genuine adventurers, almost always after banishment, seeing their tribe wiped out, getting lost, or otherwise finding themselves separated from the group. Without a strong leader, lone goblins drift until they find someone else offering food and protection. They eventually grow a shameful streak of loyalty toward any companions—even humans—with whom they travel long enough. Goblins separated from their own kind long enough may even begin to shy away from murderous impulses or express uncharacteristic qualities such as empathy and compassion, ensuring their tainted hearts will never find acceptance among their own kind again.


7 people marked this as a favorite.

I'm just going to throw in my 2 cp since people keep calling out lore as a reason to not include Goblins. Cool? Cool. =)

Pathfinder Goblins! Issue #1. Gribbet of the Reformarium. Yes, the goblins here start out as cannibalistic monsters, but with the application of magical potions these goblins now act as novel house servants rented for parties and run a bit of an information ring. Evil, yes, but Disruptive? No.

Spiral of Bones Issue #1. You see a goblin in an inn, eating pickles out of a legally purchased jar in Kaer Maga. You know, the town where troll oracles dwell who read their own entrails for the other races the same way varisians would read harrow decks?

Pathfinder Goblins! Issue #3. Flork Fumblepot, a goblin who taught himself to read and now only wishes to bring theater to his backwards goblin tribe.

I'm sure I could find more if it wasn't 3am-ish here.


8 people marked this as a favorite.

If very young children injure another child, the responsibility lies with the supervising adults, not the children allowed to commit the act.

If very young children fatally injure another child, the responsibility lies with the supervising adults, not the children allowed to commit the act.

If very young children eat the corpse of another child, the responsibility lies with the supervising adults, not the children allowed to commit the act.


5 people marked this as a favorite.

I hate how quickly these discussions can get away from where you were in a couple hours, and half of the things I was going to respond to got removed :-p

But anywho nothing discussed here has nudged my stance. Players who will cause problems will do that. Doesn’t mean they will be problematic 100% of the time. Maybe a goblin character was the catalyst to them awakening to their disruptive niche. Maybe it was the first time Craig decided to role play a female character then realized he could explore some new horizons of making people uncomfortable, but people who will not be considerate of how their actions might ruin people’s fun don’t always show that trait immediately, but will do it eventually. And sometimes they are problematic all the time.

Somebody using “but this is what this race does, hurr durr” as a smokescreen is not playing some special trap card, they are being an idiot and the rest of the table is responsible for calling them out on it. I once played with a guy rolling a human gunslinger, who despite not being a goblin was the most awful person to play with. His gun broke in our first fight, and instead of drawing a melee weapon he dropped to his knees and tried to fix it. Mid combat. Said “My character would need to do this right now.” That isn’t some roleplaybsmokescreen, that is him being an idiot. His character eventually dies because duh, the guy refused to cooperate with the rest of the group, and the next character he rolled was a kitsune ninja. And holy crap was that worse. Like wow. My only experience with kitsune actually, which is surprising considering the general weeb makeup of my tabletop group.

Anyway, despite literally 100% of my experience with kitsune at the table being negative, I don’t want kitsune banned or wouldn’t write a 12 paragraph essay on why they shouldn’t be core. Because it was the player who was the issue, and he was always going to be an issue. And playing a kitsune enabled him to be even worse because then all of his anti-social bs was magnified by shapeshifting and ninja tomfoolery. We finally stopped inviting him to games after he refused to listen to people telling him to play with the group.

A goblin option might be a beacon for someone who is prone to bad behavior, but I have not seen arguments to convince me it’s going to be big enough to warrant concern for them being core. Goblins are One of the biggest mascots for Paizo and Pathfinder, it was bound to happen that they were going to get more support and availability for players. It’s not crazy to think they will retcon or adjust the Golarion setting a bit to enable their use to be less problematic. If they say goblins are cool for PCs in the world, that’s really all the explanation needed. Everybody is going to feel real silly this fall when we have goblins at our tables and we are all still having fun.

Silver Crusade

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

The point being there’s nowhere in text where an adult goblin eats any humanoid baby.

Baby eating is nowhere part and parcel of goblin character, that particular characterisation is inaccurate.


1 person marked this as a favorite.

Eating babies is not a charge that has been levelled only at goblins and certainly isn't restricted to Golarion (sadly).


4 people marked this as a favorite.
DM_aka_Dudemeister wrote:

The point being there’s nowhere in text where an adult goblin eats any humanoid baby.

Baby eating is nowhere part and parcel of goblin character, that particular characterisation is inaccurate.

Unless you're going to argue it's all metaphor, there are references to eating babies in goblin songs in both Goblins of Golarion and We Be Goblins. There are numerous references to goblins eating sentient creatures in many Paizo publications. To argue that goblins don't eat humans, elves, etc, including children, is to ignore a vast body of evidence in the canon.


7 people marked this as a favorite.
pjrogers wrote:
Unless you're going to argue it's all metaphor, there are references to eating babies in goblin songs in both Goblins of Golarion and We Be Goblins. There are numerous references to goblins eating sentient creatures in many Paizo publications. To argue that goblins don't eat humans, elves, etc, including children, is to ignore a vast body of evidence in the canon.

And there are no references in Golarion's lore to cannibal humans?


8 people marked this as a favorite.

Oh by the gods, how many threads do we need of this?

If you don't like goblins, fine. Dont allow them in Games you DM. But dont take them away from people like me who are excited to play goblins in the new ed.

And remember. Not everyone makes characters based on stereotype.


5 people marked this as a favorite.
Aldarc wrote:
pjrogers wrote:
Unless you're going to argue it's all metaphor, there are references to eating babies in goblin songs in both Goblins of Golarion and We Be Goblins. There are numerous references to goblins eating sentient creatures in many Paizo publications. To argue that goblins don't eat humans, elves, etc, including children, is to ignore a vast body of evidence in the canon.
And there are no references in Golarion's lore to cannibal humans?

A couple of thoughts:

1) In the world of Pathfinder, cannibalism refers to the eating of one's own race. So, a human could eat a goblin or a goblin could eat a human, and neither would be considered "cannibals."

2) Yes, there are small groups of humans who are cannibals and eat other sentient beings. They are a small minority of humans and are always viewed by other humans as evil and dramatically deviating from the norm.

3) What makes goblins somewhat unique is that a key part of goblin "ethics" is that all non-goblin life is food, hence the line from one of their songs - "We be goblins, you be food." The eating of non-goblin sentient creatures (from babies to senior citizens) is a central part of goblin culture as it has been portrayed by Paizo up to now.

4) FWIW, here's what GoG (p. 10) has to say about cannibalism ...

"Cannibalism occurs in some tribes, particularly after a death, and goblins do have an unfortunate habit of eating anything if they are hungry enough. There’s no real social stigma for goblins regarding cannibalism, but notorious goblin cannibals quickly become shunned and feared for the same reasons a goblin might fear anything that’s developed a taste for goblin flesh."

Silver Crusade

2 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
pjrogers wrote:
DM_aka_Dudemeister wrote:

The point being there’s nowhere in text where an adult goblin eats any humanoid baby.

Baby eating is nowhere part and parcel of goblin character, that particular characterisation is inaccurate.

Unless you're going to argue it's all metaphor, there are references to eating babies in goblin songs in both Goblins of Golarion and We Be Goblins. There are numerous references to goblins eating sentient creatures in many Paizo publications. To argue that goblins don't eat humans, elves, etc, including children, is to ignore a vast body of evidence in the canon.

Plenty of human songs have more provocative lyrics.

So far it’s never actually happened on screen as far as published material.

So it’s not a retcon to say: Goblins’ reputation for baby eating is fear-mongering from humans and goblins alike (humans to maintain the agenda of keeping chicken thieves out of town, goblins to intimidate longshanks into not raiding goblin swamps).

Pathfinder 2e can easily support core goblins that don’t actually need to devour any babies to be role played correctly.

Silver Crusade

3 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

Also Lizardfolk are anthrophages and are notoriously neutral.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Mass Kneebreaker wrote:

Oh by the gods, how many threads do we need of this?

If you don't like goblins, fine. Dont allow them in Games you DM. But dont take them away from people like me who are excited to play goblins in the new ed.

And remember. Not everyone makes characters based on stereotype.

My concern, and I know this is shared by many others, is that including goblins in PF2e's core rule book will lead to them being a legal race in organized Society play. I have no problem with the current PF and Society rules about goblins as PCs, and I would like to see them retained in PF2e.


2 people marked this as a favorite.
DM_aka_Dudemeister wrote:
So far it’s never actually happened on screen as far as published material.

Please see my post directly above yours with the quote from GoG that states "goblins do have an unfortunate habit of eating anything if they are hungry enough." Babies fall into the broad category of "anything."

There is also this section from p. 10 of the same book ...

"There is an old goblin saying: 'If it moves eat it. If it doesn’t, pickle it and eat it later.' Able to digest practicallyanything organic, a goblin is always hungry, and prefers to eat meat (ideally cooked and well salted) but is pretty much happy to eat anything with plenty of salt in it."

So ...

1) Goblins will eat anything if they are hungry enough

2) Goblins are always hungry

Therefore, they're eating babies.


11 people marked this as a favorite.
ENHenry wrote:
So any given civilized town in Golarion, a world which generally tolerates humanoids of varied skin colors, transgenders, and non-hetero sexual orientations, is rabidly xenophobic against one goblin being vouched for by a party of adventurers at the town gates? And to be otherwise is wholly implausible?

Don't even invoke the real-world intolerance card.

Goblins have been presented to us as a specific thing for the last decade. That thing is chaotic, violent, comedic, and sociopathic. That thing has been presented specifically to give us a Bad Guy that is amusing.

In-setting racism and intolerance is valuable.

The one-off vouched-for goblin can exist, and always has, per GM approval. Making the race core requires changing the nature of the goblin racial description to justify more than the odd singular rare goblin accidental hero, by making them less goblin.

At that point, you've got a player playing a non-goblin, and you've got a GM who has lost one of the best monster races in the setting. Who wins here?

Personally, I'm okay with the idea of goblin as a core race as long as the fluff remains as it always has, and it's made clear these are an advanced roleplay race that may require special handling to justify at the table. That I'd think is cool. Not this" "you get to play a real cannibal... but of course... you don't eat people, because cannibals have been misunderstood over the years and lots of them - including you - don't actually eat people."


4 people marked this as a favorite.
Starfinder Charter Superscriber
DM_aka_Dudemeister wrote:

The point being there’s nowhere in text where an adult goblin eats any humanoid baby.

Baby eating is nowhere part and parcel of goblin character, that particular characterisation is inaccurate.

Page 114, panel 3 of the Pathfinder: Goblins hardcover.

Just as an example of why one should never make "Show me just one example!" type arguments :)

(I know you'll say it's a comic, etc.,)


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder PF Special Edition Subscriber

First I would like to thank ThePuppyTurtle for a well written, thought out articulation of the problem. Until I had read this, I was finding it hard to understand the #NeverGoblin stance, because in the main thread that position was so often expressed in one-liners like "not at my table", which didn't help. This post does.

I generally agree with Dudemeister's equally well written in-depth response. I understand I won't close the debate any more than he did, but here's my take:

To the concern that goblin PCs are going to disrupt, I get it. My group had its share of disruptive players back when I started playing (we were younger), and "I'm just roleplaying him as he should be roleplayed" was the go-to excuse. We eventually solved the issue by growing up. With that hindsight, I can say this problem is 100% the player's responsibility, not the rules or game world's. There are those who say that core goblins create a bad incentive or slippery slope for otherwise OK players to behave badly. In my view, this changes nothing to the fact the player, not the imaginary character, is responsible for his/her contribution to the game. ThePuppyTurtle made the point that this can only be enforced by banning goblin PCs: This would be the equivalent of cracking a hazelnut open with a sledgehammer. There are plenty of other things the GM can do, such as banning evil characters (plus CN, if you must), giving warnings at character creation, or using in-game tricks. I'm not a PFS player, but I understand PFS disallows evil and PvP: I think this covers 95% of potential disruption from a goblin PC.

To the concern about the integrity of the game world: For a full answer, we need to wait for Paizo to publish the full rulebook showing how Golarion evolves. I trust them to not do a huge, sudden retcon on the world. Until this is available, I can understand the issue. However, the GM is master of the game world, and even if zero changes to Golarion were introduced, it is still possible to portray this evolution without difficulty: Just make it one goblin at a time, ie the one goblin at your table is the beginning of this new world. Sure, this forces you, as GM, to let go of the idea that any normal community would kill the goblin on sight, and find a rationale for why it's not the case just for this particular goblin. In effect, I'm saying you don't need to do anything different from what you'd be doing in PF1 when allowing a goblin as a non-core race. Then, presumably the Golarion updates will explain how to deal with it in a more expansive way.

51 to 100 of 484 << first < prev | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | next > last >>
Community / Forums / Archive / Pathfinder / Playtests & Prerelease Discussions / Pathfinder Playtest / Pathfinder Playtest Prerelease Discussion / Why Making Goblins a Core Race is a Bad Idea: An Essay All Messageboards