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The same way the orc book was released in this same line of books. Of course back then the line was called Pathfinder Companion line. I imagine it will explore the race and give stats to play them as PC's.
I use that for my half orc character a fair bit though. This? Not so much.
Edit: Obviously it's not a released product. I play in a home game where we stick to the core races, and I play in PFS where goblins aren't legal. I just can't see how this would be a 'player' resource for us.
Cool a companion book goblins, that is awesome.
Whhoooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!*Runs around giggling happily.*
I have been wanting this since it was hinted at. All praise to the fecund little runts.
The same way the orc book was released in this same line of books. Of course back then the line was called Pathfinder Companion line. I imagine it will explore the race and give stats to play them as PC's.I use that for my half orc character a fair bit though. This? Not so much.
Edit: Obviously it's not a released product. I play in a home game where we stick to the core races, and I play in PFS where goblins aren't legal. I just can't see how this would be a 'player' resource for us.
For you.
I know of at least one fairly well known fan played goblin. The Ugly, a goblin gunslinger from one of ashton sperries games.
And i know that i would love the chance to really get my teeth into a distinctly not human race. Goblin psychology as presented is amazingly cool, and while the chance to play a 'good' goblin, while maintaining the character quirks is cool, just going with the insanity of the goblins is also a prospect I relish.
Totally cool.
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The same way the orc book was released in this same line of books. Of course back then the line was called Pathfinder Companion line. I imagine it will explore the race and give stats to play them as PC's.I use that for my half orc character a fair bit though. This? Not so much.
Edit: Obviously it's not a released product. I play in a home game where we stick to the core races, and I play in PFS where goblins aren't legal. I just can't see how this would be a 'player' resource for us.
For you.
I know of at least one fairly well known fan played goblin. The Ugly, a goblin gunslinger from one of ashton sperries games.
And i know that i would love the chance to really get my teeth into a distinctly not human race. Goblin psychology as presented is amazingly cool, and while the chance to play a 'good' goblin, while maintaining the character quirks is cool, just going with the insanity of the goblins is also a prospect I relish.
Some other forum members gave me some fantastic advice on that subject. ;)
I do hope some time is spent on advice and fluff geared towards playing goblins that veer away from their alignment expectations. That was my big disappointment with Orcs of Golarion. I know they want to keep these races as mostly evil, but it would be nice to throw those of us that don't like inherently evil races a bone or two to work with.
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The same way the orc book was released in this same line of books. Of course back then the line was called Pathfinder Companion line. I imagine it will explore the race and give stats to play them as PC's.I use that for my half orc character a fair bit though. This? Not so much.
Edit: Obviously it's not a released product. I play in a home game where we stick to the core races, and I play in PFS where goblins aren't legal. I just can't see how this would be a 'player' resource for us.
For you.
I know of at least one fairly well known fan played goblin. The Ugly, a goblin gunslinger from one of ashton sperries games.
And i know that i would love the chance to really get my teeth into a distinctly not human race. Goblin psychology as presented is amazingly cool, and while the chance to play a 'good' goblin, while maintaining the character quirks is cool, just going with the insanity of the goblins is also a prospect I relish.
Some other forum members gave me some fantastic advice on that subject. ;)
I do hope some time is spent on advice and fluff geared towards playing goblins that veer away from their alignment expectations. That was my big disappointment with Orcs of Golarion. I know they want to keep these races as mostly evil, but it would be nice to throw those of us that don't like inherently evil races a bone or two to work with.
Yeah, and let's get a CG Drow option somwhere there too! With two scimitars. And a panther companion.
*snark*
That's one way of looking at it. The other ways are:
1) Fleshing out those Goblin NPCs, either as challenges for PCs at low levels or as 'background' characters for your epic-level Players to encounter and have a laugh at.
2) Giving GMs a greater insight into Goblin mentality, physiology and cultural ideology (did I just use all those words in the same sentence as 'Goblin' .... igh.) for a Golarion-set Homebrew game or perhaps even their own Setting!
3) Us OCD people who must know as much about the Pathfinder Setting as our wallets, jobs and family members/pets/friends will allow.
4) Evil Campaigns. They are as rare as Cockatrice teeth, but they do happen, and for a piddling $11.00, I'm up for that!
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I was against a Goblin book on a very fundamentalist and irrational base of my vehement dislike for "monsters as PCs" option, but now that I see that Richard Pett is writing this, I can be safe that it's a one-shot "so wacky that it's cool" offering. Can live with that.
But I can't get over my burning opposition against a party made up of:
* a Good Goblin (he got hit on his head and was never the same again)
* a Good Drow (angsty exile freedom fighter against the matriarchal regime, cool story bro)
* a Good Mind Flayer ("Brainz not tastys, honest!")
* a reformed Barbed Devil ("I used to be like that evil, but then I got this brochure!")
It's just ... not right. Forgotten Realms never found a place in my heart for a reason.
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But I can't get over my burning opposition against a party made up of:* a Good Goblin (he got hit on his head and was never the same again)
* a Good Drow (angsty exile freedom fighter against the matriarchal regime, cool story bro)
* a Good Mind Flayer ("Brainz not tastys, honest!")
* a reformed Barbed Devil ("I used to be like that evil, but then I got this brochure!")It's just ... not right. Forgotten Realms never found a place in my heart for a reason.
But that's not what people are asking for.
Oh well, guess those of us that would like to play good orcs or good goblins get to go another edition without any official support for our playstyles, ever.
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But I can't get over my burning opposition against a party made up of:* a Good Goblin (he got hit on his head and was never the same again)
* a Good Drow (angsty exile freedom fighter against the matriarchal regime, cool story bro)
* a Good Mind Flayer ("Brainz not tastys, honest!")
* a reformed Barbed Devil ("I used to be like that evil, but then I got this brochure!")It's just ... not right. Forgotten Realms never found a place in my heart for a reason.
But that's not what people are asking for.
Oh well, guess those of us that would like to play good orcs or good goblins get to go another edition without any official support for our playstyles, ever.
Eberron famously had no enforced racial alignments. Any sentient species could be any alignment. Meant that the handy colour coding on Dragons were more guidelines.
Who said anything about CG drow.
Look providing that goblins have free will and are not so innately psychotic that they can form some sort of society, it is relatively reasonable to see a range of goblin alingments. Sure the goodly ones aree very likely to be beaten up until they start actin' right, but that shouldn't invalidate the occasional one making it to the status of goblin hero.
And evil and good are not the only alignments. The neutral holds three cool alignments also, and i can see a chaotic neutral goblin witch being hella fun to play. Crazy superstitious non-sense, schizophrenic delusion and magic rolled into a biting, spitting and utterly dingbat crazy parcel. An entirely playable and not evil character option.
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Eberron famously had no enforced racial alignments. Any sentient species could be any alignment. Meant that the handy colour coding on Dragons were more guidelines.But that's not what people are asking for.
Oh well, guess those of us that would like to play good orcs or good goblins get to go another edition without any official support for our playstyles, ever.
Eberron had really gotten my hopes up on that front, but then they went and never further developed or detailed those orcs. That was the element that I was most interested in to be honest, and nothing got done with it from what people have told me when I asked around about it. :(
I had been hoping for inspiration to use for my own orcs, but c'est la vie...
runs through thread with a burning torch and a block of cheese
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Eberron famously had no enforced racial alignments. Any sentient species could be any alignment. Meant that the handy colour coding on Dragons were more guidelines.
Also makes playing a good character more an exercise in intelligent analysis and thoughtful action, not just wantonly slaughtering anything of race X or color Y because 'they're all evil.'
If alignment is included in a game at all, I definitely prefer for 'good' people to not have excuses to genocide anyone they run into based on outward appearance or circumstances of birth.
(Although I prefer my outsiders with alignment types to remain pure good, evil, chaos, law, and not have to deal with the fallen angel / redeemed devil stuff. IMO, an angel can't choose not to be good, anymore than I can choose not to be made out of meat. Good is what they are made of. I'm comfortable with my own hypocrisy.)
Golarion Goblins are whacky fun, but, IMO, way too limiting, and being one of the more egregious cases of fluff not matching crunch. They are described as behaving in a manner that would suggest *massive* penalties to Intelligence and Wisdom, for instance, and living in conditions that would *require* a bonus to Constitution, just to survive their first three days of existence. Int 6 and Wis 6 to 8 sound about right, for their portrayal. They'd be even less 'playable characters' and even more 'monster / vermin,' if their stats reflected how they are portrayed in Classic Monsters Revisited.
As with so many cases where the fluff and the crunch don't mesh (for me), I'd be inclined to go in both directions. Most goblins would be Int 3-6, little better than animals, and almost iredeemably dangerous and inherently malicious and unreliable. One in a hundred would be different, sort of like the 3.X 'blues,' and have a more advanced intellect, and not be uncontrollably terrified of writing, horses, dogs, etc. (although it might still *choose* to have nothing to do with such things!), acting more like a 3.X goblin, and being at least marginally 'playable' or reliable enough to serve as a flunky, follower or cohort.
That way, the game would accomodate both options. Goblins, as a race, as un-teachable vermin that it's 'okay' to go all Final Solution upon, and some goblins as whacky sidekicks or plucky underdogs.
Alternately, perhaps the great secret, that few would even suspect, is that goblins aren't a race at all. They are larval hobgoblins. Those that survive their whacky barely-sentient goblin years grow larger and smarter, and become hobgoblins, inherently worthy of respect to their hobgoblin kin, as they have survived an *incredibly* dangerous crucible to walk among their adult kin (one that less than 1 in 100 goblins survives).
And if they manage to thrive in the cut-throat world of the hobgoblin, perhaps one in one hundred goes on to a final stage of growth, becoming a bugbear...
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1) Fleshing out those Goblin NPCs, either as challenges for PCs at low levels or as 'background' characters for your epic-level Players to encounter and have a laugh at.
2) Giving GMs a greater insight into Goblin mentality, physiology and cultural ideology (did I just use all those words in the same sentence as 'Goblin' .... igh.) for a Golarion-set Homebrew game or perhaps even their own Setting!
Umm.... this is exactly my point, it's a "Player Companion" product and your two best examples are GM oriented.
3) Us OCD people who must know as much about the Pathfinder Setting as our wallets, jobs and family members/pets/friends will allow.
4) Evil Campaigns. They are as rare as Cockatrice teeth, but they do happen, and for a piddling $11.00, I'm up for that!
I can appreciate option 4, particularly in light of the forthcoming Goblin adventure. I'm just a bit skeptical my players will get a lot of mileage from this book, this sort of crazy evil campaign is a fun diversion but not really what we wind up playing often.
1) Fleshing out those Goblin NPCs, either as challenges for PCs at low levels or as 'background' characters for your epic-level Players to encounter and have a laugh at.
2) Giving GMs a greater insight into Goblin mentality, physiology and cultural ideology (did I just use all those words in the same sentence as 'Goblin' .... igh.) for a Golarion-set Homebrew game or perhaps even their own Setting!
Umm.... this is exactly my point, it's a "Player Companion" product and your two best examples are GM oriented.
I can appreciate option 4, particularly in light of the forthcoming Goblin adventure. I'm just a bit skeptical my players will get a lot of mileage from this book, this sort of crazy evil campaign is a fun diversion but not really what we wind up playing often.3) Us OCD people who must know as much about the Pathfinder Setting as our wallets, jobs and family members/pets/friends will allow.
4) Evil Campaigns. They are as rare as Cockatrice teeth, but they do happen, and for a piddling $11.00, I'm up for that!
It should make Goblins legal for society play as well. This could be interesting.:) Goblin Ninja! ;)
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1. I am FINE with non-evil monster NPCs in Golarion. An occasional neutral Lich or Good Vampire never hurt anyone (cheap pun intended).
2. I am NOT FINE with non-evil monster PCs. Drizzt, die. Slowly. With your guts out in the sun. Bastard.
3. Errr ... what 0gre says. A one-off "crazy town" episode of a Goblin book/module combo is fine, but if that's going to be a regular feature, I SHALL LOUDLY COMPLAIN ON THEM INTERWEBS. Because we all know that works.
Excellent! Looking forward to this.
It should make Goblins legal for society play as well. This could be interesting.:) Goblin Ninja! ;)The same as they legalized orcs after Orcs of Golarion?
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Oh wait
But there are no half-goblins (besides Erik said more then likely they would be allowed in society at GenCon).
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I cool idea for introducing goblins or orcs as a PFS legal race would be to have it as a certed reward for completing a 12th level story arc, resulting in the retirement of your 12th level character.
I do see it as being slight difficult to add goblins and orcs to the PFS with an in-story reason. However, the RP potential would be astounding!
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But there are no half-goblins (besides Erik said more then likely they would be allowed in society at GenCon).
Well the fact that there are no core player Goblin options is why I am a bit skeptical of a Goblin player book to begin with.
This book would fly off the shelves if it were to legalize goblins in PFS... It would certainly make it more appealing for me.
I don't think it will though, and in spite of the fact that it would be fun to play a goblin PC, I suspect it won't work well in PFS so I hope they don't.
NOW I understand why some players want to have guns. It's because other players want to be goblins! Fire when ready, Gridley!
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But there are no half-goblins.Huh, I always thought a drunken encounter between a human and a goblin explained the existence of halflings perfectly...
This doesn't help for PFS play, but an interesting take on half-goblins is presented in Raging Swan's Retribution.
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I was against a Goblin book on a very fundamentalist and irrational base of my vehement dislike for "monsters as PCs" option, but now that I see that Richard Pett is writing this, I can be safe that it's a one-shot "so wacky that it's cool" offering. Can live with that.
I too am no fan of 'monsters as pcs'; not counting one off's or a brief campaign where all the PC's are a monster race like Drow nobles or in this case Goblins. Back in earlier editons I would not allow Deep Gnomes or Drow pcs for a regular campaign, much less a minotaur or a lizard man.
But I would still get a 'monster book' to mine it for details on the customs, religion, mindset, etc. of a particular race. Books of these types would be a great springboard for adventure or role playing ideas.
Even small tidbits like typical stats penalties or traits would be telling.
But I can't get over my burning opposition against a party made up of...
There was actually a fun adventure in Dungeon Magazine where the pcs could play humanoids from a tribe. The tribe's chief needed to clear some space in the tribe's caverns to make room for his in laws (ha!), so he sends the humaniod pc's on an "important" (i.e. suicide) mission to get some room freed up.
Great adventure for a one off!
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So I'm not totally opposed to Monster races as Gorbacz is, I will likely buy this book...
My concerns are threefold.
Is it going to really be a player resource?
Orcs of Golarion was hit or miss on this. Quite a bit of the content seems more geared towards NPCs than Players and even the player 'friendly content' is useful mostly to barbarians, or people in parties with barbarians. The traits are the stand out exception to this and are quite good for nearly anyone. There is also a ton of really nice background content for orcs in Golarion, but in general the playable rules oriented stuff isn't very exciting for players.
The Player Companion line is no longer suitable for vanilla campaigns
The vast majority of the Player Companion line can be dropped into any vanilla Golarion campaign. The orc book bent this idea and the goblins book just tosses this out the window.
The Player Companion line has been the subscription for PFS players
To date this has been the PFS players subscription line. Unless they are going to legalize goblins this book is not suitable for play. It's a 'Players' book that you can't use in Paizo organized play.
So it's not so much that I'm against the book, I just think it doesn't belong under the "Player Companion" brand.
To date I have purchased 1 Player Companion book, and that is the Inner Sea Primer (wonderful product, btw).
This will most likely be the second, for 2 reasons: 1. The Goblins of Golarion are awesome and I love the promise of adding even more flavor to them. 2. It's written by Richard Pett, who has yet to not exceed my expectations (no pressure, Mr. Pett).
Imagine a Goblin Gunslinger who has cap pistols instead of real guns. He just cannot figure out why he never kills anything!! :)
"Meez know i hit it!"
wait, no one's asked for Kobolds of Golarion yet? I'll be first then!
There was actually a fun adventure in Dungeon Magazine where the pcs could play humanoids from a tribe. The tribe's chief needed to clear some space in the tribe's caverns to make room for his in laws (ha!), so he sends the humaniod pc's on an "important" (i.e. suicide) mission to get some room freed up.
Great adventure for a one off!
Actually, there were TWO monster adventures in Dungeon magazine. One was "Monsterquest," in issue 10. The other one, from issue 22, which I think is the one you're citing, was actually written for BECMI, or more specifically, for the "Orcs of Thar" Gazetteer. It was called "Rank Amateurs."
So there you go; Put together Monsterquest, Rank Amateurs, Reverse Dungeon, and We Be Goblins, and you got yourself a whole campaign!
Gang I could use your help. Although the goblin book is still many months away, I am having trouble convincing a couple friends that goblins can be ninjas. They believe they lack the discipline and don't fit into Golorion at all. I like to believe that with a little creativity anything in this game is possible but I need some plausible ideas on how a creature one step up from a Gremlin (the movies) could become a ninja.
Thoughts?
I'm all for this, as long as there is at least some place where its fairly clear that goblins are best suited for evil campaigns, and that the general assumption in Golarion is that goblins are almost always evil, and almost never good.
Plus, I really don't want to see goblins legal for PFS. For all of the discussion about gunslingers breaking suspension of disbelief, I'm really not wanting to sit at a table with five non-evil goblins working for a scholarly institution. My brain might melt.
Chief Technical Officer
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Is it going to really be a player resource?
Yes. Keep in mind that while Player Companions do provide stuff for players that directly use whatever the topic is, they also provide stuff for players that might only run into whatever the topic is now and then. In much the same way that you don't need to play an elf to get something out of the Elves companion, or you don't need to be from Cheliax to get something out of that companion.
The Player Companion line is no longer suitable for vanilla campaigns
First of all, if we could only ever produce "vanilla," the line would get pretty stale fast.
That said, don't players in vanilla campaigns run into goblins now and then? This will provide those players with some information about goblins that their characters are likely to know.
The Player Companion line has been the subscription for PFS players
Um... who said *that*? I've certainly never had that view on it...
This book is heretical and must be burned! This discussion is heretical and must be burned! All who participate, read, or hear mention of either of these are heretics and must be burned! All those related to heretics are heretics and must be burned! The spider familiar that crawled through here is heretical and must burn! The spider's master, the wizard A-Number-to-large-to-recite-in-a-goblin-lifetime, must burn! All of the wizard's servants, past and future, must be burned! All who have seen the wizard's works must burn! I will burn once I have burned all of these!
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Chief Technical Officer
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This book is heretical and must be burned! This discussion is heretical and must be burned! All who participate, read, or hear mention of either of these are heretics and must be burned! All those related to heretics are heretics and must be burned! The spider familiar that crawled through here is heretical and must burn! The spider's master, the wizard A-Number-to-large-to-recite-in-a-goblin-lifetime, must burn! All of the wizard's servants, past and future, must be burned! All who have seen the wizard's works must burn! I will burn once I have burned all of these!
Are you aware you're using writing?
This book is heretical and must be burned! This discussion is heretical and must be burned! All who participate, read, or hear mention of either of these are heretics and must be burned! All those related to heretics are heretics and must be burned! The spider familiar that crawled through here is heretical and must burn! The spider's master, the wizard A-Number-to-large-to-recite-in-a-goblin-lifetime, must burn! All of the wizard's servants, past and future, must be burned! All who have seen the wizard's works must burn! I will burn once I have burned all of these!Are you aware you're using writing?
I think he's dictating this to an underling . . . ;)
if ya noticed he plans to burn himself last. But someone has to do the dirty work for the faithful.
I think he's dictating this to an underling . . . ;)This book is heretical and must be burned! This discussion is heretical and must be burned! All who participate, read, or hear mention of either of these are heretics and must be burned! All those related to heretics are heretics and must be burned! The spider familiar that crawled through here is heretical and must burn! The spider's master, the wizard A-Number-to-large-to-recite-in-a-goblin-lifetime, must burn! All of the wizard's servants, past and future, must be burned! All who have seen the wizard's works must burn! I will burn once I have burned all of these!Are you aware you're using writing?
I will sacrifice my thoughts and words for this! Your japes will only incur extra buring!