If I've read my flavor text right, Goblin Dogs live nearly exclusively with Goblins. This would suggest both creatures thrive in the same environment.
But Goblins have Darkvision... and Goblin Dogs have Low-Light Vision.
This suggests that creatures that typically live (or at least often dwell) in darkness have mounts that can't see where they're going in the same situation. This seems very counter-intuitive. Am I missing (or misunderstanding) something?
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If I've read my flavor text right, Goblin Dogs live nearly exclusively with Goblins. This would suggest both creatures thrive in the same environment.
But Goblins have Darkvision... and Goblin Dogs have Low-Light Vision.
This suggests that creatures that typically live (or at least often dwell) in darkness have mounts that can't see where they're going in the same situation. This seems very counter-intuitive. Am I missing (or misunderstanding) something?
Were I to explain this, I would say that Goblin Dogs have recently relocated or been 'domesticated' to Goblin use/co-habitation and originated elsewhere.
But that's me.
Were I to explain this, I would say that Goblin Dogs have recently relocated or been 'domesticated' to Goblin use/co-habitation and originated elsewhere.
But that's me.
But why would Goblins domesticate a creature that can't see in places that goblins can? They may have well stuck with the traditional worg, which has both darkvision and low light vision.
(And which is what I may do... the whole reason I noticed this was I am running a Pathfinder demo soon, and I was going to use some goblins with goblin dogs as adversaries... in part to introduce goblin dogs as one of the new creatures in Pathfinder... but if I can't make sense of why they would live in the underground place I want to put my goblins, then I may as well use something else that makes more sense, even if it isn't new. Just a shame, because I wanted to mix up some old and new as part of the demo)
Creative Director
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Goblins have darkvision, but that doesn't mean they only live in the dark. They're very visual creatures and quite enjoy seeing in color, after all. And their love of fire and burning stuff more or less guarantees that they'll have lights in their lair. And goblins' love for goblin dogs is so strong that they'd probably ally with them even if they weren't immune to the dander.
Goblins also aren't the sharpest knives in the drawer, so don't make the mistake of assuming they always make the most efficient choices.
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Goblins have darkvision, but that doesn't mean they only live in the dark. They're very visual creatures and quite enjoy seeing in color, after all. And their love of fire and burning stuff more or less guarantees that they'll have lights in their lair. And goblins' love for goblin dogs is so strong that they'd probably ally with them even if they weren't immune to the dander.
Goblins also aren't the sharpest knives in the drawer, so don't make the mistake of assuming they always make the most efficient choices.
Might I take this opportunity to remark that I love the PF interpretation of Goblins. So much flavor!
Goblins also aren't the sharpest knives in the drawer, so don't make the mistake of assuming they always make the most efficient choices.
So.... uh... I shouldn't have taken that goblin's advice when building my stock portfolio? Ah, poo.
Goblins also aren't the sharpest knives in the drawer, so don't make the mistake of assuming they always make the most efficient choices.So.... uh... I shouldn't have taken that goblin's advice when building my stock portfolio? Ah, poo.
well did it invoke singing or fire?
Goblins have darkvision, but that doesn't mean they only live in the dark. They're very visual creatures and quite enjoy seeing in color, after all. And their love of fire and burning stuff more or less guarantees that they'll have lights in their lair. And goblins' love for goblin dogs is so strong that they'd probably ally with them even if they weren't immune to the dander.
Goblins also aren't the sharpest knives in the drawer, so don't make the mistake of assuming they always make the most efficient choices.
Thanks very much for the response, Mr. Jacobs. Can I take this response to mean, "Yes, we gave goblin dogs low-light vision only on purpose?"
I suppose that limits my options for how I want to design my underground adventure. Probably just means I will abandon the goblin dogs for worgs, for the particular demands of the adventure I am designing. Maybe I'll leave a few goblin dogs in their lair for flavor.
For the record... Goblins excel at stealth and have no negatives to Intelligence or Wisdom, so I personally use them in my gameworld as clever-enough (but not "educated" or "smart" in a civilized way) with some good tactics at hand for their sneaky lifestyle. Of course they don't 100% live in the dark, but they'd need their closest allies to follow them whereever they can go, and needing to light the way for their allies would go directly against their instinct to use stealth.
For the record... Goblins excel at stealth and have no negatives to Intelligence or Wisdom,
Ya know this will sound odd but....Being Intelligent has nothing to do with not being dumb. I have seem some pretty Intelligent people do some pretty dumb things. I look at goblins as not being dumb, but not having patience, not thinking things though and not letting silly things like whats efferent getting in the way of whats fun. And they are sadistic little bastards after all
So ya got a sadistic race, that likes fire and little patience, yeah they may not have low intelligence but they are not "smart"
For the record... Goblins excel at stealth and have no negatives to Intelligence or Wisdom,
Ya know this will sound odd but....Being Intelligent has nothing to do with not being dumb. I have seem some pretty Intelligent people do some pretty dumb things. I look at goblins as not being dumb, but not having patience, not thinking things though and not letting silly things like whats efferent getting in the way of whats fun. And they are sadistic little bastards after all
So ya got a sadistic race, that likes fire and little patience, yeah they may not have low intelligence but they are not "smart"
What you're talking about would be a lack of wisdom, which goblins don't have either.
Not really, you can KNOW something is a bad ideal...But it's just soooooooooo damned cool ya do it anyhow
Ya can have an avage wisdom and still do dumb things. Sometimes "Make it go BOOM!!" over rules 'This looks unwise"
I get the feeling "Y'all watch this" is a goblin motto
No... that's what wisdom is. It's the ability to resist the urge to do something stupid like that. Humans do plenty of stupid things, but goblins are truly foolish.
Well, they aren't massively penalized, but their Wisdom does take a negative modifier, since its a 9, and thus below average.
Some of you seem to be intentionally ignoring context for the sake of argument. I know you all are smarter than that, so let's assume I'm the one that's being dense, and I'll try to clarify:
I said:
"I personally use them in my gameworld as clever-enough (but not "educated" or "smart" in a civilized way) with some good tactics at hand for their sneaky lifestyle"
Please note the following:
1. "Sneaky lifestyle." I do not think goblins are all around geniuses, tacticians, and icons of common sense. But I would think that what they like to do, they probably do well--sneak in, steal stuff, wreak havoc, inflict pain, and if the heat comes down on them, get away quickly before they get caught.
And I can thus see goblins doing something like say--hiding in complete darkness to set up an ambush. Or setting off a big flash, grabbing some loot, and running for cover into, say, an area of complete darkness where human pursuers couldn't immediately follow them without a light source. They wouldn't take along allies that would hinder them from doing what they're good at doing.
2. Note: In my gameworld. So yours can be different. I'm just noting that the rules do not tell me that goblins have an inherent weakness in intellect or common sense. So I have no mechanical impetus to make them unnecessarily stupid.
KnightErrantJr: That's for the Goblin Warrior I statblock. Of course a 1st level Warrior is going to put a dump stat in Wisdom. Goblins are built with character classes. There's nothing mechanically stopping you from making a Goblin Druid with a Wisdom of 15 or 16 if you wanted to. Me, I personally wouldn't make a lot of goblins with a high wisdom, but it's not outside the race's capability.
Anyway: since as far as I can tell, the statting is intentional, I'll just forget about goblin dogs and stick to traditional worgs. I've got the solution to my problem and the answer to my question, so thanks for your... participation.
In my gameworld.
So in your world, give the Goblin Dog darkvision? Problem solved.
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I had thought that Goblin Dogs, still being in large part dogs, were used by Goblins at the point of interaction with the surface world.
rotrl spoiler:
In such a context goblin dogs wit low-light vision makes sense - they're always on the surface, hunting with the goblins at night, and not really going down into goblin dwellings or tunnels.
In one of the Darkmoon Vale adventures, Paizo actually delivered a group of cool underground mounts for kobolds (medium-sized, sabretooth frogs) which would also work for goblins.
Anyway: since as far as I can tell, the statting is intentional, I'll just forget about goblin dogs and stick to traditional worgs. I've got the solution to my problem and the answer to my question, so thanks for your... participation.
I don't think anyone was indicting how you use goblins in your own campaign. Any statements defending the portrayal of Pathfinder's goblins comes from the fact that many of us like how they are portrayed at this point in time, not from a desire to tell you that "you're doing it wrong."
I know that goblins do not suffer a negative in ability scores to Wisdom, my point was that simply the average goblin, as shown in the goblin stat block, does not rank Wisdom as a high priority.
Spoiler for Burnt Offerings:
I think most of us already discerned that you had you answer and had moved on with it, but I agree that I am often a bit frustrated when the original premise of a post is lost. In this case, I don't think it was lost, so much as the thread already dealt with its original issue and ventured off the path, so to speak.
I'm sorry if the level of discourse didn't please you.
Devoted to the Hunt Mature Goblin dogs may undergo a divine ceremony of bonding. In this ritual a dog is marked with goblin blood and bound to a particular tribe.
Following this ceremony the goblin brave is blind for a 24 hours and must be led and cared for by his mount. The Goblin dog receives Darkvision permanently while they are with that tribe.
This ritual is not known to non goblins.
~ Bo Vandenberg (because I like this idea)
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Creative Director
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You can of course give goblin dogs darkvision in your game. But as designed, they are not cave dwellers. They're above ground creatures, and as such they have low-light vision to help them operate at night when they've got starlight or moonlight. Furthermore, they're animals, and very few animals actually have darkvision, as that type of vision is a bit more over-the-top than something more "real world" than an animal normally has.
In my gameworld.So in your world, give the Goblin Dog darkvision? Problem solved.
Probably will. But not for the demo I mentioned in my original post (the "in my gameworld" note was originally part of an aside, sorry if there was any confusion. :)).
Houseruling a rules demo would miss the point. I needed to hear Paizo's official word on the matter before I finished designing the adventure for that. But I got an official answer, and I have an "official" solution to my problems (which is just to not use the creature for the particular scenario I am running). :)
So.... uh... I shouldn't have taken that goblin's advice when building my stock portfolio? Ah, poo.well did it invoke singing or fire?
Fire. The poo was on fire. Who ever heard of something as silly as singing poo? Even goblins have enough sense not to believe in such fairy tales!