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As many of you will remember, when Goblins were first announced as a core ancestry, there was much gnashing of teeth and rending of garments in protest.
"They don't make sense"!"They'll be disruptive!"
Now that we are 6 months in to the PF2 Era, have anybody's predictions of gloom and doom come to pass? Have any normally non-disruptive players become so when playing a Goblin? Or, did anybody actually just ban them from their game for thematic reasons.
Since I only play PFS2 I haven't encountered any problems.
Can some of you feed my schadenfreude?
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I have not encountered any problems. On the contrary, I've been amused by some peoples' interpretations of goblin PCs.
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It turned out how I expected, with the people gravitating towards goblins being generally disruptibe players who felt that playing a goblin legitimized their behaviour.
God I hate the "I am just roleplaying my character" argument when it is used to cover up being consistently disruptive.
I have one player who is playing a chaotic goblin but retaining a level of respect for others and in a oneshot I ran for two groups only one group had two troublesome goblins.
But I always sat on the "I wish it were uncommon" side of things but have no issue with them being in the CRB.
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No one has played one in PF2 yet, but people in my group have played goblin characters in other RPGs (5e primarily) for years with no issues.
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I've seen a player use it as an excuse to be stubborn and disdainful for no reason, unwilling to compromise with the group and be xenophobic to all other ancestries. Wait that was a dwarf.
But did s/he insist on the dorf wearing an utilikilt, spoke with a shoddy pseudo-Scottish accent and drank heavily? Because if not, it's not a real dorf, just some gneum on steroids.
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There is one goblin our our game. He isn't disruptive. Rather, he is played as naive, but trying his best as a young adult who happened to become an adult at the age of 8. He doesn't start fires or fights. At worst, he lacks some nuance in his dialog.
He is everyone's favorite character. The GM loves him. The players love him. He will be remembered forever. He is the highlight of the campaign. Or so I imagine, since he is my character.
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The biggest problem when transitioning from PF1 to PF2 was not the goblin in our group but how to handle goblins as an "accepted" race in general. Even without some traumatic goblin wars to begin with our group more or less directly went from Rise of the Runelords to Age of Ashes and most players were: Wait, wait, wait, haven't those creatures been the baby-eating bad guys before?!
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The biggest problem when transitioning from PF1 to PF2 was not the goblin in our group but how to handle goblins as an "accepted" race in general. Even without some traumatic goblin wars to begin with our group more or less directly went from Rise of the Runelords to Age of Ashes and most players were: Wait, wait, wait, haven't those creatures been the baby-eating bad guys before?!
The way I handle that is pointing out that there are savage and nasty humans, elves, and even evil cannibalistic crazy halflings.
I have goblins as not being widely accepted (as they aren't as written) but mostly tolerated or acknowledged that there are exceptions.
I also have them treated differently from region to region, in Varisia and places like sandpoint... well a goblin might want to be careful choosing a drinking hole.
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The biggest problem when transitioning from PF1 to PF2 was not the goblin in our group but how to handle goblins as an "accepted" race in general. Even without some traumatic goblin wars to begin with our group more or less directly went from Rise of the Runelords to Age of Ashes and most players were: Wait, wait, wait, haven't those creatures been the baby-eating bad guys before?!So the earth equivalent is saying "We just finished a game in France, where the local goblins were eating babies. Why does everyone accept the goblins in this game set in Italy?"
Well. Because you are hundreds of miles apart, and the goblins in Varisia are not the same as the goblins in Isger.
2e has done away with (the frankly ridiculous) idea of world spanning mono-cultures.
Why would goblins from one part of the world be exactly the same as those in another? In some areas, goblins are despised. In others they are welcomed with open arms.
There's also been a decade between Rise of the Runelords and Age of Ashes, which is two entire generations of goblins. That's a lot of time for social change and growth, and goblins were already in the process of integrating into wider society even before that.
The very first published nonevil goblin in Golarion appeared in Dark Markets: A Guide to Katapesh in the form of Krebble-Jeggle, a CN goblin who ran his own casino.
The second nonevil goblin appeared in the very first adventure path for the Pathfinder rules set: Jinkoo, the Hell Knight sewer goblin, LN defender of Hell Knight basements and blower of loud horns.
Since that time goblins have had a diverse and checkered history with the people of Golarion, but there's some key turning points that helped further integrate them into society:
The Frostfur goblins of Irrisen became wards of the Pathfinder Society about 8 years ago and some of them are now functioning members of the organization, with many more who consider themselves to be Pathfinders despite not having been formally accepted.
The Dragonskull tribe of Iobaria were "adopted" by the Farheavens, a clan of Sarkorians currently working to reclaim their former home in what was once the Worldwound. Experts in navigating burns, the Dragonskull goblins have found that their skills make them excellent scouts and earn them some prestige amongst the other ancestries. Several Dragonskull members also accompanied Pathfinder agents for a time, and their association with the organization opened a few doors for them in places where the Society is held in high regard.
The Mudchewers of Magnimar, a city that has long shrugged and accepted that the goblins occupying its sewers are less dangerous than the things they keep out, were rescued by a group of adventurers from a parasitic monster and have had nearly a decade of slow integration into society since.
Swinging back down to Katapesh, the goblin Yigrig Moneymaker and his extended "family" of freed goblin slaves (read more about the atrocious practice of enslaving goblins in Dark Markets: A Guide to Katapesh and comics from our friends at IDW written by the fine folks here at Paizo) has long been a member of Katapeshi society but recently made connections with the wider world when he helped the Pathfinder Society root out a traitor from within their own ranks.
The iconic Fumbus has his own backstory that covers his journey dangerous journey from Isger (where most folks still wanted to skewer him on sight) to eventually finding a permanent home in the Puddles.
And perhaps most notably, the Crookedtoes tribe of Isger earned themselves a home in Absalom, the City at the Center of the World itself, when they allied with the last remaining Knights of Lastwall to fight their way through Tar-Baphon's undead hordes. So the center of information trading and commerce for the whole Inner Sea has an entire tribe of celebrated hero-goblins living in it, which is the kind of thing that is going to get around fast.
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I have a goblin player at my table and he's practically role-playing the transition between "crazed baby eaters" and "playful nuisance."
He came from a tribe of warlike, murderous goblins still sharpening knives after the Goblinblood Wars. He met a tribe of accepted goblins, who had made peace with the "longshanks" and were now living in harmony with them. The character scoffed and tut-tutted about this, but eventually came to love the humans and the peaceful ways of the tribe.
And then, because I am an evil GM, I had his original tribe come to the town with a warband, burning and pillaging as only a goblin tribe could do. It was a grand moment as he and the peaceful tribe of goblins protected the town against his own family.
My player was thrilled, loved every minute.
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The goblin player among my characters ended up the party face/leader because she was most responsible member of the group.
She has been known to bite people/things out of curiosity for what they taste like.
"Most responsible" is not a high bar for my players.
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The biggest problem when transitioning from PF1 to PF2 was not the goblin in our group but how to handle goblins as an "accepted" race in general. Even without some traumatic goblin wars to begin with our group more or less directly went from Rise of the Runelords to Age of Ashes and most players were: Wait, wait, wait, haven't those creatures been the baby-eating bad guys before?!So the earth equivalent is saying "We just finished a game in France, where the local goblins were eating babies. Why does everyone accept the goblins in this game set in Italy?"
Well. Because you are hundreds of miles apart, and the goblins in Varisia are not the same as the goblins in Isger.
2e has done away with (the frankly ridiculous) idea of world spanning mono-cultures.
Why would goblins from one part of the world be exactly the same as those in another? In some areas, goblins are despised. In others they are welcomed with open arms.
There's also been a decade between Rise of the Runelords and Age of Ashes, which is two entire generations of goblins. That's a lot of time for social change and growth, and goblins were already in the process of integrating into wider society even before that.
The very first published nonevil goblin in Golarion appeared in Dark Markets: A Guide to Katapesh in the form of Krebble-Jeggle, a CN goblin who ran his own casino.
The second nonevil goblin appeared in the very first adventure path for the Pathfinder rules set: Jinkoo, the Hell Knight sewer goblin, LN defender of Hell Knight basements and blower of loud horns.
Since that time goblins have had a diverse and checkered history with the people of Golarion, but there's some key turning points that helped further integrate them into society:
The Frostfur goblins of Irrisen became wards of the Pathfinder Society about 8 years ago and some of them are now functioning members of the organization, with many more who consider themselves to be Pathfinders despite...
Don't forget Snapjack!
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The goblin player among my characters ended up the party face/leader because she was most responsible member of the group.
She has been known to bite people/things out of curiosity for what they taste like.
"Most responsible" is not a high bar for my players.
I trust her judgement.
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I've only played 2E under the society umbrella, but I have been pleasantly surprised that none of the goblin payers have been disruptive. Most have presented interesting takes (some stereotypical or obvious) on goblin PCs. I have had zero issue with it, from that perspective. What I dislike is the general rebranding that goblins had to go through in order to make this happen. The original theme of the Paizo/Pathfinder goblin was something that I really enjoyed. I am saddened that is gone now, but if it makes everyone happier and increases participation, then I guess its worth it.
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All of the goblin PCs I have seen so far were largely playing against type- erudite, charming, polite, bookish, etc.
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I didn't expect any kind of disaster, since we'd already cultivated a player base with nice people. But I have been pleasantly surprised by just how much goblins seem to fire up peoples' imaginations, coming up with different ways of playing to or against type (or both at the same time).
Notable locals:
King Tub the brainchild of one of our local GMs who is famous for his love of running The Frostfur Captives. King Tub claims to be king of all Frostfur goblins and so far most players have happily gone along with that. (He tends to delegate almost everything, including most decision-making, to his various advisors.) Under the hood, an alchemist.
Machine the character of the son of King Tub's player. Machine is a killing machine, a goblin barbarian.
Count Giacomo della Resse aka Smeek, a foppish bard complete with a powdered wig that makes him almost as tall as a human and beauty spots.
Wiggun the Big'un a giant instinct barbarian with a ginormous sword.
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My Age of Ashes group has a nice lil' goblin fellow who is an ex-river pirate trying hard to find new industries and fields of expertise. He's a Rogue, of course. His first visit to the fruit market in Breachill involved trying very hard not to "borrow" some fruit and ultimately paying for them.
His internal struggles got even more profound during the opening scene of the adventure, because he was supposed to put out something goblins love so much. Poor tyke!
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James touched on this in a recent Pathfinder Friday episode.
Many goblin players are playing their goblin against type, like PossibleCabbage mentioned.
A lot of people seem to forget that this isn't an MMO- just because there are thousands of groups in the real world playing an adventuring party doesn't mean there are thousands of adventuring parties in Golarion. Everyone's group are the main characters in an epic story. Most people in the game world are barkeeps, sailors, soldiers, farmers, and the like.
So your goblin that is being played against type is truly off-brand. He or she really does stand out.
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All of the goblin PCs I have seen so far were largely playing against type- erudite, charming, polite, bookish, etc.
Same, it's also the type that I typically go with when playing a Goblin too. The way I figure it, most of the "intelligent" goblins wouldn't really fit in with the stereotypical roles that they used to fill. Becoming an adventurer or scholar is par for course for them at that point.
My favorite Goblin trope to reference is their fear of reading and writing. Though I tend to scoff at it being a result of a misunderstanding of how writing works. If putting my thoughts onto paper steals them from my head then obviously I just need to read it all to steal them right back, can steal them from everything else he reads too! He keeps an extensive collection of journals cataloging all of his travels.
I just hope that the system starts allowing for those sorts of options through official support in their ancestry feat options at some point. Closest they have right now is Junk Tinker.
Would love to have a straight-up engineer/tinker Goblin. :D
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My entire play group is planning on making a party consisting exclusively of goblins for Extinction Curse. XD
When I asked them for the name of their troupact was, some of the ideas the three out were:
The Trash Compactors
The Wendi Go Gos
The Gruesome Troopsum
The Jibber Jabbers
In PFS and Age of Ashes, there have been some antics to be sure, but nothing I consider disruptive.
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I think for a lot of players the impulse when playing something for which the stereotypical version is negative is to try to turn that on it's head somehow.
Like "Saintly Tieflings" and "Changelings who are actively fighting against being Hags" are a lot more common in games I've seen than "vicious cruel and evil Tieflings" and "Changelings who are really leaning into Hagdom."
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As many of you will remember, when Goblins were first announced as a core ancestry, there was much gnashing of teeth and rending of garments in protest.
"They don't make sense"!"They'll be disruptive!"
Now that we are 6 months in to the PF2 Era, have anybody's predictions of gloom and doom come to pass? Have any normally non-disruptive players become so when playing a Goblin? Or, did anybody actually just ban them from their game for thematic reasons.
Since I only play PFS2 I haven't encountered any problems.
Can some of you feed my schadenfreude?
no problems here , my wifes goblin who was raised by a dwarf family is hysterical but has not been disruptive , the other goblin character died but was fine while he was around
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I've seen a player use it as an excuse to be stubborn and disdainful for no reason, unwilling to compromise with the group and be xenophobic to all other ancestries. Wait that was a dwarf.But did s/he insist on the dorf wearing an utilikilt, spoke with a shoddy pseudo-Scottish accent and drank heavily? Because if not, it's not a real dorf, just some gneum on steroids.
funny :) my wifes goblin raised by dwarves is largely like this :P
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My entire play group is planning on making a party consisting exclusively of goblins for Extinction Curse. XD
When I asked them for the name of their troupe/act was, some of the ideas that were thrown out were:
The Trash Compactors
The Wendi Go Gos
The Gruesome Troopsum
The Jibber JabbersIn PFS and Age of Ashes, there have been some antics to be sure, but nothing I consider disruptive.
Stupid autocorrect. Hopefully this will make a little more sense.
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no problems here , my wifes goblin who was raised by a dwarf family is hysterical but has not been disruptive , the other goblin character died but was fine while he was aroundAs many of you will remember, when Goblins were first announced as a core ancestry, there was much gnashing of teeth and rending of garments in protest.
"They don't make sense"!"They'll be disruptive!"
Now that we are 6 months in to the PF2 Era, have anybody's predictions of gloom and doom come to pass? Have any normally non-disruptive players become so when playing a Goblin? Or, did anybody actually just ban them from their game for thematic reasons.
Since I only play PFS2 I haven't encountered any problems.
Can some of you feed my schadenfreude?
This is hilarious, because my party is three goblins and a dwarf raised by goblins.
That poor dwarf! They will have seen three or four generations of their adopted family grow old and die before reaching adulthood.This is hilarious, because my party is three goblins and a dwarf raised by goblins.no problems here , my wifes goblin who was raised by a dwarf family is hysterical but has not been disruptive , the other goblin character died but was fine while he was aroundAs many of you will remember, when Goblins were first announced as a core ancestry, there was much gnashing of teeth and rending of garments in protest.
"They don't make sense"!"They'll be disruptive!"
Now that we are 6 months in to the PF2 Era, have anybody's predictions of gloom and doom come to pass? Have any normally non-disruptive players become so when playing a Goblin? Or, did anybody actually just ban them from their game for thematic reasons.
Since I only play PFS2 I haven't encountered any problems.
Can some of you feed my schadenfreude?
Not necessarily true.
Three or four generations born, certainly, but goblins can live to be fifty if not violently killed and dwarves reach adulthood at forty, so it's entirely possible the dwarf's parents are still alive, even.
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That poor dwarf! They will have seen three or four generations of their adopted family grow old and die before reaching adulthood.This is hilarious, because my party is three goblins and a dwarf raised by goblins.no problems here , my wifes goblin who was raised by a dwarf family is hysterical but has not been disruptive , the other goblin character died but was fine while he was aroundAs many of you will remember, when Goblins were first announced as a core ancestry, there was much gnashing of teeth and rending of garments in protest.
"They don't make sense"!"They'll be disruptive!"
Now that we are 6 months in to the PF2 Era, have anybody's predictions of gloom and doom come to pass? Have any normally non-disruptive players become so when playing a Goblin? Or, did anybody actually just ban them from their game for thematic reasons.
Since I only play PFS2 I haven't encountered any problems.
Can some of you feed my schadenfreude?Not necessarily true.
Three or four generations born, certainly, but goblins can live to be fifty if not violently killed and dwarves reach adulthood at forty, so it's entirely possible the dwarf's parents are still alive, even.
50 or more. No goblin's ever gone long enough without meeting a violent death for anyone to be entirely sure what the upper limit is.
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The Dragonskull tribe of Iobaria were "adopted" by the Farheavens, a clan of Sarkorians currently working to reclaim their former home in what was once the Worldwound. Experts in navigating burns, the Dragonskull goblins have found that their skills make them excellent scouts and earn them some prestige amongst the other ancestries. Several Dragonskull members also accompanied Pathfinder agents for a time, and their association with the organization opened a few doors for them in places where the Society is held in high regard.
I notice that on pages 35 & 39 of the Lost Omens Character Guide, that Goblin tribe is called 'Dragondweller'. Why the change?
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The Dragonskull tribe of Iobaria were "adopted" by the Farheavens, a clan of Sarkorians currently working to reclaim their former home in what was once the Worldwound. Experts in navigating burns, the Dragonskull goblins have found that their skills make them excellent scouts and earn them some prestige amongst the other ancestries. Several Dragonskull members also accompanied Pathfinder agents for a time, and their association with the organization opened a few doors for them in places where the Society is held in high regard.I notice that on pages 35 & 39 of the Lost Omens Character Guide, that Goblin tribe is called 'Dragondweller'. Why the change?
I wrote both entries, and the goblin section of the Lost Omens Character Guide was turned over around the time that Breath of the Dragonskull was being developed, so the most likely answer is that I'm either misremembering the final name used for the goblin tribe in Breath of the Dragonskull or it was changed during development of the scenario and that change didn't propagate over to the Character Guide since they were being developed at about the same time by different departments. I'm out and about at the moment, so I can't verify which.
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I wrote both entries, and the goblin section of the Lost Omens Character Guide was turned over around the time that Breath of the Dragonskull was being developed, so the most likely answer is that I'm either misremembering the final name used for the goblin tribe in Breath of the Dragonskull or it was changed during development of the scenario and that change didn't propagate over to the Character Guide since they were being developed at about the same time by different departments. I'm out and about at the moment, so I can't verify which.The Dragonskull tribe of Iobaria were "adopted" by the Farheavens, a clan of Sarkorians currently working to reclaim their former home in what was once the Worldwound. Experts in navigating burns, the Dragonskull goblins have found that their skills make them excellent scouts and earn them some prestige amongst the other ancestries. Several Dragonskull members also accompanied Pathfinder agents for a time, and their association with the organization opened a few doors for them in places where the Society is held in high regard.I notice that on pages 35 & 39 of the Lost Omens Character Guide, that Goblin tribe is called 'Dragondweller'. Why the change?
I can confirm the name of the goblin tribe in PFS1 10-12 was 'Dragonskull'.
BTW, I just love how you used Season 10 to better establish goblins as more than monsters!
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It was never really an issue for either group I GM. I got to play a goblin in a one shot for the purpose of getting to be a player character. All those involved had a good time, or at least I hadn’t played so horribly that people thought I was being disruptive.
I think we had a really easy transition because the campaign’s I run are in my home world and not Golarion.
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This alias is my goblin character. He started as a fill in for my Age of Ashes campaign for when a player ran a side quest.
He is a very helpful goblin (a chirurgeon alchemist), who is very good about fixing things he breaks or burns (including healing fellow PCs), but is a little less careful about catching his team mates in the splash zone of his bombs. All in all, a good little fellow, if not a little careless.
Of course his formula book is more pictures and smears, rather than words.. and his healing kit often seems to be not much more than a variety of muds that he rubs into wounds... he does claim that “there is very little night soil in there, I promise!”
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I play almost exclusively PFS, and of the 20 or so local players, I think only 1 besides me plays a goblin (that I know of). Almost everyone universally hates goblins, and thinks they should have been left as something for one shot adventures like the We Be Goblins line.
I specifically made my goblin to break stereotypes, and play him as a normal adventurer, who just happens to be a goblin.
The other guy was playing his as an over the top exaggerated version of the cliche pyromaniac toddler who eats all the gross stuff, and had to be told to reign it in because they were ruining other peoples enjoyment of the game, and reinforcing the stereotype that everyone hates. Even reigned in, the character still bothers me sometimes...but it is far more tolerable.