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Altair_the_Vexed
2006-11-28, 08:06 AM
I'm thinking about lumping almost all the CR1 or less evil humanoids together for my homebrew campaign setting.

There are a lot of 1HD (or lower) creatures that essentially have little statistical difference between them - orcs, hobgoblins, gnolls, kobolds, goblins, and so on. Thematically, they tend to have been used in very similar ways in classic D&D games.

Why not make them all variants of one race? Call them all "Goblins" and let them be the varying types of a diverse species? Alignment differences can be dealt with by ensuring the "generally" part of the alignment entry in their stats is honoured.

I envisage a community of Goblins, with a stealthy scout caste [goblins], a smart warrior caste [hobgoblins], a bezerk shock troop caste [orcs], a sapper caste [kobolds]. Goblin [goblin] commoners become the normal non-combatant population.

How could this go wrong?

Ping_T._Squirrel
2006-11-28, 09:48 AM
That is very much an interesting way to do it. I do not like the, "Every race not in the PHB wants to destroy all" style that WotC has with those races mentioned.

If I run a new campaign, I'll consider this as a base for the less civilized races.

Squatting_Monk
2006-11-28, 11:30 AM
I like this idea, too, but I've got my own rendition of it I'm using in my campaign setting. I'm having the species all be goblinoids, yes, but they're going to live separately instead of in the caste type of system you mentioned. Regional and ideological differences split them up long ago, and they've been developing relatively separately. The races of orcs, goblings, hobgoblins, and gnolls are major branches of the goblinoid family, and each branch will have its own variations and subraces. Kobolds I derive from dragons, however, and I'm grouping them with lizardfolk and sahuagin.

Altair_the_Vexed
2006-11-28, 11:42 AM
I like this idea, too, but I've got my own rendition of it I'm using in my campaign setting. I'm having the species all be goblinoids, yes, but they're going to live separately instead of in the caste type of system you mentioned. Regional and ideological differences split them up long ago, and they've been developing relatively separately. The races of orcs, goblings, hobgoblins, and gnolls are major branches of the goblinoid family, and each branch will have its own variations and subraces. Kobolds I derive from dragons, however, and I'm grouping them with lizardfolk and sahuagin.

Yeah, that works too - I'm just playing with ideas here. I have in mind a continental region that is dominated by the monstrous humanoids (it's the right sort of terrain and the demi-kind races have never encroached into it), so maybe I'll use both concepts.

In any case, the common in-charatcer conception in my proposed setting is that all monstrous humanoids are "goblins".

belboz
2006-11-28, 07:20 PM
Just a minor nitpick--I don't think you want to include gnolls in that list. They have 2 HD, not 1, and are much more of a challenge for low-level characters than the other goblinoids. Fighting 3 goblins is a standard encounter for a part of 4 first-level PCs. For the same group, fighting 3 gnolls is climactic-battle stuff.

Rainspattered
2006-11-28, 08:38 PM
Gnolls also aren't goblinoids, and neither are orcs. They're each their own sub-group of humanoids, if you look. That's not really important, though, what is is that gnolls aren't even vaguely goblinoid in appearance, either. Orcs could blend. Hyena-hominids, not so much.
If you'e lumping them into a civilization, I'd cut away that general "evil" thing and make them a legitimate civilzation, which just happens to rival the players. Good beating up on a shameless, iconic evil can be fun, but it's not interesting enough to even last the entire length of the first epic poem recorded; pure Good vs. Evil only lasted through the first third of Beowulf. The same holds true for D&D campaigns, largely; going around slaying evil is all well and good, but not so interesting. Fighting a rival civilization, with wives and chilren and homes and their own morals gets into much more interesting moral territory, and takes the Innocent Civilian goblins out of "Free XP" range for caring PCs.

Fireball.Man.Guy.
2006-11-28, 08:48 PM
I advise leaving Kobolds out of that. So much extra fluff and things have been made for them, tears would be shed if they disappeared.

The're dragons, they're not dragons, they're dragons,they're not dragoins, they're dragons and not dragons.

Altair_the_Vexed
2006-11-29, 08:05 AM
I'm not just including Goblinoids. My idea is that goblins are an enormously varying species - more like Brian Froud's goblins than any homogenous race.

Okay - so maybe kobolds have been put outside the group by virtue of their newfound lizardy-ness, but I stand by having gnolls, Classic D&D Thouls, orcs, ogres and various other monstrous humanoids as I see fit in the "Goblins" camp.

The culture I'm going to give these goblins in their own land is going to be based in part on "might is right" and the strongest being in charge. (Strength isn't measured in physical ability only, though.)

icke
2006-11-29, 10:27 AM
What do You do if one of Your players wants to play a goblin( of any kind)?
Pick the original race, lability and level adjustments etc.?
Where do they stand in this society of Yours? Are they outcasts, strangers?

The Vorpal Tribble
2006-11-29, 03:12 PM
Works pretty well. Have Blues as the masterminds/behind the scene masters.

Yakk
2006-11-29, 03:31 PM
The DM in a game I'm playing right now has done something neat with Goblins and Dark Elves.

Elves live forever, and have few children. They are very infertile.

Dark Elves live forever, and have many children. A DE who has sex will have at least one child from it. Their children, however, get progressively ... less ... as their empowering lifeforce fades.

These lesser children are "goblins" of various size. Presumably the children can have children. These children come in many shapes, all twisted by their lack of empowering lifeforce.

In this campaign, the DE and E are at peace. DE exist to destroy, leaving room for creation. Elvish legends speak of a time when the world was becoming full of creation -- trees that burned in the very sun -- and the coming of the Dark Elves cleanse and make room for new creation.