paradoxGentleman posted:

Really? I always felt like you are given such a limited range of choices, especially as far as clothing goes, that it's hard not to have your heroes look rather same-y.

paradoxGentleman posted:

SteelMentor posted:

I remember a lot of crying about this version of Age of Wonders as they did away with the Gygax rear end "every race has a alignment they can't deviate from" so you could make holy crusader Goblins and other such un-traditional combinations as well as reframe the Goblins in the canon story to be more victims of circumstance rather than inherently evil.


Nerds are so lame.

SteelMentor posted:

I remember a lot of crying about this version of Age of Wonders as they did away with the Gygax rear end "every race has a alignment they can't deviate from" so you could make holy crusader Goblins and other such un-traditional combinations as well as reframe the Goblins in the canon story to be more victims of circumstance rather than inherently evil.


Nerds are so lame.

Beffer posted:

Do they look like duck goblins?

Screaming Idiot posted:

Screaming Idiot posted:

How do y'all feel about orcs and goblins by different names in sci-fi/sci-fantasy settings?

Screaming Idiot posted:

How do y'all feel about orcs and goblins by different names in sci-fi/sci-fantasy settings? In my story I've got a race of engineered humanoids referred to as GRNSK (or "Grensk" as they were colloquially referred) that used to be intelligent, nigh-emotionless servants distinguished from normal humans by their greater height, exaggerated proportions, and the vibrant green skin color for which they were named. They were created specifically to replace sentient robots that had rebelled and started their own state, but after the company that created the Grensk was shut down and its owners held accountable for nearly recreating the circumstances of the aforementioned android rebellion, the robust and highly modifiable GRNSK genetic template was stolen by an opposing faction of humans to be turned into a variety of super-soldiers.

The project failed, however. The first attempt to produce a self-replicating biological factory -- an enormous womb-creature called a Motherpod -- ended up creating two specific sub-varieties of Grensk; the massive and muscular Grunzen and the diminutive Zwerg.

Despite their brutish appearance, the Grunzen inherited the pacifistic tendencies of their kin, and turned out calm, intelligent, and amiable, but with single-minded work ethics and an aversion to confrontation. Their immense strength and rapid healing made them an ideal workforce, perfect for building, but their timidity kept them from being the warriors they were intended to be.

The Zwerg, however, are stunted Grensk, inheriting the more human appearances of their progenitors, but with stunted proportions. Surprisingly strong and resilient despite their height, the Zwerg tended to be more forthright and assertive than their larger brethren, and more often than not provided direction when groups couldn't come to a compromise, though they didn't lead. These new Grensk remembered their ancestors' origin and believed centralized leadership would merely replicate that -- a hand holding a whip was still a hand holding a whip regardless of that hand's skin color.

The ones who remade the Grensk were not pleased with the direction their fledgling society had taken, and created new Motherpods designed to forge new varieties of Grensk to take control: the Stier, the Schwein, and the Schackal.

The Stier are more bestial than the other breeds of Grensk, walking on their knuckles and protected by thick, ridged, bony hides. The Stier act as bloodhounds for the Schackal, and as mounts for the Zwerg that serve them by turning their backs on their brethren.

The Schwein are the enforcers for the Schackal, oafish and piglike, with jutting tusks and wide snouts perfectly suited to sniffing down "criminals". The Schwein are trained from the emergence to obey their superiors and to maintain order by any means necessary, and in return they live in comparative luxury and leisure.

The Schackal were the most "successful" of the attempts to make weaponized Grensk; nine feet tall, wiry and muscular, but hunched over almost double with grotesque features, the Grensk were the most notably altered of their kin. With bulging eyes capable of looking about independently like a chameleon, flappy ears, rounded peglike teeth, and six wickedly clawed fingers on each overlarge spatulate hand, the Schackal's outer grotesqueness reveals the madness within, for every Schackal is born into a culture of survival of the fittest, and all newborn Schackal forced to fight one another until only the strongest and most cunning are left to feast on the flesh of those proven weaker.

The Schackal quickly overran their creators, and their penchant for violence and utter lack of empathy allowed them to dominate their Grensk brethren, and in time new Motherpods were grown in biovats by enslaved engineers and implanted all over. The pods would then take in nutrients from the soil until they grew large enough to burst free, where the creature would be fed by caretakers until it could begin producing new Grensk, primarily Zwerg and Grunzen as they are the most stable of their kind, with the occasional births of the other breeds as required by their controllers.

Despite the inclinations genetically engineered into each breed, however, the Grensk are no monolith -- there are violent Grunzen, kindly Schackal, anti-establishment Schwein, and so on, with the biggest factor maintaining the stereotypes being the society that was constructed for them.

Anyhoo, this isn't just worldbuilding for the sake of just that, I've got a couple stories written about a colony of Grensk that lived in a sewer system under one of the capital cities in my setting that helped to save the world from a menace they had been forced to aid in creating, and another story in the works involving a Grensk running for a seat in the Interplanetary Senate of the Central Union.

drrockso20 posted:

The whole "grown in gross pods or pools" aesthetic is one of my favorites for Monstrous Humanoids so that gets a thumbs up from me

Atlas Hugged posted:

This is the only part I read, but it's an interesting question! What is the essence of a goblin? Is it a goblin because it is named a goblin or is it a goblin because of some intrinsic goblin-ness? At what point does it devolve into 19th century "race science"?

Tolkien himself is kind of all over the place on this.

Screaming Idiot posted:

How do y'all feel about orcs and goblins by different names in sci-fi/sci-fantasy settings? In my story I've got a race of engineered humanoids referred to as GRNSK (or "Grensk" as they were colloquially referred) that used to be intelligent, nigh-emotionless servants distinguished from normal humans by their greater height, exaggerated proportions, and the vibrant green skin color for which they were named. They were created specifically to replace sentient robots that had rebelled and started their own state, but after the company that created the Grensk was shut down and its owners held accountable for nearly recreating the circumstances of the aforementioned android rebellion, the robust and highly modifiable GRNSK genetic template was stolen by an opposing faction of humans to be turned into a variety of super-soldiers.

The project failed, however. The first attempt to produce a self-replicating biological factory -- an enormous womb-creature called a Motherpod -- ended up creating two specific sub-varieties of Grensk; the massive and muscular Grunzen and the diminutive Zwerg.

Despite their brutish appearance, the Grunzen inherited the pacifistic tendencies of their kin, and turned out calm, intelligent, and amiable, but with single-minded work ethics and an aversion to confrontation. Their immense strength and rapid healing made them an ideal workforce, perfect for building, but their timidity kept them from being the warriors they were intended to be.

The Zwerg, however, are stunted Grensk, inheriting the more human appearances of their progenitors, but with stunted proportions. Surprisingly strong and resilient despite their height, the Zwerg tended to be more forthright and assertive than their larger brethren, and more often than not provided direction when groups couldn't come to a compromise, though they didn't lead. These new Grensk remembered their ancestors' origin and believed centralized leadership would merely replicate that -- a hand holding a whip was still a hand holding a whip regardless of that hand's skin color.

The ones who remade the Grensk were not pleased with the direction their fledgling society had taken, and created new Motherpods designed to forge new varieties of Grensk to take control: the Stier, the Schwein, and the Schackal.

The Stier are more bestial than the other breeds of Grensk, walking on their knuckles and protected by thick, ridged, bony hides. The Stier act as bloodhounds for the Schackal, and as mounts for the Zwerg that serve them by turning their backs on their brethren.

The Schwein are the enforcers for the Schackal, oafish and piglike, with jutting tusks and wide snouts perfectly suited to sniffing down "criminals". The Schwein are trained from the emergence to obey their superiors and to maintain order by any means necessary, and in return they live in comparative luxury and leisure.

The Schackal were the most "successful" of the attempts to make weaponized Grensk; nine feet tall, wiry and muscular, but hunched over almost double with grotesque features, the Grensk were the most notably altered of their kin. With bulging eyes capable of looking about independently like a chameleon, flappy ears, rounded peglike teeth, and six wickedly clawed fingers on each overlarge spatulate hand, the Schackal's outer grotesqueness reveals the madness within, for every Schackal is born into a culture of survival of the fittest, and all newborn Schackal forced to fight one another until only the strongest and most cunning are left to feast on the flesh of those proven weaker.

The Schackal quickly overran their creators, and their penchant for violence and utter lack of empathy allowed them to dominate their Grensk brethren, and in time new Motherpods were grown in biovats by enslaved engineers and implanted all over. The pods would then take in nutrients from the soil until they grew large enough to burst free, where the creature would be fed by caretakers until it could begin producing new Grensk, primarily Zwerg and Grunzen as they are the most stable of their kind, with the occasional births of the other breeds as required by their controllers.

Despite the inclinations genetically engineered into each breed, however, the Grensk are no monolith -- there are violent Grunzen, kindly Schackal, anti-establishment Schwein, and so on, with the biggest factor maintaining the stereotypes being the society that was constructed for them.

Anyhoo, this isn't just worldbuilding for the sake of just that, I've got a couple stories written about a colony of Grensk that lived in a sewer system under one of the capital cities in my setting that helped to save the world from a menace they had been forced to aid in creating, and another story in the works involving a Grensk running for a seat in the Interplanetary Senate of the Central Union.

Splicer posted:

*sapient

Jinh posted:

A goblin by any other name would smell as sweet

When I ran DND one of my players was a goblin named Graxel.

Graxel was a necromancer. So he did a whole bunch of evil stuff, and at one point he had a curse put on him for his greed that forced him to eat his level x 10 worth of gp in gold, precious metals or gemstones every day to survive. He could also smell treasure, and he grew a third little green arm out of his chest.

Later he and some friends were invited to the local vampire lord's castle for a very fancy dinner party. Graxel asked for nothing except water, then proceeded to eat the silverware and plate in front of everyone. And made an after-dinner snack of a silver candlestick.

paradoxGentleman posted:

Making the law enforcement grensk literal pigs is a nice touch.

Screaming Idiot posted:

No, I specifically meant sentient. The original Grensk lacked full awareness and were lobotomized fleshy automata. They were created to replace machines that began as sentient and later became sapient through emergent AI, and the creators wished to avoid that as much as possible.

sasha_d3ath posted:

This reminds me of the time I ended up inheriting "traitor" in Betrayal at Baldur's Gate (poo poo game, you should play it) and we got a scenario with Glurk, the Goblin Warlord, conquering Baldur's Gate. I played him with an ABSOLUTELY MANIC HIGH PITCHED VOICE, LIKE IF COBRA COMMANDER WAS A CHILD YOU GAVE A BUNCH OF CANDY TO!!!!

He was also incredibly profane, leading to the catchphrase (said after half of every move I made when I roleplayed commanding my armies) "I'M MOTHERFUCKIN' GLUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUURK!!!!"

He died at the cusp of victory thanks to the timely intervention of a literal war-submarine the PCs inherited, and he died shivering and looking the party dead in the eyes, "Never forget...I was...motherfuckin' Gluuuurrrrrk..."

lilljonas posted:

Hot take goblin discussion topic:

What is the best goblin design: big nosed goblins, or small nose goblins? I'm not sure, I used to really prefer big nosed goblins, but I can kinda see the point of small nosed goblin designs too.

lilljonas posted:

Hot take goblin discussion topic:

What is the best goblin design: big nosed goblins, or small nose goblins? I'm not sure, I used to really prefer big nosed goblins, but I can kinda see the point of small nosed goblin designs too.