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neversterling
2015-08-18, 08:18 PM
GMed by: Neversterling, first time GM. Mistakes will be made.

This is the play journal of my group's first session of the one-shot We Be Goblins, which we hope to turn into a proper campaign. Spoilers Ahead!

Since there's only 3 PCs, I allowed everyone to go gestalt, but insisted that they use the stat block present in the pregenerated characters for the adventure. Our group really likes Dreamscarred Press, so that's allowed. I didn't specify a restriction on which class combinations were legal(Full Caster//Full Caster), but given that I don't know how far up in levels this campaign will go, I think it's a safe bet that a full caster//full caster is a bad idea mechanically. Prestige classes will be allowed assuming we make it that far, with the restriction that if it progresses a particular class feature, you take the prestige class on the side of your gestalt build that provides that class feature. If it progresses class features of both sides, you cannot take levels in those previous classes. Example: An Oracle//Bard is going to go Mystic Theurge. The next class level is Mystic Theurge//(Anything but Bard and Oracle).


Broodadoo: Actually a “Blue” psionic goblin who keeps his racial identity on the DL, Broodadoo was chosen for this mission by Chief Gutwad for his ability to wrap himself in the ghosts of his enemies and make them his arms and armor. Or at least that’s how Chief Gutwad sees it. His pet toad is named Food, and is half-eaten in honor of his simultaneously famished and gluttonous god, Venkelvore. (Soulknife//Annihilator Aegis)

Broodadoo’s Song:
My mind is strong,
But yours is weak,
Broodadoo shall devour the meek!

Ratpainter: An avid painter of all sorts of animals who is dangerously curious of the “writing” thing and secretly has a plan to have dominion over all the creatures he paints, Ratpainter was destined to be the scout that would successfully lead them through the more perilous parts of the Brinestump marsh. He enjoys long walks on the beach while praying to Zogmugot. His pet toad is named Stinky. He licks it lots. (Druid//Unchained Rogue)

Ratpainter’s Song:
Paintin' rats and fish and frogs,
Catch 'em all on painted cloth,
Souls of creatures of the bogs,
Make 'em chase all others off!
Ratpainter smart by catchin' beasts,
Use 'em all to fight an' kill,
Slash with claws an' bite with teeth,
All obey Ratpainter's will!

Ragnok: The youngest of all and self-described as the most handsome as well, Ragnok is a proud and eager warrior of Zarongel, god of dog-killing and mounted combat. Some of his many different goals are to go on his first raid, to find a worg to ride, to prove himself worthy to the Licktoad tribe, to come up with a better song that highlights his exploits once he has exploits, among many others. His pet toad is named Rabbit. (Omen Rider Harbinger//Hawkguard Dervish Defender Warder)

Ragnok’s song:
Goblins burn and goblins bash!
Turn the dogses into ash!
Fire spread on humie plight!
Flash and flare and scare them right!
Longshanks run and longshanks flee!
Goblins slice and scream with glee!
Fire burn, hot and bright!
Lock youse doors! Cower! Fright!
Burn the houses, nice and hot!
Put the longshanks in a pot!
Fire dance and fire smite!
Tie them, stake them, wrap them tight!
Chop them, slice them, burn them well!
Fire is our sacred spell!

Previously, on We Be Goblins!

A Goblin, heretofore known as Scribbleface, surprised and terrified everyone in his tribe when he was found to be secretly writing things down! As any sane and good Goblin tribe does, the Licktoads of Brinestump marsh exiled him, marking him by branding his face with those letters he loved so much. While plundering his house and taking all of his stuff, they found something fantastic: Fireworks! Also, a map. Chief Gutwad secretly invited the village’s most promising goblin warriors to a meeting the next morning to order them to follow the aforementioned map to even more fireworks.

After a brief and shocking(because he never speaks to any Gobs but Slorb, his mouthpiece and advisor) monologue by His Mighty Girthness Chief Rendwattle Gutwad, Slorb gives them the map to more fireworks, as well as some supplies for the journey. But of course there has to be a party before they leave to burn away the rest of the bad juju Scribbleface has put upon the tribe.

After hours of preparing the bonfire, licking toads, and other festivities, the party starts with a bang, as well as some second degree burns, as Mogmurch the alchemist hurls his fire bomb into the bundle of wood at the center of the village, missing his mark slightly and setting Drubbus and Stumpbiter on fire. Slorb demands that the still-fermenting apple cider be brought out, which is promptly drank by Broodadoo and Ragnok. Ragnok gets a little queasy and has to sit out on the first set of dares, which makes him sad considering how much he likes to show off. The dares, as presented by Chief Gutwad through Slorb, are riding the village “boar”, Squealy Nord, eating a bag full of bull slugs real quick, hide or get clubbed, and squeezing through the Rusty Earbiter.

Broodadoo jumped at the chance to ride Squealy Nord, and rode him bareback while holding on with his hands, feet, and teeth. As the goblins chanted, double dares were shouted out. First, Poog shouted out, “Double dare! Do it with no hands!” which Broodadoo accomplished with ease. Then Cheeks shouted, “Double double dare! Set it on fire!” splashing some oil on the pig and setting it alight with a torch! Even with a flaming pig, Broodadoo stayed mounted, and the other Licktoads were awestruck, giving him a wand of cure light wounds, alchemist’s fire, and a potion of mage armor on top of the dragon brew gourd awarded by Slorb.

Next was the bull slug-eating competition, for which Ratpainter stepped forward. Bull slugs are gross, bitter, and as any young goblin who eats everything in the swamp finds out eventually, mildly poisonous. Knowing full well that this was probably going to make him sick, he gags on the first as the onlooking Mogmurch breaks into a wide grin. After the initial hiccup, he manages to get the five sausage-sized black slugs down his gullet when Mogmurch calls out, “Double dare! Wash it down with this!” and hands Ratpainter a bottle of something. Bravely downing the entire bottle, Ratpainter immediately regrets his life decisions when he becomes nauseated and begins retching, at which point Broodadoo challenges, "double double dare! Drink your vomit!" which Ratpainter somehow manages to do without becoming even more sick. This amuses Mogmurch and the Chief so much that Ratpainter is loaned the Gorge of Gluttons from the Chief’s personal armory as well as Broodadoo's newly found wand of cure light wounds and Mogmurch's vials of Acid, Alchemist’s Fire, a Tanglefoot Bag, and a Smokestick.
By now, Ragnok is feeling a little better after purging his binge-drinking, and makes his way to Slorb to announce his acceptance to the Hide or Get Clubbed dare. Reta and Chuffy cry out simultaneously, “Double dare! We club too!” as Ragnok runs into the swamp and dives into the undergrowth. Slorb calls out that Stumpbiter be the Chief’s champion, and The three goblins grab clubs and go running in after Ragnok. The three come back a few minutes later, empty handed. Stumpbiter is pretty sure that Lotslegs ate him, but a minute after they returned, Ragnok emerged with his unclubbed noggin. Slorb congratulated him with a ring that lets you climb real good, and Chuffy and Reta begrudgingly gave up their grappling hook and rope made from mole tails.

Emboldened by his success, Ragnok then took on the Rusty Earbiter, a column of pure nastiness made by a mad tinkerer who was carried off to a mysterious fate one day while testing his bird-attracting hat. The Rusty Earbiter is made from bent swords, twisted wire, a tangle of brambles, and barrel hoops. The object of the dare is to squeeze through the 20-foot column before the goblins get bored. Looking down the tube, Ragnok could see where the contraption gets its name: a few pieces of goblin ears still hung from the jagged wires inside. Ratpainter says to Ragnok, “Double dare, do it with vomit on your head” as he throws up more pieces of slugs and pickled what-nots and gummi worms onto Ragnok’s head. Quick to get it over with, Ragnok plunges headlong into the Rusty Earbiter, getting almost halfway before getting snagged on a jagged bit of metal. Behind him, he hears Buggy cry out, “Double double dare! Set it on fire!” lighting a fire at the entrance to the contraption. Not interested in being a roast goblin, he quickly makes his way through the rest of the Rusty Earbiter without any further snags, and is rewarded a wand of Shocking Grasp by Buggy, the Gorge of Gluttons by Ratpainter, and a loan of the Useful Robe that is very useful by Chief Gutwad via Slorb.

The party dwindles as Broodadoo becomes increasingly drunk on cider and everyone gathers around the bonfire as the fireworks hidden inside go off every now and then. The next morning, Slorb approaches them as they are eating breakfast and gives them the leftover fireworks from last night, spurring them into leaving post-haste.

About ten minutes away from the Licktoad camp, the trio was approached by a wolf-like creature with intelligent eyes. Feeling the strings of destiny tugging at him, Ragnok approached the beast, which appeared to accept him as his rider. Or perhaps it was the beast that chose the goblin. In any case, they seemed to have some strange bond that was immediate, and Ragnok rode his mount for the rest of the trip looking very pleased with himself.

After some crisscrossing of creeks without much incident, the gobs came to some dense nettle mixed with spider webbing. Now on their guard, they began to realize they were in the territory of Lotslegs Eats Goblin Babies Many, the giant spider that has been harassing the Licktoads on an increasing basis as of late. Ratpainter hears a shuffling above and then sees the webbing that spreads from tree to tree over their heads. Suddenly taking initiative, the spider charges at Ragnok as he passes the tree she was on. After a few moments of vain attempts to bite Ragnok, the spider is dispatched by a mighty swing of Broodadoo’s magic sword which appeared from nowhere. Knowing that this prominent spider probably had a lair nearby, Ratpainter tracks the silk strands to a fallen, hollow tree with over a dozen desiccated bodies inside, both longshanks and goblins. After a quick looting and eating of some tasty licorice taffy that seems to help with Broodadoo’s hangover, the goblins set the lair, as well as the webbing that guided them to it, on fire as they make their way back to the creek.

After another uneventful 10 minutes, Ratpainter hears a distant splash some distance up the creek. For some reason, all the goblins immediately go into the creek to see what they can see, only to catch a glimpse of a longshanks stepping out of the creek, followed by a menacing bark. Through the trees along the creek runs a vicious dog, bee-lining for the tender throats of the wee goblins. Broodadoo swiftly came to meet the dog in mortal combat, slashing the dog to bits in a fell swoop. Ragnok cried, “Hey, that was my dog to kill!” at the same time as a human voice called out “Bully! You bastard goblins killed my dog!” and an arrow is fired from behind a big tree ahead. Ratpainter thinks about changing the weather ineffectively, as Ragnok and Broodadoo surround the human and Broodadoo finishes him by cutting through most of his neck. Needless to say, they loot the body.

Finally arriving at the location indicated by the map, they find it to be a shipwreck, hundreds of feet inland, surrounded by a makeshift fence. Upon stepping into the enclosure, they see that the ground is covered in terrifying hoof prints, and a sinister neigh as a gigantic black horse with a bad attitude comes galloping towards them. Barks come from aboard the ship, Ratpainter hides behind the fence, and Broodadoo drinks his dragon brew gourd.

The battle with the horse quickly ends, as Ragnok slices effortlessly into the horse with the Gorge of Gluttons and the horse crumbles into a bleeding pile of delicious horsemeat, while the battle with the dogs aboard the ship is just beginning. Broodadoo runs up the leaning gangplank, ignoring the large lump of apparent mud as he does and finds out too late that it was actually a wasp nest as it drops and explodes in a brief swarm of wasps that fail to affect anyone. He spots a dog and hears more on board, apparently all chained to the masts of the derelict vessel. The dog he sees quickly breaks the chains that bind it, only to meet its doom to Broodadoo’s blade.

With the trio now all aboard, they start towards the upper decks, but are met with more doggy resistance. These two dogs are apparently made from sterner stuff, and manage to take a bite out of a goblin or two before being smote by Ragnok, who had claimed the bigger one as his personal enemy. After killing the dog, he finished it off by slitting its throat with his dogslicer, and then set it ablaze with a torch as a sacrifice to his god of dog-killing, Zarongel. Broodadoo hears barking from the galley and is met with the gnashing teeth of an even larger dog, which manages to take a bite out of him as he jumps away and breaths fire on the dog, setting into a helpless yelping frenzy that eventually dies down at the same time the dog does.

At the same time, on the deck below, Ratpainter manages to get the door to the main deck open, but neglects to check for traps in the heat of battle, and doesn’t manage to miss the spear that springs from the opening door. Squinting in pain, he still clearly sees the menacing face of Vorca, the goblin cannibal, with a snaggletooth grin and fire in her hand. He takes his chance, running inside and filling the room with a thick fog. Vorca lashes out angrily, but fails to hit anything due to the obscuring mist. Somewhere in the room, a loud croak is heard. Ragnok ventures into the fog to assist Ratpainter, and manages to lay some blows down on the cannibal. Ratpainter attempts to flank, but is brought low with Vorca’s flaming hand, falling unconscious. At this time, a severely dog-bitten Broodadoo enters the misty chamber and spits fire at Vorca as her giant toad comes out of nowhere to try to stick a goblin with her tongue, having no luck. Vorca’s flame is snuffed, and she begins to summon another trusty dog to aid her. Broodadoo and Ragnok corner her, and she tries to flee up the wall, but fails to dodge the blades of the goblin heroes and falls unconscious. The giant toad is quickly dispatched, and the Broodadoo revives Ratpainter with a potion, then immediately goes for the tantalizing red chest, finding it filled with…fireworks, what else?

Upon searching the rest of the room and the rest of the boat, they find Vorca’s latest victim in the galley: Scribbleface himself, whose heart and right arm were mysteriously absent. In her chambers, aside from the engraved red chest, they find trinkets of all sorts, including a folding fan that Vorca had been drawing on. They all load their treasure, as well as an unconscious Vorca, into the chest and carry it happily back to the village without incident…except for the launching of a few fireworks.

When they arrive, they are greeted as heroes by the awestruck Licktoads. Another party is immediately held in their honor, and the goblins take Vorca’s body to string her up for execution. Broodadoo launches a skyrocket at her and Vorca bursts into flames. Everyone cheers! Slorb calls the heroes before the Chief and grants them titles after taking back the loaned items. To Ragnok, the very image of a mighty Zarongel-devoted warrior, he grants the marriage of his daughter, the beautifully corpulent Goopy Wartbits. To Ratpainter, who seems to have an affinity for animals, he granted the title of Master of the Pig Pit, and to Broodadoo, who spits fire, he granted the title of Boss of the Big Fire, making Mogmurch kind of surly.


Session concluded...for now!

I should have had the worg approach after Ragnok got his first dog kill, but in this was he was predestined rather than rewarded, so I guess it works itself out. Two of the other players are GMs in games that I play in, and we were all very comfortable with each other's acting like goblins. It was a blast.

neversterling
2015-08-25, 04:34 PM
Session 2: We be raiding! We get cheese! Slice the longshanks at the knees!

For this session I used encounters from the first book of Jade Regent to put the pieces together of what happened to the Licktoads after We Be Goblins. SPOILERS AHEAD!

Broodadoo: The Licktoad Boss of the Big Fire proved himself quite worthy of the title when he set Vorca ablaze. Now we can see what he does on a raid!

Ragnok: The newlywed barely got to consummate the wedding before it’s time for his first proper raid! Maybe he’ll name his worg, or kill many bigsies. Definitely kill many bigsies.

Ratpainter: The night after their virgin voyage into the swamp, Ratpainter was dared, then double dared, then double-double dared to drink increasing amounts of the still-fermenting cider, eventually drinking the entirety of the large barrel, and re-winning Chief Gutwad’s items for the next few days. Unfortunately, this left the Master of the Pig Pit a nauseous mess for the next day.

Previously, on We Be Goblins!

Our esteemed heroes are awakened by the voice of Slorb beckoning them to come with him to the moot house to talk to the Chief, so Broodadoo and Ragnok pick up Ratpainter and hustle over to the moot house, where the Chief is feeling rather empowered by the surplus of fireworks. He instructs the three of them to go raid the roads just outside of the swamp, and find him something shiny. Or tasty. Or more fireworks.

Not wanting to carry around their nauseous companion on their dangerous assignment, Ragnok crafts a clever sculpture of blankets and pillows to hide the groggy Ratpainter, takes the dare prizes from him, and sneaks out of town with Broodadoo and his worg along the path to the not-marsh.

As the duo and mount come to a bridge, they begin to tread more carefully, knowing that there’s always a greater chance of ambushes at bridges. They hear a splash up the creek, and they both see a pale figure swimming away from them. Ragnok throws a sling rock at it, and it takes off down the river, swimming to the bank and running full speed away on dog-like legs. And so, the duo take chase.

They track the creature's’ clawed feet for almost a mile along the bank of the creek, crisscrossing across the creek at times to finally reach a fork in the flow of water with a large mass of sticks, logs, and damp and rotting reeds, apparently formed by floodwaters from the creek. Broodadoo notices a pile of bones lying beside it, and correctly suspects its artificial construction, as the two goblins and the worg approach with their guard up. Suddenly out of the water jumps the monster, attacking Ragnok’s mount ineffectually. Having already been injured, he falls swiftly to Ragnok’s blades.

Upon inspection and recollection of Licktoad bonfire stories involving a pale monster, they realize that they have slain the fabled Soggy River Monster, a creature supposedly responsible for at least 5 Licktoad disappearances. Broodadoo searches the mound, finding it to be filled with tattered clothes and trophy heads of eleven victims. After destroying the mound, his eye catches the glimmer on a broken ranseur lying at the bottom of the creek, which nabs before heading off.

They head towards the closest trail that leads out of the swamp without too much trouble. Broodadoo finds a toad and starts to licking it, giving him the ability to see magical auras for a short time. He and Ragnok begin licking toads back and forth, tripping balls. (And out of character, learning what happens when you lick toads) When finally reaching the trail, they go decide to continue their mission and leave the marsh. None of the bridges proved themselves dangerous.

Upon exiting the marsh and climbing the slope up to the road, they see no one coming in either direction, with a hill across the road. Broodadoo starts to climb the hill to get a better view and sees bones scattered upon the hill, with Ragnok dismounting to follow. Piecing the bones together, they find the shattered bones of a long-dead goblin, with tattered clothes and a battered cap. Recalling a famous goblin tinkerer who disappeared some time ago with a bird-attracting hat, Broodadoo straps it to his head and starts to bang on it. Just then, two creatures come from the sky, flying straight for them! “Oh ****! It’s working!”

It turns out to be a couple of disease-ridden stirges, which are basically overgrown mosquitos, which they eat after defeating them with ease. Broodadoo gives a lick of his toad and takes a look down the road for any travelers to waylay. While he is paralyzed from an overdose of hallucinogens, he sees a two-headed horse flanked by four ants some distance up the road. After regaining his senses, he tells Ragnok of his vision, after which Ragnok confirms that there is a horse-drawn cart with four guards. Being about a mile away, they begin looking for the most advantageous spot to launch their ambush, finding a slight hill in the road with significant shrubbery on either side.

Ragnok and worg on one side and Broodadoo on another, they lie in wait at the top of the hill and make a suprise attack against the dwarf and human traveling at the front, one-shoting both. The horse rears and pulls, but the traveling band see it’s only two goblins and figure they were out of lucky shots. That’s when the horse goes down. The driver panics first, followed by the halfling and the lastly the elf. The halfling yells to the driver, “Are we seriously being TPK’d by a couple of goblins?! Did you make these?!”, But the driver can’t respond due to the presence of a mind blade going through his throat. The elf unleashes a cone of flame that only ends up lighting the dying human on fire, then makes a grease stain on the ground to successfully trip up Broodadoo. He rolls away and makes a wild swing at her feet, and Ragnok goes in for the kill, having finished off the fleeing halfling. They begin eating the half-roasted human.

Searching the cart, they find eleven 40-pound wheels of cheese, as well as a partially concealed 10 gallon barrel of ale. They load all of the loot back into the cart and burn the elf’s book, but keep the scrolls for Ratpainter’s paintings. They eat some cheese, drink some ale, and strap the cart to themselves to carry through the marsh, celebrating their victories with some toad-licking.

As they are about to reach one of the bridges, a giant snake drops from a tree, attempting to bite Ragnok, but is distracted by his intimidating mount. After taking a licking, it retreats into the creek, disappearing in the depths. Broodadoo spots a giant leech floating under the other end of the bridge, and carefully approaches, but not carefully enough. The snake bursts onto the bridge gives Broodadoo a vicious bite, coiling around his upper leg and crushing it. Held down by the snake, the giant leech makes its move on Broodadoo by clamping down with its bloodsucking mouth. Ragnok slices the snake from Broodadoo and as his companion rips the leech from his body and kills it. They carry on to the village without further incident.

The heroes return with enough cheese to last the village at least two days, if they make it stretch. They hide the barrel of ale and scrolls in Ratpainter’s room for themselves, presenting the cheese and longshanks equipment to the Chief as their spoils. As they unload the cart, Ragnok spots a hidden compartment in the cart, and opens it to find a belt with the symbol of gemini in the buckle. He immediately puts it on and has an uneasy feeling in his pelvis. Apparently it does nothing but make him feel uneasy, so he offers it to the Chief, who feels a similar uneasiness, and puts the belt in his trophy room.

And that’s where we stopped for the night! Hope you guys had fun reading!

The belt is cursed, obviously. The guys had been calling Ratpainter a girl in-session even though Ratpainter is male, and I was wanting to have a gag that the players might enjoy that wouldn’t hurt too much. The danger was if Ratpainter himself found it and immediately put it on, of course. Ragnok’s player commented that it should probably be harder. The party with the cart was a typical D&D first level party, with a halfling rogue, human fighter, dwarf cleric, and elf wizard, and I thought it would be fun to be meta for a second. Also didn’t want to give away too much power, but still wanted to have something hiding in the cart, and this way they can still trick someone into trading them shinies for it.

oshi
2015-08-27, 01:20 AM
Very cool. The tone reminds me of the Deffwotch games I've played, I love the casual insanity.

Seto
2015-08-27, 03:25 AM
Ha ! I must say I'm curious to see how that idea of making a one-shot into a campaign turns out.

We Be Goblins! is actually the only prewritten module I've ever played (my friends and I usually make up our own plots, we like it), about a month ago. It was in order to introduce a friend to RPGs without having to make up a story on the spot. Problem is, we were only two players with the prewritten characters, and, well... we did well until the boss fight, but Vorca (and specifically her Toad) demolished us.

CGNefarious
2015-08-27, 04:48 AM
The write-up doesn't go into it, but Vorca was very tough for us as well. I actually feared we might have been TPKed. She is no joke.

neversterling
2015-08-31, 07:38 PM
Ha ! I must say I'm curious to see how that idea of making a one-shot into a campaign turns out.

We Be Goblins! is actually the only prewritten module I've ever played (my friends and I usually make up our own plots, we like it), about a month ago. It was in order to introduce a friend to RPGs without having to make up a story on the spot. Problem is, we were only two players with the prewritten characters, and, well... we did well until the boss fight, but Vorca (and specifically her Toad) demolished us.

Yeah, I played the module with a different group of four players, three of which were new to pathfinder, and the one with the wand of cure light wounds literally used all nine charges in the fight against vorca and her toad. The toad ended up being a lot meaner in that fight. Without having more targets to hit and more hit points to spread out the damage, Vorca can be a mean one. Produce Flame is no joke, AND she has a scimitar. I felt like the pre-made characters were underpowered, which is why I gave them more choice of traits and a bonus racial feat.

neversterling
2015-08-31, 07:47 PM
Session Three: Rats might bite us, but we bite back! Skellies rise and we attack! Bring the shines back to tribe! Somebodies burned it; they pay with lives!

Once again, I used material from the Jade Regent adventure path to embellish and create the background and encounters. As always, SPOILERS AHEAD!

Broodadoo: Bringer of cheese and Boss of the Big Fire, this Licktoad slays his enemies and protects himself with his mind-material!
Ragnok: Worg-rider and proud owner of the fabled bird-attracting hat, he is looking forward to sticking his blades into creatures over and over! He named his worg Gir.
Ratpainter: Finally sleeping off the day-long hangover, the Master of the Pig Pit gets an early start on a day filled with mischief and the claiming of lives.
Previously, on We Be Goblins!
Hearing about a mysterious belt that no one could quite figure out, Ratpainter sneaks through a window into the Moot House in the wee hours of the morning to try it on for himself. She comes back a changed woman. Ironically, throughout the rest of the session, the other two players incorrectly call him by male pronouns. As the sun is rising, Slorb comes to beckon them into the moot house for their next assignment.
Upon entering the Moot House, they see His Mighty Girthness Chief Rendwaddle Gutwad sitting atop his teeter chair and pondering over a fan that Vorca had scribbled on, trying to make sense of it. Broodadoo offers to help ponder and takes it away from him, which gives the Chief just the change of perspective he needed! He sees that he had been looking at it upside-down, and suddenly it all makes sense. It’s another map! This one is much less intelligible than the one Scribbleface had, but appears to outline a path to a cave at the bottom of the southern cliffs that border the swamp, about one or two days journey by foot. Maybe there’s more fireworks? A goblin can only hope.
The Licktoad goblins have little awareness of the southern part of the marsh, since it is within the dominion of a dangerous swamp witch. However, it’s been a while since she has been spotted, so maybe she moved away. Nevertheless, their guard is up as they slug and slosh through the marsh, eventually reaching a path that apparently hadn’t seen travelers for a while and was on its way to being claimed by the swamp; The very same path that led to the swamp witch’s hut. Judging the path a quicker route, Ratpainter led the group towards the hut, throwing caution to the wind.
Eventually they approach a hut that has fallen into disrepair. Holes in the roof where moisture can get in are readily apparent from the outside. Ratpainter climbs Broodadoo’s back to get a better view. Ragnok circles around, cautiously trying to open all of the doors, but they are jammed. Ragnok eventually quietly gets through the back door, as Ratpainter and Broodadoo force the front. They hear a whispering sound that appears to come from behind the shed that is apart from the house, and go to investigate, as Ragnok continues trying to open doors within the house. As Broodadoo and Ratpainter round the corner, they see a trio of dire rats within the shed through a collapsed wall!
Ratpainter jumps off Broodadoo’s back and they attack. Ratpainter gets momentarily surrounded, and Broodadoo takes a nasty bite that looks like it might get infected, but they dispatch the rats relatively quickly.
At the same time, Ragnok is carefully searching the house that apparently has many tiny footprints on the moss and fungus that covers the floor of the house. He opens another door to an apparent laboratory, when out of nowhere a tiny rat-like figure with human hands attacks him! Ragnok steps away and gives him a slicing, then the ratling runs away through a crack in the floor. Ragnok throws his torch into the lab in the hopes of setting the spilt alchemical reagents ablaze, then flees to the other side of the house to search the bedroom, hearing a satisfying explosion and the cracking of timbers from the laboratory.
From behind the house, the skittering of many feet suddenly becomes audible as a swarm of rats appear rolling around the corner coming at Broodadoo and Ratpainter just as they are finishing up their dire rat situation. Not sure of what to do, Ratpainter hurls alchemist’s fire at the roiling mass of rats and tells Broodadoo to hit them with his mystical stick, which Broodadoo does. The rats swarm over Broodadoo, delivering tiny bites all over, and Ratpainter throws more chemicals at them, eventually causing them to disperse.
In the house, the little rat with human hands reappears from the floor to attack Ragnok again, biting deep into his leg and nicking an artery. Ragnok screams and slashes at him again. Ratpainter throws acid into the house at the both of them, not caring so much for Ragnok’s safety, and Broodadoo steps up to finish it off, failing to do so. The ratling runs again down into the floor, but Ragnok has a supernatural sense of where he is and follows into the next room to attack him through the floor, smashing through some of the floorboards. Broodadoo follows Ragnok, assuming he knows what he’s doing, and stands directly over the floor as he smashes into it, ending up with his foot inside of the tiny ratling’s head.
They do a quick search of the rapidly crumbling house and Ratpainter finds a scroll tube with a detailed map of the swamp, a medium sized dagger, and a few scrolls which he hoards to himself. He shows them the map and tries to hide the writing, but Ragnok sees and promptly lights the map on fire. The Licktoads blow the joint, sparking the rest of the chemicals and bursting through the walls until it ends up a collapsed smoking heap of wet wood. They follow the trail from the back door which leads to a small rowboat, which Ratpainter thinks they can use to make better time towards the cave.
Navigating up the creeks that cover the marsh, the goblins make their way rather quickly to the cavern that sits at the bottom of a 50 foot high cliff at the southern edge of the swamp. Slightly obscured by poisonous nettles which Broodadoo pushes aside with his mind blade, the trio steps through into the dim, wet cavern and start to explore.
Almost immediately they stumble onto an occupied spider’s den, with a much less intimidating spider than Lotslegs. The spider never even gets a chance. Next, they find an island with many sparkling gems in a pool of dark water. Ragnok calls dibs and has Gir jump the water, when a giant amoeba suddenly attacks! Short work is made of this too, and Ragnok collects the gems and continues.
They come upon a few skeletons, one in the water at the edge of the cavern, and one filled with a huge nest of snakes, and Ratpainter throws a vial to break up the snake nest, only suddenly both snakes and skeletons go on the offensive! Two of the skeletons surround Ragnok and Gir and start to take slashes at him with their bony claws, and the mass of snakes come to cover Broodadoo and Ratpainter in bites. Ratpainter becomes nauseous from the feeling of snakes all over his body, as Broodadoo smashes messes of them at a time, dispersing the mass. Ragnok and Gir attack with less effectiveness than they would like at the skeletons, nicking and gnawing at their bones with their respective scimitar and dogslicer and teeth until they eventually fall. Out from the darkness at the end of the cave, a skeleton armed with a wakizashi steps up and hisses a challenge at Ragnok, the mounted goblin, suggesting that he should either leave or die. Broodadoo becomes upset that he wasn’t challenged, and whacks at the skeleton with his mind stick, while Gir charges up a wall in an arc that ends with a bite against the skeleton, who is a lot tougher than he looks. Ratpainter throws fire as Ragnok and Broodadoo fight him back, and Broodadoo delivers the perfect blow: CRACK! On the back of the neck, shattering the spine and throwing the bones everywhere. They see a chest, which the skeleton was apparently guarding, and take a few minutes to open it. After they do, they check the skeleton and find the key to the chest. All sorts of goodies are in the ornately carved chest, including more fireworks! Ratpainter licks his frog Stinky and realizes that time is just another dimension to capture souls in, and also that the sword the skeleton was wielding is magical, and can be used to protect others, if that were a thing that goblins really wanted to do. Close inspection of the chest reveals a ring that can magically mark things, a wand that tells what things are, another wakizashi, and a bunch of potions.
After a successful day of fireworks hunting, they board their rowboat and venture back to the Licktoad village. On their way there, however, they hear the distant sounds of explosions coming from the village. It sounds like they’re having a party without them! They begin rowing furiously to get there faster, but the sound of distant fireworks stops before they reach the village. As they reach their home, they see it burning. Everyone’s house is on fire! They also see the aftermath of a battle near the pig pit: A bigsy dwarf with heavy armor and a long axe is surrounded by over a dozen goblin bodies. He’s very dead, and much burned. Around the rest of the town, more bodies are found, though the bodies of Slorb, Goopy Wartbits, Chief Gutwad, Buggy Bugeye, Poog of Zarongel, Mogmurch, and Squealy Nord are nowhere to be found. Broodadoo throws and empty ale bottle that the dwarf had in his backpack and hears a whimper from the underbrush. They go to inspect and find Mogmurch, who had hidden to survive the fight, unlike his wife Rempsy. He says that Chief Gutwad ran away when he saw the bigsy dwarf killing all of his underlings, and that he’s going to the Birdcrunchers, another tribe about two miles to the north in the mountains, to become part of their tribe. Gobs gotta stick together, after all. He invites them to come along, but they say they want to track down the Chief and save him first. Before Mogmurch gets too far up the road, though, they come back up the road to ask him a question. Ratpainter says, “there’s something in the Chief’s Moot house I want you to take a look at. We’ll go with you to the Birdcruncher’s after.” Trusting them as the brave and competent warriors they are, he agrees, but is dismayed when they throw him into the hut along with his wife’s corpse and set the building ablaze, laughing as they leave! I guess that’s what you get for not protecting the village, Mogmurch!
Following the trail was easy, as Ragnok recognized the footprints of his wife, and Slorb is terrible at covering his tracks. There were also other tracks interspersed with the goblin tracks. After a few hundred feet, they came to a section of the soggy river delta that was particularly wide, and saw a faintly glowing woman in the distance, with the faint glow illuminating a small bipedal frog, a Halfling, and a few bodies lying on the ground. The Halfling hears the goblins and turns his head, and in doing so the goblins also notice the red chest that the Licktoads had brought back from Vorca’s ship strapped on top of his backpack. The battle starts.
This was a long fight, and oog it was getting late into the night, but it was still fun, at least for me. Given these circumstances, I don’t remember the play-by-play, but I will try to highlight the most notable moments.
Ratpainter jumps upon Broodadoo’s back, and Broodadoo jumps halfway into the river, screaming, “I’m gonna f#&k you!” at his enemies, and the Halfling and frog pull out bows and start shooting at Broodadoo. Ragnok and Gir run up the river, over a downed tree that forms a bridge, Ragnok quickly jumps off, and then charges at the anti-goblin trio, and the woman pulls out a heavy pick and starts swinging at Ragnok. Broodadoo and Ratpainter spend their next turn swimming to the other side, and Ragnok attempts to corner the Halfling, while the frog drops his bow and pulls out two kukri to attack Ragnok, and Gir and the woman lock themselves in melee. Ratpainter summons a giant centipede to aid in Ragnok’s fight with the Halfling, giving him the flanking bonus to bring him down, as Broodadoo delivers a massive hit to the frog, but he remains standing. It appears as though the remaining enemies get a second wind every time they attack. Gir and the woman remain locked, trading blows back and forth. The frog attempts to attack Broodadoo but misses and his second attack slices at air as Broodadoo slides away. The lady steps out onto the water and the frog gets surrounded, eventually leaping into the river after her in an apparent bid to flee. Ratpainter summons a fiendish dolphin to attack the frog, and Broodadoo takes a moment to form his mindblade into something that can be thrown at them from the edge of the river, as Ragnok jumps on Gir and tries to run to the other side of the river to head off their escape. Broodadoo hurls his blade in vain, the frog swims to the other side, and the lady engages with Ragnok while still standing on the water. Ratpainter heads for the tree-bridge as his dolphin tries to bring the frog under and the Broodadoo follows in his speedskin. Ragnok and Gir attack the woman, but it seems to have little effect, and they run away to engage with a sling. The frog reaches the shore and begins flailing around with his blades, hitting Broodadoo with a butterfly’s sting, leaving an opening for the woman, and she casually steps off the water an pierces deep into Broodadoo with a critical hit, bringing him down hard, as she licks the point of her pick. Broodadoo’s suit saved his life, however, and he stabilizes. Ragnok reengages in melee with the frog, charging in and teaming up with Ratpainter to surround him. The frog drops to one knee, and tries to leap away, but is delivered two unlucky blows as he is not as quick as before, and is brought to death. Ragnok attacks the lady, and brings her down, but not out, and she delivers a final swing against him, but passes out in the middle of her swing.
They check the bodies that were by the mysterious goblin killers and found the corpses of Slorb, Chief Gutwad, and Goopy Wartbits. Ragnok takes the frogs’ belongings, Ratpainter takes the halfling’s, and Broodadoo, after being revived, takes the woman’s belongings and presumably eats part of her face. They find everything that the Chief had kept in the red chest, save some fireworks that were obviously used against the dwarf in the attack on the village.
Whew! Long session.
Ratpainter’s player pointed out that he’s gotten nauseous during every single session so far, including the one that he wasn’t even here for, which was amusing. Ragnok’s player said that the terrain of the final fight was annoying, but in a good way. I hadn’t actually planned on using the lady’s ability to walk on water, I just wanted both Sleeping Goddess stances because that’s what I would do if I just wanted extra power points. Then I went and accidentally used terrain that worked perfectly for that ability. The male frog was a Grippli Fighter 3//Stalker 3, and the slightly luminous woman was an Ifrit Paladin 3//Zealot 3. They both had Martial Power, and she had the beginnings of the whitelight shakes, a disease brought on by an overexposure to positive energy. I took away her Lay on Hands, power points, and spell-like abilities, and his ki pool, assuming that they would have been used up on the village fight. The Halfling was a Ranger 4 with goblinoid as favored enemy. It’s slightly less fun in combat when the enemies just take forever to die, but it made sense for the enemies that slaughtered the entire village to have a health battery and be hard to hit, so that’s what I went with. Tactics-wise, they kept attacking the dog to keep them from getting away, and were relishing in the deliverance of pain to the goblins.
I forgot some stuff in the loot, and some details about the battle, but I was tired. I mentioned bodies, but failed to identify them when they got close.

Urist Mcmage
2015-09-02, 10:31 PM
this is awesome, I cant wait to see more!

Red Rubber Band
2015-09-21, 10:34 PM
I'm enjoying this! Sounds like a lot of fun.

Same concept as that campaign journal where everyone played Orcs. I think it was on the WotC boards. Also a good read.

neversterling
2015-10-16, 11:18 AM
Session Four: We be tribeless, but we be strong! We make all goblins sing our song!

We took a break because of school and work schedules, but recently got some more time to spend on goblins! In the interim, I allowed everyone a free rebuild as they hit level 3!

Broodadoo is now a Annihilator Aegis//War Soul Soulknife,
Ragnok has multiclassed and is now a Dervish Defender Hawkguard Warder//Omen Rider Harbinger\Vigilante Stalker,
And Ratpainter is now a Blight Druid//Soul Hunter Stalker.

Previously, on We Be Best Goblins!

Our goblin “heroes” had a pyrrhic victory, losing their tribe but defeating the interlopers who did the cleansing. After their arduous battle, they rest in the thick underbrush of the marsh in one of the many little holes goblins have a knack for finding and hiding in (Broodadoo slices open the female ifrit and crawls inside of her for warmth like a Tauntaun. “I thought longshanks smelled bad on the outside”). The next morning, they lick their toads and try to assess their predicament. While they’re doing that, Ratpainter takes Ragnok’s bird-attracting hat and puts some of the halfling’s fingers on it to see if it attracts any birds. A giant vulture with riding harnesses appears from the sky, lands, and begins eating the fingers. An awestruck Ratpainter attempts to be friendly towards the flying beast, as a determined Ragnok attempts to ride it. Ragnok jumps right on and they fly off into the sky, coming back about a minute later. “I am master of all the animals! I will name him…Gah!” While they deliberate what they will do with the giant vulture, it poofs out of existence. Dumbfounded with this new information, they continue deliberating what they will do as if nothing had happened. The late Mogmurch had suggested they go to the Birdcruncher tribe to join them, but they didn’t like him so had dismissed his idea. Now sitting in the swamp counting dead bodies, they start to reconsider it. They find all but Buggy Bugeye, Poog of Zarongel, and Squealy Nord the Pig accounted for, and begin to search for goblin and pig footprints.

Ratpainter quickly finds the three trails in the soft undergrowth leading away from the Licktoad camp in different northward directions and begins to track the pig with Broodadoo. Ragnok and Gir attempt to track the goblin tracks, eventually losing themselves and bumping into each other as their trails apparently cross. The goblin and his worg continue in the same direction they had been generally travelling in as if they know where they’re going, finally exiting the swamp and seeing his compatriots who have been tracking the pig a few hundred feet away. From here, they all follow the pig’s trail as it eventually crosses the Lost Coast Road. While stealthily crossing the road, Ratpainter’s big ears prick up as he hears a “hhrrmm” a ways up the road, and turns to see a squat, broad bigsy with an overstuffed backpack and heavy shiny armor looking at an outcrop of rocks. Ratpainter: “A dwarf. Should we **** him up?” Broodaoo: “Let’s **** him up.”
Music for this encounter: 10 hour Diggy Diggy Hole loop
Getting closer, they could see the dwarf was delicately poking at the rocks with his lucerne hammer. Broodadoo, not being one for stealth, runs full tilt towards the dwarf. The dwarf reacts, reflexively trying to shatter the dangerous-looking mindblade, but barely makes a dent. The worg rider charges, but fails to do much against the dwarf’s comprehensive armor, and Gir weaves to avoid the dwarf’s hammer. Ratpainter moves forward, and with a fiery hand, chucks a glob of fire into the air at no one in particular. “I hate ****ing goblins! Goddamn greenskins.” The dwarf steps back and Gir follows his step, frustrating the dwarf as he smashes his hammer into Broodadoo hard, knocking him backwards. Broodadoo drinks a potion of enlarge person and steps into a flank with Gir and Ragnok. Ragnok stikes with both weapons and disarms the dwarf with a flick of the wrist, and Gir nips at his enemy’s heels. Ratpainter’s next glob of fire actually goes in the dwarf’s direction, but still goes wide. The angry, injured dwarf draws from inner strength and pulls out a light hammer to smash into Ragnok, knocking him off Gir. The dwarf dodges the mindblade, and Ragnok hits the dwarf again, with Gir continues to try to find a weakness in his armor using its teeth. Ratpainter’s last glob of fire almost hits, but the spry dwarf deftly dodges the fire. The dwarf knocks both Ragnok and Gir back with his light hammer, drops it, and picks up his much larger hammer. Broodadoo tries again in vain to land a blow on the dwarf, and Gir finally finds a weakness, biting the dwarf and knocking him unconscious. The party delivers a collective coup de grace and loot his very dead body, finding a variety of folding adventure gear in addition to a fancy looking belt and 500 pounds of unusual metal. Broodadoo snatches up the belt and hears a voice cry through his mind, “I’M STRONG!” and puts it on, checking his gender expectantly, but instead feeling like he could carry three times as much stuff. He snatches the muleback cords from Ratpainter and pushes a 6000 lb. rock on top of the looted body to make it look like nothing had happened, and they scatter before any of his longshanks friends come looking for him.
On the other side of the road, they find the trail to be harder to pick up, but deduce that the general direction of the previous tracks would indicate they were going to the Birdcruncher’s themselves, so the goblins cut through the heath to follow their fellow Licktoads.
On the way there, they come upon a creek, which Ragnok remembers is called Cougar Creek by the longshanks. They see an orangutan chilling in a tree across the waterway, looking like he has better things to do than bother some goblins. Ratpainter: “Should we **** him up?” Broodadoo: “Let’s **** him up.”
They cross the river by leaping and splashing across and line up on the other side, drying themselves off, when Ratpainter sees a mountain lion on the prowl and rushes it. Broodadoo follows, charging and striking it hard with his magic stick. Ragnok hangs back and mounts Gir, while the Orangutan looks on at the brawl with a disinterested expression. Ratpainter lays the killing blow on the mountain lion, and Broodadoo shoots a crystal shard from his hand at the orangutan, drawing its wrath as it charges but flails harmlessly at Broodadoo. Ragnok charges in response, bringing the beast down. Ratpainter makes a quick sketch of the beasts to claim dominion over them, and they go about their merry way.
As the Licktoads enter into the hills they know to belong to the Birdcrunchers, they see it to be abandoned, with none of the usual goblin guards. Broodadoo fires off a skyrocket firework to announce their arrival, but no one emerged from the hills. Moving further toward the main cave in which the Birdcrunchers dwell, Broodadoo begins firing off two desnan candles, demanding attention, but still no one approaches, until they finally are able to see the mouth of the cave and see little red eyes looking back at them from the dark. An old goblin with a wrinkled face and bulging eyes approaches them. She is adorned by many trophies: dog paws, a horseshoe, a dead stirge, and the shrunken head of a mite. She is noticeably not the chief, who would be wearing the famous Crunch Crown made of bird bones, but she seems to be an important figure. She introduces herself as Wise Mummy Sprattleharsh and welcomes them to Birdcruncher lands, and seems to know all about their present lack of tribe, as well as their previous exploits as Licktoad champions. Wise Mummy offers them a chance of a lifetime: since the Birdcrunchers are presently lacking a chief and doesn’t have anyone in its members worthy enough to become the new chief, the Birdcrunchers will host a chief moot to decide who among the Licktoad “heroes” should be the new chief of the Birdcrunchers. The first duty of the new chieftain, of course, is to drive off the ogre, Pa Munchmeat, who has moved into their territory with his many pets, including a fire-breathing boar, and been terrorizing the goblins for months. Broodadoo: “Sounds like your reading from a script” Sprattleharsh: “I’ll make you read if you interrupt me again!” She sprattles a bunch of orders to the various goblins and they break off in seemingly random directions, preparing for the chief moot. Mummy turns back to Broodadoo to comment about the incredibly overstuffed backpack he’s carrying, and expressed curiosity about the strange raw metal. She didn’t know what it was, but knew there was expert on the subject living in exile outside of the cave named Arf the Fisher. Only thing was, he was a nasty devious blue, so you couldn’t trust anything he said, as he would try to weasel his way back into the tribe and turn them all into blues. Treat him how you will, she says, just don’t bring him back. The trio and worg go off into a corner and begin their plotting, and notice that Poog of Zarongel and Buggy Bugeye had made it to the Birdcruncher’s as well, but saw no sign of Squealy Nord the pig. Broodadoo and Ragnok go over to talk to Buggy: Ragnok to show off his shadowy beast and Broodadoo to hit on her, and then decide that they should go to Arf the Fisher to find out how valuable their loot is.
On the way to the place that Sprattleharsh indicated was Arf’s home, they see a hooded figure several hundred feet away on the side of a lightly wooded hill, going away from the party. Ratpainter and Broodadoo lick their toads, rendering them blind and paralyzed, respectively, leaving Ragnok to follow. The figure appears to lift a hatch and disappear down a hole in the ground, and Ragnok finds the hatch easily, lifting it to see what appears to be a slide that goes into the ground. He bravely ventures forth into the dark, landing in a 10x10 foot room without doors or windows, just a peephole in one wall and a grate (aside from the slide) in the ceiling. Several seconds pass and a voice is heard from the grate: “Oh, I’ve caught a goblin. What’s your name?” Ragnok: “My name is Ragnok. My friends are with me, they’ll be here shortly. We wanted to ask you a few questions.” Voice: “Do you know who I am?” Ragnok: “You’re Arf the Fisher, right?” Voice:”That bitch. I’m the ****ing Artificer! And my name is…Add’em.” The other two finally catch up and Ratpainter rides on the back of Broodadoo as they slide down. Add’em tells them just how he feels about Wise Mummy Sprattleharsh and how the tribe’s current woes could be directly attributable to her influence. He also asks if he could take a look at the metal if they could leave it here for him to study, and offers them things for trade for their trouble: A scroll for Ratpainter, a potion for Ragnok, and a power stone for Broodadoo. The wall lifts pneumatically into a recess in the ceiling, and they are greeted by a small bluish goblin with a very fine looking crossbow, who guides them up the stairs which emerges to a small cottage near the top of the hill with a view, and sees them off as they depart for Birdcruncher-ville.
And at this point, we stop for the night, since I had an emergency to attend to.

Next Time: The Chief Moot!

So I gave them access to a crafter, in part because they don’t have access to a store to buy equipment. We’ll see how that turns out. The dwarf was a PC from another campaign, and the player often places a lot of emphasis on his racial “abilities”. He was looking at the rocks for unusual stonework, and he was very “hatred”-y. That +1 to hit goblins was real handy.

CGNefarious
2015-10-17, 01:35 AM
Music for this encounter: 10 hour Diggy Diggy Hole loop
Best decision ever.

And by "hatred-y", I think you mean racist.

Also, he was a lot more difficult than I was expecting by himself. Though that could also have to do with only one person other than Ragnok actually hitting him, and that being Ragnok's pet for the final blow.

Let's hope the dice fare us better next time. I think we had a combined total of over ten natural 1's rolled that night.

neversterling
2015-11-22, 11:20 AM
Session Five: "We get points in perilous pie! When did horses learn to fly?!"
These chieftains-in-waiting are gearing up for a day full of dares!

Broodadoo: He pushes large boulders on to dwarves! He uses his mind to manifest instruments of death! He’s Broodadoo!

Ratpainter: He’s svelte, but sturdy; druid-y and murder-y; He claims the lives with his sickle and paints rats on rats with rats; He’s Ratpainter!

Ragnok: This master of martial maneuvers has high hopes of being a chief and doesn’t mind playing dirty! He’s Ragnok!
Previously, on We Be Best Goblins!
After seeing Add’em the Artificer off, the trio decide they’re feeling puckish and return to the Birdcruncher camp for the feast that the tribe has been preparing all afternoon, but when they arrive are gravely disappointed when the feast is not prepared by the time they return. Wise Mummy Sprattleharsh consoles Ragnok by giving him a squeaky beakie, and Broodadoo begins eating dirt. They lick their frogs when they have nothing better to do and Ratpainter goes temporarily goes blind, Broodadoo vomits up dirt, and Ragnok hits himself in the face. After Ratpainter regains his sight, they begin to point randomly at goblin tribemembers and name them: Rumble Bandersnatch, Bargle, Broodadoo 2: Electric Boogaloo, Craaaaaiiiiiigggg, The Waitress, Garf, Zagnut, Doogle, Food, Zip Zop Zoobity Bop, Zubba Wubba Lub Lub, Garmadarnar, and Aapeece Ouftoest.
After they’re done naming things, the Birdcrunchers prepare to start the feast with the lighting of a bonfire, for which Broodadoo takes over as proud owner of the title, “Boss of the Big Fire”, and picks up Ratpainter to use him as a fire starter(He casts spark). They wheel out troughs of bird-related dishes, such as seagull soup, charred grackle, raven’s-eye pudding, vulture-ups, spicy sparrow poppers, and the aforementioned squeaky beakies, enough food for the entire tribe plus three very hungry Licktoads. Broodadoo digs into some vulture-ups, which look like Flintstones push-pops filled with vulture meat, as Wise Mummy Sprattleharsh brings out the Crunch Crown, the traditional headpiece of the tribe made up of bird bones, skulls, wings, and twigs, to an appropriate amount of “ooo”s and “ah”s. She informs the trio that whoever wins the crown tomorrow, will have the right to be chief of the tribe, as well as loot the chest of the last chieftain. Ragnok asks how the last chieftain died, and she gives them a vague response of “they died protecting our home”, leaving them to speculate, as she reminds them about their own duties after the chief moot of driving out the ogre from their lands. Ratpainter grows suspicious and asks if Sprattleharsh intends to just offer them up as sacrifice to make the ogre leave, and she consoles him that she would rather have them kill or drive off the ogre. They sense her motive and figure that she probably just hadn’t considered it, but any way to get rid of the ogre is good for her and the tribe, but she’d rather not be a leader herself. It usually leads to an untimely death.
The next day, they prepare for the challenges of the chief moot. Wise Mummy Sprattleharsh guides them into a valley with a set of birdcages spaced out across it at even intervals, with a group of goblin onlookers off to one side. She announces the dare: The Blind Bird Shoot, and hands them each a shortbow with three color-coded arrows. Ragnok gets red, Broododoo gets blue, and Ratpainter gets black. She begins to explain the point system and Ratpainter zones out completely and starts painting rats on rats with rats while not paying attention at all to what Wise Mummy is saying. She then instructs a few of the goblins in the crowd to blindfold the chiefs-in-waiting, and trots over to the first bird cage. Broodadoo and Ratpainter attempt to cheat by slipping off the blind-fold a little bit to see where they’re shooting, but Ratpainter is found out and has to put his back on. Ragnok gets a big whiff of the gulls trapped in the cages and homes in on the scent, as Sprattleharsh cries out “Ready, goblins?” And throws down a thunderstone as she opens the first cage. Ratpainter casts obscuring mist to keep Broodadoo from having an edge, while also cheating himself by running outside of the mist on the opposite side from the crowd and launching his first arrow, which flies over well over the flock of gulls. From the fog, Broodadoo and Ragnok fire their arrows and both hit the flock. Then Broodadoo runs out the mist after Ratpainter and they both fire their second arrows, both hitting different birds in the flock. Ragnok fires from the mist, but doesn’t hear the appropriate squawk this time. “Final Wave!” cries Wise Mummy, as she opens the last cage. Ragnok slips off his blindfold a bit and runs out of the mist after the compatriots, takes down a bird with his final arrow, and runs back into the mist to make it look like he didn’t cheat. Ratpainter and Broodadoo follow his idea, with only Ratpainter successfully hitting, as they flee back into the safety of the mist. After the air clears, Wise Mummy addresses them to inform them of their current rankings: Broodadoo 6 points, Ragnok 8 points, Ratpainter 10 points. Broodadoo says, “double dare! Give me points!” Sprattleharsh replies,”What is a double dare? Birdcrunchers do not know of this concept” At which point the trio extol on the virtues of the double dare by double daring a still blindfolded Ragnok to shoot Wise Mummy. She takes 1d4 unamused damage, and starts to take their sacrifice idea more seriously, as she guides them to the next challenge, in an even lower valley filled with a tepid pond.
In the pond, there were posts with narrow planks laid across in a random pattern, with giant flying bugs called stirges tethered with lengths of rope to the posts. As the trio approach the pond, Sprattleharsh begins to explain the rules. “This dare is called the Stirge Swamp Stomp. You will wear these boots taken from humans and kill the stirges that have been tied to the posts. Careful you don’t fall in, or you’ll be disqualified!” She throws down a thunderstone to start the challenge, and Ragnok is the first to jump out onto a plank and make kicky-feet at one of the stirges. Ratpainter chooses to ignore the rule on hitting things with boots and casts flaming sphere, setting a bug on fire. Broodadoo shoots a crystal from his hand at the closest stirge, but it buzzes out of the way. Ragnok puts one of his boots on the end of an arrow to shoot at the next stirge, but the weight of the oversized boot causes the arrow to plunk harmlessly into the water, as Ratpainter moves his ball of fire to set another bug aflame and tries to create a small storm cloud that just becomes another easy obstacle for the gigantic flies to avoid. Broodadoo fires his crystal again, clipping one of the fliers, and Ragnok jumps to the next plank, sailing past a stirge as he whips out a kukri to slice through two at once. Ratpainter moves his ball of flame around and creates pockets of inclement weather to little effect, as Broodadoo steps cautiously onto his first plank to swing at the air around the stirge in front of him. Ragnok takes a brave leap to the next plank over, but fails to get enough air, falling short and grasping out in a doomed gesture. Sprattleharsh calls out, “Ragnok is disqualified! No more points for this challenge!” as he swims to dry land. Ratpainter pulls out his sickle and leaps out onto his first plank, slicing through a stirge whilst in the air and landing surely, while Broodadoo moves carefully next to a stirge on his own plank and kicks it apart. “In the game, guys!” Ragnok doesn’t like the sound of that, and leaps out at Broodadoo, knocking him off the plank. “Broodadoo is disqualified! Ratpainter is last goblin standing!” Ratpainter raises his arms triumphantly and falls backwards into the water. After Broodadoo is done promising to go back in time to kill and eat Ragnok’s mother, Sprattleharsh declares the standing with the points: Ragnok with 12 points, Ratpainter with 16 points, and Broodadoo with 8 points, and leads them back to the cave for the final dare, with Broodadoo crying about his lack of points the whole way.
Back in the cave, the air is filled with the smell of rotten meat and spoiled milk. As they come to a depression in the floor that is being filled with a not-quite-boiling hot slurry of spoiled milk, mud, swamp water, mashed-up grass, and dead birds, covered in a flaky crust, Wise Mummy begins to explain the rules: “This dare is called ‘Escape from the Bird Pie’. You will be bound and stuffed into this pie with four birds. Points will go to whoever escapes the quickest, as well as whoever kills the most birds.” Suddenly it dawns on them all that they are called Birdcrunchers because they almost exclusively eat birds, as they are bound at the hand and foot and slipped into the pie with four eagles. Wise Mummy throws down her final thunderstone to mark the beginning of the challenge, and the goblin crowd cheers! Ragnok and Ratpainter struggle with their bindings as the angry birds lash out with their talons, and Broodadoo makes big energy stick appear out of nowhere, crushing an eagle in half. They start to feel themselves cooking and Ragnok is really inspired to get out of this pie, driving him to break his bonds and jump out, scoring him ten points as the first to escape. Ratpainter opens his mouth to scream but it fills with the burning hot pie filling. Broodadoo rips an eagle’s head off with his magic bat, and the spectators hear a gurgle as Broodadoo lets out a battle scream. Ragnok runs around to Broodadoo’s side of the pie to kill an eagle to even the odds, slashing through the flaky crust and hearing a satisfying gurgle of a squawk. The remaining eagle flails in heated desperation at Broodadoo, and he strikes it down with a slosh. Ratpainter and Broodadoo continue to struggle in their bounds, and Ragnok sets the crust on fire, much to the glee of the onlookers, and takes a full-round action to fan the flames as he waits for the other chieftains-in-waiting to escape. They are certainly taking their sweet time. Broodadoo and Ratpainter continue to struggle with their bindings. They really did them tight. Like, really tight. They continue struggling. This is probably how they die, being slowly baked into a pie. They struggle some more. Ragnok tries a taste of the crust, which mostly tastes like birds. Ratpainter and Broodadoo struggle harder while being baked alive. Finally, Broodadoo snaps the ropes and resolves to grab Ratpainter, but Ratpainter slips his bonds at almost the exact same time and moves out for the second-to-be-out-of-the-pie points, vomiting up the pie filling that went into his mouth during his screaming. Broodadoo follows him, getting out of the pie and punching Sprattleharsh, then grabs his goblin genitals and says “Bake this!” She wipes the pie filling off her face and gives a knowing grin. “The total points are: Ragnok with 22 points, Ratpainter with 21 points, and Broodadoo with 23 points. Congratulations, Chief Broodadoo.”
Cheers erupt from the crowd for a momentarily dumbfounded new chieftain, and Ratpainter whispers something to Broodadoo. Broodadoo names Ratpainter his trusted advisor, and names Ragnok the Titleless. Sprattleharsh hands him the Crunchy Crown, which he takes a bite out of as he dons it on his head. He then names Wise Mummy Sprattleharsh as Ms. Poopypants, and she tries to dip out before being insulted further, but they convince her that Ms. Poopypants is a title of high honor in the Licktoad tradition. Many of the goblins prostrate themselves before their newly appointed masters and kiss their feet, getting Broodadoo’s toes all moist with their runny noses and wet lips. Ratpainter suggests baking these gross goblins into the pie, as Bargle sets himself on fire and Mothmangler, the Birdcruncher skald, begins juggling live stoat for the new chieftain’s amusement, but isn’t very good at it and drops them into the hot pie. Diana the druid squeals at this and picks them out of the pie to be her new pets. Garf leads them to the previous chieftain’s chest, which of course is locked and no one has the key, but Ragnok picks the lock with ease, and Broodadoo picks out his potions, hands a wand to Ratpainter, and a dogslicer to Ragnok, keeping the rest for himself. Broodachief declares a feast be held in his honor, and they serve the pie that he was just baking alive in.
About the time that the pie is finished, they hear an unearthly howl that panics almost all of the goblins, except for Food, who is yawning at the time and confused as to why everyone is running around and cowering. Zagnut says, “****! We haven’t given tribute to Wingstomp in like a month! We’re doomed!” Broodadoo and Ratpainter give confused looks to one another as Ragnok, who recalls having heard of this beast, gives a knowing nod, and explains that it’s a creature that haunts the area which looks like a horse with giant bat wings, but stands on its hind legs and has vicious teeth and breaths smoke and fire. Normally, Zagnut says, they would drop trinkets and food down the pit that the beast inhabits, but they haven’t ventured out in so long that Wingstomp has grown unsatified. Broodadoo commands that they go and kill it, but they protest that its power is overwhelming, so Broodadoo picks up Diana to go out there with them and see what they see. On top of the ridge above the cave, they see the shadowy form of the horse, standing on two legs. Even as goblins, they can tell it’s definitely not from the material plane. Ratpainter stands his ground, emboldening his chief as Ragnok hides in the bushes. Ragnok shoots a flaming arrow that strikes it right where a horse’s heart usually is, but the flames don’t sear its flesh and it eats the arrow that sticks from its chest. Broodadoo fires a crystal, which shatters against it mostly ineffectively, and tries to climb up the ridge to get at it but doesn’t make much progress, and Ratpainter summons a positive energy elemental to fight for him. The winged horse pauses, then surrounds itself in a thick fog. Ragnok drags Diana in front of himself for protection, and from the fog a blinding flash comes, blinding Ragnok and Broodadoo. Gir, who has been by Ragnok’s side the whole time, is telepathically directed by Ragnok to offer Diana up as sacrifice, and attacks Diana. Ragnok, smelling her blood as it is spilled, swings his dogslicers at her and knocks her unconscious. Their sacrifice prepared, the group runs away into the shrubbery to either wait and watch or ambush. From the fog cloud, the winged horse emerges and breathes a blast of fire onto Diana, turning her into a crispy critter, and takes her up into its mouth to fly away. Thoroughly intimidated, they each blame the other two for Diana’s death and decide to let it leave, making note to give Wingstomp tribute on a more regular basis. Broodadoo then declares it to be bedtime, and resolves to “kill” an ogre the next day.

The part where two of them were trapped in the pie was pretty hilarious, despite dragging out for a while.
“Wingstomp” is my attempt at introducing a BBEG before the point where they could actually defeat it to give them a goal to work towards (they have so many now). I didn’t actually intend to introduce it till later on, but it felt like night-time was the right time. Unfortunately, it would have been a one-hit TPK if the creature had engaged them, and I hadn’t read up on its abilities beforehand to play up the mysterious nature of it.
They’ve been plotting to talk to the ogre rather than driving it off or killing it, so we’ll see how that goes. They all have fairly poor diplomacy.

oshi
2015-11-24, 01:23 AM
Session Five: "We get points in perilous pie! When did horses learn to fly?!"
*snip*


I am suspicious of your accounting as described... Was that point distribution completely arbitrary?

neversterling
2015-11-24, 03:34 PM
I am suspicious of your accounting as described... Was that point distribution completely arbitrary?

****, guys, I'm being audited.

I distributed points according to the We Be Goblins Too! Module, with slight modifications. To break it out, the blind bird shoot gets successively harder because the birds are being released further away, with more points being given to later shots: 2 then 4 then 6; so Broodadoo hit the first two, Ragnok hit the first and last, and Ratpainter hit the last two.

On the Stirge Swamp Stomp, killing a stirge got you 1 point, killing it with a boot got you 2, and being last goblin standing got you 5. Broodadoo killed one with a boot kick, Ragnok killed 2 with kukris and 1 with boots, and Ratpainter killed three with a flame sphere and sickle, and ended up being the last goblin standing.

In the Pie: it was 5 points for every eagle killed as long as you were still in the pie, 10 points to be the first out, and 5 points to be the second out.

Now that I'm reading back on it, I definitely did some goblin accounting there, only giving Ratpainter 3 points for being the last goblin standing in the Stirge Swamp Stomp. That may have been a last-minute decision I made in-session. What will happen when Ratpainter learns of this material misstatement? Will there be an adverse opinion? Find out on the next We Be Best Goblins!!!

oshi
2015-11-24, 09:11 PM
In the Pie: it was 5 points for every eagle killed as long as you were still in the pie, 10 points to be the first out, and 5 points to be the second out.

That was the part I mostly twigged on, didn't occur to me that they might not get any points once they were out :p.

I was actually just curious, I thought it would be a super goblin-y thing to do, having a big flashy competition but scoring it completely arbitrarily (Or by the whims of a smarter goblin looking for a specific outcome...).

neversterling
2016-01-01, 06:12 PM
Session 6: “Dares are done, Diana’s burned, now it’s time for ogre’s turn! Go on secret diplomatic mission, unite our tribes if he’ll listen! Or burn his home and kill everything.”

Super Duper Chief Deluxe with Cheese Broodadoo: The technicolor “blue” that randomly changes colors every day and leads a doomed tribe of miscreants, Broodadoo!

Mossssssssssssssssst Trussssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssted Advissssssssssssssssor Ratpainter: Ratpainter’s player actually says his full title exactly like this.

Ragnok the Title-less: And he’s really upset about it!

The dare audit revealed that I had lowered the point value to be last goblin standing in the Stirge Swamp Stomp to 3 points from 5 without making a note of it, and had I not done that Ratpainter would have tied with Broodadoo. Broodadoo asserted that he would beat up Ratpainter if that happened, and Ratpainter agreed, so it would have been the same result.

Early the next morning, at 2 PM, the goblins are awakened by Ms. Poopypants who reminds them of their chiefly duties to go get rid of the menace of the ogre Pa Munchmeat, finally fully informing them of the dangers involved: He has fire-breathing pigs at his command, as well as a daughter with a pet giant weasel, among presumably other creatures that he surrounds himself with. He casts creepy plant spells, like Ratpainter, and has a mystical armor that covers his whole body, like Broodadoo, and has a fiery spear to make goblin shish kabobs. Poopypants hands them a rudimentary map to remind them of the general direction of where to go to get to this place, and tells them not to bother returning until they have completed their task. Super Duper Chief Deluxe with Cheese Broodadoo gets uppity, not appreciating her threatening tone given his high status, but they leave grumbling threats and start their secret plot of turning this trip into a diplomatic mission to convince the ogre to join their tribe.
They make the journey stealthily, taking twice as long to cover the distance, eventually reaching a rather ominous portion of wilderness that the GM had drawn down on the mat. They begin arguing amongst themselves, giving each other new titles, finally Broodadoo says, “You’re both ‘who gives a ****’! Shut up, ‘who gives a ****’!” and ‘who gives a ****’ Ragnok stabs him. Broodadoo commands ‘who gives a ****’ Ratpainter to heal him, and their diplomatic mission is off to a great start. Ratpainter erroneously calls Gir a dog and almost gets stabbed herself. Incredibly, they aren’t ambushed during their in-fighting. Crawling through the terrain carefully after the arguing has settled down, Ratpainter’s ears perk up as she hears an animal rooting around in the underbrush, and spots a boar in leather barding about 60 feet off. The gang drops behind a big rock and begins to strategize. Broodadoo puts on his big suit, and Ragnok positions himself to intercept the boar when it runs at the party, calling the shots on how they will take down this boar which is clearly straight out of Dark Souls, while Ratpainter screams, “Don’t tell me what to do!”, and throws a glob of fire at the boar. The boar runs forth, but gets intercepted by Ragnok, getting burned by his flaming dogslicer and hurt badly, and the boar belches a mouthful of fire at Ragnok and Gir. Mostly Gir. Broodadoo moves behind the boar and wallops him good, setting the Boar reeling in pain, barely remaining standing. Ratpainter sets some nearby bushes on fire, clearly on purpose. Gir grabs one of the piggy’s piggy feet in his mouth and brings it to the ground, and Ragnok puts both dogslicers through the boar’s throat, killing it instantly. They jump up and high five each other, and begin debating how to best do this diplomatic mission while also fitting the ogre’s dead pet’s armor on Gir and chomping on some bacon. Broodadoo raises concerns, but is assuaged by his companions. They eat some of the boar and hide the rest for later, convinced that pork lasts forever.
The GM spends the next 15 minutes drawing the next map and the goblins make fun of him and themselves as he does this, as well as talk about Brendan Fraser movies. Finally they arrive at a valley with a stream meandering through it, surrounded by a palisade with a two-story stilted house in the center standing 9 feet off the ground with a coop on the roof. An overturned boat makes up part of the palisade, and they spot several outbuildings from their high position. The maggot-infested heads of three goblins are on pikes at the obvious entrance of the place, with some writing that is indecipherable to even Ratpainter, the only one that has the secret and dangerous ability to read.
They stealth into the place and look around, and can smell all sorts of animals, as if they were on a farm; Ratpainter hears chicken clucks, a low growl from under the house among the stilts, and oinks from the boat. Ragnok approaches the house while Gir stays behind, but stops as he’s crossing the bridge over the stream as he spots what appears to be a bear with the face of a bird in the enclosure formed by the log-sized beams stilting up the house. He tries to make a signal to the others indicating danger but they interpret it to be an intimidation attempt. Broodadoo and Ratpainter approach the boat instead, spotting a corpulent boar near the open hole in the side of the boat. Ratpainter coaxes it out with her “empathy” for animals, oinking and grunting back and forth with it, and gives it a vulture-up which it quickly consumes. Broodadoo heads into the boat to explore and finds a familiar looking squealy pig who has been chained up. It’s Squealy Nord, the Licktoad pig! Broodadoo breaks the chains, picks him up like a little baby, and puts him in his backpack with his head sticking out in the cutest image possible, and then picks up a couple of gourds of fire burping that had rolled into the straw of the boar’s bedding. Ratpainter takes out her drawing book to paint the boar, and the boar starts to eat the pages. Broodadoo spots the owlbear under the house as he heads around the boat towards the sound of chickens in the buildings behind the house, not thinking much of it as long as it was paying attention to Ragnok. Ragnok steps toward the owlbear and sees it react with its muscles tensing. The fat pig begins eating Ratpainter’s clothes. Broodadoo tosses a weird skull he’s been carrying around at the pig to distract it with more food as he and Ratpainter head across one of the bridges and pull up the planks behind them, and they finally see the entrance to the house proper: a steep plank propped up by more stilts against the back of the house leading up to a door. The sound of a dog behind one of the chicken coops becomes obvious to Ratpainter’s enormous ears as Broodadoo is disassembling the bridge, and she goes over to coax the dog into being her friend but doesn’t appear to be making headway, as the dog growls at her. Finishing up, Broodadoo comes around to the other side of the coop just as Ratpainter decides to cut the uncooperative dog’s throat with her sickle, crying out, “You will follow Ratpainter! Die foul beast!” At the same time, Ragnok fires a fiery arrow at the owlbear through the beams, striking it high and deep in the chest and singing its fur, and it rushes out of its enclosure and reaches Ragnok at the same time that Gir does. Gir draws attention by biting the owlbear’s leg as Ragnok rolls around the beast, pulling out his dogslicers, jumping up and striking it in the neck with both weapons and bringing down hard. Meanwhile, the dog bites deeply into Ratpainter’s leg and drags her down into the mud. The chickens are going crazy with all of this fighting as Broodadoo swings wildly at the canine and Ragnok attacks it from the ground and rolls away. Squealy Nord poops in Broodadoo’s bag as the dog gets a large chunk of goblin chief in its mouth. Ragnok rushes over to help, quickly mounting Gir and reaching the others just as Broodadoo misses again and tries to put himself in a more advantageous position, getting bitten again in the process. Squealy Nord takes the opportunity to bite back as the dog gets near, and Ratpainter finds her feet under her, finally ending it by cutting the dog open. Broodadoo demands healing services from Ratpainter, and Ragnok heads over to a shed covered in vines and sees the pig with a voracious appetite starting on the corpse of the owlbear. He licks his toad and begins to see auras, seeing a green aura emanating around the shed. Heading inside, the place is chock full of this aura, which seems to be coming from the vines that have completely claimed this building. The place has the workings of a magical laboratory with discarded materials used in the craft strewn about. In a cabinet, a muffled red aura catches his eye and he cuts away the vines to find two more gourds of fire burping, and he rejoins the others at the ramp up to the door.
Upon entering, they notice four things: A trap door in the floor, a door to the right, a distinct lack of stairs to the upper floor, and a giant weasel laying on some furs in the corner. Gir and Ragnok rush in and slash at it twice, knocking it unconscious. Broodadoo binds the weasel with Squealy Nord’s leftover chains, and instructs Ratpainter to stabilize the animal so they have a bargaining chip. Ratpainter pats at its wounds ineffectually and Broodadoo tries stabilizing the beast himself until Ratpainter gets her act together. Just then, a part-ogre female opens the door to the next room, exclaiming incredulity and surprise in an unknown language. Broodadoo says, “It’s still alive!” as she reaches for her morningstar. Ratpainter cries out “You shall now face the wrath of Ratpainter!!!” and unleashes a storm burst into the room. It manifests as a little bit of a fart in the distance between her and her target, and Broodadoo screams “I will kill you and your pet if you do not stand down! We only wish to treat with you and your father!” Ragnok prepares to kill her if she approaches, but she lets out a familial call in a monstrous language and runs out the front door. Still hoping for diplomacy, Broodadoo hefts the weasel over his shoulder and heads after her, but finds the door being held shut. Ratpainter looks to make a killing blow on the weasel, but is intimidated enough by his chief that he decides not to, and instead opens the trap door and jumps down into the owlbear’s nest to see through the stilts and boards the lady ogrekin’s feet at the top of the ramp in front of the door, as well as several large eggs nearby. Ragnok hides in a corner, hearing very heavy footsteps from above. The ogrekin makes a run for slanted beams that access the rudimentary patio on the second floor, while Broodadoo follows, climbing with care where she looked like a natural. Ragnok inspects the room that the ogrekin maiden came from, spotting a headless goblin in fancy black leather armor that has an aura to it, and nabs it before leaving the room. The ogrekin disappears into a large opening on the second floor and begins relaying what information she has to her father, Pa Munchmeat. Ratpainter begins a summoning benath the house, twenty feet below, and Broodadoo rounds a corner to see an ogre and his daughter conversing in the Pa’s room connected to the patio. He sets the weasel down gently and says in common, “Uh, was wondering…Um, uh, the three of us did not mean any harm when we came here. We were sent here by the Birdcrunchers to kill you - We have no wish to do that! We desperately wish to parley with you in the hopes that we can form a strong, unified tribe!” Broodadoo says a prayer out loud to Venkelvore, and gets a 9 his Diplomacy roll. “I didn’t kill your weasel, we didn’t kill anything that didn’t attack us, and your delicious, beautiful pig is still safe!” The ogre and his ogrekin daughter share words while Ragnok is making his way the second floor patio, and she says to Broodadoo in common, “We’re going to feed you to our pigs. And then I’m going to sew your fat, gorgeous head to my doll!” Broodadoo screams back, “I’m going to rape and murder both of you. I don’t care anymore. I’m going to hereby resign as goblin chief. I give the title to no one. I will dissolve the f^#&ing Birdcruncher tribe to nothingness! I will salt every field I come to! I will BURN and MURDER EVERYTHING! FOR I BE BEST GOBLIN!”
The ogrekin broad steps up to Broodadoo and makes a bodyblow with rib-crushing force, while Pa Munchmeat steps back and begins a spell. Suddenly, a gang of stirges appear out of thin air to attack the ogre family as Ratpainter’s summon spell goes off. One falls to the lady Munchmeat’s morningstar, while another attaches itself to Pa and begins draining him. Ratpainter then begins lighting the house on fire by spawning a flaming sphere and having it jump up through the trap door and start rolling around on the first floor. Broodadoo puts all of his energy into his swing against the Munchmeat wench, but misses, and his mindblade mysteriously disappears as it connects with the floor. Ragnok and Gir, almost within striking distance, charge around the lady to hit the ogre, but they bounce off his comprehensive armor. Squealy Nord begins squealing wildly and tries to bite Pa’s daughter, but she skirts away with fancy footwork. Broodadoo does the same when she attempts to bite him, but not before getting hit again with another blow from the Morningstar. Pa Munchmeat’s spell completes, and Broodadoo and Squealy Nord find themselves covered in hundreds of swarming piglets, while Pa steps back to try to stick Gir and Ragnok with his flaming spear. A stirge sets its teeth on the ogrekin and starts to drain her while Ratpainter rolls his flaming sphere around in the room above him and grabs some owlbear eggs in preparation to leave. Broodadoo breaks off a fire bead from his necklace and chucks it into the corner, blasting the female who quickly covers her face with rags and dispersing the swarm of piglets, as well as incinerating a stirge. Squealy Nord takes the opportunity to bite her while she’s distracted, and Ragnok finally connects a solid blow with his flaming dogslicer, only to find that flames do not harm the ogre. The ogrekin smacks Squealy Nord a good one and steps backward to protect her father, while he smashes the bug that is attached to him and tries to stab Ragnok, who kicks dirt into his eyes and dodges deftly, cursing the giant. Ratpainter squeezes through the stilts forming the owlbear’s enclosure but finds himself floundering in the stream, having completed his task of setting the first floor on fire. Broodadoo breaks out a bead of force and smashes it into the floor between the ogrekin lass and Pa, knocking his daughter unconscious with tremendous force. With the woman out of the way, Squealy Nord charges at the ogre and bites down hard on his toes, barely piercing the armor. Ragnok sinks his flaming dogslicer back into a more lightly protected spot on the ogre, and the ogre steps back and strikes at the worg, knocking the mounted warrior and his mount back. Ratpainter discovers how to swim and reaches the other side of the stagnant stream, making his way up to the second floor patio via the slanted beams, while the fire starts to come up from the floor below and take over the room, but luckily everyone avoids getting burned. Broodadoo runs up and slides into a flank with Ragnok, while brandishing a wakizashi he obtained from a skeleton and clinking it off of the ogre’s very protected body, and Squealy Nord bites even harder on the ogre’s enormous toes. Ragnok swings twice, but the blades slide right off the ogre without hurting. The ogre responds with his own pair of drunken misses with his spear. Ratpainter reaches the room to find the floor on fire in large patches as it comes up from the floor below, and screams, “Ratpainter will paint with your blood!” charging at the ogre, and Ratpainter’s sickle just plinks off of him. Then Broodadoo, in a stroke of genius, turns his attack to the fire-weakened boards of the floor under the ogre’s feet, and smashes through them with the wakizashi, knocking the ogre into the completely fire-engulfed floor below, where he breaks through the next floor as well into the owlbear’s nest beneath the house, almost smashing the remaining eggs. Broodadoo jumps after him and lands on top of him, again trying to pierce his armor with the force of the fall behind it, but finds it unyielding. Ratpainter yells down, “Do you like Ratpainter’s home improvements!? Ahahahahahaha!!” Ragnok jumps off Gir and into the hole where they land softly next to the prone ogre, but Ragnok finds himself fumbling with his weapons and doesn’t manage to land a hit. The ogre, finding himself at a disadvantage, tries to turn into a bat to run away, but Broodadoo and Ragnok find the bat much less intimidating and cut it out of the air as it tries to get away, killing the transformed ogre immediately. Broodadoo shouts up to Ratpainter, “Kill the daughter!” and grabs everything the ogre has of value, including his head from his shoulders, while Ragnok snatches up the rest of the owlbear’s eggs before they high-tail it out of the nest made of kindling, with the large dismembered body in tow. Ratpainter grabs some gold off the bed and an explosion goes off in the room, burning her eyebrows off and convincing her not to stick around for long. Squealy Nord follows her. They decide to bring back as much as they can carry as trophies and food, and set up a food-on-a-string-attached-to-a-stick routine with the corpulent boar using Food(Broodadoo’s toad) and make their way back, picking up the corpse of the first boar they encountered along the way.
All of the goblins in the Birdcruncher tribe are very surprised to see three totally-not-dead goblins return that night dragging lots of food and other junk behind them. Ms. Poopypants congratulates them during the “gobligatory” celebration, at which point Broodadoo announces, “I now pronounce this tribe: dispersed!” Everyone cheers and starts calling themselves Dispersed instead of Birdcrunchers, and the leaders of The Dispersed reflect on their journey becoming heroes of an unfortunate group of craven losers.

Broodadoo’s player had thought (erroneously) that the mind blade went away when he expended his psionic focus, which is why he switched to the wakizashi in the big fight.
I gave Pa Munchmeat gestalt levels in the War Hulk Aegis archetype, because I thought it was flavorful since ogres are subtypes of giants and this guy was supposed to be a weirdo. So why not psionic? This raised his AC an unfortunate amount (to 23), raised his HP by about 20 with the free toughness feat and +2 enhancement bonus to CON from the astral suit, granted him DR 3/-, and had the potential to increase his damage output if I had gone that way, which is why I added the drunk template to tone it down a notch. I realize now that if I hadn’t raised his resiliency so much, the fight would have lasted two rounds at best, since Ragnok regularly dishes out 20-35 with Swift Claws, Flick of the Wrist, Strength of Hell, and regular full attacks in Outer Sphere Stance. However, leveling up a multiclassed tri-initiator (Warder, Harbinger, and Vigilante Stalker) is taking a toll on the player’s sanity, and he’ll be rebuilding Ragnok to be more easily manageable, probably Dervish Defender Hawkguard Warder//Vizier(Path of the Seer) for some passive bonuses and action economy hacks.

neversterling
2016-02-28, 06:21 PM
Session 7: "Finally leaders of our band! We gather force to conquer land! Strong warriors and crafters too, We be goblins and rulers true!"


Ratpainter’s new song:
Ragnok strong but he be weak,
Ratpainter strangle him till he squeak,
Never trust such a lowly miser,
Ratpainter most trusted advisor!
Chieftan super deluxe with cheese,
He be the last that Ratpainter squeeze,
Stab him, bite him in his sleep,
Then slink away without a peep.
All other goblins will die and fall,
Ratpainter best goblin of all!

We did some rebuilding of the PCs, since there was some complaining of an overabundance of ability tracking. Ragnok took several hours to level up, so decided having 3 initiating classes learning and trading out maneuvers wasn't working out, and Ratpainter was feeling like martial maneuvers didn't reflect his non-combatant character well, so Ragnok is now a Dervish Defender Hawkguard Warder//Vizier(Path of the Seer) and Ratpainter is a UnRogue//Druid who has Squealy Nord as a companion, dropping his domain. Broodadoo takes his first level in Metaforge as well as Brutal Slayer Stalker.
Previously, on We Be Best Goblins!
Broodadoo and Ragnok set off to The Artificer’s house to extend a formal invitation to the little guy, with Chief Broodadoo repeatedly referring to him as Art, so it’s canon now. Ratpainter stays behind to bond with Squealy Nord and unwind with some painting. They spend the trip trying to come up with other names for their tribe, temporarily settling on “Best Cheese” as they approach Art’s house and notice a hang-glider on the roof. Broodadoo opens the door – or tries to anyway, as the doorknob falls off in his hand and a chute appears beneath his feet, and he falls into a familiar room without any doors. Ragnok narrowly escapes the chute trap, and instead breaks into the house through a rear window. The room is just as clean and barely-used as he remembered it the first time, and he heads downstairs, where he sees a blue goblin speaking into a grate. Art is surprised, and apologizes for the trap shenanigans. Broodadoo takes the opportunity, after being let out of the chute-drop room, to invite him into their tribe, where he could sell his wares and not have to have chute traps everywhere. The chief then notices a bit of chainmail being worked on and Art identifies the metal as Oricalum, a light metal that has curious properties in relation to electricity when forged properly. Broodadoo then drops his enormous sack and opens it up to start handing things to Art, various treasures from longshanks that don’t quite fit goblin bodies, so that he might make use of them as a trade for future services. Art points out that he’ll have to move all this stuff over, so they can help him move, and he points to a shelf with 50 potions on it where Ragnok can start. They make a slow, almost-overburdened trip back to the village and arrive at just the same time as Art does on his hang-glider, sweeping in with flair.
As his first edict when he gets back, Broodadoo demands a Dare Hall be erected for all future dares to be placed, so long as they’re inside-dares. The gang then sets up Art as their advisor on magics and artifice, and begin brainstorming on their gobligations of feeding their huddled masses and aspiring armies. Broodadoo proposes a raid on a local farm to gather food, while Ragnok counterpoints that they could arrange a protection/extortion racket against a farm, to trick the longshanks into 'framing' for them and giving them half their food. In between brushstrokes, Ratpainter says they should just kill everything(including subjects), problem solved. Broodadoo favors Ragnok's plan, and drags his fingers through Ratpainter's painting in a show of disapproval. Ratpainter promises to watch over Broodadoo in his sleep tonight in her totally-not-going-to-kill-you voice, and takes a walk to get away from the bullies. She turns into an eagle to fly around for a bit, spotting a 'frame' somewhat away from the others, as well as a wagon camp relatively near their cave with a fire burning and several humanoids and animals. Figuring this information would be well rewarded by the Chief, she returns to find him sleeping, and quivers with excitement as she hovers over his bed, drawing her sickle. The literal breathing on his neck wakes a perturbed Broodadoo, and the super-creepy Ratpainter decides to tell him of her findings. Upon hearing this, Ragnok suggests they might be bandits whose elimination would help them work their protection angle on the frames. They head towards the camp the next day, and put both Art and Ms. Poopypants in charge, figuring the two definitely wouldn't collaborate on a coup against their new leaders.
They arrive at the camp in a clearing at the edge of a forest to find several mongrel half-breed humanoids and a bobcat gathered around a fire, several hungry dogs chewing bones, and a couple horses tethered to a tree. Ragnok with Gir and Ratpainter with Squealy Nord wait in the undergrowth while Broodadoo, clearly visible, saunters up, saying "Uh, p-parley, gentlemen! I've come to parley with you!"
One of the longshanks, looking like an orc crossed with something from a nightmare, walks up, strapping on his shield for trouble. "What the hell? What’s a goblin doing here?"
"That's a stupid question, this is goblin country" says the lone human of the group.
"I mean you no harm, I only wish to talk", Broodadoo says as the rag-tag campers slowly steel themselves and form a semicircle about 50 feet from him.
"I don't like the way you seem to be surrounding me. Stop doing that."
He whispers into the overgrowth, "Assist me, Ratpainter! This seems to be going poorly!"
Ratpainter steps out, surprising the group, but attempting to assuage the situation. "Another one! Where there's two, there's twenty, look out for more!" Says a troll-blooded longshanks, when a short reptilian-orc cries out, "Look at that belt the little one's wearing! That's the boss's belt!" Pregnant pause. "Kill them!" Shouts trollblood.
Protective of her gender-swapping belt, Ratpainter cries out, "Nobody kills Ratpainter! Ratpainter kills all of you!", as she puts up a 3-foot tall defensive wall between the the two groups and strides back into the forest. Broodadoo dives behind the wall for cover while willing an extra-long blade into existence. The orc-nightmare runs up to stab the chief behind the wall, getting sliced in the process and failing to do really anything, while the orc-reptile commands his bobcat to go the long way around while he puts up some goblin defenses with a spell. Trollblood shouts out, “Use your tactics, dummies!” to which Broodadoo responds, “Kill that one first!”
Ragnok obliges by emerging from the overgrowth mounted atop Gir and firing off three darts of force, one to kill a dog and two of which hit trollblood in the neck, and he falls. The humie runs up to take a swing at Ragnok, hitting air, as the dogs go on the attack to surround Broodadoo on the other side of the wall. From beneath a tree on a low hill about a hundred feet away, a single arrow flies into the fray, knocking the mind weapon from his hand, and the figure of a tall, stocky dark elf can be seen from the direction of the attack.
On the opposite end of the battlefield, Ratpainter manifests a flaming sphere to engulf the human, just as Squealy Nord enters the fray to lock himself in animal combat with the bobcat, while Broodadoo creates a new weapon and slashes both dogs in twain with a single stroke. Ragnok almost gets bit by the ork-obold, but dips low in the saddle and escapes his attackers, killing the human as he leaves, and getting grazed by an arrow for getting closer to the archer who calls out for his employer. Ratpainter starts chucking balls of fire at everything he can see through the trees while he redirects his flaming sphere, laughing maniacally. The nightmare orc breathes a bit of hate at Broodadoo that hurts his feelings, so he hops the wall and slices off the nightmare’s still-hissing head, saying, “I said I wanted to parley!”
The orc-asaur tries to help out his bobcat, who seems to be in trouble fighting the pig, and Ragnok charges the archer, with Gir dragging him to the ground. A dark pulse of energy comes from the archer as he gets up off the ground, throwing Ragnok off his game, and a well-built, ogre-orc-looking longshanks carrying a club the size of a young tree emerges from the large tent at the rear of the camp, shouting “What is this? What’s going on here?!” to which Broodadoo responds, “You fools! I said parley! Now look what you did!”
Ratpainter chucks a glob of flame at the apparent commander and sets his flaming sphere on the cat, who falls unconscious from the severe burns. Separated from the orc-ogre by the alarmed and restrained horses, Broodadoo takes what he can get and brings down one of the horses. Ragnok tries to slice up the elven archer, but gets his dogslicer shot from his hand. The archer takes a gamble to cast a spell and break away, but finally gets knocked unconscious by Ragnok who takes advantage of the opening. The ogreblood walks around the remaining horse, picking up a rock and chucking it at Broodadoo, bonking him on the nose. Broodadoo is non-too-pleased, and gives the leader of the campers a swift blow to the head that rips his helmet off and knocks him unconscious. Ragnok goes to help Squealy Nord, who is quite handily taking on the orc-reptile with the cat out of the way. Broodadoo, still incensed, gets kicked by the horse as he starts butchering it. A moment later and nary a one of the mongrel campers is left standing.
Ratpainter emerges from the forest and starts slicing throats, ostensibly to get ‘paint’ for his sketch of the bobcat. Ragnok searches bodies and finds a healing wand with a bit of magic left to it, and Broodadoo commands that the remaining living be bound and stabilized. Of those that hadn’t been finished by Ratpainter, there were two still breathing: the tall dark elf and the ogre-orc leader. Ratpainter spends the last bit of magic from the wand at Broodadoo’s behest to try to revive the two, but only the leader comes to. He wakes with a grunt.
“Hrgh. What do you want, goblins?”
Broodadoo leads: “I only wished to parley. Now look what happened because you didn’t listen. Your horses are dead, and now we have all your wagon-things.”
“Pssht. They’re not mine. And I was sleeping, I just saw you attacking us.”
It dawns on Ragnok that these were Sczarni bandits, local outlaws that occasionally make raids of travelers much like goblins, but very rarely cooperatively. He begins to converse in Goblin, which the half-ogre doesn’t seem to understand. “Do you think we should extend an invitation to this guy? He’s big and strong and intimidating; we could bring him along so that more people take us seriously.”
“A cunning plan, Ragnok” responds Super Deluxe Chieftain with Cheese Broodadoo, who extends his invitation to the big guy. “We would like to give you a position of some power in our new tribe, The Dispersed. We intend to unify the more monstrous variety of humanoids under our leadership. You would be beholden and subordinate to us, and renounce your allegiance to your old leadership. However, if you do well, this arrangement could be very rewarding to you. If you refuse or turn on us, we’ll kill you of course.”
The orc-ogre mulls over this. “Interesting offer. Allegiance or death, huh? I guess I’ll have to go with allegiance. Name’s Rommel.”
Broodadoo grins broadly. “Well met, Rommel! Finally: a proper parley! What about your friend here? Do you think he’ll be as amiable to this arrangement as you?”
Rommel shrugs, “Probably. He seems alright.”
The gang lashes the covered wagons together and, by the power vested in Broodadoo by the heavyload belt and muleback cords, he drags them both back to the cave. On the way, Rommel comments to Ratpainter: “Nice belt. My old boss’s boss is looking for one just like it that was stolen on the road before it arrived in Sandpoint.”
Ragnok overhears, asking “Who was this person that was looking for this belt?”
“One of the heads of the Sczarni in Sandpoint, name of Jamie” Rommel answers.
When they arrive, they find the cave has been split between east and west: Those that follow Ms. Poopypants Sprattleharsh and those that have become endeared with Art’s potion prowess and harmless demeanor. Construction has begun by Ms. Poopypants’ side to divide the cave with a wall, and Broodadoo is unamused by this diversion of resources away from the Dare Hall he requested be built. A forced mediation is demanded by the Chieftain, bringing forth Art and Ms. Poopypants. Poopypants refuses any conversation with the Blue, but listens to Ragnok, who relaxes her with promises of placing her into a position of power, which she can leverage to keep an eye on her rival since she evidently can’t be convinced to trust him. She agrees to disband her Anti-Arf the Fisher group, on the condition that he not be allowed alone with the goblin women, lest his psionic taint be spread. Art’s reaction to the demands are a wee bit incoherent. “No women? I’m not…I mean…that’s not…I don’t think that’s…How would I…”
Broodadoo whispers consolations in Elven, “Hey, it’s fine, we’ll get you tons of girls, be cool.” Broodadoo agrees on behalf of Art to Ms. Poopypants demands, and Art is free to ply his wares to 50% of the cave’s population(and the other 50% under observation), with Ms. Poopypants assuming an official position as the enforcer of goblin safety.

And that was session seven of We Be Best Goblins!
The combat featured prominent use of Bloodforge races, as well as 3 ACG hybrid classes, for the curious.