My take on Hobgoblins (3.5)

[Harperfan7]

So, it's exactly what it sounds like. I'll probably end up doing one of these for all the MM humanoid races, including humans.

Hobgoblins

HOBGOBLIN CHARACTERS
Hobgoblin characters possess the following racial traits.
+2 Constitution, -1 to will saves. Hobgoblins are disciplined and punished harshly since birth by a highly dominating society, developing healthy enduring bodies but lacking personal willpower and the mental ability to block influence. A hobgoblin instinctively follows commands and orders.
A hobgoblin’s base land speed is 30 feet.
+4 racial bonus on Move Silently checks.
+3 to Grapple checks
+2 to all Art of War checks (Bull Rush, Disarm, Feint, Overrun, Parry, Sunder, & Trip)
+2 vs. all Art of War checks (Bull Rush, Disarm, Feint, Overrun, Sunder, & Trip)
+2 to Knowledge (architecture & Engineering) & Proffession (Seige Engineer) checks
Any hobgoblin who is adjacent to an ally hobgoblin gains a +1 shield bonus to AC against melee attacks.
Automatic Languages: Common, Goblin. Bonus Languages: Draconic, Dwarven, Infernal, Giant, Orc.

Half-hobgoblin
+2 Wis, -2 Cha. Half-hobgoblins are looked down upon and ignored by their parent races and thus have weaker personalities, but develop greater self-control and perception by learning for and teaching themselves. They tend to say little and listen much.
A hobgoblin’s base land speed is 30 feet.
+2 racial bonus on Move Silently checks.
+2 on all endurance checks.
+2 to Concentration checks.
+2 to Grapple checks
+2 to all Art of War checks (Bull Rush, Disarm, Feint, Overrun, Parry, Sunder, & Trip)
+2 vs. all Art of War checks (Bull Rush, Disarm, Feint, Overrun, Sunder, & Trip)
+2 to Knowledge (architecture & Engineering) & Proffession (Seige Engineer) checks
Any hobgoblin who is adjacent to an ally hobgoblin gains a +1 shield bonus to AC against melee attacks.
Automatic Languages: Common, Goblin. Bonus Languages: Draconic, Dwarven, Infernal, Giant, Orc.

Hobgoblins are a conquering race that inhabit areas that used to be occupied by other races, usually a receding tide of humans. Hobgoblins live wherever they find suitable defensible dwellings. They add superficial fortifications and dwellings onto a base structure that they cannot replicate, though some powerful hobgoblins tribes and nations use slaves to build fortresses and cities that they design, and these fortresses and cities are often of higher structural quality than the majority built by humans. Some of the largest and strongest fortresses in the world are in (or bordering) hobgoblin lands. Any hobgoblin leader would go to great lengths to own a dwarven fortress. Hobgoblins living near water often pirate and raid from fortified battle-ships with siege weaponry (their ships tend to be very large, often with wide platforms, but aren‘t quite seaworthy.

They exist in tribes which occasionally, under the right leadership, form into small (but very strong) kingdoms. They raid the communities of other races (and their own) for slaves, whom they use for menial labor, agriculture, crafting, animal handling, mining, battle fodder, and other miscellaneous (and often horrible) things. Hobgoblin society leans heavily on the use of slaves. Hobgoblins rely on other cultures for resources, as they lack the skill to make what they need (except for armor, drums, siege engines, and weapons), relying on their martial prowess to take what they need. Hobgoblins will sometimes trade with cultures they cannot dominate (yet) for things they cannot create or greatly desire (often fueling black markets in those cultures).

They are almost constantly skirmishing with orcs, whom they acknowledge as dangerous, but lack respect for. They are just as often at war with other hobgoblins, usually over territory, slaves, or some defensible location. They occasionally fight with dwarves, whom they regard as fierce and dangerous enemies, but can rarely defeat them on their home ground (which is where the vast majority of dwarf vs. hobgoblin battles take place). They rarely fight with elves, whom they have an almost fanatical hatred for, and will go far out of their way to kill when they catch wind of them (often meaning huge losses if in an elven forest). Hobgoblins consider killing an elf a great achievement, and many make trophies of the elves they have slain. If a hobgoblin is a ranger, they will almost surely pick elves as their favored enemy.

If a hobgoblin tribe is successful enough, they will breed their slaves to ensure a second generation. This sometimes means that whole generations of other races live and die as slaves to hobgoblins. Some hobgoblins hire themselves out as mercenaries to humans and other races. Most human leaders are loathe to go to war with hobgoblins, as such always leads to heavy battlefield losses.

Most hobgoblins are of the warrior class (usually with a focus on phalanx fighting), with siege engineers being experts. Many Hobgoblins are fighters, usually of the combat expertise feat tree. Hobgoblin leadership typically includes clerics of Maglubiyet (Hextor, with Trickery instead of Destruction), warmages, or marshalls, and often a triumvirate of the three, with evokers taking an advisory role. Hobgoblin adepts are almost always smiters* and serve in the same role as warmages. Hobgoblins have a strong tradition of ninja/monk hyrbids, although an individual hobgoblin may only have levels in one of the two. The highest regarded class of any hobgoblin, however, is the blackguard. Many champions and heroes of the race are blackguards.

Hobgoblin clerics and evokers have a strong relationship with barghests through the planar ally/binding spells, and the barghests are held in high regard in hobgoblin society, existing outside the usual hierarchy. Barghests often sponsor blackguards, and half-barghest hobgoblins are usually blackguards (half-fiend with the barghest ability to turn into a wolf instead of having wings). Hobgoblins usually feed low worth slaves to barghests in return for being called. Hobgoblin warbands under a barghest leader will usually ally with a pack of wargs.

Strong hobgoblin tribes or nations will sometimes breed small armies of skull crusher ogres for use as elite heavy infantry and shock troops, or, rarely, as heavy cavalry mounted on war elephants. Hobgoblins rarely ride horses, instead, they ride either dire wolves raised for battle, or wargs enlarged through a permanancied first level spell created by their evokers. Magic hobgoblin armor usually has the shadow and silent moves enchantments. Hobgoblins favor flails, tower shields, and armor spikes. The most common template for hobgoblins is half-fiend (barghest).

*The smiter is an adept variant from a third party book, "Ultimate NPCs". It's basically what you would get if you crossed an adept with a warmage.

[Jota]

I like this. I actually think this might be stronger than the SRD original (for those who can't be bothered to find it), which is LA 1, albeit a "designers' on crack" LA 1.

That said, the bonuses here really are numerous. Granted these checks don't come up all the time, but some of them have the potential to be significant early on. I do feel that you're sort of in limbo between non-LA and LA 1, but I cannot explicitly say that this is better than a human, strongheart halfling, or hill dwarf, and so on, so it's probably fine. I will say I think +1 on and against Art of War checks would still emphasize their military prowess with less movement on the RNG at lower levels, which is where most games are played. I think it'd be LA 0 either way, it's just +2 to all of those checks feels like a lot of numbers, you know?

Though by RAW they cannot stack, did you mean for a hobgoblin to be able to benefit from multiple allies via the adjacent ally shield bonus?

Also, side note concerning the above, I find it interesting you could swap hobgoblin for Spartan in a lot of respects. I guess I'm sort of saying that in some way a lot of these things feel like something absorbed through culture rather than something inherent in a race, though there's nothing necessarily wrong with that from a mechanics perspective.

Will also add that I didn't read the fluff, as I generally know what hobgoblins are about.

[Tyndmyr]

+0 is fine for this. It's decent enough that it might be attractive to some people, but I wouldn't hesitate to take a race that grants feats or a bonus to my favorite attribute over them.

[Harperfan7]

I like this. I actually think this might be stronger than the SRD original (for those who can't be bothered to find it), which is LA 1, albeit a "designers' on crack" LA 1.

That said, the bonuses here really are numerous. Granted these checks don't come up all the time, but some of them have the potential to be significant early on. I do feel that you're sort of in limbo between non-LA and LA 1, but I cannot explicitly say that this is better than a human, strongheart halfling, or hill dwarf, and so on, so it's probably fine. I will say I think +1 on and against Art of War checks would still emphasize their military prowess with less movement on the RNG at lower levels, which is where most games are played. I think it'd be LA 0 either way, it's just +2 to all of those checks feels like a lot of numbers, you know?

Though by RAW they cannot stack, did you mean for a hobgoblin to be able to benefit from multiple allies via the adjacent ally shield bonus?

Also, side note concerning the above, I find it interesting you could swap hobgoblin for Spartan in a lot of respects. I guess I'm sort of saying that in some way a lot of these things feel like something absorbed through culture rather than something inherent in a race, though there's nothing necessarily wrong with that from a mechanics perspective.

Will also add that I didn't read the fluff, as I generally know what hobgoblins are about.

I considered making them just +1 to all the art of war checks, but I didn't think it would be enough. The way it is, they are just as good as an orc with the same base strength on the strength ones.

Yeah, I know it looks like a lot, but as you said, they have to compete with humans.

They only get a +1 shield bonus, regardless of how many of them there are.

Except for the +4 on move silently, they are basically humans with a very dominant culture, and yeah, they're pretty much a race of spartans and it was intentional.

However, the fluff was the main reason I posted this. (you oughta read it!)

[Jota]

The fluff is pretty solid for the most part, although you don't really touch on the feudalistic/hierarchical aspect of their society that I had always thought was their most (or at the very least one of their most) distinctive feature(s).

[Harperfan7]

I figured heirarchial and lawful evil are a given match.

But I don't see them as feudalistic because their nations are basically big tribes and its rule by the strongest, not bloodline or anything. It's also pretty theological, as their culture lines up pretty well with Hextor's dogma.
(and how often does it come up in an adventure/campaign anyways?)

[KiwiImperator]

I like it, and it translates rather handily into Pathfinder as well! Much more interesting than the original Hobgoblins. Well done.

[Zexion]

I like this idea. Very fleshed out. Might want to add in a sample hobgoblin tribe.

[Eloel]

How do hobgoblins get a will save penalty, but half-hobbos get a will save bonus?

[imp_fireball]

The fluff is pretty solid for the most part, although you don't really touch on the feudalistic/hierarchical aspect of their society that I had always thought was their most (or at the very least one of their most) distinctive feature(s).

I always thought that was more of a human thing.

Since pretty much all of big human civilization is defined as going through 'feudal ages' at any point in time in real life, y'know (although I'm only thinking of Japan and Europe at the moment... most certainly it applies to others as well with obvious exceptions like ancient civs and brief empires like the mongolians - although even they may have been 'feudal').

[Harperfan7]

@KiwiImperator: Thank you, kind sir.

@Zexion: How so? Like under the "organization" part of the MM stat block?

@ozgun92: It's a cultural thing. Hobgoblins are raised a certain way, half-hobs have to raise themselves.

[Zexion]

Like, you know, the % of fighters/wizards/clerics/etc, etc, etc in a hobgoblin town.

[Harperfan7]

66% warriors
10% experts
5% smiters (blaster adepts)
5% fighters
2% ninjas/monks
2% clerics
2% marshalls
2% warmages
2% evokers
2% rogues
1% blackguards (can have any mix of base classes)
.5% rangers
.5% other

Thats the entire hobgoblin population, period, so there could easily be entire towns/villages/forts without a blackguard or with more or less of whichever class.

Roughly 1/3 of all hobgoblins are children/adolescents (there are few noncombatant elderly) and are not represented in the above percentages. Hobgoblins have no room for commoners, the only commoners in a hobgoblin settlement are slaves. Keep in mind that there are probably something like 10 times as many humans in the world as hobgoblins (thats a conservative estimate, it might be as much as 100).

As to what level each is,

Spoiler

Show

assume that 38% are 1st level, 20% are 2nd level, 15% are third level, 10% are fourth level, 5% are fifth level, 4% are sixth level, 3% are seventh, 2% are eighth, 1% are ninth, .9% are 10th, .08% are 11th, .07% are 12th, .06% are 13th, .05% are 14th, .04% are 15th, .003% are 16th, .002% are 17th, .0001% are 18th, .00009% are 19th, ..00005% are 20th, .00001% are epic. Any left over are pooled back into 1st level warriors.

So, in a city of 10,000 hobgoblins (not counting slaves), you'll have...

Spoiler

Show

3,300 noncombatants (99% of which are children), 4422 warriors, 670 experts, 335 smiter, 335 fighters, 134 ninjas/monks, 134 clerics, 134 marshalls, 134 warmages, 134 evokers, 134 rogues, 67 blackguards, 34 rangers, 33 miscellaneous.

6,365 will have the average array
335 will have the elite array

How many of each specific base class of what level with what scores is way too much math for me, but it will take 100,000 hobgoblins to have a 21st level hobgoblin, and 2 million to find one that started with elite stats.