Fridge logic: why life must be unfair to goblins.

[Dr.Zero]

Premise: why I call what follows fridge logic?
Because we knew since a while that the OOTS was going to face that they treated their monsters -and goblins, particularly- foes differently from the way they treated their PC's races foes, yet only now that this is on the table, we are going to reason about the "RL" consequences of being treated more or less fairly.

Now, to the point: goblins are created by a god to be explosive breeders and to age and mature quickly. I myself pointed out in another thread this is a not so uncommon strategy in strategy games: the so called zerg-rush.

But what happens if you give to explosive breeders a lot of resources?

Typically they breed enough to the limit of said resources. And then they try to expand.
It happens to basic lifeforms (bacteria, viruses), to completely pacific animals (an interesting example is the Australian rabbit problems), and to intelligent creatures (we have only ourselves as example, and we don't categorize ourselves as explosive breeders -and anyway goblins are supposed to breed more than humans- and, well, we mostly colonized the whole planet, just because there was "some free space there").

The only thing that stops explosive breeders is a natural predator or a limit to their resources.

What would happen giving to the explosive breeders goblins good land and resources? They could quickly outnumber the other races and conquer them.
Or, even if for some reasons goblins would be more peaceful than what they are in classic D&D, a problem about the fact that they would, at some point, need more and more resources would arise.
Because resources aren't limitless.
But, again, if that problem escalates in a war, and goblins had already time and resources to outnumber the other races, goblins would simply stomp everyone else.

So the only way to avoid goblins to be a problem for everyone else is for them to have a scarcity of resources (making hard for them to start reproducing too much) or to have "natural predators" keeping their number under control.
Some kind of not-sentient monster would work great, of course, because we wouldn't have to deal with the harsh fact that a sentient creature must kill others sentient creatures just because the latter reproduce too quickly. But, if such a monster doesn't exist, yes, other sentient races need to take the role of the "natural predator".

So the conclusion is: all in all, goblins' life must suck, because if it didn't, all other races' lives would suck.

[Buckethead]

Typically they breed enough to the limit of said resources. And then they try to expand.
It happens to basic lifeforms (bacteria, viruses), to completely pacific animals (an interesting example is the Australian rabbit problems), and to intelligent creatures (we have only ourselves as example, and we don't categorize ourselves as explosive breeders -and anyway goblins are supposed to breed more than humans- and, well, we mostly colonized the whole planet, just because there was "some free space there").

I think if goblins were real, and could see and survive in sunlight etc (in other words be OOTS style goblins) they would easily conquer the Earth and outcompete us humans, they mature to full size in like 5 years right? In real life starting resources are not significant except in what evolutionary pressures they generate. There is no evolution or natural selection in OOTS, as Thor explicitly states at one point. It's only once real life creatures get to a certain technological point that they can actually utilize the environmental advantages they possess in the first place. Goblins, humans, elves, are all created "as is" by gods. I'd like to see a few irrelevant of context OOTS strips about the creation of the world. Like bam, thor just slaps down a level 1 male dwarf fighter, a level 1 female dwarf cleric and leaves them to it? A world procedurally generated by gods taking turns would in practicality be absurd if taken seriously.

[chanman]

Premise: why I call what follows fridge logic?
Because we knew since a while that the OOTS was going to face that they treated their monsters -and goblins, particularly- foes differently from the way they treated their PC's races foes, yet only now that this is on the table, we are going to reason about the "RL" consequences of being treated more or less fairly.

Now, to the point: goblins are created by a god to be explosive breeders and to age and mature quickly. I myself pointed out in another thread this is a not so uncommon strategy in strategy games: the so called zerg-rush.

But what happens if you give to explosive breeders a lot of resources?

Typically they breed enough to the limit of said resources. And then they try to expand.
It happens to basic lifeforms (bacteria, viruses), to completely pacific animals (an interesting example is the Australian rabbit problems), and to intelligent creatures (we have only ourselves as example, and we don't categorize ourselves as explosive breeders -and anyway goblins are supposed to breed more than humans- and, well, we mostly colonized the whole planet, just because there was "some free space there").

The only thing that stops explosive breeders is a natural predator or a limit to their resources.

What would happen giving to the explosive breeders goblins good land and resources? They could quickly outnumber the other races and conquer them.
Or, even if for some reasons goblins would be more peaceful than what they are in classic D&D, a problem about the fact that they would, at some point, need more and more resources would arise.
Because resources aren't limitless.
But, again, if that problem escalates in a war, and goblins had already time and resources to outnumber the other races, goblins would simply stomp everyone else.

So the only way to avoid goblins to be a problem for everyone else is for them to have a scarcity of resources (making hard for them to start reproducing too much) or to have "natural predators" keeping their number under control.
Some kind of not-sentient monster would work great, of course, because we wouldn't have to deal with the harsh fact that a sentient creature must kill others sentient creatures just because the latter reproduce too quickly. But, if such a monster doesn't exist, yes, other sentient races need to take the role of the "natural predator".

So the conclusion is: all in all, goblins' life must suck, because if it didn't, all other races' lives would suck.

I think the term you're looking for is Malthusian Crisis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malthusianism.

In the OOTSverse, every group/nation/species should expand until they either reach the carrying capacity of their local resources or evolve socially to the point where their growth has slowed or stopped (see: how human birthrates plummet as wealth increases). In the absence of war, it's not just birth rate and the speed of maturity that count, but also the fertile period and general life span - if Goblins were both at peak reproductive age for a much shorter time than humans, and also have a correspondingly shorter lifespan/higher mortality rate, then the effects may well cancel out - in the absence of adventurers and dangerous environments, the high death rate could also come from vulnerability to disease, or residing in particularly hostile environments/disaster areas.

There could also be other biological or societal characteristics that limit Gobbo growth if they are biologically or culturally disinclined to cooperate - the cultural aspect can be changed, but biological barriers (say, elevated aggression and territoriality) would be harder to overcome. One real-life issue is the way that childhood malnutrition and disease can greatly hamper growth - stacking obstacles on top of obstacles for the disadvantaged - for a poor child to advance in society, they and their family first have to overcome those initial resource disadvantages (malnutrition, poverty), then issues of resource access (quality of education and medical care), before they are able compete to less advantaged children (presumably at the secondary or post-secondary education level or possibly military service). At that point, they're still left with varying degrees of social stigma and (comparatively by default) a smaller network of potentially powerful allies and patrons.

Whether the Goblins' biological advantages would give them the edge in a war is also kind of ambiguous - other resources count for a lot in a war, as do any cultural aspects impede or facilitate discipline, cohesion, and organization (which are things RC brought to the table, but presumably were previously lacking). Gobbo culture or neurobiology could also just happen to turn out a lot of cognitively impaired individuals or be less likely to produce individuals with a lot of leadership qualities - where someone like RC is a 1-in-10 million occurrence rather than 1-in-a-million. With evolution, such disadvantageous traits often tend to either be linked to some other more advantageous property (increased likelihood of sickle-cell anemia, but greater resistance to malaria, for example) or is tied to a deeper advantage in second or third order side effects - for example, homosexuality offers the individual no direct reproductive advantage, so theories/research tend to be in the direction in how individuals that don't have children of their own contribute to the success of their group (like the non-breeding/non-alpha members of a wolf pack) or if the observable end result is the side effect of other aspects that are advantageous.

In OOTSverse though, a lot of that is out the window - as an 'intelligently'* designed world, many of the characteristics of the species that populate it are literally because a god wanted it that way. Certainly, a few thousand years is enough to introduce some small degree of environmental selection, especially for species with short generations (Goblins). Life sucking for the Goblins is a design/project management flaw - Fenris not only gave the Goblins the qualities that they have, but presumably also placed them in a position near other species so that they could compete (remember, his plan was that they could in Thor's explanation: "outcompete all the other groups" without really providing them with the resources to do so (due to Fenris losing interest).

Had Goblins been left to themselves in say some kind of OOTStralia, maybe they would have remained a bunch of fragmented warring factions, or formed some kind of harmonious egalitarian society, or a ruthless totalitarian theocracy, or <insert other potential outcome here> accounting for their unique Fenris-given features - but because of the rest of the world creation process, they ended up as XP-filled meatbags. - arguably a role also often played by Kobolds

*For some values of intelligence

[Ganbatte]

I mean, we know for a fact this happened at least once before.
We know the Dark One united the separated goblin tribes and with those numbers he savagely conquered the northern countries, putting them at his mercy.
We know that after he was assassinated during a diplomatic meeting his followers killed a million humans in a single year.

And this was done with the goblins allegedly only having the worse lands to live in at the time.
Imagine if that wasn't the case.

[Bootman]

I mean, we know for a fact this happened at least once before.
We know the Dark One united the separated goblin tribes and with those numbers he savagely conquered the northern countries, putting them at his mercy.
We know that after he was assassinated during a diplomatic meeting his followers killed a million humans in a single year.

And this was done with the goblins allegedly only having the worse lands to live in at the time.
Imagine if that wasn't the case.

Wouldn't this (and the hobgoblin army) imply the the Goblins do have the forces and numbers to do things but their real issue is fighting each other all the time? Like the second they receive any sort of uniting or direction that can wreck things. So they might even have more natural advantages then any other people in the world they're just held back by infighting.

[hamishspence]

United the goblins, yes. Conquered the northern countries? Where?

Spoiler: SOD

Show

"But when he was done recruiting his army, the Dark One did not attack the humans."

[Ganbatte]

United the goblins, yes. Conquered the northern countries? Where?

Spoiler: SOD

Show

"But when he was done recruiting his army, the Dark One did not attack the humans."

I'm going by the Oots wiki for that part, and by the comic for the slaughter that followed his death.

[Dr.Zero]

Wouldn't this (and the hobgoblin army) imply the the Goblins do have the forces and numbers to do things but their real issue is fighting each other all the time? Like the second they receive any sort of uniting or direction that can wreck things. So they might even have more natural advantages then any other people in the world they're just held back by infighting.

I think their real issues is yes, that they are unable to unite, but not because infighting in itself, more because they lack a strong leader.

Some threads ago, when I talked about the zerg-rush, there was a funny reply about generals and cleric dying of old age when they gained some level.
I think that wasn't too far away from hitting the spot: their lack of magic user, their not particularly strong build -when taken singularly- could justify (if we suppose Rich thought about it) the fact that only one of them -naturally dotated- was ever able to gain enough levels to become a unifying leader.

But cue RC entering the scene as leader of a single hobgoblin settlement -by chance, not even wanting really to be the leader of them- and they (helped a little by the azurites themselves) won in a day a war against one of the most important bastion of lawful goodness of the planet.

But this is for now mostly my mind-canon: again, I don't know if Rich tougth about something like this.

[Bootman]

I think their real issues is yes, that they are unable to unite, but not because infighting in itself, more because they lack a strong leader.

Some threads ago, when I talked about the zerg-rush, there was a funny reply about generals and cleric dying of old age when they gained some level.
I think that wasn't too far away from hitting the spot: their lack of magic user, their not particularly strong build -when taken singularly- could justify (if we suppose Rich thought about it) the fact that only one of them -naturally dotated- was ever able to gain enough levels to become a unifying leader.

But cue RC entering the scene as leader of a single hobgoblin settlement -by chance, not even wanting really to be the leader of them- and they (helped a little by the azurites themselves) won in a day a war against one of the most important bastion of lawful goodness of the planet.

But this is for now mostly my mind-canon: again, I don't know if Rich tougth about something like this.

But if that is the case, that it's a lack of leadership due to their life span (which I think would be a fantastic explanation) then that takes away basically any real world applicability and themes. It would be really great world building but then it isn't about land or being shafted in any way other than how their god designed them, and by that logic you have humans with shorter life spans then elves, elves with super low fertility, Halflings and their size...

[SN137]

United the goblins, yes. Conquered the northern countries? Where?

Spoiler: SOD

Show

"But when he was done recruiting his army, the Dark One did not attack the humans."

Thor states in 1143, that the Dark one had killed many of his followers as a mortal, and in SoD

Spoiler

Show

That he was famous for battles, and united the various goblinoid species as bretheren

Given Thor is a northern deity, and it's unlikely TDO would be positively thought of by Goblins if he exclusively killed Goblin's, it's pretty likely that Goblin legends are at least partially propaganda as presented, and the idea that he killed humanity during his life is pretty well founded by context and statements in comic.

[hamishspence]

Or, there have been occasional battles between the Goblins and the dwarves, and the humans, but not an outright "conquest of many Northern nations".

Spoiler

Show

"While we have often been at odds, I come here in the name of peace."

[Precure]

I'm still wondering about why and how goblins were placed on bad lands.

[rbetieh]

I guess no one here reads Dr Stone, since they blatantly call out how silly the "there arent enough resources" argument really is. The oots planet is vast, and with a little modernity there ought to be no problem feeding and taking care of everyone.

And that's without mentioning that they have Magic and Clerics can cast spells that create food and water. Maybe Goblin Clerics couldn't before the Dark One because Fenris just didn't grant that one, but now what is the excuse? Why wouldnt TDO grant that spell? Any species with access to Clerics that can get to 3rd level spells should never ever have a resource excuse for maintaining their survival.

[Ganbatte]

I'm still wondering about why and how goblins were placed on bad lands.

Maybe they weren't.
Maybe at the start everyone had their fair share of land, but the goblins ended up losing most of theirs through time when their concept didn't work out in practice.

[Mike Havran]

Had Goblins been left to themselves in say some kind of OOTStralia, maybe they would have remained a bunch of fragmented warring factions, or formed some kind of harmonious egalitarian society, or a ruthless totalitarian theocracy, or <insert other potential outcome here> accounting for their unique Fenris-given features - but because of the rest of the world creation process, they ended up as XP-filled meatbags. - arguably a role also often played by Kobolds

Point of fact: When hobgoblins were left alone in the mountain wilderness, they eventually managed to build and run a well-organized and apparently prosperous city state.

Spoiler: GdGU

Show

And they did not even attack Azure City lands until they started to get raided on by Sapphire Guard Gobbocide Squad.

[Ganbatte]

Well, it is interesting that The Dark One appears to have only one cleric in the entire world as far as we can tell....

Maybe he's especially weak, or maybe he hasn't figured this stuff out yet.

Or maybe he deliberately holds off on this for some reason.

Wait what? Redcloak isn't the only cleric, he's just the High Priest or whatever. Jirix is a cleric too.

[GeoffWatson]

They're not that poor. They (at least the hobgoblins) can afford a huge standing army.

[hamishspence]

That's not a regular standing army - that's almost the entire population, conscripted and given weapons.

Spoiler: War & XPs bonus strip 320a

Show

General: Trust me, the paladins and the regular army of the Azurites have kept us completely penned in those mountains for almost 30 years. They aren't expecting us to just suddenly break out and invade like this. They put most of their military energy into Blueriver.
Redcloak: I guess it's never occurred to any of your previous Supreme Leaders to mobilize 90% of your population.
General: To say the least.
Xykon: Probably that pesky "self-preservation" thing. Don't worry, we'll drum that out of you soon enough.

[masamune1]

Wait what? Redcloak isn't the only cleric, he's just the High Priest or whatever. Jirix is a cleric too.

Oh? I thought he was just a Hobgoblin who was raised from the dead and became a bit of a prophet.

Maybe I wasn't paying attention or forgot "shrug"

Even so, that would be two- not much of an improvement.

If there are more, and the rest are just nameless mooks...well, that raises other questions. There are spells that can make life easier for the goblins.

[Ganbatte]

That's not a regular standing army - that's almost the entire population, conscripted and given weapons.

Spoiler: War & XPs bonus strip 320a

Show

General: Trust me, the paladins and the regular army of the Azurites have kept us completely penned in those mountains for almost 30 years. They aren't expecting us to just suddenly break out and invade like this. They put most of their military energy into Blueriver.
Redcloak: I guess it's never occurred to any of your previous Supreme Leaders to mobilize 90% of your population.
General: To say the least.
Xykon: Probably that pesky "self-preservation" thing. Don't worry, we'll drum that out of you soon enough.

Huh, so a coscript army toppled one of the biggest nations of the land at a moment's whim.

[Fyraltari]

Huh, so a coscript army toppled one of the biggest nations of the land at a moment's whim.

Funny that, it's almost like the army in question was lead by two of the most high-level casters in the world while the big nation in question had just had its leader murdered causing all of the nobles to bail out of the fight, taking their armies with them, with a side helping of a random sky-pirate disabling their walled catapults.

You know what would be funny, though? It'd be if evennwith all that the conscripts only managed to conquer about half the land of the nation.

[GeoffWatson]

That's not a regular standing army - that's almost the entire population, conscripted and given weapons.

They had 87 legions (of 300 each) when Redcloak took over.

[Ganbatte]

Funny that, it's almost like the army in question was lead by two of the most high-level casters in the world while the big nation in question had just had its leader murdered causing all of the nobles to bail out of the fight, taking their armies with them, with a side helping of a random sky-pirate disabling their walled catapults.

One, Xykon didn't take part in the siege and Redcloak was offset by the OotS.

You're kinda severely downplaying just how much a few united tribes managed to accomplish, though I'm not sure why.

[Fyraltari]

One, Xykon didn't take part in the siege and Redcloak was offset by the OotS.

He killed Sangwaan and 90% of the Sapphire Guard.

You're kinda severely downplaying just how much a few united tribes managed to accomplish, though I'm not sure why.

I'm just saying they couldn't have done that any time they wanted, they had a lot of luck.

[hroþila]

They had 87 legions (of 300 each) when Redcloak took over.

You might be assuming the word "legion" is used in the same sense as in the Roman army, as a unit in a standing army. Apparently it isn't. Hobgoblin society is highly militarized and most of the adult male population seems to have some military training. As per War & XPs bonus strip 320a that was not a standing army, Redcloak's army was the people in arms. "Legion" seems thus to be more of an administrative term, possibly as a way to divide the general population in terms of how many soldiers they provide for the general levy.

90% of the population might refer to all hobgoblins (unlikely, since we don't see women in Redcloak's army, unlike in HtPGHS*). More likely it refers to all male adults, all able-bodied male adults, or all male adults with some military instruction (but the latter only works if the vast majority of male hobgoblins had some military instruction).

*Was the previous Supreme Leader a misogynist that banned hobgoblin women from fighting? Or perhaps were they only allowed/expected to fight at home?

[Dr.Zero]

He killed Sangwaan and 90% of the Sapphire Guard.



I'm just saying they couldn't have done that any time they wanted, they had a lot of luck.

While it's surely true that the azurites helped somehow (and I told it so, somewhere in this thread), and X killed the most of the mid-levels SG, it's even true the azurites got a lot of unexpected help, which normally wouldn't be there: namely, the OOTS.
Belkar alone killed tens, if not hundreds, of goblinoids (living ones or undeads)
And V, mostly indirectly, did the same, or even more, banishing the elementals (saving soldiers that then killed enemies) and creating the giant soldiers barrier.
We don't know much about Durkon and Haley, but I think it's not a bad guess thinking they killed another great bunch of goblinoids (Elan probably sucked, compared to them, but I think some tens were killed by him too).

Compensating the help received by X from one side, to the help received from the OOTS on the other side is not so far-fetched (RC, instead, is out of the equation: he is the strong leader of the goblinoids)

[Sapphire Guard]

Redcloak does make a speech indicating that the hobgoblin women and children were mostly left behind.

The thing about Redcloak and Xykon is, they use deliberately awful tactics like 'wait for enough hobgoblins to be killed to make a ramp'. Red hasn't had his moment of realisation yet, he's still going out of his way to get as many of his troops as possible killed.

[KorvinStarmast]

The thing about Redcloak and Xykon is, they use deliberately awful tactics like 'wait for enough hobgoblins to be killed to make a ramp'. Red hasn't had his moment of realisation yet, he's still going out of his way to get as many of his troops as possible killed.

I'd say that he has. (Responding to the italicized bit... but maybe you are using 'realization' in a different sense?)

[Fyraltari]

Was the previous Supreme Leader a misogynist that banned hobgoblin women from fighting? Or perhaps were they only allowed/expected to fight at home?

Considering the losses they suffered, it may have been cold pramatism. Demographically speaking losing the majority of the females would be worse than losing the majority of the males.

While it's surely true that the azurites helped somehow (and I told it so, somewhere in this thread), and X killed the most of the mid-levels SG, it's even true the azurites got a lot of unexpected help, which normally wouldn't be there: namely, the OOTS.
Belkar alone killed tens, if not hundreds, of goblinoids (living ones or undeads)
And V, mostly indirectly, did the same, or even more, banishing the elementals (saving soldiers that then killed enemies) and creating the giant soldiers barrier.
We don't know much about Durkon and Haley, but I think it's not a bad guess thinking they killed another great bunch of goblinoids (Elan probably sucked, compared to them, but I think some tens were killed by him too).

Compensating the help received by X from one side, to the help received from the OOTS on the other side is not so far-fetched (RC, instead, is out of the equation: he is the strong leader of the goblinoids)

If you count the OOTS as outside help for the Azurites, you have to count Redcloak as outside help for the hobgoblins as well. He's not a regular part of their military.

[hamishspence]

Considering the losses they suffered, it may have been cold pramatism. Demographically speaking losing the majority of the females would be worse than losing the majority of the males.

The Giant's "out-of-universe answer":

Out-of-universe, my bet is that Rich copied and pasted a hobgoblin figure a zillion times, realized after the fact that he'd wound up with an entirely male hobgoblin force, slapped in a note about how the hobgoblin women stayed back at home to take care of the kids, and didn't really think about it again.

It warms my heart that someone is finally beginning to understand how my creative process works.

But also, I wanted to make sure the audience was on the Azurite's side during the battle. Giving their side gender integration was an easy shorthand way to show that they were more enlightened, socially. Further, having all the hobgoblins be identical helped de-emphasize them as individuals, which made it easier to do things like a horse ramp of dead hobgoblins. Having several different models for the Azurites (male, female, sword-and-shield, archer, halberd, etc.) made them feel more like people and less like cogs in a machine. I didn't really want the audience to weep for the hobgoblin dead, though, so I made them all interchangeable.

I suppose it would have been equally valid to make the entire fighting force identical women rather than men, in that case, but a.) it didn't occur to me, b.) I think that would have required more explanation, and c.) it may have lead to a weird misogynist vibe when I did things like the aforementioned horse ramp, or Belkar's Sexy Shoeless God of War scene. Maybe there will be a day when we're all so gender-blind that a bloodthirsty male killer standing atop a pile of women's corpses and bellowing about his martial and sexual prowess will be seen as nothing but a warrior who has courageously defeated his worthy combat adversaries with great skill, but that day ain't today.

There are female hobgoblin clerics though:

https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0779.html

and some of the regular goblins in the afterlife in the Dark One's Army crayon strips were female.

https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0704.html