This trailer for MTG's Lorwyn Eclipsed is freaking fantastic...

The lore for Magic: The Gathering (which I will still stand behind as my favorite game ever) has entered a strange place over the past several years.  For a while there - and as I think I may have noted on here a time or two - the MTG story team at WotC was absolutely killin' it from my perspective.  (In a good way, in case that isn't clear.)  They repeatedly addressed the question, "What would ____ look like as an MTG world?" with creativity and genuine affection for both the mother IP and the genres that were tackled.  Along the way, there were some real high points for fans of innovative, game-able worlds (especially, as MTG lore fans are called, Vorthoses): the fantasy cyberpunk of Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty, for example, and the friendly anthro-animal antics of Bloomburrow were both pretty well-received.

That's not to say that every decision was 100% spot-on.  Folks got tired of what came to be known as hat sets, the expansions that overlaid a theme on the MTG multiverse partly by putting characters in hats that you don't expect in a traditional fantasy setting...for example, cowboy hats for a Western set and detective hats (or...sort of fedoras, I guess...) for a murder mystery set.  (It really is interesting that the sets that have been praised over this time - like those mentioned above - basically followed the same gameplan as the oft-dismissed hat sets, they just didn't put characters in funny hats.  So, while I suspect that the set design and gameplay also had an impact on the sets' reception...well, maybe there really is something to this hat thing...)

Of course, that approach is arguably negligible when you consider the biggest change to the MTG creative approach over the last several years: the release of Universes Beyond sets (which feature IPs outside of MTG's regular lore) and their eventual incorporation into the regular cadence of yearly set releases.  Right now, in Magic's Standard format - which is treated as the "default" format for competitive MTG enough to be called "Standard" - folks are playing with cards representing the lore of Final Fantasy, Avatar (the Airbender type), and (perhaps most surprisingly) freaking Spider-Man.

I will admit that I am so far undecided on how I feel about this "invasion" of other IPs into the MTG battles played out on tabletops around the world.  (I don't play enough currently, especially out in public with strangers, to really have an opinion yet.)  BUT...I can definitely understand why this grinds the gears of many MTG lore devotees.  It has not gone unnoticed that when the Ninja Turtles set (yep) drops in about a month and a half, there will be more currently available Magic expansions set in New York City than in most of the (maybe any...?) original MTG worlds.  And I'm kind of okay with that (I like NYC!), but it is...weird.

Anyway...all of that is to say that when this promotion for the new set Lorwyn Eclipsed was released a couple of weeks ago, it was such a breath of fresh air that I don't think some MTG lore fanatics knew what to do with themselves.  The bright plane of Lorwyn and its dark counterpart Shadowmoor are built upon the folklore of the British Isles, and the new set (which just had prerelease tourneys this past weekend) really examines the interaction between the contrasts of the related planes.  And that includes this amazing music video, featuring some beautiful puppet renditions of the settings' goblins (AKA boggarts), produced by The Jim Henson Company.

I'll quit rambling now so you can just enjoy this video...

[Biome] Goblins for 5e-ish games

I've been thinking a lot about forest goblins lately.  You know how that is.

So...I guess I should start by just making it clear that I like goblins.  Quite a bit, actually.  This is at least partially a direct result of my loyalty to the lovable little troublemakers in Magic: The Gathering.  I really enjoy playing so-called 'typal' decks, and Goblins are probably the creature type that I've built around the most (with Merfolk as the only other group that could maybe mount a challenge for that 'honor').  Goblins have a great history in the game and a lot of solid cards that still manage to feel like underdogs due to their often tiny stats and goofy themes...even if we all know they're actually quite good within the rules and goals of the game...

For the most part, MTG's goblins fit a fairly standard fantasy model.  There have been lots of little green guys.  Over 30+ years of history, though, they have managed to mix it up pretty well...with a few quick examples being the turtle-like Akki from the plane of Kamigawa and the bipedal rodents who serve as snacks for dragons on the plane of Jund.

Which (sort of) brings me to forest goblins.  Creatures in MTG usually represent at least one of the colors of the game, and goblins are the iconic small creature type for the color Red (with the accompanying iconic large creature type being dragons).  Red is the color of chaos, emotion, fire, and lightning, and...perhaps most informatively with regard to goblins...its mana is found naturally in mountains.  This fits nicely, I think, with our regular association of goblins with mountains, hills, and caves.

There are MTG goblins that touch each of the five colors, and some of my previous blog posts probably reveal my affinity for the little guys all across the spectrum, including those that (perhaps unexpectedly) deal in Blue or White mana.  After Red, though, MTG's goblins are most common in the colors that serve as Red's 'allies'...Black (death from the swamps) and Green (growth from the forests).  And as with many aspects of fantasy fiction, I have often found myself drawn to the elements that reflect a connection to nature...which in the case of goblins, usually means they tend toward the feral and shamanic.  Here are a few of the cool gobbos that touch green:

Naturally (heh), I'd like to work some goblins into the gaming projects that are currently solidifying around my hopes and daydreams.  They've shown up in the Monstrous Matters campaign as part of a pretty key plot point, and there's no reason they shouldn't be able to menace the elite soldiers in UNLTD or the time-traveling Agents of SKA (time goblins?).  And there's one other very specific reason that I want to make some solid rules for forest goblins...which I'll get to soon...hopefully in my next post...hopefully.  As with many fantasy species, though, I think goblins lend themselves to categorization based upon their biome of choice...so it should be easy to have a simple setup for creating Forest Goblins, Swamp Goblins, Desert Goblins, and so on...

I have the Guildmasters' Guide to Ravnica and checked out the Goblin species there for some inspiration.  Also drawing from the Goblin's stats as a 5e monster and as an OGL species from Arcanist Press's More Ancestries & Cultures, I think a ____ Goblin that covers the necessary bases while allowing for some environmental flavor should be pretty straightforward.  Let's try this...

[Biome] Goblin

Forest goblin art by Paul Bonner, found via the Scent of a Gamer blog

_____ Goblin Traits

Speed: 30 feet

Ability Score Increase: Your Dexterity score increases by 2, and your Constitution score increases by 1.

Darkvision: Goblins typically have darkvision at a range of 60 feet; for some biomes, evolution may have led to this being lost or even replaced by a visual ability more useful in that environment.

Size: Adult goblins are generally between 3 and 4.5 feet tall; their weight can vary greatly due to a large range in how thickly they are framed.  Overall, they are usually classified as small.

Age: Goblins usually mature faster than humans, reaching adulthood and old age at earlier points in their lifetimes.  A 50-year-old goblin is a rarity.  Some groups of goblins may age at about the same rate as humans, but you will never find goblins that are as long-lived as elves or dwarves.

Languages: Goblins are fluent in the common language of the game world, as well their own particular dialect of the Goblin language. They are often literate in settings where this is feasible for a goblin.

Nimble Escape: You can take the Disengage or Hide action as a bonus action on each of your turns.

At HOME in the BiOME: You aren't just a Goblin.  You're a Mountain Goblin.  Or a Swamp Goblin.  Or maybe a Forest Goblin.  You may treat whichever biome you are from as favored terrain, with the corresponding bonuses granted to a Ranger with the Natural Explorer ability.

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A Goblinoid Family Tree

(Or really a phylogenetic tree.  I just liked the sound of family tree more in the title.)

So, in reading a post by James over at Grognardia, about Dragon articles on fantasy languages, I started to wonder if sometimes I just don't fly my geek flag high enough.  As in...maybe I'm not appropriately minmaxing the fun I could get out of the RPG hobby by not allowing myself to just go nuts like I want to as a nerdy scientist who also loves games about elves and goblins.

James posted a tree of language families, originally appearing in Dragon #66, that shows the development of the Middle Elfin tongue into a variety of fae languages.  And it's awesome.  I love that sort of stuff, so why don't I do more of it?  I wonder sometimes if I remain so focused on having an "anything goes" attitude about the world(s) I game in (like the setting for the Monstrous Matters campaign) that I miss out on creating things that would genuinely make me smile, even if I don't completely buy into all of the specifics.

With that in mind, I'm going to consider this a worthwhile way to spend a few minutes.  Here's a phylogenetic tree of a few goblinoid species, along with a few creatures from that galaxy far, far away that I suspect might be closely related.  (If you have access to genetic data, please let me know; this is just based on physical characteristics.)

Images from the Forgotten Realms Wiki, Wookieepedia, and Scryfall

I feel like this just opens up a whole world of stories for how these species became distributed as they are.  Maybe I'll follow up there.  (If you'd like to see some of my related ramblings, please check out the stuff I've written about the Fantaspora Hypothesis and #WookieesAreBugbears.)

Thanks for looking!  Now, for a character (cribbed from RPGGamer.org):

Image from Wookieepedia

Wicket

Full name:  Wicket Wystri Warrick

Species: Ewok

Home: Endor

15 HP, 12 Defense (small size)

Strength 3
Dexterity 3
Knowledge 2
Presence 4

Skills: Survival +4, Thrown Weapons +3, Languages +2, Climb +1

Goals: Helping and protecting his friends

Quote: "Goodbye.  Good-bye."

The Monstrous Matters Campaign, Part 2: So this is how goblin genocide starts.

A little while back, Father Josh threw me another tabletop bone by playing as the sole PC (with a supervisory role over the other protagonist) in Session 2 of the Monstrous Matters campaign.  (For my Session 1 ramblings, check out the post HERE.)

The high points of this session:

    1.  The first pieces were planted to tie into what might turn out to be a meta-narrative that makes its way through multiple adventures.  I say "might" because I'm committed to not railroading this thing...BUT I can have the overarching story in the back of my mind that MAY become obvious to the game's player(s) over time.

    2.  We returned to a more "standard" dice pool resolution mechanic for the D6-based system we're playing with.  I see this being The Way going forward, but I've honestly never determined what I find to be the optimal approach to the Wild Die/Ghost Die in these games, so I'll probably still play with that over the coming sessions.

    3.  The importance of player motivations with respect to the goals of the game itself came to the forefront, as one of the characters shifted into murder-hobo mode in a game that is, ostensibly, very much not about murder hobos.  The thing is, it really worked narratively, so it's drawing our attention to the value of determining the PCs' ethical views of creatures that have made their way to our world via connections to magical fantasy realms.  I'm sure there's also some political commentary that could be dropped into this exploration, but I'm going to do all I can to avoid that because (1) it seems cheap and exploitative, and (2) this is very much meant to be escapist entertainment.

So, here we go...

To begin the session, the team (Fingers Watson and Bobby Flech) move down the staircase from Level 1 to Level 2.

From the free and excellent Dyson's Delve mega-ish-dungeon...check out this level HERE.

Moving east, they peer into a room with six goblins; none notice them outside the cracked door. Five of the goblins are dressed in tattered rags, while one is in much nicer attire (including some fancy brass-ish goggles). He seems to be in the middle of a chemistry experiment. (When questioned, he says that he is “just trying to make it explode.”) He looks something like this:

On his wrist, there is a striking signet:

When asked, the goblin says that the signet is the symbol of his guild, the Izzet.

It doesn’t take long now for Watson’s long-harbored hatred of planar outsiders to show itself. He first tricks a few of them into falling into a carefully deployed portable hole. As they attempt to recover, he kills one with a dagger thrown into its eye. He then pulls out his sidearm and shoots four more dead. Finally, the chemist – by now the dozing victim of a scroll of Sleep – is strangled by Flech at Watson’s direction.

The protagonists have now shut themselves in the goblin den. There are other dungeon inhabitants outside, alerted by the noise and trying to get in. It doesn’t look great for the Monstrous Matters pair. There is a wildcard here, though: Fingers would happily kill every last one of them...