"any suggestions for a goblin-based campaign?" Topic

Hey everyone -
I am considering hosting a campaign game with the main characters as goblins. Not orcs, not hobgoblins, not half-orcs, but scrawny, runty, much-maligned little fellows that inhabit the bottom of the dungeon food chain.

Any suggestions for existing campaigns or rule-sets that might work?
(or is this a game I should build from scratch?…)

Recommendations?

You might look for this long OOP Dungeons & Dragons title, "The Orcs of Thar (GAZ10)."

Lots of ideas for a chaotic land of humanoids where the goblins have a niche. This may be a very collectible item these days however.

I've been trying to fiddle together some rules for a "Jawa's bad day" game.

It's a whole long pile of untested rules right now, but it focuses on a few things.

I'm stealing a lot of inspiration from "Kobolds Ate My Baby" (because Jawas, like Kobolds and Goblins) are infinitely disposable and prolific. Each time a Jawa dies, they make a test against their "fortune" stat. The test will result in a "relative position" and a change in one of the other stats.
If you start out playing "KrBleck the Jawa" you will end up playing "KrBleck's cousin's roomate's tailor's grandma" to whom the family fortune has been passed along with several odious habits and a sack of credits.

I'm planning this as a one off rpg, so the rules have to be simple, easily understood, and lend themselves readily to killing off jawas which are immediately replaced.

I'm considering using the Savage Worlds Rules as a fallback position, since I was so impressed with them a few years back whilst playing in a "low life" campaign.

The Goblins comic has some fun ideas,
goblinscomic.com/06292005

Have you considered G.U.R.P.S. Goblins by Steve Jackson Games or Green Ronin's ORK!The Roleplaying Game for inspiration. Ork! has some amusing notes on Goblyns in the "Foes of Orkdom" chapter and one could play as Goblyns rather than Orks.

You could always track down 'Wormy', a comic that ran in the back of Dragon Magazine starting in the late 70s, for about a decade. It's mostly from the 'humanoid perspective' and has some great artwork. There's an online archive somewhere…

I'm not sure what to suggest for rules. Something that has a relatively even playing field for npc and players… MERP maybe?

I usually run goblin based games a lot like Paranoia. A whole lot like Paranoia. Replace the computer with an evil wizard, keep the secret societies name changes, that sort of thing.

For clones, each character belongs to some sort of secret brotherhood or clan or what not so that there are multiple incarnations willing to step into there brother's shoes.

The E6 concept for d20 works well for this type of campaign, especially when the players know they are capped in power and the rest of the world isn't.

wow – excellent suggestions. Thanks for responses. Glad to hear that other games have considered not just anti-heroes as characters, but LOWLY anti-heroes. Now it's off to follow-up on your leads.
I'll keep you apprised of how this thing shapes up (may take a few months to create… )

Evil wizard's minions could be a good scenario. They might need to collect all sorts of gory odds and ends for their boss's potion research.

Halfling foot hair, elf ears, dwarf beard, pegasus feathers, badgers noses, ocelots nipples etc.

I like the collection angle – since my intent is not to have these critters level up into some sort of super goblins, but rather stay consistent with their goblin nature – small, scrawny, nasty. A scavenger game would be perfect….

ALSO, found the Orcs of Thar title for sale… cheapest copy was around $50.00 USD US. Book looks great, but I could buy alot of figs for fifty bucks…

The GURPs book looks considerably cheaper, but I don't know anyone who's actually played the GURPs rules. How do these rules play?…

I too am considering the Savage Worlds rulesets. They seem pretty quick & playable… affordable too.

Toklien Middle Earth. This goblins were not very strong or lethal on their own, but in numbers they were scary!

Gurps was ok, as a rules system, but from what i recall suffered from its aim of being 'a system for everyhing', so lost the flavour of a world specific or period specific type game.

Rule set wise, lots of choose from. I am planning on using Bladestorm, for my fantasy campaign this year. A modified version, to fit my aims, inspired by MERP< but merp being a bit too weighty for the games i want to run.