The Goblins Fan Forum

Gormash wrote:I have a theory that I've not seen yet, though how likely it is remains to be seen.
Sometime in the future, Forgath goes through some seriously disturbing stuff and ends up transported back in time and ends up as Kore.

The "Korgath" theory is one of the most commonly posulated ones in this thread, and has been rejected repeatedly for being silly. Personally, I'd point out:

There is no precedent for time travel in Goblins.
Kore is really, really old.
Dwarves aren't exactly rare in Goblins - it just seems that way since we've only seen three (Kore, Forgath, small child at the tavern).

EDIT:

MakesNoSense wrote:

Skulexander wrote:Somebody has probably already stated this before, but what if Kore is Forgath from another timeline/reality? If Forgath kills him, then the prophecy of Forgath being killed by another dwarf will still be fulfilled.

The "Koregath" theory has been widely circulated already I'm sure if you look around, you can find all sorts of input into it.

BuildsLegos wrote:What really annoys me about that Koregath bullshit is that they have OBVIOUSLY DIFFERENT HAIR AND IME COLOR, which are things that don't ever change. (not to be confused with loss) But you know who DOES have red hair, but less grey than Kore? FORGATH'S FATHER! "He died hours later from his wounds." And yet the gasp all but proves that's him.

Well, I suppose Kore could be an older brother, but then where's the named armor piece that he should have?

DrinksTooMuchCoffee wrote:

Synch wrote:I don't know if anyone has mentioned this before, but I think Kore is actually Korgath.

Everyone has mentioned that. All the time. Forever. Repeatedly. Endlessly.

And while I'm digging up old posts, I'd like to ask again:

Glemp wrote:Something I've been pondering - can the Mods make a pinned post listing common theories and their counterarguments? Kore being Forgath and the repeated prophecy false alarms, for example.

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The executioner in Brassmoon was also a dwarf.

edit: If you make a list, I'll pin it for you.

RocketScientist wrote:He appears to be using a magic item (rock or bean) in the first couple of panels of the previous page.

Or that's a material component, like a pinch of sulfur.

RocketScientist wrote:It doesn't seem likely to me that he's based on anything soul spike devourer related. That's a 4.0 monster according to... actually I forget who told me that. But anyway, the comic was fully written during 3.0/3.5. Things that pop up from 4.0 are just add-ons. But you never know. It could be possible, I suppose.

I assume he's based on someone's PC and this is serious homebrew, just because the PCs are usually the ones who have the seriously weird things happen to them (or threaten to happen to them). I'm just throwing out the "devourer" idea because it hits the radar as at least close to following the rules. Two or more creatures in there, with an enslaved Paladin and a brainwashed(?) thing which believes it's on a "holy" mission, possibly even a brainwashed thing which has been taking levels in fallen Paladin.

Or maybe just an insane Fallen Paladin with enslaved souls, including enslaved Paladins... actually that works pretty well right there.

I suspect we'd get multiple readings from a Detect Evil, which is why we haven't had a Detect Evil used on it yet.

It could be a material component, but have we ever seen anyone else use one?

Which panels are you talking about? The ones where he's pulling the axe out of his hand?

They must be talking about before the page I linked to, rather than the current update. Kore feeds some kind of magic bean to Y&B's corpse to ask her questions.

Oh yeah, what I like to call his magic Altoids. Seems to be some custom consumable magic item.

One thing that I wasn't expecting from the coloring update was all of the nearby ledges and cliffs. We've already seen an alt klik capable of flying around while carrying alt MM, so it isn't a stretch at all to think that the new klik will be able to get Forgath to a safer ledge.

Zathyr wrote:Oh yeah, what I like to call his magic Altoids. Seems to be some custom consumable magic item.

Yeah, maybe... but that made a lot more sense back when we thought Kore could be resupplied by someone, any one. He's a high level Character, he should have access to serious contacts, fellow adventurers, maybe even a magic shop. Goblin Slayer seemed to be proof of that kind of thing. It made sense that Kore would have built that, or paid someone to do so, given Kore's lifestyle.

But now it seems unlikely that Kore can deal with *anyone* without calling them "evil" and then killing them. That doesn't entirely leave out the idea of a custom consumable magic item, he's certainly killed enough people to loot bodies of adventurers, but we already know he's accessing powers/spells he can't reasonably have. If he can cast Paladin spells, why not Cleric spells too?

Forgath seemed to think Kore acquires souls, whatever Kore is, he/it is clearly not a vanilla Paladin, and this whole "stealing souls" thing is apparently seriously involved in how he can be Evil and have Paladin abilities.

I don't think any character that has been around as long as Kore would qualify as "Vanilla". If he is the last of the paladins from when the Axe was created (still speculation I know), then he's had a very long time to accumulate other skills that would not be traditional. I also wonder if by absorbing the souls of those he kills, he can also gain some access to their skills? If that's the case, he would have access to all sorts of capabilities. He very well may be able to produce/repair his own equipment in that event. Of course, we've never seen him DO anything that doesn't fall in the traditional paladin skill set (other than absorbing souls and remaining "unfallen").

Because this also belongs here....(quoted from Face of Kore thread)

Wolfie wrote: My new theory/supposition/wild guess: Kore was hit with some holy weapon that allows him to "save the souls" of those he kills, both innocent and evil, in his quest to rid the world of all evil. Maybe he's gone through the Maze of Many and saw that Evil in the multiverse is winning and has decided that by making this world pure good, he could help to tip the scales. (The primordial powers that be have decided to let him since balance in the multiverse is key). The weapon he was hit with, split his head open (ghastly wound) that enhances his "Detect Evil" ability down to a fine level. Over the years, it has driven him mad (the weight of that many souls would do that to a person), and he's noticed a pattern: Just taking out evil that is already there isn't enough. You have to route it out before it takes hold, like poor little Targath of the Bladebeard Clan. When he's done, he gets to take his own life, knowing what he's done is a necessary evil, thus completely ridding the world of all evil.

If this has been said before, please ignore.. .nothing to see here.

I don't recall seeing that idea. The face of Kore does open up some new ideas, certainly.

The "save the souls" thing is a good - I like it, but I'd take it a step further. What if Kore made a Wish? "As a paladin, I wish to save everyone's soul." or something to that extent. Wishes are universe-altering magic. Good-intentioned, but poorly worded, the wish could turn to a curse, compelling Kore to go around killing everyone and "saving" their souls within himself bypassing the normal rules of the universe. The idea of a wish gone wrong isn't a new idea, but I think this is actually a decent guess as to what such a wish might be.

Now Thunt has stated how he handles weird wishes. He takes a sort of "least energy used" approach to it. So I can kind of see someone making such a wish and instead of altering the state of everyone's souls to redeem them as intended, it alters the paladin to grant the wish in a strictly literal sense.

I keep thinking of what Thunt said about eventually visiting every location on the map and the paths our protagonists have taken thus far: it's a spiral, and the Greyhill ruins are at the very end. It wouldn't make any since for Kore's Secret to be revealed before we get there, so there's another 15 years at the very least before we find out.

You know, I just realized something; if Kore's right eye is replaced only by that hellfire-abyss of a wound, how does he aim and counter incoming attacks with such accuracy?

Even if the helmet allows him to see through it like an one-way mirror, the lack of depth perception should at least hinder him in close combat, and especially at aiming his crossbows over long distances. Yet we see little to no impact on his fighting ability, and he is deadly accurate with those crossbows. An explanation for this situation could be that he actually sees through those eyes that are on the other faces, but that then begs the question of "why does he even need to look at anything with his real eye when the other eyes could likely serve the same purpose".

It's entirely possible that I am overthinking this, and missing an eye has no effect on your combat ability. (Though MinMax doesn't count as a counterargument, since he can still see perfectly fine with that eye, it only looks like that)

That's high stats for you.

It probably doesn't mean anything, but I just noticed that the fissure on Kore's head is a similar shape and position to the slit in his helmet, just on the other side.

It's just a vertical chop, where as Kore's eyehole has an obtuse angle on each end.

BuildsLegos wrote:It's just a vertical chop, where as Kore's eyehole has an obtuse angle on each end.

Yeah, I get that they're probably not related (except maybe symbolically), but in the third panel of The Face of Kore, you can see it glowing in the background. I had wondered about the reason for the odd eye slit in the helmet before, and it just struck me how it was somewhat similar to that injury.

Now that you mention the glow, I do recall the slit glowing that same shade of yellow a long time ago, possibly while "hunting" Taps. It figures that in dim light, a glowing gash would fill the helm.

I actually don't think Kore can be one of the original Holy Guardians when the Axe of Prissan was used to slay the Demon at War Crater. Dwarves weren't allowed to be Paladins until 3rd edition D&D (In 1st edition Greyhawk and 2nd edition they were restricted to Humans only) and a characters age is relative to what edition they were created in (E.G. Thaco)

raaabr wrote:the lack of depth perception should at least hinder him in close combat, and especially at aiming his crossbows over long distances.

At long distances it wouldn't make much of a difference. Depth perception at those ranges is not based on stereoscopic vision, as the differences between what both eyes see gets too small.

As for close combat, I guess he's just that good... It could even be an official flaw on his character sheet which lowers his dexterity bonus to armor class or something, but as a heavily armored paladin that would not be too inconvenient for him, he relies on passive armor rather than dodging and blocking. Maybe it also gives him a penalty to base attack bonus (although hitting a person is far less precise and depth-vision requiring work than blocking a swinging blade), but he has plenty of other attributes that make up for it.

Within the context of a world based on d20 mechanics, where you can become a much better fighter simply by proclaiming "I am now a player character" it wouldn't be a very big handicap, not with the right fighting style. One level difference between two combatants would generally make a bigger difference. And Kore is a seriously high level.

Ok, I have never been a fan of the Koregath idea...but the fact that Forgath is now surrounded by Kliks, and one of their types has been revealed (via twitter) to be "temporal", that might actually lend it some credit.

Imagine what happened with Dies and Junior happening to Forgath and a few hundred Kliks. If he bonds with an energy Klik, he might wind up with a permanent well of holy energy within him (possibly changing his IME by essentially overwriting his soul), and his "Junior's" Positive might be souls (the negative could be Evil/Unholy energy, or something we haven't been introduced to yet).

Then, his "Junior" goes as crazy as Dies' Junior...except that Klikgath is energy, and not a physical limb which can be cut off. So, Forgath would be stuck with this insane holy energy within him forever. If he started to battle the other Kliks, and one of the Klik types is Temporal, it's possible that he winds up getting dragged far into the past (by a fleeing temporal Klik), and stranded.

If that's too contrived (I think it would take a *lot* of pages for Thunt to display that entire character arc, given how long it took Dies' Junior to "awaken"), it's possible that something like this has already happened to Kore, and that's why he is the way he is. Being permanently bound to an insane orb of pure holy energy which never sleeps, and burns your soul with every breath would probably do weird things to person's mind...but I am not a psychologist.

Nah, Kore doesn't have the Indestructibeard.

Knucklekraken wrote:Nah, Kore doesn't have the Indestructibeard.

I get the impression that the indestructibeard is only temporary: normal hair will keep growing from his chin, and the indestructible portion will eventually fall off when then normal hair breaks past a certain length.

And the lack of the Indestructibeard in no way prevents Kore from not being 'our' Forgath.

It is possible someone has answered this before, but if Kore is not using their own magic, but rather exploiting the magical energy of the captured souls would it be Kore's IME that is displayed, or those from whom the magic originates? The different IME seems to be the main argument against Koregath, and people's hair does change with age. I'm not wholly convinced by 'The Koregath Hypothesis' (which should be a Sherlock Holmes story), but this would seem to be a reasonable workaround to the IME problem that would possibly make even more sense than our current conception of IMEs.

I'm still not wholly convinced that Forgath's surprised expression originated so much out of recognition of the non-disfigured side of Kore's face as actually seeing the messed up side.