So sad (Tangentially related)

[Occams Meataxe]

This is why Thunt's work is so important. Goblins get no respect.
http://www.girlswithslingshots.com/comi ... i-ramirez/

[Runsaround]

Probably dire rats, not goblins.

[Krulle]

This is why Thunt's work is so important. Goblins get no respect.
http://www.girlswithslingshots.com/comi ... i-ramirez/

This is what happens if I play first person games. Or multiplayer jump'n'run games. Or use console controlers.

I can so relate to the guy.

[Liesmith]

I'm really distressed by the casual bigotry on display in that comic.

[Runsaround]

Are they even really goblins? They aren't stated to be goblins.

[Lionday]

Are they even really goblins? They aren't stated to be goblins.

The girl says so at the end of the panel. Course its possible these rat things are a different enemy and she only starts to attack goblins in the last panel.

[JustRight]

The human attitude toward other species in general (even parts of their own species) is divided into two camps - those with some empathy / respect and those with none. Thunt manages to focus this issue quite acutely and clearly; I for one am eternally grateful. But he is optimistic - he makes it appear there is room for changes of heart - like Forgath's attitude toward some Goblins and Minmax's relationship with Kin. Our reality is not so nice. It's now becoming clear the respect / no respect condition in humans (and perhaps others sharing our DNA) is a genetic trait (probably non-negotiable with Republican meatheads in America - Taliban meatheads in Afghanistan - or **your choice of** meatheads anywhere). I praise Thunt for creating the basis for this dialogue. I wish his vision of reformable meatheads were real.

[Liesmith]

I was playing Neverwinter Nights 2 today, and I came across a section with goblins. They were characterized as brutish and barely intelligent enough to string words together into full sentences. It was really rather sickening. I thought back to how much I enjoyed this game as a child and became so embarrassed with myself that I wound up deleting it from my computer.

[DrinksTooMuchCoffee]

Kobolds don't get it much better in DDO, but at least they are articulate: Kobold_Still_Hates_You_(Forever).mp3

[Liesmith]

Well that's different. Kobolds are filthy, aggressive creatures, and I don't trust them.

I'm sorry, I was raised in a different edition.

[T' Northerner]

I'll not deny that I slaughtered my fair share of kobolds in the Nashkel mines, but how could anyone travel with Deekin and still say that they are filthy and aggresive. Annoying and terrible singers, I'll grant you.

[DrinksTooMuchCoffee]

Well that's different. Kobolds are filthy, aggressive creatures, and I don't trust them.

And those kobolds are union workers too.

[Lionday]

Kobolds are filthy, aggressive creatures, and I don't trust them.

I'm sorry, I was raised in a different edition.

Oh God there fire arrows. There were so many... so many. They kept spawning man By God they kept spawning!

[Liesmith]

Then, in Neverwinter Nights 2, Deekin decides to open up a shop in the main thoroughfare of the largest city on the Sword Coast! It's not enough that these yappy little lizard dogs use adventurers to bypass our immigration laws, but then they take jobs from honest, hardworking NPCs.

When I was running the keep later, I had to invite the little blighter to operate a shop in the courtyard, just to appease the kobold lobbyists.

[willpell]

I praise Thunt for creating the basis for this dialogue. I wish his vision of reformable meatheads were real.

It very much is possible, but not under the conditions we currently live in, which combine a sense of individual safety, which encourages hypocritical and spoiled attitudes and a lack of fear of consequence, with the capacity for people to get in each other's face via the media. I guarantee that if an alien armada showed up and kidnapped all the Islamics and Republicans and beamed them down in little lifeboats or desert islands on separate alien planets, one of each apiece with no hope of them getting together with the rest of their camp, the vast majority would find that they preferred to live together rather than die together. It's very easy to talk tough with big rhetoric when the other guy is far away, or when you have him at gunpoint; when forced to interact on a personal level, especially under desperate circumstances, most people find that their illusions are less able to survive than themselves.

I was playing Neverwinter Nights 2 today, and I came across a section with goblins. They were characterized as brutish and barely intelligent enough to string words together into full sentences. It was really rather sickening. I thought back to how much I enjoyed this game as a child and became so embarrassed with myself that I wound up deleting it from my computer.

To be fair, that game was in development well before Goblins started, and came out only 1 year into the comic's life, before it had gotten very popular. Back then, that portrayal of goblins was pretty standard; they do have an Intelligence penalty under the rules, after all (blues excepted).

[Hellborn_Blight]

I find it a little strange how emotional some of the comments are. Not that I'm insulting anyone, feel what you wanna feel. But rather than get all teary-eyed about a made up races plight, it makes me ponder on a few things. Like, if goblins weren't fodder and picked on and little deviant pieces of evil crap, our goblins wouldn't be special at all. If they weren't an exception to an established set of parameters, there wouldn't be any need to write this comic. It also stands to reason, even within thunt's (or i guess Herbet's) game world, most of the things about goblins that are generally accepted (referencing the monster entry here) hold true. And that's fine because you always need bad guys. After all with out them, where is conflict going to come from? In fact, the only truly bad thing about goblins being evil little monsters is that no matter how many of them you kill, there are always more of them...which is weird. Same with orc's in that. Kill them for centurys, still enough of them to march on some settlement every Tuesday on dawns first light.

But getting back to my point, the goblins in this comic are special because they have separated themselves from much of what it means to be goblin traditionally. They have carved out a niche amongst goblins, and if other goblins weren't filthy, ignorant savages, we would not have this comic to look forward to every for or five days. So thank you, you evil little bastards, it couldn't have been done with out you!

[T' Northerner]

Well, mostly I think we're all being facetious. Also, I think the point isn't that the GAP are special goblins who are separate from all the other 'evil' goblins, but that goblins and the monster races in general are just people, with good and bad and hubris and weakness like any other people, and that the perception of them as mindless child kidnapping adventurer fodder is wrong. Indeed, Thunt even satirises the whole 'abandoning the evil ways of my people' trope with the not so virtuous drow in book 1.

[willpell]

Indeed, Thunt even satirises the whole 'abandoning the evil ways of my people' trope with the not so virtuous drow in book 1.

The worst part of it is that, rather than behaving in an evil way that suggests their upbringing among the Drow, which would at least be good roleplaying (if you grow up in a society that totemizes sociopathy as the ultimate virtue, nobody can really fault you too hard for turning out a sociopath). No, they do the same kind of banal, petty evil that is pretty much standard among player characters of any variety. Contrary to their intention in playing the foremost race of Special Snowflakes in D&D, there is nothing remarkable or unique about any of them - they're just another gaggle of rapacious thrill-seekers looking to harvest easy XP and collect loot. (Never mind that in a properly-run D&D game, there is no such thing as easy XP; the idea that you got XP for killing monsters is a long-running and pernicious misconception, but the seldom-remembered truth has always been "you get XP for overcoming challenges"...which means that had Thaco not been there, and Seth had just executed Taps and Asks-Nonsense, he should have gotten little to no XP for them, making his determination to kill them as pointless and spiteful as, well, a huge chunk of what players everywhere are doing much of the time.)

[T' Northerner]

The monsters=XP is probably as much a fault of the DMs as the players. Its easier to ramp up the difficulty by spamming monsters than by making puzzles or non violent encounters. Not that I'd know really. I've only played three games so I'm still very much a D&D noob and probably make all the mistakes the drow/ex-drow party make in the comic.