D&D MONSTER RANKINGS - GOBLINS 

"Goblins are often one of the very first types of enemies that low level adventurers face." A common mistake for beginners...

"Even if you destroy the Demon Lord there will still be goblins. Perhaps if I spent my years searching I find one good Goblin. But in the end the only good Goblin is one that doesn't crawl out of its stinking hole!"

Given goblins are the rats of humanoid races in most worlds, their +1 con makes sense. They can survive almost Literally anywhere.

My favourite story of Goblins in DnD; we saved a goblin, the DM said he could have a level in rogue, We called him None and for every kill, we would let him take their name and add it to his own but we didn't give him a weapon until after his first kill. Also, the time we crucified a goblin and used him as satnav

1:15 "Whimsical Disney style that always has a happy ending" Remember that German version of Cinderella that had the evil sisters cutting off parts of their feet so that the shoe would fit? You're right Esper, fairy tales are *messed up.*

Don't forget Boblin the Goblin

Goblin Slayer: Ah Finally. A video I can truly appreciate.

Demon Lord tier list? Just an idea. Or maybe a tier list of something in 4th edition. Because honestly, monster variety and lore is one of the greatest strengths of it.

Esper: I don't think goblins can ever be eradicated. Goblin Slayer: Did someone say, goblin?

Hobgoblins are my favorite enemy in 5e. I treat them like even more ruthless spartans.

love how calm his voice is and how the music is absolutely shredding it in the background xD

He raged at the world, at his family, at his life. But mostly he just raged.

You: You should never be able to kill all of the goblins in an area. Also you: GoBlInS ArEn'T KnOwN FoR HaRdInEsS! This is a well documented and thought out video that I enjoyed but I found that funny.

FUN FACT: Maglubiyet actually means “Defeat” in Turkish. No wonder they lose a lot

I love the variety of goblinoids. With each sub-type, you have so many options of how you want to play them. Hobgoblins especially could range from hired mooks to skilled strategists.

It's also important to remember that Romans and Greeks would change the "K" sound for a "G"G sound. So Kobolis was "Gobolus". Gobolin.

Its hard not to think that the Barghest should be on the list, even though not really a goblin, its lore is bound to them.

"Goblins quaff, and Goblins beat Goblins laugh, and Goblins bleat Batter, jabber, whip, and hammer, hooooo! You go, my lad! Ho ho, my lad!" -The Hobbit (1977) Complete Soundtrack, _Down, Down, To Goblin Town_

Warhammer goblins and gretchin definitely are my favorite esthetically. Something about the ears and nose matched with ramshackle attire really does it for me.

Idk why but whenever I think of goblins I think of the pathfinder goblins. Just something about em makes me like em

"Shoud they be eradicated like cockroaches" Goblin Slayer intensifies. "Or do you they have a chance for redemption." Goblin Slayer "And he lost me."

6:12 wow those goblins look like they absolutely LOVE that spider wig

17:15 'Bah, you know nothing of my people, or our gods. The Mighty One would never poison his blood, with thine human drink, so frequently that it would swell his gut.' - Greldrerad the Hobgoblin Avenger, after seeing this video.

I've never understood why hobgoblins are always armed with swords. Swords are human weapons, best suited for self defence and fighting unarmored foes. Hobgoblins are lifelong soldiers, battleaxes, war hammers, spears and halberds suit them way more. The first two are also cheaper to manufacture.

I love the Pathfinder goblin look because the oversized head,and ears.

S++ tier: Boblin the Goblin

I'm goblin these videos up . . . I'll see myself out.

"A VILE FORCE OF DARKNESS HAS ARRIVED"

Gnome village next to a goblin pit, quest: theyre not violent theyre just having a prank war and the gnomes want your party to do an epic prank on the goblins

While magic the gathering has an interesting array of good and bad goblins, I'm most fond of the red/yellow skinned ones experienced in 5e. It gives them a more distinct racial aesthetic. Also Hobgoblis have a culture that makes them more interesting than the other two, if you find the literature.

I Have always loved hobgoblins and One of my favorite characters to play is a hobgoblin. I would rate them much higher than the rest and would argue they are far more flexible. They are strict, and disciplined. They can coexist with other humanoids if they deem it furthering their cause. They are also not just as intelligent, but one could argue even more intelligent than humans on average based on their bonus to int. But they are less creative that other races, painfully rigid and logical, seeing little value in arts or other such frivolity. And as you have said with regular goblins, they too represent an ugly reflection of humanity, but not the small craven wretch, but malice given purpose. They are the embodiment of what human evil can do when organized. But in this they are also the most dangerous for they are not wantonly destructive. The walk as speak as we do, they can even live among us. They in many ways are us if we observe how many dominate and imperialist nations operate in the modern world.

Although they are generic greenskins, I love warhammer goblins.

My sister read German translations of the brothers Grimm when I was four. As I grew up I saw that my experience of these stories is much darker and grittier than the other kids

When one of the boys become famous and get a tier list of all his best to worst looks.

I have a Hobgoblin Eldritch Knight who was a soldier the 3rd Holy Empire but after the Empire suddenly declared all no common race (any non Humans,dwarfs,elves, or halflings) to be exterminated. Well after a Skyrim like escape Khon as vowed to unite the gobliniod races and burn the empire to the ground and from its ashes build a new Goblin Empire.

I can't wait until my party encounters the Steelmarch Legion Remnant hiding in the sewers of waterdeep. I can't even imagine how they will react to the nilbog the hobgoblins are forced to tolerate. *The brightly dressed creature parades, around the room. And you swear one of the motionless guards twitches*

Drizzt once met a goblin in a short story that was intelligent. It was a really good read. If you haven't read it, I wont spoil it for you, but the goblin makes Drizzt think back to his OWN people and how they are viewed as monsters. That maybe there are other races with good and smart creatures in it, but can't be that way in their own society. He left Menzoberranzan for that very reason. If you get a chance, its a very short tale, look it up, its worth the read.

What about a 'Classic Hero List' ranking guys like Drizzt, Tanis, Bilbo, Red Sonja, and Conan.

you've only touched the tip of the iceberg of mtg goblins. one plane has a whole race of cyborg scavenger goblins. they get weird

My last campaign, we were playing a 5-6 player module with 4 players, so the DM allowed us a lot of leeway when creating our characters. I created a Lawful Neutral Hobgoblin Paladin of Tempus (Oath of Conquest, obviously) who was asked by a cleric of Tyr to aid the village against the local cultists mostly because the cleric was out of options and Kurac (my paladin) was returning to Waterdeep and passing through. Obviously, there were some issues with local society and law enforcement, and the party were very leery of him, but we ended up doing quite well for ourselves. Was possibly the best campaign I ever was in, especially after we introduced a paladin of Tyr (we recruited a 5th person later on) and he kept trying to figure out what "my scam" was, but couldn't. Because there wasn't one.

Bugbear is considered a goblin? WAT?

At the start I forgot I was watching a dnd video and thought I was listening to an inspirational speaker talk about my inner demons

Few characters have provided me with as much fun as my goblin evangelical trickster priest of Nilbog.

Best Goblin Picture?.... Absolutly the one with the Hedgehog Sling .. poor Kithkin/Hobbit/Halfling who gets shot by that ^^

The modern goblins are very different from mythological goblins, who had almost no breeding, innate invisibility, and a prank version of prestidigitation, who were not generally murderers, those that were are known as red caps and Hobs were housekeeper spirit

Nilbogs used to just always automatically be healed by direct HP damage of any sort, but harmed by healing. (There's also a variant called a Llort, trolls who as soon as they are injured have degeneration that causes them to rapidly start taking more damage every turn until they die, then being trolls they eventually heal back up to just above death, and then die again over and over)

I have placed infront of my players a nilbog, very memorable, they struggled so much and a lot of hilarious scenarios happened He also almost stole the bow of the archer before running of leaving him unarmed in the dungeon

Honestly, I really like the leg design on the 5th edition Bugbear

What's funny, during one of my brothers first playing, he actually made 2 bugbears and 2 goblins joined the group. These four defend the Phindalin while the party were away.

17:08 it’s for the poison resistance not the HP

Giving Goblins increased Constitutions makes sense when you remember that they eat garbage. The Pathfinder Goblin art fits the hyper-stylists aesthetic of the game in general. I will say I like the design of Goblinoids in 5e best, since the art makes them all look somewhat related (similar ears and noses, for example). I’ve always had mixed feelings about Bugbears (their name sounds like a joke for one thing), but I’m using them and the other Goblinoids as a major ancestry in my newest homebrew settings in place of Orcs, and so far it’s working out.

I love the design of bugbears. It reminds of some goblins from The Edge chronicles. If you're looking for original goblins, read it : there is hammerheads goblins, flat-head goblins, long-haired goblins (looking quite like the bugbears)... This serie is so inspirationnal if you're looking to create strange races and worldbuilding.

I really like the idea of goblin artificers. Tinkering with magics and machines typically beyond their understanding. MTG of course has a lot of representations of this. maybe a group of goblins stumble into a dormant or abandoned warforged mine. After a few years they may not have become skilled with this new technology but at least more dangerous and complex.

one thing you chould/should do with the nilbog: when the party kills the weak spell caster, turn a random goblin into the new possesed one and become a nilbog. now they have to work like the goblins. let the jester do it's thing and focus on your own work instead.

Esper, yet again a well researched and put together video. Keep them coming.

I really like 5es depiction of the hobgoblins, it really puts alot of focus on the lawful aspect of them and shows them as commanders with stern and disciplined looks, well maintained armor and weapons, it really gives you the idea that with the right circumstances a good enough hobgoblin can make as a great threat even to more experienced adventurers

No idea if it's possible, but I would love to see a Golem tier list.

Pathfinder Goblins look the coolest imho. Funniest looking

Feel like im the only person who likes the cartoony green goblin aesthetic

Yeeaaahhhh my favourite fantasy race! Goblins are top shelf

I mean, there is certainly a charm to the goblin with it's more 'evil' ascetic filed down a bit. One need not look further than things like Warcraft's incarnation to see that kind of thing. They are still shrewd and diminutive, physically frail but with a cunning intellect, but they have far more focus on that cunning and intelligence with the crafting arts than completely screwing up their local environment. To the point that after the Second War for Azeroth, the goblins split apart from the Orcish Horde for a while and went full-tilt into their mercenary and inventive ways. Other franchises and homebrewed worlds also give similar presses for goblins to be heavily alchemy related, though perhaps still shrewd and self-centered in their own ways. Honestly, I'm having a bit of a blast with a homebrewed settlement of goblins I created as a side area for an obgoing Pathfinder campaign. The main settlement is ran by what you'd expect from Pathfinder basic goblins (Lamasthuian cult acts as the primary lead, severe hatred of 'pinkskins' and other surface dwellers, a growing space crisis, etc) but there's a side group that I created that were goblins who were basically bandits, who realized toughening up and growing stronger was the way to go. Whereas the goblin setup we use gives a -2 to STR for +4 DEX, I've instead modded it to +2 S/+2 D/-2 I, and debating modifying the stealth-based Racial bonuses of this template for something strength related. End point, these lot at their higher-tier NPC points will be lugging around 2-handers even if they aren't going to be the most witty of conversation.

My best friend played a game with her boyfriend and one of his friends to kind of get used to playing with her bard, when they came upon a pack of bugbears. They, of course, took 'em out, so they were looking around for loot, when my friend asked if there were any bugbear babies around, and her boyfriend said there was one in a den. And my friend up and adopted it, so that her bard could raise him to be a force of mass destruction. To combat this, her boyfriend had someone steal the baby from her, and now it's a running joke with us that her drow bard's backstory is that he is now looking for the bugbear baby that was stolen from him.

Best monsters in D&D. Great video, good sir!

I’ll never forget when my two best friends and I first did a sample encounter as written and died to a pair of drunken goblin sentries 😂 turns out having only two instead of four party members and completely miscalculating the hit point totals for everyone involved made a big difference in the encounter difficulty 😅

I still remember the first boss fight in Baldur's Gate:Dark Alliance for PS2, fighting a bugbear chieftain leading kobolds in the sewers. And a bit later, fighting the Beholder crime lord whose thugs mug you at the start of it.

"GOBLINS ARE WEAK TO FIRE AND ICE BOTH!"

30:43 wild you can still fool yourself into believing that after we went over the goblin mages in this VERY video. Denial is a powerful thing 😂

> Exist as bandits or raiders/shadowy, mucky dens away from the bright lights of civilization The goblins didn't make the move to Vegas. Their lair is still the Black Hole in Oakland-Alameda County Colosseum. They all carry tiny cameo portraits of Al Davis in the pockets of their ragged cloths, amid all the detrius and scraps they have scavenged. They call this portrait their presssious, and long for a return of the mystique they claim it once imparted upon their desperate kind.

I can understand preferring more unique goblin designs, but I don't understand how you can like goblins while hating their most iconic appearance of green, big nose, bald/little hair. It's iconic for a reason

Esper: calls goblins someþing that should be wiped out. Me: *sad short stack noises*

Why so much hate for WoW Goblins? They really do fit into the world they belong to. I like them as a counter to the Alliance's Gnomes. They are mostly designed as player characters which really does set them apart from a traditional Goblin.

Sometimes old age is fun, I heard hobgoblin Iron Chef. Your time starts now, secret ingredient is villagers !

I've been waiting for this episode ever since I discovered your channel thank God that you made

Idea for a video. Anything ooze like. All things slimmy and terrifying 😁 love the channel, keep on rolling

I agree 100% about the aesthetics, though to be fair with the WoW goblin, they are a playable race and fit their universe. As for Goblin PC stats in 5e, keep in mind +2/+1 is the standard of the edition. Can't go and give them a -2.

How about a Fey tier list?

Swish, smack! Whip, crack! Smash, grab! Pinch, nab! You go, my lad! Ho, ho! My lad! The black crack! The back crack! The black crack! The back crack! Down down to Goblin-town Down down to Goblin-town Down down to Goblin-town You go, my lad! Ho, ho! My lad! Goblins quaff, and Goblins beat Goblins laugh, and Goblins bleat Batter, jabber, whip and hammer, hooo! Yo go, my lad! Ho, ho my lad! Below, my lad! Ho, ho!

I remember one Halloween AL event at my local game store. A bunch of level 5 characters almost died to a nilbog who was mind controlling some children, because he kept using the kids as human shields and we all kept failing our Charisma saves. Anyway, I fuckin love nilbogs.

Esper I once had a player make a goblin mage who wanted to help his people so whenever the party came across goblins the mage would transport them to his cave system and then called upon them to take down the final boss of the campaign which I made the bad decision of allowing it and had about 2 million goblins take down Unther the chaos god.

In my last campaign, my group of 5 all died to 3 goblins in their second encounter. It was hilarious for me so I had to deus ex machina them.

I love goblins. I still need to create a mighty roman style hobgoblin empire.

i don't think that hobgoblins are more advanced socially then goblins, instead it just has a different shape. hobs are militiristic, clear leadership hierarchy. goblins are more a tribe, a clan, a group of people, not soldiers. a social situation is a lot harder when one isn't as clearly above another. i'd also much rather run a social encounter with goblins then with hobgoblins. what hobgoblin would go against their orders? goblins though, they are not bound by loyalty or anything like that, leaving them with much more options. my very first session ever was against goblins where my character spoke goblin which was a great help in getting combat to be easier by simply having more of them just leave instead of continuing to fight us (which was a good thing because we were not doing well).

Our poor 2nd level druid got splattered by a bugbear.

Orcs are indeed in other many works goblinoids as well, moreover in tolkien books from which are based the original RPG's orc are emparented to goblins.. being the later actually a subrace forming from the moast weakling amongs them. So I never new why Wizard of the Coast put orc out of the subspecies. I belive maybe in later editions they should regain their emparental status in D&D. Greetings

I created a random encounter of a wandering Hobgoblin NPC called Corn Bob the Corn Hob who always just "happens" to pass by the party at the weirdest of times and offers free corn to the party with a genuinely honest southern charm. Suffice to say, he sorta became the team's mascot.

I recommend using the player stats for hobgoblins from Volo's, then making a battle master fighter to be your warlord, and make them a level of your choosing. Much better.

31:43 this is gonna be a hobgoblin npc for me now xD thanks dude

I personally think the +1 constitution for goblins makes sense, they live in squalid and filthy conditions and don't contract diseases, can survive without much food and such.

*a red eye glows from the darkness as a male wearing a beat up old armour, with a shield strapped to his arm and a sword with a strange length steps forward* “Goblins you say” For his name is Goblin Slayer

I like how you used the term cravens in this video. Very apt!

33 minutes!? How many goblins are there!?

Constitution bonuses express eating fetid mess and living in grime and mire

Ahhh freaking always loved goblins. They were my favorite as a kid just starting dnd and wanted a goblin character so bad back then

Is it bad that all my friends that have played dnd with me as the gm have agreed that Im a goblin

Give a look over the Kenzer & Co's 3.5 HobGoblins. They flesh out their society and flavor quite nicely. Also, PathFinder 2e goblin deserves another chance . They are directly linked with fiends in their creation myth, which may lead to their red eyes 👀 when reflected by fire 🔥light . Yet the ones I find most enjoyable are the trailed & furred Monkey Goblins. Sadly the PF2 Hobgoblin is weakened being closer tied to the Goblin. The better path is to build on Kenzer & Co's version.

Goblins are Superpolinators. Hence goblin+elves=hobgoblin, goblin+horse=pooka, goblin+dog=barghest, goblin+bear=bugbear, goblin+kobold= gremlin. As superpolinators they can breed with anything.

Ever since I bought my niece the light novel series Goblin Slayer I run them exactly like that.

I love playing as a goblin. I have Dink, a NG collage of valour Bard. She's a young little one who grew up in the streets. She wears disguises to preform as a halfling in the pubs. She's modeled after Link armed with a sword, shield, and ocarina.

I once made a goblin I was happy with He was a goblin cleric. Can't remember the details but he was a death cleric. And I had named him Ratbag the Shiny. And he has a pet rat named Ratt the Fluffy

I use a nilbog on my lvl 4 players as part of a goblins host, he never died and leads to a player death, quick. Those are nasty!