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Goblin

From Dwarf Fortress Wiki
Revision as of 22:49, 3 January 2022 by 85.250.152.65 (talk) (added info from:https://villains.fandom.com/wiki/Goblins_(Dwarf_Fortress), cc3 main contributor XZippy see history for further info)
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xTATTEREDx  · +FINE+  · *SUPERIOR*  · ≡EXCEPTIONAL≡  · ☼MASTERWORK☼
Goblin
g
Urist likes goblins for their terrifying features.
Portrait

No portrait

Biome

Any location

Attributes
Alignment: Evil

· Learns · Humanoid

Cannot be tamed 
Size
Birth: 3,000 cm3
Mid: 15,000 cm3
Max: 60,000 cm3

Age
Child at: 1
Adult at: 18
Max age: Immortal
Cannot be butchered

Wikipedia article

v50.14 · v0.47.05
This article is about the current version of DF.
Note that some content may still need to be updated.
A medium-sized humanoid driven to cruelty by its evil nature.
A goblin riding a beak dog, drawn in crayon by Bay 12 Games.

Goblins are intelligent, evil, aggressive humanoid creatures and are the main opponent in fortress mode. The threat of the goblins may vary depending on where the player chooses to embark their settlement. If the player has embarked on a remote island where no goblin civilizations are present, goblin sieges will never occur.

Goblins are immortal beings, dying only to violence and disease. For spoiler reasons, they never need to eat or drink, despite being carnivorous. Goblins speak the goblin language. Some traitors dwarves like goblins for their terrifying features.

Ethics and values

Dwarf head pixel.png  This article or section contains minor spoilers. You may want to avoid reading it.
Green and heartless.

Goblins show the least concern for ethics out of any race in the game, with the sole exception being that treason is punishable by death (which currently has no effect on successful attempts to bump off a leader). It appears that goblins do not enforce punishment, but instead simply ignore crimes and leave any punishment to be determined by the parties involved. It is because of their acceptance of controversial acts that goblins become enemies with nearly every other race. For example, goblins find the torture of animals, the butchering and consuming of sapient beings, oath-breaking, and general malice acceptable or consider it a personal matter.

Goblin civilizations are created when a particular kind of uniquely powerful demon escapes the Underworld. Such demons remain in charge until they're killed or otherwise defeated, in which case normal goblins will take their place. This could imply the reason behind their particular (lack of) ethics. Goblin civilizations in fact require these demons to appear in worldgen - should you use advanced world generation to forbid demons in your world, the goblins will be locked away in the Underworld in their place, and will remain there until they are freed by a civilization digging too deep and too greedily.

Goblins consider power to be of the utmost importance. They also value cunning, independence and martial prowess. Goblins dislike peace, perseverance, hard work, tranquillity, cooperation, tradition, decorum and friendship. They don't value loyalty, introspection, eloquence, harmony or nature at all. Goblins abhor law, truth, self-control, fairness and sacrifice.

Gameplay

Goblins are represented with a gray g in gameplay. They live in settlements in the form of "dark pits" or dark fortresses, though it may be hard for some to imagine that goblins are capable of building those obsidian monoliths. Goblins only exist in evil biomes, and never neutral or good ones. Depending on where the player chooses to put their settlement, the goblin threat varies due to how close they are. The closer the player is to a goblin settlement, the more often they will be attacked, making the game much harder. Note that the evil biomes that goblins live on are very abnormal and hellish, such as deathly gas clouds blowing by, rain made of blood, corpses suddenly being reanimated over and over, and extremely dangerous animals spawning instead of harmless or benign ones.

In the standard "Fortress Mode" gamemode, goblins will attempt to harass dwarven fortresses early on. First, goblin babysnatchers will stealthily attempt to steal young dwarves unless they are caught or attacked beforehand. If the babysnatcher succeeds, the kidnapped victim will be taken to a goblin settlement, but not killed. This also causes relatives of the kidnapped victim to become sad or even suicidal. A strong dwarf military can be sent to a goblin settlement as a mission to rescue kidnapped children, however, if a child is at a goblin settlement long enough, they will be manipulated to join the enemy's cause.

Once the player's settlement increases in value, goblins will begin sieges: sending many armored goblins at once, coupled with some of them riding large animals as cavalry (mostly trolls and beak dogs). The sieges will become larger depending on the increasing value of the player's fortress. Sieges usually retreat after a certain amount of time and resistance, and remaining enemies will cower away if enough of its evil allies are killed more than willing to sacrifice their wounded comrades in a badly organized retreat. Their strength generally comes from pure numbers, as they're usually weaker than a dwarf one-on-one (a notable exception is their weapon lords and masters, who can be VERY talented in warfare.)

Detailed Behavior

Goblin babysnatchers carry a bag for their purpose. Their soldiers are commonly armored with copper and iron armor, and armed with copper, iron and silver weapons, generally with no quality levels unless on weaponmasters, and also typically accompanied by other creatures, such as other humanoids they have successfully kidnapped, trolls and beak dog mounts. Their items can be a valuable source of metals for fortresses that embarked in metal-scarce areas (leading some players to refer to the plunder from a defeated goblin attack as goblinite). Defeating a majority of an attacking force usually sends the rest of them running.

ISieges will contain one or more squads advancing on the player's fortress. These squads may contain mounts like the aforementioned trolls or beak dogs, but stronger forces may also contain mounts such as ogres and/or cave dragons - creatures easily capable of destroying buildings. These enemy squads may also contain non-goblin races, including brainwashed dwarves that were previously kidnapped by a babysnatcher.

If a siege is warded away or killed off entirely, a stronger siege will take place some time after the last one. Enemy sieges are a very common way to lose a fortress. When hitting the 'Esc' button, the "Retire your fortress" option will be changed to "Succumb to the invasion" for the entire duration of the siege (but note that that happens during a siege from any creature, not just goblins).

Community outlook

Out of the non-player races, the goblins are the ones the player interacts with the most, given the fact they're the ones that are always hostile and eager to attack you. Compared to elves, goblins can actually be a threat to a fortress, and an unprepared player can easily lose all their dwarves by being overwhelmed by the greenskin tide. However, their tendency to run off when outmatched as well as a general feeling of dwarven superiority has led to the goblins gaining a reputation of being cowardly little bastards who rely on sheer numbers to match the might of a dwarven warrior. As the main enemies of the dwarves, goblins make for perfect target-practice in fun projects.

The community plays most of their evil acts for laughs (such as implying baby-snatchers are trying to save dwarven children from their unhinged parents), and generally treats them as being equivalent to ineffectual cartoon villains who can't quite get anything done properly. A goblin will generally be treated more favorably than an elf, though; despite goblins wanting dwarves dead out of pure malice, the antipathy the community has with the elves comes from their awful, stuck-up attitude, which goblins actually lack entirely. They're evil, but they're not jerks.

D4Dwarf.png This article or section has been rated D for Dwarf. It may include witty humour, not-so-witty humour, bad humour, in-jokes, pop culture references, and references to the Bay12 forums. Don't believe everything you read, and if you miss some of the references, don't worry. It was inevitable.


Despite their bloodthirsty, selfish, unsympathetic and cruel nature, goblins are also recognized as a benevolent and merciful race in some aspects. Goblin Baby-Snatchers claim moral superiority by rescuing innocent lives from the slavery of making rock trumpets until they are eaten by a giant cave spider. Atrocities such as the so-called dwarven day care institution also spur snatchers to rescue the children from constant abuse. Goblin sieges are considered to be a form of mass mercy-killings, as a fort can die in the most horrific of ways, such as social disagreements, an infestation of parasitic organisms (some masquerading as dwarves) or worst of all: a visit from the circus. And goblins who are friendly towards dwarves have been observed after de-transforming from a werebeast.

In addition, dwarven science[Citation needed] has proven that the violence between goblins and dwarves does, in fact, start on a purely instinctual level. Leaving a goblin and dwarven child locked in a room together will result in them kicking, punching, and biting each other to death the moment they notice each other. Whether this natural animosity stems from uncounted centuries of war, or opposing viewpoints on the treatment of children has yet to be determined.

Despite being mortal enemies of the dwarves, goblins are still infinitely better than the despicable tree-hugging hippies.

Playing as Goblins

Goblins are normally not playable in adventurer mode, as the player isn't able to make adventurers from their civilizations. However, you may be able to play as one if populations of goblins have been absorbed into dwarven, human or elven civilizations during worldgen, though as noted, they will not actually belong to the actual goblin civilizations, meaning your goblin and the others will be hostile to one another. "Goblin" settlements will sometimes be completely goblin-free, having been displaced by the descendants of children that were captured in ages past. In this respect, whilst they're a goblin faction, they're populated purely by unfortunate prisoners and other brainwashed humanoids.

By modding, however, Goblins can also be played in fortress mode as well.

Many different races can be chosen for the player in the game's second gamemode, "Adventure Mode". However, without any form of hacking or game file alternations, the player cannot choose to play as a goblin.

Trivia

  • Despite the goblins' evil nature, some can be morally-balanced visitors to your fortress, acting as skilled leaders or politicians.
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