How many goblins can you take in a fight -- or: size modifiers and realism

[mhd]

One issue is whether the goblins themselves are well-organized. In lots of campaigns, they're a pretty cowardly, barbarous lot, mostly living in the tunnels built by other races.

Then, quite often the goblinoid races mix, so the goblins themselves would only be part of the army (sappeurs, skirmishers, scouts, cannonfodder), so you'd have bugbears, hobgoblins or orcs in the shock trooper / phalanx role.

But assuming they have to stand on their own and are willing to do that, I'd go with fortifications, too. If they have the time, preferably tunnels, as this works to their advantage, size-wise, as opposed to walls (which would be huge for them to barely keep humans out).

And then there's the Warhammer heritage, where goblins are natural engineers. Which might actually be quite realistic, as for one thing they'd have to equalize things somehow, and by the sheer numbers they can provide: A lot of work done on siege engines and the like isn't that much dependent on strength per person, but on persons total (at least that's what I'd assume, correct me if I'm wrong). Thus a horde of goblins could quickly come to some results here. Especially if they're not strictly nocturnal (i.e. not blinded by day light), and thus able to work longer hours than humans (probably in shifts).

Speaking of numbers, I wonder how the logistics would work out for that. Not about the birth rate, which is easy enough to hand-wave, but about food requirements. Chimps spend a lot of their day time gathering food. Partly because it might not be the most nutritious (leaves etc.) – which is a problem goblins might share. But if I remember correctly, it's also about the size, i.e. they need to eat more often (heat retention?). Not sure about cal/body mass, i.e. if their total food intake is proportional to a human's.

Probably one reason why halflings have that many meals per day…

[Verjigorm]

Originally Posted by Anders Gabrielsson

However, that won't work at all against a phalanx or tercio-style formation. is there any way for kobolds or goblins to fight effectively and take advantage of their smaller size in that type of situation?

Run away and skirmish. If you can't take the Phalanx head on, you have to withdraw before it, or get chewed up. I mean, even the Roman legionaires had trouble fighting Phalanxes.

Or you could take a page from Warhammer: drug fueled nutjobs with a big ball on a chain, and that will make a mess!

[Anders Gabrielsson]

Originally Posted by mhd

(heat retention?)

Yeah, that's square-cube stuff. As your size shrinks your surface/volume grows, meaning you lose more body heat. Really tiny warm-blooded animals have to spend nearly all their time eating to keep from freezing to death.

However, for chimps I think it's more that they're eating low-energy food. Dogs don't spend much time eating for example.

[roguebfl]

Originally Posted by Anders Gabrielsson

However, for chimps I think it's more that they're eating low-energy food. Dogs don't spend much time eating for example.

But that's might have to do with a dog's only real way to dumb heat is to pant.

[Anders Gabrielsson]

It's more that when dogs eat they scarf down big amounts of high-energy food.

[mhd]

A dog's only way to cool down maybe, it's dumping heat perfectly fine. Most dogs I've touched have been pretty warm, after all…

I think for my campaign I might go with this and make goblins a bit more omnivorous than humans, i.e. they *would* be able to get by of roots, maybe even leaves. But that requires them foraging for the whole day, and they don't particularly like that.

Or make them solely carnivorous, which would be quite a problem for the more barbaric tribes. You'd need to hunt a lot. Or have a rather violent culture, so that your high birth rate is kept in check…

I do note that the Pathfinder goblins (cf. "Rise of the Runelords") have huge heads and mouths. Maybe they're not able to sweat, too. A couple of dozen of panting football heads with pointy teeth might soon lose its humor for PCs…

[Bruno]

Large heads means they can keep their brains similar in size to humans, despite being overall smaller. This does mean, however, that their overall energy budget is going to be disproportionately taken up by that brain, even worse than humans.

Big mouths are good for panting, also big ears are good for radiating heat (See desert foxes for some really extreme ears). Big mouths are also good for taking big bites out of things, and less good for elocution - humans have small mouths because we don't have to take big bites out of the torsos of animals bigger than our heads very often, and because those fleshy, muscular cheeks and lips, and small mouth openings give us an amazing vocal flexibility. Chimps have better biting attacks, but far worse ranges of consonants, and consonants are the bulk of human phonemes as far as I know.

Big heads are also popular in burrowing species, but there big heads are used to "Shove" their way through dirt. A tool using species that burrows with its hands or with tools isn't going to plow the way with its noggin, and a big head will get stuck in small tunnels.

Realistically, an actual, adapted-for-burrowing species will make most tunnels only slightly wider than their shoulders, and just tall enough to get their heads through - less dirt to move, and less risk of collapse. Tool using surface creatures that have migrated to a subterranean lifestyle are the ones that make tunnels big enough to stand on their hind legs in without bumping their heads (ie, humans ;)). So if goblins are burrowers, they're like humans, and have taken to the lifestyle later.

Or they were created that way by a divine being who can just make whatever crap up whichever way they want, of course.

[Last Pawn]

One thing I don't recall seeing mentioned is caltrops. Not only do they do damage based on the enemy's ST (which makes them a good value for weak combatants), they hold the potential for crippling the enemy's foot, which has a chance at putting said enemy on their posterior. If the caltrops fail to do enough damage to cripple the foot they can lodge in the foot continuing to do damage each second they're walked on and removing them in battle is a two turn action. Even if foot based DR is to high to do damage they still turn the hex into bad footing. Add in retreating tactics and missile fire and Mr. Big has some legitimate trouble on his hands.