"These small, evil humanoids would be merely pests, if not for their great numbers.

Goblins have flat faces, broad noses, pointed ears, wide mouths and small sharp fangs. Their foreheads slope back, and their eyes are usually dull and glazed. They always walk upright, but their arms hang down almost to their knees. Their skin colors range from yellow, through any shade of orange to a deep red. Usually a single tribe has members all about the same color skin. Their eyes vary from blight red to a gleaming lemon yellow. They wear clothing of dark leather, tending toward dull soiled-looking colors.

Goblin speech is harsh, and pitched higher than that of humans. In addition to their own language, some goblins can speak in the kobold, orc, and hobgoblin tongues.

Combat:
Goblins hate bright sunlihgt [...]. This unusual sensitivity to light, hovewer, serves the goblins well underground, giving them infravision out to 60 feet. Tehy can use any sort of weapon, preferring those that take little training, like spears or maces. They are known to carry short swords as a second weapon. They are usually armored in leather, although the leaders may have chain or even plate mail.

Goblin strategies and tactics are simple and crude. They are cowardly and will usually avoid a face-to-face fight. Mpre often than not, they will attempt to arrange an ambush of their foes.

Habitat/society:
Humans would consider caves and underground dwellings of goblins to be dank and dismal. Those few tribes that live above the ground are found in ruin, and are only active at night or on very dark, cloudy days. They use no form of sanitation, and their lairs have a foul stench. Goblin seem to be somewhat resistant to the diseases that breed in such filth.

They live a communal life, sharing large common areas for eating and sleeping. Only leaders have separate living spaces. All their possesions are carried with them. Most of their goods are stolen, although they do manufacture their own garmets and leather goods. The concept of privacy is largely foreign to goblins.

A typical goblin tribe has 40-400 adult male warriors. For every 40 goblins, there will be a leader and his 4 assistants. For every 200 goblins there will be a sub-chief and 2-8 bodyguards [...]. The tribe has a single goblin chief and 2-8 bodyguards [...].

There is 20% chance that 10% of their forces will be mounted upon huge worgs and have another 10-40 unmounted worgs with them. There is 60% chance that the lair is guarded by 5-30 such wolves and 20% chance od 2-12 bugbears. Goblin shamans are rare [...].

In addition to the males, there will be an adult females equal to 60% of their number and children equal to the total number of adults in lair. Neither will fight in battles.

A goblin tribe has an exact pecking order; each member knows who is above him and who is below him. They fight amongst themselves constantly to move up this social ladder.

They often take slaves for both food and labor. The tribe will have slaves of several races numbering 10-40% of the size of the tribe. Slaves are always kept shackled, and are staked to a common chain when sleeping.

Goblins hate most other humanoids, gnomes and dwarves in particular, and work to exterminate them whenever possible.

Ecology:
Goblins live only 50 years or so. They do not need to eat much, but will kill just for the pleasure of it. Thy eat any creature from rats and snakes to humans. In lean times they will eat carrion. Goblins usually spoil their habitat, driving game from it and depleting the area of all resources. They are decent miners, able to note new or unusual construction in the underground area 25% of the time, and any habitat will soon be expanded by a maze-like network of tunnels."

AD&D 2nd ed. Monstrous Manual

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