2020 - The Year of Blackmoor - 50th Anniversary - Day Eighty-Four

Celebrating 2020 - The Year of Blackmoor - 50th Anniversary of Blackmoor and of Role-Playing!

Today is Part 29 of my series of looks at OD&D starting with Monsters & Treasure Volume 2.

For those coming in, in the middle of this series I am giving you my take on OD&D during my first exposure starting in Sept of 1975. For this first part it is just the first three books of the original woodgrain box set and prior to obtaining the Greyhawk, Blackmoor and later Supplements.

As we continue with the monster descriptions.

GOBLINS: These small monsters are as described in CHAINMAIL. They see well in darkness or dim light, but when they are subjected to full daylight they subtract –1 from their attack and morale dice. They attack dwarves on sight. Their hit dice must always equal at least one pip.

You may think that goblins are not a difficult encounter; however, if you use the numbers in the table you can see that 40-400 (average 220) goblins can easily overwhelm a party of 16 - 3rd to 7th Level Adventurers. Take note that it is difficult for an Adventuring party to avoid behind surprised by goblins. My goblins used clubs and small spears as well as slings for weapons. Goblins encountered typically had the home court advantage and intimate knowledge of the terrain. 

Players learned that it was advantageous to make goblins an offer they could not refuse, bearing in mind that as they are Chaotic creatures you always had to watch your back. But goblins want to stay alive just as much as you do, so they could be dealt with, as long as dwarves were not present. Due to a long standing enmity with dwarves and their scorched earth policy towards goblins.

Composition of Force: When in their lair the “goblin king” will be found. He will fight as a Hobgoblin in all respects. He will be surrounded by a body of from 5–30 (roll five six-sided dice) guards as Hobgoblins also.

Very early on I arrived at not having fixed hit dice for monsters as per the table, but having variable hit dice. Yes the majority of monsters would have the standard hit dice, but 10, 15 or 20% of any given monsters encountered could have greater (sometimes much greater) than standard hit dice. Also if there is a "goblin king," then it made sense that he might have captains, lieutenants and sergeants too. So goblins are not a disorganized mob, they are an organized and often well disciplined fighting force. I extended this concept to most humanoid monsters and the variable hit dice to all monsters.

KOBOLDS: Treat these monsters as if they were Goblins except that they will take from 1–3 hits (roll a six-sided die with a 1 or 2 equalling 1 hit, a 3 or 4 equalling 2 hits, etc.).

Everything I said about goblins goes for Kobolds as well. Even a well armored high level Fighting-Man can be brought low by a swarm of Kobolds.

ORCS: The number of different tribes of Orcs can be as varied as desired. Once decided upon, simply generate a random number whenever Orcs are encountered, the number generated telling which tribe they belong to, keeping in mind inter-tribal hostility. When found in their “lair” it will be either a cave complex (die 1–4) or a village (die 5–6). The cave complex will be guarded by sentries. A village will be protected by a ditch and palisade defense, 1 light catapult per 50 Orcs, and a high central tower of some kind. Orcs found in a cave will possibly have strong leader/protector types, as will those in villages:

Depending on whether it is a cave complex or a village, a tribe of orcs might be lead or protected by a 7th to 9th Level Fighting-Man or an 11th Level Magic-User (some may be renegades or not) or a Dragon, 1-6 Ogres or 1-4 Trolls. Those were the examples given and other strong leader or protector were used in our games. I address "inter-tribal hostility" in a moment.

Orcs will defend their lair without morale checks until they are outnumbered by 3 to 1.

Given the village might be up to 300 individuals it would be hard for a party to outnumber them 3 to 1 without a massive expense for hirelings. Also note that I took the number of up to 300 to be referring to fighters only and not counting the non-combatants. 

Here is a good place to again note that all of these monsters are neutral or chaotic not necessarily evil, although some might be. Genocide was not part of the original game and in fact that would never have occurred to us to try to run around wiping out villages and such. I do not remember the players ever attacking a village. I do remember payment of tolls going both ways on occasion.

If found other than in their lair Orcs may be escorting a wagon train of from 1–8 wagons. There is a 50% chance for this. Each wagon will be carrying from 200–1,200 Gold Pieces. Wagon trains will have additional Orcs guarding them, 10 per wagon, and be led by either a Fighting-Man (die 1 = Champion, die 2–4 = Superhero, die 5–6 = Lord) or Magic-User (die 1 = Sorcerer, die 2–4= Necromancer, die 5–6 = Wizard), 50% chance for either (die 1–3 = fighter, die 4–6 = magical type.)

Yes, orcs use wagons and as noted build a palisade and ditch defense, build towers and use wagons. They have escorted wagon trains that are guarded. They escort gold shipments, they have an economy and trade structure. They may even carry on trade with humans. Those Fighting-Men and Magic-Users might be leaders or mercenaries for hire. Player Character might even fill such roles at times.

Note that if Orcs are encountered in an area which is part of a regular campaign map their location and tribal affiliation should be recorded, and other Orcs located in the same general area will be of the same tribe.

Have you done this in your campaign? I recommend it as it opens up many possibilities and options.

Orcs do not like full daylight, reacting as do Goblins. They attack Orcs of different tribes on sight unless they are under command of a stronger monster and can score better than 50% on an obedience check (4–6 with a six-sided die for example).

Orcs are semi-nocturnal, and are more active at dawn/early morning and dusk/early evening and nighttime. This does affect were they are found. They like wooded hills and areas with caves. The wagon trains for instance will camp in the woods during the middle of the day - roughly 7AM to 5PM in a 24 hour day world and then resume travel. Unless heavy overcast and then they may travel throughout the day.

Orcs are very territorial (inter-tribal hostility.) and that is why different tribes attack each other on sight. If they are in another tribes territory it is usually a raid. But under strong leaders they may cooperate and fight side by side. So on occasion there have been orc and human or orc and other monster wars.

Oh, btw none of these above monsters were black or brown bitd IMC. The orcs were white, befitting a semi-nocturnal non-furred creature that avoids sunlight. Goblins and kobolds just appear dirty, one reason they are dangerous is that they camouflage themselves, so who knows what color they really are. Since they also do not light sunlight, they could be white, but no one knows.

Tomorrow we continue on.