RQG 2015 Goblin Quest Festive Special!

## Content Warnings

Part 1 Poor sound quality (including laughter maxing out mics), Character death, comedic violence, food and eating, implied animal cruelty, animal death (dogs), animal blood (mention)
Part 2 Poor sound quality (including laughter maxing out mics), Character death, comedic violence, corpses, dead animals (dogs), blood, blood drinking, animal death (dogs), mention: butchery (dogs), animal cruelty (sort of; horses, goats), disease, explosions, self-sacrifice

## Plot Summary

Join Alex, James, Bryn, Ben, Lydia and special guest Grant Howitt as they play Goblin Quest! The wild tabletop RPG featuring excessive goblin death!

We meet some goblins, feed some bugbears, survey a wizard that is definitely not a squid and get exposed to Mrs. Haversham. Mrs Haversham spreads, a horse is extracted from a tuba and all five of the spice girls die!

## Character Summary

### Goblin clutch: The Yulebringers

Played by Alex. The clutch's Expertise is Excessive Meals, and their Quirk is that they're prone to massive sugar highs. Their Dream is that the goblins must always eat as much as physically possible (and more) at every given opportunity. The clutch's Heirloom is the the Ladle of Yuletide Justice: a ladle wrapped in tinsel, or possibly old paperclips. The goblins are: Chomper (excessively greedy), Slurper (obsessed with drinks rather than food), Dribbler (very very slow), Gnasher (bites), and Gnawler (really likes carols).

### Goblin clutch: 'Al Rosenblatt Begum Kahn'

Played by James. The clutch's Expertise is Psychobabble, and their Quirk is that they have good hair (one hair per goblin). Their Dream is that they wish to make friends. The clutch's Heirloom is The Rusty Quill, a rusty quill. The goblins are: Longjohn (enthusiastic about pirates/piracy), Inigo (must avenge the death of his father, despite goblins in this game reproducing without parents), Donald (too competitive), Lucy (permanently has a mild headcold), and Titch (a massive pedant). All James' goblins are also naked.

### Goblin clutch: Clauz

Played by Bryn. The clutch's Expertise is delivery (in the courier sense), and their Quirk optimism. Their Dream is that they want to see lots of different places. The clutch's Heirloom is a sleigh, and definitely not a bent, rusted piece of corrugated iron. The goblins are: Fred (a ringbearer- carries around a large sack full of cheap plastic rings), Jim (All the hats), Brian (saucerer), Al (genre-savvy; wears a T-shirt with 2D6 on it), and Vic (Definitely a flying reindeer; wears a onesie, has a red nose and antlers).

### Goblin clutch: GoblinCorp Party Council

Played by Ben. The clutch's Expertise is Mandatory Fun, and their Quirk is that they are departmentalised. Their Dream is to, as builders, create a thing. The clutch's Heirloom is The Rules Box: a never-opened battered old briefcase containing paper (probably). The goblins are: Sandra from Accounts (maths), Henry from HR (de-escalation), Bill from Reception (receptioneering), Grumble from Grumble (Delivery (in the management sense)), and Trudy the Exec (organisation).

### Goblin clutch: Balldroppers

Played by Lydia. The clutch stumbled across an abandoned time hole the Wizards had left lying around, which led to New Year's Eve at all conceivable years simultaneously in our reality. All the goblins in the clutch are wearing glasses depicting the years that impressed them the most The clutch's Expertise is partying, and their Quirk 'out of sync'. Their Dream is to enforce resolutions. The clutch's Heirloom is a party popper missing its string. The goblins have´named themselves after the years they liked the most: 1973 (being really quite out of it), 2017 (has a drone connected to the internet- also note that at the time of recording, new years 2017 was 1 year in the future), 1812 (wearing an orchestral-inspired tailcoat but backwards), 1920 ('well-heeled'- a flapper), and 1995 (autotuned; All of the Spice Girls).

## Synopsis

### The players collaboratively build their Quest

The characters' Dreams equate to initial Quest ideas of::

1) Factfinding for the office party;

2) Deliver a bunch of presents;

3) Teach the world to sing;

4) A jurassic turkey will happen;

5) Find and defuse the Glitter Bomb.

Grant's potential story starts thus: The GobCorp Party Council has heard rumours of rogue invasive parties from giant turkeys in the armies of good (GobQuest is set in the battlecamp of the Armies of Evil), and has set up a guerilla counter-party initiative.

This is broken into three Tasks, and each Task has three Stages. Complications will be thrown in at a later stage.

Task 1 (4 Victories needed to progress): Fact-find about the rogue parties in the camp, and find out what the other factions in the camp would like from a party

* Stage 1: Interrogate the competition
* Stage 2: Find out what the Wizards want from a party
* Stage 3: Hold a small, focus-group party

Task 2 (5 Victories needed to progress): Set up GobCorp-approved party

* Stage 1: Steal refreshments
* Stage 2: Steal music
* Stage 3: Steal decorations & set up

Task 3 (6 Victories needed to win): Delivery (in the management sense)

* Stage 1: Summon guests
* Stage 2: Defeat invaders
* Stage 3: Defuse the Glitter Bomb

### The Quest begins!

The Goblins were born in the spawning pits in the centre of the great battlecamp. They are surrounded by the armies of Evil: the horrible pub of sneaky bugbears, keen on dogfighting and drinking; the boring and bureaucratic hobgoblins; the punch-happy, turnip god-worshiping orcs; the Wizards in their great black tower. The goblins (specifically Sandra from Accounts) have been informed by their superiors at GobCorp that rival Christmas parties have been seen around the camp and that revenue is right down. Sandra must arrange a crack goblin team (Executive Committee) to sort the problem. Sandra pick the nearest goblins to her.

**Break**

### Task 1: Discover rogue parties and plan own party

**Stage 1**

Fred throws a ring to the other party members; 1973 misses. They decide to go to The Dun Inn to talk to the bugbears (Fred throws another ring). The bugbear at the door likes the ring, but wants to eat Fred and chases him. Fred tries to escape on his sleigh. The sleigh picks up enough speed during the escape to smash through a gate into the bugbears' secret party HQ. Sandra runs through the gate, hitting two with the briefcase, but is pinned by the third one. 1973 runs in and threatens the bugbears with their party popper, but drops the party popper and falls over due to a heart attack. The three bugbears pull out their crossbows but 1973 is already dead. chomper pulls out several cans of dog food away from the bugbears in an attempt to distract them, but is injured in the process. The bugbears run out of their HQ and start eating the dog food. At the back of the bugbear party HQ is a gnome DJ, conjuring beautiful illusions of Christmas things using their DJ equipment, including giant turkeys and krampuses.

**Stage 2**

Suddenly, a thunderstorm starts! The other goblin team is trying to find out what kinds of parties the wizards like (the wizards are definitely not just badly-disguised octopodes). Longjohn uses his rusty quill to write a market survey for the wizards, with the intention of posting it to them using the Goblin Delivery Service. The question: *How do you feel about parties ? Y/N.* A wizard walks past, and asks Longjohn if they're doing a marketing survey*.* Longjohn then asks how satisfied the wizard is with the marketing survey experience. The wizard is happy to fill it out, but secretes it in his robes along with the rusty quill to do so. It comes out covered in ink, and the wizard notices that it is unintelligible and not a survey at all. Longjohn also presents him with an ethnic diversity monitoring form and a data protection disclaimer to sign. The wizard writes Race: Octopus, before realising that blows his cover, and hastily buries Longjohn in a big hole.

Longjohn dies, and the wizard is now wise to the goblins' market research schemes. He asks the other goblins if they are also doing market research, to which Sandra replies no, but that they do have questions. The wizards is fine with just 'questions', however and leads them through a 'horrible corridor' of traps, slithering like a perfectly normal human across the traps and and avoiding setting them off by using his suckers. Fred tried to punt the goblins across the trapped floor with his sleigh. Fred sets off some of the traps whilst not hurting anyone (apart from himself) and one even sends the sleigh into the air. The goblins are invited into the wizard's parlour, and he asks what questions they have. Chomper distracts the wizard by pointing at Sandra, then necks and energy drink and searches the room at unnatural speed due to the sugar high. Chomper finds a wizard's party album, entitled 'Our Favourite Parties'. There are photos of wizards possibly communing with, or drinking the souls of, three-eyed goats, and the wizards in the various photos are all in different fashions. Meanwhile Sandra asks the wizard his favourite type of cracker (green), what a party popper should spray (goat blood), and suggests extra lightning- the wizard agrees. Fred offers the wizard eight rings (the wizard protests that they wouldn't need eight rings because they're a perfectly normal human), and Fred says it's one for each finger. the wizard seems confused by the concept of fingers. Lightning strikes 2017's drone and it comes to life and asks its master what it can do. 2017 asks it what the time is (it's half past three, and the drone is exasperated since it's connected to the internet and could give 2017 any information they want).

**Stage 3**

2017 sets about trying to find a focus group (one member of each fantasy race in the battlecamp) for GobCorp's trial party. They invite the wizard (Shindig Preference), who says he'd love to come, before remembering he's busy later- he's taking part in a rival focus group. 2017 convinces everyone to take over the rival focus group rather than bothering to find people for their own, and everyone agrees. Shindig offers the goblins a ride on his back on the way to the focus group, but eats 2017 on the way, who dies. Shindig enjoys the taste of 2017 and becomes more amenable to the party's wishes, and the party arrives at the focus group, the party concealed in the wizard's robes. There are six people in the focus group (one of each fantasy race). Fred offers them rings. Inigo tries to charm Lady Haversham, a posh Orcish member of the focus group, to get information. He brushes his single hair back into a quiff, and opens with the subject of avenging the death of his father.

### Episode 2

Inigo continues to charm Lady Haversham, and she takes him aside to an alcove and tells him all about her favourite parties. She's an incredibly influential and powerful woman. She gives Inigo a large, single kiss, and off-camera perhaps more happens...

### Task 2: Set up own party

The goblins have learned that the denizens of the battlecamp like from a good party: Dog food, goats and goat blood, and a band (needs to be kidnapped), and decorations.

**Stage 1**

The goblins think about going back to the bugbears' pub to raid their dog food supplies, but are a little confused as to whether 'dog food' refers to 'food for dogs' or 'food made of dogs'. they decide to go back to the Dun Inn (the bugbears' pub) with the dog corpses from around the camp (electrocuted by the wizards' lightning defences) to chop them up and turn into food. At the pub, the security has been tightened. The goblins decide to climb in via the roof, but Fred, climbing first dies as his bag of rings splits open, and the rings fall into a neat conical pile the others can climb more safely. Fred is buried under the pile of rings. Chomper runs up the pile of rings to the roof, then using the Ladle of Yuletide Justice, scoops around inside the chimney to try and find dog food. He knocks out one of the bugbears in the room via the chimney, and when Chomper brings the ladle up through the chimney again, it's full of delicious bugbear blood. Food for the party! The bugbears sound the alarm and the dogs start making noise.

1812 then jumps down the chimney, firing cannons from the hip, and takes out various dogs and bugbears. 1812 can see the dog food pantry at the other end of the room, containing food made for dogs, food made by dogs, and food made of dogs. Sandra takes some boots from the bugbear corpses and fills them with dog food. Sandra takes as many boots as possible and fills them with dog food (Sandra dies though), and the goblins abscond with it on their sleigh. the new sleigh-runner is Jim, who wears six hats.

**Stage 2**

Inigo is at the orcs' place, trying to steal some fancy music. The orc appear to have been infected by Lady Haversham, and have all become rather posh. The orcs are in a ramshackle ballroom, dancing with horses to music somewhere between heavy metal and baroque. the goblins head to the orcs' church, from which they can hear the sounds of fancy music and bewildered horses. 1812 is having a great time. The goblins decide to steal one of the orchestral horses to provide music for their party. Inigo uses his rusty quill to tickle the orc organist, infecting him with Haversham Disease. He successfully frees that horse, but is fully infected with Haversham disease in the process and is lost in the posh, simpering crowd of infected orcs. The horse, still tied to a tuba, only wants to escape, however, and runs riot. Two brawling orcs (both with moustaches and both called Lord Ingram) then roll into the centre of the ballroom, fighting over Lady Haversham. Jim has been handing out party hats to the ballgoers, and places a pair of his own earmuffs on the horse to act as blinkers. He manages it, but is kicked in the chest and later dies. The horse is also accidentally blinded by the earmuffs instead of blinkered, and it's still taped to a tuba and is pretty enraged generally.

Henry from HR comes along to de-escalate the situation. He tries to calm everyone using management speak. The whole room goes quiet, and Henry smashes open his briefcase of forms to give to the orcs to fill out. Lord Ingram loves forms but Lord Ingram hates forms, and the two Lord Ingrams start fighting again. The blinded, angry horse starts filling out a form. Chomper slowly tries to lead the tuba-ridden horse out of the building using the ladle of bugbear blood as a lure. The horse tramples Chomper to death, and now has a taste for goblin- but at least the horse is happier now.

**Break**

*[At this point Grant changes the rules to the 'Hyper Turbo Goblin Quest' version. Previously dice rolls were: 1, 2 = injury, 3 = bad thing, 4 = good thing, 5, 6 = victory; in the Turbo Rules, 1 = two injuries (= death), 2 = injury, 3 = bad thing, 4 = good thing, 5 = victory, 6 = two victories. This is to speed up scene resolution and the goblin death rate.]*

Donald, hyper-competitive, believes he can stomp goblins to death better than the horse can, so runs over to Chomper's corpse and starts stomping on it some more, to show the horse who's boss. He also coils his single hair to look like a horse's mane and tapes the tuba to his own face. The horse eats Donald, but it is getting full now. 1812 now tries to lead the horse to the party by singing classical music to it. 1812 manages to lead the horse out to the party location (the graveyard of the orc church), but dies in the process. The horse is knocking over gravestones and causing problems, and the poshness of its neigh shows it's been infected with Haversham Disease.

**Stage 3**

The goblins are now trying to decorate the party graveyard. They need goat blood amongst other things, and see a herd of goats walking past. (Goat noises ensue.) Henry enters a goat fray and his briefcase flies out of the cartoon dust cloud, filled with, and covered in, goat blood. Slurper, scenting blood in the air, and, picking up the Ladle of Yuletide Justice (containing congealed blood), empties the congealed bugbear blood onto the ground, scoops some goat blood from the briefcase, and sprays it around as decoration. The graveyard is beautifully decorated, but the remaining goats aren't amused, and everyone's covered in goat blood. Jim then sacrifices himself by removing all of his hats and hanging them on different gravestones- he dies because hats are all that make up his person. He suffers his physical and ego death quietly, in the middle of the graveyard. Meanwhile, Lucy, who always has a mild head cold and therefore always has tissues, writes 'festive' messages on snotty tissues using the rusty quill and the goat blood. The goats appear to be appeased by the good tidings. 1920, spinning in her flapper dress, pops the party popper by slamming it against a gravestone. It foes too well- a portal opens and ALL the party poppers in all dimensions detonate, forming a mushroom cloud of confetti and decking those halls.

### Task 3: Party time!

**Stage 1**

The goblins try to summon their guests- the entirety of the battle camp. They start with the wizards. Bill the Receptionist uses his company messaging system (an elderly pigeon) to invite the wizards and put the party on his departmental Lookout calendar. He is successful but is pecked to death by the pigeon. Shinding preferences looks out of the window of the wizards' tower and sees the party in the giant calendar, and encourages the wizards to attend the sexy party in the graveyard. Brian the saucerer, each pocket full of condiment packets and wearing a beer hat, drags the rusty toboggan to the top of the roof and slides down, trailing ketchup and mustard behind him, and yelling 'For Jim!' He's on his way to the kobolds to invite them. He is successful- the kobolds smell the ketchup and come to the graveyard to get some- but Brian's toboggan crashes into a wall disastrously, sauce packets exploding everywhere. Brian dies somewhere in there. 1920 decides to invite the orcs, who are currently having their own posh party. Upon opening the door, 1920 is greeted by all the orcs simultaneously throw their heads back and laugh poshly- the Lady Haversham disease has spread, and all the orcs are now infected. 1920 tries to break through the posh 19th-century style social mores and teach the orcs to dance flapper-style. She is very successful, but treads on their own toes in the process. The party has got going, and currently consists of wizards, orcs, and kobolds dancing around in blood-soaked confetti in a graveyard.

**Stage 2**

fedora-wearing gnomes are gatecrashing! They get out their techno DJ equipment and start summoning giant turkeys, laying down fat beats. Lucy is very angry with the gnomes for fat-shaming those beats: this party is a safe space (in that sense at least...). The gnomes are successfully admonished. Slurper, surrounded by ketchup and tartare sauce, incensed by the giant turkeys, decided to pick a fight with each gnome, one after another. Slurper grabs every sauce and guzzles them for the sugar high, and runs along, trying to flip every single gnome's fedora off their head. They manage it, defeating the gnomish invaders in the process. The fedoras had been the source of the gnomes' power, and the turkey illusions and music flicker and die. The gnomes run from the party, but they shout as they leave that they've planted a Glitter Bomb! In only 6 minutes, the glitter bomb will go off and destroy the battlecamp of the Army of Evil.

**Stage 3**

1920 sacrifices herself, summoning 1995 (1995 is All The Spice Girls). 1995 chants, in high-pitched, out-of-sync autotune "I'll tell you what I want, what I really really want- what I want is for to bomb to stop!" 1995 hopes the bomb will stop with the power of Girl Power. [*the players all chant in high-pitched goblin voices "I'll tell you what I want, what I really really want"].* It mostly works, but 1995 dies from the exertion in the process. *[As 1995 dies, the players chant in high-pitched goblin voices "zig-a-zig arrggghhhhhh......"]*

Suddenly, a big, overly-friendly dog appears! It's running around, stealing sausages, licking things etc. Slurper, Dribbler and Gnasher all sacrifice themselves, so that Gnawler (who really likes carols) can lead the biggest, most rousing Christmas carol possible, in an attempt to overwhelm the glitter bomb with sheer Christmas Cheer. They use the Ladle of Yuletide Justice as a microphone. It works a bit, but not completely- then an orc in a ballgown walks up and quietly shoots them to stop the racket. The orc demands poshly that somebody solve this horrible situation, and Lucy gives it a go. She scales the pole the glitter bomb is sliding down, and opens a hatch on the bottom to reveal a number of wires. The wire colours are: glitter, UV, and neon. Lucy attempts to short-circuit the bomb by plucking out her single good hair and ties it into the bomb, sneezing on it for extra conductivity (she's been sniffing iron filings). It works! Lucy is a little electrocuted, but, centimetres from the ground, the glitter bomb is defused! It flies back up into the air and new year is cancelled! Hooray!

## Dice rolls and Mechanics

Goblins have 2 HP.

**Episode 1**

Bryn rolls for Fred to successfully bribe the bugbear: 6,4 (1 victory and something good happens)

Ben rolls for Sandra to run through the gate: 6, 5, 2 (2 victories and 1 bad thing happens)

(Lydia is given the Boss Hat, allowing them to re-roll one roll)

Lydia rolls for 1973 to threaten the bugbears into submission: 2 injuries

Alex rolls for Chomper to throw cans of dog food at the bugbears: 5, 4, 1 (1 victory, 1 good thing, 1 injury)

The first Mishap occurs: A thunderstorm

James rolls for Longjohn's survey to be legible: 3, 2, 2 (1 bad thing happens, and two injuries: Longjohn dies)

Bryn rolls for Fred to punt the goblins along the Horrible Corridor: 2, 3, 4, 5 (an injury, something good, and a victory- the 4 trumps the 3 )

Alex rolls for Chomper to search the room on a sugar high: 4, 6, 6, 7 (a good thing and three victories)

Lydia rolls for 2017 to make the focus group takeover happen: 6,4,2,1 (Lydia rerolls and takes off the hat). Re-roll: 4, (5 or 6), (two of either 1 or 2): 2017 dies, along with a good thing happening and a victory.

James rolls for Inigo to charm Lady Haversham: 7, 6, 6, 5, 5 (5 victories)

---- ---- ----

**Episode 2**

Bryn rolls for Fred to climb onto the roof of the Dun Inn: 2, 2, 2, 4 (3 injuries, a good thing happens). Fred dies.

Alex rolls for Chomper to find dog food in the chimney: 6, 4, 4 (a victory and a good thing)

Lydia rolls for 1812 to jump down the chimney, firing cannons from the hip: 6, 6, 4, 4 (two victories, and a good thing)

Ben rolls for Sandra to take as many boots from bugbear corpses as possible to fill with dog food: 5, 5, 2 (two victories and an injury). Sandra dies, as Ben opts to kill Sandra in order to get another success.

James rolls for Inigo to infect the orc organist with Haversham Disease: 1, 2, 3, 5 (2 injuries, a bad thing, and a victory)

The second Mishap occurs: Two brawling orcs!

Bryn rolls for Jim to use his earmuffs on the horse: 2, 3, 5 (an injury, something bad happens, and a victory). Jim dies

Henry from HR tries to open his briefcase of forms: 1, 3, 3, 5 (an injury, a bad thing happens, and a victory)

Alex rolls for Chomper to distract the angry, blinded, tuba-beset horse: 0, 3, 3, 5 (an injury, a bad thing, and a victory). Chomper dies.

The rules change- they are now playing the turbo version of the rules, where a 1 counts as two injuries, and a 6 counts as two victories.

James rolls for Donald to out-horse the horse: (James rerolls) 1, 2, 3, 5 (3 injuries, a bad thing, and a victory). Donald dies.

Lydia rolls for 1812 to lead the horse from the ballroom to their own party: 2, 2, 4, 5 (2 injuries, a good thing, and a victory). 1812 dies.

Ben rolls for Henry to grab a goat: death and victory. Henry from HR dies.

Alex rolls for Slurper to ladle goat blood around the graveyard as a party decoration: 5, 5, 3 (2 victories and a bad thing)

Bryn sacrifices Jim to add an extra die to his next roll

James rolls for Lucy to write festive messages in goat blood on snotty tissues: 5, 5, 4 (two victories and a good thing happens)

Lydia rolls for 1920 to pop the party popper: 6, 7, 7 (6 victories)

Ben rolls for Bill the receptionist to put the party in the Lookout calendar: death and two victories (1 & 6?) Bill dies.

Bryn rolls for Brian to sled down the roof spraying condiments: 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 4, 6 (9 injuries, a good thing, and 2 victories). Brian dies.

Lydia rolls for 1920 to teach the posh orcs to dance flapper-style: 5, 6, 2, 5 (4 victories and an injury)

James rolls for Lucy to tell off the gnomes for fat-shaming those fat DJ beats: 5, 5 (2 victories)

Alex rolls for Slurper to remover each gnome's fedora: 6, 5, 5, 3, 2 (4 victories, a bad thing, and an injury)

Lydia sacrifices 1920 to summon 1995

Lydia rolls for 1995 to try and defuse the glitter bomb: 6, 6, 5, 2, 1 (5 victories, 3 injuries). 1995 dies.

Alex sacrifices Slurper, Dribbler and Gnasher to add 3 dice to his next roll.

Alex rolls for Gnawler to overwhelm the glitter bomb with a christmas carol: 2, 2, 3, 4, 4, 4, 5 (2 injuries, a good thing, and one success). Gnawler dies.

James rolls for Lucy to short-circuit the bomb using her single good hair: 4, 5, 2 (a good thing, a victory, and an injury)

## Notes

Goblins all speak in high-pitched, grating voices

Unfortunately Ben’s microphone broke during recording. Alex tried as hard as he could to salvage the recording but eventually had to admit defeat so apologies if Ben’s voice is quiet in this episode.