Goblins vs Humans idea

Billijak

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Hi all,
I'm working on my first book (Possibly a trilogy) set in a fantasy realm. The main back story is a stand of between goblins (Larger human sized versions rather than the small impish ones) and a medieval type human kingdom. The goblins have the ability to use magic, although I will use this sparsely and most humans are non magical but those that are have some kind of link to the goblins. The first books plot involves 2 young best friends who become involved with the heroic lauded knights/guardians who patrol the border between the 2 warring races.
The main antagonist is a human prince/Lord who carries an injury that plagues his health brought on by a human wizard who can use goblin magic. In order to ease his pain he dabbles in goblin magic and begins to plot against his own kingdom and the knights/guardians.
My question is, has this been done before or does it sound similar to other books/films? I guess the closest thing to it that I'm the aware of is the Warhammer movie but the plot and characters are quite different.
Any advice or opinions would be warmly welcomed.
Thank you.
 
It doesn't ring any bells with me, but there are a lot of members who are greatly more well-read in fantasy, so I'm sure they'll know if there's anything similar around, though when it comes to plots there is little new, and it's the execution of the idea that is so very important, rather than the idea itself.

Meanwhile, I'll move this thread over to Writing Discussion as it will attract a little more attention there.
 
The word similar can be something of a piece of string. How antagonistic are relations between goblins and humans?
 
It seems to have some familiar elements—which is not necessarily a bad thing, since ideas get reused because they resonate—but it looks like you have combined them in a way that I've not seen before. But as with any story, it all comes down to the execution. I suggest you keep on writing and find out whether the story develops along predictable lines or if, in the process of writing it, you find that your characters and your plot take some unexpected directions.

(You will note from my user title that I am rather fond of goblins, although in my own writing I am always reinventing them. Over the ages, the word goblin has been used to describe a variety of different creatures, from fairies, to Tolkien-type orcs, to ghosts, etc. etc. Your conception of goblins is something else that can and might develop in unexpected ways.)
 
Well, human vs goblins is a fairly common theme in fantasy.

But having the very human lord to plot against his own kingdom just to save himself provides quite an interesting arc to orbit arround, specially when it's served as a plot twist.

As for the protagonists, I may have some issues around the "commoner to hero" type, as it is very, very common. I'd advice to focus on them, build interesting character arcs and put attention to their interactions to make them unique and relatable. I'd also suggest to build multi-dimensional "lauded knights", so these heroes don't end up being a cliché, and who knows, one of the heroes may not be what everybody thinks...

Looking good!
 
It doesn't ring any bells with me, but there are a lot of members who are greatly more well-read in fantasy, so I'm sure they'll know if there's anything similar around, though when it comes to plots there is little new, and it's the execution of the idea that is so very important, rather than the idea itself.

Meanwhile, I'll move this thread over to Writing Discussion as it will attract a little more attention there.
That's great, thank you. Appreciate your feedback.
 
The word similar can be something of a piece of string. How antagonistic are relations between goblins and humans?

Thank you for your response. The relationship between goblins and humans is pretty hostile.
The goblins source of magic (I'm trying to create my own word for this as the word magic doesn't quite sit right) is an ancient giant tree (Very Avatar, actually it might not be a tree come to think of it), anyway whatever it is, it's been destroyed by the humans a few centuries before the main story starts and the goblins power is fading. They become desperate and venture into human territory to reclaim/extract the magic from the humans.
Which is where the Knights/guardians come into play.
Most humans have little or no magic but one goblin finds a human with a near infinite amount of magic that it tries to get back into goblin territory which is where the story begins.
 
It seems to have some familiar elements—which is not necessarily a bad thing, since ideas get reused because they resonate—but it looks like you have combined them in a way that I've not seen before. But as with any story, it all comes down to the execution. I suggest you keep on writing and find out whether the story develops along predictable lines or if, in the process of writing it, you find that your characters and your plot take some unexpected directions.

(You will note from my user title that I am rather fond of goblins, although in my own writing I am always reinventing them. Over the ages, the word goblin has been used to describe a variety of different creatures, from fairies, to Tolkien-type orcs, to ghosts, etc. etc. Your conception of goblins is something else that can and might develop in unexpected ways.)

Thank you for your advice.
I'm not an avid fantasy reader but I have read a handful of the classics and watched plenty of movies and I think Goblins are underused. There is plenty to explore and many ways to interpret them.
For my story I visualise them as almost human size, thick rough skin that is pale green, large arms with long fingers, It's hard to be unique here because its all been done before but I guess you can accessorise them.
For example, in my story, they are able to control magical beetles (Bear with me) that have been trained to seek out magic in humans. I would be interested to hear your goblin ideas.
 
Well, human vs goblins is a fairly common theme in fantasy.

But having the very human lord to plot against his own kingdom just to save himself provides quite an interesting arc to orbit arround, specially when it's served as a plot twist.

As for the protagonists, I may have some issues around the "commoner to hero" type, as it is very, very common. I'd advice to focus on them, build interesting character arcs and put attention to their interactions to make them unique and relatable. I'd also suggest to build multi-dimensional "lauded knights", so these heroes don't end up being a cliché, and who knows, one of the heroes may not be what everybody thinks...

Looking good!

Great feedback, thank you.
This is all very helpful.
All of these ideas are really just the back drop to the relationship between the 2 friends and how they deal with the events that unfold.
The main character is very reserved and a bit wary of people and the world but is often caught up in trouble because of his rebellious friend. Its the rogue friend who pushes the main character along into the story and builds up his confidence. At some point in the first book the main character becomes well known for his heroics and the other friend is overshadowed and left a bit bitter. Still working on the relationship arc between the 2 characters to make it a bit more interesting but that's the general idea.
 
Well I can think of a dozen books that's got something of the idea - talking about the tree made me think of Elfstones of Shannara in particular - but none that's very close, and I've certainly seen books with greater similarity to other works published. I think you're good.
 
Its the rogue friend who pushes the main character along into the story and builds up his confidence
These characters are also more reckless and prone to make mistakes. It's important to make characters go wrong sometimes, that makes them more relatable.

the main character becomes well known for his heroics
Put attention on how does a reserved character become heroic. Heroes take risks and are willing to put other's wellbeing before their own, and that may be non consistent with a reserved character. Something strong must drive that willingness to step up and generate repeated acts of heroism that result in that reputation.

and the other friend is overshadowed and left a bit bitter
This sounds very interesting, and may arise as a conflict. If you built the story around their "long lasting and unbreakable freandship", envy and resentment may be a big issue and bring drama to the story.

Have you decided the tone? It may picture a fairly idillic fantasy world, or a more realistic and somber one (medieval world was filled with poverty, disease, etc).

Have you thought about the scope? Some put focus on worldbuilding, others write more about battles and action, some go more for politics and others go for relationships and character insight.

Again, it looks good.!
 
Hi,

All of this has been done before in one form or another. I'm thinking the Warhammer games, the bloodsteel movie and of course the Shannara series as well as some of the D and D movies. But that's not the point. People always say they want to write something new, but take it from me - you don't. You want to write something that's your own and maybe not formulaic. I've written a couple of extremely original books and while I liked them, my readers clearly didn't.

I suggest that you write the book you want to write. Tell the story you want to tell. And don't try to be different to everything else out there, but also don't try to follow the same plots either. Just write your own book and ignore everything else.

Cheers, Greg.
 
The idea of a wounded king / prince is a very ancient one, which has played out in narratives across time, such as the Fisher King in the Arthurian legend, Shakespeare's Richard III, Rand in The Wheel of Time, and Bran Stark in ASOIAF. Usually the wounded king is symbolic of the nation being in dire straits, so you're on solid ground there (to be clear, I think that's a reason to pursue the idea rather than jettison it). What you've done is make this character the antagonist (history's replete with disfigured villains also), which is potentially interesting as well.

The important thing is what you decide to do with it. On the face of it, it doesn't sound like you have any problems with your set-up, so go for it, and best of luck with it!
 
These characters are also more reckless and prone to make mistakes. It's important to make characters go wrong sometimes, that makes them more relatable.


Put attention on how does a reserved character become heroic. Heroes take risks and are willing to put other's wellbeing before their own, and that may be non consistent with a reserved character. Something strong must drive that willingness to step up and generate repeated acts of heroism that result in that reputation.


This sounds very interesting, and may arise as a conflict. If you built the story around their "long lasting and unbreakable freandship", envy and resentment may be a big issue and bring drama to the story.

Have you decided the tone? It may picture a fairly idillic fantasy world, or a more realistic and somber one (medieval world was filled with poverty, disease, etc).

Have you thought about the scope? Some put focus on worldbuilding, others write more about battles and action, some go more for politics and others go for relationships and character insight.

Again, it looks good.!
Thanks very much. Very grateful to all of your comments. It seems strange discussing my story with people when it's only really been in my head for the past year and not discussed with anybody!
My focus will generally be on the characters and plot. I want to zero in on their motivations and interactions and see what happens. Although there will be battles these will mostly be small skirmishes. I like a good battle but I feel often the characters get swallowed up in the large scale and the focus is lost. Although I've seen this done well in some books.
I much prefer a small fight between characters that have been developed. If the reader has invested in the characters then there is a heightened sense of threat if you know 1 or 2 characters are unlikely to walk away alive. Game of Thrones is a great example.
 
The idea of a wounded king / prince is a very ancient one, which has played out in narratives across time, such as the Fisher King in the Arthurian legend, Shakespeare's Richard III, Rand in The Wheel of Time, and Bran Stark in ASOIAF. Usually the wounded king is symbolic of the nation being in dire straits, so you're on solid ground there (to be clear, I think that's a reason to pursue the idea rather than jettison it). What you've done is make this character the antagonist (history's replete with disfigured villains also), which is potentially interesting as well.

The important thing is what you decide to do with it. On the face of it, it doesn't sound like you have any problems with your set-up, so go for it, and best of luck with
 
Thank you.
You're totally right of course. The wounded/disfigured villain is a common trope.
I'm interested in creating a 3 dimensional villain and my hope is that the reader will have some understanding of his motivations and actions and possibly some sympathy at the beginning, until he starts doing terrible things of course.
He is concealing some hidden pain (Caused by his own foolishness when he challenged a wizard) that he is ashamed of but it can only be alleviated by taking more magic into his system. However this magic can only be obtained by dealing with the enemy and how far is someone willing to go to help themselves to the detriment and danger of their own family and kingdom.
I'm sure this is very similar to other villains and would love to know if anyone knows if this has been done before. I've no doubt it has to some degree.
 
These characters are also more reckless and prone to make mistakes. It's important to make characters go wrong sometimes, that makes them more relatable.


Put attention on how does a reserved character become heroic. Heroes take risks and are willing to put other's wellbeing before their own, and that may be non consistent with a reserved character. Something strong must drive that willingness to step up and generate repeated acts of heroism that result in that reputation.


This sounds very interesting, and may arise as a conflict. If you built the story around their "long lasting and unbreakable freandship", envy and resentment may be a big issue and bring drama to the story.

Have you decided the tone? It may picture a fairly idillic fantasy world, or a more realistic and somber one (medieval world was filled with poverty, disease, etc).

Have you thought about the scope? Some put focus on worldbuilding, others write more about battles and action, some go more for politics and others go for relationships and character insight.

Again, it looks good.!
 
This is great advice. You've pointed out something important here that I've overlooked. In order for the rift between them to carry more weight I will need to focus from the beginning just how close they are. I guess I can throw in a few challenges early on and show how they overcome them working together. Not to make it too nicey nicey because as best friends they'll be alot of bickering and banter between them.
Also, I've alot of work to do establishing the main characters development from fearful young man into reserved hero and make it convincing.
Thanks again!
 
I would be interested to hear your goblin ideas.
Well, OK, but you may be sorry that you asked, since my ideas about goblins became more and more complex as I wrote the stories in which they appear.

In Goblin Moon there are, first of all, the gigantic Goblins of myth and legend, voracious and terrifying, exemplified by the personification of the devouring moon, swelling and growing hungry for half of each month, bringing high tides that eat greedily at the land when the moon is full, as well as tremors in the earth, and occasionally quite serious quakes. Rivers jump their bounds washing away villages and farms, people, houses, graveyards, etc. etc. It is during the full moon that the discovery of a coffin floating on the river, containing the remarkably well-preserved body of a sorcerer and his books, which launches the main plot, involving a mad alchemist obsessed with the magician’s books, a vengeful fairy duchess and her intended victim (a young girl who has reached the magically dangerous age of sixteen) and the swashbuckling adventures of our dashing hero.

Then there are the common, everyday hobgoblins. In appearance somewhere between a rat and a monkey, hobs have clever little hands with opposable thumbs, which give them the ability to open locks and creep inside houses. It is almost impossible to keep them out when they want to get in. At the full moon they are most vicious, for then the rumbling in the earth drives them from their underground dens. Their bite is poisonous, and if not properly treated may result in the loss of a limb. For all these reasons they are regarded as vermin, and killed without compunction.

But in the sequel — originally called The Gnome's Engine but re-issued a few years ago as Hobgoblin Night— which finds my MCs (fleeing the wrath of the Duchess) across the sea on another continent, where Humans and Dwarves and other races of so-called "rational beings" have been settled for a scant few centuries, the hobgoblins are actually a separate species from the Old World hobs, mistaken and misnamed by the early settlers, because of a superficial resemblance and the fact that they live underground. They are mischievous but not dangerous: thieves, mimics, a terror to gardeners because they'll eat a rosebush from the bottom up in a single night, and they'll undermine the foundations of buildings with their tunneling and appetite for wood. Are they vermin? Are they intelligent? What are they up to and what should be done about them? These are some of the mysteries that my main characters must solve. (If you look at the cover for Hobgoblin Night, down below in my signature, you can see what my hobgoblins look like, though due to artistic license on the part of the cover artist the hob is depicted somewhat larger than life-size.)


It was several years later that I wrote The Queen's Necklace. Like GM and HN it is set in swashbuckling 18th century type setting, but it is not the same world. Originally the villains were to be a beautiful but terrifying race of fairies, which I named the Vough, who had ruled the world for five thousand years (give or take a century) before they were overthrown by humans and supposedly exterminated fifteen hundred years before the beginning of my story.

How the Vough became Goblins instead of fairies I don't remember, but somewhere between completing the outline for submission to my agent and publisher and writing the first chapters it somehow happened. After a while, I decided that "Vough" did not sound threatening enough, so I changed the name of their species to Maglore, something I ran across in a book of fairy tales, the name of a vengeful fairy godmother. Still beautiful, they had become willful, ruthless, and vain . . . and of course some of them had survived to produce future generations, or what would be the use of them?

As they had once ruled a world-spanning empire and lost it, when my novel begins they naturally want it back. Much of the story revolves around the schemes of the Goblin princess Ys, and her formidable governess, Valentine Solange.

As the story developed, my ideas about the Maglore evolved. They had survived because they are outwardly indistinguishable from humans, allowing them to hide in plain side, but that appearance is deceptive. Internally, the Goblins of TQN are more closely related to plants than animals.

There are other Goblins in the story, four species once subservient to the Maglore. Regarding them as harmless, Men contented themselves with herding them into ghettos, where they continue to live in poverty, even though many are exquisite craftsmen, or gifted in philosophy and the natural sciences. I had come across the names previously — Ouphs, Padfoots, Grants, and Wrynecks — and liked the sound of them. The first three are mentioned in the Denham Tracts, which were written in the mid 1800s, as part of a long, long, long list of fairies, goblins, spectres, woodland spirits, and other supernatural beings (which rather interestingly includes hobbits). I don't remember where I encountered the name Wryneck. These Goblins lack the beauty of their former masters — in the eyes of humans they are small and malformed (Ouphs and Padfoots), or tall and gangly (Wrynecks and Grants) — but share the Maglore's vulnerability to salt and fire.

The natural life span of the Maglore is measured in centuries, and for most of that span they age slowly, but near the end they swiftly deteriorate, mentally as well as physically. They are expected to suicide as soon as this process of rapid aging begins, but vanity drives many of them to do so at the very first wrinkle. But the last Empress was greedy for life, and not only lived on as her beauty withered but even after her mind had lapsed into senility. When she died she had no obvious heirs, since her daughters and granddaughters, nieces and great-nieces had all departed at the first signs of age. With the succession in doubt, the government in turmoil, the Maglore were vulnerable, and it was then that Men rebelled and won their freedom.

There is much more I could say, since my ideas continually evolved in researching and writing the story, but I am sure I have waxed eloquent for quite long enough! ("Too Much Information," I can hear everyone cry.)

By the way, I know of several recent books which feature goblins as characters, so I think they are not as under-used as you might think, though there is certainly room for many more such books.

______
Much of the above is adapted from a guest post I did a few years ago for Jo Zebedee's blog.
 

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