Kobolds
Kobolds are aggressive, insular, yet industrious small humanoid creatures. They are noted for their skill at building traps and preparing ambushes, and mining. They are distantly related to dragons and were often found serving as their minions. Cities will often employ kobolds as laborers and engineers.
Basic Information
Anatomy
A kobold is a reptilian humanoid, standing between 2' and 2'6" (60cm – 75cm) tall, weighing 35 to 45 pounds (16 – 20kg), with scaled skin between reddish brown and black in color and burnt orange to red eyes. Their legs are sinewy and digitigrade. They have long, clawed fingers and a jaw like a crocodile. Small white or tan horns protrude from their head, and they have rat-like tails. They will often smell of wet dog and stagnant water. Kobolds like to wear red or orange garments, which are usually ragged.
Genetics and Reproduction
Kobolds do not maintain monogamous relationships, and due to the importance they place on propagation, they choose mates by practical measures rather than love or other emotions. Mating is an impersonal act for kobolds.
Kobolds are extremely fecund egg-layers, having the highest birth rate among humanoids. A pregnant female will lay her egg within two weeks. About one in ten pregnancies lead to two eggs. An egg needs incubation for about two months, but the newly hatched kobold can walk in just hours. The eggs are particularly sturdy, and the young inside can survive even if the egg breaks as much as fifteen days early. Kobold young mature quickly, reaching young adulthood in six years. They often lay eggs in a common nest, with specialized foster parents watching over the eggs and wyrmlings.
Some rare kobold children have wings, while still others are dragonwrought, showing signs of descent from a specific color of draconic ancestor. It is possible to identify a dragonwrought egg because the shell will be speckled with flecks of the dragon's color, which become more numerous throughout the incubation period. While winged kobolds are often disparaged by ordinary kobolds, ritual demands that dragonwrought eggs be taken to a sacred hatching place so that dragonwrought kobolds can be raised above ground in case they were able to fly and need to learn to use their wings.
Dietary Needs and Habits
Kobolds are omnivorous, eating plants and animals, but will not refuse to eat intelligent creatures if the opportunity presents itself. They are able to eat just about anything when the situation becomes desperate, even tree bark or bone. Due to their cold-blooded nature, kobolds that have spent time in a warm place will not need to eat for days.
Biological Cycle
Like other reptiles, kobolds shed their skin periodically. A growing kobold might do this as frequently as weekly, but a developed one usually shed once per season. Unlike snakes, kobolds do not shed their entire skin at once; they instead shed portions of it over a period of time, much like lizards do. The process is usually accelerated by rubbing. Bitterleaf is often applied after shedding to help the new scales acquire strength and shine.
Behaviour
Kobolds are resentful of their short stature and hate members of other races who poke fun at them for this. Most feel as though they ought to compensate for their small size in other ways, such as humor or aggression. They will naturally tend to hate larger creatures, and although they will show respect and obedience if required, they always look for ways to display their resentment.
The ultimate goal of the kobold race is to conquer as much land as possible. They plan and dig mines industriously, while laying cruel traps for interlopers, preferring an ambush to direct confrontation. If they ever confront an enemy, they will try to overwhelm foes with sheer numbers. Among the monstrous humanoids, they are known for cunning plans, and unlike many others, will also share those plans among the entire tribe. General plans and goals will be common knowledge, and detailed plans are shared with all who asked to allow them to work fruitfully for the good of the tribe. Their society is influenced by their lawful evil alignment. Kobolds are confident and happy to remain separated from the other races.
“
Even tall ones are shorter than I am, when they're flat on their backs in a hole filled with spikes.
”
— Irthos, master trapmaker
Where other races consider heroes to be those who enact great feats of strength or military prowess, kobold heroes are those who show great prowess in trap setting, torture and ambush.
Additional Information
Social Structure
Kobolds use their cunning and sheer weight of numbers to defeat enemies. They prefer to lay traps or ambushes, and will only engage a foe directly after it is weakened. If their numbers are diminished such that they have less than a two-to-one advantage, the group will usually flee. Kobold traps include spike pits, tripwires, flaming oil, and poisonous vermin. They dislike gnomes to such an extent that they will usually attack on sight.
Kobolds will usually loot what treasure they can carry from their defeated enemies, who are usually killed. Occasionally, kobolds will enslave their foes, who then might be sold on, unless they were gnomes, which kobolds will always kill, but never eat.
Kobolds live in the dark, ideally underground or thick forest, in tribal societies. Their lairs are often overcrowded, although when one tribe becomes too numerous, it splits into numerous smaller ones. The overcrowding eliminates the concept of privacy, so kobolds sleep in communal areas where nudity is not regarded as shameful or offensive, even to the opposite sex. Kobolds wear clothing for function or ritual, but not to prevent nudity. The common overcrowding often leads to conflict, and two kobolds will fight to settle their differences, although these fights are not usually lethal. This leads to a lack of deep-rooted divisions or grievances in kobold society.
They are respectful of authority figures, and will obey diligently, particularly when their ruler is of lawful evil alignment.
Kobolds have specialized laborers, yet the majority of kobolds are miners. They possess darkvision and are particularly sensitive to bright light. Kobolds preferr exile to execution, and in some disputes, kobolds will split tribes in order to spread their kind over a larger region. Kobolds have natural tendencies towards sorcery. They can live up to 135 years, and dragonwrought even longer. Kobolds are similar to dragons, but while dragons have warm blood, kobolds are cold-blooded. Due to this, they are susceptible to cold, especially if it is brought on quickly. They enjoy swimming and will gather to bathe together, especially after shedding. Kobolds will take a lot of care maintaining their claws and teeth, using smooth stones to polish claws and chewing roots to clean teeth.
While each kobold values its own life, the tribe came first. They consider the success of their tribe to be their own success.
Symbiotic and Parasitic organisms
At some point in time, kobolds learned to domesticate dire weasels to serve them as guards and hunters. This resulted in lycanthropic kobold dire weasels. Around one in ten thousand kobolds is a natural lycanthrope in this manner.
Civilization and Culture
Common Dress Code
Most kobolds are miners and so dress in sleeveless tunics and breeches; but kobolds enjoy dressing in more elegant clothing for festivities. These include clothes made from silk or leather, but tailored clothes are only common among leaders. Garments are often made to compliment the wearer's eyes, which involve the use of orange or red dyes. Other garments might be dyed to demonstrate the wearer's affinity to a particular kind of dragon. Kobolds require the dexterity in their feet too often to wear footwear, and the soles of their feet are hard enough to cope with most surfaces. Due to the amount of time kobolds spend mining, gemstones are readily available, and they use these to adorn their clothing, and to make jewelry.
Culture and Cultural Heritage
Kobolds often create their lairs by mining them from the rock. Mining is a meticulously planned and conducted process where nothing is left to chance. Divination magic is used to locate ore and mineral deposits. A high proportion of a kobold tribe are miners. Each family group is expected to cut its own room, the walls of which they would adorn with a pictorial history of the family.
The greatest art for kobolds is trapmaking. The use of invention and cunning in traps is the mark of a good trapmaker. The other art form is the pictorial representation of the tribe's history, created on the walls of a specially created room in every lair. Kobolds enjoy making jewelry from the gems and precious metals they encounter while mining. They can be possessive about their personal jewelry collections, and much effort is put into crafting beautiful jewelry, unlike other items, which are functional rather than aesthetically pleasing.
Historical Figures
Muurg was a kobold hero of some renown. Muurg's heroic career remained largely unrecorded. He was known for briefly possessing the unique set of enchanted chainmail, the Zeal's Walk. The armor was created by a witch coven, the Newt's Brood, for their lover, who tossed the item when he married an elven lass. Muurg briefly owned the Zeal's Walk but lost it in death, possibly somewhere in the Lonely Barrens, where the armor was hidden under a rock.
Common Myths and Legends
The main deity of the kobolds is Kurtulmak, the god of war and mining, who hates all living things besides their kin. A main part of their religion is to seek out magic items that they believ may help free Kurtulmak from his eternal prison. The other main god worshiped by the kobolds is Gaknulak, the god of protection, stealth, trickery and traps. A lesser-known kobold demigod is Dakarnok. The remainder of the kobold pantheon is comprised of deified kobold heroes.
Kobolds are also known for serving dragons and praising them as gods. A kobold tribe will present a dragon with tributes and sacrifices and whatever they think it may like; they might even see it as a great honor to be devoured by the creature. If a kobold tribe is not accepted by a dragon they might start working for it in secret. Once a tribe settles to serve a dragon, their entire existence is to serve their god in every way.
Interspecies Relations and Assumptions
Kobolds hold a hatred for nearly all other humanoid races and enjoy killing and torturing them, in particular brownies, gnomes, pixies and sprites.
Lifespan
50 years, up to 120 years
Average Height
2' to 2'6"
Average Weight
35 to 45 lbs
Body Tint, Colouring and Marking
Kobold coloration varies, though usually it is of a reddish or brownish hue and tint.
Geographic Distribution
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