Full Item Description

A strong, 20’+ long wooden pole, with a sturdy basket at one end large enough to carry a small goblin, and a leather-wrapped handle on the other end, sized for huge hands.

History

A refinement of the scaling ladder, this was constructed to take advantage of the great size of the larger humanoids, and the small size of others.  It’s origins have been attributed variously to the goblin chief Narku, the oddly intelligent ogre chief Morkaar, and by others to a rogue dwarfish necromancer known simply as He.  What is known is that at least four human forts have fallen to this device, generally at night time or in bad weather.  The number of goblins expended in failures, however, no one can tell.

The Goblin Pole is a specialized device used by humanoids to break into places.  It requires a team of an ogre or similar large humanoid, and a sacrificial , er, volunteer goblin.  Since most fortifications are not that huge, a 10’ ogre can usually put the goblin up on a 25’ wall without much difficulty, though the experience is generally quite harrowing for the goblin.  Once on the wall, the goblins mission is to sneak down and open the gates.  It is expected to be used when something has either distracted the garrison, or when things such as inclement weather make detection unlikely.

Other uses include having the goblin to drop items onto the wall, such as poisonous snakes, oil, etc.  In this role, the goblin is often strapped into the basket to allow them to better focus on the mission. Theoretically, they could be used in battle to give a goblin archer a better line of sight, but few goblins are brave enough to serve effectively in this role - their nerves ruin their aim.

Campaign Use

Likely a one-shot wonder that a mixed humanoid army could use to surprise PCs’  One can make it even more subtle by introducing variants which can be broken down for easy travel, or even have been made invisible by magic.