>>5335979>>5335943>>5335915>>5335845>>5335766>>5335729>>5335546>>5335530>>5335526>>5335525>>5335501>>5335489You are yet uncertain as to what scale you wish to hit the dwarves. The fantasy of negotiating a massive swell of dark elven support, added t o the individual might of the bugbears… It is certainly more appealing than a small raid on a single outpost. But is it realistic? You know so little about the inner workings of these so-called ‘company towns’ of the bearded apes.
On thing you DO know is, for all the asset they might be, at present the Bogbarri are a liability.
They are utterly undisciplined. They bark and shout in their horrid tongue, occasionally ‘singing horrid’ ballads while playacting as Reptilians or Drow—waving a hand behind their rears as a false tail or pointing fat fingers up beside their head to mimic the elves’ pointed ears, and mincing or slithering a bout to the amusement of their cohort. This rowdy and belligerent activity, half-understood with just enough nuance for your forces to feel insulted, at first seems like immature, primitive bluster… But then you realize it goes deeper. When the Drow and Reptilians leave their sight, disgusted or annoyed, the Bogbarri grow restless, and fall into mockery and of one another, and then into brawling; only their ‘Boss’, whom the other males all fear, seems to be able to beat or coerce the into a measure of solidarity.
“They are no social creatures,” you speculate aloud to the Novice and the Translator.
“What do you mean?” the Translator asks. “No intelligent mammal of their sort can be asocial. They have a leadership structure, don’t they? And they must have… Females, spawn, somewhere. These are a soldier-caste, a dedicated warband. That is a hallmark of society, albeit a primitive sort.”
The Novice narrows her eyes, understanding what you are attempting to communicate. She, unlike you, ahs the formal education in these matters to voice it more eloquently:
“They aren’t They are individual hunters and foragers. The one who attacked the Dragonborn and… The other Serpent Priestess… he was alone. They have no ‘warband’, no ‘soldiers’. They have a bunch of solitary hunters, forced by circumstance to cooperate.”
The three of you watch them over the next day. The bugbears resent one another’s presence—bristle at it, are plainly uncomfortable even turning their backs on one another. They can only unite by mocking and hating a common foe… or fearing a shared threat. Their… ‘Boss’, their leader, he is FORCING them to be here. You can see his own frustration growing—not at being here with others of his kind, but at essentially having to constantly bluster and bully a gaggle of unruly animals. It almost reminds you a little of your own frustrations with the kobolds—your inability to make your fellow reptiles see things as you do.
Something needs to be done about this.
