War in the Holler
The holler has always been a place of peace, until it isn’t. Sure, it’s calm enough if you don’t mind the odd hog gone missing, a moon-pie heist, or Cousin Mo swapping your porch rocker for a shiny hubcap he “found.” But when questions of territory, resources, or bragging rights rumble through the hills, the goblins of the holler go from neighborly to battle ready in the time it takes Pa to loosen the belt.
Even the old timers can’t agree on the first spark. Some swear war began the day the Ridgebiters filched a creek map and stumbled into Hollowteeth land. Others point to Ma laying down the law, “No goblin leaves hungry or half-prepared”, which meant everyone suddenly needed more food and bigger weapons. Whatever the truth, the holler has lived by one rule ever since: fight to win, fight fierce, and don’t torch Uncle Kinxy’s still unless you like your stew smoky.
The Four Kinds of Clash
Everyday Skirmishes
These pop up whenever tempers flare. One cousin bumps another’s ward, or a neighbor clan tries sneaking lumber off Holler land and boom, war flag raised. Skirmishes are quick: each goblin gets two swings at an enemy base. Take more wards than you lose, and you win the right to laugh first at the next fireside.
Territory Wars (Clan War League/CWL)
Territory Wars run a full seven days, sunrise to moonset. Eight clans square off; each goblin only fires one shot per day, so Pa’s battle plan matters. He marks targets with pine tar on a ridge map, and Ma tracks who’s hit, who’s missed, and who’s “resting their eyes” down by the creek. Miss your hit? Uncle Kinxy’ll find you polishing his boot, or Pa may just drag you to the woodshed, the slow, deliberate way that dares you to miss your attack again.
By day four, Ma is usually sitting with her head in her hands, ready for it to all be over.
At week’s end the standings lock in: first place snags first pick of spring water rights, plus enough glory to make Cousin Cletus insufferable till next cycle. Last place guards the goat path nobody wants and has to host the victors for a celebratory hog roast.
Raid Weekends
Humans don’t believe in goblins, which makes them perfect targets. From Friday dusk to Sunday midnight the holler launches copper wire raids on dark porches, busted floodlights, and any house where “If you hear a noise, no you didn’t” is the rule. Scouts confuse cameras with mirror wards, JT slings blackout tonic at overhead bulbs, and Cousin Krypto disables alarms with a rock and a grin. Loot returns fuel new defenses, and occasionally a porch freezer stuffed with moon pies. Lil Looty goes straight for any marshmallows he can find.
Clan Games
Every few weeks the Ancestor Spirits drop a parchment of dares: build three new traps, knock down four Inferno Towers, steal twenty jars of lightning bugs, and so on. All from other neighbor bases, which obviously sparks minor impromptu skirmishes throughout the holler between rival clans. Each dare earns Points. Ma keeps a ledger based on what each goblin brings back to prove they’ve met their challenge, Highest score at the bell wins potions, spare loot, help with upgrading, or even a day off from root pulling duty. It’s goblin versus goblin, which means cheating is expected, just don’t get caught.
Earning Wards (a.k.a. “Stars”)
Every base is protected by three mystical wards:
- Flame Ward – keeps fires roaring on defense.
- Root Ward – anchors walls and roofs to the land.
- Echo Ward – powers drums and rally horns so spirits won’t falter.
Snag a ward during a war, earn a star. Snag all three, claim a clean sweep of your target. Whichever clan steals more wards than they lose is the winner of that war.
Wards are stubborn; once uprooted they never quite settle into their new post. Half the time a stolen ward turns out to be your own, pilfered months back by a rival clan. When that happens the whole holler throws a homecoming party, Uncle Kinxy cries into his jug, and Ma hangs the ward where everyone can hear its hum.
(For the folks who don’t speak goblin strategy: imagine each ward as a giant padlock. Break one padlock, you’ve scored. Break two, you’ve nearly cracked the safe. Break all three, you’ve cleaned the place out and taken the hinges for good measure.)
Siege Machines & Weapons
The clan’s arsenal grows wilder every season:
- Log Roller – a wagon wheel strapped to enchanted fence posts that rolls out logs into enemy defenses as it advances; still smells like hickory smoke from the time it rolled through Uncle Kinxy’s still.
- Flame Flingers – goblin grade flamethrowers; only issued to cousins who haven’t singed their eyebrows this month.
- Battle Blimps – patched quilt balloons tethered to treetop zipline rigs and buoyed by Ma’s temporary air holding potion. They drift silently above the trees, until a sharp breeze or enemy bolt brings them down. Cousins help one another pilot.
- Stone Slammers – enormous boulders hauled skyward via vine-and-pulley ziplines strung through the oaks. When the line snaps, on purpose, they drop with devastating force. Timing is everything. Ma sometimes enchants them with weight reduction spells until release, but the spells only hold for so long and timing is important, leading to one legendary incident where a slammer caved in the outhouse. They can be unpredictable. Pa calls them “trash”, but goblins still use them.
- Hog Riders – trained hogs in iron helmets. Sometimes charge the wrong way, but always look heroic. Sometimes you will find a cousin riding one, enchanted hammers in hand to smash everything they come across. They’re good to send in first to hit and distract as many defenses as possible.
- Earthquake Boots – fence shaker boots wired to lightning rods and using battery packs stolen from human raid weekends. Work great until they don’t, at which point the wearer lights up like a porch lantern. It’s certainly a use at your own risk enhancement, but many do because the benefits of issuing ground shock to whatever fence or weapon is around is greater.
Mirror wards, crossbows rigged to weather vanes, and experimental Tesla Towers (thanks to scavenged spark plugs) round out the catalogue.
Pa keeps hoping Uncle Kinxy will catch that emu so it can be added to the troop arsenal, too.
Defenses of the Holler
Hidden makeshift cannons peep from cabbage patches; scattershots pepper the fields; monoliths that shoot fire from the coal driven flames inside hum beside scarecrows; mailbox posts double as spear racks. Inferno Towers keep the night warm, too warm if Ma forgets to aim them away from the still, also courtesy of coal fueled fire inside, and sensors that zap on sight. The goblins even wired a spare freezer into a Frost Cannon that fires hailstones the size of chicken eggs.
When the fog lifts and the war drums echo across the ridge, all the chaos, escaped hogs, broken blimps, cousins arguing about whose turn it is, falls silent. The hills listen. Three wards glimmer in every base, waiting to be tested.
And when that first ward flickers out and Ma hears its distant hum? The holler sharpens its teeth, tightens its belts, and remembers: peace is sweet, but victory tastes like moonshine and glory.
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