Goblins as a rule are weird but can be defined by the guilds they belong to. Builders, diggers, warriors and lab rats have some common features, so you know what to expect if a goblin wears a mining helmet or carries a saw. But sometimes goblins go beyond these guilds to form likeminded communities. These groups are massively weird and inhabit a small area, but they are surprisingly stable, following the same customs for decades or centuries.

Cave goblins are a small band of fifty goblins that have decided to act like primitive beings. They wear only animal skins, although nobody can identify which animal they came from. They only use stone tools, ignoring bronze, iron or steel when offered. And they speak in a series of unintelligible grunts and hoots.

Odd as this is, cave goblins live exclusively in the philosophy department of the Vastan Institute of Magic and technology, an exclusive and fantastically expensive school of higher learning. All efforts to evict them (the cave goblins, not the philosophy department) have failed and resulted in major property damage. The philosophy department eventually decided to ignore them and hope they go away. This makes for odd staff meetings and frequent messes in the break room, but it sort of works.

Gibberish goblins get their name from the utter nonsense they speak. This originated thirty years ago when a foreigner wandered into a village of three hundred goblins and tried to speak with them. They didn’t understand his language and after a few minutes the man left to try his luck elsewhere. This gave the goblins the idea of inventing their own language.

Except it’s not a language in any sense of the word. Bored linguists have tried to decipher the gibberish goblins’ language and failed. There’s no logic to it, and what few rules there are changes on a weekly basis. It appears even the gibberish goblins themselves don’t understand it. But they’ve gone on talking total nonsense for thirty years.

The three hundred Uncle Bob goblins aren’t as weird as cave or gibberish goblins, but not for a lack of trying. Centuries ago, they met a man from the Ethereum Empire who had survived the destruction of his airship. Goblins gathered around the strange man, who at one point used the expression ‘Bob’s Your Uncle’. This confused the goblins, who had no uncle, but they very much wanted one. They pestered the poor man with questions until he fled, never getting a good explanation of what the expression meant.

Still confused, the goblins decided they somehow acquired an uncle named Bob. They didn’t know who he was or where to find him. In their twisted little minds everyone became Uncle Bob regardless of race, age or gender, and they addressed everyone they met as Uncle Bob. If you give them your real name, they insist you’re confused and are really Uncle Bob. If they encounter dozens or even thousands of people, all of them are Uncle Bob. It is a sign of great love and respect for someone if they use that person’s real name.

Lastly is the Goblin Gambling Syndicate, an organization eight hundred strong with branches in three cities. Goblins love gambling and make frequent wagers on ridiculous events, so when a few of them stumbled upon an illegal casino they felt completely at home. They tried to participate in the betting, but they were thrown out for the silly reason of having no money. Annoyed, they swore that they’d make their own casino.

It shouldn’t have worked. It did. They rallied more goblins to their idiotic cause, took over abandoned barns and set up wagers and betting events. In typical goblin fashion these were stupid bets, like when will the moon explode or who would win in a fight, a tree or a rock. Goblins gathered in their thousands to bet small green frogs on the outcomes. The fact that some bets haven’t been completed in two hundred years doesn’t bother the goblins at all.

The Goblin Gambling Syndicate has had one breakout success, baby racing. In this event babies old enough to crawl but not walk are raced against one another by placing them in lanes twenty feet long with a cup of vanilla pudding at the end. The baby that reaches the pudding first is declared the winner, although all the babies get to eat their cups of pudding. Babies are brought by older siblings who also receive free pudding. Goblins wager furiously on these events, and to everyone’s amazement so do some humans. There have been efforts to outlaw these events, but the baby racing lobby is surprisingly strong.