Magic the Gathering Tokens - Goblins

If you're familiar with any games or stories set in the high fantasy genre, you've likely come across your fair share of goblins. These low level threats are a staple of the D&D Monster Manual, they exist in both Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter (although with vastly different physical and mental characteristics), and there's a video game series half named after them. The goblins of Magic: The Gathering delight in foolish antics as much as they do in causing violence, and they always travel in large numbers. Of the 43 total cards that make tokens of the goblin creature type, all but 10 of them create the standard 1/1 Red Goblin that we know and loathe.

Goblin tokens of the above-pictured type were printed in 29 different sets with 14 unique-art printings - both second only to Zombies - and the early history of both types of tokens mirrors each other exactly. The first one appeared as part of Magic's first parody set, there was one with the old-school card frame given out as a Magic Player Reward, and then the first expansion set to feature tokens that correspond to specific cards in that set also featured a goblin. But before going into gameplay specifics, I'd like to mention the discrepancy between these creatures' color identity and their color palette. While the leering Pete Venters goblin from Unglued is wearing a red tunic, the Darrell Riche token (which goes with Warbreak Trumpeter from Legions) is climbing up a red mountain, and there's a red haze of battle surrounding Dave Kendall's hapless-looking grunt from Tenth Edition (corresponding to a reprint of Siege-Gang Commander from Scourge), the goblins themselves all have distinctly green skin. I guess this goes to show that the Magic color wheel goes deeper than just physical properties.

Speaking of the goblin token from Tenth Edition, it features the most-reprinted art of any goblin token, appearing in eight different sets. And speaking of the one goblin-creating card from Tenth Edition, Siege-Gang Commander is one of the most powerful goblin cards ever printed, as evidenced by its headliner status in Magic's first ever Duel Decks product: Elves vs. Goblins. S-GC also highlights a classic feature of goblins in Magic: the ability to sacrifice them for value, in this case, to deal direct damage. This mechanic calls back to the very first card to ever produce goblin tokens: Goblin Warrens from way back in Fallen Empires, which allowed you to create three goblin tokens... in return for sacrificing two goblins (of any kind, not just tokens). It's fairly high starting price, but if you get the engine going, the reward could be INFINITE GOBLINS!

Moving to the bottom of the image, we see another parallel between zombies and goblins, both of which were represented in Shards of Alara, although technically the creatures created by Goblin Assault have haste, which is not printed on the tokens. The visual style is interesting to note as well, with the goblins shifting to furry rat-like creatures. Goblins and zombies also coexist in the Scars of Mirrodin block, with tokens for the former showing up in the first and third sets, and the latter only in the second. I didn't mention the Alaran/Mirran undead in my last post because there were just simply too many zombies to go over each one individually.

Based on the expansion symbols, it might seem like there were two separate goblin tokens released with the Magic 2013 core set (to go with the legendary Krenko, Mob Boss and his command), but if you look closely at the bottom of Jim Nelson's token (second from top left), you'll see that that more generic one was actually given out to the top 10 finishers in that year's Magic League. Like the character Krenko, who is from the city-plane of Ravnica, the only two cards from the Return to Ravnica block that create goblin tokens (illustrated by Christopher Moeller, second from top right) don't appear to be affiliated with any of the ten two-color guilds. We'll see if that changes at all in the upcoming Guilds of Ravnica expansion.

Dave Allsop's silver-bordered goblin token for the joke set Unstable actually should go after the next two, chronologically speaking. However, I went out of order so as not to separate the two goblin tokens from the Tarkir block, one from each of Khans (Kev Walker, bottom left) and Dragons (Mike Bierek, second from bottom left), in what is yet another parallel to zombie tokens. These two return to the Alara-style red and furry body type, although these goblins look more like monkeys than rats. With the return to Magic's "home plane" of Dominaria (which includes the third unique art printing of Siege-Gang Commander), we also return to the more traditional green-hued skin, in a different piece of art by Kev Walker (second from bottom right). In the last callback to zombie tokens, the most recent core set also gets a brand new goblin token, this alley-dweller courtesy of Filip Burburan.

OK, there's just one more comparison I'm going to draw between goblins and zombies. While one specific type of token makes up the vast majority of each (1/1 Red for the former, 2/2 Black for the latter), there are several other variations of different colors and types. The first of these is a multicolored goblin with a class level: namely a red and white soldier first created by the card Goblin Trenches from Apocalypse (top left). This card was later reprinted with new art, and a corresponding new token, for the Eternal Masters compilation set (top right). The top middle RW goblin soldier does not come from a reprint, but rather goes with the card Rise of the Hobgoblins from Eventide, in the Lorwyn/Shadowmoor block, which is also responsible for the Black goblin rogue (and its Modern Masters reprint version) and the Red/Green goblin warrior in the middle row.

On the bottom left is our first example of a legendary token - well, technically second overall, but it's the first that was included in a specific set's booster packs. This one is equal parts goblin and golem, as it's the resurrected artifact version of the equally legendary Tuktuk the Explorer from Rise of the Eldrazi. The last two goblin tokens on this list each have a combat-related line of rules text, making them the only non-vanilla goblin tokens in the game. These come from Hold the Perimeter, a card of the Conspiracy type from the second Conspiracy expansion, and Goblin Spymaster from Commander 2016, respectively.