Be cautious

You decide to fight defensively -- an aggressive manoeuvre is too risky here.

Parrying blow after blow, you keep the goblins at bay, even sneaking in a few ripostes. For all their lacking in book smarts, goblins aren't stupid, however. They manage to evade most of your attacks and keep you bottled up in the rocky outcropping where you spent the night. You do manage to score a few glancing blows, causing one of the goblins to hiss in pain as foul-smelling blood splatters across the rocks.

Unfortunately, your determined efforts aren't quite enough. You can feel yourself wearing down, your swings growing clumsier and less precise as your parries and blocks come fractions of seconds slower. The goblins chatter and yip with glee as they see their advantage and begin to grow bolder, but by now you are in no position to capitalise upon it.

The first sting of the vine whip is felt against your thigh, though you manage to escape its grasp before the goblin can do anything more. Now wholly on the defensive, you see this battle can only end one way. You've lost the initiative and have no hope of regaining it. A few more **** parries are all you can manage before the bolas wrap around your leg, sending you off balance. The vine ensnares your sword arm a moment later, disarming you with a jerk, and then it isn't long before a weighted net entangles you in its debilitating hold.

Down but not out, you pull a knife from its scabbard and hack clumsily at the net before scoring a deep wound on a goblin who had evidently thought you defeated. A piercing shriek fills the air, and the howling creature's comrades are soon upon you, dragging you down with the weight of their bodies and the painful scratches of yellowed claws. Disoriented and mobbed, you lose hold of the knife amidst the tangle of goblinoid bodies and netting, and deft, cunning fingers quickly relieve you of any remaining holdout weapons.

You cry out in despair as you realise with certainty that you've lost. Your hands are bound behind you amidst the excited chattering of the goblins. Gagged and hobbled with more thick, leathery vines, you are made to stand and march to your fate.