Orctober!

It's October, and you all know what that means. No, I'm not talking about Halloween - though I have no shortage of love for the harvest season, the changing of the leaves, and of course the celebration of all things spooky. No, this also happens to be the time the old-school gaming blogosphere gets passionate about orcs.

Orctober started out as a tradition in the Oldhammer community, with blogs devoting the month to painting all manner of orcs (and orks) from the glory days of 80s Games Workshop. My current work situation makes it rather unlikely I'll have much time to devote to collecting and painting miniatures - but my homebrew setting of the Lunar Lands is in large part a love letter to the British old school fantasy gaming world (something I posited the existence of as a distinct phenomenon in this Reddit post and which was consequently elaborated on most wonderfully by Uncaring Cosmos), and you can trace just about everything produced in that milieu to Rick Priestly (my previous post on familiars was basically an excuse to stat up all the old-school Chaos Familiar miniatures - yes, I'm coming clean about that now!). To that end, I figured I might as well celebrate Orctober in the best way I can - by describing how I handle orcs in my games and my setting.

Fighting Fantasy

As far as anyone has known, as long as there has been man, there have been orcs. Various legends speak of their origins - some say they were originally humans cursed to become beasts in punishment for their relentless bloodlust; others say they were spawned from the spilled blood of demons, and still more say they were beasts that became intelligent by drinking dragons' blood. The orcs themselves scoff at such silly tales - in fact, they have just as many such stories about humans. But regardless of where they came from, they have come to spread across the lands, and their tribes and villages can be found just about anywhere.

Orcs come in all shapes and sizes; their phenotypic variety has more in common with that of dogs than humans. Some are green, others grey; some have faces like pigs, and others like apes; some have
horns, some have tusks - and everything imaginable in between is possible. The creatures sometimes referred to as goblins, bugbears, and hobgoblins are really just different strains of orc, and while some clans are relatively standard in appearance, there are some villages where all these types can be found living alongside one another.

Art by Jerry Boucher

Some scholars have used the term trollkin to include common orcs, goblins, and their respective variations, though this itself is a misnomer as these races do not seem to be related to trolls. Once again, the orcs would just laugh at our foolish obsession with splitting hairs. To them, an uruk is an uruk, or a bigger, smaller, or hairier uruk if the distinction is truly necessary. What to call them means nothing, only their strength.

Orcish cultures vary as much as their appearances, and every tribe practices its own customs - observances that are known around every fire pit and mead hall in some villages would only net blank stares at others. However, a common feature is the value placed upon strength and valor in battle. The most powerful orcs in society are not necessarily the best talkers, or the most learned, but those who are simply strong enough to beat down any dissenting voices. Orcs are well known to raid human villages, not only for food and wealth, but also as an opportunity for the youth to prove their skills and gain clout among their kinsmen through impressing others with their deeds, and duels are a favored way of settling disputes.

This is not to say that orcs are without honor. Quite the opposite, in fact. An orc who has brought down a worthy foe in battle, bearing the scars to prove it, is an accomplished warrior worthy of respect and riches. An orc who has never had his blood spilled because all of his victories have been against unarmed children and the old and infirm is a coward, and would be mocked and shunned by his peers. Taking down lesser foes in the name of honor is, while not exactly considered criminal, frowned upon - not for any moral reasons so much as because it's too easy. That does not preclude orcs from preying upon the weak for more material reasons than social status - pillaging a defenseless village to make off with its gold and livestock is considered no different than hunting game, as long as no one brags about it. Attempting to assign human society's ideas of morality to orcs is, in short, going to be a headache.

On the flip side, the orcs' sense of honor and deference to the pecking order can be exploited. Many an enterprising warlord has assembled an army or a garrison force made up of orcs because they are easily swayed by great deeds of arms, and can be convinced to fall in line under the command of a warrior stronger than they are - though as some of these would-be tyrants have learned, it would be a fatal mistake to assume that they do not care about being paid, or that they would not turn against their masters if they saw the opportunity to do so. Even one who fights orcs may gain their respect in battle - there are many such ballads concerning orcs that become brothers-in-arms with humans when they came to recognize them as equals in strength and bravery.

Types of Orcs

Although every orc tribe is different, their societies can be grouped into a number of distinct cultures that follow similar patterns. It is possible these arose from common ancestors, trade and exchange of ideas between tribes, or a combination of both.

Art by Keith Parkinson

Horse Orcs, or Plains Orcs, are the most numerous, and most infamous, of those in the Lunar Lands. Semi-nomadic in nature, they often set up villages to house their people and graze their animals in grasslands, trading and raiding with whatever neighbors they may have, until their resources run dry and they move on to the next appropriate site. As their name suggests, they raise, breed, and train horses, which they respect for their strength and mobility. Although a typical orcish horse is more comparable to a draft breed, their agility still makes them useful for cavalry charges and migrations alike. Horse Orcs also favor archery, thanks to the far lines of sight provided by the plains. An army of mounted orcs firing arrows from horseback is a terrifying sight indeed.

Aside from war, these orcs also use horses for sport, competing to prove their valor in races and in a peculiar sport involving carrying a dead goat, often liberated from a nearby village as a token of victory, to a goal while being pursued by other riders. Sometimes these games can turn violent - there is a well-attested account of a war between two orcish clans that broke out when the goat split in half during a game, and no one could decide whether the larger part or the part containing the head should count for scoring purposes.

It was an enterprising chieftain among the Horse Orcs that formed the greatest empire orc-kind has ever known, uniting the clans into conquering much of Togarmah in its heyday before being brought down in the series of conflicts known as the Orc Wars.

Down in the Dungeon

Iron Orcs include many of the most technologically sophisticated tribes among their numbers. While other orcs obtain arms and armor either through pillage, cobbling of scrap, or rudimentary blacksmithing, the Iron Orcs are known for their metallurgy, with some even mastering the art of steel. They tend to be more settled than other cultures, owing to their dependence on steady sources of raw materials, and often favor easily defensible locations in mountains to make their homes and house their smoke-belching forges. Some have even formed enduring trade deals with dwarven holds, though it is arguable how much of this is because of mutual benefit and how much is because it is easier to trade with Iron Orcs than to defend a mountain against them. Their armies tend to be more regimented than those of other tribes, and are well-equipped with armor, swords, pikes, and in some cases even war machines.

Art by Verminard

Northborn Orcs are among the largest and burliest of all orcs (use the stats of a bugbear for a common specimen), with many possessing thick coats of fur to provide warmth in the cold regions they inhabit. Because these lands are often poor of soil and scarce in resources, they also tend to be some of the fiercest, something that serves them well in their squabbles over valuable food and territory.

Much like the Northmen, some that dwell on the coasts have taken to building great ships and raiding more temperate areas for gold and supplies. Due to their fearsome fighters and the inhospitable climates they call home, the clans of the Northborn Orcs have only rarely been conquered by their enemies - something they take with pride - and they hold sway over some of the most powerful orcish polities.

Art by John Howe

Cave Orcs encompass all orcs that dwell beneath the ground.
Some do so out of necessity, shunned by their neighbors (orcish or otherwise) and forming their own societies in the wilds, while others favor caves for the strategic opportunities they offer in defense, and still others have delved so far underground as to establish a homeland in the World Beneath. Due to the cramped conditions of their underground homes, these orcs tend to be smaller in stature, if not stooped or stunted, and are most likely to be of the varieties termed goblins - though this is not to say that they can't grow to greater sizes. Tales even speak of eyeless, pallid creatures in the darkest depths where light cannot reach, with some questioning if they can even still be considered orcs at all.

Like Northborn Orcs, Cave Orcs have a hardscrabble life - though some have managed to farm mushrooms and fungi for sustenance, others, particularly those closer to the surface, are more inclined to raid for their resources. Stone tools and weapons are not uncommon among them, and they are well adapted to see in darkness, though some, consequently, may be less adapted to light.

Fighting Fantasy

Civilized Orcs are a point of controversy. Some scholars would argue that such a term is oxymoronic - and some orcs would take offense at the implication they are uncivilized (or that the life their more settled cousins have taken part in is at all comparable to the soft and hypocritical ways of humankind, for that matter). Nevertheless, some of the more larger and cosmopolitan cities of the land have their fair share of orcish inhabitants - be they descended from trading partners who decided to settle, orcs who saw opportunity among the urban setting, or any other reasons they may have. Other times, a fief on the frontier may decide that the nearby orcs make better allies than threats, and over time they may intermix.

With the decree of Matriarch Wilmarina I of Lescatie that orcs do indeed have souls and can carry the favor of the gods, this level of integration has become more common, though there are still those who oppose it. It also varies from place to place - many cities, either by official proclamation or by patterns of settlement over time, boast an Orcish Quarter that functions as a community of its own, while in others, seeing a goblin at the seat beside you in the tavern won't even cause the locals to bat an eye. There are some orcs that have fully adopted local customs, but others still hold ties to their tribal honor pacts, and this often leaves the local magistrates to arbitrate disputes when matters of law run into conflict with the warrior code.