Ye Olde Inn

Since HeroQuest was derived from Games Workshop, Orcs and Goblins are hairless asexual humanoids with pointy ears and greenskin -- have that evil smile, while have an under-bite with sharp lower teeth. Naturally, Games Workshop jumped on the D&D bandwagon in the early years, and over the years, they tried to set their fantasy world apart form D&D -- thus the creation of the . This seems to be the most popular representation of Orcs, Goblins, Hobgoblins, etc. from other mediums (cartoons, comic books, video games, other fantasy games and so on). I might be wrong, but I remember seeing early GM Orcs with an ugly tone of human-like flesh. It was likely a byproduct of their wilder early years, well before they really established their overall setting. To my knowledge, early hobgoblins had brown/orangish skin before they became green.

D&D Orcs on the other hand were always described as looking like pig-men: pointy ears, pug-noses, tusks, brownish skin with pinkish highlights, etc. Although, when Holmes Basic D&D hit the UK, the art was changed to show Orcs as cyclops people. That was an odd example, but it really highlights the liberties an artist can take with established elements on an open-ended fantasy. (Can you imagine if those Orcs got a foothold in the UK and become an iconic representation over there.) For the most part, Orcs are depicted as savage, but with fairly good (if unkempt) gear. Goblins seem to change form edition-to-edition, but are always shown as 4-foot tall humanoids. Hobgoblins are depicted as man-sized militants with good gear, and often with blue noses (for some reason). Bugbears are usually branched with goblinoids. Do to a mistake with a teenage artist in the early years of D&D, the first depiction of a Bugbear was a lanky, jack-O-lantern-headed creature (this has became popular with many OD&D Grognards). Later, they became hairy, bandy-legged brutes. The Gnoll was a signature D&D monster that could have looked really freakish given the fact that they are horrid hybrid of gnomes and trolls, but instead they have the heads of hyenas -- now they are just humanoid hyenas.

Of course the grandaddy of all Orcs/Goblins are from the pages of J.R.R. Tolkien. Their descriptions tend to fly off the map in places, but the commonly quoted line is "..they are (or were) squat, broad, flat-nosed, sallow-skinned, with wide mouths and slant eyes; in fact degraded and repulsive versions of the (to Europeans) least lovely Mongol-types." Art wise, the Hildebrandt Brothers were the most iconic visual representation of Middle Earth. Their vision of them range from fleshy and pig-like to green and lizard-like. Ever since the movies, people have been gravitating towards how they looked on film. The filmmakers added a lot of detail and diversity to how they all look, including elaborate back stories for each tribe and the types of gear they use.

Whet it come to having an ugly evil race, everyone seems to have their own vision -- often in ways that reflect how we see other cultures, or the darker aspects of one's own culture. This is nothing new, as history is full of stories of larger-then-life heroes dealing with ugly savage sub-human people that threaten their way of life. They are usually built form old ideas of racism or xenophobia, but is also apart of human nature. They also serve as an easily recognizable enemy that are beyond redemption and can be killed or mistreated without the hero looking like an evil bastard. With cartoons, comics and video games, it is considered less violent to show the killing of inhuman monsters and if the blood is of an odd color like green (the asexual aspect form WH makes them even more family-friendly, as they have no family to morn for them). In a way, hostel space aliens have been used in the same fashion in sci-fi for years. Also, in old war propaganda.

What I'm getting at is what are your preferred look for Orcs, Goblins, Hobgoblins, etc.? Warhammer-ish? D&D-ish? Tolkien-ish? Or do you have another preference?

My first real meeting with orcs were through Warcraft: Orcs and Humans (in the good days before Blizzard went full anime armor). The image of the plotting orcs has stuck with me ever since as the quintessential orcs.
Green, wide jaws, tusks, yellow/red eyes, well armored...


After that I soon discovered Warhammer which at that time looked quite a lot like Warcraft. I prefer the bulkier orcs in contrast with GW's early skinny orcs.
This is a very excellent example of a perfect orc to me:


Leter GW's orce evolved into even uglier fang filled monsters. I like those very much and they are very distinct. You never mistake a GW orc for anything else. Sadly they fit in bad with old miniatures.

I've never been fond of the pigfaced orcs or orcs of any other color than green. They are okay, but not what I think of as an orc.

I've always loved GW's description of orcs. They live to fight and will fight themselves if there's nothing else to beat up. They are ugly, mean and violent all day every day. WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!!
Here Blizzard fell flat. Their orcs started out like a mysterious invading force from another dimension (I can dig that), but soon everything went politics, diplomacy, and love stories. Thrall even has blue eyes FFS!

I'd say early GW/HQ is the way Orcs and Goblins should look like in fantasy games.

Movies is an entirely different story though. Gimme Peter Jackson's LotR orcs and goblins anyday. Not so much the Hobbit goblins though. They were fun, but LotR also had goblins, and they were a lot better. Kinda weird the same guy made up two completely different races of goblins...

LotR (not very consistent to begin with):


Hobbit:


The latter ones have a "Labyrinth" feel and look. More Jim Henson than Tolkien.

I read the Lord of the Rings only when I already was into fantasy for some years.
The first occasion I ever heard of "orcs" was in the RPG The Dark Eye, first edition, with its stylish illostrations by Bryan Talbot:



DSA orcs are by no means bald, just the opposite, they sport black fur over all their bodies.
So this was the image of orcs I had for years, but playing D&D and other RPGs, HQ and Warhammer eventually changed it to the more standard type.

Malcadon wrote:They are usually built form old ideas of racism or xenophobia, but is also apart of human nature. They also serve as an easily recognizable enemy that are beyond redemption and can be killed or mistreated without the hero looking like an evil bastard.

For HeroQuest, I prefer the Warhammer/Confrontation cartoonish/less naturalistic look. Because of the simple moralisms of HeroQuest it doesn't hurt to have them physically very much deviant from anything human, but still humanoid-ish to actually grasp the evilness of the race.
I like both the fantasy (really green leaning towards yellowish highlights) and naturalistic (subdued greens with rehular skin color highlights - see promotion Confrontation painted figures) skintones.

For other purposes, however, I also like the decpiction of Orcs in D&D miniatures and newer 2000's art and in Earthdawn art. The beastman style. And I'm talking the Beast-Man from masters of the Universe.

Goblins: I want Warhammer style without any steering around this. Also Gnoblars, Snotlings, and whatnot have been depicted as I'll always prefer them. I don't much care for the skincolor, and have no problems imagining them depicted with any green, reddish, orangish, yellow/ochrish, light to dark blue, charcoal, or brownish skintones. I'm thinking about all these skincolors when I paint mine under the assumption that the genetics of goblin skin is completely random.

I started with Tolkien about the same time I learned about D&D. My first preference was the Hildebrant look, but without green. I've always been bothered by green orcs and goblins. Green is for reptiles, not mammals. Orcs, goblins, and the other humanoids mentioned are human-based mammals.

I must admit, however, some of the movie coloration for orcs and goblins doesn't work well with miniatures. I'm thinking LotR minitures by GW painted in brown and gray. The "realistic" look doesn't say as much on a 30mm fig, though some of the reddish ones aren't so bad. I had painted some of my old school goblins with red-brown, and they turned out okay. I'd like to try the bluish-gray or greenish-gray hue sometime to see if I could get it to look OK. The movies made that look unwholesome, which is part of the nature of a darkness-dwelling monster, I think. Not too sure I'd be willing to do that to HQ orcs and goblins, though. They already have a canon skin color.

Daedalus wrote:I started with Tolkien about the same time I learned about D&D. My first preference was the Hildebrant look, but without green. I've always been bothered by green orcs and goblins. Green is for reptiles, not mammals. Orcs, goblins, and the other humanoids mentioned are human-based mammals.

I must admit, however, some of the movie coloration for orcs and goblins doesn't work well with miniatures. I'm thinking LotR minitures by GW painted in brown and gray. The "realistic" look doesn't say as much on a 30mm fig, though some of the reddish ones aren't so bad. I had painted some of my old school goblins with red-brown, and they turned out okay. I'd like to try the bluish-gray or greenish-gray hue sometime to see if I could get it too look. The movies made that look unwholesome, which is part of the nature of a darkness-dwelling monster, I think. Not too sure I'd be willing to do that to HQ orcs and goblins, though. They already have a canon skin color.

The issue I have with the green skin used in Warhammer and Warcraft is how smooth they usually look. I can understand that they go for that color to make them look ugly and unnatural, but they never look gross enough. To me, its lazy monotone coloring, but it makes sense as they are easier to paint in large numbers. On the otherhand, if they look blotchy (ideally greens, yellows and grays) and wart-covered, then they would look more ugly and menacing.

The HeroQuest/Warhammer Orcs and Goblins I have are all green. I painted them up years ago, and it too much work to repaint them all.

As for the pig-like D&D Orcs, I usually give them blotchy tan-rutty (reddish) skin with pink highlights. They have thick black hair. My Orcs, like any Goblinoid, are not known for their modesty or hygiene.

With Goblins, I like to make them look pale, blotchy and pasty, in the sickly colors of green, yellow or gray. They have pale, twinny hair, and big eyes that glows red like rats in the dark. They are small, lanky and hunched-over.

As for Hobgoblins -- a race built on the forced breeding of goblins and human captives, who also spends more time under the sun -- they are tan or rutty skinned, with the sickly goblin colors as an undertone. They have shaggy black or brown hair, with brownish-red in some cases, and they have smaller, but noticeably large eyes with a less intense red glow. They are lanky, but walk upright. Thouls (a sub-class of hobgoblin with troll blood and are also ghouls -- see Basic D&D) look like Hobgoblins... well... as pale naked, wart-covered Hobgoblin corpses, at least!

Since I like the Gnome-Troll freak-show more then the established hyena-men, I have Gnolls as tall but hunched-over. Their skin is pale green or yellow, and covered warts and slime. They have ugly Ferengi-like heads, with big ears and noses. They have black bushy hair and beady red-glowing eyes.

And with Bugbears... Well, I like to have them as menacing bogymen who lurk in the shadows (even with darkvision, they are hard to see) to torment my players like it was a game of Slander! They are dark lanky figures with clawed hands, Jack-O-Lantern-like heads, and burning eyes and mouths. They tend to make their eyes and mouth glow and not glow while moving around to claw or snatch people away, all the while whispering or laughing to taunt their victims. They are not treated as Goblinoids, as per the normal rules, but are evil undead spirits.

I did a test paint on an orc and goblin to see how I'd like them if they were red. I liked it way more than I thought I would. Will probably do a full line of redskins after stripping the bad ones I got from ebay.

Bruenor did beautiful brownish red ones.

IvenBach wrote:I did a test paint on an orc and goblin to see how I'd like them if they were red. I liked it way more than I thought I would. Will probably do a full line of redskins after stripping the bad ones I got from ebay.

I personally would not paint those ugly things *that* color, as I'm partial to that skin color used on something much more sexy:



(In the books, she and her people are all nudists! )

And yes, Barsoom (Mars) has its own race of green skin brutes -- Thark, Warhoon, etc.