Morality of Orcs

[cynthialee]

[This OP was split as a new topic and renamed by Daedalus on 9/28/2015]

I am rather fond of the Orks are a cousin race to the Elves concept of Orks.

It allows my NPC Gnome Scientist to make wild claims about the genetic similarities of the tribes and then to postulate an interdependence of the two species as a part of their evolution. "These wars between your factions are just the result of natural selection and evolutionary forces. In-fact I postulate that should either side in this war become extinct the other race would surely follow in short order".
But recent events (past 200 years of in world game play) in my game world have placed Ork and Elf shoulder to shoulder fighting the menaces of the un-dead and often the humans and their masters the Dragons....There is still a remnant of the idea of Elf vs. Ork warfare in the various tribes, but none of the younger generations have had any war with the other species. It is far more likely that an adventuring and exploring Ork or Elf will have become part of a larger group of like minded souls. Such large bands of adventure seekers must combine skills and knowledge to survive in the magic warped wilds and ancient undead cities that lay full of plunder. These individual relationships complicate the desires of the ancients to eradicate the other side. Who wants to war on the tribe of the dude who covers your left flank, is the attitude of the youth. If a few more of my 'immortals' get whacked for any reason there could well be an alliance of Ork, Elf, and Dwarf looking to remove the humans and Dragons from the genetic pool. {The immortals and demi-gods are the ones who fuel the hatred on both sides. With out their influence who knows how things may turn out in the long run...?}

[Anderas]

This is depressingly realistic. How much peace could there be in the real world without a third jealous neighbour fueling the hate, the separatists and bavarians, the guerillas, the extremists and the mafias?

How much worse is it if the immortals and demi-gods (Immortals knowing powerful magic? ) are conspiring in addition to this normal-world effect, to keep the races at war and at low-level technology?

Imagine, anybody inventing gunpowder is the next on the agenda to be reduced to harmless rests.

[cynthialee]

I shoot for social realism or at least socially logical outcomes. Sure there may be powerful magics and the mechanizations of powerful immortal forces at work on the game realm, but people act like people.
Orks are a people when it all boils down. Ork mommies treasure their children just like every other creature. Ork men would rather spend a day drinking grog with their friends and bragging about all the things they would do in battle, than actually fighting and maybe dying on a battle field.
Orks may be monsters to humans and elves but consider a tribe of orks without a diabolical or Machiavellian power manipulating them and no immediate threats to their livelihoods for a number of generations:
I postulate that they would civilize, form some form of society and engage in commerce amongst each other. Furthermore they would become less inclined to warfare and would likely take up the plow and the anvil. That is until their culture eventually splits and the offshoot tribe/s and the mother society go to war with each other. Why would things change.

[cynthialee]

@ Cynthialee on orc society
While that probably is the most realistic way to go - and I'm certain it can easily work out well; I'm not a fan of the "orcs are just misunderstood people" route.
If a fantasy race is basically just humans with a different look it removes the reason for them to exist. Why not have a realistic setting with just factions of human tribes then?
In fantasy you have the chance to create something that is not realistic. A race can be evil and do evil things for the sake of being evil because that's just their (evil) nature.
The more different from humans a certain race is the more exciting in my humble opinion.
Orcs doesn't have to behave like people. Orc mommies throws their babies into the woods; whomever survives, good for them. Orc men live for the thrill of slaughter on the battlefield and feel purposeless in peacetimes.

Well indeed there must be social differences in the various bipedal sentient species but I am solidly of the opinion that Orks are 'evil' is due to the Zargons and Sauron's of the universe that corrupt them. With out a corrupting influence I can not see any species engaging in dangerous to their survival behaviors.
Also, this way allows me to have The Empire of Snarl of the Fang Tooth Clan, formerly The Empire of Thrax the destroyer, formerly the Empire of Draknar the Feared...A large Empire run by Orks with a dangerous culture for an outsider to have to navigate is fun stuff. It is very easy to offend the locals who just happen to believe in a trial by combat system for those who are mighty. Player characters tend to fit into that category. Watching them squirm and hold their tongues while they walk past the slave markets is fun stuff. Yes there are Elves and Humans in the slave pits. But I remind the players that their heroes come from a culture that also has a slave class and most of the slaves in their own society are human and elf.

Also a monster with some of the same goals as the player races allows for the chance at parlay and treaties. A monster that just wants to maim and harm and be illogically chaotic is a one dimensional enemy. Also it provides little theoretical chance for these monster to breed and increase their numbers.
In my campaigns one of the prime reasons the Elves fear the Orks being a civilized people s the Ork birth rate. Orks always have a litter and typically the two or three strongest survive to adulthood provided there are certain food resources available. {Rutabaga and Beef in my campaign.} Ork children who are raised in safe environments with plenty of resources become Uruk'hai, those who are raised without ample resource grow up to be mere Orks.
Elves on the other hand are much longer lived and have 1 or 2 children at a time and rarely will they have a large amount of children.
Elves must interfere with the orks and keep them lowely lest an Empire of Uruk'hai come knocking at their door steps.

[cynthialee]

I'd be quite interested to see your campaign cynthialee, especially some of the support materials.

Well allot of my game world and ideas can be discovered in this tome:

http://www.lulu.com/us/en/shop/cp-busse ... 28586.html

However this book was written with all the 'propaganda and deceit' of the Kingdoms and Empires in mind so as to misguide the players into a particular mindset about their liege and sovereigns. Most of the real dirty back room deals and conspiracies are contained in my head and the various Loremaster notes I have in my campaign bag. Those of course are not for dissemination.

My game world has thousands years of "played history". Not that we have played that long as it would be impossible. But the events of one storyline I will run often will have wide sweeping effects on the long term game. When new characters are written up I tend to advance the time line at least enough to avoid old heroes encounter new heroes. I the case of the few immortal heroes that have spawned in the game I try and keep them very busy in far off lands. This is not the case with the campaign I am running now as I plan on tying the last three sets of characters together into one great and final epic battle against the Arch Lich who has been getting his minions butts handed to him by heroes for the last 3 campaigns. {I like to try and step out of my box every once and awhile.}

Back to the topic at hand:
As I know of nothing in nature that is intrinsically evil and it is mainly only in individuals that we find true evil , none of the species in my game world are intrinsically evil. Now sure...Orks, Goblins and Ogres tend to be evil in the estimation of Humans and Elves; there is a clash for resources and the goblinoid types are easily manipulated by evil forces, this makes for an easy to label as evil culture. Even my Lizard men who want nothing less than the eradication of the humans are not actually evil. They are a long lived race that hails from the time of dinosaurs. They have seen many different races and cultures come and go over the eons and they have decided that the humans are a true danger to their long term survival. Thus the humans need to be dealt with much like one would deal with any other deadly pest. It isn't evil to kill so you may survive. That is the very core of life.

[alyndavies]

I'd be quite interested to see your campaign cynthialee, especially some of the support materials.

Well allot of my game world and ideas can be discovered in this tome:

http://www.lulu.com/us/en/shop/cp-busse ... 28586.html

However this book was written with all the 'propaganda and deceit' of the Kingdoms and Empires in mind so as to misguide the players into a particular mindset about their liege and sovereigns. Most of the real dirty back room deals and conspiracies are contained in my head and the various Loremaster notes I have in my campaign bag. Those of course are not for dissemination.

My game world has thousands years of "played history". Not that we have played that long as it would be impossible. But the events of one storyline I will run often will have wide sweeping effects on the long term game. When new characters are written up I tend to advance the time line at least enough to avoid old heroes encounter new heroes. I the case of the few immortal heroes that have spawned in the game I try and keep them very busy in far off lands. This is not the case with the campaign I am running now as I plan on tying the last three sets of characters together into one great and final epic battle against the Arch Lich who has been getting his minions butts handed to him by heroes for the last 3 campaigns. {I like to try and step out of my box every once and awhile.}

Back to the topic at hand:
As I know of nothing in nature that is intrinsically evil and it is mainly only in individuals that we find true evil , none of the species in my game world are intrinsically evil. Now sure...Orks, Goblins and Ogres tend to be evil in the estimation of Humans and Elves; there is a clash for resources and the goblinoid types are easily manipulated by evil forces, this makes for an easy to label as evil culture. Even my Lizard men who want nothing less than the eradication of the humans are not actually evil. They are a long lived race that hails from the time of dinosaurs. They have seen many different races and cultures come and go over the eons and they have decided that the humans are a true danger to their long term survival. Thus the humans need to be dealt with much like one would deal with any other deadly pest. It isn't evil to kill so you may survive. That is the very core of life.

Skaven are evil

[cynthialee]

Skaven just want to live like any other person. They are treated like vermin, hated on by the other sentient species and ordered around by the agents of Chaos...I'd be less than civil also under these conditions.

[knightkrawler]

Skaven just want to live like any other person. They are treated like vermin, hated on by the other sentient species and ordered around by the agents of Chaos...I'd be less than civil also under these conditions.

I wholeheartedly agree. They drop 16 kids a litter and live underground. They need the freakin' space, so they undermine every imperial town and village for raids, wanting to conceal their racial identity and keeping to the dark because they know they will be flooded out (well... it's gonna be an attempt, at least) like the Orcs were, and the Beastmen, and the Elves, even. And they don't have much time... 15 years of life expectation and social caste pressure to the extreme. Social stress makes for some utter crazy prophetism of horned gods and mad science of glowing rock and councils of 13 individuals. Wait, that sounds like our human reality now.

The word evil is just overused.

[Goblin-King]

What is "evil"... Can someone actually truly be evil... yadda yadda yadda...

Okay so Skaven are not evil? But they sure like being sadistic, mutilating and experimenting on slaves, murdering, poisoning, spreading disease.
They are basically at war with everybody... If Skaven aren't evil, nothing really is.

[cynthialee]

Of course they are like that. They have been the pawns of dark forces for a very long time. They are so far removed from living in a state of nature they have lost any semblance of a civilized people. They are a marginalized community on Glorantha.
Left alone in a healthy environment, and with a bit of guidance they could become as civil and vital a culture as the elves or dwarves. It is only the influence of evil forces that cause them to be the way they are.
Skaven mommies love their babies just like all other mommies do.