D&D (2024) How did I miss this about the Half races/ancestries

[Chaosmancer]

Why? The only thing I have taken from the humanoids in Mystara is the blue knife.
The PC wanted a weapon that could transform from a warhammer to a glaive. I inserted the backstory, that the blue knife was this weapon, found/stolen by his parents and left to him when they disappeared, but more so the blue knife in my campaign was a shard of the Rod of 7 Parts and proof of a cosmos beyong Mystara given that it was made from no known material.

Okay, now I'm very confused. You said you ran games in Mystara, but now you are saying the only thing you took from Mystara was an item called the Blue Knife? Or is this a case of when you said "human centric" in your last post you meant "I ignored all lore for anything non-human for the entire setting"?

Yes, plenty monsters with intelligence are simply in the game as disposable monsters. They're just not that important unless they're important to the PCs.

So, if we change their official lore, you couldn't care less. After all, you've never read it until this week. Game running for a decade or more, and you never even bothered to read the monster lore. Really makes me wonder why people have screamed that if we change orc lore it will lead to the death of DnD and the rise of Sunshine Kisses and Happy Hugs the RPG.

I will tell you what is confusing for me.

I never did a deep dive into the lore between the Elves and Gruumsh. You mentioned a couple things in your post which paints the Elven deity as pretty suck-y and provides understanding, if not justification, for Gruumsh's actions. I propose a whole bunch of ideas based off that lore you provided which I'm assuming is correct. I would have never come up with those ideas were it not for the lore you gave.
Given we are dealing with deities and specifically the orc deity, I'm thinking orc or half-orc PC or PCs is necessary to pursue such a game (cause I'm into character goals) and it would be a higher-level play given my ideas propose some drastic changes in the cosmos.

You then want to know why I never inserted these ideas ever in my campaign despite the fact that I do not have orcs or half-orcs PCs and that I haven't done many high-level campaigns. But still you want to know why I didn't derail my current campaigns and my current PC's goals because the PCs encountered orcs.

Can you not see the disconnect with your line of enquiry?

I see a lot of disconnects. This lore isn't a deep dive. It is pretty common knowledge.

But, my pointing out the lore was in your response to "I don't see how this write-up is racist", it had nothing to do with ANY campaign. But then suddenly you started going on about some campaign and declaring this was the reason for the lore, to allow you to build this campaign.... but only if you had a high level orc character.

So, I'm confused. The lore as it stands helps demonstrate WHY the write up is racist, but you won't attempt to fix it, nor do you think anyone should attempt to fix it, unless it is through a campaign? Why not just... fix it? You aren't attached to the lore, because you had never read orc lore or half orc lore or Gruumsh lore, so why is this so difficult to change and then go back to ignoring?

So they do not know they are made in their creator's image (Mark of Gruumsh) but are aware of their own religion, history as you stated below?

What are you talking about? Why wouldn't they know about this supposed Mark of Gruumsh? I never said they weren't aware of it, I said that it was a thinly veiled attempt to use some racism. I mean, it literally says in my copy of the PHB, in the Mark of Gruumsh section, "The most accomplished half-orcs are those with enough self-control to get by in a civilized land."

But you know what, let me offer you something else, just to really drive this home. Want to see my write-up of orcs?

Orcs trace their creation to their father Gruumsh, the One- Eyed God, an unstoppable warrior and powerful leader and their mother Luthic, The Blood-Moon Witch, a wise sorceress and fierce protector. The Gods formed their children with certain gifts to help them thrive on worlds beset by monsters, specifically the burning blood that suffuses every Orc, driving them to move, to act, to fight, to dance, and allows them to take one more step in the face of death.

Orcs are, on average, tall and broad. They have gray skin marked with darker patches which burn red when they get excited, ears that are small and slightly pointed, prominent lower canines that resemble small tusks, and facial ridges that give them a slightly craggy appearance.

No mention of a primitive life style, no need to destroy, no "can they pass as civilized". And the orcs are still made in the image of Gruumsh. He just isn't pointlessly evil.

No, I said the lore inspired me to come up with that redemptive campaign for Gruumsh.

Okay, cool. So, going back to how the half-orc write up is racist and we should change it then, because I don't care about your potential campaign.

Because a PC of Kelemvor will likely pursue Kelemvor-business. I have TWO such clerics in my campaign.
One was reforged after death. He looks the same, but only has shattered memories of his previous life, with no emotional connection and has been tasked to kill someone by Kelemvor. I only provided the reason why Kelemvor wanted this individual dead, the rest was all the player's idea.
Another suffered a crisis of faith and has since found his place within the order as a paladin rather than a cleric. Again all player.

My players will not be interested in the Gruumsh redemption storyline because they are not playing orcs or half-orcs.

So why even bring it up? If it has no bearing on the conversation, and it isn't your solution to the problem, then why are you wasting time with this and avoiding the questions?

You see it as something bad, I do not. I see the Mark providing a basis for the rage whereas before orcs were just quick to temper for no good reason. It is not unusual to me for a creator to instil some part of themselves into their creation. We do that wittingly or unwittingly with our own kids.

Oh, hey! Look at that write-up I did that does the same thing, but not in a way that is racist and makes people seem like beasts. Sure would be nice if we could have something like that in the core books, instead of racist garbage. Luckily, the One DnD people agree, and made this

Orcs trace their creation to Gruumsh, the One-Eyed God, an unstoppable warrior and powerful leader. Gruumsh armed his children with certain gifts to help them thrive on worlds beset by monsters. Even when they turn their devotion to other gods, orcs retain the gifts that the One-Eyed God bestowed upon them: might, endurance, determination, and the ability to see in the dark.

Orcs are, on average, tall and broad. They have gray skin, ears that are small and slightly pointed, and prominent lower canines that resemble small tusks. Young orcs are often told about their ancestors’ ancient conflicts with elves in forests, dwarves under mountains, and invaders from evil planes of existence. Inspired by those tales, young orcs often wonder when Gruumsh will call on them to match the heroic deeds of their ancestors, and if they will prove worthy of the One-Eyed God’s grace.

Another decent write-up that has a "mark of gruumsh" upon them, without being racist and terrible. It is almost like this isn't exactly rocket science.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Nuance requires additional page count, and research, and time, all of which require additional money. Far more likely for WotC to just provide less lore across the board, and push for bland and inoffensive. Gets the loudest, most damaging voices off their back.

Ah yes, the classic "it will only suck and make things worse, so there is no reason to try and improve things."

Don't care if it takes more pages, research, time and money. You want to make a quality product, you make a quality product, not just slap things together because it is convenient. And since their current lore push ISN'T bland, you seem to be flat out wrong.

 

[Chaosmancer]

What makes you think, it applies to a whole species? The PHB doesn't have room to speak about the entire species, so it talks in general terms.

If read in a text book that the British enjoy tea, do you assume every single person living in Britain enjoys tea, or do you assume the majority do?

Strange how Max was so adamant that this was how ALL dwarves viewed ALL elves, but now you want to say that it is only the majority of dwarves that are racist towards elves. Like that makes it better?

 

[Chaosmancer]

Yeah, I know. That's why I tend not to use WotC lore. It bugs me how all the "good" races are basically just humans wearing Halloween masks, while the "evil" races are baby-eating demon-worshipping savages that just kill and raid because they love being evil and want everyone to die.

A species that acted like that in real life would've driven itself to extinction before the Elves even learned how to make pants.

Huh, it is almost like the lore is a problem and should be improved... weird that. Hope someone figures that out and points it out so they can be accused of trying to destroy DnD and rid the world of creativity because they are overly sensitive.

 

[HammerMan]

View attachment 281180

I tried to find a thread talking about this but couldn't...

This is how One D&D will handle this?

So via their example your just a halfling who looks like a gnome and may have a different life span than either.

Game stats wise though, you’re a Halfling. Talk about the most boring solution.

They couldn't come up with someway to combine an attribute of each to make something unique? Not just a weird looking basic Orc or Dwarf or Elf etc. Like pic one special ability of the Dwarf parent and one of the Orc parent (I have the Stonecunning of a Dwarf and the Aggression ability of the Orc) decide how you look (I'm light green like an Orc but the size and shape of a dwarf... with a beard!) Instead it's Im just a somewhat green Dwarf. Yawn.

The most safe yet boring way to deal with the Halves... and Halve nots.

I would like a full “salad bar” of race abilities to just make my own

 

[Bagpuss]

And in D&D, elves, goblins, and humans have always had the same values, emotions, social mores, and intellectual capacities--same with every other humanoid race in the history of the game. D&D is fantasy, not hard SF.

They haven't even been able to achieve the same level until 3rd Edition,

And they haven't had the same intellectual capacities until 5th edition, in fact not until updates to this edition.

 

[Mecheon]

They haven't even been able to achieve the same level until 3rd Edition,

And they haven't had the same intellectual capacities until 5th edition, in fact not until updates to this edition.

Level limits were dumb and like, the most common homebrew around was ignoring them for a reason

But, in the words of Garrosh Hellscream, times change. The orc of today, heck, even Tolkien’s orcs, are as smart as men, and the original playable orcs had a dex penalty, not int. DnD flipflopping on it isn’t exactly a point of consistency in their favour for presentation and why DnD failed at having much influence on the pop culture orc

All the more power to people wanting their orcs like chimps or whatever, but it’s gonna get pushback with any new players because that’s as far from “orc” to the point making dwarves into maggots is still closer

(You do not even know how long I’ve been waiting for a chance to drop a Times Change in this thread)

 

[Micah Sweet]

Ah yes, the classic "it will only suck and make things worse, so there is no reason to try and improve things."

Don't care if it takes more pages, research, time and money. You want to make a quality product, you make a quality product, not just slap things together because it is convenient. And since their current lore push ISN'T bland, you seem to be flat out wrong.

Bland is subjective. And I see no evidence that WotC is all that interested in making a quality product, just something a lot of people will buy, probably because it says "Dungeons & Dragons" on it.

 

[Hussar]

Well, humans are animals, but that's beside the point. Presenting Orcs as naturally violent and uncreative isn't really racism to me because (unlike humans) they're literally different species.

Expecting an Elf, a Goblin, and a Human to have the same values, emotions, social mores, and intellectual capacity is like expecting a fox, a dog, and a coyote to share the same behaviors and temperament because they're all canines.

And, taken in isolation you’d probably be right.

Except for the fact that the violence and increativity traits are described using identical language as in word for word quotations very nearly- to the way minorities, name black particularly, were described in unbelievablely racist writings from the early twentieth century.

That’s the entire problem with this conversation. Everything gets stripped of context and taken in isolation. Calling a group tribal is fine. There’s nothing wrong with using tribal to describe a group.

Using tribal to exclusively describe evil, brutish, stupid, uncreative groups with little or no culture or redeeming qualities IS the problem.

This conversation would actually be productive if people would stop being so myopically reductive.

 

[TylerDurden]

I agree that the "Half" in the name is a problem, but I feel like they can just come up with a better name... elfkin or orcling, or whatever. Have a list of options and have folks vote.
Personally, I think every species should have a section for blended ancestry that lists what traits would apply when mixes with anther species--kind of like they have for Multiclassing. That way you can actually have a distinctive blended species.

Why? This is pure fantasy and for 50 years there have been half-orcs and half-elves.