D&D General Why are "ugly evil orcs" so unpopular?

[ASchmidt]

No, it’s happening with drow too. The Lolth-worshipping, slave-taking drow of Menzoberanzan are now just one group of drow among many (well, among 3), most of which are not evil.

Yes... but both of the "good" groups are small isolated groups while the Lolth worshiping group is still the main one. It's almost a "look, they're not all bad, there's a token group over here, see!"

 

[Umbran]

It’s also less “accused” and more “observed.”

Tolkien himself wrote that orcs 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"

Mind you, he also made some clear statements against the racism of WWII Germany. So... it is complicated.

 

[Charlaquin]

Yes... but both of the "good" groups are small isolated groups while the Lolth worshiping group is still the main one. It's almost a "look, they're not all bad, there's a token group over here, see!"

Yeah, I mean, if you’re saying the attempt to fix the drow is sorely lacking, you’re preaching to the choir with me. But, they are doing something.

 

[Faolyn]

You don't need to be alien to be scary. powerful pillaging hordes are perfectly fine.



Not all threats need to be existential, physical is perfectly fine as well.

But then you get into questions like, why are all orcs scary, powerful, pillaging hordes? Why aren't there any orcs who are fine at making their own stuff and live as farmers, ranchers, or hunter/gatherers? And it always boils down to "because the DM says so so there will be a kill-on-sight baddie for the campaign," and that's just not really useful or meaningful for a lot of people.

 

[Charlaquin]

Tolkien himself wrote that orcs 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"

Exactly.

Mind you, he also made some clear statements against the racism of WWII Germany. So... it is complicated.

Yeah, I mean, I don’t think the takeaway from Tolkien’s use of orientalist tropes should be “Tolkien was a racist.” Rather, it should be that Tolkien, like everyone, had unconscious biases, and we should recognize that if we want to avoid unconsciously perpetuating them ourselves.

 

[Faolyn]

I'm confused. Orcs were not evil but chaotic?...And then follows a quote which describes them as killing things for their own amusement. Is that not evil?

I mean initailly there was no evil alignment, so they couldn't be labelled evil. But that seems a really pedantic and silly way of splitting airs.

Don't forget that no matter what OD&D liked to claim, they nearly always wrote Lawful to mean Good and Chaotic to mean Evil.

 

[Mannahnin]

Tolkien himself wrote that orcs 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"

Let's note that in context of being a personal letter in which he described their physical characteristics. No doubt he had some unexamined internalized racism and imperialist apologetics bound up in his worldview. As portrayed in the books, of course, the orcs whose voices we hear and who have dialogue are given lower class British voices and dialect. Adding some classism to the mix.

And yet this is also a man who famously made a very pointed anti-racist and pro-Jewish reply to an inquiry from a German publisher about his own ethnic heritage. And one who in other letters about the nature of orcs described them in more metaphoric terms, opining that in WWII the equivalent of Orcs were to be found on both sides..

Yes, I think the orcs as real a creation as anything in 'realistic' fiction ... only in real life they are on both sides, of course. For 'romance' has grown out of 'allegory', and its wars are still derived from the 'inner war' of allegory in which good is on one side and various modes of badness on the other. In real (exterior) life men are on both sides: which means a motley alliance of orcs, beasts, demons, plain naturally honest men, and angels

 

[TheAlkaizer]

I don't think they're really unpopular. Most interactions I had with orcs while playing D&D was with some version of the chaotic evil orcs.

Personally, I don't have an issue with a specie being considered chaotic evil, because I take for granted that there's some groups that splinters off it and might see things differently. As I do with all other species. And when I worldbuild, I generally decide on what role I want a specie to fulfill for this part of the world, and if later I want to include individuals or smaller groups that are different, I don't stop myself.

Saying orcs are evil or no more a creative box than saying dwarves are good. I don't have issue creating an evil dwarf, why would I do creating a good orc.

That being said, I stick mostly to the chaotic part. I often use orcs as a wild and unpredictive force that wanders to sack and pillage. Not out of malice, just out of necessity. That's their lifestyle, it's tied to religion and beliefs and culture. It doesn't have to be evil. But you can also have a leader be evil and pulling down everyone towards doing things that are a bit on the evil side of things.

Although, I'm very happy that they're portrayed as more intelligent than in the past. Dumb evil creature are pretty boring. Smart evil creatures are fun.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

There was a goodheart orc subrace, the odontis, even with some magic tricks.

The orcs are no-Caucasian vikings, and they are perfect to play a no-human barbarian, and you can use orcs to create savage tribes mixing elements of ancient hunter-gatherer societes (celts for example) without worry about complains for cultural apropiation.

I remember the planet of the apes, and these weren't evil by nature but they had got different gray shades.

 

[Faolyn]

That doesn't really answer anything though. I accept that things change. The question is, why orcs? Fiends are still evil as are gnolls. Why the segregation of "it's okay for these imaginary creatures to be evil, but not these"?

Fiends are made out of evil, at least in standard D&D. They are literally Evil in physical form. No different than modrons being Law in physical form.

And gnolls... should either be another humanoid (and completely rewritten) or actually a fiend (perhaps what 3x called a Native Outsider). I think one of the writers even said that they had mis-typed gnolls and they should've been fiends.

At any rate, I'm pretty sure that gnolls as they're currently written don't breed. They're just created and programmed by Yeenoghu, made out of hyenas that eat gnoll leftovers. I could be wrong, but I'm too lazy to go look it up right now. So what that means is that there's no baby gnolls and there's a logical reason for there being no gnoll culture and no purpose for their existence beyond murdering everything. Personally, I'd have gnolls as being made out of any predatory animal, not just hyenas. And having them be subject to exorcisms/dispel evils.