D&D 5E What Makes an Orc an Orc?

[Remathilis]

I have kinda lost track of who argues for what in all these ork threads, but the fact remains that the the general idea of what orcs are has shifted. Due them being sympathetic and playable in popular computer games such as WoW most people no longer see them as Tolkien-style monsters. People want to play orks, they want the orks to be represented as nuanced real people. So that's what D&D should do.

Not just orcs. Sympathetic monsters are a huge trend in modern culture. Drow have been the iconic "bad boy" race since Drizzt. Warcraft generated a lot of sympathy for "the Horde" races. Vampires are werewolves have moved from irredeemable monster to "boyfriend material". Even the recent attempts at horror, such as the eldritch horror child kidnapper Slenderman, has well...

I think that is separate from the racism element being discussed, however. That "monsters are waifu" movement has overlapped with the social justice movement, with the only common denominator being making monsters less monstrous.

 

[Guest 6801328]

The Player of the orc character was happy, and my other player was happy, but it shows this deep problem with keeping orcs as always evil and warring with humans and elves and such. That means that most half-orcs are children of rape, and that is deeply troubling for a lot of players, myself included.

Doh.

It hadn't even occurred to me, until I read this, how half-orcs perfectly illustrate the problem.

I'm only going to speak for myself here, but I'm guessing a lot of players share this experience. When I picture a half-elf, I assume some kind of interracial love story. The dad might be the human, or the mom might be. They're probably living happily in a tree-house or rustic farm or maybe in an apartment above their magic shoppe.

When I imagine a half-orc, the orc is always the father. And let's just say there isn't exactly a romcom in the backstory. Yaknowhaddimean?

To me this shows how effective the language and imagery around orcs have been. Orcs are the archetype of the bestial savage that is going to invade our country and rape our women. The bogeyman that has been invoked for centuries...millennia?...by those who want to vilify another people for political or economic ends.

Yup, no more half-orcs in my games. I might eventually re-visit the theme, but for now easiest to remove them. It's just too....icky.

 

[Wishbone]

I thought this video from D&D Beyond with a panel of Black Tabletop Creators (including Orion Black) was very good on this particular topic. The relevant timestamp for a brief mention of orcs and how these specific creators see orcs as rooted in racist concepts. The whole video is worth watching and listening to for getting a better picture on their individual lived realities and considering why not incorporating the criticisms of fantasy races is hurtful and exclusionary. If people don't believe someone who says a fantasy race calls on negative stereotypes associated with their own identity in real life, then the idea of trust and inclusion in a hobby fundamentally built on collective social contract between players of the game is being overridden because it is inconvenient.

Hell, this thread hasn't touched yet on dwarves and antisemitism. As an Ashkenazi Jewish person, when I tell you the presentation of dwarves across fantasy is rooted in notions of specific antisemitism and people argue it's an overreaction, then what is happening is that they are saying they care less about driving people like me out of the hobby than considering how things that aren't directly relevant to them are worth interrogating.

It may be some concepts are too far gone to be fixed, but the least that can be done is to listen to the people who are personally impacted by these things and to try to be better about our own blindspots.

 

[Guest 6801328]

Many people claim orcs are PoC.

J$%$s F#$@ing Christ, Oofta. You've been participating in these threads this whole time. If you still think that's what people are saying...I truly do not know what to think.

No, just no.

Some people who want to pretend there's no problem have been making that strawman, and it's been very effective in that others who are confused about the problem have been misled by those strawmen. But NOBODY has been claiming that Orcs are PoC. Nobody. At all.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Doh.

It hadn't even occurred to me, until I read this, how half-orcs perfectly illustrate the problem.

I'm only going to speak for myself here, but I'm guessing a lot of players share this experience. When I picture a half-elf, I assume some kind of interracial love story. The dad might be the human, or the mom might be. They're probably living happily in a tree-house or rustic farm or maybe in an apartment above their magic shoppe.

When I imagine a half-orc, the orc is always the father. And let's just say there isn't exactly a romcom in the backstory. Yaknowhaddimean?

To me this shows how effective the language and imagery around orcs have been. Orcs are the archetype of the bestial savage that is going to invade our country and rape our women. The bogeyman that has been invoked for centuries...millennia?...by those who want to vilify another people for political or economic ends.

Yup, no more half-orcs in my games. I might eventually re-visit the theme, but for now easiest to remove them. It's just too....icky.

I mean I'd imagine half-orcs the same way than you describe half-elves, but that's probably only because my impression of orcs is largely shaped by non-D&D sources. But yeah, if orcs are 'evil monsters' the issue you describe definitely exists.

(Now personally I usually remove half-races because I want the races to be so distinct that they cannot interbreed. But that is another matter entirely.)

 

[FrogReaver]

I thought this video from D&D Beyond with a panel of Black Tabletop Creators (including Orion Black) was very good on this particular topic. The relevant timestamp for a brief mention of orcs and how these specific creators see orcs as rooted in racist concepts. The whole video is worth watching and listening to for getting a better picture on their individual lived realities and considering why not incorporating the criticisms of fantasy races is hurtful and exclusionary. If people don't believe someone who says a fantasy race calls on negative stereotypes associated with their own identity in real life, then the idea of trust and inclusion in a hobby fundamentally built on collective social contract between players of the game is being overridden because it is inconvenient.

Hell, this thread hasn't touched yet on dwarves and antisemitism. As an Ashkenazi Jewish person, when I tell you the presentation of dwarves across fantasy is rooted in notions of specific antisemitism and people argue it's an overreaction, then what is happening is that they are saying they care less about driving people like me out of the hobby than considering how things that aren't directly relevant to them are worth interrogating.

It may be some concepts are too far gone to be fixed, but the least that can be done is to listen to the people who are personally impacted by these things and to try to be better about our own blindspots.

Or there are two worldviews at play. One finds those things to be racist and the other doesn’t. Can I disagree with others worldviews without discounting their feelings? And if so what does that look like?

 

[dave2008]

If you remove the dex bonus from elves and halflings, strength from orcs, general bonus across the board for humans, etc., you are taking away a good chunk of what makes them different from one another.

Possibly, but in this hypothetical scenario I would replace those bonuses with something else. I'm not sure what that is yet as I am not really interested in doing a redesign. Personally I am fine with most of the distinction between races being fluff / lore and not mechanical.

 

[Wishbone]

Doh.

It hadn't even occurred to me, until I read this, how half-orcs perfectly illustrate the problem.

I'm only going to speak for myself here, but I'm guessing a lot of players share this experience. When I picture a half-elf, I assume some kind of interracial love story. The dad might be the human, or the mom might be. They're probably living happily in a tree-house or rustic farm or maybe in an apartment above their magic shoppe.

When I imagine a half-orc, the orc is always the father. And let's just say there isn't exactly a romcom in the backstory. Yaknowhaddimean?

To me this shows how effective the language and imagery around orcs have been. Orcs are the archetype of the bestial savage that is going to invade our country and rape our women. The bogeyman that has been invoked for centuries...millennia?...by those who want to vilify another people for political or economic ends.

Yup, no more half-orcs in my games. I might eventually re-visit the theme, but for now easiest to remove them. It's just too....icky.

Eberron does have a decent justification for half-orcs and their dragonmarked house—consensual blending of human settlers and orcs in the Shadow Marches with half-orcs representing a unity between the two. I'm sure that's still problematic in how it presents orcs as being unable to have the dragonmark of finding unlike half-orcs and humans (likely a function of orcs not being a core race in 3.5E), but there's no reason to keep it that way going forward.

 

[FrogReaver]

J$%$s F#$@ing Christ, Oofta. You've been participating in these threads this whole time. If you still think that's what people are saying...I truly do not know what to think.

No, just no.

Some people who want to pretend there's no problem have been making that strawman, and it's been very effective in that others who are confused about the problem have been misled by those strawmen. But NOBODY has been claiming that Orcs are PoC. Nobody. At all.

I’ll take a step back and say you aren’t. I’ve been in the discussions too and I don’t believe your assessment here is fair to what has been said.

 

[dave2008]

You achieve "different from the typical member of your race" simply by being above an 11 in a stat(13 and 12 for the +2, +1). Giving a floating +2, +1 enables better than any other member of your race that isn't a PC. Dwarves would have a maximum intelligence of 18, unless you are a PC or special DM NPC, which would give you a starting maximum of 20 int.

If I really had at it and wanted to go all mechanics as a way to define race I would have all kinds of wacky restrictions and bonuses. But few would agree with my approach and it would severely nerf some races and buff others. That is fine for my game, but it is not a good idea for a game for everyone.

I would definitely have different min. and max. for each race. And each race would probably have unique way of rolling stats or point buy.