D&D (2024) bring back the pig faced orcs for 6th edition, change up hobgoblins & is there a history of the design change

[Sithlord]

They can be. There's just no reason to be. Orcs as just another race is so old hat to me now. I was doing it in the 90s. I phased them out because they were adding nothing. (And they never actually stop being problematic unless you remove anything recognisably Orcish from them)



Or things to run away from or hide from, or you can try to evacuate towns of people from their path (with the added horror that these are creatures that cannot be reasoned with). Yes you can use zombies, just like if you have a culture of nomads you can use humans. As I said, there's not really any good reason to use Orcs at all.


You can but there's zero reason to.

Apparently some think there is a reason too. It is this now badwrongfun.

 

[Charlaquin]

But if you make them a people with their own culture you might as well just use humans.

See there's no good reason to use Orcs at all.

Except, you know, wanting to use orcs.

 

[Don Durito]

Except, you know, wanting to use orcs.

Well duh!

 

[Charlaquin]

Well duh!

That’s not no reason, though. It’s the opposite of no reason.

 

[Don Durito]

That’s not no reason, though. It’s the opposite of no reason.

Context is your friend here.

 

[Faolyn]

They can be. There's just no reason to be. Orcs as just another race is so old hat to me now. I was doing it in the 90s. I phased them out because they were adding nothing. (And they never actually stop being problematic unless you remove anything recognisably Orcish from them)

A big, burly, rather boisterous people with pointy tusks is plenty orcish and not at all problematic. Then you just add some other cultural elements and you've got yourself an interesting people.

Or things to run away from or hide from, or you can try to evacuate towns of people from their path (with the added horror that these are creatures that cannot be reasoned with). Yes you can use zombies, just like if you have a culture of nomads you can use humans. As I said, there's not really any good reason to use Orcs at all.

No one says you have to. You can easily have very fun and interesting worlds without a single orc. But making them indistinguishable from fiends doesn't magically make them more interesting.

Nothing wrong with it.

Assuming you mean "nothing wrong with making them an Always Evil species of otherwise normal creatures," yes, there is, because of the implications it presents.

And on the opposite end Even the 1E greyhawk boxed set had a good orc living in greyhawk.

A "one good orc" whom, I'm guessing, is surrounded entirely by nonevil humans is not a particularly non-troublesome statement.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Fiends are generally assumed in D&Dland to be distilled out of actual, pure evil. Whether this evil is pumped out by the universe or made out of the souls of dead evil people, fiends are that evil's embodiment. They are literally made of Evil.

I'm not sure that is entirely supported. Zariel is listed as a fiend, but was created as a celestial. If it is possible for a celestial to fall and become a fiend, it implies it is also possible for a fiend to rise and become a celestial.

Not 5e, but there is also the character Fall-From-Grace in Planescape: Torment, a lawful neutral succubus.

 

[Mind of tempest]

I'm not sure that is entirely supported. Zariel is listed as a fiend, but was created as a celestial. If it is possible for a celestial to fall and become a fiend, it implies it is also possible for a fiend to rise and become a celestial.

Not 5e, but there is also the character Fall-From-Grace in Planescape: Torment, a lawful neutral succubus.

I think celestials and fiends are all the same kind of thing and are all just made of morality thus they are just changing opinion which changes their form if that makes sense.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

I think celestials and fiends are all the same kind of thing and are all just made of morality thus they are just changing opinion which changes their form if that makes sense.

Certainly in 3rd edition they would have both been classed as "outsiders".

 

[Mind of tempest]

Certainly in 3rd edition they would have both been classed as "outsiders".

yeah they are all just outsiders from well given that the outer planes have to with morals I would say moralia, and they are all one thing.