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

[Oofta]

I think an issue is that the orc in the MM is presented as a "default orc" when really it's representing an orc warrior that typically gets in the way of characters' goals.

I wouldn't be surprised if in future printings WotC avoids having stat blocks in the MM for generic humanoids, and instead has explicit roles for the orcs, goblins, hobgoblins, etc presented there. Having the stats for a "goblin thief" or "orc raider" or "hobgoblin soldier" would divorce those stat blocks from generalizations about the race while also clarifying the expected behaviors and disposition of that foe.

Maybe. They should definitely emphasize that it's just a default and that you should do what you want to do for your game.

 

[Doug McCrae]

despite Gary Gygax's abuse of English language, orcs are not a race.

Gygax’s use of the word "race" to refer to non-human entities like elves, dwarves, and orcs probably derives from his sources.

Appendix N

The Hobbit, JRR Tolkien:
"Ever since the fall of the Great Goblin of the Misty Mountains the hatred of their race for the dwarves had been rekindled to fury."

The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien:
"No dwarf could be unmoved by such loveliness. None of Durin’s race would mine those caves for stones or ore, not if diamonds and gold could be got there."
"Suddenly the slow-kindled courage of his [Merry’s] race awoke."
"In the last years of Denethor I the race of uruks, black orcs of great strength, first appeared out of Mordor"
"These creatures [orcs], being filled with malice, hating even their own kind, quickly developed as many barbarous dialects as there were groups or settlements of their race"
In Appendix F, ents, orcs, trolls, and dwarves appear under the heading "Of Other Races".

Three Hearts and Three Lions, Poul Anderson:
"Curiously, for beings said to be soulless, the Faerie race were under severe physical handicaps, and must rely mainly on guile."

The King of Elfland’s Daughter, Lord Dunsany:
"A curiosity arose in the forest amongst that brown mass of trolls, for their race is profoundly inquisitive."

Land of Unreason, L Sprague de Camp and Fletcher Pratt:
"These kobolds are a race that consort not with us, loving labor like Egyptians."

Tolkien's Sources

These use the word "race" in a similar way.

The Princess and the Goblin, George MacDonald:
"In these subterranean caverns lived a strange race of beings, called by some gnomes, by some kobolds, by some goblins."

The Marvellous Land of Snergs, E A Wyke-Smith:
"The Snergs are a race of people only slightly taller than the average table but broad in the shoulders and of great strength. Probably they are some offshoot of the pixies who once inhabited the hills and forests of England"

 

[Sacrosanct]

And how is it more troubling than your earlier example about sharks being bloodthirsty? If sharks can be bloodthirsty than why can't orcs? I think you may be implying a link to racism, but that argument doesn't hold because, despite Gary Gygax's abuse of English language, orcs are not a race. They are an entirely different species in EVERY setting I've ever seen that includes orcs. In fact, in the default D&D setting they don't even share a phylogenetic tree with humans; the shark in the earlier example is more closely related to us than the orcs are.

This is...not true. In fact, the opposite is true. Not only have orcs been referred to as a race, half orcs are literally a playable race in the PHB. And the fact that there are half orcs to begin with completely shatters your assumption that sharks are closer to humans than orcs. Can sharks interbreed with other humanoids?

In 80s cartoons? Yes. In D&D? No

 

[jayoungr]

despite Gary Gygax's abuse of English language, orcs are not a race.

Gygax’s uses of the word "race" to refer to non-human entities like elves, dwarves, and orcs probably derives from his sources.

It's just an old-fashioned usage of the word. Race used to be a much looser term back in the day and could be as broad as "species" or as specific as "ethnic group."

 

[Vaalingrade]

I wouldn't be surprised if in future printings WotC avoids having stat blocks in the MM for generic humanoids, and instead has explicit roles for the orcs, goblins, hobgoblins, etc presented there.

That's what 4e did.

There were no 'this is a goblin', it was 'this is the goblin that throws javelins at you', 'this is the goblin who wizards at you', 'this is the goblin who has rogue abilities'.

 

[Charlaquin]

Alignment is just an aid that goes along with the descriptive text. Orcs have been around for so long I don't need it, but I find it useful for other monsters. For someone running orcs for the first time that has a decent grasp of the concepts but has never picked up a MM in their life I think it's useful.

Well, the people who are actually running the games for the first time have a different take. They’re picking up the book and seeing entire humanoid “races” listed as “good” or “evil” and they’re saying “that seems pretty racist.”

Also easy to ignore if you don't like it.

I disagree.

As far as simplification, I deal with complex stuff at times in my games. Other times I want a simple beer and pretzels game. Usually it's something in-between but the majority of times, yes, there is a bright and clear line between good and evil. It makes it stand out more when the lines are murky. I wouldn't have as much fun in a game where I had to deal with realistic all the time. I have to deal with reality all day long, sometimes I want a break. Different people play for different reasons, I think the game can and should support different styles.

Yeah, like ai said, wanting to avoid complex moral dilemmas in game is totally understandable. But if that was my goal, I would leave the question of good and evil out entirely, rather than oversimplify it. Trying to eat one’s cake and have it too inevitably leads to mixed messages and unfortunate implications. Of course, feel free to do whatever you want at your table. But, I think it’s irresponsible of WotC to oversimplify these topics, and they should stop doing so yesterday.

D&D is all about simplifying reality to easy-to-grasp and implement rules. I don't see why default alignment should be any different.

I don’t agree at all that that’s what D&D is about. Certainly the rules are more abstract than reality. That doesn’t mean the game is about simplifying reality.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

And sharks are literal bloodthirsty killers, but we don’t call them evil either. The notion of evil generally implies knowing better and willfully choosing to do the wrong thing. The idea that such willful malice is genetic is not harmless.

This reminds me of something someone wrote about the nature of evil. Specifically about Lord of the Rings orcs...

Essentially, the orcs of Lord of the Rings actually do understand morality. They understand that betrayal and backstabbing are bad things, and complain when they believe their enemies do it. However, when orcs do it, they see nothing wrong and encourage it.

This is very different than sharks being bloodthirsty or cats killing birds for fun; predation is part of their very nature, and if they had sentience I doubt they would find it immoral if they witnessed other species doing similar behavior.

To close, the problem with the Lord of the Rings orcs isn't their culture (they don't really have one), or their morality (which is hypocrisy), it is that they are given Cockney accents and that Tolkien admitted he based them physically off of Mongolians. To tie to the thread title, if they looked more like pig-people and talked like pig-people, they'd be much less tied to real peoples and are much more acceptable "generic base guys." Much like how the Trollocs are depicted in Wheel of Time (which really are just pig-people/beastmen).

 

[Oofta]

Well, the people who are actually running the games for the first time have a different take. They’re picking up the book and seeing entire humanoid “races” listed as “good” or “evil” and they’re saying “that seems pretty racist.”

I disagree.

Yeah, like ai said, wanting to avoid complex moral dilemmas in game is totally understandable. But if that was my goal, I would leave the question of good and evil out entirely, rather than oversimplify it. Trying to eat one’s cake and have it too inevitably leads to mixed messages and unfortunate implications. Of course, feel free to do whatever you want at your table. But, I think it’s irresponsible of WotC to oversimplify these topics, and they should stop doing so yesterday.


I don’t agree at all that that’s what D&D is about. Certainly the rules are more abstract than reality. That doesn’t mean the game is about simplifying reality.

I've played with a lot of newbies, introduced many people to D&D. My current games includes 20-somethings who have never played the game before. Orcs being evil by default has never once been raised as an issue. So unless you have some independent study your assertion is meaningless.

As for the rest, we're just going to have to disagree. Which is fine. Different people play for different reasons.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

ALL thought and behavior is a product of biology.

Yeah, no. Culture (and more importantly) how people are raised by their parents has a huge impact on folks' thoughts and behavior. If this wasn't true, psychologists and therapists would behave radically differently than they do.

 

[Sacrosanct]

I disagree.

Technically it is easy to ignore, just like it's easy to ignore anything. I mean, it doesn't take me much effort to just ignore alignments. However, that misses the point, which is where I think you were going (I don't mean to assume). That is, even if an alignment listing is technically easy to ignore, the overwhelming number of players, especially newer ones, will not ignore it because it's presented as a rule and/or attribute of that creature as the default, and people don't tend to ignore rules unless they are explicitly told to ignore it. For example, you can technically ignore the rule to go to Jail when you land on the Go To Jail square in monopoly, but I doubt most people who play the game do that.

So I think we very much need to consider the context of how the rule is actually implemented and used by the people playing the game. And if people assume all orcs are evil because it's in that stat block, that can be problematic for numerous reasons already given in every one of these threads. Thus, is why I am a proponent of making default alignment for intelligent mundane humanoids as null, and let it be campaign specific. IME, the game opens up when the players don't just immediately attack every orc they run into. Some memorable NPCs can be orcs. Plot hooks can be advanced by talking rather than attacking. And the reality is, if orcs are defaulted to evil, most players will just attack first and be justified. Since they are evil. Because that's what's happening now, and has been for decades (in 1e, there were actual statements in the DMG to punish players who always attacked rather than talked, but I don't recall that rule in later editions, which resulted, in combination to the move to XP for monster kills rather than treasure, in players attacking first and always).