D&D 3.5 Orcs: back to Tolkien?

[Hypersmurf]

You sure on that, Rob? In FotR, Gandalf tells Elrond that Saruman is breeding orcs and goblin-men to make uruk-hai. I'm well aware that this doesn't match the books, but I still thought there was a difference.

Grishnakh is referred to as both an orc and a goblin in The Two Towers (the book, not the film).

"Orcrist" is translated as "Goblin-Cleaver".

Somewhere in a foreword to The Hobbit, Tolkien states "ORC is not an English word. It occurs in one or two places but is usually translated goblin (or hobgoblin for the larger kinds). Orc is the hobbits' form of the name given at the time to these creatures, and it is not connected at all with our orc, ork, applied to sea-animals of dolphin-kind."

-Hyp.

 

[Mystery Man]

Besides, what's wrong with DnD returning to it's Tolkien roots.

It's really the best fantasy reference to draw from IMHO.

My orcs are Tolkienesque in the way that they are portrayed. The hordes of evil, the scourge of civilization, destroyers and haters of all that is good, etc etc..

 

[psychognome]

You sure on that, Rob? In FotR, Gandalf tells Elrond that Saruman is breeding orcs and goblin-men to make uruk-hai. I'm well aware that this doesn't match the books, but I still thought there was a difference.

The way I see it, the goblin-men are the humans that originally dwelled in what is now Rohan, but were forced to flee to the mountains by the horselords. They didn't directly mingle with orcs, but did sometimes work closely with them. In the Fellowship of the Ring Saruman is actually addressing a group of such people, and when the people of Rohan are mentioned one of them shouts "Murderers!"

I might be mistaken, though. Hey, I've read the Middle Earth Companion!

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

You sure on that, Rob? In FotR, Gandalf tells Elrond that Saruman is breeding orcs and goblin-men to make uruk-hai. I'm well aware that this doesn't match the books, but I still thought there was a difference.

In the books I believe the Uruk-Hai are bred from Orcs and men, though I can't for the life of me find a citation. What it actually boils down to is this: Tolkien use the term "goblin" in The Hobbit, which was basically a children's book. By the time he wrote the Lord of the Rings, he had decided that goblin was too faerie-tale of a word, so he came up with Orc to describe basically the same creature. I'm not sure how often Goblin gets used in the books.

So the goblin-orc thing in LoTR is a bit of an author retrofitting his setting; something all of us DM's are no doubt very familiar with!

And of course Imperialus is also right - there's a great variety of orcs in Middle-earth. Tolkien describes the Moria orcs and the Mordor orcs being much different, and of course the Uruk Hai are even nastier (and they don't mind the Sun, which is another big deal).

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

Aha! Found it - basically, the Uruk-Hai are left without a specific origin. Treebeard says, "For these Isengarders are more like wicked Men. It is a mark of evil things that came in the Great Darkness that they cannot abide the Sun; but Saruman's Orcs can endure it, even if they hate it. I wonder what he has done? Are they Men he has ruined, or has he blended the races of Orcs and Men?"

 

[Umbran]

You sure on that, Rob? In FotR, Gandalf tells Elrond that Saruman is breeding orcs and goblin-men to make uruk-hai. I'm well aware that this doesn't match the books, but I still thought there was a difference.

In the Tolkien text, both words are used for the same critters. In The Hobbit he seems to have used "goblin" more, in LotR he seems to have preferred "orc". But both works use both words.

IIRC, the Tolkien-elf word for orc is "yrch". Ran into that coming from Legolas a couple times in my last read-through.

I've always thought that the Tolkien terms "orc" and "goblin" covered pretty much everything a D&D player would call a "goblinoid". Tolkien is pretty clear that not all orcs are alike. And I could see the humans, dwarves, and elves not being all that picky about giving each "breed" a different name, especialy if the little, scuttley orcs (that has a D&D goblin's stats) can interbreed with the big warrior orcs (that a D&D player would call a hobgoblin or orc).

 

[Tinker Gnome]

And to whomever it was that said D&D should move as far away from Tolkien as possible, I find that comment the most interesting in the thread, given that D&D has pretty much always been a relatively transparent rip-off of Tolkien. If it moves any farther away from Tolkien, it'd hardly be D&D anymore.

Well, i think D&D should change. The change to Halflings from AD&D to 3.0 was a step in the right direction IMHO. Not to mention, most Tolkien fans are opposed to putting in any Sci-Fi elements into D&D. Where as, i like to mix fantasy and sci-fi.

 

[Gothmog]

Wow, I hope they are moving back towards a more Tolkein-like perspective. The worst change in 3E was the sexy halflings- I house-ruled them back to Hobbits. I don't like the Orc boyz and Gobbos of Warhammer much- they feel too cockney and silly to me rather than sinister. And the bazillion subraces of elves around now? Ugh. I'd say rather than making dozens of new subraces for the game, give each race greated depth and cultural distinction.

 

[Corinth]

All your Tolkien questions are answered at The Encyclopedia of Arda

 

[Corinth]

Wow, I hope they are moving back towards a more Tolkein-like perspective. The worst change in 3E was the sexy halflings- I house-ruled them back to Hobbits. I don't like the Orc boyz and Gobbos of Warhammer much- they feel too cockney and silly to me rather than sinister. And the bazillion subraces of elves around now? Ugh. I'd say rather than making dozens of new subraces for the game, give each race greated depth and cultural distinction.

Hear, hear!

D&D needs to hew closer to Tolkien, not deviate further away from it.