Dragonlance Dragonlance Creators Reveal Why There Are No Orcs On Krynn

Talking to the Dragonlance Nexus, Dragonlance creators Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman revealed why the world of Krynn features no orcs -- in short, because they didn't want to copy Tolkien, and orcs were very much a 'Middle Earth' thing.

Weis told Trampas Whiteman that "Orcs were also viewed as very Middle Earth. We wanted something different." Hickman added that it was draconians which made Krynn stand out. Read more at the link below!

Why are there no Orcs in Krynn? Weis and Hickman give us the answer! - Dragonlance Nexus

Dragonhelm gets the scoop from Weis and Hickman on why there are no orcs in Krynn. Read More

dragonlancenexus.com

 

[mamba]

Just because it was decided by the author, doesn't make it less objective.

actually it very much does. At the time of writing, was he free to decide differently? If yes, then it is subjective.

This isn't a question of whether or not Tolkien is an evocative author or not nor an opinion that may vary based on differing characteristics, qualifications, or perspectives of the reader. If Tolkien wrote LotR so that Hobbits were less vulnerable to the temptations of the rings, and it's pretty clear he did, then that's objective.

by now it is established fact and therefore objective, but not while Tolkien wrote it, unless you say there was already an objective fact about hobbits at the time Tolkien wrote this, that he had to abide by

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Is your argument that races play no part in fantasy or in Lord of the Rings in particular?

my argument is has been and will be that restrictions in games with no reason are unfun. also that most aliens and other races are stand ins for humans
my argumnent is that making frodo a human changes nothing of the story just means that humans from the shire act diffrently then humans from gondor and nueminor

 

[mamba]

That's not how it works. It's not an opinion or belief that Tolkien's hobbits had those traits. Yes, they're imaginary, but they have those traits that he assigned them. I can't be wrong when I state that. "Could have" is irrelevant since he did not.

could have is all that matters, we are not talking about what hobbits are now, we are talking about could Tolkien have found a different explanation at the time of writing

 

[GMforPowergamers]

The ring reacted to humans differently than to hobbits. It's kind of a big plot point in the books. Like, the entire reason a hobbit could carry it and humans couldn't. The entire catalyst for the storyline and plot

and that is needed why?
why can't some humans resist it? what is the importantce?

why do we need hobbits to stand in for small town peeps who never leave home and rarely know people that do and have no ambition?

 

[Xamnam]

"Orcs are unique to Tolkien, and we couldn't possibly take them without taking their foundation as written by Tolkien."

Why are you putting things they didn't say in quotes, and calling it explicitly stated? That's conflating their in-universe/fictional positioning, and their external justification and competency

 

[Sacrosanct]

my argument is has been and will be that restrictions in games with no reason are unfun.

But there are reasons. Because you (general you) might not think they are as important doesn't make them "no reason"

and that is needed why?
why can't some humans resist it? what is the importantce?

why do we need hobbits to stand in for small town peeps who never leave home and rarely know people that do and have no ambition?

You argued that you can replace without changing the story. Making that change would have a huge impact to the story, because how races work in LoTR is a huge part of the story. Hobbits most certainly aren't just like regular men but come from small towns. I'm not sure how you can argue that while claiming to know anything about the books because it ignores the entire point of the books.

 

[Maxperson]

I am.

So we've found the issue. You don't understand what change is. It's if you make any little thing different. That's change. If Tolkien had written everything exactly the same, but made the One Ring silver instead of gold, that would have been a different story. A slightly different story, but that change makes a difference, however small. It only gets more pronounced if you turn a hobbit into a human. Now Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin aren't of a race that Sauron overlooks and views as harmless, so that theme is gone and it probably causes the quest to fail since he looks in the human shire for the ring during the time Gandalf is trying to find out if the ring is the One or not. And it gets much worse if you turn the hobbits into those frost giants Umbran mentioned.

My precedence for this is the first 2 years no one knew not to put orcs in and even TSR writer, publisher, copy editor and story editor let a half orc by without batting an eyelash.

There has been no time during the history of the setting that no one knew orcs were not on Krynn. From the first moment that the setting was first published in 1987, orcs were not present. Modules are not a setting.

my argument is orc or no orc will not be noticed.

Then you need to prove it, which you can't do since I will notice it and if even one person notices it, your argument fails.

 

[hawkeyefan]

Actually, in both those instances I wrote rpg after their names so I was indeed referring to the games.

Right, but I think there is a distinction between settings that are not created specifically to be RPGs and those that are.

Meaning that no one sells a RPG book with thri-kreen presented as a playable race in Middle Earth, and so on. With D&D, even though they add caveats, the races are presented as playable. So I don't find it surprising that someone wants to play what the books say they can play.

If I ever found myself in a situation where a player wanted to play an orc or half orc so much despite me explaining that the setting is Krynn and they don't exist in the setting "canonically", then I'm probably going to draw the conclusion that they're more excited to play an orc than they are to play in Krynn.

Fair, as what one can also say that others have frivolous reasons for wanting to play a race not native to a particular setting.

Sure. I might even agree. I have a hard time imagining that people insisting that they play a half-orc in the setting being a widespread problem. But if it happened, I just feel like in a world with so many of the other fantasy races, it's hardly disruptive. It doesn't seem to undo any of the themes of the Dragonlance stories, or the general ideas of the setting. No one's going to watch what happens in play, and when the orc takes a turn, look at everyone and say "what are we even doing here?"

 

[hawkeyefan]

But there are reasons. Because you (general you) might not think they are as important doesn't make them "no reason"

You argued that you can replace without changing the story. Making that change would have a huge impact to the story, because how races work in LoTR is a huge part of the story. Hobbits most certainly aren't just like regular men but come from small towns. I'm not sure how you can argue that while claiming to know anything about the books because it ignores the entire point of the books.

But isn't it all so heavily allegorical that we can look at it as being about people?

 

[mamba]

Dragonlance as a setting is going to have a lot of the standard elements of D&D. I don't really think that's anywhere near as problematic as many claim it to be.

that works both ways, not having orcs is not problematic either