Leisure Time: Orcs, Humans, Elves, Dwarves

[Oberton]

In a reasonably fertile area with low population, the hunter/gather lifestyle yields more leisure time than any other I know of.

They may have more time to "hang-out”, but this has to be spent protecting their food and following the prey! Remember that hunters are dependent on prey and must chase it about as it migrates... This has always bothered me about orcs in fantasy settings. They would have very predictable migration routes and such, but I have never read anything of this sort in any supplement…

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

History Fast and Loose, and the Executive

First I will defend my beloved Dwarves.

Actually, I think that Dwarves are the most aesthetic of the core races. They are the only race that gets bonuses to the actuall production of artwork, in stone and metal, and they are often the only race that has created a specifically aesthetic type of magic, runes. For textual evidence I would point to the fact that Gimli is the only character who ever rapses rhapsodic over anything beautiful. Out of all the civilizations in LOTR the only one to describe itself as advancing in anything are the dwarves who say that they're mastery of the art of stone carving is superior to that of thier ancestors.

After the fall of Mordor the Dwarves are described as moving around the world to occupy and improve the most beautiful cavern complexes.

In terms of political power, I never had the impression that the Dwarfs had an absolutist monarchy. I always thought that their clan system imposed a high degree of deliberation on thier system. The king cannot act without the clan fathers who must, in turn, consult their clans. In fact, the presence of a king, the dwarfen monarchy is the most likely to be elected in the Fantasy genre at large, speaks to the political sophistication of dwarves.

True communism and democracy are conceptual systems that decry the need for an executive power, but historical experiments have repeatedly affirmed, not I do not say proved, the need for executive authority to rest in the hands of one individual, no matter how limited that authority may be. So the presence of a Dwarish king speaks to a sense of realpolitik in the dwarfish mentality.

I think the greed is actually helpful to dwarfish social strucuture. If it is communal greed for wealth and glory, than they are going to be very good at distibuting wealth among themselves and recognizing achievement for its own sake. They are also going to be big picture oriented. If it is individual greed than they are going to be a society of small scale entrpeneurs who would be very resistant to hierarchy of any sort. I don't like it as much as the other or the possibility that dwarfish greed is merely a stereotype on the part of other races, but I do recognize that high levels of individual greed tempered by a respect for law have definite social benefits.

Of course the major disadvantage is foolishly digging up Balrogs, but that is setting specific and it only happened once. Mistakes happen to everyone.

I agree that dwarfs don't seem to want to build empires out of others nations, but they are always depicted as interested in trade and they promote stability in the nations that surround them. This is apparent in both LOTR and the fine example of the nation of Throal in Earthdawn.

Even if there wasn't an argument for dwarf aesthetics I would argue that they tend toward culture in the same way Americans , lots of work and shallow interest in high cultural affairs, and that can't be said to be an ineffective strategy for wurld dawmination.

I think Dwarfs can give Orcs a run for their money in the field. Thier weapons and armor are nearly always of better quality, they possess the same night vision advantages, they're tougher, they're better organized, and they tend to have the advantage in engineering. And I think a nation of fighters probably has the advantage in mass combat over a nation of barbarians.

Mind you, I support Orcs as major powers except for the disadvantage of their short generations and reduced access to arcane magical power.

I do have a few comments on the historical questions that have popped up so far:

First of all, we shouldn't criticize Byzantium until some other nation on Earth has managed to maintain the same constitution for around 1,000 years.

Aztecs got wasted by their own horrible regime aided by religious doubt. Smallpox didn't really wipe the people out until about a generation after they had converted to Christianity, ironically.

Incas had just suffered through a horrible civil war which had wiped out a lot of their more experienced commanders and put ALL of the power into one heir who the Spanish promptly kidnapped and then killed. Triggering political collapse.

I don't think the Spanish recieved as much aid from nations conquered under the Inca as they had from nations conquered under the Aztecs. It certainly didn't help the cause of Incan resistance that the nations they had conquered saw themselves as trading one elite ruling culture for another. And then plague.

The Spanish of that period were crazy tough as nails adventurers with mad skillz. Everyone who had to face guys that good at destruction should be given an even break by later historians.

China actually did very well against Barbarian invaders. The Mongols were the only barbarian power to conquer China, the rest just made life very very difficult if you lived along the Norther Border.

China's vulnerability to Western powers had to do with so many factors that I don't see it as a proper proof against tradition oriented societies. The China of the 18th and 19th centuries was very different from the China of the 14th, 15th, and 16th centuries and radically different from the China that had existed in the pre-Mongol period. I'm not saying that there aren't good arguments to be made against such societies, just tha this is a poor example.

In my opinion, much of Western success in the post medieval period is due to the fact that we did not have our civilization as disrupted by Mongol Conquest as the rest of Eurasia did.

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

Demographics

One more thing, though I hate myself for having one more thing:

Long lifespans generally equall large populations.

I mean a human generation is 20 years, give or take four years. Then when the first generation reaches middle age there is one other generation in the community, old age two, venerable three, and dead-maybe-four.

Now let's assume that an Dwarfen communities generation is 60 years, this assumes a very late parental age, and that each generation produces at least two viable off spring, otherwise they would have died out long ago regardless. Given these generations the Dwarfs have an demographic advantage that humans don't. Dwarf middle aged he has granchildern, dwarf old he has great grand children, dwarf venerable great great grand children, and dwarf dead-possibly-great great great great great grand children.

While this is not the population explosion that we see in human communities when lifetimes become longer in relation to generations, and Elves are screwed by the decreased lifetimes in 3E, long lives do allow demi-humans to produce a lot more people than they need to replace themselves through natural attrition.

And these are really simple demographics that do not allow for the population surplusses created by generally superior demi-human organization and life styles or the real re-population rates of kids per couple.

Mind you, I cannot think of a way to simulate the dangers of a fantasy environment without a much more coherent cosensus on what those dangers entail. Except to say that traditional societies-that is non-industrial and non-developing- tend to grow very very slowly, to suffer a great deal at the hands of large scale disasters and collapses, and to stabilize quickly after the short periods of rapid growth caused by the advent of new technologies or superior organization.

But, I do think this an effective argument against the idea that humans have a massive reproduction advantage. It is, sort of, a traditional attribute of humans, but it has never been one that makes sense to me. Particularly given what we know of our own species' demographics.

The only human society I can think that grows on the level most fantasists assume are developing nations, and almost no fantasy system includes the sustained periods of technological growth, drastic social reorganization, and lengthy periods of relative peace and stability that is required for such nations to exist.

 

[LoneWolf23]

In response to Chrisling...

Elves may be Chaotic, but they're also Good, generally. Which means they DO work together and watch out for one another, as opposed to the Evil Orcs, who squabble amongst each other as much as they fight their enemies. The closest they might come to squabbling is competing with each other to see how many Orcs they can kill individually. But they'd do it close enough to assist each other if need be, (and gloat about who's ahead of the game, too).

Don't focus so much on the Chaotic element that you ignore the Good and Evil elements. Elves are generally Chaotic Good, which means that while they're all very individualistic in their outlooks, they also care about the wellfare of others, and especially their fellows.

Orcs, on the other hand, are generally Evil, which means they generally look out for #1, Themselves. Each Orc is the moral equivalent of a 2-year old, focused on his own immediate needs Cooperation, for Orcs, is limited to keeping out of each other's way when in battle, or obeying the orders of the guy big enough to rip your head off.

The matter of Elven Magic Supremacy: Considering the Favored Class of all Elves is Wizard, you really think that they're not going to have tactics slanted towards the use of powerful magics and magic items? Sure, they don't have natural bonuses to Int, Wis or Cha, but they don't have any penalties to them, either, unlike the average Orc, who has -2 Penalties in all three scores.

As for the Psions, I generally don't take those optional characters into account for the default Orcish race. Besides, Egoists don't have a lot of healing ability anyways, And even if the Orcs have Egoists within their Tribe, you really think a Chaotic Evil Orc Egoist will favor Support Powers like "Empathic Transfer" over more aggressive abilities like "Bite of the Wolf"? Orcs are more interested in hurting others then in helping. At most, an Orcish Egoist will be a front-line champion or a warlord, using his Psi-amplified fighting prowess to lead his Horde into battle.

I do agree on Orcish Aggessiveness being a strong advantage; when all you do in your life is waging war, you're likely to get incredibly good at it. But they don't have fine-tuned strategies, beyond "Go in, burn everything, kill everyone who fights back, grab everything that's not nailed down, and rape every woman". If you want a good Real-Life model of how an Orcish "society" might work, look at the various African "Warlords". They're basically just brigands with enough military power to impose their own "Law" on an area big enough to keep a tight fist on.

Their aggressiveness is also an obstacle to their ability to organise and form a civilisation. The Slayer's Guide to Orcs proposes a valid theory as to why: The Critical Mass Theory. Basically, Orcs breed like accelerated Rabbits, so their populations quickly outgrow their local resources, causing them to attack others for more resources. When the Orcish population reaches a certain critical mass, the internal bickering threatens to tear the tribe apart, unless these aggressive tendancies are channeled outward. Some Orc tribes do just that, and the Orc-vs-Orc conflict naturally keeps the Orc population down.

Meanwhile, the Elves, while Chaotic, generally care about one another enough to co-exist peacefully, no matter the difference of opinion between individuals.

 

[Jeremy Ackerman-Yost]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Dwarven Worker Unite

Originally posted by Chrisling
Communism must be international and (I believe in a fantasy world) interspecies for it to be valid.

That attitude is why nobody's gotten it to work. That's the dream of people who forget that when you don't see and know the people whose lives your decisions impact, you are decreasingly likely to keep their best interests at heart. It's a sad but true fact that as soon as you give someone decision making power, you need to keep a close eye on him and make sure his decisions aren't controlled entirely by self interest. That's the basis for elected officials in a republic, and that's why Jefferson wanted people educated, so they could police their representatives and vote them out when they screwed up. The fact that we don't do that is another case of human nature mucking up the system.

"I've never read anywhere that dwarvish greed is clan motivated -- not that particularly improves things. I mean, isn't greed for your clan's one of the prime motivating factors in <i>orcish</i> psychology?"

As often as not, that's the why I've read it. A dwarf will need magic, money, etc. so that his clan can reclaim their ancestral hall/eliminate the goblin threat/avenge the death of their king/etc. Clan includes all dwarves within a mountain hall or what-have-you because they recognize familial relationships that are so far apart we would call them unrelated. A wandering dwarf who runs into a member of his clan who he never met before will still treat the guy like a brother (or at least a cousin). As for the orcs, they all want to lead the clan, and will kill each other to do so. That's a self-motivated situation. Dwarves just want the clan to prosper, and perhaps kick some orc tail while they're at it. They don't care who's leading as long as the trains run on time, the beer is cheap and plentiful, and the goblins, orcs, etc. are kept outside the gates.

I've never, ever grasped how a clannish culture can honestly be said to be lawful. I associate lawful with large bureaucracies, and centralization, not family governments in dispersal.

I've always accepted the Lawful = society first, Chaotic = individual first version of the Lawful-Chaotic axis. There's a hierarchy, elders first, etc. There's an order and cohesiveness to it, with respect paid to the law of the clan, because if you don't obey the laws of the clan, the clan will exile you, and a clanless dwarf is nothing. It's actually a LOT more orderly than bureaucracies. Bureaucracies ALWAYS induce clutter and competition between bureaus. I would argue that bureaucracy and centralization, while Lawful on the surface, ultimately lead to a Chaotic outcome. Look at the U.S. government or any university. They are HEAVILY bureaucratic, and ultimately it takes 10 times as long as necessary to get things done because of all the red tape and petty officials who need to generate extraneous paperwork so they can pass it in circles to justify the existence of their jobs. There are entire departments in the government (not to mention universities) that do nothing but pass paper in a big circle. That's all they do. The papers don't appreciably change, and only one of the 10 forms shuffled around is actually needed by someone in another department. But all those people need to keep their jobs, so they invent reasons to create more forms, which have to be filled out, moved around, and filed. And then you don't have enough people to do the job. So they hire another person to take care of the excess. And then that person realizes there isn't enough for him to do, and there's a department review coming up, and if he doesn't have enough important-sounding jobs, his position could be cut. So he invents ANOTHER form for people to fill out. A superficially "orderly" structure built on a Chaotic premise.

Also clans aren't dispersed. An entire city would be one, maybe two clans. And if there was more than one clan, they would choose one leader, because that keeps the trains running more efficiently, so they can keep working and improving the lot of their immediate family and clan.

"However, even if their greed is clannish, this will lead them to wars with other people in order to increase their clan's power. True communism is completely international and I strongly suspect it would also be interspecies -- in a fantasy setting, communists would not say "working dwarves of the world unite," they'd still say, "workers of the world unite." Including humans, elves, halflings, etc."

I didn't see anyone inviting the beavers, badgers, and reindeer into a communistic society. Why would dwarves do it for humans or elves? And any people who actually followed the ideals behind communism (or democracy, for that matter) wouldn't go to war with ANYONE unless that group was interfering with their self-sufficiency. Besides, I'm not arguing that Dwarves are actually Marxists, just that the structure of their society is closer to the Marxist ideal than anyone ever got here.

"So, so long as there is greed, you have the motivation for conflict."

Agreed. But the more people I value in addition to myself, the fewer people I will conflict with, yes? And if I'm part of an isolated dwarven mountain hall, the only people I will ever come into contact with are my clansmen, all of whom I value highly, and with whom all resources are shared. Where's the problem? Simple answer- There is none until a threat comes knocking at the door.

Originally posted by Oberton
They may have more time to "hang-out”, but this has to be spent protecting their food and following the prey! Remember that hunters are dependent on prey and must chase it about as it migrates... This has always bothered me about orcs in fantasy settings. They would have very predictable migration routes and such, but I have never read anything of this sort in any supplement…

Protecting their food from what? Most predators leave humans alone. Separate groups of hunter gatherers never shared the same territory for long (one group wiped out or drove off the other ASAP). In fertile areas, they often weren't particularly nomadic, perhaps having a winter site and a summer site. They only moved around to hunt or gather, and both of those things were readily available in the immediate vicinity.

But we're not talking about the real world here. Orcs don't fit the model because there are always too many of them in far too developed a landscape. But at least the mechanics of an orc back up their in-game role, unlike elves.

 

[Rhialto]

Actually, given that elves are no more prone to cooperating with each other than orcs are -- both are chaotic -- the superior intelligence, willpower and personality aren't precisely marks in their favor. They're more willful and self-important than orcs. Orcs are easier to dominate than elves.

And I'm not ignoring the magic. Like I said earlier, elvish magic supremacy isn't really supported in the rules. They don't have Int, Wis or Cha bonuses. Yes, in all these areas they're modestly better than orcs, but orcs are quite a bit better in fighting. Given that the orcs have huge numbers on their side . . . .

The picture becomes even more orc slanted if you include psionics in your game (as something like 2/3rd of people seem to). Since psions choose the ability that their PPs come from, orcs -- with their exceptional Strengths -- make extremely good egoist psions, and those are the sort of psions that heal people.

I also challenge that elves don't go around conquering orcs. In my reasonably broad gaming experience, the elves have attacked the orcs -- usually muttering something about pre-emptive strikes or preventitive war -- just about as often as the orcs have attacked other people. Indeed, as a gamer, I've attacked orcs <i>way</i> more often than orcs have attacked me.

Furthermore, if you're fighting on your home territory, <i>you've already lost</i>. It will be your fields, forests, towns and cities that will be burned. It is bad, bad, bad to fight a war in your own country.

And to address your particular point of using a rainstorm to kill the fire, well, uh, that will also work in orcish favor, you realize. Given the general physical power of the orcs, taking away longbows as their weapon forces things to go hand-to-hand where the orcs really shine.

Byzantine history is definitely interesting, because the Empire pretty continually shrank. I mean, y'know, that country doesn't exist, anymore. That's a pretty curious example if you're saying the elves are the Byzantines and the orcs are the barbarians.

Another interesting example of what happens when you put barbarians against an "enlightened" civilization is China. Repeatedly, China fell to the barbarians, be they Mongols or Manchurians. The only thing that saved Chinese civilization is the fact that the Chinese and the invaders were of the same species, really. When orcish civilization sweeps through elvish civilization, I wouldn't expect for that to be the case.

(Tho' you could have some <I>real</i> fascinating games with the long-lived orcs "civilizing" their orcish conquerers. I'm gonna do that one, some day.)

We must also remember that those <i>elves</i> don't get along with each other, either. They do not cooperate well with each other! They are <i>also</i> chaotic!

Furthermore, as I've consistently said, the constant warfare of the orcs probably works in their <i>advantage</i>. It's all they do. They fight, and the winners fight, and the winners of those fights fight, until the orc tribe with the most efficient military engine unifies the clans and they re-enact the Mongol Hordes sweeping from China to Egypt. The fact that orcish culture is constantly under intense strain <i>strengthens</i> it, not weakens it.

Just some thoughts, and often my tongue is in my cheek, here.

Hey, some excellent points! Now allow me to counterpoint! First off--yes, elves are chaotic. But they're Chaotic GOOD, which means that while they have their differences, they usually don't backstab each other, and live lives of treachery and deceit. Chaotic does not mean "self-centered jerk", despite what some people would think. That would be "Evil". And occasionally neutral, but that's another discussion. The orcs' problems aren't because they're Chaotic, their problems are because they're Chaotic, and Evil, and not very bright besides. And the constant fighting does weaken orcs, I'm afraid, because it makes them more vulnerable to their external enemies, just like it weakened the Plains Indians. Sure the occasional potential Atilla may come around, but the orcs' generally low Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma scores make them far rarer. Plus orcs have a lot of enemies. When they unite, they often wind up having to fight numerous foes at once, many of which easily match them in combat skills. And the orcs truly seem to lack the military genius of the Mongols.

Now to your other points. First off on the "if your fighting on your land, you've already lost'--bull. You've just demonstrated the difficulties of military strategy, a subject so thorny that hundreds of people have argued for several thousand years on it. The counterargument generally goes that attacking takes far more resources than defending, leaves you open to attacks yourself, is far more demoralizing, and can leave you weakened afterwards, especially if it is not followed by a decisive victory.

Also, you can't count the acts of Elvish adventurers as being representive of Elvish society. Adventurers, by their very nature, are something of a special case...

And yes, Byzantium shrank away to nothing--OVER A THOUSAND YEARS! That's not doing so badly, against superior numbers.

Oh, and to the "elvish magic supremacy isn't really supported in the rules" point. Favored class--wizard.

 

[Chrisling]

Concedes defeat.

Y'all win! LOL. I could answer one or two of ya, but, dang it, five lengthy letters? So, I concede the point.

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

Victory?!?!

Oh, Chrisling, do not concede so soon.

I'm not even sure what's being discussed here.

The idea that Elves aren't what they're cracked up to be?

Well, I have to support that. The demographic thing I did a while back started out to be about elves until I realized that humans have a generational advantage over them in the new rules. In my opinion a single war pretty well screws their ability to grow.

The thought that Dwarfs would be taken out by politicians?

Well, this I must disagree with. But that's one little thing.

The argument that Orcs would be the essentially superior race in a fantasty setting?

This I agree with, I think Dwarfs and Gnomes have some pretty good strategies for surviving generally, but overall I think the superior strength, large numbers, and nighttime advantages of Orcs make them the power to beat. I think the other demi-humans are forced to ally in order to survive their attacks. And I think they have the potentiall to create a really interesting culture based on their short life expectancies and the amount of energy that would have to be spent in some form of education.

I mean we assume they breed like rabbits, but with their short life spans they must have a phenomenally intensive learning curve in order to achieve even the disadvantaged levels of intelligence and charisma they have. The level of cultural investment they would have to make in education would surely yield some benefits. Not to mention they all wear some pretty sophisticated armor, with their numbers they must have a pretty good system of micro-level industrialization.

<sigh>

I suppose I'm upset because, this time, it really doesn't look like you will be pulling me back in. Sniff, sniff.

 

[Chrisling]

Doc Strangmonkey,

Well, the thing is I found I was discussing one or two things with four different people. Some of them were pretty far afield of the original subject at all -- I was going to have to say, for instance, that China was actually conquered by multiple barbarian societies (the Khitain, Mongol and Manchus are the ones that leap immediately to mind) but to do that I'd have to start giving attributation from sources. Ditto with the whole Aztec conquest thing. Not to mention the budding discussion on dwarvish socialism! Plus debunking the myths of elvish and dwarvish superiority in culture and battle, all for my love of orcs. I realized that I would either have to start being way more selective and essentially ignore good points, which I didn't want to do, or concede defeat, which has the added bonus of giving me more time to work on my offline game.

All of these are subjects I have some knowledge of and am interested in discussion . . . just not all at the same time. Fret not. I'm thinking of starting a post on fantasy racism. Maybe that can keep you drawn in. I'll do my best to ruin your geek time.

 

[LoneWolf23]

Re: Victory?!?!

Oh, Chrisling, do not concede so soon.

I'm not even sure what's being discussed here.

The idea that Elves aren't what they're cracked up to be?

Well, I have to support that. The demographic thing I did a while back started out to be about elves until I realized that humans have a generational advantage over them in the new rules. In my opinion a single war pretty well screws their ability to grow.

The thought that Dwarfs would be taken out by politicians?

Well, this I must disagree with. But that's one little thing.

The argument that Orcs would be the essentially superior race in a fantasty setting?

This I agree with, I think Dwarfs and Gnomes have some pretty good strategies for surviving generally, but overall I think the superior strength, large numbers, and nighttime advantages of Orcs make them the power to beat. I think the other demi-humans are forced to ally in order to survive their attacks. And I think they have the potentiall to create a really interesting culture based on their short life expectancies and the amount of energy that would have to be spent in some form of education.

I mean we assume they breed like rabbits, but with their short life spans they must have a phenomenally intensive learning curve in order to achieve even the disadvantaged levels of intelligence and charisma they have. The level of cultural investment they would have to make in education would surely yield some benefits. Not to mention they all wear some pretty sophisticated armor, with their numbers they must have a pretty good system of micro-level industrialization.

<sigh>

I suppose I'm upset because, this time, it really doesn't look like you will be pulling me back in. Sniff, sniff.

Aww... Don't worry, I can argue with you, if you want.

In regards to the matter of Elves: I actually must agree, since most legends and many fantasy settings DO portray the Elven race as being in decline, generally in favor of Humanity. However, it's percieved as a slow, dignified decline, as the Elves gracefull step aside to let the best of Humanity take over the stewardship of the world.

As for the matter of Orcs: I also agree that Orcs ARE a fiersome race in battle, and a sizeable threat to other races. But they do have some built-in limitations. Like their habit of internal squabbling. But I do agree that they would have an interesting culture. Perhaps it's built like modern-day Gang mentality, with status coming from a mixture of guts, wealth and accomplishment, and a "Live Fast, Die Young, Leave a Bloody Corpse" mentality. Just look at other, historical "barbarian" cultures, like the Celts and the Norse. Adults seldom lived long, so people admired those warriors who faced Death with courage, and didn't care if they died, so long as it was a good death. I believe Orc Culture would be based primarily on such a premise.

When it comes to Weapons and Armor, Orcs basically use whatever they've salvaged or took from their past victims. They don't manufacture armor, they just "adjust" stolen armors to fit them. And even then, they prefer non-restrictive, yet protective armors, like Breastplates, or Splintmail for those who want more protection. But again, this armor is more often salvaged then forged, so it's ill-fitting and noisy. Orcish Weapons are generally Axes and Javelins, two weapons which are simple to make and easy to learn, and take advantage of Orcish strength. This generally means Orc favor the simplest, quickest option overall.