D&D 5E Orc or Half-Orc?

[The Mirrorball Man]

Thinking about the 5e PHB and how it’s trying to be as inclusive as possible to gamers of past edition, I’ve been wondering if it’s always the best idea.

One example that springs to mind is the Half-Orc race. Apart from tradition, is there any reason to play Half-Orcs instead of Orcs? Orcs already are savage human-like creatures who live in the wild and are feared by civilized people, so what exactly is the difference between them and Half-Orcs? Is it because players would like to play Worf?

I can understand Half-Elves, because some people really want to play Elrond, but wouldn’t it be simpler and more elegant not to have all these hybrid races running around? What’s wrong with Orcs?

 

[BigVanVader]

Worf was full Klingon. Spock was half-Vulcan.

 

[Nivenus]

The main reason to play half-orcs instead of full-blooded orcs is that the latter are stereotypically evil by default, whereas half-orcs get a little leeway because they're half-human. Of course, I don't like the idea of an entire (mortal) race that's hard-coded toward one alignment or the other, but that's the way the rules were originally written and are still written to a large part.

The other reason is the same as why you'd play half-elves instead of full-blooded elves: because you like playing a hybrid race. I imagine this is a smaller factor though.

 

[Li Shenron]

Don't know, but at least in 3e Orcs were "chaotic evil" and too savage to be easily RP as a PC, while Half-Orcs often filled the role of "my nature is bad/evil but I really want to be acceptable" kind of character. Similar reasons drive a lot of people towards playing Drows and Tieflings nowadays.

Before the 5e MM I was thinking about making up an alternate story for Half-Orcs in our games, dropping the stale and awful standard of their origin, and instead going with the idea that Half-Orcs are not individually 50% orc and 50% human, but rather only as a whole, i.e. an intermediate race between orcs and humans that doesn't breed with either. This would allow me to have Half-Orcs feel the role of the popular WoW Orcs, to which they also have a much stronger physical resemblance compared to 3e Orcs.

Then the 5e MM came out and I noticed that Orcs are physically redesigned and look a lot more like WoW Orcs, but I didn't have time to read the text to see if they are now really more like WoW Orcs, in which case once again I don't know what to do with the Half-Orcs

 

[Henrix]

Half-elves and -orcs do have a more conflicted personality.
How do they tackle the conflict between their respective peoples. Does either people really embrace them, or are they outcasts from all?
Do their own natures manifest in strange ways?
Do they play at the prejudices, like a half-orc acting wild and savage in human company?

 

[Ragmon]

I myself scrapped the H-orc and H-elf, I even took out the halfling (cause gnomes are better and more unique, IMO)

If you want to mix it up, just use other Orc sub races, like the bit less savage Grey Orcs, or if you want a caster orc go with an Orog. Your imagination is the limit to a better D&D.

 

[The Mirrorball Man]

Worf was full Klingon. Spock was half-Vulcan.

Sure, but Worf was raised by humans, wasn't he? Maybe I'm failing my Star Trek check.

The main reason to play half-orcs instead of full-blooded orcs is that the latter are stereotypically evil by default, whereas half-orcs get a little leeway because they're half-human. Of course, I don't like the idea of an entire (mortal) race that's hard-coded toward one alignment or the other, but that's the way the rules were originally written and are still written to a large part.

Don't know, but at least in 3e Orcs were "chaotic evil" and too savage to be easily RP as a PC

Isn't it problematic, though? I mean, Orcs are a race of malevolent dark-skinned savages, which is bad enough in itself for many, many reasons, but in addition to that, it's very limiting for DMs. What if you want to have neutral Orcs? Doesn't the fact that they live in the wild, far from the resources that Humans enjoy, a good enough reason for them to be aggressive? Do they really need to be intrinsically EVIL?

Half-elves and -orcs do have a more conflicted personality.
How do they tackle the conflict between their respective peoples. Does either people really embrace them, or are they outcasts from all?
Do their own natures manifest in strange ways?
Do they play at the prejudices, like a half-orc acting wild and savage in human company?

I see where you're coming from, but in my opinion, an Orc character who choses to live among Humans would face the exact same challenges.

 

[Nivenus]

Isn't it problematic, though? I mean, Orcs are a race of malevolent dark-skinned savages, which is bad enough in itself for many, many reasons, but in addition to that, it's very limiting for DMs. What if you want to have neutral Orcs? Doesn't the fact that they live in the wild, far from the resources that Humans enjoy, a good enough reason for them to be aggressive? Do they really need to be intrinsically EVIL?

Oh, I agree with you. As a rule I tend to play evil races (fiends aside) as only mildly biased towards evil and largely due to their culture, rather than any kind of intrinsic moral deficiency. But that's not how they're usually written in adventures, sourcebooks, or novels.

 

[Li Shenron]

Isn't it problematic, though? I mean, Orcs are a race of malevolent dark-skinned savages, which is bad enough in itself for many, many reasons, but in addition to that, it's very limiting for DMs. What if you want to have neutral Orcs? Doesn't the fact that they live in the wild, far from the resources that Humans enjoy, a good enough reason for them to be aggressive? Do they really need to be intrinsically EVIL?

No they don't need to, but that was the choice in previous editions, perhaps influenced by Tolkien. I am sure that the basic concept of D&D Orcs was altered now and then in various published fantasy settings.

 

[Viking Bastard]

In the past, I've generally reskinned Half-Orcs as simply being Orcs, but that's when I've treated Orcs as a less monstrous race than the D&D baseline, but still very warlike and barbarian.

In my 4e game, Orcs never came into play, but in my recently wrapped up S&W game, I introduced Orcs to my players in their more classic D&D absurdly aggressive and mean role. When I started my 5e game, despite it being in a different setting from my S&W game, I didn't want to invalidate my group's first impression of D&D Orcs so immediately, so I'm sticking to that version for this campaign.

So I've largely taken the same approach as [MENTION=1465]Li Shenron[/MENTION]--you can play a Horc, milder cousin to/subrace of the Orc.