D&D General Why are "ugly evil orcs" so unpopular?

[Umbran]

D&D, by continuing to not speak to a setting, sets up the implication that it believes in inherent good or evil without action, much less inherently among species.

The movement away from unqualified alignment descriptors undermines that contention.

 

[Helldritch]

The "different species" argument is severely weakened by the existence of half-orcs.

The "different species" argument also ignores how humans are all one species, but show enormous differences in culture, attitude, and behavior over time and space - so "different species" that is used to support monoculture has issues.

Can I remind you that though horses and donkeys are different species they can have offsprings called mules?
Same with zebras and horses. Lions and tigers. And If I remember correctly, so do Orca and Dolphins...
Different species can interbreed when relatively close enough. It can even be done with plants. That is called hybridization.

So yeah, the presence of half-orcs does not really weakens the "different" species argument. Nor does it validate it though...

What I do think is that because some people wanted to play orcs, the half-orcs were created. (and the process of half-orc origins, at their beginning was quite distasteful in my opinion). Thus the creation of the half-orc was made to allow people to play orcs in a relatively tragic character fighting his "base" instincts comming from his/her orcish parent while trying to be accepted in a human community. Players were always assume to be of the half-orc that could pass as a human.

Flash foward a a decade or so, and warcraft 1-2 and 3 came. The story line of the orcs was way better (save the one with Arthas, but again, just an opinion here), they were relatively good looking and a lot of people in the gaming community started to want to play orcs (yes, they were always present, but their number grew with warcraft). Afterall, if we could play Dark elves (thanks Drizzt) and Duergars (strangely, they were never really popular, save their counter part in the Dragonlance world. Even then, it was really marginal). So why not add orcs, since the depiction of the Warcraft orcs was quite different from those of traditional D&D orcs (Good looking, Free willed and Intelligent sensible beings)? In fact, the Warcraft orcs are the Half-Orcs of 1ed made a whole race by themselves. Then came the World of Warcraft in which Orcs are still graced with the best story line.

This lead to some problematics with the dogma of monocultured species in D&D. It does create some discumfort as monocultured species can be associated with racist tropes by some. If orcs are free willed and we can play them. Yes, the player's character is an exception but what about other exceptions. Are they numerous? Could they free themselves and create and other culture free of the burden of their ancestors and thus, be more like humans? That is able to do either good or evil. This argument line is perfectly valid. And this why we now have good looking orcs.

BUT

This is ignoring the deities of the D&D universe. Contrary to our world, Deities are a sure thing. The mortals have concrete, real evidence that the Gods exists. It is not only a matter of fate as in our world, but a fact! And they can be quite active in the world either through their agents, their deific minions, their own avatars or even themselves! So if a god (or a pantheon) creates a race, decides that the race will be such and such, is it so hard to accept that the race might do what it is supposed to do? Afterall, if said race does not do as it told, a god might get angry don't you think? And when faced with a god that can and is willing to enact its godly powers, the lowly mortals will follow. Humans have gods of various alignments, elves, dwarves and a lot of other "playable" races have the same. Good allows choices. Evil does not. It takes quite an individual to fully deny his origins and move to something else entirely especially when going against real gods. Exceptions were always present in D&D.

 

[ASchmidt]

Two things. First, drow are getting a makeover. There are now 3 variations of drow, with the Lollth version being just one. There's been other discussion, if you want to read an article about it: D&D: WotC Adds Three New Types Of Drow, Retcons Drow Lore - Bell of Lost Souls

As far as what group orcs are associated with it has shifted over the years. At one point, people accused Tolkien of basing orcs on the Japanese.

I don't know, and I'm certainly not making a claim that orcs were based on any specific racial group. Just that the other major fantasy races of that time being elves, dwarves, and halflings, all of which were portrayed as white (mainly because they were using European legends as a base), made it easier to lump orcs into non-white. Interesting news though about the drow, I'd missed that one.

I personally like the direction things are going with more inclusive representation in fantasy. I mean, if you can say there's magic and dragons and whatever else, why can't you say that a dwarf is black? And similarly, I prefer to have a like that a culture is different and there's cause for conflict but it doesn't have to be that one side is evil. Most of our wars weren't because the other side was evil, they just had land, money, or people that the ones starting the war wanted. And if you just want "well, they're just evil", there's always demon/devil worshipers (while trying to avoid that many demon/devil names are derived from what were deities in a subjugated religion).

 

[Bedrockgames]

I think these things tend to come in waves. I remember periods where orcs and other humanoids were more humanlike, and periods where they were more monstrous, and every setting is different. I think its best if all possibilities are on the table for creative exploration. Reading social and political issues into media tropes, is a very subjective thing. Sometimes an orc is just an orc. In some cases they are standing in for something. In some cases the cultural elements affixed to orc culture are just an attempt to give them flavor, nothing more. I think we get into dangerous territory when we take absolutist stances on these things. I have done both evil ugly orcs and beautiful ones, as well as more sophisticated and cultured but highly militarized ones. They can serve all kinds of purposes in a setting and every setting has its own creative needs

 

[SkidAce]

...You don't need the justification of "all of these guys are evil" if whoever it is wants to stop the characters from, say, finding the magic sword or rescuing the lost prince....

I agree with you overall. I think the "evil" label/justification helps in a way though? (forgive the wording, I'm trying to think and type. )

Because you "can't"?, "shouldn't"? kill the people that are stopping you from getting the magical sword if they are also on a quest to save the world and are "nice" people.

Its a complicated thing...

 

[ASchmidt]

Here's an absolute test for "is this race evil?" You come upon a village of XXX. You kill all the adults (and likely young adults) that come out to fight your party. There are children and babies left. What does your party do? If the answer is "kill them" or "leave them to die", it's probably saying more about the party than the race.

But why we land here in this is because we're playing a "role playing" game. If it was a board game where the enemy are just tokens, it's easy to accept the black/white dichotomy. They're bad, I don't need to worry about motivations. Yay I won points! But because we're role-playing, morality and ethics come into play. Things aren't just black and white. What do I do with a bunch of kids after I just killed their parents? Are they irredeemably evil or can I take them to the temple of (insert good god here) and they can grow up "good"? And did I just become a colonizer when I did that? Wow, that all gets complex. But these are complex issues and we can explore them through an RPG which is really a good thing and makes for some interesting storytelling.

 

[BookTenTiger]

I agree with you overall. I think the "evil" label/justification helps in a way though? (forgive the wording, I'm trying to think and type. )

Because you "can't"?, "shouldn't"? kill the people that are stopping you from getting the magical sword if they are also on a quest to save the world and are "nice" people.

Its a complicated thing...

Personally I think it's a lot more fun when your opponents think they're doing the right thing!

 

[SkidAce]

Personally I think it's a lot more fun when your opponents think they're doing the right thing!

Sure, makes for great interaction and story, I'm all for it.

But if you are playing a simpler game, you cant just go around killing good folk whose goals oppose yours. IMO.

 

[Charlaquin]

I blame World of Warcraft.

It definitely isn’t WoW’s fault. First of all, regular-old Warcraft existed first. Second of all, as long as there have been always-evil orcs, there have been people who felt that idea was boring at best and also kinda gross. It’s just that, as we have progressed culturally, those voices have finally started being listened to.

 

[BookTenTiger]

Sure, makes for great interaction and story, I'm all for it.

But if you are playing a simpler game, you cant just go around killing good folk whose goals oppose yours. IMO.

If you are playing a simpler game, it doesn't matter if your opponents are evil or not. They are in the way of getting the treasure or whatever, so you use the tools you have (sword, spell, etc) to overcome.