Half-orcs, as everyone knows, are what
you get when you cross orcs and humans.
They are not uncommon in the world of
the AD&D™ game, and they do not enjoy
good reputations among most populations. One well-known authority describes
most half-orcs as “rude, crude,
crass, and generally obnoxious.”
Why do half-orcs seem to turn out this
way? What makes them tick?

To better understand half-orcs, one
needs to understand the non-human aspect of their nature. Orcs are probably
the most common sort of humanoid
creatures. They vary widely in physical
appearance, but generally seem to retain
a vaguely human look, tinged with a hint
of something . . . else.
In nearly all orcish societies, the social
philosophy is the same. Orcs are the ultimate social Darwinists; only the strong
and the clever survive, and the strongest
and cleverest orcs are the ones who
manage to reach the upper social levels
of their cultures: Orcs have no respect
for those weaker than themselves, and
are quick to step-and-fetch for those
stronger than they. They distrust all
overtures of friendship and love, seeing
these as a cover for other, baser intentions; if they discover feelings of friendship to be quite genuine, they immediately
attempt to manipulate events to take the
best advantage of them and gain the
upper hand.

Orcs are like this because of the influence of their deities (discussed in the
companion article to this one) and because of their own past. Sages have uncovered much evidence showing that
orcs developed in regions generally hostile to life; survival was difficult, and only
if a group worked closely together could
it hope to collect enough food to get
even a part of its numbers through the
year. While the group would have to
work together to collect food, distributing
it was another matter. The strongest orcs
got the most food, and the weakest ones
got none at all. (They were probably going to die anyway, right?)
The very toughest orcs managed to
receive more than just the bare minimum
of nourishment, enough to make life
more comfortable for them and give
them a certain degree of personal security. This also gave them the chance to
explore more intellectual occupations
than food-gathering, like figuring out
how to get more food and living space.
The easiest opportunity to be realized
was to take food and/or living space
away from other folks, and these other
folks were usually other orcs. Intertribal
competition became fierce, and over the
centuries many of these conflicts have
“evolved” into what seem to be eternal
states of war between various tribes.
Orcs are nocturnal by nature. They
prefer to catch prey when it is asleep and
less able to escape. Orcs have done this
for so long they’ve developed infravision,
the ability to see living objects in darkness
by their body heat. The development of
infravision was assisted by the orcish
habit of living in caves for protection.
Orcs tend to live in wilderness areas
where the sky is heavily overcast and
direct sunlight is non-existent or rare at
best. In magical universes such regions
are frequently found, their twilight
perpetually maintained by the forces of
magic cast by mortal or godling. In these
places orcs will be much more active
than is customary in the daytime, even to
the point of conducting raids and hunting,
but it is at night when orcs really become
dangerous.
 

Though such lives of hard work and
danger have made most orcs rather
strong and tough constitutionally, the
race has a short lifespan. A 40-year-old
orc has reached the virtual end of its
natural life; the average orc lives for 12 to
26 years. As might be expected, orcs
have a very high rate of reproduction,
but their infant mortality rate is quite
high, too. Barely 1 orcish child in
3 will see adulthood, and fewer still
will see old age.
None of this is any surprise to nonorcs who have made even the briefest
study of the race. But what shocks the
casual observer is the degree of acceptance, even preference, orcs express for
this situation. “How could we feed so
many hungry little mouths?” retorted
one orc prisoner to a curious paladin. “If
you have lots of brats and some of them
die, so what? They were the weakest . . .
the strongest ones will live and work for
you, make you proud of their strength.
Who wants weak sons? Your enemies
will kill you in your sleep if they see you
are protected by weaklings.”

As can be inferred from the above
comments, orcs prefer male children.
Though females are born only slightly
less often than males, much fewer of the
females survive to adulthood. Other
demi-human races with sexual imbalances have that property because of
natural reasons; orcs (and certain other
humanoids as well), however, are more
likely to practice selective infanticide, or
otherwise forcibly adjust the ratio of
males to females. The emphasis in orcish
society is on fighting ability to gain status and well-being; since they have less
muscle than males, females generally
lose out. Orcs believe that the only value
female orcs have is in bearing children
(as many as possible) and keeping the
cave clean.

Orcish religion is interesting, too, because of the great extent to which the
orcs’ way of life mirrors the tenets of the
religion they follow. By and large, orcs
do not well appreciate the consequences
of their actions beyond the immediate
present (a byproduct of their low wisdom).
What they do, they do for the here and
now, occasionally with some (but not
much) consideration for the future. This
is probably due to the necessities of their
harsh life; one does not have time to
think of the future when one must worry
about just getting through today. For
orcs, however, this reasoning applies
even when times are comparatively good
and food is plentiful. They continue to
worry primarily about now, not later.
This attitude is reinforced in their religious ceremonies; no mention is made
of the future beyond the statement, oft
repeated, that orcs shall rule the world
someday. It is interesting to note that
Gruumsh, the major orcish deity, is one-eyed; this means he has a narrow field of
vision and no depth perception at all.
The many tales about Gruumsh reveal
that, indeed, he too appears prone to act
1st and think about it later. When he
meets another godling who appears to
fail to notice him, or to give him proper
respect, he doesn’t ask why; he attacks.
When Gruumsh’s moronic (and twoeyed) son Bahgtru stubs his toe on a
huge rock, Gruumsh curses the rock and
tries to wrestle it. After breaking it into
small pieces with Bahgtru’s help, he proclaims a victory over the forces of nature.
Never mind that he and Bahgtru had
their feet cut by rock fragments, or that
they are so tired from breaking the rock
that they have trouble later fighting
giants. The point had to be made, then
and there. While Gruumsh will usually
act with some forethought and planning,
his rage is easily ignited, and it inevitably
clouds his judgment. With only 1 eye,
he has but one view of the world: his
own. Orcish shamans and half-orc clerics
imitate Gruumsh by plucking out one of
their eyes, hoping to gain Gruumsh’s
perspective.

With a background like this, it is hardly
surprising that half-orcs are as they are.
Produced under questionable circumstances at best, half-orcs will usually retain some properties of both species,
human && orc, wherever they are raised.
Those brought up in orcish society (the
male ones, at least) will be immersed in
the previously described orcish social
philosophy. Though orcs have some
degree of dislike for “half-humans”
among them, they are also aware that
such beings generally possess more adaptability and cunning than a full orc, and
have the potential to be stronger than the
average orc.

Unless rivalry between the half-orc
and his peers ends his life at an early age,
the half-orc will usually achieve a quite
respectable position of power and influence in his tribe. Aware that he is not a
full orc, the half-orc will probably feel
much superior to orcs and assume added
arrogance and pride—thus successfully
mixing the worst of human qualities with
the “best” of the orcish. These sorts of
leaders are exceptionally dangerous,
possessing enough foresight and intelligence to lead their tribes on much more
widespread raiding, banditry, and warmaking than is usual for orc bands.
Life is not all rosy for this type of leader, of course; rivalries, jealousies, and
intrigues will probably continue
within the tribe against him unless he
becomes powerful enough to command
immediate obedience at the risk of swift
destruction. A few cases are known of
half-orc females rising to positions of
power within a tribe; usually this female
is either a warrior disguised as a male
(who must flee or die if her deception is
discovered), or a cleric for one of the few
orcish religions that permit female shamans or clerics. In no known cases have
female half-orcs become as widely feared
or powerful (personally or politically) as
male half-orcs, though this is not through
any fault of their own. Orcish sexual
prejudice is deep and strong.

Half-orcs raised in human society,
usually without the orcish parent present,
have a greater likelihood of adopting a
variety of non-orcish attitudes and life-
styles, but even then will have some less
savory aspects to their nature as well.
The average human has a dislike for orcs
and anything with orcish ancestry; half-orcs will find themselves the objects of
prejudice in most human communities.
Many half-orcs react to the local
expectations of them in predictable ways
(incidentally reinforcing those expectations). In other words, treat a half-orc
as if it were dangerous and bad, and it
will probably become dangerous and
bad if it wasn’t already. Yet there have
been examples of neutral-aligned half-orcs and even a few of good nature; most
of these retain an unnatural (to many
humans) affinity for lawfulness and
obedience, but are otherwise acceptable
company. Half-orcs raised in a human
community are very unlikely to be able to
speak orcish unless they have had formal
study in it.

Half-orcs have a variety of careers
open to them, in whatever society they
inhabit. Obviously, and most commonly,
they make good fighters; orcish tradition
strongly emphasizes personal combat
and physical strength.

Half-orcs are fairly good at thieving
and banditry, but suffer from relatively
poor physical coordination and have
some difficulty in applying themselves
constantly to improving their skills. Half-orc thieves generally steal for the same
reasons as anyone else does, but tend to
feel that they are especially justified in
what they do by one of their laws of survival: he who cannot hold onto what he
has, does not deserve it. They regard
their actions as necessary for their own
existence, stealing because they have to,
not just because they want to.

The assassin’s skills, by contrast, come
most readily to the half-orc. By virtue of
their casual regard for the lives of others,
even of their own kind, the art of killing
has a certain appeal to those with orcish
blood. Half-orc assassins often come to
believe their actions are for the benefit of
the world in general; they are culling out
the unfit in the most direct way possible,
which brings out another of the orcish
laws of survival: if something can be easily killed, it did not deserve to live. Who
can resist the urge to be the one who
wields the scythe, who decides the fates
of others, who has the power of almighty
death in his hands? With their preference for a retinue of underlings, half-orc
assassins can create powerful guilds to
support them, and may end up spreading their influence into many a court or
government.

Half-orcs who become clerics will
usually combine their clerical practices
with another career, most commonly as
a fighter or assassin. This is because
half-orcs cannot advance very far in
experience as clerics, and they will eventually require another set of skills to keep
them on even terms with increasingly
tougher adversaries. Half-orc cleric/
assassin types are invariably death-worshipers, and strive to put themselves in
better favor with their awful gods by personally bringing death to as many beings as possible, within their religion and
outside it.

Orcs and half-orcs generally dislike
and avoid beings larger than themselves,
unless (as in the case of ogres) the orcs
feel they can manipulate them sufficiently,
with promises of shared treasure and
food, to make them useful to the orcish
community as guards and/or heavy infantry. Orcs and half-orcs dislike smaller
humanoids because they are inevitably
weaker, and these races are usually employed only as slaves.
Goblins, who are
only marginally weaker than orcs and
can hold their own against them at least
some of the time, are afforded more tolerance than other small humanoids.
But it is not other humanoids that orcs
hate worst of all — it is other orcish
tribes. The roots of hatred run deep between conflicting tribes; the original
cause of friction, if there was one, has
long since been lost to antiquity. Intertribal conflicts are maintained by religious
bigotries; each tribe worships a particular
orcish patron god with interests that
(naturally!) conflict with those of other
deities. Even so, all tribes usually pay
some homage to Gruumsh, the king of
the orcish gods.
 

Another question concerning orcish
and half-orcish personality should be
addressed: Why do orcs hate elves so
much? Superficial examination of the
question reveals little overt cause; orcs
and elves do not frequently compete for
the same living space or for the same
foods. But a slightly deeper examination
shows that in terms of personality, probably no two races could be further
apart. For example:

Elves are able to see many sides of a
problem; orcs see but 1.

Elves carefully examine the long-range
consequences of an action, usually
before undertaking it, while orcs could
care less for anything but the present.

Elves are very long-lived, while orcs
have one of the shortest lifespans among
the humanoid races.

That list could be longer, contrasting
many other aspects of the races’ lifestyles, but a point has been developed.
Orcs and elves are opposites in nearly
every way, and orcs resent the advantages
elves have, especially their long lifespan.
While elves do not particularly like orcs,
they think of them as a short-term problem
not worthy of prolonged consideration.
Orcs, on the other hand, are consumed
with hatred for elves, and will SLAY them
out of hand whenever the opportunity
presents itself.

Orcish mythology has several tales of
battles between elven and orcish deities.
The most famous one occurs between
Gruumsh and Corellon Larethian, the
chief elven deity. The story goes like this,
according to the orcs:
 

Gruumsh ambushes Corellon in hopes
of SLAYING him and drinking his blood, so
as to inherit his special powers; Gruumsh
fails, of course, through his own shortsightedness, and Corellon shoots an arrow at Gruumsh’s eye.
Though the arrow failed to blind
Gruumsh, apparently it was not intended
to. Elven stories of the same event (much
briefer than the tedious orcish versions)
say that Corellon meant the arrow as a
warning to Gruumsh of his vulnerability
—a hint that it would only take the loss of
his eye to break Gruumsh’s power as a
god, and that some being might be capable of bringing this about if he were not
more careful. Though Gruumsh rails and
curses the elven gods through many later stories, he never again tries to directly
assault them, and spends his fury on
mortal elves instead. Obviously, he took
the hint.

In summary, half-orcs are often bound
to take on some of the less desirable
characteristics of their orcish parents,
especially if they are raised in an orc
tribe.

Half-orcs are generally tough, respectful of power, and seek to have power
themselves. They tend to measure one
another by the number and quality of
their followers, and they work within a
group setting rather than on their own.
Like orcs, half-orcs often act before
thinking about the results of their deeds,
and appear somewhat stupid to other
more foresighted individuals because of
this. They dislike the weak, follow the
strong, and quarrel with their equals.
Again, this is not true of all half-orcs. But
at least a vestige of these characteristics
is present in nearly every one, regardless
of their individual makeup.

Information for this article was taken
from the AD&D rule books, the Players
Handbook, the Monster Manual, and the
Dungeon Masters Guide, as well as the
DEITIES & DEMIGODS™ Cyclopedia.
Some additional comments and insights
were found in Master of Middle-Earth, by
Paul H. Kocher. Though this latter book
concerns the world of J. R. R. Tolkien,
much of the information therein is quite
usable in an AD&D setting, and the work
is highly recommended to the serious
student of role-playing.