My post on how I don’t like 4th edition D&D (apparently I mustn’t call it AD&D anymore!) was reddited a few months back and has received 4 comments, the last of which claims that I don’t know what I’m talking about because “There’s no Orc race in 4e”. Now, this is very hard for me to believe because Orcs are the meat and drink of D&D (how else would we get our genocidal mojo on?), and if there were no Orc race there would be 6 million generations of pissed off D&D fans (can you imagine the emo-style whingeing that would evoke?)
But more importantly, I was there and I played it and there were Orcs. Now I don’t recall if they were officially Orcs or not but I definitely played one – and then I definitely slew some. That was the whole point of the two sessions I played. I have references, dammit (but they’re mad, and Scottish, so I don’t want to actually use them, so don’t ask for them). I don’t know for sure if the game I played was part of an official module or not (I get a sense it might have been but I wasn’t the DM so I don’t know).
But here’s the weirdness – I google 4e Orc and I can’t find much info, when I do a search on the D&D website I don’t get any 4e info (but then, there doesn’t seem to be any 4e info on the website, it’s all legacy stuff), but I do find references to half-Orcs. You can’t get a half-Orc without the assistance of an Orc (yuck). But on DeviantArt there are pictures of 4e Orcs selling for 200 pounds. So what gives – do they exist or not?
And if there are no Orcs, is D&D still D&D? What do 1st level characters cut their teeth on?
It’s still boring though…
Compromise and Conceit 
February 18, 2009 at 1:47 am
Yep. There are Orcs, right in the Monster Manual. No half-orc race though – that’s coming in PHB II, I think. Meantime, the MM has rules for creating Orc NPCs, which the players can use (if the GM allows) to create characters.
So you weren’t dreaming 😀
February 18, 2009 at 7:44 pm
Aha! I was right! I played an Orc “PC” (I recall it had no daily powers or something), and I slew lots of villagers. Well, everyone else slew lots of villagers. Funny though, when I did a search on the D&D website I only found legacy stuff for Orcs. Maybe that’s going to be a problem for them? (I think you were talking about this recently…)
Also that guy on reddit knows even less about 4e than me! Which has to be a record.
February 19, 2009 at 12:36 am
Orcs are on page 203 of the 4E Monster Manual. I have it open right in front of me, right now. Don’t listen to that jackass on reddit.
February 19, 2009 at 12:55 am
Although I’m not getting D&D 4e for more . . . important reasons; there are orcs in the game. People have commented such.
February 19, 2009 at 12:59 am
There are more important reasons than Orcs? Whatever would you have me believe next…?
February 19, 2009 at 1:09 am
How about getting married, dude? What could be a better reason than to have another person be your mate and spend the rest of your life with? * single here *
Getting unsingle is more prioritous for me than spending more money on a D&D game that copies WoW in style.
February 19, 2009 at 1:14 am
I think that’s a terribly un-nerdy way of looking at the world! How will your fellow players respect you if you eschew the edition-wars so you can go and spend time with girls?
I have always found the two to be compatible, btw, but it is noticeable that my tolerance for the minutiae of rule-systems has declined as my social life has grown.
February 19, 2009 at 1:36 am
Girls and RPGs aren’t mutually exclusive. My own feminine counterpart is running a Pathfinder game, in fact.
February 19, 2009 at 8:06 am
My partner played in order to see what it was all about but she isn’t really up for it. But I met my first long-term girlfriend at role-playing, which is both terribly nerdy and (I thought) quite sweet. I was an asssassin-hunter, she was an echantress…
February 19, 2009 at 9:15 pm
I apologize, I’m the redditor. I meant Orcs aren’t a playable race, not that they aren’t anywhere in there. You played something that wasn’t intended as a playable race, when bending the rules as such you can’t rely on your experience being a true experience of the game.
You can understand why I would say you’re article is suspect if you didn’t even realize Orcs weren’t a playable race.
February 20, 2009 at 12:08 am
It’s okay Anonymous – all my articles are suspect, no problem there!
February 20, 2009 at 1:05 am
After “apologizing”, he then lied about what you were saying here, and went on to insult you in absentia. He also insulted me, and went on to say that you and I are the same people. Argh. I guess the apology wasn’t very sincere.
Can’t trust nobody, these days.
February 20, 2009 at 1:06 am
Err . . . “the same person”. Typo, sorta.