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Author Topic: Wargs, Werewolves. Oathmark weight watchers for wargs  (Read 9212 times)

Offline Grumpy Gnome

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Re: Wargs, Dire Wolves or Werewolves
« Reply #15 on: February 19, 2020, 06:28:01 AM »
Since some folks like me have quit Facebook it is nice to see information mirrored here. Thanks for taking the time, this thread is informative and entertaining.
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Offline PhilB

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Re: Wargs, Dire Wolves or Werewolves
« Reply #16 on: February 19, 2020, 08:49:08 AM »
Great thread, and great paint on those wolf pics!

After viewing this thread, I just had to go pawing through some of my oldest figures, remembering some wolf riders I acquired in the late 70s or early 80s. I think I was still using humbrol enamels at this time, though looking at them now, maybe I had already graduated to acrylics. One thing is certain: these guys saw a lot of action on thge gaming table back in the day, and they look well-handled. Now I can see they deserve a decent re-paintjob.





I've no recollection what manufacturer or line they were from. Perhaps someone will chime in.

As to the OP's question, yes, I agree, many of those worlves are too big. As the years march on, we keep getting bigger and bigger figures, doubtless to make them more fierce, more powerful and so on (from 25mm to 28mm to "heroic 28mm" and beyond), but the "true 25s" of yesteryear still have a lot of charm.



Offline beefcake

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Re: Wargs, Dire Wolves or Werewolves
« Reply #17 on: February 19, 2020, 09:27:57 AM »
Yeah, I have a bunch of Asgard wolves too. Great minis all round for Tolkein orcs/goblins. Great to see those GW Fenrisian wolves, I've been tempted to buy a bunch every now and again but have never managed to get around to it. I Just bought the latest Underworlds Goblin wolfrider troupe so I wonder how they will match up to others when they arrive.


Offline Hobgoblin

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Re: Wargs, Dire Wolves or Werewolves
« Reply #18 on: February 19, 2020, 12:19:05 PM »
Interesting thread!

I love those old wolfriders! I think they're from Archive.

On the wolf/warg/werewolf thing, my suspicion is that wargs and werewolves are pretty much the same thing. Now, I know that Gandalf says something about "wargs and werewolves" being among the servants of Sauron, but Tolkien often uses a sort of repetitio technique, calling the same thing by different names ("goblins, hobgoblins and orcs"; "orcs and wolfriders", "they ride upon wolves and the wargs are in their train", etc.).

One point I'd make about the Silmarillion is that it can't really be used as an authoritative source on Tolkien's final views. He didn't publish it in that form, and so we shouldn't be surprised by contradictions between it and LotR. An obvious example is the "orcs are corrupted elves" thing, which doesn't seem to have been Tolkien's final view on the matter and isn't really supported by anything in LotR.

Also, The Hobbit isn't entirely consistent with LotR, despite Tolkien's later emendations to bring it more into line.

On the other hand, a lot of the material in Unfinished Tales (like The Battles of the Fords of the Isen) is clearly "supporting material" for LotR. So it's a much better source for cross-referencing with that book.

So, why might wargs and werewolves be the same thing? Well, with Tolkien, language and etymology are probably the best guide to his thinking. Philology was his first and most enduring love. So I think it's significant that Gandalf calls the Hollin wargs gaurhoth, or "werewolves". Tolkien loves to have his characters use different languages to describe the same creatures. Think of goblins/orcs/yrch/uruks/gorgun, etc. And again, he loves that duplicating rhetorical technique, so "wargs and werewolves" (particularly with the alliteration) isn't necessarily a contradiction.

But there's more. What does warg mean? Well, etymologically, it's a Norse word that means both "wolf" and "outlaw". So it's a word that describes both a man and a wolf: quite a suitable word for a werewolf.

As to werewolves being "fell beasts inhabited by dreadful spirits", I suspect that's what Tolkien had in mind as his 'rationalisation' of wargs (talking, intelligent, evil wolves). He certainly considered that orcs might be forms of various sorts animated by evil spirits. It appears to be one of his default explanation for evil species, along with "corruption". If I remember correctly, he seemed to favour "evil spirits" more than "corruption" on balance, because the latter posed him theological problems (such as the irredeemability of orcs).

I think there's a useful application of Occam's razor here. There's a well-observed geeky tendency to over-systematise things - and it's especially pronounced among tabletop gamers, who are always looking for ways to separate out different species with different statlines. Look, for example, at how often Middle Earth gamers talk about "orcs and Uruk-hai" as two separate things. Even Tolkien, with his love of repetitio, doesn't do this; he usually describes the Uruk-hai simply as "Orcs". But if we apply Occam's razor instead, we end up with one class of supernatural wolves, created by Sauron, and - like pretty much everything else in Middle Earth - more fearsome and formidable in the First Age than in the Third. That neatly explains why the same creatures are called "Wargs", "Hounds of Sauron" and "gaurhoth" (werewolves) in the space of a paragraph or two.

As to the disappearing Warg bodies, I think Ethelred has that right when he says that it suggests that they were "under some sort of necromancy". To me, it's just a spooky sign that supernatural forces were involved: Sauron or Saruman (who Tolkien at one point suggested might have come up with the idea of orcs riding wolves).

The Asgard wolfriders look really good to me; I reckon the Asgard range is among the most Tolkien-flavoured out there.

Offline Cubs

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Re: Wargs, Dire Wolves or Werewolves
« Reply #19 on: February 19, 2020, 12:31:38 PM »
I knew you'd get lured out with a Tolkein species discussion!
'Sir John ejaculated explosively, sitting up in his chair.' ... 'The Black Gang'.

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Offline Hobgoblin

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Re: Wargs, Dire Wolves or Werewolves
« Reply #20 on: February 19, 2020, 01:01:44 PM »
Like a moth to a flame - even with the Six Nations to distract me!

Offline PhilB

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Re: Wargs, Dire Wolves or Werewolves
« Reply #21 on: February 19, 2020, 02:35:29 PM »
Thanks, Hobgoblin, they are indeed Archive Miniatures figures. I'll have to see if I can get round to re-painting them.

Though I'm still caught up in a pirate-themed PF2 campaign. Hmmm.

Offline area23

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Re: Wargs, Dire Wolves or Werewolves
« Reply #22 on: February 19, 2020, 03:36:24 PM »
I believe this 'duplicating rhetorical technique' is actually an old Germanic and Norse storytelling technique, used also in the Sagas and old fairy tales.
Like John Hurt in Jim Henson's old Storyteller TV show. Love it. It's very evocative but in fact I suppose it's a poetic way to use different words to describe a particular thing and not to distinguish one from another.

All the better for us as it gives us so much to wonder about.
If you don't believe in lead, you're already dead.
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Offline Hobgoblin

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Re: Wargs, Dire Wolves or Werewolves
« Reply #23 on: February 19, 2020, 03:58:19 PM »
Yes, exactly: it's very common in a lot of older literature from various parts of the world. And, as you imply, it's a natural fit with oral storytelling traditions because it involves savouring the words for their sound. I've always thought that Gandalf's "goblins, orcs and hobgoblins of the worst description" in The Hobbit is akin to a storyteller saying something like "the woods were thick with brigands, bandits and footpads of the worst description". The narrator isn't trying to distinguish between the three words for robber; he's just using them to amplify the effect of the description.

It's been a long while since I studied Latin and Greek, but I recall lots of lists containing words that essentially meant 'warrior' and the like. Any analysis of rhetorical tropes will always contain a long list of "figures of repetition"; unfortunately, there's often little agreement on the formal terms for each (one scholar's repetitio is another's tautologia, and so on).

Offline area23

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Re: Wargs, Dire Wolves or Werewolves
« Reply #24 on: February 19, 2020, 04:10:04 PM »
"the woods were thick with brigands, bandits and footpads of the worst description"
Well, for roleplaying gamers those would be very different things, implying experience points of different level Thief.    lol

Offline Hobgoblin

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Re: Wargs, Dire Wolves or Werewolves
« Reply #25 on: February 19, 2020, 04:23:38 PM »
Well, for roleplaying gamers those would be very different things, implying experience points of different level Thief.    lol

Ha! Touché!

I reckon one reason (other than geekish systematising) for D&D's differentiation between monsters with names that essentially mean the same thing (goblin, orc, hobgoblin, bugbear, etc.) is just to match the level titles of fighting-men, etc.,. in the original rule books.

Offline Ethelred the Almost Ready

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Re: Wargs, Dire Wolves or Werewolves
« Reply #26 on: February 19, 2020, 05:06:08 PM »
Welcome aboard, Hobgoblin.  I thought that might be the argument you would use and, as always, I can't really find fault with it (I suspect you may even be right).
But, I do see werewolves and wargs as different in terms of how they seem to be employed.  Although only a little is written about werewolves in the Silmarillion, they do seem to be of a higher order of power.  Having said that, the only ones specifically mentioned are Draugluin, Carcharoth and Sauron in wolf form and these might not be truly representative of all werewolves.  Wargs generally seem smaller and easier to kill.  Possibly the spirits inhabiting the First Age werewolves/wargs were just more powerful.  In gaming terms it would then still be reasonable to have wererwolves and wargs/lesser werewolves. 

The Silmarillion was never completed by JRR but most of us would still consider it canon.  It is clear from many of Tolkien's later letters that he was not settled on many aspects of his world, from things as simple as orcs all the way to cosmology and the nature of elves. 

In the end, one could argue almost anything for the Silmarillion as it is meant to be a story told by elves  to men and then handed down over generations.  As such it could all be misunderstood or have been altered over time.  You could also argue that the elves had their own agenda and have embellished the stories for their own ends! 


Offline Hobgoblin

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Re: Wargs, Dire Wolves or Werewolves
« Reply #27 on: February 19, 2020, 06:22:44 PM »
Although only a little is written about werewolves in the Silmarillion, they do seem to be of a higher order of power.  Having said that, the only ones specifically mentioned are Draugluin, Carcharoth and Sauron in wolf form and these might not be truly representative of all werewolves. 

Yes - but isn't there a persistent theme in Tolkien's writing that most beings were more powerful in the past? He hints somewhere that goblins are still with us, but in the past they were "strong and fell". And I think there's a consistent theme of "diminishment" with regard to Men and Elves. So, just as First Age Men and Elves can be more superheroic, so too might wargs/werewolves. There's a Morgoth/Sauron comparison there too: the Shadow of the Third Age is nowhere near as dark as the Shadow of the First.

Wargs generally seem smaller and easier to kill.  Possibly the spirits inhabiting the First Age werewolves/wargs were just more powerful.  In gaming terms it would then still be reasonable to have wererwolves and wargs/lesser werewolves. 

Yes, I agree - just as you can find support for great orc warriors who were lesser corrupted Maiar. And, of course, in a game you're likely to want to err on the side of more variety.

The Silmarillion was never completed by JRR but most of us would still consider it canon.  It is clear from many of Tolkien's later letters that he was not settled on many aspects of his world, from things as simple as orcs all the way to cosmology and the nature of elves. 

I don't think there really is a canon for Tolkien's writings. The published Silmarillion wasn't published by JRRT and isn't in the form he'd have published it (we know this because he hadn't completed it); and The Hobbit doesn't fit exactly with The Lord of the Rings. So I don't think you can really establish a canon in this way. I think you can establish a canon that consists of LotR and supporting 'histories' (The Disaster of the Gladden Fields, The Battle of the Fords of the Isen, etc.) that were written to fit with it.

And I think it's clear that establishing a Sil-Hobbit-LotR canon can lead to some odd conclusions. The most obvious one is the idea that trolls were made by 'corrupting' Ents. Tolkien never, ever wrote that this was the case. But people have inferred it because of this line from Treebeard in LotR:

"Maybe you have heard of Trolls? They are mighty strong. But Trolls are only counterfeits, made by the Enemy in the Great Darkness, in mockery of Ents, as Orcs were of Elves."

Now, that line in no way inidcates that Trolls were originally Ents. But people who accept the Silmarillion as "canon" often read it as saying such, because they've read the "corrupted Elves" story in the Silmarillion. So they make an entirely incorrect inference (as Tolkien's other writings on trolls show).

But in the case of the First Age's heroic werewolves, I don't think we're necessarily dealing with a contradiction. Tolkien constantly presents the First Age as a time of greater heroes and villains than those that existed in the Third Age. On a related tangent, his last writings on Saruman's breeding of his Uruks suggests that what Saruman was doing was reintroducing the greater orc breeds that had existed in earlier times. The Disaster of the Gladden Fields obliquely supports this idea too, with almost all of the "great orcs" killed then.


Offline Ethelred the Almost Ready

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Re: Wargs, Dire Wolves or Werewolves
« Reply #28 on: February 27, 2020, 06:37:14 AM »
My Oathmark wolf riders have arrived.  Great service from Northstar, the wolves and various other figures made it across the world in only three weeks.
I was prepared to find the wolves weren't as bad as I thought they might be but was sadly disappointed.  They are fat, hairless and slightly cartoon-like.  I am very pleased with the goblin riders.  I think these are some of the best sculpts from the Oathmark range.

Below are pictures comparing my bigger wolves with the Oathmark wolf and how it looks against a goblin, elf and horse.














Offline beefcake

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Re: Wargs, Dire Wolves or Werewolves
« Reply #29 on: February 27, 2020, 07:21:51 AM »
Well that's a little disappointing. Hard to make plastic wolves though I imagine especially with all the possible undercuts (unless you have megabucks like gw to spend on tooling)