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Miniatures Adventure => Fantasy Adventures => Topic started by: Hobgoblin on January 28, 2016, 12:57:13 AM
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A few thoughts occurred to me while assembling some Tolkien-appropriate orcish forces for SoBH and DR games. This very interesting blog post (http://realmofzhu.blogspot.co.uk/2016/01/of-ancient-orcish-animosity.html?showComment=1453839498534) by Zhu Baijie catalysed them somewhat (I commented as JC). As many of us are keen on gaming in Middle Earth, I thought these might – perhaps – be of interest. On the other hand, it just might see like a completely insane post!
My main contention is that gamers have, over the decades, tended to distort the descriptions contained in Tolkien's writings and that these distortions have become quite deeply embedded in RPG and wargaming rules and publications. I think this "gamefication" also had an impact on Peter Jackson's films (I wouldn't be at all surprised if WETA had a hefty population of current or former gamers). Here are some examples:
Distortion 1. Goblins and orcs are different things This may first have been popularised by Gary Gygax, who needed no excuse to split off one humanoid tribe from another (originally, I think, to give progressively tougher opponents for player characters as they advanced in levels). In some of his earlier writings (unpublished in his lifetime), Tolkien did distinguish between goblins, orcs and "gongs", but the concept was streamlined, so that "goblin" in The Hobbit is described as a translation of "orc". The ghost of the idea survives, perhaps, in Gandalf's description of the slopes of the Grey Mountains as "stiff with goblins, hobgoblins and orcs of the worst description", but this may be just an example of Tolkien's use of the rhetorical technique synonymia (listing different names for the same thing), just as he might have said "bandits, brigands and footpads of the worst description". He certainly uses the technique elsewhere. In LotR, "goblin" is used to describe even the very biggest orcs (the Uruk-hai of Isengard) - just as it's used to describe the great soldiers of Bolg's bodyguard in The Hobbit. There are plenty of examples of individuals being called both orcs and goblins: Azog, Grishnakh, Ugluk (implicitly and, probably, explicitly) and the dead Uruk-hai at Amon Hen. One line from LotR that often causes confusion here is when Tolkien first describes Ugluk (“a large black orc”) and then Grishnakh (“a short crook-legged creature, very broad”) and then says “Round them were many smaller goblins”. This might imply that goblins are smaller than orcs – except that Ugluk’s kind have already been identified as “goblins” twice – and Grishnakh will be described as a “goblin” twice before the chapter is out. So the distinction is clearly between smaller goblins and bigger goblins – all of the creatures involved are called goblins in the text.In short, all orcs are goblins, and all goblins are orcs.
Distortion 2.There’s a distinction between uruks and orcs (rather than uruks being a kind of orc). This comes, I think, from the same "levelling up" tendency that D&D introduced. Tolkien never talks about "orcs and uruks". In the narrative voice, uruks are overwhelmingly described simply as "orcs". There are few exceptions: Pippin is depicting recalling "the clutches of the Uruk-hai"; and the narrator distinguishes between the "fierce uruks" that marshall the Durthang line of smaller orcs that Pippin and Frodo join in Mordor and their charges - as well as between the Durthang line and the uruks that crash into them. And uruks are described as such in the Appendices too – but, crucially, they are also described as orcs in the same passages. Also, in the Battle of the Fords of the Isen, in Unfinished Tales, we get a “close-up” of Saruman's "fierce uruks, specially trained". But for the most part, it's characters that talk about uruks, while the narrator just calls them "orcs". The Helm's Deep chapter provides a wealth of examples. In short, all uruks are orcs. And all uruks are goblin too!
Distortion 3. Uruks are man-height. I think this persistent distortion arose in some of the "secondary literature" that was published in the 70s and 80s, as people created bestiaries and encyclopaedias of Middle Earth. The infamously inaccurate (but wonderfully illustrated) Tolkien Bestiary describes Uruks as "as tall as Men". There is, of course, nothing to support this in the books. Quite the opposite: Gimli, despite facing the “hugest” of Saruman’s orcs at Helm’s Deep, comments that they are much easier for him to fight than the “over-large” Dunlendings. And Gollum says that the Hardrim are “almost as bad as orcs and much bigger” (as noted above, Uruks are orcs – and Gollum would have seen plenty of Uruks, both in the Misty Mountains and in Mordor). And, crucially, Saruman’s half-orcs have “goblin-faces” but are “man-high”. They remind the Hobbits of Bill Ferny’s friend, not the Uruk-hai. Uruks are significantly shorter than Men – enough to make a military difference
Distortion 4. “The Uruk-hai are half-orcs.” This is one where it’s easy to see why the confusion arose. Although Aragorn is puzzled by the Isengard Uruks’ equipment, he doesn’t seem surprised by their physiology. They’re large orcs, but he’s seen lots of those (not least recently in Moria, where there were “large and evil” orcs – “black Uruks of Mordor”). But Treebeard starts to speculate about Saruman’s orcs: “He has been doing something to them.” And, at Helm’s Deep, Gamling says “these creatures of Saruman, these half-orcs and goblin-men, they will not quail at the sun”. It’s only later (in Flotsam and Jetsam) that we learn that there were many creatures like Bill Ferny’s friend in the armies of Isengard – and that there were “many” of them at Helm’s Deep. These are the same type of creatures that show up in The Scouring of the Shire – and they are clearly not the Uruk-hai. Most obviously, they are described as “Men”, whereas the Uruk-hai are “Orcs” passim. That said, I think it’s perfectly reasonable to argue that when Gamling says “half-orcs and goblin-men”, he means Saruman’s unusual orcs and his somewhat orcish men (echoed in “Man-Orcs large and cunning and Orc-Men treacherous and vile” in Morgoth’s Ring). “Half-orc” is clearly not a taxonomic term at this stage, and Gamling may be using it differently from Aragorn. Or Tolkien may just be indulging in synonymia again. In any case, it’s clear that Saruman has two distinct type of (possible) hybrid: large goblin-soldiers and horrible Men with goblin-faces. And they’re not the same thing (The Battle of the Fords of the Isen distinguishes between them too: the Men-orcs are ferocious, mail-clad axemen who aren’t disadvantaged by height against the Rohirric shieldwall as Saruman’s orcs are). The Uruk-hai are different from the Men-orcs/goblin-men/half-orcs of the armies of Isengard and the Scouring of the Shire.
Distortion 5 Uruks are much, much bigger than other orcs. We know that some of the smaller orcs are Hobbit-sized: Sam and Frodo can pass themselves off as small orcs in Mordor. And we know that the “hugest” Uruks mustered by the Hornburg Gate are sufficiently shorter than Men for Gimli to find them easier to fight. And we know that the Haradrim are “much bigger” than orcs. The implication, surely, is that Uruks are roughly the height of dwarves. Even the huge orc-chieftain is only “almost man-high” (and thus clearly shorter than even a short Man). Again, an equivalence with dwarves suggests itself. Yes, Uruks are bigger than other orcs – by definition. But they don’t seem to be that much bigger: there’s not that much room between Hobbit-sized and “significantly shorter than Man-height”.
Distortion 6 Uruks are too big to ride wolves. This is something that is frequently asserted by gamers, the assumption being that wolfriders must be small orcs. But we don’t get any indication in Tolkien. A straight reading of LotR suggests that Saruman’s orcs are big uruks, and that some of those orcs are mounted on wolves. If a wolf can big enough to carry a Hobbit-sized rider, it’s surely not much of a stretch to imagine a wolf that can carry a dwarf-sized rider. Both would have to be fantastical wolves – which is exactly what Tolkien’s wargs are. Tolkien gives no indication that Uruks are too big to ride wolves
Distortion 7 Uruks are a rarity in Middle Earth. In typical army list for wargaming in Middle Earth, Uruks are presumed to be a relative rarity in the armies of Mordor – and even, sometimes, of those of Isengard. But Tolkien’s texts suggest that this was not his intention. Again, read LotR carefully straight through, and you get the impression that all (or at least the overwhelming majority) of the orcs of Isengard were uruks. Yes, there’s a reference to no “orc-folk of any size” escaping the Ents at Orthanc, but in context, that’s very clearly a reference to the Man-high, goblin-faced half-orcs (like Bill Ferny’s Southron friend) – which again underscores the size difference between Uruks and Orc-Men/half-orcs/goblin-men. And when it comes to Mordor, the narrative makes no distinction between sizes of orcs at the Pelennor or the Morannon. But we can say that most of the orcs that Sam and Frodo encounter in Mordor are Uruks: Shagrat and Gorbag (who self-identify as Uruks) and their companies, plus the Uruks that charge into the Durthang line versus the Durthang line and Snaga. We also get a nice definition of an Uruk: “a big fighting orc” (echoed in the appendices’ “great soldier-orcs”). And then we get this gem from the tracker: “If that’s the way you fighters go on, small wonder there’s bad news from the battles”. That suggests – very strongly – that it’s the big orcs (the Uruks) that do the fighting in the battles. So expecting the Orcish armies of Mordor to be largely composed of Uruks seems not unreasonable. On top of that, we get the appendices, which tell us that the uruks sacked Osgiliath and made Ithilien uninhabitable with their depredations. That is, there were whole armies of Uruks more than 500 years before the events of the book began. That’s a lot of time to breed a lot of Uruks. It’s more than reasonable to suppose that most of the Orcs fighting at the Hornburg, the Pelennor and the Morannon were Uruks.
Distortion 8 Orcs come in small, medium and large. Or at least Merp would have us believe so. Tolkien’s text suggests that though there are doubtless many breeds of Orc, the main division is between the big ones – the soldier-orcs of Mordor and Isengard, some of whom are also to be found in the Misty Mountains – and the small ones (slaves and levies in Mordor and living free, though generally under the rule of Uruks in the Misty Mountains). Now, as I’ve argued above, the gap doesn’t seem to be that big, but the Merp-style distinction of “snaga, soldier-orc, Uruk” doesn’t get support from the text. The soldier-orcs are the Uruks. Orcs come in many sizes, but are best thought of as “big” (fighters = Uruks) and small (slaves = Snaga)
Distortion 9 The Isengarders are more upright in posture than other Orcs. This is a gaming commonplace, but doesn’t appear to have any foundation in the text. The Isengarders certainly have thick legs, and Grishnakh’s soldier-orcs (almost certainly Uruks of Mordor) have crooked legs, but there’s nothing to suggest that one lot are more upright in stance than the others (or that those crooked legs aren’t thick too). And there’s clear evidence that the Isengarders aren’t particularly upright: “Immediately in front were bowed backs and tough thick legs going up and down”. Emphasis mine. This comes at a point when the Isengarders are carrying Pippin and Grishnakh’s troop have dropped behind them. Also, earlier the whole company (Isengarders and Northeners at this point) “run with the long loping strides of Orcs”. The physiology seems similar. Isengard Uruks do not appear to be more upright in posture than other Orcs.
Distortion 10. Orcs are primitive and stupid. This is perhaps the most pernicious of all. Although Tolkien’s orcs are articulate and cunning (albeit debased and vile), the RPG and Warhammer notion that they are dim, inarticulate and predisposed to shamanism is often reflected back on to the orcs of Middle Earth in gaming. In fact, Tolkien sets out orcs’ technological sophistication in The Hobbit: they are inventive, good at tunnelling and making weapons, interested in explosions and engines, and quite possible responsible for inventing various weapons of mass destruction. In the forces of Saruman, the orcs have mail but most of the Dunlendings do not – because the orcs can make it themselves. And, in The Two Towers, we learn that Orcs use medicine, including healing balms for wounds and revitalising draughts. On top of that, at least some of them can write in dwarf-runes (even if it’s only four letters). In short, Orcs are clever and technologically sophisticated.
Quite enough for now (or for ever!), I’d have thought. Does any of this matter? Not really, of course. But the fun of gaming in Middle Earth is that you can actually do a bit of in-depth research in a way that you can’t with most other fictional settings. So I hope all this might be of some interest or use to others who are assembling Orcish forces for gaming.
Rigth! Back to my wolfriders!
Oh, and the orcs of Middle Earth aren’t green. But we all knew that – didn’t we? ;)
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Thanks for this,,good read!
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Quite the exhaustive bit of research you did there. ;) I like it! I'll have to revisit this when I eventually do a Lord of the Rings project. :)
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Nice post,and I agree!
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Nice post. You need to start blogging!
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Awesome post! Applause applause!
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It has been some time since i last read the books, but I thought that the main difference between Orcs and Uruks were that the Uruks had a better tolerance for sunlight.
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Yeah, this one was visited a couple of months back wasn't it? I got completely crushed when I foolishly started quoting someone else's theories as Tolkein and felt most red-faced.
I would mention, however, that (I think) the Tolkein Orcs/Goblins are mentioned as having a stooping, crouching sort of posture, so although not tall, they may not necessarily be small as such, just hunched over.
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I agree, and I would add that the difference in words is because:
- goblin is the "human language" word.
- orc (plural yrch) is the "elfic language" word.
- uruk is the "orc language" word.
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..and i thought i took Middle earth too seriously ;)
I think you are on the right track. I always assumed that the "goblinoid " races come in all shapes and sizes and are all "goblins". Orcs was just a name/discription for the larger ones ("goblins" are lesser goblins and orcs greater goblins).
If i remember rightly Saruman was accused of the crime of crossing orcs with wild men and creating the Uruk-hai who could move and fight during the day. Sarumans orcs were for me normal, not interbred creatures that he gathered around him from the misty mountains or has borrowed/leased ( lol) from Sauron.
I think a lot of the other names and discriptions of the various goblin races are often just Tolkiens poetic way of writing and avoiding repeating his discriptions over and over.
Cheers
Robert
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Pretty much what I've thought all along. I'm with emosbur. Tolkien was a linguist and etymologist, so it was always going to be about using different descriptive names and languages.
When I first started fantasy gaming back in the day I was given some old Minifigs Orcs. Despite their obvious vintage I kinda liked them and kept them and have adapted them over the years and incorporated them into my own army. I'm glad to see the swordsman are now available so I can build up my unit further...
(http://i186.photobucket.com/albums/x200/sukhe_bator/Uruks/DSC03084.jpg~original)
Earlier attempts at modifying historical rulesets for ME often suggested a more humanoid alternative for the Orkish legions using a combination of Dark Age warriors and even Romans as proxies. As has been stated it is the RPG and gaming fraternity that have morphed these humanoid warriors over the years. Their origins have been stated as warped and corrupted versions of elves by Melkor.
When I started collecting I favoured Nick Lund's more humanoid Chronicle Orcs and graduated to his larger versions when he worked for Grenadier.
(http://i186.photobucket.com/albums/x200/sukhe_bator/Uruks/urukinfantry2.jpg~original)
There are some excellent examples painted up on this forum by Mr Hobgoblin. To my mind they seemed much closer to my idea of the books, but there was a definite tendency in the 1980s and 90s towards scale creep generally and a tendency to excessive caricature in the Citadel/GWs minis that always put me off them. Particularly the more comic pointy ears and gnomish getup. The battier and sillier they got the more I distanced myself from them and the more the genre put me off fantasy gaming.
The use of technology, armour and weapons is one of the reasons I particularly like the rendition of the Uruk-Hai in the PJ films. The exaggerated differences between them and the goblins of Moria in the films is one of the principle reasons I hate them. The comic caricatures of the goblins in the Hobbit films even more so.
There were a whole host of human allies fighting alongside the less human forces of Mordor, which is an area I am particularly interested in. ATM I am casting about for historical proxies for the Dunlendings and for the black clad cavalry host that issued from Minas Morgul before Pelennor in the books. I find it interesting that the colour black features as emblematic of good AND evil in the novels. Black is the new grey in Middle Earth apparently...
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An excellent couple of posts here, both descriptive and visual. Thank you for sharing.
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Great research.
What I hate about Orcs and goblins in most wargames and RPGs is that they have become a silly race of idiots, who speak in some kind of mockney accent. To me, from my reading of the LotR and other Tolkien, Orcs are just as clever as men. They are just twisted, evil and self-loathing. But they are cunning and inventive, not idiots.
For me the best representations of Orcs have been the old Perry Citadel pre-slotta ones (which are rather too large, I'll concede). Two things I like about these models is 1) they look evil and nasty and built for the business of war without looking silly or like caricatures, and 2) they had kit. Bottles, bags, clothes, armour - they obviously were warriors but it felt like to me they had their own culture, manufacturing capabilities etc. etc.
Good stuff!
EvilD
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I would mention, however, that (I think) the Tolkein Orcs/Goblins are mentioned as having a stooping, crouching sort of posture, so although not tall, they may not necessarily be small as such, just hunched over.
That's a very good point. Here's the quote from The Hobbit:
"The passage was low and roughly made. It was not too difficult for the hobbit, except when, in spite of all care, he stubbed his poor toes again, several times, on nasty jagged stones on the floor. "A bit low for goblins, at least for the big ones," thought Bilbo, not knowing that even the big ones, the orcs of the mountains, go along at a great speed stooping low with their hands almost on the ground."
It's an interesting passage. First, the passage is low from a hobbit's perspective: it's low, but not too bad. Second, he thinks it's "a bit low for goblins, at least for the big ones." So, not too bad for the small ones - just as it's not too bad for him. That supports the idea that the smaller orcs are about hobbit-sized - as confirmed in LotR. And note that the "big ones" are goblins too. And if the low tunnel isn't too bad for small orcs and hobbits, then we might well hypothesise that dwarf-sized creatures (bigger than hobbits) would have more difficulty.
We also get this interesting phrase: "the big ones, the orcs of the mountains." I've seen some people argue that this indicates that "orc" means "a big goblin", i.e. that the emphasis should be on orcs rather than of the mountains. The problem is that Tolkien shows (and tells, in later editions) that "orc" means simply "goblin": "Orc-rist" = "goblin-cleaver". And, in the appendices of LotR, we learn that there are "great uruks" in the Misty Mountains (sent there by Sauron before coming into the service of Saruman).
I think, though, that there is the ghost of an idea here that you can see in some of the drafts of LoTR (Moria's "real orcs" becomes= "black Uruks of Mordor", for example). So, after toying with "orc" in the drafts as a designation reserved for the larger goblins, Tolkien appears to settle on uruk as a word that means "goblin" but is generally reserved for the larger goblins. Presumably, "orc" wouldn't work because he'd already used it as a synonym for "goblin" (he also uses the terms synonymously in much earlier writings). So, rather than the big goblins in Moria being "real orcs", they become "black Uruks".But the point is that Tolkien settled the issue before publication: orcs were goblins, and goblins were orcs.
In the process, he evidently came to dislike the word "goblin" - which is a Romance-language word, unlike elf, dwarf, warg, wose, ent and orc, which are all Germanic. That's why he uses "goblin" so much less in LotR than in The Hobbit - and that's why the inhabitants of Goblin-town are described as "orcs" in LotR. The creatures hadn't changed, but the preferred term for them had.
The description of orcs running is carried straight over into LotR, where the Uruk-hai run "with bowed backs", Grishnakh runs "stooping low" and "bent almost double", and Shagrat "ran crouching" with "long arms" that "reached almost to the ground".
The most important point*, though, is that this, like so many of the "close-ups" of orcs, is from a hobbit's perspective. Though some orcs are as small as hobbits, many are quite a bit bigger. And Tolkien does use words such as "big", "large", "huge" and "hugest" to describe orcs. Without context, we could easily assume them to be quite big creatures. But there is context that shows that they are relatively short (the contrast with the half-orcs, the fact that a "huge orc-chieftain" is not as tall as a man) and relatively small (the fact that the Haradrim are "almost as bad as Orcs and much bigger").
They are, though, only relatively small. They seem to be quite stocky too: Grishnakh is "very broad", the orc-shapes at Helm's Deep are "squat and broad", and the Isengarders have "thick legs". So yes, they seem to be quite bulky. Big heads are a recurrent theme too. And they're evidently very strong and tough.
My sneaking feeling is that Tolkien's orcs were more like dwarves than is generally assumed.
*Important is a relative concept here! :D
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Yes, Hobgoblin did make some of these points a little while back, but I for one, am happy to see the argument fully explored with such detailed forensic analysis of the sources. (Mainly because I completely agree! :D)
(Stick that in your TL:DR pipe and smoke it!)
lol
What I hate about Orcs and goblins in most wargames and RPGs is that they have become a silly race of idiots, who speak in some kind of mockney accent. To me, from my reading of the LotR and other Tolkien, Orcs are just as clever as men. They are just twisted, evil and self-loathing. But they are cunning and inventive, not idiots.
Totally. The whole D&D and later GW subversion of Tolkien's orcs into bright green, semi-comic 'Mockney' wide boys (sorry 'boyz') is a crass piece of cultural vandalism driven by a mix of puerile taste and humour, and some kind of commercial imperative to appeal to young kids.
sukhe_bator - great pic.
I had those Minifigs orcs in the late 1970s. Think I said almost exactly the same thing last time this discussion came up... Pre D&D, pre-GW, pre-Peter Jackson and co, those were the model orcs which actually resembled what is described in the books - despite the crude sculpting (by modern-day standards). That's what Tolkien described.
Great thread :)
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What I hate about Orcs and goblins in most wargames and RPGs is that they have become a silly race of idiots, who speak in some kind of mockney accent. To me, from my reading of the LotR and other Tolkien, Orcs are just as clever as men. They are just twisted, evil and self-loathing. But they are cunning and inventive, not idiots.
Yes, absolutely - and what Captain Blood said too!
For me the best representations of Orcs have been the old Perry Citadel pre-slotta ones (which are rather too large, I'll concede). Two things I like about these models is 1) they look evil and nasty and built for the business of war without looking silly or like caricatures, and 2) they had kit. Bottles, bags, clothes, armour - they obviously were warriors but it felt like to me they had their own culture, manufacturing capabilities etc. etc.
I think they're brilliant too. Not entirely Tolkienesque, but wonderful in their own right. And yes, the kit really helps to bring the models to life. Just as I lament the "gamefication" of Tolkien, I also lament the "wargamefication" of Citadel's ranges. When the models were designed primarily for RPGs - and when Warhammer was still, to an extent, an RPG with facility for larger battles - they were much livelier, with all kinds of interesting details (and not just skulls!).
Cubs' jaw-dropping renditions of some of those have to be seen to be believed - extraordinary.
For me, though, the most Tolkien-appropriate ones are definitely Jez Goodwin's Asgard range - decades old but utterly wonderful. On which note ...
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..and i thought i took Middle earth too seriously ;)
I only take the orcish bits seriously! Honest ... well, apart from the trolls and the balrogs ... ;)
I think you are on the right track. I always assumed that the "goblinoid " races come in all shapes and sizes and are all "goblins". Orcs was just a name/discription for the larger ones ("goblins" are lesser goblins and orcs greater goblins).
The only problem with that is that "orcs" is used a lot for the very smallest ones (the tracker in Mordor and the Durthang line are never described as "goblins") and "goblin" is used a lot for the big ones. In fact, in LotR, "goblin" is used much more often for big soldier-orcs (uruks) than it is for the smaller types from the North.
If i remember rightly Saruman was accused of the crime of crossing orcs with wild men and creating the Uruk-hai who could move and fight during the day. Sarumans orcs were for me normal, not interbred creatures that he gathered around him from the misty mountains or has borrowed/leased ( lol) from Sauron.
On this, I think Tolkien vacillated quite a bit (as he did on a lot of issues). Certainly, no one really remarks on the Isengard Uruk-hai's physiques as unusual (they are big, but so are the uruks we see elsewhere). And the Appendices give us a timeline that goes like this:
1. Sauron creates the uruks;
2. He sends some of them to the Misty Mountains
3. Some of the "great uruks" that raid Rohan from the Misty Mountains have entered into the service of Saruman.
But then there is the suggestion that Saruman has been involved in what Tolkien calls (somewhere) "possible special breeding of orcs". The half-orcs are proof of this (and The Battle of the Fords of the Isen shows that these were used as axe-wielding, heavily armoured shock troops in Saruman's armies), and then there is the passage in Morgoth's Ring:
"Finally, there is a cogent point, though horrible to relate. It became clear in time that undoubted Men could under the domination of Morgoth or his agents in a few generations be reduced almost to the Orc-level of mind and habits; and then they would or could be made to mate with Orcs, producing new breeds, often larger and more cunning. There is no doubt that long afterwards, in the Third Age, Saruman rediscovered this, or learned of it in lore, and in his lust for mastery committed this, his wickedest deed: the interbreeding of Orcs and Men, producing both Men-orcs large and cunning, and Orc-men treacherous and vile."
The implication here is that the Isengard Uruk-hai are the "Men-orcs, large and cunning" (usually described simply as "orcs" or "goblins" in LotR) and the half-orcs at the Isen, Helm's Deep and the Shire are the "Orc-men treacherous and vile" (generally described as Men, though occasionally as Orc-men, goblin-men or half-orcs).
Cheers!
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Nice post,and I agree!
Cheers! I've been trying to find your wonderful Asgard orcs for ages now - and have just rediscovered them via your blog. Tremendous work, and everyone should have a look at them (http://greywolf1066.blogspot.com.au/2014/02/orcs.html).
Do you have any more shots of them? I seem to recall seeing them on another forum (or maybe on this one, long ago).
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Pretty much what I've thought all along. I'm with emosbur. Tolkien was a linguist and etymologist, so it was always going to be about using different descriptive names and languages.
When I first started fantasy gaming back in the day I was given some old Minifigs Orcs. Despite their obvious vintage I kinda liked them and kept them and have adapted them over the years and incorporated them into my own army. I'm glad to see the swordsman are now available so I can build up my unit further...
(http://i186.photobucket.com/albums/x200/sukhe_bator/Uruks/DSC03084.jpg)
Earlier attempts at modifying historical rulesets for ME often suggested a more humanoid alternative for the Orkish legions using a combination of Dark Age warriors and even Romans as proxies. As has been stated it is the RPG and gaming fraternity that have morphed these humanoid warriors over the years. Their origins have been stated as warped and corrupted versions of elves by Melkor.
When I started collecting I favoured Nick Lund's more humanoid Chronicle Orcs and graduated to his larger versions when he worked for Grenadier.
(http://i186.photobucket.com/albums/x200/sukhe_bator/Uruks/urukinfantry2.jpg)
Those look tremendous! I envy your vast Lundian horde, and the Minifigs ones are magnificent too.
There were a whole host of human allies fighting alongside the less human forces of Mordor, which is an area I am particularly interested in. ATM I am casting about for historical proxies for the Dunlendings and for the black clad cavalry host that issued from Minas Morgul before Pelennor in the books. I find it interesting that the colour black features as emblematic of good AND evil in the novels. Black is the new grey in Middle Earth apparently...
Here's a tantalising thought. Might those black-clad riders have been orcs? It sounds heretical, I know, but I present two pieces of evidence.
1. Mordor-orcs have stolen almost all the black horses of Rohan. Did they just lead them away? Or did they ride them back to Mordor? It might be hard for an orc to ride a full-size horse, but on the other hand, plenty of petite women ride horses. So a large uruk (say 5' or so) might have little problem.
2. (This is the really tantalising bit). I was reading The History of Middle Earth and the exchanges between the characters who were eventually settled as Shagrat and Gorbag in particular (they changed and swapped names quite a bit in the earlier drafts). Anyway, what caught my eye is that photo-Shagrat sneers at proto-Gorbag and his troops as "horseboys" from Minas Morgul. That made me look at Minas Morgul's black-clad riders with new eyes ... not least because I have an old Grenadier orc on a large horse to paint up.
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Brilliant posts, really fascinating.
I must say that, accurate or not, I love the PJ-sequel orcs. I occasionally play the Shadow of Mordor game and that mix of body shapes and tribalsesque styles the orcs have really appeals to me.
I agree that I think we could all do without the mockney accents mind.
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As this discussion is now touching on fantasy worlds that Tolkien didn't create, I think that the orcs, goblins and other "goblinoids" of non-Tolkien fantasy settings have plenty of self-worth as what they are (as opposed to what they're not, which is to say Tolkien's orcs). Otherwise we may as well be sniping at Tolkien also - he's hardly innocent of engaging in the bastardisation of concepts that weren't his at first.
I do find Tolkien's legendarium, in its unadulterated and "correctly understood" form, a refreshing counterpoint to the D&D-derived traditions of fantasy, but my point is that they all have self-worth independently of each other. Even GW's gorillaform orcs have their place in the fauna (although I'm not overfond of them myself).
Just as I lament the "gamefication" of Tolkien, I also lament the "wargamefication" of Citadel's ranges. When the models were designed primarily for RPGs - and when Warhammer was still, to an extent, an RPG with facility for larger battles - they were much livelier, with all kinds of interesting details (and not just skulls!).
I'll go a bit OT here. While I find that some old ranges are unsatisfactory in terms of sculpting quality, I do agree that the "wargamefication" of orcs and goblins (and other fantasy classics) into figures lacking personality (by way of "standardised" poses, overly similar weapons, armour and clothing, and a "streamlining" of details) is a bad development. What I hate the most about it is that it's leading to a competitive culture of "haves and have-nots" among wargamers and miniatures collectors, a culture which boils down to owning difficult-to-acquire OOP figures. Those that own the figures have nothing to worry about. They can pat themselves on the shoulder for having put in the hours and the money, or for having entered the hobby at an early enough stage that they were able to purchase the figures when they were still in production. Where does that leave the rest of us? It hardly sounds like an attractive hobby to me - probably even less so for newcomers. An overfixation on OOP collecting would only lead to the atrophication of the hobby, I think. What we need is more new figures (not least of orcs and goblins) that aren't so "wargamefied", to replace (and improve upon) those that have gone OOP and to provide a better alternative to modern "wargamefied" ranges like GW and Mantic.
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As this discussion is now touching on fantasy worlds that Tolkien didn't create, I think that the orcs, goblins and other "goblinoids" of non-Tolkien fantasy settings have plenty of self-worth as what they are
Yeah, I've got to say, I do enjoy the 'classification' of Goblins as little greeblies, Orcs as bigger, tougher dudes, hobgoblins as eastern 'Mongol' type goblinoids and Half-Orcs as general cross-breeds. I even like the idea of the Black Orc as the hulking brute. having said that, they've all got too big for my taste - and not just GW, but all manufacturers have gone the same way.
I like the idea of sticking closer to Tolkein as regards the proportions perhaps, but keeping to a standard use of the names with which I am familiar. My perfect style of Orc is probably the 80's and early 90's fellas, with barrel chests and crooked, sinewy limbs. Goblins should be very small and, as Hob says, Hobbit sized.
I do feel that Half-Orcs kind of got lost by the way though. They were never really developed and were caught as neither fish nor fowl, with no real reason for anyone to collect them.
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As this discussion is now touching on fantasy worlds that Tolkien didn't create, I think that the orcs, goblins and other "goblinoids" of non-Tolkien fantasy settings have plenty of self-worth as what they are (as opposed to what they're not, which is to say Tolkien's orcs). Otherwise we may as well be sniping at Tolkien also - he's hardly innocent of engaging in the bastardisation of concepts that weren't his at first.
Yes, that's very true. As my "Song of Blades" thread shows, most of the goblins I paint aren't Tolkienesque at all: they're fish-white, like Alan Garner's svart-alfar, or red, or any colour I fancy. The word "orc" didn't really exist in English before Tolkien (it's a hapax legomenon in Old English, as it only appears in Beowulf, and then only in the compound orcneas.
I do find Tolkien's legendarium, in its unadulterated and "correctly understood" form, a refreshing counterpoint to the D&D-derived traditions of fantasy, but my point is that they all have self-worth independently of each other. Even GW's gorillaform orcs have their place in the fauna (although I'm not overfond of them myself).
Yes, again, that's true. I love the Perry C15 orcs, which are much more appropriate for D&D than Tolkien. And I love pig-faced orcs - especially the old Minifigs ones.
I'll go a bit OT here. While I find that some old ranges are unsatisfactory in terms of sculpting quality, I do agree that the "wargamefication" of orcs and goblins (and other fantasy classics) into figures lacking personality (by way of "standardised" poses, overly similar weapons, armour and clothing, and a "streamlining" of details) is a bad development. What I hate the most about it is that it's leading to a competitive culture of "haves and have-nots" among wargamers and miniatures collectors, a culture which boils down to owning difficult-to-acquire OOP figures. Those that own the figures have nothing to worry about. They can pat themselves on the shoulder for having put in the hours and the money, or for having entered the hobby at an early enough stage that they were able to purchase the figures when they were still in production. Where does that leave the rest of us? It hardly sounds like an attractive hobby to me - probably even less so for newcomers. An overfixation on OOP collecting would only lead to the atrophication of the hobby, I think. What we need is more new figures (not least of orcs and goblins) that aren't so "wargamefied", to replace (and improve upon) those that have gone OOP and to provide a better alternative to modern "wargamefied" ranges like GW and Mantic.
I very much agree with the last part, but remember that quite a lot of the old, characterful figures are still available (including the entire range of Asgard orcs, through Viking Forge, and lots of Ral Partha stuff). On eBay, I never pay above modern miniature prices; I don't buy a great deal, but I use a "stop-loss" principle based on contemporary prices for new metal figures. My Chronicle wolfriders (three units for Dragon Rampant) were assembled very quickly at between £3 and £4 per wolf/rider combo, I think. Also, manufacturers like Reaper still produce plenty of RPGish stuff. Their Bones lizardmen, for example, are quite characterful, with the same sort of accoutrements as the old orcs that EvilDoctor was talking about. I think you could get some very characterful (and cheap!) wargaming forces together using only Reaper Bones - especially if you shed the "mono-racial" shackles that GW did so much to introduce.
To expand on that last point: it's a little odd to me that fantasy wargaming has descended into armies of orcs OR lizardmen OR humans OR beastmen (and so on). When I played early Warhammer as a kid, we built our forces as whim and pocket money dictated. So I had lizardmen and orcs and slann and dragonmen and chaos warriors in the same army. And my friends did much the same. I can remember the arrival of Ravening Hordes (which had a bigger impact in the "racialising" regard than the earlier Book of Battalions and Forces of Fantasy), but we largely ignored it (until just before we all abandoned gaming).
Today, when I play a game with some of the same friends, or with my kids, we just pick whatever troops we want and rationalise it afterwards. For Lion and Dragon Rampant, for example, I typically put together a number of units and let my opponent pick whichever they want. I think that's (a) a more fun approach and (b) more "authentic". The armies of fantasy literature (and myth) are often hugely varied. At the Pelennor, for example, the army of Mordor contains Haradrim, Mumakil, "troll-men" of Far Harad, Variags (similar to vikings, presumably), Easterlings, mountain trolls, Orcs (mainly uruks, one would presume, but also some of the smaller breeds, perhaps), fell beasts and wraiths. And think of the classic Warhammer poster of the Joe Dever/Gary Chalk siege. The attacking forces include orcs by Citadel, Ral Partha and Minifigs (complete with porcine snouts), lizardmen, chaos warriors and much else besides.
Taking that sort of approach allows the use of many more varied figures, and allows the RPG-friendly manufacturers to come into their own. Why, for example, should the leader of a predominantly Orcish force be an Orc chieftain. What about a white wizard ... ?
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I do feel that Half-Orcs kind of got lost by the way though. They were never really developed and were caught as neither fish nor fowl, with no real reason for anyone to collect them.
It's a shame, as the old Aly Morrison half-orcs are brilliant figures - very RPGish in their varied gear, and thoroughly disreputable-looking.
I think they were probably victims of their lacklustre Warhammer profiles - just like humans, but very slightly worse. In that way, they were like the Fimir - nice figures let down by their relative gaming weakness (caused, in the Fimir's case by a big base size).
Oddly enough, Tolkien's half-orcs appear to be crack troops: "...there appeared a company of men or orc-men (evidently dispatched for that purpose), ferocious, mail-clad, and armed with axes." These are the guys that kill Theodred, Theoden's son.
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Skewing slightly OOT (apologies) but my Goblins Army (includes Orcs, Ogres, etc.,) has a lot of 2nd hand, painted by others, OOP figures (though Iron Wind Metals is changing that last) that are painted as Greenskins/Blueskins which I rationalize as body painting/dyeing based on religious/philosophical leanings of a particular faction/tribe. It simply is not worth my time to destroy a serviceable paint job to substitute my own inferior work.
Back on topic (OT):
I don't mind the single poses for mob units such as (http://www.miniatures-workshop.com/lostminiswiki/index.php?title=Image:Rp-e613.jpg), http://www.miniatures-workshop.com/lostminiswiki/index.php?title=Image:Rp-e611.jpg, (http://www.miniatures-workshop.com/lostminiswiki/index.php?title=Image:Rp-e633.jpg,) or (http://www.miniatures-workshop.com/lostminiswiki/index.php?title=Image:Rp-e623.jpg) but the revitalization of adventurer or leader figures equipped for more than just hack and slash would be welcome to me. I am trying to figure out how to represent a supply train for a Goblin army where the pack animals wouldn't be eaten before the battle. Slave humanoid burden bearers perhaps?
And agreed that the army leader doesn't just have to be an Orc/Goblin because the mass of the army is Goblins. Sitting Tolkien aside, (heresy though it seems to me at times) why not a rogue Dwarf or renegade Elf leading the host??
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Skewing slightly OOT (apologies) but my Goblins Army (includes Orcs, Ogres, etc.,) has a lot of 2nd hand, painted by others, OOP figures (though Iron Wind Metals is changing that last) that are painted as Greenskins/Blueskins which I rationalize as body painting/dyeing based on religious/philosophical leanings of a particular faction/tribe. It simply is not worth my time to destroy a serviceable paint job to substitute my own inferior work.
Well, there's nothing wrong with goblins being any colour under the sun! :) My original post wasn't designed to inveigh against any specific gaming practices - or, heaven forfend, goblin colours! - but to explore the ways in which some of the tropes of Middle Earth gaming are quite far removed from Tolkien's Middle Earth.
I recall seeing very nice-looking blue Ral Partha orcs in the dim and distant past - perhaps in an early White Dwarf?
I don't mind the single poses for mob units ... but the revitalization of adventurer or leader figures equipped for more than just hack and slash would be welcome to me.
I think single-pose units can look really good too. What I was thinking of by "wargamefication" was not so much single poses as the figures being sculpted only with weapons and armour, rather than with knapsacks, game animals, trophies, water bottles and so on.
I am trying to figure out how to represent a supply train for a Goblin army where the pack animals wouldn't be eaten before the battle. Slave humanoid burden bearers perhaps?
What about lobotomised ogres? Citadel used to do a lovely slave ogre. Or some sort of large, scaly beast?
And agreed that the army leader doesn't just have to be an Orc/Goblin because the mass of the army is Goblins. Sitting Tolkien aside, (heresy though it seems to me at times) why not a rogue Dwarf or renegade Elf leading the host??
Yes indeed! A haughty, superbly dressed and generally disdainful elf surrounded by a horde of his slavering minions has a tremendous appeal - with shades of Bowie in Labyrinth. I like the dwarf idea too - and it could even work in Middle Earth. The dwarf Mim hires Orcish mercenaries in the Book of Lost Tales, and Tolkien says in The Hobbit that Orcs have even made alliances with wicked dwarves ...
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<SNIP>
I think single-pose units can look really good too. What I was thinking of by "wargamefication" was not so much single poses as the figures being sculpted only with weapons and armour, rather than with knapsacks, game animals, trophies, water bottles and so on.
<SNIP>
I think it is a result of the idea that warriors strip off all the impedimenta except weapons, armor, (no "u" ;) ) shield, etc., before combat. Which goes back to the balance between war games and FRPG games. As primarily a war gamer currently (convince my wife to return to FRPGs and I would have a sea change in my approach.)
There are no supply trains in dungeon crawls. :o lol You have what you carry.
Though my last buy of fantasy figured larger than 15/18mm was from Reaper and the figures had more than just their combat gear (much more in some cases) in many cases. Those would be fine for skirmish games but painting a couple hundred of them in all their finery would be beyond my talents and patience.
That said I have this lingering desire for a unit or two of marching with gear/supply train figures.
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There are, of course, a few takes on the whole "stripped down for war" idea and "carrying lots of soldiering equipment" idea. People seem to be referring to one or the other as the "normal" look of a warrior (or orc, in this case), but we could probably look at the situation from the point of view of both being possible - the orc carries his pack, water bottle, pouch with whetstone, etc., in the same way that modern soldiers carry something like 85 pounds of equipment, but in the moment before battle is joined, the pack/satchel is thrown to the ground. My preference for a "characterful" miniature is one with all the little bits of equipment. It takes longer to paint such a miniature, which may explain the movement away from those sorts of miniatures to the ones with just weapons and armour (with a "u" :o because I was raised and educated in Ireland) that we began to see more of as gaming moved towards the "really big army" format. Maybe. Possibly.
As for Variags - I always thought of them as the LoTR equivalent of Slavic peoples, maybe from the area (in the "real" world) "between" two continents. I never thought of them as Vikings, because for me the Rohirrim always had something of the Viking about them (albeit on horses, rather than in longships). But these, I guess, are the minor differences readers have regarding how they think certain characters look, and then when they share this "assumption" they are often shocked to learn that not everyone shares it, although in fact in general very few of these ideas about how different characters look are shared by readers. Which is why, of course, film/TV adaptations of well-loved book are usually so contentious.
Orcs, though, of all shapes and sizes with all of the equipment of a campaign strapped to them - that's what I loved in an Orc miniature! A devil to paint, though....
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Hobgoblin, thank you for another eye-opening topic. I really enjoy your notes and ideas on "true" Middle-Earth.
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Oh yeah, I forgot to say, the original post of this thread is very informative and I really appreciate having the facts. Some of it I've read a number of times before, both on LAF and elsewhere, but this is the most exhaustive treatment of the "Tolkien's orcs" issue I've come across and much of it is new to me. Thanks hobgoblin!
Yeah, I've got to say, I do enjoy the 'classification' of Goblins as little greeblies, Orcs as bigger, tougher dudes, hobgoblins as eastern 'Mongol' type goblinoids and Half-Orcs as general cross-breeds. I even like the idea of the Black Orc as the hulking brute. having said that, they've all got too big for my taste - and not just GW, but all manufacturers have gone the same way.
I like the idea of sticking closer to Tolkein as regards the proportions perhaps, but keeping to a standard use of the names with which I am familiar. My perfect style of Orc is probably the 80's and early 90's fellas, with barrel chests and crooked, sinewy limbs. Goblins should be very small and, as Hob says, Hobbit sized.
The realisation hadn't quite coalesced in my mind until now, but I agree with you - making orcs bigger and bigger does not make them better as a concept. Now that I think about it, my ideal "baseline" orc for a well-crafted fantasy setting (one that strays a reasonable bit from "Tolkien orthodoxy" but leaves the kitchen sink well enough alone) would be somewhat shorter than a man (but perhaps equal in bulk). Going from there, some of the rarer orcs might be a fair bit bigger than baseline, and goblins would be quite smaller to varying degrees.
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Fantastic post, Hobgoblin. :) Right cheered me up, that has.
I only take the orcish bits seriously! Honest ... well, apart from the trolls and the balrogs ... ;)
We need to get you onto the subject of how skinny elves were, and how pointy their ears. lol
As this discussion is now touching on fantasy worlds that Tolkien didn't create, I think that the orcs, goblins and other "goblinoids" of non-Tolkien fantasy settings have plenty of self-worth as what they are (as opposed to what they're not, which is to say Tolkien's orcs).
Which would be fine, except the GW style orc seems to have become the default setting, and the most common type. DnD, WoW, Rackham, etc. etc. I think I've moaned about this before but we're at a point where e.g. Mantic and Shieldwolf can release green gorillas with tusked bucket-jaws, and someone'll wax lyrical about how they're totally different from GW orcs.
IIRC the most prominent Tolkien-ish (sorta kinda) orc release of recent years, outside of GW's LotR ranges, has been Wargames Factory's plastic set, with their delightful double-fronted torsos and mitten hands. And now their probable disappearance into a Warlord Games black hole, anyway. And that leads me to agree with your next point:
I'll go a bit OT here. While I find that some old ranges are unsatisfactory in terms of sculpting quality, I do agree that the "wargamefication" of orcs and goblins (and other fantasy classics) into figures lacking personality (by way of "standardised" poses, overly similar weapons, armour and clothing, and a "streamlining" of details) is a bad development. What I hate the most about it is that it's leading to a competitive culture of "haves and have-nots" among wargamers and miniatures collectors, a culture which boils down to owning difficult-to-acquire OOP figures.
While Hobgoblin's already pointed out that a lot are still in production, I have to think that they're not altogether visible or well-marketed. (Only just found out about some of them through Hob, myself) And although I've been tempted, I also have to agree that the sculpting is... to put it diplomatically, a bit 'aged'.
What we need is more new figures (not least of orcs and goblins) that aren't so "wargamefied", to replace (and improve upon) those that have gone OOP and to provide a better alternative to modern "wargamefied" ranges like GW and Mantic.
I've thought of giving it a try. Short orcs are already part of my little fantasy background.
But it'll probably take years.
And someone'll come along and do it better anyway. ;D
I am trying to figure out how to represent a supply train for a Goblin army where the pack animals wouldn't be eaten before the battle.
Trussed-up wargs. So mad that you dared tie them to a cart, that they'll eat you before the battle.
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IIRC the most prominent Tolkien-ish (sorta kinda) orc release of recent years, outside of GW's LotR ranges, has been Wargames Factory's plastic set, with their delightful double-fronted torsos and mitten hands. And now their probable disappearance into a Warlord Games black hole, anyway.
I had to comment on this - I managed to get hold of two boxes of these mitten-handed abominations. I built 3 of the little darlings and decided "Wow, these suck!" The only useful bits out of the box for me were the heads and the crescent shields. I was able to go forward with my Dragon Rampant Hobgoblin army using these bits in conjunction with Frostgrave soldier and cultist bodies and Fireforge Foot Sergeants bodies. Arms came from these sets as well.
Trussed-up wargs. So mad that you dared tie them to a cart, that they'll eat you before the battle.
Now that's funny!
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Now if only someone could write something similar about Elves,not I unfortunately,my expression is rubbish ;D
Again; well done Hobgoblin,an excellent example of LAF at it's best!
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I like the WGF Orcs! I use the bodies and then add arms from the German warband kit, and will mix in other parts when I can.
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Very nice read there Hobgoblin. In LOTR gaming terms I really think that the best range of orcs/uruks/goblins are the Asgard ones. They come in a variety of different sizes and have a stooped look to them.
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With orcs, I tend to try different things with them as the one most tend to think of ends up being something that feels far to much like a Saturday morning cartoon villain group. Games Workshop tended to be a major contributor to that, and WarCraft has tended to go to far into the "misunderstood" victims side.
The big thing I've gone with in the warbands I've been working on and for the D&D setting I've been hammering out is taking them in a more nomadic trader type culture. They've got mammoth caravans that wander around while still taking a lot of the barbarian aesthetic for them.
Not Tolkien, but not the parody versions there.
The major setting I've used for a while has highly militaristic orcs and goblins in it, one where there had been a magical war that went, essentially, nuclear and left a good portion of the world in ruins. Orcs and the goblinoids descended from the military caste of one side of that and had been selectively bred for their military then, a process that, somewhat, continued with the clans having keepers of the lines as a major part of the culture where they are still trying to improve their warriors by pairing the best of them...
Managed to really creep out a few players in that one when they discovered that part of the setting.
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Great discussion. I agree with the original post in regard to Tolkien and his orcs. However...
As this discussion is now touching on fantasy worlds that Tolkien didn't create, I think that the orcs, goblins and other "goblinoids" of non-Tolkien fantasy settings have plenty of self-worth as what they are (as opposed to what they're not, which is to say Tolkien's orcs). Otherwise we may as well be sniping at Tolkien also - he's hardly innocent of engaging in the bastardisation of concepts that weren't his at first.
I do find Tolkien's legendarium, in its unadulterated and "correctly understood" form, a refreshing counterpoint to the D&D-derived traditions of fantasy, but my point is that they all have self-worth independently of each other. Even GW's gorillaform orcs have their place in the fauna (although I'm not overfond of them myself).
That's how I feel as well. As much as I love Tolkien's work, I can also appreciate other visions. Generally, I gravitate towards the term and concepts of "goblins" in gaming, though, as "orc" still has a more Tolkienesque connotation for me. I can keep the idea of a mischievous fairy "goblin" or a scheming murderous villain "goblin" separate from a Tolkien "goblin."
Which would be fine, except the GW style orc seems to have become the default setting, and the most common type. DnD, WoW, Rackham, etc. etc. I think I've moaned about this before but we're at a point where e.g. Mantic and Shieldwolf can release green gorillas with tusked bucket-jaws, and someone'll wax lyrical about how they're totally different from GW orcs.
I would tend to agree with this too. I think it's clear that they were riding coat-tails with their designs. Certainly not the first to do so, either.
I do admit to having a fondness for Foundry's largest great orc/ogre mercenaries, or at least the largest, foppish ones. But as stated above, that's something entirely different from Tolkien to me.
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That's how I feel as well. As much as I love Tolkien's work, I can also appreciate other visions. Generally, I gravitate towards the term and concepts of "goblins" in gaming, though, as "orc" still has a more Tolkienesque connotation for me. I can keep the idea of a mischievous fairy "goblin" or a scheming murderous villain "goblin" separate from a Tolkien "goblin."
Yes - that's exactly how I feel. I read somewhere (probably on the Fabled Lands blog) that the writers of the wonderful Dragon Warriors RPG were forced by their publisher (if I recall correctly) to include orcs along side their well-developed folkloric goblins and hobgoblins. Their hobgoblins are smaller and wizened and more magically powerful than their goblins, whose magical knowledge extended to mere cantrips.
I should stress again that my original points are only intended to apply to Middle Earth gaming - and are observations rather than prescriptions! (No one should take seriously a crank ranting about goblins on the internet! ;))
The point I was really getting at is that there is a lot of Middle Earth gaming material that purports to be based on the books, but is really based on accretions of "non-canonical" info - from the various encyclopaedias of Middle Earth to Merp and beyond. One thing I saw, for example, on the internet was a painstaking recreation of the Battle of the Fords of the Isen - except that it stated that the Uruk-hai killed Theodred (they didn't, in Tolkien's writing; it was the axe-armed "Men or Orc-Men", who are clearly distinguished from the uruks).
Now, there's nothing wrong with gaming Middle Earth "non-canonically". But I think one of the attractions of the setting is that there's so much material that you can actually dig into it a bit and uncover certain points. In that respect, Tolkien gaming is perhaps more like historical gaming than most fantasy games.
That said, I was thinking about a game of the Battle of the Five Armies. If I were to use my distinctly non-LotR "cave goblins" (who owe their colouration to Alan Garner's The Weirdstone of Brisingamen - see below) for the orc armies, they actually contradict nothing in the text of The Hobbit. In that respect, it would be no different from an illustrator illustrating The Hobbit solely on the basis of the info it contains - which is a perfectly good approach (and what most illustrators, beyond the "Tolkien specialists", actually do with the book). These guys don't fit at all with the LotR descriptions, though - or those in the wider "mythology".
I do admit to having a fondness for Foundry's largest great orc/ogre mercenaries, or at least the largest, foppish ones. But as stated above, that's something entirely different from Tolkien to me.
The Foundry orc mercenaries have a rather wonderful Puss in Boots quality, I think - you can imagine them disporting themselves in lavish but ill-kempt chateaux.
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As this discussion is now touching on fantasy worlds that Tolkien didn't create, I think that the orcs, goblins and other "goblinoids" of non-Tolkien fantasy settings have plenty of self-worth as what they are (as opposed to what they're not, which is to say Tolkien's orcs). Otherwise we may as well be sniping at Tolkien also - he's hardly innocent of engaging in the bastardisation of concepts that weren't his at first.
I do find Tolkien's legendarium, in its unadulterated and "correctly understood" form, a refreshing counterpoint to the D&D-derived traditions of fantasy, but my point is that they all have self-worth independently of each other. Even GW's gorillaform orcs have their place in the fauna (although I'm not overfond of them myself).
But the central point surely, is that it's all derived from Tolkien?
Of course there were goblins, elves and dwarves before Tolkien, in everything from Norse mythology, to Shakespeare and the Brothers Grimm, and widespread in folklore of many cultures for centuries. But these were very different from the serious 'races' that Tolkien created. And orcs specifically, were his invention. So to say there are alternative, 'non-Tolkien fantasy settings', or a 'D&D derived' fantasy setting involving orcs, which are somehow original and owe nothing to Tolkien misses the point. They are ALL derived from Tolkien. Every single wacky little games company or kickstarter running today, churning out yet more green-skinned, Mockney 'orcs', can trace a line back to Tolkien's original creation. The whole massive fantasy wargames industry is derived from Tolkien. Because if Tolkien had not defined (or redefined) orcs/goblins, elves and dwarves in his books, there would be no D&D or Warhammer or all their thousands of imitators and spin-offs - miniatures, RPGs, books, films, and so on.
You may be right that many of these legions of sub-Tolkien creations and settings now have self-worth independent of each other. But Hobgoblin's central point is (and I paraphrase) that most wargamers' notion of orcs in 2016 bears little or no relation to the orcs invented and described by Tolkien. Over the course of 70-odd years, his creations have been taken up, commercialised, bastardised and distorted to such an extent, by tens of thousands of people riding on the great man's coattails, that if you now go back to the source material, and want to portray the Middle Earth described in Tolkien's books, 99% of the commercially available orcs from wargames figure makers, look nothing like it. Basically, through a process of evolution, Tolkien's original concepts have been hijacked, gradually bent out of shape, and redefined in the popular imagination for two generations of gamers. And it's the ersatz image which has stuck, and not the original.
Which is, for me at least, a pity :)
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To add another stem to the argument, I'd have to say that one of my formative images of Orcs are from Ralph Bakshi's version of Lord of the Rings, mainly as I would have seen it for the first time around about the time I first read the books. How do we think they fit in with the changing image of Tolkien's creations?
(http://media-cache-ec0.pinimg.com/736x/f6/14/c8/f614c8f7c014704b4ce8a1d67307ff85.jpg)
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Whiskey Priest, I love those Bakshi Orcs! Always look menacing and the shear diversity of forms was great. The black riders were well done too. Not sure about the Balrog...
I'm with Captain Blood. You can do what you like with Goblins, but call them Orcs and you are referencing Tolkien. Otherwise, why call them Orcs at all? I agree that all of our modern fantasy tropes (or at least the majority) derive from Tolkien. Ask a person one hundred years ago what an Elf is (faery, fey, inhuman, magical, cruel, immortal), and you'd get a totally different answer compared to asking someone these days (human sized, pointy ears, immortal, noble, wise, kind).
Oh and Hobgoblin, I can't get enough of your Orcs!
EvilD
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Oh, and another point on the figures available these days. What wargaming/GW has led to is the idea of miniatures made to look good in regiments. This has meant (certainly in the early days) lots of regimented poses, with commonality of weapons and kit, and finally of appearance. Even now with more variation in poses, the models are the same sized and armed the same way. They may have their weapons in different positions etc., but they look like an army of clones.
People come in all shapes and sizes, fat, thin, handsome, ugly. What I love about the miniatures that Hobgoblin has shown is that they look like individuals, like each one is a character and has a story to tell. They are a joy to paint, and even if you bring a common style to them as I and Hobgoblin have done with ours (I'm a fellow pre-slotta enthusiast), they still look like individuals. This is true of many of the early miniature designs, which were built for RPGing I believe - they certainly look like the sculptor just made what they fancied rather than churning out multitudes of basically the same figure. I think there is some desire to go back that way in miniature design, especially with the popularity of skirmish games, but I lost interest in Citadel when they stopped making characterful RPG models and started churning out armies. Not my bag at all.
EvilD
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Well done Hobgoblin for a great initial post and I've enjoyed reading through this thread.
My own orcs are a wide mixture of types from Chronicle and Asgard to Vendal and Ral Partha. 400+ figures and not a single slota-based GW amongst them. Many I've painted myself, but a lot of the older models are ones I've picked up ready-painted secondhand. Although I mainly use them for gaming Middle Earth, I am aware that many of them are really too big for what they are representing. However at the end of the day, if I liked the models, I bought them. My main criteria was that the captured the "feel" of Tolkien's works, rather than that of D&D or GW. I played D&D in the 70s and owed appropriate orc models, but they were never part of my ME armies.
As an old fart my view of orcs is more influenced by Tolkien's writings and the artworks of the 1960s and 70s, rather than Peter Jackson's films. I enjoyed both trilogies, but (for me) they were just NOT Tolkien!
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So to say there are alternative, 'non-Tolkien fantasy settings', or a 'D&D derived' fantasy setting involving orcs, which are somehow original and owe nothing to Tolkien
I didn't say this. D&D is derived from Tolkien. Many other fantasy settings are derived from D&D in the first order, and Tolkien in the second order. "Non-Tolkien fantasy settings" simply means fantasy settings which the man himself did not directly craft. Non-Tolkien, not non-Tolkienesque. I doubt Tolkien himself (persnickety man prone to a disapproving attitude as he was) would have labelled Greyhawk, the Warhammer world or the Warcraft world "Tolkien fantasy settings" ;)
They are ALL derived from Tolkien. Every single wacky little games company or kickstarter running today, churning out yet more green-skinned, Mockney 'orcs', can trace a line back to Tolkien's original creation. The whole massive fantasy wargames industry is derived from Tolkien. Because if Tolkien had not defined (or redefined) orcs/goblins, elves and dwarves in his books, there would be no D&D or Warhammer or all their thousands of imitators and spin-offs - miniatures, RPGs, books, films, and so on.
No disagreement from me :)
You may be right that many of these legions of sub-Tolkien creations and settings now have self-worth independent of each other. But Hobgoblin's central point is (and I paraphrase) that most wargamers' notion of orcs in 2016 bears little or no relation to the orcs invented and described by Tolkien.
I think the point was that most wargamers' notion of the orcs of Tolkien's legendarium bears little or no resemblance to the orcs invented and described by Tolkien. Certainly D&D, Warhammer and the rest of it have had a damaging "backfeed effect" on Tolkien's legendarium. But just to be clear, I think the blame for that lies on the collective of wargamers and other fantasy aficionados making that conflation, as opposed to the "alternative" fantasy settings themselves, or their creators. Gygax and other people like him crafting Tolkien-derived fantasy settings weren't (presumably) trying to impose themselves on Tolkien. The public at large just made it turn out like that anyway.
Over the course of 70-odd years, his creations have been taken up, commercialised, bastardised and distorted to such an extent, by tens of thousands of people riding on the great man's coattails, that if you now go back to the source material, and want to portray the Middle Earth described in Tolkien's books, 99% of the commercially available orcs from wargames figure makers, look nothing like it. Basically, through a process of evolution, Tolkien's original concepts have been hijacked, gradually bent out of shape, and redefined in the popular imagination for two generations of gamers. And it's the ersatz image which has stuck, and not the original.
Which is, for me at least, a pity :)
I agree that it's a pity that Tolkien's image of orcs is less available in miniature form than many of the alternative images, especially the dominant gorillaform orcs (because in an ideal world there would be no "dominant" image). Tolkien's orcs have self-worth as well (obviously! :) ), so there ought to be miniatures for them, just as there ought to be miniatures for the alternative images that have self-worth, even the gorillaforms.
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Oh, and another point on the figures available these days. What wargaming/GW has led to is the idea of miniatures made to look good in regiments. This has meant (certainly in the early days) lots of regimented poses, with commonality of weapons and kit, and finally of appearance. Even now with more variation in poses, the models are the same sized and armed the same way. They may have their weapons in different positions etc., but they look like an army of clones.
That's the point I should have made when I was talking about "wargamefication". It's interesting to look at two of the best ranges of Citadel orcs (not very Tolkienesque, but wonderful in their own right): the C15 Armoured Orcs and the first slottabase Orcs (see below for both; both are by the Perrys).
One of the things that's so great about these is how varied they are. It's not just that they've got interesting details, but they've got tremendously varied equipment. They're not uniform and optimised for Warhammer. So, in the preslotta range, we get heavily armoured orcs with shields and two-handed weapons. We get orcs with javelins, and an armoured crossbowman. And we get a couple of orcs in heavy armour with shields and darts.
In the slottabased range, we get a leader in light armour with just a mace; he's a great figure, but he's not optimised for gaming (e.g. with a shield or a two-handed weapon) - and all the better for it (the original Grom was just the same). We get a cyclops orc with two scimitars, just for the hell of it. We get a couple of spearmen without shields. And we get a heavily armoured orc with a two-handed axe and a bow. But that variety wasn't to last. Soon after Kev Adams took over, Citadel's orcs became much more regimented: dual wielders; polearm types; those with "had weapon and shield"; and fairly uniform archers. The charming irregulars (who still owed a considerable debt to Tolkien - look at those bandy legs, scimitars and the proliferation of archers) were no more.
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I think the point was that most wargamers' notion of the orcs of Tolkien's legendarium bears little or no resemblance to the orcs invented and described by Tolkien.
Yes, I think that's really my point. I have no beef (pork?) with pig-faced orcs and the like; what really interests me here is the way in which gamers see the orcs of Middle Earth through a thick fog of often quite erratic interpretations.
Certainly D&D, Warhammer and the rest of it have had a damaging "backfeed effect" on Tolkien's legendarium. But just to be clear, I think the blame for that lies on the collective of wargamers and other fantasy aficionados making that conflation, as opposed to the "alternative" fantasy settings themselves, or their creators. Gygax and other people like him crafting Tolkien-derived fantasy settings weren't (presumably) trying to impose themselves on Tolkien. The public at large just made it turn out like that anyway.
I agree with this (and also with EvilDoctor, ZeroTwentyThree and Captain Blood that "orc" inevitably harks back to Tolkien to some extent). I think the Peter Jackson films are a good example, in many ways, as the material is approached through the game-influenced miasma that we're talking about. Look at how Jackson turns Gimli into a walking tank tooled up with god knows how many axes - and throwing axes: any time I see a thrown knife or axe in a fantasy film, I hear the rattle of D20s. And look how his uruks become tall, muscular, grunting monsters. Zak Sabbath, the guy who wrote Vornheim, said something to the effect that the third Hobbit film had little to do with Tolkien but was "the most Warhammer film ever".
I agree that it's a pity that Tolkien's image of orcs is less available in miniature form than many of the alternative images, especially the dominant gorillaform orcs (because in an ideal world there would be no "dominant" image). Tolkien's orcs have self-worth as well (obviously! :) ), so there ought to be miniatures for them, just as there ought to be miniatures for the alternative images that have self-worth, even the gorillaforms.
Yes. I don't like the recent gorillas, but then I love the old C15 armoured orcs - which have little flavour of Middle Earth either. And I think the Minifigs pig-faced orcs are superb too!
I did, however, feel a twinge of geeky self-righteousness when I read someone dismiss Jez Goodwin's sublime Asgard orcs as "not suitable as orcs, maybe OK for goblins"! ;)
I'm glad that lots of people seem to be enjoying this thread! For me, the most interesting "discovery" in writing the OP was the comment that the tracker makes about the "fighters" (i.e. the uruks) messing up the war. That served to confirm my long-held suspicion that most of the orcs who appear in the pages of LotR are actually uruks.
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This blog post (http://middenmurk.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/above-reek-and-trampled-dead.html) (from the excellent Middenmurk blog) has some excellent ideas of what can be done with the orc trope in gaming. He keeps the Tolkien original in the "Gongs" entry, but explores some of the derivative aspects - and adds some of his own. It's well worth a read.
By the way, the author gets Orknies from CS Lewis, who in turn got the from Beowulf's orcneas - which is where Tolkien got orcs in the first place.
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Thanks for starting this hobgoblin, really enjoying it.
I also consider the GW "Fantasy Tribes" pre slotta as some of the best goblins made but it might be simply nostalgia as they were some of the earliest figures i bought. I did a speed-repaint job on the army a couple of years ago after 30 years and unfortunately changed the skin from black to green (i actually wanted a reddish brown and used a maroon base colour. When you add yellow to make it lighter it goes green and i just accepted it.)
There are 3 or 4 non GW newer orcs in the pictures here.
(https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1708/24570395892_ba26480208_o.jpg)[/url]
(https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1522/24570396022_d27c8d585a_o.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/DrcGFo)
(https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1501/24060004544_2aafab2c71_o.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/DrcGHC)
I also used to have some of the Ral Partha goblins that are still partly available from Ral Partha europe and partly available (or will be) from Iron Winds in the USA.
The way the larger orcs fight in this crouched position behind their shields used to really make me think of the battles in the tunnel systems under the Misty Mountains and i used have hours of fun in the polystrene tunnels i built for them.
(https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1688/24060435284_2fbb6623e0_o.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/CE6P7y)
In 15mm the Khurusan Miniatures goblins seem to be very Tolkien in style. I will have to get some as i have the Blood Dawn orcs fromm Magister Militum which are nice miniatures but very GW in style.
.
(https://flic.kr/p/CE92a7)
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Zak Sabbath, the guy who wrote Vornheim, said something to the effect that the third Hobbit film had little to do with Tolkien but was "the most Warhammer film ever".
I enjoyed the LotR films quite a bit as something "inspired by" yet distinctly different from the books. But I was barely able to make it through that first Hobbit film, and never mustered the fortitude to see the second or third.
I should stress again that my original points are only intended to apply to Middle Earth gaming - and are observations rather than prescriptions! (No one should take seriously a crank ranting about goblins on the internet! Wink)
Understood. I think, as Roderic mentioned, that as the conversation grew, others were referencing the use of orc/orcs beyond Tolkien. And crank or not, I think it's apparent that quite a few of us are interested in such matters. ;) Thanks again for starting the discussion.
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To add another stem to the argument, I'd have to say that one of my formative images of Orcs are from Ralph Bakshi's version of Lord of the Rings, mainly as I would have seen it for the first time around about the time I first read the books. How do we think they fit in with the changing image of Tolkien's creations?
(http://media-cache-ec0.pinimg.com/736x/f6/14/c8/f614c8f7c014704b4ce8a1d67307ff85.jpg)
Oh man, those Bakshi orcs. Pure goodness.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_oBvNFMt9Ic
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But I was barely able to make it through that first Hobbit film, and never mustered the fortitude to see the second or third.
Wise choice. I didn't mind the first one too much (although the Goblin Town nonsense upset me) but sadly it was the high point for me.
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Steam Flunky, that's a superb horde of C16 goodness!
ZeroTwentythree/Cubs,
I only saw the first Hobbit film too - and that was enough. But the "gamefication" was all too clear in the heavily armed dwarves and the SuperMario goblin sequence - ugh!
This review (http://www.villagevoice.com/arts/reading-around-fantasies-tamed-and-not-7177075) of a book about gaming makes a nice point:
"All it takes to get caught up in this material is curiosity about why the trolls of Peter Jackson, which are of the high-def world of video games, seem so at odds with the trolls of Tolkien, which hail from the murky, unknowable world of fairy tales."
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Wise choice. I didn't mind the first one too much (although the Goblin Town nonsense upset me) but sadly it was the high point for me.
Yep. Adored the Lord of The Rings movies.
Hated a great deal about the Hobbit movies - except for Martin Freeman. The CGI overload really ruined so much of it, especially the orcs. A load of Kiwi extras in rubber suits were so much more believable and frightening than the ludicrous computer game characters of Azog and Bolg.
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For me, the whole Azog plotline was just bonkers. I have no problem at all with cutting bits out of stories in adaptation (I think the LotR films could have done with cutting more of the elves, for example). And I don't care what's added, so long as it's done well. But the Azog bit was just awful - shoehorned in to no good effect.
My main beef with the LotR films was with the sudden lapses of tone and taste: dwarf-tossing, endless Jet Set Will-style crumbling staircases, oliphaunt-surfing and - perhaps worst of all - the scenes with Theoden in Edoras. They did that brilliant bit with Eoywn and the flag, but then threw the audience into some zany kung-fu computer-game scene - and topped it off with an instant haircut and manicure for the king. What on earth was wrong with just letting an actor act?
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My main beef with the LotR films was with the sudden lapses of tone and taste: dwarf-tossing, endless Jet Set Will-style crumbling staircases, oliphaunt-surfing and - perhaps worst of all - the scenes with Theoden in Edoras.
Yes, those are things that rankled with me. A bit of a cop-out to chuck in such naff moments of light relief, which just jarred with the other 99% of the movies. Similarly the reduction of Merry and Pippin to almost entirely silly comic characters. Fine, so they come of age in the third film, but they were nothing like such a pair of idiotic nitwits in Tolkien...
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In short, all orcs are goblins, and all goblins are orcs.
I agree with this. There may be some slight indication of a sort of goblin<orc<hobgoblin hierarch in terms of size and ferocity in some places, but its far from definite or universal and I would not go out of my way to argue for it. I would just see this as variations within the overall race, rather than a true separate race.
In short, all uruks are orcs. And all uruks are goblin too!
I'm a bit less confident on this. Now, there were references for some of Sauron's orcs as "black uruks" which I think may have just been a descriptive term for a subset or tribe of orcs. However, to me TTT seems to make a definite distinction between normal orcs and Saruman's Uruk-hai, which are IIRC described as larger than other orcs, less bothered by sunlight (which was considered a common feature of the original evil races) and using more human style weapons and armor. Also, Gandalf(?) speculates at one point that the Uruk-hai may be the result of Saruman cross-breeding humans and orcs, which would imply they were somewhere between the two races in terms of size and strength. None of that justifies the big, strapping Uruk-hai of the movies, or course, although they do make for cool opponents for Rohan. ;)
It’s only later (in Flotsam and Jetsam) that we learn that there were many creatures like Bill Ferny’s friend in the armies of Isengard – and that there were “many” of them at Helm’s Deep. These are the same type of creatures that show up in The Scouring of the Shire – and they are clearly not the Uruk-hai.
Is it? I always took it that these were just examples of more Uruk-hai with enough human blood in them to pass as humans.
In the end, despite the endless world-building and background notes that JRR accumulated for Middle Earth, he did not AFAIK really address this definitively, leaving it open for interpretation.
Oh, and the orcs of Middle Earth aren’t green. But we all knew that – didn’t we? ;)
In that, we are in complete agreement! lol
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So... in the (perhaps vain) hope that this thread may serve as actual inspiration or reference for some "patron of the hobby" to sculpt or commission a new range of orcs in the orthodox Tolkienist tradition, what should they ideally look like? As in, what's the nitty-gritty brief that one would send to a sculptor if one was commissioning the actual figures? (To be clear, I'm not planning to do any such thing - unless I win the lottery - but I think it worth going over, anyway.)
Some aspects to think about, beginning with the assumption of "baseline" (non-uruk) orcs:
1. Body shape and size? Based on what's been said in this thread, I'm imagining bandy legs and stooped postures which make them about the height of dwarves, or perhaps slightly taller than that but certainly shorter than men. Would they be the bulk of dwarves though, or more like the bulk of men (who I assume are greater in bulk than dwarves due simply to having more height over which to distribute that bulk), given that their stooped, bandy-legged nature could potentially still make them quite bulky despite their dwarf-like height? Also, is it wrong of me to imagine that their legs would be somewhat shorter but their arms somewhat longer than those of a human? Or that their heads would be quite big but their necks quite short? These aspects haven't been mentioned in this thread (other than the big heads), but they just feel right to me. Agree/disagree?
2. Any clue in the source material as to what their faces ought to look like? Long noses, stubby snouts, or neither of the above? Fangs? Sloping foreheads? Wide, predatory-looking mouths? Overbites or underbites? What size eyes? What shape ears? Should their facial features vary to a greater extent than do those of us humans, so that for instance one might have a cartoonishly long and sharp nose, and another might have a stubby snout? Should their facial expressions convey vicious, bloodthirsty wickedness or more of a cowed, self-loathing misery?
3. Hair? How much of it?
4. Viewing the above questions in a somewhat different light, how much should they look like human actors trying to look like orcs, like many of the GW LotR/Hobbit figures do? I mean, I get (and agree with) Captain Blood's point that the "actors in rubber suits" of the LotR films beat the "video game characters" of the Hobbit films (even if I personally am equally lukewarm to both trilogies, overall), but still, excluding CGI, there's only so much you can do to make a human actor look non-human no matter the budget. You can give him a prosthetic nose, brow, cheekbones, chin, etc., change his hairline and do some other stuff like that, but you can't make his eyes closer together or wider apart, or his mouth unnaturally wide, or make the nose simply go away, or make the forehead more sloping (without the addition of a prosthetic brow protruding dramatically over the eyepits), or change the overall structure of the face to a more animal-like one that has the eyes more "at the sides" and less "at the front", and so on. You can make him adopt a stooped pose but you can't make his arms unnaturally long or his neck unnaturally short. So, given that you can do all of these things with miniatures, should you? To be honest, one of my main gripes with many of the GW LotR/Hobbit orcs is that they look a bit too much like miniatures of human actors in costume. Meanwhile, I get that there's such a thing as overly cartoonish orcs/goblins as well.
5. What kind of clothing, how much of it, and how much variety of it? Some orc/goblin miniature ranges manage to pull off a fairly "uniform" look quite well (especially the Vendel/SGMM goblins), but most of the best ranges I've seen go for a lot of variety. At any rate, does the source material offer any hints in this regard? Would there be a tendency for a specific style of dress, such as robes (as with the Bakshi orcs), or tunics with naked legs, or conversely trousers with naked torsos, or an abundance of furs and animal skins covering most of the body, or something else? If indeed they are clever and technologically sophisticated, does that mean they wear "well-crafted" clothes of their own making? Any indications in the source material of decorative garments? And what about boots, belts/straps, cloaks and other practicalities of that sort?
6. What style of armour and weaponry, how much of it, and how much variety of it? Scimitars instead of straight swords? Axes, spears, maces? "Funny" weapons like flails, tridents and spiked wooden clubs? Bows or crossbows? Thrown weapons like javelins? Chainmail, plated mail, leather armour, or not much body armour at all? What shape/size shields? What general aesthetic of their crafted items (eg. jagged, angular and "industrial" like in the Peter Jackson films, or vaguely oriental, or that iconic Angus McBride aesthetic which Wargames Factory and Khurasan have imitated)? How crude or well-crafted? How decorative? How much of a "mass-produced" look (as for instance with the Peter Jackson uruk-hai)?
7. How many discernible "combat roles"? Should there be dedicated archers or crossbow-users separate from the melee fighters, or is it more of one big mob wherein some of the orcs happen to also have missile weapons? Who (as in which variety of orcs) would the wolfriders be, and would they use missile weapons at all? Also, absolutely no "shamans" or other magic-users of any sort?
8. Keep in mind, all of the above questions have mainly been to do with the baseline orcs so far - the ones that aren't uruks and (accepting Hobgoblin's theory that uruks would have been the brunt of the orc armies by the end of the Third Age) would have been the regular soldiers before uruks came along. So, what is their role "in orchood" relative to the other types of orcs, and how does that inform the above questions, like what size they should be and how well-equipped?
9. What, then, can we say about uruks regarding all the above questions? How would their physical appearance, clothing, armour, armaments and combat roles differ from the baseline?
10. And man-orcs? How do their differences from orcs and uruks manifest in all the above respects? Would they just physically look like ordinary men but with orcish faces? Would their clothes, weapons and armour be more "mannish" in appearance? From a practical point of view, could man-orc figures be converted out of suitably warlike (or thug-like) human figures with head swaps and perhaps some weapon swaps and shield swaps, or are they more distinctive-looking than that?
11. Finally, is there a point thinking about "extra small" orcs as a separate grouping, such as might be encountered as "local tribes" (though "tribe" is probably not the right word) in the mountains, forests and other wild places all over Middle Earth? If so, what could be said about them apropos all of the above questions?
TLDR: Don't really know how to write a TLDR for this one, sorry :)
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While Games Workshop's LOTR Orcs may not be entirely faithful to Tolkein's descriptions, what they are certainly not like are Warhammer Orcs. If you want to follow Tolkein, you could do worse than just use "Moria Goblins" for every kind of Orc (about the size of a dwarf with squat, bent legged poses) and just not paint them green. Maybe use some of the standard Orcs as "black uruks of Mordor".
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When I read your opening post, I just thought, 'yeah so, we know this already'. As the thread went on, I realised 'no, its me, it's because I've been obsessed with Tolkien for 35 years'.
I've also been a gamer for as long, and I have to say I've still never found a range of orcs/ goblins that fits my mental image of Tolkien's evil race. Considering I've been in the figure industry for 28 years, it's a bit pathetic of me to have not done them myself. Maybe I should start a vanity project.
I have noticed that over the past few years Orcs are starting to have a life of their own in mainstream culture, and it's the 'green gorilla' variety rather than Tolkiens, I'm thinking World of Warcraft in particular. Everytime I see them, I just keep thinking 'The biggest orcs are just man sized!'
Apart from the ramblings above, I thought I'd throw something useful into the debate.
One of the really interesting snippets of information I got from Christopher Tolkiens 'Morgoths Ring' on Orcs was the idea that Orc armies were led by Boldogs, spirits of evil like but lesser than Balrogs, who took Orc form to lead the legions. The histories of Middle-Earths wars talk about Orc captains re-appearing in battle long after the life-span of men.
I've never seen this in any wargame ruleset, immortal spirits/ demons leading Orc armies. What an idea!
Nick
North Star
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Hmm, I wrote my post while Rhoderic was doing his!
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I agree with this. There may be some slight indication of a sort of goblin<orc<hobgoblin hierarch in terms of size and ferocity in some places, but its far from definite or universal and I would not go out of my way to argue for it. I would just see this as variations within the overall race, rather than a true separate race.
The term hobgoblin is used just twice in the works Tolkien published: both times in The Hobbit. The first time is when he says that orc is usually translated as "goblin", but that "hobgoblin" can be used for the larger kinds. The second time is when Gandalf says that the Grey Mountains are "stiff with goblins and hobgoblins and orcs of the worst description". So the inference is that the latter use is definitely synonymia (repeating different words for the same thing: he's already told us that goblin = orc, and that a hobgoblin is a big orc (or goblin). But note that "hobgoblin" appears to be an optional term, because the very biggest goblins (the Great Goblin, Azog, Bolg and Bolg's guards) are all just described as "goblins". So hobgoblins must be a subset of goblins (and orcs). We actually know that Tolkien abandoned the term "hobgoblin" when he found out that, etymologically speaking, it originally meant a smaller or more domestic goblin ("Robin goblin"). I think it's pretty clear that he replaced it with "uruk" - the word that's used in LotR for the bigger goblins.
But there's one thing that's unarguable: in LotR, even the biggest orcs are called goblins. The Uruk-hai of Isengard are called goblins twice explicitly and once implicitly. (And if you look at the early drafts of Helm's Deep, they are called goblins all the more.) In fact, "goblin" is used to describe big orcs in LotR more often than it's used to describe small orcs. I don't think there's any significance to that beyond the fact that most of the orcs encountered are big soldier-orcs rather than the smaller breeds: Tolkien did, after all, say that the words were synonyms. The other point is that Tolkien clearly began to prefer the Germanic "orc" to the Romance "goblin" as a word - which is why "goblin" predominates in The Hobbit and "orc" predominates in LotR.
Re:In short, all uruks are orcs. And all uruks are goblin too! I'm a bit less confident on this. Now, there were references for some of Sauron's orcs as "black uruks" which I think may have just been a descriptive term for a subset or tribe of orcs. However, to me TTT seems to make a definite distinction between normal orcs and Saruman's Uruk-hai, which are IIRC described as larger than other orcs, less bothered by sunlight (which was considered a common feature of the original evil races) and using more human style weapons and armor.
I wonder, did you misread my sentence in bold? :) I mean that all uruks are goblins (orcs), not that all goblins (orcs) are uruks! The latter is clearly not true, because Tolkien tells us that the word uruk was "applied as a rule only for the great soldier-orcs that at this time issued from Mordor and Isengard".
The uruks of Mordor - "black orcs of great strength"; "large and evil: black Uruks of Mordor" - are definitely a subset of orcs (the uruks are the big fighters, bred in the Third Age, about 500 years before the events of the book), as are the Uruk-hai of Isengard (who are also described as "black uruks" in The Battle of the Fords of the Isen and as "great uruks" in the Appendices of LotR). It seems pretty clear that Uruk-hai means something like "uruk-folk"; Christopher Tolkien says that "uruks" is an "Anglicisation" of Uruk-hai.
Now, there does seem to be something different about Saruman's uruks. Eomer says that they are "stronger and more fell" than other orcs, and Aragorn remarks on their man-like equipment. Yet they don't seem to be that different: the narrative voice generally describes them simply as "orcs", and if they're bigger and tougher than the Mordor uruks (presumably) under Grishnakh's command, then it's a marginal advantage: Grishnakh and Ugluk are contrasted as a pair with the smaller Northerners, and when the Mordor-orcs fall in behind the Isengarders on the run, the narrator says that it's not clear whether this was because the Isengarders were hardier or because Grishnakh had some cunning plan.
Sunlight is an interesting issue. The Northerners definitely don't like it, and Ugluk seems to ascribe this to their lack of training - but he also acknowledges that the "mountain maggots" can "see like gimlets in the dark". But there's no suggestion that the Mordor-orcs are bothered by the sun: they seem to be able to keep up pretty well with the Isengarders, and don't seem particularly scared of the Isengarders (Grishnakh is severely undermanned when he confronts Ugluk).
Re:In short, all uruks are orcs. And all uruks are goblin too! Also, Gandalf(?) speculates at one point that the Uruk-hai may be the result of Saruman cross-breeding humans and orcs, which would imply they were somewhere between the two races in terms of size and strength. None of that justifies the big, strapping Uruk-hai of the movies, or course, although they do make for cool opponents for Rohan. ;)
It's not quite that clear-cut - mostly, I think, because Tolkien kept changing his mind about what orcs (and thus uruks) actually were. Treebeard speculates that Saruman has been "doing something to them" - "Are they Men he has ruined, or has he blended the races of Orcs and Men?". If I remember, though, Tolkien somewhere (Letters?) refers to Treebeard's speech here and says that he's wrong about some things ("he does not know everything").
The thing is, the narrative voice only tells us that the Isengard uruks are "large orcs". Whatever they are, there is not doubt that they are orcs - and they're described as orcs by the narrative voice again and again. They seem generally to be bigger than the Mordor uruks, but not always: the biggest orc in Moria is "A huge orc-chieftain, almost Man-high", whereas Ugluk is merely "a large black orc". It's the equipment of the Isengarders that raises Aragorn's eyebrows, not their physiology - which, given the size of the uruk chieftain in Moria, should be no surprise: Aragorn has recently killed an even bigger orc.
Is it? I always took it that these were just examples of more Uruk-hai with enough human blood in them to pass as humans.
Well, given that they don't remind anyone of the Uruk-hai and they're never identified with them, and they're called "Men" rather than "Orcs" ... ;) They do remind the hobbits of Bill Ferny's Southron friend, however. And they're marching with the Men, rather than with the Orcs. Equally, when the hobbits encounter the same sort of creature in the Shire, they're reminded of Bill Ferny's friend and these marchers, not the countless uruks they've collectively encountered elsewhere.
Also, in The Battle of the Fords of the Isen, a clear distinction is drawn between the "fierce" and "black" uruks on the one hand and the Men or Orc-Men, "ferocious, mail-clad, armed with axes", who kill Theodred.
So, there are very clearly two classes of creature. Are they both products of Saruman's experiments? Ye, it would seem so. But they're very clearly distinguished.
[/b] In the end, despite the endless world-building and background notes that JRR accumulated for Middle Earth, he did not AFAIK really address this definitively, leaving it open for interpretation. [/quote]
Well, I think he hummed and hawed on what the Isengard uruks actually were, because he could never decide what orcs in general were (the elf-origin story is just one of about a dozen notions that he toyed with). But he does seem to have finally decided on Saruman's creatures, given this passage in Morgoth's Ring (which postdates LotR):
""There is no doubt that long afterwards, in the Third Age, Saruman rediscovered this, or learned of it in lore, and in his lust for mastery committed this, his wickedest deed: the interbreeding of Orcs and Men, producing both Men-orcs large and cunning, and Orc-men treacherous and vile.""
Again, this distinguishes between two types of creature: essentially ~orcs and ~men. And that's exactly what we see in LotR.
And yes, not a hint of green skin among them! ;)
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because he could never decide what orcs in general were (the elf-origin story is just one of about a dozen notions that he toyed with).
Now, that's interesting! Do we know what the other notions were?
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Some aspects to think about, beginning with the assumption of "baseline" (non-uruk) orcs:
1. Body shape and size? Based on what's been said in this thread, I'm imagining bandy legs and stooped postures which make them about the height of dwarves, or perhaps slightly taller than that but certainly shorter than men. Would they be the bulk of dwarves though, or more like the bulk of men (who I assume are greater in bulk than dwarves due simply to having more height over which to distribute that bulk), given that their stooped, bandy-legged nature could potentially still make them quite bulky despite their dwarf-like height? Also, is it wrong of me to imagine that their legs would be somewhat shorter but their arms somewhat longer than those of a human? Or that their heads would be quite big but their necks quite short? These aspects haven't been mentioned in this thread (other than the big heads), but they just feel right to me. Agree/disagree?
My contention would be that uruks pretty much are the baseline for the latter part of the Third Age. They seem to be a minority, though, in the Misty Mountains, where there are lots of the older breeds. I think the non-uruks would range in size from hobbit-sized to dwarf-sized, with uruks the size of large dwarves or slightly bigger. I think they would be quite bulky - "squat and broad", with proportionately large heads (this recurs in the published texts and is also noted in HoME). Short necks sound good - big heads lend themselves to thick necks (something I always found useful in rugby!).
2. Any clue in the source material as to what their faces ought to look like? Long noses, stubby snouts, or neither of the above? Fangs? Sloping foreheads? Wide, predatory-looking mouths? Overbites or underbites? What size eyes? What shape ears? Should their facial features vary to a greater extent than do those of us humans, so that for instance one might have a cartoonishly long and sharp nose, and another might have a stubby snout? Should their facial expressions convey vicious, bloodthirsty wickedness or more of a cowed, self-loathing misery?
Flat faces: in a letter, Tolkien specifies flat noses. "Protruding fangs" (seen on Shagrat) and "yellow fangs" on the Mordor-orc guard in Rohan. The letter specifies wide mouths:
"they are (or were) squat, broad, flat-nosed, sallow-skinned, with wide mouths and slant eyes; in fact degraded and repulsive versions of the (to Europeans) least lovely Mongol-types."
3. Hair? How much of it?
A human quantity of hair - and hairy arms. Presumably, they had facial hair too, though not long beards like dwarves - orcish beards might have been relatively scanty, given the "Mongol" connection in the letter.
4. Viewing the above questions in a somewhat different light, how much should they look like human actors trying to look like orcs, like many of the GW LotR/Hobbit figures do? I mean, I get (and agree with) Captain Blood's point that the "actors in rubber suits" of the LotR films beat the "video game characters" of the Hobbit films (even if I personally am equally lukewarm to both trilogies, overall), but still, excluding CGI, there's only so much you can do to make a human actor look non-human no matter the budget. You can give him a prosthetic nose, brow, cheekbones, chin, etc., change his hairline and do some other stuff like that, but you can't make his eyes closer together or wider apart, or his mouth unnaturally wide, or make the nose simply go away, or make the forehead more sloping (without the addition of a prosthetic brow protruding dramatically over the eyepits), or change the overall structure of the face to a more animal-like one that has the eyes more "at the sides" and less "at the front", and so on. You can make him adopt a stooped pose but you can't make his arms unnaturally long or his neck unnaturally short. So, given that you can do all of these things with miniatures, should you? To be honest, one of my main gripes with many of the GW LotR/Hobbit orcs is that they look a bit too much like miniatures of human actors in costume. Meanwhile, I get that there's such a thing as overly cartoonish orcs/goblins as well.
I think the same letter says that they are "essentially human" or words to that effect. But clearly their stances are very different: running bent over, with long arms almost trailing the ground.
5. What kind of clothing, how much of it, and how much variety of it? Some orc/goblin miniature ranges manage to pull off a fairly "uniform" look quite well (especially the Vendel/SGMM goblins), but most of the best ranges I've seen go for a lot of variety. At any rate, does the source material offer any hints in this regard? Would there be a tendency for a specific style of dress, such as robes (as with the Bakshi orcs), or tunics with naked legs, or conversely trousers with naked torsos, or an abundance of furs and animal skins covering most of the body, or something else? If indeed they are clever and technologically sophisticated, does that mean they wear "well-crafted" clothes of their own making? Any indications in the source material of decorative garments? And what about boots, belts/straps, cloaks and other practicalities of that sort?
Grishnakh has a knife with an ornamental hilt "shaped like a hideous head with squinting eyes and leering mouth".
We know their garb includes leather tunics and hairy breeches, and "heavy iron-nailed shoes". Some wear black cloaks.
6. What style of armour and weaponry, how much of it, and how much variety of it? Scimitars instead of straight swords? Axes, spears, maces? "Funny" weapons like flails, tridents and spiked wooden clubs? Bows or crossbows? Thrown weapons like javelins? Chainmail, plated mail, leather armour, or not much body armour at all? What shape/size shields? What general aesthetic of their crafted items (eg. jagged, angular and "industrial" like in the Peter Jackson films, or vaguely oriental, or that iconic Angus McBride aesthetic which Wargames Factory and Khurasan have imitated)? How crude or well-crafted? How decorative? How much of a "mass-produced" look (as for instance with the Peter Jackson uruk-hai)?
Most seem to use scimitars rather than straight swords, but the Isengard uruks use short, broad-bladed swords. Spears are common, with broad blades mentioned more than once. The uruk in "The Land of Shadow" has a short broad-bladed spear. Axes are mentioned in several places too, and long knives are common. At least one Mordor-orc has a short "broad-bladed stabbing-sword".
Crossbows are never mentioned anywhere in Middle Earth, as far as I know. The Isengarders have long bows of yew; the Mordor-orcs seem to have shorter bow of horn (i.e. composite bows).
They seem to wear a lot of mail, which they make themselves (The Battle of the Fords of the Isen notes that the Dunlendings generally lacked mail, because the only mail made in Isengard was the heavy, crude mail of the Orcs, made by them for their own purposes). Some orcs in Goblin-town are described as being in "full armour". Ring mail is noted too. Helmets can have nose guards and often have badges on the front.
Large round shields are mentioned for the Uruk-hai of Isengard. The Moria uruk chief has a broad shield covered in hide. He's also "clad from head to foot in black mail".
7. How many discernible "combat roles"? Should there be dedicated archers or crossbow-users separate from the melee fighters, or is it more of one big mob wherein some of the orcs happen to also have missile weapons? Who (as in which variety of orcs) would the wolfriders be, and would they use missile weapons at all? Also, absolutely no "shamans" or other magic-users of any sort?
No crossbow-men! ;) I don't think archers are separated from the melee fighters: all four of the dead uruks at Amon Hen have long yew bows, and the uruk in "The Land of Shadow" also has a bow at his back: he's a "big fighting orc". The impression given is that most orcs carry bows. Uruks seem to be unusually fast-moving, bow-armed heavy infantry. (small ones, mind!)
With wolfriders, it seems to be the wolf, rather than the orc, that the's main threat (hence my preference for using the Lesser Warbeast profile in Dragon Rampant, rather than one of the Rider ones). Archery isn't mentioned, but could be reasonably assumed, given the orcish preference for the bow (they achieve most of their notable kills through archery, it seems: Isildur, Balin, Boromir, etc.
8. Keep in mind, all of the above questions have mainly been to do with the baseline orcs so far - the ones that aren't uruks and (accepting Hobgoblin's theory that uruks would have been the brunt of the orc armies by the end of the Third Age) would have been the regular soldiers before uruks came along. So, what is their role "in orchood" relative to the other types of orcs, and how does that inform the above questions, like what size they should be and how well-equipped?
Well, I think most of the description quoted above actually refers to uruks. These are the "big fighting-orcs" that serve in Saruman and Sauron's wars. I guess that they're about the size of a dwarf - maybe a big dwarf - and that the very biggest might be about 5' (almost as tall as a man). But they are "squat and broad" (see "Helm's Deep"), and they're clearly very strong for their size.
Some of the smaller orcs might vary from the the norms above: the small tracker in Mordor is dressed in "ragged brow" and is the only orc specifically described as "black-skinned". The uruks are often described as "black" and "swart", but it's not quite clear what this means.
9. What, then, can we say about uruks regarding all the above questions? How would their physical appearance, clothing, armour, armaments and combat roles differ from the baseline?
As above, i think uruks are the baseline in the Third Age (outside the Misty Mountains). Presumably, they're better equipped than the smaller types.
10. And man-orcs? How do their differences from orcs and uruks manifest in all the above respects? Would they just physically look like ordinary men but with orcish faces?
Yes - they are described as Men, not orcs. It's their orcish faces that distinguish them:
"And there were battalions of Men, too. Many of them carried torches, and in the flare I could see their faces. Most of them were ordinary men, rather tall and dark-haired, and grim but not particularly evil-looking.But there were some others that were horrible: man-high, but with goblin-faces, sallow, leering, squint-eyed. Do you know, they reminded me at once of that Southerner at Bree; only he was not so obviously orc-like as most of these were."
10.Would their clothes, weapons and armour be more "mannish" in appearance? From a practical point of view, could man-orc figures be converted out of suitably warlike (or thug-like) human figures with head swaps and perhaps some weapon swaps and shield swaps, or are they more distinctive-looking than that?
I think head swaps or even distinctive painting/mild facial conversion would do the trick. There's a "not quite sure" aspect to them. At the Isen, they wear mail and carry axes:
"As soon as the enemy had gained possession of the eastern end of the Fords there appeared a company of men or Orc-men (evidently dispatched for the purpose), ferocious, mail-clad, and armed with axes."
These Orc-men are deployed because the Orcs are ineffective against the Rohirric shieldwall, owing to their small stature.
11. Finally, is there a point thinking about "extra small" orcs as a separate grouping, such as might be encountered as "local tribes" (though "tribe" is probably not the right word) in the mountains, forests and other wild places all over Middle Earth? If so, what could be said about them apropos all of the above questions?
I don't think so - at least not from anything in the books. Those suggest that, while there are different breeds, orcs essentially come in two sizes: small (snaga) and big (uruks). I think the Starbucks-style "small, medium, large" divisions are more or less an invention of Merp and other games. Now, there's obviously a continuum, but I don't think your "baseline orc" really exists. Some older breeds in the North and in certain parts of Mordor are small, but for 500 years by the time of LotR, the big ones have predominated in the armies of evil (and of course they've been sent by Sauron to the North too).
TLDR: Don't really know how to write a TLDR for this one, sorry :)
TLDR be damned! ;)
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I've never seen this in any wargame ruleset, immortal spirits/ demons leading Orc armies. What an idea!
The closest thing I can think of is Warhammer's Azhag the Slaughterer, who (if I remember rightly) was 'advised' (controlled) by a cursed crown he used to wear, which was possessed by some old wizard or something.
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Now, that's interesting! Do we know what the other notions were?
From memory:
Made from "heats and slimes of the earth";
Made from animated stone;
Some kind of "robot" puppet (playing "recordings" of speech - I think this one goes with one of the others);
Made from beasts;
Made from Men;
Made from Elves;
Made from the Druedain (woses);
Made from minor Maiar
Mixed origins.
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Thanks again. That's a decent amount of information to go on. You make a pretty convincing argument for the notion that there's just the two "size classes" of orc and that uruks are the brunt of the soldiery. I could still imagine non-soldier-orcs (ie. non-uruks) outnumbering the soldier-orcs, though.
Those alternative origin stories for orcs are very interesting - definitely in line with Tolkien's cosmological preoccupation in The Silmarillion. Reminds me of some contemplations I've had as to whether he intended for orcs to have souls or not, and if not (which seems likely as I think Mandos would otherwise have at least made some passing remark about the large numbers of broken elf-souls streaming into his halls ;) ), how it came about that beings without souls began to be born of beings with them. I'm sure I'm not the first one to have gotten snagged up on that detail, and considering some of the alternative origin stories (robot puppets, etc) it seems to have been part of the reason for Tolkien's own indecision as to what orcs are.
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My take on the Orcs/Goblins from the Silmarilion is a corrupted being, human, elf, whatever, not some uniform species in and of themselves, but an alteration of something else. I have been doing LOTR in 1/72 and chose to not use the Peter Jacksonesque Dark Alliance models...despite the fact that they are awesome. I use a mish mash of ancients.
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Thunderbolt Mountain Goblins as perfect Orcs? I think they hit all.the marks.
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The major setting I've used for a while has highly militaristic orcs and goblins in it, one where there had been a magical war that went, essentially, nuclear and left a good portion of the world in ruins. Orcs and the goblinoids descended from the military caste of one side of that and had been selectively bred for their military then, a process that, somewhat, continued with the clans having keepers of the lines as a major part of the culture where they are still trying to improve their warriors by pairing the best of them...
Sounds good. :) A wee hint of morlock?
I do admit to having a fondness for Foundry's largest great orc/ogre mercenaries, or at least the largest, foppish ones. But as stated above, that's something entirely different from Tolkien to me.
Despite being a bit bored of GW style orcs and Kev Adams' style, I have a sneaking liking for their regular orcs. Almost started buying them when God of Battles was the next big thing.
(No one should take seriously a crank ranting about goblins on the internet! ;))
Not so much ranting as preaching to the choir. :D
Now, there's nothing wrong with gaming Middle Earth "non-canonically". But I think one of the attractions of the setting is that there's so much material that you can actually dig into it a bit and uncover certain points. In that respect, Tolkien gaming is perhaps more like historical gaming than most fantasy games.
I think this is a plus, that applies to other well developed settings, and that gets somewhat overlooked. I've heard complaints about GW's SBG that all you can do is replay the story, and conversely, one of the rationalisations of WFB's destruction is that the story needed to progress. Historical gamers don't worry too much about replaying the stories, or whether or not a particular period like, say, the ECW progresses much beyond 1651! With a detailed background, fictional history, and that most important of features, a fantasy map, there should be a lot of battles and hooks to spark off a few imaginations, and maybe enough space for gamers to stretch their legs and do their own thing within the canon.
On the other hand, unless it's a campaign like Dark Shadows or Storm of Chaos that ostensibly determines new background, you could say that all gaming is non-canon, regardless of the setting. :) Even the most rigorously researched historical game, with-rock-solid OOBs and all the piping in the right colours, turns into fiction once players and dice get involved. Not to mention the fact that it's little plastic and metal models on a flocked tabletop.
But, getting OT, so...
Every single wacky little games company or kickstarter running today, churning out yet more green-skinned, Mockney 'orcs', can trace a line back to Tolkien's original creation...
You may be right that many of these legions of sub-Tolkien creations and settings now have self-worth independent of each other. But Hobgoblin's central point is (and I paraphrase) that most wargamers' notion of orcs in 2016 bears little or no relation to the orcs invented and described by Tolkien...
Basically, through a process of evolution, Tolkien's original concepts have been hijacked, gradually bent out of shape, and redefined in the popular imagination for two generations of gamers. And it's the ersatz image which has stuck, and not the original.
Which is, for me at least, a pity :)
Well said! The apple's fallen a little far from the tree.
To add another stem to the argument, I'd have to say that one of my formative images of Orcs are from Ralph Bakshi's version of Lord of the Rings, mainly as I would have seen it for the first time around about the time I first read the books. How do we think they fit in with the changing image of Tolkien's creations?
Bit difficult to say, with all the red and black blobs!
I'm not altogether behind Bakshi's orcs. They're an interesting impression of orcs, in the way they behave and how they're perceived (a dark, swirling horde with flashes of white fangs and red... whatevers) but it's difficult to go much deeper than that.
One of the things that's so great about these is how varied they are. It's not just that they've got interesting details, but they've got tremendously varied equipment. They're not uniform and optimised for Warhammer...
Good point.
The way the larger orcs fight in this crouched position behind their shields used to really make me think of the battles in the tunnel systems under the Misty Mountains and i used have hours of fun in the polystrene tunnels i built for them.
Nice!
Hated a great deal about the Hobbit movies - except for Martin Freeman.
I was watching that Brian Pern thing on the iPlayer the other day, where Martin Freeman was hired to record the audiobook of Brian's memoirs. He said he had a lot of voices that he could use for it.
Funniest line in the whole show. >:D
I have no problem at all with cutting bits out of stories in adaptation... And I don't care what's added, so long as it's done well.
My main beef with the LotR films was with the sudden lapses of tone and taste: dwarf-tossing, endless Jet Set Will-style crumbling staircases, oliphaunt-surfing and - perhaps worst of all - the scenes with Theoden in Edoras. They did that brilliant bit with Eoywn and the flag, but then threw the audience into some zany kung-fu computer-game scene - and topped it off with an instant haircut and manicure for the king. What on earth was wrong with just letting an actor act?
Yes, those are things that rankled with me. A bit of a cop-out to chuck in such naff moments of light relief, which just jarred with the other 99% of the movies. Similarly the reduction of Merry and Pippin to almost entirely silly comic characters. Fine, so they come of age in the third film, but they were nothing like such a pair of idiotic nitwits in Tolkien...
I could write a book about what I didn't like about the LotR movies, but it largely boils down to that general theme - mucking about with the 'spirit' of the story and characters, moreso than changing some events. Especially when you do a PJ and drain all subtlety out of it.
Gimli, Theoden, Merry and Pippin, yes. Me, I'm still narked that Treebeard and Faramir were turned into harrumphing jobsworths, until they were given a talking-to by some naïve bumpkin hobbits.
There. Peter Jackson made me speak ill of hobbits.
So... in the (perhaps vain) hope that this thread may serve as actual inspiration or reference for some "patron of the hobby" to sculpt or commission a new range of orcs in the orthodox Tolkienist tradition, what should they ideally look like? As in, what's the nitty-gritty brief that one would send to a sculptor if one was commissioning the actual figures? (To be clear, I'm not planning to do any such thing - unless I win the lottery - but I think it worth going over, anyway.)
It might not be strictly in line with the info gleaned from Tolkien's writing*, but again, as per Polynikes'(?) illustration in an older topic: less gorillaform, more chimpform. With some big, gnarly monkeys in the mix too. When I see Alan Lee's take on the tracker orc (http://corecanvas.s3.amazonaws.com/theonering-0188db0e/gallery/original/lotr_44.jpg), I see something not a million miles from a baboon (http://www.arkive.org/hamadryas-baboon/papio-hamadryas/image-G56536.html) or a drill (http://www.arkive.org/drill/mandrillus-leucophaeus/image-G33050.html). With requisite anthropomorphism.
For clothing and equipment, I'd like to stick to the general 'dark ages' europe theme that seems to be associated with middle-earth. Though that still encompasses a wide range, from what I know.
* Though given some of the descriptions, posted by Hobgoblin, it's not too different. Hunched, bandy-legged stances; flat noses; yellow fangs; wide mouths; hairy arms...
I have to admit, even with the qualifiers of "degraded and repulsive versions" and "to Europeans", I find going the ape & monkey route a little less troubling than making uglified mongolians.
No crossbow-men! ;) I don't think archers are separated from the melee fighters: all four of the dead uruks at Amon Hen have long yew bows, and the uruk in "The Land of Shadow" also has a bow at his back: he's a "big fighting orc". The impression given is that most orcs carry bows. Uruks seem to be unusually fast-moving, bow-armed heavy infantry. (small ones, mind!)
Flashbacks to the longbows vs. crossbows topic...
The closest thing I can think of is Warhammer's Azhag the Slaughterer, who (if I remember rightly) was 'advised' (controlled) by a cursed crown he used to wear, which was possessed by some old wizard or something.
'Some old wizard'. Nagash himself!
http://whfb.lexicanum.com/wiki/Azhag
I've heard of the Boldog bit; IIRC it's also an explanation for the origin of other various nasties like wargs, werewolves, giant spiders (Ungoliant's children), intelligent dragons ("and Glaurung spoke by the evil spirit that was in him"), possibly vampires, in middle-earth.
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My take on the Orcs/Goblins from the Silmarilion is a corrupted being, human, elf, whatever, not some uniform species in and of themselves, but an alteration of something else. I have been doing LOTR in 1/72 and chose to not use the Peter Jacksonesque Dark Alliance models...despite the fact that they are awesome. I use a mish mash of ancients.
That's my vision as well. Perhaps Morgoth's corruption involved barracks in a uranium mine, as I imagine orcs looking like elves that have various defects after thousands of years of cruel, twisted manipulations and tortures that carried over from generation to generation. Stuff like too many or not enough fingers, oddly shaped bones, too many or not enough teeth, etc. The Northern/Moria orcs were more true-orcs, while the Isengard and Mordor orcs had fresh injections of human and elf genes.
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Thunderbolt Mountain Goblins as perfect Orcs? I think they hit all.the marks.
They certainly have the "short legs and long arms" and "big heads with no necks" things going for them which I personally like (though the leg/arm thing doesn't seem to be canon), and I agree that they tick nearly all the boxes. The "heavy goblins" seem to measure about 20mm to the eyes which puts them at the same height as, or very marginally taller than, Westfalia halflings (my ideal hobbit/halfling figures, at least in terms of anatomy). Probably bulkier than halflings, though. I don't have any good dwarf figures around to measure right now.
There's also more poses than I recall. I don't much care for the thinness of the weapons (I have some of the weapon sprues in the lead pile - no actual goblins though) but swapping them out isn't a big deal.
They are rather "wargamefied" in regard to weapon/armour loadouts, though, and I'm not quite sure whether their size makes them more suitable as uruks or snaga.
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This is one of the coolest threads I have ever read on any forum anywhere!
I've also been a gamer for as long, and I have to say I've still never found a range of orcs/ goblins that fits my mental image of Tolkien's evil race. Considering I've been in the figure industry for 28 years, it's a bit pathetic of me to have not done them myself. Maybe I should start a vanity project.
Nick
North Star
*Now patiently waiting for Tolkien Orc Nickstarter*
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*Now patiently waiting for Tolkien Orc Nickstarter*
Yes, please! :o 8) :-*
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Yes yes.
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A couple of things I have done:
First shows a Silmarillion scene using Redbox Games Elves and GW Mordor Orcs(plastics).
(http://i728.photobucket.com/albums/ww281/greywolf1066/IMGP9637-1.jpg)
Second is a trio of Asgard Orcs,lovely!
(http://i728.photobucket.com/albums/ww281/greywolf1066/007_zps05cc2193.jpg)
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They certainly have the "short legs and long arms" and "big heads with no necks" things going for them which I personally like (though the leg/arm thing doesn't seem to be canon), and I agree that they tick nearly all the boxes.
Long arms are definitely "canonical" (in the descriptions of Grishnakh, his troops, Shagrat and the Isengarders at Helm's Deep). And Grishnakh and his followers have "crooked legs".
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This a fascinating read for a Tolkien nerd like me. Keep it up 😊
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It might not be strictly in line with the info gleaned from Tolkien's writing*, but again, as per Polynikes'(?) illustration in an older topic: less gorillaform, more chimpform. With some big, gnarly monkeys in the mix too. When I see Alan Lee's take on the tracker orc (http://corecanvas.s3.amazonaws.com/theonering-0188db0e/gallery/original/lotr_44.jpg), I see something not a million miles from a baboon (http://www.arkive.org/hamadryas-baboon/papio-hamadryas/image-G56536.html) or a drill (http://www.arkive.org/drill/mandrillus-leucophaeus/image-G33050.html). With requisite anthropomorphism.
For clothing and equipment, I'd like to stick to the general 'dark ages' europe theme that seems to be associated with middle-earth. Though that still encompasses a wide range, from what I know.
* Though given some of the descriptions, posted by Hobgoblin, it's not too different. Hunched, bandy-legged stances; flat noses; yellow fangs; wide mouths; hairy arms...
I have to admit, even with the qualifiers of "degraded and repulsive versions" and "to Europeans", I find going the ape & monkey route a little less troubling than making uglified mongolians.[/
One interesting point re: apes is that both Ugluk and Grishnakh use "ape" as an insult for each other ("the other lot, the apes of Lugubrz"; "Ape!"). And, at Helm's Deep, the Uruk-hai are described as leaping up "like the apes of the South", IIRC.
On the "degraded and repulsive" Mongolians, I agree that it sits uncomfortably with contemporary sensibilities. BUT no one seems to find anything wrong with it when miniature-makers actually put it into practice:
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A couple of things I have done:
First shows a Silmarillion scene using Redbox Games Elves and GW Mordor Orcs(plastics).
(http://i728.photobucket.com/albums/ww281/greywolf1066/IMGP9637-1.jpg)
Second is a trio of Asgard Orcs,lovely!
(http://i728.photobucket.com/albums/ww281/greywolf1066/007_zps05cc2193.jpg)
Sublime paint jobs - and great figures! Just as the creation of Orcs was Morgoth's worst deed, so it was Jez Goodwin's greatest ...
I think those are about as "canonical" as orcish miniatures have ever got. It's interesting how like the (very text-faithful) Alan Lee painting that Vermis linked to above the swordsman on the left is.
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A couple of things I have done:
First shows a Silmarillion scene using Redbox Games Elves and GW Mordor Orcs(plastics).
(http://i728.photobucket.com/albums/ww281/greywolf1066/IMGP9637-1.jpg)
Very nice Blackwolf!!
I've also been a gamer for as long, and I have to say I've still never found a range of orcs/ goblins that fits my mental image of Tolkien's evil race. Considering I've been in the figure industry for 28 years, it's a bit pathetic of me to have not done them myself. Maybe I should start a vanity project.
I have noticed that over the past few years Orcs are starting to have a life of their own in mainstream culture, and it's the 'green gorilla' variety rather than Tolkiens, I'm thinking World of Warcraft in particular. Everytime I see them, I just keep thinking 'The biggest orcs are just man sized!'
Maybe it is a good time make a few "real" Tolkien style orcs. With GW going seriously OTT with their fantasy races for AoS, there will be no realistic orcs to expect there (if there ever was) and most of the other companys make orcs more similiar to GW than Tolkien.
Also i get the feeling that in the hobby there is a move away from large armies at the moment and a lot more skirmish is played (SAGA, Lion/Dragon Rampant, Song of blades....) which means gamers are working on a variety of smaller projects instead of 1 or 2 big ones. This means they might buy a handfull of nice orcs where a few years ago they would have probably said "no! dont start another army".
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Thanks fellas :)
Should have said in my post above; these are examples of what can be done to get a canonical feel with ones Orcs(and Elves).
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I always envisaged Orcs as 'ape-like', meaning Chimps rather than Gorillas. It's the long arms and bandy leg descriptions, plus the Prof's line 'like apes of the south' line at Helm's Deep that did it for me. The insults (calling each other apes) I didn't read too much into, they also call each other maggots LOL.
The first figures I ever bought (1981) were the Ral Partha goblins, now Thunderbolt Mountain, because I thought they were 'Lord of the Rings' figures, I described them as much. (I hadn't heard of D&D at this point). Those goblins still remain the closest to my idea of Tolkiens Orcs out there, especially the Wolf Riders, but it's their nakedness (lack of both clothes and hair) that means they don't fit the bill.
I did once approach Mr Meier with the idea of doing some Tolkien-esque figures, I just got a 'get lost, spotty' answer. Ho Hum.
(get lost spotty is British humour, I apologise to my American friends if it seems an odd thing to say)
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I'd just like to say, I'm not against the 'other' Orcs. I don't like modern GW figures, but I do still have a green skinned Orc and Goblin 1980's GW army, with the Bad Moon and Sun type banners etc, and I love them. But they have nothing to do with my Tolkien interest.
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When I read your opening post, I just thought, 'yeah so, we know this already'. As the thread went on, I realised 'no, its me, it's because I've been obsessed with Tolkien for 35 years'.
I've also been a gamer for as long, and I have to say I've still never found a range of orcs/ goblins that fits my mental image of Tolkien's evil race. Considering I've been in the figure industry for 28 years, it's a bit pathetic of me to have not done them myself. Maybe I should start a vanity project.
Do it Nick! (I don't think it would be a vanity project. Judging by the amount of interest in this thread, I think there would be a market for 'true to Tolkien' orcs).
Worth dipping a toe in the water? :D
Of course it's impossible to please everybody, because Tolkien gives so little actual description of arms and armour. He wasn't really interested in the detail - unless it was the languages. He was creating an epic, poetic saga. The descriptions of swords, helmets, shields etc are infuriatingly vague and generic.
But for me, those old Minifigs orcs are the closest to the simple equipment Tolkien describes: rudimentary conical helmets or iron caps, mail shirts, swords, spears, bows and shields.
The entire ornate, gothic, extravagant depiction of sub-Tolkien armour and weapons, with all their protrusions, and fancy-schmanzy items of ludicrously baroque plate armour, are entirely the invention of Alan Lee, John Howe, and the pursuing host of Tolkien illustrators and game designers. There is, to the best of my recollection, nothing in The Hobbit or The Lord of The Rings, which justifies any of that overblown, flamboyant nonsense. Tolkien is essentially describing a low-tech, late-Dark Age, early Medieval culture.
The best depiction of Tolkien peoples in miniature that I think I've seen, were the Hasslefree dwarves. I also thought the Vendel goblins had a lot going for them. Essentially the look of both these sets of figures is dead simple, and based on historical arms and armour - not ridiculously fantastical concoctions.
In terms of the physical appearance of orcs, there are a few more clues. As mentioned - definite references to long arms, bandy legs, and swart faces. But I've always seen those as slightly misshapen, ugly men. Not green-skinned munchkins look like a cross between monkeys and pandas ::)
(http://i728.photobucket.com/albums/ww281/greywolf1066/IMGP9637-1.jpg)
This remains just about my favourite miniatures depiction of Tolkien's world anywhere, ever, Guy :)
Still brilliant.
I hope you'll do some more one day.
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It seems to me that this thread is finally bursting a dam that's been wanting to be burst for a long time. The desire for new "proper Tolkien" orcs is clearly there (especially in the face of a rising tide of orc and goblin miniatures that are decidedly "alternative" in appearance), it just hasn't been talked about as much as it should have.
I, too, would be all over a range of skirmish-friendly Tolkien orcs in a "North Star-esque" sculpting style, similar in anatomy to the Thunderbolt Mountain goblins, just with more hair, more clothes and a greater distinction between uruks and snaga, but maybe (unless it makes the range less "marketable") a less extreme, less "regiment-oriented" division of dedicated troop types (heavy melee infantry and ultra-light archers aren't very skirmish-friendly). Perhaps also another millimeter or two of height for uruks so they'll stand a bit taller than most 28mm scale hobbit/halfling figures (which generally seem to measure about 19-20 mm to the eyes).
Downplaying the "Mongolian" features of the face would, I think, be a worthy sacrifice of accuracy for a good reason. The eyes need not be so "slant", and the "flat noses" can look more like flattened versions of European noses (fleshier, with more pronounced bridges) than like the typical East Asian nasal form. The Gorgoroth fighting orc in the excellent Alan Lee illustration linked to by Vermis is a fairly good example of what I mean. The nose could be flatter than that, but having a similarly pronounced bridge. For that matter, the Thunderbolt Mountain goblins have faces that fit Tolkien's description well enough, but don't look much like any human racial stereotype.
Also i get the feeling that in the hobby there is a move away from large armies at the moment and a lot more skirmish is played (SAGA, Lion/Dragon Rampant, Song of blades....) which means gamers are working on a variety of smaller projects instead of 1 or 2 big ones. This means they might buy a handfull of nice orcs where a few years ago they would have probably said "no! dont start another army".
I think this is very true. There was a time when I'd have balked at the idea of collecting several different styles of orcs and goblins (or elves, dwarves or "fantasy aesthetic" humans for that matter) as separate projects, but no more. It's not as if I'm collecting an army's worth of any of them anymore.
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I agree with you in regards to over-blown armour.
Alan Lee and John Howe are very much two of my favourite artists, but Mr Howes use of plate armour in Middle-Earth always looked good but was wrong. So when he became the concept artist for PJ's films, it meant the Orcs GW made were not quite what I wanted. I liked the little Moria Goblins the most, and I was nearly tempted to go with them, painted a few up.
Just as an aside, have you seen the pictures of Pauline Baines? She was a friend of the Profs, and had direct contact with him in regards to the imagery of the characters of Middle-Earth. In Bilbos Last Song there are some Goblins illustrated.
https://itunes.apple.com/au/book/bilbos-last-song/id563892510?mt=11
Not saying they are perfect, but their faces, helmet shape and use of scale armour are something figure designers can take on board.
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I liked the little Moria Goblins the most, and I was nearly tempted to go with them, painted a few up.
IMO, the Moria goblins (if viewed from an "orthodox Tolkienist" POV) still suffer from a tendency in the Hollywood film industry to overthink and overdesign everything. With the Moria goblins they were thinking: "They live in the darkness, right? So let's give them extra big eyes (https://www.google.com/search?q=moria+goblins&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiPuZC22dHKAhVq4XIKHdZADGIQ_AUIBygB&biw=1366&bih=657#tbm=isch&q=moria+goblins+eyes) like tarsiers (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarsier), because they'll have evolved to see better in the dark. The audience will love that!". Now, I can see valid reasons for Hollywood's priorities being what they are, but... it still kind of breaks the concept of Tolkien's orcs/goblins, doesn't it? They don't evolve "zoomorphically" for every specific environment. I'm sure that given a chance, Jackson would also have populated Middle Earth with wetland-dwelling goblins with gills and arctic-dwelling ones covered in fur.
Oh, I just had a terrible premonition of the inevitable Silmarillion films ten years from now, wherein Fingolfin's elves will be leaping wuxia-style from ice block to ice block as they fight furry goblins on Helcaraxë lol
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On the "degraded and repulsive" Mongolians, I agree that it sits uncomfortably with contemporary sensibilities. BUT no one seems to find anything wrong with it when miniature-makers actually put it into practice:
I think the colour scheme mollifies it some. Nice job on that. :) And the vaguely eastern paraphernalia doesn't matter too much. (Old GW hobgoblins, Ogre Kingdoms etc.) But there's a little, minor niggle in the back of my head that a drive to produce Tolkien-faithful orcs (slant-eyed, wide-mouthed, big fangs, repulsive mongol types... I guess the sallow skin is up to the painter) with modern mini sculpting, could steer a little close to something like WWII propaganda of the Japanese.
Not that I think anyone would consciously aim for that! But maybe there's such a thing as too faithful.
Sublime paint jobs - and great figures! Just as the creation of Orcs was Morgoth's worst deed, so it was Jez Goodwin's greatest ...
I think those are about as "canonical" as orcish miniatures have ever got. It's interesting how like the (very text-faithful) Alan Lee painting that Vermis linked to above the swordsman on the left is.
True, all that. :)
Also i get the feeling that in the hobby there is a move away from large armies at the moment and a lot more skirmish is played (SAGA, Lion/Dragon Rampant, Song of blades....)
I'd still like big armies, but... maybe in 10-15mm.
The first figures I ever bought (1981) were the Ral Partha goblins, now Thunderbolt Mountain, because I thought they were 'Lord of the Rings' figures, I described them as much. (I hadn't heard of D&D at this point). Those goblins still remain the closest to my idea of Tolkiens Orcs out there...
I did once approach Mr Meier with the idea of doing some Tolkien-esque figures, I just got a 'get lost, spotty' answer. Ho Hum.
Ouch. :?
I think I mentioned these in passing, somewhere, but haven't linked to them yet. A guy trying to fill in the gaps of Tom Meier's various orcs and goblins ranges.
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/637455.page
He was an interesting one, claiming that there was a good chance he'd pick up the LotR license when GW were sure to drop it soon. (We know how that went) I've no idea if he got the sculpts finished and printed, or not. I'll have to find out. I don't think the digital sculpting, including the reposed-dollies look, helped them much in this case, anyway.
The entire ornate, gothic, extravagant depiction of sub-Tolkien armour and weapons, with all their protrusions, and fancy-schmanzy items of ludicrously baroque plate armour, are entirely the invention of Alan Lee, John Howe, and the pursuing host of Tolkien illustrators and game designers. There is, to the best of my recollection, nothing in The Hobbit or The Lord of The Rings, which justifies any of that overblown, flamboyant nonsense. Tolkien is essentially describing a low-tech, late-Dark Age, early Medieval culture.
The best depiction of Tolkien peoples in miniature that I think I've seen, were the Hasslefree dwarves. I also thought the Vendel goblins had a lot going for them. Essentially the look of both these sets of figures is dead simple, and based on historical arms and armour - not ridiculously fantastical concoctions.
I really like John Howe, I have three of his books here, but I have to agree. lol It's not just Tolkien-faithful orcs that are lacking, but sensible, relatively realistic armour in fantasy. Especially since the Empire and Bretonnia went down in flames.
Hasslefree dwarfs are pretty great, for the reasons you mention. (Also because Kev White is very good at what he does) I sometimes wish the unit-fillers were more nordic than norman, but beggars, choosers. :)
Not green-skinned munchkins look like a cross between monkeys and pandas ::)
Pandas?!?
The Gorgoroth fighting orc in the excellent Alan Lee illustration linked to by Vermis is a fairly good example of what I mean.
I'm amused the way Alan Lee makes them look like degraded and repulsive europeans. To my eyes!
Just as an aside, have you seen the pictures of Pauline Baines? She was a friend of the Profs, and had direct contact with him in regards to the imagery of the characters of Middle-Earth. In Bilbos Last Song there are some Goblins illustrated.
https://itunes.apple.com/au/book/bilbos-last-song/id563892510?mt=11
Not saying they are perfect, but their faces, helmet shape and use of scale armour are something figure designers can take on board.
I didn't know about that. Nice.
IMO, the Moria goblins (if viewed from an "orthodox Tolkienist" POV) still suffer from a tendency in the Hollywood film industry to overthink and overdesign everything.
Mm. I'm also a bit turned off by the spiky shields, that seem roughly hammered from one big piece of scrap metal. If the minis of those had good ol' round shield replacements, it'd be a huge improvement in itself.
Oh, I just had a terrible premonition of the inevitable Silmarillion films ten years from now, wherein Fingolfin's elves will be leaping wuxia-style from ice block to ice block as they fight furry goblins on Helcaraxë lol
Goodnight, everyone.
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Good discussion.
The gamification in the OP is why I've avoided middle Earth gaming, even though I'm a massive Tolkien fan.
I just can't stand all the D&D and WFB tropes being brought to the table by friends who just don't get it. Or my friends donating horrid old (or newer GW) figures to me...
Perhaps with Lion Rampant and Dragon Rampant I could manage something on my own?
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Thanks Richard :)
To my mind what is missing in much of the figure ranges and the films is a lack of mythicism; especially in the films(I walked out),lousy casting,appalling dialogue ("the men are quiet and the horses are restless" for example) and the subversion of major characters rolls.
I am aware that studios have to make money so bear with me; it is a shame that Peter Jackson seemed to play to the common denominator,a fault common these days,why not try to raise that denominator to a higher level,rather than lower it? This is of course rhetoric on my part ;) I hope that the Silmarillion is never made into film,I don't believe anyone could do it justice...And too many Elves,Elves in films had a very rough trot...Too much makeup does not make you look ageless...
Back to Hobgoblin's most excellent topic; perhaps if figure designers looked at Tolkien's world in a more serious way,less exaggeration and more historic reference points,whilst still retaining that 'mythic' feel? Subtlety I feel is the key...
Guy
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Great discussion guys!
Regarding miniatures, two questions: are those Asgard Orcs available in the UK? Nice models. And have you seen these guys?
http://www.alternative-armies.com/products/oh2-hob-goblin-raiders
I have these models. Nicely stooped, long arms, leering but not comical faces. There are some nice miniatures in the AA range, some comedy Goblins, but generally the Orcs are good. Think I might get some more...
EvilD
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A good discussion. As it now covers multiple pages I may have missed a bit.
I apologise for my long and less scholarly post. It has been some years since I have read LotR and I don't intend to read it again for a long time, having read it perhaps 10 times over 30+ years (I have owned 3 copies).
I agree, all orcs are smaller than humans. I think the uruks are probably quite muscled and would think of their strength in much the same way as that of chimpanzees - they are smaller than us, but you wouldn't want to pick a fight with one! Are Uruk-hai a subset of uruks in general. Without reading LotR again, I remember that Uruk-hai is capitalised, whereas uruks are not. They often say of themselves "we are the fighting Uruk-hai". I think of this as a phrase used by an elite unit as a part of it's esprit de corps (compare with the Fighting First in the American army) - although here it isn't a title as it is not capitalised. This is a very long way of asking are Uruk-hai and elite within a warrior breed of orcs?
I would also agree that orcs had some degree of technical ability. I often think the explosion in the culvert at Helm's Deep might be gun powder.
Is it also correct that there were no uruks in the first age? Were they weaker than orcs (or just the uruks) of the Third Age? They seem to lack stamina or speed. Beleg has to recover from wounds before he pursues the orcs that had captured Turin and yet he is easily able to catch up with them.
Finally, how much did orcs shun the sun. In LotR it seems the normal orcs didn't tolerate the sun well. But in the First Age this isn't so clear. Again, to go to the pursuit by Beleg, he came across the orcs camped at night, implying that they rested at night and must be travelling in the day.
Perhaps not in this thread, could Hobgoblin and others suggest how they would depict orcs for Dragon Rampant? Or possibly a thread for Tolkienising Dragon Rampant. Plenty of issues there! The depiction of magic, the nature of Nazgul, best models for elves etc.
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Finally, how much did orcs shun the sun. In LotR it seems the normal orcs didn't tolerate the sun well. But in the First Age this isn't so clear. Again, to go to the pursuit by Beleg, he came across the orcs camped at night, implying that they rested at night and must be travelling in the day.
Given that they were made by Morgoth, who hated the sun and the bright Silmarils, it could be less a physical problem and more of a psychological hatred of the sun instilled by Morgoth and Sauron. Angband, Mordor, and the various mountains were dark due to clouds and volcanic activity, so their natural homes were not well lit.
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Yes, I think you are right that it is psychological. The Battle of the Pelennor Fields was fought under the darkness that emanated from Mordor, but I believe I am right in thinking that the battle of the Morannon was fought in daylight without the dark clouds.
I suspect that orcs feared the sun, particularly when in small groups or on their own, but could fight effectively in sun when there was a large number of them. I would also suspect that they had good night vision, but still saw best when in full light and so battles on a large scale were more practical in daylight.
Again, these are my impressions based on reading the LotR last about ten years ago (although I have recently re-read the Silmarillion a month ago).
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I agree, all orcs are smaller than humans. I think the uruks are probably quite muscled and would think of their strength in much the same way as that of chimpanzees - they are smaller than us, but you wouldn't want to pick a fight with one!
I think that's right. Three supporting points: the Appendices describe the uruks as "black orcs of great strength"; the strength in Grishnakh's arms is "terrifying, and he runs with a hobbit under each arm - quite a feat if you think about it; and The Battle of the Fords of the Isen says that the only mail made in Isengard was the "heavy and crude" mail made by the orcs. That last point suggests that the mail was too heavy to be of much use to the Dunlendings - yet the "heavily armed" uruks are trained "to move at great speeds for long distances".
Are Uruk-hai a subset of uruks in general. Without reading LotR again, I remember that Uruk-hai is capitalised, whereas uruks are not. They often say of themselves "we are the fighting Uruk-hai". I think of this as a phrase used by an elite unit as a part of it's esprit de corps (compare with the Fighting First in the American army) - although here it isn't a title as it is not capitalised. This is a very long way of asking are Uruk-hai and elite within a warrior breed of orcs?
There's been a lot of debate about whether "Uruk-hai" is synonymous with "uruks". Tolkien is very inconsistent with capitalisation (orc/Orc, etc.), but "Uruk-hai" is always capitalised. The Isengarders seem to use it exclusively, but, as you note, they usually qualify it: "the Uruk-hai of Isengard", "the fighting Uruk-hai". But of course, their exclusive use of it doesn't mean that it's not applicable to the uruks of Mordor.
Now, the Mordor tracker talks about the trouble at Cirith Ungol being caused, inter alia, by a "pack of rebel Uruk-hai". I don't think that can be easily read as reference to Isengarders, but it does fit with Shagrat's description of "that filthy rebel Gorbag" and his followers. Shagrat and Gorbag are both uruks ("Always the poor Uruks to put slips right"), and their well-matched followers seem to be too. Note that the tracker's information matches very closely the info that Shagrat had to report: a "sort of small dwarf-man" (Frodo); "a great Elf in bright armour" (Sam, as reported by Snaga) and "a pack of rebel Uruk-hai" (the filthy rebel Gorbag and his troop). For me, that settles it. The terms also seem to be used interchangeably in the Appendices, and Christopher Tolkien notes that "uruks" is an "Anglicisation" of the Black Speech "Uruk-hai".
That said, I think it's clear that the Uruk-hai of Isengard are a bit different from their Mordor equivalents: a bit bigger on average (possibly as a result of Mannish blood) and differently equipped.
I would also agree that orcs had some degree of technical ability. I often think the explosion in the culvert at Helm's Deep might be gun powder.
Yes - and note that it's the Orcs (not the Dunlendings) who have brought and deployed the "blasting fire".
Is it also correct that there were no uruks in the first age? Were they weaker than orcs (or just the uruks) of the Third Age? They seem to lack stamina or speed. Beleg has to recover from wounds before he pursues the orcs that had captured Turin and yet he is easily able to catch up with them.
The Morgoth's Ring passage implies that Saruman had rediscovered a technique of Morgoth's for breeding orcs. So it's fair to assume that Morgoth had bred especially large orcs in the distant past.
Finally, how much did orcs shun the sun. In LotR it seems the normal orcs didn't tolerate the sun well. But in the First Age this isn't so clear. Again, to go to the pursuit by Beleg, he came across the orcs camped at night, implying that they rested at night and must be travelling in the day.
I don't think the First Age texts will always necessarily match Tolkien's final conception. After all, he didn't publish them himself.
The Hobbit says that orcs "don't like the sun". And the Northerners protest about it. But Ugluk makes them run all day in it with threats and menaces. And the Mordor-orcs don't complain.
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Uruks are definitely strong, their race across Rohan carrying the hobbits was no mean feat.
I think Uruks were a Third Age thing, Tolkien talks about Blacks Uruks emerging from Mordor for the first time. The other issue is that The LotR is a story, whereas The Silmarillion is a history and of an Age and doesn't go into close detail of 'orc-kind'. There may have been Orc Soldier classes in the First Age, we don't know. My impression that Uruks (and later Isengard Half-Orcs) were bred to overcome the short comings of the normal Orc type, in a final push to take over the West of Middle-Earth. The Orcs of any size were going to struggle against the Noldor and Numenoreans.
Gunpowder. I think this was a wizard thing. Gandalf had access to it, so did Saruman. Unusually, I think PJ's film covered it accurately.
Sunlight. I think this is a myth device to make the baddies seem 'other' in Middle-Earth. In this published writings, Tolkiens just says as creatures of evil they cannot abide sunlight. In some of Christopher Tolkiens note books, you get a deeper analysis. One that I recall was that Morgoth, the original Dark Lord, tried to ravish a certain female Maia. She exploded in his face, burning him so bad he remained charred forever and in pain and fear of light. The Maia's spirit then went into the sky to become the sun. Because Morgoth couldn't cope with her light, his servants became like him, they are of course bond by his will as well. Angband is belching out smoke and fumes constantly, I think they were used to cover the daylight movements of his servants in the same way Sauron did.
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Uruks are definitely strong, their race across Rohan carrying the hobbits was no mean feat.
I think Uruks were a Third Age thing, Tolkien talks about Blacks Uruks emerging from Mordor for the first time. The other issue is that The LotR is a story, whereas The Silmarillion is a history and of an Age and doesn't go into close detail of 'orc-kind'. There may have been Orc Soldier classes in the First Age, we don't know. My impression that Uruks (and later Isengard Half-Orcs) were bred to overcome the short comings of the normal Orc type, in a final push to take over the West of Middle-Earth. The Orcs of any size were going to struggle against the Noldor and Numenoreans.
I think the one bit of evidence for "proto-Uruks" is this passage from Morgoth's Ring:
"Finally, there is a cogent point, though horrible to relate. It became clear in time that undoubted Men could under the domination of Morgoth or his agents in a few generations be reduced almost to the Orc-level of mind and habits; and then they would or could be made to mate with Orcs, producing new breeds, often larger and more cunning. There is no doubt that long afterwards, in the Third Age, Saruman rediscovered this, or learned of it in lore, and in his lust for mastery committed this, his wickedest deed: the interbreeding of Orcs and Men, producing both Men-orcs large and cunning, and Orc-men treacherous and vile."
That indicates that the recipe for the "enhanced" uruks was rediscovered by Saruman - although it leaves an open question as to what Sauron did 500 years earlier to produce his uruks.
There is, in a couple of places IIIRC, a suggestion that orcs had dwindled in power and stature from earlier, more dangerous incarnations. The Morgoth's Ring passage would fit with that. And of course, as you pointed out earlier, some of those earlier, more fearsome orcs may have been "Boldogs" - corrupted Maiar.
Gunpowder. I think this was a wizard thing. Gandalf had access to it, so did Saruman. Unusually, I think PJ's film covered it accurately.
Yes, I think so. The interesting bit about its use at the Hornburg is that it's Saruman's goblins, rather than his Men, that deploy it.
Sunlight. I think this is a myth device to make the baddies seem 'other' in Middle-Earth. In this published writings, Tolkiens just says as creatures of evil they cannot abide sunlight. In some of Christopher Tolkiens note books, you get a deeper analysis. One that I recall was that Morgoth, the original Dark Lord, tried to ravish a certain female Maia. She exploded in his face, burning him so bad he remained charred forever and in pain and fear of light. The Maia's spirit then went into the sky to become the sun. Because Morgoth couldn't cope with her light, his servants became like him, they are of course bond by his will as well. Angband is belching out smoke and fumes constantly, I think they were used to cover the daylight movements of his servants in the same way Sauron did.
Interesting stuff! Yes, I think the sunlight thing seems to be more symbolic than physical - a strong aversion with only mild physical effects (the giddiness, etc., described in The Hobbit). Effectively, the Northerners say "we can't run in the sun", and Ugluk says "oh yes you can!". And run they do.
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Just as an aside, have you seen the pictures of Pauline Baines? She was a friend of the Profs, and had direct contact with him in regards to the imagery of the characters of Middle-Earth. In Bilbos Last Song there are some Goblins illustrated.
https://itunes.apple.com/au/book/bilbos-last-song/id563892510?mt=11
Not saying they are perfect, but their faces, helmet shape and use of scale armour are something figure designers can take on board.
That's a really interesting link - thanks! I loved Pauline Baines' illustrations for Narnia and Tolkien's Farmer Giles of Ham when i was kid. Frustratingly, the goblins aren't easy to make out in any of the online reproductions - I may have to buy the book!
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Great thread! I'm really enjoying it.
About Orc size, as noted earlier, I think is important to note that they are usually noted as having bowed backs. So they could be human-sized but their bowed backs would make them shorter in height. Of course, as discussed above there are also smaller breeds.
Yes, I think so. The interesting bit about its use at the Hornburg is that it's Saruman's goblins, rather than his Men, that deploy it.
Yes, but it doesn't mean they've created it. I rather think Saruman instructed them to use it, as they were his own troops. Makes sense he trusted them more than the Dunlendings allies.
Interesting stuff! Yes, I think the sunlight thing seems to be more symbolic than physical - a strong aversion with only mild physical effects (the giddiness, etc., described in The Hobbit). Effectively, the Northerners say "we can't run in the sun", and Ugluk says "oh yes you can!". And run they do.
I think what happens to Orcs with sunlight is similar to Gollum. He can function under it, but not as well as in darkness. It effects on them seems physicall to me. this is when Bilbo escapes from Goblin-town:
Of course they soon came down after him, hooting and hallooing, and hunting among the trees. But they don't like the sun: it makes their legs wobble and their heads giddy.
Sounds like it makes them disoriented, as if exposed to too much light. Much like the morning sun on a hangover morning, if you take my meaning, Mr. Frodo o_o
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In one of Tolkien's drawings, you see in the background Thangorodrim, and it's belching out black smoke. I couldn't find it on the net to send a link to.
Thanks for the quote on the larger Orcs in the 1st Age, I think that seals it! Sauron of course had no shortage of Man stock, for most of the 2nd and 3rd ages he is pretty much Master of the World outside of the West. It seems even during his long absence, he is worshipped as God.
One of the fantastic and frustrating (in equal measures) parts of Christopher Tolkien's books of notes is we get an insight into the Profs thought processes, but they are usually contradictory. I found this especially true of the section on the origins of Orcs. You feel the Prof is arguing with himself. He knows Orcs came from Elves, but doesn't want to admit it...to himself lol Anyway, one of his alternative theories goes like this:
Orcs are not bred from Elves. Some are undoubtedly caught and tormented. But the Orcs true are bred from Men. Men appear in Middle-Earth earlier than Elves thought. In the long captivity of Morgoth in the West, Sauron finds men first, captures them and starts to breed Orcs as an army ready for his masters return. Twisting lifeforms is a Sauron speciality, were-wolves are another of his creations, one of his titles is Lord of Were-wolves. So making Orcs is part of his own recipe book. Remember this was one of Tolkien's theories, not a Middle-earth fact.
Saruman. Strangely, Saruman seems to trust his Orcs over men. It's Uruks he sends out to intercept the Fellowship, they have the gunpowder at Helms Deep of course, it's Goblin-men who turn up in Bree to spy, it seems to be Orcs in command of all his battles against Rohan. You'd think he'd get less 'obviously evil' henchmen to do his work outside Orthanc. It might be the deficiency of the Dunlendings that's at fault here.
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Yes, but it doesn't mean they've created it. I rather think Saruman instructed them to use it, as they were his own troops. Makes sense he trusted them more than the Dunlendings allies.
I think this bit (alluded to several times before in this thread) from The Hobbit is critical:
Now goblins are cruel, wicked, and bad-hearted. They make no beautiful things, but they make many clever ones. They can tunnel and mine as well as any but the most skilled dwarves, when they take the trouble, though they are usually untidy and dirty. Hammers, axes, swords, daggers, pickaxes, tongs, and also instruments of torture, they make very well, or get other people to make to their design, prisoners and slaves that have to work till they die for want of air and light. It is not unlikely that they invented some of the machines that have since troubled the world, especially the ingenious devices for killing large numbers of people at once, for wheels and engines and explosions always delighted them, and also not working with their own hands more than they could help; but in those days and those wild parts they had not advanced (as it is called) so far.
It does sound like somewhere in the big mass of orcish culture there exists an understanding of explosives and the making of them. That said, I'd also agree that the explosives at the Hornburg were of Saruman's making, but at any rate, orcs seem to have a major affinity for explosives. They may not all know how to make the stuff, but they delight in it when they can get their hands on it, and I'd venture to guess they have an "instinct" for how to use it "correctly" (ie. the most destructive way possible), in much the way that their "creator" Morgoth had an essential instinct for heat/fire in its wild, forceful, primal, explosive, smoky sense.
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Pauline Baynes. Like yourself, I grew up reading Narnia and she was the illustrator for them all. What I didn't put together was the fact she also illustrated the covers to my first copies of Lord of the Rings. So there was a subconscious link between the two set of books in the young Nick's mind. http://www.eq5.net/tolkien/tbkcovers.html There are Goblin type creatures creeping around the edges of those books.
Bowed Backs. A couple of people have mentioned this. I think the bowed back, bandy legs etc just made Orcs look even smaller. It's pretty clear they don't get bigger than men. Tolkien definitely calls huge Orcs 'Man sized', or even 'almost man high'.
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Pauline Baynes. Like yourself, I grew up reading Narnia and she was the illustrator for them all. What I didn't put together was the fact she also illustrated the covers to my first copies of Lord of the Rings. So there was a subconscious link between the two set of books in the young Nick's mind. http://www.eq5.net/tolkien/tbkcovers.html There are Goblin type creatures creeping around the edges of those books.
Thanks for the link! I dimly remember a friend having a copy with beasties around the edge - probably this one - and being rather envious, as I had the set with Tolkien's eye drawing on all three volumes.
Is that an uruk in the left-hand margin here (http://www.mcgillsociety.org/bard/tolkien/images/Tolkien_front_right.jpg), perhaps?
Bowed Backs. A couple of people have mentioned this. I think the bowed back, bandy legs etc just made Orcs look even smaller. It's pretty clear they don't get bigger than men.
I agree. Another point to note is that the bowed backs and bent-over stances come when they run. So, Bilbo thinks the low tunnel is a bit low for big goblins, not knowing that they run crouched over. That suggests that when walking and standing around guarding the Great Goblin, etc., they don't have bowed backs. And we see this in action when Grishnakh runs.
I'd say that it's pretty clear that they don't get as big as Men! ;)
Tolkien definitely calls huge Orcs 'Man sized', or even 'almost man high'.
I think the quote here is "a huge orc-chieftain, almost man-high". This chap, in Moria, seems to be the very biggest orc seen up close in the whole book. Now (disregarding the note somewhere in the corpus that there was a Middle Earth measurement of Man-high that meant 6'4" - because that's clearly not what's meant here unless we get into a bizarre re-scaling of every character in the book!), that suggests to me that the orc chief can't be much more than about 5'; any taller and he would be as tall as a short man (like many in Bree, say). And then there's the "half-orc differential: if "real" orcs can be as tall as Men, then why would characters distinguish the half-orcs by their height?
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No fantasy writer awakens a slumbering academic in readers like Tolkien.
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One of the fantastic and frustrating (in equal measures) parts of Christopher Tolkien's books of notes is we get an insight into the Profs thought processes, but they are usually contradictory. I found this especially true of the section on the origins of Orcs. You feel the Prof is arguing with himself. He knows Orcs came from Elves, but doesn't want to admit it...to himself lol Anyway, one of his alternative theories goes like this:
Orcs are not bred from Elves. Some are undoubtedly caught and tormented. But the Orcs true are bred from Men. Men appear in Middle-Earth earlier than Elves thought. In the long captivity of Morgoth in the West, Sauron finds men first, captures them and starts to breed Orcs as an army ready for his masters return. Twisting lifeforms is a Sauron speciality, were-wolves are another of his creations, one of his titles is Lord of Were-wolves. So making Orcs is part of his own recipe book. Remember this was one of Tolkien's theories, not a Middle-earth fact.
The annoying thing is that even if this alternative theory were true, it would not solve the dilemma of orc fëar or souls. As it is not in the power of anyone but Eru to make souls (this being Morgoth's greatest envy in the Silmarillion), it would also seem likely (to me at least) that no one but Eru can interfere with the "natural law" that beings with souls beget beings with souls (elves, dwarves, men, possibly ents and great eagles), and beings without souls beget beings without souls (animals). And so... unless Eru somehow intervened out of pity for the broken, tortured things Morgoth and/or Sauron were breeding, how could orcs not have souls if they come from elves or men? Yet, Tolkien simply cannot have these devil-beings endowed with souls! That would be crazy!
Given some of the other alternative creation stories referenced by Hobgoblin earlier (that orcs were made from stone, or the "heats and slimes of the earth", or animals, and that they are "robotic" in their actions much like Aulë's dwarves were before Eru intervened and endowed them with souls*), I very much get the impression that the soul dilemma was a central part of Tolkien's indecision regarding the origin and nature of orcs. Those alternatives, convoluted though they are, might have spared him some headache by definitely having orcs be soulless (like animals), but then again, orcs do have human-like intelligence and the power of speech, and they hardly seem "robotic" in either of those aspects.
* Though I wonder: was the whole dwarf-soul thing perhaps an instance of Christopher Tolkien filling in gaps in the story? It doesn't really seem like Tolkien intended for Eru to intervene in the world after setting it in motion. I'd be very saddened by the notion of soulless dwarves, though.
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One of the fantastic and frustrating (in equal measures) parts of Christopher Tolkien's books of notes is we get an insight into the Profs thought processes, but they are usually contradictory. I found this especially true of the section on the origins of Orcs. You feel the Prof is arguing with himself. He knows Orcs came from Elves, but doesn't want to admit it...to himself lol Anyway, one of his alternative theories goes like this:
Orcs are not bred from Elves. Some are undoubtedly caught and tormented. But the Orcs true are bred from Men. Men appear in Middle-Earth earlier than Elves thought. In the long captivity of Morgoth in the West, Sauron finds men first, captures them and starts to breed Orcs as an army ready for his masters return. Twisting lifeforms is a Sauron speciality, were-wolves are another of his creations, one of his titles is Lord of Were-wolves. So making Orcs is part of his own recipe book. Remember this was one of Tolkien's theories, not a Middle-earth fact.
Yes - isn't the real problem for him the theological question of what happens to Orcish souls? I think his Catholicism was at the root of the decades-long wrestling over Orcish origins.
Saruman. Strangely, Saruman seems to trust his Orcs over men. It's Uruks he sends out to intercept the Fellowship, they have the gunpowder at Helms Deep of course, it's Goblin-men who turn up in Bree to spy, it seems to be Orcs in command of all his battles against Rohan. You'd think he'd get less 'obviously evil' henchmen to do his work outside Orthanc. It might be the deficiency of the Dunlendings that's at fault here.
It could also be that the Dunlendings are less loyal. You can't fault Ugluk on his loyalty - or indeed on his competence: they very nearly get away (and it was Grishnakh who inadvertently helped the hobbits to escape). Also, the Dunlendings do surrender and submit to a Rohirric peace, whereas the half-orcs stay with Saruman to the end.
For the interception of the Fellowship, the Uruks are surely the obvious choice because they can move so fast, being "trained to move at great speeds for many miles".
There's a tantalising bit in The Battle of the Fords of the Isen, in which a battalion of Uruks is called away from the battle and "It was not till later that they discovered whither the Uruks had gone". I've always wondered whether this implies that this was Ugluk's band, but the distances are too great - they'd have had to cover 200 miles or something. Still, it could be something that was to be reworked later and was left unresolved. Or were they Mauhur's band (which raises the question: how did Ugluk know about Mauhur's location?)? I don't claim any expertise on the geography and distances, but I'd love to know what's what here.
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No fantasy writer awakens a slumbering academic in readers like Tolkien.
Ha! Too true! ;)
And there's always a vague sense of guilt, if you've read this essay (http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/english/currentstudents/undergraduate/modules/en361fantastika/bibliography/2.7harrison_mj._2001what_might_it_be_like_to_live_in_viriconium.pdf) by M John Harrison:
For instance, the moment you begin to ask (or rather to answer) questions like, “Yes, but what did Sauron look like?”; or, “Just how might an Orc regiment organise itself?”; the moment you concern yourself with the economic geography of pseudo-feudal societies, with the real way to use swords, with the politics of courts, you have diluted the poetic power of Tolkien’s images. You have brought them under control. You have tamed, colonised and put your own cultural mark on them."
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Ha! Glad you said it(re Tolkien's beliefs).
Orcs have intelligence>Orcs have souls,perhaps indicative of Elves fallen nature in extremis?Sorry for going all Thomist, in idipsum..
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Ha! Glad you said it(re Tolkien's beliefs).
Orcs have intelligence>Orcs have souls,perhaps indicative of Elves fallen nature in extremis?Sorry for going all Thomist, in idipsum..
Isn't that why the whole "puppet playing recordings of speech" idea was entertained at one point? They're not really intelligent, they're just made to sound that way ...
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Indeed :)
In a philosophical light; if Tolkien was a Platonist,it could be suggested that since Orcs lack that necessary muse,or parts thereof,that they lack a complete soul.This is a somewhat neater explanation although not canon.
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Did Elves have souls? I thought the whole idea of their immortality was that they didn't have a soul, they simply returned to the earth if killed (unlike Men, which is why they envied them their immortal souls).
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Did Elves have souls? I thought the whole idea of their immortality was that they didn't have a soul, they simply returned to the earth if killed (unlike Men, which is why they envied them their immortal souls).
Elves have souls, but after death they will reside in the halls of the dead under the care of Mandos until the end of the world, and only then do they get to join Eru Ilúvatar. Men simply pass through the halls of the dead and join Eru Ilúvatar immediately. That is why elves envy men.
The bit about souls returning to the earth (and simply ceasing to exist as distinct souls) is pertaining to the elf belief of what happens to dwarves upon death (because Eru Ilúvatar did not intend for such things as dwarves to exist in the first place - Aulë made them out of a sheer desire to create and out of an impatience to live among such "children" as the elves and men Eru Ilúvatar had "previewed" to the Ainur - then, Eru Ilúvatar stepped in to give the dwarves souls out of love/sympathy/whatever). Dwarves themselves believe otherwise - that their souls too are immortal and there is a separate hall of the dead for them. We as readers don't know which, if either, of these theories is true. They are simply presented to the reader as two conflicting beliefs.
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Isn't that why the whole "puppet playing recordings of speech" idea was entertained at one point? They're not really intelligent, they're just made to sound that way ...
If (as said in the Silmarillion) Orcs were the result of Melkor's/Morgoth's corruption of Elves(and not by their own hand), it would lead one to think that Orcs could be 'saved',this is where Tolkien had so much trouble reconciling their existence and creation and to their eventual end.
So therefore the idea that they were imbued with some of Morgoth's will,and in essence automata is a much neater idea,they were Morgoth and reflected his will.
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If (as said in the Silmarillion) Orcs were the result of Melkor's/Morgoth's corruption of Elves(and not by their own hand), it would lead one to think that Orcs could be 'saved',this is where Tolkien had so much trouble reconciling their existence and creation and to where they would go...
Plus, there's the question: Are there, like, millions upon millions of orc souls, which are technically elf souls, residing in the halls of the dead, just accumulating like crazy? ;D
Mandos does speak occasionally among the other Ainur (and elves?) in the Quenta Silmarillion. You'd think he would have said something about it :)
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Edited above :D
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Indeed. And they are not green ;-)
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Tolkien does talk a lot about Orc Souls, and comes to no conclusion. It does seem he went with the 'Orcs come from men' conclusion in the end.
The Silmarillion was put together by Christopher from his Fathers papers, his subsequent books on the History of Middle-earth are him delving deeper into other papers. The other papers are mostly the earlier versions of the Legendarium, but some are the Prof revisiting his ideas like the Orcs. The Orc notes I'm refering to come from around 1956. The question of Orc Souls (I'm not 100% on this without re-reading, sorry) was that as creatures become more corrupt & evil, they 'lose privileges', so Orcs, even Elf-Bred Orcs, won't be going to the halls of Mandos. An example of this is I think is the death of Saruman, his fallen spirit reaches out to the West, but is dispersed by a west wind (symbolising rejection from his privileges in death).
Just as an aside, the book 'Peoples of Middle-Earth' contains Tolkien's only post LotR story, it's short, & it's about the youth of Minas Tirith forming 'Orc Cults' and committing dark deeds.
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Wargamify this, Games Workshop! :D
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Elves have souls, but after death they will reside in the halls of the dead under the care of Mandos until the end of the world, and only then do they get to join Eru Ilúvatar. Men simply pass through the halls of the dead and join Eru Ilúvatar immediately. That is why elves envy men.
Jebus, I am seriously outgunned in this conversation!
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Jebus, I am seriously outgunned in this conversation!
Actually so am I. "Only" ever read The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings and The Silmarillion (and the lattermost I only read for the first time less than a year ago). I didn't know 75% of the other texts referenced in this thread even existed. Definitely didn't know Tolkien had actually treated the orc souls dilemma in surviving writings - I just thought that was a big black hole in the cosmology of the legendarium. My reserves of knowledge (I use that word hesitantly) are pretty much exhausted by this point, but I hope the discussion won't die yet.
*Prods Hobgoblin and Nick with an orcish spear.*
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An orcish spear should do it Rhoderic - they're designed for functionality, not looks, so you know they're going to do their job!
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Just re-reading The Disaster of the Gladden Fields (prompted by Sunjester's comments on the orc bow thread). There's some interesting stuff therein that's pertinent to this discussion:
"If the keen-eyed Orcs marked their flight they took no heed. They halted briefly, preparing their assault. First they let fly a hail of arrows, and then suddenly with a great shot they did as Isildur would have done, and hurled a great mass of their chief warriors down the last slope against the Dunedin, expecting to break up their shield-wall. But it stood firm. The arrows had been unavailing against the Numenorean armour. The great Men towered above the tallest Orcs, and their swords and spears far outreached the weapons of their enemies. The onslaught faltered, broke, and retreated, leaving the defenders little harmed, unshaken, behind piles of fallen Orcs."
[Tolkien puts commas in very odd places by contemporary standards.]
Now, these are Second Age Orcs of the mountains, not Uruks, of course. And the Numenoreans are exceptionally tall Men (Isildur is somewhere said to be 7' tall, though whether that was contemporary with this I have no idea). But it's interesting that in the Third Age, Saruman's Orcs have considerable difficulty with a Rohirric shieldwall at the Isen (they're withdrawn and replaced with Dunlendings for that reason). There's a consistent theme that Orcs of whatever stripe are too short to fare well against a Mannish shieldwall.
That reinforces the view that all Orcs are shorter than Men - and that the size difference between smaller and larger Orcs may not be that great in any case.
A second interesting thing is this:
"The Orcs of the Mountains were stiffened and commanded by grim servants of Barad-dur, sent out long before to watch the passes ..." [A lengthy note makes plain that these were Orcs of the Red Eye.]
The passage echoes the note from Appendix B of LotR:
"Orcs begin to make secret strongholds in the Misty Mountains so as to bar all the passes into Eriador. Sauron begins to people Moria with his creatures." [Hence the "black Uruks of Mordor" in Moria ...]
Returning to the Gladden Fields text, we get a couple of further mentions of large Orcs:
"Men were falling for some of the greater Orcs leaped up, two at a time, and dead of alive with their weight bore down a Dunedan, so that other strong claws could drag him out and slay him. The Orcs might pay five to one in this exchange, but it was too cheap." [The note on the "grim servants" suggests that the Mordor Orcs were driven into a sort of frenzy by the presence of the ring.]
"... for there were certain Woodmen who got news to Thranduil by runners, and also themselves gathered a force to ambush the Orcs - of which they got wind, and scattered, for though victorious their losses and been great, and almost all of the great Orcs had fallen: they attempted no such attack again for long years after."
What all this suggests to me is that Uruks appear to be a cyclical phenomenon. When read in conjunction with the Morgoth's Ring note, the Gladden Fields text suggests that when Sauron was in power, he produced bigger, stronger Orcs than those living "wild" - just as Morgoth had done before him. These great Orcs of the First and Second Age may not have been called Uruks (but who knows?) but they seem to have been pretty much the same thing.
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My reserves of knowledge (I use that word hesitantly) are pretty much exhausted by this point, but I hope the discussion won't die yet.
*Prods Hobgoblin and Nick with an orcish spear.*
"[Orcs] do not tire."
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We have another source for powerful Orcs in the First Age, the already mentioned "Boldogs" (although I'm not sure if it was Tolkien's final view on the matter):
In any case is it likely or possible that even the least of the Maiar would become Orcs? Yes: both outside Arda and in it, before the fall of Utumno. Melkor had corrupted many spirits - some great, as Sauron, or less so, as Balrogs. The least could have been primitive (and much more powerful and perilous) Orcs; but by practising when embodied procreation they would (cf. Melian) [become] more and more earthbound, unable to return to spirit-state (even demon-form), until released by death (killing), and they would dwindle in force. When released they would, of course, like Sauron, be 'damned': i.e. reduced to impotence, infinitely recessive: still hating but unable more and
more to make it effective physically (or would not a very dwindled dead Orc-state be a poltergeist?).
Also Elves, unlike Men, can refuse the Summon of Mandos (which is a sign of their corruption) when they die and stay in Middle-earth unseen, hating the living and wanting to posses a body (and trying to communicate with them is dangerous and against the law of Eru). If you assume Orcs are Elves in origin, they could have a similar fate but since the power of their fëar is greatly dimished (compared to Elves), they could not interact with the living at all.
Coming back to Orc diversity, Personally I chose pragmatic approach taking all the four origins as "pure/original" Orc races which have mixed in different proportions over the years.
- One would be simian-like, stronger and less cunning with greish skin.
- Other would be the "standard" made out of Elves, looking like ugly Mongols with swarthy skin.
- Mannish one would somewhere in the middle, stockier than the Elf-related one and less bowed than the simian one. this one would have dark brown skin.
- The Maiar blooded would be the most perfect, strongest and most cunning and wickd. Kings and maybe some priest of Sauron's Dark Religion tapping into Sorcery. I'd give these black skin.
And then any mix of the above you can think of :D
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Hi Cubs and Rhoderic
I don't to come across as 'look how much I know', I'm too modest for that. It's just been a lifelong obsession.
I'm loath to refer to a lot of Christopher T's books, as they are mostly works his father didn't make public. But the reference to the Orcs in Morgoths Ring, I think that bit is relevant.
The books are mostly impenetrable, so I wouldn't recommend them lol
The one I'd recommend heartly is Unfinished Tales. That's easier to read than the Silmarillion, though some of the stories in it are 1st Age so you need to be aware of them to read those, but The Fords of Isen chapter is great, as is the Dwarfs perspective of An Unexpected Party.
Uruks. I knew I'd read something about Uruks, and it's in LotR appendix F ,
'Orcs and the Black Speech'
Orch is Orc in Sindarin. Related no doubt was the word Uruk of the Black Speech, though this was applied as a rule only to the great soldier-orcs that at this time issued from Mordor and Isengard. The lesser kinds were called, especially by the Uruk-Hai, snaga 'slave'.
Apologies if this has already appeared in the thread, by 9 pages I'm getting lost.
My idea of an Orc Army pre-War of the Ring wouldn't include Uruks. It's be orcs of various sizes, but each regiment led by one individual markedly bigger than the rest. I probably would have guard units of bigger orcs (Bolg has one at the battle of Five Armies), but wouldn't call them Uruks.
What I'd do for Uruks in the 3rd Age is make them bigger orcs, but uniformed. As though they had been kitted especially. It's easy for Isengard Uruks, the Fellowship describe their kit well enough for us. Mordor Uruks would take some design work. If you go for a chaotic look in dress and armour for standard orcs, including the bigger guard units, it's easy to give the Uruks the same Helmets, armour, shield to make them stand out.
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What I will do for Uruks in the 3rd Age when I commission a new range is make them bigger orcs, but uniformed. As though they had been kitted especially. It's easy for Isengard Uruks, the Fellowship describe their kit well enough for us. Mordor Uruks will take some design work. When I'll go for a chaotic look in dress and armour for standard orcs, including the bigger guard units, it's easy to give the Uruks the same Helmets, armour, shield to make them stand out.
FTFY :D
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lol
I need this Frostgrave malarky to quieten down first.
Then again,
Tolkien-esque Orc warband for Frostgrave.....
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I'm loath to refer to a lot of Christopher T's books, as they are mostly works his father didn't make public.
I think this is a really, really important point. And I'd include the published Silmarillion in that. As CT himself acknowledges, it's just one version (or a patchwork) of stories that often themselves have several versions and variants.
The orc origin story is a good example here. As we've discussed, the "corrupted elves" theory is not necessarily Tolkien's final view on the matter (and it's even presented as merely a theory in that version of the text). It's become "fannish gospel" - but it's not necessarily reliable.
On that note, an unwarranted "fannish" assumption is that trolls were made from Ents. Treebeard says something like "Trolls were made in mockery of Ents, as Orcs were of Elves". Now, "in mockery" obviously means "in imitation of" or "in derisory imitation of". But it doesn't mean "from"! People come to that conclusion, it seems, by reading the Silmarillion, taking its account of Orc origins as gospel and then fitting the LotR text into that framework, even though LotR doesn't affirm that origin story.
All that said (and as you said!), there's stuff that in UT, etc., which seems to read well as an accompaniment to LotR and appears to have been very much in line with it. I think the later stuff (UT, Morgoth's Ring) seems to be much more reliable than the earlier stuff (where some concepts have clearly changed radically by the time of the published books).
The one I'd recommend heartly is Unfinished Tales. That's easier to read than the Silmarillion, though some of the stories in it are 1st Age so you need to be aware of them to read those, but The Fords of Isen chapter is great, as is the Dwarfs perspective of An Unexpected Party.
Hear, hear!
Uruks. I knew I'd read something about Uruks, and it's in LotR appendix F ,
'Orcs and the Black Speech'
Orch is Orc in Sindarin. Related no doubt was the word Uruk of the Black Speech, though this was applied as a rule only to the great soldier-orcs that at this time issued from Mordor and Isengard. The lesser kinds were called, especially by the Uruk-Hai, snaga 'slave'.
Apologies if this has already appeared in the thread, by 9 pages I'm getting lost.
I think we've had various "micro-quotes" - the "great soldier-orcs ..." snippet - but nothing more, so it's good to get the whole thing in here. It's one of the bits that suggests to me that Uruks and Uruk-hai are equivalent terms ("Uruk-hai" seems to be acting as a plural of Uruk and a synonym for "great soldier-orcs" here).
My idea of an Orc Army pre-War of the Ring wouldn't include Uruks. It's be orcs of various sizes, but each regiment led by one individual markedly bigger than the rest. I probably would have guard units of bigger orcs (Bolg has one at the battle of Five Armies), but wouldn't call them Uruks.
My only quibble with this is that I think there's a very strong case for Azog, Bolg and Bolg's guard being genuine bred-by-Sauron-in-the-Third-Age Uruks.
This is the chronology that points very strongly to this, I think:
2475 - the black uruks of Mordor, who have recently appeared, sweep across Ithilien and sack Osgiliath
c.2480 - "Orcs begin to make secret strongholds in the Misty Mountains so as to bar all the passes into Eriador. Sauron begins to people Moria with his creatures." (Appendix B)
2790 - Thror slain by Azog in Moria
2799 - Azog killed by Dain
2941 - Bolg killed by Beorn
Add to that the persistentce of "black Uruks of Mordor in Moria" in 3019, and there is, I think, a very strong indication that Azog is the leader of "Sauron's creatures" in Moria. Bolg, his (remarkably long-lived) son, would then be an Uruk too - and, one would assume, his guard with him.
And one more point to go with it is that there were definitely "great uruks" in the Misty Mountains in 2995:
"At that time Sauron had arisen again, and the shadow of Mordor reached out to Rohan. Orcs began to raid in the eastern regions and slay or steal horses. Others also came down from the Misty Mountains, many being great uruks in the service of Saruman, though it was long before that was suspected."
It's hard not to see those uruks as descendants of Sauron's "colonists" more than 500 years before (whatever Saruman had been doing to them in the interim).
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Such a cracking thread well done chaps!
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lol
I need this Frostgrave malarky to quieten down first.
Then again,
Tolkien-esque Orc warband for Frostgrave.....
A white wizard, perhaps? With a wizened apprentice with heavy-lidded eyes? "Squat and broad" archers and men-at-arms (great bows of yew and short, broad-bladed swords; large round shields); a "knight" of the same sort; ill-favoured, squint-eyed thugs with clubs; and ferocious, mail-clad templars (or barbarians) armed with two-handed axes ...
It could all work very nicely! ;)
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"I'm loath to refer to a lot of Christopher T's books, as they are mostly works his father didn't make public. But the reference to the Orcs in Morgoths Ring, I think that bit is relevant."
I would agree with this but also add that the mythology prior to LotR was his real passion and we might have seen a different version of LotR if he had completed his history of the First Age to his satisfaction. Still, we have what we have. As much as I enjoyed the Lord of the Rings, my passion is also the First Age. The latter reads as mythology, the other more as "history". I accept that the two will never completely agree with each other. I look on the two works as one might the stories of Homer and the history of Classical Greece. I think elves are quite different in the two works, although we know that the elves started to diminish in the Second and Third Ages.
For me, orcs in the FA are smaller, more primitive, relying on numbers and savagery, while the later orcs are bigger, still savage, but have some technical savvy. But none are green!
As far as the age of Bolg, if orcs truly were descended from corrupted elves they would quite probably be immortal as well.
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Ha! Too true! ;)
And there's always a vague sense of guilt, if you've read this essay (http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/english/currentstudents/undergraduate/modules/en361fantastika/bibliography/2.7harrison_mj._2001what_might_it_be_like_to_live_in_viriconium.pdf) by M John Harrison:
For instance, the moment you begin to ask (or rather to answer) questions like, “Yes, but what did Sauron look like?”; or, “Just how might an Orc regiment organise itself?”; the moment you concern yourself with the economic geography of pseudo-feudal societies, with the real way to use swords, with the politics of courts, you have diluted the poetic power of Tolkien’s images. You have brought them under control. You have tamed, colonised and put your own cultural mark on them."
I have done just short of a thesis on ME dwarves some years ago. It finally ended me in asking myself "What the fuck am I doing here?" While Tolkien has an unprecedented thoroughness nearing completeness to his works, I have landed in thinking most of it was never meant to stick a pin in.
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Hi Cubs and Rhoderic
I don't [want] to come across as 'look how much I know', I'm too modest for that. It's just been a lifelong obsession.
Hell no, it's just a bit dazzling to see so much knowledge on the subject based on actual research instead of supposition.
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Immortal Orcs. Tolkien does talk about immortal orcs in his notes. He basically said 'Naah'. It's part of what I mentioned earlier about reducing the 'privileges' for evil things, plus he wanted to move away from the idea of Elf bred Orcs. It's also in this section where he talks about the above quoted 'demon orcs', the Maiar who take Orc forms to lead the armies. He says this explains the orc captains who reappear in Morgoths armies, rather than being immortal because of Elf blood, they are immortal because they are Maiar. But he also includes them in the debasing, corruption theory, the longer these Maiar stay as Orcs, the weaker and mortal they become.
I agree, Azog & Bolg are more than likely Uruks, it all fits the timeline.
I was always interested in what Tolkien described as the older Orc tribes in the North of Middle-Earth. When I thought Orcs might be immortal, the idea stuck in my head of these ancient tribes might be ones who still remembered the First Age, Goblin Elronds if you like. 'Course it's not the case, but what about an idea that Azog and Bolg, and maybe the Great Goblin, are Maiars, who've lingered under the Misty Mountains for eternity in Orc form, leading these independant lesser tribes. The Balrog managed it!
'Sticking a pin in it'. I agree, Tolkien never expected Wargamers to be analysing his world like a historical period. But, he did it himself. He stressed over his history being perfect, there being no inconsistencies. Famously (in my mind), the only reference in all of his books that doesn't tie up is some Queen who kept cats. Another one I noticed was Gandalf calling the Balrog Flame of Udun. Udun is the area behind the gates of Mordor. Odd thought I. Later on I read Udun was also another name for Utumno
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I would say there's enough raw material and thinking on orcs, right here in this thread, for a Masters thesis in 'Tolkien Studies'!
Someone should apply :)
Nick, I'm seeng a 'Frostgrave' plastic box of True-to-Tolkien orcs in your future... :D
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I was always interested in what Tolkien described as the older Orc tribes in the North of Middle-Earth. When I thought Orcs might be immortal, the idea stuck in my head of these ancient tribes might be ones who still remembered the First Age, Goblin Elronds if you like. 'Course it's not the case, but what about an idea that Azog and Bolg, and maybe the Great Goblin, are Maiars, who've lingered under the Misty Mountains for eternity in Orc form, leading these independant lesser tribes. The Balrog managed it!
There is that curious thing about the great orc-chieftain in Moria:
"But even as the orc flung down the truncheon and swept out his scimitar, Andúril came down upon his helm. There was a flash like flame and the helm burst asunder. The orc fell with cloven head."[Emphasis mine]
Is that flash just metal on metal? Or is it some effect of Anduril? Or is there something unusual or supernatural about that particular orc?
On the tribes: the impression I get from the various notes about Sauron reinforcing the mountain tribes with his "grim servants", both at the end of the Second Age and the beginning of the Third, is that Orcs, when left on their own, will tend to dwindle in stature over the generations. I seem to recall that there are various references in various of Tolkien's writings to Orcs having been stronger and more terrible - "fell" - in the past. But of course, there could always be some of those greater, more "fell" remnants of past ages among them. The Great Goblin's "celebrity status" is certainly notable in The Hobbit - look at the reaction to his death, both from Orcs and from the likes of Beorn.
As an aside, it's a little unsettling that Beorn clearly tortured his captive goblin for information before killing him!
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Nick, I'm seeng a 'Frostgrave' plastic box of True-to-Tolkien orcs in your future... :D
Bugger! If that happens I can see my " 400+ orcs are enough, I'm never going to buy another I'll just make do with what I've got and paint up the lead pile" promise go straight down the toilet! >:( ;D lol
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As an aside, it's a little unsettling that Beorn clearly tortured his captive goblin for information before killing him!
I'd forgot that. It is interesting because in one of Tolkiens later notes he talks about how it was impossible for the good guys to reduce themselves to Orcs, meaning that no Elf would ever torture a captured Orc. He goes on to say it was never an issue because no Orc ever surrendered to Elves in the First Age (or ever?), and part of that was because Morgoth convinced the Orcs that Elves were worse than them, and would torture and eat any Orc they caught. It was all a bit East Front WW2 out there. In Unfinished Tales, Turin gets angry with the outlaws he runs with for acting 'Orc-Like' with the Woodsmen they rob from. At first read I thought he meant 'acting cruelly', but actually his outburst ran much deeper into Middle-Earth lore than I realised.
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I dont think there is any info about how long Orcs live as so few are named more than once in the histories. The only exception i can think of is Bolg, son of Azog. Azog himself was killed in the Battle of Azanulbizar in T.A. 2799 and Bolg became chief which means he was at least old enough to be strong, dangerous and probably experienced enough to pull this off. If we accept he was at least 20 years old then Bolg, when he died attacking Erebor in the Battle of Five Armies in T.A. 2941 must have been at least 160 years old.
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I dont think there is any info about how long Orcs live as so few are named more than once in the histories. The only exception i can think of is Bolg, son of Azog. Azog himself was killed in the Battle of Azanulbizar in T.A. 2799 and Bolg became chief which means he was at least old enough to be strong, dangerous and probably experienced enough to pull this off. If we accept he was at least 20 years old then Bolg, when he died attacking Erebor in the Battle of Five Armies in T.A. 2941 must have been at least 160 years old
A though occurs to me: does Tolkien ever specify that Bolg succeeded Azog directly? There could have been a succession of sons, especially if the Orcs didn't practise primogeniture. Perhaps a string of brothers succeeded each other - as in, say, the Vandal kingdom in Africa. Not that that "helps" much with the age question - Bolg would still be at least 140!
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the only reference in all of his books that doesn't tie up is some Queen who kept cats.
Beruthiel, who was later outfloated by her husband? What did not tie up there? Just curious.
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I'm wrong. I've just done a Wiki on it:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queen_Ber%C3%BAthiel
I think I was more influenced by Tom Shippeys words than my own reading.
Tolkien spent years creating his world, and it shows, in what he reveals and also what he merely hints at. For instance, there are the famous ‘cats of Queen Beruthiel’, the subject of an off-hand comment by Aragorn—we never find out anything more about the cats or their mistress, but just the mention of them suggests that there is a world outside the story.
But apparently it is in Unfinished Tales. Which I read and never registered.
Orcs are definitely not Green.
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Back to the miniatures; does anyone remember the Orcs/Goblins from Ral Partha's 1979 catalogue,called Goblins of the North,South et cetera.Very good,though not very animated,they certainly had the look,right down to Saruman's rune; I have one or two,should have bought more,I was only 13 at the time so Minifigs made up the bulk of my LOTR armies.
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Back to the miniatures; does anyone remember the Orcs/Goblins from Ral Partha's 1979 catalogue,called Goblins of the North,South et cetera.Very good,though not very animated,they certainly had the look,right down to Saruman's rune; I have one or two,should have bought more,I was only 13 at the time so Minifigs made up the bulk of my LOTR armies.
I don't remember them in the shops; they must have been superseded by the type in the attached photos by the mid-80s: those are 1979 castings too, originally, I think. But I have seen them around; I may even have one or two in the lead pile; if so, I've never paid them much attention but I'll see if I can dig them out.
I hadn't realised that they were so Tolkien-esque. They're shown here (http://www.miniatures-workshop.com/lostminiswiki/index.php?title=Wizards%2C_Warriors_and_Warlocks). As you say, they're very clearly based on Tolkien: eyes or hands on the shields, bows on the backs, "squat and broad" - and the S-runes on the helmets of the "giant goblins" (the name reinforces my notion that Tom Meier's later giant goblins - see below - were meant to be uruks, though of Mordor).
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That archer is still sold by Ral Partha as part of their Orcs range.
http://www.ralparthaeurope.co.uk/shop/ral-partha-fantasy-c-37/fantasy-armies-c-37_39/orcs-c-37_39_96/
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That archer is still sold by Ral Partha as part of their Orcs range.
http://www.ralparthaeurope.co.uk/shop/ral-partha-fantasy-c-37/fantasy-armies-c-37_39/orcs-c-37_39_96/
Yes, I think these guys must hold a record for years in continuous production. They were old when I started gaming as a kid, and they're still going now.
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I had some fantastic little Tolkien-esque goblins back in the 70s, about 1977, I think. Sadly long gone, I'm not sure what happened to them. I remember them fondly, they were my first fantasy units after Minifigs ME range. I got them from Games Workshop in Hammersmith, back when GW was about the best source on the UK for fantasy/RPG stuff (and White Dwarf was an interesting RPG magazine). I'm not sure who made them, but they were very squat, armoured in mail with spiked helmets. There were 3 poses, one with scimitar and shield, one with axe and shield and one firing a bow - the other two figures had bows slung over their backs. The shields had basic Lidless Eye blazoning.
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I had some fantastic little Tolkien-esque goblins back in the 70s, about 1977, I think. Sadly long gone, I'm not sure what happened to them. I remember them fondly, they were my first fantasy units after Minifigs ME range. I got them from Games Workshop in Hammersmith, back when GW was about the best source on the UK for fantasy/RPG stuff (and White Dwarf was an interesting RPG magazine). I'm not sure who made them, but they were very squat, armoured in mail with spiked helmets. There were 3 poses, one with scimitar and shield, one with axe and shield and one firing a bow - the other two figures had bows slung over their backs. The shields had basic Lidless Eye blazoning.
They sound very much like the fellows in that link I posted above. "Goblins of the Night". They look great - I'm increasingly drawn to really old, somewhat crude miniatures - more room for impressionistic (and very quick!) paintjobs.
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Thanks for the link Hobgoblin,yep that's them.And I would pay good money for a collection :)
As an aside; Painted a Chronicle Orc...Awful! Them an Asgard,so good :)
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I think the orc hatred of sunlight is physical more than psychological. In the ten pages I don't think anyone has considered these lines from TTT
'What of the dawn?' they jeered. 'We are the fighting Uruk-hai: we do not stop the fight for night or day, for fair wheather or for storm. We come to kill, by sun or moon. What of the dawn?'
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They sound very much like the fellows in that link I posted above. "Goblins of the Night". They look great - I'm increasingly drawn to really old, somewhat crude miniatures - more room for impressionistic (and very quick!) paintjobs.
No it's definitely not the ones in your pictures, these were squatter rather than hunched. I wish I still had them. :(
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No it's definitely not the ones in your pictures, these were squatter rather than hunched. I wish I still had them. :(
The link (http://www.miniatures-workshop.com/lostminiswiki/index.php?title=Wizards%2C_Warriors_and_Warlocks) not the picture: E621 to E623?
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That's them!! Goblins of the Night. Now I know what to look out for.
Thanks.
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What a wonderful discussion, and I found it right on time too! I have never liked the Warhammer description of Orcs and Goblins (and especially how they look!) and always liked the more serious representations (of which there are very little).
So, very interesting discussion! :)
However, for my "world", Goblins and Orcs will stay different creatures, albeit very different from their silly counterparts, especially the Goblins.
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I think we should make a list of Tolkien-accurate Orc manufacturers/ranges!
You lot seems to prefer your Orcs oldschool style (Asgard, Grenadier...), but most of them don't hold so well compared with nowadays standar. In a more "updated" style I'd add:
- GW Moria goblins and uruks scouts (the ones with light armour and bows).
- Redbox goblins
- Thunderbolt Mountain goblins
- Mithril Orcs (these are between oldschool and actual style IMO)
Two questions wich have costed me countless sleepless night:
- What color are Orc eyes? Red? Human-like? Simian-like? Whatever you want because Tolkien never described them?
- And Orc blood, is red or black?
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I'm with Daniel36,
For me 'goblins' will always be the weedier orcs, while Orcs are the ones you need to take seriously at your peril (and Uruk-Hai even more so). It is a convenient shorthand to differentiate them in much the same way that all the different Indian sword types are actually just the term 'sword' in different languages and dialects... talwar, tegha, shamshir, sosun pattah, nimcha, pata, etc.
Arthadan,
I always thought Orc blood was on the black side and seem to recall a reference in Tolkien somewhere. I'd hate to find out it is just another piece of artificially created 'mythos'.
As for eyes - I reckon they'd vary.
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I think we should make a list of Tolkien-accurate Orc manufacturers/ranges!
You lot seems to prefer your Orcs oldschool style (Asgard, Grenadier...), but most of them don't hold so well compared with nowadays standar. In a more "updated" style I'd add:
- GW Moria goblins and uruks scouts (the ones with light armour and bows).
- Redbox goblins
- Thunderbolt Mountain goblins
- Mithril Orcs (these are between oldschool and actual style IMO)
I don't think the GW orcs are Tolkien-accurate. The small Moria ones have those odd bug eyes, which really doesn't fit with Tolkien's descriptions of "slant eyes". And the Uruk scouts fall down in several respects:
- they are too tall (in that respect, they might fit the description of the half-orcs better);
- they are not "squat and broad";
- they are not equipped with gear "like that of Men"; of which
- their swords are peculiarly right-angled or hooked; they seem to be a type of falchion or scimitar, with which the Isengarder's swords are specifically contrasted; they certainly don't look like swords that Men would use.
- their bows are short, unlike the "long bows of yew" described in the book;
- their shields aren't large and round as described in the book;
- their helmets don't have badges for the S-rune
- they aren't wearing mail.
If you're being very picky, you might sniff (both puns intended! ;)) at the long noses of the Red Box goblins - hardly "flat faces".
The Thunderbolt ones look very appropriate (and are quite superb miniatures).
The Mithril ones are a bit odd. They have quite small heads, proportionately, which doesn't fit, and I think a lot of them are too tall. Also, if memory serves, their Isengard Uruk-hai don't have the right gear (too stereotypically "Orcish"). The ones I have don't wear to wear shoes (which at least some Orcs did: heavy, iron-nailed shoes at that).
Two questions wich have costed me countless sleepless night:
- What color are Orc eyes? Red? Human-like? Simian-like? Whatever you want because Tolkien never described them?
They're never described as red, as far as I know. There's a description of the orc-chieftain in Moria with eyes that "burned like coals". That could be read as "glowing", "black" or just "fierce". It's a description that could be applied to a human, so it's hard to read too much into it. My guess would be that their eyes were fairly human-like (unlike, say, Gollum's glowing "lamps"). I think red eyes were popularised by Bakshi and Angus McBride - and perhaps by association with the heraldry of Mordor too.
- And Orc blood, is red or black?
The Hobbit has a reference to rocks that are "stained black with goblin blood" or something, but I don't think that's decisive. Again, you could imagine a description of rocks "stained black with blood" in a fight between Men (it would depend on the starting colour of the rocks!). There may be other references, but those may or may not point to the final conception. Shagrat, in Return of the King, has "a long red knife". Is it just made of some red metal, or is it red with the blood of the Orcs he's recently stabbed (Gorbag for one)?
Trolls, on the other hand, certainly have black blood (as seen in Moria and on the Cormallen).
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I'm with Daniel36,
For me 'goblins' will always be the weedier orcs, while Orcs are the ones you need to take seriously at your peril (and Uruk-Hai even more so). It is a convenient shorthand to differentiate them in much the same way that all the different Indian sword types are actually just the term 'sword' in different languages and dialects... talwar, tegha, shamshir, sosun pattah, nimcha, pata, etc.
Daniel notes that he observes the distinction in his world, though. ;) In The Lord of the Rings, "goblin" is much more often used to describe the big soldier-orcs of Isengard and Mordor than it is to describe smaller breeds. In fact, I think there is just one occasion in the whole book when it's used specifically to describe smaller Orcs. And that's in a context when those "smaller goblins" are being specifically contrasted with larger goblins. So it might be convenient shorthand, but it's certainly not Tolkien's shorthand! ;)
To expand on this a little, people often talk about "Moria goblins", for some reason, meaning small ones. But there are some very large orcs in Moria - including, apparently, the largest individual we see anywhere in LotR. There are some small ones too, of course, like those that crop up in Rohan. Those are described as goblins once, whereas Isengarders are described as goblins thrice (twice directly and once implicitly). There is a general reference to goblins in The Fellowship of the Ring, when the Fellowship are expecting pursuit, but of course that covers all the potential pursuers (and the only ones that we've had described in any detail at that point are the "large and evil" "black Uruks of Mordor").
By the way, did you see the note I made further up about the possibility - a tantalising one! - of those mysterious Morgul cavalry being Orcs rather than Men?
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I've always wondered about the whole concept of the Moria goblins/orcs and their relationship with the Balrog.
On the one hand it seems to fit Sauron's purpose to fill a strategic stronghold like that with his servants, in which case he might have arranged for the Balrog to whup some Goblin butt and force them to toe the line.
But on the other hand, I think it's Gandlaf who says (or hints) the Dwarves dug too deep and 'released' the Balrog. This would suggest to me it was lurking underground, either because that was its favoured domain and they angered it by disturbing it, or because it was trapped in some way and they enabled it to escape.
Certainly the Moria goblins/orcs appear to be as terrified of the Balrog as everyone else is, even though they are all servants of Sauron (and Morgoth presumably). Is this simply the normal sort of emotion they feel towards their brutal leaders, or the result of being bound against their will to an enormously powerful entity that some short eejits have let loose?
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There are some interesting thoughts on those topics here:
http://tolkien.slimy.com/essays/TAB4.html (http://tolkien.slimy.com/essays/TAB4.html)
The point at the end about the Moria orcs not siding with Grishnakh's troop is quite interesting.
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I am already starting to inch towards removing goblins from my world and stick to just orcs.
So unimportant hahah... But all for fun... Tbis thread is certainly an inspiration to me.
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I don't think the GW orcs are Tolkien-accurate. The small Moria ones have those odd bug eyes, which really doesn't fit with Tolkien's descriptions of "slant eyes".
It can be easily fixed with painting:
(http://www.talesofmiddleearth.co.uk/Images/Articles/MoriaGoblins/BadSkin.jpg)
And the Uruk scouts fall down in several respects:
- they are too tall (in that respect, they might fit the description of the half-orcs better);
- they are not "squat and broad";
- they are not equipped with gear "like that of Men"; of which
- their swords are peculiarly right-angled or hooked; they seem to be a type of falchion or scimitar, with which the Isengarder's swords are specifically contrasted; they certainly don't look like swords that Men would use.
- their bows are short, unlike the "long bows of yew" described in the book;
- their shields aren't large and round as described in the book;
- their helmets don't have badges for the S-rune
- they aren't wearing mail.
If you're being very picky, you might sniff (both puns intended! ;))
I'd use those as half-orcs. my collection is 28mm so these are a bit smaller.
(http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-hs60sYijYCM/VH_ySaXLMHI/AAAAAAAABIo/4xu6oAEE6ek/s1600/DSC01823.JPG)
at the long noses of the Red Box goblins - hardly "flat faces".
You're right. I was thinking about this quote, but it turns out the tracker's nose seems to be wide rather than pointy:
Presently two orcs came into view. One was clad in ragged brown and was armed with a bow of horn; it was of a small breed, black-skinned, with wide and snuffling nostrils: evidently a tracker of some kind.
The Thunderbolt ones look very appropriate (and are quite superb miniatures).
Agreed!
The Mithril ones are a bit odd. They have quite small heads, proportionately, which doesn't fit, and I think a lot of them are too tall. Also, if memory serves, their Isengard Uruk-hai don't have the right gear (too stereotypically "Orcish"). The ones I have don't wear to wear shoes (which at least some Orcs did: heavy, iron-nailed shoes at that).
I think heads look ok.
(http://www.mithril.ie/Files/95564/Img/14/mc29.jpg)
The Isengarders you're refering to are half-orcs and as such they have Man height. I'd probably use them as "goblin-men, they're ugly as hell.
(http://www.mithril.ie/Files/95564/Img/06/mm514.jpg)
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Daniel notes that he observes the distinction in his world, though. ;) In The Lord of the Rings, "goblin" is much more often used to describe the big soldier-orcs of Isengard and Mordor than it is to describe smaller breeds. In fact, I think there is just one occasion in the whole book when it's used specifically to describe smaller Orcs. And that's in a context when those "smaller goblins" are being specifically contrasted with larger goblins. So it might be convenient shorthand, but it's certainly not Tolkien's shorthand! ;)
To expand on this a little, people often talk about "Moria goblins", for some reason, meaning small ones. But there are some very large orcs in Moria - including, apparently, the largest individual we see anywhere in LotR. There are some small ones too, of course, like those that crop up in Rohan. Those are described as goblins once, whereas Isengarders are described as goblins thrice (twice directly and once implicitly). There is a general reference to goblins in The Fellowship of the Ring, when the Fellowship are expecting pursuit, but of course that covers all the potential pursuers (and the only ones that we've had described in any detail at that point are the "large and evil" "black Uruks of Mordor").
By the way, did you see the note I made further up about the possibility - a tantalising one! - of those mysterious Morgul cavalry being Orcs rather than Men?
A quick quote to support Hobgoblin's deep lore knowledge (when the Dwarves are trappes in the "front porch" of the goblins):
Out jumped the goblins, big goblins, great ugly-looking goblins, lots of goblins, before you could say rocks and blocks.
Also from The Hobbit:
The passage was low and roughly made. It was not too difficult for the hobbit, except when, in spite of all care, he stubbed his poor toes again, several times, on nasty jagged stones in the floor. "A bit low for goblins, at least for the big ones," thought Bilbo, not knowing that even the big ones, the ores of the mountains, go along at a great speed stooping low with their hands almost on the ground.
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- they are too tall (in that respect, they might fit the description of the half-orcs better);
I have to admit, one thing I kinda liked about PJ's LotR were the uruk-hai berzerkers. I'd still like to use the GW minis in games (mostly because I already shelled out for a bunch, in metal, at ebay OOP prices) but they may have to be goblin-men.
'Course, the problem then is that they don't have heavy mail and axes. Although they still might be more easily slotted into a Tolkienist view, as a sideline to the main body of half-orcs, than the regular plate-covered, square-sworded uruk-hai. (I have too many of those too; good thing they were only second-hand plastic prices...)
- their helmets don't have badges for the S-rune
In the elven Cirth (http://ring-lord.tripod.com/cirth/angerthasdaeron.htm), a V-shape set on it's side.
What's the opinion on setting that on it's side, as an 'upright' V-shape, just for aesthetic reasons? Too easily mistaken for an actual V, or an upside-down O-rune?
Oh, and orcs have a higher concentration of hemoglobin in their erythrocytes, of a type with less affinity to oxygen. (I.e. gives up oxygen to tissues and becomes deoxygenated more readily) That's why their blood is dark, and why they can charge across Rohan so steadily and for so long. ;D ;)
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Ah - I was thinking of this chap (who I had long ago): it turns out he's a Mordor uruk; I'd filed off the eye on the shield:
http://www.mithril59.com/m150.htm
(http://www.mithril59.com/m150.htm)
He does have a relatively small head, though (and is a bit tall)! I have few others kicking about, including the two you posted, which I think are among the best.
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That one is meant to be an uruk/big one.
I also like these from Bronze Age, maybe as Mordor uruks. Shame there is only one pack:
(http://www.bronzeagemin.com/IMAGES/miniatures/25MM/Fantasy/28mm-orcs/32mm-orc-set1.jpg)
And speaking about oldies, we have the Denizen ones. Really tiny fellas:
(http://www.denizenminiatures.co.uk/Images/goblins.JPG)
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The Bronze Age ones look good - and they look as if they'd mix well with Ral Partha.
There are few even older Denizen ones which are really, really tiny but very well sculpted. They're very different from those ones. I've got a couple underway - one even has an eye on his shield!
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There are some interesting thoughts on those topics here:
http://tolkien.slimy.com/essays/TAB4.html (http://tolkien.slimy.com/essays/TAB4.html)
The point at the end about the Moria orcs not siding with Grishnakh's troop is quite interesting.
All nice and chin-rubby stuff for the brain. So from that I would surmise that the Balrog was nicely comatose under the mountain until the Dwarves inadvertantly woke it. From then on, it is controlling the Moria forces (by virtue of being immensely powerful and cruel) and sometimes acting alongside Sauron's general plan (being a nasty pasty), but without really being a part of the plans as either a servant or an ally.
One thing does seem clear about goblins/orcs, and that is their weak will. They seem to be easily dominated by the will of powerful entities and need a strong leader, or they split into disorganised gangs of robbers and thugs.
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I still think the GW LotR orcs (Moria goblins, Uruk-hai and all the rest of it) falter quite badly in regard to the aesthetic of their equipment. Too jagged, angular and "industrial gothic". I know Tolkien meant for Isengard and Mordor to stand for the "evil of industry", but I simply cannot bring myself to believe he meant for them to look like that. It's just Hollywood overplaying every visual, as always.
Similarly, I can't help but feel that some of the weapons and (especially) shields on the Mithril figures look a tad odd. It's like the sculptor believed the figures wouldn't count as "fantasy" if they came with reqular round or square shields, so he had to come up with new shapes just for the devilment of it. That said, I think the Mithril orcs do get the "crude mail" thing quite right, and I must admit to the idiosyncrasy of being rather partial to those Angus McBride-style helmets.
I also like these from Bronze Age, maybe as Mordor uruks. Shame there is only one pack:
(http://www.bronzeagemin.com/IMAGES/miniatures/25MM/Fantasy/28mm-orcs/32mm-orc-set1.jpg)
I like Bronze Age Miniatures, but I don't see those figures fitting the description of uruks (or any other Tolkien orcs) we've arrived at so far in this thread. Aren't they way too big? And aren't four of the five too upright-standing?
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So far we know orcs stand low (bowed back) when they run. I t all comes down to what you consider "man-height". For me these are "almost man-height", so they would be big ones.
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Really enjoyed the first post but this discussion has become quite in depth for late comers!
I don't know much about Tolkien world, never having gone into quite the detail others have sought with Middle Earth, though I know its much bigger than is immediately in view.
However my general view of Orcs, at least in Tolkien's world, was effectively a need for an evil creature that is somewhat relatable to evil men, but appears in large quantities enough to be able to have battles with them or pose a military style threat (something that has hardly ever existed in fairy tale/fantasy prior to Tolkien). They are just generic evil cannon fodder and not much else; a bunch of generic mutants basically.
Personally I prefer the more majestic Barbarian style Orcs similar those in World of Warcraft.
As it stands for models, I thought the GW LOTR Orcs were actually pretty good.
However aside from them, I've found practically every other incarnation of 'Orcs' to be fairly meh with very few exceptions. Pre-Citadel Slotter, Citadel Slotter, Ral Partha and the current Games Workshop ones with huge immense teeth are all a bit naff I'm afraid. And because of all the variations I've come to a point where 'Orc' is really just a generic term for a malcoloured Humanoid that generally stands in opposition to Elves, Men, Dwarves etc.
In fact, what is the purpsoe of Orcs outside of Tolkiens Middle Earth? For a long time I felt a fantasy world without them was pretty empty, but its not like they can't be replaced by something else. In fact I'd say any generic humanoid that has a penchant for being a dick and can amass armies of themselves to be Orc in all but name.
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I t all comes down to what you consider "man-height". For me these are "almost man-height", so they would be big ones.
Do we know how big those figures are? I just know that David Soderquist (he of Bronze Age) generally likes to sculpt his male figures very big. I also suspect he was going for the non-Tolkien concept of orcs as big, strapping lads when he sculpted those - more of a "muscle fantasy" aesthetic than a "misty, mythic fantasy" one.
I don't know anything about those figures for sure, but I have my gut feeling about them.
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All nice and chin-rubby stuff for the brain. So from that I would surmise that the Balrog was nicely comatose under the mountain until the Dwarves inadvertantly woke it. From then on, it is controlling the Moria forces (by virtue of being immensely powerful and cruel) and sometimes acting alongside Sauron's general plan (being a nasty pasty), but without really being a part of the plans as either a servant or an ally.
One thing does seem clear about goblins/orcs, and that is their weak will. They seem to be easily dominated by the will of powerful entities and need a strong leader, or they split into disorganised gangs of robbers and thugs.
My feeling on the Balrog has always been that he was roused by the presence of Gandalf and/or the One Ring.
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From then on, it is controlling the Moria forces (by virtue of being immensely powerful and cruel) and sometimes acting alongside Sauron's general plan (being a nasty pasty), but without really being a part of the plans as either a servant or an ally.
IIRC from Unfinished Tales, and Gandalf's version of the 'Unexpected Party' in The Hobbit: he was taking a holiday of sorts in the Shire, to clear his head about the problem of Smaug, when he all but stumbled across the idea of sending Thorin, Bilbo and co. The reason he was worrying about Smaug was that Sauron might soon send his power from Dol Guldur towards the Lonely Mountain, and have the most powerful remaining dragon in Middle-Earth under his control.
It suggests that Sauron might have had a better chance of controlling (or at least dealing with) Smaug than sending west towards Moria and the last balrog. Though it's not very clear-cut: nobody among the wise or the free peoples knew the power in Moria was a balrog, until it chased after the Fellowship of the Ring, while Smaug was a much more well-publicised and definable threat.
I have no idea what they might have suspected the 'shadow' was, beforehand, but very probably a lesser power than the thought-extinct balrogs, less dangerous than Smaug, and possibly already under Sauron's sway. Re: Sauron sending uruks to the Misty Mountains hundreds of years before. And maybe that's another reason why Sauron didn't give anyone any suspicions that he was reaching towards Moria - he'd already dealt with that situation, whether successfully or unsuccessfully.
That brings up another thing: those uruks - were they still loyal to Sauron, even acting as envoys between him and the balrog, or were they completely under the balrog's rule? (If the balrog had no affinity with Sauron) I'd guess no Bolgs or Azogs or almost-man-high chieftains were among the revenge-seeking northerners in Rohan?
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The 'what ifs' and permutations are dizzying!
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I know - I almost feel sorry for posting all that. I may have started thinking too much about it.
Who said it earlier? When you nail it down, it loses something. With the Balrog especially.
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lol
I found as a lad that I had embellished whole chapters in the LOTR,and was surprised on re-reading them that certain events were much simpler,I had in effect filled in the gaps of the story telling.This of course should happen with all books one enjoys,and why we all see different things in the text; what's in our heads is very important,and the way we create our personnel visions. :)
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I think one of the reasons that Tolkien orcs grew in size over the years is the role-playing aspect. The problem with orcs as Tolkien describes them is that since they are small (by which we mean smaller than the average human), in a hand-to-hand fight involving heavy armour and weapons in which strength (often equated with size) is what's (often) most important, orcs don't seem to offer a credible one-on-one threat to roleplaying adventurers. In fact, the point about Tolkien's orcs/goblins in the novels is that their threat has more to do with their numbers than with their individual ability. The problem with RPGs is that being outnumbered in melee combat is a major problem (at least it was in Middle Earth Role Playing). It's one of the reasons why player characters love to gang up on villains. What's the solution? Outnumber the players less, but confront them with greater individual threats - in other words, bigger/stronger orcs. I guess a gamemaster could say - "Yes, it's true that they're not as tall as you [the player characters], but they are far stronger" but it's been my experience, as both a player and a gamemaster, that players don't much listen to things like this. I know this, because I teach for a living, and students are exactly the same. When I give them hell about it, I always have the odd sensation that I'm also berating my younger self.
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Excellent OP and great discussion.
I am reading through the thread again. o_o
Oh, and I second, third, tenth or whatever a North Star range of 'Tolkien authentic' goblins.
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Joining the chorus, chanting in my best sports fan voice:
"Let's go Northstar, LET'S GO!" <clap, clap>
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Joining the chorus, chanting in my best sports fan voice:
"Let's go Northstar, LET'S GO!" <clap, clap>
What's sports? ??? o_o
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What's sports? ??? o_o
It's basically a LARP version of Blood Bowl...
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That brings up another thing: those uruks - were they still loyal to Sauron, even acting as envoys between him and the balrog, or were they completely under the balrog's rule? (If the balrog had no affinity with Sauron) I'd guess no Bolgs or Azogs or almost-man-high chieftains were among the revenge-seeking northerners in Rohan?
I suspect that the "black Uruks of Mordor" description is just an indication of the type of creature they are. We get no mention of the Eye on the Uruk chieftain's hide shield, for example. There have been Uruks there for 500+ years by this point, so there's plenty of time for communications to fray. And presumably Sauron wouldn't be keen on the Balrog learning about - or acquiring - the ring.
The northerners in Rohan seem to have been generally small (though there were those "larger and bolder" ones who stayed with the Isengarders). But they were just one of the revenge-seeking parties that issued from Moria in pursuit of the Fellowship. We learn of another in Lothlorien that was led astray and destroyed by the Elves. And there may well have been more.
A more general point: in playing Middle Earth games with miniatures, there seems to me to be a tension between "simulation" and "illustration". "Simulation" is the respect in which gaming Tolkien is like gaming a historical period: you can do research and try to get it right. So, for example, if you're playing Dragon Rampant with Middle Earth forces, you might impose an additional penalty on Orcs fighting a shieldwall (Wall of Spears/Wall of Shields), to reflect the fact that their difficulty with the formation is mentioned twice by Tolkien (in UT). And that suggests that you should use miniatures that reflect the small stature of Orcs in Middle Earth (which is something that Tolkien emphasises repeatedly throughout his writings). And just as you'd paint the Red Eye or the White Hand on your Orcish banners, you wouldn't field crossbow-wielding Orcs or Dwarves, or regenerating trolls, or pig-faced Orcs, or knights in full plate armour.
On the other hand, there's nothing wrong with taking an "illustrative" approach and stylising your game however you please. My favourite Tolkien illustrations are those done by Ian Miller for the Tolkien Bestiary (useless text, wonderful pictures). In his Helm's Deep (http://ian miller helm's deep), he doesn't bother anything so mundane as S-runes on helmets or White Hands on shields, but instead gives us all manner of fantastical dragon helms and the like. But he conveys the essence - Orcs, Men and Orcish Men attack a fortress with overwhelming numbers - wonderfully. Or take Jemima Caitlin's rather nice illustrations (http://collectedmiscellany.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/original_hobbit52.jpg) for The Hobbit: her goblins are taller than Elves. Now, this contradicts absolutely nothing in The Hobbit, but it doesn't fit with the wider "Legendarium". But so what? (And I like the expression on her Great Goblin's face (https://www.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=http://i0.wp.com/foesofreality.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/Goblin-King-Jemima-Catlin.jpg&imgrefurl=http://foesofreality.com/interview-jemima-catlin-illustrator-of-the-hobbit/&h=898&w=700&tbnid=fCIv7dLXVZrVgM:&docid=TpyfPx4mh-BJZM&ei=ZvaxVriDMYXm-QG9sqGgAg&tbm=isch&client=safari&ved=0ahUKEwi4zqjwz9vKAhUFcz4KHT1ZCCQQMwggKAAwAA) too!).
Transfer this approach to miniatures and gaming, and you get a lot more freedom. I've already said that I'd have no problem using my "fish-white" Citadel Orcs in a game of the Battle of the Five Armies (again, they contradict nothing in the text of The Hobbit). And you'd have to have no soul whatsoever not to welcome Cubs' exquisite C15 Orcs (http://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=86251.0) onto a gaming table (even if you were playing a Napoleonic game!). For those of you who remember the White Dwarf with the Joe Dever/Gary Chalk article on fighting the Pelennor Fields, the accompanying photos showed Minifigs pig-faced Orcs beside a scratch-built Grond.
On the other hand, when you combine the two approaches, you might run into problems. If you're "simulating" the wars of Middle Earth in a pseudo-historical fashion, then you'll want to penalise Orcs for a lack of stature in certain situations. But if you're using towering C15 Orcs, that will "break the spell" to some extent. And so on.
I suppose that part of the attraction of Middle Earth for wargamers is that there's so much to delve into and allow to try to "simulate". I don't think any other fantasy author has that sort of depth - not even GRR Martin (though the word count might mislead you there). Indeed, there's probably more info on how the armies of Middle Earth fought than there is on various historical armies ...
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It's basically a LARP version of Blood Bowl...
Ha!
But as the Six Nations approaches, I feel geekery wane and jockism (on two counts!) wax ...
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But as the Six Nations approaches, I feel geekery wane and jockism (on two counts!) wax ...
Me too :)
In fact, I think many modern front row forwards could be a good model for orcs - hugely muscled across the shoulders and down the thighs, slightly bandy legs, thick necks, low sloping foreheads and beetling brows, pot bellies, bashed around faces, preternaturally long arms...
They are the blueprint we need to work to!
;)
(But then you see, I've always seen Tolkien's description of orcs as simply portraying ugly, slightly deformed men, rather than some kind of out-and-out animalistic green space alien... )
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In fact, I think many modern front row forwards could be a good model for orcs - hugely muscled across the shoulders and down the thighs, slightly bandy legs, thick necks, low sloping foreheads and beetling brows, pot bellies, bashed around faces, preternaturally long arms...
Hey!! WTF?!
As a practising loosehead prop, I take great exception to that!
My forehead does not slope.
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Me too :)
In fact, I think many modern front row forwards could be a good model for orcs - hugely muscled across the shoulders and down the thighs, slightly bandy legs, thick necks, low sloping foreheads and beetling brows, pot bellies, bashed around faces, preternaturally long arms...
They are the blueprint we need to work to!
;)
(But then you see, I've always seen Tolkien's description of orcs as simply portraying ugly, slightly deformed men, rather than some kind of out-and-out animalistic green space alien... )
I think it might have to be old-school, rather than "modern", front-row forwards! A few French exceptions aside, modern front-rowers are too tall!
(I speak as a fairly recently retired hooker/distinctly undersized prop.)
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This has been a great thread.
I did not suspect I would need to review my concept of "goblin" armies (Never a big fan of the Orcs/Goblins dichotomy as recently popular) to fight my perennial favored dwarf armies in a Tolkien inspired setting as being simulation or illustrative when I started reading but that is a valid point to raise that I find myself internally debating this morning.
I find the LOTR films to be a "C" as books into movie, "B" as movie adaptation to bring the books onscreen [compare Aragorn's speech to the Orcs at Helm's deep in the book (much else the freaking presence of Elf warriors who must have arrived by teleportation/magic to participate) to that in the movie, total injustice to the tone of the original] - there are so many more limitations than we like to admit in that process - and "A-" as stand alone great story. My games try to take the tone of the books as much as possible, especially in the battles only tangentially mention in the book narrative played out on the table.
That said I would have armies of the old Der Kriegspieler "smiley faced" goblins if their current production was not so spotty. How close that is to "book" goblins I dread to even think about. Style over substance I fear.
Keep coming back to what new comments have been created.
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I find the LOTR films to be a "C" as books into movie, "B" as movie adaptation to bring the books onscreen [compare Aragorn's speech to the Orcs at Helm's deep in the book (much else the freaking presence of Elf warriors who must have arrived by teleportation/magic to participate) to that in the movie, total injustice to the tone of the original] - there are so many more limitations than we like to admit in that process - and "A-" as stand alone great story.
I wasn't bothered by the departures from the book, but I thought the script was very weak in places. And I couldn't stand the "out of universe" jokes - dwarf-tossing, mumak-surfing, etc. Also, Peter Jackson really needs someone sitting on his shoulder whispering "less is more" into his ear throughout. A judicious slicing down of slow motion, wide eyes, cliff-hangers and crumbling ruins would have gone a long way.
I actually think that the script suffered in places from trying to be too faithful to the books. For instance, that odd line about the Uruk-hai being produced by crossing "Orcs and goblin-men" sounds like someone misremembering "these creatures of Saruman, these half-orcs and goblin-men" as "these creatures of Saruman, these half-orcs and half-goblin-men"!
That said I would have armies of the old Der Kriegspieler "smiley faced" goblins if their current production was not so spotty. How close that is to "book" goblins I dread to even think about. Style over substance I fear.
Can you still buy those? They look terrific! And, by and large, very faithful to the books. I love the goblins of the White Hand in particular: note the long bows, badged helmets and short, straight swords.
It's interesting that the very old ranges of Tolkienesque miniatures - these, the Minifigs ones, early Ral Partha and Asgard - tend to be far less affected by the "distortions" I outlined in the first post. That's probably because those distortions largely arose as fantasy gaming really took off in the 80s.
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Great thread!
I haven't seen them mentioned so far, but the classic Tom Meier Orcs should be available from Iron Wind soon.
Iron Wind site (http://www.ralpartha.com/index.php)
Kickstarter (https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1050509756/ral-parthas-chaos-wars/description)
They are 25mm and frequently hunched over, so spot on for size.
The Bronze Age Orcs are very nice, but are at least human sized if not larger.
I also cringe at most the attempted 'wow' moments in PJ's Tolkien films. Particularly egregious was the cavalry charging down a 60 deg slope into a pike phalanx at Helms Deep. I know the orcs were 'blinded', but with that angle of slope the only outcome is a pile of dead/wounded horses, men and orcs.
PJ clearly thinks 'bigger is better', but he all too often just goes too far and ends up with 'silly and absurd'.
p.s. It was infantry, not cav in the book …
Cheers!
Joe Thomlinson
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Great thread!
I haven't seen them mentioned so far, but the classic Tom Meier Orcs should be available from Iron Wind soon.
I still have a handful of those elves and orc from the original offering from the late 70's out in the garage somewhere.
While not quite my concept of Tolkein's orcs - anatomically they were the best sculpts of their day.
Looking at the kickstarter, my teenage geek heart wants to snap them all up out of pure nostalgia, but they're quite twee compared to my modern collection. Hmmm, given all this talk about how even big orcs are smaller than men (which I agree with) these might be scaled appropriately. Their only downside is they're a tad on the naked side - hairless skin and mail - and they're devoid of any kit aside from weapons.
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And presumably Sauron wouldn't be keen on the Balrog learning about - or acquiring - the ring.
Good point. :)
I've just recently discovered the blog of Andreas Deja, who was an artist and animator at Disney during the 80's-00's. Here's a post about the Black Cauldron, with a henchmen development sketch that might be vaguely pertinent:
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-f7vU5pxZizg/UlZNfyvyexI/AAAAAAAAH4U/60VENaOqaY8/s1600/TBCB+2.jpeg
http://andreasdeja.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/trying-too-hard.html
Little more than angry chimp heads on cod-medieval bodies, but if you squint, and imagine bandier legs...?
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Great thread!
I haven't seen them mentioned so far, but the classic Tom Meier Orcs should be available from Iron Wind soon.
I posted a couple of them a few pages back! They are indeed classic models - and about right for Mordor uruks, I think. Dilettante Geek is quite right to note their "stripped for action" aspect (which extends even to a lack of underpants). And they are peculiarly hairless - though John Blanche used to remedy that with stubble (http://thecitadelcollector.co.uk/zen/index.php?album=john-blanche/ral-partha&image=Image-067.jpg). But classics and a pretty good fit none the less.
I also cringe at most the attempted 'wow' moments in PJ's Tolkien films. Particularly egregious was the cavalry charging down a 60 deg slope into a pike phalanx at Helms Deep. I know the orcs were 'blinded', but with that angle of slope the only outcome is a pile of dead/wounded horses, men and orcs.
PJ clearly thinks 'bigger is better', but he all too often just goes too far and ends up with 'silly and absurd'.
Couldn't agree more. The abandonment of visual logic (see also all those impossible escapes from crumbling staircases, etc.) is a major flaw in those films, I think. And why did the orcs bring pikes to attack a fortress?
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I think PJ tried to get the viewer to connect emotionally with characters through overblown sentimental scenes and excessive use of slow motion to make up for the fact that the script and characterisations made it difficult for us to make that connection. The Hobbit was even harder to like than LotR. A tale of comradeship, travel and adventure was made into an action movie, and even the action was repetitive and boring. I still haven't seen the last Hobbit movie and only saw the Return of the King on DVD about two years after it's release at the cinema.
Luckily the movies haven't destroyed the way I imagine the characters and places in my own mind.
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I posted a couple of them a few pages back! They are indeed classic models - and about right for Mordor uruks, I think. Dilettante Geek is quite right to note their "stripped for action" aspect (which extends even to a lack of underpants). And they are peculiarly hairless - though John Blanche used to remedy that with stubble (http://thecitadelcollector.co.uk/zen/index.php?album=john-blanche/ral-partha&image=Image-067.jpg). But classics and a pretty good fit none the less.
Doh! So you did. o_o
But I did say I didn't see them ... ;D
Some of the English at Agincourt went pantless because of dysentery, so why not the less civilized orcs?
The Ral figures are hairless, but then again apart from top knots there haven't been many truly hirsute orc or goblin miniatures over the journey that I can recall.
Couldn't agree more. The abandonment of visual logic (see also all those impossible escapes from crumbling staircases, etc.) is a major flaw in those films, I think. And why did the orcs bring pikes to attack a fortress?
No idea, but at least they had a pointy stabby bit on the end. The business end of some the Orc pikes in the Hobbit are so curved as to make them useless as thrusting weapons, which is kind of the 'point' for pikes! ::)
Classic case of 'Form over function'.
So many questions from that movie:
- Where does the 'spoil' go from the 'Were Worms'?
- Why doesn't the north of Middle earth resemble Swiss cheese?
- Why does plate armour seem to offer no protection at all? (It seems that Thorin and the boys clearly knew this because they didn't wear theirs when they joined the battle, but the real reason as explained in the DVD extras was that the armour costumes were so bulky and constricting, they couldn't actually fight in them!)
and so on ... and on ... and on ...
Anyway, back on topic ...
Mr Northstar, put me down for a box or five of mongoloid orang-outangs. :D
Cheers!
Joe Thomlinson
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Some of the English at Agincourt went pantless because of dysentery, so why not the less civilized orcs?
If you have ever partyed with the english on a saturday night or on holiday you might find some orcs who consider that "less civilised" statement as insulting ;)
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I should've joined this forum years ago, it seems I am surrounded by like-minded individuals.
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I am learned a great deal from this post. Thank you all.
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Snip
Can you still buy those? They look terrific! And, by and large, very faithful to the books. I love the goblins of the White Hand in particular: note the long bows, badged helmets and short, straight swords.
It's interesting that the very old ranges of Tolkienesque miniatures - these, the Minifigs ones, early Ral Partha and Asgard - tend to be far less affected by the "distortions" I outlined in the first post. That's probably because those distortions largely arose as fantasy gaming really took off in the 80s.
Some of them because some of the molds are in the hands of classic miniatures.net but it's a case of loving the miniatures over producing them on a serious basis. That "career/family conflicts with casting toys" problem.
I know a guy in his 70s (young pup) with cases of unopened blisters of the old minis - like volumes of 3 ring binders inventorying the hoarded figures. And now his eyes are going with Diabetes so his painting is essentially nil. His house has more in original packaging miniatures than most large hobby stores...
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Some of them because some of the molds are in the hands of classic miniatures.net but it's a case of loving the miniatures over producing them on a serious basis. That "career/family conflicts with casting toys" problem.
I know a guy in his 70s (young pup) with cases of unopened blisters of the old minis - like volumes of 3 ring binders inventorying the hoarded figures. And now his eyes are going with Diabetes so his painting is essentially nil. His house has more in original packaging miniatures than most large hobby stores...
Stay very, very close to that guy, my fellow Californio.
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Given how interesting the discussion in this thread is, and that it apparently gave Nick from Northstar the (at least partial) inspiration for a fantasy range ( ;)), I thought I'd bump it.
How do we think the new goblins match up?
(https://i.imgur.com/gQQgbfb.jpg?1)
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At first, I had wished the Northstar goblin be smaller, because I grew fond of the PJ LotR incarnation, but I don't want Oathmark to be the same thing necessarily, and this look is growing on me.
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Looks good apart from double headed axe, but gosh aren't Northstar/Osprey teasing this out? I've wanted to see and buy the Goblins since I heard about them!!
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Looks good apart from double headed axe, but gosh aren't Northstar/Osprey teasing this out? I've wanted to see and buy the Goblins since I heard about them!!
I agree with that (I'll be cutting one blade into a spike or hook, I reckon). The goblins look great - just right for an uruk, I think. If a smaller set of "goblin scouts" or "goblin trackers" was produced at some point, the Tolkien bases would be covered.
One point from my original post: Orcs come in many sizes, but are best thought of as “big” (fighters = Uruks) and small (slaves = Snaga).
I was reading some of the History of Middle Earth recently and was struck by further evidence of this essentially binary distinction. In the early draft of Sam and Frodo's run-in with the column of small orcs, there's a description of "two of the large fierce uruks, the fighting-orcs". That's further evidence that Tolkien saw the armies of Mordor and Isengard as being made up, for the most part, of uruks, with smaller orcs in auxiliary or specialist roles. This especially true when you compare it with the tracker-orc's complaint that the war is going badly because "you fighters" are making such a mess of it. And of course it makes perfect sense: why would you spend centuries breeding big, fierce orcs and then not use them as the mainstay of your armies?
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No need to argue about orc size I think. It just depends on the setting you choose. It can be Tolkienesque and then it could be Dndesque, it could be Wordl of warcraft or any setting you'd like. Being a DnD addict I chose my orcs height at 1.80 m and elves at 1.70 m roughly. Some will agree with me ans some will disagree. My figurines being at the 1/100th scale, it gives 18 mm for an orc and 17 mm for an elf and it kind of make sense in the way I envision my fantasy world.
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One point from my original post: Orcs come in many sizes, but are best thought of as “big” (fighters = Uruks) and small (slaves = Snaga).
I'm struggling with it to be honest. I'm trying to suppress that bit of me that wants to put things in neat classifications - small goblin, medium sized orc, big black orc. I know it's not Tolkein, but I've been acclimatised to GW definitions and it's a hard habit to break. I'm not even sure I want to break it!
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I'm struggling with it to be honest. I'm trying to suppress that bit of me that wants to put things in neat classifications - small goblin, medium sized orc, big black orc. I know it's not Tolkein, but I've been acclimatised to GW definitions and it's a hard habit to break. I'm not even sure I want to break it!
Luckily it's not compulsory ;)
Given that Tolkien invented orcs, and everything that has followed is derived to some extent from his creation, I understand why some people like to go back to that original wellspring and create models in the image that Tolkien described. That's certainly very interesting to me in a way that the entire universe of 'Orks' and all the subsequent encrustation of invention that has attached itself to Tolkien's original idea - and bent it entirely out of shape - is not.
But then that's because I grew up with Tolkien in the 1970's and I'm part of that generation of wargamers who entered the hobby via the Airfix route, long before GW existed and D&D was just a twinkle in the eye of Gary Gygax. (Well, okay, it was starting up in the mid-70's, but hadn't achieved worldwide domination and spawned everything that followed... )
But everyone has a choice, of course. I guess the majority of today's wargamers under the age of 50, most of whom grew up with Warhammer as their primer, will no doubt be nonplussed as to why anyone would want to go back to basics in this way. Horses for courses, as usual :)
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Luckily it's not compulsory ;)
I know, but my usual direction of choice is old school originals. I would still look to Tolkein for inspiration, but I think my aesthetics would lean closer to first/second generation Warhammer Orcs, with their jutting jaws and wiry physiques.
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I'm not sure I completely agree with OP.
There's definitely an element of all the different types of orcs / goblins looking different (uruk-hai being "swart" over the Moria goblins being "green or pale skinned") and differing in size. Obviously it's not a complete and distinctive difference between them but there's definitely differences in the types of goblinoids in Middle-Earth.
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I know, but my usual direction of choice is old school originals. I would still look to Tolkein for inspiration, but I think my aesthetics would lean closer to first/second generation Warhammer Orcs, with their jutting jaws and wiry physiques.
And there's no reason at all that you shouldn't! They'll have to pry my C15 Armoured Orcs from my cold dead fingers, for all that they're far too tall for Tolkien! I wouldn't use them for gaming Middle Earth, because they don't fit the descriptions in the books, but they're marvellous in their own right and see much more time on our gaming table than any other figures.
My sole point in this was to show that people who want to game in Middle Earth can find lots of interesting stuff in Tolkien's writings that differs wildly from the "gameified" popular perception - and flat out contradicts it. If you're writing or adapting rules for wargaming in Tolkien's world, it surely makes sense to use Tolkien's writings are your guide, rather than Gygax filtered through GW. But if you're not (or if you are, but you'd rather just use Middle Earth as a launchpad rather than a set of limits), then there's no reason to follow JRRT.
I actually have a long, inaugural and deeply pretentious blog post on the go, in which I compare perceptions of orcs with Borges' short story Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote. Borges' point is that we interpret texts, unwittingly, though the filter of our own times. So, when my son read LotR, he had preconceived ideas of what orcs were, whereas when I read it, the only reference point I had was The Hobbit. When I drew my orcs as a kid, they were dark ("swart" or "black" in the text); when he drew his first ones, they were "green". The arm of Games Workshop has grown long, as I'll say in the blog (iif I ever finish it)
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I'm not sure I completely agree with OP.
There's definitely an element of all the different types of orcs / goblins looking different (uruk-hai being "swart" over the Moria goblins being "green or pale skinned") and differing in size. Obviously it's not a complete and distinctive difference between them but there's definitely differences in the types of goblinoids in Middle-Earth.
Yes, Tolkien clearly indicates that there are lots of different breeds of orcs. But he makes a broad distinction between "fighting orcs" (uruks) and the smaller kinds ("snaga", at least according to the uruks). Within those two classes, there are clearly different breeds, but again and again he distinguishes between two broad sorts, not three, as most games tend to do.
But you're actually making my point for me when you talk about 'Moria goblins being "green or pale skinned"'. The orcs in Moria are never described like as being green or pale. Here are the descriptions from the Moria sections of LotR:
"'There are Orcs, very many of them,' he said. 'And some are large and evil: black Uruks of Mordor.'
"...a huge orc-chieftain, almost man-high, clad in black mail from head to foot, leaped into the chamber; behind him his followers clustered in the doorway. His broad flat face was swart, his eyes were like coals, and his tongue was red; he wielded a great spear."
"Beyond the fire he saw swarming black figures: there seemed to be hundreds of orcs."
[emphasis mine]
Those are the only descriptions of orcs that mention colour in Moria - and it's "black" and "swart" only. Now, the third quotation probably refers to silhouettes, and the first may refer to livery: the huge chieftain is both swart of hide and black of armour. But there's no other mention of orcish colour at all: no "pale-skinned" orcs, and no "green" ones either.
Also, why single out the Moria orcs as "goblins"? They're called that twice in the text (though not in the Moria chapters, where they're always called "orcs" or "Orcs"); but the Uruk-hai of Isengard are also called "goblins" twice and, by implication, a third time. And there's also a "goblin" reference that includes both the Isengarders and the Northerners. Too complicate matters, some of the Northerners were Uruks in the first place (see above).
So, when I say that you're making my point for me, what I mean is that you're reading things into the text that aren't actually in it, but come from the "gameosphere" - which was exactly my point about "gamefication"! :)
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One of the things that I still scratch my head about is the use of the word 'black' or 'swart' to describe them. I'm never 100% sure whether this is supposed to literally be black skin, or just a dark complexion (brown?green?grey?), or simply a literary liberty to describe someone wearing dark clothes or being of a dark demeanour.
When painting my black orcs, I do prefer to have them as literally black skinned, harking back (to me) to the black gorillas in Planet of the Apes, being bigger and meaner than the smaller chimps or orang-utans.
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Oddly enough, I got one of these fellows via eBay today, along with some others):
(http://www.miniatures-workshop.com/lostminiswiki/images/e/e7/Rp-e621.jpg)
That range of early (1976) Ral Partha orcs (http://www.miniatures-workshop.com/lostminiswiki/index.php?title=Wizards%2C_Warriors_and_Warlocks) is interesting because it's so clearly based on Tolkien's descriptions and not on the "secondary" stuff that began to amass a few years later. So, it's about dwarf-sized, with downward-pointing fangs, wields a scimitar and has a bow on its back and an eye on its shield. The not-Isengard equivalents are only a little bigger.
Once Citadel get going with their Fantasy Tribe and C15 ranges, though, everything changes (barring Asgard, where Jez Goodwin seems to have been inspired much more by Tolkien than by Gygax).
I'm not for a moment arguing that those 1976 figures are nicer than the C15 range, though!
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One of the things that I still scratch my head about is the use of the word 'black' or 'swart' to describe them. I'm never 100% sure whether this is supposed to literally be black skin, or just a dark complexion (brown?green?grey?), or simply a literary liberty to describe someone wearing dark clothes or being of a dark demeanour.
Yes, it's far from clear. The only orc that's explicitly black-skinned in Tolkien is the little tracker in Mordor (which seems to imply that his companion, a black Uruk of Mordor, is not actually black-skinned).
And then you've got the fact that in medieval literature, "black" can mean "dark-complexioned" in application to Welsh or Scots people. I presume that refers to the "Celtic type" with very dark hair and eyes and, typically, rather fair skin. That's the idiom that Tolkien's operating in at least some of the time.
And, on top of that, you've got the rather awkward-sounding letter where he says that orcs were "sallow" like "hideous and repulsive versions of ... the least lovely Mongol types". "Swart" and "black" would certainly cover Central Asian people (darkish skin, black hair) in that medieval idiom. And of course the half-orcs in LotR are described as (a) looking like orcs and (b) being sallow - even though no orcs are described as "sallow" in the book itself.
Then there's clothing too, as you say - certainly, the orcs of Isengard, the North and Mordor all do sport black liveries (white badge on black; red badge on black; black and red banners, respectively).
When painting my black orcs, I do prefer to have them as literally black skinned, harking back (to me) to the black gorillas in Planet of the Apes, being bigger and meaner than the smaller chimps or orang-utans.
And absolutely tremendous they look too - those Ugezod commandos of yours are peerless!
When I saw the Tim Burton Planet of the Apes, the first thing that struck me was that I preferred his gorilla soldiers to Peter Jackson's orcs - as orcs!
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I'm (re) reading Slaine The Horned God at the moment (stay with me) and I'm struck by how Ukko (although a dwarf) seems very goblin-like, whereas Robym (the other dwarf in the story) seems more like an orc, although of a similar size. Other than breadth of shoulder, one interesting feature was the jawline - Ukko's goblin-like face features an overhanging top lip and weak chin, whereas Robym's face has a square jaw, with rows of sharp teeth. Perhaps it was taken to extremes in the old Citadel C-series orcs with their jaws like open sock drawers, but it's an easy way of making the distinction clear. Another one for me was that goblins have bulbous or long noses whereas orcs have snub noses. I don't know how these traditions got started!
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I'm (re) reading Slaine The Horned God at the moment (stay with me) and I'm struck by how Ukko (although a dwarf) seems very goblin-like, whereas Robym (the other dwarf in the story) seems more like an orc, although of a similar size.
I dimly - very dimly - remember that. I must reread Slaine.
Other than breadth of shoulder, one interesting feature was the jawline - Ukko's goblin-like face features an overhanging top lip and weak chin, whereas Robym's face has a square jaw, with rows of sharp teeth. Perhaps it was taken to extremes in the old Citadel C-series orcs with their jaws like open sock drawers, but it's an easy way of making the distinction clear. Another one for me was that goblins have bulbous or long noses whereas orcs have snub noses. I don't know how these traditions got started!
I think it was really Kev Adams who cemented that tradition. If you look at the C-series night goblins, there were a few with "orcish" faces - short or upturned noses and tusks (e.g. the chief with two swords and the variants of the Grom's Goblin Guard trooper and musician, as well as their originals). And you also had the red goblin champion (also a Runequest Dark Troll), who was droopy-nosed but orc-sized. Those crossovers persisted into the C12 range, the first range of goblins that Kev Adams was involved with. If you look at the Perry sculpts in that range, most of them have "orcish" faces: Archer, Bowman, Basher, Shield Slammer, Lip Keeper (my favourite Citadel slottabased goblin), Calf Spearer, Slug Slinger, Spearman, Head Taker, Guard and Mace Wielder:
(http://www.solegends.com/citc/c012goblins2/fly198509r-c12x-01.jpg)
Those guys work really well as smaller relatives of the C15 orcs - they're scrawny, large-headed and generally tusked; I'm painting some up at the moment to go in a mixed warband with C15s. The Adams ones are a bit different, though - really their own thing, and more like smaller versions of Perry trolls than Perry orcs.
The other factor is that the night, great and red goblins (originally red orcs, of course!) are replaced with just "goblins" - and the droopy noses of the great goblins and some of the night goblins take over after that last flourish of orcishness from the Perrys.
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Oddly enough, I got one of these fellows via eBay today, along with some others):
(http://www.miniatures-workshop.com/lostminiswiki/images/e/e7/Rp-e621.jpg)
That range of early (1976) Ral Partha orcs (http://www.miniatures-workshop.com/lostminiswiki/index.php?title=Wizards%2C_Warriors_and_Warlocks) is interesting because it's so clearly based on Tolkien's descriptions and not on the "secondary" stuff that began to amass a few years later. So, it's about dwarf-sized, with downward-pointing fangs, wields a scimitar and has a bow on its back and an eye on its shield. The not-Isengard equivalents are only a little bigger.
I had 40-50 of these guys back in the late 70s. I wish I still had them as they just scream "Tolkien" to me, sure they are crude compared with today's standards, but they certainly fit the bill for me!
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I had 40-50 of these guys back in the late 70s. I wish I still had them as they just scream "Tolkien" to me, sure they are crude compared with today's standards, but they certainly fit the bill for me!
Couldn't agree more! The irony of this whole thread is that I don't actually do any Middle Earth wargaming (though I've toyed with putting together some HOTT armies). But if I did, I'd want these guys for the orcs, with some Asgard ones and Ral Partha giant goblins mixed in. For one thing, they're properly equipped - mail, scimitars and bows.
They're also a great barometer of Tom Meier's progress as a sculptor; he made these just three years before the giant goblins, which are still pretty much state of the art.
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Could Northstar be the saviour of true Middle-Earth fans? I can see great potential with slightly cut of legs (easy trick I did with GW plastic orcs already).
(https://scontent.fprg2-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t31.0-8/23157443_1869559436406828_5230031918270354485_o.jpg?oh=2d3f5e45fc4ef1f2c815d99b137a31b1&oe=5AA82146)
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They do look good! And from the photo of the painted examples, they seem shorter than a man and not much taller than a dwarf - so perfect for uruks!
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Could Northstar be the saviour of true Middle-Earth fans? I can see great potential with slightly cut of legs (easy trick I did with GW plastic orcs already).
Bullshit. True Middle Earth fans? If you don't like this aesthetic you are not a true ME fan? What makes these more "true" than any other rendition of goblin ever sculpted, other than your conviction than you know what's best?
As it happens, I quite like these sculpts and may well be adding them to my collection. But I won't be doing that because I'm a true Middle Earth fan!
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The North Star goblins are really good. I look forward to seeing what the rest of the army gets as time goes on.
@Nord I think it’s safe to say that these are closer to the literature than has been around for a long time.
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Really? Show me the piece of literature that matches these figures then. Are these the figures that look like corrupted elves, or men, or apes?
Tolkien was notoriously vague in his descriptions of the orcs - even in how they were named, never mind how they looked. It's just that artwork that was around in the 70's and 80's has been taken up as the look Tolkien intended (after he was dead mind you, so no chance of corroboration). That art was then made into minis and suddenly they are the one, true way to sculpt orcs/goblins.
These sculpts might match some of the artists impressions from the 70's and 80's, but whether that makes them close to the literature is pure speculation. I wish people would stop claiming that sculpts match his vision, when the only clear thing is that nobody has a clue what his vision was.
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(http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/theeverythingeverything/images/9/93/Charles_Jeez.gif/revision/latest?cb=20140807140401)
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Great to see this thread walking amongst us once more.
Obviously we don't have any direct evidence of how Tolkien thought orcs should look (there are some pictures of spindly goblins in the Father Christmas Letters, but I'm not sure they're really admissible... and also he was notoriously bad at drawing figures, unlike his landscapes, which are really rather good) but there are some hints in the books, which Hobgoblin has diligently collected here.
How we piece those hints together into a full picture of an orc is something each of us, insofar as we think about it at all, will probably do in our own way, influenced by all manner of things. If we can find figures that fit our mental picture, more or less, then that's a bonus. But there are lots of excellent orcs and goblins out there of all shapes and sizes; and these North Star ones look as if they'll be a fine addition to the mix.
That North Star sprue picture looks very good; the scimitars, as well as being the right shape and size, look as if they won't immediately tend to break off...
One factor in the whole "swart orc" question is Tolkien's 1932/34 academic article "Sigelwara land", where he examines the name used by Anglo-Saxon writers for the Ethiopians, and concludes that the original referent of the name (which was (from memory) originally, he reckoned, *sigelhearwan) was in fact the soot-blackened and red-eyed fire giants who later crop up in extant Norse mythology.
So "swart-faced" in this sense was probably meant to remind us in the first instance of them, who in some unrecorded Germanic legendry were the malevolent "infantry of the Old War", a role taken in Tolkien's writings by the orcs/goblins (a name used absolutely synonymously by him, at least in intention, as far as I can tell).
Not sure if this helps with painting them, mind you.
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Tolkien was notoriously vague in his descriptions of the orcs - even in how they were named, never mind how they looked. It's just that artwork that was around in the 70's and 80's has been taken up as the look Tolkien intended (after he was dead mind you, so no chance of corroboration). That art was then made into minis and suddenly they are the one, true way to sculpt orcs/goblins.
These sculpts might match some of the artists impressions from the 70's and 80's, but whether that makes them close to the literature is pure speculation. I wish people would stop claiming that sculpts match his vision, when the only clear thing is that nobody has a clue what his vision was.
The thing is, I don't think that those early Tom Meier orcs are based on any particular bit of 70s art (I could well be wrong!) - and they certainly aren't based on 80s art! But they do seem to be very closely based on Tolkien's descriptions. Indeed, it's hard to see anything about them that contradicts those descriptions. So, if we take that not-Mordor orc I posted above, it has short legs, long arms and a large head (see descriptions of Grishnakh and Shagrat); a scimitar (passim); a bow on its back (The Land of Shadow and passim); a mail coat (passim); a helmet with a nose-guard and maybe even a round badge on the front (The Tower of Cirith Ungol); heavy shoes (several places, e.g. The Uruk-hai); and short stature (lots of places). There's not much else to the model but those things!
And look at this chap!
(http://www.miniatures-workshop.com/lostminiswiki/images/9/9c/Rp-e651add3.jpg)
As a not-Isengard uruk, he's again almost nothing but the book descriptions: short, broad-bladed sword; shield with a small white hand in the centre; heavy mail; long arms; thick legs; a big head; short stature (though bigger than most of the other orcs); and - and this is a great little detail - the S-rune for Saruman on the front of his helmet - just as described in The Departure of Boromir. His archer companion is an ugly figure even by these relatively primitive standards, but sure enough, he has a long bow that's as tall as he is.
In both cases, I can't think of any particular illustrations that inspired these figure. I'd love to seem them if they exist, but I don't recall seeing that S-rune, for example, anywhere in an illustration; there is, though, an old Asgard orc miniature that has it too. I can, however, identify lots of textual support for the details.
It's interesting (at least to me!) that these really old figures get the textual details right in a way which the 80s Mithril range didn't. If you look at the Mithril Isengarders, it's quite easy to point out details that don't match the text (height, lack of shoes, relatively small heads, curved swords, etc.), as well as lots of similarities with contemporary illustrations (especially Angus McBride's). But I don't think that that's the case with these older figures.
Why? My guess is that by the 80s, Tolkieniana had taken on a life of its own, so that sculptors and illustrators were influenced by the amount of non-text-based stuff floating around. One example would be the Tolkien Bestiary. It's got great illustrations, but it's full of information that looks like research but was actually dreamed up by David Day. When you've got huge books to plough through (and no internet!), it's all too easy to assume that the various published Tolkien 'experts' have done their work.
There's a side-note to all this, though. I like fanciful Tolkien illustrations (e.g. Ian Miller's and Roger Garland's) - indeed, I much prefer them to more "realistic" ones like John Howe's. And, equally, I like fanciful interpretations in miniature. And, to a very small extent, I and many others interpret things fancifully when painting up miniatures. A good example would be with shields. If I'm painting an orc of the Red Eye, I'm going to give him a red and yellow eye on his shield, just to look better. And I'd create more elaborate banners than I imagine Tolkien would ever have conceived of. And the same can apply to miniature sculpting too, obviously.
But part of the fun of the miniature hobby is finding or converting or painting models so that they fit source material - whether it be historical or the liveries in GRR Martin's indices or whatever. This whole thread is just an attempt to show what riches there are lurking in the depths of Tolkien's works - riches that gamers and model-makers and painters have often overlooked.
:)
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Those North Star chaps look not bad.
Not keen on the shields but that's an easy fix. I prefer round or kite shields not odd shapes.
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Looking forward to the North Star goblins too, I don't normally go in for plastics, but will make exception for "goblin hordes" ;)
Doing my Dwarves in metal from Conqueror Models plus NS metal command.
Some great posts @Hobgoblin, very thoughtful, please continue :)
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I'm hoping they look great when assembled, love the shields too, and it's nice to see scimitars goblins look great with them
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The comparison photo with plastic dwarf suggests the goblins are smaller than humans. So looking very promissing indeed :)
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First unit pictures from Northstar:
(https://scontent.fprg2-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t31.0-8/23275642_1871990859497019_3325875276903519856_o.jpg?oh=4080b541bee6fb58162ca9ddf9857260&oe=5A629506)
(https://scontent.fprg2-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t31.0-8/23405671_1871990852830353_3436960938083814777_o.jpg?oh=3f14c7ec4c169f3d42e4133bc45aa088&oe=5AAC3AED)
(https://scontent.fprg2-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t31.0-8/23334262_1871990912830347_5042201666867764523_o.jpg?oh=fedb0072f4031ca79f71217645ec3193&oe=5A6BDB2A)
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They do look good. Sadly, possibly too good to resist ... sigh ...
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Very nice indeed!
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They look good, I hope the orc archers can be put together so that the arrow is on the other side of the bow though... ::) ;D
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They remind me of the orcs in the 1970’s Saul Zaentz Lord of The Rings movie...
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They look good, I hope the orc archers can be put together so that the arrow is on the other side of the bow though... ::) ;D
I am probably wrong, but I thought I read that only modern bows had the arrows on the inside of the bow and traditional bows had the arrow on the outside of the bow.
In any case. Nice orcs and dare I say it "they look like prper Tolkien orcs". :D >:D
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They are not shit. But I do have a problem with multipose miniatures. It is very hard to hide that stuck-on look of the arms with makeup.
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They look pretty good to me. One quibble might be that the two-headed axe and the mace look like two-handed weapons being held in one hand - so they look a bit odd with shields. I'd cut both weapons down below the grip, I think - and probably cut down or replace the heads of both.
I've already been eyeing up a kitbash with the Frostgrave barbarians and soldiers sprues to create Isengarders with short, broad-bladed swords and long bows. And I think there might be some useful crossover with the Frostgrave gnolls.
Hammers, that's a good point. One thing I've noticed, though, is that manufacturers often try to stretch the poseability a bit in photos - as with the bow held aloft here (look at the angle of the sleeve). I suspect that more subtle variations in pose will help here; the gnolls were pretty good in this regard.
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I am probably wrong, but I thought I read that only modern bows had the arrows on the inside of the bow and traditional bows had the arrow on the outside of the bow.
I was thinking that the arrow isn't on the wrong side, so much as with the angle they're being held at, it would have fallen off!
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Looking pretty good, I'd say. Lots of kitbashing potential too.
But yes, those arrows could well fall off...
My understanding is that the arrow to the right rather than the left of the bow is not so much ancient rather than modern, but is a particular style of shooting usually associated with horse archers and recurved bows. So it's right for the shape of the bows here - the arrow is usually braced on by a thumb or fingers of the left (leading) hand. This bracing may not be too obvious here but that's probably a function of the hefty width of your average 28mm arrow...
OK, that's more than enough bow nerdery from me for one morning.
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...but it wouldn't fall off if it was on the other side...
I don't know about the way it was done or not in the distant past but from a practical point of view, the arrow tends to swing around from the string as you raise the bow to draw if it is not on the other side of the bow.
But these is Orcses, so maybe its different? I think its more likely that they've been put together a bit too quickly and it is possible to put the arrow on the other side. The sculptor knows his onions when it comes to these sort of things from what I know...
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Thank you for that explanation Sereverian :)
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From my understanding (and limited practical experience), the main determinant for the side the arrow's on is the method of drawing and releasing the string. If using the typical draw with 2-3 fingers on your right hand (one over, 1-2 under the arrow), releasing the string will twist it to your right, pulling the nocked arrow to the right as well. As such, it's far easier to have the arrow to the left of the bow, as it is like to fall of on the right side (it can be braced with your thumb, but shooting over the knuckles is more practical and sturdy). When using a thumb-ring to draw the bowstring (typical in Eastern horse archery), you instead twist the bowstring to your left on release, thus making placement of the arrow on the right side of the bow more practical (basically without exception, as you have no method of easily bracing the arrow with a finger there). I can also imagine nocking arrows on horseback to be easier when moving the arrow towards rather than over the bow (as you would when placing them left of the bow), but having no experience with mounted archery this is pure theory!
If one were to give a bow and arrow to an unexperienced archer, I think some will be perfectly happy to adapt and shoot over the thumb, but I imagine most would opt to shoot over the knuckles, especially as one naturally has the bow slightly tilted to the right, allowing the arrow to rest on the left side.
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They are not shit. But I do have a problem with multipose miniatures. It is very hard to hide that stuck-on look of the arms with makeup.
Agree with this. They are not bad, but neither are they wow, must buy. Middling. The joins on some of the figures look a bit awkward - sticking out spear arms look weird. The horned helmets don't work for me, but easy to cut off. The lips look really big and flabby on some, suspect this is down to the paint job.
All in all, not a bad effort for plastic figures, but I think there are better around. Depending on scale, they might make it into my Mordor army as heavier armed black orcs.
I just wish they could make the step up and make good rather than average figures - it's eminently possible as shown by the Perry twins, victrix and some of the fireforge offerings. It's not down to technology, it's the posing and sculpting that make or break the deal.
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I'm afraid you have a point, Nord. I'm putting it down to a rush job putting them together for release, which seems to happen with other companies releases too... (that and being too sparing with the plastic glue around the arm joints)
If there are some nice metals and the same deal(s) as there were for the dwarves in the preorder, I'm still in. However I can't help feeling a tad disappointed too.
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I've seen better pictures, and I am really impressed with the quality of this set.The sculpting is crisp and flawless, the set offers a good variety, and the character of the miniatures alone and as a group is what I imagine as being orcish.
Lovely lovely stuff.
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What a great thread! I didn't notice last year.
Nice to see other people obsessively trying to figure out how JRRT would imagine them.
Really glad to see it confirmed that these Oathmark goblins are really meant to be Tolkien orcs. It was rather obvious from when I first saw them but I didn't expect so much effort and dedication behind it.
Another important factor to consider is the fact the whole LotR was largely based in many ways on sagas and early anglo saxon literature.
From Beowulf to the Hervor Saga, the descriptions of people or creatures are largely absent, leaving it much to the imagination for instance what Grendel looked like.
In the dark ages most men probably had beards, but there's no mention of it at all. Just because things aren't said doesn't mean it didn't happen. Dwarfs have notable beards worth describing but that doesn't mean goblins don't have any facial hair.
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Indeed, there's no reason Orcs can't have beards.
There's a definite impression that they don't from JRRT. The journey of Merry and Pippin with the Orcs gives you the idea they are hairy, but not bearded. Unshaven, unwashed, working class oiks indeed. In earlier works, Tolkien talks about their long filthy hair, but not beards.
There's something fine and noble about beards in Middle-Earth, the owners of them are proud of them, very un-Orc like. There's the long ignored Bearded Elf as well, Cirdan.
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Indeed, there's no reason Orcs can't have beards.
There's a definite impression that they don't from JRRT. The journey of Merry and Pippin with the Orcs gives you the idea they are hairy, but not bearded. Unshaven, unwashed, working class oiks indeed. In earlier works, Tolkien talks about their long filthy hair, but not beards.
Yes, that is the impression, I reckon, although it doesn't rest on a great deal. There is, somewhere in some version of the Silmarillion, a bit where a (petty?) dwarf is identified as not an orc because of his beard. But then it would be a dwarf's beard, which seems to be quite a thing (waist-length or whatever).
I think there are a couple of things that support the idea of orcs not having much in the way of beards, and one reasonable counter-argument. First, there's that slightly uncomfortable bit from Tolkien's 1958 letter where he describes orcs as looking like "degraded and repulsive versions of the (to Europeans) least lovely Mongol-types". Now, I think it's fairly obvious that Tolkien had one particular (Turco-)Mongol people in mind here: the Huns. Given his interest in the Goths and Gothic, Tolkien would have been familiar with this passage from Ammianus Marcellinus:
"The people called Huns, barely mentioned in ancient records, live beyond the sea of Azof, on the border of the Frozen Ocean, and are a race savage beyond all parallel. At the very moment of birth the cheeks of their infant children are deeply marked by an iron, in order that the hair instead of growing at the proper season on their faces, may be hindered by the scars; accordingly the Huns grow up without beards, and without any beauty. They all have closely knit and strong limbs and plump necks; they are of great size, and low legged, so that you might fancy them two-legged beasts, or the stout figures which are hewn out in a rude manner with an ax on the posts at the end of bridges.
They are certainly in the shape of men, however uncouth, and are so hardy that they neither require fire nor well flavored food, but live on the roots of such herbs as they get in the fields, or on the half-raw flesh of any animal, which they merely warm rapidly by placing it between their own thighs and the backs of their horses."
And its echo in Jordanes:
"They made their foes flee in horror because their swarthy aspect was fearful, and they had, if I may call it so, a sort of shapeless lump, not a head, with pin-holes rather than eyes. Their hardihood is evident in their wild appearance, and they are beings who are cruel to their children on the very day they are born. For they cut the cheeks of the males with a sword, so that before they receive the nourishment of milk they must learn to endure wounds. Hence they grow old beardless and their young men are without comeliness, because a face furrowed by the sword spoils by its scars the natural beauty of a beard. They are short in stature, quick in bodily movement, alert horsemen, broad shouldered, ready in the use of bow and arrow, and have firm-set necks which are ever erect in pride. Though they live in the form of men, they have the cruelty of wild beasts."
The scarring story is thought to be a misinterpretation of Hunnic funerary rites, with the beardlessness actually being a description of the sparse facial hair common among men of Far and Central Asian origin. But there's no doubt that Tolkien was familiar with these descriptions, which echo his descriptions of orcs in various places and possibly show the 1958 passage in a somewhat better light. The Rohirrim are very similar to the Goths in many ways, and the Huns were the terror of the Goths, so the orcish raids on Rohan have a sort of historical antecedent. So, if orcs are in some way fantastical Huns, then light or absent beards might be assumed.
Now, the second point flips all that on its head. Lots of people have read racist stereotyping into descriptions of orcs, but it's very clear that they talk like British soldiers. That parallel is reinforced by Tolkien's letters (he refers to his son among his fellow servicemen as "a hobbit among the Uruk-hai"). While the likes of Snaga have working-class British speech patterns, the captains (e.g. Ugluk) are actually rather well-spoken ("You'll get bed and breakfast all right: more than you can stomach!") - demonic versions of British officers). But all of them are like British soldiers - and they have military organisation, including numbers. In this regard, orcs aren't "the other" but "us". Now, British soldiers would be expected to be clean-shaven (with moustaches allowed for higher ranks). So I don't think it's a huge stretch to see Tolkien picturing orcs as clean-shaven, at least at the start of a campaign. Vicious and cruel though they may be, orcs are soldiers, not "savages".
Now the counterargument: Tolkien said that his goblins were closely based on George MacDonald's:
"They [Orcs] are not based on direct experience of mine; but owe, I suppose, a good deal to the goblin tradition (goblin is used as a translation in The Hobbit, where orc only occurs once, I think), especially as it appears in George MacDonald, except for the soft feet which I never believed in."
Now, MacDonald's The Princess and the Goblin was originally illustrated by MacDonald's friend Arthur Hughes. His goblins looked like this:
(https://i.pinimg.com/564x/fd/fc/b4/fdfcb4d19f93fe4eaef96aa9141ba230.jpg)
And in the popular 1920s edition, Jesse Wilcox depicted the goblins like this:
(https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/11/Princessgoblincptr18.jpg)
Tolkien would have known these illustrations - Hughes' at the very least and probably Wilcox's too.
So, while I agree with Nick, you could make a case both ways. ;)
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Ha, interesting you're quoting Jordanes in this context. I wrote a blogpost just about that recently:
http://area-23.blogspot.it/2017/12/i-smell-man-flesh.html
I only forgot to mention Ammianus Marcellinus (adding right now!).
I completely agree re: orcs with beards. What I meant was that Tolkien decribing his creatures little as possible seems to have been a choice. Not only as a matter of style but apparently he was trying to continue a literary tradition.
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Ha, interesting you're quoting Jordanes in this context. I wrote a blogpost just about that recently:
http://area-23.blogspot.it/2017/12/i-smell-man-flesh.html
I only forgot to mention Ammianus Marcellinus (adding right now!).
I completely agree re: orcs with beards. What I meant was that Tolkien decribing his creatures little as possible seems to have been a choice. Not only as a matter of style but apparently he was trying to continue a literary tradition.
Where he does describe something he is often inconsistent. Carcharoth the wolf was too big to fit in a lair at Angband, but could lie hidden when being hunted by Beren and Thingol; Huan is able to fight the wolf, and although Huan was large, I never got the impression that he was huge. Likewise, there is the endless debate of whether Balrogs truly had wings or whether the shadow cast by it merely looked like wings. As you say, it is a matter of style and fits the literary tradition of of Norse myths etc.