Orcs

A race of creatures found worldwide. Orcs are tall, reaching up to 7 and a half feet tall, and usually broad and muscular. They have dark grey skin, black hair, and dark eyes. Orcs are most famous for their fearsome features, with flat squashed noses and prominent tusks. Orcs are usually trained in some sort of simple weapon, usually clubs or quarterstaffs. Rarely an orc will use ranged weapons, and never magic.

Orcs, when alone or in a leaderless tribe, are stupid, easily frightened, and neutral. They can barely speak their own language and run if they encounter a humanoid. Due to this low intelligence, if they come across a powerful creature, they will perceive it as a deity. The orcs form a hunter-gatherer society, with an almost insect-like social structure, with the powerful creature as the “queen”. The orcs will provide food for the queen, and sometimes hunt down a mate for it. In return, the creature leaves the orcs alone, and even protects them. The orcs will also change their personalities based on the creature they choose to follow. If the orcs worship an evil creature, usually a manticore, a dragon, or an aberration, they will become hostile towards other creatures and humanoids. However, orcs ruled by a good creature such as a unicorn, centaur, or giants will become friendly, even allying with humanoid settlements to gain food and followers for their queen. Another type of strange behavior orcs possess is that they often migrate. Sometimes they’ll even abandon their queen to do this, or force it along with them. Studies have shown that tribes of orcs can circumnavigate several times before the tribe is wiped out.

Humanoids mostly ignore orcs. They don’t usually mount large attacks humanoids, even with an evil queen, and humanoids don’t often become queens. The occasional raid may have to be dealt with, but nothing more. However, orcs will sometimes kidnap humanoids as mates when potential in the tribe are becoming scarce. The result is a half-orc, with the strength of their wild brethren, and the intelligence of humanoids.