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[Arkenstone]

I was reading Dwarf fortress talk, when I saw the question being raised on the specifics on what a 'goblin' is vs. an 'orc'

Well, first off let me explain: 'orc' is just the elven word for 'goblin' (and german for goblin is 'Kobald', but let's not get into that)
Hobbits, Dwarves, and men of the north said goblin, (Noldor) elves and men of the south called them orcs; but they're essentially the same thing-
or are they?

There were in fact several different orc-races (Ûruk-Haí in the black speech), ranging from big ones bred solely for fighting,("my fighting Ûruk-Haí": NOT a separate species entirely) to those who worked the forges; to ones almost as small as a hobbit, which were driven to battle en mass by larger taskmasters.

Now, from what I have heard of the upcoming caste system, it would be perfect for putting in the variation of sizes in a meaningful way that doesn't screw up game balance too much.

[Acanthus117]

Ooh! This is interesting.

[Tellemurius]

in my understanding there was the orcs of barad-dur and mountain orcs for mordor. goblins were probably orcs that lived under the mountains for years until they ended up skinny as hell.

[Vicomt]

very few people know of the Olog-hai - even fewer know they've seen them. (them being bigger cousins of the orcs of course - I remember very well playing an Olog-hai warrior in MERP (Middle Earth Role Playing)  - stupider and bigger than Uruk-hai, smaller than Ogres, but not by much.

I think this should be done, but it should definitely not be part of the vanilla experience. DF goblins draw from many realms of literature and thought, they are NOT tolkein orcs/goblins.

[Lancensis]

Just be aware that the Lord of The Rings is a novel, and not an encyclopedia. Tolkein was deliberately vague a lot of the time, to make the creatures more frightening and less mundane.

Making variable castes for orcsgoblins is a great idea, but if you try to make a rock solid system of classification based on the stories, you're going to go insane.

[Raphite1]

very few people know of the Olog-hai - even fewer know they've seen them. (them being bigger cousins of the orcs of course - I remember very well playing an Olog-hai warrior in MERP (Middle Earth Role Playing)  - stupider and bigger than Uruk-hai, smaller than Ogres, but not by much.

I think this should be done, but it should definitely not be part of the vanilla experience. DF goblins draw from many realms of literature and thought, they are NOT tolkein orcs/goblins.

     Aren't you thinking of Uruk-hai? Ologs were trolls.

[Vicomt]

I may be slightly out on some details, I last played MERP about 15 years ago, but I'm pretty certain that (in those rules) Uruk-hai and Olog-hai were orc variants, Ogres were separate

MERP made a reasonable attempt at classifying and describing the middle earth creatures (from what I remember as well, it was a simplish combat system with a reasonable amount of scope for doing cool stuff - or that might just have been our awesome GM.)

[edit] - I checked out a MERP roleplaying assistant - downloaded from here, and it lists the following as character races:

• Orc
• Uruk-hai
• Half-Orc
• Troll
• Olog-Hai
• Half-Troll

it makes no mention of whether or not those races are variants of each other though, and I was surprised to see plain "Orc" in there.. I guess those are more like our own goblins.

[Asatruer]

In the off chance that you guys do not know about it, the Encyclopedia of Arda is a great resource
http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/o/ologhai.html
http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/u/urukhai.html
http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/o/orcs.html
http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/g/goblins.html

Summary, Orc/goblin are synonymous, though goblin is used almost exclusively in the Hobbit with a slight implication to being smaller, and rarely used in the Lord of the Rings, and never in the Silmarillion.  Olog-hai are to Trolls, what Uruk-hai are to Orcs/goblins.  Both -hai types where created by Sauron as bigger stronger variants without having an aversion to sunlight. Half-Orcs or Orc-men were similarly created by Saruman to be resitent to sunlight, but are not described as being any larger or smaller than normal orcs.  Snaga is a term in Black-speech to refer to the smaller slave orcs of Mordor and Isengard.

[Vicomt]

I knew someone with more search-fu than I would be along to correct me good info there.

[Arkenstone]

In the off chance that you guys do not know about it, the Encyclopedia of Arda is a great resource
http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/o/ologhai.html
http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/u/urukhai.html
http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/o/orcs.html
http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/g/goblins.html

Summary, Orc/goblin are synonymous, though goblin is used almost exclusively in the Hobbit with a slight implication to being smaller, and rarely used in the Lord of the Rings, and never in the Silmarillion.  Olog-hai are to Trolls, what Uruk-hai are to Orcs/goblins.  Both -hai types where created by Sauron as bigger stronger variants without having an aversion to sunlight. Half-Orcs or Orc-men were similarly created by Saruman to be resitent to sunlight, but are not described as being any larger or smaller than normal orcs.  Snaga is a term in Black-speech to refer to the smaller slave orcs of Mordor and Isengard.

You got it!   -with a few exceptions:
literally translated, Uruk-hai and Olog-hai mean orc-race and troll-race respectively.  Note that, in the book, Saruman always calls them "[his] FIGHTING uruk-hai"; meaning the orcs that he bred specifically for warfare, NOT a different species entirely.  Therefore, the term 'uruk-hai' means nothing more than a particular breed of orc.

Olog-hai, however, may in fact be a separate race proper from trolls.  They were probably much more intelligent than any orc, and perhaps even than some men; as they were said to be completely fluent in the Black Speech of Mordor (a feat the orcs never achieved).  Alas, we have but little knowledge of them; but that, maybe, is for the best....


Also, some of Half-Orcs or Orc-men bred by Saruman were able to pass as human, even under close scrutiny; but others who looked upon one would swear they'd say that he/(it) looked like an orc if they didn't know any better.

[Asatruer]

I (nor I think anyone else) suggested Uruk-hai/orc/goblin were different species. Also while the term "Uruk-hai" in the black-speech does literally mean orc-folk, it was reserved solely for the soldier orcs of Mordor, maybe Isengard I do not recall, who were stronger, faster and resilient to the sunlight and never for any other orc.  I do not know anything about Uruk-hai or other orcs having any trouble with the black-speech, but do know that Sauron created it to be the sole language of his servants, and know that the Olog-hai only ever spoke it. Orcs in general I recall had their own heavily dialectalized language, but would imagine Sauron capable of getting his servants to speak how and what he wanted.

[Ramirez]

My understanding is that the Olog-hai were actually the mountain trolls, which were bred to be able to march even through sunlight, while the more common "regular" trolls were just cave trolls which were stupid and turn to stone in the sunlight. Goblins are a recent evolutionary offshoot from regular orcs that are particularly well adapted to living in caves was the impression I got from the novels though.

[G-Flex]

This is interesting, although a lot of this is just plain irrelevant to DF, which isn't intended to be an LotR clone.

[NW_Kohaku]

This is interesting, although a lot of this is just plain irrelevant to DF, which isn't intended to be an LotR clone.

It is in the "modding" forum for a reason, I suspect.

[G-Flex]

God dammit.

I tend to access new threads through the "unread posts" feature, so sometimes I miss the subforum.