#half-orcs

[heroineimages]

She's charming!

Commission for @questionableroyalty !

[seahagart]

Drífa went from no friends to more than 1, so she is pretty happy

[dunmeshistash]

Dungeon Meshi Daydream Hour - Race Portraits

[bugbart]

Maev for Orctober 💜🔥💜 ( nevermind that it’s November now )

[cryoverkiltmilk]

The third person in this polycule is imagining just biting the shit out of someone's arm.

[chaoticcomposition]

like a house on fire 🔥

[emahriel]

water genasi lass!!

[heroineimages]

She's charming!

Tusk, my half-orc Druid 🌼

[weenwem]

A small sketch of my Durge while I reinstall bg3 and wait for a new patch. I kind of miss this game :)

[metaphoricallyrose]

Adventuring academy gang’s all here!

[dragoryu3000]

Zarak takes it pretty far, but half-orcs being shorter than humans is accurate for the time. First Edition AD&D was kind of weird about orc/half-orc height, though.

The Player’s Handbook and Dungeon Master’s Guide both seem to proceed from more Tolkienian conception. Since "orc” is mostly just another term for goblin in The Lord of the Rings, Middle Earth half-orcs aren't bigger than humans. Instead, The Two Towers describes them as "man-high, but with goblin-faces." The PHB takes things a step further (or smaller?), depicting its smiley half-orc as shorter than the human in its drawing of various races standing together:

The DMG’s height and weight tables support this, listing orcs as shorter than humans on average:

This fits with a more goblin-adjacent idea of orcs. These half-orcs are presumably taller than the average orc and shorter than the average human...

…except that the Monster Manual lists orcs as being 6'+ tall, making them as tall or taller than the DMG's average human man:

You could chalk this up to how our cultural conception of orcs moved away from Tolkien's goblins and towards a "big and brutish" archetype/stereotype... but the Monster Manual actually came out before the PHB and DMG. As far as I can tell, orcs were first declared to be tall, then half-orcs were later made shorter than humans. You could maybe be generous and call it a quirk of hybrid genetics (like how ligers are larger than tigers or lions, ignoring the fact that tigons aren't), but I'm guessing it's just inconsistency.

Hey, it’s Zarak, everybody’s favorite half-orc assassin. He’s another of the smaller scaled figures from the LJN Dungeons & Dragons toy line. Like the others so far this week, he is also first wave, from 1983. I never understood why they made the half-orc smaller than the humans, but the choice does make for a nice skulking sculpt — he’s the only thief-ish character in the line. Unlike just about every other toy in the action figure line, he only has one accessory — his often-lost dagger.

He’s got an odd, lop-sided thing going on that I think is supposed to evoke a hunched posture and an uneven gait, and which is a pretty unusual design decision for a toy. His outfit is great, I love the pointy hood, and red and black are always a smart combo. Green skin, warts, lots of detail, though I feel like the facial sculpt is more reminiscent of the sort of gruff, middle-aged minor antagonist in a bad suit that would be a gadfly for a TV character like Magnum or Michael Knight before getting knocked off a pier or something. Anyway, a solid, fairly malevolent looking creep.

I will say, though, that the NECA Ultimates of Zarak is a massive upgrade. Holy wow, he looks dangerous. Like, as is — I can picture that little weirdo running around my house causing trouble like the goblin in Cat’s Eye.

[svenskkaktus]

No art challenge this November means more time to draw Hayzel ✨

[seahagart]

Temple Guardian and her cub❄️🐻‍❄️

Wanted to show full orc mom vs her half orc son

Reference:

[guhbwuh]

testing new brushes so orc ghost and soap.

[audsomeartist]

Pork is real, Pork is me, Pork is exactly where I’m supposed to be (outfit reference from @carrreto on Instagram, York is from Drawtectives)