by Kipper Snifferdoo & Joe Mashuga
Subraces:
At one time, the ogres claimed over eighty percent of Adlatum’s habitable regions. Their might was gathered together in an empire of powerful magic, dark temples and the will of the Gods of Evil. When the Irda, shapeshifting ogres from across the sea, arrived in Adlatum fleeing persecution elsewhere, their presence signaled the beginning of the end of ogre domination. The Age of Light began when the ogres, having stolen Irda magic and using it to bolster wisdom from their Volume of the Prophet, brought Chaos down upon themselves and were weakened enough that the elves could take their empire from them. By the time of the Canon War and the Drowning, the ogres are a lesser race, though still not as brutish as their Ansalonian cousins. Unfortunately for the ogres, the Drowning destroyed much of their infrastructure and forced them to make pacts with other races to survive.
Brute Ogres
The most primal of the ogre races, brute ogres have fallen far from their ancestors and have forsaken even the Oguna. They live in squalid villages and caves in rocky terrain. Brute ogres are a terrible and brutish people, as cruel as the Igurna with none of the grace or intelligence.
Personality: There are no laws, only survival. Kill to survive. Give pity to wish for death. Take what you will if you can. Only use others to better your own chance of survival. If you are not sure if something is ally or foe, kill it to be safe. These are the survival instincts of almost all brute ogres. As for what they were, the great people they used to be, all has been lost. Many others debate as to whether these creatures truly have sentient thought above that of wild animals.
Physical Description: Most of these massive hulks are little better than barbaric monsters. Most stand between 8 1/2 to 10 feet tall. Their faces and bodies appear heavily disfigured, with large grotesque limbs coming out at what look like dislocated angles from twisted wide bodies. It is difficult for any non-brute ogre to determine a male from a female, even if the ogre was bare.
Most tend to have large patches of hair randomly covering their bodies or even their faces. A rare few have been spotted with the hair completely covering them; these fully-covered brutes are most often the ones who exceed ten feet in height. The brute ogres’ skin and hair ranges between a very pale gray-blue to white that allows them to blend into the ice and snow of the far north.
The brute ogres who gather in groups tend to still wear thick hides and furs from kills in the wilderness. The larger more barbaric brutes, many of which are loners in the mountains, run nude with only their own body hair to give them warmth.
Relations: Few races have positive relations with the brute ogres. Even the noble ogres view them as a threat, but there have been rare exceptions. Sometimes brute ogres will have deals with noble ogres in turn for having rival brutes captured and brought into slavery for the Igurna. But for the most part, the kill-or-be-killed mentality ruins any conversational ability a brute ogre may possibly have. Often, brute ogres do not have positive relational skills with even other brute ogres.
Alignment:
2nd-3.5 Edition: The barbaric nature of their lives forces almost all brute ogres to be chaotic evil as they strive for power within their small groups and try to push away rival tribes. However a small number of the more wild loners have begun to show a more neutral nature by only focusing on survival and not caring for demonstrating their strength in attempts to control others. The violence these few demonstrate is purely for reasons of getting food or protecting shelter.
4th Edition: The barbaric nature of their lives forces almost all brute ogres to be chaotic evil as they strive for power within their small groups and try to push away rival tribes. However a small number of the more wild loners have begun to show a more unaligned nature by only focusing on survival and not caring for demonstrating their strength in attempts to control others. The violence these few demonstrate is purely for reasons of getting food or protecting shelter.
Brute Ogre Lands: In the northernmost reaches of the Frozen Mountains the brute ogres lie scattered in small clumps of tribes, many nomadic. A few live closer to noble ogre cities but rarely in them. Some loner brutes have been seen to wander across the Endless Reach into the Broken Lands, but rarely do the Sakkaran minotaurs or the Oguna let them live long.
Religion: Most brute ogres believe the gods have forsaken them. The rest are too focused on survival and showing their strength to care about matters of faith. As such, a brute ogre with a religious tie would be a very rare sight.
Language: Brute ogres communicate with each other using a highly corrupted version of Igurni simply known as Ogre. The brute ogres to the furthest north and those alone in the wild communicate with grunts and gestures if they communicate at all.
Names: Brute ogres often make up their own names or bestow them upon others at will. Whoever is strongest decides, and if someone doesn’t like their name, it’s up to them to force everyone else to change it either though violence or intimidation. Names vary from sounds to broken words of the Igurni language. Never are they very complicated or lengthy. There are no family names used in what passes for brute ogre society, and some loner ogres are so wild they do not have names.
Male Names: Cheg, Grond, Guugar, Mornag, Vrog.
Female Names: Dofgar, Hun, Joog, Penga.
Adventurers: All brute ogres are adventurers of a sort. Attacks by so-called dragons, other wild predators, or other ogres make living day by day a risk. Most times brute ogres will venture to find food and shelter, but they may also have conflicts with other brute ogres groups in the area. Some may also be expelled from a group (i.e. escaped before being killed) and venture south of the Endless Reach, but this changes the ogre’s life from having to avoid predators in the north to having to avoid predators in the south, in addition to minotaurs, humans, and Oguna.
Brute Ogre Racial Traits
3.5 Edition
Brute ogres possess the Krynnish ogre racial traits listed in the Dragonlance Campaign Setting, except as follows:
- Automatic Languages: Common and Ogre. Bonus Languages: Goblin, Gnoll, Igurni, and Minotaur.
Noble Ogres [Igurna]
The Igurna are powerful, broad-featured and dark-skinned descendants of the original high ogres of Krynn. While not witless or savage, the noble ogres are nonetheless slaves to their passions, something which tends to get in their way when pursuing political power in the Age of Mortals. They are few in number now, and are considered a dying race.
Personality: Noble ogres look down upon all lesser races, thinking they are the only true race of the gods. Most deformities and different colorations than what they say is correct, are normally taken out into the wild and left to die. They are a strict and terrible people that put a lot of credit upon ones family structure and ones bloodline. If you cannot prove your bloodline, an ogre could be viewed to be as low as a slave. Noble ogres tend to fight more among each other than with the other races to better increase their family prestige. Family prestige is everything to a noble ogre. This borders honor, but really isn’t due to the fact that a noble ogre will do dishonorable deeds in order to raise their family prestige.
Physical Description: The typical noble ogre is about nine feet tall, females being about 6 inches shorter. They are hulking, powerful, and graceful with dark blue-brown skin, blond hair, and dark eyes. Most wear their hair long, and only cut it when in shame. When a male ogre’s hair begins to change to white around their 400th year they begin to grow a beard, which they allow to grow without being cut until the ogre’s death.
Relations: Noble ogres look down upon all the other races of Adlatum. The only people the noble ogres have a working relationship with are the Teusten to the south across the Shattered Sea. They tolerate these humans only for the slaves they bring to them in trade.
Alignment:
2nd-3.5 Edition: Many of the more prestigious families tend to follow ancient traditions. These traditions have varied and decayed over the centuries, but even so many of these families hold to the current incarnation of these practices with steadfast fervor. As such these families tend to be lawful evil.
Lately, however, a growing number of Igurna are throwing what is left of these traditions aside, seeing them more as a hindrance to whatever their aims are. This growing minority of families and individuals tend to be chaotic evil in nature.
4th Edition: Many of the more prestigious families tend to follow ancient traditions. These traditions have varied and decayed over the centuries, but even so many of these families hold to the current incarnation of these practices with steadfast fervor. As such these families tend to be evil.
Lately, however, a growing number of Igurna are throwing what is left of these traditions aside, seeing them more as a hindrance to whatever their aims are. This growing minority of families and individuals tend to be chaotic evil in nature.
Noble Ogre Lands: Noble ogres stick to their vast mountain ranges in Terragrym. Here they have massive cities that were built by slave labor. They tend not to cross the Endless Reach and stick to their ancestral homelands.
Religion: As with most ogres in the history of Krynn, the noble ogres have long been followers of Dakranas (Takhisis), which means “Black Ice” in the Igurni language. Huge basilicas to Dakranas have been built in each of the major cities, along with many shrines and smaller temples. Following the Drowning, Greasnas (Zeboim), which means “Blue Deep” in the Igurni language, has found a greater following in noble ogre society, rivaling even Dakranas in followers.
Language: All noble ogres speak the Igurni language, along with Common; some along the border and the more noble families know the minotaur language. In order to deal with the brute ogres, ogres do learn the corrupt form of the ogre language.
Names: Most first-born ogres of a noble family pass on the parents’ names. So for example if a husband and wife have the names Harvvas and Thanylen of Clan Shoballaine, and they have one son, he would be named Harvvas Tras-Sev of Clan Shoballaine. Same with if they had a daughter; she would be named Thanylen Tras-Sev of Clan Shoballaine.
The second part of the name always signifies the descendant’s branch in the family, which also helps to prove how long he can trace his family roots. Tras-Sev (“ninety-five”) is the oldest family to date, tracing their family lines back 9,400 years to their race’s founding. Any children born after the first-born of each sex are named how the mother wants them to be named.
Male Names: Harvvas, Paatran, Harverick.
Female Names: Thanylen, Drenaln, Lysagra, Zeragamri.
Clan Names: Shoballaine, Renaylia, Cubrenan.
Adventurers: Most noble ogres never leave Terragrym, though there are special cases for when they will. If an ogre has shamed his family, he or she must earn back the honor and respect. Therefore, they would take it upon themselves to go on a quest. The further the ogre travels, the more perils he or she faces, and the more this brings back family prestige. So those noble ogres that were to leave Terragrym and travel to the farthest edges of the continent and return would earn the most prestige. Most do not go this route, and instead will find adventure in Terragrym.
Noble Ogre Racial Traits
3.5 Edition
Noble ogres possess the following racial traits instead of the normal ogre abilities and traits:
- +10 Strength, +6 Constitution, +4 Intelligence, +4 Wisdom, +6 Charisma. Noble ogres are powerful, mentally keen, and possess a remarkable strength of personality.
- Large: As Large creatures, noble ogres receive a –1 penalty on their attack rolls and Armor Class due to their size, and a –4 penalty on Hide checks. Their lifting and carrying limits are twice those of Medium characters. Weapons and armor sized for a noble ogre costs and weighs twice as much as comparable Medium weapons and armor.
- Monstrous Humanoid: Noble ogres are creatures of the monstrous humanoid type.
- Noble ogre base land speed is 40 feet.
- Space/Reach: Noble ogres have a space of 10 feet and a reach of 10 feet.
- Darkvision: Noble ogres can see in the dark up to 60 feet.
- Low-light vision: Noble ogres have low-light vision, and can see twice as far as a human in starlight, moonlight, and similar conditions of poor illumination. They retain the ability to distinguish color and detail under these conditions.
- Racial Hit Dice: A noble ogre begins with four monstrous humanoid levels which provide Hit Dice of 4d8, a base attack bonus of +4, and base saving throw bonuses of Fort +1, Ref +4, and Will +4. A noble ogre character receives maximum hit points for his first noble ogre Hit Die and rolls all other Hit Dice (including those gained from class levels). Noble ogres with class levels add their base attack and saving throw bonuses to their noble ogre base attack and saving throw bonuses.
- Racial Skills: A noble ogre’s monstrous humanoid levels give skill points equal to 7 x (2 + Int modifier). Its class skills are Bluff (Cha), Concentration (Con), Intimidate (Cha), and Spellcraft (Int). Noble ogres with class levels do not multiply their first-level class skill points by four.
- Racial Feats: A noble ogre’s monstrous humanoid levels provide it with two feats. They gain Simple Weapon Proficiency as a bonus feat.
- Spells: All noble ogres with a Charisma of 10 or higher have the ability to cast sorcerer spells. The noble ogre casts spells as a sorcerer of its racial Hit Dice. In addition, a noble ogre adds any sorcerer levels to its innate spellcasting ability to determine total spells per day, spells known, and caster level. Other class features (such as familiars) are determined by the noble ogre’s sorcerer class levels.
- Spell resistance equal to 11 + Hit Dice.
- +5 natural armor bonus: Noble ogres have tough hides.
- +2 racial bonus on Listen and Spot checks: Noble ogres have keen senses.
- Automatic Languages: Common and Igurni. Bonus Languages: Dwarven, Elven, Gnome, Magius, Minotaur, and Ogre.
- Favored Class: Sorcerer.
- Level Adjustment: +4. A noble ogre has an effective character level (ECL) of 8 + his class levels.
Noble Ogre Age, Weight, and Height
Random Starting Ages:
Adulthood: 75 years
Bbn/Rog/Mar/Nob/Rgr: +3d12 years
Mys/Sor/Mnk/Wiz: +4d12 years
Brd/Ftr/Clr/Drd: +6d12 years
Aging Effects
Middle Age: 350 years
Old: 550 years
Venerable: 750 years
Max Age: +2d% years
Random Height and Weight (Males)
Base Height: 8′ 2″
Height Mod: +4d6″
Base Weight: 380 lbs.
Weight Mod: x(2d4) lbs.
Random Height and Weight (Females)
Base Height: 7′ 8″
Height Mod: +4d6″
Base Weight: 340 lbs.
Weight Mod: x(2d4) lbs.