About the orc population

[Wildberry]

hey if they made grom as cool as he was in wc3 no one would want to fight him. They made him stupid so we wouldn't feel like we are being forced to kill one of our fav chars, but a more retarded version of him.

I'd be inclined to believe that, but it'd mean that Blizzard actually put a little bit of thought into how they're telling a story. We all know that's not true!

[Aquamonkey]

That's never really been reflected anywhere in-game, children seem rare and multiple children even moreso. I'd put this in the dubious canon pile personally.

The lack of children is the more dubious. Game scale is way different than lore scale. The game representation doesn't cover full grown adults, general civilian population, infrastructure, or even armies, let alone children who we wouldn't interact with as mercenaries.

[Friendlyimmolation]

I'd be inclined to believe that, but it'd mean that Blizzard actually put a little bit of thought into how they're telling a story. We all know that's not true!

I can dream! *runs back to Warcraft III*

[Mormolyce]

I can dream! *runs back to Warcraft III*

Go back and play through BTDP with Grom, I dare you.

The lack of children is the more dubious. Game scale is way different than lore scale. The game representation doesn't cover full grown adults, general civilian population, infrastructure, or even armies, let alone children who we wouldn't interact with as mercenaries.

They don't necessarily have to be depicted, but you'd think NPCs would occasionally mention their 8 kids at home.

[Friendlyimmolation]

Go back and play through BTDP with Grom, I dare you.



They don't necessarily have to be depicted, but you'd think NPCs would occasionally mention their 8 kids at home.

Hey Grom was a hot head, but at least he followed through with his talk.

[sam86]

The RPG books aren't canon at all. That's been stated by Blizzard multiple times.... and they put the population figure the highest i've ever seen it - over 200,000. Even that isn't sustainable.

The expression 'take them with grain of salt' isn't mine, it was actually from blizzard when someone asked if 'RPG books are not official lore, why you take ideas from them?"
The only 100% confirmed unofficial part of lore from RPG is Proudmoore son, because they thought it 'doesn't fit image of good marine', while in ancient time it was very normal for sailor to sleep with women and still considered be good man
What about the part in the shattering that talks about military size? Or did stormwind turn every citizen to military member and have no more citizens?
The 'size of land' has zero relation to population, egypt has around 92 million and we half size of KSA, while KSA has like 12 million
If you say KSA is sand egypt is mostly desert, ppl 'forget' that

[Deleted]

In litters of what size? You mean to tell me that female Orcs always carry around more than one child when they're pregnant?

Yes, they carry between 5-15 at a time. You know those chaos giant orcs? They're not male, they're pregnant males.

Does that mean that aggra is having fertility problems ?

No, she obviously abandoned the other 13 she made near human prison camps run by madmen, you see, she loves Go'el so much that she's willing to try to make a Thrall Jr. x13

As has been mentioned, Orcs breed in litters and mature quickly. After the Founding of Durotar and before the start of Vanilla, a large number of orcs could have been born (tens or more thousands, easily) and would have reached maturity sometime around the start of Wrath.

NONE of the populations presented make sense or are sustainable. Stormwind was once quoted (the kingdom, not the city) as having ~30,000 people living in it. That's not even sustainable.

Ok, time for me to be a bit serious. It is impossible for orcs to have matured between the Founding of Durotar and Wrath. Between the Battle of Mount Hyjal and Classic 4 years pass. So, let's assume that Orgrimmar was founded in a day (though in reality it's more like 6 more months or so). Then Classic and BC took another 1-2 years.
That means that even if we take orcs' quick maturing, they'd be only 4-6 years old... which is less than half of the orcs' age of being ready for war so to say.

I also remember that by Cataclysm 9 years had passed (since Hyjal). So orcs that were born during the founding of Durotar would have reached maturity... during Garrosh's MoP campaign... which, unfortunately, would also mean many of them died during the assault on Orgrimmar.

And yes, the numbers are unsustainable. 30k for a random fortress, sure. But for the capital of giant empires? No way. Even if we take the Middle Ages in reality, the population of Europe was about 40 mill, and it was split between... 40 nations or so? That still leaves 1 mil per nation so the capital should still have had at least 100k. And we're talking about small nations, nations like France or England had much more.

[Combatbutler]

The expression 'take them with grain of salt' isn't mine, it was actually from blizzard when someone asked if 'RPG books are not official lore, why you take ideas from them?"
The only 100% confirmed unofficial part of lore from RPG is Proudmoore son, because they thought it 'doesn't fit image of good marine', while in ancient time it was very normal for sailor to sleep with women and still considered be good man
What about the part in the shattering that talks about military size? Or did stormwind turn every citizen to military member and have no more citizens?
The 'size of land' has zero relation to population, egypt has around 92 million and we half size of KSA, while KSA has like 12 million
If you say KSA is sand egypt is mostly desert, ppl 'forget' that

They are entirely non canon unless otherwise stated by blizz.

Q: Are the Warcraft and World of Warcraft RPG books considered canon?
A: No. The RPG books were created to provide an engaging table-top role-playing experience, which sometimes required diverging from the established video game canon. Blizzard helped generate a great deal of the content within the RPG books, so there will be times when ideas from the RPG will make their way into the game and official lore, but you are much better off considering the RPG books non-canonical unless otherwise stated.

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2721372142

[Darknessvamp]

For some reason, I'm imaging that a whole lot of incest had to take place in order for the Orcs to sustain their current numbers. :/

[Blithe]

For some reason, I'm imaging that a whole lot of incest had to take place in order for the Orcs to sustain their current numbers. :/

Since they're born in litters I highly doubt it. They'd have plenty of non-related Orcs to mate with, you just have a very dirty mind.

[Arrashi]

Since they're born in litters I highly doubt it. They'd have plenty of non-related Orcs to mate with, you just have a very dirty mind.

To be fair, given the intelectual heights draenor orcs are presenting, incest theory isnt that unlikely.

[sam86]

They are entirely non canon unless otherwise stated by blizz.

While some characters from the RPG books have made their way into official lore, Blizzard has stated that Tandred will not become canon.
http://wow.gamepedia.com/Tandred_Proudmoore
As I said, while they did remove the tweet later (probably from backfire), they did say that unless they stated specific point is unofficial (like Tandred), anything else can be used for lore anytime they want, and they did, do and still will use since RPG built lot of ideas

[Combatbutler]

While some characters from the RPG books have made their way into official lore, Blizzard has stated that Tandred will not become canon.
http://wow.gamepedia.com/Tandred_Proudmoore
As I said, while they did remove the tweet later (probably from backfire), they did say that unless they stated specific point is unofficial (like Tandred), anything else can be used for lore anytime they want, and they did, do and still will use since RPG built lot of ideas

That I really doubt, since it was pretty much established that they are not canon,since they often contradict established lore, especially their very own encyclopedia.The tweet is no longer there because Loreology closed his twitter profile, because he had no longer had the time to maintain it.

[sam86]

That I really doubt, since it was pretty much established that they are not canon,since they often contradict established lore, especially their very own encyclopedia.The tweet is no longer there because Loreology closed his twitter profile, because he had no longer had the time to maintain it.

I'm not sure what you mean that you doubt here, if you doubt they used lot of RPG book material in game.. I'm sorry they did, even after they said it isn't 'official', they just want freedom to not be restrained that's all, so if they do something that contradict with RPG, they get away with it.
They did exact same now, anything you point is wrong or different in WoD than MU, they just say its AU so not all are 'same'.

[Karrosene]

I myself have had a problem with this going into Cata.

The Horde Orcs were a fraction of the original Horde that were rounded up. And Lethargy didn't kick in until they were captured, so these guys were still fighting to the death.
Then freed, not all of them joined the Horde as seen in RoC, many broke off and attacked human settlements.
With the Warsong who were small enough to evade the Alliance for so long, the new Horde left for Kalimdor.. without the Frostwolves.
Thrall's group landed on the troll island and were all captured I believe(put in cages underground if i recall)
Grom's landed on Kalimdor and fought the Humans
When they met up, Thrall's group seemed smaller than Grom's... which was only the Warsong... i believe. Then after fighting some night elves and humans, took part in a huge battle at mount Hyjal.
The Orcs then suffered attacks from Jaina's nation.
Did battle with Jaina's forces(in book)
Spread their forces out across Kalimdor
took part in AQ(may not be canon)
have had numerous battles with the night elves in Ashevale(comic)
Sent forces to Outland(may not be 100% canon)
Sent most of their forces to Northrend and lost a lot of people
~~This is the part that there should be no warriors left and it gets ridiculous~~
They deal with many many traitors leading up to Cata
Start a war with the Alliance and lost a lot... i mean A LOT of orcs in Gilneas
fight on a few fronts with the Twilight cult
lost an airship+crew in Deepholm
GAIN THE DRAGONMAW(yet no darkskin orcs filled the horde's ranks) while losing their entire airfleet
lost another airship+crew to Deathwing
Fought a huge battle for Theramore
Lost a huge fleet in Jadeforest, +Airship+crew
Lost a lot of Orcs in that stupid scenario to Varian, also had their base destroyed
Lost a good amount of Orcs in other places and a lot of Blood Elves
Lost a lot of Orcs in 5.3
Lost all of Garrosh's Horde in 5.4
~~~Here's a huge ridiculous moment~~~
We're told that only a small number of Orcs followed Garrosh, that most of the Orcs revolted... even though not a single Orc npc was on our side, but we fought literally 100's of Orcs in the Siege and many Orcs under Nazgrim were loyal regardless and died. The most bullshit lie ever told to us was that only a fraction of the Horde stayed with Garrosh... and Not a single Orc Npc was among Vul'gin's group...
Ok so let's continue...
We lose more Orcs in Blasted Lands... to Time traveling savage orcs
We go to Draenor and ohhh hey, let's fight the alliance on Ashran to prove all the bad orcs died.

There literally shouldn't be any orc force after Northrend, but some how the number keeps maintaining unrealistically. Sorry for large post.

- - - Updated - - -



Hard to tell who's weak when we get quests to kill 100's of Orcs with some crazy weapon we turned on them.

Well proably more liek this scenrio...most of the warriors joined garrosh while the barrel makers and inn keepers remained loyal to voljin. So that would make sence if you think about it.

[Extrakt]

Orcs age in 12 years to adulthood? So how old is Garona in the alternate timeline? 6 years old? She got aged quickly by guldan right?
Seems rather skillfull for a 6 year old

[Octavius]

Yes, she is. As she is a little too much mindcontrolled for a 6-year child. But it seems we'll free her.

[Verdugo]

Yes, she is. As she is a little too much mindcontrolled for a 6-year child. But it seems we'll free her.

Why dont we just kill her, she gets mind controled more often than american voters.

Ironicaly, thats the only time she is actualy effective, when someone does thinking for her.

[Deleted]

so orcs breed like rabbits?

sense it makes, think I.

[sam86]

so orcs breed like rabbits?

sense it makes, think I.

No but they mature fast
Goblins on other hand do, but they also love to explode with their experiments so they 'balance' their population problems that way