Fun With Ogres

[Hallavast]

In an upcoming Pathfinder game, my character has a goal of building on ogre civilization.

In the setting, Ogres are an ancient race that fell from grace, power, and beauty into a race of loutish brutes similar to the classic version in the monster manual.


So... how in the world would you go about building an ogre-centric civilization built on trade, magic, and relative mutualism when your people's sole export is noggin bashing?

Some thoughts I had:

1. Enchantment magic: use ritual magic or some kind of power to increase the mental faculties of as many ogres as I can, somehow.

2. Find a drug that makes people more docile/cooperative and administer it into the food/water supply?

3. Collect young ogres at an early age and set up a hidden institution to raise them to be smarter if possible.

4. Abandon this fool's errand and go to the pub.

Any source material or ideas on ogre culture or ogre civilizations from other settings would be greatly appreciated.

[Vitruviansquid]

In pre-modern settings, noggin bashing's can be a pretty valuable export.

You can run your ogre civilizations like Sparta - a relatively small population of ogres are considered full citizens, and they do nothing but practice noggin bashing and practice for such times when noggin bashing need be practiced. Under them is a relatively large population of slaves or "client peoples" who support your ogres by engaging in all the non-noggin bashing trades.

[BWR]

In an upcoming Pathfinder game, my character has a goal of building on ogre civilization.

In the setting, Ogres are an ancient race that fell from grace, power, and beauty into a race of loutish brutes similar to the classic version in the monster manual.


So, basically the Irda from Dragonlance and the ogres from L5R?

[awa]

2 doesn't actual make a civilization the ogres are unlikely to take kindly to this when they figure it and with a wis of 10 they will notice such a radical change and if they are so drugged they cant notice it then you aren't making a city just a slave camp using drugs instead of whips.

collecting children is probably not the best way to go about this either.

The thing holding the ogres back is not their intelligence not really the problem is chaotic evil.
see lawful evil can make a civilization becuase they have order and like laws so even if the people on the top are jerks trampling the people below them they do so in a way that perpetuates the system.

chaotic good can make a civilization to becuase while they don't like laws they will work for the collective good on their own they do the right thing becuase ists the right thing.

heres the problem the ogres are chaotic evil their natural inclinations are inherently counter productive to any kind of civilization warlike or otherwise.

In my opinion the best way to make an ogre civilization is not to act against their natural inclinations but to use them as much as possible. Have other nations pay you not to attack them even if the other nation is stronger then you they know that paying you is cheaper then sending troops to fight you. (only works if the other nations are close to or weaker then you in military power to strong they will smash you on principle) the ogres in your army will get use to a more structured life which will make them easier to form a civilization. Ogre have no wis pen so try to encourage the creation of clerics to a non-chaotic god if you can tie it into the military and politics of the nation all the better.

P.s. writing at 2am i apologize if this is rambling and incoherent

[Sidmen]

You want to gain ogre support, so you need to become important enough to them for them to listen to you. Use whatever means you can to do so. If the Ogres respect strength more than intelligence, make yourself stronger than them and prove that you should be their warchief. If they respect providers - arrange supplies beyond their wildest dreams so that you become their huntmaster. Whatever.

Once you have them listening to you, you start educating their children whilst keeping the adults occupied. Those young enough (adolescents) to learn - show how discipline is the route to status under you. A disciplined warrior/hunter is more productive and stronger than loutish ones.

Once you have discipline, education, and respect from the ogres - it just takes time to develop a civilization. I recommend gaining agelessness somehow to ensure that they don't slide back into barbarism. Or have a worthy successor lined up for when you get the inevitable axe to the face whilst adventuring.

[Mastikator]

Ogre mages?

They were originally a race of intelligent ogres with small innate affinity for magic, over time their culture divided into those who did magic and those who did manual labor, because reasons the two classes became geographically distanced and interacted less and less directly with each other. War broke out and eventually they split into two cultures, one that revered magic and one that hated it because of its connection with the other civilization. The ones that revered magic became fewer and more and more inclined over the generations, the other side was crippled and started favoring aggressive violent lifestyles that eventually lead to a breakdown of their civilization, and now they exist only in primitive tribes that despise anything scholarly.

[J-H]

As a warfighting civilization, you want discipline, good leadership, a strong supply chain, and good equipment. If 1/10th of the ogre pop is intelligent to enforce discipline, leadership, manage supplies, etc., you can do it.
Be good in battle, and then make your new subject populations join your army and provide their expertise (see: Mongol Horde).

For a more civilized civilization, you have to determine whether or not INT is genetic, or a reflection of upbringing and nutrition. If it's genetic, you need a breeding program or magical enhancement.
If it's upbringing and nutrition, then you need to work on education and food supply, which is a 1-3 generation long project. Encourage additional druids focused on helping the land be more productive for crops, fruits, nuts, etc. Increased crop production will attract more prey animals, which should help with the meat supply. There are some good magics that help with plant growth as well.

For trade, if you don't have finished goods and mines - well, Ogres should make excellent lumberjacks and can handle all the rough processing. Any nearby shipyards would probably make excellent trading partners.

[Honest Tiefling]

In pre-modern settings, noggin bashing's can be a pretty valuable export.

You can run your ogre civilizations like Sparta - a relatively small population of ogres are considered full citizens, and they do nothing but practice noggin bashing and practice for such times when noggin bashing need be practiced. Under them is a relatively large population of slaves or "client peoples" who support your ogres by engaging in all the non-noggin bashing trades.

+1 here. If you have the time, you'll want to control breeding. As in, when the kids get older, they are tested for intelligence. The ones that cannot be educated get regulated to the slave classes, while those who pass can try to become citizens. You will also want to inspire nationalism and glory for the people, not the individual, else they might eat each other.

[LibraryOgre]

You might check out Kenzerco's Strength and Honor, about Hobgoblins, providing several examples of Hobgoblin civilizations. An example you might follow is the Kors, who are allied with the Human Kalamarans. While they mostly live on their own, they provide some warriors for the Kalamaran armed forces... basically, bootstrapping civilization by providing humans with bruisers.

[Nagash]

In an upcoming Pathfinder game, my character has a goal of building on ogre civilization.

In the setting, Ogres are an ancient race that fell from grace, power, and beauty into a race of loutish brutes similar to the classic version in the monster manual.


So... how in the world would you go about building an ogre-centric civilization built on trade, magic, and relative mutualism when your people's sole export is noggin bashing?

Some thoughts I had:

1. Enchantment magic: use ritual magic or some kind of power to increase the mental faculties of as many ogres as I can, somehow.

2. Find a drug that makes people more docile/cooperative and administer it into the food/water supply?

3. Collect young ogres at an early age and set up a hidden institution to raise them to be smarter if possible.

4. Abandon this fool's errand and go to the pub.

Any source material or ideas on ogre culture or ogre civilizations from other settings would be greatly appreciated.

Since you say they fell from grace I would have them living like primitives among the ruins of their ancient cities rather then having them really be a functional civilization in the setting.

More of a cautionary tale like the primitives from the king kong.

[TheCountAlucard]

Is your character an ogre as well? Whether or not you're "one of them" is gonna be a pretty big factor when you decide to try and "civilize" them.

[Valefor Rathan]

I would think that the biggest hurdle would be finding other ogres that would want to get out of noggin' bashing. Getting a group of like minded individuals would be a good place to start. I don't know what your game's breakdown of their society is currently (are there shamans/clerics/druids? semi-feudal? etc.), but the role-playing bits of getting the core group together would be awesome as part of a larger campaign.

Next, where would you set up the colony? Access to water? Distance to non-friendly humanoids (in this case I would imagine dwarves, elves, humans, etc. wouldn't be too keen on the idea of ogres getting organized).

Once a Safe Place is set up, you can experiment as needed.

[Metahuman1]

I'd honestly show that your a good provider, a strong combatant, and then tell them "Look, Do what I say, and one day you will be legendary, claiming a glory not seen by our/your race ins *Insert number of generations since fall form grace here.*"

I'd also get with the GM and see if you can get Int ruled as a product of upbringing and environment and not genetic and get rid of the Int Penalty over a few generations.

A none evil way to prolong life would also help.



Beyond that, once you have them organized properly (Encouraging certain professions/classes over others at least at first. Druids and Clerics over Wizards till the Int penalty is gone for example. If this is a none Society Game and your GM is willing to let you go third party, Path of War classes over normal martial classes.), you can use that organization by having them be mercenary's for hire. A good trick would be to pick a side that is gonna get better press (I.E., the good guys.), and hire yourselves out to them so that when they win and you helped quite a bit, your civilization get's better press as a result. (Might help to have the divine casters commune to find out which side this is gonna be in a given conflict.)

Apart form that, Architecture and Ship building, which require a LOT of large scale muscle work, should be major points of focus for economic and domestic development. In time, Arcane Magic and Just straight scholarly pursuit's can be a thing. Once you get a few generations down the line and the Int Penalty is gone and a Capital/Home City is firmly established, talk to the GM about doing a quest to remove some of the fall form grace, and have Ogers take on a slightly altered physical form. By slightly altered, I mean most/all Ogers, at least in your civilization, assume a form of a Humanoid Body Builder or Fitness Model who's in the 8-10ft tall or so range (or what ever height range ogers generally run.). Possibly with like, some eye or hair or skin colors that don't happen to humans or something. This will probably require a quest or two and an artifact or ritual or something.