Roleplaying a "honorable" duel between orc and human

[Entessa]

Imagine that you are considered a friend/member of a tribe of orcs. There are many tribes but they do not war between each other, they mostly challenge each other and they rarely go full on war.

Imagine that a prey has entered the territory of a near tribe, but while being followed the preys have escaped on the territory of another tribe. In this case, the rule is clear: the orc that are following the prey can keep following her/them until they reach them. There is a but... the member of the tribe inhabiting that part of the territory can claim the prey.

What's gonna happen is that:
- the strongest between the original pursuer steps out of the group
to challenge
- the guy that is claiming the prey.

Please, suggest some rules for the fights and how you would make your own human character (and the orc) behave.

I thought that the following rules could be applied:
- no magic
- weapon allowed
- grappling allowed
- any other rules worth mentioning?

Beside, imagine that the human wins over the orc. What's a flavourful way to end the fight, without having to kill the orc? What would you do as player, to make it possible for you to make the orc surrender without losing his honor, and if yes, how? Any particular roleplaying maneveur you would adopt? I kinda want to surprise by DM by providing an interesting neat of lore that he may (or may not) accept by roleplaying it in front of him.

I'm genuinely curious.

[GodEnigma]

The list of rules for the fight seems good. If it's not to the death you may consider fighting to "first blood", "three cuts", or some other IC justification for using perhaps a wound threshold. (50% hp or first to take 15 damage, etc.)

I've dabbled a bit here and there is orc-based rp and one of the ideas I always liked was the concept of "Tusk Price" (loser owes the winner a tusk). In the lore, our tribe used, orc tusks grew back over time (albeit slowly) with grievances being largely forgotten about by the time the tusk fully regrew. The loss of a tusk generally shows that the losing party was in the wrong for demanding, eyeballing, or getting ideas about something that was not theirs.

Hope it helps, Orc lore is a fascinatingly open book.

[Vahnavoi]

If you look at intraspecies fights over game, and often even interspecies fights, they are rarely to the death. Both parties want the prey for food or other use, neither wants to lose their strongest warrior over it because that's worse than losing some game. So, it would be reasonable proposal that this duel is to submission, not to death. The most honourable way to win is one that shows superior technical skill and physical strength, that is, is most difficult for human compared to an orc. Pinning or locking the orc in a grapple, for example. Dishonorable ways are those that are too obviously lethal as well as those that are seen as not requiring great skill or strength to carry out, such as poison. Likewise dishonourable are techniques that cause long term harm but aren't all that decisive for a duel - for example, a person only has two eyes to gouge out, but being blinded doesn't stop a skilled grappler from winning a single grapple.

Of course, this all changes depending on general alignment of the orcs. The above is Lawful or Neutral outlook for when the human is essentially considered "one of the orcs". For Chaotics, especially Chaotic Evil, there is no honor beyond winning, and no capacity for the losing party to retain face other than still being too strong for rest of their party to take down.

[BRC]

How ritualistic should the combat be?

Like, is this a question of "We are going to fight, we are going to hurt each other until one of us can no longer stop the other from taking what we want, and we just put some rules on it to stop disagreements from turning into bloodbaths"

Or is this a more general "We will determine which of us is the Strongest" situation, where actually hurting your opponent isn't the goal so much as it's a means to prove your strength.

If the latter, there may be some victory condition besides "Your opponent surrenders or is too hurt to keep fighting".

For example, there may be a win condition called "Skill and Courage".

This works best if you assume only blunt weapons are being used.

First, "Skill", the combatant must declare "Skill", and then gently touch their opponent's head or shoulders. A faint tap, to demonstrate that you COULD have struck them with more force, but chose not to.

After the touch is made, you must get out of arm's reach of your opponent, and declare "Courage". This means the fight stops, but you have not won yet, you have merely moved to a new form of Challenge.

When you shout 'Courage" you drop your weapon and must keep at least one foot planted firmly on the ground. Your opponent can then strike you (once again, this only really works if you're using blunt weapons), you can defend yourself, but you can't move your feet or attack back. After each blow, shout "Courage" again. If you are still standing after the third blow, you win , having proven yourself stronger. Usually this is done after beating your opponent a bit to make them more sluggish and less able to hit you.

Alternatively, pushing your opponent out of a ring, or getting them disarmed and on the ground may be acceptable ways to end a fight with honor intact for all involved.


Alternatively, barehanded fighting or wrestling may be the way to go. As the person above said, Orcs don't want to risk their best fighters in minor squabbles.

[Aliess]

One idea.

The challenge starts with a performance, either telling everyone how great you are, how useless your opponent is, dance off or another form of intimidation. The human will probably be at a disadvantage here because they're unlikely to know what orcs consider cool.

Then the combat begins. It's fought with wooden sticks covered in paint. Each hunting party carries these if they think they might enter a neighbouring territory. If the human hasn't then that's a big no no but luckily someone in the orc party has a set.
The aim is to hit your opponent in the leg (to show they can't run away). Then the arm (to show they've been disarmed) and then the head (the killing blow).
Getting the order wrong is another no no, but the orcs will happily explain if asked the rules and definitely explain if it looks like something is going wrong.

How you win or lose will have a large effect on future relations with a tribe. If you lost, but put on a good performance, got a few hits in and generally showed you're a good sport then you can expect favourable trading, possibly even a portion of the kill.
If you win, but said the wrong thing at the start, threw sand in your opponents eyes and just beat your them into the ground with no respect for tradition then expect a generally hostile reception.

[Elder_Basilisk]

Ancient world duels from David and Goliath to the Norse sagas tend to follow a set formula whether they are to the death or have another win condition. (For that matter, chance encounters between knights leading to duels in the stories of making Arthur often follow a similar formula). You can follow that formula and help your game to feel more authentic.

The first part is the challenge. "Why do you line up for battle? Am I not a man? Are you not servants of Saul? Choose one of yourselves to come down and fight me."

Note that the challenge is issued from neutral ground and that whoever was going to fight Goliath had to leave the advantageous position on the hill to do it. So acceptance is not simply a matter of saying, "you and me fight." To accept, you had to step away from your allies into the open.

The next step is boasting, usually with some insults thrown in for good measure. "Am I a dog, that you come at me with sticks? I will feed your flesh to the birds and wild animals." In systems where it is possible, I would usually have an intimidate check to demoralize the opponent at this stage.

After that, you have the fight. Some battles did not have formal rules (as with David and Goliath) but others had traditional or even written or pre-agreed rules. In D&D, one on one combat can get monotonous so a more formal duel like the Viking holmgang (depending on the era and rules you could win by forcing your foe out of the area, and you could get an advantage by running your foe out of shields) might be better than trading attack rolls till someone dies or grappling through 30 minutes of sweaty **** punching until someone finally gets choked out. (Though some early UFC fights say that might be realistic). If you have an opportunity to win through a ring out then at least you have a couple more actions you might want to consider.

[Anonymouswizard]

Honestly in this situation something quick sounds best, a quick exchange of boasts and then fighting until one of the champions falls, submits, or begins bleeding is probably enough.

In other situations duels might be more complex, lethal, or just plain different. Yes some variety of 'the one remaining in the arena is classic, but you haven't experienced life until you've survived an orcish poetry duel (they tend to last nine hours and orcs have a *lot* of terms for sex). You can theoretically duel via anything that can be made competitive, especially if you're able to have an unbiased set of judges. Be different, give your orcs traditions not related to hunting and killing!

[Mr Beer]

If there are weapons involved, then there should be a rule about armour and shields. Say it's a sword fight and the human has only their sword and walkaround clothes but the orc has chain, shield and helmet, then the orc has an enormous advantage.

[Easy e]

Legend of the 5 Rings, challenges like this often involve art, poetry, performance, calligraphy, flower-arranging and sometimes katanas.

They are typically to the first blood, but it is possible to simply have a showdown, and after visualizing the fight, one of the combatants simply bows and gives up the game. Very rarely are they too the death.

[KorvinStarmast]

I did orc versus half elf combat as after dinner entertainment in a play by text mini campaign a few years ago. (My half elf was guest in the orc camp. I had returned a minor holy relic to their shaman earlier in the adventure day)

Great fun.
"To the first blood" was how we did it. (We used D&D 5e's "knock out" rule as the deafult)

[Anonymouswizard]

Legend of the 5 Rings, challenges like this often involve art, poetry, performance, calligraphy, flower-arranging and sometimes katanas.

They are typically to the first blood, but it is possible to simply have a showdown, and after visualizing the fight, one of the combatants simply bows and gives up the game. Very rarely are they too the death.

Yes, flower arranging to first blood. Mainly because doing it to the death was a nightmare.

[Kurt Kurageous]

Orc Rugby.

In one part of my setting, my orc and goblin tribes play a game very similar to rugby called "Game Ogre." The game was taught to orcs enslaved by giants who were so fascinated watching the orcs that they created a league (the first/premiere league). Orcs are very good at the game because of the aggression trait allows them to close down very quickly when on defense. Goblins are fast on both sides of the ball, but not as strong.

Have your two tribes play each other, winner take all.

Yes, I've written rules to play out the game using 2d6 to resolve each phase of the play. The game is not timed, but is played to exhaustion or until one team scores two goals. The ball is the torso of a a baby sheep. PM me if you are interested in rules. It would help greatly if you knew how rugby is played.

[No brains]

Just to clarify, what kind of orcs are these orcs? Faerun Orcs out of Volo's and Monster Manual? WarCraft orcs? Tolkien orcs/goblins/uruk-hai? Warhammer 40k orkz? Hipster orcs that try to buck assumptions of orc-dom by only being smug jerks that aren't 'evil'? Klingons? I ask because there's underlying lore stuff that could be used to justify a non-lethal outcome.

Absent any more information, maybe you could go for something where the pursuer has to prove they have the strength to keep the prey away from the challenger. If one or the other can keep their opponent far enough away from the prey for a certain amount of time, they proved they can keep the kill long enough for their followers to scavenge what they want anyway (not that this actually happens during the match; it keeps would be scavengers from fighting each other.) So maybe something like keeping the other X feet away from the prey for Y rounds. Ultimately, it's about claiming the prey rather than besting/ killing the other orc.

If you want to make this fun using orc traits, their Aggressive trait technically allows them to push each other extra far.* Grapple -> Move -> Aggressive allows an orc to push someone a full 30 feet away. Maybe have the challenge start with both parties grappled. Then they roll initiative to break the opponent's grapple so they can push the other. This kind of stacks the deck for an orc to win vs a non-orc, but a high athletics check, a shove at a pivotal time, or just knocking the other guy out can allow the non-orc to win.

*Some DMs may not read the grapple rules as allowing a push, but a game of orc bulldozers is fun to imagine, if only for this challenge.

[Telonius]

Before the fight, a skill challenge. Perform (Oratory), (Poetry), and (Comedy). You are basically doing a rap battle to insult your foe. (This was a real thing (https://jetsettimes.com/countries/sweden/stockholm/stockholm-culturati/decoding-viking-flyting-the-original-rap-battles/)). Highest combined total gets a morale bonus to attack and damage during combat.

Other possible rules: no outside interference. If you have an animal companion or familiar, they stay out of it.
Attack only your foe. If you're a frenzied berserker and lash out at a spectator, all onlookers are expected to beat you into unconsciousness. You lose the duel.
Weapons: only regular masterwork allowed, no enchantments. They have a selection of any weapon you want to choose from.
Armor and shields: Only regular masterwork, same as weapons.
No sundering. You're fighting your opponent, not the blacksmith.

[Slipjig]

Hunting societies will probably value skill and cunning over raw strength If. If it's a duel between hunters, it might be appropriate to have a stalk be part of the event. Pick a clearly-defined wooded area (e.g. the space between two streams, a valley, a canyon etc), and have them start at opposite ends. First person to tag the other one on the torso with their paint-stick wins.

[Entessa]

Thanks a lot to each one of you for answering.

[Phhase]

Might be a bit late, but I once ran an interesting Honorable Duel variant. One of my players wanted to ask a proud warrior race...entity a bunch of personal questions, but said entity wanted to take their measure in a fight. So the agreement became this: A duel fought until one can no longer stand. The last standing heals the fallen. All magic and weapons allowed, as long as they are one's own. No pulling one's punches permitted. But most importantly: Each damage-dealing weapon or spell strike is a question, asked and answered from attacker to target. So the true goal of the duel is not to down your opponent, but to land as many damaging strikes as possible without holding back or downing your opponent too quickly. A demonstration of your control and mastery, of both mind and body. It turned out pretty great!

[Hytheter]

Yes, flower arranging to first blood. Mainly because doing it to the death was a nightmare.

You mock, but roses and their thorns are not to be underestimated!

[Morgaln]

You mock, but roses and their thorns are not to be underestimated!

The winning move, of course is to try and smuggle a rose into a bunch of other flowers and hope your opponent gets careless. It is a devious game of subterfuge and deception.

[Rynjin]

One idea.

The challenge starts with a performance, either telling everyone how great you are, how useless your opponent is, dance off or another form of intimidation. The human will probably be at a disadvantage here because they're unlikely to know what orcs consider cool.



Before the fight, a skill challenge. Perform (Oratory), (Poetry), and (Comedy). You are basically doing a rap battle to insult your foe. (This was a real thing (https://jetsettimes.com/countries/sweden/stockholm/stockholm-culturati/decoding-viking-flyting-the-original-rap-battles/)). Highest combined total gets a morale bonus to attack and damage during combat.
.

A Practical Guide to Evil used these concepts, and to me they were interesting. Orcish "war poetry" was considered a largely lost art (since their culture was pretty much annihilated by conquest about a generation before the story starts), but the basic idea seemed to be that the combatants would fight and boast, rhythmically, at the same time. The idea being to beat your opponent into submission with both superior skill at arms and the greater weight and expression of your ideals; this was mostly used for politically motivated trials by combat though (or at least the one time it featured that was the context, swaying votes to decide who would become Warlord).

That series' version of Drow straight up rap battled each other to resolve minor disputes and flex. But they were overall very much on the MURDER MURDER MURDER side for anything more than petty disputes, since killing people meant you could absorb their power for yourself.

You could potentially use Pathfinder's Performance Combat rules (https://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/other-rules/performance-combat/) for the mechanical side of things.

[Anonymouswizard]

You mock, but roses and their thorns are not to be underestimated!

To be fair, I mostly picked flower arranging because you could theoretically do it to first blood. Or to death I suppose, which has a big advantage compared to doing cooking duels to the death.


But really, we all know that there is one one true way to duel, and it involves children's trading cards.

[Keltest]

One thing you could do is give each combatant 3 shields and a weapon of their choice and have them fight until one party's shields are all broken, one party is unconscious or dead (youre breaking shields, it would happen) or one party surrenders.

Each shield could be represented by a certain hit point threshold (arbitrarily, 10 hp worth of damage) and any other armor they happen to have is perfectly allowed, since youre not actually trying to kill each other. From there, you can work out a system of honor for recognizing when youre beaten versus valiantly standing your ground in the face of certain loss, or even losing in the face of certain victory.

[Beleriphon]

I've dabbled a bit here and there is orc-based rp and one of the ideas I always liked was the concept of "Tusk Price" (loser owes the winner a tusk). In the lore, our tribe used, orc tusks grew back over time (albeit slowly) with grievances being largely forgotten about by the time the tusk fully regrew. The loss of a tusk generally shows that the losing party was in the wrong for demanding, eyeballing, or getting ideas about something that was not theirs.

A the 40k Ork economy in teef. The Ork that is richest is the one that punch the most teef out of his rivals.