Evil races in Middle Earth

[Stormcrow]

That's a good point: a lot of the monstrous beings in Middle-earth are the results of biological experiments by Morgoth or Sauron. Their heritage could be anything.

[Erland Hakon]

Hi all.

I have been lurking this forum for a long time, but I want to explain the Ogres in my own campaign, in it they are Trolls... in fact Olog-Hai.

Obviously the explanation has more sense in Spanish, because the word for Ogre is Ogro.
When this kind of creature start appearing, for misspeaking or misunderstanding of his name in some places they started to be called Ogrog-Hai and with the pass of time they passed to be called only Ogros (sing. Ogro).

An easy way to create a variant for the Olog-Hai.

Sorry if they are any writing mistake in the test, English is not my native language.

[zedturtle]

Hi all.

I have been lurking this forum for a long time, but I want to explain the Ogres in my own campaign, in it they are Trolls... in fact Olog-Hai.

Obviously the explanation has more sense in Spanish, because the word for Ogre is Ogro.
When this kind of creature start appearing, for misspeaking or misunderstanding of his name in some places they started to be called Ogrog-Hai and with the pass of time they passed to be called only Ogros (sing. Ogro).

An easy way to create a variant for the Olog-Hai.

Sorry if they are any writing mistake in the test, English is not my native language.

That's pretty awesome, and a good testament to Stormcrow's point about there being many different ways to interpret the source material.

[Stormcrow]

Obviously the explanation has more sense in Spanish, because the word for Ogre is Ogro.
When this kind of creature start appearing, for misspeaking or misunderstanding of his name in some places they started to be called Ogrog-Hai and with the pass of time they passed to be called only Ogros (sing. Ogro).

I believe Professor Tolkien would have been quite pleased with your derivation.

[Glorelendil]

Are hobbits completely different beings than men?

Yeah, that's pretty much my point exactly. They're not completely different, but they're enough different that it's more fun to create a new category.

And, of course, we know that goblins, hobgoblins, and orcs all refer to the same creatures, though "hobgoblins" are a larger kind, and orc is just the Rohirric word for English goblin, based on Sindarin orch. By your logic, we should make all of these completely different creatures, for the sake of being not-scholars and game-designers....

Uh-huh. Whatever, man. Enjoy.

[Otaku-sempai]

Hi all.

I have been lurking this forum for a long time, but I want to explain the Ogres in my own campaign, in it they are Trolls... in fact Olog-Hai.

Obviously the explanation has more sense in Spanish, because the word for Ogre is Ogro.
When this kind of creature start appearing, for misspeaking or misunderstanding of his name in some places they started to be called Ogrog-Hai and with the pass of time they passed to be called only Ogros (sing. Ogro).

That sounds fine for your game, but I don't know that it works well within Tolkien's legendarium. Bilbo was familiar with tales and legends presumably going back for generations involving Ogres and Giants. The Olog-hai are supposed to be fairly recent, only first appearing late in the Third Age. I'm not sure that tales of them would have filtered back to the Shire at the time of Bilbo's youth.

[Erland Hakon]

That sounds fine for your game, but I don't know that it works well within Tolkien's legendarium. Bilbo was familiar with tales and legends presumably going back for generations involving Ogres and Giants. The Olog-hai are supposed to be fairly recent, only first appearing late in the Third Age. I'm not sure that tales of them would have filtered back to the Shire at the time of Bilbo's youth.

If the Third Age has three thousand years, how many years are "late in the third Age"?

It does not seem unreasonable to say that could be the last three hundred years (10% of the Age) or perhaps the last six hundred years (20% of the Age).

[Enevhar Aldarion]

That's a good point: a lot of the monstrous beings in Middle-earth are the results of biological experiments by Morgoth or Sauron. Their heritage could be anything.

Or Saruman. He did create the Uruk-hai, after all.

[bluejay]

The appendices use the words "at the end of the Third Age" and it seems the Olog-Hai were created for the War of the Ring and first introduced in the battles of The Return of the King. It seems unlikely Bilbo would have heard of them over 70 years beforehand.

Given that official TOR supplements give stats for both Marsh Ogres (Laketown supplement) and Olog-Hai (Ruins of the North) this all seems rather academic.

[Erland Hakon]

That's a good point: a lot of the monstrous beings in Middle-earth are the results of biological experiments by Morgoth or Sauron. Their heritage could be anything.

Or Saruman. He did create the Uruk-hai, after all.

Perhaps in Peter Jackson's Middle Earth but not in Tolkien's Middle Earth