Blood Axe Ork Mercs???

[Swarbie]

Well, I'd say that although orks are a sentient species, they are definitely more primitive than humans.They are generally portrayed as less mentally agile than humans and less capable with the specifics of certain thought processes such as basic mathematics (they can tell whether there are more or less enemies than orks, but ask for the actual number and you tend to get either "Lots boss" or "Not too many boss"). Their language is also very simple, described by, iirc, Ciaphas Cain (might have been someone else) as "pointing at you want and sounding angry". Although some orks have learned Low Gothic, they tend to find it difficult to understand and even harder to speak.

Physically, they outmatch humans in much the same way as some higher primates and great apes outmatch humans (the average chimp is stronger than most exceptional humans). Although they are physically stronger and tougher, their lower mental capacity would mean that they almost certainly lack any great technique in combat; most accounts of orks fighting are of them simply using their weapons, whatever they are, to bludgeon their foes to death.

Psychically, their resistance and power is very much dependent on both the number of orks present and their state of mind. It's true that if you could convince a large enough group of orks that a stick you picked up was a gun, they could take it and shoot you to pieces with it, but that would require a very large group of orks, and they would all have to be utterly convinced. In the numbersthat could be present in a game of Inquisitor, the ork/s' psychic potential would be very low, enough to keep his own weapons running and to maybe help him understand what the human yelling at him wants.

Given all this, I would give a lone ork a stat-line something like this.
WS=55 BS=35 S=90 T=90 I=50 Wp=45 Sg=25 Nv=75 Ld=30

Abilities: Furious assault, true grit.

[Myriad]

Maybe I'm betraying old school roots, but I still think of the basic ork as around the level of a brutish human.  Since we're talking about the basic ork, even S/T 70 makes them stronger and tougher than most human soldiers.  90 is around 'bionic arm' levels and seems too high.  While they have a cavalier disregard for their personal safety, once they do start feeling threatened they're not so brave.  Swarbie's mental attributes look about right. 

Blood axes are more 'humanised', which would give them higher leadership/sagacity, but I'd dock them furious assault in lieu.

[Magos Exarratus]

I've always thought of the fact that some Orks can speak any Low Gothic* as a sign of a significant amount of a certain type of intelligence, what with Low Gothic being an alien language to them. For a start there are the basic biological differences, I'd assume the vocal chords are structured somewhat differently, and the mouth, though the amount of actual difference there is might be quite small. One significant difference though would be the tusks, which would make it hard for the lips to form the sounds of the languages** I have any real understanding of (understanding of how the sounds are made, in this instance, rather then the actual meaning of the words).

So simple pronunciation would be difficult because of physical impediment rather then necessarily any sort of intellectual impediment.

Then, IMO, there is the probability that the concepts expressed in Ork and human speech are incredibly different. Concepts differ between cultures on earth, even understanding of concepts (or so I am led to believe); that is the way ideas are viewed and expressed differs between certain groups of humans, so I suspect it would differ significantly between Orks and humans. After all, different things are important in generalisation to each species. Expressing one's ideas in spoken language, in my view, carries with it the task of translating ideas from one's thought language to the spoken language. In fact I don't think it carries with it that task, I think it is that task (this is of ideas that one has already had, which differs from expressing ideas as they come). This generally relatively easy in a person's first language, because that is usually the language the person's thought language is most similar to. In fact it is often similar enough for them to be considered thinking in that language. The point I am trying to make here is that the ideas of Orks are likely suited (to a certain degree) and tied in with their language(s), but IMO are probably highly unsuited to Low Gothic, far more so then between any two languages on earth (which interestingly enough (to me at least) includes programming languages, and at least some the ideas and things said in programming languages are awkward to say in English).

I therefore set forth the idea that an Ork which has learnt to translate its ideas into an alien language must be capable of some intellectual aerobics by the very definition of what they have done. That is not to say that all Orks are really smart, but the ones who have learnt enough Imperial Gothic to hold a cursory conversation would seem to me to have demonstrated that they are smart.

* I assume that a significant number of them can, though the quotes I am thinking of I cannot place at the moment, so they could actually simply be translations.

**Being the languages near Britain, such as English, Irish Gaelic (and thus Scottish Gaelic as well), French, German, Welsh etc.

[Kaled]

It's true that if you could convince a large enough group of orks that a stick you picked up was a gun, they could take it and shoot you to pieces with it

I think that's going too far - I can't think of any evidence in the canon to support such an assertion. There's some evidence that ork weapons may work better in the hands of an ork, but essentially ork weapons work because they were designed and built by a being who has the instinctive knowledge of how to do build weapons encoded in his DNA.

[Darksinger]

ok, i'd have to agree with kaled here- a stick in the hands of even a million orks convinced it was a gun wouldnt do anything. Blood axes especially are smart enough to know that a stick can't fire bullets, and as the fluff for blood axes clearly states, blood axes will hack anyone to peices if that person attempts to fool them. Give them a toy rifle or a spud gun though, and they might do more damage. As for statlines, I agree mostly with Myraid- a higher LD and SG, but dock furious charge. Blood axes often hang back and scheme, unlike say, Speed Freakz, who obviosly tend to plow headlong into battle.

Marcoskoll- but blood axes are of a more complex mindset- your standard ork would not even be convinced to fight for a human, but blood axes will happily do so, for a right price. They employ strategy, that in itself showing a deeper mind than your average ork nob. They are cunning, yes, and although cunning and intelligence are different things, you said yourself SG is not only intelligence. What other category would cunning fit into really?

[Kaled]

I think there's a bit of confusion here, some of us (such as Marco and me) are discussing stats for an 'average' ork, whereas others are talking about particular clans.

I don't think cunning needs to be factored into any stat - IMHO it's more to do with how the character is played and what tactics he employs. Not everything needs to be, or should be, reflected in stats or special rules. And given how Sg is generally used in the game, it doesn't need to take cunning into account - but as with every character a GM should give appropriate bonuses to Sg tests if it's appropriate for the character.

[MarcoSkoll]

What other category would cunning fit into really?

If I'd put it anywhere (as Kaled says, that kind of thing is probably better roleplayed - see below), I'd put it on Leadership - which covers,amongst other things, a character's military nous.
Sagacity is largely used for tests to operate unknown machinery or recall important details. It covers logic and learning rather than generic intelligence. In short, I suppose Sg is more "Book smarts" while Ld is more "Street smarts".

Orks, if they have either, have Street Smarts. (Still, their lack of discipline means they should not have a particularly high Ld.)

And besides, obviously, stats can't include everything. There's no "common sense" stat or a "master plans" stat, because those are in what actions the player chooses. Kunnin should probably be largely the same.

[Vladimir]

now, first of all, the 'orks are psychic and make sticks shoot bullets if they believe hard enough' thing is a running joke (originating I think on 4chan's /tg/ board). Certainly, orks display a certain degree of telepathic power (the WAAGH) but this only manifests in large groups of orks and mainly affects them psychologically and physiologically. There's no cannon examples of ork tech only working because they believe it will do so that I know of. Orkish Wp will be comparatively low, representing their succeptibility to the WAAGH and usual lack of overt raw power- remember that most psychic phenomena from Orks obly occour when huge numbers are present and that Wierdboys have very little control over their own powers (hense such occourances as Headbangs and Psychic Vomit).

Sg is generally taken as representing 'book learning' rather than raw intelligence. Whilst orks are not stupid creatures per se, they are somewhat simple in their outlook and don't value knowledge greatly. I'd put their Sg mostly in the 30s.
Orkish anatomy and musculature is vastly more powerful than that of a human- IIRC they were bred as a pure warrior race and so these stats in the 90's seems more than reasonable- whilst less able than a typical space marine, they come much closer than a typical human ever could.

[Darksinger]

Vladimir- in the ork codex, it mentions the lack offunction thing (i re-ead it recntly, and it does say some of the time, not all the time. Also, you might get a few higher SG orks- for instantce, blood axe kommandoes can read and write, so will presumably have more booksmarts than other orks (maybe in the 40-45 region?)

[Swarbie]

Yeah, I know the orks turning sticks into guns is an exaggeration. However, in many cases, when humans attempt to use ork technology, it simply does not work, usually because it is missing some small but important piece. For example, I think there's a story out there somewhere where an ork  manages to pin down an Imperial Guard squad for an hour with a looted heavy stubber. When the squad finally takes the ork out, their sergeant finds the gun had no trigger.

Of course, there are cases where ork technology works perfectly normally, eg, Commissar Yarrick's power-claw.

[Darksinger]

ah yes, yarrick. The epitomy of imperial spirit though- he belives that he can defeat gazkull thraka, and that he is righteous, ect. so i would have though  he would be able to work ork weaponry.  That said, power klaws are hydralic (i cant spell that word) or battery powered, so its probably easy to use.

[Easy E]

I'm going to have a go at synthesizing some of this discussion...

for the Record, this will be the stats for a bog standard Ork boy that will vary by individual.  I realize mos tthe people here probably do not use the "random" stat generation, but I included them for completeness. 

WS= 55= 45+2d10
BS= 35= 25+2d10
T= 80= 75+d10
S= 80= 75 +d10
I= 35= 25+2d10
WP= 45= 40+d10
NV= 75= 65+2d10
SG= 25= 10+3d10
LD= 30= 20+2d10

Inherent Ork abilities: Furious Assault, True Grit, Fearsome

[GAZKUL]

gazkull thraka

Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka

call yourself an ork player?

[Kaled]

Marg

gazkull thraka

Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka

Margaret Thatcher?!

[greenstuff_gav]

Makari? where are you? Maaaakaaaaaari?!