Born to Kill by Robert J. Schwalb is a role playing game supplement published by Schwalb Entertainment for use with Shadow of the Demon Lord. The supplement is part of the Victims of the Demon Lord series which expands on character ancestries, in this case that of the orcs.
This is an 18 page PDF that is available from DriveThruRPG for $2.99 but was purchased at a greatly reduced price during a special offer. Around half a page is the opening illustration and a quarter the Credits.
The opening paragraphs explain how for centuries orcs were the primary component of the Empire’s military. Tied to the throne by dark magic, some feared what would happen if the orcs ever broke free, and those fears were justified.
Blood of Giants gives the history of the orcs. Centuries ago, the jotuns of Blötland, humans with the blood of giants, raided the coast of the Empire but there were always other matters closer to home that were important to deal with than the raiders. Until the jotun raided further inland and killed the emperor’s son. The Empire sent a fleet to Blötland and almost wiped the jotun out. Some of the jotun were brought back to Caecras as prisoners but, instead of them being executed or tortured to death, Ahriman, a wizard advisor of the emperor who some believed had either served the Witch-King or uncovered the magic of Gog, suggested that instead the jotuns be warped into loyal slave soldiers.
The newly-created orcs proved capable in their first conflict against the dwarfs, wiping out a kingdom in the mountains on the eastern border of the Grand Duchy of the West. The orcs proved increasingly useful in combat but they were also rather fecund. This meant that there would be a problem of too many orcs, so those over 33 were “retired” from service and promised their own farms. Although a few farms were established in Low Country as a showpieces, most orcs were shipped north, killed in camps and then ground up with grain to be fed to the still-living orcs.
This continued until the Matriarch of the Cult of the New God decided she wanted the orcs under her control. She sent a bishop from the Holy Kingdom to demand this of the emperor, who refused. So the bishop befriended the orc king, Drudge, then eventually told him the truth of what happened to retired orcs. Which broke all orcs’ ties to the throne and led them to go on a bloody rampage.
The aftermath of the uprising is still going on. Orcs were common in most lands of the Empire and they have all revolted. Some head to help Drudge, others tried to return to Blötland. Orcs were created to kill and their upbringing is not soft. They also believe that violence solves everything; they do not give or ask for quarter. Orcs know Dark Speech and worship the Dark Gods of their jotun ancestors, but ones that are even more violent than those of the jotuns.
Orc relationships with other races are by and large bad or nonexistent. They hate humans and haflings and have very little knowledge of most other races except dwarfs and goblins; orcs do not hate either but were so often used against both races that the races themselves have a more negative opinion. Clockworks orcs consider similar to themselves, as both were created by magic.
With the background done, more information is provided on creating orc characters. Everything needed to create an orc character quickly can be found in the core rulebook; this provides extra options for creating a more detailed character with several dozen new tables for rolling all aspects.
Finally, there is a new Expert class, the ravager, a warrior-type that is between fighters and berserkers, not as disciplined as the former but not ruled by their fury as the latter.
Born to Kill in Review
The PDF lacks bookmarks and, although not a lengthy supplement, there are enough different sections that bookmarks would have been useful. Navigation could be better. The text maintains a full colour two column format and appeared to be free of errors. There are some colour illustrations and filler and a single piece of black and white filler. Presentation is very good for the length.
The background on the orcs, how they were created and what led to the uprising has been written about in a number of places but Born to Kill collects all that information in one place and expands upon it. The primary intent of the supplement isn’t just to provide background, it’s to expand the character creation options for orcs. Which this does through the vastly more extensive collection of tables for generating much more information on a starting orc. This will of course increase the amount of time taken to generate a new character; given that Shadow of the Demon Lord can be fairly lethal, this may not be popular with everyone. Born to Kill, like others in the series, provides a nice host of new details for orcs and it can be found by clicking here.
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