The Flayed Skull Orcs
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This savage tribe of fearless, bloodthirsty and—above all—fecund orcs dwells deep in the southern woods, far from the easy reach of humanity’s retribution.
Led by their mighty chieftain, Thak Shuna, the Elf-Scourge, Slayer of Helkas Thraten and Destroyer of the Arched Tower, the tribe periodically send forth war bands from their fortress-home of Rakorzar. Such bands are small, perhaps a score strong, and led by a champion or maiwyn—a warrior bard steeped in battle lore and skilled with orc war drums. They move quickly in the hunt for treasure, slaves and heads. Such raids leave devastated homesteads, sacked villages and worse in their wake.
Society & Organisation
In the Flayed Skull tribe, personal might is all. Champions rise from among the common warriors, and the chief is always the largest, most ferocious and dangerous member of the tribe. Status is determined by bravery and battle-deeds. The Flayed Skull tribe has no time for learning, writing, farming or any other civilised skill or pastime that does not directly relate to war and conquest.
When a warrior returns a head to Rakorzar the flesh is boiled away—the tribe eats well after a successful raid—before the skull is added to the tribe’s Skull Trove. To signify their deeds, warriors receive a skull tattoo for each head they return to Rakorzar. The more heads a warrior has gathered, and, thus, the more skull tattoos they display, the greater their standing. Warriors festoon their faces, necks and arms first so that all may see the evidence of their bravery. When not arrayed for war, champions and the like often go about virtually naked so that all may gaze upon their tattoo-decorated torso and back.
In some ways, the Flayed Skulls society is an egalitarian one—an orc’s personal circumstances, birth station and so on are irrelevant; all that matters is an individual’s strength and bravery. However, this is a “fair” society steeped in death built on casual violence and indescribable cruelty meted out on anyone not of the tribe.
Half-orcs in the tribe either match their full-blood brethren’s strength and ferocity and are accepted as full members of the tribe, or they do not survive. Weaklings either die—likely killed as a result of some petty argument or disagreement—or are consigned to Rakorzar’s slave pits.
Personalities
Most of the Flayed Skull tribe comprises warriors intent on little but battle-glory and their personal standing. A few members of the tribe, however, are exceptional for one reason or another.
Thak Shuna (giant middle-aged male orc) the Elf-Scourge, Slayer of Helkas Thraten and Destroyer of the Arched Tower, leads the tribe. Heavily scarred and covered in tattoos, he is a mighty warrior and allows no threat to his leadership to endure. He enjoys decapitating captives in front of an audience. He is merciless and wholly without redeeming features. He has sired at least a dozen warriors—all of whom take after him in regard to physical strength and lack of compassion.
Bagra Grimfang (female half-orc) possesses exceptional cunning and intelligence for an orc. Slight of build for an orc and able to pass as a (hideous) human, she sometimes poses as a traveller and visits isolated settlements to get the lie of the land before an attack. She dreams of leading the tribe.
Ecology & Lair
The Flayed Skull tribe dwells in the cave fortress of Rakorzar. Extensive and heavily fortified, Rakorzar lies behind and beneath an old, long-since abandoned ruin of unknown provenance amid a range of rugged, tree-choked hills. The orcs claim the surrounding hills and forest as their own and suffer no interlopers.
Unsurprisingly, given the tribe’s proclivities, skulls are used throughout Rakorzar as decoration. Some of Rakorzar’s deeper caverns and mines are filled with vast piles of skulls—deposited there by numberless generations of savage warriors. The orcs have also found many practical uses for the skulls they harvest, using them as drinking vessels, cressets, and decorations. Some orcs even use skulls in battle as weapons or as decoration for their helmets.
Combat & Tactics
Savage and merciless in battle, Flayed Skull orcs take what they want and kill anyone trying to stop them. Warriors gather the heads of those they have slain to carry back in glory and triumph to Rakorzar.
In battle, the tribe’s warriors favour large-bladed weapons such as axes, greatswords, halberds, bardiches and the like well suited for decapitating their foes. Most such weapons are crude, functional and inventively serrated. Some orcs use shields, while others trust their ferocity, vitality and skill at arms to see them through the battle. All proudly display the tribe’s sigil—a grinning skull—on their armour.
The tribe’s few archers are the weak, the young or the old, and even these orcs carry serrated swords designed for sawing and cutting. These skirmishers also use skulls in battle—filling them with highly flammable, explosive oil and hurling them at their foes.
Often, the orcs fight against their traditional foes, the Erdukr dwarves. The Erdukr are a dwindling folk, and shortly, doughty warriors though they are, will likely fall before the Flayed Skull’s continued raids and assaults.
Credit
This is a short extract from Orcs of the Flayed Skull—a System Neutral Monstrous Delve by Creighton Broadhurst.
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