Slayer's Guide to Ogres, The

Welcome to The Slayer's Guide to Ogres, the latest installment in the long running 'Slayers Guide' series. Each book in the series focuses on a single monster or monstrous race from the pages of Core Rule Book III. This allows us to explore the monster in depth, providing details about its history, culture, and physical presence that might not be immediately obvious.

This book, and the others in the series, seeks to provide the reader with a 'ready to use' monster template that both entertains and intimidates the players. For Games Masters it needs to provide a sufficiently setting neutral yet detail rich description to be easily applied to any campaign. For players, it should provide sufficient information to both entice the player to make a character of the race and bring a level of believability to hostile encounters with them.

The most difficult question this book must address, more complex than anything to do with fictional physiology or subcultures, finds its clearest expression in the simple question: Why ogres? Why do players want to create ogre characters? Why do Games Masters want to use ogres as villains, minions, or setting elements? What about them attracts attention? What about them makes them the laughable buffoons encountered in song and story?

The basic image of ogres, of monstrous stupid men who can sweep cattle up in their arms, reoccurs in the folklore of hundreds of cultures. Every single time the ogre appears; a clever human or god appears right behind him, tricking the mighty creature to his death. Despite his strength and cannibalistic ways the ogre stands no chance against the tricky mind of an alert human being.

From the Core Rulebook III we know that ogres are large, vicious, and extremely lazy. They do not work well together, nor do they believe in bathing. Although they use some basic tactics most ogre encounters involve running away from foes.

The same source describes two (or possibly three) races of ogre. The common ogre stands nine to 10 ft. tall, smells like a dung heap, and avoid direct confrontations. The merrow resemble their land-bound cousins but breath water and swim like fish. Finally we have the ogre mage, a creature somehow related to the common ogre but remarkably different; although they share a similar physical appearance the ogre mage represents a quantum level greater threat than an ogre.

These three races represent an amalgamation of three basic folklore creatures: the ogre (large, strong, dumb), the merrow (a rather ugly merman from Irish legends), and the Japanese oni (literally ogre, demon, or fierce god). Ogres belong to all cultures. Merrow, as a specific type of relatively friendly merman, really only appear in Irish folklore. Oni come in many shapes but the Core Rulebook III limits ogre magi to a relatively mundane forms.

Although it is tempting to discard the folklore as irrelevant to a gaming supplement, that lore also provides some clues to the solutions we seek. Specifically, it points towards several particulars that can weave together to form a coherent narrative. These particulars form the framework of this book. By picking and choosing which elements fit in a specific setting the Games Master can easily add depth to his ogres. Similarly players can create interesting ogre characters from all three racial strains.