The tag alias #75490 half_orc -> half-orc is pending approval.

Reason: For the sake of unification of interchangeable terms. Currently both tags are very low in count, but half-orc seems to be the more commonly used, and so it would be best to standardize on that formatting.
This does potentially cause issues when it comes to standardizing tagging half elves, as the formatting that is more popular in that case is reversed and it's best to be consistent. However, that is a separate discussion.

I think it's better to be consistent.

I think it's better to alias both to orc. How does a half-orc differ from a full-orc? Since the design of orcs can vary between settings, some being more human-like than others, this seems like a distinction without a difference. What one franchise calls a half-orc, another could call simply an orc. In some cases, the amount of human-like traits of orcs can change even within a franchise. It also seems kinda vague, like a half-orc what? Half-orc half-dragon? Half-orc half-cat? IIRC, even D&D wanted to phase these half-* races out because they didn't work when you wanted to allow for more variations/customization (which e6 inherently allows by not being tied to D&D). Better to use orc hybrid where it matters, and simply orc for designs that can be identified as some kind of orc.

watsit said:
I think it's better to alias both to orc. How does a half-orc differ from a full-orc? Since the design of orcs can vary between settings, some being more human-like than others, this seems like a distinction without a difference. What one franchise calls a half-orc, another could call simply an orc. In some cases, the amount of human-like traits of orcs can change even within a franchise. It also seems kinda vague, like a half-orc what? Half-orc half-dragon? Half-orc half-cat? IIRC, even D&D wanted to phase these half-* races out because they didn't work when you wanted to allow for more variations/customization (which e6 inherently allows by not being tied to D&D). Better to use orc hybrid where it matters, and simply orc for designs that can be identified as some kind of orc.

the problem is that since we treat human as a form as well as a species we can't say human orc hybrid, can we?

dba_afish said:
the problem is that since we treat human as a form as well as a species we can't say human orc hybrid, can we?

An orc is basically already humanoid. humanoid_orc and orc_humanoid are aliased to orc. That's part of the issue, that the design of orcs in different settings vary in how human they look, making "half-orc" not really mean anything.

So, if there’s a particular depiction of a half-orc from a particular franchise that can be distinguished from their regular orcs, that can get its own tag (for example, half-orc_(d&d). Without a franchise-specific modifier, they could look like anything from a standard orc to a human with tusks (and maybe not even that), so probably not really useful to us.