Orc — Scars of Honor race

There is no orc lore on record. No capital city, no starting settlement, no origin account, no faction storyline — nothing comparable to the Undead's Velas and Gloomset, the Infernal Demons' Soul Ring, the Humans' Whitesong City or the Sun Elves' transformation myth. This page will not fill that gap with invention.

What can be stated is placement. Orcs belong to Domination, and were named alongside inferno demons when the final faction presentation was being described in October 2025. Their absence from the deeper lore material is consistent rather than accidental: across the sources that set out capitals, origins and faction storylines, the orc simply does not appear.

The race is also old in development terms. An account of the project's early art and formation says the orc changed substantially over time, which places it among the designs that predate the current art direction and were reworked into it rather than created inside it.

One thing worth noting for players choosing a side: Domination's opening scenario is described as revolving around the problems of the undead and how they are incorporated into the faction. If there is an orc narrative role, it has not been described.

Orcs have no published racial bonus. Neither does any race in Scars of Honor, because the system has not been settled.

The December 2025 development position was that racial traits are still under internal discussion rather than cut, and that their absence from the redesigned website is a symptom of that unresolved debate. The stated objection was balance interaction with the talent tree: with roughly 300 nodes, flat percentage racial bonuses risk becoming disproportionately strong. The stated argument in favour was that race choice should mean something in gameplay and not only in appearance. Designers were described as divided, and no decision was presented.

April 2026's community Q&A returned the same answer. Traits remain under internal design debate; the main worry is that over-tuning them pushes players into meta picks, choosing a race for stats instead of identity; and if traits ship they are unlikely to be game-breaking or highly impactful. No final decision was locked.

Community discussion sorted candidate traits into acceptable and unacceptable groups — out-of-combat movement speed, resting and regeneration and profession perks in the first, damage bonuses against specific races and combat stats such as critical strike and haste in the second. That is player sentiment. For an orc specifically, nothing has been proposed by the developers at all.

The list below is the Domination class pool as defined by the game client data behind this site's gear planner. All four Domination races carry the same seven entries, which differ from the Sacred Order's set in three places: Necromancer, Mystic and Pirate in place of Druid, Priest and Paladin.

Because orcs were absent from the April–May 2026 alpha, almost nothing about their class access was tested. Two community reports survive from the chart era. In March 2026 Priest was described as apparently orc-only on the Domination side — the mirror of the dwarf-only Necromancer arrangement on the other faction, and the subject of the same complaint, that a single race should not be compulsory for a whole role. In April players reported discovering that orcs apparently would not be able to play Rogue.

Both of those are player readings of material that has since been withdrawn or revised. The developers pulled a race/class chart in March 2026 because it did not reflect the latest setup, said in late April that combinations were still being adjusted in response to feedback, and in the same month presented a full race × class availability matrix as the current plan for early access and likely 1.0 while stating explicitly that it is provisional and subject to change.

When Bearan and Gronthar were added for the playtest, the stated effect was that both factions gained access to all available classes — a change that applies to Domination as a whole rather than to orcs individually.

Art direction is the only area where orcs are well documented, and the direction is unambiguous. The intended look is inspired by the larger, more brutal orc style associated with The Hobbit films and similar fantasy references. The preferred silhouette is explicitly not slim: the goal stated in November 2025 is heavy and intimidating.

A male orc model shown in April 2026 followed that brief — large, bulky, physically imposing. The same discussion recorded an alternative that was considered and not taken: a smaller, more crooked or sneaky-looking orc, mentioned as a personal preference rather than the chosen direction. That alternative resurfaced later the same month, again framed explicitly as a subjective art-direction reflection rather than a confirmed redesign plan, describing a wish for something more crooked in place of the current bulky style. Readers should not mistake either mention for a planned change.

The orc is part of a broader pattern the developers themselves identified: several non-human races in Scars of Honor are trending toward large and massive silhouettes, orcs, Gronthar and Bearans among them.

As of March 2026 an orc model was being deliberately held back as an unrevealed asset for a later presentation, and in April the male model was still described as in progress, with the female orc named among results yet to be seen. No orc customisation walkthrough has been published — no face options, hairstyles or race-specific features have been shown, in contrast to the detailed passes given to Humans, Undead, Infernal Demons and Bearans. Players asked in April 2026 for orc women who do not look like dainty afterthoughts next to the men; there is no published response to that request.