“Cutting across warband and tribal boundaries are the Ork clans. The Clans embody a philosophy (for want of a better term) among Orks, each clan emphasising particular elements of Ork culture above others. For example, the Goff clan embraces aggression, hardiness and hand-to-hand combat as true Orky virtues while the Evil Sunz clan is dedicated to speed, lightning attack and having the snazziest vehicles.
Typically, a tribe and its component warbands will exhibit the characteristics of a single clan. Some Orks become obsessed with clan ideals and it becomes something akin to a religion for them. Where this is the case the ork will seek out like-minded individuals and join with them to create a warband which completely exemplifies the purest traits of ‘their’ clan. However most tribes are less dominated by the clan ideal, and clan values merely serve to instill a sense of unity and make a common enemy of tribes which are part of other clans. ” (Tribes and Clans, 3rd Edition Ork Codex, pg. 45)
Let’s get this out of the way. Do you think there are only 6 Clans?
If you do, you’re wrong.
I don’t really like using such extreme language with regards to fiction [blatant lie], but this is one of those that I think trips up a lot of Ork players. I’m sure a few of you may even be wanting to debate this with me, and I heartily welcome you to, at least on the understanding that I have every Ork army book in existence and not one of them has ever said there was only 6. Quite the reverse.
It is true that there are the Big Six, and they really are the Big Six. They span the whole 40k Universe with a sense of universal [bad pun] consistency. There is likely very few Orks, if any, who are not well versed in the nature of those 6 clans. Clans are simply a part of Ork Society, an intrinsic reality of considerable influence. Their origins are a mystery, and even their function within Ork society is not wholly certain.
For those of you who have been living in a shed in Colchester with only an Penguin Book of Astrology for companionship, I should name them. The six dominant Ork clans are the Goffs, Evil Sunz, Bad Moons, Snakebites, Blood Axes and Deathskulls. If you needed me to tell you that, I am very worried about you.
Various stabs at their origins and function can be made based on reading the source texts, and it is likely that most of those stabs are probably part of the overall explanation of what the Clans are and where they came from. I would however like to offer my own suggestion to the possible origins of the Clans, and this suggestion is based on what the Clanz do in Ork Society.
I mentioned in the Resonance articles that Orks are unimaginative and require external stimuli to enact change. This is mostly true, however it’s actually a little more complicated than that. Your average Ork is completely unimaginative, and wont come up with any new ideas, unless those ideas are required at that particular moment. Most of this is indeed external, but there is a distinction to be drawn: any stimuli that could affect an Ork will be external to their usual experience, but they might not be external to Orks as a whole.
Because this is what the Clan system provides. Orks are infamous for their almost-constant infighting. Some may view this as counterintuitive, or rather silly, but it actually serves the Orks with a societal function. It is essentially an elaborate system of societal analysis; in other words, it gives the Orks a chance to test how well their society works, through conflict and competition.
It’s a classical Darwinian (technically Spensorian) system: testing the strongest so that the weaker aspects are ironed out. I’d argue that Clans are there mostly in order to give the Orks not only an obvious target to fight, but different perspectives and societal attitudes. It encourages the Orks to look for alternative solutions to problems, and testing them to reward success. There is more to Clans than that, but at least in the mainstream, common view of Orks, Clans provide particular divergent traits that can help to provide the Orks with new (or at least better) perspectives.
Ultimately though, it allows the Orks all the practice they will ever need. They can test their abilities on each other, or see how each other works in a combined Waaagh. Ultimately if the Ork wants warfare, or interesting competition, it will be never far away from them.
How an Ork becomes part of a Clan is very much up for debate. In my time I’ve seen it argued as pre-determined, interchangeable, or simply due to circumstance. I believe it extremely likely that Clan creation is subject to all of these. Sounds pretty mad, I know, but bear with me. I certainly think that Clans are most likely (especially the Big Six) embedded in the Ork subconscious, and I think it likely that Clans are somewhat fixed, yet interchangeable at the same time. Again, resonance makes Orks flexible enough for this reason. Certainly I think an Ork’s predetermined traits are likely to steer them in one particular direction, but do remember that Clans can span a whole society, and are thus simply more inclined towards certain traits, but like all Ork societies and Clans, all traits are likely to be present to some degree, even if less common between Clans.
Clans are most likely created and fostered by conflict. Waaargh! The Orks even has a term for Clans created in this manner, called “Splinter Clans”. A good example of a Splinter Clan would actually be the Ork society from Gorkamorka. You have a tribe that is placed in an extreme situation, and is isolated from other Ork Cultures, presumably for quite a long time. From the offset one sees that the society is vastly different to other less isolated ones; the society being ran by Meks, lacking more complicated technology, engaged in a religious schism (very rare), no sign of other clans, and other rather glaring differences to usual Orky Kultur (particularly the Ork treatment and opinion of gretchin). The isolation and extreme situation has caused a completely different attitude than is usual, thus an unorthodox Ork society, with different ideologies. These are the hallmarks of a splinter clan. That would at least explain why the Big Six clans not there, and that GoMo fluff is pretty damn rubbish.
This leads me on to Tribes, because the concepts are pretty interchangeable. Ork Tribes are the subject of multiple misconceptions, and this is often because people are looking for a structure and standardised pattern that simply isn’t there. In fact, it’s a rather wide misconception. I’ve heard many arguments about how Clans are used to enforce orthodoxy and discourage individuality. That is not the purpose of Clans at all.
If you want an example of this, just look at the fluff, artwork or pictures of miniatures that show Clan heraldry. In Space Marine forces, these are typically subject to orthodoxy: the same symbols, the same location, with a little individuality, but only to exemplify differing rank, caste or regiment. Orks, on the other hand will have personalised iconography, variations to exemplify particular “families” or “households” within a clan, placed in differing locations between individuals and so on. So long as a Clan member wears their respective colours and/or iconography, personalisation is completely permitted. Bearing in mind that Orks live in a “kustom” culture, Orks are probably the most individualistic faction in all of 40k!
So then, what’s the difference between a Clan and a Tribe? Well, a Clan is essentially an ideology. Orks united in war might not share the same basic ideology. However any gathering of Orks that fights together can be viewed as a Tribe. A Tribe is usually led by a Warboss, although a Tribe, or a collection of Tribes can be led by a Warlord, such as Ghazghkull or Nazdreg etc (although by that point you’re using the term WAAAGH! as a collective noun of Tribes, essentially). A Tribe can contain any amount of Clans. Some have argued recently that it doesn’t make sense for a Mono-Clan tribe, but such an argument is based on applying a general precedent to Orks that is ultimately not very accurate, because a general precedent will rarely work with Orks.
Orks may seek out other likeminded Orks who share the same clan ideal, or they may ultimately be more interested in finding a worthy skumgrod, or at least a target that yields enough booty and conquest. Some Tribes are Splinter-tribes from divisions brought on from infighting, changes in ideology, or simply death. At the end of a Waaagh, many Tribes will simply split up and go their separate ways. Parts of a Clan or Tribe might leave for whatever reason and go Freebooting instead (more on this in the next chapter).
There is an absolutely infinite amount of possibilities for Ork Tribe layouts, so to apply a singular concept to it actually undermines much of what makes Ork fluff so great.
A lot of what unites a Tribe has to do with the individuals and dominant castes or factions within an Ork society. The direction they take will invariably steer the likely progression of the whole tribe, potentially down to the biological level. Any particular Warlord or Warboss is likely to have prejudices and preferences towards particular aspects of Ork society, and the likelihood is that this will filter down to the whole tribe, potentially killing or exiling aspects that they don’t approve of.
Chance can also play a part, with disagreements happening down the line of a Tribe’s progression, new leaders taking over, the deaths or divisions of various aspects, etc. There could be new alliances; some Clans may fail, causing various disagreements etc. Two Clans might ally on a temporary basis, or a particularly wise Warboss may ultimately embrace the perks of all Clans to give his Tribe military flexibility. A recently exiled/dethroned Warboss may even take an exiled number of his Clan-based followers with him, and seek to make a new mono-clan tribe so that his authority is never questioned again, and so on.
Clans are usually quite deep-rooted and complicated things. They’ll have a view on the entirety of Ork “Kultur”, and not just part of it. We usually take only a mere segment, a stereotype of a particular Clan and make that representative of its entirety. There’s nothing to suggest that a mono-clan society is any different to a multi-clan society in its basic function. Just because there are no Evil Sunz doesn’t mean a Tribe wont have warbikes, trukkboyz or other vehicles, and they may even still be painted red. A Tribe without Bad Moonz may still have Flash Gitz or Meganobz, and so on.
It is certainly true that a Clan or Tribe may have more or less of particular Castes of Ork society. The term “Caste” isn’t quite as widespread as it used to be for Orks, but it essentially represents the various aspects and roles within Orkdom. The Oddboyz each embody a caste, so too do Nobz, Gretchin, Boyz, etc. These days you’d probably have a number of sub-castes that relate to various units that represent those castes (MANz and Flash Gitz for Nobz, for example). [There will be more about Castes in Chapter 9]
Clans in particular tend to favour or shun various castes, depending on their societal inclinations:
Goffs tend to have an awful lot of Nobz, Boyz and Stormboyz, but shun the likes of Runtherds (with their Gretchin and Snotlings) and Weirdboyz. They are not massive fans of vehicles, but they’ll have a few where necessary.
The Bad Moons again have a lot of Nobs (although more likely MANz and Flash Gitz) and Weirdboyz. They’ll also have a lot of Gretchin servants and attendants. Bad Moons aren’t quite as prejudiced as other Clans, but they err more towards “showy” and ostentatious representations of themselves, thus some things will be less common with Bad Moons simply because they are common.
Deffskullz have changed a fair bit, probably more than other Clans, but their most common castes are Boyz (Lootas here as well) and loads of Gretchin (who are the best looters in Ork society). With Oddboyz, they classically had an awful lot of Doks and Madboyz.
The Evil Sunz naturally favour speed, and thus all units associated with it, particularly biker and trukk boyz. They have more Meks than any other Clan.
The Snakebites are traditionalists, so favour Boarboyz, shun technology, and have many Runtherds, Snotlings and Gretchin mobs. They also have lots of Weirdboyz and Madboyz, but very little in the way of Stormboyz.
The Blood Axes have probably changed the most, but ultimately they favour militarised units, taking Stormboyz (and now Kommandos as well), and you could also justify human mercenaries and Ogryns. They also have lots of Nobz, but very few in the way of Weirdboyz and Runtherds. Between them, the Goffs and Blood Axes unofficially compete for Clan who least likes Gretchin.
This is mostly based on the old Waaargh! The Orks model, but it hasn’t really changed that much, really. The one that tends to be controversial is the large amount of Doks in Deffskullz. It is typically argued that it makes more sense to be Meks. But this is a pretty feeble argument really, because it assumes, again, a totality rather than a proportion.
Clans embody preferences and prejudices, but this does not mean there aren’t the hallmarks of a regular Ork society underneath it. Deffskulls will still have a normal amount of Meks for an Ork society. This is the key, ultimately. Ork society usually functions by having all castes available in some way; there is nothing to say that Clans wont have their own similar representations, it’s more that they’ll err towards particular solutions, but they are still an Ork society first.
Let’s take Deffskulls and Meks, for instance. To assume Deffskulls have a lot of Doks suggests they have more than a typical Ork society would have. But Ork societies typically have a representative need of most societal castes. Any Ork Tribe is going to have a lot of Meks, and the bigger it is, the more Meks they’ll have. It just means that Evil Sunz have an abnormal amount.
All castes will be somewhat representative in scale. Ork Society in any form wouldn’t get far without certain services and subtypes, and it is likely that all Clans have evolved to provide their own solutions in the absence of other Clans that usually fill those roles. It’s an easier case to make with the Big Six, as splinter clans usually form up out of isolation, and that generally makes for very unpredictable results.
Ultimately, the best thing to take away from Ork Society, Clans, Castes and Tribes is that Orks can be massively individualistic. No Ork society will ever be the same, and that means that orthodoxy is ultimately a pointless endeavour for those who truly understand Ork fluff. Hell, even the general gist of what Clans are is fairly subject to change. If you want your Deffskulls to have more Meks, you’ve just got a Deffskull clan out there that has needed more Meks for some reason, and their own society has served them up.
Orks are very flexible, and so should your view of them be.
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