So Justin LaNasa (LaNasa) has released Orcz: Those Pesky Orcz. also titled as Those Pesky Orcs, full title: Those Pesky Orcs: A Game About Vile, Corrupt, Aberrant Creatures By Justin LaNasa¹ (Those Pesky Orcz) and… it’s not very good. In fact, in the time that has passed since its release and my writing this, it has been confirmed it is not just bad, but it is a wrong thing that should not exist.

The evidence of this is that on 19 June 2024, the official Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) channel on YouTube released a 41+ minute video² that briefly features a depiction of orcs as like, a happy people with mixed personalities, and roles, and the old school gamers community collectively shat themselves in disbelief.³

A screenshot of Wonderfilled reposting an X post by "Drunkards and Dragons" (@The_DrunkDragon) 21 June
"It's time to start the trend #DnDIsDead after seeing the new players handbook artwork for Orcs." — Yes, Stephen Erin Dinehart IV also tried to jump on this bandwagon.

There was a torrent of raging Twitter posts (X was called Twitter back then), YouTube videos and all the rest about how this could not be – if orcs were not cartoonishly and ontologically evil, it was not D&D.

But literally nobody pointed to Those Pesky Orcs as an alternative, as a product that supplied a better and more correct explanation. That’s how bad it is.

Now it was taken off the market but it seems that it’s now in this weird situation where 3rd party retailers will sell and also if I try to buy it through Amazon Australia they will try to offer me a Print On Demand copy from the USA.

The product claims to be family-friendly, but I feel the need to provide content warnings for the following things that I personally would not expect in a regular tabletop role-playing game (TTRPG): piss-play (consensual and non-consensual), sexual assault, ritual murder, rape, slavery, and human trafficking.

Oh yeah. Welcome to the final release of the nuTSR saga.

I. THE PRODUCT

It’s a combination of reused garbage and new garbage. The core rules are almost entirely copy-pasted from Goblinz: Those Pesky Goblinz. A role-playing game by Justin LaNasa⁴ (Those Pesky Goblinz) – with a few changes such as orcz have a default of 3d6 stats just like humans, and have slightly different random tables, and different names of classes… but otherwise it’s the same game with copy-paste, and a lot of the rules are still nonsense.

From the introduction, you get a clear idea of the quality of writing you’ll be in for. The first paragraph is 11 sentences long, and 5 of them begin with the word “Orcz”, 3 with “They” and 1 with “Some orcz”. It reads entirely like you asked someone to just dump a bunch of ideas on orcs (including rules), rather than asked them to explain what an orc is. ⬆️

A. Comparisons To Those Pesky Goblinz

It is, in fact, such a copy-paste job that when unofficial nuTSR shill The Evil Dungeon Master did a video to promote it, the PDF copy he had was supplied was clearly unfinished as some of the content still clearly said “Those Pesky Goblinz“.⁵

A screenshot of Vincent Florio's video, at 34 minutes in, of the video for Those Pesky Orcz they are looking a character sheet that is clearly labelled "Goblinz" with the Those Pesky Goblinz artwork. — Highlight on the character sheet is mine.

“Bred by an ogre” had been replaced with “bred by a lesser demon” with different overpowered benefits. Inherent talent for occupations are no longer linked to skin colour. There’s new backgrounds, which seem to indicate tattooists are an orc thing. I wonder if this is because LaNasa owns a tattoo shop.

Like Those Pesky Goblinz it is not a playable game, rather a vague gesture to the idea of a TTRPG with an expectation of praise for having scribbled nonsense.

Some of this recycling becomes profoundly weird, as the continued vandalism of Mike Carr’s In Search of the Unknown⁶ by including the same Magic Pool spell as the goblins… which is both another repeat of non-consensual piss play. Not only is this definitely not a great surprise element in a game supposedly for the whole family, but it just really shows what LaNasa’s respect for the early creators of D&D looks like.

The magic section indicates the Orc Chieftain is a dual class magic user/rogue type.⁷ This kind of worked as, maybe a joke reference to Jareth in Labyrinth (1986) (which sadly seems to have been confirmed during the leaked material in the TSR Bankruptcy)⁸ and was consistent with the ways of goblins, but orcs are supposed to be prone to attacking everyone on site and both of those are lower on the hierarchy than priests or “lords”.⁹⬆️

B. Leftover Problems

Even the final versions of Those Pesky Goblinz had some pretty hilarious mistakes. Most of them seem to have made it into the 1st 1st Edition of Those Pesky Orcz.

The stats information page has glaring errors remain (the Intelligence chart starts at 8 ¹⁰ despite the book depicting orcs as a society consisting entirely of comically unintelligent individuals consistently through the book). It was particularly ridiculous Those Pesky Goblinz because 95% would roll 3d4 but the fact that it made it into Those Pesky Orcz shows that they never noticed.

Naturally the tables are also completely inadequate (again) as you can end up with a +2 to all ability scores but there’s no entries for 20 in any table.¹¹ Similarly, the level caps are wildly inconsistent and there’s a magic item that can let you have an extra 10 levels… somehow.¹²

The random ~~monster~~encounter table now has instructions how to roll a d30 – but they’re mashed into into the margins, it’s the only time this approach is used, and it adds nothing and further showcases their innumeracy.¹³ Also, yes, it appears their understanding of “encounters” is “killing things”.

A pretty standard element of broad spectrum random encounter/wandering monster tables was they were tilted so some outcomes were rare and others become common. It’s extremely simply – if you use 2d6 you’ll get 11 slots, and #1 & #12 will be the rarest while (less than 3% of the time), #7 will occur about 16% of the time. This just has an equal 1 in 30 chance of a Bandit, Human Fighter, Goblin, or a Wererat (which requires silver or magic to harm – if the party doesn’t have those… I guess the campaign ends there).¹⁴

And in case you’re wondering, no, it does not specify the species of the bandit or berzerker but does for the other professions for unclear reasons. Also “orc” is on there but without a class/profession/whatever and the notes are “Tribal, hostile”.¹⁵

There’s also plenty of nonsensical references to material that isn’t in the book, and binds it to it’s D&D roots. It’s not a real product, it’s nota real supplement – it’s just the weird notes your standard 14-year old edgelord shows you when he (it’s always guys, it seems) brags he’s invented his own TTRPG. ⬆️

C. Worst License Ever

Among quite a few people who are law educated, Creative Comrades¹⁶ is often cited as the worst open license available since it:

Doesn’t really tell you what you can or can’t do with the material; and
Applies unworkable limitations (where is the line for “big business” and “discrimination”?)

The 2nd/3rd/4th/who-knows 1st Edition of Those Pesky Orcz includes what may be the worst promise of an open license at it, does the above but also:

Cites the Creative Commons project but doesn’t clarify which of their many licenses; and
Requires you to send a copy to the “copyright holder” without having any way for you to know who that is at any given point; and
Can be severed at any time (so not a Creative Commons license)¹⁷ if it is deemed to be damaging, inappropriate or fitting the brand – with no exit plan (like does the copyright holder return the copy they received?)
Doesn’t include any contingencies or information about these conditions – like whether the sample sent to the copyright holder is attached to the copyright, and so much be transferred to a new copyright holder upon sale, succession or other change of ownership.

Protip: Those Pesky Orcz, is a creative work – so can’t grant anything, the copyright holder has to do that.

Keep in mind, when this was released we’d already had the OGL debacle, ORC was already out and Justin had spent six figures on lawyers over the other nuTSR nonsense. Also, at time of writing, this post is still up:¹⁸

A screenshot of Facebook post by Dungeon Hobby Shop, 14 January 2023, "(Attention all Publishers) It isn't truly an open game License if you have to acknowledge the owner's illegal claims of owning a game system."

Now, to be fair, there is no good solution to open licensing and brand protection – the only way to make sure that everyone licensed to publish your material follows your expectations is to set up individual licenses and watch them very, very carefully.

The important thing is to know that this license granted to the public is inside the sample on Amazon but not in my printed copy – so this was also the worst possible distribution and just such a great illustration of the “make an irrevocable decision for clout now, worry about the consequences later” approach of nuTSR. ⬆️

II. THE ORCZ

Orcs, as we understand them, are a relatively new concept – first being solidified in The Hobbit. The term had floated around and been connected to goblins and malicious supernatural beings in general – but Tolkien was the first establish them as a fantasy race who are an adversary to good.

Oddly, despite LaNasa favouring the username “Morgoth” on Discord, and most origins of Tolkien’s orcs pointing back to Dark Lord Morgoth – there’s nothing about that there and they seem to take inspiration entirely more contemporary sources.

Perhaps a certain quote was too on the nose for the authors…

“The Shadow that bred them can only mock, it cannot make: not real things of its own. I don’t think it gave life to the orcs, it only ruined them and twisted them.”
Frodo Baggins in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Is this an awkward time to point out that Justin likes wearing “Neutral Evil” t-shirts?¹⁹ ⬆️

So much concentrated cringe in this confession.

A. What is an Orc?

According to the book orcz are a fierce warrior society that attacks many things on sight, have shamans that befriend the undead, create kobolds from thin air, create trolls, interbreed with anything but elves – including trolls and demons.

The summary on Google Books was basically a copy and paste from the AD&D Monster Manual – but with added, surprising racism (given lots of people would describe LaNasa as brown, and as you can see above – he likes wearing black).²⁰ Also, obviously, the writing went down in quality dramatically.

AD&D Monster Manual (page 76)	Those Pesky Orcz (Google Books)
Orcs appear particularly disgusting because their coloration — brown or brownish green with a bluish sheen — highlights their pinkish snouts and ears. Their bristly hair is dark brown or black, sometimes with tan patches. Even their armor tends to be unattractive — dirty and often a bit rusty. Orcs favour unpleasant colors in general. Their garments are in tribal colors, as are shield devices and trim. Typical colors are blood red, rust red, mustard yellow, yellow green, moss green, greenish purple, and blacklish brown. They live for 40 years.	Orcz appears in many different shapes and sizes but are quite disgusting because of the brown to blackish or brownish green with a slimy blue sheen skin tone, which highlights their pinkish snout and ears. They have bristly wiry hair ranging from black to dark brown, sometimes with patches of other colors. Even their armor favors unpleasant colors like brown, black, and any subdued colors. Their garments are always in tribal colors, as are their shields and trim.

AD&D Monster Manual (page 76)

Those Pesky Orcz (Google Books)

Orcs appear particularly disgusting because their coloration — brown or brownish green with a bluish sheen — highlights their pinkish snouts and ears. Their bristly hair is dark brown or black, sometimes with tan patches. Even their armor tends to be unattractive — dirty and often a bit rusty. Orcs favour unpleasant colors in general. Their garments are in tribal colors, as are shield devices and trim. Typical colors are blood red, rust red, mustard yellow, yellow green, moss green, greenish purple, and blacklish brown. They live for 40 years.

Orcz appears in many different shapes and sizes but are quite disgusting because of the brown to blackish or brownish green with a slimy blue sheen skin tone, which highlights their pinkish snout and ears. They have bristly wiry hair ranging from black to dark brown, sometimes with patches of other colors. Even their armor favors unpleasant colors like brown, black, and any subdued colors. Their garments are always in tribal colors, as are their shields and trim.

Basically imagine what an anti-social fourteen year old boy who jerks it to shock clip compositions of sex and violence in Goblin Slayer and Berserk (any adaptation) but finds the original source material too talky and too challenging with it’s discussions about morality, trauma and what makes a monster.

The orcz on the cover are clearly inspired by Gygax era of D&D, but coloured by someone who didn’t read the actual description – but the ones inside are written more like the Orks from Games Workshop’s Warhammer 40,000 – but horny instead of being a fungus. (If you don’t get that either don’t worry about it or get ready for a rabbit hole).²¹

They’re brutish, “will breed with anything”,²² operate in a strict hierarchy, are prone to violence and are “lawful evil” by default with no option to be “good”. (Though alignment is never explained so… 🤷🏻‍♂️)

They are certainly not the orcs of original D&D, and it the ignorance of the authors is once again reconfirmed as this ridiculous work makes a species that is incompatible with Gary Gygax’s stories of Quij, the orc who was spared by the will of the dice, became a henchman and then a hero (kind of ).²³

It really lays bare who the Dungeon Hobby Shop Museum was always intended as a grift and despite having access to people and artifacts of the day, LaNasa knew less than a curious fan with Internet access. ⬆️

B. Omissions

Perhaps the most telling thing about Those Pesky Orcz is what isn’t in the book. I present a non-exhaustive list of questions you won’t find answers for in the book:

What happens when you reach zero hit points (Death? Unconsciousness? Bleeding out ala Advanced Dungeons & Dragons(AD&D)?)
How to run a round of combat?
No seriously, how do I roll initiative? Work out where people are? Decide on range and the spell effects?
How long do powers like Befriend Undead work for?
How much food and/drink do you need? What happens if you don’t get it?
Can you heal without magic? If not, what are the effects of rest/lack-of-rest?
What are the rules of orc society? What are the consequences of breaking them?
What are the rules and consequences of alignment? What is required for an orc to become “good” ?
How does an orc move up the hierarchy specified in the front of the book?
Where do orcs come from? Or where do they believe they come from?

Essentially there’s no actual core rules, no substantial lore and what is in the book is incomplete and unworkable. It also doesn’t include any kind of guidance for how to handle things that aren’t covered in the rules, are show any awareness to its referencing rules that it never explains.

Taken in context with Those Pesky Goblinz, it doesn’t read like a book about particular group of any sort. Rather it reads likes scribbling over photocopies of a failed attempt, and then putting it out with the hope that because nobody bought the first product, nobody will notice its a bad copy of a bad product.

Now, being extremely derivative of D&D and being a variant of a bad product does not inherently make it a bad product. It is, however a substantial issue that Those Pesky Orcz seems to be unclear which version of D&D it’s emulating, and the author(s) are seemingly incapable of introspection.

People fail on their first attempt all the time, and lots of the TTRPG market is variants on D&D. But Justin has opted not to revise and explore the concept beyond the musings of so many angsty teenagers, but rather just congratulate himself with “Yeah! I said it! I bet nobody else has! Only I am so bold and so genius!” ⬆️

C. Making An Orc

Much like GiantLands and many other “OSR” products, the character creation essentially eliminates all player agency.²⁴ You may as well have a ~~Perl~~Python script that generates the characters for you, complete with an animation of pulling the lever on a slot machine with dinky flashing lights and a shitty tune.

Sure you can arrange your rolls, which many people would argue is anti-OSR, but its rather meaningless when your randomly assigned “Traitz” and “Backgroundz” will likely make the choice of class for you.

It has this weird convention where you read the classes, and some of them tell you that you’ll need particular

One noteworthy factor is that it is designed specifically to be unbalanced and facilitate the suspicious “I rolled this at home” characters. If you roll a 1 on Traitz, you get to re-roll to get 2 Traitz… and this can stack infinitely.²⁵

During the now taken down “playtest” of Those Pesky Goblinz, LaNasa specified that people could just re-roll characters with bad stats – referring to them as “abortion” characters. So this unfair randomness is not consistent, and thus seems to exist purely so people who abuse their status in the group can show up with suspiciously luckily rolled characters.

But where it gets really weird, is looking at the stats. They don’t line up with AD&D, or Basic D&D. Some are simply non-sense they invented themselves, but the rest: these are simplified version of 2nd Edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons(2nd Edition) stats.²⁶ This is: very funny.

LaNasa and his like will rant until they’re red in the face about how sacred Gary Gygax and his intentions were – assigning the mortal man divine significance, but almost invariably it turns out the version of D&D that they most like to play is the one that was released by Lorraine Williams (who they portray as an evil, non-gamer usurper). They claim to be pure crusaders of refined taste, but they’re basic bitches with no sense of integrity or capacity for self-reflection.

LaNasa has tried to conceal this in a few ways – not all columns are present, some integers have been converted to percentages, etc, but the patterns are obvious.

In that spirit, there is also the hilarity that the character sheet at the back has a space for “Breed” which is never elaborated on in the rules. Thanks to the singular promo video done by collaborator Vincent Florio, we know the character sheet was one of the last things they made so this is a very, very funny error.²⁷ ⬆️

D. Orc Magic

So, the majority of Orc magic is copy-paste of Goblin magic, which is to say that most of it is remarkably similar to spells in the original AD&D²⁸. I’ve included samples for the first few examples in this non-exhaustive list, but no more since I don’t want to be DMCA’d by Wizards of the Coast… but you can probably guess how the others go.

Those Pesky Orcs	1st Edition AD&D
Sense Magic (at 19) “When the sense magic spell is cast, the conjurer detects magical radiations in a path 1″ wide, and up to 3″ long, in the direction, he or she is facing. The caster can turn 60º per round.”	Detect Magic (at 44) “When the detect magic spell is cast the cleric detects magical radiations in a path 1″ wide, and up to 3″ long, in the direct the caster is facing he or she is facing. The caster can turn 60º per round.” (then the limitations follow)
Cloud of Sleep (at 19) “When a Conjurer casts a Cloud of Sleep spell, it will usually affect every creature in the area (other than undead and particular other creatures specifically excluded from the spell’s effect).” (technical specifics follow)	Sleep (at 68) “When a magic-user casts a sleep spell, he or she will usually cause a comatose slumber to come upon one or more creatures (other than undead and certain other creatures specifically excluded (see ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS, MONSTER MANUAL).” (technical specifics follow)
Open (at 21) “The open spell will open stuck, held, or magic locked doors. It will also open barred or otherwise locked doors. It causes secret doors to open. The open spell will also open locked or trick-opening boxes or chests. It will loosen shackles or chains as well. If it is used to open a magic locked door…”	Knock (at 70) “The knock spell will open stuck, held or magic locked doors. It will also open barred or otherwise locked doors. It causes secret doors to open. The knock spell will also open locked or trick-opening boxes or chests. It will loosen shackles or chains as well. If it is used to open a wizard-locked door…”
Sense Invisibility (at 21)	Detect Invisibility (at 69)
Negate Magic (at 22)	Dispel Magic (at 57)
Fog of Death (at 24)	Cloudkill (at 79)
Cure Damaged Monster (at 27)	Cure Light Wounds (at 43)
Cure Disease (at 30)	Cure Disease (at 46 – 47)
Animate Monster (at 31)	Animate Dead (at 46)
Cure Wounded Monster (at 31)	Cure Serious Wounds (at 48)

This is particularly awkward since Orcz is supposed to be “1st Edition Compatible” and you can buy a PDF of the Player’s Handbook on DriveThruRPG for half the cost of Those Pesky Orcz

This is hilarious since, while calling this a supplement, Justin appears to have randomly repeated random content from the source material. A file has been waved in the general direction of the serial numbers, but they’re fully visible.

Ultimately it means a large part of the book is completely redundant in a self evident way, its just padding that is presumably there to avoid having to do any actual work.

The other spells included in it seem to be poorly defined, and open for abuse – 1st level Conjurer spell Create Kobold creates a permanent loyal companion kobold, who has has abilities “+3 all saves Ambush, Traps”²⁹ so if cast every day two weeks before a confrontation means he can arrive with 14 minions of about half ability to a regular orc each. These minions are apparently good at ambushes, and can set traps for the orc’s enemies.

Ork War Banner essentially creates a temporary magic item that gives every orc within 100 feet: +1 bonuses to saves, attacks, damage, immunity to morale checks (no rules for those provided) and it lasts for 20 minutes per level of the caster. A spell of similar level makes the target immune to normal weapons.³⁰ So so any tribe with a level 8 or greater Priest can basically buff their entire army (including the secondary armies of kobolds) and be led by an invincible war chief. Seems unbalanced to me.

Much like Those Pesky Goblinz it specifies that the priests have to make sacrifices to unspecified dark gods but provides no consequences for failure, no clarification on volume or rewards for more etc. Casting times include “segments” which are not explained unless you assume it’s AD&D and if you are, the immediate observation is that it makes orcs the most powerful spell casters. ⬆️

E. Orc Magic Items

The magic items are also bad in the same kind of boring way, with the same kind of ineptitude – lazy slop hammered out by someone who is not really that experienced with the game and not very creative.

To give you an idea of just how lacking in creativity they were, one of the items is a dagger which was – thanks to the posting history on the Dungeon Hobby Shop Facebook page – a lazy tracing of a novelty toy carved from the Aletai meteorite, and mechanics crowd sourced in comments.³¹

A screenshot of a Facebook post by Dungeon Hobby Shop, 8 January 2024:
"Magic Dagger made from a meteorite
What could its properties be GO !"
Beneath is a photo of a novelty letter opener made from meteorite metal.

A screenshot of a Facebook post by Dungeon Hobby Shop, 26 January 2024:
"Sneak peak at a fan built dagger for Those Pesky Orcz
Meteoric dagger +1 Magical
(MSchultz Dagger)
When thrown it transforms into a meteor doing damage and effects as per the spell This ability can only be used once and the dagger is consumed."
Below is a basic line drawing, traced from the photo, with "Meteoric dagger +1 Magical".

And, that’s actually the most developed item, it’s the only one which has a more than compressed summary (and 1 of 5 where the summary is more than 1 line). The vast majority and simply repurposed A&D items listed in the tables with single line and there distinctive items that are available. The unique items are basically homebrew nonsense that provide no insights or flavour.³²

1. Asanal’s Magic Ring

A one time item that works the first time you have to save vs magic or a curse, automatic success and it’s named after LaNasa (his surname spelled backwards). ³³

2. Rod of the Orc Elder

This one stresses it was forged by the god (which, why, or how… not covered) and allows you to go to level 20 (no rules for that) and 90% magic resistence etc… but is presented in a random magic item table. So, rather than being reserved for a high level quest, it’s just a thing you can find if you are lucky. ³⁴

Incidentally this random mechanic in TTRPGs is popular with people who like to bring their own character who “just happened” to roll the best possible combination of stats, traits and magic items possible.

3. Asanal’s Mystical Key

Basically a magic key that unlocks any door and is named after LaNasa.³⁵

4. Armor of Tensor the Mad

This is a one line summary item which is a reference to Ernie Gygax, and is a red loin cloth that provides the same protection as plate mail armour. ³⁶ This does not match any depiction of Ernie’s actual character, Tenser, that I can find anywhere. Maybe it matches Ernie’s idea, or maybe LaNasa just assumed that one scene in a novel published in … was a better source.

5. Golden Chainmail of Holding
This is by far the funniest one, as it’s a suit of golden armour that functions like elven chain (no rules for that within the book, you’ll have to look elsewhere) and comes with a complimentary Bag of Holding. So it’s actually two magic items in one. ³⁷

None of this is vaguely useful for building a world, or establishing where orcs fit in that world – its just masturbatory nonsense. ⬆️

III. THE MODULE

It’s a pile of orc feces.

It’s a baffling demonstration of how AI writing tools via Large Language Models (LLMs) can take a bad writer like proud Nazi, Dave Johnson and turn them into a vendor of terrible gibberish.³⁸ While it’s not clear how much of the blame likes with Dave, and how much lies with the true author (some burned out graphics card) – what’s clear is there’s no coherent goal of the project.

These are not the subtle mistakes either, like the LLM repeating the same phrase oddly, or using strange references etc. These are blatantly obvious ones that cannot possibly be either the work of a human author, or have passed with the most basic quality check.

Nobody could look at this and think it was suitable for release, not even the person who punched in the prompt into the system. This goes double when you find the filler information that includes numerous instances of referring to “Page 00”. It therefore stands to reason, that not even Dave Johnson read the output.

But just to be clear, Dave had been doing this for a while and LaNasa had told people it was great… like publicly.³⁹ ⬆️

A. What’s Not In The Module

What you notice pretty immediately about the module is what’s not in it – it’s striking at even the slightest examination. Modules have been in production for about fifty years now – so the formats and formulas are pretty well established.

1. Guidance for party levels, structure, or general theme/tone

Seriously, there is nothing. Ordinarily I would assume an introduction module would be for 1st level and have a clear goal. Those Pesky Goblinz was incredibly lazy with it’s module but at least that gave you the task of finding the sexy stein that detects orcs and specifically female orcs.

The "Tonight's Episode: The Writer's Barely-Disguised Fetish"/Police Squad meme image. — This is the only viable explanation for why it identifies female orcs. Source.

It also made it clear what your goal was, you were going to raid a village because you’re goblins and you wanted the stein – plus it had a map which kind of made it clear where you’d start, where you’d go.

To be clear, it goes to shit immediately after that with the locations not being written with the plot in mind and the goal being in one of the first buildings you’re likely to enter – but it at least had a vaguely competent “start”.

This module starts with a story about a NPC orc talking to another NPC, then tells you that you start in a random room in the dungeon – rather than at the clearly signalled entrance. It is not explained why you’re there, how you got there, etc. You’re just there, and the end conditions are contradictory to this beginning.

2. Reasonable summaries for plot specific characters

At no point, in this module – does provide any information about any plot specific characters except for 1 orc chieftain who appears in one room and basically seems to be there as a bad joke (more on that later).

Multiple NPCs are introduced before the first room, most of them are forgotten but the main one Iris the female Orc Ranger. Her existence seems to go against literally everything else in the module and there is no background on her, no way to understand it.

The Fire Witch seems to appear in multiple rooms – doesn’t really have anything going on other than she lives alone, but with her own cult, and in this world but also in Hell.

Now – you may be thinking that’s fine, but this module makes it explicitly not fine by having an entry which specifies in bold text that 2 NPCs are “pre-generated characters”.⁴⁰

Gentle reader, they are not. They are nothing more than names with vague descriptions that create a burden upon whoever is running the adventure to do all the work the module writer was supposed to do.

I cannot stress enough: All named characters are developed to an extent where it is actually more work and more difficult than if you just invented someone for yourself on the fly. It achieves the opposite of the goal. ⬆️

B. What IS In The Module

Okay, so this module makes up about half the book, 45 pages, so it’s got to have something in it right? Well, aside from grid maps of rooms that you are not likely to visit or do anything that requires knowing the layout of room. Seriously, there’s a whole bunch of maps of cramped bedrooms.

1. AI generated nonsense

Huge amounts of the text and images are clearly generated via a LLM – though they aren’t honest enough to confirm which ones. Dave Johnson does really want to create or care about what he’s supposed to be creating – he just wants clout.

One of the funniest parts about this is Dave spent so little effort on editing and refining the prompts that some entries have utter nonsense and scenes where the LLM clearly got confused and thought it was writing background/short stories instead of a TTRPG encounter.

The second most obvious was this encounter where the players are expected to provide an answers to 3 “questions”:⁴¹

“First question: What does power without wisdom yield?”

GM NOTE: Tell the answers are limited to one word and that the whole room is now a magic mouth with a 60′ range.

At this point, the players might know what they’re doing, but they must ask questions. If they do, tell them that “and” is considered conjunction and “or” is a synonym for “either or”.

“Power” is a noun, and “without” is a preposition, but both words do not give a correct answer and should not be chosen. (for example, power or without)

“Wisdom” could possibly go with “power,” but it wouldn’t make sense in the context of the sentence. When the question is asked, there is no power that the players have, so wisdom is the only logical choice.

So the answer is “wisdom”.

“Correct!”

That wall of text is the whole encounter – the other 2 questions do not exist and there are not details on what you would would get as a reward.

The funniest is the obligatory “AI writer” section where it appears Dave included the prompt (complete with his spelling “tailor” as “Taylor”). It follows the section where the text reads “Stats for the gnolls go here”.⁴²

Later in the module, a gnoll issues a challenge of 3 riddles, with the first being a philosophical question “what is life?” and after they muse on the idea that love is life – the module specifically instructs that an Gnoll NPC should step forward, give the correct answer (a non-sensical fantasy word) and collect the prize. ⁴³

I guess Dave figured if he couldn’t be bothered to write any of the module, nobody would want to bother playing it.

2. The spectre of a plot

Randomly in rooms there are entries that indicate some sort of plot element was supplied to the prompt – but that it lost in the LLM’s inability to comprehend the task at hand. Free LLMs are notoriously bad at remembering things, or understanding complex instructions, and paying for the service is no guarantee of improvement.

Thus every now and again you will find an entry to depicts a named NPC, features a dialog exchange, etc. None of them tie together – there is no arc that can be determined and no ability to establish what the motivations or inner workings of the NPCs are supposed to be.

Like, there are elements that are repeated but also always with an entirely different approach to it – to the extent that you can understand there is definitely supposed to be hero-villain plots going… but it is never clear who the heroes or the villains are.

This is infuriating because every now and again I would catch myself second-guessing if I had missed something – that there might be some sort of theme or plot (and hence, more horrible shit) but it turns out that no – it’s just it being written by the LLM as though there is.

Honestly I’m not sure if this is Dave’s incompetence, or if its just that LLM are always prone to this due to the training data. My best guess is that these are part of the “surface level fluency” that In The Thorns explained exceptionally well.⁴⁴

3. Worst map ever

I want to stress here – you have to work hard to create a notably bad map in the TTRPG scene. Cartography is difficult at the best of times, and there’s a reason that architect is a prestigious profession. Arranging things is hard.

Dave Johnson didn’t bother trying, he just got the generative AI to make a map, then put numbers on it in a random assortment – make no effort to track where the the locations are when generating the text, or to each other.

Part of this is the inherent laziness of Dave Johnson and LaNasa, in that they will not bother to read their own work once – let along experiment with drafts and ideas, then revise, revise, revise until they have purified it. They just see filling the pages with text as an accomplishment they should be rewarded for.

The other is that the LLM is incapable of actually understanding, or remembering the map, or telling its operator it doesn’t understand. It will happily vomit out garbage and flattery in equal measures, for as long as the operator is eager to consume both.

Yet, this is worse than the usual garbage you would expect given that there are overlapping entries (room 1 is not connected to room 1a), multiple rooms declared as the “entrance” and while the map makes it clear this is an underground labyrinth – the room descriptions include cheery inns and villages.

It seems that Dave Johnson is, almost, the target demographic of those charlatans who tell you they’re going to teach you how to write with AI – only unsuitable since he lacks the funds and willingness to pay for their advice. Even if he did, he would probably be too lazy to remember to include in his prompts (“this is in a fantasy underground complex”).

No seriously, as an example: Room 21 claims it is a “Goblinz Area” in the title, and “Starting Location”, then immediately goes on to elaborate it’s an Orcz village. So literally the first thing you’ll find if you follow the instructions (are are not mislead by the “ENTRANCE” section) will be mislabelled and confusing due to retroactive changes in the same entry.⁴⁵

4. Slavery of women as a norm

Now reading this, you’re probably thinking “well that checks out for orcs” but the problem here is… it’s not put as a real orc thing. The first orcs you can meet who own slaves are named Henry Oliver Waddel and Benjamin Dover. They are business partners who operate the Broken Wind Tavern, and literally nothing in the multi-page entry focuses on orcs – though there is a bit that Henry is a sociopath for selling others into slavery (not women).⁴⁶

The nightly visitors of the tavern can include a druid of the” “forrest” (quotes mine so you know it’s not my typo), a dandy, a tart, wizard, a nobleman, a rake and a doxy… all of these things seem antithetical to the orc society we have been introduced to. Even the explanation for the slaves doesn’t fit:⁴⁷

This is the room where Henry O. Wendell’s female slaves and their five daughters live. he bought them from northern slave traders (indentured servants) with the money he made from his gambling business. Every so often, Henry would get rid of the oldest woman and buy a new one from this source. Benjamin was the only one who knew that they were slaves and was forbidden to speak to anyone outside the tavern.

This is basically the only civilized area you can spend time in, with no real options to investigate, challenge, etc. It just seems to be in there because they were really determined to elaborate on nameless young women being slaves because they like the idea of living in that kind of society.

Like, that’s the whole fantasy to them – be rude in a civilized society, own women. That’s where their interest in orcs begins and ends.

A screenshot from the article, showing particular orc from the Lord of the Rings movies by Peter Jackson, with the caption "Wood said Peter Jackson made the decision to model an orc on Weinstein after having difficulties with him on the way to making the Lord of the Rings films. Photograph: Landmark Media/Alamy" — This seems… too on the nose right now.⁴⁸

5. The most bizarre win condition

So the module introduces a mix of stories and goals – which would be fine if they actually played out. But as covered above, they do not.

There the introduction story about the quest of Iris the Ranger (who is an orc, despite there being no rules for orc rangers) given to her by a different witch that involves removing the Fire Witch (and everyone else).⁴⁹ There is a bit about how you have to kill all human invaders (there are zero encounters with them).⁵⁰ There is a bit where there is a surprise attack against the orc chief (where Iris is present, but it has nothing to do with her quest).⁵¹

Then, in the description for a tiny side room, Room 52, it states that there is a portal there and if the party has completed the quest given to them by the Fire Witch – the adventure ends.⁵²

There is no scenario in which you get a quest from the Fire Witch – who seems to only be creepily obsessed with a dead guy named Gary (read into that what you will).⁵³

And no, there is no interactions between Iris and the Fire Witch – nor are there any clarifications on how to window down after the module “ends”, where the party might go next, etc. If you could finish the module, it would be immensely unsatisfying.

Alternatively, the “win condition” is for the party to first find out that this portal room expects them to complete a task for the Fire Witch, then find a way to convince the Fire Witch to give them a task. Then invent what happens afterwards? ⬆️

C. Other Shenanigans

The credits of the product claim it was edited by Jeff “Duck” Leason, I and many others find this spectacularly unlikely. While Justin may have requested input, or reviews of specific bits and ideas – there is no way Duck would have let many of the errors slide in isolation, let alone so many together.

There is also strange mention of Green Ronin as a potential encounter that you can’t really encounter – because it’s a rumour in the tavern and while there are some stats, there’s no ability to actually do anything about it.⁵⁴

As mentioned, the module is clearly written almost entirely by an unknown LLM with prompts provided by Dave Johnson. Dave isn’t credited in the front of the book, so I guess we can take that as their confession they know he’s a piece of shit and they shouldn’t be dealing with him. ⬆️

1. We have Warlock of Firetop Mountain at home

For those not familiar, Warlock of Firetop Mountain was the first book in the Fighting Fantasy series⁵⁵ – one of the most definitive and successful type of choose-your-own-adventure books. It is definitive enough that despite the original being printed in 1982, it was adapted into a video game in 2016.⁵⁶

The plot of the book hinges on the idea there is a warlock, who commands a dungeon called Firetop Mountain and that you, a lone adventurer, are going up there to end the warlock. This module starts by introducing a Fire Witch, and has a chaotic dungeon map so you don’t have sequential paragraphs but due to relying on LLM to do the actual work. There is nothing that really makes it fit.

It’s kind of amazing how badly executed this was, the introduction implies the story is going to be about a female orc going on a quest related to the Fire Witch, then she is just mentioned in random parts of the book. I want to go into a theory that this was originally going to be a knock-off, single player adventure – hence the terribly laid out map – but it’s too incomprehensible to give them credit for that.

To be honest, I am kind of glad that its been executed too incompetently since given Dave Johnson’s history of espionage writing (mercifully obliterated with the closure of Kindle Vella) knows that the man would not be capable of writing a heroine vs villainess story without creating the kind of girl-on-girl scenes that classify as a hate crime against actual women-loving-women.

Perhaps the best indicator of this, is that aside from the names and concepts I can’t find any indicators that Dave actually read Warlock of Firetop mountain – which would fit with his later admitting he never played Star Frontiers, and his brief hilarious era on Substack where he wanted to advertise himself as a fan of public domain knock-offs of the world of Robert E. Howard.

Actually now I think about it… I assume Dave Johnson just saw the Steam banner.

The Steam banner for "The Warlock of Firetop Mountain" which has, for some reason, a femme presenting person in fantasy wizardy attire the middle. — Tin Man Games, I’m sorry, Dave Johnson may or may not have cranked it to this.

2.Chief Tluarrev (aka Tom Verrault of Tabletop Tap Room)

The introduction to the module includes this deeply bizarre story about a work war chief who loses an eye, and a hand, and in each case expecting his tribe to sacrifice their own body parts to honour him.⁵⁷ The chief’s name is the surname of Tom from Tabletop Tap Room,⁵⁸ in reverse – a traditional way in TTRPGs of signally the character is an analog for or heavily inspired for.

Of course, again because of LLM, the work is incoherent but serves a purpose. In this case, it shows that Tabletop Tap Room with its regular video updates (now unlinked) on nuTSR really, really got under the skin of Justin and Dave.

Taken in conjunction with the weird cards in Dungeon Crawl,⁵⁹ AI generated novels that Dave generated, about Lord George the Younger, and Sir Justin of Wilmington, paint pictures of true profoundly pathetic men who are unable to accept being disliked, and enact their revenge through profoundly lazy attempts to insult people who are happier than them.

Truly a staggering example of creative impotence combined with incompetence.

And that’s before your consider the heading of this section is “Forward”, yes, not “Foreword” but “Forward”.⁶⁰

3. Adamantite Games… and other dog whistles.

There was never any legal entity created for Adamantite Games, or at least not one publicly confirmable – so it was either a trade name for Justin or a partnership with Justin and Dave Johnson. There was briefly a Facebook page, but that disappeared without any meaningful updates.

Weirdly the logo for this trade name, included a pair of lightning bolts that many (including Tom of Tabletop Tap Room) felt looked entirely too much like the SS lightning bolts, you know, the Nazi symbol. Definitely a choice for a book where one of the authors is a self-proclaimed Nazi.

Yes, you can argue that they don’t look exactly alike etc, but the more obvious fact is that there is no other discernible reason for high-detail armoured figure to be holding these cartoony lightning bolts.

But doesn’t stop there, it’s dog whistles all the way down. In his video made under supervision with the special PDF edition, Vincent decided to wear a Trump 2nd-Amendment cap – as in the only way to get one was to buy it off the Trump campaign web site. The “no politics in gaming” crowd really loves to crowbar their politics into the gaming space.⁶¹

A screenshot from the Fire Side Reviews: Those Pesky Orcz video marked up to show that Vincent is wearing a Presidential Seal "Save the 2nd Amendment" (with a skull) trucker cap.

Dave Johnson isn’t credited at the front, but the “module” proudly declares that it is the work of proud Nazi Dave Johnson in a post-No Hate In Gaming world. Shit, in a post-Star Frontiers: New Genesis world.⁶²

The inside cover says “Special Thanks to the Grognards (Real Ones)” which has to be a dog whistle, because this product was made by supposed fans who don’t care enough to fill out stat tables correctly, or bother to write a module for themselves. Oh, and ultra-grognard Tim Kask couldn’t stand them.

Lastly… is it a coincidence it came to 88 pages? ⬆️

IV. CONCLUSION

The book is hot garbage, serving mostly as evidence that the nuTSR crew had no interest in actually creating quality products – rather they were hoping that branding and a reactionary mob would carry them. But you already knew that.

The only fixes from Those Pesky Goblinz are ones the book was openly roasted for. Effectively counting on the audience to do the work of proofreading for the creators.

But you probably already guessed that.

So the real questions are – is this plagiarism and what is the claimed appeal?

A. Is It Plagiarism, Generally?

Like Those Pesky Goblinz, this piece of shit is mostly badly copied work from other people, both directly or indirectly (through LLM). The spell section is mostly copied from the AD&D, with the occasional disaster homebrew. The rules are a mishmash of various existing rules. A lot of it would likely be difficult to argue copyright violations, but its undoubtably highly derivative to the point where many people would call it plagiarism.

Most importantly, there’s not really any original ideas in it – nothing in it is a paradigm shift or an original interpretation. It doesn’t expand on or build upon anything in a meaningful way. This is exactly what you’d expect if you asked a bunch of no talent losers who know they could never get paid for anything that they create so just waste time.

If you were to take this to anyone well informed in the TTRPG space, it seems very likely they would think of it as a shitty copy of D&D but the players are orcs. So yeah, I’d say it is, spiritually at least, plagiarism.

More interesting though, it is definitely plagiarism of Those Pesky Goblinz, which was a contentious product since the inside claimed it was owned by TSR LLC, then the 3rd 1st Edition claimed it was owned by OSR Games LLC once TSR LLC was bankrupted.

Like, the copy they gave to Vince to shill it still had the Those Pesky Goblinz character sheets in the back – it was very clearly a copy-paste of the material. If it wasn’t a fundamentally worthless product, it’d be an issue but honestly even with statutory damages in the US it wouldn’t be worth prosecuting. ⬆️

B. “Flavour”

Reactionary shitbag, frequent commentor and occassional creator of TTRPGs, Vincent “The Evil Dungeon Master” Florio advocated that this book might not be good for rules, and clearly used AI content (which he argued could be fixed) but contained some good “flavour”.

So, now this is quite amusing since previously he’s said that orcs (along with goblins and kobolds) don’t need feelings. But hey, that was from 2021… maybe he’s changed his opinion since…

A screenshot of a post on X by The Evil Dungeon Master (@TheEvilDM)
"Orcs will always be evil fodder monsters in my game for the PCs to slaughter for glory, gold and fame!" — Oh. ⁶³

Now, this seems pretty contradictory to someone who claims there’s good “flavour” for the fodder monsters that exist only to be slaughtered. Surely any amount of work on these creatures outside that would be wasted – let alone stuff about diagnosing each other via tasting piss. Furthermore, if Vince know half as much about AD&D as he claims to, he’d have recognized immediately that it was mostly redundant copy-pastes that didn’t even bother to file the serial numbers off.

But I think this gets to the heart of the matter, the real appeal of “orcz” as evil monsters to these guys. It ties in with the conspiratorial reactionary response to “evil”, whether it’s in conspiracies or play. That is that they take a diabolical pleasure in imagining extremely fucked up pleasures, and transpose this onto an “other” to avoid thinking about themselves or society.

They want to think about, and jerk off to, terrible ideas regarding rape, torture, kidnapping, etc but they don’t want to think about how their favourite two-term President is a rapist who is really invested in hiding the Epstein files, or how all their favourite commentators are very comfortable with that. Evil has to be the domain of the alien “other” because otherwise they may be morally accountable for their choices.

Because Vincent is the kind of back-stabbing asshole who will accept help paying for his spouse’s surgery, then gleefully hand over personal information obtained in receiving that help to an fake confederate, Nazi apologist in hopes he’ll get to collect the audience of the person who helped him.⁶⁴ He is the evil he claims to want to abolish, so he needs it to be represented as something apart from him.

If orcs are people, that means both that there aren’t rules of inherent good or evil, and that evil is a personal choice – like the choices he makes. He wants to be evil, but is too much of a coward to risk even self-reflection as a consequence.

This is also why Vincent’s TTRPG advice in general is sub-bottom-of-the-barrel. He is fundamentally incurious, and too cowardly to have an interesting opinion so all he can do is recite the same juvenile ideas you get from a 14-year old edgelord. According to Vincent, this the target market for a product like Those Pesky Orcz.

But is it? ⬆️

C. Who Is It For? Anyone?

You can definitely trust Justin to give an unbiased review of his own product. Also, its always a good sign when you have to besmirch negative reviews in advance.

Examining weird right-winger attempts at making role-playing games has become a hobby of mine of the years and I’ve become increasingly convinced that their games are never intended to be played, or be enjoyed by the audience, but rather they are a declaration of identity and the act of purchasing them a loyalty ritual.

Even the higher quality ones by more strategic grifters are full of obvious issues, but are showered exclusively with 5 star reviews by the people who buy them. Many of them are unworkable due to issues like low contrast between the font and the background, or simply missing information. It’s not about having a quality product to play with, it’s about affirming your identity.

So, that begs the question – what identity would you be affirming?

A Facebook screenshot from TSR Hobbies "1985 this might be a good re boot Table Top RPG"
Below is an image of "Aunt Vicky's Li'l Chamber of Horrors Presents: The Nasty Naughty Nazi Ninja Nudnik Elves by Joshua Quagmire" — TSR Hobbies defended this as the same as playing WWII table top war games.⁶⁵

While writing this I found that Vincent Florio had created his own piece on how orcs need to have pig-faces (showing he doesn’t know that most pigs look pretty cute) and be evil.⁶⁶ It’s only fifteen minutes of talking with the content being redundant, and poorly written as Those Pesky Orcz and the Substack summary looks suspiciously like an LLM summary of some sort.

It has 7 tracked likes on Substack and at time of writing has 311 views, and 6 very supportive comments (all loved by Vincent) on YouTube. This makes it one of his more successful videos in recent years – though not as successful as his promotional video for Those Pesky Orcz.⁶⁷ Which still did better than this one:

A screenshot from YouTube showing Vincent also has a "The Evil DM Podcast" video titles "Little update about games and no Orcs, Goblins and Kobolds don't have feelings." I have highlighted that it has 4 views, and is 1 year old — Chat, is it bad when just mentioning your game drops the views 95%?

For Vincent’s audience, sitting in the corner and sucking on your thumb while crying about how people aren’t doing orcs how you want is more relating and engaging than his original ideas or his campaigns.

I guess you’d have to be the kind of person who knows that oppression, sexism and harassment are all terrible – but really want them to be normal and don’t want to examine whether that’s insecurity, toxicity or a kink. They don’t want to examine, because they don’t want to admit to any of those things – rather they want to point to the “other” as ones who really feel that way.

The unexamined life is not worth living.
– Socrates

Now to be clear, these players certainly don’t represent the majority of or even a really substantial portion of people interested in old school roleplaying games – they’re just very vocal and gullible. That’s why people like LaNasa and Vincent see them as good marks for these grifts. ⬆️

APPENDIX A – NIT SUJ AS ANAL

So, I know what you’ve been wondering – what kind of orc would LaNasa play? Well, I’ve tried making one with the rules, based on the sort of person who insists on playing a porntastic were-tiger in a game where everyone else is just having a regular character, and just happy to be playing with Ernie.⁶⁸ So, let’s look at what sort of character he’d show up with if you just told him you’re running a game, and just bring whatever character he wants.

Immediately we run into a problem – since he’d naturally roll 18 on every of the 6 stats, and have traits that boost them further – none of the stats will be within the parameter. This is a fascinating problem – because it cannot be resolved by the text, or the sources – despite it easily possible for you to come Constitution of 25.

This doesn’t really surprise me, given LaNasa’s admiration of Elon…⁶⁹

And there’s an interesting, unique quirk of 2nd Edition, where if your constitution is 20 or above you actually start to regenerate health. This isn’t in the rules for Those Pesky Orcz (much like not adjustment to Poison Save), but the table stops at 18 so its more ambigious.

At 25 Constitution, you would regain 1 hit point every 10 minutes, which is exactly how long it takes to bleed to death if you hit zero – so if you’re the type who tantrums until you get your way it essentially makes you immune to the risks of combat. But also like, there’s a ring of regeneration item so we’ll assume he has that and infer the the stats where the tables end.

Name: Nit Suj As Anal
Traitz (3): Shorter, Natural Magic, Sired by a Lesser Demon
Background: Tattoo & Body Artist
STR: 22 (+3 to hit, +8 to damage, +2500 weight allowance, 1-5 open doors, 60% bend bars/lift gates) (note: yes we skip percentile strength, because it’s not in the game)
DEX: 18 (+3 reaction adjustment, – 4 AC) (“I rolled a 16…” as there is no bonus for 20 vs 1`8 on this stat)
CON: 25 (+2 hit points per level, rolls of 1-3 always count as a 4, 100 % system shock, 100% resurrection survival, regenerate 1 hit point per turn)
INT: 20 (Chance to know spell: 96%, min spells per level: 9, Max spells per level: All, 9 languages)
WIS: 18 (+4 magic attack, -, -) (“I rolled 2 sixteens… see… the stats are legit”, no benefit to a non-priest above 18 Wisdom)
CHR: 20 (Max Henchmen: 25, Loyalty Base: 60%, Reaction bonus: +45%)
Class: Blackguard/Conjurer
Level: 20/10
Hit Points: 180 – 420 (20d12+20+40+10d6)
AC: -5 (equivalent of 25 in 3E onward)
Spells: 4-3-3-2-2
Magic Items: Golden Chainmail of Holding (AC 4), Red Dragon Scale Shield (Shield +3, total immunity to red dragon breath weapon), Ring of Protection (-1 to AC & Saves), Ring of Regeneration (1 hit point/minute), Rod of the Orc Elder (allows level 20, 90% magic resistance, +5 mace which has a vampiric power),
Saves (roll above to save)
Poison: 2, Wand: 2, Stone: 2, Breath: 2, Spell: 2:
Blackguard Abilities
Assassinate: 99%, Identify Poison: 99%, Make Poison: 99%, Open Locks: 99%, Find/Remove Traps: 99%, Pick Pocket: 99%, Move Silent: 125%, Hide in Shadows: 120%, Climb Walls: 125%, Hear Noise: 1-5 on a d6, Read Languages: 80%
Followers: Tons of orcs and conjured kobolds

This is the most hilariously overpowered character, all following the rules in a game that is less than 40 pages, with a normal level cap of 10 (which is also, not the traditional low level cap: 9). This is all within the scope of the game, as in it is theoretically possible to have this character without breaching any rules etc.

And just to be clear here, I’m not saying LaNasa has this character or would play this character in a serious sense because it is clear nobody (including LaNasa) is ever playing this game. It’s just to illustrate the point of how absurd and self-serving the game seems to be designed as. ⬆️

APPENDIX B – SOURCES

As mentioned, while the book declares it is 1st Edition compatible. Obviously, it is not – but it’s really funny to see how fast it switches sources and how incoherent it is.

Page	Item	Source
7	Orcs have a -1 in sunlight and infravision.	AD&D Monster Manual
12	Armour and initiative rules.	Basic D&D
12	“Pivot Points”	These are, apparently, an Ernie Gygax homebrew rule – so I guess: Ernie
13	Marauder class	Basic D&D Fighter Class
13	Conjurer class	Basic D&D Magic-User Class
14	Priest class	Basic D&D Cleric Class
14-15	Blackguard class	Basic D&D Thief Class AD&D Players Handbook Assassin Class
16	Attributes	Second Edition
17	Equipment	Basic D&D
18-33	Orc Magic	AD&D Player’s Handbook
34-35	Random Magic Items	Basic D&D
36	Encounter Chart	Various D&D It’s just a mess…

It don’t think I need to explain that none of these systems were actually meant to be used together. Each of the editions was a response to something in another, and preferences boil down to what aspect of it appeals the most – whether its the granular detail of AD&D or the more polished yet flexible heroism in Second Edition.

This does not respect the source material in any way shape or form. This is not loving adaptation that tries to find ways to marry the author’s favourite elements of different systems to create a new experience.

Of course, since it never explains its own rules properly – let along how these external rules are meant to come together means that (as per the previous appendix) you hit areas of bizarre ambiguity.

This is so chaotic, and so incoherent, it is difficult to see it as anything but a show of contempt for the work of everyone who has ever worked on a TTRPG product. ⬆️

1
Justin LaNasa Orcz: Those Pesky Orcz. A Game About Vile, Corrupt, Aberrant Creatures (Adamantite Games, Wilmington NC, 2024) [“Those Pesky Orcz“]
2
“New 2024 Player’s Handbook Reveal | D&D” (19 June 2024) D&D Beyond YouTube <www.youtube.com>
3
Brian Anderson (21 June 2024) Drunkards and Dragons (@The_DrunkDragon) X née Twitter <currently suspended for a rules violation>
4
Justin LaNasa Goblinz: Those Pesky Goblinz. A role-playing game by Justin LaNasa (TSR LLC & OSR Games LLC, Lake Geneva WI, 2023)
5
Vincent Florio “Fire Side Reviews: Those Pesky Orcz!” (10 March 2024) The Evil Dungeon Master (@TheEvilDM) YouTube <www.youtube.com>, at 34:00
6
Mike Carr Dungeon Module B1 – In Search of the Unknown (TSR Inc, Lake Genevia WI, 1979), at 17-19
7
Those Pesky Orcz, above n 1, at 18
8
Kim Wincen “NuTSR declares BANKRUPTCY!” (21 January 2026) A gentleman with opinions <blog.wincenworks.com>
9
Those Pesky Orcz, above n 1, at 8
10
Those Pesky Orcz, above, at 16
11
Those Pesky Orcz, above at 10
12
Those Pesky Orcz, above, at 35
13
Those Pesky Orcz, above, at 36
14
Those Pesky Orcz, above, at 36
15
Those Pesky Orcz, above, at 36
16
Creative Comrades <creativecomrades.org>
17
“Considerations for licensors and licensees” Creative Commons Wiki <wiki.creativecommons.org>
18
Justin LaNasa (14 January 2023) Dungeon Hobby Shop (@RPGANONYMOUS) Facebook <www.facebook.com>
19
Justin LaNasa (25 March 2021) Dungeon Hobby Shop (@RPGANONYMOUS) Facebook <www.facebook.com>
20
Gary Gygax Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Monster Manual (TSR Inc, Lake Geneva WI, 1977), at 76
21
“Orkoid Fungus” Lexicanum <wh40k.lexicanum.com>
22
Those Pesky Orcz, above n 1, at 7
23
Gary Gygax “The First Orc Hero” in “On the Soapbox” (October 2003) Dragon Magazine #312 (Editor in Chief: Chris Thomasson, Paizo Publishing LLC, Seattle WA, USA)
24
Kim Wincen “GiantLands (2021)” (30 March 2024) A gentleman with opinions <blog.wincenworks.com>
25
Those Pesky Orcz, above n 1, at 10
26
David “Zeb” Cook (Designer) Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, 2nd Edition, Player’s Handbook (TSR Inc, Lake Geneva WI, 1989) at 16-23
27
Vincent Florio “Fire Side Reviews: Those Pesky Orcz!“, above n 5, at 34:00
28
Gary Gygax Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Player’s Handbook (TSR Inc, Lake Geneva WI, 1977)
29
Those Pesky Orcz, at n 1, at 19
30
Those Pesky Orcz, above, at 32
31
Justin LaNasa (8 January 2024) Dungeon Hobby Shop (@RPGANONYMOUS) Facebook <www.facebook.com>
Justin LaNasa (26 January 2024) Dungeon Hobby Shop (@RPGANONYMOUS) Facebook <www.facebook.com>
32
Those Pesky Orcs, above n 1, at 35
33
Those Pesky Orcs, above, at 35
34
Those Pesky Orcs, above, at 35
35
Those Pesky Orcs, above, at 35
36
Those Pesky Orcs, above, at 35
37
Those Pesky Orcs, above, at 35
38
“No Hate In Gaming” <nohateingaming.com>
39
Justin LaNasa (14 July 2023) Dungeon Hobby Shop (@RPGANONYMOUS) Facebook <www.facebook.com> (screenshot 📸)
40
Those Pesky Orcz, above n 1, at 81
41
Those Pesky Orcz, above n 1, at 69 (Nice)
42
Those Pesky Orcz, above, at 58
43
Those Pesky Orcz, above, at 76
44
“AI Writing Is Trash, But AI “Writers” Will Never Notice” (30 November 2024) In The Thorns YouTube <www.youtube.com>
45
Those Pesky Orcz, above n 1, at 60-67
46
Those Pesky Orcz, above, at 62-66
47
Those Pesky Orcz, above, at page 67
48
Gloria Oladipo “Lord of the Rings orc was modeled after Harvey Wenstein, Elijah Woods reveals” (5 October 2021) The Guardian <www.theguardian.com>
49
Those Pesky Orcz, above n 1, at 45
50
Those Pesky Orcz, above, at 42
51
Those Pesky Orcz, above, at 80-81
52
Those Pesky Orcz, above, at 83
53
Those Pesky Orcz, above, at 72
54
Those Pesky Orcz, above, at 65
55
Ian Livingstone & Steve Jackson Warlock of Firetop Mountain (Puffin Books, UK, 27 August 1982)
56
The Warlock of Firetop Mountain (Tin Man Games, Australia, 31 August 2016)
57
Those Pesky Orcz, above n 1, at 41-42
58
Tabletop Taproom (@tabletoptaproom) YouTube <www.youtube.com>
59
Kim Wincen “Dungeon Crawl, TSR Cons & Meltdowns” (9 January 2026) A gentleman with opinions <blog.wincenworks.com>
60
Those Pesky Orcz, above n 1, at 41
61
Vincent Florio “Fire Side Reviews: Those Pesky Orcz!”, above n 5
62
Kim Wincen “Star Frontiers: New Genesis (Unreleased)” (6 October 2024) A gentleman with opinions <blog.wincenworks.com>
63
Vincent Florio (1 February 2025) The Evil Dungeon Master (@TheEvilDM) X née Twitter <x.com>
64
Tenkar “Vince Florio, The Truly Evil DM – The Betrayal, In His Own Words (Screenshots from the TSR Discord” (11 July 2022) Tenkar’s Tavern YouTube <www.youtube.com>
65
Desert Gled in “The Full Glorious History of nuTSR” (13 July 2022) EN World <www.enworld.org>
66
Vincent Florio as The Evil Dungeon Master “AD&D – Orcs with Pig Faces” The Black Notebook Substack <www.theevildm.com>
67
Vincent Florio The Evil Dungeon Master (@TheEvilDM) YouTube <https://www.youtube.com/@TheEvilDM/videos> (screenshot 📸)
68
Justin LaNasa as Dungeon Hobby Shop Museum (2 July 2022) Dungeon Hobby Shop Museum Facebook <now deleted> (screenshot 📸)
69
Justin LaNasa (27 November 2022) Dungeon Hobby Shop Museum (@HobbyMuseum) <now deleted> ( screenshot 📸)

Orcz: Those Pesky Orcz (2024)

TABLE OF CONTENTS

I. THE PRODUCT

A. Comparisons To Those Pesky Goblinz

B. Leftover Problems

C. Worst License Ever

II. THE ORCZ

A. What is an Orc?

B. Omissions

C. Making An Orc

D. Orc Magic

E. Orc Magic Items

III. THE MODULE

A. What’s Not In The Module

1. Guidance for party levels, structure, or general theme/tone

2. Reasonable summaries for plot specific characters

B. What IS In The Module

1. AI generated nonsense

2. The spectre of a plot

3. Worst map ever

4. Slavery of women as a norm

5. The most bizarre win condition

C. Other Shenanigans

1. We have Warlock of Firetop Mountain at home

2.Chief Tluarrev (aka Tom Verrault of Tabletop Tap Room)

3. Adamantite Games… and other dog whistles.

IV. CONCLUSION

A. Is It Plagiarism, Generally?

B. “Flavour”

C. Who Is It For? Anyone?

APPENDIX A – NIT SUJ AS ANAL

APPENDIX B – SOURCES

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

I. THE PRODUCT

A. Comparisons To Those Pesky Goblinz

B. Leftover Problems

C. Worst License Ever

II. THE ORCZ

A. What is an Orc?

B. Omissions

C. Making An Orc

D. Orc Magic

E. Orc Magic Items

III. THE MODULE

A. What’s Not In The Module

1. Guidance for party levels, structure, or general theme/tone

2. Reasonable summaries for plot specific characters

B. What IS In The Module

1. AI generated nonsense

2. The spectre of a plot

3. Worst map ever

4. Slavery of women as a norm

5. The most bizarre win condition

C. Other Shenanigans

1. We have Warlock of Firetop Mountain at home

2.Chief Tluarrev (aka Tom Verrault of Tabletop Tap Room)

3. Adamantite Games… and other dog whistles.

IV. CONCLUSION

A. Is It Plagiarism, Generally?

B. “Flavour”

C. Who Is It For? Anyone?

APPENDIX A – NIT SUJ AS ANAL

APPENDIX B – SOURCES

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