He's lost his orc-ish-ness. Does he cease to be?
No, but since said orc has Strength 10 (stats below a 6 are in the "not going to survive", and orcs have that even more than we do, so...but that mechanic is another story.), it won't happen, either.
So let's say he's armwrestling someone with 12.
No, he hasn't. But all things being as close to even as possible, orcs have better developed muscles and worse developed brains.
There are no orc Stephen Hawkings, unfortunately. (In my setting, with my list of races, etc. etc. In yours, there might well be one. And I'm not stopping him.)
And why is an Orc Wizard an option in Elennsar
s player's handbook? So that newbies to your game who don't know that Int is tell-all to a Wizard and not a Sorcerer stat can belly up to their table with a character incapable of meeting the same challenges as Elennsar's Elf Ranger?
Int as tell-all to a wizard is one of the first things that you read in the Wizard description.
If you overlook that, that's your problem. If I failed to put it in, that's my problem.
I doubt this is going to stop the holy war, but could people uninvolved in the current one flame me for being stupid?
As you said, it hurts the mathtarded. Which means that it involves math and paying attention to math. Ew.
Beyond that, I'll have to get back to you. But count that as a wisp of a flame if you so wish.
For further lols: Human women are weaker, on average, then human men. Why don't they get a STR penalty? Maybe because It's *conceivable* that an 18 STR woman could exist? And we don't want to prevent the player from playing one?
Human women have roughly the same limitations and advantages as human men. Orcs have different limitations and advantages.
Would you want to have apes be able to have Int 18? I wouldn't. Same problem with orcs.
Now, if there's anything remotely interesting about this character concept, explain to me why game mechanics should discourage it in any way, even slightly.
Because you are going against the nature of what your race does well or poorly.
That said, I would rather have them "hinder" than "eliminate" this character, if such a character should be able to exist (in my setting with my setting's orcs, he wouldn't. In another equally valid setting, he would.)
Since that is the thing. "Going against your race's nature" ought to be difficult. Doing something wildly uncommon, not necessarily, but if you want to overcome being small and puny, that should not be "well, you're an exceptional kobold: Strength 18 is fine!" I wish I had an answer, however.
If you insist on having different characters be different strengths, you have to let each player play multiple characters so that it all adds up.
However, you could have different characters -have- different strengths. So yes, my elf makes a better archer-ranger than your dwarf, but your dwarf does equally well somewhere else and we both have a natural environment we rock in.
Insisting that "No, you can't be a better archer-ranger" is a bit much.
Also, an 18 Int isn't that special. It's like .5% of the human population. After accounting for aging Int bonuses, it's a few percentage points of the entire population.
Mathmatically, yes. Presumably, less commonly in practice for some reason. Die, die rolls. </mini-rant>
Trust in the Emperor, but always check your ammunition.