I was watching the Lord of the Rings trilogy recently and I came to that scene where Aragorn, Gimli, and Legolas are chasing after the orcs who have the two hobbits. At one point the orcs stopped and sniffed the air and said they smelled their pursuers. Then the next scene said the pursuers were 3-4 days behind.

That got me to thinking, it'd be super cool if orcs could smell over great distances. This powerful sense of smell could be used in a lot of different ways, but the specific way I thought of was a corpse-finding ability akin to gravesight without the equipment-locate aspect. Useful for exsanguinate, fetishes, war banners, etc.

'TRACK PREY' TRACKPREY
Syntax: trackprey <victim>

This skill allows the Orc to follow the blood trail of its last
opponent through wilderness areas. The trail must be fresh and
if the Orc attacks or is attacked by another, they will lose the
scent of their prey and the trail can no longer be followed.

'DEATHSCENT' DEATHSCENT
Syntax: deathscent

This skill allows the Orc to locate the decaying corpses
of the deceased. The corpse need not be fresh and, in fact,
may be easier to find as it grows more rotten.



<100%hp 100%m 100%mv> deathscent
The corpse of Wilhath lies to the east near the Eastern Road
The corpse of Zulghinlour lies above you in Asgaard
The corpse of the Ravens lies sadly in the east near Baltimore

And now you want them to be able to smell corpses that are actually a continent away? For realism? Or for the overpoweredness of being able to rush in and loot their pies?

Lawwwls.

Yhorian.

hence the "more rotten the easier it is to detect them" part. You'd think the longer a corpse has been decaying the lighter it would be in the loot department. It's more similar to the lich-constantly-locating-corpses-for-phylacteries thing than anything else. Orcs, particularly Mundunugu, can make useful things out of corpses. But as it stands they either have to make the corpse themselves or just happen across one somebody else made. This ability would give them a modest bump up without adding yet another pseudo-defensive skill like "bully" or psuedo-offensive skill like warshout and fits perfectly into their skill list. Additionally, you could put any number of limitations on it up to and including windiness, proximity to the corpse, decay timer, terrain (i.e., probably more difficult to smell a corpse in the swamp than it is one upon the barren slopes of a mountain) etc.

and it is similar to a skill I suggested to some people a while back, but this seems more thought out.

-----Abernyte

One of the big things I've had problems with as my orcs is locating corpses for warbannering. I've tried multiple approaches (asking younger orcs to tell me about corses, bribing high level magi for corpse locations, etc.) but neither of these are half as effective as having some inherent way to locate corpses. I'd be all for anything in this general direction.