The First Ogre - Dwarven War

The First Ogre - Dwarven War

Of the Rakthokian Kingdom and general Dagnor:

For centuries while the elven empire grew to the east, the dwarves and ogres had thrived in the mountains to the west, surrounding the forest presently known as "Lesser Faydark." The dwarves settled into the jagged cliffs of what is known as the butcherblok mountains and there had established their golden kingdom of Kaladim, "The forge of Norrath." The ogres were able to wrestle control of nearby lands from the orcan hordes of Faedwer after a decade of warfare and established the first ogreian kingdom in the nearby Rakthokian ridge mountain range, named after the first ogre leader "Rakthok the Warlord." There in the Faydark west the dwarves and ogres lived in an uneasy peace.

While the immense empire of the elves could have easily crushed either one of the kingdoms, the ogres saw the dwarves as a primary concern. Raised in a culture where only the strength in your arms and the size of your weapon mattered, the ogres of the kingdom of Rakthok considered only the dwarves to be their equal and thus a very large threat. The ogres were also greedy of the gold-rich mountain mines and the stone cutting skill of the Kaladim kingdom, and to make matters worse, the friendly disposition of the dwarves did not agree with the savage and chaotic tendencies of the Rakthokian ogres. What resulted was an intense racial hatred and many small fights between the two kingdoms.

In the beginning of the second age, when the elven rebels against the god Innoruk began to surface, Dagnor the Butcher was chosen as the 5th warlord of the Rakthokian Kingdom. Clearly the most ambitious of all the previous Rakthokian kings, Dagnor was the first to realize that the small skurmishes between dwarves and ogres would never solve anything and that for the ogres to gain anything substantial, the dwarves would have to be completely overcome or slaughtered. He saw the mines of Kaladim as an infinite source of limitless wealth and power. Almost immediately after he seized the throne Dagnor began to assemble the largest combined army of ogres since the orcan clans had been overthrown. Dagnor was held in check for a long time, however, because Kaladim was a chief source of gold and weapons for the elven empire and the dwarves would find the elves a strong ally if war broke out. The ogre king was smart enough to realize that his kingdom could not survive an attack from both sides and so he did not advance and the dwarves did not regard him as much of a threat. While the indomitable elven empire loomed over western Faedwer, war was not an option for either the dwarves or the ogres.

Of the attacks on Northern Kaladim:

Dagnor is sometimes referred to as the destroyer of two empires. When he began his campaign against the dwarven kingdom of Kaladim he began the fall of his own kingdom of Rakthok, but also he stopped the dwarves from giving aid to the elven empire against the ever increasing elven rebel armies. Many historians surmise that if the dwarves had not been pulled into war with the ogres, their help would have caused the downfall of the rebel army and the old elven empire would still be in existence.

In any case, with the war of the broken crown raging to the east, Dagnor knew the elves could not afford to lend aid to the dwarves and he took the opportunity to launch his own campaign against the kingdom of Kaladim. The warlord knew that the key to beating the dwarves was through the less guarded lands of northern area Kaladim where the dwarves had primarily established trading centers and peaceful mining villages. So in the middle of the second age, the 5th warlord of the Rakthokian kingdom marched his army of ogres and orcan slaves west across the hills of shade directly to northern Kaladim without fear of elven intervention.

Old dwarves still tell the horrible tales of the first ogre attacks. Ill prepared to meet such an invasion force, the peaceful cities of northern Kaladim were swept over with tremendous speed. Ogre warriors burned everything they could put a torch to and killed every dwarf they saw be it man, woman, or child. In little less then a week the forces of Dagnor had surprised Kaladim and caused the deaths of hundreds of dwarves. The warlord had found the weakness in the impenetrable kingdom of Kaladim and now marched directly for the capital.

Of king Grimmly Fireforge, and the battle on the hills of shade:

It was Dagnor's unnecessary need to stop and make sure everything was dead in the wake of his army that gave the time the dwarves needed to prepare. Word reached the capital city of Kaladim days before the ogres arrived. Hearing the startling news of the advancing army, the 12th dwarven king Grimmly Fireforge, an excellent fighter and brilliant military tactician, began to assemble a defensive force. Dagnor also did not anticipate the speed by which the dwarves could gather into a force large enough to repel his own. It was the warlord's first mistake.

When the army of ogres reached the Crakthorn ridge, just one mile from the capital city of Kaladim, they were met by an equally large force of dwarves lead by king Grimmly. The fighting on the ridge was savage and brutal, but being less skilled at fighting in tight tunnels and with low light then the dwarves, the ogres were forced to flee. Dagnor ordered his army into the hills of shade where the dwarves and ogres could fight on equal ground.

Day and night the battle raged across the hills of shade above the lesser faydark and the grass was bleached red with the blood of the fallen. Both armies were fueled by soldiers from their respective kingdoms and soon the war had ground into a stalemate.

Of the orcan betrayal and the battle of the shattered spear:

Thinking that the war would either be won or lost on the hills of shade, Dagnor ordered his southern most forces guarding the forest of lesser Faydark to move north and add more strength to the army in the hills. He left instead a handful of ogre soldiers and mostly a host of orcan slaves. It was Dagnor's second and most fatal mistake.

For the first time in history dwarves and orcs came to an agreement and entered in on an alliance. The dwarves promised the orcan slaves of the defeated orcan clans their freedom if they would not interfere in the war in favor of both sides. Completely in favor with the plan, which gave the orcs freedom but did not require them to fight, the orcan slaves retreated from lesser faydark to the east, deserting the armies of Dagnor and leaving the southern hills wide open. King Grimmly took this opportunity to assemble a second force to the south and then attacked Dagnor's army from both the front and the undefended flank. The ogre forces on the hills of shade were demolished. Dagnor fled with few others and the Rakthokian kingdom was now completely vulnerable. Grimmly gathered his remaining forces and headed straight for the ogre capital, leveling any fortresses he came to and burning Rakthok to the ground. The Rakthokian army had been broken.

The last official battle took place beneath the forest of lesser Faydark as the remaining ogre forces, lead by Dagnor, attempted to flee to the south. They were met there by a small force of vengeful dwarven soldiers who were able to hold them off until the arrival of the main dwarven host. When King Grimmly and his army arrived, the forces of Dagnor fought viciously and were able to kill many, but were ultimately defeated. A story tells that Grimmly and Dagnor met eachother face to face on the shores of a lake to the south of lesser faydark during one of these fights, and that Grimmly stabbed Dagnor with a spear with such intensity and ferociousness that the weapon shattered into thousands of pieces even as it cut straight through the ogre lord's chest. The story goes on to say that the warlord fell to his death immediately in that same lake and that the evil in his blood made the water boil and turn red. Thus the dwarves mockingly renamed the lake Dagnor's Cauldron and thus the final battle of the ogre-dwarven war was called "the battle of the shattered spear."

Of the trail of blood and the new kingdom of Oggok:

Barely more then three hundred ogres had survived from a host of thousands and, saying their prays of forgiveness to their god Rallos Zek for loosing the war, the survivors hastily retreated to the south-west. For two weeks the ogres fled and the forces of king Grimmly hounded them at every step, killing all those they could catch up with. The ogres plundered every small city they came to, even the shattered ruins of the elven capital of Caerthiel where they found ships and supplies they could use. Finally fleeing all the way across the Loping Plains, they set sail across the eastern oceans and away from the closing dwarves. The first Ogre-Dwarven war had officially ended.

The ogres: beaten, wounded, and without a leader, reached the then barren continent of Antonica a month after setting sail from Faedwer. Day and night the forces of a once great Rakthokian Kingdom marched tirelessly through the endless desert of Ro and soon to the empty mountain range of what is now known as the serpent's spine. Wanting some time to rebuild and recuperate, the ogres found the mountain's natural geography a good advantage over any invasion force. Here they started the foundations of a new ogre capital, guarded on all sides by two rivers, a desert, a lake, jagged mountains, and a thick jungle, where they could start to assemble again and build a new army for the second ogre-dwarven war. They called their new kingdom "Oggok" which in ogreish means "Revenge."

The second age ended in war and death with the promise of a new beginning. The petty squabbling of the elder races on the continent of Faydwer had ended tragically and none of the kingdoms would ever fully recover. The seeds for revenge had been sewn and the entire world had changed for all the elder races. With the immigration of the dark elves to Neriak on Antonica and of the ogres to Oggok, new lands had been discovered and none of the elder races had the power anymore to stop the kingdoms of the gnomes and halflings of expanding nor did they have the strength to control the ever increasing population of the humans. The second age was a time of death, sadness, and change for Norrath.

-- From a post by Dalyn Darkbear

Note: Originally taken from Everquest lore distributed by Verant during Beta.