Ogryn

Ogryns are a sub-species of monstrous Abhuman which feature in Games Workshop’s Warhammer 40,000 universe.

Description
Towering over a regular human, most Ogryns stand at close to ten feet tall and are built like living walls of muscle, but are relatively stupid creatures. Evolving on planets with high gravity and a sparsity of what other species would call food, Ogryns have developed a digestive system which will allow them to convert virtually anything they can fit down their gullets into energy.

The planets which Ogryn come from were initially deemed too hostile by the humans who would become the Imperium of Man to be considered as regular settlements, and to this effect, most of these worlds were designated as penal colonies, where the most hardened criminals were condemned to either live a tortuous existence or die.

Despite this, and their barbaric nature, in the modern age Ogryns have developed a black-and-white concept of morality, and when rediscovered colonies of these brutes are introduced to the ideology of the Emperor of Mankind as being a wondrous and benevolent being to be followed, embrace his religion with an almost childlike fervour. As a result, Ogryns are amongst the most fanatically loyal beings in the Imperium, and will usually follow orders given in the Emperor’s name until death.

An interesting point of note is that Ogryns tend to be highly claustrophobic, although why this should be the case is anybody’s guess.

Ogryns in the Imperium
Due to their aggressive nature and the fact that they have little comprehension of the idea of personal property, Ogryns are generally found in the Imperium at large only as part of the many Imperial Guard regiments which fight to keep humanity’s foes at bay.

Unlike most Imperial worlds, who are called upon to raise regiments of Guardsmen to fight as a single entity across the galactic Empire, Ogryns are recruited in much smaller units, usually of no more than a few dozen individuals. They are then broken down into smaller squads which are subsequently assigned to a particular regiment in order to give those units some hard-hitting shock-and-awe troopers to use when the need arises.

Equipment
As Ogryns are exceptionally strong but clumsy creatures, the tech adepts of the Imperium of Man have developed a special weapon which suits the needs of a standard Ogryn trooper: the Ripper Gun. Named for the noise it makes when fired, this weapon is designed to compensate for an average Ogryn’s poor accuracy by pumping out a high volume of large-calibre rounds, although its range is very short. In addition, it is so sturdily built that when an Ogryn runs out of ammunition (which it will quickly accomplish, as playing with such a fun toy never gets tiring for creatures who possess little forward planning) it may use the gun as a makeshift club, crumping anything which comes too close. This is just as much fun for one of these brutes as pulling on the trigger which makes its enemies heads explode.

Another common piece of battlefield gear issued to Ogryns is the Slab Shield, a massively thick piece of armour plating which a sufficiently well-disciplined squad of Ogryn can interlock to form a mobile wall capable of defeating all but the most powerful of armour-piercing weapons. Needless to say, due to the average strength of an Ogryn, these shields can also be employed as highly effective blunt-force instruments.

Bone’Eads
The most intelligent Ogryns inducted into the Imperial Guard are put through the BONE program. This surgical and chemical procedure (which stands for Biochemical Ogryn Neural Enhancement) gives the recipient the ability to actually think for itself, and allows a limited perception on how it’s actions, and those of the soldiers surrounding it, will affect the outcome of any particular engagement. These Ogryns, known as BONE Heads (or simply Bone’Eads as they are referred to by the bulk of the Imperial militia) function as the sergeants and NCO’s of the small units of Ogryns which operate alongside regular Guardsmen.