Another Orc suggestion: The Common Soldiers

I love that the orc areas have orcs.... LOTS of orcs.

However, the one problem is.... graphical lag.  The current orc soldiers are 'dynamic' models (like PCs) rather than single model appearance (such as ice giants, spiders, pretty much 99% of the creature appearances).

On lower end systems, this can cause graphical lag. I would even get this on my last laptop which could run NWN at high resolution, full detail, shadows, the works.... Enter the tesh portal room, get the mob to spawn.... stutter, stutter.

The game simply has a hard time rending ALL those orcs with their multi part armors, their head models, plus their weapons, their shields, the arrows and the arrows' acid VFXs, ect, all at the same time.

I get the same thing with other areas with lots of dynamic NPCs, such as Macedone's or tradeholm's open markets... lots of dynamic NPCs "in sight" on top of all the placeables and such. It sucks in the towns, but it's a minor nuisance there.

It's problematic with the orcs because.... well, they want to kill

My suggestion... give them a non-dynamic appearance.

I know it would be a bit of work to put together all those separate model parts into a single model, get the animations worked in.... BUT, it would be really great on the player end.  Huge mobs are fun!  Non dynamic orc models would let them still be fun, and remove all the extra work our clients have to do rendering 20 to 22 separate models per npc.

The more "unqiue" orcs like destroyers, blood witches, ect, don't really need a non-dynamic model... just the mobs, the ones you'll have 10 or more of on screen at once.

I'll second this, as I still play NWN on a 12 years old XP system.  Anything to reduce lag when crowds form, I need it.

Didn't realize that most orcs, even the lowly grunts, were 'dynamic' models with multi-part variables.

I'd wager that that fortress defense with the unending orc swarm idea from another thread probably won't even work with these dynamic NPCs.

It would.... but low-end PCs like ours would join the dead very quickly

Single model orcs would be much better.... I know my computer has no problem with say, 30 zombies or 20 ice giants and however many of their dragon/polarbear/ice troll buddies on the screen at once.... 10 or more dynamics though....