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  2. There's an awful lot in there to unpack and I recommend people digest it very carefully. I think you are right - between 1981 and 1982, the broo went from evil philistines to embodiments of trauma who must continually recreate that trauma in order for the species to survive. They were warped by the cosmic rape that resulted in Wakboth, and became microcosms of it. They are sentient endoparasites - quite aware of what they do to survive. They became true nightmares - like Vivamort's vampires and Thanatar's heads.
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  4. Before we go deep into how to use the dead place, back to my original question. Given that any broo met in the dead place would have been there a while, then any disease spirits connected to them would have long since been left behind. So are broo in the dead place devoid of disease? I think so. The only angle I was thinking was that maybe when this first happens to the broo, the disease spirit turns into some form of chaos slime, the broo could then dip their weapons into it. The effect of this might be that those wounded at first notice no ill effects necessarily. But when they leave the dead place the slime turns back into a disease spirit and initiates an attack via the wound. Remember in the dead place no wound can be magically healed. So first aid is your only hope to heal a wound and stop bleeding. Maybe a crit or special cleans the slime out as part of the healing. In my game the players have an NPC shaman they work for, they had brought some blessed mud with them, and the shaman had made it into a non magical salve that could cure a few hp and seal a wound. Otherwise sending in a PC to the dead place who meets an armed foe could be death from a single wound that a first aid fails on and they bleed to death. Maybe this mud cleanses the wound, maybe it seals the slime in? Only time will tell….the point is any wound in the dead place is potentially fatal if serious enough.
  5. Rolling back all the way to that particular opening crawl reveals something: "broo reproduction" doesn't appear in print until Borderlands decides to reveal or invent that narrative. Before that, broos are, like Iggy Pop says about the "philistines" in the movie Dead Man, mostly just real dirty people . . . "given to atrocities and foul practices" but mostly spreading diseases. This becomes their "Mallia" aspect that supports their role as mercenary muscle in Nomad Gods, RQ1-2 and so on. Or another way to say it is that Mallia is the entity who shamans can summon within the rules of the Jaldon Games. Thed comes later and I encourage people to read the COT version closely. If you find anything sexualized in this era, shout it out. To me, these broos come off more like S. Clay Wilson bikers than anything else, maybe with a Kenneth Anger scorpio rising vibe. There's no parasitic pregnancy motif, which tells us that while Alien has come and gone theatrically and home video exists, it doesn't seem to make much of an impression on Greg or Sandy until 1982. They wouldn't hold a revelation like that back, especially when the Thed layout ends with significant page space to fill and they were already throwing everything Sandy could think of to stretch as far as they could. After Borderlands, the "broo as sexual violence" and "Thed as rape goddess" narratives get rolling with Noyeep in the Big Rubble (1983) and forty years later here we are. But Borderlands functions as the literal crossroads at which we meet the devil, as it were. You still have the "Mallia" broos, who are basically all the females (closing a loophole in COT) as well as the males who "dislike all-male associations." That's a strange thread. Does it mean all Thedists are gay? Or is each of them the only male that matters in their perspective, so that everything else is potentially a "wife" and a "mother" to your children? The one unspoken rule here seems to be that they can't or won't or don't like to impregnate each other, or else only the strongest broo would survive beyond two seasons +1d8 weeks and we know that they can coexist in relatively stable gangs for a lot longer than that. Another thing that's interesting is the reference to "varied maternity." I know we've talked about Wire Mother and Soft Mother before but every male broo has a choice of which mommy to follow in terms of how they relate to the larval host. RQ3 Thed obliterates any surrogates. Her broo might not identify with her or emulate her so much as she (as a ghost and not a conventional goddess) yearns to emulate them. She gets them to do things to recapitulate her trauma. In the RQ3 accounts, that trauma is all she has left. In that ecology, there are no other women, just an appetite for new victims. I feel like many of the more deliberately occult NPCs in LOT and DOLAD reflect these complicated and polymorphous family and gender identities, where a son can be a daughter and a brother and also a wife. But Mallia is simpler. By definition she's the other woman and that's really it. When you emulate her, you are not the cruel absent mother. You're your own woman. The boys become carriers of your complex, spreading her sign. And this is the broo mother you can contact in the Jaldon Games. The stepmother can be approachable in ways the mother never is. Where is this going? First, IMG Thed is a perversion of the Covenant because her cult deliberately blurs the taboo relationship between herd and harem. Her broos don't have wives and their children don't have mothers. They have plenty of meat but they don't get milk as a baby. She's one of the things that happen when something goes very wrong with the meat. Nobody who observes the Peaceful Cut will countenance any of this. Prax can't afford to tolerate chaos. Life is already too rough in their broken world to intentionally make things worse. Second, Thed's association with the Crack spell is poignant in light of both Dorasta's ruined cleft and the "breaking of the vessels" that seeds creation in the zohar or wherever. She knows how to break everything. Maybe in a demiurgic context she has wisdom to provide but it's hard to say . . . sooner or later, people who have delved her mysteries end up functionally equivalent to broos. On the way from here to there you find the mysterious Cacodemon character in the courts of chaos, son of the devil (looking at you Argin Terror, we've barely touched on the West) and grandson of Thed. He's fond of ogres, who start to look a lot like broos when you breed out the obvious goat strains.
  6. Thanks for the update! It's great to hear news, even if that news itself is disappointing. I hope everything goes smoothly after getting out of the port!
  7. Once upon a time, Greg described his views on how the approaches differed. You can see an overview of this in Arcane Lore p.15, but did appear in a number of other earlier sources that he drafted. The distinctions/approaches he provided in that work were: Liturgism; Venerative worship and sorcery magic Veneration is the method of worship. It is submission of the individual to the All, usually through the agency of social institutions whose leaders (sorcerers) can direct a portion of this veneration energy to perform magic. Animism; Ecstatic worship and shamanic magic Worship includes any ecstatic behavior that merges the person and world, such as trance inducing dances, deprivations, possessions, or other methods of merging with spirits or nature. Ecstasy is the personal experience of the Life Force inducing a transcendent event. Integration and rejection are the methodologies. Integration of the individual into the large world is experienced in the ecstatic moment, and subsequent training and experiences allow integration for longer periods of time and with larger entities. This results in magical actions performed by the person without effort. Integration of entities into the collective "us" is mutually rewarding, and internal adoption of disembodied entities is necessary to progress towards higher religious power and purpose, which is merger with Nature or one of the Great Spirits. In dealing with outsiders, whether "Them" people, spiritual, or demonic; interaction may be in the form of begging, bargaining, tricking, conquering, requesting, or surrendering. If successful, the natural entity or spirit merges with the shaman, granting its powers or its service. Theism; Sacrificial worship and divine magic Theism is the practice of making sacrifice of time, attention, and material goods to cooperate with deities. Deities (gods and goddesses) are entities that underlie the whole world. Worship of a god consists of sacrifices to it to strengthen it, and to guarantee (as much as possible) that it will deliver its magic when promised. Sacrifices include time, by participating in regular ceremonies; material goods, both as sacrifices and to support priesthood; and includes following customary behavior and evaluations of right and wrong. Cooperation with the Greater Powers is the primary method of Sacrifice. Following the actions established in Creation, people engage in a non-equal but reciprocal relationship with the immortal powers of the world.
  8. You're right, it shouldn't be. But it may well be. Australian warehouses *just* got Alone Against the Static, which was released in December 2023. It could be months yet before the Lunar book arrives there. The big difference is that AAtS, and the Arkham book, were both purchasable from jump, long before the physical books arrived in all warehouses. It's not a Chaosium policy to wait, it's specifically a RQ policy... which baffles and annoys me.
  9. My take is that the biggest difference between the "Gods" vs. the "Greater Spirits" is that the "Gods" mostly either (this list off the top of my head): have distinct interests in mortals / the mundane world prefer to deal with mortals in a theistic way simply find it most efficient/effective to deal theistically (or all of these, of course). It's not that they cannot interact via the Shamanic methods; but it isn't the way they usually do it, and they usually have their own very-good reasons for the way they do it. So if you try to Shamanically-approach a "Greater Spirit" who prefers to be approached theistically (i.e. a "God") it's kind of like going up to a major political/business/religious figure saying "hey, you asshole, gimme some of your time." This isn't likely to be your best approach; take a -50% on all rolls interacting with this "Greater Spirit." As always, YGWV
  10. I have always assumed that the minor diseases are Darkness Rune based, the major diseases are Death Rune based and only the plague is Chaos Rune based. While my assumptions aren't borne out by RQG anymore (major & minor are Chaos and Darkness based). Plague is only Chaos. While major & minor diseases can be caused by Chaos, they have no taint. Whereas plague is definitely chaotic. I also assume that any spirit in the Dead Place dies within a week as they've nothing to sustain them. Their bodies are the dust and their magic points are very slowly regenerating the place (there are now a few hardy plants).
  11. Some clarification. On Roll20 community sheet creators are basically locked out of using compendiums. The Roll20 sheet displays all the result of the the attack and the range of damage possible based on the roll result Success/Special.Critical and the hit location with one button click.
  12. Now that's a beautifully Mostali way of looking at things. Or, perhaps, a distortion of Mostali philosophy through a human-centric viewpoint (which fits neatly with that being the origin of sorcery). Mostali heroquest to reforge the world engine (the One True Tool). That's the end-goal of Mostali sorcery. Try teaching that to a human student that's only half paying attention, spending the rest of the time daydreaming about being a conqueror, and you could get something like 'you can heroquest to reforge these so-called gods into tools you can use to further your own power'. I also like the insinuation that Orlanth is just an air conditioner that's got way above its station...
  13. My current idea is that diseases would manifest as minor forms of Malia (thinking of the Gods War "miniature" here) crawling off, possibly attempting to merge with other such little Malias. As they merge, they might acquire Chaos Features. Entering the Dead Place is a bit of a challenge, agreed. The Good Shepherd is said to know the secrets of navigating the place, but with a base camp on the outcrops of the Dead Place, people secured on ropes should have no serious trouble to leave again. For a scenario of mine (actually a sidequest for the scenario) I have pondered expeditions into the Dead Place to collect dust from there, to be used in enbalming, to make certain that the separation of body and spirit(s) remains intact. It should also suppress putrefaction (assuming that that is caused by living Darkness). The Wild Hunter (Gagarth) can be summoned in the Winter Ruins, IIRC, possibly stripping him of his Wild Hunt for a while. There is also a holy place of Inora inside (hence the name) which may lead to if not regular then not that unusual pilgrimages by those seeking her continued support. Hard to do for a shaman leading a Spirit Cult or Spirit Society, though.
  14. A middle way is possible, I suppose: viruses/bacteria/parasites and disease spirits are not identical, but it is hard to get rid of something in the first category if you are under attack by its associated disease spirit. Then ditching the disease spirit in the Dead Place would enable “normal medicine” — Arroin? — to take over, improving your chances without being an insta-cure.
  15. Here we move into grey area. Chalana Arroy can fight spirits, but will likely have a moral dilemma when in the Dead Place, they are no longer spirits or diseases, The dust or mud may kill them first. If you reach a point where you need to take a possessed person into the dead place, that's a whole adventure in itself.
  16. There is already player character template for humans. You just need to copy that and edit it for new characters. Beaty (and flaw if not implemented) is that Foundry will automate lot of things that Roll20 does not. In example that picture Makarios scored critical hit. You can automatically press "max Special damage" to get damage numbers, you get automatically experience marking corresponding skills. Target can just add that damage to whatever hit location was rolled, and vtt will reduce all armor (not from crit, but normal) from it, etc. Another neat feature of it is that when you create example some monster template. It has current stats and how they are calculated -> when you drag and drop it to scene/map, Foundry automaticvally reroll those and you now have automatically small variety in monsters. I tested both Roll20 and Foundry and decide to do my "starter set" campaign in Foundry (In Forge actually, but it is just cloud service for Foundry) as it is more complete even in its current state. Roll20 is just basically character sheet.
  17. Or — to take the sorcerer’s view? — all tools have their limitations. Your problem isn’t much like a nail, but unfortunately the god/magic/tool you have hold of is very much a hammer; watch where you put your thumb. Experimental heroquests as attempts to reforge the tools.
  18. So basically the Dead Place has a great potential to be a cure to all diseases, with Chalana Arroy fighters able to beat the manifest diseases to death? There ought to be some side effect to the bearers, I suppose, but shifting this to something a Heal or Heal Wound might repair outside of the Dead Place still would count as a win.
  19. I love this question. Is it asking something like — please, do not mistake me for a theologian — whether Gloranthan reality is “catholic” (for some or all gods, a priestly class is required to interact with them) or “protestant” (with the right techniques, anyone can interact with any god — whether or not that is wise, whether or not the god welcomes the interaction)? Malkioni might be a special case, taking neither the protestant nor the catholic line. According to them: the Invisible God is unreachable no matter who you are; anyone can contact the other so-called gods … but they are not really gods, as there can be only one. Presumably, stroppy shamans — and I like to think they all have attitude — think that self-proclaimed gods are just spirits with pretensions and could be contacted. As for worship, surely there is a lost Godlearner document detailing experiments to track the energy flow in worship — does it ever flow through the priest, and if it does, must it?
  20. This is the way I see all interactions with gods in Glorantha happening (whether someone is a true believer or not). Providing magic to their followers is pretty much the only way they can still influence the world of Time, so they're going to use it to drive forward their agenda. All gods have an 'ask'. Some people are just so blinkered that they cannot fathom that their god's ask might be something that's not in their individual best interest... Though I do like my worldbuilding a little on the Lovecraftian side...
  21. But forewarned is forearmed — or in Orlanth’s case … well, you can make the punning adjustment, yourself — and the theist schmuck on the Clapham omnibus meets the gods “blind” (or at least “blinkered”)?
  22. Does that bode well for Cults of Glorantha: The Lunar Way? (I realize someone commented on those other titles in this thread, and that's fine. I just wondered if the news overlapped.)
  23. To shamans, most gods will be "villains". They want something from the shaman (their soul!) which the shaman doesn't usually want to give up. So if your shaman encounters them, the gods will be devious and dangerous, perhaps offering Faustian bargains.
  24. Doh, Dead Place blindness - apologies!
  25. Thx @Scotty, although I did mention the dead place in the original post, but generally agree with your follow up answers. The players clan were involved in sending them into the dead place… loosely following the beer with teeth Lifethief scenario but adjusted to fit my own campaign arc. So the PCs were forewarned of dead place dangers, they are well prepared…and entering in storm season, so dust less of an issue, mud a definite issue, and the alkaline effects were warned and they are prepared … but nothing stops all that damage, and one is still wearing his dwarven plate armour….
  26. Gloranthan reality is defined by mythology, not by hard logic or physics. RQG, Magic and Mythology, page 8 You didn't mention the Dead Place in your initial post. In the Dead place, spirits become physical, so a broo acting as a spirit vortex would pop out a physical disease, or it's giant disease spirit would physically appear and bud off more smaller diseases, or any disease spirits hovering as a cloud would just precipitate out. I'd give them a SIZ & STR equal to their POW. In this environment I'm not sure they'd attack, and most would would likely wander off. Adventurers won't catch diseases. Yes. Although bear in mind the fine alkaline dust which hangs in the air, damaging lungs and burning skin. (RQG 124). Adventurers in my game would only travel there when raining as the dust was an hourly attack (POT = half max daily temperature) and daily vs metal armour. Travelling across alkali flats in the rain is miserable and your feet still need protecting. See Prax Temperature and Precipitation, RQG 122. Getting down into it is the biggest problem as the steep stream gullies are prone to flash flooding Yes, they'd appear physically and be released. They could be chased down, physically captured and forcibly taken out, then rebound outside of the Dead Place. Alternatively find the Father of Independants and sacrifice for Dead Place Ferry (RBM 40).
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