GMKen

Now I may be overthinking things... So I took a closer look at the dimensions of the Elf Sea, and as far as I can tell it is at best about 120km east to west and about 65km north to south. This makes it approximately the size of the Great Salt Lake or Lake Khanka (which is freshwater and so probably a better comparison). So the first question that pops into my head is can you see the far shore? My physicist brain is trying to figure out horizon distances, but I realized that Glorantha, as a lozenge, wouldn’t follow those rules. Like I said, overthinking it... But I’m still curious, would 65km (about what, 39-40 miles) be a reasonable sight distance across a body of water in Glorantha? Yeah, and the depth question... Given the fairly gentle slopes down towards the sea, I wouldn’t expect it to be too deep. Then again, maybe a chunk of the Spike impacted there, punching the surrounding terrain downwards toward the impact site and creating a deep hole and birthing a water goddess to fill the volume. Or not. If shallow, then Frog Masks are definitely a good option. They would seem to limit your line of sight, though, making aquatic ambushes quite likely. Heh, heh, heh. Would provide access to any sunken wrecks of the living boats of the Aldryami, which would be interesting. Who knows what kind of lost treasures might be found therein...

Thanks for all of the great input. I do have Griffin Mountain (GM), and just ordered the POD so that I can put away my old copy and hopefully preserve it from falling apart much more (joining my 2nd Ed. rule book and 2nd printing William Church cover Cults of Prax, since I have the Kickstarter hardcover and Cult Compendium to work with). And yes, it is frustratingly light on details about the Elf Sea. Poking around the internet didn’t help much either, and I have pretty good google fu. The crocodiles I want to keep to the shorelines and rivers. Ideally the party is going to be sailing to a small island a few miles out, where there is some kind of decrepit structure abandoned when the monsters closed the sea. Elasmosauri and plesiosaurs and hadrosaurs are all dinosaurs, and so dragon-related. Hmmmm. Going to have to do some more digging into that. Why was there suddenly a lot of bad dragonewts showing up in the Elf Sea? Looking forward to Book of Doom if it’s going to have some good watercraft rules. Want to look for relevant spells in RBOM, but the dead elf edition isn’t due until Q2. Ugh. Yeah, I know about the pdf discount, but I work from paper. And the budget is already being set aside for the Guide to Glorantha (which it seems I can’t order through my local game store. Their distributor apparently has a lot of issues, hence the monthlong wait for the Bestiary). I do wonder how deep the Elf Sea is. Guess it’s going to be aluminum armor and tridents and a bag full of frog masks...

I’m trying to put together a scenario where the characters will visit a small island in the Elf Sea. Apologies in advance for not having the Guide to Glorantha or the Glorantha Sourcebook. As best I can tell, there is no boat traffic on the Elf Sea, although it was plied in the past by specially-grown elf boats. This ceased in the 2nd Age (IIRC), and has not resumed. Presumably because of the water worms and big fish and other big watery monsters. So, did the Elf Sea ever have Murthoi? Or was it just land-lubbers on boats? What is the movement rate of a boat? Haven’t found that one in any of the books I have on hand. What kinds of boats would we see? Curraghs would seem to be natural for Balazar, but surely the Lunars on the west end of the sea would have better tech. Unfortunately I’m still waiting on my local gaming store to get a copy of the Gloranthan Bestiary (ordered a month ago), so don’t really have a sense of what kind of watery beasties may be found therein. Not finding many water creatures with the materials I have on hand. Big fish just seems a bit too prosaic. Is there a really good source of info on the Elf Sea that I’m just overlooking?

Believe you me I get that the Johnstown Compendium is a labor of love for the Runequest community. That’s part of why I want to contribute something. But I’m a bit of an iconoclast that wants to create something unique reflecting my own experiences back in the 80s. So I’m looking at all the old materials, how they were presented, the layouts and so forth, and imagining how I can emulate that, but with a modern feel, while still completely retro. Part of that is the art. Did find a Pinterest page for coffeemancer, and it seems that they are focused on figures. Which is okay; if you look at the old Judges Guild materials they would often feature drawings of individuals as part of the art (Hellpits of Nightfang and Broken Tree Inn come to mind). Now I’m just cogitating on what figures would be appropriate to include, and where. Conceptually, it will probably be structured as a collection of 3-5 short, crunchy dungeon crawls, the sort of thing you might have found in the fanzines of the early 80s. While written for Balazar and the Elder Wilds, they will hopefully be the sort of thing that could be plopped down anywhere. After all, where won’t you find an old Zorak Zoran raiding outpost? So one piece of art could be a Dark Troll zombie to be included in that section. I do want to be clear that I will either be paying for the work of art or the right to use it in my work. Profit-sharing doesn’t work because there’s no good way to really verify the numbers to ensure you’re getting proper payment. Too easy to cook the books. Trust me [no, don’t], I worked in banking and finance for two decades, cooking the books on something like that would be child’s play. I’m not comfortable with that, so I have to insist on clear legal title for a commercial publication. It’s just the proper way to do it.

Some trollball plunder: Pom Poms of Power - these trollball accessories are created from long thin strips of skin from whatever creatures are handy. After drying the strips are secured at one end and imbued with at least one point of POW. In use they are shaken to create a loud rustling sound as the dried strips jostle against each other. The magic is invoked when the movements of the Pom poms achieve a certain synchronicity with the movements of the user (often called a cheer leader), as represented by a Dance roll. When this happens, the team supported by the cheer leader will receive a +5% on their next offensive play. This is cumulative, so the more cheer leaders able to make successful rolls, the greater the offensive bonus. Oddly, the trolls have discovered that this effect also works in combat. Sadly, troll warriors having squads of cheer leaders supporting them during combat never took off as a concept, as the cheer leaders represented a significant vulnerability. Apparently “All Cheerleaders Die!” was a popular Aldryami battle cry for a time.

So many conflicting feelings... -the libertarian in me says that no one is my slave, and you pay for the works that others do for you that they may prosper by their labors. [some Orlanthis] -the Republican in me says Capitalism Baby! Take the work of others and make money off of it. [Lunars] -the Democrat in me says Let us share the glory of a successful publication together. But I keep all the money for my...charitable RPG foundation. [also Lunars] -the Socialist in me says let us create something good together for society’s benefit. If there are profits, I promise I’ll share them. [yeah, right...And again, Lunars] Putting aside the political philosophy agendas for a moment, my first question would be “What do you have in mind?” Remember, I’m going for an RQ2 feel. So probably a Perrinesque figure on the cover, likely female. A couple of William Church homages inside. Haven’t thought too much about what else, though. So, what did you have in mind?

I’m thinking more:

Don’t forget the deep-fried pixie poppers. Delicious dipped in a nice blood ranch...

[Think 1950s-style cheerleading] Oak Land Raiders are the best! They belch and fart and $#!+ the rest! Destruction is the Z’rak Z’ran way! Wade on in to our trollball fray! Enjoy the taste of your @$$ We hand it to you good and fast! Enjoy defeat it’s all you’ll know, Oak Land Raiders are Go! [While a solid team in their time, with a winning record drenched in blood, their fortifications were reportedly overrun in 721 as part of the overall purge of trolls from the southern Elder Wilds, i.e. Balazar, in 721 by Aldryami and humans, leaving the Oak Land Raiders trollball team as just a footnote in troll history] [P.S. If it could be found, the outpost is rumored to have been home to some potent anti-chaos weapons...]

Trollball!!! That is all I have to add. Well, and it has been useful as I put together my own scenarios.

Thanks for all of the suggestions. These are great! I haven’t really considered an art budget (just trying to get a dungeon layout), but have been a patron of the arts over the decades. Now that I’m thinking about it, given that I’m going for an RQ2 feel, I may try to do a couple pieces myself in the style of William Church. His work always conveyed to me that the game was meant to be fun, even a bit silly. So I would like to pay homage to that. Thanks for the prod in that direction. And hey, it’s just three lines over and over, it can’t be that hard, can it? [yes, it can] That being said, I can think of a couple pieces that would be interesting to have. As an example, the unnamed Votanki hero who was trying to master the five elements to unite them against chaos used a combination of earth magic and strategically placed large fires to unleash a glacial lake at dawn (so dark on that side of the Rockwoods in the Elder Wilds while still day) from the Eleven Big Giant mountains onto a horde of chaos monsters. That image is one of many on the walls of the long entry corridor into the tomb. There’s no way I could do something like that justice. That would take a professional artist. Nowhere near that far along though. Everything is very raw and still on paper as the ideas coalesce (like the Alchemist’s Flask [q.v. Plunder] with a couple doses of Royal Jelly [q.v. Trollpak] in the Queen’s gift chamber. Or the Zorak Zoran raiding party whose lair was overrun in 721 [q.v. Trollpak] having a trollball team named the Oak Land Raiders (the playoffs were mapped on the wall of the mess {literally} hall). It would probably be early next year before I get to the stage of seriously looking at art. But it will be considered.

So I’ve been putting together some scenarios for my upcoming Balazar campaign, thinks like a tomb of a Votanki chaos fighter, a 2nd age troll raiding outpost, an aerie where might be found the wings of Trilus, that sort of thing. I decided to get a bit ambitious and started thinking about submitting them for the Jonstown Compendium to share with others. After looking over the preview that MOB posted for The Last Barrow, I’m realizing that my crappy hand-drawn maps aren’t going to cut it. Even if I take a stylistic approach of laying out the adventures like the old materials circa 1980, which is my preference, I’m still going to need to up my game for the ‘dungeon’ layouts. Are there any preferred or recommended mapping programs that y’all could suggest? I wouldn’t need anything too elaborate. But when the maps in The Sea Cave are better than what I can come up with then I know I need help. One of the reasons I’m considering submitting them to JC is that as I go through the latest round of Runequest materials, I’m finding that they feel very ‘scripted’ as compared with the RQ2 materials. I want to offer up some basic, crunchy scenarios that offer the GM more flexibility as to how they develop, or where they are located, and aren’t necessarily tied to some meta-narrative (though they will be in my particular campaign). Thoughts?

My local gaming store just got my copy of Pegasus Plateau, so maybe some spoilers in this discussion for those who don’t have it. Looking over the scenario, my guess would be yes. And looking at it more closely I might guess that some of the content has been ported directly in but updated. Kind of like with the new Apple Lane scenario, where stuff from the original round of stuff in the 70s/80s shows up as history in the current round of scenarios. In which case I’m even more curious to see the original scenario that led to a chunk of the upper tower getting blown out like Helm’s Deep in the LOTR movies. Alchemy, b!+€#3$! Now that sounds like a fun scenario.

Pretty much filled out the collection with Apple Lane, RQ Companion, and Trollpak, which has proven quite useful for a scenario I’m putting together of a long lost 2nd Age Zorak Zoran raiding outpost in Balazar. May have to get a new copy of Griffin Mountain to preserve the original one I have which is falling to pieces. Any chance we could see the scenarios mentioned in the prefix of Sea Cave as part of the POD lineup? Don’t worry, I’m picking up the new stuff as well. When my local gaming store can get it from their supplier, who doesn’t really seem to have any RQ stuff in stock. Pegasus Plateau is next on the list, which apparently is in another round of printing per the supplier. What I like about the old stuff, though, is that the scenarios had a certain flexibility to them that allowed me to slot them into my campaigns where needed. So Apple Lane could be a small village in far west Balazar closer to Imther and the civilization there. The Sazdorf holdings could be a barbarian complex in the Troll Hills. Duck Tower and Pond could be parked in marshy areas just north of the Elf Sea (where they’d be forgotten by just about everyone). Sea Cave is going on the Elf Sea, and who knows where I could put Miskander’s Tower, or Illyssia’s Grove? Pretty sure the Howling Tower would go in the Gork Hills, though...

Sorry to bring up Judges Guild material as an aside. For the POD I meant Howling Tower, Expedition to Miskander’s Tower, and Illyssia’s Grove, the original subjects of this thread.

I know I’d be interested in them, especially in the same format as Sea Cave. But then I was a GM back in the early 80s and am totally fine with the old school format; don’t need gloss and fluff, just the core content. FWIW I’m going to transfer the Sea Cave to the Elf Sea and use it as part of the characters’ journey up into the Elder Wilds. As far as the Howling Tower goes, weren’t there rumors of a vampire presence up in the Gork Hills? I plan to put the Hellpits of Nightfang near there, but perhaps there might be more to the rumors... Why not make them part of the new POD effort?

Old school GM here who is putting together a campaign in Balazar & the Elder Wilds which will culminate in participation in a hero quest to destroy the Festering Island. So I’ve also been looking for movies that could help new players get a feel for the stone/Bronze Age world of Glorantha. A few that I’ve found: Quest for Fire/Alpha double-feature. Both are nice examples of a hero quest returning gifts to the tribe. The addition of Windwalker would make for a great triple-feature. 10,000 B.C./Red Sonja. Equal servings of cheese, just in different flavors. Mmm... Warrior women... Vikingdom/Viking Quest. Speaking of cheese, the first has a certain Kung Fury vibe to it that makes it fun. In the second a water wyrm can only be appeased by the blood of kings’ daughters and a young man who plays with lightning undertakes a quest to shape the future. Pagan King/Last Warrior. Mmm... pagan fertility rites... and some good examples of fighting strategies like a shield wall. The latter has more spiritual elements, and the gods make known their presence. Both of these are very, very loosely based on historical events. The Last King - the Lunars are after the head of the bastard infant of the dead tribal king. Two warriors must protect the infant in its flight through the frozen lands of the icy north. Roar - a very young Heath Ledger undertakes a heroquest to unite the tribes of Ireland against the pernicious advances of the Empire. A fun and under-appreciated TV show. Musa (the Warrior)/Dragon Inn. The first will make you want to learn how to fight with a one-handed spear and features some excellent battle sequences. Dragon Inn helped serve as inspiration for the recent RQG adventure Highwall Inn. Make sure you bring your own chopsticks. There have been follow-ons, like Blades of the Dragon Inn that are also fun. Vikings/13th Warrior. The first I’m kind of meh about, but I get why people include it. 13th Warrior is brilliant and a perfect example of a game in action. (Okay, you need to make an athletics roll to swing across the falls. Make a move silently to sneak through the runnel) There are more that I’m looking for, but kind of focused now on putting my campaign structure together. The overall arc is 12 Rune Lords/Priests/Lord-Priests from mostly minor cults are collectively tasked with eliminating the wound in our world that is the Festering Island. They mostly don’t know who the others are, and the adventure will require bitter enemies to work together against what they think are their best interests to collectively fight a larger foe that threatens everyone. Adventurers will be in the entourage supporting their efforts, a la the Cradle Run in Pavis. They’ll start out adventuring north into the Elder Wilds around the Elf Sea, so Sea Cave, and then some Duck adventures (Pond, Tower and maybe Raven in the Roost) in the swamps and woodlands to the north. Eventually they’ll hook up with the main story line and shift to things like thinning out the chaos presence in the surrounding regions. So Scorpion Hall, Devil’s Gulch and my own little nasties. Maybe some vampire hunting in the Hellpits of Nightfang near the Gork Hills. Act 3 will of course be an epic experience of massive coruscating magics and last minute despair as a chaos monstrosity tries to force its way through the reft into reality. Oh, and the 13th warrior is a dragonewt. For some reason. No one really gets that one, but it is what it is. Happy gaming!