14 minutes ago, mfbrandi said:

So how does our sun fit into this categorization? It is shining now — without requiring energy inputs — but it will degrade over time, and it is not clear to me that anything can be done about that.

Currently working, next scheduled maintenance is October 23rd, 97165471 CE.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_lifting

Some philosophy-minded Mostali have a fourth category, perfected, in which a thing operates without even the need for scheduled maintenance. This is a theoretical idea, one clearly never realized within the world. Or it would not be in the state it is.

i'm not sure magic versus non magic is even the right framing, in a flat world with a hole in the middle.

Perhaps more useful is the terminology used by the Mostali:

• working: functions according to its nature without requiring energy inputs
• malfunctioning: requires regular energy inputs from an external source (i.e. requires regular donations of MP)
• broken: requires repair or recreation (i.e. requires sacrifice of POW)

For example, the sun is currently working, in that it will shine on worshiper and non-worshiper alike. Before the First Great Repair, this was not the case. Such local sources of light and heat as did exist either required continual sacrifice to maintain, or become degraded over time.

Most human food production systems are malfunctioning, in that storms, droughts and crop blights require active intervention. 

The sea is broken, as the sun once was. Most Mostali consider plugging the Chaos rift at it's heart the highest priority for the next Great Repair.

At a guess, the Pol Joni have waha shamans, but not khans. Those shamans are very much marginalized weirdos, barely part of the mainstream trial culture. They probably follow personal geases, like _ride no horse_, or _eat only horsemeat_. They may or may not have ambitions for their personal magical practices to become the primary tribal religion, with their taboos becoming cultural rules. 

However it is one thing for a few magical specialists to follow some rules; after all Orlanthi healers are pacifists. For the whole tribe to follow those rules would be ecologically and economically impossible. And changing that would require doing the impossible;  a heroquest. There would be little support for this by the mainstream Pol Joni. It would change their way of life, as a horse that was a member of the Waha covenant would be a rather different animal than one that wasn't.

Also, failure risks the tribe literally becoming hippogryph fodder. So if they push those ambitions too aggressively, they are likely get outlawed or exiled.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Przewalski's_horse

You could do something with alchemy as an extension  of the sorcery rules.

1. modified alchemy skill /5 gives you your effective 'free int' limiting the intensity of spell manipulation
2. 'infuse' is effectively an additional sorcery technique that is added to the requirements to cast a sorcery spell.
3. generic valuable components and/or wild herbs provide effective mp to the potion
4. specific exotic components provides effective mastery of a rune or technique required by a spell
5. potions must spend intensity on duration twice; once for shelf lifetime and once for effect lifetime.
6. the base for shelf life manipulation is 10 (2 days); 1 extra intensity gets you a potion that lasts 4 days, 3 one that lasts 4 weeks.

So an alchemist, perhaps a follower of the Chalana Arroy subcult Arroin, wants to create an 'accelerate healing' potion. They have a skill of 60, which is modified by ritual bonuses to 80. This gives them 16 points of intensity  available.

However 'infuse command life' is three techniques, so the cost is 8x, meaning only 2 intensity. Without exotic ingredients, or sorcerous knowledge, they can create a potion which doubles natural healing rate for 20 minutes. This is mostly used as a hangover cure, but if no other magic was available might work to prevent someone from bleeding out.

On the other hand, if they have a supply  of alchemical essence that provides mastery of the 'infuse' technique, they could do a lot more. And if they have the liver of a walktupus, and are a sorceror who has personally mastered the 'command' technique, they can create an intensity 16 potion, with a shelf life of a week, duration of 2 days, and triple effect.

Which will cure most ills, and doesn't require any critically limited resources like castings of CA cult magic.

If i remember correctly, Cragspider's magical power in the dragon pass boardgame was to destroy every living thing in seven map hexes, on a scale where several military units fit in each map hex. 

That's a greater level of destruction than entire lunar magical artillery regiments. If that is some form of rune magic (i.e. power granted by worship or emulation) then the Cragspider must be channeling something big.

A 30 point rune spell would actually be pretty mechanically interesting. You could learn it in day 1 of a campaign, and then spend an entire heroic career trying to get your stats high enough to have a rune poll big enough to cast it.

1 hour ago, Jeff said:

Not all deities have power to lend, even to their initiates.

So it is possible to initiate to such entities? is there any restriction, or could you just go round declaring yourself an initiate of Arachne Solara, a random rock, or whatever?

Would that just mean you get the rune pool, but have nothing to spend it on?

i suppose there is a plausible case of an entity that only offered 2 point or greater spells, which couldn't be cast from a 1 point RP. And them maybe some of the entities that are normally considered beyond the reach of mortal worship, like Aether or Glorantha, could actually potentially give out magic.

All you need is to get your RP high enough to cast the smallest spell they have available. if that is, say, 30 points, then only the likes of Cragspider can actually cast it.

Lords of Terror (the 1994 RQ3 version of Cults of Terror) had cult shamans for both Thed and Malia.

5 hours ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

It also seems to me that broo "culture" would not support the long term  apprenticeship which develops shamans.  

 

Maybe a long term apprenticeship is only required if you want to give your apprentice better-than-even odds of surviving.

1 hour ago, Shiningbrow said:

I'm not sure that's what's been intended in the writings.

yes, your interpretation was common, and probably correct, for rq2 rules.  Initiates sacrificed POW, lay members didn't.

To go from vampires to squids, tales of the reaching moon #10 has a Magasta cult writeup. That has not-always-voluntary 'initiates', who have to donate an additional 2 POW annually to remain a member, but get no magical benefits. While the full priests get to summon kraken.

Part of the change in RQ:G to give initiates reusable rune magic was effectively dropping the initiation tax. 1 POW gets you first cult RP, or your 10th. So now the rules distinction between lay members and initiates is whether they have cult RP, not whether they spent POW.

So I'd imagine a RQ:G writeup of that version of Magasta would have it be  lay members who do the sacrificing, as in the Malia and Vivamort, and maybe it doesn't have initiate members at all.

is the unlife rune still canonical? if so, is it a condition or form? 

1 hour ago, Shiningbrow said:

You seem to be doing the opposite of what I was thinking.

Which i guess shows that, while NPCs can do what they want, if you want to have players initiate in a cult, you probably are well served by writing down what their magic can do.  The rune spell format works well for this, although sometimes one of the other magic systems works better.

Conceal Terrain is one spell, Find Lost Path would be another. Someone who is an initiate in a cult is, more or less by definition, going to know which it is they are doing when they use their powers. And everything is going to play much smoother if the character, player and gm are all on the same page as to how things work.

41 minutes ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

The fact is, Glorantha is based on Earth.

Note that Gloranthan vampires react to the death rune in a similar way to traditional vampires do the cross. I think that shows Glorantha is based on myths and legends of earth, and not earth itself as understood by scientists.

So anything believed by some group of humans at some point is fair game as any of

• the basis for how things really work 
• a system some group shapes the world into by force of magic
• a delusional mistake that hasn't yet caused an unrecoverable catastrophe

A lot of play is sorting out which is which. For example, the Lunars think they are the first, and Argrath would say they are the last. A detached western observer may well pick the middle option.

37 minutes ago, Shiningbrow said:

even have POW sacrificed to (ie, making initiates)

i agree all that kind of stuff happens. All I'm disagreeing on is terminology. You think sacrificing pow makes you an initiate, even if the entity sacrificed to takes that gift and uses it to do something other than forge a link to the worshiper. for example directly saving the world. rather than empowering worshipers to save the world, as is is typical of cults that follow the myth of the great compromise.

The 'i.e.' makes it seem like saying spending money gets you a car. Which ignores the fact that if you instead give the money to charity, you don't get a car. So you then become someone who has spent money, but is not a car-owner

For another example , in the current bestiary entry for vampire, it says:

Then initiates and victims must give POW and hit points (blood) to the new vampire.

1 hour ago, Shiningbrow said:

I can definitely imagine this in the middle of Prax, where a local watering hole will have a spirit that keeps the pool full for initiates, but may mysteriously evaporate when non-initiates are near.

Given that is only present for initiates, it an be perfectly well written up as a rune spell based on the runes of illusion and water. After all, gloranthan illusions can be real enough to be nourishing.

Mirage: 1 point, duration 7 days

You perceive [place] as lush and vibrant, and can gather a basic nourishing diet of water and fruit with minimal effort, and  without requiring a survival roll . Food and drink gathered in this way cannot be shared with others, and disappears after the duration ends.. The spell immediately ends if you kill an oasis creature. Once the duration ends, you will become thirsty somewhat more rapidly than normal, as the illusionary water dissipates. However you don't suffer any ongoing effect of malnutrition or dehydration, as your body was supplied with what it needed so long as the spell was active.

Creating an oasis that can support non-initiates would be a much larger spell, typically a ritual enchantment. In this case, the entity actually performing that ritual could be a mortal sorcerer or shaman as easily as a spirit or deity. And those supplying the POW could be victims as easily as lay members.

But will rarely be initiates, because the two things are competing solutions to the same problem.

I agree it is perfectly possible to initiate into a cult and get a gift, secret skill, or other magic power instead of, or in addition to, a rune spell. it might be a reasonable rule extension that some those things add to your rune pool?

However the key thing about saving/destroying the village/world is that that is not a benefit that can easily be restricted to initiates. 

One relevant reference I have handy is the RQ3 Malia cult writeup, which has

- proprietary worship, where you sacrifice a POW in return for catching diseases last 

- initiate membership, where you fully commit to helping spread diseases, and are granted magic to help you do so.

Also, if there  anything in the rules that gives initiates easier pow gain rolls, i am missing it; the only benefit mentioned under the worship skill is regaining of rune points. Which naturally lay members don't get as they have none.

2 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

There is NO requirement that the deity/spirit gives anything back to the initiate - at all!

Glendower: I can call the spirits from the vasty deep.
Hotspur: Why, so can I, or so can any man;
But will they come, when you do call for them?”

Anyone can worship anything. But being an initiate of a cult is, in the RQ:G rules, defined as being one of those those who get something back. In a rune cult, this is a rune spell; other types of cult may provide other types of magic.

Some rune cults do require a sacrifice of pow to join at all; those who take that deal. getting nothing magical back, are lay members.

Note that this is a change from previous versions of the rules, where initiation merely gave you the ability to learn rune magic, and even that was one use. Anyone is, of course, free to change it back. But I think it is worth stressing that the change exists, as a lot of old hands seem to sometimes forget.

To me, it is a logical change from a world-building and play perspective. players will except to show up at the temple in the next city over and be recognized as an initiate.  And as Linkedin isn't really a bronze age technology, that means initiation more or less has to be a magically-visible status.  The descriptions of spells that provide magical visibility seem to support that, in that they are called out as providing an estimate of the size and nature of rune pools.

i suppose there could be an edge case where you somehow have a rune pool in a rune cult but know no spells. It's not clear how that could happen,by the rules as it only goes up when you learn a spell, and always goes down when you cast a one-use spell.

My understanding of the current rules, and guesses on pending (unpublished) changes to them:

1. if summoned by a daka fal priest, or someone using similar magic  - ancestor cult
2. if summoned by a single shaman - spirit cult
3. if summoned by a number of shamans who share secrets - spirit society
4. if a permanent presence, in the form of a wyter, at one or more dedicated temples - full rune cult
5. if an integrated part of the wyter at one or more shared temples - subcult
6. if a permanent presence at a shrine in an existing temple, by agreement with the temple authorities - associate cult
7. if a permanent presence at a standalone shrine - minor rune cult
8. if a permanent presence in a mortal body - hero cult

For all of these cases, you initiate by learning a Rune Spell; there may be additional requirement or tests to pass to get to do so, but it is the process of gaining the magic that established the link. If the entity doesn't have a rune spell to offer, you can't initiate to it.

For the Rune Spell learnt to be reusable, 10% of time and income most be spent maintaining initiation status. For cases 3, 5 and 6, this initiation status is shared with that of the main cult; it does not add on top of it. Spells learnt are added to the main cult Rune Pool. So in principle that is the better deal.

5 is strictly better than 6, but requires both that the spirit support multiple rune spells, and that it be mythically close in nature to the parent cult, at a minimum sharing more than one rune.

Many craft guilds choose option 7, despite the downsides of multiple initiation, because controlling trade secrets is what guilds are about. the exception that demonstrates the rule is weaving, which is generally considered everywoman's work.  This is commonly taught at an Ernaldan temple (so male tailors have to be Nandan). A similar point applies to farmers, hunters, trappers and hired mercenaries. Other craft guilds have no rune magic; some teach sorcery instead.

Thieves gangs and bandits tend to choose  option 2, because long-term viability is not a priority. When the shaman dies spirit cult initiates typically lose access to their magic. But they probably died first.

Dead heroes can be worshipped at their tomb, if it contains their mortal remains. If brought back to life, their tomb loses significance.

Most of the time, the answer is 'a wizard (or rune priest) did it'; I guess this is one of the exceptions.

Alternatively, you could have potatoes being native to the highlands of the Red Moon. as such, they only grow within the glowline, and so far are too novel to get widespread cultivation. What does gets produced is normally disdained by the wealthy, and so ends up in the poor ration. However elements within the imperial government do have great plans for the crop.

Some claim it can nearly match the yield of maize, while not requiring blood sacrifice...

6 hours ago, Jeff said:

Correct. Heler is worshiped by most Orlanth cultists as Rain, the loyal follower ever at Orlanth Thunderous' beck and call. That's pretty much all he is - the source of the Rain spell.

That's in line with how I understand associated cults to work.There could be a Heler shrine in an Orlanth temple, just as there could be a shrine to a number of other deities, as per the temple size rules. Noone involved thinks those gods are the same just because they can be worshipped in the same temple; Theyalans are not monotheists.

The issue is that, if Heler is an associate not an aspect, the example given by David above breaks the current temple size rules (RQ:G p 284: worship [at a shrine] provides access to a single rune spell special to the cult).

I vaguely remember some previous version of the rules (RQ3?) having a Great Temple being able to contain minor temples to associated deities; if so, that would make sense of how an Orlanth cultist can access all of Heler's special rune magic.

So the apparent inconsistency may be a result of those rules changing in that, or some other way, or being dropped. Or he may have made an mistatement. or there may even be an editorial inconsistency between the cults books and the main rules.

As i see it, what really made Heroquest so hard to run as a new player was the lack of game mechanics to guide you in learning the setting. It mostly worked fine once you did, but getting there was not easy. If that is one of the motivation for using a crunchy system, then those detailed game rules really should to be consistent with canon Glorantha.

GMs can of course choose to bend or break them, but they need to know what they are in order to get to that point.

For me, following the rules as written, or at least as intended, works fine. 

Problems only really come if you look at the (to be fair, often very loose and informal) wording and think 'taking a strict reading, that could be read as implying this ludicrous thing'. 

Ideally chaosium would publish a 1.1 edition with cleaned up language, for example consistently using either  'engaged in combat' and 'engaged in melee' at the appropriate points. Meanwhile, the workaround is to understand how it is _supposed to_ work, and read the rules based on that knowledge. 

1 hour ago, Geoff R Evil said:

 Just general thinking right now...thoughts and ideas please

Remember to point out to your players that one possible outcome of that quest is the creation of a new tribe of equine morokanth. 

Hippogriffs work quite well for that; they probably already eat people. And would eat them more if not for the existence of bows and spears.

Relevant: 

7 hours ago, hipsterinspace said:

Having all 3 special rune spells available.

I suppose there is another possible interpretation of what a 'subservient cult' means. As per the rules, only one spell can be learnt at a shrine  An associated cult maintains separate cultural and political existence, and so ensures that spell is the same at every shrine. The shrine spell represents a formal alliance or deal that strengthens both cults. But they do not trade away all of their magical secrets.

A subservient cult doesn't hold that line. All of it's magical secrets have been plundered or given away to the cult it is subservient to. So all can be learnt by simply visiting each such shrine, and all renewed at any. As such, the cult genuinely no longer has a reason to exist. If it still does, it will be in terminal decline.

3 minutes ago, hipsterinspace said:

This post and this post, both from David, seem to directly contradict your assertion here.

I would suggest David there is using 'provide' to mean 'renew', not 'teach'. Otherwise that directly contradicts the temple size rules he also quoted a page or two back, and:
 

Quote

 

If your local temple doesn't have the subcult, you will need to travel to one that does

 

if your temple supports a shrine to a deity, you can renew any magic from that deity by worshipping there. This is, after all, how most Lightbringers work on a clan level. Your clan lawspeaker may have trained in Jonstown, but they live here. This just requires the deities be associates, not aspects. Which I _think_ is what David means by 'subordinate cult' versus 'sub cult'. A shrine in a temple is not going to have its own permanent staff, but will exist entirely on the good will of the temple hierarchy.

As always, if no single temple has everything you want, then you have to spend twice the time and effort to keep on good terms with both of them, and keep their divergent teachings separate in your head (i.e multiple tithing, and split rune pool).

Or else maybe the Invisible Orlanth movement is correct, and every god is actually an aspect of the big O,... 

- double post -

3 hours ago, hipsterinspace said:

I can understand that from a sort of magical division of labor perspective in a place as populous as Esrolia, but if someone can call upon all of both Heler and Orlanth Thunderous’s magic, it seems like that is going to completely discourage any independent initiation into the former.

I've not seen anything that suggests Heler can be considered an aspect of Orlanth, and so treated as an aspect subcult (i.e. flavour) of Orlanth. Instead, as Scott says above, he is an aspect of river deities like Engizi (or perhaps vice versa).

The way I understand Odayla works is that some clan temples support Odayla (aka Orlanthson Bearwalker) instead of Orlanth Adventerous. From the clan's point of view, it is very much a side-grade; they won't produce 'normal' Orlanth Rune Lords locally.

Six Seasons in Sartar, from the Jonstown Compendium, has the Haraborn clan who teach unique stag magic; it is still an Orlanthi clan. 

As an outsider, you can visit such a clan. If you are not at war or feuding with them, they may grant you the right to worship at their temple, and so renew any Orlanth rune magic.  If you were to marry or be adopted into that clan, you become part of it, worship daily at their temple. And you  are truly part of the clan the day you learn your first clan Rune Spell. In this case, you keep your own, because it's still an Orlanthi temple, so worshiping there will renew your magic.

Or, staying as an outside, maybe you do them some great service, and they let you learn some unique rune magic. When you return home, you can maintain renewable access to that magic at your local temple,. As Odayla is an aspect of Orlanth, you can do this without having to spend any of your time and energy maintaining a shrine, as you would for, say, Heler. However, either way. if you want to learn more magic, you still have to return to the temple that teaches that. Hopefully now you are an honored guest and they will do so in return for a smaller favor.

In cities, for some cults there are small temples that work much the same way, except on more of a commercial basis, explicitly expecting payment to learn magic. For Odayla, by it's nature, this is uncommon. Perhaps there is one small temple in Boldhome, sponsored and supported by those who see Bearwalkers as a military counter to the Telmori? For more, you'd have to visit Saird.

In effect, 'independent initiation' at a communal level is required in order to support 'subcult access' at an individual level. Someone has to maintain the temple a PC can learn magic at. That's the level at which 'balance', in the form of plausibility and internal justification, applies.

12 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

(I don't like how subcult-Odayla being just better makes standalone-Odayla a sucker's choice because how dramatically inefficient it is in comparison, but I guess this can be handled by roleplay as well.)

Well, if you are supposed to be ignoring the associated cult rules, both pale in comparison to subcult-Ernalda;-0