radmonger

Almsot all published adventures could be tackled by a party based around the bodyguards and companions of a young Irripi Ontor sage. Her diplomatic mission comes from the Great Sister herself; to undertake a Journey to the South.

Thereby demonstrating that Rigsdal definitely, without doubt, is _not_ Orlanth.

If that change had stuck, why do you think that would mean Orlanth _was_ Rigsdal? Apart from the fact they have entirely different runes and natures, if Orlanth is dead, and Rigsdal is Orlanth, then Rigsdal is dead too. So what's the point?

You can imagine an alterative history of Sartar in which Orlanth stayed dead. So many  Orlanth tribal and city temples rededicated themselves to the previously minor deithy of Rigsdal, just as those in Tarsh adopted Barntar a few generations earlier. Much magic would be lost in the process, but over time new shrines would be built, new secrets discovered.

You could describe that process, from a historical persepctiuve, as the Orlanth rune cult becoming the Rigsdal rune cult. But that doesnt mean the Orlanth became Rigadal. It's an acknowledged Gloranthan fact that any diety can have zero, one or many rune cults, in the same way a city can have zero, one or many football teams.

The thing that doesnlt work is to try to found a football team where there is no city.

On 7/20/2022 at 11:01 PM, Akhôrahil said:

I also liked a suggestion in HW that merely being invoked and railed against as an enemy in a religion is enough to pass some spiritual energy towards them, and that this is how purely enemy gods without much in the way of worshipers keep going.

While plenty of people in Glorantha believe so, I suspect the gods don't need worshipers. Plenty of gods preceded humans, and there is little correlation between cosmic significance and number of worshipers. Worship mostly strengthens the worshiper, not the worshiped. 

The thing is, with great strength comes great responsibility. If you have the magical power to affect the climate on the level of a Cloud Call or Bless Crops Rune spell, you had better use that power wisely.

Daga doesn't need a cult; he is the Other of one of Orlanths aspects/ In other words, he is the anthropomorphic description of what happens when priests of Orlanth Thunderous fumble the relevant roll. Every worshiped god has such an Other, because every d100 sometimes rolls 00.

4 hours ago, Joerg said:

How would this person be able to pass an identity challenge?

I belive there is Trickster magic for that.

But then I think some versions of the Orlanthi gender list have 'eurmali' at the end. Which presumably represents those who find it funny to sneak into sacred spaces they are not supposed to be in. This usually ends about how you would expect.

1 hour ago, Darius West said:

I could see the Lunar Empire weaponizing and reinforcing Daga so that the usual Aroka HQ didn't work, just to mess with the Orlanthi.  Watch their crops fail, their animals die of thirst, and their magic deplete.

I don't think that kind of mythic weaponisation would take the form of founding a cult that taught a 'cause drought' spell. You need their lands ravaged this season, not in several generations time. Surely by then they will be good Lunar citizens?

Instead it would be more a matter of a few magical specialsts and hero candidates directly doing whatever  mythic dirty work seemed most tactically useful right now.

1 hour ago, Jeff said:

An initiate of Barntar may become an initiate of Orlanth simply by sacrificing 1 point of POW to establish a link with Orlanth Thunderous. All the initiate’s Rune points with Barntar are added to those of Orlanth, and for that initiate, Barntar becomes effectively a subcult of Orlanth Thunderous.

Which brings us back pretty much back to the original topic. The first sentence there is duplicated under the writeups of Orlanth's other independantly-worshipped kin; Yinkin and Odayla.  The second is not. My reading is that it should be; alternatively there could be a description of what happens instead. As written it seems to be meaningless; by the base rules, almost anyone can so initiate, and so the close mythic connection between those gods apparently counts for nothing.

Note also the sentence under spirits of Reprisal; 'these spirits do not come into action when initiates transfer to an associate cult'.  They don't have that caeveat abput leaving a cult, so unless that sentence is an orphan from some earlier understanding of how things work, transferring between cults must be something distinct from leaving one and joining another.

Fully writing down the rules for initiation into subcults that also have minor independant worship would probaly take a paragraph or two; do you not see the advantages of writing that in one place and referencing it where relevant?

I think the obvious answer is that the initiation ceremony renders them significantly less biologically male. In particular, they can no longer father children. Those sufficiently dedicated to a nandan gender role may be ok with that.

39 minutes ago, Jeff said:

With Ernalda and Asrelia, it is that the Earth religion recognises them as different stages in the same goddess.

You mean like how Barntar is also recongnised to be Orlanth,  Ond so is  Vinga. Irripi Ontor is also Issaries, Than is also Atyar, and Yelmalio is also Yelm? How many gods are there actually that don't have close kin that share some portion of their identity?

As I see it, that kind of in-world mythic justification is the thing that game rules should support and reflect. Rather than the rules declaring a thing as impossible, and then in another part (the cults book) saying nevertheless, it actually happens. Some gods are connected at a deep ernough level that transfer between cults is possible. Sometimes 'possible' means a unknown and dangerous heroquest, sometimes it means talking to the High Priestess. For others, such transfer is genuinely impossible; any attempted heroquest would fail, or break the world[1].

You do bring up a good point that RQ:G has, with ratings in runes, an existing mechanism will affect how reliably you can cast magic associated iin runes you are weak in. If you have little storm or movement in your soul, then you are not going to be suited to Vinga. That seems to me to be sufficient rules.

[1] Some say this has already hapenned.

22 minutes ago, Jeff said:

Unless you plan to risk yourself and others by heroquesting upon unknown paths and transform yourself.

So now we are getting somewhere. It is indeed possible to magically transfer allegiance between cults; it is just that normally takes experimantal heroquesting. 

But what we also know, from the Ernalda cult writeup you posted above, is that in some cases this magic has been discovered, and is widely available. The Ernalda cult writeup says that an Ernalda priestess can become an Asrelain priestess without starting again as an initiate with a single RP. How does that happen if not by the use of some such magic? They can't all be doing experimental heroquests.

So all thet needs to be decided is in what cases that magic is known, and what are the conditions for casting it. Do the Hrestoli know some variant for ascending between castes? Do the Lunars know a ritual that lets an devout Issaries trader become an equally devout Irrippi Ontor trader? Do some Orlanthi clans know the secret of the Red Widow Ritual, and others do not? 

Maybe in the official canon Chaoisum Glorantha the answer is 'no' to all of the above. Maybe the stuff about Orlanthi widows dying their hair red and becoming Vingans has been oficially decanonised, and never happens.

To me, that just means that magic has been lost, and awaits rediscovery.

39 minutes ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

f I m not wrong, there is no issue of gender here, there is the gender "both", you are Ernalda the woman and you are Orlanth the man (in a vingan body)

I don't think that is right; Orlanthi society, per RQ:G, has 4 sexes and 6 genders. With the genders being orlanthi, ernaldan, vingan, nandan, helering and other. One of the sexes (mythically rere) is 'both', but you can't have two genders.

I would take that to mean being an initiate of both Ernalda and Vinga is going to be strictly taboo. Helerings may switch routinely, but they can't be both at the same time.

43 minutes ago, Jeff said:

If you had 16 Rune Points to Ernalda, why on earth aren't you an Earth Priestess? That's massive commitment to your cult in any case.

I think the scenario would apply to a Rune Priestess too; if not more so. They can't dedicate that much of their time to both Ernalda and Vinga. So if it is at all possible for an Ernaldan priestess to become a Vingan, or one of the Gors, then you need something other than the current rules. 

Maybe a High Priest level spell Transfer Cult, following the template for Ban? With the effect of moving the Rune Pool of a willing worshipper to an associated cult temple in an approved way. Spells known that are not regainable at the new temple (generally those from associated cults, as association is not transitive) become one-use.  They can now  learn new spells as normal. Thye don;t need to pay tithes or maintai8n links with the old temple.

That then naturally works for Ernalda/Asrelia/Ty Kora Tek, the Lunars, Hrestoli, and so on[1]. Non-PCs who don't matter[1] don't get that spell cast on them. PCs are provided with an opportunity for roleplaying and conflict . In this particular example, there is clearly goping to some level of opposition, out of reluctance to let a well-liked and much-needed Priestess throwing her life away in vengeance,. But she has the myths on her side...

[1] Plus perhaps cases where you move from Orlanthi clan A to clan B thorugh marriage?

[2] and aren't described by the rules, in which it is literally impossible to have 1 or 2 Rune Points[2].

[3] Are there any NPCs in Chaosium supplements with 1 or 2 RPs?

1 hour ago, Jeff said:

You want to learn Ernalda's deeper mysteries - join her cult!

So, you learn many of Ernalda's deeper mysteries, having joining her cult 10 years ago . Then the Lunars kill your children, you swear vengeance, die your hair red, and initiate to Vinga. Both temple wyters and all of the priests approve of your decision, and so do not inflict any penalty. You stay part of the clan, but from now on you go to the Orlanth temple. You spend no more time there than anyone else, and don't pay a double tithe.  Do you then forget all those mysteries? 16 points of Ernalda magic is always going to be more useful than 1 point of Orlanth magic, even in combat, so why did it ever seem to make sense for you to do this?

Surely you now worship Vinga with Ernalda as an associate? By the rules, worshiping at an Orlanth temple with an Ernalda shrine[1] will refill a pure Ernaldan's Rune Pool.  So why would it not work for you?

It is just that you have knowledge of secrets you wouldn't have been abler to learn if you hadn't had the history you did, hadn't birthed and buried a child.  The rule about CHA capping the number of Rune spells you can know organically provides a mechanism by which if you continue to follow this path for more than a few years, you will gradually start to forget what you once knew. 

Or is it that the 'few exceptions' include all cases where there exists a myth or cultural expectation that this is a thing you can do? In other words, Orlanth and Ernalda, all cults closely associated with them like Asrelia, Yinkin and Odayla, cults with direct Lunar equivalents like Humakt and Issaries, and probably every other case where a player character might actually want to change cults for roleplaying reasons? So the baseline rules on changing cults only apply to something essentially no-one[2] in Glorantha ever actually voluntarily[3] does?

[1] are there any in Dragon Pass that don't have such a shrine?

[2] ok, Arkat. But note that when Arkat initiated to Kygor Litor, he did so as a mistress race troll, not a trollkin. 

[3] they do seem like they would work well enough for people captured as slaves and forced into worship. 

8 minutes ago, Joerg said:

I don't quite see why rune point pools should be transferable. It is not like you can yank your soul investment away from the greater soul of Orlanth and shove it over to Lhankor Mhy. And why should you?

That logic would imply that magic from every distinct mythical figure needs its own rune pool. So a starting Orlanthi character could have three Rune Pools; one containing only Dark Walk, one containing only Heal Body, and one containing only Bear's Strength. So I am going to assume that logic is wrong, if only based on the available space in the character sheet.

Orlanth, or Orlanthi society, approves of Orlanthi becoming Lawspeakers. It is not like converting from Reform Judaism to Orthodox, and more like becoming a Justice of the Peace[1]. Ideally rules should capture that distinction, lead GMs into running things the right way.

[1] A thing in real-world common-law countries where the lowest level of magistrate or judge is recruited from the general community and given legal training, rather being a lawyer all their life.

1 hour ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

What do you need differently from the rules ?

Explicit clarification that in such cases, you do not end up with a split rune pool, because every spell you know can be renewed at a temple of Orlanth. And that consequently, you only pay 10% of time and income, not 20%, because you are only actually attending that single temple.

In particular, it would be nice if the cult write-ups that supported such things could just refer back to the general-case rules for cult association and sub-cult membership. Rather than having to spend much of the write-up spelling out up new cult-specific rules, as is the case with the current Yinkin and Odayla write-ups in RQ:G.

20 minutes ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

You are Orlanth and want to become LM ? you have to work, learn new secrets, learn/develop the runes.

Yes, if as a teenager you run away and leave the clan, find work in the big city as a scribe, or somehow support yourself as a philosopher.

No, if you stay with the clan until your beard turns grey and your sword arm isn't as strong as it used to be. But, from those decades of life, and having solid values in the corresponding runes, you know more about clan traditions and laws than anyone else alive. People start to come to you for advice, which implies taking on the role of Lawspeaker. To help you into that role, you first gain the associated LM Rune Spell from the clan shrine. Then you make a point of going to the big city on the right Holy days to learn the magic that supports that.  Now the priest at the Jonstown Library may regard you as an uneducated bumpkin, but educating Lawspeakers is part of their religious duty, and they need your donations to fund their research. So they mostly limit any oppostion to dark sarcasms they think you don't notice.

You can renew all the spells you learnt at your local clan temple, so once you feel you have everything you need, you no longer need maintain active ties to the Library. You are still a full can member in good standing, i.e. an Orlanthi.

Maybe you even take to your new role beyond expectations, and establish a wider reputation as fair and wise. So a tribal or higher leader appoints you to as formal position as part of their retinue. You start your path to becoming a Rune level of Lhankor Mhy.  Your duties take you away from the clan, and your membership finally lapses.

1 hour ago, David Scott said:

Personally I don't really see the need for new rules that will rarely be needed, but I understand that's not the way every GM wants their game to work. I'm always happy to make up new stuff and bend the rules so we can get on with the game.

If you know how (your) Glorantha works, then I agree you personally have no such need for explicit rules. Now I think I understand how this area works, I don't really either. Though it certainly helps discussion here if everyone on the same page...

More importantly, it will help GMs new to Glorantha to learn the craft if the rules of RQ:G don't have an obvious interpretation that is quite so directly contradictory of that shared understanding how Glorantha works. It's obvious to me that someone 'graduating' from Ernalda to Asrelia is not going to be attacked by a spirit of retribution, and if the rules said they would be, then the rules would be wrong. But someone new to RQ:G only has the words of the rules to guide them in building that understanding of how the world works,

Odayla and Yinkin were new to me as playable cults with RQ:G. Until these two threads, I didn't have that kind of understanding of their internal cultural and mythic logic. And if anything, the rules were a hindrance in building that understanding. It is a bit too easy to interpret them as treating polytheism as if were the plural of monotheism, such that one more follower of Yinkin means one less believer in Orlanth.

The Red Book of Magic repeated and updated the general section of how magic works from RQ:G; is the cults book going to be doing the same for the section on rune cults?

4 hours ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

yep another question then, is there one runepool for Orlanth thunderous and Orlanth Odayla or because one is an orlanth's mask and the other a god, does that mean two runepools ?

I do think there are some missing rules covering cult progression or transition as opposed to initiation. Moving from cult A to cult B in a more or less  culturally-expected and magically-supported way seems inherently different from joining a cult as a stranger in town. For example, I can't see that switching from Ernalda to Asrelia, Vinga to or from Ernalda, Orlanth Adventerous to Lhankor Lawspeaker, or Humakt to Yanafal Tarnils counts as a new cult initiation in the rules sense. Surely there is some ritual where a powerful Ernaldan priestess widowed by Lunars dyes her hair red and becomes an equally powerful Vingan for a year? 

Odayla and Yinkin are just two cases where the lack of such explicit rules causes confusion. A quick suggestion is that in the case of mutually-associated cults, learning the spell provided by the association is the only inherent requirement. Though there may of course be additional conditions enforced by either side, at the level of cult, temple or individual priest.

You only get a 'split' rune pool if you join the graph of associated cults at two different starting points. In short, if you turned the cults book into a diagram, it would look something like this.

One distinction that exists in my Glorantha is between rural clan/tribal based society on the on be hand, and urban 'civilised' worship. In the former, basic initiation is by a somewhat dangerous[1] magical ordeal, with the outcome determining which god you are chosen by. Roll to join, as per the standard rules, the list of available cults, in order of preference or GM whim. Failing _all_ initiation rols has bad consequences; it probably shouldn't happen to a actually played PC. Luckily there are no shortage of gods to roll tests for.

Urban people generally regard initiating 15 year olds to Humakt as a war crime. Instead, initiation is not universal; it is typically associated with the completion of a professional apprenticeship, military training, or similar. It represents a test of the skills taught. Failure simply means you try again after more education, assuming you or your familiy can afford it.

Sartar has both, with an indistinct boundary . Much of the HQ-era material describes Sartaritre rural society, whereas earlier publication eras focused on cities.

[1] maybe a death per decade per clan?

4 hours ago, JRE said:

as 97% of the Westerners seem to be expected to use other magics

If you want something for that 97% that is immediately playable, and balanced with Rune Magic , simply say Caste Magic is, in rule terms, Rune and/or Spirit Magic. You get it by attending a temple, can cast it either at will or about once per season, and so on. You just need to write the 'cults' of Dronal, Horal and Talar.

That leaves actual sorcery playing roughly the role mathematics plays in real-world Western society. Fundamental to everything, but rarely an immediately-useable tool or weapon. In the model, one of the responsibilities of the zzaburi caste is to monitor and perhaps adjust what is locally avalable using caste magic to the needs of the region. They develop, research and perfect a spell, then roll it out to mass consumption. The hrestoli probably even innovate; everyone else is just trying to adapt what was once eternally true to the fallen state of the 3rd age Glorantha. .

16 hours ago, soltakss said:

Dating his Dad's MILF ex-girlfriend.

Redalda can't you see, you're just not the girl for me

I'm in love with your Earth mom.

7 hours ago, metcalph said:

I got the impression from the RQG rules that Tapping (specifically Steal Breath) was easier in that there was less moral objection whereas originally most Malkioni schools have forbidden the usage.  

I kind of like the dynamic where where you either get societal support, or routinely use tap. Perhaps with the option for ultimately transcending the need for either. Tapping doesn't need to be strictly forbidden in emergencies to be a thing you don't want happening in your neighborhood every day.

All the stuff with MP bookkeeping badly needs abstraction though.

It should probably work something like professional skills. 'Power source' would be a new type of skill, representing things like your level of magical community support, or ability to get away with tapping something noone cares about. Different skills would have different conversion rates, like different professions have different incomes. Roll once per season to see how many MP you can use to refill storage, or cast long-duration spells. If you fail or fumble, bad things happen. What they are depends on the nature of the source.

Doing something that causes you to have access to more MP, like paying for devotees to focus their prayers on you,  is equivalent to raising that rating. It counts as experience or training in the power source skill, not something you have to break out a spreadsheet for.

Meditation would be a power source skill, but one that return low rewards for with minimal risk.

3 hours ago, PhilHibbs said:

So game mechanically, what would it look like to have a system for creating a familiar, that presented clear advantages (otherwise why bother), but does not tip the balance such that Malkioni aren't the best sorcerers? Which we know that they are. So "best sorcerers" stems from something big enough that "having a familiar" really doesn't register on the scale.

But I think to be truly satisfying it has to be something that is incompatible with having a familiar. They don't have familiars, but they have X, which is incompatible but better.

It seems to me a familiar is an inherent advantage; you can cast spells at twice the rate, from two locations. You are twice as hard to surprise, capture or incapacitate, and can take it in turns sleeping. And probably the familiar can fly, sneak, fight or something else useful.

A basic system would be something like raising your Magic Rune gives you powers (or gaining magical powers raises your Magic Rune). Each such power has a rating; the sum of such power ratings you have cannot exceed your score in the Magic Rune.

A familiar would be a 5 or 10 point power, and so would come at the cost of something else roughly equivalent, say conditional unaging. Different magical traditions would tend to provide access to different powers in different orders.

22 minutes ago, PhilHibbs said:

It makes sense that there should be something there for sorcery.

To me, it doesn't; the presence of such an entity would suggest a impure or hybrid approach.

A Brithini (is the word wizard sitll used?) would perhaps say something like:

Quote

 

Zzabur was tasked with the duty of understanding of the world by it's maker. He did not delegate that duty to any mere spirit or tool. I am similarly tasked by my Talar with understanding the portion of the world he has responsibility for. I cannot provide him with sound advice unless I perform that duty myself.

If a primitive shaman dancing in woad[1] has  a spirit fetch, then I am my Talar's fetch.

 

Orthodox Mostali would say something similar; they do not ask the spirits what the machines they build do, they _know_.

[1] Here he is failing at his job, of course, not quite getting the distinction between shaman and priest.

4 hours ago, JRE said:

The same point as having an ally spirit, or in part a fetch. Potential magic resistance (if the famliar has higher POW), someone that can cast spells on you, or potentially others, without being easy to disrupt (very important with sorcery), that you can trust, and will not be subject to easy Dominate or Command spirit spells.

Those are argument _from_ the rules to Glorantha. So they are unpersuasive in the context of deciding what the rules _should_ be.  The others are not invalid, but are also not likely to be universal.

What we know from Glorantha is that sorcery can eventually lead to the kind of personal power level that causes the Lunar Empire to negioiate with you as a peer. And also that sorcery is rare enough that 'when 10,000 magicians have walked through this gate' was intended as a way of saying  'never'.

As Gloramthans aren't stupid, this implies that magic is difficult to learn; you don't reach the full extent of that power until your lifetime matches that of Delecti or Zzabur. While has been true of all previous sorcery rules, they have also the downside of making even experienced PC sorcerors mostly unplayably low in capability. Which in turn lead to a cycle of using hacks like familiars to boost sorceror PC power back up to match or exceed that of Rune levels, and then writing that into the game because the rules now imply all effective sorcerors must have familiars.

If I was writing such rules, I would say the one near-universal rules characteristic of powerful magicians is a very high rating in the Magic Rune. Such ratings would grant certain inherent heroquest powers, including improved resistance rolls.

Then I'd probably clean things up a bit by moving the rules about what magically happens when you hit rune priest or  full full shaman status to be tied to the magic runes too. So appointment as a Rune Priest would either grant, or require, such a rating.

That way, different magician archetyoes go upo in power more or less in synchronisation; it is just that the non-sorcerors eventually either die of old age or transcend mortal status.