Brian Duguid

Many thanks to everyone who has bought The Children of Hykim over the last nine months or so. It has now hit Electrum best-seller status, which is an unexpected delight! To celebrate, I've added two more pieces of bonus content. There's a short "words from the shaman" type thing, for the Lotari raccoon people, which was originally prepared for a player in my own game. There is also a full (lightly edited) transcript of the Hsunchen episode of the God Learners podcast, featuring myself, @Joerg and @Lordabdul, for anyone who prefers reading to listening. (For anyone who prefers listening to reading, or doesn't want to buy the book, the podcast is here). http://tiny.cc/TCoH

I've sent messages to both now.

There are a few good images of hairstyles on the Well of Daliath: https://wellofdaliath.chaosium.com/concept-sketches-of-hairstyles-for-aristocratic-esrolian-women/ https://wellofdaliath.chaosium.com/hair-and-beard-guide-reprise/ There are also quite a few useful images under this heading: https://wellofdaliath.chaosium.com/tag/art-direction/

Storm Tribe.

There are a Craig Pay, a Mitch Lockhart, and a James Holden on the RuneQuest Facebook group. I can send any of them a message if you like, but people don't always pick up messages on there from people they don't know.

Given that Jeff has said it will have 19 cults and there are 19 cults listed under Lightbringers here, you can probably be fairly confident what will be in that book :-). And likewise for the 16 cults in the Earth Goddesses book, and I imagine similarly beyond that ...

Absolutely. We're all successfully GMing games in RQ today without a GM's Guide. We have player characters who can play as members of up to 28 different cults (core book + bestiary) with sufficient rules and magic to be getting on with - and more if we use RQ Classic or other material. I'm in the "will probably buy everything" camp, and look forward to expanding our knowledge and opportunities. But each and every book in the Cults series will do that, we don't need them all to get value out of the first group to come out.

There are quite a few more in the Gateway Bestiary as well: https://www.chaosium.com/gateway-bestiary-pdf/, which are for RQ2 but easy enough to use with the latest edition. The RQ2 Trollpak also has a few that aren't in the current bestiary: https://www.chaosium.com/trollpak-pdf/. As noted already, there are many, many more spread across specific publications both official and on the Jonstown Compendium (e.g. check out Anaxial's Manifest: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/377924/Anaxials-Manifest?affiliate_id=1107865). If you want an overview, there's an index to published monsters from before the current edition in the Meints Index to Glorantha: https://www.chaosium.com/mig3-the-meints-index-to-glorantha-pdf/ Personally: I'm more than happy with what's currently available. Like most people's RQ games, I don't play it as a monster hunt. You can encounter trolls many times, and the experience may be different each time. And much of my game is about interaction between human tribes and cultures. But if you are after monsters, there are plenty more waiting for you in other existing publications.

These are legit, yes? For sale on eBay, in case you need tiny RQ spaceships in your life.

Page 76, regarding Koth, the son of Argan Argar who became the cult's spirit of reprisal:

It's the same chart as per page 21 of the GM Adventures book, if you want the neat version (with a couple of minor spelling changes). That version omits Nameless, presumably because she is severed from her clan and family relationship.

See here and then the linked thread from that discussion: I can say very little else of assistance, as my players have just awakened Orgorvale Summer, and the repercussions have yet to be played out, and I don't want to share my thinking online! In my group, one Orlanthi and one Ernaldan chose to become initiates, which is nice given that Orgorvale is considered to be grand-daughter of both Orlanth and Ernalda.

I've put together a quick video preview for the Print-on-Demand edition of The Children of Hykim:

Here's something Greg Stafford wrote, back in 1988, published in a piddly little fanzine that I published:

Personally, I am happy to draw "from all ages of Gloranthan publication", to quote one very insightful reviewer. For me, it's all potential inspiration, stuff to draw upon in the same manner as Nick used GRoY. Grist to the mill. Toppings for the pizza. It doesn't matter whether it's right, so long as it's useful and hangs together consistently. Sometimes even the things that feel like they'd be out-of-place still make sense when placed next to each other (pineapple? Who knew!) Having said that I tried quite hard for conistency with current canon (especially the Guide to Glorantha). I don't really care too much about canon as far as playing the game goes, but I've noticed that some others online seem to care about it a lot, and I didn't want to listen to any quibbles about "no, it's not like that". Much more importantly, I took to heart a quote from Nadia Boulanger that an architect friend of mine shared: Obviously, we're not talking great art here. But self-imposed restrictions of some sort can be a way to focus the mind, and wriggling around to test the limits of that straitjacket can, for me, inspire ideas. It also acts as a quick decision-making filter: is this consistent? No, then it's out. Or find a creative way to make it consistent. They are both considered out-of-date, but I like my myth to be enigmatic and contradictory anyway, so it feels easy to grab and adapt as required. Material on how the culture operates, on the other hand, which includes the cult affiliations, is much more likely to be contradicted in the game rules, official sourcebooks, and other scenarios. The further you depart from the current norms of the setting, the harder it is for anyone aligned with those norms to use your stuff. And much as I believe in radical visions of Glorantha, I wouldn't personally spend a lot of time writing for the Jonstown Compendium just for nobody to read it.

Here's a concrete example, not a cult nor a deity, but a repurposing of something from the HeroQuest era. In The Children of Hykim I have a short chapter on the Puma People, who were introduced into Glorantha via HeroQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha and the accompanying HeroQuest Voices publication. A Puma Person had a minor walk-on role in The Eleven Lights. They are a non-Hsunchen shapechanging people, and I think they had their origin in a story by Greg. They aren't mentioned in the Guide to Glorantha, nor any RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha book, and I feel fairly sure that they have been retconned out of existence. My JC book allows you to use them as PCs or NPCs in a RuneQuest game, should you wish. I believe what I've provided is entirely compatible with what was said in the HQ sources, but doesn't repeat any of it directly. That was a choice, it's clearly not essential. You could do the same with Durev (I can't personally see the point, but set that aside). I think there are a few key points. If Chaosium had already done a Hsunchen book for HQ, converting that across to RQ:G would not be acceptable, however much paraphrasing took place. But there is scope to repurpose, to re-imagine (emphasis on "imagine"), to expand (with permission, if the kernel of source material merits it), and so on. Most of the chapters in The Children of Hykim are massive expansions on tiny paragraphs and even throwaway lines from previous official publications. It offers readers something that doesn't compete with Chaosium's plans but is hopefully useful, creative and entertaining. So for me that would be the interesting question for Durev. There's no point just reiterating the sub-cult in RQ terms. There's possibly little point doing a book that describes "ordinary" Sartarite life, given that Chaosium will be publishing their own Sartar book, and it will hopefully be definitive. But is there scope for a book about Sartarite (or other) crafting, in a way that doesn't just conflict with Weapons & Equipment? A book that provides gameable material on craft trades, their rituals, magic, guilds, objets d'art, scenario hooks, example tradesfolk characters, etc. Riffing on The Book of Heortling Mythology, where Durev was called the Woodwright, what could that mean in an RQ:G world? The myths say that Durev himself was carved out of wood, Pinnochio style. Just who is allowed to work as a woodwright in Orlanthi culture anyway? There must be much more scope in treating this outdated old relic as a jumping-off point for something new, than there is just repeating stuff that no longer fits with how the culture and its mythos is presented.

We know there are crafts with very specific magical secrets associated with them. Heat Metal is an example, a spirit magic spell that I assume is secret to Gustbran and related cults. Gustbran also provides Furnace Fire, and makes various Enchant (Metal) magics available to Initiates, that are normally only available to Rune levels in other cults. There are skills which have a clearly stated ritual aspect and may be reserved to particular cults. Peaceful Cut is the one that jumps to mind, it is essentially Craft (Butchery) by another name. Perhaps it involves the expenditure of fractions of magic points to placate the spirit of the butchered animal. My thought is that many if not all crafts do involve "magic", the knowledge of ritual secrets and the invocation of magical power. They are not inherently simply tasks that anyone can do; but for game purposes the magical knowledge involved is simply subsumed under the skill rating itself. Craft (brewing) is not just "making and flavouring beers", but includes the minor magics involved in that process (invoking the sprit of fermentation, or whatever). Craft (masonry) incorporates sorcerous secrets stolen or learned from the dwarves. These are guild secrets, and perhaps the carpenters guild in Jonstown does invoke Orstan the Carpenter in their rites, freemasonry style. But that doesn't necessitate a cult of Orstan, let alone a sub-cult of Orlanth the Woodworker.

I found this one pretty despicable to be honest: did they genuinely think it was okay to print and resell to others copies of something they had bought a copy of only for themself? Apparently, they did.

@Lordabdul - regarding the diagram of the Gloranthan cosmos, the original version is here, drawn by Mike Dawson from an original by Greg Stafford: The layout and text is almost identical to the original, although more gods and underworld demons have been added.

Not really, and it is a nightmare to do arithmetic using them. Presumably much easier using a Roman abacus, though i.e. a tool adapted specifically to that task. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_abacus

I was just reading Temples and Towers (and you have a new review added, @M Helsdon, because it's really good and astonishing value for money). Any chance of making some of the images and floorplans from that available as JC-permitted art as well?

That one is already in hand, although nothing the discomfort this discussion has caused, I'm looking at describing two alternative outsider initiation rites for my planned black elf book. 😉.

Fairly minor, but another fanzine: Imazine #17, 1987. RuneQuest hardback, pg 17, review of the GW RQ3 hardback.

This is certainly one point of difference. I didn't see it as cruel, any more than I see real-world ritual (and non-ritual) activities that involve piercing, scarification, tattooing and the prolonged endurance of pain as inherently cruel. As Effy asks, it's reasonable to query whether human initiation to Aldrya must only involved transformation, or whether a membership / allegiance option is possible. I don't have any issue with both options being possible. But if it's about transformation, we shouldn't shy away from the rites being genuinely transformative.

Controversial, no. But the real world comparison only assists to a point. It tells us that a process such as that described for elf transformation is credible in as much as it reflects experiences we have often seen described in the real world: it's not out-and-out bizarre. That is, it's consistent with a magical description of our own reality, although not with a scientific description. But Glorantha is entirely a magical reality. The real-world comparison helps in establishing credibility, but tells us nothing about whether the elf initiation rite is appropriate in Glorantha's own terms. I'm happy that it definitely is, and that it would be a duller world otherwise. If an elf wandered into this initiation rite and the candidate was not being properly disembowelled, they'd know both that cheating was taking place, and also that it simply could not work. I'm not trying to convince you of my perspective, and IRL I hold no religious or spiritual faith at all. I'm very happy that people come at this in different ways. But I wanted to acknowledge that some reaction (it's surgery, mutilation etc, and therefore not somehow appropriate) suggest an unsympathetic approach to equivalent beliefs in our own world (it's not mutilation, it's rebirth).