Prince of Cinders

A few from me:

1. Chaos destroys reality because it is the only thing that makes it feel whole.
2. Dragon Pass is weirdly boring and I am not sure why.
3. Mongoose 2e had some good bits in it.

I'm considering putting together a Jonstown book on Ralios and I'm putting together a history of Ralios combined with some bits of homebrew to fill in gaps and spice up the play dynamic.

I am taking all comments and criticism!

Recent Ralian History

Anything in Italics is not strictly canon, but is placed to infill gaps.

This history goes from when grandparents are at adulthood until the adulthood of the player characters. 

1561 - Grandparent is born.
1582 - Grandparent comes of age, parent is born. Marost is seized by Naskorion.
1595 - The Partanites attack a gathering of the Ancient Beasts Society in a raid called the Beast Butchery. The Count of Jorglaban’s brother is one of those killed in the raid.
1597 - Fleet of Jorglaban is sunken and the ruler of Tinaros is lost at the bottom of Lake Felster along with his regalia. His widow sacrifices her three children to get revenge and they say she lay with the Devil. Soon, Argin Terror is born.
1599 - Fleet of Partan is sunken by the Estali league. Rumours spread that this was done at the exact moment that Argin Terror uttered his first word.
1600 - Partan is razed by the Estali League. Rumours spread that this was done at the exact moment that Argin Terror took his first step.
1604 - Parent comes of age, character is born.
1605 - Surantyr the Non-Heretic overcomes magical ordeals atop Top of the World Mountains and experiences the Chariot of Lightning revelations.
1608 - Surantyr becomes master of Valantia.
1610 - Jarabolos is conquered by the Duke of Naskorion.
1611 - Surantyr conquers Fiesive and unifies Otkorion.
1613 - Kadesos (a city known for the quality of its kafl leaf) is conquered by the Duke of Naskorion.
1615 - Seshnela controls Dangim after the count is killed and replaced with a rival member of his family by the King of Seshnela.
1616 - Utorost is conquered by Naskorion
1617 - The Guild of Chaos Monks began their uprising in Dainmol.
1619 - The city of Dainmol is retaken by the Prince.
1619 - The army of Sentanos is destroyed by Surantyr's forces after the Hero Garundyer of the Seven Storms liberates Siglolf Cloudcrusher. This battle is thereafter known as the Battle of Falling Stones.
1621 - Meime the Tournament King marries Ingye the Queen of Galin. Scandalously, they are actually in love.
1621 - Great Winter, Year One. The Seventh Malkioni Council occurs. Surantyr the Non-Heretic is amongst those summoned and is severely injured before making his escape. At the same time, the Dangans perform a ritual to bind / harm Orlanth at Hreler Amali. One or both of these events causes Orlanth's magic to become greatly weakened in Ralios.
1622 - The trolls of Guhan complete a magical ceremony generations in the making. They move across Ralios with the help of the Argan Argar Chain although they are helped and hindered by humans all along the way.
1622 - Great Winter, Year Two. It is broken by a small group performing the Lightbringer ritual at Hreler Amali.
1623 - King Guilmarn invades Safelster to eliminate all Arkati.
1624 - Broo invasion from Dorastor into Karia. Hezel Darong is a new Chaos deity worshipped by their powerful shaman.
1624 - The Duke of Naskorion is wed in a ritual that takes place in utter darkness. Those few men who are invited must crawl on their hands and knees to find their place. It is said that he has married a powerful troll-wife.
1625 - Argin Terror performs a great ritual that Taps all Chaotic beings within Tinaros. For a brief moment, Tinaros is completely free of Chaos, before the energy flows forth transforming Tinaros into the City of Terror.
1625 - The Safelstran states finally unify and fight back against King Guilmarn, revealing new secrets of Arkat as they do so. During a battle at Dangk, Archon Foyalfine of Azilos betrays the alliance at a critical moment, leaving Guilmarn weakened but undefeated and the forces of Safelster scattered.
1625 - The Duke of Naskorion declares that he is allied with Guhan and Halikiv and titles himself the Stygian Emperor in a ritual that transforms him into a troll.

Here are some quick possiblities:

• Wounded / Weak - Arkat as a child or as a butchered man. Worshipped by the World of Losers Movement.
• Conqueror - Arkat as conqueror and emperor. Worshipped by most nobles.
• Hero / Saviour / Defender - Arkat as the defeater of foes to save the weak. Worshipped by everyone reasonable.

From Guide to Glorantha Page 385:

Quote

RALIOS: Arkat Returns

Five times! The ways of Heroquesting are abruptly opened, and it isn’t what everyone expected. One is a troll, one is a Chaos monster, and no one is quite sure which incarnation the other three are. The resulting Heroquesting provides awesome weapons of destruction to the leaders vying for power.

From this, I do not believe that this means that Arkat himself has actually returned (as so many people have seemed to assume in other threads), but maybe I am missing something from an ancilliary source.

This seems to mean that the HeroQuest paths for Arkat offer five distinct versions of him and at least some of them seem to not clearly correlate with people's vision of him.

Here are seven of the venerations of Arkat as listed in Guide to Glorantha Page 376:

Quote

Arkat Cults

An ancient Hero named Arkat once benevolently ruled this region. His long and complex history provides a fascinating and confusing story whose truth has been lost among the propaganda and lies of many centuries of oppression. Several philosophers and historians believe that more than one person named Arkat lived and were compressed by faulty memory into one character. Now, several fragments of the old hero cult of Arkat exist, most of them exclusive of each other, all of them claiming to be the genuine heir to the ancient secrets. Among them are:
GREAT ARKAT – Arkat in his aspect of Founder of the ancient peaceful kingdom.
ARKAT LIBERATOR – Arkat as the Hrestoli Man-of- All who liberated the region from an army of monsters and an army of Chaos creatures.
ARKAT THE SAVIOR – Arkat as the bringer of truth to destroy the lies of Gbaji, the evil Deceiver who oppressed Ralios and Tanisor.
ARKAT CHAOSBANE – Arkat as the destroyer of Chaos in all its forms. Stories are told that Arkat was responsible for destroying Wakboth and Krjalk in the God Time.
ARKAT PEACEMAKER – Arkat as the bringer of peace between species, commemorating the friendships he forged between humans, elves, and trolls.
ARKAT DESTROYER – Arkat as the incarnation of Destruction, whose worshipers believe that he came, and is coming back, to destroy the world.
ARKAT THE DECEIVER – This cult believes that Arkat was, in fact, Gbaji and/or Nysalor either before or after his fight in Dorastor.

And here is the description of the Arkat art from Guide to Glorantha Page 376:

Quote

Seven-Headed God

The seven-headed and fourteen-armed god Arkat, the Dark Emperor, is an important and contradictory hero-god-demon. Each of his different heads is associated with a right and left arm carrying or conveying the symbols of that aspect.
Peacemaker: This head represents Arkat as the bringer of peace between species, commemorating the friendships he forged between humans, elves, and trolls. His right hand is outstretched with an open palm in a gesture of fearless peace; his left hand is held out, palm uppermost, the fingers pointing downwards as a sign of balance.
Chaosbane: Arkat as the destroyer of Chaos in all its forms, bearing in his right hand a long leaf-shaped sword and in his left a thunderbolt.
Savior: Arkat as the bringer of Truth against the lies of Gbaji. In his right hand he carries a small bronze axe and on his left arm has a small round shield.
Great Arkat: Arkat as the founder of a great kingdom after the defeat of Gbaji, holding in his right hand a serpentheaded scepter, and in his left a rod and ring symbolizing his kingship.
Liberator: Arkat as the historical Western Man-of-All who liberated the land from Gbaji, carrying a spear in his right hand and holding a Law Rune wreathed in flames in his left
Destroyer: Arkat as a monstrous incarnation of Destruction, bearing in his right hand a flanged mace and in his left a black sphere.
Deceiver: Arkat as the Demon Gbaji, his evil nature betrayed by his taloned hands. He makes an esoteric occult sign with the fingers of his right hand and in his left clutches a flaming spear.

So we have two Arkats that we know of:

• Chaosmonster / Deceiver - Worshipped by the Guild of Chaos Monks.
• Troll / Destroyer - Worshipped in Naskorion and by Uz.

Notably these correspond quite specifically to two different times in Arkat's life.

So the question becomes:
Do these incarnations correlate to times in Arkat's life, to aspects he displayed of himself or to a combination of these? Depending on the answer to these, what are the three other Arkats?

I believe that there is Arkat the Hero in the Gods of Glorantha book and I would be happily spoiled on this. In fact, if Chaosium wants to send me an advance copy...

On 7/14/2021 at 10:34 AM, Prince of Cinders said:

• New Pavis
  • Conquered by Argrath Whitebull
  • Argrath Whitebull is possibly dead, possibly not, army destroyed by a Dara Happan demon
  • Who is in control?
  • Likely some (controlled) fighting between Old Pavisites, Lunar dissidents, Praxian tribes-men and Sartarite refugees

I discovered in the RQG Family History section, it mentions that Argrath returns to Pavis.

Unfortunate, as it makes the Praxians in Pavis a stronger power than needed.

1 hour ago, Akhôrahil said:

Canon is that he survived and went on to do the other Argrath stuff in King of Sartar, but you don’t have to go with that, and the increased volatility of having AWB dead (with room for a PC to replace, perhaps) could be fun for your game. Or maybe even more interesting if no-one knows what happened yet.

I think one of the things about Argrath is:

• There's obviously meant to be potentially more than one of him and either accounts have got it all mixed up or the past Argrath was intentionally taking hold of the achievements of the other Argraths. (A suggestion made about Jesus of Nazareth in the Bible etc.)
• King of Sartar seems to deliberately confuse him with Arkat. His "wolf tribe" turns on him and gets cursed for it is one example.

I think leaving AWB possibly-dead, possibly-captured, possibly-alive and free would be the best place to do it (especially with reports of him coming as dead).

1 hour ago, jajagappa said:

The demon turns out to be Cwim.  (And since Jeff is running that campaign, I think we can pretty much take that as what will be the canonical line.)

Until it's in a published book, I don't treat it as canon. 😄

And even then...

22 minutes ago, jajagappa said:

You can get a feel for the 1626 era from the Chaosium house campaign:

Argrath Whitebull, King of Pavis, is very much alive, though a sizable portion of his army was defeated at Hender's Ruins by Cwim (a Chaos terror, not a DH demon).

While the nomads were allowed to sack Pavis, Argrath is also very much in control, but coming to accommodations with locals.  Bits and pieces of Robin Laws' updated setting have been hinted at in various interviews, but we do not have any references yet as to where/when that is in the release cycle, but likely that Argrath is rewarding loyal followers with treasures, buildings, or even locations to "rule" in the Big Rubble.

As you note, the Big Rubble has not changed to any great degree (though MOB's Sun County history noted above has several significant events occur there).

 

Cheers for the campaign link!

I have a sneaking suspicion this is a "YGWV" sort of deal.

The Argrath Whitebull Gloranthapedia page (https://glorantha.fandom.com/wiki/Argrath_Whitebull) says:

• He suffered defeat in 1625 ST by a demon sent by Tatius but it is not known whether he was killed then.

The Army of the Bull page (https://glorantha.fandom.com/wiki/Army_of_the_Bull) says:

• In 1625 ST, it marched against the New Lunar Temple but was destroyed by a demon.

I need to read King of Sartar and check the accuracy of these.

2 hours ago, Runeblogger said:

MOB has been sharing the history of Sun County after the Cradle here:

 

Some really good stuff there.

2 hours ago, Akhôrahil said:

Robin D. Laws is making a Pavis & Big Rubble supplement that will bring them up to the current day. I have very high hopes about it.

Would love to see it.

1 hour ago, Joerg said:

Color me surprised to learn about the destruction of Corflu.

As far as I know, Argrath and other Wolf Pirate friends descended on the place in 1624 in a naval assault (I assume) and killed or more likely captured any Lunar-related folk, to ransom them or to sell them off into slavery. There may have been a few pleasure-killings, but I don't see many cases of revenge-killings, the people of Corflu are too insignificant to warrant that. Afterwards, Corflu became their base for a while - you don't destroy a place if you want to use it for a base.

Some of those Wolf Pirate buddies may have gone on to capture Grantland settlers for cash or workforce while Argrath summoned the White Bull brotherhood and coordinated the march upon Pavis, or they may have continued some coastal or commerce raiding from the port facilities (which are decent, and fairly well known to them). Sure, there are more pleasant places to have a pirate lair, but not in this region. The dragonfly priestess hired by Tolkazzi certainly would have received enough incentive to go on doing what she was doing while the Wolf Pirates were there.

When Argrath and the vast majority of his followers left for Pavis, would they have burned their ships and the place behind them, or would they have left an anchor watch in the relative comfort of the place?

I may have read "seized" as "razed". If I was a tribal ruler and I was planning to travel inland... I would definitely burn my ships.

One of the reasons people are so upset about the Valley of Cradles timeline is that it seemed to make an interesting, adventuring hook rich area into "Praxians come in and stomp on Lunar faces, they are so cool".

However, I have been looking through all the material and it's a lot more interesting than people think. The area has no real significant control as of 1626. Argrath has been defeated, most of his forces lost with him. New Pavis is a boiling mixing pot filled with people who very likely hate each other (and offers players the ability to be from basically anywhere).

The rest of the Valley of Cradles is in a bad situation. The Praxian tribes are still treating it as their watering hole while broo (and other chaos beasts) run wild up and down the valley.

As far as I can tell (after scouring near endless material).

Geographically:

• New Pavis
  • Conquered by Argrath Whitebull
  • Argrath Whitebull is possibly dead, possibly not, army destroyed by a Dara Happan demon
  • Who is in control?
  • Likely some (controlled) fighting between Old Pavisites, Lunar dissidents, Praxian tribes-men and Sartarite refugees
• Big Rubble
  • Pretty much use as-is from Big Rubble
• Corflu
  • New ruin
  • Undoubtedly filled with magical goodies
• The Grantlands
  • New ruin
  • Overrun by broo?
• Sun Dome / Mo Baustra
  • Probably still an independent fortified state
• Zola River
  • Plenty of Riverfolk on it after the destruction of Corflu

Religions:

• Lord Pavis
  • Some retconning suggests he had babies with every race possible to give a balance of elements
  • Partially limited Rune Cult, partially Sorcerous?
• Flintnail
  • Sub-cult of Lord Pavis IMO
• Zola Fel
  • Standard river cult
  • Probably has sub-cults of River Horse, Frog Woman, Cleansed One and Diros the Boatman
  • Possibly Lunar identification of the Cleansed One as an Illuminated broo?
• Lanbril
  • Minor cult but a cool one

Does anyone have any ideas of what is missing from the current lore?

If I write up anything good, I might try putting it as a Jonstown Compendium.