mfbrandi

Before we knew the light of the Sun, three friends felt something nagging at the backs of their brains: there was something they didn’t understand, but they couldn’t say what it was; it was infuriating. The wisest of them said, “Be calm. Let us meditate. Perhaps an answer will come.” “Where shall we sit?” The wisest of them marked three lines meeting at a point. Now each had their own space to sit, facing the centre and the void. No one can say how long they sat, for back then the rise and fall of the Sun did not mark the passage of days. Perhaps they sat for an aeon, perhaps it was only a moment. Zorak Zoran opened three eyes, screaming. He burned, and soon others would burn around him. He said, “Now I see, but it gives me no peace.” Argan Argar opened two eyes. He looked around and said, “These will be useful. Xiola Umbar, why do you not open your eyes? Do you not want to know this new thing?” Xiola Umbar smiled and said, “Are my eyes closed? I think that they have always been open and that we have always been bathed in Light. But perhaps, my friend, you will always find comfort walking in the shade.” And she laughed, rose, and stood behind Zorak Zoran. She laid her hands on his shoulders, and he was quiet — for a short time, anyway. ————————————————————————————————————————— A new thread to get away from the gonzo Arkat stuff. A new telling of the myth because “for a time they viewed it from a distance” in the Trollpak version was bugging me.

Isn’t this what happened to Zorak Zoran? And man, I really stings. If an illuminant is burning from the inside, stand well back. Do not return to a lit firework. Aren’t the watchwords of the Orlanthi religion — seen capaciously — “there is always another way” and “violence is always an option”? These are sometimes seen as being in opposition, but one can combine them: there is always another way to unleash Hell. Arguably, this goes all the way back to Orlanth’s accepting Death from Trickster and using it on Yelm. Then the question is whether Orlanth is a numpty who acts impulsively and lives to regret it, or is subtle and playing the long game. In the long run, murdering the Sun worked out just fine, but at the time — oi! So just how un-Orlanth is improvising weapons of mass destruction? If I were the cattle raider on the Clapham omnibus, I would be terrified by Argrath’s shenanigans, but if I were Orlanth themself, wouldn’t I be looking down fondly and saying, “That’s my boy”? Again, Orlanth and the Orlanthi are a blindspot for me — or maybe grit in my eyes — so I may have that all wrong. As for Arkat (illuminated among the Aldryami, one supposes), surely he would stop at nothing to further his war with himself/plunge into darkness — ZZ Arkat was always in the cards, even if there was a post-war period of reflection in the Autarchy/Empire of Peace. So problematic how? Or problematic for the bystanders because Arkati, all-too-Arkati?

I don’t know though: as a naïve hick from the sticks, the Welshman is quite “relatable”, no? A bit of a Rurik the Restless. (I suppose it depends on the teller of the tale.) This comment is really just an excuse to plug the absolutely stunning film by Éric Rohmer, Perceval le Gallois.

I am not trying to say Argrath is Achilles, just that one should ask what the relationship between a people and “its” hero is. Achilles is a petulant child who learns a measure of compassion rather late in his short life. He may have “martial virtues” — which we imagine were important to Homer’s audience/readership, who might have to fight themselves — but these don’t seem to be unproblematic for Homer: the Iliad is a rather chilling read. Sure, she is his patron, but that doesn’t mean she is him. Still, you may have a better feel for this than I do. Why is that? I can see that when trying to rouse the Orlanthi rabble, Argrath might want to make it seem so, but would they go for that? I am not the person to speak authoritatively, but I would imagine that 3rd Age Orlanthi have some stories about Arkat and can see Argrath as an Arkat-type hero (Deciever, Betrayer, Destroyer), even if they don’t think that he is literally Arkat come again. If they do, then siding with Argrath is going to seem like doing a deal with the Devil — Gbaji, Wakboth, or Kajabor: take your pick — isn’t it? Taking the long view, that Devil’s bargain may be wise — because it gets the gods out of human affairs — but for the short-term goal of throwing off the Imperial yoke, one can expect a high price to pay, no? Now, I can never get a handle on the Orlanthi: they preach freedom, but they seem conservative. IRL, this is common enough, but are the Orlanthi supposed to be the NRA or the Proud Boys? Anyway, the ideology of Orlanth has him as a rule-breaker, an innovator, and someone willing to shed a lot of blood to get his will enacted or to satisfy his pride, doesn’t it? (Forgive me if I have that wrong, he is a massive blind spot for me.) Wouldn’t that make Argrath a pretty good Orlanthi hero, in the imitatio Orlanth sense? Doesn’t mean he won’t throw you — and Orlanth — under the bus, but being like Orlanth is not the same as taking tender care of Orlanth and his people, is it? Of course, if your hero does seem to embody your god (rather than being an ambassador for him), it might be hard not to follow him over the cliff. TL;DR: I don’t know.

Wiser heads than mine would have a better idea. IMO, I don’t think the Greeks thought x is a hero because x exemplifies the virtues (or flaws) of god, y. I also grew up thinking that the Greeks didn’t see the Olympians as moral exemplars — that is why I liked the Greek myths: a break from bible stories. I may be wrong, but I doubt I will shake that attitude at this late date. Well, they are both supposed to be wise, but he is whingeing, womanising, and devious, which maybe doesn’t fit her. (I see Athena as like Supergirl: the powerful woman who upholds the patriarchy — a “class traitor” if you like.) Isn’t Odysseus supposed to be more of a Trickster figure? “That man of twists and turns” is Fagles’ translation, I think — which might make him a Hermes figure if he must be compared to a god. And so back to Argrath as Orlanthi hero: that needn’t mean that he is exemplary in an imitatio Orlanth sense. But only @Joerg can say exactly what he meant.

Well … that still leaves open the question of the relationship between a people and their archetypal hero. I mean, just look at Achilles!

Derivations of Darkness, Cold, Heat, and Fire from Light: The cultic sigil (rotate at will): What are the cult’s runes? It surely cannot have all of these. Depends who you ask. Ostensibly, Harmony, Darkness, and Disorder — they seem safe — but in the right company, this is displayed: And that, I promise, is it.

We have already derived Phi and Harmony. Moon is a trivial derivation. We get Stasis and Motion by breaking the Moon and playing with the pieces. Storm is like Motion but diminished, an altogether lesser thing: Sea/Water and all the other straight line segment runes are too boring to construct. The Man rune is straight lines plus Light and the Moon segment we used to create Motion and Storm/Air. If we ever have any non-runic pieces left over, we just multiply them by Light. (This shows that Light is as much the void as Darkness is.)

Disorder from Chaos — Taken directly from a Transport for London project plan.

Harmony from Chaos (it was deprecated because they didn’t want you to know), Fibonacci style.

Well, we are not a million miles away from the plant rune, are we? All part of the secret of the light within, so be careful what you wish for.

Self-dismemberment is a core Arkat capability — like the cosmic dragon creating the world.

You say negative, I say inescapable complement or concomitant. Truth values are 1 and 0, not 1 and -1. More of this anon (i.e. once I have drawn the pictures). Derivations coming. Honest, guv!

No just running variations on light–dark using the truth–illusion superposition that was surely always intended. I thought about curving the arms of the truth rune to suggest the motion rune, but … nah!

Well, that’s how it looks, but I am increasingly of the opinion that Arkat the Deceiver, the Destroyer, the Trickster, really is on our side and suffers and dies at his own hand over and over again to “save” the world. Every time he destroys and recreates the world, it is a little bit better … and a little bit closer to its end.

A theory, he says. Could one get more Tricksterish than Arkat — “No, he’s Gbaji!” — Nysalor, the lozenge’s greatest one-person double act and magisterial manipulator of smoke and mirrors?

Invented to melt Valind’s Glacier and raise sea levels?

You shouldn’t need full Acrobat to add a page to front and back (if that’s what you want). For example PDF-Shuffler is free. If that won’t run on your platform, PDF Split and Merge probably will. Or message me and arrange to send me the files and I should be able to do it for you today — fingers crossed!

Presumably, it occurred to @Squaredeal Sten, as he immediately reached for flamingo-keets as Glorantha’s flamingos. Maybe … but possibly not good to lean too hard on IRL etymology of words “translated” from the Gloranthan. Also the theory that Durulz were a race (species) of birds cursed into humanoid form might have led people to hypothesize an original “purely avian” race of ducks that may never have existed (and then squished the words together). Either way, the Durulz might take “duck” as an insult. Could Durulz and Keets be hsunchen who were cursed to remain in an intermediate form? Maybe for embracing “modern” technology/lifestyles. If, say, all reindeer are Uncolings, then one might expect the avian forms corresponding to Durulz and Keets to be gone from the lozenge if entire species were cursed — which would be a shame. Bird hsunchen seem to be thin on the ground [sorry!]: there are the Flari owl people, the Ri-si woodpecker people, and that seems to be it — the Qa-ying eagle people having been retconned into wind children (yuck!), requiring an amusing switch of sides in the Battle of Six Herds (Guide p. 283 versus the earlier Well of Daliath). Still I have my fingers crossed for honest-to-god feathery dinosaur flamingos (although in Glorantha that’s a whole other can of wyrms).

I don’t know why, but I thought they were all parrot-like. “Flamingo” didn’t make it to the index, but here it is (Guide p. 108): I like this on p. 492 “Chili eating competitions are popular on the island, although the keets normally win.” Presumably this is because like Earth birds they are undeterred by capsaicinoids (birds spread chilli seeds, but the plant doesn’t “want” them to be eaten by mammals). The specification of keets as two to four feet tall might make for odd flamingo-men, if an Earth flamingo can be 187 cm (over six feet) and mass 4.5 kg. And pelicans roughly the same size as terns. The Procrustean bed of anthropomorphism. If keets are so into martial arts — must be a 1970s’ thing — you would hope for cranes. If Glorantha has the durulz, does that mean it doesn’t have “ordinary” ducks, or is that a sign that it does?

Please tell me Glorantha has flamingos. Even ZZ zombie flamingos:

Well, he looked inside himself and was burned by what he found. The man had problems. But there is solace in the Dark.

Yeah, not just Australia. I had thought of linking to the Wikipedia article on saponin, but I thought I had said more than enough, yesterday. The Salmon People better not get into it with the Aldryami. For anyone with JSTOR access, “Fish-Poison Plants” (mentioned in the Wikipedia article) from the wonderfully named Bulletin of Miscellaneous Information is downloadable for free. ———————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————— The TL;DR of “Fish-Poison Plants” is that such plants are widespread, have a diversity of active ingredients and so of speed and effectiveness/lethality, aren’t all soapy, are widely but not universally used, are often banned (and not just in modern times: e.g. Kaiser Frederick II banned “yew fishing” in 1212), some are effective as insecticides, some keep rodents away or act as rodenticides, some make crocodiles come out of the water (gulp!), eels and marine fish may be more resistant (but there is poison-fishing at sea), some are blistering agents (to human skin), some are cited in court in human-poisoning cases, and some are said to make the fish spoil more quickly. So it seems reasonable for Aldryami, fishing cults, and herbalists to know about the local fish-poison plants (for ideas of what grows where, look up IRL equivalents here) — some of which may be good for poisoning people or use as arrow toxins. Arroin cultists (and fish hsunchen) can be expected to be knowledgeable but very disapproving. Don’t say I never give you any gameable content. I am wondering whether one could make slug pellets for dragonsnails from some of the more extreme fish poisons.

Maybe the Zorak Zoran temple is a good place to buy soap: they have plenty of ashes and surely plenty of brains splattered about the place.