davecake

I'd interpret Bofrost being a 'Breath Shaman of Umath' as meaning he is of a tradition closely related to Kolat, but that also deals with Air spirits outside those that Kolat deals with, including spirits of the Vadruding deities such such as Valind, Inora, Gagarth etc. As befits a character who is a bit of a disreputable campaign antagonist, IIRC. He might not have Kolats connections to the Luck Rune though. Inora is a well known Vadruding spirit that is often contacted by shamans. Shamanic traditions usually are much less organised and have much more internal variation (and fuzzy boundaries), they are much more organic and more like generalisations about about a population of individuals within which one shaman (or lineage of shamans) may vary significantly from their fellows. And almost every shaman worth their salt ends up with multiple spirit cult connections that are specific to their community or homeland. Even if a shamanic lineage is tiny, or is just a single individual who got their powers in a unique way, they will still probably share a lot of spirit cult connections to other shamans in their community. That said, Darkness connections for Kolat: The Below Me spirits from their core Seven Winds practice are Darkness, but probably not what you are after. Their role is protective against the Six Foes: undead, possession spirits, spirits of Death, spirits of disease, and curses sent by women, and their taboo is never kill. The Sabi Varn, the "Night Listener", tradition has a couple of kinds of spirits, the Awakening spirits that stand guard during the night and awake the shaman when whatever the shaman asks them to wait for happens, and the Eye and Finger spirits that live in tiny sling stones. The Eye and Finger spirits provide abilities like Cause Pain to Intruder, and Frighten Intruders, and I'd actually probably treat them as just as example of spirit magic (Disruption or Demoralise) learnt from a shaman. Darkness spirits include Spider spirits. Grandmother Spider is from Shadows Dance, and she can teach a spell to cast Webbing. She also grants friendliness with spiders. Spiders can teach Spirit Binding in their webs. Raven is widely known, not just in Prax, and he is both a Darkness and an Illusion spirit, he can teach Invisibility and sometimes other Illusion and sneaking spells - he is a thief, and half way to being a Trickster. The Six Sisters are a group of six mountains, each with an individual spirit cult, on the border between Sartar and Prax - one of them is a Darkness spirit, the Wolf Sister, who grants powerful biting magic.

The Kolat write up in the Sartar Companion is still the best source on Kolating spirit cults.

Malkion recommends fish. (is an actual story from the Abiding Book)

And yes, things are a bit different to the normal switching back and forward of alliances between the tribes, because it represents some contact with an external power and their magic - just like the Pol Joni, the Pure Horse People in Prax, the alliance with the World Council to defeat the horse lords in the first age, alliance with Sheng in the third age, alliance with Paragua and other giants to destroy Robcradle, eventual treaty with Pavis, Jaldon Goldentooth and his weird foreign and ancient magic, etc. Individual Praxians tend to retain their ancient prejudices, but again and again the Praxians tribes have shown that they will pragmatically ally with foreigners, no matter how strange their magic, for advantage. The Sables allying with the Lunars are mostly unusual because the connections with the sable riders of the Hungry Plateau mean there are also ancient alliances.

Note the Vough in the Bestiary has a whip, but their whip attack seem special (it does 1d10, which seems a lot for a whip).

Yes. The quality of the answers in the RuneQuest Core Rules Questions recently is a bit variable. In some cases, worse than the uncertainty was.

Which makes sense, but I also thought the ancestors of the Daron, the heavy cavalry horses of Seshnela and Fronela, are descended from the Deskuval horses of Danmalastan - but I guess the ancient Brithini didn't ride them onto battle, just used them as beasts of burden? Or maybe dragoons? I see the Brithini horali as incredibly competent at arms, well protected with magic, and very inflexible and lacking in creativity in tactics. Attacks them in ways they expect, and they are in a lot of trouble. Attack them in ways they don't expect, and you have a reasonable chance.... once.

Yes, succubi are far more common in Pamaltela, and Fonrit in particular. They are common in Pamaltela generally because they are corrupted love nymphs (which are also common in Pamaltela, probably because Pamalt is still alive, notably also required for the life cycle of Red Elves) and probably (as with most of the Bad Things in Pamaltela) ultimately due to the Vadeli. I think the Vadeli deliberately would perform rituals of a sexually perverse and taboo nature to create succubi, that they could then use as spies and sources of discord in their battles with the Artmali and Doraddi - probably they even ultimately created the Seseine cult. Thats the ancient mythical reason, but their prevalence in the modern era is largely because of the Seseine cult (not just among the mortal population, but because the Seseine cult is maintained and spread by the succubi themselves). A think a lot of Pamaltela stories about Chaos etc result from ogres that are the children of succubi (as at Black Rock) - things like people who pursue forbidden love (of various kinds) or illicit power finding themselves having children with succubi/incubi who grow up to be wicked villains of various kinds. This happens comparatively less than the Genertelan pattern of ogres being ancient lineages of cannibal families. They tend to be more powerful individually, often great warriors and shamans. In Fonrit of course the Seseine cult is well established. Besides those who worship it purely out of perverse desire, it is also popular with the masarins who see it as a potent source of tools for manipulation and seduction of their rivals and their people.

Noting that Gorgorma and Bodkartu are cognates, and that Gorgorma teaches the alchemy skill and I think this is mostly knowledge of poisons.

I don't think that there is a god of poison - there are multiple types of poison, and all the different poisons have different sources. Krolar is just the deity of scorpion venom, but other venoms have different sources. But Bodkartu in Kralorela is a deity who is a patron of poisoners, and I think to a lesser extent Gorgorma in Peloria.

I agree with the general consensus that Vorthan is a native cult of the planet and the underworld. I don't think it has much cultural connection to Shargash or Tolat, but is the same divine entity obviously. Croesia is acknowledged as his sister, but this isn't important most places (except in Croesium, obviously). And Vorthan is also connected to the various entrances to the Underworld, especially the Red Door and the Pit. I agree that Vorthan will be one of the hundred gods of War worshipped by the Kingdom of War. I had a theory that of the Three Weapons of Talor, the Sword was associated with Humakt, the Axe with Babeester Gor, and the Flail with Vorthan, but it was just a theory. It might be interesting in the Hero Wars if the Vorthan cult realises the connection between their god and the Red Sword kept in the Temple of War in Spada in Loskalm. They might try to recover it to use for or against the Kingdom of War.

Yeah, Magic Crystals can be gemstones (though some are more mundane forms of mineral)

Yes, sorcerous cultures still have wyters, just different wyters.

I run some Lunar Demons as bestiary demons, but with the Moon rune instead of Darkness. Some as intelligent Lunes with extra powers. Some as other things according to my whim.

And that’s why there is a quite playable selection of cults right there in the rules book.

Dormal is in the Gods book. The main Earth pantheon deities are in there - including full writeups for Asrelia, Babeester Gor, Ty Kora Tek, Maran Gor, Voria etc. There is also a thorough discussion of the grain goddesses. And some other important gods of the region, like Caladra and Aurelion, and Choralinthor. That gives you most of the major deities of Esrolia. There are a few major deities specific to Esrolia that will likely be covered when an Esrolia related book is released - for example, Norinel, the goddess of Nochet - but you should be able to mostly run an Esrolia based campaign with what is in the Gods book. That idea of Esrolia being the land of 10,000 Goddesses of course doesn't mean they have 10,000 cults - those thousands of goddess include what we would normally categorise as hero cults, sub-cults, subservient cults that don't even count for anything in game terms (ie a certain being might be named as the source of a particular rune spell for the cult, but its exactly the same in game terms), famous ancestors, nymphs of various kinds, landscape spirits, or variants (for example, different goddesses for different plants and animals, even though they might be regarded as the one minor deity in other lands). They do have a lot of major cults, and a lot of minor ones too, but not insanely so - mostly they just call things goddesses that would regarded as something else by others, and like to distinguish between the roles of beings that might be conflated by others.

I know the Chaosium Fonrit book planned for HeroQuest was going to be set in Garguna, and some work has been done on it. But I do not expect it will be completed any time soon, there are other priorities and a lot of things ahead of it in the queue.

I couldn’t possibly describe what I’ve seen (I have the draft that was released at Gencon last year) as disappointing. It’s terrific, huge and rich. It has everything that was done for previous editions - like Cults of Prax, Cults of Terror, Troll Gods, a fully fleshed Earth Pantheon, a fully fleshed out Solar Pantheon, a mass of great Lunar material that is entirely new and opens up the Lunars for play as never before, all in one, all with new gods we haven’t seen before in the mix. it’s not the last Gods book we’ll see, it’s the first. And it’s an amazing start. Sure, I can’t wait for Gods of East or Sorcery of the West either, or material on Pamaltela. But once this first book is out, we’ll be better off for material in the core regions of play than we ever were before, and Jeff just made it clear there is plenty more in the pipeline.

But adequate for the major races. Enough that if you wanted to have Aldryami PCs you could, for example. A bit light on Mostali, but that’s natural. Very solid for trolls. There is basically everything you need for Central Genertela. The Orlanthi pantheons in detail, both Earth and Storm. The Darkness pantheon including major troll gods, and what you need for Kitori, Shadow plateau, etc. The major Lunar and Solar pantheons, enough to run a campaign in Peloria/Dara Happa if you needed, certainly for the provinces - more info about the Lunars than we have ever had. The major Praxian gods. The other major areas of Kethaela, like the gods of Caladraland. The Sea/Water pantheon isn’t fully complete, but everything you need for adventures that include the sea and islands of Kethaela. A few important foreign gods that are important to the story of Dragon Pass - like Ygg, who though native to Fronela is an important god of the Wolf Pirates. A very solid selection of The coverage of shamanism feels quite superficial to me. There are a few spirit cults, and the major religions that have shaman-priests are included, but very little that seems to broaden beyond that. You get a handful of pages about Illumination/mysticism, more than we had before but just scratching the surface - probably all you need for central Genertela for now though. What it doesn’t cover: pantheons from outside central Genertela, except where it is covered by ‘God Learner’ mention of foreign cognates. So don’t expect much about Kralorela, Teshnos, Pamaltela, East Isles, etc. or the native religions of the West. Sorcery - there are a few spells here and there in the descriptions of gods that also use sorcery, like Irripi Ontor. But no descriptions of the major sorcerous sects, Malkionism, etc.

I think the God Learners know only a very limited conception of Illumination - and it is intentional that they have striven to differentiate their ideas about it from either Arkati or EWF ideas about it, and so reject a lot of what both those traditions know about it. I think they think of it as a way to connect with the mind of Makan or Malkion. They regard it as a way to cleanse oneself and transcend certain sources of UnLogic (even though paradoxically, one must experience the seemingly paradoxical to do so - conceptualised as transcending the limits of mere mortal thought as necessary to approach the One from the current devolved world, to try to glimpse the Second Action). Greg would totally have regarded God Learner Illumination as a limited/failed mystic path and a mistake - but then, he mostly thought that about Pelorian Illumination, the EWF, Eastern martial magic, Sheng, and pretty much everyone except Eastern orthodox sages. Jury is out on Arkat (and pretty sure they declared a mistrial and the jury is never returning a verdict, and it will remain (deliberately) unknown for ever). In game terms - I think the God Learner version of Illumination has only a limited ability to Illuminate others (I think their understanding is a complex intellectual form that is very opaque to outsiders, and requires magical exercises on the Essence plane or heroplane etc that make it very difficult for non-sorcerers), and they are also very limited in their ability to combine incompatible runes, again mostly only able to unlock this ability via heroquest (though this mostly doesn't bother them unduly - they are still able to utilise magic from incompatible runes via sorcerous means like any other sorcerer - learning Death sorcery doesn't much interfere with learning Life sorcery, etc).

I think the God Learners are very intellectually and magically diverse, and this is obvious in Middle Sea Empire. It also evolved considerably over a few centuries, and went from being overtly hostile to Illuminated/Arkati thought, to being somewhat riddled with it. I think some of them were Illuminated, and some were not. Some of their acts required Illumination, and some did not - for example, the Goddess Swap probably did need some Illuminated insights, but notably Zistor and the Clanking City, being almost entirely a sorcerous project, did not. The Puzzle Canal is notably an Illuminated project, being a physical/magical structure that grants Illuminated insight itself. I think the Illuminated stream of God Learner thought can be identified with Malkioneranism, and mainstream un-Illuminated God Learner thought with Makanism. But as you can become Illuminated (rarely) without doing anything intentional, and a lot of Malkioneranist projects became quite major parts of God Learning, there is inevitably some cross over. It's also notable that other forms of Malkioni thought likely have a quite a few strands of Illumination running through them through Arkatism, or related Arkati thought. I personally think that Talor had secret doctrines to do with mysticism/Illumination, and like Arkat they are not inherently hostile to it, but are even more cautious - its something like the last temptation offered by the demiurge.

Yes. There are 17 of them because it was a necessary number to make the magic work - one for each of the Doraddi Witnesses. But not all of them were equally important heroquesters - some were of distinctly lesser importance and influence so their cult has survived only as more or less a Guild patron deity, and probably that only by virtue of the support of the rest of the cult. Some only got a role at all due to internal politics of the original conspirators (Alakhainas, for example). Some of them forged a new civic identity only mildly related to their original cognate role, and so are more important. There clearly was process after the heroquest where the different leaders contended for power and influence in the empire they were jointly building by conquest. Some played a major role in the heroquest and became magically more important, or may have risen in importance with later notable leaders. Part of it is that translating roles from a society of mostly animist relatively un-hierarchical mostly plains nomads to a civilised, urban, very hierarchical, mostly theists means some roles don't translate. For example - Dama is not a major member of the Necklace of Pamalt, but his role as God of the Dead makes him important to animists - he deals with ghosts and helps talk to the ancestors etc and I think becomes a patron of activities including both oral history (stories of the dead) and of some activities done at night, including some social ones (the history becomes the songs, and then dances, and so becomes part of the social fabric if not with much social power, as well as being magically important). That translates in Fonrit to his cognate, Udayankos, just being a patron of music - which isn't, as an activity or profession, given a lot of social power, though individuals may be highly regarded, and it doesn't need a priesthood or magic to sustain itself, certainly not a god of rigid centralised rulership, so we find his priesthood oddly noted for the arts of falconry and leopard training because they failed to control music as a profession. The cult clearly failed to make itself an important power of the hierarchy (I suspect they associated themselves with a traditional style of music that failed to be popular outside temple rites) and now is important only because its one of the 17 so must be incorporated in all the large format rites. The god Keraun is a beloved goddess in Kothar especially - the typhoons in Dark season and Storm season are mostly really unpleasant across the marshes where only goblins etc live, and are a welcomed source of water across the Kothar plains. She is the primary benevolent weather deity to them (in contrast with Sikkanos, the deity of bad weather - who would be a Vadrudi like Gagarth or Ygg in Genertela). But in Fonrit the Keraun typhoons are destructive and dangerous. And her cognate role, Lallamainu, has to symbolically represent the North, and so the Veldang, and she is given a role that Garangordos has designed to be unpopular and unimportant. But by luck she seizes on becoming patron of what seems a very minor trade - perfume, one with very little role at all in the Doraddi plains, associated with trade to the North (for the Doraddi meaning elves and jungle inhabitants*, rather than coastal trade). They are able to translate it into a very profitable trade - and so what to the Doraddi is a mostly benevolent and practical weather deity, becomes in Fonrit pretty much just a trade guild deity. * this trade to the jungles to the North is later supplanted by the Kresh providing many of the same goods but fresh and locally available.

We've had the occasional player that couldn't make the game in person play via Skype etc, and one player self isolated (due to what is likely a cold) last night, we are now using Slack (which has a nice like die roll app we use. We are planning to do that more if we have to, up to running our whole regular game via Slack/webex/Zoom etc and maybe something like Roll20. I'd like to know if anyone has suggestions other than the apps mentioned above. I know Roll20 has RQ support, don't know about alternatives. For those that did turn up, we have got everyone hand sanitising as they turn up, using individual bowls not sharing snacks, etc. We expect that my house will be isolated at some point, and I'm the GM and host, as my wife is an emergency medicine doctor and so at significant risk. We'll soldier on somehow.

More exhuming ancient Simon Bray content from the digest Simon Bray said, in 1997:

I'm quoting Simon Bray, from over 20 years ago, so thank Simon, I'm just good at searching archives.