davecake

The Unicorn King of Huntwood - compare the Monoceros in Anaxials Roster

Very insightful stuff, Joerg. I love the idea that the Uncolings survive only by mostly spending most of their time in reindeer shape. Maybe they do this every winter, then recover their human forms, and human clothes, every summer? Does this even apply to children, who are not initiated? Could any possible Polar Light magic be connected at all to Altinela? There definitely seems to be a very consistent theme of the greatest Hsunchen shamans are serpent/dragon people (Hykim or Korgatsu), who represent a unifying over culture for the Hsunchen (and this extends to the Doraddi, who presumably learnt many of their greatest shamanic secrets from the Fiwan). Human non-hsunchen mostly perceive this as the Horned Man instead (and the doraddi see both the serpent and the horns). Wooly rhinos, mastodons, mammoths - According to Anaxials Roster, mammoths are god creatures, created by Valind, and Mastodons are spirit creatures, created by Valind, and the Elephant wars their part of the general god time Animal wars between god animals and spirit animals. But the Guide seems to reverse this, and the Mammoths are the spirit creatures, and the Mastodons presumably the creatures of Valind. The wooly rhinos (kunkorn) are also god-creatures created by Vadrus. It is possible that there could be bears that are not represented among the Rathori, if they were god bears. But we haven't heard anything about them, and the Rathori would likely war on them, so still probably not. Are the Neechen perhaps a human Valind worshipping culture?

I'd heard essentially nothing about Ketha before this, though of course there is the name kethaela, or her father Entru . It seems very much as if Ketha is another name for Esrola, used by the pig people. Ketha is associated with the boar people at the dawn, but certainly there is nothing about the name Entru associated with the Kethaela area during time, as far as I can tell, and for the most part they seem to have left for Slontos during the Darkness, presumably displaced by the Vingkotlngs (the conflict recorded in the Arrowmound story of the battle against Harand?). It is odd that the name seems to have persisted - whether this indicates that Kethaela and Esrola are not really the same goddess is worth discussing? Thereafter there seem to be, more or less, the Western pig people, who are proudly Entruli up until Palangio conquers them (and we can talk about later when we get to Slontos), and the Eastern, or Harandings, who have already accepted Orlanth as their leader god by the dawn, but are not Vingkotlings,

Is the Rathorelan Blue Bear related to the Tibetan blue bear, the Alaskan blue bear AKA glacier bear, or some different gloranthan species, perhaps one that is actually blue?

The rolling lead centipedes of Oral-Ta have always reminded of these M.C. Escher creatures

Anyone know anything more about the Neechen?

Lalja Vainemule is a bit too obvious a reference to the great Finnish culture hero Väinämöinen for my tastes (or Vainemune in Estonia), also a great shaman and a magical singer. Also, by making him an Uncoling, it kind of confuses the ethnic Finns and the indigenous Sami (who are far more associated with reindeer), which I think might be quite problematic.

Understanding the symbolism is the same as understanding the magical formula being invoked, which is roughly speaking the sorcerous equivalent of knowing the myth. Which is to say that it might help by avoiding total misunderstanding, but it reveals only possible obvious issues, not secret weaknesses etc.

The Nidan Council of Nine rule "all True Dwarves in Genertela" - one suspects they are True Dwarves in a 'True Scotsman' kind of way. I have always presumed that the Queen of the Kiss, as mentioned in Gunda the Guiltys description, was the same as the ruler of Zoria. but nothing says so directly.

Good example of why it's often helpful to post the art direction with the art on page 220 - art direction says the Loskalmi soldiers are clean shaven, the one in foreground has a very full beard. Good example of why posting the art direction with the art isn't always great on page 215 where several nearly, but not quite, identical sentences about the City of Brass are quite redundant and just next to each other.

Seeing stones - yes, palantir or crystal balls are the obvious, but there are other antecedents. I tend to think of the Shew stones of John Dee, just because they are in the British Museum and I've seen them (and because it's also part of that magic tradition I find useful as inspiration for sorcery). The most well known of these is an obsidian mirror of Mexican origin which clearly Dee did not create but there is also a round crystal sphere among the collection of Dee's scrying equipment.

The garishness of the robes worn by the Halkomelemites might indicate that it is a different shade of Blue than the Blue of Zzaburi robes (which I tend to think of as a fairly dark, rich blue). Perhaps it's a water Rune thing, for a major river site?

Mother point on the Swallow - yes, it is migratory, but it returns to the same nest year after year, rebuilding it if necessary, so it is a symbol of faithfulness and constancy. And I'd add that no single symbolic meaning needs to be the 'correct' one. The sophisticated Wizards of the order are quite capable of finding a symbolism that works in multiple ways to express several core ideas of the Order.

I find the imagery of the swallow flying upward towards the Law Rune, found on the shields of the Order of the Swallow, relevant to its symbolism. So it may represent the soul ascending towards the divine - swallows fly notably high. Compare the dove, which is known for its diving flight pattern, and so represents divine energy descending towards man. This is classic Christian imagery e.g. "I saw the Spirit descending like dove" from John 1:32 or for a non-Christian use of the same image, I'm struck by the Lamen of the OTO, which also features a triangle as a divine symbol (the European occult tradition that descends from new-Platonism/hermeticism is all very relevant to ideas around sorcery IMO, and certain aspects of Crowleys ideas particularly relevant to Irensavalism) So I think of the Swallow as being about man ascending towards the divine, as a complement to the Dove being being the divine descending towards man. The order of the Swallow, being made up of Wizards who have already ascended through the farmer and Guradian castes, certainly would think of themselves as being on a magical/religious upward trajectory through their own effort.

Omphis - the severed head symbolism doesn't make me jump to either Thanatar or Eurmal, but it does seem a nice symbol of transcendence of mortality. The 'each teacher has complete autonomy' aspect is a useful story hook for stories of corrupt or problematic sorcerous lineages of all kinds though.

Eeontree - it's interesting that the Great Trees are normally, due to being deep in the forest, inaccessible to non-Aldryami. But one of the Great Trees of the Erontree (the 'brown' deciduous one) is directly accessible as a stop on the Imperial Highway.

Croesium - formed where a fragment of the moon fell in God Time. This is presumably a fragment of the Blue Moon? The goddess Croesia does not seem a known part of any other moon mythology. The possible link to Varganthyr the unconquerable is interesting.

So why did the Eleven Beasts Alliance, who are all hsunchen, encourage clans to worship the Lightbringers? i can understand the later embrace of Nysalor, but the Lightbringers seems counter intuitive.

The text says the Great Tree of the Elder Wilds was in the Bear Woods, but was destroyed in the Second Age. But a great tree in the bear woods is marked on the map. A new one created since the destruction of the first?

It is also very helpful to look at the Kolat tradition in Sartar Companion. The core spirit society is the Seven Winds, and most (male, anyway) Orlanthi spirit magicians members join that, and after that may go on to join others. Joining that society is necessary to learn how to create your own powerful charms, etc. but only gives you access to six spirits. There are 5 other spirit societies that are part of the Kolat tradition (some of which may also be part of the Serdroda Earth Witch female tradition), and they must all be joined individually, and may require some effort to join (such as locating someone already carrying out those rites, or traveling to a particular sacred place). A shaman, however, has more options (such as contacting those spirits on the spirit plain, and directly asking tradition spirits about the rites if he does not know them), and is recognized as playing Kolats role, so can easily take part in the rites of any of these known spirit societies.

A bit of tangent, but - Not only do I believe that this is not strictly true, but Heretical dwarves teaching their sorcery to humans pretty much exactly describes the Flintnail cult (who teach a Rock Mostali grimoire to all cult members). Teaching dwarf sorcery to humans is certainly something an Orthodox Mostali wouldn't do, but it's clearly a thing that Openhandist Mostali would consider. This doesn't, of course, mean that they'll teach sorcery to just anybody, or do it without recompense. The Flintnail cult human sorcerers are still forbidden to teach it to outsiders.

i took a crack at how the Aldrya cult would work under HQG rules. One thing that quickly became obvious to me - most of the Aldrya magic that clearly fitted under the Plant rune was 'a thing that you have', and so was most readily represented in the HQG as a charm. Plant spy is a special plant whose sense you can use, tangle thicket is a special seed that grows into a thicket, a war tree is, well, a large tree that comes alive. Arrow trance, according to the spell description, works by melding your consciousness with your elf bow. So, how do people feel about the idea that all Aldrya magic under the Plant rune takes the form of a Charm, making Aldrya a mostly animist religion? This certainly clarifies the role of shamans. And i would still be treating magic cast through the Earth or Life runes as affiniities eg theist. Earth magic mostly deals with earth elementals, enchants copper, absorbing magic, etc. Life mostly deals with healing, gives then their resurrection spell, etc. Exactly where their camouflage and silence sphere spells fit in here is a good question. Possibly as effects usable by a select few who can use the Plant rune as an affinity?

i think that what isn't being taken into account in this comparison is that sure, elf and troll shamans are limited in their animist abilities compared to other shamans, but they are also both part of traditions that also have plenty of access to theist magic, which rather evens things out - neither tradition is in any danger of 'dieing out'. i totally disagree that there are no limits in game terms though, i just think those limits are compensated for in other ways. There are plenty of limits. Trolls have no access to other elemental spirits - that can be a significant limit. You have have no access to most possible captured or foreign spirits - your ability to suborn your enemies spirits, make unusual alliances, etc is quite limited. You are quite limited in your ability to learn new traditions if you travel and need to deal with spirits from an unfamiliar landscape. And being limited in the ability to access the spirit world can also be a real limit. but yes, being limited to a single rune is a limit, but not a massive one. In particular, trolls are creatures of darkness, so 'darkness spirits' includes ancestral trolls (and while i haven't heard of ancestor worship among the Aldryami, the same presumably applies. And yes, there will be Aldrya spirits that have the plant form rune but give access to unusual abilities through it. And so on. And to be honest, I very sincerely hope David is wrong about RQG - because if the 'spirit menagerie' of spirit types in the game is so limited and undifferentiated that it really makes no difference, then that does not bode well for HQG animism in general. I am hoping that RQG will not aim to be 'RQ2/3 shamanism improved', but something more like trying to implement the rich variety of spirits we see in the Sarter koH Kolat writeup, which currently is my inspiration for how to do gloranthan shamanism right.

i personally think each wagon is independent. I definitely think their lineage plants have remained unchanged.

The limit about spirit types makes a different depending on how the game works - I think in games with a rich and interesting spirit menagerie it is a bigger limit. Look at the Kolat writeup in the Sartar companion as an example for HeroQuest. In the main Kolat tradition there are 6 types of spirits, only 3 of which are air spirits - but if you look at the range of spirits they have access to via other spirit societies, its much more of an issue - there are 6 in the Chalk man, 4 in Oakfed, 2 in night listener, a wide range in Serkos, multiple different three bow spirits (5 different abilities I think), and none of those additional spirit societies are air spirits. So the shaman has a far, far wider range of options because they are not restricted to air spirits. the other thing is, spirits encountered and defeated in play can usually then by bound to the fetch and then used again later in play, and this option is not usually open to them. that said, yes, there are a wide range of darkness and plant spirits - its a real limitation, but not a crippling one.