Ian Absentia

c. 1978-79 (monochrome and color covers both) Tusk Riders had a CHA of 1D6. However, low CHA didn't have the same limiting effect on Rune Magic that it does in the current rules -- it was all about the POW. !i! [Edit: As @lordabdul suggests above, the current explanation for the collision between Tusk Riders and Rune Magic hasn't been entirely satisfying, but they do get to do more with what they have.]

Yeah, maybe so. I understand that both "elfs" and "elves" are used in English, which may be the source of the Professor's commentary on the plural of "dwarf". It's fair to say that Tolkien gained common currency in the last century. !i!

Yes. And "dwarfs". This ain't Middle Earth. !i!

Ouch. The Family History is clearly the default, but the optional rules included as a call-out in the main body of the text are suggested for games or players who want to jump right in (the text of the call-out itself admits that Family History is optional and "can take quite a while" -- in my experience decidedly on the "+" side of "30+ minutes"). The OP referred to the simple paradigm of other games -- I suggest using them as an option for players who're feeling their way into the game first and the setting second. !i!

Especially with the rules for detachable limbs. !i!

@Psullie is on the nose, though, that the Passion and Rune mechanics in the latest version of RQ will help define what kind of murder-hobos your players are playing. Like I was saying above, let the mechanics guide your initial play, like when you're trying out a new video game for the first time. You really don't understand how your actions fit into the programmed game world -- you're just trying to understand how the mechanics let you break stuff. After a while, the mayhem becomes more nuanced. Either you move on to a new character, or you retrofit your existing character to make sense within the canon. Or...you retrofit the canon to fit your characters. Along these lines, let me further suggest that new GMs and players consider the character creation option on p.29 of RQG, "Skipping the Family History". The Family History section provides a very programmed and rather narrow approach intended to anchor your characters to specific events and places within the current canon, which may or may not help explain the setting to your players, and may be inappropriate if you're playing outside of Dragon Pass. Players may get shorted on skill, Passion, and Reputation bonuses that would otherwise accrue from random chart rolls, so give them a few extra percentages to make up for it beyond what the rules suggest. See also, "Additional Experience" on p.81 for characters older than 21, which you can reverse-engineer for younger characters, too. !i!

As I've recently observed in another thread, stupendous catastrophe in play is often the sign of a resoundingly successful session. After X number of decades of roleplaying (X being greater than 1 and less than 100), I can recount plenty of adventures gone horribly awry, but not so many of the ones that went according to plan. My best advice for RuneQuest is don't sweat the canon. Play it like you're learning a new video game. Let the mechanics guide you at first, run loosely with your general impressions, make a little mayhem in the process, then course-correct once you and your mates take a genuine interest in the setting itself. That's more or less how they made the game back at the beginning in the '70s, and if it worked for them it'll work for you. !i!

Passion: Hate (Mostali - flavor) !i!

I'm going to cross-post this idea from the Babeester Gor and the Elves thread. My theory (apparently borne out explicitly in other, more hostile Aldryami realms) is that the "rootless" elfs, by breaking away from their stable communities, are effectively cut off from the sustenance of the Earth. As a result, they have to procure their own means of sustenance, but out of deference to Aldrya they abstain from harming plant life for food and drink, making them strict carnivores and eating all meat-beings they kill. Rather than being aberrations from Aldryami society and culture as we've long been told, they are the mulching process of Aldrya and an integral part of the Growing Way. So trolls aren't the only ones who get in on the cannibalistic fun. Please note: Mostali are NOT meat-beings. They require special mulching processes. The trolls call this "marination". [Thanks to The Elder Scrolls for inspiration.] !i!

This probably belongs in the Your Dumbest Theory thread, but I rather like taking a page from The Elder Scrolls (itself derived in no small part from RuneQuest and Glorantha). In those games, the Wood Elves are strictly carnivorous in order to cause no harm to plant life. Translated to Glorantha, the rootless elves are no longer sustained directly from the Earth, and instead become part of the Earth's digestive process by, er, "mulching" the meat-beings they kill. Babeester Gor is a marvelous means toward that end. !i!

Witness the deflection. Invoke Skeletor, which was never part of the objection. And white people wear fezzes too! Never mind that the characters, portrayed by white actors, are dated stereotypes of indefinite impressions of late-colonial Arabs (or Persians or Indians, as depicted elsewhere in other garb). But definitely don't look back on the needlessly specific depiction of Latinos, blacks and feminists as criminals that was clearly supposed to fly under the radar while still registering with the reader. I take no great joy in hounding you -- I actually appreciate some of your posts about gaming -- but you consistently employ a well-known playbook with a coded message that goes beyond being merely politically conservative. And it's not okay. !i!

No resources handy, so please remind me -- these are bitumens, right? Crude oil/tar and coal? !i!

What's wrong is that being Latinx or black or a feminist is not bad or evil, but @seneschal has pointedly included them in an otherwise reasonable post on gaming as dog-whistles. You know that he's "winning" every time we have to call this out, right? !i!

So, @seneschal, updating early 20th century racist tropes to early 21st century racist and sexist tropes. I await your typical paean that you are, in fact, complimenting them by recognising that their struggle against adversity has rendered them competent villains worthy of inclusion in your games. Your dog-whistles are as clear as a bell. !i!

I have a copy of STOMP! right here, right next to an original copy of Kill Doctor Lucky as it happens (from Cheapass Games, not Chaosium). Lost my wine-stained copy of Credo, though, ages ago, so if Chaosium can push that re-release through the pipe anytime soon I'd be very grateful. !i!

In other words, a resoundingly successful RPG session. Congratulations! Yeah, I was going to point this out. It's sort of like Sense Chaos, only expressed as an ability instead of a skill or spell so the shaman isn't merely confirming (or not on a failed roll!) what they already suspect or know. Ah, shamans. I really need to make time to write that RQ:Ghostbusters scenario I've been mulling over. !i!

G'ah! Talk about blind spots -- how did I look past Solaris for a book of short stories? And if we're talking about "seminal works" that set the tone for a whole genre, Frankenstein and The Time Traveler both definitely belong on the list. !i!

C.f. Kieron Gillen's The Wicked + The Divine and Alan Moore's Promethea. !i!

A-hem. I'd reckon it's a distinctly Anglican lens focusing the Catholic prism that's refracting the Islamic/Buddhist source material. It's definitely an act of cruel parody. I was going to suggest The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but I see it's already on the list. I'm not aware of it's influence on the development of any particular game titles (Paranoia, maybe?), but it certainly had a profound influence on my Traveller campaigns. Little did I know the early cross-over influence it provided from Doctor Who. How 'bout Stanislaw Lem? The Cyberiad? Short stories, and probably more influential in the background of later, more famous western authors. !i!

I may have misunderstood, and I didn't mean to tut-tut you. Formatting of PDFs is a big thing with electronic distribution being so prevalent. Making a PDF non-transferable, non-copyable, or non-translatable are important goals in controlling online distribution. Now, back to that Hellraiser hot-take... !i!

By the way, you answered your own question there. [bold emphasis mine] Information may want to be free, but writers and publishers generally want some reassurance that they'll get paid. !i!

Might that've been me? I'm not aware of Rosenkreutz's "Chymical Wedding" being part of the French canon, but I've been beating that drum for years. Not that it would replace or invalidate the parasite or symbiote models, but would instead represent another competing world view in the Nephilim Diaspora following the "Babel Event". But look at that -- it's just another divergent theory from the original French material, which itself has undergone radical change over the years. It's fair to say that wherever they started together, the French and English language games have become different animals. It's my understanding that, as of several years ago, all involved parties have expressed a disinterest in doing so. As suggested above, there are conflicting views on what the Nephilim RPG should look like. That said, seeing the recent publication of translations of Würm and Aquelarre under Chaosium's banner...who knows? Things change over time. !i!

Perhaps the solution - and I have no idea if anyone's ever toyed with this - is making Specials and Criticals easier when dealing with small creatures (and, conversely, harder with bigger creatures). Currently, this is handled with rules for extremely large weapons doing geater damage against normal sized foes. Bear in mind that a Bow vs Bird is something like Catapult vs Soldier, and Catapult vs Giant is essentially the opposite*. What it really boils down to is the distribution of impact and shock over mass, with smaller and larger creatures feeling that impact on a geometrically greater and lesser scale, respectively. So rather than trying to scale damage along a linear scale (or, worse, leaving it static), increase or decrease the chance of a Special or Critical according to difference in SIZ range. Bows will start to wipe out flying birds (though, honestly, go back to my story about Rasputin the rooster) and will only very, very rarely be truly effective against a giant. !i! [Edit: Wait, no. Strike that. Like Bow vs Soldier, which is not the opposite.]

Ha, ha! I'm so embarrassed to learn that I was handed a masterpiece that I couldn't even read in its original language and told, "Yeah, no need to stay true to the original - knock yourself out." Now, back to that Hellraiser hot-take... !i!

Say it ain't so. The path out of the 1970s is going to be a bumpy ride. Coolsies. I'm interested in seeing how far back people proposed ideas before they eventually made publication (present company excepted). !i!