soltakss

How this is reconciled with the Trollpak version, I have no idea. It just doesn't mention how he wounded Kyger Litor/Korasting. Not mentioning something isn't the same as saying he didn't have them, for me. If one source says he had them and another doesn't mention them then, for me, it isn't necessarily a contradiction. The Trollpack version doesn't have the Devourer being made up of thousands of trolls, from memory, it doesn't mean that it wasn't the case, just that it isn't mentioned.

I always liked (A) Too Awful to contemplate

In RQ2, we played that an Allied Spirit with 18 POW was effectively an Associate Priest, so gained Reusable Runemagic. That was very useful indeed. Soltak Stormspear's Allied Spirit had Teleport, so if I became unconscious, it could teleport me out of there.

Yes, for me the wyter of a City is its City God, or Founder, if it has one. So, the City of Pavis would have the Demigod/Deity Pavis as its wyter. In this case, as a worshipped entity, Pavis also grants magic, of various kinds, to worshippers, which wyters don't always do. HeroQuests's hero band guardians also gave some abilities or magical powers to their followers, but I am not sure if this translates into RQG.

Ah, you have to do it properly. The PCs cut up Argrath into seven pieces, so he couldn't come back and did the same to Harrek, but bound him in a Lunar Hell, next to Sheng Seleris.

So, just use the published story line as a rough guideline and everything is fine.

Cowboys in the Wild West were not noted for their literacy skills, especially the ones driven insane by playing in Down Darker Trails scenarios.

Sorry for picking out your post, but it seems almost the exact opposite of the way that I play. A lot of GMs do. It isn't as bad as you'd think. Look at someone like Harrek, if you kill Harrek you don;t get the Wolf Pirates helping Argrath, unless someone else leads the Wolf Pirates. What you might do is to have the Wolf Pirates as enemies of the PCs who killed Harrek, which would be interesting. If they sided with Argrath then the Wolf Pirates would be against Argrath while the PCs were his allies. If they were neutral then the Wolf Pirates would hunt them down, perhaps. If they were against Argrath then the Wolf Pirates would support Argrath, so business as usual just without Harrek. If the PCs took over the Wolf Pirates, then they would do whatever the PCs wanted, but perhaps with resistance until they cracked enough heads. You can do the same with all the major NPCs. In two Gloranthan Campaigns that I have run, the PCs in the first campaign killed off both Argrath, as one PC saw him as a rival to becoming the head of the Orlanthi in Sartar, and harrek, because he was Argrath's mate and they thought he would come and get revenge. In the second campaign, the PCs disabled Jar Eel, killed the Crimson Bat and purged it of Chaos, then killed the Red Emperor, becoming the Golden Dragon Emperor. Each major event meant that I had to adjust what might happen in the future, but it was really no big deal. In fact, many GMs do this on a regular basis, If a scenario assumes that an NPC has a role and the PCs kill the NPC off really early, the GM has to adjust the scenario to take into account the NPC's death. Killing off major NPCs is just the same, but easier as the general campaign-level plots don;t impact the PCs on a session by session basis. I don't agree with this at all. In a Robin Hood campaign, if you kill the Sheriff of Nottingham or save King Richard from his crossbow bolt wound, does the campaign continue merrily following the official historical timeline? No, it changes. Same for Glorantha. The future Timeline is a guideline, nothing more. You are safe to use it as it is, use parts of it or totally ignore it. Now, some future scenarios might rely on some NPCs being around, but a GM can adjust them accordingly or just not run them. Yes they can. Yes they can. Yes they can. Treat the Timeline as one Alternate History that might have happened, it happens a lot on SciFi books/series/films and in historical fantasy works. Treat the future events as something that might happen and react accordingly. So, if Argrath is killed and a PC takes his place, what happens? Do they take control of the White Bull Brotherhood? Do they liberate Pavis? Does Kallyr support them or become Queen herself? In my last Gloranthan campaign, the PCs instigated the Cradle scenario, the Boat Rising, Dragonrise, the Liberation of Pavis, the White Bull/Stallion Society, uniting Prax and bringing back Pavis, Tada and Genert. Garrath Sharpsword, who becomes Argrath in the timeline, changed from being an important Pavic NPC to just another NPC to a flunky who turned to drink muttering "I could have been a contender if it wasn't for those blasted River Voices". In someone's campaign,m you are the GM and Players. You can take the campaign to wherever it leads, without being constrained by the official Timelines. You don't have to robotically follow the Timeline as written. I really couldn't disagree more. One of the conversations I regularly have with my Players is "Is this a major NPC? Would it matter if we defeated or killed him?", to which I always say "It doesn't matter, as I can work around it".

Now, for a very important sidetrack - Does the picture remind you of someone bending down and mooning, or a grumpy-looking penis? Being a Trickster, of course, it could be both.

HeroQuest.

You probably can, but it won;t be anywhere near as cohesive. A group of people coming together is a community. I think that the act of creating the community will form a small, weak wyter, especially if the community has an official formal founding. Even an Adventuring Party can have a wyter. HeroQuest had the idea of Hero Bands, which were groups of people banded together with a Guardian, essentially the same as a wyter. There isn't much difference, really. A wyter is more like She who Waits or Jinna Jar, the spirit that guards. A City God is normally the Founder, a real person who becomes a deity. However, once the deity has passed over to the Other Side, it becomes in effect a wyter that is worshipped. You could think of the wyter as being the soul/spirit of the Founder. I don't think that wyters are power gaming. They can be used to help clans etc. and people can then try to optimise them, but anyone who abuses a wyter for their own personal gains will find that the wyter is reduced in power and might not be able to, or want to, support them.

Welcome to the Internet, where most debates are pointless.

RQ3 Doraster has Dokat as the ghost of the city of Dokat, which wanders about trying to take revenge on those that destroyed it, i.e. everyone. That is clearly a wyter in RQG terms, but one that has lost its cores support and grows by destroying enemies, i.e. everyone.

dolts is fair enough, though ...

It might do and, in my opinion, it should. To quote Avatar, "And when we destroy it, we will blast a crater in their racial memory so deep, that they won't come within 1,000 klicks of this place ever again." The Dragonrise brings back a True Dragon, this also brings back racial memory of The Dragonkill, an event so awesome that it gives people of the area the Fear Dragons trait/Passion. Seeing a True Dragon rise again brings it all back, racial PTSD. Now, PCs might be Heroes in the Making, so might not worry about a True Dragon appearing, which is all well and good. However, as other people have mentioned, the political landscape of Dragon Pass changes after the Dragonrise.

In our RQ2 game, when we were at a loss for things to do, we sometimes played "Rich Merchants". Basically we'd dress in fine clothes with big coin bags hanging from our belts and wander down into the rough areas of town, talking loudly about how quaint these places were. When we were attacked by thugs or local hoodlums, we would "reluctantly have to defend ourselves", normally with a mixture of extreme violence and magic. When the Guard or Watch turned up, we would explain very carefully what had happened. Normally, we'd only do this once per town, otherwise the authorities would catch on.

That's about the only one that makes sense to me, as there seems to still be a difference in sizes between men and women. However, I wouldn't really use it in a game, unless someone asked for it for their PC.

They can be good fun to play. Lunars have gone through several incarnations over the years. For me, some of the ways of doing Lunar Magic is completely unusable, so I ignore them. What I do is to treat Lunar cults the same as other Cults. So, they general cult is the Seven Mothers, which is a catchall umbrella cult "Isn't the Lunar Way great? We can do anything". Many of the individual Seven Mothers are analogues of other Cults, so Yanafal Tarnils is like Humakt, Irrippi Ontor is like Lhankor Mhy and Queen Deezola is like Ernalda, so you can have them as fully-fledged cults performing similar deeds. Etyries is like Issaries, although not one of the Seven Mothers. Hero cults such as the Conquering Daughter, Hon Eel or Yara Aranis can be worshipped for special powers. The Young Elementals provide a lot of elemental magic to all the Lunar Cults, which is a big advantage. The Red Goddess cult is for Lunar Mystics and the Red Emperor cult is for Lunar Nobles. Above all, the Lunars accept Chaos as an integral part of Glorantha. This doesn't mean that all Lunars are Chaotic Monstrosities, but does mean that they can accept Chaotic Magic or use some magic and allies that would be seen as odd by other Cults. A lot of Lunars are Illuminated, because the Red Goddess met Nysalor and became Illuminated, then found her own way. So, you could play Lunar soldiers, scholars, traders, Sable Riders, healers, mystics or whatever.

The way I play it is that you need to give a proportion of your income to your Cults. If you are an Initiate then you give 10% to your Cults, if you are a Rune Lord then you give 90% to your Cults. The Cults then divide that up accordingly. so, a Troll Death Lord is almost always going to be an Initiate of Kyger Litor, so gives 90% to the Cults, which is then divided into effectively 81% to Zorak Zoran and 9% to Kyger Litor. Similarly, an Elf Light Son gives 90% to his Cults, of which 81% goes to Yelmalio and 9% to Aldrya/High King Elf. All Citizens pof Pavis need to be members of the Cult and many are Initiates, of they also belong to other Cults then they tithe accordingly, so an Initiate of Pavis and Yelmalio would give 10% to Cults, with 5% going to Pavis and 5% to Yelmalio. A lot of people play it differently. There is a reference to Bolthor Brighteyes, in Cults of Terror, tithing his money to several cults, for example.

The commoners just remained and converted to other religions, or retained their normal Malkioni beliefs. However, a lot were killed when Slontos rolled over or Jrustela broke up. The leaders, HeroQuestors and magical elite were mostly killed off in the wars and disasters that ended the Middle Sea Empire. Some, such as the Heroes of Tessele, just became so intertwined with the cults they founded that they became Heroes of those cults. Some were captured or enslaved, so Ralzakark has some God Learner slaves, who succeeded in awakening him from his sleep. Unlike Arkati, who became Guardians of the Other Side, the God Learners generally don;t take up such a role, as they were the Destroyers of the Other Side.

We know that Praxians eat herd beasts, although perhaps not every day. I see their food as being similar to steppe nomads and their descendants, so lots of thin soups with some vegetables, roast or barbecued meat, with dairy products, cheese, butter and curds. Drinks might include koumiss variants, but made from fermented herd beast milk rather than mares' milk. They get a lot of their spices and flavouring from the plants of Prax and the Wastes, especially from those growing in Ronance Trackways or around Oases. Oasis Folk, in my Glorantha, live almost entirely off the produce of their Oasis. Each Oasis has its own special, sacred, crop that grows especially well at the Oasis. Peoplegather the crop, dry it and eat it all year round, perhaps mixing it with other things grown at the Oasis. Some Oasis Folk also raise livestock at the Oasis, but this is surplus to what is needed and not essential. They also trade with Praxians for meat. Spices and grasses used for flavouring also grow at the Oases and some can be quite specific, only growing at one Oasis, so flavourings vary from Oasis to Oasis. Drinks are usually made from the Oasis crop, fermented and stored to age. Citizens of Old Pavis eat pretty much anything, due to their Pavic Survivor heritage, While this means that they can eat Rubble Runner, Insects and so on, few do, for it reminds them of the Bad Old Days. However, most Old Pavic families have a ritual meal every year where they eat the stuff that they survived on in remembrance of their history. Many Old Pavisites still grow mushrooms underground and grow things like bean sprouts. They catch fish from the Zola Fel and some know how to farm mussels and other seafood on the banks of the Zola Fel, or in specially-designed farms built into the banks of the Zola Fel. Some trade with the elves of the Garden for herbs for flavouring. Sartarites farm sheep and cattle, Esrolians farm pigs, with some sheep and cattle. They also grow the crops of their Land Goddess, so Esrolians grow barley. I think that people from Dragon pass generally also grow other crops, such as oats and wheat. They certainly have orchards, Apple Lane being the most famous. I see them as eating meat in stews, thick soups, roast meat, oatcakes, biscuits, flatbread and so on. Dragon Pass is very fertile and has a lot of places for growing herbs for flavouring. They drink beer, ale, mead and import wine. Lunars used to bring in gin, but I think that has been depreciated. Dara Happans grow wheat and rice, Lunars grow maize. They raise goats, pigs, sheep and cattle. I see their food as being similar to North African cuisine, for no other reason than it sounds right to me. Grazelanders have herds of horses and eat horseflesh and dairy products, drink koumiss and have a similar kind of diet to the Praxians. However, they also eat cattle, sheep and pihs raised by Vendref and eat the grains grown by Vendrefi, although in my Glorantha they are not themselves farmers or tax collectors, instead their braves travel to a Vendrefi farm as a hunting party and hunt cattle, pigs and sheep that the Vendrefi release. This gives them a far richer diet than Praxians. Pentians are like Grazelanders, byut don;lt have Vendrefi support. Some Pentians only eat horseflesh, others raise herds of cattle. They drink koumiss and eat dairy products.

Any scenario can start whenever you want, unless it specifically refers to an event that has already happened, an event that happens during the course of the scenario or an event that will happen in the future. I haven't read the official scenarios, in the vague hope that I'll be able to play in one sometime, so cannot advise on specifics.

Derak the Dark Troll, in our RQ2 Campaign, had his bones slowly turned to Lead by his Lead Fist. Before he became a Living Lead Skeleton, he realised that he could open up a wound and carve things onto his bones, so he carved all his Foci into his Rib Bones, on the assumption that he could lose a limb but was unlikely to lose a rib. He discounted tattoos on the basis that they could be sliced off. When he became a Living Lead Skeleton, he enchanted some wraiths to permanently whirl around his bones and through his ribs, just because it looked cool.

I always give PCs the chance to dodge breath attacks, as it only seems fair. Also, I give Cacodemon and Fiends Heroic Casting of Vomit Acid, as they are not powerful enough as they are, so when a hundred foot tall demon grins and starts to gulp, you know it's time to move out of the way! I thought about having him stick one of his fingers down his throat, but he'd lose a Claw Attack that way.

You missed off Dull, excellent in combination with Talk for Hours ...