Joerg

What I would do when GMing: If the object is engulfed by the wielder's aura, a POW vs POW roll may be called. Dullblade on a spear point should succeed most of the time without resistance. Long hafted axes or naginata sword sticks too, unless held in a shortened grip.

Ducks riding sylphs (or getting tossed by them) might count as flying, and might incur Yelmic wrath...

It keeps you from falling up.

Which opens up interesting heroquesting opportunities. Are there any underwater Chaos monsters? (Other than the giant, possibly winged walktapus in the East Isles, and some of the spawn of the Mother of Monsters?) Rule, opposed to cult, and possibly only after the Volsaxi secession. IMO the temple is where air breathers can make the transition onto the Fish Road, similar to the temple in the Nochet harbor. No idea whether merfolk have a dry part of the Fish Road in Backford, though. It will be fun to copy the Sacred City from Nochet to Durengard, but make it the center of Belitnar's administration rather than the seat of the Earth Queen.

I regard the vajra as one of these magically extendable spear-like weapons - I have seen Indian depictions with significantly longer handles. Nothing like a slingstone, in any case. Orlanth never had to wait for clouds to cover enough of the sky overhead...

Yeah, City Rex might be the term of choice nowadays. Certainly beats "mayor". But, unlike a Sartarite city rex, this would have been an appointee, not an elected leader. The Guide uses "companion" for the former count of the County of the Isles. Guide p.249: The map of the Fish Roads (p.254) shows that the Fish Road extends further up the Syphon, but it also shows that the rainbow bridge from the City of Wonders would have touched down at or near Durengard, and I rate that map information as slightly more authoritative than the text I quoted. The Durengard text doesn't mention Belintar's Bridge, but confirms Durengard as the political center of Heortland outside of the Volsaxi lands and seat of Belintar's governor-king.

My 1994 use of the older English spelling and the Iron Age Anglo-Saxons sprinkled with just a thin veneer of Plantagenet memes may be a thing of the past, but the term "Earl" actually appears in History of the Heortling Peoples as a carry-over of a Middle Sea Empire term (to avoid the immediate "burn 'em" reaction to the term God Learners) as a deputy official to one of Belintar's appointees, with Backford most likely being a seat of one of these worthies. I'd be as happy with variations of "raja" and other Sanskrit terms for Middle Sea Empire officials. "Talar" etc. doesn't quite cover the differences in rank. Most Aeolians outside of Esvular and the Bandori region live in cities - the largest group in Nochet, the rest distributed over the cities in the Malkonwal parts of Heortland. Possibly including Jansholm and Karse, probably excluding Sklar which is mostly an upstart fishing port with some shepherds in the narrow hinterland below the unscalable cliffs (at least unscalable for any useful traffic - there might be smugglers' routes inside the limestone of the cliffs, but not for bulk). Backford has a temple to Belintar, and may have played a role as administrative center alongside Durengard (which appears to be closer to where Belintar's bridge touched down). All of that will have attracted some Esvulari population as staff. Yes. Although, as always, exploiting the salt will ultimately lose you the land. Unlike Rungholt (which sank in part because the surrounding marshes had been lowered by burning the salt peat), the flood here will be Gagix Twobarb and her scorpionfolk. The Syphon flows uphill because it sears away much of the Chaos that manifested in the Footprint. With the river weakened by exploitation, the Chaos can get stronger in the Print. A river doesn't have to be brine to wash away Chaos - on the other side of the Storm Mountains, Sounders River runs into the Good Canal to cleanse whatever bad stuff may bubble up from under the Block. But taking away the Nelat-ness of the Syphon probably weakens it somewhat. That's also why I am not quite happy with that multi-arched Roman bridge across this specific river. More on bridges later. I picture the river bed at Backford as a fairly wide valley carved out by the writhing tendril, covered with pebbles and crisscrossed with lesser channels and a main channel splitting up to have shallow streams around small islets, often changing. We know from the Guide that Backford has a temple that serves as the terminus for the Fish Lane towards the underwater area of the City of Wonders, which may still be there. For the fish road to work, the water downriver has to be quite deep, so ship or at least boat 0traffic up to Backford should work, too. I would expect this to be quite a rough ride, though.

https://wellofdaliath.chaosium.com/home/gloranthan-documents/prosopaedia/deities/g/gagarth/ While I seem to recall a cult of Gagarth in one of the Praxian issues of the nineties fanzines, a web search showed up Sandy Petersen's version of Gagarth in the RuneQuest Daily: https://glorantha.steff.in/digests/HenkDaily/v940312p1 As good as you can get short of an official publication (which I am unaware of). Imagine that as becoming a prospect in the most brutal biker gang you can imagine. They will ask you to prove yourself being up to their standards. One is a stout spear-like weapon (and a ranged rune-spell), the other is a magical slingstone (or thrown rock). The Thunderbolt spell requires quite heavy cloud cover to be able to call it down, while the stones work in all weather conditions. Ironically enough, the Lunar army uses Thunderstones en masse, courtesy their Thunder Delta slinger regiments from Thrice Blessed which collect them from their tundra homeland.

😁 In all fairness, the magisaur starts out as a now mortal scout dragonewt, and gains size (and loses intellect) with rather advanced age. So, yes, problem solved. Certainly better than starting with a demibird-riding warrior newt with the option to become a triceratops within a few reincarnations.

A magisaur instead?

Are Sorala and Nathem left-handed?

Clearly a bogus myth. You claim that Umath had a brain? If the Dara Happans fetishize parts of Umath's anatomy, its the part between the legs. Umath and Shargash already exchanged missiles crashing down into the north. Umath was obviously throwing Thunder, but Shargash may have done so, too. When Umath was mortally wounded, he left behind countless thunderstones in the Thunder Delta region.

You get runic meanings of alphabetic symbols when you apply numerology, using the letters as number symbols. It doesn't really help that the Greek letter names were inherited from Phoenician rather than using native letter names (such as "C is for cat"). But then, Linear B is not an alphabetic script for Greek, but a syllabary. Unless your players are pretty fluent in the Greek alphabet, you don't lose that much familiarity, and those syllables may be closer to existing words that may have runic meanings.

They were willing to make an exception for the House of Sartar. Both of Terasarin's (legitimate) daughters married their cousins and bodyguards, sons of Kostajor Wolf-Champion, and Salinarg married a female bodyguard of his about a dozen years before he became Prince.

Yes. Thunderbolt is not a lightning, it is the mighty Thunder striking, the explosion caused by the magic of the Thunderer. It is a power apparently shared with Shargash, who may have taken it from Umath. Foes hit by the Thunderbolt are thunderstruck, not struck by lightning. Real world superstition says that hot thunderstorm strikes are the lightning striking, and cold strikes (without resulting in a fire) are the thunder striking. Glorantha operates on the same assumption. Note that the Thunderbolt is different from the Thunderstone tossed by Umath. There is another real world superstition/myth from Germany say that Belemnite fossils were created where the Thunder struck. These fossils do resemble the glass cones that can be created from lightning striking quartz sand. Even his children didn't mourn Vadrus passing away much. After all, they got to keep his nifty inheritence. Daddy coming back and wanting his toys back would irritate most of his offspring just as much as he would the rest of the world. There is a name for that, and that is Ragnaglar.

The Red Moon Goddess of Godtime. Originally a white "son" of Yelm, overseer (king/queen) of Mernita, also known as Jernotia (or both in the male -us form). The Copper Tablets (an in-world document shown in the Guide) shows how the eight planets react to Umath entering the "Perfect" Sky, dislocating the eight planetary sons of Yelm, causing most of them to enter the Underworld or otherwise leave the sky. Kargzant/Reladivus/Lightfore is the notable exception. Yes, that had only a local effect. But Argrath might be going to build an Orlanth temple big enough to cover the surface world. Without Shargash dismembering Umath in Hell, we wouldn't have seen the rise of his five sons - Storm Bull, Vadrus, Humakt, Orlanth, and Ragnaglar. And without Ragnaglar, at least the Chaos attack on the Spike would have failed. There still would have been Zzabur shattering the world to get rid of the Vadeli (and the Glacier, which we might have avoided) and High King Elf applying Death to the roots of the Spike. Well, we have a Jack Russell Terrier which chases his tail angrily, too. We throw him out every now and then, but we let him come back after he has cooled down. No need for all that purification nonsense. Dirty as the Earth comes... Yes, Umath and the three Aetheric brothers Dayzatar, Yelm and Lodril are sons of Aether. Umath is the only one who has a mother, Gata the Earth. The other three are idle thoughts, or playing around with the firestick. Whatever you prefer. All the Celestial Court deities are transcendental deities, except for Uleria who still has a surface world cult that doesn't require enlightenment to join. These are higher deities worshiped by the gods (well, ancestor worship, but you know what I mean). Once you get on the same level as the deities, yes, you could initiate to these deities. It takes quite a bit of apotheosis or enlightenment to get there. Not a problem, deities have multiple presences (pluripresence). Greg pondered using such pluripresence as a factor in a more board-game type heroquesting game (possibly related to the Masters of Luck and Death boardgame experiments, possibly for RuneQuest), and texts about that are in Arcane Lore in the Stafford Library. You might wish to get illuminated first before tackling those ideas and concepts, most of which won't be in the heroquesting rules for RQG as far as I can see. Yes, bullying water is something of a specialty of his. Fathering the Triolini merfolk, drying up Faralinthor Sea, slaying Enkoshons the first of the Blue Dragons (fathering Iphara on the Blue Woman in the process). Orlanth copied his methods for Aroka, but fathered the Hellroar onto Kyger Litor on his way there, and failed to impregnate Heler that time. There are other theories, like the Dome being constructed from brick or masonry in the image of Anaxial's Ark, only upside down to sail the advancing glacier from below. The Dara Happans brought Antirius (the remaining Cold Sun Disk, at least of their part of the world) inside the dome, making the world outside darker. Storm Age Dara Happa didn't just have a winter, it had an Ice Age, and it weathered that beneath the ice in that dome. After the Chaos invasion had split the Glacier and broken the dome, the Dara Happans ventured outside again. Having missed the worst of the Chaos invasion while Storm and Earth had battled it, and lost, the following bleak period of the Greater Darkness was as much a problem created by one of their own cities (Alkoth, home of the Shadzoring hell demons) as it was one of Chaos.

Yes, Lightning is one of Orlanth's Four Elemental Weapons. He stole the Sandals of Darkness, got rewarded by Huraya's Scarf of Mist, received the Shield of Arran through marriage and wrestled Lightning Boy into submission. Thunder Rebels gives us plenty names and (sometimes somewhat silly) subcults of Orlanth. There, the Storm Brother subcult of Lightning gets then name Yavor, and has hints at myths. One other subcult, FInovan the (cattle) Raider, wields a sword of lightning which has the same source as the lightning javelins.

Kill Orlanth. It already worked once, at Whitewall. Prevent Shargash from following Umath to Hell. (Prevent Verithurusa from being impregnated by Umath in Hell.) Give Umath a place of his own in the universe, a nice little playground - be a nice uncle. Nah. Lodril keeps squirming inside the Fertile Earth, he doesn't need any prep-work. And Papa Aether showed how fertizing the Earth was done when he sired Umath by turning the firestick vertical and injecting Lodril while lying atop Gata. Yelm has embraced his Death, and his return from it. God of Life and Death, ruler of Fire. Night is a time of terror. The Dara Happans would love to get rid of night, or winter. Winter is easier. Last time they managed to get rid of night, the world almost snapped. It was called the Sunstop, and the Dara Happans would have been happy if that moment had ended History and Time and led off into a timeless solar bliss. Alas... Sure. But Glorantha is a world of myths - things are the way they are because of myths. So what are the myths that make the farming year the way it is? (Even for peoples that don't farm) Exactly. But nobody seems to have done so, yet.

Daughters, listed in the Sourcebook. Iphara is the murderous goddess of murderous fog, and Molanni is the goddess of Still Air, mother of Daga by Yelm/the Evil Emperor, god of droughts. Gagarth is the (leading) god of the Wild Hunt, an evil spirit storm (probably inherited from his father), and his desert tornados/dust devils are also known as whirlvishes. A source of power for Praxians outlawed and excommunicated. The latter makes sense. No, that was stolen/conquered by Orlanth from the Sky - a place Vadrus apparently has not graced with his destruction, or saved from Chaos. Not sure about Thunder, either. Howling gales, certainly. Yes, early on (after Umath had been dismembered by Jagrekriand (Shargash/Shadzor), Vadrus was the leader of the Storm Host, the sons of Umath having their fun with an unprepared Golden Age. Orlanth flew in those ranks, as did Aerlit (father of Malkion), and probably Kahar did, too. Umath introduced Pastoralism as a culture to the world, and most storm gods have a pastoralist aspect. There are dozens of herder deities or Founders throughout the Barbarian Belt. They failed to establish themselves as supreme in Pamaltela, but their pastoralism seeped into Doraddi culture. It is quite hard to draw a definitive border between Hsunchen founders and storm gods in many cases. There are quite a few carnivore totems which have storm aspects, too. Rathor and Odayla aren't that far apart from one another, and the concept of hunting his own totem may have been learned by Harrek during his stint in the Empire, in contact with Sylilans. Orlanth rose to importance by adopting cultures rather than destroying them. He is the only major storm god who adopted farming in the myths. (The Kereusi, Bisosae, and Enjoreli of the Bull pastoralists and the Enerali horse pastoralists adopted farming, too. They didn't make it to top ruling deities, though, or readily identified those aspects of their storm gods with the Orlanth of the Lightbringers.) Vadrus never had the patience to stay anywhere and rule - even less so than Harrek. Fifth son of Umath, not Orlanth. Sorry... but then, at times Orlanth is Umath. Being Ragnaglar's brother is enough of a burden. But then, the Solars don't really care much about Chaos, other than Yelmalio. They are bitter about Storm, Sea, and Darkness. Orlanth or Umath is somehow paternally related to Bad King Urgrain, or lesser social Chaos in the Orlanthi world view. Yelm sired Tolat and Veldara when in Hell, and some Blue Moon empire turned to Chaos. And he begat Daga on Molanni, an evil god skirting the evils of Ragnaglar but lacking enlightenment.

You can worship the fragments (aka sons and daughters) of Vadrus - Valind, Gagarth, Iphara, Molanni, the Triolini male ancestors, and second generation offspring like Ygg and Thryk, and hope to synthesize the Godtime entity. A noble undertaking, similar to re-assembling Sedenya. In The Initiation of Orlanth, Vadrus is the force of the wind - he churns up the seas, and emerges from the funnel inside the waters. Violence is his trade mark, as is raw strength. Might makes Right - that's the Vadrudi creed, one of the legacies of Umath. Vadrus is everything Ernalda doesn't let Orlanth be. When it comes to herd beasts, Vadrus has a tendency to go for unruly, untameable beasts, like the woolly rhino (in Anaxial's Roster), although the humans worshiping his offspring often herd goats. As much as Kolat is the Spirit Wind, Vadrus is the God Storm. Forget about Orlanth for a while, he is nothing but a local by-blow that made it big, and incorporated a high number of similar local deities to swell to his current size. Humakt before Death is interesting. Possibly the Essence or sorcerous part of Storm? The heir of the sword of Umath, a disciple of Kargan Tor even before picking up Death. And then there is Ragnaglar, the other fifth son of Orlanth. Associated with goats. Vadrus somehow escapes the accusation of being a rapist. Or does he? Another stupid theory: We never learn the name of the Storm God that mothered the Gnydron merfolk. Maybe Vadrus still is alive, and happily married to Magasta?

The order of the character sheet is simply ascending order from bottom to top (if you start the cycle with Darkness). I read those arrows as "looks up to". This is also the sequence of the first five days in the Theyalan week starting with Darkness. Yet another sequence would be the order of birth, before before before before . The HeroQuest sequence always skips one in the order of birth. The sun shining at all during winter is a great improvement over the Greater Darkness. But the annual cycle of seasons is yet another weird order: before before before before Weird because there is no precedent for this in Godtime, unless we have lost a lot more to Chaos than we can even guess at. Alternatively, this is a myth that needs writing.

Mythic precedence, as much as the way weather works. While Umath's ascent into the sky was thwarted by the god of the green, southern city, that was just a temporary setback. Given the Ernaldan motherhood requirement for priestesses (which includes queens), I don't think that the Demivierge is an actual Earth Queen - more like a ruling maiden (well, somewhat...), unless she managed to get semi-pregnant or had a virgin birth prior to catching up with the naughty stuff. Interesting character, anyway. If Yelm counts, then so would Nontraya, and possibly Sh'Harkarzeel... Ernalda had been made a concubine of the Emperor, according to the "Orlanth woos Ernalda" myth. Dara Happan Yelm has amazing powers of observation which coincide with the power to fertilize with a glance, provided the recipient of said glance made the right preparations (like Hon-eel did). (I wonder what became of her demigod children - they or their offspring would be valid candidates for emperorship, both paternally and maternally). Plenty of other deities are going to share at least parts of the Yelm cult. Yu-Kargzant is more down to earth than the Dara Happan equivalent. Whether the other sun emperors are as big on aloof purity isn't quite clear. The Pentans share quite a bit of the Grazer mythology, and so do the Zebra Riders of Prax and the Old Pavisites related to the Arrowsmith dynasty. The Teshnites associate their sun emperor with elephants, sorcerous sun scopes, and fire. The Kralori HeenMaroun is the Emperor, not necessarily the Sun itself. The identification with (the post-Bright Empire Theyalan identification of the Emperor and) Yelm was made by the Seshnegi adventurers who used God Learner methods to infiltrate Kralori lore and wisdom. They succeeded with the lore, and toppled the dragon emperor with that. The Vithelan Emperor Govmeranen does have a dragon parent, but is not a child of Vith. He (and his successor) succumbs to the invasion of the Sea antigods. The Pamaltelan/Agimori sun god is not an emperor - or at least, not an emperor any more. It isn't quite clear whether the civilization of Tishamto relied on solar sovereignty for its ruler. In Fonrit, the cult of Ompalam and even some city gods have greater claim to sovereignty than the sun god. Ehilm in Ralian and Malkioni myths doesn't quite claim imperial sovereignty, either. His one lasting impression are the Flames of Ehilm, found in Hell as something separate from the Ashlord Emperor when presented as a test to the Lightbringers. A Dara Happan sky deity, identified with a prominent star in the Celestial City, named as a brother of Lodril and Dayzatar (and Yelm, at least by Plentonius, the Dawn Age author of the Glorious ReAscent of Yelm in-world document). Definitely not a husband-protector of Ernalda in any myth that names him. Chief Servant or Minister of the Celestial Gods, leader of the celestial people, the Shanassae and/or Luxites (also spelled "Luxates"). Pretty much unknown outside of Dara Happa, and speculated to be the original form of Brightface by some scholars. The Sourcebook makes Arraz a child of Dayzatar rather than a brother, but then generations between deities aren't as reliable as they are with mortals. Compare Odayla, who is referred as a brother of Orlanth by the Sylilings. Wyrm's Footnotes 10 has "Lux" for Arraz.

It might be argued that interaction between Dara Happa and the Storm Tribe started only after the Flood retreated. Umath's interaction with the Upper Sky did shake up the spheres above the cities in the Copper Tablets, but those don't appear in the writings of Plentonius. I sort of prefer the slaying of the Evil Emperor to have played out between the local storm son of Kero Fin and the Esrolian usurpator over the syncretic myth manifested by the Bright Empire exchange of myths (and Harmast imprinting the local Kerofinelan deity on Ralian and Fronelan Orlanthi despite the Bright Empire's efforts to minimize Heortling influences).

"I know he caused that!" "How do you know?" "He breathes!" Eurmal may be what keeps people from burning cat witches. Especially elderly ones.

I view Harono as the Emperor god, first and foremost. The incarnate sun sitting atop the ziggurat. Possibly in dragon form. Sitting atop the ziggurat removes the emperor from the embrace of earth.