Joerg

Or Umath, who was explicitely armed with Creation to face the Predark, as per King of Sartar: The First Harp (p.49 in the hardback).

Then it is all Gbaji's fault!

They aren't expected to eat certain kinds of meat, as per the Guide p.52: So, your wealthy dronar cast burgher may very well have access to meats you would usually think of as reserved for other castes. (Which begs the question who owns the draught beasts, and what happens when one of those beasts dies from overworking or sickness.) But then, there might be restrictions to how the meats are prepared. Which means that they also do eat vegetables in recognizable form, rather than only in suitably processed form. Elder Secrets had a dwarf recipe which included plant matter in its list, and which was criticized only for its rather high gold content which might have furthered unnecessary individual thought. It doesn't mean that they don't eat the usual processed stuff dished out to orthodox mostali. I take that to mean vegetarianism in the modern real world sense, since the Mostali heresy doesn't make sense for humans whose ability to process mineral food is mostly limited to salt. While I do think that both fasting and ritual consumption of certain foods are part of ritual preparations for magic, I don't quite see the "eat no meat" as a necessary part of that. I can imagine that there are a number of Seshnegi and Carmanian magics which would be greatly helped by the ingestion of lion meat. Isn't Resurrection a rather hands-on magic? That makes the taboo for wizards at least a mite problematic. Subsequent purification makes lots of sense, but that didn't stop surgeons going from the section table to cut open women in complicated births without washing their hands for a few centuries... Still, the Gloranthan mindset would probably have prevented that specific horror. The talar caste includes a vast number of body servants for the highest ranking talars, if I interprete the frieze that was presented as an example how art direction turned into art correctly: https://www.glorantha.com/docs/seshnela-art-direction/ If that is the case, then dealing directly with the dead body of a talar caste member should be restricted to talar caste servants. Dronar caste workers might still be required to do the heavy lifting etc.

To be honest, I wasn't expecting the concept of "private rooms" in Sartarite society, whether urban or rural, except for studies and workshops. The text about the masonry leaves out one of the (at least to me) most crucial facts about the masonry: the kind of stone that was used. Different stones have different durability and ease of workability - as a rule, the easier a type of stone is worked, the less durable are buildings made of it, with chalcite a notable anomaly because while it is pretty hard to work, it isn't very stable chemically (i.e. weathering) and will erode much quicker than silicaceous rock of similar hardness. Sitting at the foot of Mt. Quivin, a son of Veskarthan and Kero Fin, I expect the available rock to be quite durable and inert to weathering. That will mean a demand for quite hard tools. Even with Gloranthan bronze being harder than terrestrial bronze, and possibly brass from bones of Veskarthan's kin especially able to cut through rock of similar descent, a lot of the fine work is probably done with stone tools, grinding and polishing the surfaces into shape. "Polygonal stones" probably means polygonal-based prisms. Right angles still seem to dominate the building outlines ("square" doesn't leave much wiggle room, really). Are vaults or domes or just arches used in separating the stories, or are all interior floors wooden planks or weavework, possibly overlaid by clay, held up by massive beams resting in cavities or on ledges protruding from the masonry for this purpose? One building style I encountered on Cyprus had a stone arch forming the support for the roof ridge of the slanted roof. I could imagine similar constructions upholding the floors, possibly with small tunnel vaults resting on these.) The roof construction in the living areas may well be hidden behind highly decorated textiles in wealthier households, and less well-off households would strive to put up displays of their superior needlework or similar craft, too, or alternatively hung with aromatic herbs left there to dry and to enrich the atmosphere. In the cooking area, roof space is probably occupied by baskets or even pottery hanging down from beams, to keep them out of the reach of most vermin. Mankind was able to construct water-proof vaults in megalithic drystone architecture (e.g. Newgrange), so I don't think such vaults would be out of place in our Bronze Age fantasy. How is the interior of these houses lit? Is there a central light shaft, are there numerous windows, or perhaps systems of mirrors (which could be just white-glazed pottery for lighting purposes), or is artificial lighting (i.e. oil lamps, braziers, candles, or magic) the normal mode? The "thermodynamics" of the Gloranthan Lower Air need a bit mythical explanation if you are with me in thinking that a direct application of the barometrical height formular is unwieldy in a place with 30km high geography. As you fly higher, air density shouldn't decrease as much as it does for terrestrial conditions, although the real measure for storm god presence probably is wind force. We still know that mountain tops are cool enough to maintain ice caps throughout the summers, but how much of that is owed to mere height above the surface, and how much of that can be attributed to vertical air movement around such peaks? I'd still expect updrafts on steep slopes, so we need a reason how and why they shed heat despite approaching the supposedly fiery sky. But then, a lot might simply come from Umath's statement (through his mere existence) that he was not fire but something new. Devotees of Orlanth are immune to wind chill, but not to Himile's cold. Valind is the storm that has allied with Himile, bearing that Cold. But then, Orlanth's half-sister Inora is bearing that cold, too.

While I can attest to the Anatolian highlands in February being cold enough that I caught hypothermia from the falling winds blowing into the opened airplane in Antalia, that is under current climatic conditions. For much of the bronze age, temperatures were significantly higher than today. The Unetice culture of eastern Germany probably enjoyed near mediterranean conditions, and the mediterranian proper may have been even warmer. And before anybody starts thinking about global warming, those may have been localized phenomena, limited to Europe and the fertile crescent. The Ötztal ice mummy is wearing the copper age equivalent of a survival suit for high mountains. Yes, those are leather pants rather than kilts, but this guy would have crossed snow fields high up in the mountains. I watched a documentary on two volunteers from the Bodensee stilthouse experimental archaeology camp crossing the alps on foot, wearing just period clothing. Going barefoot come snow or mud was pretty common. Shoes were known, but would easily chafe, and wouldn't last long on forced marches. As a rule, textile and leather finds are the exception in archaeology. The Ötztal ice mummy and a couple of hapless salt workers in the Hallstatt mine provided us with a good portion of known samples of textiles. Bog mummies probably accound for much of the rest, alongside with the Egyptian mummies preserved for eternity (or rather until they were ground up for producing mumia, a popular remedy and pigment). This means we have few samples of authentic clothing, and only pictorial recreations from other pictorial sources like e.g. the various attire of the sea people from the Ramses frieze commemorating his "victory". The Nordic Bronze and Iron Ages with their bog mummies offer probably a better insight than the collective finds of Mycenean gear.

It would be cannibalism if they ate other man rune mobile plants. An aldryami eating leaves from a shrub is no different from an Orlanthi drinking milk or eating fish.

I think that the main problem with undercover Illuminates is that their low regard for the cultural norms of the people they joined goes both way. They are about as reliable as tricksters (though they aren't Tricksters in the normal sense). You'd probably need more advanced illuminates to handle them somewhat, but then those more advanced illuminates have utterly different concerns, and why should they bother? Special teaching by the Red Emperor or the Great Sister might be the only thing to motivate them. Or not. Think of illuminate infiltrators as a cadre of chemtrails devotees sent to investigate the aircraft industry for cartel moves.

IMO often "Trester" or "Ramazotti" - made from the remaining pulp rather than from the wine that is ready for consumption.

I'm down with a light cold, and to pass the time I have been watching a fourty old documentary on the beginnings of metal use: Mention of the difficulties tracing the source of the Afghan tin for the Bronze Age world due to the soviet conquest made me think of a weird scenario where modern (or near future) archaeologists excavate a mound over an abandoned city in Dark Troll territory, with contractual obligation to leave behind most of their equipment to make up for the exotic food they carried away from that site. Possibly including draft animals, and at least with negotiations about leaving some of the local work force to be left for eating, too. Just a weird idea, but might make a one-off convention scenario when I am more clear-headed.

Personally, I think that the Grazer creation myth is basically true for Harrjeen and maybe a few of his followers, to create the precedence for the rest of the former Pure Horse kin to enter Dragon Pass. I have no information on the presence of significant numbers of centaurs prior to the establishment of Remakerela in Dragon Pass. This indicates that the centaurs of Beast Valley are quite likely descended from Pure Horse "volunteers" who were joined with their mounts to create this magical species, and that this procedure could indeed be undone. (It would have gone even better if there were Minohippoi about, humanoid bodies with stallion heads, to provide the lower part of the bodies for the cut ones, and heads for the horse torsos. You'd end up with leftover arms, though.) Heroes who apotheosize carry their unique heroquesting paths as their myths. All of that happens in the Godtime, adds to it (rarely substracts from it - there will always be an Aroka to slay for drought-plagued Orlanth or Barntar heroes.) This availability already starts with worshipped heroes, like Hofstaring.

I doubt that Ulanin had to deal with just uz, but also with dehori and other dark critters. No idea whether "Proud in the face of Darkness" would be an appropriate name for a passion in RQ. In HQ, this would work just fine.

IO is LM or perhaps rather Buserian with some Lunar cycles flanged on. But in Theyalan societies, if you can read more than Tradetalk tallies, you are a worshipper of Lhankor Mhy - at least a lay member (and that probably even goes for literate Thanatar cultists). If you are Lunarized, you can worship the 7Moms or IO, but the act of reading goes through LM. Pelorian script probably does the same through Buserian. Western script goes back to Tadenit, who is either another name for LM, an avatar of the bearded man, or a very close relative. What this means is that there appear to be no ideographic scripts like the Egyptian hieroglyphs in Genertela west of the Shan Shan, but letter systems like the ones derived from Mesopotamian (or possibly Levantine) cuneiform. Older imagery is more like a picture story in the tradition of the Bayeux Tapestry, possibly less chronological than that. Petroglyphs preceding that probably don't attempt to invoke a syntax or sequence, but who knows? It is quite possible that accountants are only associate worshippers of LM and connected to a mercantile or logistics cult instead, like Issaries, Argan Argar, Asrelia and probably others. Skalds don't have to be literate, but those that are will probably be skalds first and foremost and scribes only on the side - in life as in religious practice. The cult of Lhankor Mhy (in the Holy Country) offers a number of quite variant careers for the sages, including a whole number of knowledge-based crafts. While every apprentice of the sages must spend some effort as copyist, far from every graduate (or quitter) will spend the majority of their time writing.

Nothing a passion wouldn't do. Passions and runes are the "low magic" augment approach in RQG that previously was reserved to Battle Magic spells. Members of the Ulanin subcult could gain and cultivate an appropriate passion. Preferably with a different wording than "hate".

Or you could share the burden of spirit combat around, letting the spirit attack basically everybody for a while. (If that spell had been available in RQ3, you would have waited for the current target to get their POW experience check before attracting the spirit to someone else. Possibly via Mindlink.) I note that the Distraction doesn't require to overcome the target's POW to take effect, so it doesn't generate a POW check by itself. Rather than spirit combat ability, combat availability may also be a concern. A player with a hit location taken out but safely out of melee can still engage the spirit in spirit combat, letting the non-disabled party members concentrate on overcoming the physical foes. Never happened in my games. Wraiths, Shades and Lunes were bad enough, and the occasional ghost was more than enough to send a party back for expert support. But then, the POW gain mechanic never worked as supposed in my RQ3 games.

That was back when they thought that Gods of Glorantha would fit into a single book. Those times are gone...

There's also the "I'm originally from a feuding clan/tribe, so of course I detect as an enemy" excuse. You admit to being originally hostile to the hosts, but in the interest of the cult, you are overcoming those obstacles.

If it has a trunk and tusks, it can be found in or around Fonrit, but mastodons and mammoths are (also) native to northern Fronela. Archaic and less archaic rhinos are quite at home in both Pamaltela and (the woolly variant) in northern Fronela, too (provided it wasn't hunted to extinction by the trolls). The killer pig isn't necessary for Glorantha, we have enough over-sized Tusker boars to populate our semi-wilds. No idea whether there are giant sloths anywhere in Glorantha, and hardly any idea where to look for humped camels. The older, marine fossils are found wherever you have marine sediment - IMO these sediments formed before the Earth broke out of the waters, much like mother of pearl, on a more than continent wide scale. While the Earth Cube was (concentrated) food to the Sea Tribe, depleted debris settled down as sandstone or chalky sediments. Benthic marine organisms would have accreted more of that stuff, also on the flanks and below, and later on in the cracks.

We know mushroom-based drinks of the dark elves. Are there teas with psychotropic or simply bedazzling properties, too, beyond the standard caffeine bush enjoyed in Seshnela and Kralorela? Beers and ales and meads are made from a mash that isn't that different from stewing tea leaves or ground coffee beans, only given some time and the right conditions to ferment. I wonder whether the Gloranthans have a concept of alcohol as being the intoxicant inside beer and wine, and whether they cultivate yeasts or just are lucky to have natural yeasts (or "spirits acting like yeast") on some of their ingredients. (A similar question can be asked about breads - there are plenty of ways for making bread-like grain products without yeasts.) The "Burned Wine" mentioned for the Sartarites doesn't really identify the substance, nor does it tell what fermentation material exactly was put into the still. Giving the dredges a go before feeding them to the swine would be the economic way to go, unless inebriated hogs are part of a traditional festival, sooth-saying or similar. Speaking of wines, there are white wines made from the liquid extracted in the mashing of the wine, and red wines made from fermenting the entire pulp. Which are produced where? Clearwine sounds like a white wine to me. Wines made from other fruit than grapes might offer such a choice, too. But then, most players will only be interested in the results, and how they get served. Is there a culture mixing moderatly heated malty beer and milk? Reading about the maize beer reminded me of the special kick of the Elkoi beer described in Griffin Mountain. Are such side effects still in?

In that case, that's just an aspect of the deity. Really. And if you need to branch off another deity from the list, why LM and not Irrippi Ontor? The name (and original function) of the deity is "sacrificer of cows", the priest. Writing comes as an afterthought, and starts with record-keeping (counting) the tax and harvest. Star-seeing is a special subcult, or possibly hero cult grown big. But yes, Buserian the scribe or archivist is the mask of Lhankor Mhy the scribe, but not the Lightbringer, and neither the Lawspeaker - that's the province of Yelm alone. Buserian the tallymaster, bull sacrificer etc. has a number of other functions not shared by Lhankor Mhy in Esrolia or the far west. Much like the flensing knife isn't standard Lhankor Mhy equipment, either, even though taking off the skin of living enemies for magical writing material is a well-beloved custom among the magical scribes of the West. Makes me wonder why we get Shargash when we have Zorak Zoran. I recognize the pressure of limited space in a printed product, but I really think that we would fare significantly better if we said "these are distinct deities, but in this list of myths we cannot say whether the one or the other is the original actor." The same myths do of course lead to the same magics, so from a spellbook approach (only) this makes sense. In the "Mythos and History" section, the differences should be pointed out, and limitations of the other ones. Elmal doesn't get Sunspear. Buserian doesn't get Lightbringer associated magics. The dragonslaying for the waters (Enkoshons, Aroka, Barntar's Daga quest) is a shared myth between Orlanth, Vadrus and Barntar, and while Barntar might be presented as an aspect of Orlanth, Vadrus is harder to place there. Is Odayla different from Orlanth, Arakang or Rathor, or just the same? IMO both cases are true. Some magic and myth is shared, other parts are unique to a specific aspect and not available to similar entities. The advanced quester or researcher may know how to use or exploit such parallel drifts to switch paths while questing. Some of the standard quests like the LBQ likely have incorporated such sideway switches into their mainstream version.

The Shaker Temple definitely is a holy site to Maran Gor, but it also sits at the foot of Kerofin Mountain, and serves as a kind of "low temple" to the mountain itself. The Necklace of Kero Fin was first mentioned being worn by Aram ya Udram, the leader of the Aramite boar riders of the Ivory Plinth, and human representative on the First Council. Maybe the goddess can. The Hero Wars era book Storm Tribe does present Ana Gor, the aspect of human sacrifice, and makes it subservient to any number of cults that require human sacrifice. Sorana Tor is (among other things) a representative of Ana Gor, at least in her role in the Illaro dynasty.

Traumatic experiences have a way of recurring that is hard to block. Whether those memories remain unchanged, and whether the heroquesting efforts so far influenced that timeless moment, I cannot say, but a mistress race ancestress will surely remember that burning in their collective wombs.

Sorana Tor as dynastic founder is an incarnation of Kero Fin, IMO. All she is wearing is the Necklace of Kero Fin. But Maran has always been a mother goddess, right next to Kyger Litor on the affection scale. That said, she deeply cared about her offspring, the Earth Shakers, and went to the Dark Side as a consequence of their extermination. She might still have appeared as a child. Compare the children of Salinarg, Harsaltar and his younger sisters, forming the Household of Death. I am not quite clear how much the "Child Prodigy" line of kings of the Illaro dynasty still is canonical. The one or two times I discussed this with Greg he was serious about baby boys radiating divine/royal power.

Basically, I made it up. Annilla cult, RQ3 Troll Gods. All of the Elder Giants have a Blue Moon connection. The reason the Cradles are sent down the Pool is to meet the Ancestress. The Storm Age was an age of blue planets (and/or moons) populating the sky, and three years into the Cradle's journey, there is a new blue planet in the sky. While not Annilla's Blue Moon, this event will be significant to any blue moon worshipper, and might bring other restitution projects onto the agenda. She might very well be a preparation for the appearance of the White Moon, or even more appropriate, the Invisible Moon talked about in King of Sartar, possibly providing a body for that incarnation of Lunar power. At least, that could be the insight that Argrath passed on to Anderida. "The Pass Giant said that his daughter would be the Moon to Come. Do not hinder her passage."

Chiming in on this rather RQ-mechanical discussion: If your Red Cow character has gained the "Hate Chief Broddi" passion for some previous hostile interaction between these two, will that person register as an enemy of Broddi every time the spell is cast, or does it only register when said character is prepped and ready to perform a kinslaying? In my reading of said spell, it reacts to "killing intent". The two guardsmen half-dozing before the entrance to the holiest section of the temple aren't enemies as long as they are blissfully unaware of the breaking and entering party. Two other guardsmen already in pursuit of the party on the other hand are actively inimical. Yet another group of guards waking up to an alarm chime stepping up prepared to take on any intruder might register as they radiate a general readiness to get violent with everyone out of their place. In the case of the Disease Master detected by the Arroyan, the person might be glossed over by the spell as long as he doesn't mean to harm the Arroyan personally, but any disease he carries might register on the Arroyan enemy radar.

The giant baby is an incarnation of the Blue Moon Goddess. AFAIK she is the first female giant reported in a cradle. Killing or obstructing this Blue Moon mission might have weakened the Lunar Way. On the other hand, raising the baby in Glamour might have been something to the greater glory of both moons.