Joerg

Whatever it is, for this specific subject line, necroing a thread feels strangely appropriate.

I would allow the fire elemental to engulf the weapon as soon as it impales. That would cause hit location damage to the impaled location and to the weapon hand(s) of the wielder, plus any hands that would grab the spear to pull it out. Limiting the engulfed area to the spear head would only do location damage, but wouldn't prevent the impaled person to pull it out. Basically, this seems to be an awful lot of POW down the drain for a bypass of "Fireblade doesn't impale" to "acts like a Fireblade on impales only," especially when normal hits don't have any bonus from the weapon. As far as I can observe, fire in Glorantha needs contact to two kinds of fuel - something combustible, and some form of air. The impaled bit lacks access to air (unless the lungs are impaled - in that case that person would breathe fire, if only briefly). "Inject fiery semen" might be an adequate (but probably un-publishable) Lodril spell, without any elementals involved. But then, a harmless spell name like "Cauterize Wound" might do the trick. No bleeding damage after removing the weapon after an impale, but heat damage while it is inside.

Speaking as a chemist with lab experience, "too hot to hold" means "I will rather take 2 points of heat damage to the hand than 2D6 acid damage from dropping this hot vessel.." There are also tricks around handling too hot items. Robert Bunsen famously held blobs of liquid lead in his hand by letting them move around, not staying long enough in one place to do any damage. You don't have to be Man-and-a-Half to be able to handle something too hot to handle. (And in case any of you who met me in real life might accuse me of sharing some of that ability due to my size, I am way too pale to fit into that niche, and I drink way too much tea to qualify.) All it takes to keep it from lighting everything is a clay jar that easily fits around the weapon. If this is limited to a single, signature party item, why not allow it. The Temple of the Wooden Sword set an example how heroic parties ignore limiting rules.

Another example of Glorantha not really being a Bronze Age world in the way that we understand it in the real world. Glorantha has paper, parchment, papyrus, clay tablets and so on. Far more than existed in the RW Bronze Age. That depends strongly on which kind of Bronze Age we are talking about. The Cuneiform belt with its Linear B outlier certainly was quite familiar with the written word, whereas e.g. the Golden Hat and Nebra Disk culture of Middle Europe used no written language but possibly some astronomical code. (Kalin decorated Dayzatar with such a golden hat in the Sourcebook, p.95, if you don't want to browse for museum web pages.) Literacy is fairly high in Orlanthi society, certainly better than in Karolingian, though maybe not quite as high as in high Merovinigian. The papyrus used by the Merovingian administration did not survive the climate, though, and Karolingian era parchment was way better preserved. Don't underestimate wood carving. We have quite a bit of apprentice level writings from Bergen carved into beech staves (indeed the German word for letter is "Buchstabe", derived from beech stave). Orlanthi wood carving is well established - their first leader Durev was carved from wood. (That makes all the Orlanthi the equivalent of Pinocchio's children and grandchildren. Maybe something the ducks could allude to when your party insults them mercilessly.) Depending on the importance and holyness, other material might be used, too, like sheet metal. "Don't decay" is an illusion, however. Maintaining a library is a constant battle against mold, vermin, and other forms of rot. Copying tattered volumes to keep the knowledge accessible probably is 80% of a Great Library's activity.

Atarks (a male version of Rashorana that got castrated by KaCharal, a Maker/Earthwalker father of Turos. I.e. another form of Gbaji.

Orlanth has a bunch of mythical excuses to use spears. Thunder, lightning, stuff wrestled from the Solars, even tridents. Getting mythical excuses for swords in pre-Carmanian Peloria is a lot harder, though. Sickles less so (there's a myth about that). Even the God of the Red Sword (Tolat, mainly known as Shargash, Shadzor or Jagrekriand in Peloria) wields a club, or a club and a spear in Pelorian depictions. Daxdarian traditions might have brought a stabbing sword along with the hoplite concept.Other than that and curved cavalry swords or sword sickles, the myths don't favor the sword.

Speaking as someone whose campaign was set just west of Backford, in Heortland you are left on your own. There is hardly any fan material to use, and even less official material beyond what you find in the Guide. I haven't seen any info on Volsaxi clans, a few mentions of Curtali, Bacofi and Sylangi clans in fan material, and nothing south of the Solthi River. My own invention, the Jaranings of the peninsula between the Solthi and Syphon estuaries, are highly uncanonical in detail, due to the age of that material. Out of Volsaxar, you will have first to decide whether your clan has a Hendriki tradition or whether it stems from one of the clans that used to be subject to the Foreigner Laws of early Second Age King Aventus, mentioned in History of the Heortling Peoples - which is a necessary resource to scrape together at least a little detail for your clan history. The verdict is still open whether clan and tribal size in Kethaelan Heortland is as small as it is in Sartar, or whether somewhat larger organisational units dominate the game. The four (over-) tribes of Heortland - Volsaxar, Jondalar, Gardufar and Esvular - would be called kingdoms in their own right in most other Orlanthi regions. Ancestor influence means that clans will maintain traditions from before the EWF, which may set them apart from the Hendriki (whose traditions dominate the clans and tribes of Sartar). If you have coastal clans, the tribe may actually be a mix of agricultural Orlanthi and quite Orlanthized Pelaskite clans with little dry land activities. Other than the descendants of the Hendriki, the clans of Heortland are quite used to paying tribute to rather distant kings and godkings, from the Kitori "equal exchange" which later became confused with Arkat's Command to the taxes collected by Belintar's governors, Rikard's nobles, or Fazzur's Tarshite administrators, and probably some tithing to the Ludoch of the Mirrorsea as well. Quite a bit of the Eleven Lights and the Colymar campaign is difficult to rip out of Sartar. On the plus side, you get to deal with Wolf Pirates, Scorpionfolk and other Chaos from the Footprint, and with funky leftovers from Belintar's three centuries of reign.

Basically, you give up one melee round for always acting first, and with an aimed blow, as that is what going last in the previous melee round means. Little different from spending the first melee round getting ready and magicked up, really. There is the issue with having to deal with all manner of attacks before that action, but that would be the same if you placed that action as the very first action of the next melee round. It really is a question of perception.

The Veldara cycle doesn't need any other moon color than blue to go through all those stages (except crone, she or her planetary body was killed/destroyed before it came to that). The different fathers do play a role in their inherited (and occasionally quite different) powers. The affinity to the waters is something that the Pelorian blue moon never quite mentions or achieves, but it is a core identity of Annilla (of troll and elder giant myths, and as known in the west) and Veldara (the Artmali are among the most successful sailor cultures in Glorantha). According to the sourcebook, Tolat doesn't share that heritage - son of the sun god and the goddess of night, conceived in the Underworld, while Annilla is the daughter of a sea god and a darkness goddess. The various moon myths defy the God Learner cycles of the world through the cycles of their own, which do intersect. Annilla as per Troll Gods is one of the main actresses in the war of dragon and giants, so deep in the mythic past that there are no elemental myths to match them. After her husband died/was maimed beyond recognition, she begat a dead child and took over its body, rising into the sky. That's where her myths fall into the Blue Moon pattern. Trying to match the earlier Annilla to any of the Pelorian pre-blue moon goddesses becomes very much a stretch. Verithurusa the Red Moon wanderer did mate with a huge male freshly arrived in the Underworld (as per Lives of Sedenya) as the arrival of Umath restarts the cyclical pattern of the heavens for a short time, until the Bad Emperor summons forth Shargash to stop Umath (Sourcebook). The Veldara Cycle is firmly placed in the Storm Age, but it has the entire cycle again, from Afidisa's innocence (very similar to what is hinted but never detailed about Verithurusa's wanderings) over Artmal's first empire with the demigod entombing himself for apotheosis (Sourcebook) or getting imprisoned by Storm opponents and Trickster, over Artmal's heirs who fit the Storm Age and Greater Darkness patterns while both their ancestor and ancestral goddess are dismembered by enemies, and a desperate and in the end ruinous alliance with Chaos.

I would say the Devil obviously wasn't Zistor, since Zistor was beaten 133 years before the end of the Age. For comparison, the Bright Empire lasted only 75 years. And Zistor wasn't exactly born. It was revealed. It wasn't the birth of Nysalor that produced the break of the Compromise, but Palangio manifesting Daysenerus in the Battle of Night and Day. The uz manifesting the Black Eater in response were as Compromise breaking, but hey, can it be broken twice in a single battle? The same reasoning applies to Renvald manifesting Orlanth in reaction to the revelation of Zistor. No, Nysalor was a perfectly valid demigod birth/rebirth, all within the rules of the Compromise, as if orchestrated by a lawyer. The Devil moment of the Gbaji Wars probably was Arkat and Nysalor manifesting their Chaos Monster aspects at the final battle, something enabled by Harmast's Lightbringer's Quest. Their battle must have been an re-enactment of the big slug-out Kajabor had with Wakboth, which left Wakboth remaining in Prax to be hit by the Block and Kajabor roaming Hell to be caught in Arachne Solara's Web. The survivor at the Battle of the City of Miracles somehow managed to transfer all the Chaos into the curse laid on the land of Dorastor and return mostly un-bedeviled to Ralios. We have no idea what exactly went on on Jrustela, other than that there was some naval or maritime assault or action ("damn the torpedoes", although reading up on the origin of that phrase attributed to Admiral Farragut at the Battle of Mobile Bay, it may have quite a different meaning than I originally assumed, referring to naval mines in the way the ships would be taking, and not incoming ammunition). It is more than possible that a conflict similar to that between Halwal and Yomili caused another magical implosion. Jrustela isn't glowing in the night (any more), but if that conflict was naval, some place under the water might. The Luatha faced only token resistance in Seshnela, but they may have faced much worse out at their island, with their rite in Seshnela a desperate magic to support their real fight. I would still like to blame an Orlanthi alive in the late phase of the Second Age, but all draconic leaders had undergone utuma in 1042, and while a Hendriki king died heroically failing to defend against the allied Carmanian - Dara Happan - (Dog) Sairdite raiders, I see little potential there for a devil release. Post-Halwal Ralios doesn't offer that good a cataclysmic battle or struggle, either, and same for Fronela (unless Jonat did something a lot bigger than I know of). That leaves Umathela or Slontos. But then, maybe this lack of such an Orlanthi made that devil comeback mostly a non-event.

On a tangent - could said Thanatari steal dragon magic earned as a reward for a bachelorhood of faithful service to a newtling?

Nick Brooke's Game Report of his run of Gaumata's Vision also had YOY at some stage...

Unit traditions and such may outlast short religious fads decided by wizards. Being close to Ralios (especially Holut with its Galvosti variation on Hrestolism) and Fornoar offers areas of retreat, being close to Kustria offers wizard-disapproved outlets for Adventurism. Having left in time to escape official wizard scrutiny probably helps, too. If you want to have sorcerer knights, any form of Hrestolism will be preferable to Rokarism. In Mularik's case, I would make a case for closet Galvosti Hrestolism for his men if they are from Rindland. If Mularik assembled his unit after he had to leave home, all options are available, including inheriting a sizeable contingent of Sir Narib's Pithdarans.

No, but the art has to be redrawn with a lot less textile.

If you don't think Nontraya's demon army is special, well that is pretty much all he has. That, and the Unliving Horde. Which is bound to be massive. But I am not so much thinking about the master undead but about his major agents, who would be party fodder. In case of doubt, lend them a few torturers of the dead to boost them. Some of them may be more of the vampiric kind (psychic ones, maybe), whereas others should resemble lich or similar "high level undead" familiar from that other game. He is able to work on a 'non-volunteer crowd' mostly by whipping them into action with his horde of demons. So, in your opinion, the majority of the Unliving Horde are regular dead who just don't have the luxury of having arrived in their prospected afterlife? Nontraya's role in that myth is basically a re-run or parallel to Death being thwarted by Tada burying Eiritha alive, which has made me wonder whether there are common myths for Nontraya and Humakt (i.e. heroplane acts performed by heroes in either deity's name). True. That's where Illumination kicks in, before the transition is made after an offer that can't be refused. Or some kind of body-change. Wait, what exactly was Belintar's nature?

According to your idea of "countermagic field compatibility", it should. If it doesn't, that disproves that excuse for not using the rules for CM when casting a Shield spell on an existing CM. The whole issue with divine spells "acting like CM" when they clearly don't (no 1 point interval, won't evaporate unless dispelled) makes me wish they had found a different phrasing back in RQ1 and 2. And it is clear to me, from the rules of CM, that there is no compatibility check for the spirit spell. There is one for the Shield spell, and even in that case, the CM has to be stronger than the shield to take effect. No stacking of a 1 MP CM with a one point Shield for an effective 4 MP spell protection. On the whole, these spells are badly described, and have been for ages. There is no reason but "game balance" for disallowing any combination of CM, Protection and Spirit Screen or Shimmer in in-world magical theory, or is there? Are these aura-altering spells, and a person or item can only have one aura? If that would be the case, then Shield would be on top of that, on the outside of the aura. (At least that's what the name of the spell suggests.) But then what about Berserk and Suppress Lodril? Are these aura-altering spells, or are they changing the nature of the person inside the aura? And warding would be half a Shield but on area effect. And sorcery wouldn't interfere with the aura, but with the essence of the target? That would narrow down the aura to a Spirit Plane emanation of the creature or object that extends beyond its physical material. In that case, with a proper mezcal, I wouldn't be hallucinating, but for the plural of worm, I would be beyond delirious. Even cross-eyed vision only doubles the number of dead grubs in the booze.

Lots of lesser Lhankor Mhy cultists (not sure whether this includes lay members and associate cultists) form the rest of the literate class in Heortling society (and presumably in Esrolian society, too). But then you don't need to be able to read yourself in order to value book knowledge, as long as you can afford hiring a librarian who will read them to you and who will be able to research them. You need to be wealthy to have one. Issaries doesn't have libraries, but the cult may have registers and archives. And collections of letters, diplomatic as well as mercantile, and possibly letters analyzing these letters for more diplomatic or mercantile endeavors. In other words, primary and secondary sources for research sages. Travelogues like Ottar's (Othere's) and Wulfstan's might be found in Issaries collections, too. But then, a decent library that is not a great temple or a royal library is likely to be of similar word count than the total of printed Glorantha material (for a greater private library one copy of each edition, each language), possibly with the same amount of information duplication, too. That amount of text can lead to lots of derivative writing or discussion, as proven by (almost? already? When did the Bell Digest take off?) thirty years of online presence and 45 years of fanzine and magazine coverage (with significantly lower word count), not to mention private letters or mails discussing the stuff.

Let me ask you how you handle Countermagic and Berserk. Do they stack? If they don't, can CM3 take effect to spells from non-chaotic sources while the doubled CM2 effect works on spells from chaotic sources? Can they co-exist at all? Next Suppress Lodril, which works selectively against fire worshippers. How (if at all) does this combine with CM? If you wear a CM4 inside a Warding 4, what spells are you protected from? 5 point spirit spells won't be caught by the warding, but will activate the last use of your CM and evaporate along with it, if they don't stack on one another. If they do stack, you're pretty safe from most sane magics. That doesn't stop Countermagic from doing its job (in case of stronger spells, evaporating trying to do so) before the Shield (or Berserk) can even take effect. Other spells (like Suppress Lodril) have a targeting function, but the spirit spell CM does not. Part of the problem is the different behavior between the CM-like effects that Rune Spells have (less fickle, but one point above the spell already gets through, leaving the lower barrier intact) and the spirit spell with its hysterics. I'll have to check whether RQ3 had the same double standard as RQ2 and RQG which have roughly identical wording. And it is inconsequent, too (quoting the RQG rules example) : Erm, no? Because a 2 point spell is within the blockade range of a Countermagic 1 (which is a one use spell by design - only a CM 3 or stronger has a chance to survive a first encounter with any one point spirit spell. A CM2 will block a 1 point rune spell boosted with 1 MP while evaporating. A Shield 1 won't block that combo, but remain in action. So Berserk or Suppress Lodril are compatible with CM, too (though Suppress Lodril only if you aren't a fire worshipper)? And Warding doesn't react to CM being cast across it? Lots of potential cans of worms I can avoid simply by adhering to the description of the Countermagic spell without making a subsequent casting of Shield an exception. That's along the line of the "Suppress Lodril" stuff I mentioned above, and opens ever new containers from the possession of Pandora.

Who says they have to? There are numerous examples of the same entity being magically approached through multiple names, with some differences. Nontraya has command of his talokan demons, who sound like a pretty different bunch of beings than Vivamorts normal tactics. I guess that's ongoing "trauma" from the Elmal/Yelmalio identity hiccup. Command over underworld demons isn't anything that special - Ethilrist can do such a trick, too, and has a small zoo of them (the Hound, the Diokos Horse demons, the Black Cloak goblins). I don't get any particular hint of 'nobility' from Nontraya. He commands a horde of vicious demons. Undead who retain a functional sapience are generally regarded as the nobility of undead, compared to the mindless zombie or skeleton masses, or even your run of the mill ghoul. "Noble undead" does in no way imply gentleman behavior, land ownership, inherited wealth or inbreeding. You'd find that in undead nobles, but that's another topic. He opens the door to the Underworld, but that doesn't mean the dead are all his minions. No, the normal dead are outside of his reach, he requires special rites now to make the dead his own. At least after Heort and others (even Vogarth, who built a dam) separated the Living from the Dead at the onset of the Silver Age. Nontraya is something like the shadow of death, a missionary of his state of being willing and able to work on a non-volunteer crowd while accepting volunteers, and probably giving them plum assignments. Take a look at the Bat feeders for how such an approach works. Prior to the Silver Age, I think that the dead could be approached by him, too. Whether comparatively fresh ones can on the holy days of the walking dead I cannot say, but an occasional case would sure give a couple of scenarios worth of storylines. IMO it is Nontraya who came to Prax and was tricked by Tada, but that would make him an evil that was not tainted by Chaos (yet). Humakt and Eurmal slaying Grandpa Mortal released him, and the subsequent deaths made him follow that stream of subjects to their source, but that's a Lesser Darkness event, not part of the Chaos Wars. His confrontation with Ernalda (after the one with Eiritha, or was it the same?) marked one onset of the Greater Darkness. (The Spike imploding obviously marks another one, courtesy of High King Elf and other non-Chaotics.) It is part of Ty Kora Tek's role to send such back to where they belong.  When the individual in question is officiating for TKT, there may be some problems with the proper procedure. And the time-tested precedent of assassination of such characters runs into unprecedented problems...

Not a straw man at all in connection with Berserk. Once you're under the influence, you have no free will left to cast protective spells on yourself or anyone else. If you can stack your Berserk with a hefty CM, that's one worry less to ignore while under the influence.

I still have some trouble giving Nontraya the exact same powers as the Vivamort write-up (and that extends to me procrastinating about writing the final confrontation in the Norinel crypt between Norinevra's heirs and Norinevra's undead foe whose binding was dissolved upon her death). The Nontraya undead surely is what other settings (e.g. Tekumel) call the "noble undead", an undead retaining much of their former personality and abilities in an altered, non-living body. Nontraya turns living people into undead minions of his, but there is no hint at all that an exchange of blood is involved, rather some soul-ripping in a modified Sever Spirit way. Any other powers like "inheriting" powers his victims had when they were living aren't described anywhere, and I am not quite sure that Nontraya needs them. On the whole, Nontraya is pretty much Humakt without the staying dead. There's also the question whether Nontrayans are limited in their movements in the open from Dusk till Dawn. Also, being an Esrolian phenomenon, there are bound to be a lot of ancestors of the Esrolians in his ranks of minions, not just from the Greater Darkness, and these may plague their (direct, or their siblings') distant offspring when tending to their honorably (but annually returning) dead ancestors. Worse, they may gain entry into otherwise protected houses when mingling with their truly dead kin and being invited in, wearing a layer of magical detection protection, or having achieved illumination. There might even be an illuminated undead Grandmother or two in the council of Grandmothers ("so weak of body that she requires lots of magic to move about, but still sharp of mind"). Think about the Black Ajah paranoia in the Wheel of Time White Tower, and apply it to the government of Esrolia.

It doesn't affect the casting of the Shield spell other than it must be stronger than the CM to take effect at all. In your version, you could cast a one point shield on top of a CM 3 or stronger without any boosting, but not a one point Restore Health. Explain. SImple. The Divine effect doesn't get dispelled when a stronger Countermagic is cast, whereas the fragile Countermagic either blocks weaker magic or gets dissolved by equally strong magic (which gets blocked) or stronger magic (which takes effect). Always has been that way. This means that the dissolution-proof divine spell needs to be the basis, and that the CM needs to be stronger (including boosting) than the basis to take effect at all, and it has to be cast second. It makes it logical, which for me means I don't get to deal with rules lawyers claiming similar exceptions for whichever spell they feel to sneak by a CM-protection to boost or heal a character. CM is a fickle spell. Most players I know go for Protection for themselves anyway, rarely spirit screen, and reserve CM shenanigans for enemies. Probably my player experience varies. For the Coutermagic not to perish on the successful casting of a stronger Shield and for it not blocking a Shield cast on it, I want that clarification in the description of Shield and any other Divine spell that offers a CM effect, like Berserk. (There may be more.) Otherwise, rules as written rule. If you think about finicky, imagine being the victim of a Neutralize Spirit Magic spell cast at you, and trying to get Countermagic up, and vice versa.

Countermagic (or Countermagic stacked with Shield) will still stop healing attempts regardless of the origin, or spells like "Sever Spirit". I'll believe that when the designers say so. Phil put the question up for Jason. Gods being limited in their abilities is a defining element in the Gloranthan setting. I would accept this from a god of magic. Shield comes from more martial deities. And while we're at it, how do Berserk and Countermagic interact with one another? The CM after the berserk obviously has to come from an ally or an opponent, as the berserking character cannot cast protective magic any more.

"Foul spawn of Chaos..." as used by Zero in conversation with the werewolf in Smell of a Rat. Could be used intra-party in sufficienty mixed groups.

Snce neither Spirit Screen nor Protection evaporate when another spell is incoming, the sequence of casting these spirit spells and Shield is irrelevant. Countermagic is different. If it recognizes that the new magic is a Shield, then it doesn't act up? Let me ask you a slight variation. Argrath has a Countermagic 3 on, but his supporter Elusu didn't recognize this, and casts a Countermagic 4 on him. What happens? IMO the CM4 fails, but evaporates the CM3, too. Now why again should a Shield 2 behave different from the CM4?