Joerg

No. But you suggest that gold was less valued than silver in (unspecified portions of) Europe and in the Chinese trade, and rebuked my statement that Roman gold made it to China. Wikipedia can be used to support any claim. Here's a nice piece of mine: It is true that Pliny the Elder values the trade deficit as 100 million sesterces (probably overstated by an order of magnitude or three), but that doesn't mean that that amount of silver coins vanished into the east. Please state your sources for that. The links you provided don't corroborate this. Yes, and gold wasn't used for normal trade in Europe, either, but for royal payments. Define late Roman Empire. Eastern Rome? Source? Plinius the Elder's 100 M sesterces? The Romans, the Venetians and finally the Fuggers of Augsburg depleted the accessible Alpine silver reserves. The gold reserves didn't last long enough for the Fuggers to have a chance at that. So which period of devalued gold are we talking about? Between the conquests of the Aztek and Inka empires and the discovery of Mt. Potosi, or earlier, or...? You are claiming that in Medieval and Renaissance times silver would have been more valuable than gold. Where, and when? As far as I can see from the examples in my history books, the Holy Roman Empire (which was under Spanish administration in that time) never valued silver over gold. I also suppose that would have been news to the Venetians or the Lombard bankers. With the exception of the Hajj I mentioned earlier, the flow of gold from the West African mines (then the main source for gold in Europe) into Europe usually was more of a trickle, and did at best compensate for the removal of gold from the currency either in art and architecture or in trade deficit with the far east. Livius: The Romans removed a few cubic kilometers of mountain at a silver mine in Spain by this method, which probably involved heated vinegar poured into the cracks formed by the fire, spreading the destruction a lot further than just fire-heating. At least according to a TV documentation I watched on that topic. Funnily that is the time when the Spanish sent out expedition after expedition to find the Golden City in the jungle, and not some silver place. I didn't doubt your numbers for the Spanish/Portuguese Imperialism. I just don't see Modern Age as as relevant. Even using the middle Roman Empire evidence is late by almost a millennium.

What exactly would you call Trickster runes? Combinations like Vasana's, with Moon as secondary element? In the normal RQ character generation, it is possible to select Disorder and Illusion as main powers, but does that make the character a Trickster? Getting Chaos through hereditary predelection would take quite a bit of GM interference. I thought that there would be post-birth blessings and omens which would offer first indications. Stuff like the violet eyes/left-handedness apparently are recognizable at birth. But then, initiation is a heroquest, and decisions or unexpected failures may alter a course otherwise taken for granted. Like the encounter with cacodemon.

Usually that object needs to be seen or touched. So if you keep your spirit-holding crystal in a bag, the enemy caster might detect it, or even perceive its presence with Soul Sight, but would not be able to target it directly (any more than Soul Sight would allow to target a Disrupt through a sufficiently thin wooden door or similar). If someone with the Control (Entity) spell gets their sight on the item, they may take it over without going through the usual spirit combat sequence because the holding item takes care of that. And yes, a shaman could discorporate, approach your item, cast Visibility, then the appropriate Control spell. You don't connect a computer without any firewall, password or anti-virus software to a site known to infect machines, do you? In praxis, the danger is moderate. The caster needs to know and see the binding item and the correct type of Control (Entity) spell, and active Second Sight or similar to target the entity. Identifying the item could be done through a Detect (Entity) spell. Now if you are specialized in hunting down Malia cultists, the combo "Detect Disease Spirit" and "Control Disease Spirit" might be good to have. Still, even while the Detect might show you which of the leather bags on the belt of that disease master contains a crystal with a held spirit, your "Second Sight" won't be able to target it through the material. You might get lucky if you have darksense and the sorcerous Pierce the Veil, assuming that darksense can be used just like vision to target sorcery, as darksense may penetrate leather. (Yes, those trolls will see that you are naked underneath your clothes...) Elementals are risky - there are only five types, and using them is hardly covert, so there is a good likelihood that your opponent may have that spell in his arsenal if he prepared for the encounter, so you better had that entity in an access-protected binding enchantment. Spirits held in animals have fused with that animal for the duration of its (or the caster's) life. (Until the confirmed, irrevocable death of the caster, I would rule - a Rune Lord returning from Death through Divine Intervention should retain his allied spirits.) Spirits held in crystals are a liability, but as the holder of the item, you get the power to give a "Control (Entity)" command for free. I wonder whether a melee round spent instructing the spirit to ignore all commands but your own would counter any such control attempts for the next two minutes. Would this prevent any enemy caster from controlling the entity? The spirit spell "Control (Entity)" is as impractical for combat use as ever. It is a finishing move for spirit combat to imprison a spirit in a binding, which is the only action any entity with zero MP can perform. And, to add insult to harm, if you are able to discorporate in order to initiate spirit combat, chances are that you are a shaman who has a fetch able to capture such spirits without requiring any control spell. This leaves the spell only one sensible use - to instruct a bound entity to do the caster's will for the next two minutes. This allows you to release a spirit, let it act on your command for nine melee rounds and then bind it back in the tenth (taking all of your actions for that re-binding). There is no practical use for Control <animal> as the animal in question will be unconscious from having zero MP, unless you use Extension. (If a creature regains an MP within the 2 minutes the Control spell lasts, you wouldn't have been able to beat it down to zero anyway...)

Aram ya Udram (human ancestor of the folk that would become the Tusk Riders in the EWF era) did exactly such a feat to Gouger, the son of the earth goddess. That (and possibly some certain animal charme) earned him the Necklace of Kero Fin, the approval of the local earth mother, and the position as human representative on the Unity Council. A demon pig can be seen as a punishment by an angry earth goddess, but also as a test for a possible mate. Given the location, the reward after this test (and probably a few more) might be an intimate relationship with Tarndisi?

And I thought that nipping tedious buds was the very service the Gorgorma cult provides in Solar societies?

How so when we find silver hoards from say before the Anglo-Saxon exodus on Fyn or in Juteland? Silver by weight was the international currency north of the Holy Roman Empire until Scandinavian kings and trader cities started coining silver, too (about the time the Hanseatic League expanded into their territory). Significant portions of that silver (and some gold) were taken out of circulation in hoards or grave gifts. The precious metal economy of the late Roman Empire bled lots of gold east along the silk road. Presumably back then gold was valued more than silver in China. What remained were silver coins and (in the coinless barbaricum) fragments of valuable metals, mostly silver. This kind of mining activity can be associated with the Roman Empire. The Spanish mineral resources had been mined systematically by the Carthaginians and later the Romans, destroying entire mountains in their pursuit. Hannibal used such mining techniques to carve an elephant-grade passage through the Alps at one or two choke points. I am not aware of any pre-medieval mining activities for anything but bog iron, flint, soapstone, jetstone or amber anywhere in northern Europe - maybe copper (Malachite) in places where the mineral surfaced, but that would have been mined out quickly as bronze was introduced. But then our definitions of Northern Europe possibly differ, and you might really mean "outside of the Roman Empire". Dacians and Celts (both continental and island) did have mining operations which "invited" the Roman Republic/Empire to invade. Northern Europe had a unique export article with its amber, already in Mycenean times and possibly earlier. Metal would have been as valuable by volume to the northerners, which may have introduced the first copper or bronze items to the north. The Roman Iron Age in northern Europe saw quite a bit of southern and presumably some central European precious metal, through raiding (or mercenary service fees), trading and diplomatic gifts. Earlier metal imports like the sky-disk of Nebra had copper from Alpine mines and tin and gold from Cornwall. Given the location of the Unetice culture, I have to assume that the material made its way north through the amber trade. The battle of Tollense bridge might be seen in the context of the amber trade, too.

True. Which is why they wouldn't be wasted as assault troops aka marines, but be in charge of navigating the vessels.

I'm on the record claiming that whenever the compromise got broken and the Gods Walked the World again can be quested to. How else could a questing troll mother take the primal curse of D'Wargon onto herself than by re-visiting the Battle of Night and Day as the Black Eater? The dragon sun's daughter incident is a strange one. What was the Dragon Emperor planning? Was he in a similar position as his enemy Cartavar? Tharkantus: The Sun Dome temples had originally fought against the dragons. When Karvanyar rebelled, the Sun Dome temples were the border troops for the EWF, with surviving Old Day Traditionalists inside the EWF few. After Karvanyar's success in Dara Happa, some of the Sun Dome temples switched sides again - by the time the True Golden Horde reunited the previously warring successors of Sarenesh and Cartavar, the Tharkantus cult of which Balazar was a part had become staunchly anti-dragon once again (or at least couldn't say no to the promise of rich plunder, a repeat of the 1042 revenge raid).

Out of reacts due to sharing the grief... From a Yelmic perspective leaving the ability to have a son, or leaving any sons alive, has always been a bad mistake. The emperor is all-seeing while being cursed with a biased perception. The Widow's Son is the story how the overt deeds of the future hero or, in case of Avivath, the founder of the bloodline of the future leaders, is hiding behind unremarkable menial tasks. And if you look at Orlanth's first three contests, all they do is to establish that storm godling as a buffoon - go play elsewhere, little kid. Having played Beat-pot once in the White Bear Red Moon freeform, there is a chance that he still might find his calling. Look at little brother, so proud of his favorite toy, but then carelessly leaving it lying around to be found by whosoever when sleeping off his excesses. But then, looking at Wendaria, how can we tell that Lodril is the little brother? Doesn't the yelmic myth paint Yelm in the position of the Third Brother who doesn't repeat the mistakes of the first two? The Naverian story-line about the White Queen usurped by Brighteye gives us a chronology different from YS, where the Earthwalker Mountainmaker Firepainter has been active for a long time before Brighteye invents a new meaning for justice, "deneb". The glare of Brighteye obscured all of the heavens. The Birth of Umath and later the initiation of Orlanth allowed the sky to be re-populated by entities like Lorion and Buburstus. Look at the Copper Tablets instead, for the inverted pyramid in the southwest, and allow for the altered course of the Oslir that puts Nivorah as the southeastern city northeast of Alkoth. I think "We All Are Us" was never more true than when it came to strike down the Emperor. RebellUs TerminUs. Four participants are acknowledged e.g. by Jar-eel, three of them had been to Hell and back, four if you take Orlanth's weapon. The Avivath/Khordavu dynasty uses this story. Not quite the case for the Soul Arranger, who "sat down" at the shaking valley in between sowing the Rockwoods in a way that divided both incompatible populations, forcing them to make arrangements on either side of the divide... The spike was neither Earth nor Sky. Something like a gameboard and a set of attribute cards where you exchange the Gods Wall rune with the one on your attribute cards for your helpers to define your approach? Is this limited to the Ten Tests, or do you prepare more? With each exchange possibly triggering more powers to collect on your own tablet`? When do you get to do the final challenge to place your rune on the throne? What did the Ten Princes who descended from Avivath do? Sheng Seleris was really close to re-uniting the Solar empires on a scale much grander than anything Dara Happa had ever done. He had covered the solar thrones of Raibanth, Kralorela, Teshnos, and sent out a first fleet towards Vormain which was rebuffed. Sheng was an astonishingly patient conqueror, as his 100 year term in austerity shows. His first incursions to the Lunar Empire had been rebuffed, too. When Argrath releases Sheng from the Lunar Hell, Godunya has departed, and we have no information whether a new Emperor would have been able to establish himself. It is quite possible that Sheng re-acquires both Kralorela and Teshnos in no time short. I am not quite sure what Sheng Seleris' victory condition would be in a Hero Wars edition of Gods War - have a temple each in Peloria, Kralorela, Verenela, Vormain and Seshnela/Ralios?

I am deeply saddened at the passing of the Great Shaman. I will miss you, Greg. My deepest condolences to Suzanne and his children. I am as deeply grateful to have met Greg in person, to have listened to his story-telling or readings, to have gamed with him, even to be called to do some work for him on Glorantha, and to explore the concept of transcendence under his guidance. It was an honor and a joy.

To my mind, when that happens, it is likely the result of the second person performing a HeroQuest emulating the first person. The second person definitely gets some of the benefits of doing the same things in the same way, or by overlaying the first myth onto the current reality. Unfortunately, Karvanyar's (or rather Urvanyar's) example cannot be heroquested unless there is a precedent for it in Godtime. And looking at Yelmic orthodoxy, if there was, then not on an imperial level.

I am aware of that, and of some ancient lineages of maize recovered from Inka grave goods. But having used aged whole wheat flour for making my own bread while living abroad (and the result still beating the kind of bread I could buy there), I am only too aware that this aged grain will be unacceptable to pampered palates. Those folk will demand fresh grain, and so will traders who have to transport it for considerable times to other markets, and make it competitive there. This means that the keepers of the grain storage must maintain some bureaucratic effort to make sure the stores hold sustainable portions of seed grain (for spring-seeded summer grain and as a reserve for harvest failures due to supernatural causes), fresh food grain, only slightly superannuate grain and some dredges good only for emergencies or fodder. According to @jajagappa, the grain distribution in Nochet is managed by the Asrelia cult, which means senior members of the high profile Houses of the city. Unlike in a clan, the grain will go to all established factions in the city, be they native Houses, immigrant clans, foreign colonies, cults, guilds or resident and/or contracted mercenary bands, and usually not for a price but for a well-established set of duties and services. If grain quality comes into this, too, these sets of obligations become really complex. Asrelia has the earth storage magic which also acts as a safe, which makes her cult the deposit bankers of the Theyalan lands, too. (The Issaries cult is for venture capital, that cult wants to keep the currency floating around.) That magic and some stasis magic probably prevent the grain from spoiling, but I am less convinced that it keeps it from deteriorating in flavor and nutritional value. Putting stuff down into TKT's Dark Earth would probably kill all flavor. Since it might do the same to any vermin and mold affecting the grain, some rather spoiled low-rate grain might actually benefit from such treatment. Is that number limited to the city, or does it include the rest of Latium (like e.g. the bustling port of Ostia with a high number of transients), too? I have a gut feeling more than evidence that the Esrolian mesopotamia is the real grain basket of the country, producing most of the grain dedicated to export. Also because the two rivers facilitate bulk traffic. Rhigos used to be the main grain port before the Opening, but it would only service the ports at the river estuaries of Heortland. Grain going to Sartar or the Grazelands would sensibly be collected in the parts of North Esrolia close to the Lyksos and transshipped either near the Building Wall, New Crystal City, or at Duck Point (using either the gap between the Spine and Arrowmound north of Arkat's Hold, Orstan's Pass between Rich Post and Queen's Post, or one of the three northern passes or gaps of the spine if carried on Sartarite royal highways). Honestly, I doubt that there are any grain shipments on the road between Boldhome and Jonstown, as that is a serious pass of its own, and the other two routes are as unsuited for bulk goods. On the other hand, Grazers might spare little cost when it comes to raising their special golden horses, importing specially blessed grain from holy fields. The Vendref traders of Rich Post might import grain to make up for the heavy demand their grazer overlords take from them. The original Lyksos River has a tributary leading rather close to Rich Post, so there might even be barge ducks braving the wrath of the pony breeders all the way up there to deal with the Vendref of Rich Post. Looking at your play with numbers, halving the grain-producing area in North Esrolia would still provide sufficient surplus to feed Nochet. Esrolia is also known for vinyards, orchards etc., and the cattle needed to sustain enough oxen for plowing all that land will take up quite a bit of pasture (making up for that with some dairy production). Given that Rome was known to use lentils as power food along with grain and to allow for a significant number of transient population in Nochet, I think I would up the annual grain consumption of Nochet to about 36 milion tons. There is beer production and probably some export, too. So let's assume Nochet has enough grain for three years in its silos. City population during Fimbulwinter will swell to maybe 150,000 rather than the usual 120,000 through refugees, who may receive some of that lowest quality grain I wrote about above. The grain will have to last for two harvests before the surrounding lands can spare any grain to the city. That means only enough grain for half a normal year's consumption may be available for trading away from the city as seed stock. Nochet does have a financial windfall when Harrek and his wolf pirates drink and whore off their plunder of Tatius' solar mages in the city in 1624, making up for some of the financial recovery. Exporting seed grain to Dragon Pass and possibly Heortland in 1623 will be profitable, too, and logistically just manageable. (Possibly already in late 1622 if the Heortlings sow winter grain, too. I really haven't seen any bit of evidence for this, and hardly anything that might imply otherwise.) If the Heortlings do sow winter grain, the immediate storage situation for them might mean a lot less remaining seeds (only the summer portion) in the silos. The barley plants might have survived the Fimbulwinter under the snow, and if the farmers use them for hay or pasture in late 1622 to prevent the plant from trying to reproduce, the 1621 winter seed might actually provide half a harvest in Fire Season 1623 as the plants would have been sufficiently developed to survive like grass. Any Bless Crops magics used on those winter seeds would have been broken with the death of Ernalda, though, but there might be a chance to renew that spell late in 1622. Replenishing the herds will have to wait for Argrath's Tarsh campaign, which ought to re-distribute a fair amount of Provincial cattle south.

Several approaches here, really, but my main thrust is the world-building I do to make my settings and encounters come to life. One thing I like about the Orlanthi culture is that initiation really grounds almost everybody in the magic of their deities, and that it gives them a perspective for their afterlife. Without cult iniitiation, we go to a Hades-like postmortal experience while waiting for recycling. That is not exactly how I perceive the Orlanthi. There has been the looming threat of agents of reprisal ever since Cults of Prax was published, too. That these haven't been mentioned in RQG yet probably is because there have been no full cult write-ups, yet. "Your heroes are exceptional" - that's a gamist position that doesn't help (me) with world-building. If my heroes are exceptional, then their rivals need to be as well, and so do their friends, and their rivals, and even more their foes, and we end up with a Bronze Age version of Marvel Superheroes. Which is fine once you start messing around with gods and empires, but takes away the "everyman" charm and gritty sense of belonging that RQG wants to promote. Heortling society is pretty egalitarian. No. I have e.g. babies and toddlers as NPCs in my games and scenarios, definitely not initiates, but very useful to me as GM, and a very powerful augment for their parents through passions. Every NPC encountered should have the potential to provide a meaningful opposition that cannot just be magicked away. If only one side has Shield 4 and the other side at best Bladesharp 2, you have the immaculate tank vs. the helpless victim. Have you read my suggestions for Elmali families? I did try to show capable though not overpowering characters there, with somewhat memorable traits and abilities that set each other apart - and that within specialized households (somewhat elite households, due to the role of Elmal, but I got to include a couple of cottars, too). It is possible to make memorable characters who aren't initiated to any specific god (and who aren't sorcerers or shamans). Rune magic was used sparingly in my RQ games (where I had a reusability house rule only slightly harsher than the one presented in RQG). Given that the player characters' opposition often was about to die, their use of rune magic possibly was greater than that of the player characters who would encounter a series of such opponents. If you can have spirit (or godling) allies doing their magic for you, you don't need to have that magic yourself. But apart from hiring a shaman to ambush and abduct a spirit for you, there were only the cults who provided cult spirits - to their initiates, not to lay members. Your average initiate will have something between one and four points in their rune pool, and may have used half of it already when you encounter them. Basically the other folk in your clan spending their rune points is the only reason why your player characters still have most of theirs available. RQ3 was the first RuneQuest which had a "Gamemaster's Book" which dealt with creating a setting, and a very well done one, too - it was one of the main selling points that made me switch from another similarly gritty but more restraining system. Is that preference of yours based in game balance, or does it reflect your imression of Glorantha? Either way you would do well with a campaign set in Solar Peloria, where this is the norm, or with characters from a Heartland Corps regiment. Unfortunately, all the source material we have for RQG right now is about the place with one of the highest density of initiates anywhere in Glorantha. Orlanthi thrive on individual prowess, including the individual power to do magic, although their magic as a community and expressed through the embodiment of said community (called the wyter) is another important aspect, so far mainly available in the prose of Vasana's Saga (the Alda-chur experience, p.367. If your concern is mainly about RuneQuest and you don't care that your Glorantha bears only superficial similarity to the one presented in the Guide, then you managed to exaggerate the points I made about NPCs. My concern is RuneQuest Glorantha, and its integration with what we know from the Guide. The guide and many other sources available make it clear that "all" (6 out of 7) Orlanthi initiate to a specific deity of their pantheon, and that 6 out of 7 initiates belong to the cults of Orlanth or Ernalda. The Orlanthi expect an afterlife in the God World in the home of their chosen deity, at least until they are called in for another go at mortal life. There probably is no ancient society without (layers of) adulthood rites. And there probably is no Gloranthan society without a magical awakening, making the runes (or the virtues of the caste, etc.) available for augments. Heortling initiation conveys that magical awakening, the raw influence of the runes.

Getting back to the Seleric empire: This is of course a ploy to maintain the local resistance against the horse warlords, with the board game just the socially acceptable front that would keep the few steadfast Dara Happan Lunars from abandoning the case against Sheng. I missed this earlier. What makes you think that Great Sister is tied to any moon but the red one in the sky? Given the location, that female individual might have been a denizen of Castle Blue.

But who is to say whether he "inherited" that office from a lineage of thanes, or whether he was a powerful quester who made himself the better option than all those rich heirs? Sartar did not start with a tribe as his power base, but with a city confederation (Wilmskirk). Illaro had an even greater problem because all of post-Twin Dynasty Tarsh was at civil war. The local conflicts resolved by Sartar (as a neutral party in Wilmskirk, as a combatant in Jonstown, and invited in Swenstown) were of much lower scale.

That's one of the inheritances that come from including older texts more or less verbatim into new products. On the one hand, it does give a nice continuity to scan a familiar and well-edited text, but on the other hand this kind of data may come as a burden. I suggest that we investigate the Lunar "potato", which probably is as similar to the Terran one as Gloranthan quicksilver and aluminum are to their Terran equivalents. Given the origin in Peloria, the plant has to be winter-hard or reliant on Lodril magic. It has to be starchy, but not dry starch as in wheat or the other grains (and even pseudo-cereals like buckwheat), but rather humid, with about 30% of the original plant retrievable as starch. One common source of such starch in the Empire would be reed rhizomes.

Sorry, but Illaro is the founder of the current Tarshite dynasty - Hon-eel used the lineage of Illaro to put her son on that throne. His great-grandson was seduced by Hon-eel, and three generations further Moirades was seduced/liberated by Jar-eel, fathering a future Red Emperor. This makes Illaro the founder of the (other) dominant dynasty in the most detailed part of Glorantha.

Those of you who participated in the RQ-Daily might remember that this topic was confrontational already 25 years ago when we tried to apply the information in King of Sartar to our RuneQuest games set in a largely unexplored Sartar. Actually, it doesn't. Although with the RQG somewhat experienced characters, it doesn't matter if your focus is solely on the PCs. But then, this is RuneQuest, and your sidekick younger cousin is not a set of three abilities for your main character, but a semi-complete character sheet for himself, like Mr. Baboon in the Quickstart. Now if you are playing Sarotar and want to make good use of your cousin Dorasar who has just been initiated, this suddenly invades your game. Creating an Orlanthi or a Praxian clan or an Esrolian house probably is going to be covered (at least in part) in the Gamemaster's book, hopefully with playable scenarios to introduce your weird family properly, or otherwise in a "there's no place like home" scenario/background product. That's when population statistics are going to be written up. My easy answer to the problem "why doesn't every Orlanthi fly" is simply that quite a lot of the reliable, non-adventuring clan members spend the rune points they recovered in the seasonal worship rites on the fertility, protection and economy of their community early on, leaving them with maybe one or two available rune points if that many. Your stickpicker will probably be feasted once or twice per season for providing his magical rune point service for a carl or thane, and think nothing of that but enjoyment of that exceptional treatment. But let's tackle when the young adults become initiates of a cult, gaining rune points: Orlanthi boys get abducted (usually as a group) by the evil uncles, yadda yadda, and experience the I Fought We Won myth to some extent. They emerge as adults, without any rune points. The first part of the initiation is experienced as Orlanth the Youth, up to the point where the feast with the uncles takes place. Then it turns to Heort's I Fought We Won quest. Heort himself never initiated to Orlanth, although he may have sacrificed to him. But then Heort was a shaman and a shapeshifter. So, after having undergone this adulthood initiation, are the former boys more than lay members of Orlanth? Their runes manifest (as tattoos) as a consequence of the quest, as do their identity tattoos. But then, their runic make-up would have been observable already before the initiation rite, not counting quest benefits derived from details (e.g. which strangers you struggled with, which strangers you made your first allies). Initiation to the main cult(s) of your clan would follow soon. The boys can join any cult they like, as long as it is Orlanth (sometimes known as Barntar), or in special clans Elmal, Heler or Argan Argar. Given "parental" sponsoring (could be a grandfather or uncle, or a Vingan or Redaldan aunt), the boy might be processed through the cult initiation right away (possibly on the next day). Getting into the Lightbringer cults (Iss, CA, LM) may take some apprenticing, as do the lesser cults of the clan (Barntar, Elmal, Heler, Argan Argar, Engizi, Odayla, Yinkin...), but then much of that apprenticing may already have occurred prior to the adulthood rites if the omens were read correctly. Eurmal and Humakt are special cases. As is talking to spirits. (Biologically) female adulthood initiation is biologically triggered, and may involve a hands-on introduction to sexuality if the gender fits. When does gender manifest in Orlanthi society? And which rites will the two non-standard biological sexes attend? The young female gender adult emerges as a well-informed young woman as much as anatomy, conception and avoidance thereof are concerned. She may have lost the biological proof of virginity. No idea what the oddballs like Vingans undergo. Are they already put into the boy's initiatory groups, or do they have to participate in that after clearing the womanhood initiation? Whenever I played a game of "fresh adults" right out of initiation, the characters were already defined in their cultic role, both as player and as GM. You might forward player hero exceptionalism, but meh. You want to give the player characters rivals, enemies, or just good contacts, and those shouldn't be zero level civilians as in the early Ampersand games, but on a comparable or at least somewhat "useful" level.

A bastard sword is basically a long sword with enough of a pommel or handle extension to be able to wield it two-handed. A Katana is a perfectly fine one-handed cavalry sword if gripped normally with the right. What goes for a katana basically goes for any bronze weapon of similar blade length, althouth the shape of the blade probably will be different. The question is how good bronze swords are for slashing at all. That makes sickle blades with something like a T-profile on the back rather less drastic.

Handling gold may have been a privilege. Also, Europe bled itself dry on gold in the silk trade, with gold being one of the few European goods coveted by China. Northern Europe as in Scandinavia switched only rather lately from a weight silver currency to coinage. Providing a place to exchange hacked-up silver into coinage appears to have been a major function of Schleswig up to the formation of the Hanseatic Leage in Visby.

That's because the -ar or -or suffix indicates male names. Heracles sure isn't named after his father, Zeus, either. And in Roman Catholic Germany "Maria" is a common second or third name for males, invoking the name magic of the mother goddess. Yes, it appears to be a dynastic element for the first-born son - Saronil, Sarotar, Jarosar, Terasarin, although this breaks down with the children of Jarosar and Terasarin. Kallyr appears to be the female form of Kallai. -yr is also a male suffix, as in Anatyr. Kallyr might have started out as Kallyra, dropping the female suffix upon Vingan initiation? The Ernaldori actually may be another pointer to a male name using Ernald- as a component. I wonder whether the arn- in Arnbord also stems from Ernalda. Few among the Larnsti in History of the Heortling Peoples have such lineages, and we don't have any information about Arim's or Illaro's ancestry.

Where do you think would the Gold Edge Templars have been stationed during the Dragonrise of 1625? The Native Furthest troops are a kind of fyrd rather than professionals.

I didn't mean to imply this, but you're right, there is a good chance that this is related. I meant to show Intagarn as an example for a non-beast-rider who was able to attract a significant force of Praxians for a raid on a civilized place. Intagarn was a Hiording, hardly involved with either Sylila or the Grazers. I suppose he chose Yanasdros' capital as the hardest target available in Dragon Pass, to prove his worthiness as the future Colymar king. Quite possible, although I have no information about Jaldon raiding anywhere but Dragon Pass (and of course Pavis).

Both are true. If everyone is an initiate of one cult and a lay member of two others, then two thirds of cult members are only lay members of that cult. If everyone is a lay member of four other cults, then 80% of cult members are only lay members. I mistakenly posted my reply to this in the questions thread, where it has been deleted. Anyway, your average clansman in Orlanthi or similar (e.g. Yelmalian) society is initiated to one or maybe two cults (not counting spirit cults), or primarily an ancestor worshipper, and lay member to just about all of the dozen deities that your clan relies on for their annual magics. Your average Pelorian citizen may be initiated to a specific deity, although possibly rather in a spirit cult temporary way, as Pelorians are known to drop worship for inefficient cults and to march on towards more efficient ones. For their afterlife connection, they might rely on Ancestor worship - that would explain Duke Raus of Rone, a nobleman from Kostaddi and ancestor worshipper. Pelorian godtalkers probably still are initiated to their deity, although the Yelmic lesser priesthood that oversees the rites for the acceptable cults might be the ones to do all the magical heavy lifting. In that case, it would be interesting to learn how the deity's magical blessings - formulated as rune spells - would be cast on the attending worshippers.

There are beast riders outside of Prax, in the Wastes, especially near the Iron Forts or the Fever Trees where they can go raiding those civilized targets. These would easily be recruited by a confident Zolathi leader, much like Intagarn of the Hiording clan was in 1440 to stage his raid on Bagnot. After initial successes, they can accompany the warriors back to their clans, then invite the entire clans to go on a rampage. I wonder whether there are more Praxian-descended folk in parts of Kralorela than there are in the Wastes. (The Pelorian descendants from their Dawn Age settlement there either were assimilated into local culture or remained clan-sized like the Sables of Kostaddi. Unless you count their non-tribal bastards.)