Joerg

The Talar, a number of his zzaburi and horali are likely immortal, or at least aging very slowly. IMO most of the Brithini peasants are aging, but slowly, too. The most accomplished among the Ingareens may have found ways to slow down aging, like Leonardo the Scientist. Aeolians have a normal human life-span. The Ingareen school of natural philosophy is built on the absence of Malkion: God Forgot. They did accept the (presumably unabridged) Abiding Book and Zistorite teachings (tied to the Malkioneran abridged edition thereof) in the Second Age. It isn't clear when the Talar and his Brithini staff arrived in God Forgot, possibly on Waertagi ships in the Gray Age. The Ingareens might be stray Kadeniti survivors of the Expulsion Walk, lacking the Brithini longevity for their troubled experiences. I suspect that they retained quite a few of Malkioneranist ideosyncrasies in their survival ghettoes during the Machine Wars, possibly renouncing the Invisible God after the Fall of Locsil.

While there are a number of Lodrili (i.e. non-Yelmite) Lunar clans which have come to the ranks of (previously exclusively Yelmic) Overseers (like satraps), none of these have managed to replace the Emperor, at best his mortal shell (like in 1607). But again, the vast majority of Lodrili Lunar nobility derives their status and acceptance from having a child of the Red Emperor among their ancestors. Denesia all over again and again. (Or Hon-eel.) Teelo Norri and Valare Addi are deified Lunar heroines. Both were illuminated - Teelo when she was killed, Valare before she set out and provided a mythical truth that shows how the "aboriginal Yelmic nobility" were nothing but rebellious upstarts when they took on rulership. Not at all what I was about to say. The Pelorian peasant hero who makes a name for himself will be the named rebel who is punished, even after his cause may have been resolved - a martyr for the cause. The Sun God (by definition a "son of Yelm") who gets defeated at the Hill of Gold becoming a peasant usually loses his imperial inheritance. Karvanyar is the only Dara Happan emperor prior to Magnificus who hid out as a peasant.

The spear god probably won Hill of Gold before the Darkness came to the surface, which is probably why he went there in the first place - in order to repeat a mythically significant feat that benefitted the emperor. The Char-un example. Probably as old as the theft of fire by Trickster. Kralorela is a solar empire with lots of dragon mystery. But then the dragon emperor of Dara Happa may not have started with the EWF take-over, but may have much older sources - at least if you can trust Sandy Petersen and his choice of representation of the Yelmic hero. I think that Sheng is terraforming rather than destroying. This does have bad consequences for anyone with ideas contradicting Sheng's ideas of a perfect world, but I do think that Sheng has a vision of a perfect world, and it is one with the horse nomad equivalent of the Norman forest in former dry-farming lands. Lodrili rebels win by getting their overlords to cave in to their demands, then go on being nice little proletarians doing their assigned jobs. It is like capitalism with working trade unions, where it is rare for a union member to rise to a position of authority in the state. If anything, the Pelorian peasant hero is a tragic hero, much like Jannisor (who was a hill barbarian). His rebellion might achieve what it meant to achieve, but the leader will be eliminated by the ones in power, for the greater good. Stepping up as a rebel leader is similar to volunteering to the role of the sacrificial king. I think of the twenty or so Egi that made up Takenegi, maybe a few of the original ones survived, and of the prepared runners up too many didn't make it, either. Magnificus is the best that the Empire could come up with after a long hiatus of training replacement Egi.

So against the evil overlords, may they be the Dara Happans, people conquering Dara Happa, or evil Argrath who disables Kalikos. Being a peasant in Peloria has always been an underprivileged existence since civilization had been introduced. And it is not about second amendment barbarian farmer warriors. There are no peasant heroes in civilized Peloria, only nobles hiding as peasants, or their low-born wives who heroically take them in and cover for them. Danfive Xaron might be the closest to a peasant hero the Pelorians have.

Yes. The Ingareens are a bit like Brithini, a bit something else. They have a significant number of primary producers - farmers, gardeners, fisherfolk, probably a lot less herders. They might cultivate a few food plants unusual to the rest of the Theyalan world. Judging from the expected marsh and sand soil, I could make a case for cabbages (like in Ditmarsia). Normally, the climate might have allowed perennial plants which aren't quite winter hard. But then, I expect the Brithini to have spells to bring olive trees or similar through their ice age, and why shouldn't the God Forgotten not have those? Unlike the Brithini and the Aeolians, I think that a low level of sorcery is rather wide-spread among Ingareen artificers. Natural philosophers rather than crafters.

I think it is similar to watching some underwater scene, only that spirits give off some active "light" under Second Sight which does get weakened by interspersed dense matter. The curtain analog probably is quite apt as you might perceive spiritual endowed entities in the mundane world from the spirit world like candles through a textile. Similar curtains - possibly weaker - might separate different spirit realms from one another.

No, anything Hellenic comes from a long naval tradition, something the Lunars definitely lack. Even the Spartans used to have a navy and founded (failed) colonies in the Tripolis area. If anything, you should look at the Roman navy in the Punic Wars. The Romans were at that time a land power without much knowledge about ships or naval warfare. Just like the Lunars, who know about river barges and moon boats, and that's about it. The traditional Yelmic regiments have officers who are initiates of Yelm. The rank and file worships sons of Yelm. There are a few Yelmic Second families whose economic reality makes it near impossible to maintain cult obligations, and who might enter yelmic regiments. If they are initiates of Yelm, they are accepted administrators or officers (usually staff rather than rank and file). Most Heartland troopers are lay members of a couple of Imperial cults, but initiated to none (or maybe to something like the RQ3 "Yelm the Youth" which was basically a lay member who had sacrificed a point of POW for the afterlife benefits at the adulthood rites). That makes quite a few of them Daka Fal cultists, but absent family members, this doesn't really give them much help when fighting abroad. Lunar soldiery will have a greater amount of initiates than the Heartland norm, but I would be astonished if they reached a 50% quota. Typical Yelmic martial cults are Hastatus (Yelmalio without all the baggage of Hill of Gold) and Sagittus (Golden Bow). Heartland Lunars might include illuminated initiates of the Red Goddess. Of the other immortals, Yanafal, Irrippi, Deezola, Etyries, Jakaleel and Hon-eel probably are the most encountered initiates. Provincial Lunars (including Sylila and Oraya) are more likely to initiate to a specific deity than the mostly sheltered Heartlanders, and Provincial forces probably consist mainly of initiates. The Seven Mothers cult will dominate. Officers' cults are named such because to join you have to prove that you are officer material. In the Heartlands, that's pedigree. In the provinces, ability probably plays a role. An officers' cult won't necessarily welcome the hoi polloi in their cultic ranks. "If you want to initiate, initiate to the unit's deity!" The Lunar military command structure is fairly unspecific at lower ranks.We know about Fazzur's staff, but we don't know whether a patrol leader is an officer or a man from the ranks who has risen as far as he can expect (the equivalent of the Roman Centurio). I can see a lot of "master sergeants" interpreting the commands of their noble officers to the least damaging outcome. This has been a rule in civilized warfare for millennia.

Vamargic didn't really make friends, although he attracted followers while he was around. Reports on his activities will show grudging respect at best. In case of the uz, a throwback or atavistic troll is something positive, not negative - a troll closer to the mistress race. The cave trolls were mutated mainly from Dark Trolls, although Mistress Race trolls may have been affected, too. It isn't clear whether they are subject to the curse of kin when mating with one another, but mating with dark trolls can trigger the curse.

Special weapon feats may come as some form of magic. The eastern Martial Artists train both armed and unarmed combat, but few will approach a foe unarmed if they can avoid it. That said, kicks or barehanded attacks while weapons are locked are well within this scope. Heroic leaps (possibly combined with kick attacks) might be another application of Martial Arts in normal combat.

Both Yelm and Yanafal are officer cults, whereas I understood the premise to be more on the non-com and grunt level of soldiery. Actually, pretty close to the very small core of survivors of the Black Company after they left the sorcerers' service in the north. Seven Mothers, a Pelorian river god (e.g. the Black Eel, inheriting much of the Engizi cult) from around Mirin's Cross, a Lunar monitor or two (the magic-support squad members, Odayla - all of this would be found in Sylila or the Provinces and might be detached to naval duty.

That approach is quite similar to what I came up with in response to the Runepower suggestions that flooded the Daily or Digest around 1995 - all rune points were directed to a specific spell, and the maximum stacking limit was the number of POW sacrificed to that spell. On the other hand, I was cool with having multiple castings of that spell rather than that other spell which had produced those extra rune points. But that was for a world where magic was somewhat less common than Glorantha, and where it followed slightly different rules.

Nice argument, could be made for any conqueror, like e.g. Hwarin Dalthippa, Hon-eel, or Phargentes. No one is forcing the Lunar resistance to take back the lands that they conquered (from the Carmanians, in the Zero Wane, or from others in the Second Wane). They all could just stop and lay low. Which is what happens in Kralorela, which fares much better in the Seleric Empire. Indeed. The Pentans don't exactly want pent. They want rich pasture and subservient cities providing them with the luxuries of civilization. The Horse warlords want Peloria back. Simple as that. It used to be theirs, and Sheng is giving it back to them. Think of them (and their Dara Happan supporters) as the Alt Right, and you get the idea. Some of the Dara Happans were quite willing to adjust to the new regime and had no problem taking up their old importance without those Lunar upstarts pretending at nobility. Mainly the rice-growing urban nobility - and all their dependents. No, there is a third group you are under-estimating - the Old Day Traditionalists. Not with the ambush-style riddling the Lunar Mobs inflict on their unwitting Pelorian contemporaries. Madness may be a holy state of being in the Lunar Way, but it is hardly a happy one. So what's the news? Random peasants have ever been the victims of military conflicts. Sheng's troops are worse than Jaldon's raids only in that they are staying. And a major portion of Sheng's troops are willing collaborators who accept the solar warlord as the just (in Dara Happan definition) imperial authority. Sheng doesn't claim emperorship of Dara Happa, he claims superior emperorship, and leaves that detail to a brother. Seriously: what exactly is your source for this? Where do you get this from? Yes, there were massacres, reminiscent of Bartholomew's night, Magdeburg, or the crusaders' conquest of Jerusalem. Or Assyrian "examples", pour encourager les autres. I bet that there were places in Sheng's empire where you could leave a pile of gold in the marketplace, and you'd find it complete when you return, just like in Vlad Dracul's county. Does it want to liberate people, or does it want to liberate the Goddess, with the population becoming an organ or similar of hers? Reminds me strongly of the EWF Great Dragon. The Empire doesn't care about the individual, or about happiness of the inhabitants. It cares about security and control. Individual enlightenment is rather meaningless, only deep advances in Lunar enlightenment is reflected back on the empire, spreading more madness. Yelmic chauvinists, indeed. Business as usual in Peloria. And mandarins and even exarchs in Kralorela. The imperial bureaucracy in Teshnos. And bureaucrats transplanted, so that you would find Kralori and even Teshnan bureaucrats - all beautifully chauvinist solar, Kralorela is as much solar as it is draconic. TarnGatHa, HeenMaroun and Metsyla correspond to Aether, Yelm and Antirius. Gorgorma can be awakened in the Empire at any time. Yelmic Justice is never just to the peasants, and has never been. At best, it is established. Sheng re-ordered the land, plundered the Lunar nobility and their clients. Look at the distribution - the ancient Dara Happan cities all lie in the rice area, whereas the upstart Lodrili-turned-Lunar nobility come from the pasture belt Sheng and his horse folk re-establish. (Which is hardly distinguishable from the Reforestation plan of the elves except in the outcome.) It is a clash of systems. Sheng's new system did not have a chance to remain, otherwise he may have become the Gloranthan Ghenghis or Alexander. As it happened, he only made it to the Gloranthan Attila. The creation of the Glowline, expanding the madness belt from the Silver Shadow to the entire empire, is a reaction to Sheng, and does impact the anti-Lunar population quite adversely. There were three Dara Happan contenders for the Emperorship after Yelmgatha's death. That doesn't sound like a happy Dara Happa. Jannisor had little problem raising half the Heartlands against the Red Moon. The Arrolians have de-coupled the moon worship from the Empire, and that gives them a liberated experience. The Pentans aren't nice. The Char-un aren't, and most of the Grazers aren't really, either. But then, neither are the hill barbarians. The Lunars have long been presented as villains, which was wrong. But in the war with Sheng, they aren't exclusively the victims. The Pentans have been bloodily expelled from their ancient homelands in Peloria time and again, and they have re-established themselves on occasion. It was the Horse Warlords who led Peloria out of the Darkness, a feat all too easily forgotten and suppressed in Peloria. They are about as reviled as the Kitori. In the Seleric war, the only innocents were the victims of both sides. Yeah, hear me arguing from a Dara Happan position... I am long on the record for disbelieving the benevolence of Dara Happan despotism. The reign of Brightface was started with a coup and expanded at the cost of decency. Yelm is to blame for the corruption of the many masks of Sedenya. Sylila was the weird fusion of Orlanthi values, Dara Happan values and Lunar liberation which had developed quite the momentum, until Arim's Kingdom struck back and liberated Hwarin's conquest south of Sylila proper one by one. Yanasdros had unified the traditional Orlanthi to the extent that they could be unified (like the raid for the Ivory Throne upon his (imminent?) death). He did ally with Sylila to deal with the horse barbarian intrusion at the Battle of Quintus Vale, recognizing the greater common values even with Hwarin's perversion vs. the horse warlords, but then he had had his own problems with the horse warlords to his south, and had come out victorious. The Spolite heresy is a big issue for Dara Happan illumination, and happened even before Syranthir arrived at Lake Oronin. Syranthir came down hard on the Spolite homelands, allowing the Dara Happans to ostracize the Spolite doctrine as much as possible, but they didn't manage to eradicate it from their culture. Jakaleel inherited much of that when the Seven Mothers rebelled against the bull shah emperors. Like Sylila, Carmania had the enthusiasm of the recently converted. The houses who had joined the Lunar Way had profited greatly in the earlier wane, and weren't about to lose that advantage to their traditionalist rivals of old, so they became one of the most fervent agents of the moon, proceeding to inflict their Lunar version of harm on those who had succumbed to Sheng's rule. I would assume a certain revival of sinister Spolite or even deeper blue-skinned sorcerer ways already among the Lunarized Carmanian nobility. I guess that a visit to the Moon was involved where he was recognized as one of the Egi, and chosen as the mortal shell to house the Red Emperor. He may already have been an Egi, or a promising candidate for an Egi, when Takenegi still was around. Not all of the Egi spend all of their time on the Red Moon. Sheng would have hunted down the Egi similar to the Lunar assassination wave against the House of Sartar initiated by Moirades, who appears to have had a special grudge against Tarkalor's offspring. As a result, many established Egi would have been eliminated, enough so that the former shape of Takenegi was lost.

There are Brithini in God Forgot, including a golden-skinned ancient Talar, blue-skinned Zzaburi, red-skinned Horali, and hardly distinguishable brown-skinned Dronari who blend in with the non-immortal Ingareens and Esvulari who are the typical brown-skinned wareran Theyalans. There might be some paler types among the Esvulari descended from the Slontan conquerors/city founders. I doubt that any influx of Jrusteli to the Ingareens would have made it past the Machine Wars. What Ingareens survived that conflict must have done so in Jon Barat or Refuge.

IMO Second Sight only gives the ability to see spirits that are in the same segment of reality as the observer, it doesn't allow the view across the curtain. Shamans have their permanent spirit world presence through their fetch, they exist on both sides of the curtain. Their Second Sight is the normal perception beyond the curtain, and is active on the mundane side.

Two points: Sheng's Empire was constantly beset by the vengeful former masters of Peloria, forcing Sheng to remain in force. The madness that accompanies the Lunar Way especially in places like SIlver Shadow or Graclodont is almost indistinguishable from the nightmares accompanying Sheng to the non-illuminated or non-initiated (Seven Mothers). The Spolite ways are part of the Lunar Way, and they can make the Shadzorings look civilized. There can be more rational leaders in the Empire who can create tolerable conditions for the citizens. They aren't exactly in the majority. Sheng did not have unlimited numbers of Zolathi at his side. Possibly enough to equalize the Lunar College of Magic with its demonic Full Moon Corps and their magicians. The Lunar resistance certainly was "all heroic and not at all bad for the population", much like the rebel outlaws in Lunar occupied Sartar. They caused a good portion of the hardship in the Sheng-occupied lands.

That's where I differ. The austerities are meant to be overcome by the mystic. Once you have advanced far enough, there is no suffering. Whatever the torturers might think of, the Outer World you explore has a much higher degree of "purification" to inflict on you, or destruction to embrace and integrate if you go the Venfornic way. Sheng has a way to collect all of his Zolathi buddies before some of the last steps to the Void, but even there, suffering is long overcome and austerities are just a meditative aid. He then has them use all the temptations they have been offered going that far.

In the original Hero Wars, you had to be a devotee to perform a feat, and I think that carried over into HQ1. That reduced the number of flyers significantly.

Depends strongly which ethnicity and rank you are assigning, and which Red Emperor. In Dara Happa, I would have to become illuminated to survive the hierarchy. As a horse rider, the answer is clear - Sheng Seleris. Ask Parg Ilisi about it. Danfive Xaron. The Mad Sultan. The Vampire League. The Cult of the Bat. Gerra is as much about torture and slavery as is Sheng, only Sheng chose the power path rather than liberation. Only when Moonson is a total ass, like Argenteus. When there was a capable and ascetic emperor, Great Sister would be all about debouchery and excess. The original Takenegi and Great Sister may have been somewhat balanced, with not too extreme cycles, but the subsequent masks of moonson have been quite irregular in capabilities, and generally free of compassion. (Thrice Blessed - the name is a sick joke.) As it should be in a good solar patriarchy. Given the right position, life in Sheng's empire is at least as good as in Takenegi's. Just don't become one of the victims - but that is true for the tens of thousands of Tarshites, Sartarites, Votanki, Arkos folk and Pentans enslaved in the post-Sheng Empire, too. The Lunar way preaches liberation and promotes slavery and mass human sacrifice. Sheng preaches might through suffering and promotes a well-ordered empire. Either are somewhat unpalatable but acceptable under the pressure to Dara Happans - any strong emperor is a good emperor, regardless what he does to some of his subjects.

And all of that preceding the Sunstop Empire of Brighteye. Quite likely a time when the Sunpath or something like it was used by the White Goddess, possibly going through a dark phase when passing through the Underworld. Oria is an aspect of Ernalda, and probably was a concubine like many other goddesses that showed up in the marriage contest. Genertela Box had this intriguing passage mentioning the three orbs glowing above the metropolises of Dara Happa. This is an arrangement similar to how the eight planets are depicted on the Copper Tablets (which show an interestingly winding Oslir managing to place Nivorah northeast of Alkoth), and probably what the Red King was about, too.

Why would he inflict wide-spread long-term torture that would create anti-Shengs sooner or later? Sheng chooses an elite of volunteers and possibly a few highly suitable conscripts to educate. The Char-un follow such a belief anyway - not so much slavery, but they make a cult of hardship bordering on suffering to define their manliness, and have no regard for sedentary folk unless they are able to win over them. And then at best grudgingly, and constantly testing their boundaries. Another Garangordos? Oh please. Abject serfdom, yes, much worse than the Vendref before the FHQ, or the Ergeshi in Sun Dome County. Sheng treats the sedentary folk much like the Alkothi treat the Darjiinians. He does exchange bureaucrats and magicians between the big former empires, and establishes a brutal but efficient order. SS or Red Army occupied recently conquered lands. Genocidal? Certainly. But so were others before him. Palangio did the same to Orlanthland - he initiated a decades long drought (according to Ten Women Well Loved), and Lokamayadon prevented access to Orlanth. The Bright Empire didn't shy away from all manners of chaotic behavior. Not that the curses summoned by Arkat and Talor were any more wholesome. Before the FHQ rose to power, the vendref experiences just that - a life worse than the Oasis Folk. The Fifth, maybe. The Sixth are the garbage dump and miserable swamp folk. The swamp folk would normally live on tubers and whatever crawls and swims between them, much like the durulz. The Frog-eaters of the Bodensee pole houses paid for that diet by contracting bad parasites which would eat them up from the interior. At the best, the weeders may have access to wild rice. Rice paddies probably were left untouched by Sheng, after all you cannot turn them into useful pasture. The Dry Farmers on the other hand had to plant grain only to have it grazed off by the horses. The reaction to Endarkus Bull-slayer's revolt was on a similar level to the massacre of Gio, and won't have been the only such retaliatory strike. The oh so civilized rulers of the three empires conquered by Sheng were as brutal in establishing order. As a conqueror, Sheng had more opportunities to do so. Tolat may be a god of matrimonial fertility, but Shargash is not a god of love. Shargash is Zorak Zoran in the sky. His berserks quite likely partake of corpses before their raids and smear themselves with ashes and corpse wax, emulating the Shadzorings of old. They are civilized, which makes them more terrible than the Storm Bulls. I don't see much of a qualitative difference between Nontraya and the god of the Shadzorings, other than "but he is our monster" (which he often enough wasn't). Only because he wouldn't be distracted from his temple project. Earlier actions like the Dundealos incident show that Tatius enjoyed exactly this kind of cruelty. It is a Dara Happan cultural trait to exact the worst punishment on the unworthy (Gerra) and rebels. Probably the Thirty Years War in the Germanies, or the fifty years longer conflict in the Netherlands? A few Magdeburgs, a lot of Marode regiments, plundering, raping, force-recruiting... It was the True Golden Horde inflicted on Peloria? Sheng had as much use for the dry farmers as the US settlers had for the Cherokee, or Atatürk for the Armenians, or Charlemagne for the Saxons, so he acted accordingly. He may have done the wheat equvialent to the bison massacre which destroyed Plain Indian culture, or the Tasmanian conquest. He may even have rounded up unnecessary dry farmers for target practice, or have had his quite erudite Kralori and Pelorian bureaucracy arrange mass migrations into destruction. His main force - the horse nomads - had quite a few grudges to get even for, Golden Horde style. From history, you could name Attila, Timur Leng, Vlad Dracul and any number of European culture governments in the second half of the nineteenth and the first half of the twentieth century for cruelty. Sheng did build up an empire, and made maximum use of the civilized assets that didn't inconvenience his horse riders, like the Kralori fleet he sent to Vormain. His empire was well ruled, supporting a huge army. The peasantry was struggling to feed the army and themselves, but they managed, just like the Oasis Folk in Prax do. Re-dedicating wheat fields for pasture is no bigger a deal than declaring vast tracts of England as forests (hunting preserves), evicting or hamstringing the resident population. Don't get me wrong - Sheng was a power-hungry, cruel, mad demigod. But like Avanapdur, his empire worked for quite a while when Lunar Chaos was fought off as much as Kralori dragons. His opponents in the Lunar Empire were as ruthless as Sheng.

Still is if you have the Char-un or similar horse riders as occupation forces. The Grazers might have shed a bit of that after accepting the reign of the Feathered Horse Queens, and Joraz Kyrem probably made is followers obey more civilized rules, too, but the rest of the horse nomads have never been known as tender overlords. Tatius' Windstop was worse on the natives, and Tatius enjoyed that greatly. Those demons could just as well have been Alkothi, and that kind of diet probably wasn't too uncommon among the Sixths of Dara Happa without Teelo Norri alms. For lack of fire probably not prepared as a gumbo... So did he compare favorably or unfavorably to the Bull Shah episode of the Empire? Did he unleash the Bat on the population (from controlling it)? Yelm worshippers are a callous lot, and so are horse nomads. Combining these traits makes for charming folk. (Not that violent Storm Pentans or Praxians on steroids are any better...) I don't recall any repeat of Dagguneri ("Eats Women") for Sheng's reign.

Probably born on the Other Side, and possibly his father was a Kitori and Zorak Zorani who could take on Dehori shape, and/or got himself possessed by a suitable spirit. Vamargic quite likely was born when the EWF still bled off weird draconic magics, but possibly only after the fall of the Clanking City.

Indeed. I am willing to allow two or four inches of aura/breath to expand the notion of self that affects clothing, weapons etc. within that aura. Anything protruding from that (cloaks, long weapons, backpacks) is not. I am not quite convinced that CM can be cast on objects. If it can, you could cast it on a (rolled up) tent cloth, and then unroll it to have a CM screen covering several people, possibly even with narrow slits to fire arrows through. (Protection offers the same possibilities, in addition to making your parries more efficient if cast on a weapon.)

I don't recall seeing that in the discussion, yet, so no. Neither. Now that you ask, not really: I would have gone for no reduction in magic point cost, but David Scott argued for a free boost of the spell by the amount of POW invested. That didn't address the occasion where the spell would be cast at the amount of POW it was inscribed with, though. One might argue that a spell inscription worth 4 POW would be able to release the spell without using any MP, but a 1 MP activation cost sounds like the minimum I would ask for. It is like an enchantment, even somewhat lower in return as it isn't transferable at all. Enchantments can be expanded after the initial investment. Is it that much like an enchantment? To me this seems like it is a personal achievement, similar to acquiring rune points. So once you inscribed a spell with duration 2, it will always have to be cast with duration 2? That would be a matrix enchantment rather than an inscription. That's a bit like manufacturing the sorcerous equivalent of Truestone. It creates an INT extension that can be used in addition to Enhance INT. A middle way would be to have each point of Intensity provided by the inscription cost one MP regardless whether the technique or the runes are known or implied.

The twin eggs are for the mayonnaise...