Joerg

No, definitely keep posting that story. Take the money anyway.

The current thought is that sacrificing your non-permanent POW aka magic points on a holy day or a high holy day may gain you a POW check and regains one point of divine magic. It could be argued that spending the holy day not in reaffirming the world but instead in increasing your magical power should be penalized rather than rewarded. Like, you forego your chance for a POW check when sacrificing POW for a new spell (point in your spell pool). That selfish activity detracts from your experience of the magic. But then that assumes that you experience the holy day in ceremony at the temple, and not flying the winds to the nearest Holy Mountain from where you enter Orlanth's Hall. If your holy day is spent flying on the winds and then feasting in Orlanth's hall, where do you find the time for sacrificing for a new spell? And where do you find a priest not involved in enabling that holy day magic? Learning your new spell by exiting Orlanth's Hall into the appropriate myth could be possible, though. After all, the magic of a divine spell draws the mythic reality of that incident to the caster of the divine spell, enabling him to act like his deity. But that results in less carousing with the host of Orlanth, less strengthening of your soul. Less chance at re-gaining that point of POW you are going to transform into a spell pool point. If you want more out of that Other Side visit, it is up to you and your supporting community (or communities) to start a heroquest on that day. That's the only way I would interfere with the point-for-point economy of divine magic in RQ. I would agree to an argumentation that divine magic cast in ritual context on the holy day gets casting benefits. So, whether you undergo a structured liturgy on the holy day or whether you visit the other side, your personal business is distracting from the real purpose of the holy day. Holy days are about the role of the deity in the world more than they are about the individual worshipper.

At the time I went to RQ, RQ3 was the only version available in my corner of Germany. My first RQ campaign was based on the RQ3 Vikings box, one of the first original publications after the rules came out. The version I had was the Games Workshop hardcover, and I wasn't that happy with the organisation. In order to get the rules, I started translating them, and I managed to go through about 60% before I learned that a German translation had already been finished. RQ3 became my baseline for RuneQuest and BRP. I didn't miss Glorantha - while I had Gods of Glorantha and used it as guideline for my world's cults, I didn't have the background that went with it. My first Gloranthan gaming was the Dragon Pass boardgame, but my RQ campaign remained in my homebrew world that had started with my Viking campaign. I did inherit elements from other RQ publications like Griffin Island (GW edition) and Land of Ninja (GW edition). It was Troll Pak (3rd ed. AH) which made me notice that the Blank Land of Balazar wasn't if it had Votanki hunters like the ones I knew from Griffin Island. My first Gloranthan RQ game as GM was a playtest campaign using the 1994 version of RuneQuest - Adventures in Glorantha, never published. I found it a solid continuation of RQ3. RQ3 also remained a go to reference because that used to be the only version translated to German, prior to TDM's RQ6. I haven't used any of the published scenarios, although I have made good use of the sandbox elements offered there. By the time the RQ3 renaissance petered out, I had managed to buy the (Games Workshop) RQ2 rules, but those didn't make me want to switch. Prax never really caught my fancy. I have played a few convention scenarios there, but the beast riders never made me want to play them. Dragon Pass, the Principality of Sartar, and the Holy Country south of it with their Orlanthi and the chance to play just before the Lunar occupation there were a lot more what I wanted from the setting that the boardgame had brought to life for me. I didn't buy MRQ1 after I found the setting book making strange assumptions about the EWF. I tried to master Hero Wars for Glorantha instead. I played a single game of MRQ2 hosted by Loz when he was working on the first scenarios of a Harreksaga campaign. For non-Gloranthan fantasy, I guess that I will stick to Mythras, unless the setting comes fused to a BRP rule system. For Gloranthan gaming, I am open for all of the current systems. Writing for HeroQuest is pleasantly laid back as I don't have to produce (and lay out) stat blocks. I still have to see RQG (beyond the Kickstarter) or 13G to see how those will fit my way of running and preparing a scenario. I still should be able to sit down and improvise a RQ3 scenario, including estimates for hit locations and weapon damage. I don't have that familiarity with any other version of RQ. That abundance was traded at impossible rates after RQ3 was on the market. I partially completed my RQ2 collection in the 90s, on convention auctions. Compared to that, the Avalon Hill DeLuxe set was dirt cheap.

When researching big numbers used by Gloranthans, I took a closer look at the Plentonic dating in the Guide. At first glance, it appears identical to the table in Glorious ReAscent of Yelm p.4, there is a significant addition: That's 20,000 years before the first (Dara Happan) people are created (according to this timeline), and another 10,000 years earlier than Murharzarm's enthronement in 60,000 YS. It was another 15,000 years YS before Umath's encounter with the eight planetary sons and his chaining/dismemberment. So basically, this list acknowledges the presence of Umatum alongside with the Yelmic Court for 45,000 years YS before coming into conflict. Yelmic and Brithini reckoning of Godtime years aren't that far apart - the Dara Happans allow 11,000 years between the Sunset and the Dawn, the Brithini add 3,825 to the number of 14,825 Turnings of the Red Sands of Time (which get extrapolated to correspond to years in history by calculating the year 1621 to 16,446 on p.112). Comparing documented datings from Kralorela or Vormain would be interesting (but those probably don't exist anywhere in the Real World). I still wonder what suggested the turn of years in Godtime. We are told that Godtime is cyclical, but what does that mean? Cycles of harvesting and of following beast migrations (whether wild or domesticated) are dictated by the terrestrial year. We know that the people of Dara Happa and of Brithos had cultures based on a majority of people engaging in agriculture. Murharzarm ordered canalization and irrigation when he overcame Sshorga, starting the ancient Dara Happan wet farming culture with its domesticated gazzam. This doesn't tell us anything about the rhythms and cycles of farming, though. Stars were invented when Umath disturbed the planetary sons. Prior to that, there was only the Golden Dome, under which the 10 orbs would hang, so only around 75,000 YS. Apart from those ten immobile objects and the golden dome, there was nothing to see in the sky. If Arraz and the Luxites/Shanassae were active prior to the planets' fall, such activity was limited to realms above the sun dome. On another note on YS dating: the Birth of the Red Goddess in 1220 almost fits into the extrapolation of the Plentonic dates. Strict Plentonian dating would have expected 1221 as the start of the 10,000 year era following the 1,000 year era of Yelm. The GRoY doesn't offer any suggestions about who should be patron of that era, but Lunar doctrine certainly will claim this for Sedenya. If not for the Carmanian occupation, the Dara Happans may have awaited that year fearfully or joyfully. The Carmanian overlords might even have used this, too, to declare this the era of Idovanus.

I guess you're purposefully missing my point - both Venice and Amsterdam were founded after the demise of the empire, in places where there were no extant remnants of that empire. I doubt that the location of Swenstown was used for a major center in the Imperial Age while Ulaninstead was strong and the center of Orgovalland. Trier was one of four capitals of the Roman Empire, and has a continuous history as a city since the Roman empire (unlike e.g. London which was abandoned as a city during the early Anglo-Saxon period). My initial comparison "like finding authentic Greek architecture in Washington DC", but Swenstown does sit on the edge of the former EWF core region, even if there was no strong EWF presence there and then.

EWF era buildings in Sartarite cities? That's a bit like expecting classical Roman architecture in Venice or Amsterdam. The EWF wouldn't have built much aerial defense against big flyers. They had a problem with traditionalist Orlanthi flyers, not with huge flying entities (or even wyverns or giant hawks).

Jeff clarified this over on the RQ thread: I think I prefer Andrey's image over the aerial view in Sartar - Kingdom of Heroes p.240. The octagonal building might be standing above a cistern, from the map it looks like the place could use one. I would replace part of S-KoH's shanty town inside the Dwarf Gate with this street panorama in my Glorantha. I guess we won't get definitive 3D-models of those cities anytime soon, The aerial view maps of the three cities probably aren't that definitive. Swenstown should be more urban than Red Cow Fort, and Andrey's buildings offer a glimpse of that. When Satar founded those cities, he attracted urban craftsfolk from Kethaela, who would have brought their own architecture with them. This would be their quarter, with rather small plots of land and hence higher buildings. Speaking of 3D-models, I would be interested to hear ideas for the look and feel of Karse. Is the old Midkemia Press/Chaosium publication with its aerial and side view map of the place using the basic layout of Caernarfon still somewhat current?

Pyjeemsab of course comes from a lineage that had avatars of Sorana Tor as mothers for two generations at least. And probably the two or three following generations as well. Which makes me wonder about the Orindori family (Fazzur's father and ancestors). They appear to be of Tarshite lineages, but like Philigos and Phargentes had Sylilan holdings, so maybe the family came from Sylila and managed to establish itself in the leadership of a Tarshite clan. On the other hand, the Orindori are named as one of the families taking care of the royal horse herds. Looking at the history of Tarsh, there is a good likelihood that these were established under Yarandros, and while the office may have turned into some kind of local kingship after Orios' demise, there is a quite high possibility that the current keepers of those herds trace that responsibility back to the establishment of the herds. (I wonder whether the princes of Sartar had a similar establishment, possibly in cooperation with the Pol Joni?) For a native Tarshite family to gain significant holdings in the (barbarian) Heartland Satrapy of Sylila the Orindori may have engaged in special marriages with Jillaro. The heirs of Hwarin Dalthippa don't seem to have supported Hon-eel's Tarsh adventure much, and Phargentes rising to the post of Provincial Overseer may have galled them a lot. Still, the exiles from Palashee's Tarsh appear to have prospered in that exile, except perhaps their deposed king Philigos himself. Estal Donge related to Pharandros, Moirades and/or Fazzur: The author of the Sartar CHDP and the Fazzur fragment disagrees with the author of the Tarshite CHDP in a couple of points. (And I don't think that either of them was Densesros - that Vendref sage was most likely the collator and reluctant editor of those texts.) Oronin Satrapy cries Eel-ariash, and while the clan left its name on two of the Inspirations of Moonson, it may have pursued yet other goals of its own with the Temertain plot. When I designed my own campaign around the Lunar occupation of Sartar and Heortland, one of my leitmotives was the different approaches by the Tarshite royals, the Orindori, and the Dara Happans to managing the newly won lands. Fazzur is credited as land owner of significant tracts of conquered Sartar. I wonder where, and whose clan lands were confiscated. Apart from the Lunar manor in Colymar lands and Wulfsland, there are no confirmed cases of Lunar landholders in occupied Sartar. The Sartar dynasty had little if any royal land - the roads, and maybe the three keeps named after Saronil's sons and surrounding lands. And possibly Duck Point, which might cast an avaricious note on Fazzur blaming the ducks for the rebellion. Depopulating the land around that town might have gained him control over what was left of the river trade with Nochet. So there wasn't really any time when a "High Queen of Saird" was a reality until Argrath made it so? If Inrana's daughter is commonly named Inkarne, does Inkarne basically mean "sovereignty goddess avatar wife of the Liberator," and could this be a title also bestowed on Samastina for enabling Argrath's kingship over Kethaela?

Via a friend on G+ I stumbled across these short videos: The Call of Cthulhu Dr. Seuss Style (by R.J. Ivankovic) CGI 3D Animated Short: "The Mountains of Madness" - by "The SpookySpookyShoggoths"

However, it is Inkarne who is remembered as ruling for a hundred years. So is Inrana's daughter named Inkarne, too? We know that Inrana's daughter is brought to the Kerofin temple for further education in 1634, and is hidden there after the defeat at Yoran. I sort of wonder whether Verenmars used anything like this when he founded his kingdom of Saird? Inkarne: And through Moirades also the granddaughter of another Feathered Horse Queen (Guide p.175). Since Tarkalor married the third FHQ in contest with Phargentes, this means that Moirades is the grandson of Yoristina (assuming that she was "Keeps the Children"). CHDP states that Phargentes was happily married, and calculating Moirades' birth to 1558, he could have married her upon his ascendance as King of Tarsh. Having married a sister or cousin of "Mother of Land" almost two decades earlier may have hindered Phargentes' ambitions to become King of Dragon Pass against Tarkalor. Then we have Estal Donge, named in the Sartar section of CHDP as sister of Pharandros (and presumably a daughter of Hasta Orindori, making her Fazzur's niece). "A noblewoman from the city of Durnsa, in distant Oronin." On the other hand, Moirades was well known for orgiastic indulgences, and it would have been possible for a Lunar house like the Eel-ariash to slip a fertile daughter of their house into his amusements, e.g. during the coronation festivities of the current mask of the Red Emperor which Moirades is likely to have attended, more in his role as kin to the emperor (through Hon-eel and the Telsor lineage) than as provincial king. Interestingly, the mention of Estal in the Tarsh section of CHDP for interceding with Argrath on behalf of Pharandros has been changed from the softcover to the hardcover edition to Pharandros' mother, Harsta, Fazzur's sister. The mention in the Sartarite CHDP still has Estal Donge and names her his sister. The Guide doesn't know anything about a city named Durnsa in Oronin. The closest it can offer is the city of Durnvok in Doblian, which also offers presumably ecstatic oEgret rites (compare the heron rites of Dorkath, on the other end of Suvaria) which are congruent with her description in Sartar Kingdom of Heroes. But old Pelanda has other ecstatic cults, too. The Lost Fragment (exclusive to the hardcover edition of KoS) names Estal a rival of Fazzur, sent by the Emperor rather than by the Tarshite court (which is represented as being ruled by Moirades). Speaking of weird lineages, who are the -Telsor lineage, descended from the Red Emperor, that married Phoronestes? They might have had a hand in Pharandros' education in Glamour.

Penraltan apparently was the chief for Varnatol the Durtarl, and his exploits at Dwernapple are the last paragraphs of the Grazer section of Composite History of Dragon Pass. It is a bit unclear how the author was able to mention Penraltan's gift of gold horses at the same wedding where Varnatol presented the Composite History, but I think this would have to be the wedding to Inkarne. (There may have been a previous wedding, but with the new information about Inkarne being the daughter of Moirades and Riches Without ... I think that Argrath married only one FHQ. In that case it is unclear how Inkarne became tied to Holay, though.) King of Sartar names Jandetin as the Grazer chief at the first (1629) marriage to the FHQ, so Penraltan must have been there for a later wedding. On the other hand, if the 1640 date for the completion of CHDP was correct, we are looking at another marriage between Dwernapple and 1640. Did Argrath and the FHQ repeat their year weddings several times before the 1643 wedding? And how does Holay get into the game of weddings? Another Inkarne? Unless Penraltan's gift of the gold horses preceded Dwernapple, the CHDP confirms that he survived (p.98 hardcover edition): That would have to be the 1629 wedding. If Inkarne is the daughter of Moirades, she would have been in her mid twenties. I am not sure when Moirades became King of Dragon Pass. Riches Without Tears first set her bride price high, but was outbid by Moirades. Basically, that's the three player scenario in the Dragon Pass boardgame, and would come after the Full Game with complete diplomacy. That sounds like lots of poetic license for the CHDP version: Basically, Annstad (a vassal of Argrath, and not quite in the league of Jar-eel) neutralizes the enemy superhero through his je-ne-sais-quoi (especially after having seen his portrait). "ignoring the cries of the Lunar troops" makes it quite clear that they regarded this as weakening their side. "Both were from nations which hated each other" was unproblematic when I assumed that Annstad was one of the Tarsh Exiles. We learned about him being another Fazzurson only when some of the contents of the Glorantha book from the 13G kickstarter were leaked. Annstad was a Lunar Tarshite already when he joined Argrath in 1624 or 25, and probably never ever hid his Lunar religion. Let's assume that he went over to Argrath after Fazzur resigned from leading the Tarshite force at Dangerford, and sent one of his sons to establish rapport with the new power that was able to deal with Pharandros. I'm a bit curious why he joined Argrath rather than Kallyr, but maybe Kallyr had proven immune to his charms after having shared the bedding with Rigsdal, and his advances might have earned him a dismissal from Boldhome. As far as I am concerned, Unstey is Annstad. The Fadabius letters are another version of the war history as played out in the Dragon Pass boardgame, so they naturally describe the line-ups in the scenarios of that game. The Grazers certainly are part of the "independent" faction in the three player game, but the various FHQ switches brought switches of alliance quite a few times. Yoristina appears to have been the only FHQ allying with neither Tarsh nor Sartar.

Taken from the Status Update thread into the Glorantha forum, where this kind of nitpicking belongs. Once again, hats off to the artist to allow such a discussion to be had at all. I remember similar discussions only for the covers of Strangers in Prax (whether that red orb visible was the Red Moon) and maybe one or two other pictures. Getting the skyline, the Sunpath and the Red Moon right must be a strange requirement for an artist producing a realistic picture of any Gloranthan location. Continuing the quest for where exactly this city could be. Good point about considering the sun angle. I wonder how you arrive at east-ish, though. From the angle of the shadows both on Harmast's neck and on the city gate in the background, the sun is about 45° up, meaning it is either mid-morning or mid-afternoon. Noon would see the sun directly overhead. The Sunpath doesn't go north or south to the extent people living outside of the tropical latitudes expect. If we see vertical areas directly lighted by the sun, they must point either eastward or westward, depending on whether this scene is in the morning or in the afternoon. I would guess if I was standing there to observe the scene, the sun would be somewhere just behind my right ear, so I am not looking directly along the east-west axis, but I turned right by maybe 30 or 45°. This means I am either looking into the northwest (in the morning) or into the southeast (in the afternoon). Looking into the northwest, I could expect to see the Red Moon somewhere, so southeast is indeed the more likely direction. Taking this into account, my earlier suggestion of Arkat's Hold falls flat - the 1000 meter high Shadow Plateau, with the shadows drifting above, would be visible from there in a morning scene, or otherwise the Skyreach Mountains in the afternoon. Much of Tarsh lies on an northwest-southeast axis between the Crater (with the moon above) and Kero Fin, making a placement there a bit more unlikely, too. Checking the map for Swenstown: where would the Block hide? Is that red building in the center high enough to obscure the Block? Mountains can be hiding in haze. As a formerly frequent visitor to Munich, the Alps could be seen from there only during Fön, an inversion weather situation that cleared the air of haze. The Alps would have been 10 to 20 hexes away. Whitewall has the additional benefit of elevation, but after a two-year siege with area effect attacks including a rain of gorp or similar corrosive stuff, the buildings would be either a lot more worn (when I visited Berlin in 1981, there were still buildings with bomb damage in parts of the city), or spanking new - not the impression this picture gives. I think that Praxian herd beasts are rarer in the environs between Boldhome and Swenstown than they are further west. If you live within raiding distance of Prax, using Praxian herd beasts is an invitation for braves from those tribes to visit and take back what they regard as rightfully theirs. If you use horses and mules (and presumably donkeys, to breed those mules) instead, you are a lot less likely to be visited. The further you live from Prax, the less likely you will be surprised by Praxian raiders. Hence North Esrolia or Hendrikiland may have a greater share of Praxian riding animals than Killard Vale between Boldhome and Swenstown. Dusty conditions suggest Fire Season rather than a location. As for dingy, the entire region has been subject to the year-long winter of the Windstop and to warfare before and after that event, so cosmetic repairs may not have been a top priority of the survivors. That depends on whether you are part of a trade network comfortable with transshipping to other means of transportation, or if you are a smaller trader with the Gloranthan equivalent of a Firefly type transport - to wit, a small herd of bisons trained as beasts of burden and mounts. If you are servicing the rural outback as well as the city, the all terrain hoofed caravan probably beats any wheeled transportation. My personal vision of Jonstown has been formed by the map Ingo Tschinke used for his (never published) supplement project, and had more multi-storied houses than the aerial view in Sartar Companion p.18. Still, the houses give me a different vibe than a place less than 150 years old. Jonstown has the New Market just inside of the North Gate, so no direct match, either. Comparing the cover of Pavis-Gateway to Adventure, no match. As @M Helsdon showed in his Towers thread, the city gate has two towers of different height, and round diameter. Yes, or perhaps Jansholm? I still see Jansholm (and Durengard) as located in a river valley, not unlike the panorama of Castle Stahleck. That would mean some skyline of the surrounding plateau. Alda-Chur looking southeast might work, although I see more of a heritage of both Vingkotling and EWF fortifications there. I am still keeping Esrolia in the wider choice. True, one would expect more murals, and there But in the end I guess we ask too much of the artist (who got lots of details right) to consider all of these facets even we Glorantha grognards have difficulty to get right at first glance. If we want that much realism, we need a 3D simulation. I for one would love to have one. I wish I had the time to build one out of GIS tools.

I would have expected ostentatious Lunar decorations around the gate in Tarsh, or at least some damaged remnants thereof. I regard Lunar architecture as propaganda set in stone. The lack of mountain silhouettes sort of precludes Arkat's Hold, a city where I would expect a more sombre style of decorations, although an approach from the northeast might work. Karse might be a possibility, with its mix of different influences (Esvulari, Heortling, Esrolian, Pelaskite) preventing any ostentatious religious ornamentation of the gate. The look would have to be to the south or southwest to avoid the cliffs showing. The city has seen better times, at least the building on the extreme right with plaster fallen off from the burnt brick wall. Basically: big kudos to Andrey and the art direction that we can play "Where exactly in Glorantha" with this piece.

There are three bisons packed with bundles, and the front one with a soft basket, but I don't see any riding saddle. I would say we are seeing pack beasts here. I like the contrast between the look of concern displayed by Yanioth and the bored disinterest by Vasana. From the look and feel, I would say no. The city gate in the back doesn't look like New Pavis to me, and the houses all are multi-storied. That probably rules out cities of Sartar as well, if you compare Sartar Companion p.18. So probably Esrolia, or possibly one of the larger cities of Heortland.

Amazing piece of art indeed. The level of details is enormous.`The background scenes alone might serve as illustrations. Are those two ladies in the front Vasana and Yanioth?

I like the silver mask, rendering the unit as indistinguishable lunar demons (to their foes). What do we know about the history of this magical regiment? Calling down rocks from the moon has the presence of the Red Moon in the sky as a prerequisite, so they cannot be older than First Wane.

The last time I hired good soldiers, all the gold went to them. Bad soldiers take all your gold, too, but you don't even achieve your military goals.

Actually, no. The triceps and the shoulder musculature are what is required to fire a bow. There were a almost 50 yew longbows in the Nydam Mose finds, which I would expect to have drawn at 80 to 100 lbs at average (28 inch) draw length. If you have a longer draw, draw weight increases quite dramatically - I draw a nominal 55 lbs flatbow to about 75 lbs at 31 inch draw length. Those yew bows are likely to be even less forgiving at longer draws. It takes two to three days a week training to be able to fire more than two dozen arrows in a span of about as many or less minutes. Military requirement were four dozen arrows, if I am correctly informed. 150 yards range is manageable even in unfavorable winds when firing at units, 70 yards or less when firing at individuals. At lower than 50 yards, contemporary armor gets pierced, The shields found at Nydam Mose were of soft wood, and rather thin (a quarter inch), designed to capture the arrows and slow them almost like ballistic cloth.

And you are playing agents of the tax agency, or alternatively of the monopoly holder. Who may be chaotic cultists of a rival organisation, as you may find out after busting that first organisation, only with imperial endorsement. The point I want to make is that mind-altering substances aren't inherently bad in the eyes of the population. They are a common component of rituals, and practitioners of magic are likely to use them for various magics. The Yelmalio cult has quite rigid standards of behavior it forces on his own people as well as on visitors. Letting them have a moral problem with addiction would be in character. In Orlanthi clans, the addiction doesn't matter much as long as the individual contributes to the clan. As to native Old Pavisites and Riverfolk, as long as it doesn't threaten survival, drug use might even have been an approved way of coping with the burden of the troll occupation. As to the Lunars, to them it is a case of imperial privileges and taxes. Their deity bestows madness on followers as much as on foes, so why bother about substance-induced madness? So yes, play the righteous enforcers of a morality you force on people that may or may not share with you, in the service of an authority that makes big money from the imperial privilege, professing to sell to worthy customers only. (You know what makes a customer worthy: wealth or influence.) Have them supported by the delightful peltasts from Tarsh War.They will be quite motivated and helpful to make the first find, but might be quite lackadaiscal afterwards until their stash runs out. Maybe add one of those Carmanian magicians, with similar goals and motivations. Give them an imperial scribe or tax assessor who is part of the ring they are prosecuting, or at least on their paylist. Have a Lunar slave farm somewhere (e.g. in the Grantlands) which grows the stuff legally, and which buys additional crop from a secret joint venture with a southern Sun County village headman. Blow up the ritual use by Orlanthi heroquesters out of all proportion, have them crack down on a number of Orlanthi rites (which are illegal for other reasons) without finding more than maybe two pipes worth of the stuff. Find a huge clandestine or compromised operation with the destination Whitewall (or some other major build-up of Lunars vs. Orlanthi), and have them follow it into all manner of dark channels, but none leading to the Orlanthi. You might sacrifice a few hard working Issaries merchants supplying the Manirian road on the way. After they turn on or turn in (some of) their original employers (and co-workers), have some survivors of the cartel they just busted approach them to pursue an imperial monopoly against their former employers. Just for the groans. Possibly through Halcyon var Enkorth (who may have been involved in some payment from the first ring, too).

Note that the persecution of hazia possession or production should not be a case of a war on drugs. For Yelmalians, hazia use might be legitimate only in certain rites, possibly restricted to members of certain ranks in the cult hierarchy. In Lunar occupied lands hazia growing and use is "illegal" when it is sidestepping the Lunar monopoly on that stuff. If you pay your tax to the emperor, and purchase a users privilege, the Empire will be delighted buy your crop to imperially regulated prices and to sell you the stuff at individual rates per dose. Farmers caught growing this stuff illicitely may have their harvest burnt if caught by Sun Dome authorities not bribed to look away, and if caught by Lunar authorities have their harvest impounded, license fees impounded and additional fines or punishments for disregarding imperial monopolies. Sun Dome authorities avoid to notify the imperial authorities to avoid having to pay those fines from their community coffers.

No idea how non-sapient monsters are created in WoD, as I only have experience playing one of those systems, but there are quite a few non-sapient creatures who are mainly physical or spirit representations of some rune. Giving any spirit (or other entity sent by Humakt) an element for defining the magic would be mythically wrong (for Heortlings). Humakt severed his Storm ties. That said, at least some of the Pentan North War Wind spirits should have magic through the Storm rune. It isn't clear whether they ever brought some of these spirits along through the Redlands into the Elder Wilds, though. Yes. Even the Praxian tribal ancestors who come from elementally affiliated tribes shouldn't necessarily have that element available for magics they pass on to their descendants, or cast on behalf of them. Individual dead who retain some of their runic connection from while they were alive may have elemental runes to draw their magic from. From what I understand, this ability to pass on magic not generally available to one's cult is a minor form of hero worship, which helps maintaining this lifetime identity even after death. Lacking some directed support from the Living to maintain that identity, these abilities fade away, and the spirit will only be able to grant normal ancestral magic, acting more like a conduct to the founders' magic than as an individual entity. That is quite similar to the Orlanthi and Pelorian concept of a person possessing multiple souls, into which they break up upon death, but which might be reunited in a limited way if there is a way to contact them as individuals. Again, this might require directed worship to make this come to pass. Basically, I am trying to make an argument when spirits _can_ have an elemental connection, rather than claiming that they must have one.

There are creatures lacking elemental runes. RQ3 had the concept of "incomplete creatures" (applied to stats rather than runes, but we have a correspondence between stats and elemental runes), and spirits are one kind of incomplete. Some spirits have implied elemental connections only, e.g. plant (usually earth, but fire and water are possible) or beast spirits. A wolf spirit as a mammal will be tied to the Storm Rune, but that is very tenuous, and its habitat may be as much worthy of having an Earth Rune.

That text has a section dealing with the force on a charged particle migrating through the field. Following actio = reactio, this means that the field-generating loops will experience the opposite force, moving them out of the L1 position unless there is another force (from other interaction with the Solar Wind?) keeping it in position. A combination with mirrors (solar sails) possibly increasing a selected band of radiation on the surface of Mars could contribute to the terraforming. I don't subscribe to the idea that terraforming necessarily involves introducing new material to the planet in question, but it certainly involves re-arranging the material of the planetary surface, atmosphere, hydrosphere and (you need to deposit some stuff somewhere) upper crust. For our own world, the hottest topic in conservation of the status quo in natural terraforming is carbon sequestration. In case of hypothetical attempts to give Venus an Earth-like surface, it would be sequestration (or export) of sulphur and carbon. Installing an L1 mirror/filter set regulating the amount and spectrum of radiation hitting the planet would be a first step on that way. Given the gradual changes our primary undergoes, maintaining the status quo of our global climate will involve such filtration efforts, too, or otherwise even grander efforts to alter the orbit without completely destabilizing it. The same (today scientific fantasy) technology could be applied to the other rock planets in the system, and some of the larger moons as well. I don't think that we will ever overcome scarcity of certain resources, but that a leap out of our gravity well and a start in grand scale construction in solar orbits could shift the scarcity problems to quite different concerns even with existing technology and material science. What we are lacking is the drive to prioritize such a development, a drive like the one provided by the Cold War and the USSR space exploration successes which pressured Kennedy into making his "in this decade" statment which led to the Apollo missions. Right now, a few oligarchs like Elon Musk are at the forefront of initiatives getting us to the resources of the material beyond our gravity well, including the immense resource of the Solar Wind that fails to be captured by our little planet, not to mention solid bodies populating less stable orbits around our primary or its satellites. The energy and much of the matter is up there. The settings of SF games usually make some assumptions how the gravity well has been overcome. Once overcome, an object in a more or less stable Goldilocks orbit around the sun with a decent stock of material might generate all of its energy just paying off the initial investment cost and some (possibly significant) maintenance effort. It could start repaying that initial investment by collecting solar wind matter for reaction mass or for high energy transmutation into elements that are considered as scarce. Once established, its inhabitants wouldn't need to master more technology than the maintenance of solar panels, mirrors, or steam turbines and simple electricity to keep most of their installation operable for generations. Some regulation could be done by hardware-coded, heavily redundant "expert systems" for more generations than projected for this kind of installation. A huge, none-planetary civilization could grow, possibly mostly populating Lagrange points or similar orbits of convenience. Populations on mostly self-maintained platforms could live through decadence into primitive societies, providing ample roleplaying seeds. All kinds of healthy and unhealthy interrelations between such platforms and other entities in the system could result, creating a "third world" or "fourth world" segregation in space.

The Deep Sea entities harvest the energies from whichever "Food" (dry land stuff) arrives at their realm at the bottom of the seas, then the water wells up outside in a huge circular current inside the outer Dome of Darkness to become Sramak's River (which reaches from the middle Underworld to the surface world). The vortex of Magasta's Pool avoids being tapped by the Chaos Void as long as it continues to run with all the energies of the waters of the world. Instead, the All Waters form a huge single entity with internal vortices and currents, separated from the Void outside of the universe by Darkness (below, and outward as the lower half of the spherical dome). Varchulanga and Drospoly sit at the bottom of the bottomless oceans, below the lower limits of Earth, bordering on the Darkness below, giving birth to entities better left unencountered. Sramak's River is an endless vortex of water, under a likewise endless vortex of storm. There is no reason why there couldn't be other floating islands of calmness hidden somewhere far outside, known only to the most primal expressions of these two elements, with their very own stories of creation and destruction, maybe sharing some isolated properties of the outermost entities with Glorantha (like the Deepest Underworld, the outermost sky), and entirely different stuff of their own, possibly including their own inner Sky Dome and their own Near Underworld. Possibly also an own version of the Axis Mundi rooted in the Chaosium upholding that inner Sky Dome. But possibly sharing a branch of the River Styx. Given the wealth of weirdness and unexplored themes Glorantha offers, nobody has yet seen the need to explore such a setting. Most of us lack the time to explore what is there already.

Indeed. That's why I object to the pumpkin. I fail to see any connection there.