Joerg

As a size 19 person according to that table (quite a long time for height, and now unfortunately for weight, too), I feel a bit left out. The lower size range doesn't allow for Roman Empire average sizes, but caters to Migration Age middle- and northern European sizes. Observations have shown a dietary effect on height that may account for 25 cm in a genetic group depending on a switch to a diet richer in meat (and possibly dairy). This does add to ancestral predispositions, creating populations with different means and standard deviation. SIZ is an abstraction that is used in ways that aren't part of the specification. In RQ3, SIZ did not convert well into Encumbrance when one wanted to carry a wounded ally out of a battle. Getting less specific would be better than given distinct ranges of concrete measurements.

On the topic of the coming flood, I think that Belintar provided for this. I think he had two plans to deal with this (apart from evacuating folk to high grounds). One plan was the tidal magic which raises the City of Wonders above the Choralinthor Sea. Why not think about this as an ongoing magic, adjusting itself to the water level? And I see the possibility that Belintar would have prepared "rescue sites" near other important holy centers of Kethaela. The other plan are the Fish Roads which allow air breathers to enter the waters. There are three entry points to these roads outside of the City of Wonders - Nochet, Backford, and Seapolis. Belintar could have ordered an exodus into these roads, and a pilgrimage beyond Deeper, to petition the Sea Gods to return the land. And then there is the escape by boats. That may have been one of his motivations to support the Dormal ventures. With Belintar gone, the plan of raising parts of the land probably cannot be done any more, although player heroes are more than welcome to quest the Tournament Grounds for this magic and apply it to their community. Or to quest for the Fish Road magic and make their place such a nexus, welcoming the invading waters.

You would need a place with very irregular rainfall to warrant the effort to build such wells. I looked up the source for the image, which did mention the sanitary problems these cisterns had, so I wondered if we place such edifices in Glorantha, what kind of water entity would we want to invite into such a construction. These wells serve the dual purpose as reservoirs for drinking water and as facilities for ritual cleansing, with a third use as a refuge from too hot days. When we discussed the saltiness of the Gloranthan seas, I realized that elemental water doesn't want to be devoid of minerals or life (such as algae or minuscule crabs, or smaller life forms like amoebae which may be unknown but still present in Glorantha). Potability is not a concern of the water entity. Purity is a virtue of the waters, but that purity doesn't necessarily result in clear and potable water. A turbid river is a happy river, having accrued plenty of "Food" to carry back the the All Waters. Having sent most of its energies into Magasta's maelstrom, it has little energy left to separate its flows, and usually none to create the counterflows of clear, hungry water which allowed the Godtime rivers to invade the land. But rivers have their connection to the Sea, and in a way a river continues from its headwaters all the way into Magasta's Pool. At the very least, you could have cultists of Engizi at Deeper, below the exit of Choralinthor Bay. What about water entities without such (obvious) connections? When I look at the rivers and oases of western Prax, I cannot help but think of subterranean aquifers. The fact that the River Horse is able to jump from oasis to oasis sort of corroborates that subterranean connection - it shouldn't be able to jump into a man-made reservoir isolated from the All Waters. But there is another class of water entities, those of standing waters like lakes, bogs and even seas. If you look at the sea entities as presented in the Guide or the Missing Lands (which has a few more entities) you will notice strange names apparently without function, like the "wives" of Magasta or Lorion, Benara and Boveluru. What is the function of these? They are bodies of water, without any concern for movement or energy, but simply the presence of the water as making up a greater whole - collective entities that don't mind that their substance is shared by currents, fish or plants. Bays (like Choralinthor or Maslo), lakes and bogs are just like this, too. And so would a water entity fed only by the hungry waters of Heler, without any other connection to the All Waters - a water entity of a rainwater cistern. I described Heler's waters as clear and hungry. They will joyfully perform cleansing as to them it means feeding. However, this will accumulate a lot of food, which may make the body of water turbid and satiated. I think that all waters desire to share their food with the All Waters. They don't quite mind if they become muddy bogs as long as they convey those energies to the All Waters. The sediment may be dumped, it has lost the appeal as food for the Seas, but its energies remain. How does a water entity "feel" or think about being drunk or irrigating a field? In a way, it might welcome the opportunity to spread out its self. I think that a Gloranthan has a different notion of self than a typical European or American. For us, our sensations end at the membrane of our skin. Our "distance senses" of sight, hearing, smell and heat only register what interacts with that membrane. An Orlanthi (a person strong in the air rune) has awareness of the air around him - his breath. A person strong in Fire or Light will have an awareness wherever his sight falls, beyond just receiving a picture of what is going on in his field of sight. A person strong in the Earth rune will be in communion with the soil she touches beyond just that layer that has skin contact. Darkness probably gives a sense of space, of "thereness", in addition to whichever experiences material Darkness may give that our world has no equivalent of. And a person strong in the Water rune will be able to interact with the waters around them - feeling the raindrops before they even hit their bodies or the ground around them, and feeling them flow on. (Trying hard to keep ablutions out of this... I'll leave those to the Trickster-possessed.) So, any water that an entity strong in the water rune has "touched" (interacted with) will expand its perceptions or its self. Sharing a portion of its extended body will expand its presence, although only up to a point where its essence gets diminished. So, a cistern could of course be nothing but a container where water is collected. But a water temple as elaborate as such a step cistern will most certainly have a spirit/deity/essence inhabiting the water. It will quite likely have a conch near the bottom of that cistern where it can retreat in the case of extreme draught that might dry up the cistern. And once a year, preferably at the end of the dry spell, this conch will have to be removed from its resting place near the bottom of that well, and carried in a huge procession to the river or the sea, where it will share all the energies it has fed upon with the All Waters, and then return to its resting place. And as soon as the conch starts upon its annual pilgrimage, the priesthood will oversee a dredging of the mud and a scrubbing of the stairs. It is quite possible that the waters of this well or cistern will be declared taboo for a week or two, as the entity will need to rest from its journey, and make itself at home again. It is quite possible that the regulars of this cistern forego all use of untreated water (except for rain) for the two weeks of this taboo, and consume only (diluted) wine or thin beer during this recovery of the well. There will be no dip-bathing in this time (but other methods like steam-bathing and lathering the skin with oils will be available), but there may of course be rain-dancing. This does sound like a good Sea Season festival for the three rainwater cisterns around Grace Temple (Haraheler's, Harenalda's and Voriof's Catch), and set those immigrants apart from the rest of the Esrolian-descended people of Nochet. It will attract people sharing the festivities from other quarters, nonetheless, and the local houses will be expected to grant hospitality (and beverages) to the pilgrims who went to the cisterns performing their sacrifices there (carrying a small container of sediment or dirt from that cistern?) which they can show as a badge for getting a drink. If the festival is a moveable festival starting with the first rains of Sea Season, part of the worship service might be to carry water from the catchment areas for rainwater in that district up to the upper outer wall of the cistern, where there are Pythagorean cups that need to be filled by the worshipper. An attending acolyte will grant the token that allows the subsequent debauchery when the supplicant's cup has emptied itself. The baths using rainwater in this district might have such descending stairwells. They will probably have a funnel drainage at the bottom, too, which leads to a "mud well" where the sediment can be dredged up without disturbing the waters in the bath. I don't think the cisterns themselves will have these stairwell, though. All cisterns are likely to have some sediment collecting drainage. Those cisterns connected to the three aqueducts probably have a flow-through system, with height-adjustable exit pipes that drain from a certain water depth to take the muddier water from below out into the sewers.

Uz would say so, yes, but we have two cases of Orlanth winning over Chaos - when he cast down Tyram from the Skies, and a much lesser but significant to uz incident during the Westfaring when he sided with the wester Uz against the Lesser Kajabori. As a defener of the earth against Chaos he is notoriously useless, but maybe he realized how permissive his wife's kin was towards all kinds of suitors, even Chaos.

I have been using this term for pre-Rokari Hrestolism for ages, and I haven't seen a better term yet. Abiding Book Makanism doesn't quite appeal to me, and it misses the (non-Irensavalist) Hrestolism nature of the pre-Rokari Malkionism. The Loskalmi Idealist utopia is a weird aberration of Malkionism and has little in common with the Hrestolism that powered Seshnela since the third century. "Linealist" basically has everyone remaining in their caste (however that is decided, whether the caste of the parents or the Brithini was of assigning the caste based on birth order) unless they qualify for the title of a (wo)Man-of-all (castes), formerly also known as "knight". You inherit the caste of your parents (including the zzabur caste) rather than "rise through the castes", a concept starkly at odds with the Brithini claims about the equal worth of each caste. Hrestoli mysticism is based on the concept of Joy of the Heart rather than ascetic denial, which makes it a quite rare path when compared to the austerities and similar self-inflicted atrocities you find in other mystical schools. You cannot get rid of the Abiding Book - its Jrusteli authors picked elements from the prevailing philosophies when suggesting the text to the Hand of God. I won't say it was a scam, but it may have been the magical consequence of a huge body of philosophers creating a critical mass of sacred text that manifested itself. At the very least, some portions of the Abiding Book like the list of witnesses read very much like sponsored ads. RM p.17 on the last paragraph admits a greater human input to the document than the pious story usually sold to the masses. I remember discussions where people stated that Rokarism was the prevailing form of Malkionism outside of Fronela, and backed up claims that this went for Umathela as well. Fortunately this blatant disregard for the consequences of the Closing has disappeared. Still, this has left a vacuum of information about the Malkioni schools in Umathela. The Sedalpists cannot have taken over all of the Malki cities.

Personally I expect that variants of linealist Hrestoli Makanism (the pre-Rokari form of Malkionism in Seshnela and most of the Middle Sea Empire) still are prevalent in the Malki coast, forming the basis for schools similar to the Pasos Navigationalists. The information in Men of the Sea probably is too churchy for the current model of Malkionism, but it had alternatives to the weird Sedalpists which aren't applicable to mainstream, in the box at the bottom of p.35.

The Orlanthi of Umathela were brought there from Maniria or Slontos, some via Jrustela. They weren't exactly like the Heortling Orlanthi of Kerofinela, Kethaela and Saird, but they had received Theyalan missionaries and adapted their ways of worship etc. They may have found deities left behind by Desero's horde, though no humans or cattle. Desero's folk north of the Tarmo mountains would have lost their herds when the Mostali raised Somelz, and they would have been the first to be enslaved by the Vadeli of Chir/Oabil. It is possible that descendants of Desero's Horde are among the wretched human slave population of Slon. It is possible that the Mostali bought from the Vadeli, like they did when the Vadeli annihilated the Tadeniti. In that case, the population of Slon is going to be a weird mixture of Westerners, Storm worshippers, Agimori (both Doraddi and Thinobutan), Fiwan and Veldang, all bereft of any remnants of their original culture, magic, and identity, creating a melange of all Gloranthan human types except the Easterners. Uroxi aren't well suited for Pamaltelan Chaos - usually the creatures are few but immense, with the exception of the offspring of the Mother of Monsters. The Chaos corruption in Fonrit and the God Learner ruins is more subtle, and doesn't lend itself to maintain the storm khans like in the Praxian or Genertelan Orlanthi ecology. In the Storm Bull cult, you usually become Khan by killing a Chaos monster on your own, long before you become a hero able to slay huge emanations of Chaos. In Pamaltela, there may be Chaos worshippers one can slay with abandon, but that doesn't entitle a Storm Bull to become Khan. Yoranday might be a major exception with the Psychic Zoo and its Otherworld Monsters. If you look at the Prophecies of the Hero Wars, it doesn't look like Umathela has the luxury to fall upon Afadjann, and Afadjann has even less opportunity to deal with Cerngoth as it has to fight the Blues uprising initiated when the Zaranistangi hero Gebel joins forces with the Fonritian rebel Gabaryanga, who challenges the basis of Fonritian society by returning a nation of blues like Vontabu (sponsored by the Jrusteli, later conquered by them anyway). Enkloso is facing annihilation by dwarf machinations. The raising of Somelz is prepared by burning vast areas of forest, and the aldryami of Enkloso will rely heavily on their Umathelan allies to slow the Mostali destruction. The coastal cities might think they can sit by while the hill tribes bear the brunt of the conflict, but once Slon starts moving, it will wrap around the Malki coasts and create another front in the north. They might need to ally with Terthinus to counter that threat. In the meantime, they might receive visits by Vadeli or Waertagi to make their lives miserable, or of course increased demands by Terthinus and his Malasp.

There was this minor incident called the Breaking of the World, aka the Implosion of the Spike, and the formation of a world-piercing void in the center of the Lozenge. The cube of Earth still is apart, and although the first repair effort to close up one of those rifts (the one that ripped the repair project Somelz apart) has started with the symbolic towing between Slon and the Capstone, the other rifts are still open. A lot of geography has disappeared just northeast of the -guya islands. The Somelz Repair Project demands that there is a rift below Jorkar's Sea, though unusually not a vertical rift like for the Denestlazam, Sedlazam and Seralazam oceans, but apparently deflected into a non-vertical gap. The sea bottom of the Swermela Sea is going to glide under Enkloso, which would overhang an underground ocean unknown to the land dwellers, and soon to be destroyed by the Mostali. Vralos might escape the Somelz plan, but Enkloso is going to see a major Elder Races war with human sepois on both sides. The Dark Trolls of Tarmo might join in just for the fun of it, as will Terthinus. It will be interesting to see whether the Pelmre/Slarge from southern Tarien will fight the Mostali or rather push the Agimori out of Tarien and southern Jolar, on top of whichever Genertelan chaotics emerging from the Nargar Desert. Kumanku should lie on the Pamaltelan "plate" (or better shard) rather than on the Somelz/Jrustela shard. I would expand Bandaku into some of the sea bottom of the Marthino and Dashomo Seas. Pamaltelan myth has Bandaku raised by Bolongo, but destroyed in the struggle between Pamalt and Vovisibor, and in some stories Pamalt taking credit for that. Hence I am not convinced about the role of Kanem Dar as the Little Spike of Pamaltela. I would rather locate the Bandaku peak off the -guya fingers. And? Finding a moon worshipping cult among wretched heirs of the Artmali Empire isn't that surprising. The "Leapers" bit does offer a taste of the Lopers, but no such creatures were reported. Now Gabaryanga operates in the name of the Blue Moon from Jokotu in Mondator. Using Tarahorn as staging ground for a blue "republic" in the style of Wontabu probably promises some old God Learner magics. Not enough, so that Seseine Kallig has little difficulty to sell her Chaos alliance to the desperate blues. Because it isn't affected by the Closing any more, and probably never was, except for the wavefront that preceded the spread of the Closing and may have created or deepened that body of water. Mental autocorrect running amok here - I meant Thinobutu. Yes. We agree on there being big deficits to God Learner knowledge, which is quite strange since they were extremely active in Umathela. But then they didn't seem to believe much in expeditions to those uncomfortable lands in the south, preferring armchair declarations of extinction. Bredjeg unmentioned elsewhere: Events in the Sky are among the few things most of the Gloranthan myths can agree upon. Shargash sort of disappears as a Sky Defender after his collision with Umath, instead ruling from below Alkoth, or roaming about as Tolat, emerging from the Underworld into the sky where and when he sees fit. I don't see evidence for planets rising and setting at a regular schedule (measured against the rotations of the starry sky) after Yelm's descent into Wonderhome. Orlanth's invasion sending the Emperor into the Underworld is shared by Pamaltelan myth. Kendamalar in Hell begets Chermata and Veldara on Enjata Mo, and Veldara serves as ersatz-sun for much of the Artmali Period. It would have been convenient to identify Tolat's sky invader with Orlanth or Umath, but there was no Artmal then if Veldara is indeed the child of Enjata Mo conceived in the Underworld. Before the rise of Enjata Mo and her two children, there could be no Artmal. Veldara and Lorion apparently rise as a team, coloring the sky blue. Did Tolat oppose this invasion? Then why would Artmal help Tolat fight his own father Lorion? So, no fun here. The only known victory of Orlanth against a major Chaos foe is his victory over Tyram in the (Middle?) Sky. (Apart from that, we get his fight against the Lesser Kajabori aiding Shankgaro (Uzlord of the West, which probably means Halikiv) during the Westfaring, and that's it. Otherwise he leads armies which lose and retreats in up to 48 parts.) This and the sequence of the major Chaos incursions place this conflict long after Artmal's dismemberment by the hands of Baraku. This leaves a very narrow window for Tolat to have fought Bredjeg and gaining aid from his nephew, or otherwise another nonsequential appearance of the semi-mortal son and ruler of a major contestant in the Gods War. Was there a storm reaction to Sea and Moon conquering the Sky Dome, or was Orlanth satisfied with having won the Middle Sky as his domain? And that places him two ages before the birth of Veldara, let alone Artmal, which was a consequence of Kendamalar sent to Hell and replaced by Vovisibor. Like I said, stellar invasions are world-wide events. They may have lesser reflections, like the double Kalikos appearance, once in the Umath smashes the Northern Pillar myth, and again in that Kalikos defrosts the Sky Dome myth of the Char-un. So, was Bredjeg a lesser reflection of Umath bowling nearly a celestial strike before ending up in the retrieval ditch? Or do we have an Artmal already in the Golden Age/Old People Period? Stellar events provide the shared timeline, remember? Orlanth not being mentioned in the relevant sections sort of proves my point - he had completed his conquest of the Middle Sky, and remained its uncontested ruler until Tyram showed up. (No idea which part of the Sky Tolat/Shargash/Jagrekriand roamed, but he never attempted to oust Orlanth, for all we know - their major showdown was at Arrowmound. Although Orlanth's Exile might be read as such an incident when you look at it from a Tolat perspective.) Again: Kendamalar the Sun Emperor is sent to Hell, for which the Doraddi blame Bolongo or the Five Evil Ones (add Sedenya7proto-Veldara, Tolat, Artia/Pujaleg, and Baraku/Orlanth. Enjata-Mo is his transformed widow, who emerges from the Underworld with her two children conceived from the cinders of the sun, Veldara and her twin. (Which should be Tolat rather than Lokarnos... so much for sky myths being somewhat universal.) Both Tolat and Veldara are former Planetary Sons of the Sun Emperor, sent to Hell and re-emerging. It would be convenient to have the Vadeli occupying Fonrit for some time during the ups and downs (phases) of the various Artmali empires, and I would enjoy a Vadeli meddling with the Thinobutans in addition to Artmali badassery and Adpara/Antigod devastations. Oabil was known to and feared by the Doraddi of the Veldt, too, which is why I think that a significant portion of Chir would have been south of the Fense. You wanted to plant Yeetai's earliest Artmali in Fonrit, which is what I found hard to justify according to all the mythical maps of the Spike or its lesser reflections. That's what I protested here. And Bandaku obviously had some population besides Bolongo. And besides the Vadeli immigrants and the aldryami. The uz could have come at any time, from below, but that exit should have disappeared along with Bandaku upon its collapse. Placing Afati in the Artmali ups and downs: In this approach Afati conquers, then leaves. Much like Sheng in Kralorela or Harrek in Laskal, or Arkat in Tanisor. He then establishes the Tishamto-descended Doraddi in Banamba and the break east of the Tarmo. After Afati leaves, Kungatu either reverts to its previous emperor (if that was Jarkartu away with his armada) or otherwise gets a new emperor, possibly from Artmali allies of Afati. Kungatu gets conquered or at least Possible. Do we have a clear, non contradictory source for that? The mysterious "story" synopsis explicity says "Afati's New Artmali" in the explanatory paragraph. Maybe settled here by a previous emperor of the Artmali, possibly enslaved by the Vadeli of Chir (and possibly liberated by Afati, and possibly taken over by Veldang out of Afati's army). Afati's conquest (or simply settlement?) of Laskal is followed by the successful invasion of Basmoli ("Seshnegi") and Thinokans leading to Thinokos. Where the Basmoli may have done the invading and the Thinokans doing the settling. The Doraddi from Tishamto would have to conquer the aldryami to settle in Banamba and south of that. I was pondering the possibility that the original Afati still was around, leading a hidden life as one of the people, and then emerging as a leader. Afati the Agitorani cannot have left a lineage plant, since as an Agitorani he wouldn't leave a lineage. The rest of the Tishamto are Doraddi with lineage plants. (Basically, the term Doraddi refers to the reception of lineage plants, and makes a useful difference to the "race" moniker "Agimori" which is about as accurate when applied to the Thinobutans as the use of "Wareran" for Pelorians.

I agree - much in the southwest is conjecture, like e.g. the Heron Hegemony, which would be a reference to Suvaria in relation to Yuthubars. Some of the obscure stuff like the "Camp of Innocence" appears to be correct nevertheless, although it also gets conflated with the Red Camp of the Dara Happans. The Afidisa story mentions four camps around Pamalt's realm, but doesn't get beyond Innocence. And I do put some faith in the Western maps which show Chir on the eastern shore of Churkenos - if not from Brithini sources, then from Waertagi ones. Conflating other high places with the Spike is endemic in that map, yes, or mythical Glorantha is a fractal repetition of patterns like central mountain, four camps around it, etc. - I did already mention Suvaria. There is one mention of herons in Pamaltela - there is the Kyowkuk green heron tribe of Fiwan in Tarien, as per Guide p.589, but that small Hsunchen folk doesn't make a Heron Hegemony like Surenslib's Suvaria. So Thinobutu really is Sharzu. No problem with that. But still, we have all the recorded drownings of the Eastern Lands, and the Agimori footmarsh to Teleos and onward to Prax just before the lands were flooded, and that mpst likely after the battle with Vovisibor. The seas suffered a great setback after Worcha's defeat, and even Faralinthor's sea disappeared in the later Storm Age. I'm with you here. I'd add Hrelar Amali, Mts. Turos and Jernotius and Yuthubars/Raibanth as further "little Spikes", and Magnetic Mountain in Curustus for the Western perspective. Note that the Pamaltelan myth has Bandaku collapsing, too. The remains may be little more than a stump of a mountain nowadays. True - the "Agimori" of Thinobutu don't get decent maps, or a somewhat conclusive history. There are a few peculiarities that could support a mixed army of Veldang and Agimori led by Afati, plundering Kungatu before turning north into Selvukko to avoid retaliation for their retaliation. Are there any blues or significant numbers of Torabs in Banamba? Here's what I had prepared for this discussion, which you beat me to posting in a different thread: After the conquest of Tishamto, the Agitorani Afati conquered the southern Artmali Empire. This would have been during the rule of Jarkaru, or shortly afterwards. Revealed Mythologies presents this in a most confused form (p.49): “Story: Afati (an Agitorani) leads an army against the southern part of the Artmali Empire, takes it, then leaves. Truth: Afati was probably from Tishamto, after its downfall. “Southern” simply means it was south of the wall mountains.” The Glossary names Afati as King of Tishamto. One way to read this is that he was defeated by Jarkaru, and his lands conquered. It isn’t clear whether that removed him from his position as King of Tishamto, or whether he was king for Jarkaru. He leads an army against the southern part of the Artmali Empire and takes it. It is possible that he manages to raid the Artmali of Kungatu, possibly while the Armada with the majority of its warriors was elsewhere, and Afati has a decisive victory over the remaining imperial Artmali forces. We don’t learn who served in that army. It would be Agimori from urban Tishamto as Afati’s house force, but it could just as well have included Veldang rebels who had been disowned by the Emperor seeking a comeuppance. If Afati did invade Kungatu and achieved a victory there over the remaining forces, he and his allies might have realized that the Indigo Armada would return, and take the land from them again, so it is possible that he just plundered it to provide for the exodus north, into Fonrit. “Story: Seshnegi and remnants of Elamle ally to destroy the remaining part of the Artmali Empire. Truth: This is the destruction of the last of Afati’s New Artmali in later Fonrit. Again, Elamle means Gendaran” I don’t see any way the “Seshnegi” could have intervened here, unless we are talking about Basmoli lion people on their migration north from Tarien into Seshnela. In that case, they could have been the ancestors of the Pendali. Overall, this sounds like the settlement of Thinokos by Outrigger People with Thinobutan ancestry. According to the mythic maps both in RM and the Guide Fonrit was completely land-locked in this time. To the west, the coast of Chir was under Vadeli control. Probably populated by Agimori and Veldang slaves taken from Tarien. It is difficult to locate the position of the Churkenos shore due to the later raising of Somelz by the Mostali, effectively eliminating the southern portions of Chir in the process – a light loss in the light of the conquest of Zerendel by their main empire of Endernef. It is possible that the coastline of Chir/Churkenos ran along the western edge of Vralos, with much of Umathela below the floods of Churkenos. (The Enkloso forest must have been established or at least spread out after the Breaking of the World with its separaion of eastern Somelz and the weakening of the southeastern (Slon) Mostali. For some reason, they gave up Mt. Tharkarn – possibly already during the raising of Somelz – and went underground, to the current location of Slon.) Vadeli presence in modern Fonrit depends on how far the modern peninsula was from the Churkenos sea. The further east this coastline, the greater the Vadeli presence here, north of the Fense. This wasn’t the southern slave empire of Oabil, though – that was in Tarien, in all likelihood far inland from the modern coastline of the Hornilio Marsh.

Sorry about hijacking this thread about Pamaltela resources on the web... maybe it has the potential to become one in itself. I was looking for any waterway leading around Somelz or its precedessors to what now is Fonrit, but I failed to find any. Churkenos went too far west before the rising of Somelz, and if you try to put Gendara etc. onto a map, Loral may be the only remaining dry part of it. Kimos is shown far inland and to the south. Of course we don't have reliable maximum shore lines for the Storm Age. I would think that the Flood Age map would aim to provide some sort of High Water mark, but that seems to be true mainly for Genertela. From remarks further down in your quotes it seems that you assume that the land south of the Spike would have been flooded significantly more than shown on the Flood Age mythical map, at one point or another. There is however a much limited flooding from the Torrential Wars, leaving places like Sharzu or Gendara the northern shore of Pamaltela, nowadays far outside in the Marthino Sea. I see a possibility that the Seas invasion went past Gendara, covering parts of the forest there all the way to Fonrit. From the Western maps, RM pp.8 and 11, it seems that Churkenos never experienced an eastward connection around the Spike, and that's corroborated by the Pamaltelan maps of pp.46, 48 and 51. Only the composite maps of the Guide report the Sevasbos invasion, and name it only for the second of the maps it appears on. For the eastern Pamaltelan coast, the RM maps of the East may be more informative than those of Pamaltela, but those maps too always show an intact landbridge and forest from the foot of the Spike to the Fense mountains north of Tarien, Jolar and Kothar. For that reason I looked for an overland settlement of Selvukko by the Veldang, and the cryptic Afati notes offered one possibility. Did they have a shore there, then? Or did Yeetai's cloud ships land on some inland body of water? What are your indications for placing these obscure places in Fonrit, other than to make this fit your theory? I read Coborandra as a planetary land, halfway between Earth or the Spike and the upper sky. The Soft Heart may as well be the hole now occupied by Pole Star which remained unfilled when Umath pushed the Sky up from its pivot on the Spike. The Zaranistangi connection to Mastakos/Uleria/Emilla makes a second planetary body likely. RM p.47: So, this suggests that there were other celestial bodies carrying life and even civilizations, and as far as I am concerned, the Zaranistangi are one of those from a different celestial body than Veldara. The Loper beasts are nowhere to be found in Fonrit, or any beasts like them. Somehow the Loper Riders appear to have been able to find nourishment for their beasts in the Wastes, suggesting that they have an acceptable origin. But then the Sable antelopes appear to be of not quite Storm Bull ancestry either. According to the Mythical Maps of the Breaking of the World and the Grey Age, there were no water bodies inland of the -guyas at the Dawn. The God Learners called Kanem Dar "Kebor Island", which indicates that the Poysida Strait already existed. Looking at the map of the Flood Age, Tishamto and Gendara form out of the Jungle, possibly cleared by the initial impact of the Sevasbos invasion into that forest. Interestingly, the forest surrounding the Spike's base (piercing through the Earth) now is the Greenwood rather than Yellow Elf jungle. Like I said, the coast lines needn't be exact, but I did not get the impression that the forest between Spike and Fense was drowned prior to the Great Torrent just before the Breaking of the World. Bredjeg is never mentioned anywhere else apart from this Veldang myth. The Sky Wars mentioned appear to have seen Tolat and Lorion on the same side, united against Bredjeg. Lorion's rise occurred after the birth of the stars, instigated by Umaths path of destruction through the eight planetary sons (and daughters) of Yelm. The only cognate in Genertelan myth would be Umath clashing with Tolat; Orlanth invading the sky, then going to Hell on the LBQ; or the invasion of Tyram the Sky Terror (which the Orlanthi claim Orlanth ended, rather than the Red Planet god). This creates a problem with the sequence of Godswar events, though - the Zaranistangi and Veldang are supposed to appear only after Orlanth's conquest of the Sky, and long after Umath's attack on the Eight Planetary Sons (all but one - who instead went into the Pit - of whom went to Hell, and only some came back). Still the maps show Oabil as south of the Fense mountains, and Chir north of it, and west of the Jungle. Poto and Chir are mentioned in the Vadeli chapter, while Oabil is the Pamaltelan term, so I would assume Poto to be identical with the Oabil in the maps. The absence of the floods is what makes Fonrit so difficult. The Sevasbos Sea is described as a host of sea gods led by Serelazam, but it shows no expansion between the Middle and the Late Storm Age, and only the Great Torrent preceding the Breaking of the World finally drowns the interim Thinobutan exodus lands. This does indeed conflict with the assumed long-lived empire of the Indigo Conqueror, but I thought that Afati might have intervened in a succession struggle after Jarkaru's demise, and temporarily have conquered Kungatu and Mondator before moving north. Not dissimilar from Sheng conquering Kralorela, then bringing lots of Kralori to continue his conquests of Peloria while remaining absent from the East for long times. (But then we don't have too many details of what either Sheng or the Lunars did in that war. Fortunate Succession is possibly our best source besides the Guide, and that's meagre in details compared to the place mentions in the Guide.) The Agimori of Laskal and Baruling, the parts of Fonrit without any Veldang population? I agree that this survives a shave with Occam's Razor. I would guess that Afati would be an inherited name rather than a presumed identity with the Storm Age immortal leader. I find it rather hard to imagine a non-drinker going diving. It still leaves the issue with the yellow elf forest stretching all the way from north of the Spike to Dinal. Pamalt's countermove against Vovisibor may have used the devastation left by Filth-Which-Walks, but otherwise those forests should have been impenetrable. Those Five Evil Ones get one mention, on RM p.51. P.66 states that Vovisibor had been called by Bolongo, who was killed by it. The Pamaltelans have no account of how the Sun Emperor died, only that he went down into the Underworld. Apparently that's the "*Bijiif" who fathered Chermata and Veldara on Enjata-Mo. Does Kendamalar have to get a different set of conspirators than Yelm? Mother Pujaleg and Tolat should be a sufficient Pamaltelan contribution. So what was he? Filth Which Walks could be a Vadeli, or a Vadeli creation. It doesn't have to be Vadel, although Vadel's journeys into Bamatela rhyme with the many encounters Pamalt had with Vovisibor before. Fonrit is the surviving part of Baraku, the Spike Lands. The magics that shaped Fonrit also plagued the rest of "Selvukko", the lands north of the Fense, and we know that Artmali and possibly Vadeli influence hurt the Thinobutans.

Belintar was the bringer of a manifestation of the magical Otherworld (as mapped in the "Spiral Map" in Arcane Lore) in the populations and lands of Kethaela. It doesn't seem like this Otherworld ever was a Godtime representation of Kethaela, but rather an expression of the Godworld beyond the normal Heroplane (which basically is a visit in pre-Dawn myths more or less locatable on the map of the world). The Spiral Map of the Godworld might even be a "pre-collision of the worlds" expression, catering to an idea endemic in the Hero Wars/HeroQuest 1 era and in the books of the Stafford Library. Basically the missing northern, Theist component that would complete the other three Revealed Mythologies approaches from a Separate Worlds model, one never explored because on his explorations of the Lunar Empire Greg lost himself in Pelorian weirdness rather than providing a unified Genertelan approach. So, whatever roots of Creation the Lord of the Harshax has been reaching back to, it is Deep Heroquesting, different from the Green Age explorations that get hinted at in Entekosiad or shown in the Eleven Lights Quest, but as fundamental. And possibly a place Arkat never visited. Belintar fears the return of the Destroyer (as per Prince of Sartar webcomic), and we are made to think of Arkat. I rather think of Gbaji, the bi-directional mask between Arkat and Nysalor, and, since Arkat was pushing back the Bright Empire, carried before Arkat into the lands of Kethaela. Never mind that Nysalor's enveloping Bright Empire altered the magic of the land, too. Arkat's advance destroyed those alterations, and probably some of the underlying mythical strata altered by the Bright Empire was destroyed, too. IMO the Sixths reflect the radiants of the Spiral Map, with five elemental sections and one mystical or empty (Meldek? although I hate that term) section (corresponding to God Forgot). Moon is not an elemental radiant on that map, but manifest in the inner part of that map as three mountains (white, red and blue) and a missing black mountain that would be in the gap. That means that a Lunar component is immanent in all the other elemental radiants (even Storm) in that magical Otherworld of the Holy Country. Basically, Belintar re-created this magical structure by acquiring powers from each of the six hitherto un-united populations of the Holy Country. The Kingdom of Night did not really include the Rightarm or Leftarm archipelagos, and the God Learners never managed to conquer the Shadow Plateau. I am convinced that Jar-eel, coming from the Pelorian traditions as outlined in Entekosiad and Glorious ReAscent of Yelm, would have been rather ignorant of this special magical Otherworld which contributed the part of Belintar that she wouldn't perceive, and neither Harrek, not in 1616 and not in 1624 when plundering the City of Wonders. Part of Belintar, and a good portion of his capital, underwent some partial form of utuma through Jar-eel's interference, trapping the essence of Belintar not composed of those Sixths in that Otherworld, along with the previous winners of the Tournament of the Masters of Luck and Death resident there. Belintar wasn't able to force the Only Old One and the Storm Sixth into his scheme without much reducing them. At some time the theory went that Belintar placed an Iron Sword in the Only Old One, preventing his Healing, and the webcomic has Belintar chaining the spirit of Freedom (and Change) in order to control at least part of the Storm worshipping Heortlanders, much reducing the magic of the Larnsti. The governors do have a magical role in this - their ritual obligations maintain the five elemental and the non-elemental Guardians of the Sixths. The Red Emperor Takenegi was a manifestation of the Egi on the Red Moon. Until Shen Seleris destroyed the original Takenegi's ability to return in his original shape/mask, this immortality was more of an obnoxious reappearance of the same entity regardless how often you squashed and exterminated it. The different masks of Moonson are a much more recent development, and one might accuse the first of these masks to have imitated Belintar's established method. The details of Sheng's wars against the Lunars haven't been published, and I doubt that they are hidden in the extremely limited collections of Greg's Vault that went to maybe two dozen top supporters of the Guide kickstarter. Good question. That Larnsting (in the meaning of an expression of the Celestial Court entity Larnste) is an expression of the freedom virtue of the Orlanthi which is also tied to Orlanth's ability to Create. Then there are the Larnsti, holy people among the Hendriki tribe who embody these virtues of Orlanth and Larnste and who used to wield considerable magical power. History of the Heortling Peoples names several powerful Larnsti for the end of the Gbaji Wars and the early Imperial Age, several of them becoming kings of the Hendriki and the adjoined Foreigner Folk (Kerofinelan exiles, Esrolian exiles, Pelaskites and Esvulari). At one time it was stated that the Sheriffs of Heortland wielded some Larnsti powers through Belintar (and presumably that chained entity). In all that time, only one free Larnsti emerged, and he manifested his powers outside of the Hendriking lands, in Dragon Pass. That individual was Sartar. So, in this light, you will want to explore that Magical Version of the Holy Country, a heroquesting realm of highest stakes that may eat up the questers, cripple their magic or at least aspects thereof, and at the same time may open other magical powers to them. Whenever Belintar's latest body died, dozens of individuals in the Holy Country would be transported into that realm, struggling to reinforce their personal powers and to acquire relevant powers they did not bring into the Tournament, wrestling them from other contestants or picking them up from challenges the magical environment poses. I always thought it would be a waste if all (or almost all) of the participants would emerge burnt out of all of their powers, so I thought long and hard how to bring back questers changed. IMO one of the first "victims" of questing in that magical version of the Holy Country was Andrin, the Hendriki King "slain" by Belintar, and returned a year after his death, significantly altered - missing a significant part of his soul (perhaps that Larnsting chained to Belintar, bestowed on him through his coronation as King of the Hendriki?), but magically and physically as powerful as before, only now a true follower of the Godking. Orlanthi Taliban/Fox Trumpeteers have maligned the returned King Andrin as "Zombie King". IMO this has been read in a wrong way - Andrin emerged as much alive as any other Kethaelan. His Kingship was crippled, though, a most significant part chained to Belintar, and rather than bestowed to the King channeled in trickles through his deputies, the Sheriffs. But Andrin gained significantly during this experience, too, compensating the loss of that Freedom spirit of his kingship. He would have gained a deep insight into the greater magic of Belintar's Holy Country, and manifesting that multipart-made-into-more--than-its-sum ability. I think that participants of the Tournament of the Masters of Luck and Death all gain some of this magic, which might make up for the loss of a specific (and self-defining) ability they lose to the "There Can Be Only One" (Highlander) concept of the Tournament where questers eliminate one another from the Tournament. In other words, you cannot leave the Tournament without losing some of your original and acquired power, as the remaining candidates accumulate the sum of magical properties that make up Belintar. When the winner's body has become compatible to the sum of what makes up Belintar, he is released to an Otherworld/Godworld existance retaining his Will (his ability to effect Change there) while Belintar takes along that which ties together the Sixths plus the six major and countless minor manifestations of the Holy Country into the City of Wonders, giving the next body of the Godking, for a while. The "losers" of the Tournament - those who return from it with powers - would IMO make a cadre of Holy Country agents and facilitators supporting Belintar's rule in some way, a hero band which rarely if ever assembles completely but quite constantly on detached duty. After Jar-eel removed the Lunar power manifesting the center of the magical Otherworld of the Holy Country, that power could no longer be obtained by a participant in the 1616/17 tournament, resulting in no quester returning hale or sound, and more significantly failing to produce a new body for the Godking. Somehow, the six governors - often given the chance to participate in the Tournament when initiating the ritual that starts it - did not participate, or if they did, they didn't survive. I used to think that the Governor of Heortland would have participated, but History of the Heortling Peoples and the Guide tell a different story. Hendira certainly remained around after 1617, so she probably sent in some other high priestess of Ernalda. It should be possible to enter that magical version of the Holy Country outside of a Tournament. Entering it through the Tournament rites will most likely result in death or spiritual dismemberment without much if any gain in compensation. Bypassing the Tournament through similar rites may put questers in a weaker or harsher starting position, may still sear of some of their selves (in game terms expressed through runes from their initiation), or alter existing runes in their expression, as it did with King Andrin's Storm and Mastery, and replacing his Mobility/Change with something else. (Possibly Moon...) Gaining a knowledge of the Tournament grounds through preparatory questing there might open the way for a return of the Lord of the Harshax, if your players are inclined to go that way. If you know some French, check out Philippe Sigaud's group's experience on their (non-canonical, time-line-ignoring and therefore glorious) campaign to bring back the Godking. Some of the material on http://kethaela.free.fr/ is available in English, too. All of the above is my personal speculation, extremely likely to be contested by other regulars, but I think this offers a way of approaching what makes up Belintar while providing questing material. There is hardly any information on the features of that magical Holy Country, the map in Arcane Lore has more or less colorful place (i.e. encounter) names which you would have to flesh out in creative ways, and possibly in different ways for each visit there. I said above that this might be territory without much if any Arkati presence, so maybe Arkati training (whether in Ralios, Arkat's Hold in the Esrolian North March, or through other sources) might be a game changer when questing there. I feel that the God Learners did damage the interface to Kethaela a lot during their stranglehold on parts of Kethaela, but they never penetrated Kethaela's deepest roots, at best creating a secondary access like the Caladra and Aurelion cult at the Low Temple. There are sealed-off or haunted remnants of God Learner activity in Kethaela. It isn't clear how much Belintar used these scars in the magical landscape to punch through to the special Otherworld, and how much the God Learner activities there may have required the Lord of the Harshax to become this re-possessing, fast-aging semi-immortal. Researching Delecti (who does a similar, much less palatable returning game using corpses) might be a good side-activity for curious questers. Lots of potential there. Have fun with it!

Revealed Mythologies is volume six of the Stafford Library publications, available as pdf from Chaosium. https://www.chaosium.com/stafford-library/ This book gives myths and snippets of history for the West, the East and the South. You get a number of myths for each of the periods of Pamaltela, with coastal Pamaltela (Thinobutan Outrigger folk and Fonrit) getting a few pages apart. I find it difficult to get a somewhat coherent picture for the history of the Artmali and the settlement of Fonrit - right now I think that Fonrit was settled by Veldang under the leadership of the urban Agitorani Afati, whereas urban Agimori were originally found only south and east of Koraru Bay. The main Chaos invader to Pamaltela was Vovisibor, aka Filth Which Walks, and he/it was defeated already in the Late Storm Age. Later Chaos and (eastern) Antigod interaction was limited to the coasts of Pamaltela, most of which were sunk before the Dawn.

Sanuel is a unit from the Dragon Pass boardgame, which means it is part of the basic canon. The exact background of that unit has been subject to speculation, though.

There is nothing "heretical" in the MRQ2 rules - they are basically the first edition of the Mythras rules, and a solid system in the RQ family. Battle Magic translates as common magic - spells that can be learned by anyone, even though many are taught by temples. I would guess that Sanuel has a couple of Lunar guides for the troops and military advisors for the officers, including a priest or two. I don't think that there will be significant spell-casting support for a mercenary unit when enclosing the hillfort, but it is quite possible that a small detachment of siege engineers and magicians might be deployed to cut a longer inhibition on the road short. You can treat magical support by NPCs like calling in artillery fire, or as a flashy blessing or glamour carrying an attack into the thick of the enemies. Having either blown away after an initial effect could leave them stranded in a hard place, forcing the players to give significantly more than 100%. You might have followed the thread about Warding, one of the most useful RuneQuest spells to shore up a broken defensive area, and its potentially fatal effects on intruders. "Gnome" is a term for Earth elementals. These can act as mutable golem-like creatures or as vortices or waves inside the ground. They require loose earth rather than bedrock (animating bedrock should take them a lot more energy, at least in my Glorantha - you need to rip out a part out of a greater whole in order to animate it, which should at least increase the difficulty. That's a common phenomenon when you throw interesting tasty bits of unresolved questions into the shark pool, but feeding frenzies can be productive at times. Don't hesitate to ignore our ramblings and keep asking what exactly you want to know.

Chaos is all that, but the Devil was more - it was evil for evil's sake. It isn't clear whether Chaos would have ultimately entered the world and fragmented it, but the description of the Unholy Trio clearly states that the Birth of Wakboth added intent to that nihilism. I will grant the Lunars that they mostly refrain from that added evil intent (but then the Dara Happans are all too happy to provide it for their imperial policy).

An animal other than domesticated cattle, horses, donkeys, camels, or trained wild-born elephants, moose... Yes, riding oxen or cows is entirely possible, and sitting on the back of draught beasts would have been done. An important point here is that the beast needs to be acclimated to the presence of and domination by humans. Which the Praxian herd beasts are, to a point. I have never enjoyed parting with my money or other forms of wealth. And yes, in the age of digital credit, dealing out coins does come across as old-fashioned and quaint, when our digital economy of renting flat rates, pre-paying services, or even paying a patronage for artists, are a bit closer to how things were done before the state-monopoly for monetary exchange. I am used to being in a minority, but does recreating a decimal coinage system in a world which doesn't really do measurements really enhance the fantasy, or does it break the immersion? Not more than once or twice in a campaign. Outside shake-ups of the legal tender can lead to scenarios or scenario-hooks. But it can fail to do so just as well, as I found out years ago when exchanging campaign data with @Jeff. But then I don't keep an account book on my character sheets most of the time. I have been advocating a re-think on property for quite a while now, because this is another fantasy we can draw upon. A world where your material success is measured in your contribution to the community rather than in your own enrichment. A world where your community provides a social net that will buffer your fall, to a certain degree. The association of money with the castes sounds good at first, but there are a couple of things I would do differently. Reserving gold for the talar caste is very appropriate. I don't think that Zzaburi should have to pay for goods or services in any other way than by magic, or magical credit, though, or maybe in gems useful for their spellcraft. Perhaps the Ralians have a different view on this, one that might use lead tokens for secret transactions. Horali and burghers should be allowed to handle silver, while non-burgher dronars might as well be restricted to clacks, if nothing else for lack of exposure to money. Lead coinage might be the mark of the outsiders and the untouchables, at least where Arkat is regarded as a major error in history.

Any term for coinage apart from Clack, Wheel or Lunar is going to be anachronistic - the Lydian pieces of electrum (the first metal coins ever) are post-homeric. Non-metal coinage such as Kauris or Wampum might be older. And don't underestimate beads of glass, amber or pearl. On the topic of different denominations and giving exact exchange - I would avoid that. Even a monetary ancient society wouldn't operate much with small change. A lot will be done with credit, possibly prepaid credit. What is the Esrolian concept of property? Rural Orlanthi have the clan chief as the sole legally entitled decision-maker for expenses of clan property, which includes much of the clothing, arms and armor worn by the rural characters. Making something a personal possession is something of a big deal because it is taking the item out of communal property. How do the Kibbuzim manage this? Both thrift and generosity are virtues. Esrolian Houses likewise have the Grandmother in the role as top manager of the estate. Asrelia. The question is whether personal property among rural folk mainly seeing only their own House folk is more prevalent or the same as in Heortling society. When you go elsewhere, you get to carry a certain amount of house or clan wealth to cover trades with outsiders. Living in the city, you might have a stipend against House or guild accounts. Life in a city or some other place where your own community is significantly present but not the majority will make exchanges outside of the community commonplace. Gambling implies personal items of worth - which may be future services as well as material items. Is it okay to wager items loaned by the clan/house? Will such loans be reckoned in terms of coinage or some other form of ´numeric evaluation?

Sure, I said so. But either way, the river needs to form an island on the city map, which needs to be added to both of the maps you posted above. Sure, although a bridge across a magma-filled ditch has its appeal, too. That's rather dangerous - if such an underground river gets blocked if the city above caves in the spells might be broken. If I was one of the sorcerers inside the volcano I would be rather averse to that risk. I see an interesting profession in the river outside of the citadel - fishing for the brass that drips into the river, possibly using water-filled buckets. Possibly tolerated or even encouraged by the sorcerers as the channel might tighten up if the brass is left to grow uncontrollably into the channel. The brass is of course the molten bone of the fire god.

The text box on p.216 makes it clear that there is a magical need for Sog City or at least the Brass Citadel to be surrounded by water. If it falls dry, the volcano god beneath might shake off his fetters: So there should be an arm of the river going by the city, or at least by the citadel, or else we are going to see a new mountain. There would be no point in having called down the Janube all the way from the Sweet Sea defying normal hydrology if it didn't keep Sog separate from the mainland. The hex map doesn't have enough detail to provide that information. The city maps you provided probably were drawn without knowledge about this, which is why I mentioned the lack of the river arm.

Slightly different source of building material than my suggestion of the Indigo Clouds (water, air, and moonglow), but a very similar effect. That might already have been the case on Veldara, and repeated in Veldarahab. And quite likely also the case for the buildings of Tishamto. This sounds a lot like something an advanced animist society might to - treat their constructs and dwellings as having a spirit, and consequentially making it so (in case of doubt by inviting spirits from the spirit plane to take residence in those artificial bodies). Whatever they build or craft may serve as a talisman. Their glyphs may not have been writing, but reflection of memories that would, illuminated by moonglow, activate the memories in the "reader". Possibly something like an Aztec code like the ones our mobile electronic devices use, working directly on the mind. (In an untrained or alien (non-Veldang) mind, this might overwrite existing memory paths, creating a special kind of madness, as is appropriate for Lunar or Selenic writings...) The first external influences after Cathora's arrival on the Blue Moon (which started their culture) would have been a cross-pollination with the Doraddi, from Afidisia's contact with them. I think the Godtime map in the Guide p. 684 got the location of Veldarahab wrong. It is basically the location where we find Senmara, the Agimori capital, on the next map. (I have a few more problems with the Pamaltelan maps, like the absence of an isolated and untouched Dinal on many of them. I wonder whether the Artmali ever managed to get the upper hand in their struggles with the Vadeli of Oabil, Poto and Chir - possibly when Zzabur managed to imprison the Vadeli after the Tadeniti extinction. This late phase might have been after the fall of (most of) the Blue Moon (most of it onto Mernita, in the distant north). Their moon-infused "technology" fails, the tides no longer make their buildings pulsate, and they turn to something else that will aid them. I wonder whether the Artmali regarded their relationship to Chaos as subordinates, equal partners, or superiors. If they inherited/stole this from the Vadeli, they would probably have felt as masters of those powers. Having taken a look at the date of the Firefall according to the God Learner Maps, it precedes the Battles of Stormfall and Earthfall and the destruction of the Spike. This takes the southern Pamaltelan Greater Darkness out of the Chaos Wars. I feel this is somewhat unsatisfactory, but might explain why the Agimori left to fight Chaos elsewhere, and when. At the same time, it keeps the Artmali level of Chaos corruption rather low compared to the massive corruption of the Greater Darkness. The Zaranistangi Veldang appear to have remained active participants throughout the Greater Darkness, despite partial loss of their home planets.

Gold coins are pretty universally called wheels anywhere Issaries merchants make deals. The sacred nature of these coins probably prevents mints from producing other denominations (sizes) of gold coins. The silver penny may be called after the owners of the minting privilege, like the Guilder or the Lunar, or after a prominent feature of the inscription. 300 years of Belintar's reign may have unified the Kethaelan coinage to some extent, while still allowing commemorative stamp designs on behalf of the rulers. The silver penny will most likely be round - square coins make sense for Earth Metal, but not for Star or Sky Metal. Depending on the quarter of Nochet you visit, coins may be of exotic origin like Fonrit, Umathela or Kralorela. Outside of those quarters, you might have to find someone to change them to more convenient local coins for them to be accepted at face value (minus exchange fee).

Neither of the maps shows the island nature of Sog City, which is imperative for its continued existence, but which may be on the cut-off part of the map. The entire estuary will be subject to the tides, so the water separating the island from the mainland needn't be navigable at all times.

Having heard enough Lunar commanders defending unpleasant dietary or cultural requirements by parts of their troops, I doubt that even anthropophagy or rape would cause an outrageous outrage among the Lunar forces. Way more likely to cause outrage would be diversion of magic for personal rather than army purposes by people not entitled to do so. (I.e. this perfectly acceptable praxis for Yelmic nobility would be outrageous for non-Lunar, non-Yelmic Pelorians.) Think "caste crime", which only Lunars are exempted from in the Empire.

That's mainly Tatius delaying decisive action in order to have as big a magical build-up as possible, sacrificing troops over and over again in a parallel to the Carmanian Seven Year Build-up in their war against the Dara Happans where the Carmanians sacrificed an army and the brother of the Shah for a decisive magical advantage. Not quite true. Boldhome saw the full might of the empire, including a (capable) mask of the Emperor, and Jar-eel leading Lunar priestesses down impossible cliffs using a Lunar magic that caused the Red Moon to receive scars when defenders of Boldhome launched themselves into the air to stop or at least delay them. The Empire then called up magical ramps of moonlight within days after the arrival in Killard Vale and the dragon intercepting the Crimson Bat. They sent up dragonewt warrior mercenaries for the suicidal initial charge. Not just solid rock, but steeply rising solid rock. @Jeff used to compare Whitewall to Masada in terms of defensibility. The Edwardian castles held off several hundred Welsh warriors with as few as 13 or 19 defenders at Conway and Caernarfon for weeks, allowing support to arrive via the sea, so the ratio on a really good defensible fortress could be a lot higher. Most sieges end in disease, famine, treachery or settlements. Sieges may be lifted by relief forces attacking. Alesia is fairly unique in forcing the relief forces to lay a siege on the besieging forces. Pillaging the besieged object is the normal course of warfare, and it takes extremely disciplined troops to obey the command not to pillage. A credit to the professional forces under Sor-eel's command in the Cradle scenario or Fazzur's forces at Karse 1619. Unheard of in the case of mercenary forces (except dragonewts). Sanuel would have had greater logistical problems at Roadend than the defenders, even with bleeding the surrounding lands (kin of the defenders) white. His contract with the Lunars might help getting supplies delivered, but only subject to availability and priority. Sanuel was lucky that Fazzur still was in command of the overall campaign.

To cut a much longer tirade on the origin of the southeastern Artmali short: Revealed Mythologies tells us that the first Artmali descended from their ancestal lands on Veldara on Indigo Coulds which served as rafts or ships even after their arrival on the Earth. These Indigo Clouds evidently were some substance from their planetary home, probably a mixture of lunar glow and physical stuff (dust from Blue Moonrock, Water from the Blue Moon) which obeyed commands and could be coerced to take on other, urban shapes. Basically, the new settlers could have sacrificed a significant number of their "ships" for accommodation, fortifications, or harbor facilities. I don't see any evidence or need for a science-fantasy flavor here. The building material would have been highly exotic, anyway.