Joerg

? Read the books, don't make me spoil your fun.

The practical effect of the rules as they stand right now is that a sorcerer has to decide on one or two sorcery spells as presented in the rules and choose his technique(s) and runes accordingly, and then hope that he finds another spell fitting that selection. With some runes and some techniques mandatory (like magic), playing a sorcerer is playing a one spell beginner. Most sorcerers have as good a chance at hitting an opponent with an unfamiliar weapon as they have casting one of their very few spells. Maybe playing a sorcerer in an adventuring game is similar to playing an illiterate Sword of Humakt in a campaign set in a vast library. These two sorcerer characters appear to have been tweaked to provide believable sorcerer encounters, with the antagonist remaining very much in the shadows regarding how his magic might actual work under the rules we have. From what I have seen so far, in order to become a sorcerer that has any kind of serious power the sorcerer has to cheat. Starting with cheating old age while they spend a century to become reliable enough to support a military expedition in the field on the eve of battl, maybe prepare one big magical shot for the opening round of the battle. They'll be several days out of magic points for a repeat performance anyway, even if they have an entire spirit farm refilling matrices and crystals. That magic point bottleneck is enough to limit what a player-controlled sorcerer can do at a given time. With a fairly hard limit on Free INT and on magic points, even with extensions like Enhance INT or magic crystals, bound spirits and magic point matrices, offset by the possibility to cast longer lasting spells, a sorcerer is about being prepared, doing things under auspicious circumstances, and investing crazy amounts of resources which are barely renewable if he sticks to sorcerous methods only. I actually the rules implementation that a sorcery spell is a temporary spirit built from magic points. Sorcery spells attack the target POW with the sum of their magic points put towards effect. Neither the sorcerer's POW nor his current personal magic points (which may be a multiple of his POW, whether from legitimate activities like having performed a worship service to the Invisible God or from Tapping) play a role here. Such overcharging with magic points always is temporary. While Tapping doesn't limit the number of tapping attacks during the spell's duration, adding MP to the caster's account is the active part of the spell, while the passive part of the spell is defining the amount of time that account can hold MP. The Tapper can of course transfer Magic Points into crystals and artifacts, preserving those MP even beyond the duration of the Tapping spell. I think that "Worship Invisible God" should be a spell with Duration, too, and possibly with intensity influencing the yield the officiating wizard can take out of the collective MP sacrifice of his congregation for use in spells. Maybe there is something to be done with the Wyter of that congregation? For a sorcerers' game, I agree. For a Gloranthan game played with mortal PCs, possibly young ones at the start or at best the middle of a heroic career (unless that career is typically cut short), not so much. A sorcerer should be able to research a spell creating a magical effect he desires. That should be done using runes and techniques he has mastered, not just inferred. There should be some sort of rules mechanic for that in the hypothetical future publication that gives us sorcery rules for sorcery cultures, something akin to the Gods Book although probably not quite that voluminous. Sorcery as in RQG creates a magical entity almost alive, caerfully constructed by the sorcerer's mind to act independently from the sorcerer except for the few active components that the sorcerer can actually manage to control on the fly/in the field. The sorcerer relies on well-defined energy patterns to hold the spell together. These are rote formulas with interfaces to other spell components. Operating with a visual symbology like a magic circle might make this easier. I don't think that these components are easy to put together functionally. They need careful wiring, rather than clipping on another lego brick. But it looks very much like Ars Magica minus improvised magic really is the way to play a wizard with limitations in Glorantha. You may manage a sorcerer character who goes on certain adventures, supported by a cast of non-sorcerer supporters played by others or provided by the GM, and then retreat into seclusion for a research process that may involve a couple of rolls accumulating success over a number of seasons, much like researching a raiseable characteristic raise. The rules might even accommodate such a game, although they aren't designed for that style of play. Sorcerers aren't the only variant of "play, then retreat" kind of character role, either. A crafter, enchanter or alchemist might set out to gain crucial material or methods in an adventure and then send out hired or retainer characters for the rest while making slow progress on the artefact he is painstakingly crafting. A scholar will delve into obscure documents, producing a volume of annotations that may surpass the original document, to extract something that may send him off to the next field expedition (if he cannot avoid that entirely). And a prospective mystic might spend long time in meditations between short exposures to a challenge required to reach a new layer of insights to mull upon.

Part of the problem is that you can describe stuff like "Form/Set Air" as "Dispel Air Mobiliy" or "Combine Air Stasis". And there are probably spells with such runes that do basically the same thing. There is no guide to creating new sorcery spells yet with regard to how many runes and techniques you should include. Spells with target conditions are quite unwieldy, and hardly any sorcerer will know those as form runes are rather low priority runes. A flexible sorcerer really wants Magic, the Fire rune and either Darkness or Air to cover all five elements, four Power runes to imply their antitheses, and then Forms, Moon, and possibly some of the implied things. If he has time and MP to spare, one technique covers all (Command, Tap), or you need one from Summon/Dispel and one from Combine/Separate. Be prepared to pay up to 16 MP per point of the spell for a four rune/techniques spell with that approach. If you build the world from the rules, then a typical sorcerer would know very few spells decently well, and sorcerous orders may assign weird specializations to their junior members, possibly waiving some of the education cost for taking the role of a niche wizard. Personally, I prefer the HQG approach with grimoires and still those same runes and techniques but not attribute-based limitations.

IIRC London Water gets very bad press in one of the sequels to Rivers of London. In part taking the blame for the activities of Peter's lay.

I would associate few of the moomins with Darkness, but otherwise, why not?

Mostali might sound tinny like through an old landline phone. It is quite likely that knowledge of Tradetalk leads to Openhandism. There might be memetic countermeasures to that developed by the Nidan Decamony. The human slave population in Slon may speak a simplified dialect of Mostali, possibly with elements of Brithini. Darktongue is a shared language, spoken by the hardly corporeal Dehori, the humanoid trolls and trollkin, the bordeline humanoid dark elves, and darkness-worshiping humans. It has a written form which must be almost as wide-spread as the Theyalan scripts, at least in and around Kethaela and Ralios. When humans (and to some extent trollkin) speak Darktongue, it will lack the dark undertones of Darksense emanations true beings of Darkness add to it - a bit like how the Swedish of the Swedish-speaking part of Finland lacks the elaborate melodies that make mainland Swedish almost a sing-song. Aldryami might sound like Treebeard using helium or played at multiple speed. Their biology is similar, but they are so much smaller and hastier.

It is a return back to before the eviction of the Beast Riders out of New Pavis. The White Bull Society still is Argrath's "house power", much like the Kheldon Tribe is for Kallyr. While some of the Pavis County residents will have joined, it is predominantly a beast rider organisation. The accounts of that battle have nothing to say about Argrath's allies from his Wolf Pirate days. I suppose that those were present, but may have refrained from heroics against Cwim. @Runeblogger gives a pretty detailed summary for the presentation of Robin Laws's Pavis and Big Rubble project at Kraken 2019.

According to the Dragon Pass rules booklet, even the Sun Dome County forces (which are three hoplite units) include some mounted archers. It is highly likely that all the mounted archers in the Cavalry Corps and in the Sartar Free Army are predominantly Yelmalio types. The Pavis Royal Guard (as in the board game, not as under Sor-eel and Hargran the Dirty) may be a blend of Golden Bow and Yelmalio.

Humakti rune lords on clan or even tribal level should be rare, and likewise Yelmalians. The situation may change in professional military outfits, where the rank and file will provide the worshipers required to uphold such an office, while mercenary salary will provide the financial support of the office. How many private armies or escort services are there in Sartar, who are its leaders? How much do target-rich environments like the Footprint, the Devil's Marsh or Snake Pipe Hollow increase the Storm Khan population? The Upland Marsh is known to attract Swords of Humakt. In a way, places like these are pilgrimage sites, too, making the presence of rune lords from more distant communities quite likely. Pavis and the Rubble has an over-abundance of non-chaotic cults providing rune lords or ladies: Kyger Litor (Karrg), Zorak Zoran, Aldrya (High King Elf), Yelmalio, Yelorna, Orlanth Adventurous, Storm Bull, Waha, Pavis (at least once that axe is back in circulation), Babeester Gor, Seven Mothers/Yanafal Tarnils, Lanbril. There are a couple of cults in RQ2 Rune Masters that have been stripped of the lord position as early as in RQ3 and still in RQG - the other Lightbringers, Eiritha, Daka Fal. Humakt, Storm Bull and Waha have lost their priests, and all of these cases have trouble justifying a lord-priest position, too. This full declination of the RQ2 rules also resulted in other oddities like zebra-riding elves or trolls. Otherwise, the full array of Cults of Prax cults could have rune lords based on Pavis, or regularly visiting the place.

Durulz do.

1, 2, 4, ,,,,

That "Guards the Stead" myth skips the preliminaries of the Hill of Gold quest and jumps to the defense against Chaos. Elmal also figures in "Chalana heals the Scars", which may be another decisive branching moment. What I find missing is "Elmal guides the Vingkotlings" against numerous invaders. Possibly while Orlanth is in his self-imposed exile, or when he is fighting foes elsewhere, taking the majority of the Vingkotling forces and the Storm Brothers with him. Ironically, the sun god is absent from Orlanth's defense of the sky against Tyram, the Sky Terror. Plentonius refers to the god/king of the Ram Tribes facing Urvairinus as Elemalus. That's the prequel to the dome-building, including the acquisition of the Iron Ram for the northern bow of the dome. A post-King of Sartar Chaosium write-up of Yelmalio. The first Chaosium RQ cult write-up of Yelmalio is in Cults of Prax, and it doesn't get much earlier.

The official answer appears to be that the cult mass converted when Monrogh spread his revelation of many suns and offered the chance to become a slave-owning land-holder in Sun County. Elmal remains as an obscure tribal subcult in a few places. The HeroQuest write-ups had no gifts or geases, but also treated him as an extant and popular god as of 1618. The Hill of Gold is a simile for the entire Gods War, much like the Sword Story. The encounters with Orlanth, the Winter (personified by Inora) and the forces of Darkness are the preliminary to the final stage, surviving the encounter with Chaos and the end of the world. If Elmal has a Hill of Gold myth, it would probably see him ignore Inora's cold and blinding Zorak Zoran while holding up the torch on The Mountain, which may well be Kero Fin.

Except those aren't Argrath's ships, but ships of Wolf Pirate captains who chose to follow Argrath for now.

I'm about to run a game there, too., and while I remember some of the outlines from Robin Laws' and Jeff Richard's panel at the 2019 Kraken, I will have to make do with the info I can put together from Pavis: Gateway to Adventure, the classical Pavis and Big Rubble boxes, and possibly some info from the Rivers of Cradles scenario. My players wanted to play in Pavis, and so we used the Prax family background for the rolls on the table. Now I will need to explain the place to them, and somehow merge the P:GtA additional info into their character backgrounds. I'll lean on MOB's Sun County thread to give them an idea of the post-Sor-eel situation, and the upheavals caused by the White Bull society takeover and defeat at Moonbroth. Army routed, enough can be rallied to maintain the White Bull as king of Pavis. One or two of my players rolled first-hand experience for that battle. A few more joined the White Bull or at least rode with them enough to have an idea. In my upcoming game there will be politicking among therse groups, possibly some limited physical interaction about assets, but with a bunch of Wolf Pirates looking out to increase their wealth, open fighting with another local group over some asset may well result in neither getting it. I expect quite a few changes in Zebra Fort. Will Hargran the Dirty still be in command of the Pavis Royal Guard, or will some less venal Pavis loyalist take them over and make them into one of the elite personal warbands following Agrath? After a visit by Wolf Pirates, would you really expect magical or other goodies remaining? Unless you know where a Lunar symp deposited a hoard when learning about Argrath's arrival, not a big chance, IMO. Limited ruin, too. Wolf Pirates don't usually burn down whorehouses upon first contact. Same with other establishments providing comfort or entertainment. Re-distribution of wealth, yeah, surely. Color me surprised to learn about the destruction of Corflu. As far as I know, Argrath and other Wolf Pirate friends descended on the place in 1624 in a naval assault (I assume) and killed or more likely captured any Lunar-related folk, to ransom them or to sell them off into slavery. There may have been a few pleasure-killings, but I don't see many cases of revenge-killings, the people of Corflu are too insignificant to warrant that. Afterwards, Corflu became their base for a while - you don't destroy a place if you want to use it for a base. Some of those Wolf Pirate buddies may have gone on to capture Grantland settlers for cash or workforce while Argrath summoned the White Bull brotherhood and coordinated the march upon Pavis, or they may have continued some coastal or commerce raiding from the port facilities (which are decent, and fairly well known to them). Sure, there are more pleasant places to have a pirate lair, but not in this region. The dragonfly priestess hired by Tolkazzi certainly would have received enough incentive to go on doing what she was doing while the Wolf Pirates were there. When Argrath and the vast majority of his followers left for Pavis, would they have burned their ships and the place behind them, or would they have left an anchor watch in the relative comfort of the place? No known troll connections, in fact a lingering dislike of trolls for what they did to his family in Adari. The troll support for Thog didn't help change his mind, either. Other than in Dwarfside, yes. Probably allied to Argrath. Rather the one river cult we have a write-up for, with all other river cults copying from that write-up much like many city cults are derived from what we know about Pavis. The list you have are friendly spirit cults (River Horse, Frog Woman) or allied cults (Diros). One subcult is known, Kinope. The Cleansed One is mostly over-hyped IMO. If a treatment like the Baths of Nelat provides an illuminated state, what does this say about Orlanth? IIRC, one independent master thief and two rival gangs in New Pavis, occasionally operating in the Rubble, too. Plus freelancers like Griselda and Wolfhead. Griselda apparently left Pavis on the Cradle, but left the Cradle at Corflu, and did not return to New Pavis, avoiding that Halcyon period. You didn't mention the Black Fang - probably the kernel for Argrath's Assassin unit in the Dragon Pass boardgame. Any rumors about connection to the Krarsht cult will be silenced, and the spirits captured. There is no proof about that? Yeah, they are good at what they do. The trolls of the Rubble may have seen some re-organisation after the Yelmalio/Garden conflict. I assume that Yavis Gan returned to the Rubble from Corflu. The mercenaries who had taken Sor-eel's silver and failed to receive enough from Halcyon Var Enkorth may still be around, hoping for some jobs from the new government. Given the nature of Argrath's followers, I think that he might be inclined to accept their services as a policing force away from the city. The trollkin night guards and the constable might still be in office, although on probation. Jotoran Longsword certainly has no longer any official position other than prisoner. The legitimate business of the Patroma family probably has been taken over by Argrath, their wealth confiscated. Some of their underground network agents might still remain, possibly working for Argrath.

Hidden Gyffur's band of rebels in Thunder Rrbels( (p.133) is skirting the Gagarthi way really hard.

How much do standard of living and being a free man of the clan depend on one another? From the look of it, stickpickers (who may have hardly any weregeld to talk about) may still be free members of the clan, and if they somehow managed to hold on to a hard hat and a sufficiently large knife despite running around in rags, they'd still be eligible to serve in the clan, tribal and city militia, and to vote in the assemblies on any of these levels. Stickpickers quite clearly are not tenant farmers overseeing the equivalent of a hide for a rent-taker. Then there can be folk in the clan who don't manage a hide of land but just enough to gain some supplement to their other occupation, which may be some form of rural crafting, a magical occupation, or both in one. Butchers, for instance, fishermen, wood-carvers, scribes, carpenters, or producers of javelins and other such high priced equipment. People cultivating cash crops (like apples) might tend to be tenant farmers. Cash crops may include flax, woad, other dye plants like madder, or possibly breeding donkeys and mules. Where would people extracting other resources from the lands claimed by the clan be rated socially? Folk evaporating brine, burning limestone for mortar or for maintaining posh house facades, people digging up clay for pottery or for bricks to build kilns with? Are there char-coal making facilities run by the Gustbran cult with tenants, or do they simply buy from stickpickers trained in their requirements?

The last time this was tried (in 375 ST) Time re-asserted itself and drew the stopping sun kicking and screaming back into its ordained cycles. The dwarfs would prefer to bring back a Godtime before the World Machine got unhinged by the birth of Umath. It isn't quite clear whether the Lunar shenanigans fit in their ideal picture of how the world is meant to be stopped, either. (Or run in ever repeating cycles.)

Well, Shargash is another problem by themselves, with Shadzor and Alkor... Quite generally, "son of" translates as "aspect of" or "name of". Deities (and capital H Heroes) have pluripresence - they exist in more than one place and shape, or at least portions contributing to the whole do. It is a bit of the "elephant in the dark" situation, where the experience or expression of the entity may vary. I don't really think that a planetary or stellar body is restricted to a single entity behind it, with the possible exceptions of Zenith and the Red Moon. Sharing Lightfore will lead to some shared myths based on the observation of the regular movement of that planet. Activities down on the Surface World or hovering directly above the holiest place of its worshipers are separate from that. Reladivus is the hoverer above the ziggurat, even after all the stationary Planetary Suns of Dara Happa had been disturbed by Umath and sent into motion - often a fatal motion. Unlike Alkor/Shargash, Reladivus/Kargzant the wanderer escaped descent into the Underworld very long. Alkor/Shargash and Verithur(us/a)/Jern(ede/oti)(us/a/um) both descended into Hell but re-emerged inside the Golden Age. (The Mernitan goddess is even weirder. Verithurus was the white light protector of Lesilla, the blue nurturer, after the Mernitan white deity had dipped into the underworld and re-appeared red from her deflowering and maternal experience.) Trying to find a single cause is bound to leave out other factors. To me, the curse of Manarlavus sounds similar to "Khordavu rearranges the world" after the Second Council forces had overcome the Horse Warlords and their Alkoth allies at Argentium Thri'ile. There is an emperor, and of course it has to be his decree which creates or changes a situation. The size of Manarlarvus's dome has been debated, too. A dome covering Yuthuppa, Raibanth and Alkoth would have used about as much building material as the mass of the Red Moon. Did Manarlavus's quarries consume entire mountains? Not to mention that some of the building material was appropriated by the Darjiini for their hilltop fortresses. I don't really buy the concept of a single Lightfore deity or even planet before the Sun Swirl, and it takes the Bridling of Kargzant towards the end of the first century of History to put the planet Lightfore (or possibly the daystar sun) onto its regular Sunpath. There is Redalda, the daughter of Ernalda (no father given or strictly necessary), and then there is Redaylde, the daughter of Vingkot and the Winter Wife.

I don't think that Belintar was particularly tall when he arrived at Sindpaper. His body may have expanded later on as he took in divine powers, though. What swimming style did Belintar use? Did he possibly establish a new one?

The memory of the Gold Wheel Dancers, a valuable ally in the Unity Council, adopted by the corrupt empire. Using these means liberating the fossilized bodies of ancient allies, a good and honorable thing to do. There is Urrgh the Ugly's hoard at Old Wind, not causing any spiritual trouble there (other than pushing Londra to ponder what to spend it on).

The only problem I would have with that is the concept of Pooh giving hunny to others.

I don't think that there is any of the established families that supports the White Moon Movement wholeheartedly, but as you say, there will be some to lend the White Moonies some support when it disturbs their rivals. The White Moon feels like a grass-roots movement, carried by agitators of no other qualification than a whiff of illumination, madness, or both. How much are they the 1968 parallel?

One of the Lunar powers is reflection, so maybe the Mernitan servant is the mirror-bearer. An assistant for introspection, maybe. Or the blue moon connection could make those servants the guardians of secrets, aka assassins.

Reladivus is another name for the Lightfore deity elsewhere called Kargzant, Elmal, Yelmalio, or Antirius. The symbol does not appear in the catalog of HeroQuest 1st edition runes, although the lower part resembles the rune of Pella the Potter goddess. The horse-head tip of his head makes some relation to Reladiva/Redalda possible. Could the symbol be a horse-yoke used for chariots? Or a horse bit?