Jeff

Remember, few people believe that there is only one soul. What we track as the existential Self depends on what we focus on.

Malkion proclaimed Solace -that after death the essential you persists (the soul) and will be reincarnated into the mundane world. We gain Solace in this - that there is an immortal Self. Zzabur says that the spirit, the soul, whatever - that is not I AM. These are names we give to the animating energies that help constitute the I AM, but upon death I AM is no more - it is reduced to its constituent parts and is no longer I AM. And whatever it is, is of no further interest.

I can easily say the Brithini view and the Orlanthi view are equally true interpretations of what happens when you die. It just depends on what you are saying is your essential "you".

Actually it is not a mess - you just need the right vantage. The Brithini hold that your ego is you. As your ego dies upon death, you are gone. Your spirit and other energies, etc., dissipates to wherever they are attuned to - but that's the shade of you, not you. Everything else is just sentimentality and Hallmark cards. Most Malkioni hold that after death the essential you persists (the soul) and will be reincarnated into the mundane world. We gain Solace in this - that there is an immortal Self.

Yelmalio sticked it out by not letting his light be extinguished - not because of some inherent stick-it-out-ness. Same thing with Orlanth in the Lightbringers Quest - he made his way through the Underworld despite having no magic to facilitate this and reconciled with Yelm despite having no reconcile with guy you killed magic in order to save the cosmos despite having no save the cosmos magic. The gods' Rune magic reflects their inherent nature and attributes. So Orlanth is a Thunder God, Adventurer and King, so has magic that reflects that. Yelmalio is the God of Light, and has magic that reflects that. Yelmalio is an important cult because despite being the God of Light, he did not go out despite the Greater Darkness. Maybe his Sunbright spell had a lot of Extension?

Yes, and not surprisingly CoC, RuneQuest, and Pendragon all share many of these elements. Almost as if the same team worked on them all!

Joy is a moment of where one experiences the Invisible God and is transformed by it. Like henosis in Neo-Platonism - union with the fundamental source of reality. The Hrestoli tradition teaches us that we must go beyond restrictions of caste and taboo to achieve Joy, but we must also have experience caste and taboo first - this is like the theurgy involved in Neo-Platonic henosis. Malkion appeared to Hrestol in his darkest moment and showed him the path to Joy. Through Joy we have a direct line experience of the One - to the Good above the gods and Runes. During the Ban it was easy. Through training and experience, we are able to mimic in reverse the mistakes of the demiurge and achieve Joy. Indeed even peasants could do it. But now, even some of our most noble leaders are without Joy, a sign of our degenerate times no doubt. Our greatest heroes are those that could ascend and be in perpetual union with the Invisible God, but remain tied to us as guides and guardians. Bodhisattvas, gurus, helpers, and friends of the Invisible God. They are held in reverence even after their death.

But why make that a Rune spell? Advice Greg gave me in editing Cults material - if there is something a player wants to get out of a cult that seems beyond the social/magical ecological role of the cult, let them heroquest for it and gain it as a personal boon, IF they are able to experience and survive this on the Hero Plane. Don't make it a default spell or even a special subcult. And if it is really cool, don't let it be a common heroquest!

Sure - but the full-on warlord approach is a LOT more work for everyone involved (and works better in the Uther phase than in the Boy King, Conquest, Tournament, or Twilight phases). As a default, I'd always go with the Prince Valiant approach over encouraging the players to replace Arthur, Lancelot, and Guinevere. Same thing here - let the characters who are the named heroes in the White Bear and Red Moon game move around the board. Let the players bounce around them, perhaps joining them as heroes on the board. The setting can certainly accommodate additional heroes! Sure in the Iliad most versions of the story focus on Achilles, Agamemnon, Patroclus, Hector, and Paris - but there are so many more! Diomedes, Ajax, Odysseus, Nestor, Penthesilia - all of these are wonderful heroes who get great stories regardless of what goes on with the Rage of Achilles.

He is a fine adventurers cult - as are any of the cults in RQG. But Yelmalio was never a good power-gamer adventurers cult (arguably none really are). In RQ2, he was best for fighting trolls and very useful in the Big Rubble (all those light spells such as Light, Lightwall, and Lantern are incredibly useful in underground ruins!). Sunbright and Catseye are incredible spells - Sunbright gets rid of trollkin and cave trolls, Catseye puts you on an even platform with trolls in darkness. Throw in Detect Gold and you have a cult tailor made for adventuring in the Big Rubble. But Yelmalio's myths aren't about exploring the Big Rubble - they are about surviving as the Last Light in Darkness. And his cult survives by fighting together as a trained pike and shield force (which doesn't require a lot of specialised magic).

You can do that approach - and I have in the past. But I find actually the Pendragon approach works far better and is frankly more enjoyable. Let there be major NPCs that the players bounce off and interact with. There's plenty of room for another Sir Gawaine or Sir Gareth, or Perdiccas or Aristonous - that's the Prince Valiant approach. Go on adventures, get involved with intrigue and betrayal, lead armies and do amazing quests - but don't bother with making the players responsible for the full movement of the setting.

Umm, the rules for heroquesting are due to appear in the GM sourcebook and have not been published. We needed to get them in there, because the Sartar Campaign Book gets into heroquesting very quickly. But none of the scenarios we have published have at their core fighting a super-monster (unless you consider Redeye, but he's certainly within the range of the pregens to defeat, let alone a more experienced party). Terrors like the Crimson Bat are written up and given stats for the same reason Great Cthulhu has stats in Call of Cthulhu. But if I wanted to defeat Great Cthulhu it would likely be by some means other than brute force.

Clearly not.

There's a LOT there! Of course characters should try to become heroes. Many player characters already probably are. However, one does not usually become a Hero by gaining stupidly high skill levels or what-not, one becomes a hero through interacting with the Hero Plane - with the mythology and archetypes of the setting itself. That's not done by figuring out a way to have such a high skill level as to be able to critically hit the Crimson Bat over and over again (actually I am not sure that would even work) - rather it is done by figuring out a way to defeat the Crimson Bat as a mythic archetype, like we would in a dream or fairytale. That's dangerous too - but is within the realm of the feasible. That's how Hon-eel wooed Yelm, how the Red Goddess performed her Goddess-Quest, and how Harmast Barefoot performed the Lightbringers Quest. So actually I tend to throw characters into the realm of Heroes fast and early. Let them Discorporate and wander the Spirit World, or enter the Hero Plane to confront the magical archetypes of the Gods Realm. Here it is their Runes, their POW, their CON, their Passions, their Rune spells, and any Hero Points they have managed to accumulate that matter, not their skills or items. Through this the characters might gain the boon that lets them strike down the terrible Red Dragon or to confront the end of the cosmos and survive. But this is something very different from "Super-RuneQuest" - this is like adventuring in a myth of your own making, making use of your innermost self, your allies, and those who love or hate you. Does that help at all?

Why are you fighting alongside with untrained militia? Why haven't you trained them? Is there some reason why a trained linesman is fighting outside their file mates? I'm sure there is a reason why they are doing something far outside of their temple and cult strengths - which makes it a good story and a good source of adventure.

Nor did Orlanth. Or Ernalda. Or any other deity.

Storm Bull is not the dominant cult of Animal Nomad men - that is definitely Waha.

No but it is a warrior's code - and primarily deals with issues of war and warriors. Which means mythologically it is about how Death should be used and how its user should be treated.

I don't think Honor is so much a Fire/Sky thing as a How Do You Use Death thing. Orlanth, Humakt - both are concerned about the proper wielding of Death. Yelmalio as a surviving part of Yelm has that from the same event. And Yanafal Tarnils inherits his attitudes from Humakt.

That is Sunbright. An awesomely powerful spell against the Darkness and the things of the Greater Darkness.

Shamanism is a big part of the Waha cult, so of course that counts.

One might say that is exactly what you are doing here.

Yep. Yelmalio did his greatest deeds after he was stripped of most of his power, after most every other god was dead. And that was to not be extinguished. He remained, a Last Light in the Darkness, when everything else had gone.

Honor is not dependent on how your foe fights. It is how YOU fight.