metcalph

3 minutes ago, theconfusingeel said:

Is Hon-eel worshiped in Vithela?

I didn't say she was.  I just said analogous to.

7 hours ago, theconfusingeel said:

Is it possible that Octamo or the blood sun are verithurus(a)?

Verithurus is directly related to sedenya, plus there's it's sometimes regarded as female and sometimes as male which Octamo also does(thought you could say with verithurusa it's a case of different cultures interpreting the same god in different ways than  it being an actual trait they had)

Octamo is fertility related so it seems more likely that he or she is analogous (in the way that Elmal is analogous to Kargzant or Solf is analogous to Lodril) to Hon-eel than Verithurusa.  That said, I haven't seen the treatment of Hon-Eel in the Lunar Way.  As for Verithurusa's transitioning, I always thought it was due to stuck-up Dara Happans being unable to accept a girl among Yelm's sons.

4 hours ago, theconfusingeel said:

Is the blood sun really Sedenya?
I remember it has some cultists in the Lunar empire, so I can't imagine it's just a regional identification.
Plus I assume both of these cults existed before the red moon rose

From the Guide (For example Cryptic Verses of the Yellow Calendar p745-746), I think it evident that the Blood Sun worships the Red Moon.  Yes, it was extant before the rise of the Red Moon.  Then they worshipped the Sun and had weakened magic because of it.  

The worshippers in Peloria (3% of Oraya's population according to CoR: Mythology p153 or 12k!) are Kralorelan migrants making the pilgrimage to get closer to their God.  They are accepted by the Lunars as being another facet of the Red Goddess.

As for Octamo, it's not clear whether it had existed before the rise of the Red Moon.  Since Vormain is such a secretive place, we don't know how it changed over time or even the history of its contacts with outsiders.

The Moon is visible in all parts of glorantha so it will have a cult everywhere.  Around Vormain, the main worshippers of the Red Moon would be the Cult of the Blood Sun.  Octamo is mentioned in the Prosopaedia and the Guide

Quote

Runes: Moon and Fertility.

Octamo is the source of all blessings and patron of farmers.

Octamo has both a male aspect and a female aspect.

Octamo is the only kindly Vormaino deity seen by outsiders.

During Octamo’s great festival, war and unnecessary work is forbidden. Octamo is depicted both as male and female, or as androgynous. Sometimes Octamo is depicted as male on the right side carrying a bowl with grains or fruits and female on the left carrying a harvesting sickle. Octamo is always red-skinned.

Prosopaedia p90

I'll have to backtrack and say there are Dragonewt Roads in Ralios.

Quote

A network of invisible roads accessible only to
dragonewts crosses their lands. Much of the
continent was once interconnected, but many
roads were broken apart when the Empire of
the Wyrms Friends was betrayed and fell.

The roads are marked by peculiar
standing stones which appear mostly to
be crude and stylized representations of
dragons, wyrms, and an otherwise unknown
thing vulgarly called a “frogosaurus” in
Dragon Pass and Peloria, a “ken majee”
in Kralorela and Teleos, and a “hurler” in
Ralios.

[...]

In many places in Peloria, Ralios, and
Kralorela, stretches of dragonewt road are
visible, but unusable because no departure
sites are connected to them

Guide p76 - Bolding mine.

In addition, there's also the small manner of how the Ralian Dragonewts got to Dragon Pass for the Battle of the Smoking Ruins.  I don't think this travel is common because the Dragonewt March isn't using them despite being fairly high-ranking.  It may be that Ormsland has a one-way road that allows them to reach Dragon Pass but not return.

There are no extant dragonewts road networks outside Dragon Pass and Kralorela. 

The Dragonewts may be trying to commune with the corpse of a Dragon in a Waertagi City Shop. 

https://twitter.com/Chaosium_Inc/status/1785071797383082422?t=F0Ih86FrVniXH8wxl2zFPA&s=19

Would have been happier to see a couple more "very"s.

3 hours ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

So who is in charge after Emperor Argenteus goes down?  Great Sister should be at least one of the major players in the interregnum.  And will the Adventurers run into a Sister of New Consciousness?   What would that look like, other than Illumination?  Perhaps it's dangerous to talk to one of those sisters: You might hear a Nysalor Riddle. Any such illuminate is, of course, bucking for initiation into the cult of the Red Goddess, or already initiated. 

In my opinion the Sisterhood is a kind of a has-been, superseded by the Dolathi and their Order of Day.  You may see them in northern Peloria but they are archaic compared to the modern Lunars.

3 hours ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

Page 16: The Valar-telsor family (one of the nine great imperial families)  has unspecified family ties to the Great Sister.  Looks like great backgound for a Lunar campaign, or even an adventure into lLnar Tarsh.  Now do we know anything else about the Valar-telsor family?

Glorantha Sourcebook 2nd ed  p191  

Quote

This clan has ties to both the Red Emperor and Great Sister. They claim the pre-imperial Lunar heroine Valare Addi as an ancestor. They are notorious for their tendency to ally against whoever is the most powerful of the other clans. They are patrons of the Natha temple and of several schools of Illumination.

3 hours ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

Page 143     Notwithstanding the stuff about making peace above, Great Sister controls “A sixth force called the Sister’s Army”.  

Not a contradiction.  Guide p313

Quote

It consists of approximately 500 beautiful young men and women in fantastically glamorous uniforms. When viewed from afar, her “army” is often mistaken for flocks of gigantic birds or moving miniature forests.

In truth, the Sister’s Army is a magical unit, not a military regiment. They do not fight on the battlefield in the mud and the blood, but perform elaborate and elegant ritual dances and choreography with great magical results. It is widely rumored that the dancers are forbidden from spilling blood and their decorated weapons must never strike their foes.

Lastly she was quoted in Under the Red Moon as saying "I do not chase insubstantials" when asked why she never became a Goddess.

2 minutes ago, soltakss said:

In the olden days, there was a rule that Chaos Cultists couldn't direct the Crimson Bat, so it is a surprise to see them allowed to worship the Crimson Bat.

They are chaotics by virtue of worshipping the Crimson Bat, a chaotic demon.  The "rule" was that cultists with a chaotic feature (which the rules then called chaotics coz Runic Affinities weren't a thing then) couldn't become rune levels (Cults of Terror p74).  That said, I dunno what the Lunar Way says about:

• Cultists who have acquired a chaotic feature *after* becoming a rune-level,
• Cultists who have had a Chaos Gift.
• Cultists who can conceal their features due to Illumination and then acquire a chaotic feature.

The simplest solution might be the the High Priest of the Bat sorts it out internally by having the errant cultist trip and fall into the Bat's maw.  

When I was spitballing some ideas for Lunar Magic for HeroQuest, I did have the idea that a Lunar would be defined by the cult *and* the phase of the Moon.  Thus a Dying Yanafali would look very different to a Full Half Yanafali.  

Nothing much came of it.

1 hour ago, Tatterdemalion Fox said:

Quick question for anyone who has the new printing. Gods of the Lunar Way, list of the Seven Mothers, pg. 148-149 in the first printing: which lunar phases are Deezola and Jakaleel associated with?

Jakaleel is the Dying Moon and Deezola is the Crescent Go Moon

1 hour ago, Wheel Shield said:

EDIT: It is interesting that it's across product lines.

Given the cause of the shipping delays (Houthis), it would be astonishing if the delay only affected some product lines and not others.

1 hour ago, Mameluco said:

Until I see the rules myself I cannot give an informed opinion, but the solution seems... inelegant, for a better word. Chaosium removed the sorcery skills and replace them with techniques and runes, so they thought there were a level of brokeness in their original approach. 

On a game design note, sorcerers still have separate skills for each spell making skills for intensity etc. overly needless.  For Red Goddess magic, the base for *all* spirit magic is POWx5% so having separate skills for prolong, combine etc doesn't seem that much of a burden to me. 

1 hour ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

However the phases of the moon will affect MP costs of the sorcery spells, that is clear.  So during the full moon Lunar sorcery is going to be cheap.

This is a big change from even Heroquest: Glorantha. 

What's the Lunar Magic skill that affects more than just spirit magic?

On the specific examples, in the old GoG rules Speedart with 2 points amp would have been +10% to hit and +2 damage.  With 3 that went to 15% and +3 damage.  Demoralize is unchanged as far as I can see.  

3 hours ago, Eff said:

Referring to him being described as a pupil of Zzabur in the Guide. Hypothetically possible in the right Gloranthas, but suggestive.

Pretty sure that's Ostorious Archmagus, not Talar Malaskan Phillippe, you are thinking of

4 hours ago, Eff said:

This does seem to scan with God Forgot and Malaskan Philippe's apparent caste-hopping.

Malaskan Philippe is an Officer, not a Warrior.  Even where he's commanding troops, he's always described as a Talar.

2 hours ago, Eff said:

3. gwymirs: Obsoleted.

Gwyymirs were a rank of elite Brithini warriors in Arkat's Saga and the narrator of that tale hoped to become one but thought Arkat would become one first.

There is an early unfinished Stafford tale "Aftal the Waertag" which was printed in Missing Lands and indicated to have been written in the mid-60s.  It also mentions the Deri which appeared in the Guide and the Little People of Jrustela, who are probably now Timinits.

2 hours ago, Jason Farrell said:

That's extremely disingenuous considering that is one of three solutions Soccercalle wrote. 

Listing other poorly thought-out alternatives doesn't make the "Let Them Eat Cake" attitude any better.

2 hours ago, Soccercalle said:

I get that some deliveries can reach the warehouses at different times and that is not a problem if we talk about 2-3 weeks difference. But if THE SAME warehouse (seems to be Australia) always get the stuff 2-3 months later than the other something has to change in order to enhance customer satisfaction.
This can be done in two or three ways. 1) Close the outlier warehouse and have the people there order from other warehouses (Fedex or DHL from EU to Australis is 2-4 days which will better for the consumers than waiting 2-3 extra months, even if the price will be higher). 

I'm just happy at this point that Chaosium isn't taking your advice.  

Looking through the Book

• The genealogical tables for many of the ruling houses have been changed from a powerpoint presentation to actual coins of the rulers.
• There's a piccie in the Xeotam dialogues.
• The sketch map of the Gloranthan Underworld has been replaced by the Cosmology of Glorantha that was in Cults of RuneQuest: Mythology.
• A map of Golden Age Glorantha has been replaced by a Map of the same period from the Guide to Glorantha.
• The same is true for the maps of the Storm Age and Great Darkness.

3 hours ago, Wheel Shield said:

Update. I am assuming The Lunar Way is coming too, but this says what it says, and predictions seem to be folly.

Judging from Jeff's articles on Facebook, which have been Lunar themed over the past few days, its release seems to me to be near.  Aetherworks, the presumed milestone before release, is a bit more pessimistic.

14 minutes ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

by the way, is this notion still relevant  :  gods (like Orlanth or Yinkin) are different than great spirits (like Kolat or Fralar) ?

No.  It's more like the Gods have a preference for the type of magic that they give.