metcalph

On starting out with iron, the real question is whether the weapon or armour is enchanted or not.  Unenchanted iron may be commplace but I've a feeling they are handed out to people who suck at spirit magic. Enchanted iron would be much rarer and borne by nobles and horali weaponmasters. 

I do gave an idle thought about how some Seshnegi can ignore the presence of iron when casting magic (probably caste magic or a Humakti gift) but use its defensive properties for spells cast against them.  The only drawback is in the case of being unconscious and in dire need of Heal 6.

1 hour ago, Richard S. said:

2. What do y'all think the most common form of Talar ancestor worship is? Daka Fal variants like the ones in CoRL, or specific cults like Talor, Gerlant, or Issaries?

I think the Seshnegi ancestors were originally spirits like Surenslib and Votank in the Daka Fal Cult writeup in  Cults of RuneQuest: the Lightbringers.  Over time and through Wizard research in the Dawn Age (alluded to in that paragraph in the Daka Fal cult writeup), they became associated with the Big Gods.  Hence Aerlit, the father of Malkion, originally provided one storm related rune spell to his worshippers but today, he is worshipped as a subcult of Orlanth in Seshnela (to confuse matters, the Seshnegi refer to the entire cult of Orlanth as Aerlit).  

There are still ancestors that are worshipped through the rites of Daka Fal today (I think the local name for him is Malkion the Old but the contempuous wizards call him Daka Fal because of longstanding cult tensions).  A noble would think nothing of worshipping at a temple of Aerlit or Seshna Likita and then going to the priest-shaman of Daka Fal and worshipping some other ancestor instead.

1 hour ago, Richard S. said:

3. Similar question, but what cults should the Dronars mostly use? I'm waffling between Grain Goddess (Seshna) and Daka Fal for the primary one, but I'd like some more input.

Grain Goddesses, Barntar, the Lowfires etc.  I think ancestral worship (ie Aerlit) is a prerogative of the nobility and that the Dronars can only act as lay members in the ancestral cults.  I also think most of the magic obtained in the temples is syphoned off to be used by the local wizards.  (Are the Noble temples to their ancestors similarly treated?  Don't be silly)  

Some Dronars might serve the Wizards directly as Hunters (either of Monsters or Spirits or both).  Think the Winchester Brothers or Scooby-Doo.

A few dronars might be condemned and their "execution" is initiating into Humakt.  That way, the Nobility can mobilize a few more troops without the Wizards getting antsy.

9 minutes ago, ChrisWentWhere said:

But looking through Lightbringers I am seeing that Associated Cults only provide specific spirit spells (like Ernalda providing Second Sight and Chalana Arroy providing Heal to Orlanth the cult for example). Am I reading that correctly? I am not complaining just trying to get my head around it. 

That's from the shrines to the Associate Gods in the main god temples.  If they want other spirit magics, they have to go to the associate god's temple and join as a lay member.

In terms of becoming a  Man-of-All (there's other forms of Hrestolism but this is the most blatant), there's a difference in my opinion between acting as a noble and legally being recognized as a noble.  The former is required for a Man-of-All status, the latter is not.  Therefore one can become a Man-of-All in Seshnela without being part of the establishment.  I do feel that to attain the Talar caste, one has to be an actual leader of men.

I don't believe the Wizards exert a policing function in Seshnegi society.  They generally stay within their haunts, collecting the magic that is owed to them and casting the spells requested of them by the nobility.  The Watchers and the like are principally concerned with policing the Wizards themselves to see whether they are engaging in Right Thought and abjuring forbidden philosophies (ie Hrestolism, Arkatism, God Learnerism) that will cause magical disasters if left unchecked.

The Nobles on the other hand do concern themselves with the spiritual welfare of the subjects.  If their subjects do not follow the minimal standards of prescribed caste behaviour or fail to turn over the required magics to the wizards, then that's a problem for the Nobles.  But this doesn't require that everybody serving the Nobles be Rokari, merely that as many of them as practical. 

So a Seshnegi Noble meets a Man-of-All would be more like an Orlanthi King dealing with a Storm Bull warrior (or perhaps even a Gagarthi).  Depending on his open-mindedness, he might be willing to retain the Man-of-All's services or send men to encourage him to move along.  But to denounce the Man-of-All to the Wizards?  Most Wizards have better things to deal with than to chase after a deranged madman and think it's the job of the nobility to sort out.  So there's little incentive to ensure total conformity when the Nobles can live with some level of heterodoxy within their lands.  

That doesn't preclude some Watcher in Leplain having a watching brief to track all the Men-of-All within the Kingdom and casting magical curses at the more powerful ones.  The principal concern of this Watcher is not that the Men-of-All are roaming the Kingdom but that they might be corrupting the local Wizards.  So if a Wizard has a noteworthy encounter with a Man-of-All, the Watcher in Leplain would be more concerned about questioning the Wizard to ensure he hasn't fallen into error rather than hunting down the Man-of-All.

15 hours ago, Erol of Backford said:

He brought an "enlarged company" of knights with him which from 1615 to 1619 grew in size or so we suppose over those years as sides are chosen due to the power vacuum and with exiles from Sartar.

An enlarged company is what 100-200 fighters.  The Esvularings are something like 100K (History of the Heortling Peoples p86) and would have at least a thousand professional warriors.  If Rikard is recruiting exiles from Sartar, then those exiles would be unlikely Malkioni purists willing to trash Aeolian shrines.  Moreover the Guide actually points out the Aeolians supported Rikard (p247) which is something they wouldn't do if he was oppressing them).

15 hours ago, Erol of Backford said:

So he and his company goes to the Marches, (not canon but again gives him a starting point) guessing to be Knight Fort but not sure as it could be Exile Stead as well? At Knight Fort He grows his company further with exiled Sartaites and then comes back to the Plateau when the time is right to set up New Malkionwal.

Knight Fort is upriver from the Monkey Ruins (RQG p135).  Since it is not present in the Guide, it's not around as of 1621 and probably was established later.

15 hours ago, Erol of Backford said:

He does care about filling his coffers to fund New Malkionwal... and to that point we like the idea that Rikard begins confiscating "pagan" idols, etc. made of gold, silver, gems, thus being able to hire more mercenaries, likely some displaced Sartarites and anyone who is roaming or not wishing to be left out. Really what are Orlanthi serfs doing with all that money anyway?

Who is we?  Also you are shifting from the original notion of cleansing *Aeolian* shrines of pagan idols to seizing idols of the Orlanthi (ie non-Aeolians).  Which the big problem is this: according to you, Rikard has recruited Orlanthi exiles from Sartar whose attitude towards pagan shrines would be rather reverential.  So I'm not really seeing any looting the temples to pay for mercenaries.  

15 hours ago, Erol of Backford said:

In 1619  Lunars and than battles with them, as I understood, having great losses on both sides, so he must have had a formidable force, easily enough to ride into smaller town and even larger one's, enter temples and confiscate such valuable items. If he didn't have a few thousand how did he manage to fight all those battles?

There's circular reasoning going on here.  Rikard must have a formidable force to loot the temples.  But if he didn't loot the temples, he doesn't need such a formable force does he?

But a better way of looking at this would be to look at the Holy Country army.  Heortland has a population of 300k people.  Assuming 1% professional warriors and another 9% tribal militia, that gives 3k professional warriors and another 27k militia.  Rikard is King so can command these troops using the traditional methods (he's got the support of the Aeolians who used to run Heortland for Belintar).    Even allowing for dissatisfaction with his rule and other commitments (guarding against Praxian raiders etc), he should still be able to muster an army of 20k without needing to loot any temples.

10 hours ago, Erol of Backford said:

We are looking for reasons the Caprati do not like trolls. We are not saying they do so but wish to create this dislike if they do not. Maybe they just don't like nonhumans? Would that include Agimori or they human enough?

The Caprati come from Seshnela.  Right next to Seshnela is Guhan.  About seventy years ago, the Seshnegi fought a war against them which resulted in the Uz Eats Wizards (and their King too FWIW).  Nobody needs a better reason to hate trolls than to have an ancestor dishonoured in that battle.

On 9/16/2023 at 5:15 AM, Erol of Backford said:

Another add from that article is that Rikard and the du Tumerine's don't like the Aeolians or at least steal their pagan ornamentation from the shrines... this along with other things sends Gwydion to the hills for a bit...

I don't think this is plausible.  Rikard didn't bring an army with him and for him to persecute the Aeolians doesn't make much political sense and more importantly, the modern understanding of Malkioni (ie not Christians), he really wouldn't care about such things.  His wizard(s) might grumble but Rikard can take an indugent view of their differences.

The story of Rikard breaking the crown into four pieces comes from King of Sartar p122 (2nd edition, was present in first).  The Guide did not rewrite anything and asking questions about the tradetalk article just wastes time.  

Why would his family have been traditional enemies of Seshnela?  All that is said that he comes from Tanisor which is the current heart of Seshnela!

Given that the Guide p249 describes him as a "heretical Hrestoli exile", he is not necessarily related to the Royal Family and may not even be a noble at all.  If there was a Tiger warrior society in Seshnela (created by Teshnan immigrants during the Imperial Age), then he could have been a horali leader who decided to seek his fortune aboard.  That would fit in better with the description of him as an adventurer.

The Lost Chapter (KoS p138) has Rikard accepting rule over all Heortland but breaking his oaths and escaping shortly afterwards.  

12 minutes ago, Godlearner said:

Would rather have it fixed than an agreement.

I don't see it as needing to be fixed as it is a skill peculiar to the Yelmalio cult(s) whereas other mounted archers (Impala, Sable, Pentans, Wasp Riders etc) do not even use the skill at all. 

16 minutes ago, Godlearner said:

LOL, not likely/ But even if so it still make the skill totally useless to any player character.

Which is what both sides in this debate have already agreed (but only one side is apparently aware of this). 

I'm not really seeing the Aeolians as non-monomyth.  They were within the God Learner zone and since the God Learners obtained their mythology from the Lightbringers, Aeolian knowledge would be well and truly within the God Learner corpus.  They would have some points of difference but the known points of difference (three castes rather than four, worship of the Gods) is comparatively trivial compared to what some of the supposedly orthodox Malkioni get up to.  So Septuagint rather than Masoretic might be a better take IMO. 

13 minutes ago, Ian A. Thomson said:

I think the Praxians call Chalana Arroy the White Lady?

I believe they also had different names for Orlanth, Issaries and Humakt.

Does anyone have access to that information?

What I most need are the names that were originally given, as I am merely mentioning the differences. And any simple and basic description of how the Praxians see them differently

This is all stuff I think I recall from Drastic: Prax which I no longer have, but I could be mistaken

That was an old style of thinking which has since been abandoned.  Chalana Arroy, Issaries, Orlanth and Humakt have always been known to the Praxians under that name.

If Barntar is worshipped in Sun County, I think he would be worshipped as a subcult of Ernalda (CoR:TL p77) rather than as a subcult of Orlanth Thunderous as they do up north.  I expect this to be true of clans or tribes where the local Husband-Protector has no association to Barntar (ie isn't Orlanth).

Quote

The cult is quite open in its racial requirements. The only
races it does not allow are broos, ogres, giants, and other things
tainted by Chaos.

Storm Bull writeup p131

The cult is open in its racial requirements. The only races
it does not allow are broos, ogres, giants, and other things
tainted by Chaos.

Ygg writeup p152

Given that Giants are tied to the disorder rune (Glorantha Bestiary p45), I suggest deleting the bolded words..

1 hour ago, g33k said:

 

• post-Argrath, the "Lunar PC" concept becomes a much-harder lift

 

There is still a Lunar population in Pavis after Argrath takes over.

Reconciling Cults of Terror with Arkat the Deceiver

I think this began as a *study* of Gbaji with a view to identifying his signs and powers.  Later the Arkati realized that it could be heroquested against with the damage they inflicted upon it be magically reflected in their enemies in the world at large.  Any damage Gbaji inflicted upon them was acceptable losses.  

Accordingly every Safelstran City has a cult of Gbaji.  Every season they have public stonings or burnings of the images of Gbaji.  At the same time, the city's Arkati carry out magical combat against Gbaji.  The images are usually representative of neighbouring cities although other states and species have been used (like say Theoblanc the White or an EWF Dragon).  

But the danger of these rituals is that with enough damage, an Arkati might succumb to the Deceiver.  If undetected, the Arkati might become attracted to the Lords of Terror and join some horrible cult such as the Summer White Society, the Borists or the Chaos Monks.

10 hours ago, Zac said:

The text I am quoting might be old and rewritten or re-interpreted. 

I admit I am reinterpreting the old text to fit in what is known about Safelster today as opposed to when the text was written.  A key part in my observation was that the Arkati make a big deal about opposing Chaos yet they live in Ralios... which hardly has any major infestations (Karia has just woken up within the past decade or two whereas the Arkati have been around for a millenium).

A way of reconciling the absolutism of the Cults of Terror might be this.  The Arkati are following a branch of Neo-Platonism (Iamblichus IIRC) in which they substitute Henosis (mental unity with the One Mind that is central to other Malkioni wizards - mentioned in RQG p384 in learning new runes) with mental unity with the pagan gods.   The only Gods they avoid are the Lords of Terror hence their prohibition*.  It also gives other Malkioni schools a good reason to call the Arkati heretics when they tolerate worship of pagan gods within their own society.  But we have to wait for the Invisible God book...

*Setting Arkat the Devil aside who probably is even more complicated.

It was a random encounter in Griffin Mountain. 

Please don't be afraid to start new threads in the future. 

Their condemnation of chaos comes not from unthinking instinct but through a rational appreciation of the dangers.   Although they hate chaos, they hate Gbaji even more and focus their attentions of eliminating his worship.  However this leads to problems.  There is no widely accepted definition of who worships Gbaji and as a result the first solution they arrive at is the Arkati of the other cities are Gbajites (they can and do make exceptions).  The second is that they hate Gbaji so much and Chaos not that much (because of illumination, see) that a few Arkati find working with Chaos to use against servants of Gbaji to be morally acceptable.  

18 hours ago, Orlanthatemyhamster said:

No, it sounds bloody awful!
It means that 2/3 might well have a penalty, so, many will be ineffective. I want all of my army to be effective as they can be. Battle is harsh and chaotic enough without parts of it being useless. 

You may want your army as effective as they can be.  Quite a few real world armies have been staffed by officers who chose to field increasingly poor quality troops for a variety of sad and depressing reasons.  If you are training horse archers and putting time and money in the training then they won't be trained in Kuschile Horse Archery.  If you prefer to steal the money for which you have been given for those troops or you need new horse archers right now because Sheng just slaughtered your old ones, then Kuschile Horse Archery is just the thing for you!

Wyrms Footnotes #15 has an article on the Upland Marsh but really he's kinda like the Crimson Bat or the Horrors of Dorastor - too powerful to be used in a Boss Fight.

21 minutes ago, M Helsdon said:

page 115: the club of Ankylosaur - I thought there were no dinosaurs in Pamaltela? It seems there are.

There are no *dragonewts* in Pamaltela.  Pamaltelan Dinosaurs (excluding Slon) are mentioned in the Guide in Tarien and Jolar.  For example Molibasku p582, Tarien Regional Activity p610, Sligo River p615

There were healing baths in the vicinity of the White Sea which Umath attended and was ambushed by Shargash.  However the source is IIRC Thunder Rebels. 

Moladehas or Mouladehas?

Mouladehas is found on pages 3, 47, 87 and index

Moladehas is found on page 33 and index.

On page 40, the Elf Story has two subheadings  "The First Plantings" and "The Second Plantings".  On page 41, it's just "The Third Planting".  Consider making the third heading a plural.