simonh

You’d have to be in spirit combat with an embodied living being though, and it’s hard to imagine a circumstance in which a Chalana Arroy worshiper would be in that position. However yes I suppose in that case they would have to abstain.

I think from the perspective of the characters the CA healer has a cool moment and the problem just goes away, otherwise it detracts somewhat from the peace and harmony vibe, but sure. Nice catch on Natyrsa Phil. The stuff schisms are made of, but there's lots of narrative potential in that.

Cool, it doesn't say it kills the baby. As I said removing a parasite which then dies for lack of a host might be ok.

The thing with the Wild Healer is, over there in a chaos infested forest surrounded by other Broo or worse, who's he healing all day every day? When some chaotics raid a stead nearby and some of them get wounded, who is it that patches them up so they can come over raiding again? Time for an expedition to sort this one out, who's in?

Those are good reasons for others to kill them or wage war on chaotics, but that's for them. It's not what Chalana Arroy is about. The healers are not responsible for what a broo baby, or whatever does, they are responsible for what they do themselves. Yes of course here's an argument to be had about standing by and letting things happen. Have that argument, but Chalana Arroy stands on one side of it and you stand on another. That's just the way it is. Sure, there are those that backslide and make compromises. There may well be some Chalana Arroy worshipers of various degrees and shades that vary in their level of devotion and abstinence from violence. I think the strongest and deepest magic and heroquests are only going to be available to those who follow the strictest path though. It may not even be practical out on the plains to maintain the ritual purity necessary to be a priest for example, that might only be possible in places like the Paps (EDIT Unless the tribe is willing to bend itself a bit out of shape in order to accommodate the needs of a CA priest). Compromising will have it's costs. I don't think so, it's about healing the wounded cosmos and attaining the ritual purity necessary to attain the deepest cult secrets and magic. All violence, of any kind and regardless of the intentions harms reality.

Broo babies are a real problem, I'm not sure they can do this. There would certainly be those who decide it is wrong. Someone else might have to do it. Surgery yes, I think that's fine although there are likely to be some that would avoid those arts in favour of specialising in other forms of treatment. parasites are also a dilemma, they would prefer to use treatments that remove the parasite alive and if it then dies, well, that's a shame. I don't think most diseases are recognised as being living things, mostly they are caused by spirits Killing or butchering animals, no. I don't see that at all. If other people want to eat meat, why can't they do it? Killing peacefully? A direct contradiction in terms. All these seem like sensible, practical compromises but no. Just no. Compromise is the death of purity. I can see that some places make it hard to meet the strictest conditions, but that's just tough. Yes the expectations on lay members and propitiatory worshipers, i.e. almost everyone, is very different. Maybe they can just abstain from meat for holy days and such.

Fair enough, but chaotic living things are still, well, alive. They can even worship Chalana Arroy.

I didn't think the Chalana Arroy abstention from violence was excepted for chaos creatures. Undead yes perhaps, because they are not creatures, although there is a risk of misidentification. In general though, even against undead or anything, using violent means is a slippery slope. It's not as much about the target, it's about you.

I'd say the expectations on worshipers varies with their rank in the cult. Initiates may get away with non-violence against sentients, while priests might be expected or required to practice total non-violence. I think the phrasing in the sourcebook gives a slightly false impression. It says worship is widespread for "everyone desires her blessings", and worshipers practice total nonviolence, but clearly total nonviolence is not widespread in Glorantha, and it's certainly not for everybody. So clearly it's possible to worship CA and not practice total nonviolence. I suspect the issue is the author didn't want to use a term to distinguish seriously dedicated worshipers, because saying something like devotees, or priests for example looks too much like using a game mechanical term. After all these are both names for specific game mechanical statuses in various game systems.

Mainstream Heortling theology.

The PDF I have has a mod date of 2002 in the metadata. I can't remember when or where I got it, in fact I'd forgotten I even had it, but the file creation date says 2010. I vaguely remember finding Steve's web site and being in touch with him at some point so that must have been it.

Both AM and WEG-SW came out in the same year, 1987. Arguably RQ3 used some stats directly as modifiers for skill categories, albeit you deducted 10 from the stat first so a DEX of 16 gave you +6% on Manipulation.

I think it's legit here because we're discussing it in the context of what it means in Glorantha and in relation to other things we know about Glorantha, not in the context of using it in a game.

Against an opponent in advanced plate and mail yes, you need to close or grapple first, fair point. They're still pretty wicked weapons though. I'm not too bothered, Daggers do the same average damage as a one handed sword, they just don't max out as high on a lucky roll.

Good point on criticals, yes protection spells clearly have gaps, and I don't se why they shouldn't. There's no particular reason to expect them to be uniform force fields, maybe they are literal magical suits of armour. We know the long term armour enchantment cast on one famous Greek hero had a very famous gap in it.

Right, magical armour is a problem. We could give a dagger armour penetration if you can get in close, and closing was a tactic I favoured back in RQ3, but do Protection spells have gaps the way armour does? Edit: I don't know if its worth the bother. Ancient world armour was much less complete than the medieval stuff so you didn't need as specialised equipment and tactics to defeat it, so special rules are probably unnecessary. I stand by the practical point I made though, the important thing is that weapons and tactics that were used historically remain effective, and whatever the finer points of whys and wherefores, the current rules achieve that. If that means long spears get a few extra points of damage so they remain the weapon of choice in armoured combat then that's fine by me.

Maybe with a longer weapon you can devote more energy and focus on offence. The extra range means you’re not under as much threat, so can throw a lot more time and energy into the blow. In RQ in practice high damage rolls is largely about getting through armour, so we give high damage rolls to ‘military’ weapons were likely to be using against armoured opponents. Lighter weapons are seen as being less effective against armour, or even just less commonly used against it. A short spear is a hunting weapon, hunters don’t often go up against mail, but long spears are used in phalanxes against armoured opponent. Let’s give them more damage so they are effective. We want weapons used in a context to be effective in that context, right? Honestly I’ve been uneasy about the correlation between weapon size and damage for a while. I can see the momentum argument, but take medieval daggers like the Rondel. These things were vicious weapons specifically used to kill armoured knights. If you could get in close to an armoured opponent the dagger was how you got through a gap, put some weight behind it and ended them. This is shown graphically several times in The King, notably Timothée Chalamet as Henry uses this tactic in a duel early on. It also seems to be how Richard III met his end.

The example given in the Lie spell description, that the sun won't rise tomorrow, is also outrageous. It depends what the actual lie is. "Embrace Chaos" isn't a lie, it's not a fact. You can't use Lie to issue an order, only to deceive about a specific fact or belief and hope that inspires the desired outcome. In the example it says the priest of Yelm could try finding out what is going on using Divination, so while the victim believes the lie, they can still act to try and get more information. Not necessarily to falsify it as such, they believe it is true so they don't doubt the lie itself, but they're likely to be confused and seek clarification if the lie contradicts other things they know or believe to be true. Lie is deep magic and it's why I made the comment about Gbaji (or was it Rashoran?) being a mask of Eurmal. I see a close correlation between how Eurmal distributes Death to all the gods, so everyone has a bit of this power, with how Rashoran teaches them all Illumination. Also the way that both illumination and death aren't problems for the gods the same way they are for mortals. Chaos is the death of the cosmos, but it's also it's origin. The godtime isn't history, it's not an era in the past, it's happening all the time right now powering magic and the cycles of the world. Chaos is creating and destroying the universe right now. That's what time is. That's the truth. Or did I just cast a Lie spell. How would you know?

I think it's a matter of interpretation of the spell description. "a successful ritual ensures that the soul does not return as a bad ghost" I think what the spell actually does is placate the ghost and delivers it to it's proper place in the underworld. However if some other mytho-magical event or summoning or such then disturbs the ghost, I wouldn't expect this spell to do anything to prevent the ghost getting mad again. So maybe this is and issue with this bit of the description? How about this: "a successful ritual ensures that the soul does not return as a bad ghost by delivering it to it's proper place in the underworld." I think this makes it clear what's going on, and implicitly opens the door to said ghost getting upset again if said delivery to the underworld gets undone.

The Vadeli don't just break the laws of Malkion as such, they follow an inversion them.

I read it as more like “and it’s a good thing we don’t do that”.

There are various ways to reconcile a change like this. Changes in the political situation, culture or needs of the cult have lead to a change in policy. Warfare, strife and general attrition has reduced the number of initiates and the cult is in dire need of new recruits.Maybe this is a short term change until the crisis is over. It's a difference in policy between temples, the one the PC initiated at is a strict old school sect and the talentless noobs these other temples let in would never cut it under the strict masters your PC was tutored under. If it is just a rules revision and it doesn’t fit with your established campaign, just change it back. No biggie, it’s your game. I think things like cult initiation requirements are only ever general guidelines for rules purposes. They're a default you fall back on, but in practice may well vary in some respects with time and place in the setting.

She can join the queue. Mind you, this does mean she legitimately gets the title "Mother Of All Hangovers".

I have no problem that transgenderism is not a mental disorder, and clearly removing homosexuality from the DSM was the right thing to do. I'm a Brit so the DSM isn't directly an issue here but of course the debate here and in the US are closely linked. Sure transgender and homosexual people can seek counselling, but then so can some heterosexuals, and given the social treatment of both groups it's understandable. That doesn't make them disorders. Transgenderism is a medical issue though in ways that homosexuality is not, because it often involves medical treatments such as medication and surgery. This means medical professionals are going to get involved. I don't know what productive and appropriate engagement by medical professionals should look like, but just to establish some context, is it fair to say that generally these interventions are successful and lead to better outcomes for people? I hope that's the situation, the cases where things go wrong seem to be a worrying but small minority. So basically can we say that medical treatment is often necessary and appropriate, it's the debate and negotiations around that which get complex and fraught?

Bearing in mind he got her stupid drunk, and Baeester Gor is the goddess of fermentation, maybe the god of hangovers?