Darius West

6 minutes ago, David Scott said:

Of course they need to eat, that's why we send them along with grave goods. Why do the dead not need to eat? We've plenty of examples where they do - The feasting in Orlanth's Hall for example.

So what do the dead eat exactly?  And as to the feasting in Orlanth's Hall, who says anyone there is dead? If immortality means what immortality means, then a dead god is merely very self indulgent and sulky.

15 hours ago, MJ Sadique said:

Why do the Giants use the River of Cradles?

Perhaps a little odd that the Giants send their children into the underworld... to die... when the kindly God Learners were quite happy to help them die in the Middle World, yet that upsets the Giants for some unfathomable reason

4 minutes ago, David Scott said:

Resurrection clearly existed before time as the power of Life could clearly recombine soul/spirits with their bodies as the opposite of Death. Resurrection within time has two clear definitions; the within seven day version that Chalanna Arroy and other cults use, or the beyond seven days version that's going to the Underworld like the quest for Arkat, Harmast and Hostfaring Treeleaper. It's not always the Lightbringers quest, although that is one vehicle for going there and back. The Seven Mothers did another variety. 

If what you say is true, then Chalana Arroy would not have had her impetus for the Lightbringer Quest, which was a wound she could not heal, being death.  Prior to the Lesser Darkness death wasn't an issue.

On 12/23/2016 at 3:20 AM, boztakang said:

I fear that you are beating an underworld horse here...

And the trolls that the Lightbringers are apparently feeding Flesh Man to... alive or dead?  And if dead, then why do they need to eat?

16 minutes ago, Steve said:

You can't see the difference between someone else calling the Humakti back to life (e.g. through a Chalana Arroy resurrection), and the Humakti himself choosing the leave the underworld and travel back to the land of the living? What is your canon source for saying "If you are in a state that is defined as being "dead" then as a Humakti you are bound to remain that way"?

There's a big difference between someone else resurrecting a Humakti who has been killed in the living world, versus a Humakti who chooses to venture into the Underworld and chooses again to return.

I don't think Humakt or any hero quester who is physically alive on entering underworld is actually dead.  I think that is a poetic affectation that others have mistaken for a truth.  If it were true, then no Humakti should ever leave the underworld once they enter it for any reason.  My source is Cults of Prax.  As resurrection is defined as all forms of coming back from the dead by any means, not just the spell, the above follows.  Otherwise Humakt would probably be a cult that accepted undeath too.  They are prepared to accept other people resurrecting, but don't think they like it.

On 12/19/2016 at 7:09 PM, boztakang said:

Humakt enforced his own Truth that was stronger, and so killed Orlanth too. But Humakt showed the secret of his honor and justice and let his brother arise again through the Lightbringers’ Quest. 
 

So, as a quick question on this point.  Did Humakt kill Issaries, Lhankor Mhy, Chalana Arroy, Eurmal and Flesh Man too ? How did they all wind up dead?  Seems pretty dishonorable to kill poor CA.   I thought Humakt liked her?

Flesh man in particular is of interest I should think...  Being a man of flesh in the underworld is a really interesting point if you think about it.   After all, if he is flesh and dead in the underworld; isn't he a zombie if he keeps walking around ?  Or perhaps he is still alive?

1 hour ago, David Scott said:

You seem to be confusing cultural viewpoint with God Learnerism. I suggested earlier that we look at different cults and cultures and their practices, looking at their in-world perspectives rather than the absolutes of canon. Praxians for example have many different practices around death based on cults. Most have the seven day wait, then the Good Shepherd takes them to the Path of Silence that leads to Daka Fal's Hall. There they usually go to the Great Herd where Waha, Eiritha and their Many Friends live. This is where Praxians visit to meet their ancestors and the Great Ones. Eventually, the ancestors leave the Great Herd to be reincarnated, although some remain to teach and guide the living (much like lamas). There is some variation of course, for example Yelornans go to Yelorna's campfire in the Sky World. They can be called down to meet their living descendants in the Great Herd, often descending as small meteors. Praxians only travel to the spirit world if accompanied by a shaman or assistant. Going with your body attracts always Hungry Ghosts, the malign and other powerful spirits who want a body to occupy so they can fulfill their needs in the Middle World. Thed and Mallia's spirits are always on the lookout for a body to corrupt and pollute. Spirits aren't generally interested in those without bodies unless they are close by. It's the bodies that are important not the spirit. Few would risk the HeroQuest crossing to the otherworlds via the Spirit World without this help, unless they were practiced or powerful themselves. Most Khans have the ability to do it and some of the Tasks of Waha aid in this. In Waha and Daka Fal, Daka Fal teaches Waha how to tell the difference between the states of Living and Dead, and the songs to send those who are just spirits to the Good Shepard or the Path of the Dead. Those who have completed Waha and the Goddesses Dream, go right back into Eiritha's womb to meet Waha from before he was born. There they can see the Underworld through the eyes of the unborn god and experience the Dream that the Goddesses inhabit - it's the Green Age. Many Tasks take Khans to the Underworld to participate in the rites at the end of the World. 

On the contrary, I see this notion of being "dead" in the underworld as a form of God Learner monomyth that has been superimposed on cults where it has no place.  We are told that all spirits pass beyond the Gates of Dusk, are judged, and then go to their fate.  You say you can take your body with you on these quests, but it attracts unwanted attention from unpleasant spirits.  I have no problem with that notion; it should be problematic and terribly risky, but the body should not automatically be considered dead.  Being alive in such a situation and taking those terrible existential risks is the very definition of heroism after all.

As an aside, as you seem to like shamanic cultures, consider the Lightbringer Quest for a moment as a shamanic journey to rescue Yelm for a moment.  If those partaking in the quest have lost their connection to the realm of the living, how are they any different to dead Yelm whom they are trying to save?  How can they drag anyone into the land of the living if they themselves are dead?

On 12/19/2016 at 7:24 PM, Jeff said:

Humakti may not be "called back from the dead in any way" - that means resurrection, summoned as a ghost, undead, or whatever. However, a Humakti can leave the Realm of the Dead if they know the secret path and it is their own actions - not the summoning of another.

If you are in a state that is defined as being "dead" then as a Humakti you are bound to remain that way.  if a Humakti has the ability to resurrect themselves they will not do it unless they are prepared to accept being thrown out of their cult.  And what is the difference between being dead because you are in the realm of the underworld and dead because you were killed in the Middle world?  Nothing.  A secret path back is just another form of resurrection... or maybe it is the knowledge that you aren't really dead in the underworld after all...

9 hours ago, MOB said:

MOB [wearing contributor hat here]Inconsistencies, self-contradictions and logical fallacies are a time-honored and expected part of mythological/theological aetiology in the RW. Same applies to Glorantha...

I would run a hundred miles rather than be part of any of those dogmatic institutions, The fact you are prepared to write this is an acknowledgment of the fact that there are irreconcilable contradictions in play on this point.  I suspect we agree on that at least.

Apparently this one is set in stone across all cultures in Glorantha despite the fact it makes no sense at all.  Why can cultures vary on all points but the notion of being "dead" in the underworld?  RW mythology varies on this point, but most of the cultures that mainstream Glorantha draws on like the Greeks, the Norse and the Celts accept the notion of heroes being alive in the underworld. It is bad anthropology to suggest that ALL cultures will think the same way on any point too.  Next, Humakti heroquesters have potentially fatal and unlikely consequences from the idea, not to mention how doubtful trolls would feel about it.  So we have a massive contradiction, but somehow, unlike in the case of the myriad other contradictions, ALL Gloranthan cultures apparently think you are dead if you are in the underworld, and not an Orlanthi definition of all being 85% apparently, but 100%, despite the fact it doesn't hold up under scrutiny. They might vary immensely on every other issue, but apparently not this one.  Like I said, it's a group think echo chamber.  No-one is even seriously prepared to consider the notion that this point is not somehow "fixed in stone".  I find that absurd and I am surprised nobody else does.  Of all the points for all the cults to agree on, this is the one?  Why?  Because nobody has really seriously questioned it until now.

I mean, really, if this "dead in the underworld" rule applies, Humakti can't heroquest in the underworld, because dead is dead, and they can never come back.  Now I think they can, because I think Humakti know the difference between being dead and being alive better than any other cult, and they know they are alive in the underworld.

On 12/20/2016 at 3:36 AM, g33k said:

@Darius West -- Short of a Great Old One showing up to Greg this thread, we've had the definitive word; it may not be to your taste, and YGWV (as does mine!), but it is definitive.

You are departing from civility and verging needlessly toward personal attacks.

 

NOT

COOL

 

I agree, not cool at all.  Having someone say " I am more important than you because I am an editor, and I don't care if you are correct." is not cool.  

This is the problem with an inflexible notion of canon.  When a logical inconsistency occurs, the dogmatics form a group think echo chamber and recite the error over and over again until they are convinced it is correct through repetition.

When presented with a solid reason why they are wrong and they close ranks and minds.  That is the very opposite of cool.  Especially considering that they are deaf to all entreaties and alternatives.  I find that intensely hard to respect as a response to anything.

6 hours ago, boztakang said:

yarly. HQGlorantha has the following in the Humakt cult writeup.  so, at least from Humakt's point of view, Orlanth was quite thoroughly and unambiguously Dead. His only out being the LBQ and resurrection of the world.

So why isn't this salient point mentioned in the crucial King of Dragon Pass write-up of the Lightbringer Quest?  I think that point is sufficiently huge that it sort of deserves a mention if indeed it is the real reason that orlanth goes on the Lightbringer Quest.  This is the first time I have heard of this and it doesn't gel well with the other write-ups, but whatever.  This is obviously something I have not been privy too, and I will concede the point

6 hours ago, boztakang said:

 If you are doing "Humakt discovers Death" then you are home free because by the end of that quest, only one person in the whole world will have died, and it is usually not the Questor. That is the only myth I am immediately aware of that has Humakt directly traveling to the underworld, and in that case he clearly isn't dead because death doesn't exist until he "finds" it.

On the other hand, Humakt is ALIVE in the underworld to perform this deed, which is a major point I have been making all along.  My argument has always been with the absurdity of the notion of everyone in the underworld always being in some sense "dead".  Apparently through this example you completely agree with me and I with you.  I like this explanation a lot as it is a clear example of what I have been saying all along.

6 hours ago, boztakang said:

Another common way for Humakti to participate in underworld heroquests is as another god (usually Orlanth)'s equipment. If I'm traveling as Orlanth's Sword, then I am clearly not a living thing, and am simply along for the ride. Cult authorities are hardly going to ding you for embodying a sword, even if you  are technically not alive while doing so.

Total God Learner stuff I am not saying that you are wrong in any way, I actually like this answer too.  You are completely correct.  You can say that you are the "Sword called Humakt"  mentioned in the Arming of Orlanth stage of the Lightbringer Quest.  The Jrusteli did that sort of thing all the time, and it is a good work around, in fact I like the way you think.  On the other hand, this sort of trick won't work in a HQ where Humakt is the primary actor. 

On the other hand, seriously consider this for a moment...  the notion of playing the sword is an ambiguous position for the Humakti.  Swords are, after all, objects.  Now a live Humakti is NOT an allied spirit bound to a sword, they are a flesh and blood person with a spirit.  If they go into the underworld and are therefore "dead" then they cannot come out again.  Now your argument of them being considered a "magical object" is yet another example of someone being in a state other than being "dead" while in the underworld.

Given your first example, it does seem a bit odd for Orlanth to be armed with the sword that allegedly killed him...  It almost suggests the Sacred Utuma ritual that the draconized Orlanthi mysteries would have adopted.  (As an aside, I wonder if Dragonewts go to the underworld on their way back to their eggs?  My instinct is "no", they just go back as spirits.)

6 hours ago, boztakang said:

You will also note that an awful lot of Humakti HeroQuesters end up illuminated. Arkat being the prime example. "I was dead, but now I'm not, but I never resurrected" makes a mighty fine Nysalor riddle, after all.

Heh, the Yanafal Ta'arnils ploy.  I can resurrect because I am an illuminate, and cult strictures don't apply to me, as I am immune to spirits of retribution.  Oh wait, my cult spirit of retribution is actually my god intervening in person.  Well that's a relief, he didn't break my sword and every sword I pick up, he just bent it into a scimitar

As to Arkat being the "prime example", I would like to agree, but on examination I can't.  When Harmast Barefoot performs the Lightbringer Quest that brings Arkat back from the dead, Arkat is at the time a member of the Malkioni military caste, and not yet an Humakti.  It is only after coming back with Harmast that Arkat initiates with the Humakti, taking the epithet Humaktsson after that.  A good thing he was an illuminate, because otherwise when he converted to ZZ we would have found out exactly how unbreakable that sword of his really was.

As to Humakti becoming illuminates, I am not going to contest that, in fact I remember reading the suggestion that Rashoran may have illuminated Humakt during God Time somewhere?  Was it in Cults of Terror?  Nysalori break the rules worse than tricksters, but on the other hand, if they do it too publicly there can be big repercussions.  The notion that "you can't complete this hero quest without becoming an illuminate" would be a big drawback for a lot of Humakti I suspect.

29 minutes ago, Jeff said:

Darius - as the Creative Director of Chaosium and lead writer for Glorantha since 2009, I think I am entitled to define how things work - as least as far as official publications are concerned.

If you don't like the idea that people in the Realm of the Dead are dead, then by all means don't use it in Your Glorantha. But please give it a rest.

Pulling rank like this is lame and dishonorable, you shame yourself by taking this path.  You challenged me to prove to you that your interpretation of canon  regarding being dead in the underworld was wrong.  I have done that. Admit that my concerns are not selfish, they are not illogical, they are not against canon, and that I want to make Glorantha more internally consistent, then admit that you were wrong and fix the canon.  I have done nothing wrong here, what I have done is the altogether apparently less forgivable behavior of actually being correct.  Do the right thing and fix the problem of your misinterpretation of the information. Apparently you are not lacking in editorial authority, how about using that power constructively instead of trying to bully me with it?

3 hours ago, Jeff said:

Humakti may not be "called back from the dead in any way" - that means resurrection, summoned as a ghost, undead, or whatever. However, a Humakti can leave the Realm of the Dead if they know the secret path and it is their own actions - not the summoning of another. In that way, they repeat the deeds of their god. That is no more a contradiction in the cult's beliefs than the summoning of Chaos by Orlanth cultists as part of their rituals.

Ghosts in this world are spirits of the dead who *should* be in the Realm of the Dead but aren't for one reason or another.

But this whole discussion has now reached the "how many angels dance on the head of pins" point. 

But no, because ACCORDING TO YOU, everyone who enters the underworld is "dead", and a Humakti who is dead must stay dead or be turfed from the cult.  Now if you admit that the Humakti are ALIVE in the underworld, suddenly there is no problem, and they can return to the middle land, but you must then admit you are wrong about being dead in the underworld

You say that all people in the underworld are dead, and yet this completely fails in every respect in the case of Humakt, because Humakti cannot repeat the deeds of their god on a hero quest into the underworld unless your model of death and the underworld is wrong and they are in fact alive.  At what point will you allow Chalana Arroy to heal the scar of certainty under YOUR tongue? 

This is not an isolated case, there are many examples of the fact that this whole notion of being "dead" in the underworld is at best a dubious idea that undermines the whole established notion of what death actually is.

As for the "how many angels" statement, are you sure it isn't Aesop's fable about the Fox and the Sour Grapes?

Now you have not exactly been slow in suggesting that my point was invalid and suggested I was trying to force "my version of Glorantha" onto "the canon", and that was pretty uncharitable really, because as you must now acknowledge, my case has more legs than yours, and while I can match you argument for argument, in this case you have no answer because either way you turn you are wrong, and Humakt is not a trivial cult, it is major and heavily invested in this issue and makes a mockery of your whole position BASED ON THE VERY CANON YOU CLAIM TO REVERE SO MUCH.  So don't pretend there is some sort of cult work around, no self respecting Humakti would accept it, they knew they were dead the minute they entered the underworld and it is against their religion to return to the middle world thereafter UNLESS THEY AREN'T DEAD IN THE UNDERWORLD.

3 hours ago, scott-martin said:

Shows how much time I spend with those guys . . . I was remembering the ban as just a set of hardcore geasa but point taken. How's the rest of it hold up though? You died in the rite, he sends you back in the body (a loophole in the usual death cycle), after that you're on your own.

There is a "lovely" niche picked out for you in Than Ulbar.  Treak is a cruel master, but if you don't annoy him he will probably not actually spiritually destroy you.  The other rotting head ghosts are pretty bad for conversation, and you sort of get why they are all mad after trying to chat with them, but as your own brain decays in your skull you no longer even care.  You spend the rest of your day flailing at people whose tattoos and silver skull with rams horns medallions utterly block your aggression.  You are eventually spiritually annihilated by 5th Age Kralorelan Hero Questers.

12 minutes ago, scott-martin said:

I ain't gonna be the one to tell the Humakt crowd that Bridge of Swords is just another entheogenic puppet show, much less claim such a thing in front of all you serious characters. What I always thought it did was give the Death God ownership of your soul -- you are dead -- and then send you back in order to deliver his grim gospel here in the land of the living, i.e., kick ass. Once that happens, it's not really up to you whether you breathe another day up here or go back down to hell whenever the master says your time is up. You don't decide. And you definitely don't challenge his will by seeking outside resurrection. If you feel strongly enough when you run out of hit points, take it up with the master and roll the DI dice.

Utter rubbish.  Dead is dead is dead. There is no grim gospel for you. You have utterly contradicted the central tenets of the cult if you come back from this silly notion of being "dead" that you promulgate about the underworld.  You don't get to go to the Einherjar.  You get no DI.  You get fed to the spirit of retribution, and then to the howling void of ignominy.  You are merely another head claimed for Thanatar; gibber and go insane.  You failed the hero quest.  But I am polite, please allow me to return your posterior, don't eat it all at once, thanks for playing. 

2 hours ago, pachristian said:

Description: A carved piece of "Ice" that looks like a flame. Red to orange to yellow coloring. Usually about fist-sized. Often mistaken for glass. Cool to the touch. 

Here's another reason not to eat the yellow snow   Nice item btw.

On 12/18/2016 at 5:29 AM, boztakang said:

The upshot is, that at the climax of the Myth, everyone is Dead, and the world has to be fundamentally re-made to let them live again. Once Orlanth entered the Gates of Dusk, he could Not leave again without making peace with Yelm. He was Dead.

ORLY?  You are only saying that because things turned out that way, the truth is that Trickster had already been to the underworld before, AND left, and had he wanted to he could have done so again.  Now Orlanth was honorable, his position in the underworld was voluntary and ethical, because if he wanted to, at any time he could have said "Hey trickster, f**k this for a game of soldiers, lets go home and fight in the I fought we won battle instead".  They had the means at their disposal to leave the underworld, so no, not dead, not even a bit dead.

For your next trick, explain to me how Humakti hero questers who go to the underworld and are therefore "dead" don't break their cult precepts regarding coming back to life by returning from being "dead" in the underworld at the completion of their hero quest.  Oh, and on your one way trip to the Einherjar, ask not for whom the Thanatari wait, they are waiting for you.

On 12/18/2016 at 1:33 AM, David Scott said:

Dead meaning you are in the underworld, but with your body and spirit intact, not just your spirit and your body in the middle world. In this case death being separation, would sever your spirit from your body. I think I said earlier, your body may appear back in the ritual starting space. Whilst your spirit remains. Casting sever spirit on a spirit in the underworld, will have no effect IMO. I defined two states you can have in the underworld in both cases your spirit is there, with or without your body. In both cases you are "dead".

Obviously casting sever spirit on a spirit is pointless, because it is already "severed".  As for someone's body reappearing in the ritual space, sure, failed hero quest, not my point of contention at all. 

My problem is how can you not see the absurdity of a person who is "dead" just because they are in the underworld and yet has their body and spirit joined, which is the very Gloranthan definition of being "alive".  You seem to say "nope, they're dead" across all cultures of Glorantha, just because they are in the underworld, and I think in terms of game mechanics that is false, in terms of it being a trans-cultural definition that applies to all Gloranthan cultures it is wildly unlikely even post God Learner monomyth, and it doesn't fit with the activities we see taking place.  Gloranthan cultures agree on very little, why is this point something they agree about?  Justify it please?  Nothing breaks narrative like internal and irreconcilable contradictions.

Clearly there is a  MASSIVE QUALITATIVE DIFFERENCE between the state of the Lightbringers in the underworld to that of Yelm and his court in the same place.  If they are all equally "dead" how can that be accounted for?  Are we back to some sort of Princess Bride business where they are only "mostly dead" or some equally comical notion ? 

Now if someone's spirit is still animating their body in the underworld, if sever spirit can work on them, they must be alive, because the whole point of sever spirit is that it emulates the death rune.  Now if someone were as dead as you say they are in the underworld, then actually, if you were being honest, you would have to admit that death ceases to have much power over the dead.  So why is sever spirit a threat in this instance?  Simple... they're not dead if their body and spirit are still joined.  

Next example, trolls came from the underworld and were alive there, and nobody says they are somehow "dead" for being on the middle world which is not their natural habitat, so how come humans are somehow "dead" for merely being in the underworld, especially when they have their body and spirit joined?  Or were trolls always dead when they were in the underworld?  There are, after all, trolls who never left the underworld, so are they alive or dead?  "Dead" according to what the fundamentalist interpretation of "scripture" says, and despite all evidence to the contrary.

NOW IF NONE OF THAT HAS CONVINCED YOU, THIS WILL...

If you are "dead" when you enter the underworld, then Humakti who heroquest in the underworld can never return, because that would be returning from death which is utterly against cult precepts.  Oh, but perhaps the Humakti don't consider merely going into the underworld is being "dead".  If not, it's off to the Einherjar with you, you one shot meat-sack.  Now I am pretty sure that Humakti have some pretty important hero quests to perform in the underworld... RECONCILE THAT.

Are you even remotely willing to consider that the whole thing about being "dead" in the underworld was some throw away poetic line from a Donandar minstrel that everyone was struck by the beauty of and adopted as true, but which was in fact nothing more than a lyrical affectation from the Second Age? 

Most importantly, why defend a point that is teleologically false in order to dogmatically support a point of "scripture" that in all likelihood doesn't mean what anyone thinks it means?  Meaning is use; if a term is not useful it is not meaningful, and in this instance it introduces contradictions that undermine the logic of the whole established system of what life and death mean in the game world, as I have repeatedly outlined ad nauseum.

1 hour ago, David Scott said:

It's not a ruling, it's an established part of Greg Stafford's world. Jeff is certainly not the origin of this, Greg almost certainly is. Jeff (and myself) will certainly uphold Greg's basis for the world. Having heard Greg talk about this kind of stuff for years, I feel that this is an established Gloranthan world view. Also, mythology doesn't have to make sense, that much I did learn from Greg and my own subsequent experience and education. You are most certainly welcome to argue your point, I don't however think it will change established Glorantha to your version. 

Fine, where is it SPECIFICALLY WRITTEN in the canon that heroquesters and deities are dead merely because they are in the underworld?  Because if they aren't separated from their bodies, then death has not overtaken them.  Greg has Gregged himself before btw, and that is just another reason why the whole notion of canon carries its dangers.  Even Greg can't be right about all things in all parts of Glorantha at all times, and nor should he be made to be, it's kind of unfair on him to expect that.

According to what you are saying you see, what happens when a heroquester in the underworld has sever spirit cast on him?  Nothing, because according to "canon", they are already dead.  In fact, if two negatives result in a positive, you might even be forced back into the land of the living.

Agreed.  I remember reading (in Wyrms Footprints perhaps?) that the EWF experimentation was performed by Delecti in his "stitched zoo", and that the centaurs he created this way were in constant pain and hence called Pain Centaurs, and that Ironhoof subsequently heroquested to restore his people to their status as true centaurs from before time.  Obviously this is not true of the minotaurs so much, as sons of Stormbull and new minotaurs are still being born such as Morak from Cults of Prax.  Ducks are long term allies of Beast Valley (Do they count as Beast Men?).  Other races of Beast Valley include Elurae (Fox women), Anstanabli ( "little people", probably like sprites, who have a feud with the "winged folk"), manticores (cross between human, lion and scorpion), fauns (term used synonymously with satyr) and probably others.

On 12/16/2016 at 0:01 AM, Steve said:

Except that Jeff has already said that's exactly how it works, back in the previous thread - if you're in the underworld then you're dead. What is your source for contradicting this?

I'm a bit puzzled about the way that you're trying to argue against Jeff. I could understand it if you were saying "well, in *my* Glorantha, it works like ...", and that's cool because we all know that YGWV. But you don't seem to be doing that, you seem to be trying to argue the canon.

I am saying that such a ruling makes little to no sense, and that there are precedents within the collected lore that seem to contradict this notion as being as iron clad as many seem to think it is.  On close inspection, you will find that the notion of always being "dead" if you are in the underworld introduces a series of logical contradictions which I have outlined previously.

The primary contradiction is this...

There is a MAJOR difference between (a) entity who is killed by another entity and sent to the underworld, and (b) one who goes there as part of a hero quest, entering the underworld while still alive.  (a) is involuntary, (b) is voluntary.  If (a) happens you are stuck unless someone does (b) to get you out.  Of course things can go wrong during (b) and they might become actually dead and therefore unable to return, but they are NOT otherwise actually dead...

For how can you be dead if you are not separate from your body?  It flies in the face of what has been established by spells like resurrection and sever spirit, not to mention cults like Daka Fal to say that a person who has not been separated from their body is dead, even if they ARE in the underworld, except as some spurious theoretical and factually incorrect "ritual notion of death attached to entering the underworld", developed by cult theologists but having no practical bearing on what actually happens. 

There is also as more precedent for LIVE mortal heroes of various Earth mythologies within the underworld as there is for them being notionally "dead", especially if we are drawing from the Greek, Celtic, and Norse traditions, which are the main mythological traditions on which most heroquesting is based.

To make the ruling "you are always dead in the underworld" dogmatically "part of the canon" is rigid and absurdist fundamentalism, and also, when you look at it in practical terms, unworkable, as it creates more problems than it solves.  It is certain that SOME cultures assume that you are dead within the underworld even when you were alive going in, but there is "no way in hell" they ALL think that, and the ones that do probably have major gods who died.

6 hours ago, David Scott said:

Me and lots of background reading, that's how I'm presenting it in the Prax book. Looking at the devolution of the Animist's world in Cults of Terror, you can see that the Primal Plasma gave rise to the runes, which included the spirit rune, but there was no separation at this point - It's called the First World, the Ultimate in Arcane Lore. So discorporate beings have existed since creation, it wasn't until the use of death that other beings could have their spirit/soul part separated from the rest of their being. The world was then filled with the living, the living who had had their bodies separated into two parts - a corporate part and discorporate part, and the beings who had always been discorporate. The discorporated living wanted their bodies back and there was no way to do this (this is a common theme real world animism and shamanism). set this against the backdrop of the Gods war and the Great Darkness and you have a mess. Daka Fal established how to tell the dead from the living and as a result was made Judge of the Dead at the Dawn. He established that the dead spirits go to their respective land of the dead, clearing the world of the confusion. The separation of the Middle world and spirit world at the dawn established the barrier between corporate living and the discorporate beings who weren't dead. Hence my use of "Clear separation".

I don't want to be deliberately obtuse, but are you saying

(a) that the corporate part was "alive" without the discorporate part to animate it (before time)?  If so, why would the discorporate feel cheated by being separated from their still alive bodies?  Surely "Death" would become the gift of being able to travel the spirit world freely as a shaman does if the separation didn't involve the actual loss of direct ego control of the corporate, the corporate ceasing functions such as breath and pulse, and ultimately the corporate part decaying to nothing ?  If the corporate and discorporate were simultaneously alive after death Before Time, surely people would hold Humakt up as a gift giver and the grand teacher of the shamanic path and Horned Man would be out of a job.  

Or

(b) There was a Humakt induced "shaman plague" brought about by death, with newly liberated spirits hijacking other people's bodies, while their own bodies went on living like Brithini (i.e. without spirits)?  Because in such a case there were plenty of bodies, because death wasn't really death as we understand it, but merely the alive corporate being separated from its alive discorporate.  Because apart from some stronger spirits getting better bodies in the deal, it isn't as if any spirits were truly without homes to go to.  Daka Fal would have been rounding up the homeless dead and allowing them to choose from the spiritually empty but alive bodies that could host them.  I imagine that under such circumstances you might well wind up with POW being equal to the SIZ +STR+DEX+CON/4 of the conquered host, as each spirit finds its natural physical level of body ownership based on its spiritual energy.  On the other hand, we have a problem, as two spirits can live in the same body, it is a process we have spirit possession rules for.

Or

(c) If the corporate ceases to function and begins to decay to nothing, leaving the discorporate howling in the hostile alien darkness of the Near realm and being dragged inexorably to the underworld, you might understand why the newly discorporate and "corporeally disinherited by death" wanted a better situation that the one they just had forced upon them, and consider death a bad thing.

Perhaps we need to invoke "The Princess Bride" here and consider a gradation of exactly how dead we mean?

Now the notion of death before time is problematic.  If there is no Time, then death is sort of impossible. Under such circumstances it is perhaps prudent to think about the space the entity occupies rather than their actual "death".  So "death" becomes tied to place.  For example, "I am dead in Sartar but not dead in Tarsh and Far Point... or... I am dead in Prax, but thanks to Chalana Arroy I live again in the Stinking Forest and I was never dead in Dara Happa", with all the intrinsic mythic implications that may mean for a deity, while proto-mortals only get the single territory that is their habitat to be "alive" in before time and death but subsequently have that attachment ruined by the ubiquity of death in the Lesser and Greater Darkness and After Time.  This also lines up with the "Many gods in the Lands of Dawn, few gods in the Land of Dusk" notion of how the further West you go, the fewer deities there are because at Dusk is the Gate of Death.  

On the other hand, perhaps Time as we understand it in Glorantha is actually entropy? Obviously "Before Time" things happened, but without time, is action even possible?  Everything is static and there can be no story because nobody can move, or speak or act without a time dimension. So do we view the world before time as having movement or was it actually a static meaningless frieze that Kajabor put into motion with by introducing new dimensions?  No, we must dismiss this heresy.  Clearly the world was like a comic book or a run of friezes like the God Wall, where the Observer could superimpose their notion of meaning, process and narrative onto static panels, but the Observer is located within time looking backwards in a form of retro-relativity i.e. you only appear to move because I am moving.  This model fits with the idea of the Gods giving up free will and having no ability to really change within time, except there is no meaningful "Great Compromise"; that is merely the explanation for why things are the way they are, and if fresh deities come into existence, they distort the static pre-Time reality into themselves and engender an entropic quasi-karmic backlash.

As to the Chalana Arroy 7 day skill loss rules for resurrection, sure, I have no problem with that, in fact I like it.  A pity in some ways that Glorantha doesn't have a River Lethe to cause them to forget their skills, nor does Glorantha really have a solid mechanism for Bad Karma clouding the memory of the reincarnating spirit (to explain the ignorance of babies etc.) as one finds in the Bardo Thodol.  Instead we have something akin to an entropic process of memory decay in the discorporate, more akin to a notion of brain damage due to oxygen deprivation becoming irreparable after 7 days as opposed to 15-30 mins.

14 minutes ago, M Helsdon said:

Only if their spirits aren't in the Underworld... Restless spirits aboard in the mundane World are quite different.

So... are you suggesting that the dead when resurrected by spells aren't in the underworld?  Isn't the Near spirit world largely coterminous with the mundane world but a spirit version of the same, with slightly different features that can be seen with the Spirit Sight spell, and only the Far Spirit World is really the Spirit plane?

14 minutes ago, M Helsdon said:

Perhaps you need to read the myth again. I'd suggest The Greek Myths, Robert Graves, chapter 28, paragraph c. A succinct and short version, which includes the conditions you neglected to include.

I prefer to read Virgil's version, "The Georgics" Book 3 in Latin thanks.

38 minutes ago, David Scott said:

The clear separation of body and spirit/soul only happened as a result of the compromise. 

I have never come across this.  What is your source please?   I would argue that the separation came when death came to the world from the underworld and bodies and spirits were first separated.  Daka Fal according to Cults of Prax is judging who is living and who is dead and helping his cult engage in body swapping hi-jinks before the beginning of time.  You say he is definitely Grandfather mortal?  Good.  He'd know.

39 minutes ago, David Scott said:

You can go to the underworld with your body if you choose with a heroquest, you are then dead unless you can return. 

You are not "dead" merely because you are in the underworld.  You are dead if you die in the underworld, and the underworld is inimical to life, which means staying alive is much harder down there.

17 hours ago, Iskallor said:

Byll you can describe the Painted Wall when you lot arrive at it.

Lol, planning a holiday are you?  Definitely book in with Thurkan Clubfoot at the Lokarnos temple.  For a small donation he can arrange Sun County Travel papers and even get you booked into accommodation at Eiskolli which is the closest "major" settlement near the Painted Wall.  Shamans can also make their own travel arrangements through the intercession of the Larnste spirit subcult of Trivago Wheelpincher.

Also remember how hard it is to get bookings at this time of year, and try to complete your arrangements in advance.  I would definitely not consider a trip out there except in Sea Season.  Fire Season is out of the question and may actually get dangerous, not to mention that Eiskolli's accommodation is booked solid around the Yelmalio high holy day, but you might be lucky if everyone has gone to the Sun Dome to celebrate.

Merry Sacred Time.