Yelm's Light

My first thought when I saw it was, 'graphic novel.' I really like the storm-shrouded mountain in the far background (not Wintertop, that's too far and across the Upland Marsh. Irnar's Peak?). Nice piece, but if it's being considered for cover art, I'd hope for a more realistic landscape. ETA: Doh, wrong thread...sort of. :))

Bah...of course GenCon is in Indy-freaking-ana...

I doubt I'm the average run of RQ player, as I suspect many of the posters here aren't. From a very young age I was fascinated with mythology, and my father having been an archaeologist, I'd already absorbed a lot of the terms and cultures of the ancient world. (Interesting that Joerg is related to Schliemann, btw.) He had a storeroom piled with those shallow fruit-crates filled with old sci fi periodicals, so my interest in fantasy/sci fi developed at roughly the same time. Hence 'getting' the idea of RQ was natural to me, and without a lot of guidance other than what was in the rule/sourcebooks, I was able to apply my own definitions to the main cultures of Prax/Dragon Pass, though generally a bit more recent than Bronze Age...unless you're talking about the near end. As it happens, I was also a member of the SCA at the time I came across RQ2, so everything dovetailed pretty well. It was the perfect game system for me. I guess I'd put my games and view of RQ as in the 'sort of, but not really Bronze Age' category. Nor did I have any background whatsoever in ancient miniatures.

I've never seen Glorantha as particularly similar to Lankhmar. Gods are at most peripheral to the Fafhrd & Grey Mouser books except in Fafhrd's origin story...you could even call Mouse the first atheist hero. Leiber's books focus on the personal where Glorantha is more involved with the sweep of history and the clash of war. Leiber's heroes aren't great leaders, in fact they're just about the exact opposite, and they don't change the world so much as loot it. Magic is prevalent in both worlds, but its respective rationales are completely different. Glorantha is more along the lines of the plucky city-states of the Three Hundred resisting the waves of Persians (cf. Lunars vs. Orlanthi) and the Odyssey.

It's fictitious in our world, but it's not myth. It's used to derive actual (non-fictitious) motion in a rotating system.

Why would it be a spiral, if there's no rotation to cause a coriolis force?

Having great difficulty shedding science and logic, I'd always assumed that physical forces worked the same as in the RW, which would tend to indicate that the processes involved are the same. I looked at it as magic counteracting or modifying basic physical laws, and generally only locally. Whatever the case, it seems it's more instructive to examine the differences than the similarities between the two physical worlds/universes. So...are there any other differences that people can come up with? (Maybe, as mentioned above, we should start a separate thread...)

Arachne Solara's web, I think.

Of course these are all canonical and deadly enemies, right?

That reminds me of something I'd noticed before in the same section. The general (non-combat) movement rates for the QS are listed as 1 km/hr on foot and 2 km/hr mounted. While the point is made that that's for the particular scenario, I'm hoping it won't be extrapolated as a general rule to RQG. Even with the 'weakest link' rationale, basing them on the slowest-moving members of a party, those numbers seem very low.

Ever see Dances With Wolves? I know what styopa's Indian name would be: Big Man Behind Little Keyboard.

Funny, but the only rage here is your own. I don't recall ever saying you couldn't run it the way you want. That would be as pointless as your using a powergaming excuse to justify violating the basic background of the world in a big way. You can post all the silly graphics you want, it only makes you look like an idiot. Gotta love the internet, where anyone can throw insults around that would get them brained face-to-face. Suffice it to say you'll never have any worries about my playing in your game. Enough, soltakss. We both know my comment was sarcastic.

I've got it! Let's all just be one big happy family! Lunars, Praxians, undead, Chaos, Elder Races, everyone!

Thanks for that serious and well-thought-out response. Any more insults you'd like to throw my way?

And if you want to be That Guytm who blithely butchers some of the basic logic and interactions of the world, more power to you. But you might as well play generic D&D or BRP, because it's not Glorantha.

My initial thought was this:

It's a fair cop.

You'd be an exception rather than the rule. I'm mostly curious how the elf didn't become a tasty vegetarian snack for the trolls. And how those (at least seven) disparate interests stayed together for any significant length of time (i.e., more than one campaign).

For those who have the original edition of KoS, metcalph's reference is on pp. 76-77, under the heading, "Orlanth And Sofala."

And what else floats? ...

I'm curious which decision axes the armor-vs.-ball gown thing was on. But seriously, folks... Even trolls can be difficult without a fairly deep knowledge of the culture and their mindset. It's definitely not for the inexperienced RP'er. I've done a fair bit of thought along this line for every major race except Mostali, who just don't strike me as all that good for MGF. It's a lot easier to run a homogeneous group of whatever race than an integrated one. For one thing, it can take some serious pretzel twists to find rationales for the group staying together. And then, of course, there's the issue of the hungry troll gazing longingly at his human party-mate's leg as if it was a drumstick or a PC of one race making an unintentional insult to a PC of another. There can often be a fine line between peace and an intra-party brawl (although that can be fun, too) or fragging (not so much fun). It's especially problematic keeping enemy races from jumping each other. In many, I'd even say most, cases players anthropomorphize at least to the point where cooperation is taken for granted, where realistically it wouldn't be anywhere near that easy. Also, there can be the issue of communication, especially with dragonewts. Those which speak 'alien' languages are usually of the high-powered and highly-placed variety on vital missions, which doesn't work so well with lesser-powered PC's. Among other things, it can lead to players assuming GM favoritism, and lack of game balance in terms of forces encountered. This type of arrangement tends to have a fairly short shelf life. An all-dragonewt party could be very interesting if played, though; at least they'd have the same mission and not have to deal with the inefficient communication of what, from their point of view, likely would be viewed as 'lesser races.' There'd be plenty of opportunity for comedy relief for the players, as well, as g33k's example illustrates. Further, how does that fresh-from-the-forest Aldryami with no foreign languages communicate intelligibly with the first group of non-Aldryami he's ever encountered? Even if s/he does have some linguistic ability or knowledge, what cultural references might s/he miss, and in what ways can that cause embarrassment or more comedy? Granted, the GM can come up with rationalizations for just about anything, but believable, logical ones can be a lot more difficult to create and especially sustain. That's as much of a test for the GM as RP'ing the interactions is for the players. Some of these concerns can be trivial to deal with, but others have the potential to be game-breaking, especially from the perspectives of suspension of disbelief and immersion.

Made even more difficult by having 40 or 50 basic particles and myriad interactions to deal with. More likely, the mighty sorceror Oppen Heimer would be researching how to steal a piece of a star, deliver and unleash it.

Hmm. Sorry, but to this scientific mind, the concept of tiny Runes as the basis of reality is going a bit too far. I see no contradiction in there being fundamental physical laws upon which Runes can act.

This ignores the basis that a round isn't really a set amount of time. 1 SR doesn't necessarily equal 1 second. Also, there's a difference in effort between poking with that stick and thinking through a formula and/or mouthing a few words. As far as I know, there's no somatic requirement for most battle or rune magic spells.

Best case, it takes up SR's that could've been used for other actions.