EricW

I would argue the only reason Trickster doesn’t have a chaos rune is he agreed to help fix the mess he created when the joke goes too far. Would the EWF Great Dragon project have broken the compromise? Likely. Trickster didn’t necessarily suggest the Great Dragon project but he gave mankind the tools to stuff up the world, by teaching them how to learn Auld Wormish. Is Trickster chaos? Absolutely not. Do Trickster’s pranks sometimes lead to the compromise being threatened? Absolutely.

Given Trickster’s role in EWF and likely other violations or near violations of the compromise I suspect any serious concentration of Trickster power is way too unstable and close to chaos to rule anything. Look at what happened to the God Learners in Slontos, who built a great temple to Trickster. There is no rule against Tricksters attacking each other, so tricksters with access to an infinite range of divine spells would have wielded unimaginable destruction on each other, until the land itself gave way. At least that is my theory 😉

Disorder can mean strife but it also represents breaking away from the old order. Disorder could represent a youth movement, like hippies rejecting the societal rules of their parents, or people refusing to participate in the deadly clan feuds of their elders. Like a group of youths who refuse to initiate as warriors. How would they survive? Would they be easy prey to the first group of enemies? Or would the primal disorder they embrace somehow protect them, cause plans to attack them to go astray, magically divert bullies and enemies? How would the Lunars react to a movement which was sapping their enemies of potential warriors? Or would the Lunars have their own problems with youths refusing to take up the holy Lunar mission to heal the universe? One thing for sure, the parents would not be happy with this rising movement of lazy deserters, they would accuse them of everything from being secret chaos worshipers to clan traitors.

They wouldn't even need a machine shop. An old guy I used to hang out with sometimes once whittled a pistol out of steel - worked out the mechanism on a piece of paper, cut rough pieces out of a piece of steel plate, then whittled the parts to shape while watching TV, using a small but very sharp cold chisel, one almost invisible metal shaving at a time. Watching him really looked like someone whittling a piece of wood, except what he was whittling was the action for a gun, into a perfectly shaped component. The pistol wasn't for me - I have no idea what happened to it. Point is if someone is an expert fitter and turner or machinist, I wouldn't require them to have anything but the most basic tools to make something like a set of lock picks, people that skilled could probably fabricate a set of lock pick out of a few pieces of hard steel and an abrasive rock.

Eurmal Swallow spell. The book says death, but perhaps with Trickster it is not exactly death, so I would argue the Dragonewt may not reincarnate. Whatever happens to them I suggest their chances of returning to the mundane world are pretty slim. Unless Trickster decides it would be incredibly funny to unleash a broken, half insane dragonewt wearing a permanent clown face in pursuit of justice against one of his followers.

Its the hero wars - why does it have to be someone we have heard of? But perhaps Belintar himself was the reason no hero came forward to restore Belintar, the stagnation of having Belintar in charge robbed his subjects of much of their initiative. What were the Seven Mothers trying to do?

I’ve always wondered why someone in the Holy Country didn’t perform a hideous seven mothers style quest to put their god king back together, with chaos as the glue and replacement for any missing parts. I mean they just seem to wither away, instead of the usual Gloranthan response to disaster of attempting something desperate.

Trickster hero war? Now that would be strange. They could deploy “Eurmal’s Harmony” to keep the peace. Eurmal’s Harmony causes everyone at the meeting to talk over each other, and leave the meeting convinced that everyone else fully agreed with their position Obviously this could lead to some confusion, but if the harmony spell was cast at every meeting, everyone would always be convinced the peace negotiations resolved all differences. So all you need is a trickster with an endless supply of harmony, then no more war.

Malia worshippers are killed, preferably from a distance, and their houses and possessions are burned. Orlanthi on the few occasions they capture and execute a traitor rather than just killing them probably fling the traitor off a cliff, and let Orlanth choose whether to grant them clemency.

This came up a while ago. Most GMs interpret it as magically neutralising harm, but I like the idea of whatever is happening tearing the wizard apart, but the wizard magically reforms as fast as the damage is dealt. How grisly would that be? Blood and entrails everywhere, magically flowing back together, like those liquid metal robots in terminator, except a lot faster and a lot more colourful. San checks all round!

Humakt also survives...

Ah, you're talking about the Church of Eurmal, Scientist. Eurmal Scientists believe that since the entire world is an illusion, only by embracing the illusion rune can one hope to discover the path to ultimate truth. They dress in robes, try to look serious all the time, and write angry pamphlets about how unfair it is that the ignorant followers of other knowledge gods do not take their faith seriously, and refuse to engage them in debates as fellow knowledge seekers. They play pranks on each other at cult meetings via a formal rota, with a selected member ritually deploying a series of fart spells or other trickster pranks, while other members discuss the deeper meaning of what they are witnessing and experiencing. Many outsiders are hostile to the cult, and allege it entraps vulnerable new members with deceptive group discussions and community events. The Church of Eurmal, Scientist is widely believed to have started when a trickster hero bet another lightbringer he could start a new religion, but members of the cult vehemently reject such offensive trivialisation of their sacred beliefs. Members claim their founder, Eh Wrong Cupboard, received his divine revelation while standing alone in the middle of a magical elven grove while performing an unspecified trickster ritual.

Yet Tricksters lie to themselves all the time. I've got to say I kind of like the idea of tricksters being able to fool truth spells, providing they accept the consequences of believing their own lie. But maybe that would be too powerful.

What a fascinating idea. If a trickster casts lie on themself, do detect truth spells show they believe they are telling the truth?

One persistent theme in CoC is if an entire region comes under the sway of the mythos it kind of decays and is forgotten. So with The Shadow over Innsmouth, the townsfolk deliberately cut ties with other towns, to preserve their secret, and because other towns no longer offered anything they cared about, except maybe a few trade goods. The Innsmouth folk became totally obsessed with joining their relatives in the sea. Or if there is a catastrophe, it is simply written off. Consider the Tunguska Event (a 12 megaton explosion in Siberia in 1908), the East Mediterranean Event (a multi-kiloton explosion over the Mediterranean Sea in 2002), even the Chelyabinsk meteor in 2013, most people have never heard of these events, forgotten about them, or only think of them when someone mentions them. Or the Tsar Bomba in 1961, a Russian arctic nuclear test so large it shattered windows a thousand miles away. Any of these events could have been say a summons of Azathoth which got out of control, in the CoC Universe - but people simply dismissed them. An event which attracted attention would have to be insanely impactful. One of my favourite examples is Thor Meets Captain America, which despite the cheesy title is a brilliant short story by famous Sci Fi author David Brin. Brin's editor pestered him to write a story where the NAZIs won, so Brin wrote a story in which the NAZIs crushed the D-Day landing by somehow summing the Norse Gods to fight on their behalf. Loki of course betrays his fellow gods and helps the allies, but refuses to explain how the NAZIs managed to work the ancient magic. Only at the very end of the story does the main character understand the awful secret Loki is concealing, and why he couldn't tell anyone.

Obviously a chaotic ally of Gloomshark... 🙂

I think that cover would be pretty risky, chances are the Trickster would fumble secret handshakes and trigger any market spells, unless they were very well prepared. Probably easier to impersonate a worthless bum, if challenged they could claim to be a lay member of some cult nobody has ever heard of. Especially in the wake of the Lunar occupation there must be lots of people of dubious sanity wandering about, Trickster would fit right in with the street panhandlers and ragged misfits.

YES - complete with that nasty ring thing on his head, whenever some meanie hits them with the lightbringer summons.

As many as are needed to make the story funny. And most of them will be weird. Borrowing from Pratchett, Like that shrine out the back of the pub, where Tricksters have to wait shivering through the night. In the morning the old cleaning lady hobbles out and beats them up with her broom, cursing all the smelly strangers who keep infesting the trash dump. She is a master of broom attack, because it has been happening so long. The old woman is the shrine. Most visitors think the shrine is the broom. Many tricksters have attempted to steel the broom, but it doesn't work once they steal it, and they get an extra hard beating next time the old lady spots them. The shrine teaches "sorry mum". Providing the trickster has not struck any blows, causes the attacker to pause long enough for the miscreant to get away relatively unscathed, because of the piteous squealing.

Perhaps it is the world which does not exist😉

Who are we to judge right action? We know Eurmal was instrumental in saving the world from the devil, therefore either on some level what Trickster does must be right action, or dragonewts are agents of chaos working to complete what the devil started. Is the continued existence of the cosmos wrong? If you believe that existence is right, yet you question the rightness of the actions of a god who helped save the Cosmos from dissolution, your questioning of the rightness of Eurmal is really just an expression of your cosmic ignorance and inability to embrace a higher level of consciousness.

New Eurmal Spell - Eurmal's Draconic Wisdom. Trickster takes on a luminous aura, and sits floating in the air. Functions as a continuous lie spell, everything the Trickster says is perceived as ultimate wisdom, until he repeats a word he has previously spoken or accidentally tells the truth, after which the glow is abruptly extinguished, the trickster falls to the ground with a thump, and the audience is left feeling like complete idiots.

Is Eurmal a master of dragon magic? Or does he regard dragon magic and draconic thinking as a joke to be inflicted on others?

There are videos online, the best resource was a university study I read, I can't remember who wrote it. Bear in mind picking locks or having lock picking tools on your person is a serious criminal offence in many jurisdictions, carrying the tools of burglary is frequently accepted by courts as proof you intended to rob someone or worse.

Ability to be restored to life, no matter what harm has befallen, through being buried in the Earth? Being buried then rising from the dead? That could cause some confusion... 🙂