jeffjerwin

1 hour ago, Oracle said:

During the creation of an extended Family History for a new RuneQuest Adventurer, I've realised the following:

The Family History tables in the RuneQuest: Adventuring in Glorantha rule book seem to imply, that (at least in many cases) marriages happen after a child has been born from the relationship between the people to be married.

• Adventurer characters are born in the year 1604 (last section on p. 31)
• The parents of the adventurer, if married, would have been married by the year 1605 (boxed text on the top of p. 33).

This was kind of a surprise to me, because I do not think, that this is the normal custom.

But I may be wrong here, so I would like to know, if I'm missing something here ...

Often a year marriage (not a full one) results in a child, and if the parents choose, they then make an open-ended, formal marriage. Some year marriages are created to see if the pair is fertile, because child-bearing is necessary to be a full initiate of Ernalda. If the match doesn't produce a child, it is automatically dissolved.

4 minutes ago, Atgxtg said:

Well, the Book of Sires is supposed to do something similar with Pendragon. I think something along those lines could work for Glorantha-at least for a particular region, say Dragon Pass, and for a certain number of years, maybe a century or two. In some ways it could be easier in Glorantha, because the calender and date for given events more firmly established, and there is less contraction among the sources. 

It would be a project though. And even if someone did start earlier, there'd be little support material to help them. All the older RQ stuff only goes back about a decade in Gloranthan time. So if a GM pushes the clock back by 20 years, he won't have much to help him work up adventures. 

 

 

I was working on something here: 

2 hours ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

Is the paddock for public use (ie. grazing commons/overnight pasture for cattle safety) or for more exclusive animals (chief & thanes' horses/messengers horses)?

Good question. Maybe have two of them? However, the role of 'chief' and 'thane' is not substantially different from the other villagers. There may be a small paddock for travelers to keep their horses separate from the sheep and cows - though they're only there at night or when there are tuskers in the area.

5 minutes ago, Lord High Munchkin said:

Only two thoughts. You might need a few buildings for farmers and other non-adventurous types.

The well is pretty close to the "drop" in the topography. What's to stop the water draining away from the well, out into the "valley"? The water table would be pretty low.

Thanks. I'll move the well closer to the paddock. All of the buildings outside the ones listed belong to farmers, herders, and small craftspeople... (Who also moonlight as entertainers in many cases).

The 'well' might connect to a First/Second Age pipe system, however, running down from Nala's Hills. Basically the history of the settlement is:

1. Vingkotling stead dating to the Grizzly Peak period; later abandoned.

2. Stravuli stead (the Dawn)

3. Conquered and left in ruins by the Liornvuli

4. Rebuilt during the Second Council as a trade post between the Liornvuli and the Aramites (who are not yet monstrous) along with Aldryami, Dragonewts and Trolls.

5. Fortified by the Bright Empire

6. Arkat is repulsed as he besieges the Wideway (c.436)

7. Captured and destroyed by trolls. Later an Argan Argar trading post.

8. Rebuilt during Orlanthland, when it becomes part of the Proximate Holy Realm and the Puppeteers settle here.

9. Draconized during the EWF. Bridge under construction.

10. Destroyed by Alakorings and Golden Horde.

11. Rebuilt in a makeshift way by Velebar

12. Abandoned in Dragonkill

13. Reoccupied by Puppeteers.

14. Visited by Arim the Pauper

15. Incorporated into Tarsh c.1400

16. Takes in refugees from Chaos eruption in Ginijji (c.1450)

17. In no-man's-land from c.1490-1582, irregularly occupied by Lunar Tarshite garrison

18. Attacked by Tusk-riders on a repeated basis (1605-present)

There are three temples (Orlanth Drogarsi, Ernalda Skovari and Donandar), a healer, a redsmith, a carpenter, a miller, a potter, a cartographer/sage, a cartwright, and a Tarshite tax official/Etyries merchant.

There is a twice-weekly market, with two tinkers, a horsetrader, a weaver, a knife-sharpener, and a leatherworker who visit. There are 38 structures in the town.

After repeated breakdowns in discipline, there are no permanent Tarshite troops posted here.

Too Far is a basic Heortling village in numerous ways. It is governed by a version of the Lightbringer Ring. Herds and gardens are kept in common, and there is an unusual amount of turnover in the composition of the ring, including the town thane, who is said to be a different man or woman every time there’s a census, though the name is the same, as if people are taking a role. There is no aristocracy in Too Far, and bloodlines are heavily mixed with outsiders, sometimes from very far away.

Table of locations. Unmarked are ordinary homes.

2. Barn

6. Watchtower

8. Etyries market official

9. Barracks (abandoned)

10. Miller

13. Redsmith

18. Carpenter

28. Potter

29. Healer

30. Cartographer/Sage

31. Temple of Orlanth Drogarsi

33. Temple of Ernalda Skovara

34. Temple of Donandar

38. O’er-reach Inn

(Feel free to help me brainstorm names and idiosyncratic details)

5 hours ago, David Scott said:

 

Exactly. The pain of chaos is going give them a problem around the Red Goddess Temple. It's likely a few have attempted together in and died in the process, but it's likely to be one of the more heavily guarded buildings in New Pavis for a number of reasons.I suspect that the presence of Krasht gives them a bigger problem and more headaches. We know there are 20 initiates of the Red Goddess in Pavis, and at least a few of them will have a taint.

Though the temple is in fact dedicated to the Seven Mothers, who are not a Chaotic cult. There's a shrine within to Rufelza, but it's not visible, so Bull initiates are unlikely to be err 'triggered' by the overall temple, I think... outside it, anyway

Now RG initiation is really a Lunar Heartland thing, so those 20 Lunars are almost certainly high-up elite Lunars, surrounded by guards. The real Lunar Chaos nest is in the Governor's Palace...

(This doesn't change much about the narrative, of course)

I discussed with Greg over the summer about making a "Book of Ladies", where courtly intrigue and female protagonists are put front and center. We also talked about female knights in medieval literature, which, if properly adapted, would make the game more interesting to many players.

The main issue with PC magicians is that their natural enemies and allies are other magicians, not knights, which undermines the idea of a 'mixed party'. Obviously, evil sorcerers are taken down by knights in several romances, but these characters tend to be one-offs.

18 minutes ago, EricW said:

I don't see how the Stormbull guard around the Block would be possible without bulls having at least some discretion about whether to charge chaotic foes, otherwise all the block guards would have been killed resisting the Lunar incursion.

I mean imagine a Lunar raid for truthstone around the block, if Bulls couldn't behave strategically the raid would start by luring out all the Stormbull guards by driving a herd of obvious chaotics past the Block, then ambushing them and cutting them down with a barrage of long range missile weapons after they go berserk. The bulls might have taken heavy casualties the first time this was attempted, but if they kept falling for this trick every time there would be none left.

Overt alliance with Chaos tends to cause problems with Lunar allies like the Sables, and perhaps the Sun Domers, I'd think.

40 minutes ago, JonL said:

What's tricky about the Lunars is that most of their openly Chaotic members are also going to be Illuminated. 

That's pretty much required. Illumination ameliorates the worst aspects of chaos, like the nihilistic despair.

However monsters like the Bat are perhaps not technically illuminated.

Just now, Sir_Godspeed said:

What's the periscope-looking thing?

It's a horn, sort of like an alphorn or tibetan horn in my imagination... I may change the shape.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBQNuPwgN1c

Here's my crude & freehand sketch of the site.

7 minutes ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

Gotta say I'm impressed with how you can take a (to me) seemingly random location and piece together a really fascinating and unique locale.

Every dinky hamlet in Glorantha is unique, of course, but we don't usually know the stories of its people.

2 hours ago, Darius West said:

Sounds about right.  I like the bits about the reaching glowline. 

I suppose there may have been non-human puppeteers who survived there during the Dragonkill.  I would imagine they would be a motley assortment of the "comedy races" i.e. baboons, ducks, morokanth, newtlings, satyrs, etc.  

Indeed.

1 hour ago, VonKatzen said:

All societies are not created equal.

Magic is not science; nor is it technology. Unless it's sorcery... and the intimate understanding of the spiritual world that Praxians have and Lunars and Sartarites do not gives them a significant advantage in their homeland. The Praxians were 'conquered' (extremely temporarily) because they were disunited, not because they were inferior. Outside of Prax, sure, animal nomads have issues - yet not serious enough issues to preclude their use as mercenaries in Tarsh.

The only recourse against the Bat is better magic. Isn't it interesting that the Empire never bothered to send it against the Wastes?

Glorantha is not our world. Applying our history and our rational understanding to it is useful, but insufficient. No-one has ever conquered the Wastes in any lasting way. Sheng drew tribute from it, but that is the closest thing I can find.

There's a core piece of Glorantha's history here that bears thinking about: it is in part, in the Hero Wars, a story about asymmetric warfare. It's not an accident it emerged in the 1960s.

1 hour ago, VonKatzen said:

But since everyone uses magic, and civilized people are better at it, it washes out at best, and is more realistically overpowered by the sorcery of the Lunar Empire or even the rather more sophisticated 'barbarians' like the Orlanthi.

I think you are mistaken. Praxians are much more skilled with magic and staying alive with it than the average Lunar, even the average Lunar soldier. Praxians and Praxian shamans are pre-eminently about survival in a way that even the Orlanthi don't approach.

So, based on Darius' suggestions, and Harald's, I have imagine my Too Far as follows:

The site is a palisaded village (triangular in shape, on the DP map I note...) at the edge of a huge collapsed bridge - some sort of EWF structure - stretching toward the Stinking Forest. Where the bridge ends is an Inn called the 'O'er-reach Inn'. It is here that the Puppeteers winter. Ropes run from the bridge to the next fragmentary span, where acrobats practice. Eroded cliffs descend toward the river and the Trader's Valley road below, which passes through the arch below the Inn.

Overlooking the village to the north is a Dragonewt Plinth. It is here that Arim encountered the creatures for the first time after venturing past the Death Line, and hastily fled. Too Far is the closest of any human settlement to a plinth and these beings are sometimes seen in the market.

Hostile groups tend to find the site hard to locate. Sometimes there is a bridge, sometimes there is nothing. Sometimes there is vast ruin. The Glowline is irregular here: sometimes it encompasses the village, and sometimes it is a bit to the west. When the Moon comes to visit, there are occasionally mystics from the Empire attending the performances.

10 minutes ago, jps said:

So I should start with the quickstarter?

The quick starter is a bit better at illustrating the ins and outs of Sartarite culture than the admittedly dated Apple Lane. Though Apple Lane has a bunch of entertaining animal-folk in it...

Start small!

Apple Lane and the Quick start adventure are an excellent way to start with people new to the setting. This goes for any newbie of any age.

10 minutes ago, Scout said:

I'm wondering how much "wonder" is in Glorantha. By wonder, I mean things that make a player go 'Oooh that's so cool." 

I use Earthdawn as an example. Earthdawn has exotic races like T'Skrang (lizard men), Obsidimen (8' tall humanoids made of stone), Windlings (12" tall winged faerie types), and  kaers (underground complexes filled with traps and treasure by people who fled there to escape the scourge - a 400 year period when horrors entered the world and ravaged the land). Magic items that have to be researched through adventuring to find their secrets that allow you to unlock their magic abilities. It's a pretty exciting setting. 

How would Glorantha compare?

Gods walk the earth, plant-like elves, dwarves fashioned from earth(?), the cosmology and planet itself are pretty cool. What else is there, how does RQG present magic items?

The Red Moon.

Gonn Orta the giant.

Dragon's Eye

Magasta's Whirlpool

The Dragon-ships of the Waertagi

The Juggernaut

The Mother of Monsters

The Dragon-rise

There are many many others...

12 hours ago, Darius West said:

Mularik Iron Eye is an Arkati Sorcerer and a companion of Argrath. 

Interesting that Mularik gets ganked eventually and conveniently for Argrath. But he claims to be a descendant of Arkat, which might not be quite the same as being a true follower of Arkat.

BTW, Darius, I know that you hate chaos, but it's doubtful that things were ever meant to be that cut and dried in Greg's Glorantha (though they can be that way in your Glorantha). The Red Moon can certainly be reasoned with. So could Nysalor. We don't even know what happened in the battle between Nysalor and Arkat, but it may not have turned out the way you think.

38 minutes ago, Richard S. said:

In a lot of Gloranthan art I've seen illuminates tend to be pictured with a third eye in their forehead. Is this just an artistic representation of their illumination, or are third eyes something that actually appears on illuminates, if not physically then on the hero or spirit planes. And if so, do they have any use or are they just there for looking cool?

I think the 'third eye' is an actual physical symptom of the alterations that occur to the magical organs in the head, but it may be invisible unless viewed by another mystic or when mystic magic is being utilized.

On 12/23/2018 at 9:36 AM, jeffjerwin said:

2. "Hola's Hills" is the name of the hills where it is situated.

Hola is Nala on the DP Gazetteer map, as it turns out. In the DP Gazetteer it is associated with a range of hills that doesn't exist in other maps, between Too Far and Goldedge; but a look at Greg's maps shows it is the name of the small ridge that extends from the Grizzly Hills where Too Far is situated.

According to the BoHM, Nala's Hills is where Face Rot, a spirit that causes domestic disorder, tended to appear. It is well known for causing Vingkotling divorces. Hedkoranth smashed it. Earth Top Hill is the largest hill in Nala's Hills. The Nala Hills is where the Vingkotlings held their marriage sacrifices.

"Nal[a]" is a phoneme found in the names of Mahome's brothers, the Lowfires. It probably means '[bon]fire'.

On the locations: on the earliest DP map by Greg the village is shown (almost illegibly) about one hex SE from its location in the GtG. It moves closer to the Dragonewt road - a plinth is actually on the site of the village - in later maps. In the Tarsh in Flames it is outside the Glowline [and a hex east of where it is in the GtG] and in the DP Gazetteer maps (by Wesley Quadros, the same artist) it is within the Glowline. These locations form a triangle... an illusion rune.

If Too Far is connected to the Dragonewt road, then my suspicion is that the name emerged because Arim and his band encountered Dragonewts here and ran away...

As to why the EWF-connected but spared Puppeteers have a special connection to a site located 'on' a Dragonewt plinth - and note they share teleportation powers with dragonewts... - I think we could speculate about.

PS. This has been a lovely bit of brainstorming.

Too Far may be where the old Puppeteers retire and raise their children... It could be really old if the Puppeteers date back unbroken to the EWF or before.

Also, Too Far moves around on Greg's maps...

2 hours ago, jajagappa said:

The reference as a place for the Puppeteers was likely just forgotten about.

Seems like a reasonable choice - that way when you can travel again, you can head into Tarsh, over to Alda-chur, or down Dwarf Run to Sartar, depending on how you interpret the omens for the year.  And perhaps far enough away from Snakepipe Hollow that you won't get as much Chaos coming your way.  It's likely going to have trolls and tusk riders, though, but perhaps that would be their Darkseason audience!

That's an interesting idea... Though another camp is very close to Cragspider's digs, which is more trollish. The Tusk Riders are perhaps, um, a bit unruly for a performance. Trolls at least like music and dancing.