Richard S.

Is the fiery dude Karkal?

Probably, but they went through some pretty massive changes at each step. Glorantha died and became Ginna Jar, Ginna Jar traveled/was brought to the depths of the underworld and emerged as Arachne Solara, now Arachne Solara governs the compromise that prevents Glorantha from being destroyed again. Is a reborn soul the same person that it was previously?

I'm planning a game set during the resettlement of Dragon Pass, year 1320 or so. Are there any available maps of Dragon Pass without indications for cities, landmarks, etc.? Thanks.

"An individual adventurer's skills category modifiers may adjust [base chance], so that even at the beginnings of their careers different adventurers have different skill ratings. Any percentiles of the skill learned through previous experience or training are added to the base chance." RQG page 141

"If the roll, as modified by the appropriate skills category modifier, is higher than the adventurer's current skill ability, the adventurer improves their rating in that skill." RQG page 415.

Current skill ability refers to base chance + experience (inc. occupation, cult, etc.) + category modifier. The value on the sheet should only be modified by situational modifiers like augments or difficulty levels. However, because the category modifier is also added to the experience roll you functionally are rolling against the rating as if it didn't have a category modifier applied.

For example, a Sartarite Orlanthi warrior with a DEX of 16 could have a Broadsword skill of 10 (base chance) + 5 (manipulation bonus) + 15 (Sartar culture) + 25 (warrior unit weapon) + 10 (Orlanth Adventurous) + 25 (personal bonus) = 90%. To improve it by experience, they would have to roll a 91 or above on 1D100 + 5 (manipulation bonus).

Trolls eat people. Iron burns trolls. Human blood obviously doesn't hurt trolls, ergo it doesn't contain iron. Glorantha doesn't operate by our rules, even if many of its rules create effects that resemble our own.

30 minutes ago, John Biles said:

There is no such road in the Argan Argar Atlas or the maps in the Guide to Glorantha.

There's hardly any roads in the AAA, even ones we definitely know exist like the Royal Roads. The Pavis Road exists on the master maps that Jeff sometimes posts.

The Argan Argar Atlas map (#30) is the most detailed, with a scale of 5 miles from hex edge to hex edge. The map from Nomad Gods is approximately the same scale, but has some things shifted a few hexes, is missing a handful of region and feature lables, and lacks several settlements along the River of Cradles.

The Dara Happans really like the number 10, which probably has something to do with Yelm originally having ten kids.

On 8/24/2024 at 1:04 PM, Akhôrahil said:

It does seem like it's just OA/OT that this applies to, not any other subcults. Which might be regarded as a little odd - this seems as though it should be the standard system - but that's how it is.

I think this is probably symptomatic of just how big the divide between Adventurous and Thunderous still is. Orlanth has two entirely separate priesthoods who don't always see eye to eye, and needs a Rex to keep the Wind Lords and Storm Voices working together much of the time. Adventurous and Thunderous are almost like separate cults that just happen to share the same Rune point pool - they've each got their own subcults, their own associates, even their own temples in most places.

IMG, having a Fetch is the equivalent of having a rating in the Spirit Rune. "This Rune describes disembodied entities existing in the Spirit World." (RQG 15) - by definition it does not apply to embodied, living beings. Among mortals, only shamans can exist in both the physical and spiritual planes at the same time. I haven't read Six Seasons yet, but if you want a player to start with a strong connection to the spirit world then they might be an assistant shaman or even an involuntary full shaman, their Fetch awakened in youth by the Horned Man. Or they could just have a high aptitude in abilities that deal with that world, like Spirit Combat, Spirit Travel, CHA, POW, etc. - the sort of stuff that might make for a good shaman in the future.

I think if somehow a human did have a percentage rating in the Spirit Rune, it would mean they exist in a kind of half-state very unlike that of a shaman, unable to fully partake in either world. The more of a spirit you are, the less of a man, beast, plant, or whatever you become; a wraith with only the shape of a living being. In this model, gaining a Fetch would allow you to "offload" your spirit rating into a place where it doesn't conflict with your physical self, allowing full participation in both halves of existence.

2 hours ago, Nevermet said:

As I push everything into being about Maniria, I did some quick math on this. The Holy City of Kaxtorplose, a rather isolated enclave of Malkioni with roughly 1,000 people, would break down as...

• 900 Dronars
• 50 Horali
• 30 Zzaburi
• 20 Talari

That gets interesting to me.  Specifically, I'm unsure if its sustainable for a small Malkioni community like that to have castes that are guaranteed by bloodline.

Yeah it does break down a bit on the smaller scale. "Any given Malkioni community" was a bit of a stupidly broad phrase for me to use, sorry. However I think your observation about sustainability is probably exactly what led the darkness-era Brithini settlers to abandon their old ways - they just didn't have the numbers to keep things going like they always had. I think nowadays my percentages are probably roughly true on the kingdom and provincial scale, but as you zoom in talars, horali, and zzaburi will concentrate in the cities. Maybe something like 60-70 dronars for every talar in rural areas, while urban populations could be closer to 20-30 dronars per. Just spitballing here, I'm no sociologist.

On a related note, I think that Old Hrestolism probably had new adults test into one of the four castes rather than it being assigned only by birth (though talar kids probably did have an advantage at becoming talars themselves). I imagine that a lot of the minor schools still do it that way, outside the influence of the Rokari and New Hrestoli.

2 hours ago, Nevermet said:

Also... anyone have a guess how working toward being a Knight / Man-of-All would work, either in terms of the process or the eventual benefits?

Someone on a Discord server suggested there's a parallel between Illumination's potential to allow people to leave cults without repraisals, and someone able to somehow transcend caste-specific definitions of rightness, though I'm unsure how that'd work mechanically.

I think it probably boils down to initiating into the cult of Hrestol. From Jeff's notes, we know that his initiates can ignore caste restrictions as long as they act with "Justice", and they get some Rune magic from him. Otherwise I think the benefits of the class are largely dependent on your own actions and how much your community supports you. So long as you're Just you can do just about anything, but God isn't going to hand you the world on a platter.

Some of my personal (and very incomplete) rules:

Rokari - Talars, horali, and dronars characters begin play as initiates of one of the four caste subcults of the Invisible God, which provides no Rune or spirit magic but allows them to be affected by "Brithini Enchantments" (name pending) so long as they haven't violated the laws of the caste they initiated to. Most Brithini Enchantments are long-term, area-of-effect sorcery spells centered on the Invisible God's temples and maintained at the weekly ceremonies, and benefit all lawful Malkioni within range. If desired, characters may sacrifice additional POW during character creation to initiate to and gain Rune points and spells from another cult. The gamemaster should determine which cults are available to join, based on the area of play and the opinion of its local talar, but generally these will be no more than local spirit cults centered on the wyter of the character's house, regiment, or guild. Talar, horali, and dronars still begin with 5 points of spirit magic as normal, regardless of whether or not they're initiated to another cult - it's assumed they learned it as lay members. Zzaburi only learn and use sorcery.

New Hrestoli - All characters begin play as initiates of the Invisible God and as part of the worker caste unless they qualify for a higher caste, in which case they can begin as a member of it. They must also meet the qualifications for all lower castes if they want to be a man-of-all, wizard, or ruler (i.e. to begin play as a wizard they must also qualify for the soldier and man-of-all castes). New Hrestoli do not use Brithini Enchantments, but they still expect the restrictions of the current caste to be followed. All New Hrestoli may learn sorcery and may join the cults of the Ascended Masters to gain Rune magic, but they're not allowed to learn spirit magic.

Henotheists - Henotheists are a broad category, but in general they are initiates first of a normal Rune cult and only lay members of the Invisible God. This means they cannot benefit from Brithini Enchantments and are not obligated to follow caste restrictions, though many still do out of personal belief or community pressure.

The Hrestol Cult - initiates of Hrestol do not lose the benefits of Brithini Enchantments by violating caste restrictions, so long as they follow the cult's code of honor.

Demographics [EDITED] - Approximately 2% of Malkioni will be talars, 3% will be zzaburi, 5% horali, and 90% dronars. Rural areas will have more dronars and more equal amounts of the other castes, while cities will be more skewed to the upper castes.

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Brithini Enchantments are basically my personal replacement for the previewed "Rightness" rules and caste magic. Maybe my opinion will change once the full rules come out, but currently I'm a little wary about there being non-human-originated magical benefits for obeying caste, which seems to fly in the face of Malkioni humanism.

47 minutes ago, Gamesmeister said:

Very much so. The initial effort was to get the contents of the core rulebook out, but now that's done the plan is very much to start adding content from other RuneQuest publications

Are there plans to allow gamemasters to add custom content like new homelands, cults, and spells?

The individual Thunder Brother sub/cults of the HW/HQ1 era are the air god equivalent of Grain Goddesses.

Independent, regular storms like Destor, Finovan, Daylanus, Hedkoranth, and Helamakt can be initiated to without technically joining Orlanth (though Orlanthi always count as initiates of these storms, of course). They act for most intents and purposes like weaker versions of Orlanth Adventurous or Orlanth Thunderous, depending on whether they're primarily a windstorm or a thunderstorm. Unfortunately, Thunder Brothers can only be contacted through worship when physically present, which is a real problem given their natural unpredictability, but some areas at least one of them is regular enough to support a small cult (e.g. Pelanda and Doburdun).

I like most of your ability ideas, though with the ease at which Rightness can be lost or gained it might be a headache to track all your modifiers. You did also leave out the one ability we do have confirmed for zzaburi: their ability to store MP in the spirit world (1 RIGHT = 1 MP? Or maybe 1D10 in the spirit of enchantments). I'm not sure how I feel about your idea of White Wizards being Dayzatari - I know there's been reams of conversation on the place of theism in Malkionism, but I think the zzaburi of all people should have no part in it.

Personally, I think I'm going to ditch Rightness altogether from my own west (can you ditch something that technically doesn't exist yet?). I think that giving caste restrictions having magical consequences not caused by human action goes against the Malkioni idea that humans can exist without external magical aid. Instead, I'm ruling it that most Brithini or Brithini-derived spells can only affect people who are obedient to caste law (the level of obedience can vary with the spell), and in return give significantly improved benefits over standard sorcery like we see in the core book. "Bless the Fields of Dromal", for instance, probably doesn't work on fields not being tended by the most righteous of dronars, but if it is then that field might see yields rivaling those of Esrolia.

Of course, this leads to the whole new headache of tracking exactly which caste laws the characters have kept, broken, returned to, etc...

On 1/24/2024 at 10:49 PM, Richard S. said:

Dumb Theory: the Dara Happan Sacred Alphabet is written top to bottom, left to right - i.e. in columns instead of rows.

Dumb Reason: solely because I've been using it to write private notes recently and it feels more comfortable that way (which of course means those stuffy Buseri probably do it the other way). I also think it looks nicer in columns.

I've now got strong evidence that New Pelorian probably has some roots in a "cursive" form of the Sacred Alphabet, developed by scribes whose wrists were getting damn tired from having to make all those straight lines and perfect corners. Further research pending until my hands start to uncramp.

Deezola does have one very important power of sovereignty - her cult has complete independence from Yelm's, which is no small feat among Pelorian earth goddesses.

Edit: I guess it's not total independence, considering that the cult technically does report to the high priest of Yelm. But it's pretty damn close.

7 hours ago, Mark Mohrfield said:

I notice that ZZ provides her with Command Shade. But isn’t this redundant? Surely her own Command Cult Spirit covers this, as well the other elementals provided by the Young Elementals. Am I missing something?

Jakaleel by default can only control small darkness elementals. Zorak Zoran gives her the ability to control any size of shade.

Page 31, Shield is included in the list of rune magic available to Seven Mothers associates. Hwarin Dalthippa's associate description only grants Shield to chief/high priests. Either Shield should be removed from the rune magic section, or the restriction on who can learn it should be removed, depending on what was intended.

Found some copies on shelves at my LGS today, a little earlier than scheduled.

For a bit of a mechanical preview, the rune spells for each cult have been added to the alphabetical lists on the Well.

https://wellofdaliath.chaosium.com/home/catalogue/publishers/chaosium/cha4034-the-red-book-of-magic/rune-magic-by-cult-and-associate-cult/

Foundry VTT is what I use, and it's excellent. There is a one-time $50 to use the software, but it's been very much worth it. The Runequest module is unofficial, but it includes all the material from the official wiki so character building at least is a bit easier.

Some of you may remember a while ago I asked some questions related to starting a campaign in Seshnela. While that unfortunately did die, we managed to get a few adventures in and I got some background notes written up which I'm now trying to clean up and expand into something a little more useful. Starting with some rather broad-stroke stuff on cults, most of which probably won't seem too unusual to anyone on here, I'm trying out using a blog to post my notes on:

http://abidingpamphlet.blogspot.com/2024/02/malkioni-cults-and-characters.html

Any observations or ideas of your own or feedback on my ideas is appreciated. I'm pretty unused to writing longer posts like the above, so any general writing advice would also be welcome. Thanks!

It's been a few weeks but I just want to say thanks to everyone for your advice and encouragement. I'll admit that I haven't actually gotten started with anything, but the hill definitely look a little less steep now. Thank you.

Spirit cults can theoretically teach any spirit magic spell, since their priests are shamans. Rune cults have lists of spirit magic not because they are unique in knowing them, but because those are the only ones their priests usually know and can pass on. Some spirits cults may definitely prefer certain spirit magic spells, and make these more accessible to worshipers, but spirit magic itself is not bound up in cults like Rune magic is - anyone can learn any spell, as long as they can find a teacher. It's also possible that the spirit worshiped by the cult itself knows and can teach spirit magic, or is at least closely connected to other spell spirits, which saves the shaman a trip to find those spells elsewhere. At your discretion, the spirit may be able to teach these spells itself without the shaman as an intermediary - either during holy day ceremonies or in "friendly" spirit combat - which is much faster than the week required by a mortal teacher.

4 hours ago, Agentorange said:

The day after that i go go wandering and find Dark Disruptor  which despite it's name is not something from an Ann Summers catalogue but a disruption spell variant that only does 1d2 damage to most people but 1d3+1 to those tied to the darkness Rune...

I love small spell variations like this. We know that each spirit magic spell is really hundreds of unique charms that all just have similar effects, so it makes sense for there to occasionally be small differences.