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On 1/23/2021 at 6:46 AM, Shiningbrow said:

D&D also has Small, Medium, Large, etc... And, one of the downfalls (in my more simulationist opinion) is that a tall bulky STR-based human can wear the same gear (loot) as a short slim DEX-based elf... all Medium!

Iirc there are rules for plate armors that must be fitted for new owners in D&D.

On 1/22/2021 at 10:03 AM, egyptian said:

I'm really new to Runequest, and still trying to get my head around the setting. One of the things that's giving me some trouble is understanding the technology level of Glorantha. I know it's 'Bronze Age', but I also see a lot of things that would be anachronisms-heavy horse, two-handed swords, crossbows, heck some of those clothes dyes probably wouldn't have been around until the 19th century! I'm as ready to accept differences in the march of science in a magical world as anybody, I'm just curious if there's somewhere to start so I know what is and is not available in this world. Thanks in advance, any help is much appreciated.

The tech level of Glorantha is about 300 BCE Mediterranean and China with its pike phalanxes, triremes, crossbows, water mills etc. Ie. centuries later than bronze age Earth. But the objects which would have been made from iron are made from bronze.

Fonrit has millers (Guide p. 43) and there are water mills in Peloria: The Empire works like a good waterwheel, which goes on day and night whether the miller is there or not. (Guide p. 307). And there's also a hamlet in Colymar called Greenbrass, though the name might not be from the mill's brass anymore.

On 1/22/2021 at 4:04 PM, coffeemancer said:

Well, Heortal from the "cattle raid" adventure have accompanied the PC's as a pathfinder and carrier for a few adventures and now become the backboy(squire) and servant of the thane of apple lane.
He's the one-boy fanclub of the PC's, who gifted him a sword after the battle for apple lane.

His mum is rather upset with them, as a PC feud got him nearly killed but she also got hired as a house servant by the thane and she cant keep Heortal from becoming a warrior forever...

Hah, he became a squire in my group too.

3 hours ago, Akhôrahil said:

Does Glorantha have what used to be called blue-green algae? Presumably it does? In that case, we would seem to have a slam dunk for (the Gloranthan equivalent of) prokaryotes and bacteria.

Blue elves perhaps?

On 1/22/2021 at 7:07 PM, Ladygolem said:

That's what I was trying to get at earlier - despite skis being very useful on snow, they are only widely used in Scandinavia and the Russian White Sea coast until the 1800s, with some very early evidence of their use in Xinjiang about 5000 years ago. This was not widespread tech, even if you only consider areas with significant snowfall. Clearly, other factors are at play here.

There is scant evidence of snowshoes outside of North America, but here they are widespread across almost every indigenous people from the Arctic to the Great Plains. These make much more sense as widespread snow-traversal technology, and sleds even more so, which were used worldwide.

 

Yeah this is the reason why I thought that Sartarites didn't use them, even though they would be useful and Sartarite craftsmen being able to make them. But looks like that they are more widespread than the Guide says, even if not common.

10 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

Yes of course, but it illustrates that ditching your shield when you run away is standard. You probably leave any metal leg greaves at home as well, because I cannot imagine that running in them is much fun.

And considering that a medium wooden shield costs 60% of the value of a cow (!!), tossing several of them during a retreat makes a significant economic impact on the raid.

I use houserules for movement and encumbrance, so ditching greaves and shields is a valid option in many situations.

2 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

If I were an Orlanthi, I would like to invent a Taser spell, because man, it sucks to kill people!

My players decided that since killing just three opponents would be more expensive than all the cattle were worth, and that was assuming they won, they went full orate and animal lore instead, rolling really well too.

Smart move! As for the tazer, Demoralize and Befuddle are quite useful for that purpose, and get you POW increase chances too. Of course they have a limited duration.

My take is that they are buried Orgorvale's worshippers. Perhaps only priests and nobles?

Just now, Akhôrahil said:

I'm also using various fraught encounters (Cattle Raid from the GM pack was another) between the PC clan and another one to slowly build towards a feud.

Hah, that one almost caused a feud in my campaign, since the players went all murder hobo. It was settled with wergild, but they earned a few enemies still.

41 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

Wergild or feud, yes. Something has gone seriously wrong if a shepherd has died.

I'm currently GM:ing the scenario from the quickstart, and there will be so much legal fallout from it that the scenario doesn't discuss.

In my Colymar campaign bloodfeud is one of the themes, and the antagonist in the Quickstart scenario was from the feuding family, and the dead herders were from the pcs' family.

If a group of youths want to go raid some cattle, do they need permission from their family elders and clan chief for it? And how big a share can they keep from it, and how much do they give to the family elders and chief?

37 minutes ago, Scorus said:

Yeah, the books are all over the place on this one. Most anyone conversant in English will define "someone that has been initiated into a cult" as being an Initiate of a cult!

If few are initiated, then why are all the NPCs in the RQG publications initiates? In GA, Vareena, the 21 year old waitress in the small village of Apple Lane, is an initiate. Her father the livery man is an initiate. Arnalda the tenant farmer is an initiate. Her 16 year old daughter is an initiate. All of the Varmandi herders are initiates. I'm not seeing a named, human lay member in any of GA, Pegasus Plateau, or Smoking Ruin.

The cults themselves seem to back up the fact that initiation is not common by charging 20L to become an initiate, the equivalent of a year's salary for most people. All the people listed in the last paragraph are among the poorest professions and yet 100% of them are initiates.

Could Jeff just come here and answer this one? It really does make a difference in our games whether 30% or 100% of adults have rune magic!

My guess is that it's for game balance reasons.

39 minutes ago, Alex said:

"Not most", "60-70%", or "nearly every adult" -- Our Glorantha Has Rarely Been So Varied!

But the Q&A disposes of that last (albeit rather generously to their own frankly poor wording -- initiated non-initiates? -- and rather unkindly to the hapless reader).  The first two are actually rather compatible, if you apply the reading I suggested earlier:  Sartar is noticeably initiatier than average.  So the "not most" is lozengeally true in general, but the "60-70%" is true specifically for "hardcore Orlanthi" types.

Yeah, the meaning of initiate is someone who has been initiated.

10 hours ago, John Biles said:

The rulebook also explicitly says nearly every adult (in the lands the rules cover, anyway) is an iniitiate.

I asked about this in the first Q&A thread:

Q: Page 269 in the RQG book: “Most who belong to a cult are lay members, without any authority or position within the cult.”

Page 73 in the RQG book: “Nearly every adult is initiated into the cult of a specific deity.”

Which is it?

A: You’re confusing being initiated into a cult with being an initiate of that cult. Most everyone in the world is a member of one cult or another, a lay member. Only a small number take the test sacrifice a point of POW and gain a Rune point, and still fewer go on to become Rune Masters or God-talkers within that cult. 

I agree that the word choice on page 73 is confusing. A clearer version might be “Nearly every adult is a member of the cult of a specific deity.” 

For the purposes of player character adventurers, all are considered to be initiates, so the sentence on page 73 applies specifically to them.

48 minutes ago, Beorne said:

Reading RQG I have not well understood how many adults are Initiates or only lay members to gods, it seems that almost everyone is Initiate to some God ..how much Lay members between adults, especially in Dragon Pass Area?

Thank you.

Yeah, this should definitely be put in the books somewhere. 10-30% are the numbers I've seen in some threads, but I can't find an official answer.

16 minutes ago, metcalph said:

There's been a mention of skiing elves in RQ3 book5 but that's it

Like, one elf using two other for skis?

17 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

Maybe Snow Trolls are biologically adapted, with large feet to spread the weight, similar to bears?

Iirc this was mentioned in some older book.

7 minutes ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

How do you manage a character 1.70 meter tall (size 11) and 140 kg (size 20) ?

What size will you use as the "official one" ? (to calculate skill bonus/malus, etc )

 

My first intent is to choose the height size  (for strike rank) but I see some issue with hp and stealth bonus.

The last thought I have is mixing them :

- height size for strike rank

- max(height size and weight size) for stealth bonus

- average size for hp

- the appropriate size in situation of charactristic roll (watch beyond the wall : height, break the bridge: weight)

and I may miss other impacts.

 

I m not challenging the rules, one size characteristic is enough, that is not my point. I m cleary focus on house rule to solve a very very local issue

 

 

I'd use height for strike rank, and mass for everything else, if the character's density is the same as humans'. But if the character is eg. made from stone, I'd use the height for armor price too (I'm using the older edition's rules where larger armors cost more.)

32 minutes ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

I wouldn't put it past trolls to ski or use snow shoes. They'd get tired of trudging through three feet of snow too, I'd imagine.

The Guide specifically mentions that the Snow Trolls don't use them, but perhaps Dark Trolls might.

1 hour ago, Akhôrahil said:

Rathori canonically use snow-shoes.

Oh yeah, I had forgotten about them.

On 1/15/2021 at 5:55 PM, Akhôrahil said:

I think it's pretty bad (but then I also have membership in that band). I don't think I have ever seen a game that is this good in all the other aspects while having this poor consistency and rules-editing. The rules look like they've been slapped together through copy&paste from different products.

Agreed. At times I've felt like a haruspex looking at entrails when trying to understand RQG's rules, but the official Q&A threads have been useful. And these days the response time is very fast.

Does anyone else other than the humans near Valind's Glacier use skis or snow shoes?

6 hours ago, soltakss said:

I think the standard advice should apply:

• Don't bother converting D20 scores for Hit Locations, recalculate HP per Location and Strike ranks, just use the values in the supplement
• Add runes and passions on the Fly, if you need them
• Use the Runespells as written, don't bother converting them into a Rune Pool, unless you want the NPC as a recurring character

From memory, the scenario should work reasonably well as it is, without any particular conversion.

Yeah it worked fine when I ran it. My players' characters were from MOB's Sun County Cradle scenario, and worked perfectly for it. It's a well written scenario, quite Cthulhu-like, but unfortunately the rest of the book isn't as good.

28 minutes ago, coffeemancer said:

if you sail into another world would it be one of the Gloranthas that may vary?

Oh, this is a good one.

1 minute ago, Montellano said:

Thought it also had something to do with the humungous flowers growing there.

Isn't that a bit south?