HreshtIronBorne

1 hour ago, icebrand said:

Bow, crossbow and firearms are their own skills, again you roll with a different type at -20 and with a different class at 1/2. So a character can actually pick up a mostali flintlock and fire it and have a chance to hit instead of wasting their action. My rationale is that using different weapons almost never happens, and this encourages a bit of variety (+ it's a bit more realistic imho)

I really love this. Some of our most epic moments at the table came from using things we just found or things we'd had a long time in ways not quite supported by the rules. I vividly remember throwing a Stone Greataxe at a flying enemy while under the effects of Berserk. I got lucky and it worked and it was awesome. It would be fun to encourage that sort of stuff a little more. 

17 hours ago, Darius West said:

In the case of the Orlanthi, their tactics generally will not favor their victory against a pike formation.

My favorite trick when playing an Orlanthi PC against enemy formations is the Teleport spell. Some coordinated Teleportation can do wonders to shatter a shield wall. Along with all the other spells an Orlanthi clan can bring to bear. 

That's where an argument can be made for AP and HP of an object but, tracking all that can get fiddly unless everyone at the table gets drama out of watching their weapons/shields get battered down and they help keep track. 

I think having a "close" fighting distance would do a lot to emphasize the real utility of natural weapons, daggers, and the like in the most elegant way. It also backs up some of the more dangerous elements in the lore of Glorantha without having to give them gross/obnoxious/incongruous powers to let them tackle tough targets. A shortsword should beat a greatsword in a dark Pavis alley or bedchamber. 

There are specific shaman abilities in the RQG core book that allow a shaman to Specialize in the sense that he will be more likely to encounter more powerful examples of his specialized spirit and has a bonus to interacting with them. 

This has led to our shamans showing a definite tendency to specializing in the local spiritual 'fauna' so to speak. A praxian was pretty likely to take bonuses versus animal spirits and use them and their spells pretty liberally. We also used a bunch of the new spirit powers like Spirits that can bite and stuff so they can interact on multiple levels. 

I had never even noticed the 5 year rule. Our PCs took something like 7 or so years to get all of the stat and skill requirements to go out for Priesthood and/or Rune-Lordship. We also were playing Six Seasons in Sartar at the time. I will keep spoilers to a minimum. 

I would have to strongly disagree. It might not be everyone's cup of tea but, high-level play is done. The RAW for RQG do make skill % in the several hundred range harder to achieve if you stick with the One Adventure and One Chance to Go Up per season. 

Combining the powers of different child and cultures can turn things up to 11 and let even relatively new characters mess with baddies that would ROFLstomp initiates in old RQ2/3 days. 

This combining of differenr magics is basically exactly what Argrath and everyone else is trying to do as we race towards the Hero Wars. I am sure when we get rules for HeroQuesting officially we will have a great window into how mortal men can gain the powers to defeat Gods. Without having to come up with the details yourself. 

I did forget to mention that in my post but, Multispell is incredibly powerful for giving your PC or party the edge in terms of action economy and damage/utility throughput. Being able to launch Disrupt 3 for 3d3 or put protection X on half the party in a single round is a huge deal. 

An allied spirit with access to a buttload of MP, some solid spirit spells, and Multispell is a force multiplier to be feared! Not to mention God Tier spells like Heal Body. 

This also reminds me of how strong Full Shaman are in the RAW. Depending on how your GM rules on combining Multispell and the Shamanic Ability - Spell Barrage you can get truly RIDICULOUS levels of spell flinging. In our last campaign the Shaman was using Multispell 5 and had spell barrage 6, I think he was nuking 6 dudes at a time for 6d3 damage, which almost assuredly disables a hit location on most things. 

On 4/1/2022 at 3:38 PM, EpicureanDM said:

So tell me about the special abilities, magic items, and allied spirits that you've seen used to defeat foes even close to the level of these NPCs. How do the players actually use the rules of the game, round by round, to win this sort of fight?

We played a game using the RQ3 rules that lasted about 2 and a half, maybe 3 years. It was pver a decade ago so I cannot be incredibly specific with the details. 

My character was basically Argrath. We were doing a whole Grand Argrath campaign. Started out as River Voices, from Borderlands, I think. Eventually freed the White Bull and sailed down in the Cradle. By that point my PC had 150ish base hit chance, fully buffed around 210 or so I think. He had just acquired the Wind Sword from Griffin Mountain, so had some badass Sylphs and a ton of MP to fuel himself and his allied spirit. I know at one point he had a Spell Enhancing 6 crystal thay would double any spell up to 6, so he was casting protection 12 and bladesharp 12 and so forth. 

At the end of the campaign when we were slaying Kaiju for fun and killed the Avatar of Cacodemon from Dorastor my PC had something like 450% Greatsword skill fully buffed. He had sacrificed for a ton of Teleport (his favorite spell) and Shield. We were playing with the ability to layer Chainmail and Iron Plates, dunno if that is RAW. So, my PC had full Iron which I think was something like 17 points of AP everywhere? That plus a Protection 12 and Shield 12 goes a LONG WAY to surviving against ridiculous enemies. The hardest part is the CHA limit on RP makes it hard to get to crazy levels of Rune Spells with a very seasoned adventurer in RQG as opposed to RQ3, although initiates can now ACTUALLY USE their spells so I will take it! I vividly remember cutting King Kong from Monster Island in half in a single hit, Greatsword + Bladesharp 12 + Truesword + Strength 12 + Strength of Basmol on 22 Str (Thanks Gosman) = a HELLUVA lot of damage. Approx. 4d8+12+4 or 5d6(I can't remember RQ3 DB chart) specialing on a 90 for 8d8 + 12 + 5d6 and critting on a 23 for 76 +5d6.

Most of our adventures came straight out of the books and we found most of our loot from them, some stuff we got was invented by the GM. He specifically gave us a Staff of Chalana Arroy early in the campaign with a Resurrection and a Heal Body as we really liked our PCs and didn't wanna reroll a lot (sue me, I was 16).

We had done a LOT of HeroQuesting throughout the campaign. At that time we were basing our acquired powers on Crits during HeroQuests so he had powers like Always Lands On His Feet because he survived an Impossible Jump/Fall on a Heroquest with a lucky crit. 

In my experience any campaign that runs long enough tends to get PCs that can push 200ish or more percent pretty easily if they have good stats and therefore category bonuses, even in RQG. The last RQG PC I played only 7 or so years of game time at one adventure per season mostly and had 150 or with Greatsword and a dozen or so RP and just had become a Sword of Humakt. He had just slain Brangbane after an epic adventure leading a small party. He was equipped with a mayrix he had sacrificed most of the POW for that the local Sword made for him with linked Strength + Coordination + Mobility and an MP Crystal which is a great buff spell! Our party also contained a Sorcerer capable of casting a +3d6 damage Boon of Kargan Tor for 8 weeks or so, so he maintained it on all of the party warriors. Simply gross on the Humakti! With an Iron Greatsword and armor he was really just getting started though, he would have nearly no way of tackling the stuff that Dorastor would throw at him without very clever tactics or a lot of running. I can definitely see ways you could gain the power to fight those enemies with the tools present in RQG though. An Orlanth Adventurous /Odayla initiate has access to some pretty freaking amazing spells and abilities. Orlanth mixed with almost any allied cult is awesome!

Very specific example of battle for the Humakti. Cast Shield 4 on self, cast Truesword on Sword, then Shield 1 on Sword (to precent dispelling for at least 1 swing). Cast Strength, mobility, and Coordination with the Matrix. Allied spirit casts bladesharp 6 on sword, Protection 6 on Self. Orlanthi casts Leap on Humakti. Humakti leaps over battlements and proceeds to destroy entire Lunar garrison, barely slowing until he hits the leader. They have an exciting duel. This is without Sword Trance as the Humakti needed to have presence of mind to get in and out. 

Our party had a lot of passive buffs as well, like Boon of Kargan Tor from the sorcerer which is a huge buff. For really big battles we knew were coming we would use the Humakti's Morale which does a LOT to buff the party for big deal battles. Combining Humakti Morale with am Ernaldan's Bless Champion, (with say Protection 6, Earth Shield, and Shield for example) can turn one guy into an absolute fucking BEAST for a whole adventure. 

3 minutes ago, Godlearner said:

Sure, then fighting trolls. The good thing about them is that you do not need to attune them. You can then locate the arrow heads with a Detect Iron spell

Ooooh, that is a great Idea for a Hawkeye/Green Arrow-ish character with arrows for certain baddies and a couple of relevant deredtion spells.

These 6 Iron Arrows have slain 27 Trolls! Lol

I have seen UnEnchanted Iron used in Arrow heads, also Silver for harming werewolves and the like. Silver works either enchanted or not to hurt magically weak cretures. Any kind of Lead is a fantastic Sling Stone. 

7 hours ago, jajagappa said:

If these undead are enchanted constructs, fueled with added MP, then they are almost like spirit binding matrices.  If a spirit did attack, and brings the MP to 0, they might get pulled into the undead, and effectively trapped within (though potentially they could then animate the corpse).

Ooops, it's a Ghoul!

1 hour ago, Richard S. said:

1 hour ago, Ironwall said:

So you can with summon specific ancestor but what about summon ancestor. Could it still be from that far back.

Yes, but since its random it's entirely at the discretion of the GM.

Or an appropriate and/or hilarious series or Crits/Fumbles. Depending on whether you really would rather have that ONE ancestor notice you or not. I could see some of Orlanth's mean old uncles being rather unpleasant to meet face to face. 

1 hour ago, Ladygolem said:

To me this implies that in actual play terms, you can call for divine intervention after damage is dealt. "That's 26 damage to the head, you're dead. Do you want to try to D. I. before that happens?"

This is almost verbatim how it comes up at our table too, regardless of cult. Lol. 

I was mostly referring to the list of powers that seems almost completely outside the purview of the other Gloranthan Magicians. Self-Resurrection is no more OP, really, than any other amazing Gloranthan Magical Power. It is sure as Hell an awesome ability though!

Just looking through the Shaman Abilities and new powers for Spirits in the bestairy gives a TON of really awesome stuff to work with.

Things like Spirit Affinity would make the local spirits more likely to help and on average more powerful. Spell Barrage is FREAKING AMAZING, especially if you combine it with Multispell and how your GM solves that headache. (We had a Shaman Thanos Snapping something like 8 dudes a round out of existence. Spell Barrage 3, so 4 spells a round and Mulstispell 3 for 4 spells in each set of casts. 3 disrupts per target for 3d3 just mangles people) Self-Resurrection seems hella ridiculous OP and Sorcerers ain't got shit on that unless they are awesome HeroQuesters or something. 

Between a Fetch and Soul Expansion a Shaman can have effectively Unlimited Power depending on how long they have been at it and how weird they can get with Taboos. I cannot find it in the rule right now but, I think the Fetch adds to the Shaman's POW for Magical attack and defense. Which would mean they almost always hit with their multitude of spells.

Also anytime at our table. Even for a Humakti. Sometimes people get caught up in the excitement of a situation or get talked over or something. Best to not nitpick on protocols as far as our group is concerned.

Divine Intervention is just a CHANCE to get saved, anyway. Even if it does save you, you can be completely crippled if you roll badly. 

As for having an NPC running a fully Extended Find Enemy, I would reserve it only for the dedicated Bodyguards of the most badass NPCs. They can afford to have a guy on retainer that spends a portion of his RP to lock in a solid defense against. I would say 80-90% of encounters wouldn't need to worry about Detect or Find Enemy used from an NPC side, unless they suspected sneaking enemies for some reason. 

The exception would be places of extreme magical power, like an enemy Temple or something where there is a lot of POW and MP dedicated to defending a small area. 

My point was mostly from a PC use perspective. I think that 5 RP is a good solid investment in being a badass defender of your people. 

I like the idea that the birth of Osentalka/Nysalor/Gbaji was a Lozenge-wide Worship Ceremony or HeroQuest. I feel it sort of jives with what we have recently heard from Jeff about the Holy Country and Proximate Divine Realms. 

I had never considered the Sun Stop from the ppint of view that maybe Time HADN'T stopped. Could you even tell if there was time if the God Time/Golden Age Static Sun was overlayed on Glorantha?

Maybe the Pseudocosmic Egg and the machinations of the Council brought the God Time to the Material World in the same way but everywhere?

The Spider in the Sky would be an interesting God Time moment to ponder. 

If someone wants to spend a boat-load of RP on Emulating thier God/Bringing them to the World to help them Defend the Stead or be the Dutiful Watchmen then more Power to them. 

Humakti and Babeester Gori can throw down huge power spikes in Truesword/Slash and Sword/Axe Trance and other spells. Orlanthi can Extend a number of their spells for all sorts of shenanigans. 1-2 points of Leap or Darkwalk extended til next Holy Day means all sorts of fun. 

Why shouldn't someone be able to dedicate their RP to being a DAMN GOOD watchman? There are spells and techniques to circumvent these detections in the Rules and the Lore. So what if the average roaming band of broo or whatever is detectable? The crafty opponents might not show up due to your finicky magic, their intent to not harm, or their magically concealed malice. Who knows?

In our Glorantha the Healing Enhancing and Spell Enhancing Crystals ALWAYS affect their respective spells as long as they are attuned.

A Healing Enhancing 4 crystal would double any healing spells cast, up to its POW of 4.

Making Heal 1 into 2,

Heal 2 into 4,

Heal 3 into Heal 6,

and Heal 4 into Heal 8.

Any further points of Heal would only have 4 additional levels, Heal 6 would cast as Heal 10. 

All of the bonus comes from the crystals, doesn't even cost extra MPs. 

That is how we have played them anyways. 

A caravanserai advertising pack would be great! Good guide to fuel the adventurous Issaries.

16 minutes ago, soltakss said:

In my HeroQuesting, HeroQuestors can use skills they don't have, simply because the deity had the skill (Heroic Knowledge). They can pick up some of the skill after the HeroQuest, as a residual effect, so they magically learn the skill.

Do they do this by using a Rune the God had or something else to embody whoever they are playing on the HeroQuest?

Sorry, should I buy these rules somewhere? :D

We have always played with damage in excess of parry going to the rolled location. 

I am just starting up a new cmapaign with Glorantha newbies and I think I am going to try out Shield parries having excess damage go to the Shield Arm, as it could give shields a bit of an adge over dual wielding and will DEFINITELY increase the longevity of new players. Lol

1 hour ago, Ryan Kent said:

So I checked out the Well of Daliath entry on the Spirit Binding spell in the RBoM and it indicated that with Spirit binding, as opposed to Control (Spirit) you don't need to first defeat the spirit in spirit combat to bind it.  You merely have to cast the Spirit binding spell and then win a POW vs. POW roll to force it into a crystal or an object prepared with Binding Enchantment.  

Well, fantastic! That makes it incredibly easy to get your crystals filled with spirits. Huzzah for regenerating mana batteries!

Spirit Binding
1 Point
Ranged, Instant
This spell is used to bind spirits into familiars or magical objects: see the Binding Enchantment spell (RuneQuest, page 249) and Binding Spirits into Animals (RuneQuest, page 250) for more information. Binding spirits into familiars demands the use of special cult-bred animals. Magical objects for holding spirits can be made using the Binding Enchantment ritual (page 110), others can be obtained from a temple or while adventuring. The death of the binder frees the spirit, even if the binder is immediately revived through divine intervention or other methods.

This is the full text of the spell from RBoM pg. 121. 

It looks to me like it would allow the caster to try and put the fresh "ghost" into a crystal if there were an empty one available. It just says you need a suitable Binding, it doesn't matter what kind. 

My only question would be what the procedure is? Is it just POW vs POW? Do you need to make it visible unless it is attacking? Can a shaman just snap up spirits he sees randomly with a 1 point spell and some crystals?