Austin

On 2/11/2021 at 10:23 AM, PhilHibbs said:

They do make a fair few very minor mistakes, like 1D6-1 for skill experience instead of 1D6, shamans getting +20 on POW gain rolls, strike ranks are often out, etc.

Another one worth noting is player uncertainty about if the fetch's POW adds to adventurer POW for just magic defense, or both defense and attack. That error's relevant because of how the Hero Soul was being compared to the fetch, in that in addition to its other abilities it adds to the adventurer's effective POW.

IMO that constant bonus to POW for attack and defense is probably the most powerful ability of Hero Soul, because it doesn't cost resources to activate.

Also worth remembering that some rules for Hero Soul were published in TSR:

(page 187)

Which seems to match up more or less with Jeff's explanations in the house campaign, and the further speculation on this thread.

On 2/11/2021 at 3:03 PM, PhilHibbs said:

Also the mechanism that we have seen doesn't cover coming back with a magical item or creature. "I brought back The Purple Cow, whose milk tastes of Parma Violets!" How do you express that in Hero Soul POW?

I speculate that we're seeing a portion of the heroquesting mechanics, not the whole gamut. The adventurers didn't lead the Short Lightbringers Quest, they participated in it. If they were the ones leading—organizing the quest, taking the role Kallyr did, etc. etc.—I imagine the success/failure rules and consequent rewards or penalties are part of the main quester's portion.

23 minutes ago, Ladygolem said:

I love the illustration of the Foreigner's Gate, even in such a simple style it has a really good sense of scale and use of shape! I can picture how badass the relief would look even now! The whole thing has a really grounded feel, like this could be a reconstruction of an RW archaeological site.

Thanks! I've ended up reading a lot of archaeologically-bent history recently, and anything I ever read always bleeds into what I'm working on. I can't remember what the lintel relief depicts anymore - a city hero triumphant, I think? - but on the inside of that great wing-fortification, facing those leaving the city, is a similar-size relief of Issaries Pathfinder, blessing those who have visited. Both carved by the same sculptor, a cousin of Everendros (the architect who shaped the great walls).

Second portion of my downtime project mapping Sylthi, in Esrolia. As before, this is a rough draft, and questions and/or suggestions are welcomed.

Of note is that I'm pretty sure I've mucked up my scale on both this and the previous. Got out a tape measure in my living room to get a grip on what 5m feels like and the scale's probably closer to 6 or 8m per cm in small buildings, 5m in large spaces (like the Hall of Fire).

And a vista of the Foreigner's Gate in the south of the map. Less formal, more defensive, with a big ol' relief of Babs telling people to bugger off if they're enemies. I drew the vista concept a while ago, the map's more accurate to my current conception.

On 2/6/2021 at 4:05 PM, PhilHibbs said:

The up side is, like a fetch, these Hero Soul points add to your defence against incoming spells.

Do we know how this (or Hero Soul in general) interacts with a shaman's fetch?

I've gathered 2020's issues of #MOTM into one nice, convenient bundle over on the Jonstown Compendium.

Need man-eating Illuminate clowns? A cult of trap geeks, or clouds made of sheep? How about a duck leviathan? Monster of the Month has all that and more in this 150+ page bundle. Including printer-friendly NPCs, weird spirit cults, and a full-length adventure, MOTM has something for all players of RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha.

Note: I gave it a discount, because I felt slightly silly bundling these together without one. I gave it a *small* discount, because I felt that was most fair to those lovely persons who have bought issues as they came out.

If you're looking for a larger discount, you'll have to be patient, and wait for one of DTRPG's site-wide sales.

The first #MOTM issue of the year is now available!

This month's issue inaugurates a series presenting powerful Rune Masters for your game of RuneQuest. Shaivalla is a power-hungry priestess of Ernalda. Inside, you'll find her history and motives, a magic item, and the retinue which accompanies her throughout Dragon Pass.

About this Series: Monster of the Month is a series of bestiary entries for Chaosium's RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha. In addition to statblocks and behavior, most issues include supplemental detail and advice for gamemasters and/or new adventurer options for players.

As some folks may remember, I've been working on Esrolia material. I shared this rough draft map over on the Facebook groups recently, and thought some of y'all who don't get over there often may enjoy it.

It's one district of the small city Sylthi, which I've been exploring and writing about. This project's something more or less on the backburner, but I find working on visual elements a fun way to relax, so I keep chipping away at it. Feedback or questions are welcomed, but I'm mostly sharing because I like how this turned out. As I work through more maps I'll probably share them in this thread, too. This is very much a rough draft, and will probably be revised several times as the City Guide keeps developing and changing.

At the moment, my focus for Jonstown material is writing issues of MOTM, then probably Treasures of Glorantha volume 2, then something else (probably a piece called Melikaphkaz: the O-God of Traps). If you'd like to know more about what I've been up to (and see some more Sylthi concept doodles) I wrote about it over on my blog recently. The posts are long, but I hope pretty comprehensive. I'm happy to field questions about that stuff too, if folks have them.

Stone & Bone's great, and you can grab and go with it.

I wrote up a conversion to RQG for the adventure "Temple at Feroda" from the Gloranthan Classics series Pavis & Big Rubble, which is available somewhere on these forums (a search for the title should do it). I believe that adventure is also in Pavis: Threshold to Danger for RuneQuest Classic but my memory on what content is in what product is a little fuzzy there. The supplement premise plays pretty well as written in the 1625 timeline.

My adventure The Throat of Winter and the adventure in MOTM #12 The Quacken both can fit in Prax with minimal alteration. Although Throat is set in Sartar, I actually ran my playtest of it as part of my game in Prax! It's site-based, and suggests alternative locations. Likewise The Quacken adventure works basically anywhere along the coast - I suggest a few miles east of Corflu would work well (or with Corflu itself, though you'd need to make up more stuff on your own, then).

18 hours ago, soltakss said:

I am happy to answer any questions here.

Favorite spell/skill?

RELEASE! THE! QUACKEN!

(Sorry, I couldn't resist...)

The Quacken introduces a terrible new sea monster to your RuneQuest bestiary. This leviathan-sized issue of MOTM includes:

• A full description of the quacken, including a juvenile and a truly legendary variant, based upon the best knowledge Lhankor Mhy can look up
• The coastal settlement of Stone Dock Village, a movable micro-setting including a map and three non-player characters
• Clash with the Quacken, an adventure intended to provide one to two sessions of play, which pits the adventurers against the powers of the Sea
• Plus illustrations of squiddy horror, portraits of most major non-player characters, and printer-friendly handouts of their description for the gamemaster

This supplement includes everything the gamemaster needs to put the fear of Magasta into their adventurers!

Holiday cash burning a hole in your pocket? Neglected to get something for your penniless adventurers? Treasures of Glorantha has plenty of plunder to reward them with! On sale now at the Jonstown Compendium (but only if you use this link). This discount's only good for a few days—if you want to take advantage, do so now.

50 minutes ago, Jason D said:

I'm making edits now based on everything prior to this post, and will do another pass at the very end of December. There'll be a new .pdf released soon after that. 

Thanks for letting me know. Here's my notes thus far. If I get the opportunity to make further progress, I'll update.

Red Book of Magic Errata Notes.pdf Red Book of Magic Proofreading Notes.pdf

1 hour ago, Byll said:

I suppose one could reduce the SIZ required by placing the illusory sight behind an obstruction of some sort? Or would that be cheating? 

Since illusion magic is essentially cheating to begin with, manipulating to the utmost it is probably OK.

Or, use a very thin illusion. Very, very thin.

JW, is there an ETA on when the corrections thread will be closed? Sorry if this has been stated before, I don't have the time presently to skim through. I'm working through my own proofread of the RBM, but can't imagine I'll be done until sometime after the New Year.

1 hour ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

Captain Souls is top tier magic. Brings back Mindlink plus its better?

IIRC it's one-way, not two-way.

Thus far, my obvious cheese highlight is Cyclical (characteristic). Add in a minion running around throwing Glowspot at you for added effect. "Only" 14 Rune points to double all of your characteristics.

Of course, the best use is to use Cyclical INT to improve your Free INT for casting Moonfire. I love the smell of moon rock in the morning...

I wrote another "first impressions" article, in case anyone's still on the fence about Ye Olde Mountain of Spells.

1 minute ago, Jeff said:

It actually has to be - there was not a God Time Red Moon, so it is very had to have a Rune Spell hurl meteors of Moon Rock down on the earth. It needed to be a spirit magic spell and that had the added bonus that it could get manipulated by Lunar magic.

Ooh, like that logic.

This month's issue of Monster of the Month is now available! Enormous thanks to Diana, of Beer With Teeth infamy for designing this wonderful monster (though I must confess, I encouraged her).

Air Toads! brings an amphibian with explosive temper to your games of RuneQuest. A cousin of the common cliff toad, air toads can be found on mountain crags and in sullen marshes anywhere in Glorantha.

This supplement includes:

• An essay on the behavior and biology of air toads
• Advice for the gamemaster, including adventure seeds and "The Proper Use of a Deceased Air Toad"
• Brief perspectives from non-Orlanthi cultures
• And printer-friendly handouts for ease of use at your table.

About this Series: Monster of the Month is a series of new bestiary entries for Chaosium's RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha. In addition to statblocks and behavior, most entries will include supplemental detail and advice for gamemasters and/or new adventurer options for players.

12 hours ago, smiorgan said:

What do we know about the planned Starter Set?

I can't provide quotes, but from the buzz I've heard I believe it's a boxed set, and the content is focused on Jonstown. It will have new pre-gens (I've heard around a dozen? but I don't think I've seen that guess from a Chaosium employee), and a soloquest. I presume it'll have at least one standard adventure as well. I believe the focus is on usability for both new and experienced players.

On a related note, I've put together a Monster of the Month bundle, which will remain public for that same limited time. You can get it here!

The bundle is of all current issues of MOTM (so it won't include the new one this month). 25% off a total of 90 pages of content! If you already own any issues, the bundle excludes them from the listed price.

19 hours ago, Caras said:

Do any other cult have minor holy days, other than Ernalda? It is only one in corebook that says of having them.

Issaries is also listed in the core rulebook. Which immediately led to my player constantly trying to spell trade his "spare" Rune points. I think there might be one more which does, but I can't remember off the top of my head.

Don't forget your associate cult holy days too, for extra RP replenishing! IIRC minor holy days don't count, only seasonal or HHD.

I believe it has been stated in forum/FB threads that Orlanth has a weekly minor holy day as well, and that this will be in the forthcoming Cults book. I can't recall an exact source on that to point people towards.

A lot of the major cults, getting filled up to 10-ish RP is fairly easy each season, if you attend every available worship service. Seasonal, 2-ish associate, hey-presto, magic battery is ready to rock. The only adventurer in my game who regularly had trouble was a Humakti (no associate cult worship) with 9 RP because he began play as an old man. He really cared about his adventurer's worship opportunities, to the point of slightly-derailing a few adventures.

When I'm playing D&D/D20 stuff in my RQ games, I use a rule of thumb of Modifier ×5 equals skill percentage. So if an opponent has +12 to hit, that's 60%. It's not perfect, obviously, but it gets the point across and helps me fly by the seat of my pants from the book.

Magic's a lot harder, because the approach to magic in D&D and in RQ/BRP is pretty different. The biggest difference is HP pools. This seems especially true in 5E, where basic scenario design seems to be about HP attrition and how players respond to it. Plus, depending on your edition, there may be a greater variety of spell effects provided for in D&D/Pathfinder than in BRP. Sometimes they just don't map one-to-one.

My preference is to mostly re-write NPCs like Simon shared, if I've got the time for it. I often need to re-write magic items, too, but not always. Remember that while some folks might poo-poo it, a +1 bracers of armor or similar simple, generic magic items are plenty useful and welcome in BRP games. That sort of constant Protection effect is the sort of magic item my group actively desires. I was very excited when I finally got my first +1-equivalent sword in RQ. I would recommend making those items more rare than they're treated in most D&D editions, though. BRP's typical scarcity of magic items makes them more desirable, but a simple, generic magic item is perfectly useful.

Another useful rule of thumb is to use an effect's DC as part of a resistance table roll, compared to a characteristic. Or, to use DC×5 and a characteristic× in a Mythras-style opposed roll.

For experiences, most of the RQ I've done as a player was old AD&D modules my friend ran for RQ (I think he used a monster generator for characteristics and just swapped what was in the module for something comparable). Of those, I'd definitely recommend trying out The Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan. It's pretty much a straight-up dungeon-crawl, but in a more lethal game like RQ/BRP it's really hard. Really fun, too. GMing RQG, I've mostly run my own stuff, but I have also run a few things using D20 in RQG (an adventure excerpted from the Wheel of Time D20 campaign, and The Spire of Iron & Crystal for Pathfinder, by Frog God Games).

1 hour ago, g33k said:

Q for the author:  is one of these NPCs named "Clackwise?"

Well, a few of them have some clacks in their pocket, although none are especially wise about spending them...

This month's issue of Monster of the Month is now available — Happy Halloween!

Content Warning: This supplement contains themes of grisly horror and violence. Gamemasters are encouraged to confer with their players before bringing this material to their group's game.

The Troupe of Terror presents a gang of six man-eating ogres with which the gamemaster can terrorize their players. Woken to Illumination by the magical performances of the Puppeteer Troupe, they represent the worst evils enabled by that mystical consciousness. Now, these ogres roam Dragon Pass in the guise of minstrels and clowns wielding the reality-warping illusions of the Puppeteer.

This supplement includes:

• A sketch of Illumination and Puppeteer magic, including markers to where the interested reader can learn more.
• Three adventure seeds to help introduce the Troupe into your game of RuneQuest.
• Six antagonists with a variety of skills, magics, and stories.

A Note: there's fair odds I'll expand this a bit in the next few days or weeks. I've got a short story in the works I'd like to include but I'm not quite satisfied with, and of course I still need to add the printer-friendly versions at the back of the PDF.

About this Series: Monster of the Month is a series of new bestiary entries for Chaosium's RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha. In addition to statblocks and behavior, most entries will include supplemental detail and advice for gamemasters and/or new adventurer options for players.