Austin

15 minutes ago, Jeff said:

This steep and conical mountain thrusts up abruptly above the Richvale. Its summit has an elevation of 2250 meters

Well, that's going to make the climb rather more interesting... suppose that's the adventurers' problem, not mine!  Thanks, Jeff, and David too. Nice to have a bit more info on the White River.

Are the mountain measurements from their visual base, or are they measuring from sea level like on Earth?

4 hours ago, DrGoth said:

Peace would involve change. Which makes absolute sense to me. What's the point of the game if not to change something?  These are the Hero Wars. You have to change things and make it happen. It's the end of a Gloranthan Age. Things do not stay the same.

Another point of my understanding of the two books was that that was what was going to happen without player intervention.  So, yep, things are mess unless the players make it otherwise.

Which to me makes for the foundation a for a good game.

7 hours ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

As a general rule, I tend to prefer not to "lose" cultures/factions/groups in fictional universe. The idea of the Lunars or Orlanthi having to disappear bums me out (although the canon does allow for some survival of Lunars in *some* sense). 

I've got a player experiencing the same frustrations both in-person and in-character as he starts digging into the lore and exploring the canon future. Which, for the record, I've explicitly told the players will basically happen unless they change something. Perhaps this reaction to the canon is intentional? I.e. "here's a terrible prophecy that says..." and then see how the players react? Glorantha's not a fiction setting, but a roleplaying game setting, after all.

A big part which bugs him is the death of the gods, the loss of magic. More the general apocalypse than the "keep everyone alive" angle. But I think the sentiments remain similar.

At the same time, as a storyteller I do feel it's important that not all stories have an "everyone wins" option. I typically find muddled endings more emotionally powerful than "and everyone lived happily ever after..." And Arkat/Argrath's sacrifice of moral character to save the world qualifies, for me.

Orlanth has a cuckold fetish. (I'm a little sorry for that.)

Has Wild Mountain ever been described in more detail than is in the Gamemaster Adventures book? I didn't find anything with a ctrl-F of Sartar: Kingdom of Heroes or the Guide.

2 hours ago, Richard S. said:

Maybe someone should start a "Smart Theories" thread at this rate, or at least a "Reasonable Theories" one...

Suspiciously-Plausible-But-Not-Quite-Substantiated Theories.

To Whom It May Concern, a black & white printer-friendly version of "Treasures of Glorantha V1" is now available! You should be able to find it in your library on DriveThruRPG under updated titles.

Bouncing off of Jeff's comments over in the Kallyr's LBQ thread...

It's suspicious to me just how similar the Seven Mothers' story is to the Lightbringer's Quest, and I believe there's some canon/apocryphal stuff about God Learnerism and using the LBQ or whatnot, but here's an extra Theory: they didn't just use the LBQ, they actually did the LBQ. The LBQ brings back what's needed for a Good Cosmos. For some reason, what was needed when the 7M did the LBQ was the Red Goddess.

1 hour ago, 7Tigers said:

Link to post

Did not know that was a tool. Thanks!

Sasa Radivojevic (the cover artist on Treasures and The Throat of Winter) posted this over on FB, and I thought it was too funny to not share over here, for those who aren't in both places.

Before and after!

This is why I need artists.

15 hours ago, Charles said:

Her son is dead, killed during his godquest.

Are you (or is anyone else) able to elaborate on this a little? I've never heard about Kallyr having a child before.

As a gamemaster, I use it to abstract large battles, as outlined in the core rulebook on page 176 so that we're not playing out ~100 rounds of melee combat. I also occasionally use it for smaller encounters when we don't have the time to run the encounter—for example, a skirmish with bandits on the road. I imagine it'd be useful for an adventurer to represent both tactical knowledge ("Hey GM, I want to roll my Battle to see if my adventurer knows a good strategy here that I don't.") and insight into preparing for combat ("Your successful Battle roll indicates that those high cliffs would be perfect for an ambush... if someone's not already up there.").

As a writer, I use the Battle skill to abstract how experienced a non-player character is with warfare, and to give a guideline on how they might behave. For example, an NPC with Battle 15%, but Broadsword 80%, is probably an excellent duelist, but has no clue how to make a shield wall. Likewise a character with Battle 90% but Short Spear 55% knows a lot about tactics and surviving a big conflict, but isn't personally an excellent warrior.

I also find the Battle skill useful as gamemaster shorthand for an NPC's combat skills.

8 hours ago, soltakss said:

17 hours ago, scott-martin said:

Are there no dumb fans?

Yes

My New Dumb Theory: There Are No Dumb Fans.

Lecture series coming soon to the University of Glamour...

Treasures of Glorantha is now out and available for plundering on the Jonstown Compendium! I've updated the OP to reflect this, and include a link. Enjoy!

FWIW I'm not convinced Iron rusts in Glorantha. I suspect Bronze corrodes because a) how common it is, which means b) lots of Air/Storm gods died in the Gods War, so there's plenty of mythic reason for bronze to "fail." I'm not convinced that a similar story currently exists to explain what we terrestrially understand as the oxidization process.

NB: it's become something of a joke in my game group that metals are completely, utterly bizarre in Glorantha because there's no chemistry, just mythology, and that colors a lot of my speculation regarding them.

5 hours ago, g33k said:

Or as an alternative take...

 

Sedenya goes a-heroquesting to repurpose the Storm-taming "Yoking of Urox" myth, instead taming Orlanth.

Orlanth becomes Prince-Consort under the Red Moon (literally "under", as she ascends through the Middle Air, and joins the Sky).

Peaceful coexistence (but Ernalda is probably pissed, so... maybe not).

Or both things happen; Jar-Eel/Sedenya fulfills the Storm-taming roles, while Argrath/Orlanth fulfills the wooing of Ernalda roles. Each seeing their own role, naturally, as the more important one. It seems to me that a common thread especially in Storm/Earth mythology is that a success can't happen without both roles involved, and each participant sees their role as the most important.

The one which always returns to my mind is that Orlanth couldn't have Made the Storm Tribe without Ernalda.

Just now, GAZZA said:

Happy to, but honestly my research will have to start with, "Holy Country, The" and proceed from there.  I suspect someone far cleverer than me has already developed something far more interesting, but I'll see what I can do.

Trust me, I've been there, am there, and will continue to be there . Just expressing my curiosity!

47 minutes ago, GAZZA said:

I suspect I'll need to work in this Belintar disappearance soon.

Please share what you do--that sounds really interesting!

1 hour ago, Richard S. said:

I'd believe it

Then clearly we need to go dumber.

The Red Goddess is a redhead.

Vinga is a redhead.

Therefore, Vinga is the Red Goddess.

QED.

1 hour ago, Tlalchitonatiuh said:

if i were to try and "sell" my group on playing runequest glorantha, what adventure do you all think would be the best to cut out teeth on?

If I were to start a new campaign with new players, I'd probably start with the title adventure of The Pegasus Plateau & Other Stories. I think it captures the ways in which Glorantha is weird and distinct from fantasy Middle Ages really well. That said, the Gamemaster Screen Pack is probably the best entry point for a new gamemaster & players because the adventures are integrated into a mini-campaign.

38 minutes ago, jajagappa said:

I don't agree with that premise.  Yes, Ernalda is central to Esrolian life, but citizenship needs to be broader and encapsulate men and women.  Citizenship encompasses such aspects as the markets, the guilds, even the Irillo hundreds.  

That makes sense. I'll try considering it longer. I think my brain went "Esrolia? Female superiority + earth goddesses, bam, done." That said, I do find something attractive in how those sorts of citizenship requirements institutionalize both the status of a city's noble houses and the status of women.

In my Sylthi, Syltha is something like an ancestress, like how I think Norinel is from what Joerg & dumuzid discussed. I've been treating her as the localized embodiment of Ernalda as well, and thus she would have been something like a nymph or oread. Semi-divine, probably within near descent from Esrola. I haven't determined the specifics yet, or mucked around much with the specifics of Sylthi's pre-Dawn mythology. She (or her descendants) found a family-house, from which the city's named (Sylthi, the people of Syltha). Her bloodline goes (supposedly) extinct in the Adjustment Wars, and House Netha refounds the city sometime between then and Belintar's arrival. I loosely imagine that event as similar to the Orane quest presented as an example in the HQG rulebook.

I'm willing to extrapolate that the "default" Esrolian city-goddess in my view is a land goddess/ancestress, and that most folks of a given city-state are consequently tightly tied to the land, in religious terms. But I'll give that some more thought as you suggest, both broadly, and for Sylthi in particular (it could be true of one and not the other, and either could be the true one).

Are other city gods/goddesses written up anywhere? I'm only really familiar with Glamour (which is Lunar, and weird even for Lunars I suspect) and that there's a very bland RQ3 City Gods entry in the gods pack. Right, Pavis, I should re-read Pavis's cult, too. Still, the extant city cults I can think of seem to be weirdo exceptions... which I suppose isn't surprising for an RPG!

3 hours ago, Joerg said:

I wonder how the Lhankor Mhy/Hevduran presence in Sylthi does upset that all-matriarchal set-up. What came first, the city, or the library?

I don't currently see it as upsetting it deeply, but in part that's because of the traditional prohibition on Lhankoring involvement in politics, and because the current Chief Sage Vodris Leatherback places the library's focus firmly on education and research. His second (blanking on the name) is rather more hot-blooded, and is typically an itinerant Sword Sage, rather than a temple guard. (I see the Sword Sages as basically either temple guards, or Indiana Jones; basically kung fu sorcerer-monks because rule of cool. And I'm aware that probably contravenes canon. )

I know the library's older than the refounding of the city; it was successfully defended using Hevduran's unique magics, and so wasn't sacked and destroyed despite the rest of the city being wrecked. I'm not certain if it's older than Sylthi's founding. I don't think it is. I know it is at least older than the Great Darkness, but probably not older than the Gods War. I've got Hevduran's myth outlined somewhere, but not written yet. Basically defense v. Chaos, valuing knowledge over family, etc. I'm pretty sure the library was minor originally, but rose to prominence because Hevduran successfully defends it, and it's around (or the scholars of it were, and the building was destroyed) at the Dawn. I'll need to review Nochet's history before fiddling with that further.

On 6/7/2020 at 9:28 PM, dumuzid said:

There is an existing Esrolian term for a 'kingly' husband-protector: Kimantor, or Lord Kimantor.

I'd thought Kimantor was the first human that followed OOO, or the founder of the Kitori, or something. I'll have to double-check 10K. Thanks for the suggestion, though! I definitely like the sound & style of "Kimantor Dur-Gaddi" although I'm not certain if I'd use Kimantor for humans, myself.

I think one part of why I like "king," despite Esrolia, is the tension it has with the Grandmothers as a consequence of the Vingkotling Sword & Helm saga. A leader from Orlanth is a king; and that makes everyone with real power uncomfortable, even if the king is primarily ceremonial.

On 6/8/2020 at 1:07 AM, John Biles said:

So I read a book on Carthage's history and learned that all the cultures of the Mediterranean had Hercules legends; variations established claims to areas/things/etc.  I would expect some of the stories would, in some way, establish claims to places by the Queen he served.  Who likely varies some by local traditions.

I'm really liking the localized Vogarth stories idea! I might move away from him as psychopomp, but find another way to fit his folklore into the city. I'll probably blend my psychopomp notes into the river cult.

As I was re-reading A Rough Guide to Glamour and working on a review, I realized I'd missed out on a notable topic in "minor" cults: city cults. While I doubt many cities have a cult requiring as extensive a writeup as Glamour, save Nochet and perhaps the other coastal metropolises, I do think the notion of "citizen" has a religious definition, rather than an economic/political one. The notion was mentioned briefly under Earth Cults, but I think it needs expansion.

An additional source on the topic is the old writeup on New Pavis and its concepts on citizenship (which I've been exposed to in the form of Pavis & Big Rubble from Gloranthan Classics). I recall the claim that Pavis generally follows the model of Sartarite cities. While Sartar & Esrolia have cultural relationships, I don't know how substantially Sartar was influenced by old models when he confederated the tribal cities. I believe there's a relationship, and that shapes my thoughts, but I'm not sure the dynamics of that relationship.

CITY CULTS

A city cult worships the communal spirit of the city, called the wyter by Heortlings. In Esrolia, this is nearly always a goddess, and nearly always the local land goddess. Consequently, the city goddess is inextricably woven together with the city's Earth Temple complex, and with the cult of the local manifestation of Ernalda. While other entities are known to be an Esrolian city deity, for present I will focus on the most common manifestation, and leave the idiosyncratic cities aside.

Citizenship is most basically defined as initiation into the city goddess's cult. Given that the city goddess is an aspect of Ernalda, Esrolian citizenship is generally restricted to women, and persons who perform female roles. Each local land goddess has a citizenship subcult, which generally has specific restrictions to entry. These restrictions are determined by the city council—and consequently by the noble houses which lead the city. Common restrictions include a certain level of wealth, matrilineal relationship to one of the city's noble houses, or performance of significant deeds on the city's behalf. A citizen has the privilege to care for a portion of the goddess, and the duty to provide her bounty to the city's leaders. (The citizen can, or must, own property as part of being a citizen, and has to pay taxes on it. Citizens are landlords to non-citizens who work the land.) In addition, the citizen has a right to be nourished by the goddess (receive a corn dole through the temple granaries), and the right of the goddess's protection (easier access to getting Rune magic cast for them, as well as appeal to the city council for justice/"justice").

Male Citizenship

A man married to a citizen receives certain rights and benefits, and is termed a "citizen consort." These are similar to the benefits in other lands of being a citizen foreigner. It generally entails legal, if not social, equality and the right to appeal to the city's queen or council for justice in disputes about the citizen consort's labor. A citizen consort has the right to be nourished by the goddess, but is not entrusted with caring for a portion of her body. (Men can't own land, but hypothetically have legal protection, as well as access to the corn dole. Legal cases are still often prejudiced against them. They still owe taxes/tithes to the goddess.) When the marriage ends, the citizen consort's status ends as well.

A similar status is extended to the male children of citizens, including adult children. Termed "Citizen minor", they receive the protections and rights of a citizen consort, even if unmarried. Citizen minor status lasts only so long as the citizen parent lives. One notable exception is that citizen minors can be the subject of an arranged marriage upon their mother's death, as decreed by the city council. This is not the case in all city-states. If they do not become married within a year--and become a citizen consort--they lose their citizenship.

Example—Sylthi

In Sylthi, the subcult of Ernalda Syltha is the citizenship subcult. It is part of the city's Ernalda cult, and has no independent existence. The city queen is the priestess of Syltha as city goddess, as well as being the city's High Priestess of Ernalda. All worshipers of the Earth—whether lay member, initiate, or Rune Master—are also lay members of Ernalda Syltha. A female initiate of Ernalda can join if they show they have cared for and maintained a portion of Syltha's body—i.e. have rented or purchased the right to, and maintained—for five years, or if they can demonstrate a matrilineal relationship to Houses Netha, Pareninna, or Lorel. The right to join Ernalda Syltha has also been awarded in the past for extraordinary deeds on behalf of the city (such as when Lorel Whitehair married Heler and saved the city from drought, founding House Lorel). In addition, a little-known part of the city charter determines that any person who can demonstrate they are a descendant of the extinct House Syltha automatically bears the privileges and duties of citizenship.

19 minutes ago, Joerg said:

Restructuring the North American tectonics to get rid of the Rockies and to create the Rockwoods would be more than just a cataclysm, and with that much going on I see no reason to keep roughly the same shape of dry area in that case.

"Your Dumbest Theory"

53 minutes ago, scott-martin said:

What convictions do YOU have that you recognize are ridiculous but love them anyway?

I am confident that Argrath is just a trickster way in over his head.