Austin

3 minutes ago, g33k said:

I've (long) considered going through and revamping all the stat-based bonuses to a regular pattern, but different than the default one.

• 9-12 = average, bonus 0
• 13-15 = +1 / +5%
• 16-17 = +2 / +10%
• 18 = +3 / +15%
• 19+ = extra +1 / +5% for every point
• on the downside, penalties below 9 are symmetrical with the bonii above 12

That would be for the case where a stat is a "primary" influence.  If it's only a "secondary" influence, push the +/-'es one category out (so 13-15 (and 6-8) give no modifiers, then +/- 's follow the pattern as above).

*whistles innocently* RQ3's method may be worth looking at, if you're interested in smaller modifiers...

3 hours ago, Jon Hunter said:

Are the geases for Humatki, Yelmalio,  are they Intended as

1. definitive lists of what  does exist within the cults in game world
2. examples of things that could exists within the cults, and is presented a limited list for sake of brevity and game play

RQG 296:

Quote

Humakt’s Gifts

The following shows twelve standard Humakti gifts. Others have been given by the god throughout Time, and may be given again.

Yelmalio (RQG 308–309) does not specify one way or another. I would rule that exceptional geese exist, because it is the case for Humakt (and because I find exceptional or unusual gifts & geese to be Most Fun).

48 minutes ago, Manu said:

If this PC wants to wear a chain mail (ENC 4), it is 4x7=28 ENC (without any weapon, shield and backpack).

I think you might be criss-crossing editions? Quickly skimming the armor table in RQG, I'm not seeing a chainmail option. Or, actually, anything with ENC 4; there's a bunch of 3's, and then segmented bronze plate cuirass at 5.

IIRC RQ3 had chainmail, etc., but it used a pretty different ENC system. One I remember liking quite a lot, but I never GM'd that system so I can't recall how it works.

HPL's fingerprints are on a lot of horror cinema, I suspect. Even if just because of how gigantic his influence was on King—IIRC King says something like "all my good ideas basically came from Lovecraft/Lovecraft did them first" in his memoir, On Writing. A King sort of is the voice of American horror literature for the last forty-odd years.

The film Cabin in the Woods ends on a distinctly Lovecraftian note (I'll not say further, in case you want to go watch it—I don't have much taste for horror, but I quite like that movie).

Another early influence/co-conspirator worth noting is Clark Ashton Smith. Like Howard, he was part of HPL's correspondence circle. He mostly wrote short stories & poetry; although his taste for the cosmic came before he met HPL, the latter's influence and encouragement was substantial. I haven't read much HPL myself, but CAS and REH's works are quite good.

2 hours ago, Beoferret said:

I like the idea, but I honestly don't know how much difference it'll make in overall practical gameplay, having only gm'd one session of RQG to this point. Anyone have any input?

I don't really know CoC at all, so my first question is: does CoC use the same type of movement rate as RQG? Meaning, 8 is the default MOV for humans in RQG, which means they can move 3 meters eight times during a melee round. If CoC's movement system is the same, then I imagine using that game's rule to determine MOV shouldn't be too complex.

43 minutes ago, Richard S. said:

A hundred trollkin with typewriters, given infinite time, will eventually type the entire works of Chaosium...

But—and here's the real question—would they ever finish heroquesting rules?

10 minutes ago, 7Tigers said:

Hum, for B&W books, I'm not sure HQ pdf are really needed. Lulu printing is not HQ anyway: useful and enough to play, but definitively not HQ...

*Shrug.*

Like I said, I'm not Rick; just trying to recount what I recall him sharing about the technical challenges.

1 hour ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

Since y'all are offering the Stafford Library through LULU, is there some objection to just running reprints of the PDFs through them? At least then they'd be in print.

I'm not Rick so I can't be authoritative, but I recall this topic coming up moderately frequently, and that the answer is basically "we don't have print-quality PDFs to use" due to old formatting methods. So basically there is a reason, but I don't remember the exact technical thingie-ja-whummits involved.

3 hours ago, Chromatism said:

Brilliantly informative on both counts, and I think it sets me leaning towards Borderlands and Beyond to begin with... though Pavis and the Big Rubble absolutely sounds like something to absorb and dive into sometime soon.

For now I shall also indulge in play throughs of King of Dragon Pass and Six Ages and dream of a good old tribal campaign. Many thanks!

Welcome to the tribe!

Great collection of summaries above on the material. As a comparatively newer member myself, I just wanted to add in that of the classic content, I picked up both Pavis & Big Rubble and Borderlands & Beyond pretty early on. While I skimmed both initially, I ended up reading Borderlands pretty much cover-to-cover; I really enjoyed just absorbing that book, whereas Pavis &. felt more "crunchy." Plunder and Runemasters (included in B&B) give a great, brief insight into Glorantha which IMHO makes B&B the best bang for your buck in both time and money.

1 hour ago, gochie said:

Clearly I understood (for whatever reason) that you could boost any spell to resist dispelling magic... Which sounded crazy to me.

I think your confusion's coming about because some folks are tossing that around as a house rule (or in fact have been playing with it).

Though, I've gotta admit, the weeb in me does see a certain joy in that; two magicians each dumping hundreds of magic points into trying to overcome one another's ridiculous spells. It does feel a smidgen Dragon Ball and I'm kind of okay with that...

17 minutes ago, Aubrey the Malformed said:

So is there any word on what might be next, and when?

As far as I'm aware, scenarios are next. Two scenario packs have been discussed around here and elsewhere, "Smoking Ruins" and "Pegasus Plateau & Other Stories." The free adventure, "The Rattling Wind," is excerpted from the latter.

I agree it's frustrating that in terms of official RQG releases this year, we've had one scenario. If you're looking for new content, at this time I'd suggest checking out the Jonstown Compendium (Tales of the Sun County Militia looks to me the strongest of the fan-created scenarios due to its new setting and backdrop in Sun County—but yes, there's a full scenario in it, and one I quite like—and could combine with some of that old Prax material somewhat well).

I can't recall where this was, but I seem to remember some months back a comment by one of the devs hoping for a PDF release by Christmas. Now, if that was gonna happen I imagine we'd hear about it by now... Still, I suspect that we're sitting right on the edge of new scenarios.

13 minutes ago, lordabdul said:

43 minutes ago, Crel said:

Further, the context taken pretty universally on here in rules discussions about Trance spells has been that they are capable of Extension (and that doing so is a bad idea)

Why is it a bad idea?

As I understand it, the authors' intent to the [Weapon] Trance spells is that you can only do that thing while they're active. This wasn't included in the core book spell descriptions, but that was an oversight. Arrow Trance in the Glorantha Bestiary provides some description of how they intend Trance spells to work.

So, if you Extend a Trance spell for Extension 2+ (a day or more) you'll start struggling with thirst, hunger, and lack of sleep since you're only able to wait for more things to Weapon.

4 hours ago, Akhôrahil said:

I believe the game would benefit from having a limit (likely dynamic with the stats) of how many MPs can be spent for a spell or in a turn. Sorcery has this (intensity up to Int only), but not the rest.

Well while there's no total MP cap, you still can't spend more than 1 MP/SR on a spell. So casting a gigantic Sword Trance is gonna take a couple rounds to a couple minutes. Doesn't change much in case of ambushes/prep, but makes the strat not viable when you're the one getting ganked.

3 hours ago, soltakss said:

15 hours ago, Crel said:

Non-stackable spells can neither be improved through additional rune points, nor be subject to Extension (for instance, I can’t Extend Madness).

That seems very off to me. It is a great shame that some examples weren't given in the RQG Rulebook about this kind of thing. 

Yeah, it does feel odd, and have me wondering if the Q&A is wrong here, namely because of the number of spells which therefore can't be Extension'd. Beyond the transformation spells noted in this thread, it includes such disparate things as Breathe Air/Water, Charisma, [Weapon] Trance, True [Weapon], and Darkwalk.

Possible evidence to corroborate the Q&A's reading is the Knowledge spell, which is Temporal and Nonstackable: "Any information that cannot be assimilated fully within the 15 minutes of the spell is lost" (page 333). If the spell could be stacked with Extension, then I'd expect that to read "assimilated fully within duration." However, other "Temporal, Nonstackable" spells often use language inclusive of Extension'd durations.

Further, the context taken pretty universally on here in rules discussions about Trance spells has been that they are capable of Extension (and that doing so is a bad idea) rather than "you just can't extend them."

Personally I've been playing largely without the Extension/stackable rule and I don't anticipate changing that; I would however like to be as aware as possible of what RAW intends.

5 hours ago, g33k said:

If the OP wants maximum agreement with "canon" and yet (as jajagappa suggests) "all are dead," you could just hypothesize some heir (a bastard son, maybe?) who had logistical problems getting to Pennel Ford from somewhat further away.: A blocked pass, a small side-battle (20 leagues distant) that they just can't break free from, etc etc etc...  Their unit was SUPPOSED to rejoin the main army a week earlier, but... shit happens, ya know?

Honestly, that in itself sounds like a blast as the start of a campaign. "So Harrek's just killed your meal ticket, your meal ticket's sons, and a good half of everyone you knew (alongside this Broyan fellow and Argrath ragamuffin... you're fifty miles away with the snotty-nosed youngest son of your meal ticket, who now claims he's a ruler. Half the countryside wants to kill you, half wants to enslave you. What do you do?"

1 hour ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

So while the commander of the militia is a woman, she's also literally the only female devotee in Sun Country.

On the one hand, only devotee =/= only initiate; on the other, it's still a fair point. However, I likewise wonder what proportion of Orlanth devotees—Wind Lords & Storm Voices—are female. If Yelmalio fulfills the role of "men's god" in Praxian Sun County in a similar way that Orlanth is the general Sartarite "men's god," perhaps it's not unexpected that, proportionally, only one female worshiper of Yelmalio would be a devotee.

However, I do think in that context that it's worth noting the dynamic between Yelmalions & Ernaldans in Sun County seems quite different from that in Sartar, from what I've been following on this thread (I don't have much of the Sun County material myself).

On 12/4/2019 at 5:08 AM, Joerg said:

On 12/4/2019 at 3:20 AM, Crel said:

One of the challenges in RAW for the transformation suite of spells is that they all have the "nonstackable" tag, which excludes them from use with Extension. One of the things which made me very sad playing my Odaylan; but it does feel reasonable at times—season-long doubled STR is probably overpowered.

To be honest, I am surprised by that interpretation of "nonstackable". To me, the flag "nonstackable" indicates that the spell cannot be turned into a more powerful verstion by putting an additional amount of rune points into it,  unlike say "Shield" which comes with an effect number.

I see no reason why a spell like True Weapon should not be extended

Came across this while searching out other answers on Well of Daliath:

Quote

Stackable Rune Magic (page 315)

To clarify:

• To stack a rune spell, the spell needs to be listed as stackable (duh!).
• If the spell is listed as stackable, I can spend additional rune points to get better results.
• If outside combat, I can also stack any stackable spell with another stackable spell (like Lock and Passage).
• If in combat, I can only stack stackable spells when they are being stacked with Extension, or if they are Illusion spells. 

Yes

• Non-stackable spells can neither be improved through additional rune points, nor be subject to Extension (for instance, I can’t Extend Madness).
• Whether a spell is stackable or not has nothing to do with whether the spell requires additional Magic Points to work better. 

Yes. 

So that's where I ended up thinking nonstackable=no Extension, it looks like.

@lordabdul @soltakss @HreshtIronBorne

5 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

My question is basically, does boosting non-attack spells, i.e. those that do not interact with Countermagic, increase the spell's resistance to dispelling? I am trying to figure out how to actually KEEP a truesword spell. My DM just throws Dismiss Magic and Dispel Magic around all the time and the Humakti shines a lot less. With truesword being a 1 point spell it only takes Dismiss 1 or Dispel 2, cheap and fast, which is immensely frustrating.

Page 248 has an example of boosting a spell with MPs, but as written strongly implies that this instance only applies to overcoming defensive spells. Although I seem to recall that a magician could spend MP boosting a temporal spell to make it more resistant to dispelling, I'm not finding that as I skim back over the text. To my knowledge, the MPs spent increasing the effect of a Rune spell don't count as MPs boosting the spell, for purposes of pushing past Countermagic; so the MP spent to increase your True Sword wouldn't make it more resistant to dispelling (likewise with RP spent on Extension, as noted by lordabdul. I haven't (yet) found specific text detailing this.

I also don't see anything immediately enlightening in the core rules Q&A on Well of Daliath (although it does confirm that Extension doesn't increase a spell's resistance to dispelling).

2 hours ago, lordabdul said:

To cast Dismiss/Dispel Magic, one would need to specify a spell to dismiss/dispel... otherwise, you just aim at the target, and it will affect defensive spells first. Sure, True Sword will make the Humakti's weapon glow and drip blood or something (since Rune magic is always visible), but it might not be always obvious what spell exactly is making that.

FWIW I figure "I'm gonna throw my Dismiss Magic at whatever hijinx is going on with that weapon" is something I'd allow my players to do (even if they didn't know exactly what spell it was), I figure it's fair game for non-player characters to do as well. YG(ame)MV.

2 hours ago, lordabdul said:

5 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

My idea is to use the 63 MP from storage and throw up a Truesword with Extension 5 for the year that should, in theory be immune to dispel magic? 

Wait, you have a 63 MP storage available for real?

One of the adventurers in my game has well over 100 MPs available. Can't recall the exact number.

He's started talking about getting the Issaries to help spell trade him a Sword Trance from the Humakti, to buzzsaw opponents with over 1000% Broadsword (he has no actual skill in it base). I've warned him that if he does, I'll probably insist that his character seek out initiation with Humakti immediately after—he's tasted the rawest, most pure glory of the Sword God and has a deep need to reach that oneness with "swordness" again.

2 hours ago, Pheres said:

But can subcults have particular subcult skills?

I don't see why not. I imagine they'd be more specialized/otherwise specific than the main cult. Or swap skills out—like, "your Orlanth Adventurous uses Broadsword, but our Orlanth Adventure-ish uses Dagger!"

2 hours ago, Pheres said:

For exemple, can a Daka Fal subcult that is related to an ancestor who is the daughter of Orlanth be associated with Orlanth cult (Daka Fal cult is not in good standing with Orlanth, basicaly)?

I don't have any information about the forthcoming cults book, but my inference is that the Odayla cult in the core rulebook is basically this situation. (BTW, the way it was explained to me around the forums is that Daka Fal doesn't get along with anyone because he (as Grandfather Mortal) blames the gods for killing him, and they blame him for dying, the asshole.)

34 minutes ago, Pheres said:

First of them, because an initiate is an apprentice shaman who spend 90% of is time with his mentor, i think that 80% or more of daka fall initiates are trying to become shaman (and also priest) in order to become "free". So this particular cult should have more priests than initiates. And as i have understand this is not a common thing for a cult..

I don't think all Daka Fal initiates are apprentice shamans. For example, I'm an apprentice shaman because my great-uncle Borog recognizes my birth-mark as a sign that I've been chosen by the Horned Man. My father is an important leader in the family, but wasn't chosen by the Horned Man. He's still an initiate—he can summon our ancestors to receive advice, cast magic, and so on—but he can't see into the Spirit World or go in search of other spirits.

The following is may be largely speculation: I believe that most family bloodlines, noble houses, and so on essentially represent a Daka Fal cult. In some instances, there's probably a "normal" priest of said cult, in the role of the family head. Or perhaps they fulfill that role as the priest of the family wyter, a notable ancestor (probably family founder) housed in some artifact. Yet some families still probably have the presented shaman-as-priest, where someone of the younger generation is present to become the future shaman-priest.

42 minutes ago, g33k said:

So let's put you to the question, then (since you're so bold as to step forward and don the target!) -- do you anticipate being a player in some/all of this RQClassic content, or most likely the GM?  Because players v. GM's may have differing opinions...  😉

That's fair .

I'm currently the gamemaster for our group, although we've started to trade off the role a bit to give me a fighting chance at keeping up on writing/prepping/converting material. I was originally a player, and wandered off to start delving further into Glorantha lore (from our Glorantha-lite game) during that time. Likewise, one of my current players has picked up the lore bug (which is in part what began driving him toward trying out GMing), and consequently began delving himself into whatever he could get his hands on.

It seems to me that folks who go far enough to get on this forum (like my friend and I) aren't too worried about spoilers—we want information. We've got a few decades to catch up on, after all!

On 12/7/2019 at 5:14 AM, Bill the barbarian said:

And how do you feel about spoilers, yay or nay,

Speaking as the young pup in the pack, comparatively, I'm still broadly in agreement with soltakss on spoilers. There seems to be an ambiguous "statute of limitations" on this sort of thing, and IMO that's been long past for most RQ Classic material, and for the broad strokes of the Hero Wars to come. Newer material, it makes sense to be a little hush-hush when discussing a key plot twist, but thus far I haven't seen anything (in RQG anyway) so substantial as to require spoiler warnings. After all, the "Dragon of Thunder Hills" is on the GM Screen Pack cover!

1 minute ago, David Scott said:

RQG Bestiary (2019) - Horses - page 145

Oh, of course. I went and didn't see anything in the Hippogriff entry itself, and assumed there wasn't information elsewhere. Silly me.

9 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

https://sixages.fandom.com/wiki/Hippogriff_Reborn

Thanks! One of these days I'll get around to playing Six Ages. It looks great.

Where can I find the Hippogriff -> Horse story in a text? I've heard it before but I don't know the source, & a quick Ctrl-F of the Guide and the Sourcebook isn't finding anything.

While I'm aware that RuneQuest has a long history of fan publications and that many folks around here have been involved in doing so, as a comparatively new member of the tribe I really don't know well who does, and wants to do, what sorts of work. With the recent advent of the Jonstown Compendium, it seemed to me wise to build a list of community members interested in freelancing. In particular, since people involved in the RuneQuest & Glorantha fan communities are more familiar with the setting and content norms than others.

So here's what I suggest: if you're interested in being contacted through the forums to collaborate on community content products, add a comment noting what work you'd like to do, and I'll add that information to this topic post for ease of access. For example, writing scenarios, editing, proofreading, B&W art, color art, cartography, graphic design & layout, general critique, playtesting, and so on.

Note: no guarantees are made regarding the quality of work or compensation requested by persons listed below. This is a networking resource for content creators, not a marketplace.

Jonstown Compendium Community Freelancers:

• @Crel: Editing, proofreading, manuscript critique. Writing/playtesting if time allows.
• @lordabdul: Proofreading, layout, B&W art and cartography.
• @Jerry: Content writing (scenarios, articles, NPCs/monsters, magic items, new mechanics), editing, proofreading, manuscript critique, playtesting, and cartography.
• @M Helsdon: B&W artwork.
• @10baseT: Proofreading, playtesting.
• @davecake: Proofreading, editing, Glorantha fact-checking, playtesting, character & mechanics development, technical assistance for publishing.
• @soltakss: Content writing, proofreading.
• @Puckohue: Editing.
• @Shawn Carpenter: B&W and color illustration.
• @Shiningbrow: Editing and proofreading.
• @Diana Probst: B&W and color art.
• @gochie: Art, editing, and rules revision.
• @Bill the barbarian: Editing, proofreading, copy-writing, Suspicious Humor.
• @Dragon: Editing, proofreading, manuscript critique, playtesting, writing (especially mechanics and magic items).
• @pookie: Reviews.

3 minutes ago, Joerg said:

To be honest, I am surprised by that interpretation of "nonstackable". To me, the flag "nonstackable" indicates that the spell cannot be turned into a more powerful verstion by putting an additional amount of rune points into it,  unlike say "Shield" which comes with an effect number.

I see no reason why a spell like True Weapon should not be extended.

You know, yeah, maybe I did goof. I could have sworn I returned to re-reading the magic rules recently and found my above interpretation (to my disappointment and similar mild confusion) but now that I'm skimming back over things—and seeing the great variety of "nonstackable" spells—I suspect I just stacked errors atop one another.

The only source I can find presently leaning toward that reading is p.247's definition of Stackable/Nonstackable, but Extension's entry doesn't seem to care about a spell's stackability, just its temporal-ness.