Leingod

Well, the actual definition has changed over time, but in the modern day it seems to refer to a particular tribe of Darkness-worshiping humans in Kethaela. The Torkani are said to belong to a cultural grouping called "Dark Orlanthi," are described as being "descended from" the Kitori but are not Kitori themselves in much the way that any Sartarite tribes or clans that originated in Hendrikiland wouldn't still be called Hendrikings.

Point. Then again, it's not like there can only be one god for one thing, even within a pantheon; I think Uldak the Thirsty Earth might also be a god of drought, given his name and what his domain of Boulderwood looks like. Actually, Boulderwood kind of looks like the site of an impact. Maybe he was thrown down from the Sky into Boulderwood? He's described as an "outlaw" son of Oria, after all.

I mean, there must have been intermarriage, both when there was only the One Clan and then when there were Four who were still close enough together to be warring and allying and whatnot, so someone bragging of being descended from Zenangar isn't out of the question. Isn't Daga the god of drought, though?

It's actually a little strange how much more your clan's leaders have to say about the other three leaders of the Four Clans - even Nameforgot! - than their own founder Basikan. Especially Zenangar, who has so much nice stuff said about him you'd swear your clan were his descendants instead. I guess the good feeling is at least partially explained by the fact that they seem to have been allied and there's no mention of hostilities, but still. Or at the very least it fits with their seemingly not distinguishing between suns and moons. To be fair, though, his art does ascribe to him a bit of the same solar iconography given to other "Small Suns." More to the point, only some claim that he is "an evil piece of the sky" (i.e. the representation of more harmful aspects of the sun, namely its ability to cause famine) and the "Hungry Sun," while others claim he is an evil spirit created by the destruction of many smaller, kinder spirits in the chaos of the Storm Age, and thus call him "Hunger Maker" instead.

A "Scorpion Queen" is the only class of scorpionfolk who can lay eggs, and there are definitely more than one. Presumably, Bahoka is just the one the Hyalorings are actually familiar with (the whole "Chaos" thing is actually pretty new to them in general). They're also totally unfamiliar with, for example, dragonewts and are only passingly familiar with thunder lizards through stories. Presuming "grandfather" here means "Umath," I'd suppose it's probably one of the fairly frequent fights between the different followers of Umath's sons, like the Orlanthi and Vadrudi. That might refer to the Riskesting Empire that was later overthrown by Eskarlavus and Manarlavus. On the other hand, it could perhaps refer to the Manimati people, also called the "Stork People," who under Manimat ruled much of the empire from Darjiin until Manarlavus won the first-ever "I Hate Darjiinian Usurpers" Ritual War. Which is interesting, as Manarlavus was the reigning Emperor when Hyalor and Samnal defied the empire's orders to raise a dome over Nivorah and the one who decreed that Elmal's name be forever forgotten because of it. So if we presume that the Dara Happan calendar deserves any credit (which is a big "if," IMO) we can say that the exodus from Nivorah happened sometime during his 722-year reign from 108677 YS to 109399 YS. That's interesting. I'll note that the family line of King Venef the Stallion (who rules the Berennethtelli in the time of King Heort) goes back 7 generations, i.e. Venef is son of Iverlantho, son of Brolarulf the Son, son of Vinglanth, son of Vingulf, son of Ulvargar, son of Beren the Rider. This genealogy probably isn't accurate, though, given that Venef's son Vesten was born in 255 ST, well after the Dawn. Of course, it's not at all unusual for the heredity to be "simplified," with generations being squished together and some names that repeated being confused as being one person and so on; note, for instance, that Beren is stated at the end of the game to have had a son also named Beren, who could very well be "Beren the Rider" in that genealogy, with people confusing the two Berens as the same person. Plus it should be noted that the Hyalorings have a certain habit of using the number 7 in stories, a bit more so than the Orlanthi (who also do it), so it's easy to imagine the genealogy being simplified to just 7 generations over time. @RHW posited exactly that on the "How do the Alkothi view Shargash?" thread. I also pointed out there that this would explain Shargash's predilection for collecting (and then throwing away/abandoning) fertile wives in "Nyalda's Bride Price;" he first had a Rice Wife, then threw her aside for his River Wife, then tried to do that again with Nyalda, who he claimed would be his Green Wife. The former did apparently make the Jord Mountains, so he's certainly in the right place for that, and it makes sense that the people living in the area would say that earthquakes were made by the two's warring with each other or something along those lines. Though "Earthquake Father" isn't among his known titles (which are Raiser of Hills, Long Runner, Father of the Kostaddi, Spear Shaper and Old Hunter). Maybe he loses that title when he triumphs over the Granite Man? I assume he triumphs, anyway, since Granite Man is only scarcely mentioned in the GRoY (where it's stated that their feud created the Hungry Plateau) and is mentioned in the past tense. I love how consistently baffled the Riders are with the great importance the Rams place on poetry and how they never seem to ever understand a word of it. My favorite is when they get dragged into some inter-clan poetry dispute about which clan's sheep (one has white sheep, one has black sheep) look prettier. Yeah, I pretty much always get that sometime before Beren's birth.

Huh. At that point it starts to feel like there's some foreshadowing going on here. Given that the Golden Wheel Dancers survive on to become part of the First Unity Council, I can only hope we'll get some answers in Lights Going Out and/or The World Reborn (fingers crossed that these games can get that far!)

The Hyalorings previously had no actual Death god or god with the Death Rune, so that's almost certainly Humakt. But yeah, for me he just appeared out of nowhere trying to suck the essence out of Beren to restore himself, and apparently he gets back up if you kill him. I don't really remember how I handled that one. Given that's a Sun Disk that guy's holding, it certainly seems like we're dealing with Dara Happans again. Also found another event on the wiki I've never gotten that's... dark, but interesting. It almost seems like Raven is either expressing disapproval of slavery, or at the very least is using a cruel prank as a way of highlighting your clan's hypocrisies. Which is generally what I imagine as one of the primary functions of a Trickster figure in most cultures, but doesn't seem very prevalent among the Orlanthi (at least as far as I've seen); there, they tend to regard Eurmal as just dangerous and capricious for the sake of it, and generally don't try to think of any kind of moral to Trickster's tales except the ones that end with the Trickster himself being humiliated and defeated (and then that's usually a way of reinforcing common Orlanthi values or virtues). I wonder what that says about them?

Also, I looked at the blog and was very pleasantly surprised by this recent update: https://blog.sixages.com/index.php/2019/06/19/june-status/ In short, the Windows & Mac versions are in "Alpha" and are going to enter beta-testing soon, there's going to be an update to the existing version to fix some bugs and add a new interactive scene, and perhaps most excitingly they've got most of the art and about half of the writing for "Lights Going Out." Really hoping I can make our clan still be Elmali even if we're now part of the Berennethtelli...

Cool find! Looking through the wiki, I had no idea there was some actual extra contact to that crazy Burned Hero who attacked Beren out of nowhere in one or two of my playthroughs: So apparently he's a champion of Gerendetho, who the wiki tells me is the Earth God of the Kostaddi who made the Jord Mountains. In the next event if you interrogate him he'll tell you that his last Impossible Blessing is the "Blessing of Stolen Nourishment." Apparently it needs to be another Hero to allow him to properly recover.

My personal take on it is that Ygraine's father rules the Isle of Man and is a distant descendant of the sea god Manannán mac Lir/Manawydan fab Llŷr, who owns a boat called "wave sweeper" and a chariot called "water foam." That connection to the sea and the Otherworld helps explain away a lot of the weirdness around them, and Ygraine herself might have a Faerie mother to explain how she seems to age so slowly and why at least two of her daughters seem to inclined toward magic.

That really depends on how active she is in the proceedings. After all, in Six Ages Nyalda's quest is essentially just that, but she's very active in dealing with the unworthy suitors: she traps Yelmalio under a hill with a troll, then summons Shargash's previous wife to attack him, and so on.

I wouldn't call it "skepticism" so much as that Conan noticed that basically every magic-user he'd ever met throughout his adventuring career was evil and wanted to kill him and came to the obvious conclusion.

I guess that explains why in Six Ages Shargash seems to have a thing for "fertile" goddesses, having married and tossed aside a Rice Wife and a River Wife before trying to then get with Nyalda (Hyaloring Ernalda) to be his Green Wife: When you perform the Ritual in-game you can also deal with this station of the myth by summoning the Rice Wife instead, who threatens him with hunger.

Aeneas is the son of Prince Anchises (cousin to King Priam) and Aphrodite. Personally, I've always viewed Shargash as essentially the Solar equivalent of the Air pantheon's Urox/Storm Bull. The Dara Happans and Orlanthi respectively see Shargash and Urox as bullying brutes who've done a lot of terrible things for seemingly no good reason, but are also kind of a necessary evil because they've defeated enemies that no one else was able to. The Praxians don't change Storm Bull's essential nature when they venerate him as their chief god, though they certainly emphasize certain traits over others, and they also justify Storm Bull via his necessity, rather than trying to portray him as this misunderstood just protector. I always figured the Alkothi see Shargash in a similar way. Neither a Praxian nor an Alkothi would ever claim that their god is a nice or good god, but they both see their god as a necessary one who offers something worth following them for.

It's interesting how different that is from what's in the Book of Sires, which includes a lot of information from the HRB (though it messes with the timelines to get it to fit). Piecing together all the different bits of information your ancestors could potentially have/witness in the Book of Sires (I like that no one has the complete picture), it appears to be: Vortigern has King Constantin assassinated by a Pict hired from the North (who may be a Pictish knight's ancestor). A Cambrian knight's ancestor who is Vortigern's bodyguard might even see the Pict leaving the scene of the crime before the body is discovered, but his later testimony is ignored because... A knight of the Atrebates (i.e. a Silchesterman) is found standing with a dumbfounded expression over the High King's body with a dagger in hand when Vortigern and his guards stumble upon the scene. Likely capitalizing on the opportunity to have a scapegoat to avoid inconvenient questions, Vortigern immediately proclaims that this knight killed the king, and the Atrebates knight (potentially a Silchester knight's ancestor) is killed before he can speak a word in his defense, with the first knight to do so being rewarded with the "murderer's" lands by Vortigen for avenging the king's death. After barbarians take the death of Constantin as a good opportunity to go raiding, Vortigern heads to London, where he convinces the reluctant Constans to take up his father's crown. The Supreme Collegium are also called to gather, but the warfare going on prevents them from meeting until next year, so Vortigern marches an army to Cambria to settle that himself, where he convinces the Deceangli and Cornovii to join him in presenting an ultimatum to the Irish of Estregales for reparation for their raids. King Aldronius sends a force of knights to serve as bodyguards for all three of his nephews. Next year, King Mor of the Brigantes tries to contest Constans' claim to the high kingship, arguing that Britain needs a warrior king. Vortigern debates the strength of arms versus the strength of words (using his own use of "diplomacy" to make peace in Cambria previously), and convinces the majority to vote for Constans. "Constans is a young, bookish type: learned in laws and customs, but not in governing." A Cambrian bodyguard to Vortigern will be present when Vortigern suggests Picts as bodyguards, in case there are any disloyal vassals like the Atrebates knight who killed his father. Constans thanks his uncle for looking out for him and asks him to see to it. These replace the Breton knights, who are dismissed from service as Constans' bodyguards by Vortigern. Reports of his nephew being guarded by Picts makes Adronius worried. The next year, as I detailed above, Vortigern - who has been wining and dining the Pictish bodyguards and playing himself as a good friend to the Picts in Jagent that he invited over from Caledonia - gets them drunk, drops some hints, and then Constans is killed. A Breton knight's ancestor may be sent as part of a delegation to Constans prior to this, and will notice that Constans is beginning to assert himself more. The Picts are then immediately turned on by Vortigern, who has them all rounded up and killed before they can defend themselves. A surviving bodyguard relates this to the Picts in Jagent, who realize Vortigern is a false friend - though some rightly point out that they did still kill the king, and it's not like they were ordered or anything, so some of them remain loyalists. Shortly after Constans' death, Vortigern tells his bodyguards that the princes have been "kidnapped" by "foreign villains" and orders them to get them back and take them to safety (likely so Vortigern can keep them under lock and key and/or arrange another unfortunate "accident" down the line). These kidnappers are actually knights from Brittany sent by King Aldronius (who suffered a stroke and is on his deathbed from news of Constans' death) to take them to Brittany for their safety, as he now believes Vortigern is plotting against them. The raids from the Picts in Caledonia are actually unrelated to this - after all, it's not their tribesmen - and is partly caused by the King of the Brigantes, pissed off that he's been passed over as High King and likely will be again (since Logres and Cambria are now in Vortigern's pocket and he thus has most of the seats on the Supreme Collegium as his vassals), makes an alliance with the Picts to help them in their invasion. Some of the Picts of Jagent turn against the Britons (often by pretending to be Caledonian Picts in their raids) to get revenge for years of raids by Britons who either see all Picts as the same or want revenge for Constans' death.

That's actually explained in the book (because one of the possibiities is a Jagent Pict, whose grandfather may actually be one of said bodyguards): Vortigern is the one who offers two Pictish tribes land in Jagent (which has been more or less abandoned by the native Durotriges) in exchange for protecting the area from Irish raiders. Vortigern provided them with plenty of tools, livestock and grains on top of that, free of charge, and essentially made himself out to be "a good friend to the Picts." A surviving bodyguard (possibly your ancestor or relative) that what happened with the assassination: “While drunk with wine, we were duped by Vortigern thinking the king was forcing him into a position way below his station. Since we thought he was a noble man and our friend, in our passion and drunkenness we killed the king. But then he turned on us and had everyone killed before they could explain themselves! He is no friend to the Picts!” And in the Cambrian timeline, your grandfather might be one of Vortigern's bodyguards, where he will witness Vortigern wining and dining the Picts for over a year and will overhear them expressing regrets that Constans no longer values his counsel and that he fears he might be expelled from court any day now. Said bodyguard grandfather (the Cambrian one) can also be sent by Vortigern to "rescue" Aurelius and Uther from "foreign villains" who have "kidnapped" them, who are of course the knights of King Aldronius of Brittany, who suspects a murder and wants to save his two remaining nephews. So while you certainly can portray Vortigern as (at least early on) a good chancellor and friend of Constantine who really does try to be a good regent for young Constans in your own campaigns (and it's certainly an interesting interpretation to take), the default assumption is definitely that Vortigern was always a schemer hungry for the throne. But a schemer who, as it happened, actually wasn't doing too bad a job of it until Hengest and Rowena come into the picture and play him like a fiddle. The early years do a lot to establish him as a great general and diplomat, and his administrative reforms are so useful that Aurelius Ambrosius chooses to add to them rather than try to dismantle them. I think Vortigern makes for a more interesting contrast to the line of the Pendragons when you keep him as a not particularly good person who nonetheless was able to rule as a good king for a while.

Bought the Book of Sires a few days ago, been poring over it since, definitely a lot of fun. I like most of the changes or elaborations it's made on the lore, and also I generally find Vortigern pretty interesting when you read between the lines and notice that a lot of his initial policies were carried forward by the Pendragons (which in earlier books were usually attributed to the Pendragons themselves, and is something I could see happening in-universe over time, as no one wants to associate good ideas with a hated tyrant, so it's a nice touch). But it also raised a question: What was Constantine (III) thinking in regards to the succession? He was appointed High King in 415, presumably as an adult. He married a daughter of Coel Hen immediately after, and eight years later she gives birth to Constans, his heir apparent... who Constantine then hands over to a monastery in Winchester. Then Constans does basically the same thing with both Aurelius Ambrosius ten years later and Uther three years after that. And apparently by the time of his death 25 years into his reign Constans is still at that monastery. What did Constantine think would happen when he died? He doesn't seem to have done anything to prepare any of his sons for becoming rulers, he seems to have just thrown them to the monks and then forgotten they existed. Constans was a bookish boy with no experience and no real credit with the people of Britain outside of his lineage, and it took fast talking from Vortigern, the most powerful king in Cambria, just to get him the crown of Logres, let alone Britain. It would be one thing if Constantine just didn't want the High Kingship to become hereditary, or wanted someone else to rule other than his sons... but there's no indication that Constantine did anything at all with regards to succession. If he had anyone or any alternate method in mind, it was never brought up in the timelines. 25 years of rule, and in all that time he never did anything to make sure things wouldn't go to pot the moment he was gone? I'm trying to wrap my brain around this, because I'd love to be able to have vignettes or flashbacks or anecdotes far back in the past during campaigns, and I'd like to have some idea of how to portray major actors and their decisions, but Constantine is just baffling me with how little effort he seems to have invested in securing his legacy.

The wiki mentions that they once inhabited Dorastor sometime before the Dawn. An internet search reveals more info about them (and information/speculation?) on the Gold Wheel Dancers, courtesy of Jeff Richards: http://glorantha.temppeli.org/digest/worldofglorantha/2007.12/4609.html http://glorantha.temppeli.org/digest/worldofglorantha/2007.12/4612.html

Good points. I guess "Storm Tribe" is just the obvious name; there's a "Fire" Tribe and a "Water" Tribe and a "Darkness" Tribe all based on what the general ruling elemental rune is, so Air or Storm Tribe just makes sense when they're all discussing becoming a tribe where Orlanth will be king. And I guess the reason they're still identified as Orlanth's "tribe" when they aren't yet formally such is that Beren and Redalda already understand that it will happen, with or without their input, and the important thing is that they acquit themselves well enough here to secure a blessing for their peoples in the future.

It's also coming to Steam, hopefully by the end of the year. Also, from the subreddit, someone's been picking apart the end-game "Ritual" set out on by Beren and Redalda: I hadn't really considered the idea that many of them are actually a different perspective on myths already known to us, just with Beren and Redalda being involved (with Beren sort-of standing in for Elmal, as well). Though I don't think "Rivalry between warlords" is actually "The Making of the Storm Tribe," because the tribe seems to have already been made. Incidentally, I found an event-let where a Wheel clan will suddenly like you more, because: "The [Wheel] clan say they were visited by a golden hoop that rolled into their lands from the south. It spoke directly into their minds, telling them that all the clans would need to band together to face deepening darkness. A peculiar tale." So yeah, the Gold Wheel Dancers were apparently trying to unify people even long before the Unity Council was formed.

I actually had much the same idea for that kind of campaign a while back; I got overzealous with the backstory for a PK whose coat of arms I very loosely based on the name and arms of my maternal great-grandmother's family and ended up making this whole extended family tree full of colorful characters that went way beyond anything that would be likely to ever come up in the career of the "Knight of Starlings" (whose great-grandfather claimed to have learned a magic secret from the same starling that Branwen, daughter of Bran the Blessed, once taught to speak, and that this allowed him to understand the songs and cries of birds; this was to justify the "Good With Birds" trait).

I think air-breathing sea creatures like whales and dolphins are specifically called out as the children of Water deities by Air deities, just as seafaring birds are claimed as the offspring of Water and Sky. Other animals like bats and the like are probably also considered to be in that kind of nebulous space where they inhabit one elemental "sphere" but have obvious traits of another and thus are regarded as the result of the two mingling.

King of Sartar says that the Lightbringer Ring has seven special officers: the five that are predetermined are Orlanth, Issaries, Lhankor Mhy, Chalana Arroy and Eurmal. The other two are more flexible; Flesh Man is often one of them and is also often represented by the "clan ancestor," probably making it symbolic in most cases. The book says that Vinga often fills the last seat, but in practice I think that's the one with the most variance. Meanwhile, the heads of households are collectively referred to as Ginna Jar, in the same way that the "outer ring" of more traditional clans are often referred to as the Thunder Brothers or by other mythically relevant symbolic names. Because remember, a clan ring isn't actually just an inner circle of seven people who make all the important decisions: there's also an outer ring, which is typically vague in regards to membership up until they actually gather, and might at one time be all the clan's thanes and at another only the most respected elders of each bloodline or some other configuration, but certainly isn't to be discounted. As for how clan rings are chosen, that's been answered here: http://glorantha.temppeli.org/digest/gd8/2000.10/0578.html

Because it's been repeatedly stated that a Lightbringer clan ring has seven people sitting on it, and that odd number is important for the sake of tie-breaking.

Ever since the first time I got one in King of Dragon Pass, I just fell in love with the idea of using triceratops as beasts of burden. That imagery of something incredibly fantastic but simultaneously mundane and practical just really spoke to me, and is probably what I'd say I love most about Glorantha if pressed to choose just one thing. It very much feels like a setting where people look at the world that's around them and actually figure out how to make it work for them organically. As Your Glorantha Will Vary, I'm pretty much inevitably going to want to insert that element somewhere into my Glorantha; all that remains is to decide how far to go with it. I don't think they'd be a universal thing; not at all. They'd inevitably be a lot more demanding than oxen in terms of how much they eat, how to safely stable, train and work them, the sheer size they'd demand in general, etc. Then there's the concerns in terms of society and religion: oxen are kind of central to Orlanthi agriculture mythically, with their strong association with Barntar. And though they're creatures of Earth, they're more often associated with Maran Gor, the Earthshaker (and in fact "Earthshaker" is what they're generally called), who very much doesn't represent the fertile, life-giving aspects of Earth. I think Esrolia would be a natural place for the use of Earthshaker Lizards as beasts of burden to be most prominent, all things considered. A lot of flat, fertile ground, a reverence for all aspects of the Earth and knowledge of how to deal with them, etc. I'd like the lands around the Shaker Temple to be another place with them, but given the description of the terrain I'm not sure how that'd work out; maybe that's where you get the alternate path of using them as elite (very expensive and rare) battle mounts?