Sir_Godspeed

Ah, the famous erotic imagery of French. Bow-chica-quack-quack. --- I have nothing to add to this thread beyond saying I absolutely love the creativity that flows through this forum. Keep up the good work, folks!

Well-made points above, and I agree with them. We do know that Heroquests can blow up in some people's faces (Valare Addi was blinded for trying to prove that the Red Goddess was Entekos, the God Learners ruined Slontos by trying to prove two earth goddesses were the same, etc.), but what exactly marks a "limit", if anything, is unknown. I personally find this inescapable subjectivism one of Glorantha's main strengths. There's no omniscient third-person narrator to tell you what *really* is true. Different groups try as best as they can, but they are ultimately finding very different answers to the same problems. Whether these different answers are a part of the same overall mythic "truth", fractured interpretations, or whether they are in fact creative processes is, as has been mentioned, ultimately unkowable, and thus largely irrelevant. Put in another way: if it works, it works.

Not sure if any of the Orlanthi groups practice this, but in the RW, bride prices can be paid through labour, and can be delayed, sometimes as a part of the betrothal or courting period. For example, the suitor/betrothed man might move in with his prospective in-laws, performing work on their land as a form of "payment". Both in practical terms, and as a form of showing serious intent and all that. It might also take the other form, where a man might move in with his in-laws after the wedding, and for a while "pay down" the bride price by working for his in-laws. This uxoriocality (moving to the wife's family) can in the RW be temporary or permanent. In either case, however, it's worth noting that it's not really a *literal* payment. A literal payment in the sense of market economics implies the cessation of the relationship after the transaction is done, or in other words, that the exchange of the wife for the bride price is a discrete, singular relation that is closed off, as if you were buying food at a shop. This transaction does not mean you and the shopkeeper are friends now, for example. In-laws are for life, however (in basically every society I know about, although there are always exceptions). Instead, the bride price is not a "payment" in the literal market sense. It is, as others have pointed out, an attempt to compensate for the loss of labor from their daughter (or I guess, son, in the case of an Esrolian groom price), however this compensation is often symbolic, and the ACTUAL "compensation" is actually performed through, well, helping out the in-laws throughout the remainder of their life. Simply put, they are family, and there is a reciprocal relationship there that the groom or groom's family can't just buy themselves out of. This is one of the reasons why bride prices in the RW are often symbolic in nature (although definitely not always). At least theoretically. Exceptions occur, of course, and in cases of brides having to move very far the practicality of helping out her parents is difficult, but that goes without saying, I guess. ---- I'm not entirely sure how this applies in the highly corporate clan societies of the Orlanthi. The clan is the primary supporter of a family in times of need, with the in-law connection perhaps being secondary in importance (an educated guess). Still, in-laws make for good diplomatic connections, so having a good relation to your wife's or husbands' parents by way of semi-regular giftings, visits, odd-jobs, etc. is probably a good thing. It's also entirely possible that the Orlanthi practice BOTH bride prices AND dowries, but that the actual proportion or function of them vary depending on the settlement patterns, marriage types, social classes/wealth and prior relations (as well as individual bargaining skills/charisma).

Maybe they cross over the northern sea ice during winter as well? Do you think this is a decent fit for North Pent? Lots of small marshes/bogs inbetween rolling hills dotting the more even tundra plain sounds like a fitting image, at least. I guess the further north you get the thinner the soil layer is going to get, but that's speculation on my part. There are rivers laying sediment northwards, and sea erosion might make gravel or something. Still, the northern coast there is probably not very welcoming in any sense of the word - even for North Pent. I like the idea of using moraine ridges as traveling vectors, for example, as they'll be mostly dry in summer and snow-free during winter, but they'll obviously be interrupted, irregular, etc. Speaking of the Troll Marsh, I've been brainstorming how society there might be. I was thinking that they might have a pretty active Gorakiki cult. Even if the winters might kill most of their beasts off, maybe they rear new ones each summer or something. I was considering having, for example, certain Gorakiki trolls be trading with the Muskoxi, while other troll groups be hostile. Trying to avoid monolithic "trolls vs. humans" simplifications. That being said, there might be some overall Uz cult hegemony in the centre of the swamp. Not a Queendom or anything too fancy, but like a ritual centre, maybe. Just spitballing. Not sure if they'd be culturally distinct from the White Sea coast trolls that live in the limited taiga and shrubland north of the Marsh. I'm also thinking about making the Deer Hills a significant cented of the Gopher People Hsunchen. They're the only Hsunchen mentioned in the area, and while their population is quite tiny overall in Pent, I'm trying to justify having them interact with the Muskoxi, even if it's not intensive. Deer Hills struck me as an interesting point, as it might potentially be a wooded highland that's arguably(?) defensible against Pentans, and also far enough south to not have permafrost (which I'm guessing is sort of a hard limit on how far north the Gopher Hsunchen can go). I'm still not quite sure on whether the reindeer people from the west will be Hsunchen or not. Any suggestion is welcome. I like the idea that they are magically powerful, though. Perhaps seen as particularly so by the other groups - although I might be projecting some Scandinavian stereotypes/literal archetypes of the Saami onto them.

That's a genuinely awesome event, thanks for sharing it.

I haven't been able to do a lot of work in the last week or so, but slowly I'm figuring out the general lay of the land, and populating it with little oddities here and there. I've been able to find a map that extends further north than the ones in the Guide and AAA, however it is less detailed, and so I'll have to do some cross-referencing to make sense of it. One thing I've been worried about, but that is slowly becoming increasingly obvious is the odd lack of a glacier in eastern Genertela. While there might've been one there in the Storm Age/Greater Darkness, it's just not there anymore on any recent map (it's there on some older maps, but they're so different from current canon that I don't feel like I can justify going quite so out of the way). This creates a conundrum for me: how exactly does this affect the Muskoxi's relations with Valind, Frost Trolls and Frost Giants? I had initially envisioned them as contesting with their northern neighbors throughout winter, placating North Wind King with sacrifices, and occasionally heroquesting up north to get boons and such. But now that there's no glacier, I might have to rethink that. Sure, it'll be frozen over in winter, but I'm not sure if that's the same. On the other hand, North Pent appears to connect to the Kenyiran Sea, which is neat. This differs a bit between the AAA maps and the one I've found (it's the one where each region of Genertela is labeled with big, red letters, I believe it also occurs in the Guide, but in smaller resolution and possible cropped slightly more, not sure), but ultimately this means rivers going northwards, coastline, and all that this entails. A second issue is whether the Troll Marsh is an endorheic basin or whether it has an outlet towards the north. The maps are ambigous, I think. Not sure what the ecological consequences are of that difference, besides shifting size more extremely in the case of an endorheic basin (if I understand my geography correctly). Still, it would be nice to know. (EDIT: No, it clearly flows out into the Keniyran Sea through the White River, and an additional river in the northeast. Not sure how I forgot that. Nevermind this paragraph, then.) Lastly, I've tried to read up on moraines, since this is one of the few landmarks I can throw up on endless plains that will be a proper landscape-defining thing. Granted, realistically a lot of the moraines will be overgrown with grass and mosses, but still, it's nice to have something to put down on the map. The access to many sizeable, loose rocks will also make the moraines a prime vector for cairns, which I'm realizing I'm making kind of a defining cultural train for the Muskoxi (don't worry, this is just a temporary pet name to avoid having to write out Muskox People all the time). I'm considering there to be an overall significant terminal moraine running along the latitude of the Deer Hills, but this is just speculation. I've also read up on the Guide some more, and things are looking to be potentially interesting: North Pent might potentially see Lo-fak, Huan-to demons, and even Wind Children coming from the north-western Shan Shan mountains. I'm considering making the Muskoxi and Lo-fak be pretty chill with each other and potentially have there be the occasional cultural spillover in the form of "converts" one way or another, by way of intermarriage, adoption, migration, that sort of thing. That might be messing with the "purity" of the Hsunchen bloodlines, but I was never fond of the idea that blood descent determined Hscunchenness anyway. The Wind Children won't exactly have any aeries out on the North Pentan tundra, but I was considering having them occasionally fly over the area and land to have a chat with the Muskoxi, or be drawn there by magic/rituals. Gift exchanges ensue, and such. Huan-to are monsters, so don't really need a reason to go and do bad stuff, I guess. ------ Speaking of moraines, I initially toyed with the idea of making rocks jut out of them to mark fallen, sleeping or dead giants from the God Time (a bit like the Uffington Horse of the Chalk Man in England, or even like the tumuluses in Prax). While this is still in the cards, I went ahead and wrote up an idea I had for a group of surviving giants. I didn't want there to be tons of them mucking about, so I've written up a family of six, living out a kind of twilight existence there. I don't know if this is in line with how Glorantha should be written, or if they're too out of tune, but I had a bit of fun here by mixing the mundane with the deeply mythic in these enigmatic, semi-immortal beings. The two giant females being basically dead was intentional. I had initially intended to just have males, so as to mimic the depopulated rural communities that exist in many places (including my own country, deep in the fjords or up in the mountains) where lots of ageing bachelors are resigning themselves to being the last inhabitants on slowly delapitating farms, but I ended up making the dead wife an actual character and adding the grandmother. I quite like the idea that for giants death is this long, drawn out process that doesn't even really hinder them all that much beyond the grossly physical. They just sorta go rocky and meld together with the landscape and fall asleep and dream forever, or at least until a new age comes to pass when giants can get up and about again. Maybe.

Those are fair points, though what does that mean about the nature of their worldview in general? Are they just venerating a Hero for the sake of tradition (and profit), almost like a pseudo-clan ancestor? Are they Henotheists who view Issaries as the truest identity of the Invisible God and engage in some loosey-goosey theism? Or rather, perhaps more specific, what do the Trader Princes' Zzaburi (provided they have any, and I'm presuming they do) believe? When a (talar) Trader Prince family member comes to his Zzaburi, what does the Zzaburi tell him? I have to admit I consider the chaotic aftermath of the God Learner collapse, coupled with the pluralistic and heterodox Safelster would open the idea for someone like Castelain, regardless of caste, to act as a philosopher of sorts, whether through complex mediations, or indeed through "saintly"/heroic example.

Unless you're Dragon Pass, of course, in which case there's almost nothing EXCEPT Mary Sues.

The Woodland Judgment of Umathela might provide inspiration for Maniria post-Reforestation.

I think I prefer the idea that the Trader Princes follow a common ideology (or credo) as a means of interacting over the idea that they're just sorta a bunch of unrelated Malkioni holed up in their caravanserai-fortresses, but YGWV. I admit I am a sucker for Rule of Neat.

Liberation/Salvation is often a painful ordeal. Reminds me of the prophecy from Wheel of Time:

There are some obvious visual similarities between late BC/early AD cataphracts and the European knights of the high middle ages (heavy armor, barding, etc.), so you're not totally off. Conveniently for us, that means we get to play at the whole "knight" fantasy introduced to western Glorantha way before my time, but without ruining the whole Antiquity feel.

There's an alternate interpretation. We're also told in the Sourcebook (iirc) that the goddess Kralora was worshipped in Kralorela during the New Dragon Ring, but that the cult diminished/disappeared after. To me at least, this reads like Teshna and Kralora are essentially God Learner exports of their own, culturally idiosyncratic "land goddess" concept, implanted in cultures with different earth/fertility goddess models, and once the empire fails, these imperal-sponsored cults recede. I could be wrong, but that was my personal reading on it.

Well... they might've known it, but they were *heavily* in denial about it. Hence the Monomyth. I believe that's Chaosium's stance on things, yes. Personally, I must admit I have a bit of an insistence on that Dronar guilds (masons, engineers, merchants, smiths, jewelworkers, you name it) might/can have some sorcerous spells passed down as part of their common rituals and training. Whether they view it as sorcery, or just as "the customary gift of guild traditions" is up for debate. A mix of a fellowship of professionals and a mystery cult, if you will. This is, I admit, mostly rule of cool, but it's also inspired by the various sorcerous roles of the different Danmalastan peoples (Kadeniti, Tadeniti, Kachisti, etc.), as well as the mention of the two ancient Brithini Dronars living in Akem. Smith and Tinker, they are called, and they reportedly have an "ancient rivalry with Nida". Sounds to me like if you're going to compete with Dwarves, sorcery would be a good aid. But your assesment fits the Chaosium canon/current approach.

Don't forget that Sheng Seleris is an "Arkat" too. His orginal name is "AgartuSay" (ie. basically Agart(h)).

I think they were regional deities, since the texts usually go on to specify something along the lines that "in one area crops failed" and "in another, divorce rates skyrocketed" or something similar.

Found a Waertagi sword: (from the Dresdner Rüstkammer, actual efficacy dubious).

Well, Glorantha has Dronar and Dromal, so it's not like stuff like that hasn't happened in-universe as well. Love the Horali, though, he looks quite dashing.

Is this in any way going to affect Argrath & the other "Arkats" (speaking in the mythopoeic sense)?

Clearly they are Little Suns.

That would be matrilineal (counting descent through women) and patrilineal (counting descent through men). These are not always synonymous with uxorilocal (man moves to his wife's location) or patrilocal (woman moves to her husband's location), but in Heortling culture they appear to be. Patriarchal (rule by fathers) and matriarchal (rule by mothers) is a whole different kettle of fish, and Sartarites seem to tend more towards a certain sense of gender-equality in terms of political and legal rights. Also, I am not entirely certain that the options of Sartarites are so limited as you set them out to be. Certainly politics and tradition are important, but those will matter the most for high-ranking nobles and potentially also the absolute desperately poor (giving away child-brides to make sure they at least are fed and housed, f.ex.). For the Sartarite "middle class" (anachonistic term, I know, but carls/free, etc.), I think bachelors and maidens have a larger room for self-determination as long as they choose among the pool of socially acceptable partners (ie. mostly other carls/free, etc.), a trend that, to be frank, most modern Westerners follow as well, for all our notions of romance and love winning over social differences. Basically, I'd imagine there to be a mix of social pressure from family, goading, guiding, help, and variosu degrees of drivenness and obstinate behaviour from the young. Heortling culture has lots of traditions, sure, and life isn't fair, but they're also notoriously strongheaded and there's this cultural ideal that promotes willful individuals, I think ("No one can make you do anything", "There is always another way", etc.). Depending on the family and family situation, the unmarried person might win through, or fail. There's no automatic direction it goes in. That being said, Heortlings definitely view sexual dalliances and flirts as conceptually different from marriage, this much we know. Like some pacific islanders, they seem to be perfectly fine with unmarried adults hooking up and fooling around (wild oats, etc.), but when time comes to marry, that's about securing a safe, stable prosperous household, not just sentiment. These kinds of opposing cultural ideals conflicting and creating drama is very prevalent in the RW as well, so I think it's perfectly applicable for Sartarites. Sorry if most of this has already been covered.

Let's not call them balls, but upper class collective religious rites that involve unmarried youth performing in various roles for the pleasure of the gods and/or the elders. Whatever we call that is largely irrelevant. A chance to show off one's piety and one's skill in one skill or other. A chance to verify or falsify the claims your second-cousin has been making about the character of his son. While I totally agree that Yelmites are cynical marriage arrangers with a strict control from the pater familias (and informally probably from some widowed grandmother or aunt as you suggest), it would still be in a pater familias' interest to check out the lad he is about to promise his daughter away to. Alliances are strengthened if the ones used to secure them aren't complete buffoons (although in some cases even a complete buffoon might be worth a very desireable alliance). I also don't entirely discount the notion that a soft-hearted father might listen to his daughters pleas to not be wed to a particularly unsavory fellow. These are human beings, after all, and while romantic love doesn't really enter the equation, fear or disgust might. People are complex beings and do not robotically follow a cultural script like a computer program.

The ultimate source of whatever souls are made of is probably the Chaosium, the place at the bottom of the Underworld. However, this isn't super useful, since that's where all the energy that enters Glorantha comes from. If there is a specific process that specifically makes souls, or some deity that does it, I wouldn't know, though I suspect lots of deities would claim the honor, and Larnste does have that byname. It's also worth considering that the creation of specific souls coincides with the creation of specific bodies, but then again reincarnation is not unheard of.

I'm not sure if oil/ash and strigil counts as a bath, but at least it's one way to avoid water.

And apropos of Ernalda: in Esrolia, land of 10k goddesses, there's the story of how the Sky King (I forget his name, but I think he's a Yelm/Arraz/Aether analogue) wanted to conquer the earth godesses, but eventually decided to become a Husband-Protector instead after he grew to respect Ernalda (or whoever, it's been a while since I read it). Later going on to protect her against the predation of Sky and Sea, iirc. Not directly relevant to Yelmalio or Dara Happa I suppose, but there's at least room in Esrolian mythology for a Sky god who's a... well, he's a man, but you know, not bad for a man.