Lordabdul

You shouldn't pay too close attention to my wording The goal was to be an exhaustive list, not as a descriptive list. I changed the wording slightly, to "allied/bound", because wyters (like I say a sentence later) are both allied (to the community leader) and bound (to a sacred animal or object). There was a short discussion not too long ago, however, about whether wyters really do have free will and their own agenda or not. So far I haven't found any text that indicates one way or the other, but what makes me wonder about it is that AFAICT there is no precedent of a wyter going against the will of the community leader -- usually when something "wrong" is done, it tends to be the ancestor spirits who show up and complain. There are also no rules or anything about having to convince or negotiate with a wyter when you ask it to do something. So... I don't know. Needs more research. Or more @Joerg

It's worth noting that good art in a book also provides more tools to the GM. I (almost) never show any of those illustrations to my players (I don't name monsters either... if they fight a Deep One, I never label it, I just describe it in as creepy/vague/etc. a way as possible). But having a good illustration gives me something to draw from (get it?) for that moment in the game when I need to describe it.

Why is it a bad idea?

That actually makes sense to me, thanks. So to protect True Sword from being dismissed/dispelled, you cast a Shield on top of it like mentioned previously?

Oh right I forgot about that -- still not quite able to grasp all the basics about Rune and Spirit magic.

I don't think you can cast Shield to protect the weapon from having its True Sword dispelled, can you? Those would be 2 separate spells -- if someone can spot what spells are running, they could choose to dispel the True Sword directly at the normal cost, no?

Like I said, I would personally allow it, but I'm not 100% sure I'm interpreting the rules right. One thing that's clear (as per the RQG G&A) is that the Rune points that you spend on Extension would not count in the "strength" of the spell.

Wait, you have a 63 MP storage available for real? I'm not sure your GM is playing very fair (and yes I know this is the egregious munchkinery thread, but it's about the players not playing fair! not the GM!). 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. Having some support character cast protective magic on the party's fighters would, in addition to, obviously, provide some protection, also provide a layer that general magic dismissal would hit before True Sword. I would indeed use the same system as Countermagic for Dismiss/Dispel. If I'm reading this right, you can spend magic points to boost Rune magic... is that right? So you could cast True Sword (1 RP) with a decent boost (4 magic points) and that would require either a Dismiss 3 or Dispel 6.

Nice adventure hook! What kind of gateway was it? Was it a gateway to the Spirit World, like, so you could go there without having to know and cast Discorporate and leaving your body behind? How was the Lunar witch planning to use that gateway?

LOL that flew way way WAY above my head

I have zero idea what you're referring to here... is this some obscure RQ mailing list in-joke thing? (searching for distilleries in my big PDF index didn't give my any results).

Yep that's what I'm thinking -- and maybe even simpler than that. Narratively speaking, I just want a decent "blank slate" starting point for the PCs, especially since none of my players know anything about Glorantha (which is why I'm picking an isolated area to start..., but with many options available in all cardinal directions to grow, discover the world, and get involved in THINGS). I could save myself from the burden of clan migration logistics by having them just be a family/bloodline fleeing Alda-Chur and recently adopted into one of the Bachad clans. Since those clans are in complete disarray in 1611 after the sack of Alone, and probably in serious need of new thanes/healers/etc., it shouldn't be hard to be adopted. And that will still provide some good opportunities to introduce/build things up... like, say, introducing players to the concept of a wyter by having them recover/repair it after Harvar's people potentially destroyed or stole it. I trust your knowledge of Gloranthan publication history It's just that the narrative about the Tres being a new tribe spanned a good 10+ years, including the 2012 issue of Wyrms Footnotes 15 which has a dedicated chapter on the Far Place, and a detailed map of the area in the style of the Argan Argrar Atlas, so I figured the authors might have made up their mind by then. (not a criticism, though... just surprised... doesn't matter too much for my campaign) I'll check it out, thanks.

WE'VE GOT AN OFFICIAL DATE OH MY GOD (cue Jason flying down on a griffin to edit the post and cast Befuddle on everybody) Are you talking about the cult writeup in RQ3's Sun County? (haven't read that yet... the cult writeup in Cults of Prax doesn't come across as misogynistic to me).

Thanks @Jeff ! The maps are super useful. A few comments/questions: So it looks like we're indeed back to the Amad and Bachad tribes having settled the Solfint valley since the mid-1580s (that's why you should always listen to @Joerg, folks!). That's fine... I'll have to figure out if I want to keep my Glorantha varying or not I'm surprised that the Tres is retroactively being made into an original tribe though. I assume the lack of little red dots demonstrates how poor the local clans are, and how wild the area is... so probably just a collection of farm steads of varying sizes? I would still imagine at least a village for the clan centres. If things like Highwall Inn and Erenia's Inn are registered on the map, surely we're missing a few more dots? It's fairly uncommon that the Tres and Bachad don't have their own tribal centre, and instead share Alone for that, no? (as opposed to the Amad who supposedly are the poorest, but they still have Amadhall) Are the population numbers written as of 1625? Are the other numbers (under the population numbers) the number of clans in each tribe? If so, it looks like the Amad and Bachad have been downgraded since Wyrms Footnotes 15 (Amad: 2 down to 1, and Bachad: 4 down to 2) Storlock appears on the west bank of the whatever river that is there... that would place it in Bachad lands. Is this a mistake? (IIRC it's supposed to be a joint Torkani/troll trading outpost)

While I totally agree that Yelmalions are horrible people in many ways, it might actually be indirectly because of how much Yelmalio has been treated like shit during the God Time. The Yelmalio cult is the farthest from "forgiving and altruistic", but Yelmalio himself kinda used to be that, I guess? The more I think about it, the more I see Yelmalio's own character arc as, basically, a "making of a bad guy" arc... like, errr, Syndrome in The Incredibles, for instance. He was the sidekick that nobody bothered giving any credit to, was constantly excluded from the cool people club, kicked down and mocked, and still trying to prove himself. At some point he snapped, started breaking the Compromise and all that, and his initiates turned into this horrible bunch of people who don't want to take any shit from anybody, and are now kicking other people down to make up for it. Frankly, in an alternate Glorantha where, say, the Red Moon was never born, I could see the Yelmalions as the bad guys, a cult who rises to prominence based on their increasingly lucrative mercenary work, until they start turning against their former "customers", taking over and purging all the other cults of deities who were mean to the guy.

I agree with this. My understanding is that in their latest/upcoming iteration, the Elmal worshippers understand the relation between their deity and the "main" deity (Yelmalio) in the same way, say, Barntar initiates understand his relation to Orlanth. They're still going to pray to Elmal/Barntar, tell different tales/myths about it, and get different magic.... but instead of being reckless barbarians (Orlanth) or fanatical hoplites (Yelmalio), they are instead sturdy farmers (Barntar) or, err, I'm not sure what Elmal people are...

I'm not sure if they are contradictory... I don't know if a subcult has to necessarily be exclusively subservient to a unique cult -- i.e. it could be a subcult of 2 cults, because it's about a deity that merges aspects of 2 other primary deities. That said, I don't know if there's any precedent on that. AFAICT, Arroin is a subcult of Chalana Arroy, but an associate cult of Humakt (at least according to the Cults Compendium). That's a fascinating subject that would merit its own thread (and yes, I slightly disagree)

Also I had forgotten about Spirits of Reprisal! Added now.

I would do that too. So for Storm Bull, it would be Cult Lore plus a couple skills to show you know your way around an axe, and/or that you can hold your beer But I agree with the OP that it's an error in the rules -- "errors" don't have to be mechanical errors... in a general definition of the term, I think they can also be typos, inconsistencies, unclear wording, etc.

Added, thanks!

So would it be not uncommon to see some possessed wild boar or bear or trollkin making trouble in your clan lands? Bad spirits don't have much to lose -- they can indulge in whatever trouble-making they want, and discorporate as soon as anybody looking vaguely like a shaman shows up (I'm not sure how long it takes them to discorporate, actually). Dominant, I suppose? I think covert possession is used more by "simple" spirits that don't have much intelligence/personality? (disease, etc.) Oh good point, I didn't notice that spirits are also the source of some passions/dreams/etc. (which... sounds weird to me, actually). Didn't know there were Pain Spirits. (edited the top post to add this)

For those interested in this, I went down a rabbit hole of internet archaeology these past couple days, and I think the conclusion is that nobody really knows where the Amad and Bachad tribes were before 1611... The Tres tribe, according to John Hughes himself, was definitely rewritten as a "newly formed" tribe when it wasn't the case before. People on mailing lists got confused a bit throughout the 2000s about the increasing changes in wording where the Amad/Bachad tribes, previously considered as having always been around Alone, now seemed to have fled there from somewhere. But there was no definitive word that I could find on the topic (only stuff in fanzines or online blogs). True to himself, Ian Cooper pitched in to say that you could have it either way in your Glorantha... so I think I'm going to indeed Vary My Glorantha, and try to keep going with my initial theory, which I find the most narratively attractive. There's a bunch of things I still need figuring out on my own (who took over the tribes' former lands and what that meant politically speaking, how the Bachad became "renowned troll fighters" in the span of <10 years, etc.) but there's one question bothering me: what are the magical/spiritual logistics of a clan moving to a different place? Sure, hopefully you don't lose your wyter in the transport, and whatever friendly/worshipped/bound spirits you had that were tied to a place (temple, shrine, river, etc.) are lost. But what about, say, founding myths, traditions, and such? Are those weakened because you moved away from where they possibly happened? Do you have to find a new founding myth through heroquesting? Does it matter?

Now for the questions: Can a spirit try to possess animals by themselves (i.e. by spirit-fighting them), or can they only inhabit an animal if specifically bound to one by a magic user? Imagine you're a malign spirit looking for a joy-ride in the mundane world. Who would you target? Would you attack and possess a trollkin, or other low-POW creatures? Would you attack a sick person, or would the fight against disease spirit not be worth it? Since bound spirits are released when the binder dies, does Glorantha not have the usual trope of finding an ancient temple or artefact with a spirit trapped inside it? I'm pretty sure there are published scenarios with this premise – am I misunderstanding something? How would you decide between binding a spirit to an object, animal, or place? The first two can be transported, in case, say, a clan has to pack up its wyter and move somewhere else. An area can't be stolen or destroyed though. I would probably go for area-bound spirits for guarding a temple/shrine, and use an animal or object for everything else. I suppose a spirit is also released if the bound object is destroyed? (same as when a bound animal dies)

So I've been trying to wrap my head around the role of spirits in Glorantha, and I came up with this list of all the various situations where one might find a spirit, how and why. Feel free to point out anything missing (in which case I might edit this post to keep the list fairly exhaustive). Hopefully it helps other people too. Spirits and Where To Find Them Attached to People Allied Spirits: Rune Priests and Rune Lords of a cult will almost always have an allied spirit (unless they recently lost it). The spirit is an initiate of the cult, and is linked to the Priest/Lord at all times. Shaman's Fetch: a shaman's fetch is the shaman's own spirit, awakened in the Spirit World, but also behaves in many ways like an Allied Spirit. Pacts: a shaman would typically have ongoing pacts with a few spirits in the Spirit World. They are in contact with the shaman, and provide a few services. A character might lose control of an allied or contracted spirit if they're too weakened, as some spirits might take the opportunity to engage in spirit combat and get free. Bound Spirits Animal/object: a spirit can be bound to an animal or object using magic. In the case of an animal, it must be a special cult-bred animal. Place: with more magic a spirit can be bound to an area, such as a guardian spirit or a Sprul-pa. Anybody can communicate with the spirit by getting in physical contact with the animal/object/area. Anybody can release the spirit and give it one order, but unless magic is used to control the spirit, it is freed after carrying out the first task. With magic, the spirit can be forced to obey more orders, or to go back into the animal or object. The spirit is released when the binder dies, even if they're immediately revived through magic or divine intervention. If the spirit is bound to an animal, the spirit is also released when the animal dies. Wyters Wyters are a special kind of allied/bound spirit, which serve and defend a specific community (clan, temple, city, army unit, etc.). A wyter is both bound to an animal or object, and allied to a person (the community's leader). Unlike normal bound spirits, wyters can travel outside of the bound animal/object. When bound to an animal, they can be transferred to another animal with a special kind of ritual. Temporarily Summoned Spirits Ancestors: a character can summon the spirit of an ancestor to provide help, but there's a small chance this spirit turns out to be bad or evil: they would either turn against the summoner, or engage in spirit combat against someone, as per the summoner's wishes, but retain permanent possession of the host. Cult Spirits: a character can also summon a cult spirit to provide help. Spirits of Reprisal: when a character leaves a cult without going to an associated cult or sub-cult, a spirit of reprisal is sent to punish them. Possession A spirit might be found in possession of a physical creature if they bested it in spirit combat. A character currently discorporated to wander the Spirit World is vulnerable to spirits possessing it body. As Natural Phenomenon Physical Health: sickness is generally caused by disease spirits, who generally serve Mallia (and are sometimes former Mallia initiates). Healing is generally performed by healing spirits (some of which are former Chalana Arroy initiates). Some spirits might just inflict pain for sheer pleasure. Mental Health: spirits can be attributed to mental state, from various passions (lust, etc.) to madness. Physical Phenomenon: physical phenomena in Glorantha might be caused by spirits instead of chemical reactions, optical interaction, thermodynamics, or similar. Shadow/darkness spirits (many of which are called Dehori) come out at night, haunt dark places, or gather around light sources like active volcanoes to keep them contained. Fermentation is caused by Zymurgeist spirits, which initiates of Minlister (Orlanthi god of ale) can summon and control. Climate and Weather: Darkness spirits get more prominent during Dark season, river spirits during Sea season, thunder spirits during Storm season, etc. Miscellaneous: earthquakes, tornadoes, dust devils, and such might be caused by earth/wind spirits (a.k.a. elements). In the Wild Spirits can be wandering the Spirit World randomly, although they often stick around a specific place tied to the Mundane World. Those are called Genius Loci. Landmark Spirits: one can find spirits tied to special natural features. River spirits and plant spirits (tied to a field or grove or forest) are common. Some such spirits have special additional powers, including the ability to incorporate in the physical world, like Nymphs or Voughs. Ghosts: the restless dead might haunt a place or object. Additionally, ancestors might become restless and come haunt you suddenly if they consider you haven't been respecting their traditions.

Mmmh so you're saying Alone would have stone fortifications all around it, with gate houses? I didn't picture it so sophisticated but that's probably for the better since it will be the main city at the beginning of the campaign, so might as well make it pretty! I was actually talking about the (still theoretical) mass migration of the Amad and Bachad tribes. I was trying to figure out what it would have looked like if I went with my original theory, as opposed to the other theory that the Amad/Bachad have always been around Alone. "Enslaved" is a term I see used sometimes in references to the Alone Confederation tribes, but indeed it's probably the wrong word. They're occupied, and pay a heavy tribute to keep existing, but are still free and rebellious AFAIK. Assuming we're still talking about the potential migration of Amad/Bachad from the Alda-Chur region over to the wilderness around Alone in 1611, I'm not sure I see a lot of good alternatives for hiking there: if you don't walk east through the northern part of the Dinacoli tribe, you would have to go through Vantaros/Tovtaros lands, and those might not be as friendly at that time, since they're full of Harvar supporters/apologists. Here is a crude drawing of the migration I had in mind (pink areas are former Bachad/Amad lands, not really to any thought-out scale, and the red arrow is the path of migration). The other 2 theories are, of course, that (1) both tribes were always around Alone, or (2) both tribes were actually neighbours to the Tovtaros, and the Tres moved into their former lands, but that last theory is probably the one that makes the less sense to me. I was talking about a permanent presence of armed people in/near Alone at the service of Harvar Ironfist, to keep an eye on the rebellious Orlanthi of the Far Point. Since Harvar had, at this point, the blessing of the Lunar Tarsh government, I figure that this military presence could either be Harvar's people, or Lunar military on loan to Harvar. Would either Harvar or Euglyptus really leave all the Alone tribes by themselves, with no oversight, except for an occasional meeting to collect taxes and tributes? Thanks for all your answers, really appreciated!