JRE

Personally I think spirits of reprisal fill two functions. One is mechanical, as in the first versions of RQ the social aspects were not well developed, to keep players from joining cults just for training and some cool battle spells and then leaving as soon as they had the goodies they wanted. The cooler the goodies, usually the tougher the penalties, and Black Fang in RQ2 was a clear example. The second is to represent the magic that pervades all of Glorantha, so there are penalties that apply even if there are good reasons to leave a cult. It also give the GM tools to punish wayward cultists before they go fully apostate. In general I believe that in the new enlightened roleplaying, the social penalties will usually be worse than the magical, and they will apply even for the illuminati, so they do not get freebies. So you may well have champions of the cult challenging you (if they know you are beatable), you will lose your ransom money, and probably no friendly cult will take you in. In the case of lunar cults, I wonder if their traditional status as enemy cults meant that they were cults you were intended to leave eventually, and join the plucky rebels... So no reprisal. Though it also fits with a culture of illuminati and cult mobility, with the lunar elite flitting from cult to cult as needed. To show them as munchkins that exploit the system, and the Lunar way allows them to do so...

In my opinion it depends if he wants his role to work as an insider in the Orlanthi culture, or as an outsider. Working from inside, some peacemakers will be Orlanth Thunderous, but most will be Issaries, as they fill the role of diplomats, herals and public relations, besides traders. For a tribe level diplomat, dual initiation should be typical, both Issaries and Orlanth. Only an exceptional outsider could work as a peacemaker, but you could try to follow Sartar footsteps and follow Larnste or other obscure deity, including those mentioned above. If he is just peaceful, but does not aspire to make others peaceful, Barntar, Voriof or even a reversed gender role Ernaldan could work, though that might have some problem with the voices in the wind. If I were a tribal elder, that would be a sign to apprenticeshipe them to a kolati or some other personal connection with storm, rather than a cult approach. Heler would be a great option for a "lover, not a fighter" character.

As probably others, my first exposure to skill based games was Call of Cthulhu, so when I encountered RQ2 in 1984 it was already well established in my mind, so RQ was instead the game where everybody used magic, and magic really was everywhere, specially outside combat. I only started playing when I got RQ3 Gods of Glorantha. Erocomatose lucidity for the win. The plentiful CoC scenarios compared to the scarcity of RQ was the biggest advantage of CoC.

Not up to speed on DH myths. The Glorious Reascent of Yelm has always blunted my attempts to understand yelmites. But woudl it be possible that most of DH culture just skipped the whole Greater darkness, going to the underworld and returning with the sun? That way only the Alkothi and the nomads (as well as the Uz and the ram people) really survived Chaos, and remember the events of the Chaos war...

What I probably used too many words to say is that you cannot judge NPCs by PC standards, specially improvements. PCs are among that 0.001% of people that may become heroines, or even, depending on your game, superheroines. Leika and Nameless had the possibility of becoming heroines once, but maybe after seeing how well that worked for Kallyr and Broyan and their peoples, they have let that option go. So they are skilled humans, but not the kind of monomaniacal obsessives that actually become heroes. Monomania is someone who does not fight so often, but all seasons focuses on Sword fighting, when you are already at 100%, instead of enjoying that they are not fighting and dueling all the time.

I think what is missing is that real people (and therefore well designed NPCs) lose skills as we age. This is not in the system (and it is in only very few RPG systems) because players will scream bloody murder if they are losing their hard earned skills every year, but that is how it should be. People are used to getting weaker as they age, but they believe they should get more skilled, as there is much more personal involvement in that development. As anyone over 40 knows too well, that is not necessarily true. Constant use is critical, and even with constant use many skills reach a plateau in reality, even if our paper analogues can progress indefinitely. Mechanistically I would propose lose maybe 1 point in 1000/skill weeks without exercising, or tweak the numbers to give you your own decline. Occupational experience might count as exercise, but it may not. Another option used by other systems is to have a maximum combined skill level, usually dependent on intelligence, dexterity and will (POW). That would mean that to keep developing your sword skill, you have to start letting go of charioteering, cooking and Pavis Lore, specially after years without driving a chariot, visiting Pavis or cooking your own food. It was not important with rootless adventurers having adventures every week, and with a life expectancy measured in months, but the shift to seasonal adventuring puts age and the passage of time into perspective.

Going back to the original question, that is clearly an opportunity for an interesting myth. Godtime being what it is, the first question is what Arroin is involved, the powerful healer or the broken non-magical medic. Considering troll chauvinism and availability of healing, it would be better for it to be the second case, and probably involve a magic dead area (at least one is not that far from Dagori Inkarth). That may well be a way for an Arroin devotee to become a troll-friend, at least with trolls in Dagori Inkarth, or a way for a troll to extract some healing from human healers, possibly for iron wounds. As an outline from the troll side, KL sons foraging for food for their mother stumble on a depression where nothing lives. Desperate to find food they scout the whole area. Finally they find a chaos beast shaped as a bull or heifer Praxian beast (depending how much you wish to antagonize Storm bulls, in case you place the myth in The Dead Place, but they find their magic fails, and without their magic they cannot defeat it. When all seems lost KL arrives with her entourage looking for her missing children. She devours the beast whole, but it has spikes of death metal that wound the All-mother insides. No healing (XU may be involved if desired) seems to work in this place, and the death metal wounds do not heal naturally. Looking all over the place favoured son X (your choice who is the favored son, either an ancestor or Karrg) finds hiding in the dead area a weakling dressed in white, and remembering that is the color of healers among the weak, brings him / her back. The healer shows no fear, despite its weakness, and after discussing the situation, agrees to be swallowed by KL. Although she still suffers from heartburn, the unguents and salves of the healer take out the poison of the death metal out, and the great mother can heal again. As thanks, she spits the healer out, in case she or her children need the healer again. Just an example of how a throwaway sentence may become an interesting event, or a HQ opportunity. The human side of the story would probably skip the male uz part, and have Arroin, who has taken refuge in a magic dead zone, either to try to heal the Earth or to escape some enemy, meet a wounded KL. She has eaten something she should not, so Arroin courageously and selflessly accepts to be eaten to heal her from within. After he succeeds she lets him out again and they become friendly. Depending on your take on Glorantha, and how you interpret Harmony and Life runes you could even have some R rated content. That could be a good way to cement a relationship.

In my opinion the presence of the FHQ changes the typical Solar patriarchy, as normally we would expect an asymmetrical relationship, with men being allowed to do as they want outside marriage while women are not allowed any fraternization except in secret. However the FHQ clearly can marry outsiders, and I would expect her entourage to do so too. An additional factor is that many men (and selected women) will spend long periods away from the clan, either as mercenaries or as part of the horse herds foraging around. So that creates the opportunity on both sides. I would expect a ceremony similar to the Romans shortly after birth, where the husband (which would be male, or a female acting as a male) either recognizes the child, and they are Pure Horse, or does not, and they are Vendref. All children outside marriage are automatically Vendref. With a twist, as the FHQ or her representatives can overturn such declaration, as she is the authority on who is Pure Horse and who is not. There could be a ritualized exposure, where the Vendref rescue the abandoned child, or the FHQ representative does.

What the Darkness would like is a place of their own, with absolutely no light. Orlanth is doubly bad, because he first sent the sun to the underworld, and when they were just prospering in the overworld (with the Greater Darkness you could say the world was turned upside down, and the surface was the new Wonderhome) he fixed it so the sun will be almost everywhere, though only half the time. From a Darkness point of view, the result of the LBQ is a clear loss, if we discount that chaos that they will always say that they were (b)eating without any need for help.