Imryn

I really thought the answer to the question I posed was self evident, but never mind. My answer to my question is to fix the ignorance through better education and to not change the definition of the word. Laziness is harder to fix, but I would not change the language to accommodate it.

Well, if everyone is using their own definition of what matriarchy means, and nobody is willing to take any other definition, even as a starting point for further discussion, then this thread seems to be pretty pointless.

I think you should take a close look at yourself before accusing someone else of lacking basic civility. I fully understand that a living language is something that changes and evolves over time, and understand that the people that maintain the dictionaries need to continually update their publications to keep abreast of these changes. OTOH when a word is being misused out of laziness or ignorance should the definition of the word be changed? In particular, when a word is hijacked by a group of feminist anthropologists who decide to re-define it to mean something different, should the dictionary be changed to accommodate them, thereby changing the work of every anthropologist who came before them by altering the meaning of a word they may have used? For all we know this may have been a deliberate ploy by those feminist anthropologists to co-opt their predecessors work by linguistic manipulation. Words that are commonly used can change and evolve freely over time. Words that are specific to scholarly work should have fixed definitions in order to preserve the work of the scholars that use them. These words might very well be misused in common usage, but that should not alter their definition. Command of the English language is not a class issue or a race issue, it is an educational issue. The accent you have when speaking the words is irrelevant, as long as you use the words correctly. It used to be that people took pride in using language correctly, in being able to express themselves with eloquence and clarity, but no more apparently. I really think the "hellworld" you exist in is entirely of your own making. Finally, learn to recognise a joke when you see one!

The word "matriarchy" is the inverse of a "patriarchy" with the gender roles reversed. Everything else is implicit in that statement. I am making no assumptions about a female society; use of the word "matriarchy" to describe a society carries all of the assumptions with it. If you don't like the assumptions you should use a word that better describes the society you are describing. Not a matriarchy. 1. The woman is not in a position of power. The power belongs to the man. The woman is in a position of influence, not power. 2. A matriarchy requires most positions of power be occupied by women, not just one. Is the UK under Queen Elizabeth a matriarchy? Or with Theresa May as PM? No of course it isn't. There is only one valid model of a "Matriarchy". There are many possible social structures for societies with women in positions of power, its just that only one of them is called a Matriarchy. If you want to describe a different social structure use a word that correctly describes it, don't use a word that describes something different and insist that it now means what you want it to mean.

The word "Matriarchy" was created as the inverse of a "Patriarchy". It was not created to represent some other different structure or way of doing things. It is not based on any real world example, although the ancient Amazon's were probably of some influence (and there is precious little evidence that they even existed and even less on their social structure). The word carries all of the same baggage as the word "Patriarchy" but with the gender roles reversed. Having a powerful woman controlling a male king from behind the scenes is not a matriarchy. Having leadership by consensus is not a matriarchy. Having equal opportunities for both genders is not a matriarchy. Each of these scenarios have their own word to describe them. The post feminist vision of how a society run by women would function, is charming and terribly idealistic. Leadership by consensus , with everyone's views being heard and no decisions being made until everyone is in agreement is utterly unworkable, even in a fantasy world. Anyone who has worked for a female CEO can tell you that there is not much difference between men and women in positions of power. The females might not chase the secretaries quite as much, and they might be a bit less aggressive in the way they deal with people, but at the end of the day they are in charge and expect to be obeyed.

It might be useful if I present what I think these two words mean. I don't want to get into a discussion about whether I am right or wrong, but would like to present them as a starting point for the rest of you to use in this interesting discussion Matriarchy: A social structure where the majority of positions of power are occupied by women. There may be a few areas where men can hold positions of power but these would be limited and there would be a pronounced prejudice, and probably laws, against men gaining power outside these niches. Matrilineal: Tracing ones ancestry through the female line only. More common in ancient times when the only parent that was certain was the mother, and the identity of a child's father was based on trust and wishful thinking. Probably less accurate in magical Glorantha than it is in the real world.

That is a really terrible definition as It is confusing "matriarchal" and "matrilineal". I would suggest getting a better dictionary, but they all seem to have taken up this horrible trend of altering the definition of words based on current "popular" usage. The English language is being steadily debased by ill-educated morons who misuse words. The answer? Get hold of a printed dictionary from about 1950 or 60 - the good old days when academics were complete snobs and didn't pander to the ignorant unwashed masses

I think this is the heart of the problem here - these two words are directly linked in the english language - "matriarchy is patriarchy with inverted gender roles" exactly describes the relationship between the two words and the ideas they embody. If you want to describe a society with a different structure you have to use a different word to describe it.

That's also a valid way to play it. The problem, in my experience, is that the play session can bog down with players making constant checks on whether this food or that drink is kosher. I would drop it in occasionally, and make it an event that requires roleplaying such as a welcome drink when meeting an important chieftain that may or may not be alcoholic, but otherwise not allow it to slow down play. I know we differ on this, but in my opinion if geases can be broken under circumstances where the player has absolutely no chance of resisting it the cults with geases are unplayable. Your example is actually a case of players conspiring. If the character is part of a group and the group sets an ambush the character is a participant, whether they act or not. I would expect the geased character to prevent the ambush or consider it a voluntary break (case 5). The concept of "resistance" can be a slippery slope. The further the character walks down the slope before he resists the harder it will be to recover. Practically speaking, I would scale the difficulty of the path back in proportion to the precautions the character took (or could have taken, but didn't). Well, DI was only suggested as a possibility, and I did say that there could be others. A Heroquest, perhaps? This is where you and I really differ. The way you GM geases makes the cults that have them unplayable, as you readily admit. In my opinion the game designers wouldn't have wasted their time creating these cults if they expected them to be unplayable, ergo your way of GM'ing them is not the way the game designers intended them to be GM'ed. You can do what you like in your own games, of course, but constantly advocating here for others to adopt your methods is undermining what the game designers seem to have intended.

I've thought about this for a while, and it does make some sense; except why do only a handful of cults have it? If it was to show devotion then all cults should have it, or we should have some explanation of why these particular cults have a greater requirement than the others.

Well, you haven't mentioned any other cults that you like to destroy characters who join them, and I've been meaning to ask if you are an equal opportunity character destroyer or not. The fact that you expect magical identification of an opponent to be an advantage comes as no surprise - remind me which cults are good at that again... I assume you mean Sword Trance plus 10 mp and True Sword? Double weapon damage (that penetrates armor - you forgot that bit) is, as you note, transferable so your Humakti follower / meatshield (your preferred role for them) can give it to you. Sword trance is ok, but if played like arrow trace its not great. So using DI to avoid death blows is somehow exclusive to Humakti Rune Lords? Every other cult that has Rune Lords does exactly the same thing, and then goes on to use resurrection as well. Of course, Lhankor Mhy doesn't have any rune lords; unless your special subcult does? I have never said that geases shouldn't be tested. I have said that the testing should be commensurate with the associated gift. Testing does not have to be destruction testing; you do not need to destroy the character to do it. There is nothing in the cult description that requires Humakti to be suicidal, nothing that requires them to seek death; they are required to dispense death, as and where appropriate. "To his followers, Humakt is a frightening but necessary agent of eternal change who can be used in a courageous and noble way to preserve the world." If any of the gifts approached Samsons gift I might agree with you - maybe permanent 100 STR in RQG terms? They don't, they are pathetic. 1 point of STR? Please, how can that justify destruction testing the character? So no published RQ rules for them? You must have made up some rules if you play them, so how about you share them with us? I assumed they had spirit magic - everyone does. So spirit magic, rune magic, sorcery (if you want), and you get to add lore skills to weapon skills as positive modifiers. No Rune Lord DI (that's a shame) unless you happen to have made them Lhankor Mhy Rune Lords in your personal rules... Sword trance is OK, but situational if played as per arrow trance; Shield and True weapon are transferable so your meatshield can give you them. That leaves Sever Spirit. 1d6 damage. Wow that's some advantage the Humakti has. But they are traveling in pursuit of knowledge, not serving a death cult, so that makes everything better. Just out of curiosity, is there any difference that an outside observer would notice when your Sword Sage loots a tomb, compared to when a Humakti loots a tomb. Oh I almost forgot Someone needs to remind me again why Humakti are overpowered. You are too modest. Your Sword Sages have personal spirit and rune magic, and access to sorcery. You don't need illumination to get access to resurrection because you already have that, but you might need it to get the shapechanger abilities, and seeing as you wrote the rules using spears instead of swords doesn't seem to present much of a problem.

I have been trying to track down references to the Hevduran sub cult you mentioned, but outside a thread here about home brewed Lhankor Mhy rune magic I can't find anything. From what I can tell this Lhankor Mhy subcult would give you access to sorcery, and rune magic and allow you to use your lore skills as positive modifiers on weapon skill roles? If I was looking for a cult to top the list of "overpowered" ones this would be number one.

In peace time. I have been reading through the HQ rules and the background stuff for Sartar, the coming storm and the eleven lights, and I came across something interesting. Apparently, in the past the cult of Humakt was able to field many battalions of up to 1000 men but in recent memory these battalions have shrunk to a few dozen men or less. I have a theory. The kingdom of Sartar is nothing but a bunch of Orlanthi tribes that agreed to work together, and an Orlanthi tribe is nothing but a group of clans that agreed to work together. Orlanthi clans are opportunistic and always look out for themselves and loyalty is always clan first, tribe second and kingdom a distant third. When faced with an enemy like the Lunar empire every clan is looking either to fight or to cut a deal , and sometimes both. The kingdom is divided by conflicting clan loyalties and the lunars are able to easily maintain control by playing clans off against each other. When Sartari leaders are able to put together enough clans to be a threat the lunars are able to buy off enough clan leaders to beat them. The individual Orlanthi clan warrior is a cattle raider, not a soldier, and has no clue how to fight against Lunar regular troops. Each clan has a small number of thanes who might have a clue, but the warriors they lead are not disciplined enough for them to be effective. The Orlanthi warriors and thanes experience of fighting against the Lunars is their "allies" betraying them and their generals having no clue how to fight regular troops. In peace time the commitment and discipline that Humakt requires is anathema to the free spirited Orlanthi warrior. Once he has taken part in a few "glorious" attacks on disciplined Lunar phalanxes he might come to see the benefit of such discipline. My theory is that as the Orlanthi resistance grows the numbers of warriors willing to place themselves under Humakti discipline will grow very fast as the fighting heats up. And probably shrink again just as fast when the Lunars are driven out of Sartar.

I am still not sure why you are so down on Humakti. They are not invulnerable, they are not overpowered, they are (to some extent) killing machines, however that is a result of the cults focus and not the result of any useless "gifts". To compensate for any advantage they may have they are already playing for higher stakes than any other cult in every battle they fight. No resurrection is a huge disadvantage when you compare them to any other cult. Manoeuvring them into lose/lose scenarios just to test geases that they have no choice about is grotesque. Its not a test if there is no pass mark, its just torture. Give them a test where they can "win" even if the price of winning is high, and I can understand, but a lose/lose "test" is pointless. If Glorantha worked they way you want there would be no cult of Humakt - shoot enough initiates in the head and eventually people will stop signing up. There is such a cult, so it follows that the vast bulk of Humakti are not subjected to your lose/lose tests, just the ones unlucky enough to be GM'd by you.

If I am reading this correctly you are advocating deliberately forcing a character into a lose / lose situation that will irrevocably damage or destroy the character. How is that a proportional response to a worthless gift? What that looks like to me is just persecution of a cult you don't like. In my experience of role playing the best experience is when the GM and the players both have a say in the world and the way the characters interact with it. As a GM I would never force that situation on a player, and as a player I would walk away from the table of a GM that heavy handed and dictatorial. And the GM would be lucky I just walked away. I think you would be better off banning the cults you don't like from the get go than behaving like this.