Imryn

1 hour ago, PhilHibbs said:

Yes. If a word changes, it changes. Most linguistic change is driven by efficiency/laziness.

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.

16 hours ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

I'm a linguist and I also do anthropology and sociology and I cannot begin to explain the ways you are just entirely crashing the plane into the ground in this thread. I mean I could, but this board is not about disabusing people of basic facts about language, nor about classism, racism, and basic civility, which you seem free to want to pull the pin on and just throw directly into the crowd.

Do you think maybe we could not do that as I feel like this is enough of a hellworld that I don't need to come into a Glorantha discussion and see someone clearly backhanding Englishes that aren't Oxford/Ohio Broadcaster?

Because honestly it's pretty clear what you mean by that, and it's beyond ugly. It's not a dogwhistle at this point, it's a foghorn.

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! 

9 hours ago, styopa said:

Except that depends ENTIRELY on your definition of what a "position of power" IS, doesn't it?  Why, for example, are you assuming a female society would be as exclusionary of males as primitive male ones are of females?  Sorry, but your model sounds more like "government by men with mammaries and vaginas" than actual women.  Read the wiki that's been linked; many feminist scholars defend the argument that the "opposite" of a patriarchy is an egalitarian society because that's what women tend to. (IMO, I think that's a wee bit idealizing women as being somehow morally superior...not sure I'd go that far.)

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.

9 hours ago, styopa said:

Man sits on throne, is ostensibly king.  Woman make all his decisions, and decides unilaterally what woman will marry his son, so that she knows someone competent will be making his decisions.  Man literally just parrots the orders she gives him: "matriarchy"?  The women have all the power and control, but don't wear the vestments of power.  Meaningful?

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.

9 hours ago, styopa said:

As I said previously, to me it's pretty simplistic to believe that the only possible 'valid' model of matriarchy is some weird negative-mirror-image of male structures.  Presumably where women are the generals and wave the swords around?

I hope I'm not offending anyone to say: that's simply not how most women seem to work, collaborate, or build power structures.  Women are intrinsically different; they are far more verbal than physical, far more collaborative than competitive, more manipulative of social orders than outright violent, more likely to kill with poison than a club to the head in a stand-up fight.

There's literally no reason (except to defend this strawman argument we're having) to presume that societies in which women have control would be in any way structured like men's.

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.

1 hour ago, PhilHibbs said:

Proscription in language never works. People will continue to use words in the vernacular even if they have a different, specific technical meaning. I would suggest using phrases like "true matriarchy" or "matriarchal governing system" for what you describe, dictionaries often define "matriarchy" to be more broad than that.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/matriarchy

1: a family, group, or state governed by a matriarch

2: a system of social organization in which descent and inheritance are traced through the female line

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

6 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

...

If we get away from thinking like "matriarchy is patriarchy with inverted gender roles", then obviously society would have quite different rules. Sometimes, those rules would surprise us. Maybe even allowing men to "dominate" some aspects of society.

...

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.

8 minutes ago, Joerg said:

IMG, geases can be broken "accidentally" - after a warning. "Eat no meat of X on N-Days" will receive warnings, like "you are served a stew with various sorts of meat." This is a "may contain nuts" warning. As to the specific days, it is fair to assume that the character knows how much time has passed in most situations, and that he will err on the side of caution. On the other hand, when the GM starts to remind the player of such problems, the player should take that as a warning.

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.

12 minutes ago, Joerg said:

A breach of contract is a breach of contract. "Nobody can make you do anything" (a Heortling tenet) means that you cannot put the blame on someone else.

"Never participate in an ambush" can be avoided through inactivity in the ensuing fracas, but that course of inaction may clash with an Oath to protect and obey some individual.

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).

18 minutes ago, Joerg said:

The Samson dilemma, and how it is solved, is such a case IMO. Has the character really done everything to avoid this? If the celibate Yelmalian is seduced after Elusu takes a seat in his lap, his failure to remove her from his lap before she gets the chance to seduce him can be regarded as having let down his guard. Getting seduced while carrying her out of a critical situation (for her lord, not necessarily for her) couldn't be blamed on the Yelmalian following orders. Yes, this is a case of victim blaming, but relaxing in the company of Elusu is a no-go for celbacy-geased folk.

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).

23 minutes ago, Joerg said:

That is definitely wrong. For a comparison, it is like a king divorcing his wife after you tired of her when you received her hand and half a kingdom as his reward earlier on. Neither apostasy nor illumination remove a geas - you have it as long as you return to life.

That's similar to DI to get access to prohibited magic, IMO - tantamount to apostasy.

Well, DI was only suggested as a possibility, and I did say that there could be others. A Heroquest, perhaps?

27 minutes ago, Joerg said:

Random rolls for gifts and geases are one reason why I (and my players) avoid such cults. inflicting such random fate is exactly what you have been accusing me of...

On the other hand, if the assignment of the geases and the gift are based on the initiatory experience of the character, usefulness etc. don't even come into consideration. If it is something other than a random lot that creates both gift and geases, maintaining them should become sufficiently meaningful even for the player (and not just the character). Turning those randomly rolled gifts and geases into a story worth telling is a big bid, but IMO a much better way than the Rules As Written. A narrative mechanic similar to the clan generation sub-game of King of Dragon Pass and some of the HeroQuest supplements would do a better trick. But creating that for each initiatory experience is an amount of work that surpasses reasonable use of resources.

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.

2 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

Secondly, the purpose of a gift and He's a, IMO, isn't to benefit the player, it's to show devotion to the deity. Therefore, said geasa (and the gift) is extremely relevant throughout their entire career.

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.

2 hours ago, Joerg said:

That I am singling out Humakti over other cultists is your interpretation, without ever having played with me.

Where there is mythical precedence for a catch 22 situation, I am likely to inflict it on a character, more so in heroquesty situations. I probably will have some sort of Plan B prepared, and a player smelling this kind of rat probably is well advised to ask me whether the character knows about an applicable myth, and to have a decent Cult Lore or similar skill to roll on. Magical identification of an opponent is a proven way to deal with things normal skills fail to deal with.

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...

2 hours ago, Joerg said:

Three rune points and a crystal full of MP give you +100% on attack and parry and double weapon damage. Not overpowered in the least? Not to mention that your friends and supporters can buff you up with more magic. Sword Trance is not transferable, True Weapon or Shield is.

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.

2 hours ago, Joerg said:

Chalana Arroy's Resurrection pales in numbers after a battle compared to the successful Divine Interventions against premature or pointless death on the battlefield by Humakti Swords. Said Sword may still die after his second DI has used up all available rune points, but he or she will have waded through the enemies thrice.

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?

2 hours ago, Joerg said:

Never testing a geas is pointless. Never giving a character who voluntarily embraced Death (his own, too) high drama is pointless, too. I am not talking about "He's dead, Jim" pointless plot-proving deaths, as per John Scalzi's excellent take on Redshirts.

Recently, we had a thread that read something like "bummer, we have this character who joined Humakt to avenge a wrong, and now she did it and is still alive, and seeks a new purpose for this life." The player apparently was willing to go down with the nemesis.

Again, let me point to Samson's desperate defense against the Philistines, his great gift, and the condition upon which it was granted, but also to his "one last time" after the condition for the gift had been broken. Don't you think this is an almost purpose-made Humakti plot line?

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?

2 hours ago, Joerg said:

The best RQ-ish source for the Sword Sages is the story "The Smell of a Rat" in the RQ2 Companion. Other than that, there is quite a bit on Hevduran in HeroQuest.

Basically, look at Sorala for a the combat abilities of a Sword Sage.

If you choose so. Spirit Magic is a valid option, too. You don't have to play sorcerers in the Lhankor Mhy cult.

That's a fairly recent RQG addition to the arsenal of Sword Sages. The traditional Sword Sage has no rune magic to aid his combat, but the normal range of spirit magic. He has probably a high Battle skill.

Carrying knowledge into combat, yes, that's what a Sword Sage is about. But does that beat specialist rune magic?

Rather than putting all of his learning efforts into combat, the Sword Sage travels in the pursuit of knowledge. He is the field working Sage, the one to traipse into ruins and copy ancient inscriptions or art that cannot be carried back to the library.  While not a front rank academic, he will need to be able to provide context to his finds.

No Sword Trance or Shield, True Weapon or Sever Spirit. No Rune Lord Divine Intervention. Yes, overpowered, I see it clearly.

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

2 hours ago, Joerg said:

Magical identification of an opponent is a proven way to deal with things normal skills fail to deal with.

Someone needs to remind me again why Humakti are overpowered.

2 hours ago, Joerg said:

I said it is my personal favorite fighter cult. Not that is the most effective combatant cult. That would be some form of Man of All or Horali with both personal rune and spirit magic (in case of sorcerous Men of All from bound spirits) and sorcerous augmentation in the umpteens for various magic parameters. Arkati... Humakti with sorcery and illuminated access to Resurrection or otherwise heroic backdoor from the halls of the dead. Possibly with Kitori shape changer abilities, allowing them to manifest as Dark Trolls, Dehori demons or humans at will. Using a spear rather than a sword, for those early strike rank kills.

There might be a reason why Kitori who follow Black Arkat haven't seen any RQ write-up yet (or for that matter, neither any HQ write-up).

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.

21 hours ago, Joerg said:

My personal favorite fighter cult is the Lhankor Mhy subcult of the Sword Sages, Hevduran.

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.

52 minutes ago, Bill the barbarian said:

Truly worth mentioning, there are no lines of impatient swordsmen queuing up  in front of Humakti Temples waiting to join the cult. Any lineups one might see would be on signup days for open non-denominational training, I would think. The exact opposite might be true. The loneliest job in Pavis ( a city not lacking in adventurous types looking to join cults) I can imagine, might be the Humakti Sword in charge of recruitment for all the reasons given.

ETA The Humakt cult is very small numerically despite its power.

Cheers

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.

14 minutes ago, Joerg said:

This is in some part a reaction to the "loveable munchkin antics" that went on with the Temple of the Wooden Sword.

I am likely to call the mythic shenanigans of any cult when the situation warrants it. As a Humaktii, you serve Death, and accept Death in the course of your activities. If you want to play a Samson character, be prepared that some Delilah will give you a haircut sooner or later. If you are invulnerable except for the heel or the shoulder blade, expect to be hit there sooner or later.

Orlanth's track record as a warleader against Chaos is about as bad as Jon Snow's track record as a war leader. He had one significant victory over the Sky Terror, and a meaningful one over the lesser Kajabori. The rest is lots of suckage, and that may afflict an Orlanthi leader sooner or later.

On the Other Side, I like to shift myths at certain parallels, especially if the antagonists have been pushing in that direction from the start. Something like this may make a heroquest path a lot harder than expected, even if the original goal can be made. On the other hand, a harder quest may have a different outcome, but not usually a useless one.

"What do you mean my character can die of this, and I don't get a save point?" If you take the bonus for playing a doomed character, not giving you a measure of doom is a failure by the GM. Like I said, I make this clear to potential players of this cult when starting a campaign, or when playing a convention one-shot. If the plan is to have a short campaign, I might play as hardball.

If I show up as a guest GM with an existing group, I try to get a feeling for their dynamics, and I won't go George R.R. Martin on them.

If you want to play a challenging and doomed concept, I am willing to accommodate you. If you want to play a loveable mass-murdering swordsman, go for Orlanth. If your Humakti concept is brooding teenage angst and violence, then my style of calling the challenge should be within narrative purpose. Going Humakti after re-life sickness, an ok concept, but the sickness remains as a plot hook, so expect to catch some plot with it.

I am all for having adventures that address a player's concept for a character, which is why I am bad with published scenarios, and a friend of sandboxes. Yes, I do offer the players some high stakes dares at times, but those are hardly the only option to continue the campaign, and entail higher risk for possibly higher or more coveted rewards. They don't come for free.

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.

16 hours ago, Joerg said:

But yes, the question remains when it is opportune for the GM to fire Chekhov's Gun and attack a geas. In all fairness, the character should have had the chance to benefit from the gift for a bit. In equal fairness, refusing the "Call to Adventure" is ok once or twice, but ultimately the character is likely to get a choice of two evils, one is risking to break the geas, lose cult benefits, and get buggered if persisting to bluff through, the other is to walk the path of the hero into a different kind of evil and hell. Escaping into the myths is always an option, and if the player is willing to go all out Humakt (or Yelmalio) and do the really bad stuff, kudos, and let's have fun with that. Yanafal offered his all - the total of his existence in history - to absolve Teelo Estara in the confrontation with the Devil/absolute Chaos. I will tell the player that myth, or a similar one, and possibly some other part of the Sword Story to choose from.

Sooner or later I will tell a Humakti about Arkat, too. There is always a deeper hole to be dug. "Apotheosis" as a guardian of the orthodoxy of a heroquest path may be a worthy retirement, and a chance to start something new.

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.

Taking a deep breath, and a step back, I would like to explain my thoughts about both gifts and geases, and the testing / breaking of them.

In RQ2 gifts were quite powerful benefits. The main reason for this was that characters started at a very early point in their careers and were years away from attaining Rune Lord status. With the new character generation system in RQG it is quite easy to create a character who is, if not already qualified, very close to attaining Rune Lord status.

Once a character has access to Rune Lord DI they can get all (or most) of the gifts with no cost. There may be some gifts that are exclusive to certain gods (perhaps Humakt is the only god who can grant sense assassin?) but that is for each GM to determine, and the majority (all stat increases, cult skill increases, additional weapon damage and HP) should be available to any Rune Lord in any cult.

Thus, the benefit gained from a gift in RQG is now minor and other characters who are in cults without gifts will very quickly catch up. The benefit gained from the gift is small and fleeting, so the cost of that gift should be commensurate.

All of the geases are described very briefly. Some, like "wear no armor on 1 location", are very clear in their intention and scope. Others, as our discussions here have shown, are less clear and must be better defined by the GM in order to play them properly.

The vast majority of the geases can be broken by the GM effortlessly. As has been repeatedly mentioned you can have a character knocked unconscious and then break almost any geas. Strap armor on their unarmored leg, put them on a horse, feed them vegetables (cooked and uncooked), meat, fish, fowl etc etc etc. But is this commensurate with the benefit gained?

I am not proposing that geases should not be tested, but I am saying that the testing and the consequences for failure should be proportional to the benefit gained from the gift.

In my Glorantha i adopt the following policies:

1. Geases cannot be broken accidentally. The character is assumed to be following the strictures during all mundane events. Where an action would break a geas the GM will warn the player.
2. Geases cannot be broken involuntarily. If the character is unable to resist the action that breaks the geas it doesn't count. This does not mean that the situation is just ignored, it means that the situation is resolved through roleplaying contrition, confession, penance etc. Players conspiring to contrive circumstances to evade geas restrictions do not count as involuntary.
3. Testing geases is appropriate and required. The player should be placed in situations that require them to sacrifice something of value to maintain the geas. This testing should take place early in the characters career and should become less frequent as the character advances in their career; proportional to the current benefit of the associated gift.
4. Breaking a geas (1). Testing a geas may involve requiring the player to make a choice, but it may also require actions such as resistance rolls etc. In the case where the player attempts to resist the action that breaks the geas, but fails, the geas is broken. The character suffers the consequences of the broken geas, however as they did attempt to resist there should be a path for them to regain their gods favour. A difficult path, but a path none the less.
5. Breaking a geas (2). If a player chooses to break a geas deliberately the character suffers the consequences of the broken geas. It is up to the GM to decide if there is any way to regain the gods favour, but if a path is offered it should be tantamount to suicide.
6. Removing a geas. There will come a time in the characters career when the benefit of the gift becomes negligible, and some mechanism should exist whereby the character can be released from the geas. One possibility is to use DI to remove the geas (and associated gift). Other possibilities exist, I am sure.

Characters should not be condemned to suffer under geases that are being constantly and harshly tested by the GM just for the minor benefit of gifts that are unavoidable, soon worthless and never worth the price demanded for them.

14 hours ago, Joerg said:

Humakti are insanely strong killing machines, and only the fact that the temples rely on society to feed them and to sell them weaponry keeps them moderately accountable for the killings they inflict on the population.

To join Humakt is to play a doomed character. Yes, you can delay your final death by DIs if you make it to Rune Lord, but most of the rank and file will die and join their deity long before there is a post as Rune Lord available, and before they qualify.

Yes, there are a few rather old Humakti. Londra and Naimless are positively ancient as Humakti go.

Many a Humakti will die before he or she breaks one of the geases (and most Humakti will have only one, and a rather meaningless gift.) They are overpowered killing machines because of their range of magic, and their cult skills generally have check boxes, which makes approaching rune level easy. Creating an opening for a new Sword isn't that hard, either.

I don't understand why you think Humakti are "insanely strong" or "overpowered killing machines". I don't see anything in their cult or their rune magic that justifies that characterisation - Sever Spirit is the only spell that stands out and that has been given a hard nerf; to the point that its not worth casting it on anyone but a red shirt (and a waste of 3 rp then).

I agree that they are ultimately doomed, but the restriction on resurrection guarantees that without any further help.

15 hours ago, Joerg said:

My personal favorite fighter cult is the Lhankor Mhy subcult of the Sword Sages, Hevduran.

I wondered why you made the comment about Humakti cult skills having check boxes, then I saw what your favorite "fighter" was. Talk about wanting to have everything! So sorry that your super duper sword fighting sage character has to develop his knowledge based skills to advance. Bitter much?

Has it occurred to you that specialising in something should allow you to advance faster, and attempting to get the broadest possible range of abilities should make your advancement slower?

I suppose if you think a pale 90 lb librarian who learned his sword fighting from a book is a good "fighter" then your description of Humakti as overpowered killing machines is a bit more understandable

13 hours ago, Joerg said:

Rape is a bad topic, agreed, and putting it into your gaming should only come after you cleared all trigger tests. I usually avoid it. I haven't made any use of Yelornan unicorn riders, yet.

The celibacy geas really is about falling prey to seduction. Now, your average player character won't fall to seduction even if he has 95% in Fertility and a low percentage in Truth if the player fears or knows that the consequences will be bad for the character. That same player will have little problem with receiving a special or critical hit as the consequence of being caught in an ambush. Now this weird "I'll play my character against her culture and archetype" is bad roleplaying. The Truth Rune cults that have geases may have an argument for their character to resist seduction, but a highly powered seduction will only be resisted by their Truth Rune (and possibly Man Rune), not completely prevented, and even a geased character will fall prey to seduction, or perhaps perform desperate self-mutilation while resistance still is possible.

...

So, for me as GM, the problem would be to make the character a rape victim.

A failed resistance to a magically enforced seduction is within fair play. Glorantha has such magic - Eurmal for instance, but also Yinkin, Orlanth, Ernalda, and Uleria. And that seduction may be same sex seduction, too - while going against one's professed gender would augment the character's resistance to such seduction, it wouldn't prevent it, either.

Heroforming a deity may separate the geased character from the person performing intercourse.

...

Not quite true. First off, in order to have Rune Lord DI (which is just possible for a well-constructed character after character creation) means that the character is saddled with two gifts for which he has taken geases - in case of Yelmalio, randomly rolled ones, which leaves a 1 in 10,000 chance or less that the character was favored by Humakt/Yelmalio and avoided any geas.

(BTW, the return to randomly rolled geases rather than the gift commensurate geases that Humakt had in RQ3 is a bad design decision IMO, and too many entries of those lists are plain stupid and not based on the deity's known myths. Which goes for a number of gifts, too.)

In the real world context we are each making our arguments based on different starting conditions. You are taking the christian churches stated position and intentions and proceeding from there. I am ignoring their stated position and intentions and basing my argument on what I think there actual intentions were. Thus, we are never going to come to any resolution.

I agree with your comments about rape in runequest above. I can imagine even including the scenario you sketched out if my players were comfortable with it. The key factor being that it is a scenario where the player has a chance to resist.

That was NOT the scenario presented in the other thread - That scenario was of an unconscious character raped by her captors. Entirely outside the players control the GM just announces "Oh btw your character just got raped by 50 bandits; so you lost your gifts and your god is pissed at you so good luck casting rune magic and your unicorn ran off".

Rune Lord DI isn't just limited to Humakt and Yelmalio - every RL gets it so every RL can get the same gifts as Humakti / Yelmalio and as you pointed out the Humakti / Yelmalio characters are at a disadvantage because the had to take gifts and geases along the way.

The gifts were very powerful in RQ2 when starting characters were years away from RL status, but in RQG they are a curse, giving access to abilities a couple of seasons of game time early but at a ridiculously high cost.

13 minutes ago, Shiningbrow said:

No, I'm interpreting "celibacy" as not having sex (the GM and players need to agree whether that means only penetrative, or anything).

Sex is not always pleasurable, even if consensual, and so the geas is about the basic act - not the enjoyment (or lack thereof).

You're obviously not happy with the restrictions (possibly)  placed upon your characters from Humakt, Yelmalio, et al... Have you considered joining Babeester Gor?

 

(There is not an argument here that will be condoning rape or sexual assault in any way, shape or form. This is not the forum, nor the people, who would even consider such an idea. Anything suggested to the contrary will not be accepted, and would only come from a Red Herring type logical fallacy...)

If you think I am upset about geases in general then you aren't paying attention. What I am getting heated about is the blithe assumption that its fine to further victimise a rape victim that is being expressed in this forum. For that matter I am also upset that anyone here could propose having a character raped just to break a geas.

1 hour ago, Joerg said:

...they are setting up the character to fail in circumstances beyond their control for the temporary enjoyment of a gift...

The character accepting a geas is set up to fail...

The player is daring the GM. If the GM doesn't cash in that dare at some point, he is just playing favorites.

2 minutes ago, Shiningbrow said:

I think that's somewhat unfair.

Sure, geasa are there as GM plot points - as should be any cult stipulations (just the fact you join a cult means you've agreed to certain limitations, which makes for more dramatic role-playing if used appropriately).

As @Joerg was saying, gifts aren't meant to be "free", and not bringing the geas into it in some meaningful way would be making it free... (and boring).

(*NOT* equating the two ) would you be as argumentative about a dietary requirement which you found unappealing? I notice that the above example of being kidnapped (and tied to the horse) didn't raise an issue. 

Not what @Joerg said at all. What he said was that if a player creates a character with gifts and geases they are daring him to break the geas. As a GM this is trivially easy, so what he is saying is that in his Glorantha if you try to play a cult with gifts and geases he will simply destroy your character. I recall he said in one of his reply's to me in another thread that he had never played a Humakt character and never had one in a game he GM'ed. That makes more sense to me now.

The fact that you DON'T see a difference between having an unconscious character thrown over a horse to break a geas, and having an unconscious character raped and then using the fact of that rape to further victimise them appals me.

The fact that your mind can even go there, and then you see nothing wrong with expressing that thought in a public forum, tells me everything I need to know about you.

33 minutes ago, Joerg said:

A strong gift without the nasty consequences is nothing than a free ride. The celibacy geas and various others aren't about conscious decisions, they are setting up the character to fail in circumstances beyond their control for the temporary enjoyment of a gift.

Defloration (that's what the bigoted unicorn is obsessed about) - whether conscious or unconscious - is the deal breaker. The cult is more forgiving than the steed.

A Yelmalian fallen prey to broo will have their celibacy geas broken, too.

The character accepting a geas is set up to fail. As long as the character avoids failing, he or se receives a super power. That's the deal, and if you don't like it, don't go joining Humakt, Yelmalio, or Yelorna. The player is daring the GM. If the GM doesn't cash in that dare at some point, he is just playing favorites.

 

Players and GM should create a social contract - possibly print it out and sign it - about using such restricttions in the game. Players who cannot stomach such demon ex machina events should avoid playing such OP gifted cults.

Ah ok, sorry I get it now.

Forget about the fact that players are forced to accept gifts and geases if they want to play certain cults, you, as GM, see that as a challenge that means you have to force them to break the geas by any means possible.

I didn't realise that Humakt was such an OP cult. I suppose since they are so OP they should be punished, it stands to reason, and at least you don't have to worry about them resurrecting right? Only have to kill of the pesky OP so-and-so's the once!

32 minutes ago, Joerg said:

The church did have a point, though, after the pornocracy of the papacy in the 10th century (and something similar again in the Borghia papacy).

The assumption of the victim role for the priest hasn't changed much in the church, only the target of the desires...

The requirement of celibacy was adopted long before that period. If anything, that period in the catholic church's history serves to illustrate how little the church enforced the vow. The one who takes, and then breaks the vow is not punished. The person who takes no such vow is brutally punished. Sounds fair to me.

37 minutes ago, Joerg said:

There are aspects of Glorantha that aren't politically correct or fun, like e.g. the dreadful practices of broo propagation, and the hardly less politically correct facts of unicorn or satyr propagation, or the origin of the Triolini races.

"Feel no love" is a gross mis-interpretation of how marriage works in a Bronze Age society. It appears as the curse of Gunda the Guilty for breaking the enslavement of the Queen of the Kiss.

"Don't have children" doesn't quite fit it, either.

As I wrote in the geas thread, a geas is a plot device meant to be tested to or even beyond its breaking point. It is meant to cause discomfort - if you take that deep discomfort away, you are making the geas meaningless, leaving only an overpowered gift. (And yes, riding a magical unicorn is way overpowered.)

"Don't accept magical healing" - imagine a barrage of foes offering 1 point Heal spells, or replacing that character's wine bottle with a healing potion.

"Never trust X" is another weird geas. "Never accept hospitality, drink, food, or kindness from X" might be how to play this out, but basically it makes your character a bigot asshole.

"I want to have fun playing this killer cult" is a statement which may tell an uncomfortable truth about the player's motivations. Coupled with "I don't want my character to suffer from the downsides of that cult" makes it "I want to play a murder hobo, only one loved by his culture." Yeah. Why not play in Gor, then?

Sure, I know that, and to be honest playing around with some of those concepts can be fun.

For me, further victimising a rape victim, even in an imaginary fantasy game setting isn't fun.

If a vow of celibacy exclusively prevented marriage then I would agree. The purpose of the vow is to prevent the priest from being subject to earthly temptations and earthly control. That includes marriage, and it includes sexual relations, but its purpose is to sever connections. I feel that the "Feel no Love" geas serves the same general purpose. You can still get married, and still have sex, but your partner is denied the level of control over your actions that a loved one would have.

A great many of the geases listed are easy to force a character to break if you want to. And none of the gifts are worth the price that can be extracted for that breakage. Everything listed for gifts can be obtained through DI without geases, and RL DI is pretty much available right out of character creation if you make the right choices.

Only two cults in RQG have gifts and geases, and both are warrior cults which stress disciple and self control. There are other warrior cults like storm bull would seem to fit the "murder hobo" theme better and without any pesky restrictions.

Gor huh? That would be the fantasy world where every woman secretly wants to be raped right?

16 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

The way I see this...

Firstly, unfortunately, yes, being raped would be a breach of the geas - no less so than being unconscious and forced onto a horse, bound and tied and having horseflesh or fowl forced down your throat, and any of the other unintended geas breakages.

As for why celibacy can be seen as a valid geas - because, as you point out, " In the real world this refers to the pleasures of fornication". Giving up such pleasures would be a form of actual 'sacrifice' (much moreso than killing off some chickens or cows, of dropping off some food/wine). It would represent a real 'something important to give up' to many people.

If you are interpreting the celibacy geas as giving up the pleasures of fornication how on earth do you interpret getting raped as a breach of that geas? Especially raped while unconscious?

Please explain which part of the process the victim is supposed to have taken pleasure from.

13 hours ago, Joerg said:

Originally, celibacy was meant to make sure that there would be no inheritable bishoprics, an instrument to keep investiture as a power of the head of the church. The patriarchic elements probably were inherent in both the Jewish and the Roman roots of the church, despite the fairly hippy elements in the original community.

Church took control over reproduction only fairly lately, according to Diarmaid MacCullogh's BBC documentary "Sex and the Church". The early church expanded into higher society mainly through female converts.

That might have been the ostensible reason given, but the christian church had a deep seated hatred and fear of women long before that. Women were controlled by so many elements of society that the church didn't need to add any more to persecute them to their hearts content. Women were already property, not people, and women were stoned for adultery (including when they were raped) where men were not punished at all for the same crime. Amongst a whole load of other inequalities.

By binding priests to celibacy the church was attempting to make them immune to "temptation" - the church feared women's supposed ability to control men by giving or withholding sexual favours. If the priest broke the vow the woman would be severely punished as a "demon temptress" - the priest would get a penance (a couple of "our fathers" maybe).

All in all it was a sordid and disgraceful (and very long) period in our history, and elements of it are still with us today. I don't see any reason why we have to transfer all of that shit stuff into Glorantha. In many ways the authors have obviously attempted to make Glorantha a much more level playing field for sexual equality than the real world ever has been, but this slipped through the net.

As I said earlier, I would substitute the "Feel no Love" geas for the celibacy ones as it achieves the same end result without the inherent unfairness.

On 6/21/2019 at 9:59 PM, soltakss said:

I've put spoilers around this, as it involves breaking a celibacy geas, but not by choice.

  Hide contents

 

So, an extreme example, a Unicorn Rider has a geas of Complete Celibacy, but she is knocked unconscious and is assaulted. This has an immediate effect that her Unicorn will not let her ride him, as she is no longer a virgin, no matter that she did not break the geas willingly. Now, the Yelorna cult might not know what happened, until she shows as being pregnant, then the High Priestess might ask her about her geas, which was clearly broken. Now, it wouldn't be fair to punish her for what happened, but she might have to take another geas to replace the one broken to keep her gifts or standing in the cult. However, to regain the use of a unicorn, she would need to go through the cleansing ritual to make herself a virgin again, in which case she could possibly attract a different unicorn, but I'd say that her relationship with her original unicorn is permanently and irrevocably broken.

 

I am not sure why you would chose this example. Of all the concepts from our world that have been translated across to Glorantha "celibacy" is absolutely the worst realised. In our world the whole concept is wrapped up in the christian churches hatred of women and desire to prevent women from having any form of control over men, and especially church officials. Distrust, and the desire to absolutely control women didn't start with the christian's; controlling reproduction by controlling women has been a key element in a great many religions throughout history.

Any slight amount of thought leads to the obvious conclusion that there was never any need to excerpt that type of control over women in Glorantha - If you want to know who fathered the woman's child you just ask her, after casting a truth spell.

Putting aside the historical context, the purpose of a "vow of celibacy" is to prevent the person taking the vow from being "corrupted by sins of the flesh". In the real world this refers to the pleasures of fornication, and i suppose from that point of view there is some justification for the same vow being present in Glorantha. What I am not sure about is your interpretation that a rape victim has somehow been "corrupted by sins of the flesh". I have not been raped, however I understand that is anything but pleasurable, and leaves many and varied mental scars.

I would like to know just how the unicorn was aware of her change of status - do they conduct an inspection before allowing the rider to mount? Why would the unicorn think the rider was no longer suitable just because they had been assaulted by a rapist? In a world with magical healing that can regrow severed limbs, regrowing a broken hymen is trivial, and for that matter I understand the act of riding a horse can cause the hymen to break even if the rider has never had sex - does a unicorn reject the rider if that happens?

Putting aside all of the absurdities, If I was GM I would not bring such a distasteful aspect into my games, and if it somehow did creep in I would certainly not punish the rape victim for the crime - there is way too much of that in the real world for us to also have it in our escapist fantasy world. In my Glorantha the High Priestess would task the woman with hunting down the rapist and his friends and returning their heads and genitals to the temple where they would be prominently displayed, and the unicorn would enthusiastically help with this quest.

As a complete aside, I wouldn't use any of the celibacy geases in my Glorantha because I think they are absurd in the real world and utterly absurd in Glorantha. I would substitute the "Feel no love" geas instead which has the same general effect without all the real world overtones.

43 minutes ago, Joerg said:

The guide will have been required to pass the barrier between the mythical place and the everyday world. Compare the quests during the hunt for the grail.

Not really. Destiny will make sure that he will arrive at his target sooner or later, unless he fails one or several of the tests/barriers on the way and gets lost.

Sure that this is ancient Greek myth, or is this cheesy Hollywood railroading? Take Theseus and the Minotaur - it builds on the story that led to Daidalos' imprisonment and his son's flight too close to the sun. Then there is Ariadne dumped on Naxos... lots of branching or just namedropping inclusion of another mythic cycle, like all those poetic classicisct references in English poetry that require Bullfinch or a full classical education to have a slight idea what the poet is referring to.

But then, nowadays there are people who can recite the Gloranthan pantheons, the full catalog of Marvel or DC characters and their abilities, or name every Pokemon. Geekery remains, only the focus has shifted.

I think you are making the assumption that the hero in the movie is engaging in a heroquest, and that's a reasonable assumption, but its another place where the comparison between ancient Greek myths and Glorantha breaks down. In Glorantha "mythical" creatures can be encountered in the mundane world.

I think the movie might have been Wrath of the Titans (2012) - it had lots of nice special effects but I have no idea how true to myth the script was.

Edit: or it might have been Immortals, <shrug>

I watched a movie a while ago - i forget the name - but the hero had to kill the gorgon. He needed to get a sorceress to show him the way to the gorgons cave, and when they got close to it the movie had the very creepiest path imaginable leading up into some hills. I remember thinking "why'd he need a guide?" because the path was that obvious.

In Glorantha he would definitely need a guide. When he got to the hills there would be dozens of equally creepy paths leading to different lairs, and all but one would be completely unrelated to his quest.

That's where the ancient Greek comparison breaks down for me. Each story has only one myth active in it, only one set of mythical entities and events that are all related to the active story. In my head Glorantha is like having all of those myths active in the same story at the same time and a whole bunch more as well.