Monty Lovering

7 minutes ago, Atgxtg said:

Do you see a  point a matriarchal fantasy societies?

Well, at least that's different to everyday life, LOL.

As is wonderful about the whole YGMV, I've always wanted that a fantasy society's differences that don't alienate female role-players. So female warriors are known and accepted in any culture, and in some cultures women are just as commonly accepted as the norm in leadership roles as they are seen as an exception in others - which Esrolia always was out of the box.

13 minutes ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

Griffin Mountain featured a female Orlanthi, (Vinga didn't exist yet) "Pay Surney" (a tribute to an RQ co-author).  Is that now illegal?  It also featured a memorable female Yelmalian Light "Son", Staryna Stormrender.

It makes some mythic sense, but the whole "female = Earth, male = Storm/Fire" isn't in the rules.  RQG doesn't have an entry under character creation "PCs with breasts may choose to add +20% to their Earth Rune".

In summary, there's no need for this complication.  Just let players play what they want.

But, does make me wonder, is Sartar (+10% Storm Rune)  the site of some toxic testosteronal waste dump after the Dragonkill War?  🙂

To be honest I never saw the point of patriarchal fantasy societies. To much like reality. 

3 minutes ago, soltakss said:

The Only Old One granted a spell called Cure Iron Burn, which works like Cure Chaos Wound, so it provides all the MPs used to heal a wound caused by iron. It doesn;t stop the wound, but makes healing it easier, especially if used with Heal Wound.

Seems like a reasonable spell. 

However, who would grant it? The Only Old One proved that he was both a Troll and Not a Troll, at various times, so perhaps he might grant it. As for the Aldryami, I am not sure where it would come from.

it would be a good reward on a HeroQuest, though.

I think so, but it is a good spell.

I didn't know the Only Old One spell. Interesting.

I have a non-standard idea re. Spirit Magic in that it is a weak folk magic form based on Runes based on primitive Runic manipulation, as opposed to Rune Magic which is magic granted for devotion by god who is powerful in a Rune, and Sorcery which is the strong an complex form of magic based on Runes cast with casters own knowledge and power. And my god's don't 'own' Runes, but are just powerful in their use as essentially they are apotheosised sorcerers of the greatest power with really good PR and a bottomless pit of sacrificed POW to draw on.

For more conventional Gloranthas the question of where the spell would come from is very good. IMG, less so.

Which makes me think; Dark Troll sorcerers travelling with a herd of trollkin they tap is a FUN idea...

Just now, Sumath said:

Game balance be damned, but if anything, I'd say troll vulnerability to iron is something that evens the game up.

Taking down a SIZ 25 Zorak Zorani is difficult enough as it is, without them being able to remove their Achilles' Heel as well.

As for elves... those tricky, ambushing buggers need taking down a notch anyway.

The fact they mostly have trollkin is the big equaliser for trolls. Kill a human, hah, they breed easy and true, Uz? Most are just uppity food.

Udderwize, bro, use and meese, hah! We'd be talkin' mockpork, living' in a pen sky clad an' waitin' 'til uz invite us to dinnah! We be sittin' there straching our arses when head gets kick inna pen from game o' Trollball the big bastids were playing, and we seh "Hey", we seh, "It's Harraeh, wondered where he get to, musta bin dessert last night" we seh.

😜 

 

I know iron weapons are rare, but it strikes me as strange that in literally millennia no counter magic of either Rune or Spirit level has been created by uz or aldryami to give them immunity to iron, even on a temporary basis

Like:

Iron Immunity, 3 points, 80m range, 10MR duration, passive, focused on others, unfocused on self: This spell allows the target to temporarily be immune to the extra damage that iron weapons have on some species.

Or is this inserting balance where none is required?

I think in the original write-ups of Vinga by, IIRC Jane Williams, it was for groups that didn't have female Orlanth devotees, those of initiate status and above would stop menustrating, most  would have their hair turn red and those that didn't would dye it with henna, and they had the Spirit Magic spell Droop, which does exactly what you might imagine it does.

That in particular is one of the many 'missing' Spirit Magic spells that I include in any campaign I run. Like Clean, Dry, Warm, etc..

@M Helsdon

Just got the PDF. It's fabulous. It's like reading an archaeological treastie on the Bronze Age Armies of the Fertile Crescent... except it's about Dragon Pass. Such detail, great illustrations.

Do you want feedback re. typos, etc.?

16 minutes ago, M Helsdon said:

Hmm, looks like five people have purchased it (thank you) but it is only intermittently available. Suspect DriveThruRPG are still recovering from last week's problems.

Argh! Want! Need’

13 hours ago, M Helsdon said:

Version 1.0 on DriveThruRPG this Friday, I believe.

Eagerly awaiting it.

More or less what I think. 
 

And like the man said,  YGMV. 

I’m tempted to have the gods as merely vastly powerful humans who were the first to manipulate the Runes, and that much of legend is actually myth, and that (whispers) the world is actually round. 
 

Bit god learner of me I know and exactly the sort of thing that gets the gods angry 😜

On 11/10/2019 at 9:24 PM, M Helsdon said:

If you are referring to British cavalry horses from the late 18th century on, there had often been many generations of breeding, and a regime of particular fodder, but even then, a horse couldn't be in constant use, day after day, but had to be rested.

Daron are still canon; not certain about the others.

Most ancient horses were smaller, though there were breeds like the Nisean horse which were much desired and sought after, that could carry a heavily armored rider (and the large Daron is perhaps a continuation of the Persian influence on Carmania - but then Carmania in our world was a province of various Persian Empires, and the name still exists as Kerman), whereas most other cavalry weren't so heavily armored - at least until larger horses were bred, including from Niseans taken from the King of Kings' herds.

Possibly, if they can retire behind the battle-lines, though it doesn't seem to have been common in the ancient world.

Oh, I'm assuming that RQ-G is Dragon Pass-centric, and the breeds I have listed from Anaxial's Roster are still canon. Rather silly if there are only four horse breeds in the world as per the Bestiary. YGMV 🙂

As far as day to day use goes, 'Chapter VIII Movements on page 245 of the 1912 Cavalry Training Manual refers; Section 179: Marches' boils down to 20-25 miles as daily maximum with forced marches of 40-50 miles in extreme need. This assumed leading the horse 25% of the time, stopping for 15 minutes every two hours, and feeding and watering horse every four hours.

For sustained operations with rest days and fighting 15 miles seems reasonable: The 5^th Cavalry Division covered 550 miles in 38 days (which period included actions fought at Nazareth, Haifa, Kiswe & Haritan). The 11th Hussars did 116 miles in 8 days including one day of 38 miles. And that's with a standard service load of 108kg. Of course distance is only part of the equation. A large one is fodder and water. In the Levantine campaign three divisions went 72 hours without water whilst working hard. Such ard use and sometimes erratic forage yielded a 5% attrition rate, including casualties. It's interesting to note that the hunters officers took over did not do well at all, whilst 15 year-old cavalry mounts could handle it. 

But go too far and you'll suffer the 60%+ attrition rate Napoleon suffered in Russia.

The actual force of cavalry (or indeed army) is one thing. The support train is another. I've read the Roman Legions (with an average of 2 cavalry per 100 men) had one mule carrying supplies for every 3.5 men or so, and that number comes up in the 18th and 19th Century too (only changing if there were more wagons available).

Just as the average person will <never> be able to draw a bow that a 14th C archer did as they practiced from childhood, so too our ideas about what a horse can do are based, largely on leisure horses. They are not the mopeds that gallop everywhere in movies, but they are capable of (with the right training and fodder) very heavy use to anything we'd think of putting them through now.

Unless you do endurance riding where 100 miles in ten-twelve hours is possible. But those horses are super-fit.

Size-wise, it's interesting there is some evidence that horses decreased in size from 14.2 (which is the average given by some studies of Roman cavalry horses) to less than 13 hands (early medieval) before increasing again. But the 16h or larger horses that some Gloranthan breeds are capable of are, as we both admit, huge.

One could arguably throw the idea of breeds out the window and just have horses used for what their size, speed and conformation suited them for, which is essentially (outside of some regional varieties such as the Nicean horse) what people did until early modern times.

As far as remounts go, I don't see an issue of a remount herd in the rear for pure missile weapon light cavalry (and light cavalry in melee in anything other than a desperation measure, a tactical feint or an easy victory is doing it wrong).

If you're in melee, withdrawal is an issue. If you are engaging the enemy at 100m and they are, by definition, less mobile than you, shooting off 20-40 arrows in five minutes and then getting reloads is what you need to do anyway. If it includes a fresh mount whoopee. The Mongols had at least four ponies each, and amazingly just like the British cavalry stopped every two hours, but their stops featured a horse change. But that string of horses was kept in reserve in a fight (although ridden on a lead rein held by the rider on the march). Thus my idea about sub-adults looking after the reserve herd, rather than having full warriors do it.

 

1 hour ago, M Helsdon said:

Most ancient armies, whether using cavalry or chariots did this, because if one horse cannot be ridden, it turns the rider into infantry; for chariots, it is even more of an issue because you require a trained team used to working together. A cataphract needs several mounts. Most mounts are expensive as they have to be trained, if not to the standard of war mounts, to cavalry, which is why many cavalry regiments are either aristocratic in nature, or aspiring aristocrats hoping for a land grant. Nomads are a bit different, of course.

This is covered in the book...

Can’t wait to read it!

But I think there’s a difference between the number of remounts needed with mounts that weigh 150kg and carry over 30% of their weight (like my image of Praxian Impala) and Fronan war horses of 700kg carrying less than 25%. 

The research I’ve done shows (for example with the British cavalry) a cavalry mount had the later expection and of being useful (if given enough food) day after day without breaking down. Yes, they had remounts but for injury and accident as opposed to returning from melee to get a fresh horse. 

And yes, canon has given us unhistorically large horses in Glorantha. Horses of Arab size (so Vusano or Churian) carrying an armoured warrior might need changing in a battle, but a big Fronan or Doran, less so. 
 

But smaller mounts - especially of cavalry using missile weapons and avoiding melee - would get changed in a battle, several times. 

5 minutes ago, M Helsdon said:

Afraid I can only create PDFs using Word.

Well, broadly speaking a PDF is a PDF. I’d just like to buy one whether it’s created in Word or Acrobat Pro 👍

I!d guessed, maybe wrongly, you were going to make the finished product available via the Jonstown Compendium mechanism Moon Design/Chaosium have created and maybe earn a little money from PDF downloads and and print-on-demand options they offer (don’t know if they do). Has the benefit of being with their blessing even if they take a cut of the earnings. 

12 minutes ago, M Helsdon said:

Thank you.

If I receive permission, I may bring some copies to sell at Dragonmeet, but: as 380 pages which have to be printed in color because of the extensive color coding, and the limited print run, it would be expensive.

Yeah, I'm in Europe so I was thinking more of PDFs. 🙂

Are you doing it under the Jonstown Compendium?

Funnily enough I've been playing around with a set of rules for the riding beasts as basically they are treated like mopeds, and the SIZ range in RQ is just absurd between members of a species or with horses, breed. The idea is to have a more meaningful way of resolving chases, and a way of differentiating between a good horse and a bad horse of the same breed, let alone between a Jillaran, a Goldeneye and a Vusano in a chase. I'm perfectly aware this is a totally minority thing to be bugged by, but oh well.

The main problem I have had is that impala are just too small, even for pygmies. So for all the pygmy tribes I have assumed that their mounts are 150-200kg (maybe the pick of the herd), which is the minimum you need to carry 50kg, and that they make extensive use remounts (just like the Mongol hordes on their little ponies did). On raids/in war, adolescents hang back from the action with a herd of remounts and as missile ammunition is depleted and mounts tire, the warriors swing back in waves to pick up reloads and a fresh impala/bolo lizard/ostrich, always working it so that there are always a wave of fresh mounts and riders with full quivers on the assault.

So the text assumes (for example) the Orlanthi just called impalas impalas because they look like what they called impalas, but actually they are the size of a lechwe, albeit a dry-plain version. And the real name in Praxian is something else.

This is all SO beautiful.

When can I give you money?

🙂

Played this on Halloween on Roll20 with a bunch of RQ newbies. My first session as GM with RQG as well as first on Roll20.

Good fun, we used the pre-gen characters, they chased off the initial attack, criticaled persuading the Red Smith to tell them what happened, and one of them got the idea about appeasing it. 

As it was a one-off and time was pressing I avoided it getting all ducked up on the way to the lake as they were going of course badly there. 

One of the ducks got killed in locating it, but then they managed to pull of their plan. 

Everyone had fun and now it looks like I might be running a RQG campaign in Roll20 if I get enough people in.