PhilHibbs

1 hour ago, Nick Brooke said:

Same here. Once the game’s afoot, I use the rules as written. It just seems petty to start a new game saying “You don’t get to have all your usual Rune points this session” (unless there’s a good reason for it: I wouldn’t just do it randomly).

I like to use the cult holy day calendar as a way to draw the players into the setting, giving them a reason to be interested in what their associate cults are and when the various holy days are because they can sometimes get a top-up of rune points on the road.

But that's not a "house rule", that's rules as written as Nick says. And I don't see it as munchkinnery either. Everyone knows how much I hate munchkins.

19 minutes ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

Maybe this belongs in the "Your Wackiest Idea" thread...

The word is "dumbest". And that's not an insult. Embrace the dumb, the dumb is the way.

18 minutes ago, Eff said:

...To contrast, Runequest: Roleplaying in Glorantha's text produces player characters who are consistently in contact with Argrath and subordinate to him through the process of character creation alone. By default, that fractal zoom isn't possible, because player characters aren't placed into a Hero Wars in miniature, they're placed close to the center of the main event and the text tells the group implicitly that the primary characters will be a continual presence.

Presenting Argrath as a central quest-giving NPC is fine as a design choice, because that works for a lot of people. Not everyone wants to take on the burden of being the great hero who defeats the evil empire, nor do all GMs relish taking that on and running a game that enables the characters to do that.

The players and GMs who ARE comfortable with that are entirely capable of ignoring the "easy mode" option presented and going off-piste with their own crazy campaigns.

So I absolutely see why Jeff says that he and Greg came to the conclusion that "Argrath-centric" was the way to go, in order to present a game where the big plot is front-and-centre.

Or, you can go explore ancient ruins all day and forget the big plot.

2 hours ago, Jeff said:

And here's what Greg and I found over decades of play... The Guide makes it clear that there is one Argrath, and that is the approach taken from there on.

So yes, if you want, as you and Greg clearly did, to make the next iteration of the game more plot-focused, then having Argrath there as a catalyst for the players to react to is great.

But I'm fine with the players saying "screw this junkie, he isn't going to get anything done, we need to take over" like The River Voices did. Not all GMs or players have the confidence to roll like that though.

On 12/28/2022 at 10:45 AM, Kloster said:

Arkat's cult (At least, in RQ3's Troll gods, Arkat's cult was teaching sorcery).

Yes but I think @Erol of Backford was saying that he doesn't want anything to do with that cult.

On 12/29/2022 at 5:22 PM, Jeff said:

I suppose you could also dump the Red Emperor just as or even more easily. But sure, Pendragon without Arthur, Stormbringer with Elric, Rome without Caesar, or whatever. Personally, I find that dull, but to each their own.

I was tempted to write "None of the RuneQuest games I've ever played in featured Argrath or The Red Emperor, yet I loved them all. None of the Stormbringer games featured Elric either." Of course that's not what you are saying, but I'll raise it anyway just to dispel it.

Sure, writing major characters out of the setting can change things a lot, and with something like Pendragon or Caesar's Rome, those characters are central to everyone's knowledge of the setting.

Most RuneQuest players will have never heard of Argrath. Not everyone has played or run The Cradle and met Garrath (I haven't), not all of those that have will have guessed that he goes on to be The Argrath, and I think I'm safe to say that most RuneQuest players have never read KoS.

So until RQG came along and made Argrath front-and-centre in character creation, Argrath was not "The Arthur of Glorantha" or "To Glorantha what Elric is to The Young Kingdoms", so the analogy kind of falls down for anyone who isn't a superfan who, for example, reads this forums.

On 12/22/2022 at 10:09 PM, Erol of Backford said:

Who wants to be a member of that cult when you can just learn the sorcery spell?!

Who are you going to learn it from?

1 hour ago, Darius West said:

Oh, as to the One Ring, our Trickster ate it.  Swallow!  Is it destroyed?  *shrug*

It'll end up somewhere. When my Trickster was beheaded, everything that he had ever swallowed came out the other end.

On 12/17/2022 at 2:46 PM, mfbrandi said:

For example:

• Cult of A says god A met god B and they fought over item C (which A had a firm hold of) and god B made off with item C
• Cult of B says that god A and god B never met, that god B had always possessed item C, and that cult of A are dirty stinking liars

Then that is the nature of the challenge, "My god encountered your god" versus "Our gods never met". If B wins then A is clearly in the role of another entity from B's myths and their identity is weakened.

In case it gets lost in the rest of the post above...

Befuddle the charging horse!

*Update*: You can't.

On 12/17/2022 at 5:33 PM, PhilHibbs said:

Fanaticism on the mount is also an option to prevent fleeing. And on the rider, unless they have a super Ride skill they don't even get the benefit of the attack skill increase (I'd need to check the wording on that though).

19 hours ago, Kloster said:

Especially efficient on mounted opponents, because most of them will not benefit of the increased attack roll. This one is an old RQ classical trick (I think it was in Runemasters).

RQG p.219:

Quote

An adventurer’s effectiveness in mounted combat is
equal to the lesser of their Ride skill or their skill with the
weapon being used.

Pretty ambiguous! If it said "their combat skill is limited by their ride skill", then I'd say that Fanaticism can increase their chance, as Fanaticism says "chance to hit" not "skill". If it said "their chance to hit or parry is limited by their ride skill", then I'd say it is not. But "effectiveness in mounted combat" could be either.

On the other hand, Bladesharp also says "chance to hit" and I'd allow that to boost hit chance above Ride, so maybe I should allow Fanaticism to as well.

In the past, we've always ruled that Fanaticism cannot increase your chance to hit past your Ride skill. Intuitively it makes sense, you're focusing on furious attack, not control of your mount, and you're going to be all over the place and off balance.

There's nothing in RuneMasters about it, although it does say "Befuddle the horse".

On 12/15/2022 at 6:06 PM, Godlearner said:

Love advise that basically says ignore what is written and do whatever.

Where in the rules does it say that you have to roll dice to generate NPCs?

If I want a warrior for my characters to fight, I'm not going to roll dice! Warriors will be among the tougher members of a population. Should I keep rolling until I get stats for a person who would become a warrior? No, I'm going to say "STR 15 CON 13 DEX 12 done!"

If I want a Rune Lord of the Bloody Tusk, I'm not going to roll stats until I get one who is good enough. I'm going to say "POW 15 CHA 7 done!"

This contradicts no printed rules.

Splitting off, because I absolutely agree with the "Thank you Chaosium" sentiment and don't want to detract from it.

On 12/17/2022 at 4:06 AM, g33k said:

In case nobody has seen this one...

Art by AI ... Text by AI ...

https://time.com/6240569/ai-childrens-book-alice-and-sparkle-artists-unhappy/

aaaiiiieeeee !!!

Fascinating. As a technologist, AI art is amazing, and I love playing with it, but I absolutely see the concerns.

The story in Time magazine is clearly a demonstration of what is possible, and as such I think the "artists are not happy about it" is absolutely the point of the demonstration. Like "deep fakes", there are clearly ethical issues about making fake political speeches or fake racism that look like a real person saying terrible things to traduce them, but it's not the technology that is at fault. My mum said "why have they created something so problematic", but that's beside the point, like nuclear bombs, someone was going to do it eventually. I'm sure there are ethical ways to use AI to generate or manipulate art, but demonstrations like the Time story raise the issues in a tangible way that people can relate to. "It's here, we need to deal with it". I expect that that is what Reshi was doing.

Would an AI trained entirely on public domain, "old masters" art, Shakespeare, Austen, and Dickens, be ethical? Even then I can still see organisations choosing to take Chaosium's line on it, because we value the creators that supply us with great content, we are those creators. And the AI output would all be old-fashioned anyway.

On 12/14/2022 at 11:58 PM, Godlearner said:

We had people casting Fanatism on opponents to keep them from parrying and casting defensive spells.

Fanaticism on the mount is also an option to prevent fleeing. And on the rider, unless they have a super Ride skill they don't even get the benefit of the attack skill increase (I'd need to check the wording on that though).

9 hours ago, g33k said:

Hallucinate ...

Leading -- quite directly -- to such ideas as the Eurmali giving piggy-back rides (across their Hallucinated bridge) to the rest of the party (to whom no bridge is visible).

Love the piggy back idea! My kind of trickster would just run across and shout "follow me it's perfectly safe!" though. Now the players would know that he cast Hallucinate so they are entirely free to let their characters conclude that he can't be trusted based on previous form.

On 12/16/2022 at 10:29 AM, French Desperate WindChild said:

🙂

but diablo and co are not D&D gameplay: they are one way of rpg-computer using D&D rules. You may use the same "engine" to build a game with runequest statistics or with vampire statistic, or with amber statistics or with your own system of statistic. this kind of game existed before any  D&D  rules were implemented in such games.

Sure, but what I want in a RuneQuest game set in Glorantha is more than just "Diablo with percentages under the hood". The "Gloranthan" part is more important to me than the "RuneQuest" part.

p.s. I'm not complaining about what we've seen and I'm not saying that it is "Percentile Diablo". I've not seen enough to jump to either a negative or positive conclusion. Just commenting on the discussion.

7 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

Possibly, but...

There's an officially published scenario in which this is part of the plot point - there's a murdered person and one can talk to their spirit days later, because they it hangs around for a week.

Sure. Some spirits hang around, some don't.

5 hours ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

p.p.s.  Also isn't clear if Arouse Passion is a "defensive" spell.

I think it's too much of a stretch. Same with Charisma.

Some people have tried to argue that Strength should count as defensive, as it increases your parry chance. I don't really have any time for that argument, simiilarly Charisma is dodgy. Vigor I'd be ok with, but no doubt some will object to some characteristic spells being ruled out but others not. Gor'am munchkins! Not all characteristics are created equal.

Shimmer is a rock solid suggestion! Undoubtedly defensive, effective against criticals (reduces the chance, a 01 still hurts though), could be a real life saver. Worth the Bless Champion just for that one.

The numbers are in my character creation spreadsheet. If you unhide the "Occupation French" and "Occupation English" sheets you can see them.

https://basicroleplaying.org/topic/7647-rqg-character-creation-spreadsheet-multi-lingual-now-includes-weapons-equipment/

The spirit might be contactable if it is hanging around, or it might not. If the scenario requires that it not be, then it isn't.

I don't think that Gloranthans have an exhaustive and accurate model for what happens between death and afterlife, and neither do the RuneQuest rules. It makes some general statements, but outside of that the specifics can vary as needed.

That's not to say that there aren't any rules. They say that magic has to have rules otherwise the narrative makes no sense, but that only needs to go so far. It also needs areas of doubt and uncertainty, rigidly defined or not. I'm sure the rules of quantum gravity are specific and perfect, but we just don't know what they are. We have some general ideas but that's it.

I'm going to be adding the Hero Wars In The East Isles character creation details to my online spreadsheet soon.

29 minutes ago, davecake said:

And islands known for god of hairdressing or special fruit, etc do not need an associated martial arts tradition. It would get quite silly quite quickly. 

You say that like it's a bad thing...

I'm sure the rune still exists in Gloranthan cosmology, and it's still there in the temple frescoes and over gates and doors, but it doesn't feature in the RQG rules in the same way that the Barntar, Elmal, and Eternal Battle runes don't.

It's just the most well known rune that isn't a primary element, power, or form.