Rodney Dangerduck

I agree with @mfbrandi

The "thief" aspect of Orlanth is called, ...    Orlanth.

Lanbril wishes he could be half the thief that Orlanth is.

30 minutes ago, Bill the barbarian said:

May I offer another possible (and sadder) interpretation. He may be referring to Steve Perrin and Ray Turney... 

 

Ray is still around.  He did suffer a stroke a decade ago and has speech aphasia, though he understands others well..  Let me know if you want contact info.

If your character is in a cult with Rune Lords, you almost certainly want them to become one.  And if you neglect to start them with a decent Devotion, you are basically screwed.  We ended up fudging this for some of the characters. 

Same for CHA.  If you are on a Rune Lord path, better start at 14ish or higher.

Would be nice to have advice like this somewhere.  Without descending into egregious munchkinnery ...

So, 5 lines of differing rules and lots of paperwork to track what got used for what and when 

I am increasingly skeptical of Augments.  Especially as players spend a minute searching their sheet, find their highest Passion, and ask if they can use it,even though it is totally irrelevant.

18 hours ago, David Scott said:

Sounds like you've planned an epic battle, what a great sacrifice, just the way death cults like to go

We didn't quite get to it this session, but next session for sure.

Thanks to everybody for the comments.

Since my semi-NPC-just-testing-a-concept Babs Gor character might cast it tomorrow, some questions about when you come out of Berserker.

1. She will be fighting chaos, so her CON will double, as will (perhaps with a rounding error) her hit points.  Say, from 17 -> 34.
2. Not parrying, I expect that she will take a lot of damage, possibly in the 20s.  Lets assume 24.
3. She can't heal herself.  Our Ernaldan is very brave, but maybe not that brave to get close to a Berserker.
4. As the spell expires, does my Babs Gor
   1. Drop dead instantly (I believe this true is by RAW)
   2. Have a GM is nice to the PCs round or two where the party healer can cast Heal Body.

Has anybody actually used this spell in a tough combat?

Thanks for any ideas on how to make this somewhat workable...

12 hours ago, Arcadiagt5 said:

One house rule I use is to increase the HP of the more expensive shield types. +1 HP / cost step. So well off Orlanthi will run wooden shields at 14 HP, and that does make a difference.

Until the slightly better off Orlanthi obtains an iron broadsword, worth 18HP.

One point I haven't seen mentioned is that augmenting (or "inspiring") your weapon skill affects both attack and parry, further discouraging shield usage.  So a good initiate can parry with a 12 point medium shield at ~100%, or with an 18 point iron broadsword at 120%.  (assuming 100% skill and a normal +20% success on Inspiration).  Unless you've got Earthshield, the decision seems pretty easy, with a few exceptions.

5 minutes ago, PhilHibbs said:

Vasana's DEX starts at 11, that's 10 points of POW to get it to 21.

Most mini-maxers would do most of that as soon as possible, dropping Vasana's POW to around 10-13.

1. She has an Ally Spirit to cast spells for her, compensating for the lower % chance to cast.
2. She resists at 21, so her POW doesn't matter as much for defense.

In any case, the change went from D10 POW lost in RQ2, to 1.  Huge change.

I guess I'm in a bad mood today, but this is a misguided thread.

In RQ2, with few exceptions, your 2nd parry was at minus everything.  Or, arguably, at half chance if you were a Rune Master., in which case your second parry was halved, and your third parry was at minus everything. 

RQG changed it to -20% per parry.  Far far less of a penalty.

Now, one can argue whether that was a good change or not. 

But one should not complain that you want ways to parry even better.

1 hour ago, David Scott said:

Yes:

Once a Uleria priestess reaches 10 Rune points (as Rune Lords), they can DI every season to start increasing their CHA to 21.

Wow.  Chaosium deliberately wrote and intended the broken DI rules?

This is another reason why players care if a cult has rune lords or not.  Using stock DI rules (we don't) Rune Lords will fairly quickly get many of their key stats to 21.

I think one issue is that Rune Priest DI went from "interesting" in RQ2 (with the explicit D.I. rune spell) to basically non-existent in RQG.  Why that change?

8 hours ago, David Scott said:

My players write it on the free Adventurer Reputation Sheet.

Nice.

One great advantage of using a new tab on Phil's computer sheets is that it can sum the numbers for you, and even copy them to the "main" character sheet.

1 hour ago, Jeff said:

Black Fang does not provide all common rune spells - only Divination, Extension 1, Multispell 1, and Spirit Block. Thunderbird only provides Cloud Call and Thunderbolt.

I'd argue that both of those cults, and many other interesting minor cults, provide nothing.  Until the Gods' book comes out.  😞

We track CHA carefully, e.g. "Found Ernalda's Mirror".  Mainly cause many PCs, mine included, were scrambling to get to 18 to qualify for Rune Lord.

We track Reputation semi-carefully, with maybe some vagueness, e.g. "Smoking Ruins".

Honor, Runes and Passions, depends on the player.  But again, we found that there is often a Passion or Rune that is keeping a PC from making Rune Lord.  Effing Devotion Vinga, grr...  🙂

We simply add another tab to @PhilHibbs wonderful Google character sheet.  Might be something to do for a future update?

I'm thinking Nelat because he is "the Purifying Waters", but kind of guessing here...

That's his real name.  (Well, maybe he's a Russian mole?)  But haven't talked with him in ~40 years.  He and his wife Debbie were active in SCA, so you might want to check there.

1 hour ago, Godlearner said:

Death rune is same as severance. I view it in that context.

So, Fertility Rune is "pro" slavery?

I see Stasis / Mobility and Harmony / Disorder as more relevant, but the Runes are fuzzy and everybody views them differently.

Has any group given the Ally Spirit a gift and geas, if they are from Humakt, Yelmalio, etc.?

We decided to skip it, but some (about half?) of them would be interesting.

Danfive Xaron.  Surprised Nick hasn't mentioned them.

It is more a "learn from your slavery, do correct thoughts and deeds, and free yourself" approach.  Not  Spartacus.

For the record, I don't think that Orlanth is an anti-slavery God. I'm sure that US southern secessionists also felt that "nobody (them Feds) can make me do anything." 

For the record, Rune Lord DI is completely broken.  And, depending on cult, it's not usable only once a season.  An Orlanthi Wind Lord can probably do it nearly once a week on the average with all the associated cults and weekly minor holy days to recover rune points.

We instantly changed the DI rules once we realized just what a crock they were.

Not quite sure where this thread is supposed to lead (as many others have asked) but my advice, echoing @Nick Brooke, is don't have some NPC priest decide.  Let the players decide.

In our campaign, an Orlanth PC became Thane of Apple Lane.  He Hates Lunars.  So, when trying to rebuild the village, get a smith, a shepherd, a backup innkeeper, or whatever, he had limited his options.  No Lunars need apply.

He has moved on to become Clan chief of the Taralings, and my PC, who happens to be his ultra-competitive Vingan sister, became Thane.  She doesn't hate Lunars.  She was tired of Apple Lane falling behind, so she told Argrath, who is also showing (at least in 1627, not so much later) tolerance for Lunars, that skilled non-chaotic ones who were willing to show loyalty were most welcome.  Voila - we not only got a smith, we got an iron smith!  Huzzah!  And as a big side benefit, she can learn Speak New Pelorian, and actually communicate with / spy on / interrogate Lunars as the campaign progresses.  Winner.

Let the party work things out.  Maybe my PC has estranged them?  It will be interesting - when the party Storm Bull heard independently about the Lunar, he came to my PC to warn her "Watchout - I've heard rumors that he's a Lunar".  My PC smiled.

Lore skills have always been a bit off, because they are very slow to increase.  I did a back of the envelope calculation and, as I recall, Sorala (the Lhankor Mhy RQG pregen) should be about 30 years old to have those skill levels.

We allow for normal checks, with GM permission.  Kind of like the Ride skill increase noted by Bill.

Also, the ceremony is presumably when any divine blessing or presence occurs.

On 10/3/2022 at 9:04 AM, svensson said:

Coyote.

Trickster, teacher, and fool all in one.

Here is the Pacific Northwest that's Raven.  But same idea.

2 hours ago, JRE said:

I at least propose several magical and alchemical anticonceptive methods in Glorantha

A lot of fan material, even official stuff, seems to assume this.  Would be good to have something more official, whether a spell, an herb, or as @French Desperate WindChild suggests, an innate ability.