Rodney Dangerduck

Great artwork!

One of our players is working on some fun cartoonish artwork for our campaign.  He's a techie, mainly playing with some 3D modelling / rendering SW, definitely not an artist, and it shows.  But it's still fun to see and a few images turned out pretty good.  (check out us teleporting onto the back of Yezrum Storn here:  https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/726878099416940614/728756994495873094/Page_4.jpg

One thing he has struggled with is how much armor to put on the players.  Less certainly looks better, more "actiony", but sometimes it feels a bit unrealistic.  We've gone more and more with "less".

Glad to see your excellent artist agrees - less is more!

2 hours ago, Richard S. said:

but in Glorantha, hero ≠ good guy, hero = powerful guy.

One reason I like Jar-Eel is that, unlike every other major Glorantha Hero, she actually has positive human qualities: she likes music, and deeply loves somebody.

Most of the others have little to no positive redeeming qualities, only negative - they are "good guys" based on what they destroy.  Arkat destroyed Gbaji, Argrath will unleash Sheng and Harrek to destroy the Lunars...  Any resemblance to a human being is, well, coincidental.

4 hours ago, Jeff said:

Yeah, but that is silly. Any cult is going to be good at what it does best. And it is not surprising that the God of Swords is the best at sword-fighting. 

Absolutely agreed.  Having fought alongside a Humakt Duck in Todd's game, and watching our own group's player, my RQG rules of engagement are

1. Don't fight a force that has more Humakti than yours (I might lump in Babs Gor as well)
2. Don't personally engage a Humakti in melee on foot, a.k.a. "Never go in against a Humakti when death is on the line". 

2 hours ago, Akhôrahil said:

I don’t believe this is really a restriction - the important thing is that you HeroQuest a myth. It can even be factually incorrect. Take a myth like the Grazers’ creation story (separated centaurs) - we know for a fact that it’s not what happened, but I’m certain it can be HeroQuested regardless.

So, when posters argue that you can "prove X via a heroquest", e.g., recently, "you can prove that Boldhome was built in a day" by doing a heroquest to find out, they are mistaken?

Don't get me wrong - I love your idea.  I like things being "unprovable".

31 minutes ago, Darius West said:

Do the maths.  Argrath is an Orlanthi, and an heir of Sartar

Guess I missed the part in Family History where your character gets to be a heir of Sartar and do all that cool stuff.  What did Argrath roll?

1 hour ago, Jeff said:

If you aren't the Red Goddess's son, you aren't the Red Emperor.

Technically, the requirement is "pass the 10 tests".  Not "prove your genealogy".  As I understand it.

However, one can disagree on whether that is a significant difference or not.   If, for example, Yolanela's son passed the 10 tests and became Emperor, might some doubt the genealogy?  🙂 

(Added) Yes, we are drifting way off topic, sorry, <slaps self>.

Out of general confusion (as in this question), a desire for simplicity, and not wanting to be bothered with math nitpicking, and, frankly, realism "you must immediately evaluate that magic item, what's its exact net present value in 1625 era lunars?" our group uses this rule:

No tithing 10% on your first cult.  The GM just "slightly lowers" some of the loot, and assumes it balances out.

1 minute ago, Jeff said:

Argrath must be able to claim that lineage (as did Kallyr) if he wants to be able to be Prince of Sartar. And being Prince of Sartar means he gets to be the head of the Orlanth Rex cult, but to have that position he must be a descendant of Sartar, or the magic won't work. Maybe a new political structure could be created, but that's easier said than done.

If Orlanth Rex wont make an exception, he deserves to lose to the Red Goddess who is much more accepting. 🙂

So, how does one become head of the Orlanth Rex cult in, say, Ralios?  Aren't there lots of Orlanthi in places other than Sartar?

Thanks @Jeff for the link.  The opening ceremonies are most interesting.

My reading is that nobody has legitimate reasons, at the time of that Council, for hating Kallyr, it's all petty jealousy.

Also, maybe its just me feeling overly American just after July 4th, but the whole "our leader must be in the bloodline of Sartar" is increasingly grating.  Do others feel the same?  If Argrath kills Jar-Eel, pulls down the Moon and destroys the Empire, and he isn't of the bloodline, does anybody care?  Is a tribal chief really going to say "Whoa there, wait a sec, I'm not sure he's qualified..."?

Somewhat dumb question, inspired by watching the first couple episodes of "Warrior Nun".

Can the Starbrow be transferred to somebody else?  I assume no, since it's never mentioned afterwards.  Seems a bit of a shame 

Having played a year (both real time and game time) as a Vingan, I gotta say, Orlanth and Ernalda are wicked good.  They have fun rune magic, (just never engage a Humakti in anything resembling a fair melee), and you can just blast away using your Rune Points because they are so fast and easy to recover.  Weekly minor days, associated cults holy days, plus your own cult holy days.  Obviously, it depends upon your game's pace of play how significant this will be.

Humakti are severely disadvantaged in comparison.  Very limited recovery.

Storm Bull is intermediate - fewer holy days, but at least they have some Associate Cults.

Depends how strict you are on "regiment".  I'd probably disallow on a random mix of murder hobos that got together for a one-off adventure.  But a group of PCs that usually adventures together in a vaguely organized manner would be o.k.

2 hours ago, Grievous said:

We can't all be Americans! Thanks for the pointer.

To balance both sides of the pond, next time will be "we shall fight (The Bat) with growing confidence and growing strength in the air". 🙂

14 hours ago, Akhôrahil said:

Four levels deep of of Bladesharped pikes really does go a long way, though

Arguing that it takes four Yelmalians to match one other cultist proves the original argument.

1 hour ago, Bergguy said:

If you can find a family tie between clans, it might result in an inter-clan dispute being resolved more "peacefully" than otherwise.

True.  OTOH, as in the complex family ties between noble families in medieval Europe, it may lead to more complex disputes.

22 minutes ago, HeartQuintessence said:

though with Moonson as Emperor we'll never have a MoonDaughter

We have Great Sister.

"Great Sister is called the Red Emperor’s Twin, even though they were born far apart from each other. In all aspects she mirrors her brother to create Balance in the Lunar Empire."

3 hours ago, BrentS said:

Not only is it simple but it just seems to make sense that professional weapon training would include skill with all facets of that weapon's use.

Maybe.  But wouldn't professional training in lying also include the facet of detecting lies?  In other words, why aren't Fast Talk and Insight combined?  Or Hide and Spot?

2 minutes ago, BrentS said:

parrying a potentially fatal blow with you 95% primary weapon instead of your 45%

My character is pretty equal in sword and shield, in the 90-100% range.  She fought at the Duel at Dangerford (vs. Robustus).  She got lucky and criticaled her Air Inspiration to her broadsword.  Even though she had Earth Shield, one of the best spells in the game, she still parried with her sword.  (And won)

The Inspiration skills hugely favor weapons over shields.

One option would be to increase the defensive HP of a shield, or, alternatively, decrease the HP of weapons.

It seems wrong to me that a broadsword parries as much damage as a medium shield.

9 hours ago, Crel said:

I also remember a story about how at a tribal moot Leika was challenged to bring forth the king's torc, to show her right to rule, and that she couldn't do it

Too bad she didn't have the Three Musketeers (a.k.a. some player characters) to retrieve it from the Earl of Buckingham.  Good idea for a scenario, eh?

Argrath's group includes a lot of Tricksters.  Fine, no problem.

But out of all of them, the one he specially chose as his **favorite**, Elusu, likes to murder people cause it's "funny".  (At least, this is how she has been presented to me).

"Yet Argrath is an honorable man" sayeth @Jeff and Marc Anthony...

Whether or not you believe that Lunar Illumination is Freedom or Slavery (to cite 1984), note that Argrath himself is, to all appearances, Illuminated.  The reason he can defeat the Lunars is he can fight just as 'dirty" as them.

5 hours ago, David Scott said:

1616 Third spirit miracle

So, when he's 16 years old, he's on his **third** miracle?

Trying to get back to the subject, has anybody computed the total number of Rezs that can happen in Sartar each season?  There are a limited amount of CA cultists who know Rez, they have limited Rune Points, and there are limits to how many RP they can recover per season.  And many of the RPs will be used for other healing.

So an interesting exercise would be to calculate, at least roughly, how many people can be Rezed per season vs. how many die violently.

3 hours ago, EricW said:

When Sheng later turned to evil

Later?  So Sheng was a "nice guy" before he met Argrath?

Forget who wrote the line (here recently) and the exact line, but it was something like 

"Sheng Selaris makes Harrek look like an annoying teen age bully".