dumuzid

2 hours ago, metcalph said:

I did have the idea that Varganthyr originally led the Malkioni Army that fought fought against the Eleven Beasts at the Sunstop.  But his folks back home feared his power and tried to kill him.  In revenge, he changed sides and fought for the Eleven Beasts against the Malkioni.  A gloranthan Coriolanus so to speak.  

Counterpoint: he (or she) was a Zaranistangi, maybe a member of the warband that fought the God Learners on behalf of the Autarchy and were banished from the Middle World.  This one managed to slip free of the God Learner magic but emerged in the Middle World centuries before they left, in Fronela, and took hold of the biggest, most familiar, untapped source of power they could find in the region: the chunk of the moon that came down at Croesium.

My campaign reaches Loskalm next session (assuming the Waertagi don't disrupt the sail into Southpoint...), and I'm reviving this thread to ask a corollary to the OP's question:

What do we know about Varganthar's story?  Built a palace at the impact crater of a piece of the Blue Moon, seems to have been the warleader of the Eleven Beasts Alliance in at least the later Gbaji Wars, called the Blue Knight and the Unconquerable, vanquished by Talor--this much I know, and is more or less relayed above.  Is there any more known about him?  Since my campaign is embarked on the quest to recover the Red Sword of the Zaranistangi and resurrect the god Artmal, Varganthar's legacy seems highly pertinent information to My Glorantha.

On 12/3/2021 at 10:57 PM, Shiningbrow said:

A new hero for the Hero Wars, blessed by their gods... 

Oh yeah, met one of those in-game once, negotiating the kid's release after he got caught lurking around an Orlanthi cattle herd helped build very useful good relations with the Telmori.  Turned out the kid's Telmor-blessed nose had caught scent of a broo infestation among the cattle, which meant a long night of healing magic and spirit combat to cleanse the herd.

My answer to this question for the game I currently run was giving a diverse set of characters a shared Loyalty passion: Argrath Whitebull.  The group is kept together despite being of highly varied backgrounds because they serve together as a cadre of Argrath's Eaglebrown Warlocks.  Also, they're on an extended sea voyage now, that tends to keep them clustered.

Whatever is going on with that I blame Yelm

19 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

Although perhaps only until it gets expelled? Could still be seriously bad news when the Storm Bulls show up.

Depends on the nature of the expulsion.  If they go with @jajagappa's very compelling idea about making it a covert possession, there's a potential here for the assistant shaman to consume or metabolize the parasitic graft of the scorpionman spirit, and gain some of its Chaos power in the process.  This may even be the spirit that becomes the assistant shaman's fetch during the shaman trials

e: conversely, depending on the assistant's spirit and cult affiliations this struggle may be a process of purification that cleanses the scorpionman spirit of its taint

double-fumbling to this piddly scorpionman spirit and getting it cohabiting with their soul should definitely result in a few pips of Chaos rune

an assistant shaman is in a bit of a pickle, not going to lie.  You might give them the chance to try Spirit Dance to use the displacement of the possessing spirit's presence to help them discorporate despite lacking the spiritual refinement to manage it without a rune magic ritual otherwise.

e: realistically though, the conventional answer is to subdue the possessed individual and get them to an exorcist, as you say.

9 minutes ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

Does anyone have any info on the Beastmen of Old Seshnela?

I've looked into this recently: my player characters rounded the Seshnelan peninsula last session, and will be landing in Rhis in the next one.  While they were off the coast of Guebelle I called for Listen and Scan checks to discern a revel happening inland, and a fumble of their Listen had the group's Tarshite sorcerer briefly bewitched by the satyr's flutes and compelled to attempt to join the beast folk, until the group's Helering talked him down.

What I learned in my research was pretty paltry.  They have a centaur king, which rings of Ironhoof and Beast Valley.  The founder of Rhis, Tierre of Caskall, was a called 'Speaker to Beast Men.'  His settlement's wealth comes from managing the iron trade with the Mostali, who still come down to do business in the ruins of old Laurmal, but given the title and the nearness of a Beast Rune in the forests south of Rhis on the Argan Argar Atlas I would hazard that some negotiations with the centaur king, or a delegate of theirs, were part of the founding as well.

I don't know that the Crimson Bat is the supreme totemic bat in that sense.  per the RQG Bestiary it doesn't even have the Beast rune, just Chaos and Moon.  I've never heard of the Pujaleg bat hsunchen in Pamaltela, or the bat hsunchen of Teshnos, having any particular affinity for Chaos either.  Is there a source that suggests the Crimson Bat was the primal bat?

17 minutes ago, JonL said:

I think getting caught up in the moment and conceiving a child in an impromptu This World heroquest without having specifically planned on such is likely an implicit risk of both serving at or frequenting an Uleria temple. I don't think an opposed roll contest for a situation like that was a good way to handle it though, as it starts to look like coercion, even if that's not what anyone at the table had in mind. Best to frame the contest in explicitly not-rapey terms. Setting out to <ahem>bull your way through your partner's contraception magic: Not a good look. Embodying Storm Bull's epic virility to such a compelling degree that the Ulerian partner decides to forgo contraception magic and accept what he's offering because sometimes that's what Fertility is all about and this is a prime opportunity to embody it: Praise Uleria!

I've been trying to work out how better to phrase the exchange being described in this thread, and this I think is the right direction.  The resistance roll in this situation represents a test of how impressed Uleria is with Storm Bull, via their mortal proxies.  Success for the Storm Bull worshiper means that the goddess was sufficiently enthused by his performance to answer it in a deeply personal and permanent fashion, for all mortals involved.

given how the Dark Season holy days are clustered I reckon there's at least a few weeks' sustained festivity around the Tarpit on the Shadow Plateau, celebrating the troll gods, grieving the Only Old One etc.  Humans willing to brave the Shadow Plateau in the dead of winter could make small fortunes selling cooked food to the celebrating trolls.

I've posted before my idea that the Torkani have an annual Dark Season festival where an Argan Argar priest rides a sleigh pulled by trollkin between the steads, leaving presents for the children in exchange for little bags of food

30 minutes ago, soltakss said:

perhaps a Minotaur

since they're twins, a human child to stay with the mother, and a minotaur child to go with the father (or vice versa) seems appropriate

the existence of the Cleansed One demonstrates both that broo are people and how tragic their current state is, given their possibilities

Then I'd expect his holidays to fall in Harmony week of each season, with the day of the week varying by the element, principle or entity/ies enslaved in the holiday's associated myth.  I'd also expect that in Fonrit the high holy day is Fireday, Harmony Week, to celebrate the supreme deed of shackling of the sun.

the arkat option: whatever plans the human characters make, the day after the babes are weaned a party of aldryami arrive, insisting cryptically that they have come to take the sacred children to fosterage in their grove, 'as per the agreement'

Is there any source for Ompalam's holy days?

Oh, under those circumstances I'd think that it rather depends on the omens surrounding that 'overcoming,' and their interpretation by a priestess.

as the original and current owner of the Fertility rune I can only imagine Uleria smiles on that sort of thing, particularly if the conception occurs during sacred duties

Just so!  Never got to heroquest that in the campaign I wrote it for.  Tried to bring it up with the Luminous Stallion King but he was too focused on the jousting at Muse Roost.

I wrote a myth a few years ago about Argan Argar and Hyalor absconding with their own black horses from Bijiif's pastures in Hell, Horses for Uz.

After over a year of play the Tarshite sorcerer in my group is almost able to Enhance INT his way to cognitive parity with the party's yelmalio elf

Well, that all sounds mighty troubling!  The Bevilt Chaosfire mentioned in the Guide as the overlord of Dinsender, they're the master of this Chaos-breeding project?

Thanks, I can find Dinsender in the Guide, that's going to have some ramifications for my 'Bones of Artmal' campaign--but not Zanch Mator.  Who's that?