Squaredeal Sten

Sartar or Argrsth? Anyhow, thanks.

It strikes me that we have been told Chaosium deals with more than one printer. While it appears that the Cults of Glorantha series is all going to one printer, probably for consistency and price, it may be that other Runequest projects can go to other printers while the Cults series is still in initial production. If so we will all be happy. Here's to hope. And congratulations to Jeff and everyone who worked on the Cults books.

Sure, you already have my email too. Or can do it my message here. Either one.

The southern parts of Tarsh that are in rebellion are probably going to see less of anything coming south on the Oslir. This looks like an opportunity for the Salt trade to restructure.

Salt! Yes, that's what I was thinking a minute ago. I open the browser and you confirm it. Tarsh is landlocked a cargo of salt from Heortland is already high priced enough to be a good trade commodity.

And the participants in that civil war need to fund themselves. The war will help make trade adventurous.

"Goods" is not particularly informative. But herbs and spices is usable. Iron is hard to make a big cargo of. Exporting mined metals makes sense because we are told elsewhere that the Boldhome bronzeworkers guild owns copper mines in Tarsh. Slaves... I guess it depends on who you trade with. And everyone buys "artifacts", I suppose they are sold under economic stress.

What trade goods would Tarsh export? Import? I have seen Tarsh described as more prosperous than Sartar. If this status is based on more than its not being a war zone for decades before 1628 ST (and yes. Peace and prosperity often go together) Then I would think the kingdom might have particular exports which would support long distance trade. Also things they often trade for. The Guide to Glorantha"s long distance trade table dies not go down to this level of detail and in it Tarsh is part of Dragon Pass.

Oh, I have not gotten to 1630 ST yet. But I wanted to clarify that he had not died in 1628 / Battle of Heroes. This makes a difference to what my players and their adventurers negotiate with Fazzur's son Annistad at Dunstop. Which in my version was not taken by assault. Instead Dunstop switches sides, so Tarsh will be in a state of open civil war for a couple of years. Which makes sense to me as Argrath goes haring off with Harrek to fight Ethelrist. It seems to me that in the background as presented there is a lot of motivation to do that. Pharandros and Fazzur are known to be in conflict since 1625, Pharandros regarding Fazzur's sons as a threat. So loyalty to Pharandros has to be gone, because in RQ loyalties are reciprocal. The Red Emperor has fled and may be regarded as a paper tiger. The Glowline blinked out because the Tarsh Temple of tbe Reaching Moon is desecrated. Tarsh is now a war zone and the family forunes will be ruined if Dunstop is ruined. Annistad already initiated to Orlanth and I interpret that as his preparing to switch sides. It is in Argrath's interest to peel off Lunar adherents and have an active ally, and trade with Tarsh, rather than to conquer a desert. And Argrath may not want to conduct a siege in winter, and to keep his Sartarites mobilized so that they miss the planting season back home. So I have Annistad prove his Orlanthi bona fides by casting Cloud Clear, and Dunstop is not assaulted. My Glorantha has indeed varied. But I don't want it to vary so massively that if you publish a 1630 Hero Wars supplement I can't run it.

When there is a big setback like a standard taken or 50% casualties I start rolling against their Loyalty passion. And come to think of it, when there is a spectacular event like someone getting their head cut off, I have rolled then too.

In a related question, whar happens to Tarsh king Pharandros? According to Jeff he is in command of tbe advanced guard at the Battle of Heroes and Argrath's Prax horde eats his lunch. I don't find anything saying he is killed. I guess that he flees to the Red Emperor at the 3rd (unengsged) part of the Lunar army, which h includes Furthest regiments, and does not stop in Bagnot or Dunstop but continues at least to Furthest. OK, then I take it there's a final break with Fazxur's family. I consider that Annstad has every incentive to negotiate to make himself Argrath's Tarsh king, and a Tarsh civil war occurs within the larger events of Lunar civil war and Argrath's conquest.

After the Battle of Heroes (dark season 1628ST) what is the condition of Tarsh? Presumably Argrath's army walks into Bagnot. As Bagnot is a day's March away. I don't see a suggestion of a siege and it would make no sense for Argrath to retreat. What's the state of the Phargentes vs. Fazzur Wideread civil war? I never did understand Fazzur's geographic base. The canon relations in their triangle with Argrath? What's the economic state of Tarsh?

The printed scenario actually has a pretty detailed tactical plan fior the troll attack, which actually seems to me not to be optimal, thus cutting the Adventurers some slack. (The Adventurers have a big section of perimeter to defend and a better plan would be to use the trollkin slingers to feint at one end, then if the Adenturers react toward them to break through at the other end.) Anyway, the only things I would add are: 1) Keep your eye on the ball, which is to get the egg laying beetles onto the target tree. It's not a skirmish, not a slugfest, it's a breaktrough. Use the initiate trolls to hold the Adventurers while the Rune Lord gets his beetles to the target. 2) The dark trolls all have Blinding and should use it with extra boosting MPs to neutralize Adventurers before the trolls charge, while the slinging is going on. 3) Remember that trolls have Darksense, so I don't know why the scenario says they waste RP on Darksee. 4) When the trolls do charge they should cast Darkwalls to isolate the intended breakthrough area, reducing Adventurer response. All the dark trolls have Darkwall. Ideally that isolates 1 or 2 Adventurers and the others don't know where the breakthrough zone is for a few melee rounds. 5) The Gorakiki Rune Lord is already specified to have cast his cult Rune spells, which give him extra limbs and head bite = added attacks. All the GM needs to do is execute: Cast Mobility and Shimmer just before the charge, by the RL and his allied spirit. Remember to use MPs from his spirits.. Cast Bludgeon 4, then melee: Use thise extra insect limbs, they are free attacks! Each added attack reduces the target Adventurer's next parry by 20%. 6) Use the two bound spirits early to cast Iron hand on the unarmed extra arm (and figure his STR bonus as you prep the session). Extinguish on Adventurers' torches. To cast Demoralize before the charge and during melee. Heal, and to cast Mobility on friends and Slow on Adventurers. More Blinding attempts. The Allied Spirit to cast Dispel Magic to undo whatever the Adventurers cast, plus cast the Rune Lord's spells. The Rune lord has 71 magic points available to buff himself before and in melee and to undo the Adventurers. Use them lavishly. 6) Finally, GM realize that the first seasonal troll attack is expected to fail. Use the War Trees to ensure that happens. Page 173. How is that for a detailed plan?

If you DI them out, you can recycle the rune lords in a second encounter in another season. Same with rune priests though with lower POW likely. So their flight is not only rational but helps you GM. And the campaign gets a recurring opponent who should anticipate the Adveturers' methods next time.

When both sides have good armor and a lot of magical protection up, then yes I saw a lot of indecisive rounds while we waited for that critical roll. For a while the Humakti with god enhanced sword and Bladesharp had modified sword skill of 150+, so the opponent's parry is degraded 50% and the player rolled for a mere 95 or less. That tended to put a hole in the enemy line. Then the Humakti player left, a sad loss. Then my players got crafty; they started doing one huge attack Rune spell like Lightning 3 or 4 or Sleep, boosted by 4 to 10 MPs to smash through the Countermagic or Shield. This is easier to do when a couple of Adventurers have storage crystals and high POW. So now with a good POW vs. POW roll. the target has his abdomen cratered by lightning. It speeds up the fight. Also of course the Lightbringer adventurers developed Rune Lord scale weapon skills and magic themselves, so while not having Humakt gift their Swords, they are pretty dangerous. That was the evolution in my campaign.

I think tbe first five responses tell you most of what you asked for. But before Jeff closes the thread I'd like to try to summarize.: I am going to answer "Why?" Not to argue you out of what YOU want. You do you. 1. Runequest and D&D have developed different GMing styles. It's been a long time since I played D&D but back in the late 1970s its monster manual provided a pretty formulaic method for GMs: Start 1st level PCs in the next level of the same dungeon hunting goblins, 2nd level of the dungeon against orcs, add critters with more dice as the PCs gain levels and go deeper in tbe dungeon. I am sure D&D has evolved but those are its roots. RQ on the other hand grew out of the dungeon paradigm (it is still used but most adventures are in open air) and is not a level based game, so evolved in a different direction. Presenting a series of new monsters with more dice is not expected or successful. The opponent and adventure progression has to be more complex. 2. Those of us who have run RQ for a few years have not experienced running out of monsters. Judging from the responses of those who have run RQ for decades, they have elaborated foes within existing categories. For example there are rolled up spirits and demons per Bestiary - then in a specific supplement there is Krampus who falls into that general category: You can buy the Throat of Winter adventure with him in Jonstown Compendium. Which I recommend. But he is not meant to be a generic Krampus that any GM throws into his 27th level dungeon, you open the room door and he says " You're on the naughty list." No he is not Santa Claus, not even an evil Santa. He has motivations, subordinates, and methods peculiar to the adventure. 3. A follow on book of "monsters" is not a good business decision for Chaosium right now. They need to get the gods book out the door, then the GM book. The big Sartar campaign. The Holy Country book(s). The East Isles are recently in Jonstown Compendium. Jajagappa did just this year publish Imther in JC. Geographic areas and cultures are the way for RQ to grow, not monsters. The areas may come with area specific opponents, some of whom are monstrous. But if a unique opponent is found in Kralorela there is no reason it should pop up in Ralios. 4. Us GMs and players are not demanding a 2nd Bestiary. We mostly don't follow the D&D method that would make it desirable. Maybe in a few years Chaosium will compile one, maybe for the oceans or for Pamaltela, but we are clamoring for other books now. That's why. In my humble but wordy opinion.

And running or surrendering is completely realistic in tbe RW. Even in close order, which supports morale, hardly any one fights past 50% casualties and 25% is more usual.. In open order, a much lower threshold. Most of the casualties in classical times were taken after the formation broke, when cavalry slaughtered the fugitives. So in Anabasis you have Xenophon explaining that the Greeks mounted some men from their phalanx because otherwise "they could not kill any", the side that ran dropped their shields so they could run faster. Unfortunately we seldom have the encumbrance stats prepared so it's hard to say when the Adventurers can't keep up.

I usually find that when the fight goes badly for the NPCs, most of those still fighting go down before they can disengage. Then a party member with Slow magics the disengaged. But what I need to improve, is managing battles vs. Enemies in phalanx. I want to have the second rank ready to step up. So I need to prepare a slightly different matrix.

No, as far as I have ever seen it explained the rest of the sky does not move with the sun. The sun moves beneath the sky dome. There are illustrations in the Sourcebook and Guide, but I have not seen any single comprehensive source on Gloranthan astronomy. Joerg did recently post links to a couple of good partial references, see above. Also see Well of Daliath.

Spelling. And I will come back and fix typos.I

If you go to a hilltop and make a basic observatoryas follows. Placing a central stone for the observer to stand or sit on. Placing a second stone in line with the sunrise. Placing a third stone in line with where the sun is seen to set. Then a line between the sunrise and sunset stones will be parallel to "true easr-west" anywhere else on Gloranths. So the parallels of latitude will be parallel. As Mick Brooke's disgrams (see Joerg's link sbove) illustrate the only seasonal variation in the sun path is in altitude. Yelm begins the day at the same point (Gates of Dawn). By the way, the same method of finding tbe east-west line applies if you use that process on RW Earth. Where if you live in the northern hemisphere above the tropics the points where the sun rises and sets will be a little southerly. You don't notice it most of the time unkess you live very far north. But if you drive to work in early morning at the same time every day along a north-south highway you will probably notice it. If you live in the tropics the sun will appear to rise and set a little northerly in summer and a little southerly in winter. In New Zealand, Australia etc. It will be northerly. The difference between observations on Glorantha and RW Earth should be that on Gloranthe the observed rising point will not vary seasonally even though the sun's position at noon will vary seasonally. Because the Gates of Dawn is a place that you can go to. We need a Gloranthan astronomy thread. This is getting off of the birthdays topic.

In another thread which drifted considerably, i recently wrote: "As several more distinguished people have written, That [advice to the GM on how to balance and organize battles] is a separate subject from monster count and deserves its own thread, which I will start shortly. I note that you seem to be asking for advice to the GM about how to balance battles and also how to efficiently organize battles. It is very possible that the forthcoming GM book will do that, since the old RQ2 book has "treasure factors" for balance and in the back is a "squad sheet" among several worksheets. I have little advice on balance. Maybe I don't even believe in balance. I do recommend mercy: try not to doom the Adventurers and especially don't intentionally do Total Party Kills, which are not MGF. Not very profound. For efficient GMing, I value Andrew L. Montgomery's and Nick Brooke's advice, which I interpret as saying that each of a platoon of mooks does not need his own page in the GM's notes, while major NPCs should get more extensive detail. It seems to work for me. Some specifics in a while." I would like to exchange notes here about GM prep for violent encounters with multiple throw-away NPCs. I have found it useful and efficient to put a simple matrix in my notes with columns for each "mook" and space for notes on which adventurer each is fighting, wounds taken, magic points expended. Which in a selection of magic each may use. They don't each need their own hit location table etc, and I can keep group notes nearby, like what superior equipment & magic the officer below may have. For example, Rank soldier Soldier Officer Soldier Soldier Vs PC Hits taken MPs used Magic up I suspect that other people have superior techniques and I'd like to hear about them.

As several more distinguished people have written, That is a separate subject from monster count and deserves its own thread, which I will start shortly. I note that you seem to be asking for advice to the GM about how to balance battles and also how to efficiently organize battles. It is very possible that the forthcoming GM book will do that, since the old RQ2 book has "treasure factors" for balance and in the back is a "squad sheet" among several worksheets. I have little advice on balance. Maybe I don't even believe in balance. I do recommend mercy: try not to doom the Adventurers and especially don't intentionally do Total Party Kills, which are not MGF. Not very profound. For efficient GMing, I value Andrew L. Montgomery's and Nick Brooke's advice, which I interpret as saying that each of a platoon of mooks does not need his own page in the GM's notes, while major NPCs should get more extensive detail. It seems to work for me. Some specifics in a while.

A sundial will always indicate 12 hours of day because "hour" is 1/12 of the day.. The shadow of the gnomon will fall along a different line if the sunpath varies north and south. But it will always be divided into 12 hours regardless of season, unless the maker chooses to mark it using a different system. And on a flat world the Shadow of the gnomon will follow a straight line or a set of straight lines, not a set of seasonal curves.

On Glorantha tbe length of any given day is the same, North or south. If the length of the sun's path changes seasonally, how does that work? I await a detailed treatise on Gloranthan Celestial mechanics. Regardless, a winter hour may be longer than a summer hour, as I understand it used to be in the RW. But who has a timing device to say exactly how much longer? And Galileo exists in the future of another world, so no one is using a pendulum to tell time. As for water clocks. Do they exist in Glorantha? As far as I know they are iton age in the RW, so not a default assumption.