Jape_Vicho

Què collons això és un escrit de Glorantha en català!? Crec que és de les últimes coses que m'esperava, però es veu que la vida també dóna bones sorpreses de tant en tant, m'ho llegiré de cap a cap. 

55 minutes ago, Joerg said:

Killing a normal god (like the God of the Silver Feet) doesn't necessarily break the Compromise (although it does break the world, at least regionally).

Just throwing in ideas but given that one of the consequences of the Syndics Ban was the birth of Lord Death on a horse, whose kingdom has a strong chaotic component, maybe the murder of the God of Silver Feet did break the compromise. 

14 hours ago, Tindalos said:

The depiction in the guide (page 238) and in Prince of Sartar (pages 44-45, referred to as his original body) has the appearance of someone from God Forgot, and dressed in their clothing. In the comic, he's even blue, suggesting he may be a Zzaburi!

I thought of that too initially, but we have to remember that the Brithini are massive cynical jackasses, while Belintar is a mystic and somewhat of a good guy (no ruler can be really good but as statesmen go, he is benevolent and preoccupied of life and well-being).

8 hours ago, John Biles said:

Broyan gets killed by the Lunars within a year of the fall of the City of Wonders.

Or by the Kitori according to some passage of KoS. 

8 hours ago, ZedAlpha said:

Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy

Adding to the "Why everybody hates Argrath" thing. Well maybe bc all other great orlanthi heroes coincidentally die about a couple years before he does his big move, and all those deaths benefit him. 

A lot of interesting info here. 

I think that a scenario set in the golden age of the Holy Country would be so cool. 

Yelmalion greeting:

-OY sister! May you always carry the Light with you on your path. 

-OY brother! May you always smite the Darkness that preys upon the world. 

How to nail the entrance of a yelmalion settlement:

-The guard: OY! Who goes there, is it a creature of Darkness? 

-The Sartarites: No, we are men of thunder, children of Orlanth, the trusted friend of Yelmalio. 

-G: Then we salute you, what is your business here? 

-S: We seek the refuge of your light from the Darkness and Chaos. 

-G: Then we welcome you, come in and we will share hospitality with you, for we all value justice and honor here. 

1 hour ago, Beorne said:

I often asked myself a thing that like most other in Gloranta, is for me very fascinating and confusing.

What is the connection (that seems very "dynamic" depending the time) betweek the poor Elmal loyal thane horse's and Yelmalio.
Now they seem to be the same thing and the cult of Elmal has almost disappeared as "Elmal" and survivies only under Yelmalio. But I am among these who discovered Glorantha through KoDP, and betweeen early sartarites it appeared to be an important deity. I wondered very much to discovered it was wiped away.
Now I see that the KoDP repreentation is considered a little "out of canon" ... where is the truth? (I understand that is a totally absurd question ... )

Thanks

 

The truth is tangled and amorphous irl, like in the Greater Darkness before Lankor Mhy found and purified it. I'm a recent arrival to Glorantha, and as such my views change rapidly as I learn new things. When you discover Glorantha and one of your first interactions is with KoDP or Six Ages, Elmal looks SO COOL. Cmon he's the best God, a fiery bearded warrior, not as stupid and violent as Orlanth, but a loyal, pure and valiant thane that stands guard and defends humanity against the many horrors that want to assault it. Then you read a little more and discover that that cult was replaced and almost wiped out by a God linked with Peloria, the home of the Great Enemy! "What's this blasphemy?!" you think, and understandably so. But we are following a line of thought that's very different from the one that the sartarites did, and the new canon fits almost perfectly (I'm yet to know everything about Yelmalio, I've still got many questions which I dare not make on this forums yet). The truth is that Monrogh Lantern SAVES Elmal by revealing Yelmalio, he does not destroy it, but saves it, if he wasn't successful, Sartar would have been plunged into civil chaos and infighting as Yelm becomes more and more worshipped by former elmali who had been innocently awed by the power of his cult on the Grazelands and Peloria, and began to slowly adopt his myths, magics and structures. By the time of Monrogh's revelation, Elmal's cult is in a horrible position, then he reveals Yelmalio, and the rebellious Yelm cult surrenders to it. I theorize that the only places that the Elmal cult still exist by 1625 were the places where the cultists didn't bow to the common trend and refused to adopt yelmic influences, remaining pure to the old cult. 

On 2/5/2021 at 4:03 PM, Jape_Vicho said:

It has been said several times that currently Elmal is only a regional variant of Yelmalio, but of which regions? It's only located at Runegate? Or has it survived on other clans too? Some sources claim other clans and tribes still retain his cult but those same sources seem to say that outside Vaantar there are almost the same Elmal and Yelmalio cultists on Sartar, and by what I've read from recent Jeff posts this must be no longer canon. 

Answering to my own question, I've found an answer that looks canonical even though it's kinda old. The only fully elmali clans (meaning the ones that have a majority of Elmal worshippers and elect elmali chieftains) are the Enhyli of the Colymar and the Toena of the Aranwyth. I propose, and this is not canon but it's strikes me as pretty logical, that the surrounding clans to those two also practice the elmali religion, given that both clans are present at a city where there is a big temple to Elmal. So I would say that the Narri, Talaring, and whichever clans share Toena fort, if any, also have some few members who practice the Elmal cult. Away from those exceptions, I would say that Elmal's cult is unheard of, as the dominant solar cult on those clans is Yelmalio, and they probably think of Elmal's cult as one of the variants of Yelmalio's, one that for some reason they don't really care about retains the old name of Yelmalio, but if a random Orlanth worshipper found a Runegate elmali and an Aldachuri Yelmalion fighting he would probably think "What the hell are those two yelmalions arguing so damn loudly about?!" 

2 hours ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

And of course my perennial favorite, Morrowind, which is in part inspired by Glorantha (although you have to squint a little to see it.)

An immortal God King who lives in a magical city that floats in the sea and rules (along with other two god kings) a Holy Country? Now where have I heard that before... 😂

But seriously that's the only obvious inspiration I was able to pick out really, I'm sure there's more though, maybe less obvious.

Also I'm not a huge nerd of TES lore as I'm with Glorantha but I have a friend who is and for what he has told me I can say that if having a mindblowingly complex mythology is a signature of Glorantha, then TES copied that too because it's a huge mess (not in a bad way).

You have all sold me on Moana BTW. I always thought it had a cool design but nothing really drew me enough to sit and watch it but now knowing that it's so Gloranthan I will definitely see it soon. 

1 hour ago, Nick Brooke said:

Oh, I ought to mention that the Greydog Clan hated the Poss Clan. Those assholes, always building effective political coalitions and successfully stitching up tribal elections while we were off being Big Damn Heroes and travelling to exotic lands to kill people and take their stuff for glory and cattle. We bitterly resented Harvald the Hairy becoming tribal King, just because he was popular and successful and his clan did nimminy-pimminy mealy-mouthed things like helping their Tarshite neighbours while we were openly debating whether to take them all as thralls, just to get their votes. It was a pathetic spectacle.

tl/dr: not all Lismelder are like the Poss; some Lismelder are self-consciously anti-Poss.

1 hour ago, Nick Brooke said:

In my experience as a Greydog, the Lunar cultural and religious influence was zero, or even less. We thought the Lunars were crazy, we derided them when they weren't around, but as the occupying power they carried one heck of a big stick, and we tended to pay our taxes on time and tread carefully if we thought they were looking. We once screwed up badly, offending the Governor at a peace banquet (by killing one of his fellow guests), and had to send our clan's warriors to fight as auxiliaries in the Heortland campaign. That was pretty bad, all things considered.

We never met any Lismelder Yelmalions or Elmali, but of course your Glorantha will vary. The only Yelmalions we encountered were either Far Point types, loyal to Harvar Ironfist, or else from the Sun Dome Temple just down the road. Remember that we were playing back in the nineties, before King of Dragon Pass gave people all those weird mistaken notions about there being an widespread, extant cult of Elmal in Sartar. There were loads of Humakti in our Lismelder Tribe, which isn't surprising when you consider (a) their origins as a Malani fraction, (b) their location next to the Upland Marsh, and (c) their alleged alliance with the Ducks.

(I say "alleged alliance" -- outsiders made a lot more of our neighbourly behaviour towards the Ducks than we ever did. Rumours that we are all web-footed clod-hoppers interbreeding with Stew's feathered friends fall well short of the mark, and we will stab you if you bring them up again) 

You were the Greydog clan itself or just some clansmen? Did you attain positions of power on the clan, maybe even clan chief? I'm asking bc it seems you had some kind of power over the clan, and that sounds pretty cool. 

1 hour ago, David Scott said:

Were the Lismelder Lunar pro-Lunar, no. Did they work for the lunars, yes. Was it their choice, sort of yes, sort of no. Was this all part of gaming group nonsense, yes.

So you mean that the tribe works with the lunars but the cultural and religious influence is minimal, right? 

1 hour ago, David Scott said:

Do the lismelder have a Yelmalio clan, not when I was playing. But it's your game, do what you want.

Yeah I know but I was wondering if it sounded absurd, like making a Yelmalio clan of the Torkani would be. 

1 hour ago, David Scott said:

The Lismelder's strength over the undead is their link with Humakt. He is the tribal wargod and the Lismelder have Indrodar's Necklace in Goodsword Lands. See the whole adventure in Sartar Kingdom of Heroes about the Sword.

I have never read SKoH but this post was because I was thinking of writing a scenario about the Lismelder in which Indrodar's Necklace and a sword linked with it were key elements. I'm going to be very sad if my idea is the same than the adventure you mentioned. 

17 minutes ago, Stephen L said:

If you did make a clan lean to Yelmalio, my money would be on the Poss.

That's a great idea actually, I thought of the Lonedi bc they don't seem to have any noticeable gimmick unlike all the others, but the Poss are even more fitting. 

I've been looking into the Lismelder tribe and I have some questions to which I have found no answer and maybe some here have them and want to discuss them:

On the wiki it's stated that (I assume by 1621) the Lismelder king is one Harvald the Hairy, from the Poss clan. He is also said to be a friend and ally of one Lergius Kassias, commander of a unit of the Belyr Phalanx regiment that is currently stationed at the Duck Valley, and it cites as source the Sartar Companion (which I don't own). At the GM screen pack when the Lismelder clans are described the Poss clan is said to have allied with the lunars during the occupation and benefited of that, so it checks that the Lismelder were, officially, a lunar-complacent clan during the occupation, at least since Harvald was elected king, and until he was most probably killed at the Dragonrise. But then I have searched about the Lismelder on this forum, and several times it is said that the Lismelder are not, again, officially, pro-lunars, and that no source points at lunar-Lismelder cooperation. How so? Doesn't Sartar Companion contradict this (I know it's not canon but as I said it ckecks with the GM Pack too)? . 

The Sartar Companion is from 1621 if I'm not mistaken, and most probably Harvald was eaten at the Dragonrise for being a lunar-loving king, but the GM Pack says nothing about the King of the Lismelder. Do we know anything about their king in 1625? Are they suffering an interregnum like the Locaem? 

This is purely opinion but do you think one of the Lismelder clans could have Yelmalio as their main God (besides Orlanth and Ernalda of course) and a minor temple to him in their village? Or the proximity of Vaantar and the importance of the Humakt as the tribal cult make that kind of absurd? Yelmalio is also a good God against undead if I'm not mistaken.

It has been said several times that currently Elmal is only a regional variant of Yelmalio, but of which regions? It's only located at Runegate? Or has it survived on other clans too? Some sources claim other clans and tribes still retain his cult but those same sources seem to say that outside Vaantar there are almost the same Elmal and Yelmalio cultists on Sartar, and by what I've read from recent Jeff posts this must be no longer canon. 

Finally, how does the Yelmalio cult work outside of the Sun Dome Counties? It seems they there are quite yelmalions on the tribes, but in RQG it's stated that for being initiated to the cult to have to either be the son of a yelmalion or save the life of a yelmalion I mean serving two years as a mercenary at the Sun Dome Temple. Wouldn't this make the cult extremely sectarian? Are most of the yelmalions outside Vaantar restricted to a few very pious and devoted lineages? What do you think in general about yelmalions outside the sun domes and their relation with their more "vanilla" clan and tribesmen? 

The most prominent is "We are all Us" from the Seven Mothers and Lunar Empire in general. They also say things like "Life is Death" (Hon Eel), "Freedom is Slavery" (Great Sister) and other contradictions. The famous Akothi/Sargashi motto is "Death creates Life". I can only guess that humakti say "Omae wa mou shindeirou" when they cast sever spirit. 

EDIT: Quite far away from Sartar but the mantra of the Seshnelan Rokari is "One God, One King, One Church". 

I'm not sure if a question in such an old post will get an answer but I wonder how did Kallyr manage to be in the good side of both the Cisina and Culbrea and of the Wolfrunners. Aren't they at war and hate each other's guts?

A solo adventure? Yay, finally I will be able to actually play RQ!

Well, 00 does not mean a hard prohibition, but if you want to talk realistic a Dululz would not be able to ride a horse, as most of the work you need to do in order to ride it is done with the legs, and Durulz's are too short for that. Ofc ducks themselves are not realistic and you can do whaterver you wish. What I would do is give him other equipement to make up for that, maybe a cool enchanted canoe, a powerful iron sword or something like that. Otoh a duck should be able to ride a chariot, even though he might need to stand upon a tool in order to see anything, or maybe his chariot is drawn by animals smaller than a horse.

6 minutes ago, Richard S. said:

Ah yeah I forgot about Zistor, though it's debatable how much of a "god" he really was. He may have just been a giant machine they built to help fuck with the other side. 

Well it was god enough to make Orlanth be able to break the Compromise "legally" because the GL had broke it first by creating it and smack his ass into oblivion. 

It's difficult to avoid thinking it was some kind of Artificial Intelligence, but that surely can't be. 

1 hour ago, ZedAlpha said:

Are they completely reliant on worship and sacrifice to keep them alive

Gods can be killed as the Great Winter shows, and even forgotten, but I don't think they live off of the mortal's worship in a sense they turn weaker if they are less worshipped. Yelmalio is not worshipped between the dawn and the Battle of Night and Day, then his cult is again forgotten for some time until it raises again because of the EWF, and all this time the powers of his physical manifestation (the Lightfore) don't seem to wane, AFAIK. Orlanth is much less worshipped in 1620 than it was 200 years prior (bc of lunar ban), and I don't think there's any mention of his powers having been weakened by that. Gods are not affected by time so they can't really react to and be affected by current events unless they break the Compromise, which they sometimes do.

1 hour ago, ZedAlpha said:

Do they have completely separate existences like Forgotten Relms, say?

They live in the Godsplane, a place beyond Time. This has many implications, as gods exist several times on this plane. I think it as a weird magical plane where every deed of the gods war is simultaneously taking place.  Of course living gods are different, Nysalor lived in Dorastor while he lived, for exemple.

1 hour ago, ZedAlpha said:

Can people just make up new gods and have them pop into existence in the God Time having always been there, or are there no new gods after the Dawn? 

There have been many new gods since time, and many ways to create them:

The Godlearners definitely tried, with mixed success. In Umathela they made up a cult and made people practice it, and then one day it suddenly started to manifest magics. They also created Zazistor/Zistor, the Machine God.

Arkat/Nysalor/Gbaji were born within time, but that is a very complicated topic. My understanding is that the Council discovered an object/place/something of pure Chaos, which is usually called the Pseudocosmic Egg, and decided to use it as well of power to create a perfect god. I think it connects with the draconic myth of Orxili, the Cosmic Egg, which is the source of all. If Orxili is the source of everything, then it must be Chaos.

Sedenya is created within time, but it could also be said that she's reconstructed, but I think there's more to Sedenya and his birth than just a reconstruction. The Seven Mothers are all gods who were born as mortals (well maybe barring Teelo Estara). Many of the lunar pantheon has been born within time really, like Moonson and his inspirations.

But the most common method of creating new gods is apotheosis. There have been many mortals who whave achieved godhood because of their deeds within time, the most famous of them might be Sartar, Dormal, Jonat, Pavis or Ompalam. This is done I think on death, so the Hero dies and is reconstructed as a god.

34 minutes ago, Richard S. said:

"nearly" because the Devil did permanently kill some gods when Chaos invaded, so there are some forces that simply don't exist

And we all thank him for killing Vadrus the Ill Wind.

Just now, jajagappa said:

As Cults "Book" is two volume plus has a LOT of art, I don't think this is too surprising.  But should be a great RQG year!

Yeah I imagine it contains a lot and have cost tons of work, but the increasing sneak peeks had me hoping it was close to finish 😄, but yeah, I'm happy that so many works are coming, makes me think RQG is doing well commercially and that is great news for all.

Wow Starter and Sartar sets before the Cults book? I did not expect that at all, I thought the Cults book was going to be the next one.

Personally I hate long combat encounters, and I usually deem combat in general the part that I like least about RPGs, but well played combat can be amazing too of course.

About time, I agree with you, 15 minutes, if the rules are well known by the players and gm should be enough, if they are still getting to them it can get about half an hour, for exemple me and my players are not yet fluent with RQ, so we waste much time looking at spells and tables, which is a shame but with time we will improve. More than that seems like too much time for me, and yes that's also one of the main reasons why I love BRP systems so much. 

But even more important than length is the context, the combat has to serve a purpose and create a threat to the players, and also it should never be just railroaded into the players face. Killing goblins, bandits or wolves for sport is incredibly boring, even if it's 10 mins, but if you manage to integrate the plot into a fight, in a way in which the story develops with the combat, that fight can take hours and be interesting, but this is a very hard thing to do.

Do the Seshnegi commonly use iron instead of bronze? Or is it still rare but less so than in central Genertela? 

In all BRP games I always let the players throw all the characteristics that share the same dice and allocate them to their liking, and then they can re-roll one of their choice. If they still come out as underpowered I either let them throw everything from scratch if they rolled absolute garbage of everything (and you would be surprised of how many times this has happened) or give them as many points to allocate as necessary for their average to come up to 12 (in RQ) if they have bad but not terrible stats. 

6 hours ago, davecake said:

Right, and as you have just essentially said you presume that what I say is inherently not to be trusted, so why should I bother to continue any further discussion? 

No, I must have expressed myself wrong. Once you said you are basing what you said in the draft from the Cults book I trusted what you said, there's no reason in lying here, I ment that before knowing it you (the inclussive you) were just saying things that contradicted my sources without stating yours. That I cannot believe, you might have been taking info from non-canon sources or just plainly remember wrong. There's no reason for further discussion anyway so it's ok. 

2 hours ago, Richard S. said:

I can't find the exact quote, but I belive it was said elsewhere (probably by jeff), that there's pretty much no PHP left in Pent - the remainder are what we know as the Grazelanders - and Kargzant the Little Sun is the Pentan's primary god. They don't worship Yu-Kargzant/Yelm at all.

They are few but they are present and important, they probably number about 80.000 or so of a total population of 800.000, as one of the Ten Arrows, the Julin Marsk, are said to be PHP. 

And yeah that is another theory, we have proposed 3 on this thread. Either:

-The Pentans worship only Kargzant, who is not the Sun (even though it is called the Sun God and the Sun Horse) but the Grazers worship Yu-Kargzant, who is Kargzant as Yelm (a cult that the Pentans misteriously lost but the Grazers retained somehow after centuries of living among storm and beast worshippers, or maybe it sprung out of nowhere when they arrived at DP). 

-The traditional Pentans mainly worship Kargzant as Lightfore but the PHP among them worship Yu-Kargzant (as I said, no proof of that on the Guide). 

-The Hyalorings and Chariot People followed Kargzant the Wandering Sun through the darkness, migrating and living free under the sky, while their walker former brethren of the Solar Empire cowered under a snow-covered dome. The former was proved to be the correct path, and when Kargzant and his Star Captains recovered all the parts of Yelm that had been scattered when he was murdered by Orlanth and he led the Sun again through the Sunpath, the Wheels and the Riders were rewarded the whole pelorian bowl and the weakened half-men that inhabited it. The Wheels started being the strongest, but quickly they were defeated and replaced by the Hyalorings. This was another short-lived victory, as the Hyalorings were in turn soon defeated by their Dara-Happan subjects and by the Teyalan invaders, and so they left for Pent, while also leaving in Peloria a huge mark, mainly manifested in the Berenings, who were theyalanized riders, and also the probable ancestors of both the Sairdites and the Runegate clans of Sartar. The solar cult of the Hyalorings that remained changed as they strode further from the hierarchical solar society and towards the liberal and socially mobile storm society, and ended up as Elmal, the Sun as a subordinate of the Storm, and with a structure of a typical orlanthi cult. The ones that left for Pent were the ones that refused to surrender Kargzant either to the pelorians or to the theyalans, and retained his cult as it was on the height of their power, meaning as Kargzant the Sun God. With time, after the PHP that would become the Grazers left, the Yu- morpheme was dropped, probably in opposition to the pelorians, as Yu- is part of the sacred Dara-Happan alphabet. Maybe it was dropped after the Night of Horrors, maybe way before, we can't know. 

All three theories have their points and flaws, and with current material none of the three can be proved right or wrong. 

35 minutes ago, davecake said:

What you probably should realise is that I am taking quite a bit of this from the draft of the Gods Book - which is not going to be exactly the same as what makes it to print soon, but is likely to be quite similar, and is much more recent than other sources - and is the closest we will get to a development of Pentan society in the near future, in that its pretty clear on Yelm/Yu-Kargzant and Kargzant worship among them. 

I've extrapolated a bit, - but I'm sure that the Pentans have many Yelm worshippers among them and treat Yelm as a very important god, but only a minority that are entitled to by genealogy, mostly among the PHP, they call Yelm Yu-Kargzant like the Grazers, and that Kargzant is a separate god. If you wish to not believe it until the Gods book is out, sure. 

Well, I don't know if I missed where you said that before but I definitely didn't see it, and can't possibly know things that are said in works that have not been released. If the Cults Book shows things are like you said it, then it's clear, I'm wrong, but I cannot know that can I? I was presenting a doubt using the avaliable sources, if some people have access to other sources I cannot reach then fine I guess but the only way I could accept your tale is if I blindly believed anything other people said over the sources I have, and I'm not going to do that.

1 hour ago, Tindalos said:

Certainly you can take the Sourcebook as agreeing there: (Page 13)

Well, that's what the Grazers say, and being that they are the only Hyalorings that the people of DP know, also what their neighboring peoples like the Sartarites, Esrolians and Tarshites believe, but that self-glorifying story of them being the "originals" is proven wrong on Six Ages: Ride the Wind, where the PHP are shown as being a deviation of the classic Hyalorings, who have herded cows since ages before, and also the Guide states about the PHP that at the Dawn "The other tribes called them the Liars, as they claimed to be the original horse people and herded only horses". And while their "weaker bc they herd cows" cousins created the biggest land empire Genertela has ever seen, humiliated the Dara Happans and Kralori and scarred the Red Moon, the almighty Grazers were being defeated by all their neighbors, confined in the poorest region of DP, and their political power was taken over by a mask of Ernalda, a goddess of the half-men, such solar power right? 

5 hours ago, davecake said:

Kargzant and Yu-Kargzant are quite different though. The Pentans are still big believers in both hereditary noble blood, and the sacredness of the Pure Horse Tribe, so only a few of them get to join Yu-Kargzant and get fully access to the powers of fire. Kargzant is still the cold sun - the god they followed that led them through the Great Darkness - and only a few of them are descended from the early First Age Emperors who were able to prove that the Cold Sun became the Sun at the Dawn. Kargzant is about surviving the harsh life of the Pentan tundra.[...] I don't think the Pentans think of Kargzant and Yu-Kargzant as different gods exactly, they think of Yu-Kargzant as Kargzant in his full power, and that only the most sacred people are entitled to worship him that way. Of course, the Dara Happan interpretation of all this is very different. 

Well that is an interpretation sure, we could sum it up by saying that in pentan society the traditional clans worship Kargzant as the little sun while the Pure Horse People worship that god as Yelm, the problem is that there is no proof for that AFAIK.

As many have said, the Guide clearly states that pentans worship Kargzant, and there is absolutely no mention to Yu-Kargzant in all their section of the Guide, the only one time Yu-Kargzant is mentioned in all the Guide is in page 177, when it talks about the Grazers' religion. Besides, Yu-Kargzant and Kargzant (and also Elmal) are described in the same way, as Sun Horse and Sun God, and the description of the Kargzant cult in page 363 clearly points to his cult being structured exactly like the Grazer one, meaning that it has a progression organized by subcults and age. So by all this, Yu-Kargzant and Kargzant cults are exacty the same, the same magic, the same myths, same structure... The only difference is the name, which I dig, as @Tindalos said, that the Yu- was dropped because of anti-Dara Happan sentiment.

I get where your theory comes from and it sounds good, but it doesn't look at all like it's a set-in-stone clear-cult canon thing, it's one of many interpretations, and until we see a full developement of pentan society and religion we will never know for sure.