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Let's consider a random Stygian ruin!


Baboon in greaves

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I'm was looking at the Runequest  book "Ruins" this afternoon and decided to roll up a random ruin according to their tables. I'm still pretty new to Glorantha, so I thought it would be fun to run it by you all and see what kind of ideas we can spin out of it.

In case you guys are unfamiliar, Ruins works by making you roll on about 20 random tables, but also tells you to ignore results you don't like. One note though, Ruins is a 2nd Age book, but I'm more interested in the Hero Wars period so let's transpose the results forward in time. With that in mind, here's what I rolled up:

Governing element: Death

Climactic backdrop: Spiral

Purpose: Town

Builders: Human, Stygian

I think this works pretty well so far. I think the Stygians were tomb builders, so the ruin can have a substantial tomb of some kind. Additionally, do Uz typically favor spiral shapes? I think I remember a spiral Uz community in one book. Moving on to history:

Reason for founding: Cataclysm (Constructed by survivors of a major cataclysm, like the Gbaji War).

Made famous by: Foreign War (War against another power)

Ruined by: Mass Sacrifice ("The ruin’s builders fell into a frenzy of human sacrifice in an attempt to appease their gods. Whether their actions pleased any divinities or not, they were overzealous and reduced the ruin’s population beyond sustainable levels. ") and Earthquake.

I imagine the cataclysm that resulted in the founding of this town/tomb was the Gbaji War. What could the other "foreign war" be, that made this place famous? Earthquake and Mass Sacrifice are a great pairing as a cause for ruination. What god could the residents have angered?

Status: Abandoned

Shape: Octagon

Size: An estate ("The ruin was a compound, usually consisting of one large building and several outbuildings, perhaps with an encircling wall. Ruins of this size include most temple complexes and military encampments as well as the estates of nobles and wealthy landowners.")

Defenses: Underground

Loot: Mortal Remains

This seems to track really well with the results from earlier, but is this place a temple, tomb or a section of a settlement? Is it self-sufficient or part of a larger complex that's now inaccessible due to cave in? What were Stygian burial practices like?

3 features:

    * Manufactory - 16-25 SIZ - Looted (This sounds like some kind of workshop. What could have been made here? Some kind of burial charms?)

    * Stairway - 26-35 SIZ - Intact (Here's our spiral stairway from earlier! A very lucky roll. This place definitely says 'pitched, climactic battle'.

    * Tomb - 26-35 SIZ - Caved-in but intact (Another lucky roll. Very in-theme with the rest of the ruin)

Decoration: Writing (I assume the Stygians had a writing system. Would many people in the 1600s be able to read their script?)

Magical Feature: Gate ("The ruin includes a place where the barriers between Glorantha and the Hero Plane are thin. God Learners are particularly interested in finding these points, which are visible to those with RuneQuest Sight." Not exactly sure what to do with this)

Guardian: Machine (This is the real wild card! How to work a machine in here - maybe a Mostali construct that was trapped by a cave-in?)

Anyhow, thank you guys for diving in with me!  I'm a big fan of this community and finally decided to join, and make this post my introduction.

 

 

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1 hour ago, Baboon in greaves said:

I'm was looking at the Runequest  book "Ruins" this afternoon and decided to roll up a random ruin according to their tables. I'm still pretty new to Glorantha, so I thought it would be fun to run it by you all and see what kind of ideas we can spin out of it.

In case you guys are unfamiliar, Ruins works by making you roll on about 20 random tables, but also tells you to ignore results you don't like. One note though, Ruins is a 2nd Age book, but I'm more interested in the Hero Wars period so let's transpose the results forward in time. With that in mind, here's what I rolled up:

Governing element: Death

Climactic backdrop: Spiral

Purpose: Town

Builders: Human, Stygian

I think this works pretty well so far. I think the Stygians were tomb builders, so the ruin can have a substantial tomb of some kind. Additionally, do Uz typically favor spiral shapes? I think I remember a spiral Uz community in one book. Moving on to history:

Reason for founding: Cataclysm (Constructed by survivors of a major cataclysm, like the Gbaji War).

Made famous by: Foreign War (War against another power)

Ruined by: Mass Sacrifice ("The ruin’s builders fell into a frenzy of human sacrifice in an attempt to appease their gods. Whether their actions pleased any divinities or not, they were overzealous and reduced the ruin’s population beyond sustainable levels. ") and Earthquake.

I imagine the cataclysm that resulted in the founding of this town/tomb was the Gbaji War. What could the other "foreign war" be, that made this place famous? Earthquake and Mass Sacrifice are a great pairing as a cause for ruination. What god could the residents have angered?

Status: Abandoned

Shape: Octagon

Size: An estate ("The ruin was a compound, usually consisting of one large building and several outbuildings, perhaps with an encircling wall. Ruins of this size include most temple complexes and military encampments as well as the estates of nobles and wealthy landowners.")

Defenses: Underground

Loot: Mortal Remains

This seems to track really well with the results from earlier, but is this place a temple, tomb or a section of a settlement? Is it self-sufficient or part of a larger complex that's now inaccessible due to cave in? What were Stygian burial practices like?

3 features:

    * Manufactory - 16-25 SIZ - Looted (This sounds like some kind of workshop. What could have been made here? Some kind of burial charms?)

    * Stairway - 26-35 SIZ - Intact (Here's our spiral stairway from earlier! A very lucky roll. This place definitely says 'pitched, climactic battle'.

    * Tomb - 26-35 SIZ - Caved-in but intact (Another lucky roll. Very in-theme with the rest of the ruin)

Decoration: Writing (I assume the Stygians had a writing system. Would many people in the 1600s be able to read their script?)

Magical Feature: Gate ("The ruin includes a place where the barriers between Glorantha and the Hero Plane are thin. God Learners are particularly interested in findings these points, which are visible to those with RuneQuest Sight." Not exactly sure what to do with this)

Guardian: Machine (This is the real wild card! How to work a machine in here - maybe a Mostali construct that was trapped by a cave-in?)

Anyhow, thank you guys for diving in with me!  I'm a big fan of this community and finally decided to join, and make this post my introduction.

Hello, and welcome!

Hmm.  There's some rather disparate elements here...

"Stygian" is an Arkat thing, an insulting term from the GL's about the Autarchy, so Gbaji-war survivors is exactly right!

Arkat of course has deep Uz links.

Arkat was also deeply into all manner of magical learning, so the "writing" could potentially be almost anything archaic.  I wouldn't expect it to be readable, or even recognizable, except to a sage-type character (LM, IO, even a scholar-specialist Issaries; etc)

IIRC, the GL's destroyed Arkat's "Autarchy," but remnants and descendants in Safelster continue to aspire to a restoration (if the whole region weren't so wedded to secretive cults and factions, there might IMHO actually be a decent chance for such a restoration).

Spiral suggests Air/storm, though... This is an element that doesn't much fit.

Machines, as noted, are most famously Mostali.  Maybe they set a guardian against anyone trying to rediscover the Arkati secrets here?  Maybe a war-machine of theirs got damaged (fighting the town) in such a manner that it cannot depart?

BUT, there is also (and maybe even better?) The Zistorite branch of GL'ism, just as mechanistic as the Mostali.  Maybe their "fame" (such as it is) and the "Machine," are from a war against Zistor...?

Given the "death" theme, I'd think the Gate would be to some underworld/afterlife location.

N.B. however that all the Mongoose-era 2ndAge material is now non-canonical, and will likely include stuff that is incompatible with the current RQG/Guide/etc vision of Glorantha.

Plenty, as noted, can fit just fine!

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20 hours ago, g33k said:

Spiral suggests Air/storm, though... This is an element that doesn't much fit.

Put it on the site of some Storm god related God-time event, later occupied by trolls but abandoned. (suggests somewhere around the Holy Country)

Arkati rediscover during the wars against Gbaji, rebuild but later destroyed. (suggests after Arkat landed in the Holy Country)

20 hours ago, g33k said:

Earthquake and Mass Sacrifice

Sounds more like the long war to destroy the Zistorites and the Clanking City.

22 hours ago, Baboon in greaves said:

Machine (This is the real wild card! How to work a machine in here - maybe a Mostali construct that was trapped by a cave-in?)

If placed in God Forgot as part of what became the Clanking City, then that was subsequently trapped by the Mostali to prevent others from investigating.

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