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How to deal with this much rune magic ?


Jon Hunter

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I was referring to Apple Lane being missing a chunk of its elders/authority figures/people you'd expect to have more RP and that this is also true for some of the Scenario's in PP rather than the general innate/rp situation....but I believe that also is true (for the bits I've seen at the stage they were at that time)  

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7 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

The Rattling Wind, at least, maintains the pattern. The villagers described (fairly regular apart from a particular event in the past) have 3-5 Rune Points in different cults. Teens have 1-2 Rune Points. Another village leader has 3 Rune Points, and an Ernalda priestess has 8. A Rune-Lord has 10.  

This is all on the expected curve.

Its also consistent with the Glorantha we know form Heroquest , RQ2(could be argued), RQ3 and the guide.

Edited by Jon Hunter
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Anyway my view from a world building perspective the RQG RP rules would be outstanding and completely workable without affecting the longstanding nature of Glorantha if;

  • Initiates regained rune magic twice a year (sacred time , High holy day ) as originally intended
  • Allow initiates access to a number of specific or general spell for each rune point. ( ie buy access to heal wound, divination, extension )

imho this creates a situation

  • Where we don't change the number of initiates in the world to justify the system. 
  • The great aspects of the RP change are kept ( i am a great fan conceptually )
  • Characters power gain arcs are much smoother and longer
  • We get lots of NPC's with interesting magic, but they have to use sparingly and with thought
  • We don't have a further power imbalance towards the large cults with many minor holy days & large temples ( there are already the most with most and powerful spells. )
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18 minutes ago, Jon Hunter said:

Where we don't change the number of initiates in the world to justify the system. 

I don't think this has anything to do with your other points. Frankly I'm going to leave that as 'that would be a ecumenical matter' and note that it appears no matter what the official policy is everyone seems to be writing and playing with the same levels of magical availability as we've ever seen. 

That aside this seems to be a solution in search of a problem. There is no issue with Glorantha being highly magical and as has, I think, been shown in this discussion there isn't a huge amount of Rune Magic being thrown about. Even with Seasonal Top Ups it's really not a big deal and players should tread cautiously as most adults will have access to a 2-5 points depending on age and status. The GOOD point about common rune magic is that it means those are a given. As such your average sheep herder is quite likely to have access to something scary should the Trolls/Lunars/MurderhoboPC's try anything and not just the much more regularly cast Bless Crops and Heal Wound style spells that he's actively going to use which is the danger of your version. It's the magical equivalent of the farmer having a shotgun under the bed which discourages robbery. 

End of the day YGMV but I don't see the need to tweak what we're seeing in published form or what I'm writing. 

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On 2/25/2020 at 12:51 PM, Jon Hunter said:

OK i'm trying to get my head round how the world of Glorantha remains vaugley the same after the rune magic changes in RQG?

I was wrongly under the impression that initiates only got there magic back on high holy days and sacred times ( don't ask me how, something i picked up in the playstest and game dev phases that stuck in my mind, and i never checked again).

Now I understand that  most adults get 2 or 3 rune points that if they live near a fair size temple they can replenish every week. Thats a  game changing level of rune magic,  available to PCs, NPC's , foes and lots of monsters.

Rune magic has Just got turned up to 11.

I've always loved gloranthas highly magical nature, but it just feels to much.

Imagine an average Farmer (Orlanth initiate). He's married (Ernalda initiate) with 2 children. Together they farm their land near Apple Lane.

Regardless of their rune points,  Orlanth initiates get to renew their magic twice per season (hopefully the floating days are evenly spread out RQG p300) and during sacred time. RQG p300. Ernaldans, ignoring the minor holy days get 5 seasonal holy days, sacred time and 2 others RQG p293.

Initiation on page 275 says you get 1 special rune spell, so what does an Orlanthi farmer choose for rune magic? Pick well as to get more you need to pay 100L per point (page 275) 100L is 5 cows. Look at what's available for farmers, Orlanth is rubbish. Personally I believe flight is the best, it lets you fly to the holy peaks on holy days. but really they are all Weather or Air based or only useful in a fight. Thunderbolt is likely the best otherwise.

Ernalda initiates? Bless crops wins every time.

So what about the common rune magic?

Divination - what are farmers going to ask about? causes of sick animals, crop blight, where is my lost brother, will the harvest go well, should I buy Bert's spare bull...

Warding - what are you going to ward - likely the cows, but that's fine, that's what it's for. You don't get the RP back until it expires. So that puts you down points. Likely you only do it when treble is expected.

Heal Wound is the single most important spell, it's what reduces overall mortality from simple problems (no one normal bleeds to death, through normal accident or childbirth issues). This an important thing for Glorantha as a setting I believe.

The only other one that i believe is of any import is Multispell, as it lets you loose off multiple healing and disruption.

The rest are very specialist.

Overall your family can benefit from rune magic every few weeks but I don't think they use it very often. Most save it up for an emergency. should I cast divination or save it just in case of an accident.

so

On 2/25/2020 at 12:51 PM, Jon Hunter said:
  • Every adults will go into every combat with full out rune magic, as they have available runepoints and will assume there opponent does too, and combats to dangerous to take any chances.

I don't think they do, unless they are specialists. The farmers above use thunderbolt. Most farmers rarely fight. 

On 2/25/2020 at 12:51 PM, Jon Hunter said:
  • Little remains hidden because most people can use divination without real cost,

Divination is still unreliable and people will likely put off using it except in emergency.

On 2/25/2020 at 12:51 PM, Jon Hunter said:
  • Everyone can heal to a  high level.

Yes, it's now a fantasy world where accidents don't kill you, but combat still can and is why no one squanders their rune points.

On 2/25/2020 at 12:51 PM, Jon Hunter said:
  • Everything steal-able will be warded

If you have the rune points and choose well.

Adventurers on the other hand are entirely different.

 

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19 hours ago, Marc said:

Yeah, that works for cults with a Holy Day each week.  According to the RAW though, that's only Babeester Gor, Eiritha( maybe, could just be for priestesses ), Ernalda, and Issaries.  None of the other cults in the core book mention weekly holy days.

This is an important point I think people missed. Honestly I dont think it's a major issue. Combined with David Scott's excellent point about _cost_ of spells your average Orlanthi (culture not cult) is going to have 2-5 RP and only a handful of non common spells. 

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6 minutes ago, David Scott said:

Initiation on page 275 says you get 1 special rune spell, so what does an Orlanthi farmer choose for rune magic? Pick well as to get more you need to pay 100L per point (page 275)

My reading of this is that it's about learning new Rune Spells outside of the ones you get for POW sacrifice for Rune Points, where no additional cost is indicated. The sacrifice of the occasional POW will be far better for the average Orlanthi than spending 100L, plus you get more Rune Points, which is handy.

6 minutes ago, David Scott said:

Personally I believe flight is the best, it lets you fly to the holy peaks on holy days. but really they are all Weather or Air based or only useful in a fight. Thunderbolt is likely the best otherwise.

Cloud Call and Rain are other winners in an agricultural setting, although it's enough that some initiates have it.

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2 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

My reading of this is that it's about learning new Rune Spells outside of the ones you get for POW sacrifice for Rune Points, where no additional cost is indicated.

Where is that? Struggling to find it... it mentions spells being accessible at certain temples, and spells being available from associate cults, but p275 is the only place I can find where it actually says anything procedural about how to learn new spells. The others are just "when you do that thing..." clarifications.

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12 minutes ago, Thaz said:

This is an important point I think people missed. Honestly I dont think it's a major issue. Combined with David Scott's excellent point about _cost_ of spells your average Orlanthi (culture not cult) is going to have 2-5 RP and only a handful of non common spells. 

Didn't we just learn in another thread that Orlanth gets a holyday every week? Feels somewhat significant, considering the typical play area. Can't remember where, but it was somewhere over here.

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8 minutes ago, PhilHibbs said:

Where is that? Struggling to find it... it mentions spells being accessible at certain temples, and spells being available from associate cults, but p275 is the only place I can find where it actually says anything procedural about how to learn new spells. The others are just "when you do that thing..." clarifications.

pp 314-315: "An adventurer gains access to cult special or associated cult Rune spells at the same time they sacrifice POW for Rune points. For each point of POW sacrificed, the adventurer acquires the right to cast an additional cult special Rune magic spell."

1 point of POW for one more Rune Point and one new Rune Spell? Sure beats paying five up cows for just the spell knowledge!

Edited by Akhôrahil
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5 minutes ago, Grievous said:

Didn't we just learn in another thread that Orlanth gets a holyday every week? Feels somewhat significant, considering the typical play area. Can't remember where, but it was somewhere over here.

Yes, it's been noted that Orlanthi have minor holy day on Windsday.  However, that doesn't mean that there's enough of a ritual to renew your Rune points. 

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27 minutes ago, David Scott said:

Initiation on page 275 says you get 1 special rune spell, so what does an Orlanthi farmer choose for rune magic? Pick well as to get more you need to pay 100L per point (page 275) 100L is 5 cows.

Man, that is a buried rule. Thanks for the page reference David. It's not present at all (as far as I could tell) in the "Gaining Rune Magic Spells" section on pages 313-314.

@PhilHibbs p.275 relevant text:

Quote

At the gamemaster’s discretion, an initiate can gain access to the cult’s special Rune spells in return for exceptional service to the cult, by donating the equivalent of 100 L per point of the spell, or for other reasons that further the cult’s goals and standing.

 

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Just now, Crel said:

Man, that is a buried rule. Thanks for the page reference David. It's not present at all (as far as I could tell) in the "Gaining Rune Magic Spells" section on pages 313-314.

It would be very useful to have some place that collects all the stuff you can get from temples for sufficient sacrifices. Gaining a new Rune spell, gaining a POW gain roll, and so on.

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Don't cults get to join their associated cults on their Holy Days of every size? Therefore Lightbringer deities are incredibly blessed in terms of recovering rune points. I haven't gone through and filled in my calendar with them all yet but, I think between Ernalda, Issaries, and Orlanth you've got a crapton of Holy Days. With ALL the associated cults there's pretty much always some place to regain RP. 

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1 minute ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

Don't cults get to join their associated cults on their Holy Days of every size? Therefore Lightbringer deities are incredibly blessed in terms of recovering rune points. I haven't gone through and filled in my calendar with them all yet but, I think between Ernalda, Issaries, and Orlanth you've got a crapton of Holy Days. With ALL the associated cults there's pretty much always some place to regain RP. 

That is the way I understand. it.

... remember, with a TARDIS, one is never late for breakfast!

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5 minutes ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

Don't cults get to join their associated cults on their Holy Days of every size? Therefore Lightbringer deities are incredibly blessed in terms of recovering rune points. I haven't gone through and filled in my calendar with them all yet but, I think between Ernalda, Issaries, and Orlanth you've got a crapton of Holy Days. With ALL the associated cults there's pretty much always some place to regain RP. 

Only seasonal Holy Days, p. 315.

"Associated Cults: With a successful Worship roll
during an associated cult’s high or seasonal holy
day, initiates get 1D6 Rune points restored, and
God-talkers, Rune Priests, and Rune Lords get
1D6+1 Rune points replenished. With a failure,
no Rune points are restored."

Something that's easily forgotten is how extremely useful Votive Images (also p. 315) will be if you have difficulties regaining rune points for your cult through worship.

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12 minutes ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

Orlanth has 13 associated cults, 5 of them aren't detailed in the core rulebook. An orlanthi can refill some RP at least twice every week by joining Issaries and Ernalda Minor Holy Days. 

By the way, is it just me who's surprised that Mastakos counts as a full cult, and not just a sub-cult to Orlanth? 

Edited by Akhôrahil
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3 hours ago, Jon Hunter said:

If they said that, it makes no sense, breaks world internal consistency and moves away from the long help RQ principle that PC's and NPC's work from the same rules, ie monsters are people to.
It also does not match the NPC's which have been written.

2 hours ago, Akhôrahil said:

This simply isn't true. What's presented in the scenarios is that average fyrdmen, average herders (age 21+, like PCs) and average cattle raiders - that is, average Orlanthi men - have 3 Rune Points. It's remarkably consistent.

I will confess to not being an expert on the new modules, I wish to play them first, so  have not torn them apart to parse them. I am relying on what  I have read from the higher ups and they have said (yes contradicting the old canon as Jon Hunter notes) what I paraphrased; that the players are exceptional. The fora are the wrong places to start trying to prove what I have read, quite deep and quite disorganized and the rules as written give the impression that all initiates are well on the road to what was known as super hero back in the day. If the modules are showing 3 RP and  a whack of cult spells to go with (I assume), so be it. But I wish the powers that be would agree with the rules that be.

 

... remember, with a TARDIS, one is never late for breakfast!

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30 minutes ago, Bill the barbarian said:

The fora are the wrong places to start trying to prove what I have read, quite deep and quite disorganized and the rules as written give the impression that all initiates are well on the road to what was known as super hero back in the day. If the modules are showing 3 RP and  a whack of cult spells to go with (I assume), so be it. But I wish the powers that be would agree with the rules that be.

PCs have considerably higher skills and runes than the average population, and they will soon enough exceed their mere 3 starting Rune Points. So they are different from the rest in that aspect, but not really in starting Rune Points. Unless you make a 31 year old, because then you’re already ahead with your 6 Rune Points, of what the large majority will ever achieve.

Edited by Akhôrahil
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1 hour ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

Orlanth has 13 associated cults, 5 of them aren't detailed in the core rulebook. An orlanthi can refill some RP at least twice every week by joining Issaries and Ernalda Minor Holy Days. 

No. You only get rp from associated cults on seasonal and above days 

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1 hour ago, Akhôrahil said:

By the way, is it just me who's surprised that Mastakos counts as a full cult, and not just a sub-cult to Orlanth? 

Mastakos is one of the Core Rune owners (Mobility) and received a long cult-write-up in preparation for RQ3 Gods of Glorantha before that publication switched to more than twice that number of deities presented in short format, if I remember an old RQ-Daily conversation with Sandy Petersen correctly. He also receives worship by the Zaranistangi (of e.g. Melib) and by Merfolk.

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Telling how it is excessive verbis

 

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2 hours ago, Crel said:

Man, that is a buried rule. Thanks for the page reference David. It's not present at all (as far as I could tell) in the "Gaining Rune Magic Spells" section on pages 313-314.

@PhilHibbs p.275 relevant text:

That's not what I was looking for, rather any other reference to how to gain Rune Magic. 313-314 covers that, I was only looking in the Cults section.

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11 hours ago, Akhôrahil said:

First off, way more than 10% are initiates in Sartar. The conservative number is 2/3rds of adults.

However, you're right that the 100 person village likely doesn't have a priestess. They probably have a God-Talker though, or at the very least an initiated healer.  

The confusion about initiation vs. initiates seems to be very common here. Yes, "everybody" in Sartar is "initiated into" the religion of Orlanth and Ernalda--as lay members. Which does mean Universal Health Care, as the 10% of the population who actually are *initiates* into one of the cults in the pantheon all have at least one rune point, though rarely more, so there's always somebody in your village who can cast Heal Wound on you, even if there isn't an Ernalda priestess is around. And if you get sick, the priestess or god talker or if you are real lucky the Chalana Arroy initiate or even god talker comes 'round, since you are in the same pantheon as she is. That's a hell of a lot better than "Medicare for All"! And even in Sartar, getting wounded is something that happens occasionally not regularly, unless you are an adventurer, so no you don't need to put 10% of your income and time into cult obligations. Farmers who don't do that are generally more prosperous than those who do, and therefore lead happier lives.

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