Does illumination turn you to a "monster"?

[GianniVacca]

I'm not sure Illumination frees you from _everything_

The Guide to Glorantha tells us that draconic mysticism is the same as Illumination (boxed text at the bottom of page 9). I don't think we have any hard figures but I believe there are many illuminated mystics in Kralorela, yet Kralorela doesn't strike me as a society where people run amok doing whatever they want. I think illuminated Kralori still think Godunya has a higher understanding than theirs and that they still must obey or at least respect Him.

[Pheres]

1 hour ago, GianniVacca said:

I'm not sure Illumination frees you from _everything_

Now, i am thinking that perhaps the both kind of illuminations exists. One that let you become a super human, and one other that let you become a super chaotic monster!

With this idea, there could be some traps in the path of illumination!

Edited March 2, 2020 by Pheres

[GAZZA]

8 hours ago, EricW said:

God learners surely mostly were illuminates after Arkat’s empire was destroyed, they would have seen illumination as a useful tool to manage spirits of reprisal.

Huh, I always thought the God Learners were sorcerers.

[Akhôrahil]

Illumination is a kind of existentialism. You suddenly realize that all the norms and moral standards you took for granted, and believed in so automatically that you weren't even aware you did, were just social constructs without any truth content, mere empty habits. Now you have to create your own self through your own decisions. Your old life had guardrails in the form of social norms, but your new one doesn't. You're radically, ultimately free, and that is both terrifying and dangerous. 

Unsurprisingly, a lot of people start to do bad things now that they know they are free to do whatever they like and that they can get away with it.

Edited March 2, 2020 by Akhôrahil

[Akhôrahil]

19 minutes ago, Pheres said:

Now, i am thinking that perhaps the both kind of illuminations exists. One that let you become a super human, and one other that let you become a super chaotic monster!

Sometimes both.

#arkat

[davecake]

I think most of what people have said about Illumination here is pretty off the mark. Either people are extrapolating what Illumination is like from game effects, and/or making assumptions about Illumination is like from the minority that abuse its abilities. The 'Dark Side' of Illumination is a minority followed by a few. 

Illumination gives you the choice to be a monster or not.

For most, this means it gives the choice back, after you gave it away to the gods when you joined a cult. Most Gloranthans will be a monster or not based on their choice of deity - a choice they may have made as an ignorant youth, probably not really understanding all the implications, probably mostly based on social pressure, often more or less just made through historical circumstance (and gender). Zorak Zorani, for example, are clearly monsters by not only human standards, but by their own standards - they like being the monster. Sure, many cult rules are seemingly designed to enforce 'good' (or at least, socially convenient) behaviour, but most aren't designed to offer much choice about it. Its probably no coincidence that its greatest success has been in Peloria - most people in Peloria (Lodril or Earth worshippers or river folk etc, anyone but an elite group really) are told by the rules of their mythology that they will never have or deserve real power and control over their own destiny, they will always be spiritually impure, but must stick to a rigid set of rules anyway, and never move beyond their station. Illumination must seem incredibly liberating to all of those people - they might never mess with Chaos or enemy gods, just know that they have value and spiritual worth, that they don't have to stick to the rigid rules of their religion, that they can aspire to something great. To most Gloranthans, the spiritual liberation offered by Illumination is very very real (if not universally valued). 

Its hard even to consider what this is like to a modern person like us, who has never grown up with that mindset. 

Illumination isn't the same for everyone (there are differences between different paths of Illumination and different peoples experience. Illumination can also allow people to understand their inner self, learn about themselves and be less controlled by their human limitations - their biases, their emotions, their ego, their desires - but also their empathy, their conscience, etc. And some people are so used to relying on their cultural firm foundation to their worldview that when it is wrenched away, they seem insane. Some become serene zen monks, some become deranged dealers with horror and madness - and if you think those two things are clearly opposites, you should investigate things like vajrayana (Tibbettan buddhist tradition). 
 

6 hours ago, Joerg said:

It may be useless for playing RQ, but as far as I am concerned, Illumination is about experiencing the Ultimate as the source of all magic and all derived existence.

Yep. Most Gloranthans pursue mysticism and Illumination for quite similar reasons to the reasons why terrestrial people pursue mysticism. Most Gloranthans aren't in a position to really increase their personal power by joining multiple cults, including dangerous enemy ones, and it is not a big motivator. But freedom from living their whole life in fear of Chaos, freedom from living their life constrained by the own mortal weakness, freedom from the arbitrary rules of the gods - thats valuable. 

Greg was very serious about basing Gloranthan mysticism on real world mystic traditions, which he thought were of real spiritual value. He told me (long ago) to understand mysticism I should read the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, for example. I know Jeff has been reading about Vajrayana and explicitly linking it to understanding Nysalor. Greg was also serious about the Nysalor/Arkat story being a story about the moral problems arising from mystic experience - according to old stories from the time, the idea of the Dark side of Nysalor came significantly from his experiences with people in his social circle (and many other people in the Berkeley science-fiction and gaming circles, including other people involved with early RuneQuest/Glorantha) such as Walter Breen (google him if you aren't familiar), who he knew were interested in mysticism, and he thought were morally corrupt. But that does not mean Greg thought all pursuers of mysticism were corrupt. 

[davecake]

9 minutes ago, GAZZA said:

Huh, I always thought the God Learners were sorcerers.

The God Learners started as sorcerers. Some of them remained sorcerers. But the thing that made them God Learners instead of just powerful sorcerers was learning about other worlds and other forms of magic, and using that knowledge (and their impressive sorcery) to alter and invade and loot other otherworlds. Not all the God Learners used other forms of magic directly (some just heroquested into other cultures myths used sorcerous magic to pillage them, summoned spirits as if they were demons) but a lot used other magic directly (initiated to Gods, became Illuminated). Not all God Learners were the same - it was a huge empire that by the end was quite intellectually, religiously and magically diverse even within itself. 

Plenty of them were probably a bit like Illuminated Lhankor Mhy philosopher sorcerer and similar. 

[davecake]

30 minutes ago, Pheres said:

Now, i am thinking that perhaps the both kind of illuminations exists. One that let you become a super human, and one other that let you become a super chaotic monster!

And they are the same kind, just with people who made different choices. Lunars may even think you can be both. 

Or neither. Plenty of Illuminates can value for Illumination for its own sake, and think that becoming Chaotic or joining multiple weird cults or whatever are terrible life choices. 

[Akhôrahil]

3 minutes ago, davecake said:

Plenty of Illuminates can value for Illumination for its own sake, and think that becoming Chaotic or joining multiple weird cults or whatever are terrible life choices. 

It might not have been perfect wisdom to write up the effects of Illumination as a munchkin's wet dream.

Edited March 2, 2020 by Akhôrahil

[davecake]

1 minute ago, Akhôrahil said:

It might not have been perfect wisdom to write up the effects of Illumination as a munchkin's wet dream.

The temptation is very real. Just not everyone gives into it. 

Most people, when given the opportunity to 'power game', do not. Normal people don't try to become crime lords, live complex second lives of deception, commit acts of vicious cruelty for personal pleasure, and so on, regardless of the opportunity. Some do. But a minority. 

There is a good argument to be made that the bigger danger of Illumination isn't people who when they become Illuminated lose all morality and empathy and become some form of terrible monster without any form or morality. Or even the people who lose all connection to normal social expectations and conventional ideas of reality, and become more or less crazy.

The real danger could be those who remain fully connected to the real world implications of Illumination, have an ethical system that they maintain, are strongly motivated towards some seemingly moral and reasonable goal (though it might be a spiritual one) - and decide that using the abilities provided by Illumination are valid, useful, practical and ethical steps towards their major goals. Arkat, Nysalor, The Red Goddess, Argrath, probably even Sheng, etc are all this type of person in their own world view. 

 

[Eff]

2 minutes ago, davecake said:

The temptation is very real. Just not everyone gives into it. 

Most people, when given the opportunity to 'power game', do not. Normal people don't try to become crime lords, live complex second lives of deception, commit acts of vicious cruelty for personal pleasure, and so on, regardless of the opportunity. Some do. But a minority. 

There is a good argument to be made that the bigger danger of Illumination isn't people who when they become Illuminated lose all morality and empathy and become some form of terrible monster without any form or morality. Or even the people who lose all connection to normal social expectations and conventional ideas of reality, and become more or less crazy.

The real danger could be those who remain fully connected to the real world implications of Illumination, have an ethical system that they maintain, are strongly motivated towards some seemingly moral and reasonable goal (though it might be a spiritual one) - and decide that using the abilities provided by Illumination are valid, useful, practical and ethical steps towards their major goals. Arkat, Nysalor, The Red Goddess, Argrath, probably even Sheng, etc are all this type of person in their own world view. 

 

Or, to put it in straightforward, in-universe terms, the Mad Sultan of Tork has committed a handful of murders and hangs out in Dorastor, the Red Goddess destroyed an empire and sits in the middle of the Middle Air.

[Akhôrahil]

6 minutes ago, davecake said:

The real danger could be those who remain fully connected to the real world implications of Illumination, have an ethical system that they maintain, are strongly motivated towards some seemingly moral and reasonable goal (though it might be a spiritual one) - and decide that using the abilities provided by Illumination are valid, useful, practical and ethical steps towards their major goals. Arkat, Nysalor, The Red Goddess, Argrath, probably even Sheng, etc are all this type of person in their own world view. 

It certainly seems conducive to a kind of solipsistic ethics... obsessed people don't stop being obsessed, they just get more tools to further their obsession, and Illumination helps remove whatever remnants of mores might have stood in the way of it.

Edited March 2, 2020 by Akhôrahil

[GAZZA]

9 minutes ago, davecake said:

The temptation is very real. Just not everyone gives into it. 

Most people, when given the opportunity to 'power game', do not. Normal people don't try to become crime lords, live complex second lives of deception, commit acts of vicious cruelty for personal pleasure, and so on, regardless of the opportunity. Some do. But a minority.

That minority does, however, include the majority of PCs.

[Akhôrahil]

1 minute ago, GAZZA said:

That minority does, however, include the majority of PCs.

Hey, the Thanatar cult has a lot of goodies!

[Joerg]

3 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

It certainly seems conducive to a kind of solipsistic ethics... obsessed people don't stop being obsessed, they just get more tools to further their obsession, and Illumination helps remove whatever remnants of mores might have stood in the way of it.

The Lunar Way is _a_ way of Illumination, and one of its main tenets is "We All Are Us." That's quite different from other approaches, like e.g. the secrecy of the neo-Arkati sects in Ralios, or earlier Yelmic forms of Illumination. Inclusiveness and solipsism may of course be united in an Illuminate, as such quite divergent expressions of self are no longer mutually exclusive once you're illuminated.

The illuminated remain an exclusive club anyway, as their experience cannot be taught or explained, at best only enabled or guided. In that regard it remains a "secret."

[Akhôrahil]

1 minute ago, Joerg said:

Inclusiveness and solipsism may of course be united in an Illuminate

If we are all us, then you are all me.

[davecake]

9 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

It certainly seems conducive to a kind of solipsistic ethics... obsessed people don't stop being obsessed, they just get more tools to further their obsession, and Illumination helps remove whatever remnants of mores might have stood in the way of it.

People who have completely solipsistically abandoned mores and ethics tend to flame out as some form of monster. Arkat, Argrath, etc they retain a moral code of sorts, one that is even pretty consistent, and at every stage it is consistent with at least the ethical code of some group of followers (if not all their past followers). But they have the ability to find new supporters, rally people to their cause. They change the world, destroy Empires, change the ethics and mores of their new Empires to suit their new moral code. 

[GAZZA]

"We are all individuals."

- "I'm not!"

 

[davecake]

11 minutes ago, GAZZA said:

That minority does, however, include the majority of PCs.

That isn't my experience so much. 

But the people that head into the more ambiguous grey areas are more fun IMO anyway. 

The fun bits are even when they do terrible things that they feel are morally justified.

"Honestly, I only learnt how to create Thanatar heads when ordered to by my commanders in the Lunar College of Magic so that I could steal the secret knowledge of Argrath's dragon magicians so I could save the Empire and save the world"

or even better 

"Honestly, I only learnt how to create Thanatar heads when ordered to by my commanders in the Lunar College of Magic Sartar Magical Union so that I could steal the secret knowledge of Lunar chaos magicians Argrath's dragon magicians so I could destroy save the Empire and save the world"

 

[GAZZA]

3 minutes ago, davecake said:

That isn't my experience so much. 

But the people that head into the more ambiguous grey areas are more fun IMO anyway. 

The fun bits are even when they do terrible things that they feel are morally justified.

Oh don't get me wrong, I'm in favour of players power gaming - as long as it doesn't come at the expense of the roleplaying. Heroquesting is fun, after all.

[Akhôrahil]

21 minutes ago, davecake said:

People who have completely solipsistically abandoned mores and ethics tend to flame out as some form of monster. Arkat, Argrath, etc they retain a moral code of sorts, one that is even pretty consistent, and at every stage it is consistent with at least the ethical code of some group of followers (if not all their past followers). But they have the ability to find new supporters, rally people to their cause. They change the world, destroy Empires, change the ethics and mores of their new Empires to suit their new moral code. 

I have to wonder if plenty of those people aren't just sociopaths though, obsessively driven and knowing how to cynically manipulate the non-Illuminated. This is my reading of Argrath, at least. There is nothing and no-one he wouldn't sacrifice if it meant advancing his goals.

Edited March 2, 2020 by Akhôrahil

[davecake]

12 minutes ago, GAZZA said:

Oh don't get me wrong, I'm in favour of players power gaming - as long as it doesn't come at the expense of the roleplaying.

I think the idea that powergaming is always the opposite of roleplaying is not really in the spirit of Glorantha. The history of Glorantha is full of people who decided to powergame ( in the sense of finding tactics that involve interesting exploits and innovations within the known rules of the world) for perfectly understandable motivations that are very much in character and provide wild roleplaying story opportunities. Usually there  area lot of other people who are jerks for doing so, but thats just even more conflicts to provide great roleplaying opportunities. If your opportunistic Orlanthi wants to use Illumination to powergame like a mofo Lokomoko Lokomayadon, thats fine within the rules, just remember how people felt about him! 

Of course Illumination allows people to do munchkin things. Thats a feature, not a bug, in the rules - it is supposed to be tempting, and its an invitation for other people in your game to recognise what is happening and react appropriately. 

[davecake]

36 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

have to wonder if plenty of those people aren't just sociopaths though, obsessively driven and knowing how to cynically manipulate the non-Illuminated. This is my reading of Argrath, at least. There is nothing and no-one he wouldn't sacrifice if it meant advancing his goals.

I think it is too easy to diagnose individuals like Argrath (or for comparison, a terrestrial leader like Winston Churchill or even Hitler) as a sociopath etc. They are willing to do monstrous and vicious acts, and certainly there will be a degree of cynicism in how they act to manipulate people, especially people who they feel do not really understand what is at stake and what needs to be done to achieve it. But the goal is one far bigger than their personal desire, may even seem like a great sacrifice from their point of view ('I could have just stayed in my mansion with my harem, you know') and when you start to look from an appropriately big enough perspective (ie think that your acts are determining the entire future for centuries for entire continents) arguments about morality can be made that go beyond selfishness. Lack of empathy for individuals is sometimes argued to be the right attitude - compassion in the big picture is desirable, but an argument can be made that a great leader should be willing to sacrifice many lives without remorse if that sacrifice is necessary to win. 

Even traits like narcissism or megalomania have to be thought about differently in people that generally important to the lives of millions. What matters about Argrath is not so much whether he is nice to his household staff, has healthy relationships wth his family, etc as how he acts as a leader, whether he is able to achieve, and what those goals are. 

A more interesting way to think about figures like Argrath, Arkat etc, IMO, is rather than using a model of modern personality disorders etc, is to look at the idea of the  Nietszchean ubermensch. 

 

[Akhôrahil]

37 minutes ago, davecake said:

A more interesting way to think about figures like Argrath, Arkat etc, IMO, is rather than using a model of modern personality disorders etc, is to look at the idea of the  Nietszchean ubermensch. 

Oh, this definitely works (and I considered it as well). And anyone thinking himself an übermensch beyond such trivialities as good and evil is extremely likely to start doing appalling things in pursuit of his goals. (Argrath seems to think God should be dead, and is ready to arrange it personally...)

(If I would pick a side in the Hero Wars going merely by the heroes involved, Jar-eel wins on walk-over.)

Edited March 2, 2020 by Akhôrahil

[JustAnotherVingan]

3 hours ago, GAZZA said:

Oh don't get me wrong, I'm in favour of players power gaming - as long as it doesn't come at the expense of the roleplaying. Heroquesting is fun, after all.

Its up to the referee to make sure that flagrant abuse has consequences.

Even Arkat lost followers along the way and unless the character moves to new areas fairly regularly people are going to notice if someone combines membership of incompatible cults and regularly acts in a way that should bring the spirits of reprisal their way. Won't be long before the local Uroxi are pointed in their direction.