Hellmouth

[Goldennose]

SPOILERS!!

 

How have you played out The Hellmouth in RQG terms? I mean the mouthdoor to Hell, that is in both major heroquests in HQG-campaigns.

 

[Goldennose]

Is Hellmouth some sort of Magic Road? In Colymar Campaign it lead to The Great Pit, but in Three New Stars heroquest it has a choosing of left or right, and those lead to the Cauldron of Pieces or the Fields of Plenty.

 

[David Scott]

Hellmouth is literally an entrance to Hell. There's certainly more than one. Along with the Sartar Kingdom of Heroes and Eleven lights versions, there's also a Hellmouth in Stafford Library: Volume VII, Arcane Lore, Hellmouth HeroQuest.

Depending on the mouth you use and the quest, you will enter Hell in different ways.

Arcane lore portrays it as a mouth with grinding teeth that can hurt you

Sartar KoH, decribes it as an experience of horrible pain and wrenching disorientation.

11 Lights builds on the above by futher describing that you must of course die and be dismembered to get into this hell. Afterwards you are put back together again.

In RQG terms I would kill the players, and keep going until there's a TPK. That for RQ players will be upsetting, but will be a good scene setter. One of the concepts behind dismemberment is the the harder you fight back, the worse it is. So a Humakti will not fight back, and get it over with quickly. At the remembering part, i'd get their god or goddess to put them back together, restore all their hit points and carry on. Any magic used up is not replenished.

  

 

[jajagappa]

1 hour ago, David Scott said:

At the remembering part, i'd get their god or goddess to put them back together, restore all their hit points and carry on. Any magic used up is not replenished.

Of course the Trickster will offer to help you here too.  But you might not get everything back right in that case.

But beware the demon in the guise of your deity!  They want to take parts of your soul for their own use.  

[soltakss]

9 hours ago, Caras said:

How have you played out The Hellmouth in RQG terms?

For me, a Hellmouth is a literal gateway to Hell. Things can go in and things can come out.

I would love for their to be perky vampire slayers in Glorantha, living near a Hellmouth, but maybe not.

8 hours ago, Caras said:

Is Hellmouth some sort of Magic Road?

It probably is, or rather you can use a Magic Road to navigate through the Hellmouth and end up in different parts of Hell.

7 hours ago, David Scott said:

Along with the Sartar Kingdom of Heroes and Eleven lights versions, there's also a Hellmouth in Stafford Library: Volume VII, Arcane Lore, Hellmouth HeroQuest.

For me, you can perform the Hellmouth HeroQuest at a cave entrance, a pit in the ground or an underground cellar. What it would do is to make that place a temporary Hellmouth, allowing you to enter Hell from almost anywhere. That has to be a good thing, right? nothing could come out, surely? There is virtually no chance of it becoming permanent, is there?

[jajagappa]

11 minutes ago, soltakss said:

It probably is, or rather you can use a Magic Road to navigate through the Hellmouth and end up in different parts of Hell.

I tend to think of it as a Gateway, Crossing, or Threshold.  A Magic Road might lead you to there.  A Magic Road might lead you beyond there.  But this is a Threshold between two places - one of which is Hell (aka some part of the Underworld).

It generally should be a One-Way Crossing, unless you have the right powers to go the Other Way.  Such should be extremely rare, and even more difficult than the way that is "allowed".

Some Hellmouths are simply the entryways into the Underworld, and may simply require "ritual" Death.  The Six Stones crossing in Lismelder lands.  The Howling Tower within Delecti's Marsh, the Hell Crack in Pent, Dekko's Crevice in Heortland, the Tarpit/Stygian Grotto in the Shadow Plateau.  You have to get past the Guardian in most of these cases to enter - after which the way is locked/barred behind you.  The Guardian is often Humakt, but could be another God of Death (e.g. Nontraya in the Earth quests; or Zorak Zoran who might happily kill you and turn you into an undead guardian), and if not Humakt, they may have minions along.

Then there are the Hellmouths (as in 11L or SKoH) which lead from the Underworld to deeper places in Hell - effectively to the "prisons"/"dungeons" of the Underworld.  Like entering another, deeper level in Dante's Inferno.  These are terrifying places.  Metal jaws that crush and tear and destroy as you pass through.  Passages of Pure Darkness where shadows devour your substance and leave you with nothing but Fear and Nightmare.  Do you have other favorite Nightmares?  Pick one (or two!).  They may be there, or beyond.

Beyond these deeper Hellmouths are realms of Demons, Fears, etc.  They will capture and flay your soul, bind you so you cannot escape.  Getting out of these realms is not trivial and there are guardians like Monster Man (see Pavis: Gateway to Adventure) who block your exit (and keep the Demons locked in too, of course).