Pavis & Big Rubble Companion: The Directors' Cut Relaunch

[Agentorange]

3 hours ago, Nozbat said:

how did Greg imagine sanitation worked in a city as large as Pavis? Maybe Gloranthans don't poo?

Well, poo is commonly known as night soil. As we all know  from soil we can form Elementals. If follows therefore that there are Night Soil Elementals. These specialised Elementals move throughout the city animating the poo and moving it to places outside the city. Other cities may have cesspits and privies emptied by gongfermors but in Pavis Poo Elementals ( known as Shites ) do the job**

** one part of this may be true

Edited August 27, 2023 by Agentorange

[Martin Dick]

14 hours ago, mfbrandi said:

Sure, it is theirs — they have every right. I am not proposing an equally monolithic anti-canon: “this is how it would be, if only they had done it right.” Not that!

Did Harrison worry about whether his next Viriconium story would cohere with his last to form an intelligible timeline? He had every right to make them consistent, but he was not motivated to do it.

Is there a single “true” version of I Got Rhythm? Do we need to splice a metric ton of jazz into a single plunderphonic megaversion?

I think the difference between Glorantha and the story and the musical piece, is that Glorantha is a shared ongoing creation, while your examples are about either a single creator or a group creation that has a singular instance and which has no impact on the other pieces that they play. The single creator can vary as much as they want (and Greg did - hello Elmal, goodbye Elmal) and its their choice and in the case of stories, if they are inconsistent, then it doesn't affect anyone else and similarly for a singular musical performance, if the performers vary the perfomance, it need not have any impact on what they do the next time they play that piece.

But if you are creating material and there are many different creators and they are creating over many products over a lengthy period of time in that shared creation and many of their consumers expect that those products are broadly consistent, then a canon is a very useful tool to achieve that expectation.

Personally, I like knowing the canon, so that I can knowingly ignore/break it and because is satisfies the packrat tendency in my brain. But maybe it's not necessary? Do you have an example of a shared ongoing creation which is satisfying but where canon is not used? Maybe the Lovecraftian shared world which has long deviated in many ways from Lovecraft's initial vision?

[Malin]

3 hours ago, Martin Dick said:

Do you have an example of a shared ongoing creation which is satisfying but where canon is not used? Maybe the Lovecraftian shared world which has long deviated in many ways from Lovecraft's initial vision?

That's the only one that came to mind for me, but can it be counted as a shared world more than Dracula or Sherlock Holmes at this point? More than fairy tales or Greek myths? Or Nordic tales or the bible?

I think to count as a shared world, there must be an assumption that other tales told of that world must at least rhyme with each other. It's not a retelling or a remix but something like a giant mural painted by many hands. There is a Center of the mural everyone looks at and is inspired by as they want to make their own additions around it, but at least for me, the center is best when it is cohesive. Something people can count on when they build their own stories. If there isn't a canon, then nothing can challenge that, or be a new take, or be shocking. There is nothing that makes it Your Glorantha.

I know it might sound weird, but for me, the best thing that happened was when the "many Argraths" part was quietly retired. Why? Because that meant that there now is one Canon Argrath, which will have his campaign and stuff. And that means that I am free to ignore as much as I can about that and do my own riff on what really happened pre-cradle and eventually onwards.

Oddly enough I find it much more comfortable to break "rules" when they actually exist rather than a vague "it's up to you". Maybe it's the Eurmal in me.

Edited August 27, 2023 by Malin

[Minlister]

Hi, 

sorry, I slightly highjack the thread to ask a Big Rubble question. Is there any description somewhere of what there is on top of the Great Wall? The walkway must be very large (ca. 6 m wide?). Is it possible to walk unimpeded from, let's say the towers in Wyvern gate to the Garden? Is there something living up there? Like flocks of gargoyle? Cliff toads hunting birds? dwarven sun bathers? colonies of elven lichen?

Any inklings? 

[Joerg]

17 hours ago, Nozbat said:

I'm with you Ian.. apart from the obvious MGF with an extensive sewer system below Old Pavis.. how did Greg imagine sanitation worked in a city as large as Pavis? Maybe Gloranthans don't poo? I'm not sure I've ever seen a thread to suggest they do or don't?? I'm not sure even Orlanth could generate enough wind to waft away the smells of city living without a sewage system!!

Sewers don't necessarily transport excretions. Rainwater removal or even rainwater catchment can be the main purpose of the "sewer" system.

The Sarli district in Nochet relies on cisterns filled by rainwater. While I don't expect the streets in Sarli district to be free of excrement from roaming pigs and whatever creatures use the area for traffic, I would expect either a separate collection system for water coming from the roofs of the district (still contaminated by bird poo), or otherwise a strict "cook before use" policy in the district.

While sand filters aren't exactly rocket science, and adding a charcoal layer for additional removal of organics isn't either, I don't think that this corresponds to ancient or even Bronze Age practice anywhere on our planet. The water shown on images on these inverted pyramid step cisterns from India resembles that which I encounter in wastewater treatment ponds, definitely not potable quality.

Rainwater with rather limited contamination by excrements can be "treated" by being kept in intermediary basins for some time, ideally with some easily removed water plants taking in nutrients, with the water plants then serving as fodder or even food. While not corresponding to German tap water requirements (which are quite similar to those of mineral water), some boiling would render that potable without summoning darkness or disease spirits to the consumers' tummies. (Said boiling may provide some incentive to remove some of the animal feces from the streets, too - charcoal is expensive, and the ashes of such fires are almost as good fertilizers as the raw feces.)

Alternatively, there might be a street soil patrol of food trollkin with a handler, leaving the pavement or gravel licked clean, but where would that leave the porcine population of Sarli?

Pavis seems to have a system of wells tapping into river-level ground water seeping through the banks or bed of the Zola Fel, making rain water removal a priority over catching the flow-off. The sewer might be little more than a shallow ditch in the streets, directing the flow-off to either absorbing wells feeding the water back into the ground, using the ground as a filtration system, or into ponds serving as animal watering places and reservoirs for fire-fighting (as long as the water lasts). The same can be assumed for Old Pavis, possibly with a little "Rivers of London" twist of seasonal drainage channels possessing genii locorum.

[John Biles]

On 8/26/2023 at 3:44 PM, mfbrandi said:

Sure, it is theirs — they have every right. I am not proposing an equally monolithic anti-canon: “this is how it would be, if only they had done it right.” Not that!

Did Harrison worry about whether his next Viriconium story would cohere with his last to form an intelligible timeline? He had every right to make them consistent, but he was not motivated to do it.

Is there a single “true” version of I Got Rhythm? Do we need to splice a metric ton of jazz into a single plunderphonic megaversion?

Harrison wasn't writing his stories to be used by thousands of people in ongoing play.

The true version of I Got Rhythm does exist - it's the sheet music.  Which Jazz people then twist, fold, and mutilate, but the actual core version people riff on is there.

(Jazz is a pretty good parallel to how gamers relate to the game canon.)

 

[Nick Brooke]

1 hour ago, John Biles said:

Harrison wasn't writing his stories to be used by thousands of people in ongoing play.

Indeed. 

[Darius West]

On 2/24/2023 at 12:11 AM, Nick Brooke said:

...but of course the God Learners were professional experts at logic-chopping and bending the rules, so make of that what you will...

IRL this skill is called Casuistry.  In Glorantha it is called Illumination.

Edited August 28, 2023 by Darius West

[Ian A. Thomson]

22 hours ago, Agentorange said:

Well, poo is commonly known as night soil. 

Oh we have nightsoil carts as well back in Pavis City. Servicing the larger poorer areas that aren't connected to the sewers, plus collecting animal waste etc. And indeed maybe the main big tunnels are in fact mostly for storm drainage? As long as they exist is the main thing. Must research the Paris sewers and see what the specs are.

Edited August 28, 2023 by Ian A. Thomson

[mfbrandi]

7 hours ago, John Biles said:

The true version of I Got Rhythm does exist - it's the sheet music.

The map is not the territory.
The architect’s drawing is not the building.

And the score is not the music? Sure doesn’t sound like it.

[mfbrandi]

5 hours ago, Nick Brooke said:

7 hours ago, John Biles said:

Harrison wasn't writing his stories to be used by thousands of people in ongoing play.

Indeed. 

And we wouldn’t want Harrison to be right about us, would we?

Spoiler

Literalisation is important to both writers and readers of commercial fantasy. The apparent depth of the great fantasy inscapes — their appearance of being a whole world — is exhilarating: but that very depth creates anxiety. The revisionist wants to learn to operate in the inscape: this relieves anxiety and reasserts a sense of control over “Tolkien’s World.”

Given this, another trajectory (reflecting, of course, another invitation to consume) immediately presents itself: the relationship between fantasy and games — medieval re-enactment societies, role-play, and computer games. Games are centred on control. “Re-enactment” is essentially revision, which is essentially reassertion of control, or domestication.

— M. John Harrison, What It Might Be Like to Live in Viriconium

Abandon control. Learn to live with the anxiety.

If you open the box, you may just find yourself with a dead cat to dispose of.

[Ian A. Thomson]

I think the Praxians call Chalana Arroy the White Lady?

I believe they also had different names for Orlanth, Issaries and Humakt.

Does anyone have access to that information?

What I most need are the names that were originally given, as I am merely mentioning the differences. And any simple and basic description of how the Praxians see them differently

This is all stuff I think I recall from Drastic: Prax which I no longer have, but I could be mistaken

[metcalph]

13 minutes ago, Ian A. Thomson said:

I think the Praxians call Chalana Arroy the White Lady?

I believe they also had different names for Orlanth, Issaries and Humakt.

Does anyone have access to that information?

What I most need are the names that were originally given, as I am merely mentioning the differences. And any simple and basic description of how the Praxians see them differently

This is all stuff I think I recall from Drastic: Prax which I no longer have, but I could be mistaken

That was an old style of thinking which has since been abandoned.  Chalana Arroy, Issaries, Orlanth and Humakt have always been known to the Praxians under that name.

[Ian A. Thomson]

3 minutes ago, metcalph said:

That was an old style of thinking which has since been abandoned.  Chalana Arroy, Issaries, Orlanth and Humakt have always been known to the Praxians under that name.

Thanks Peter

Yes, I thought that might be the case

But I am guilty in the new series of 'unabandoning' things that I like, and I would like to do so in this case too, so if anyone has access to that material I'd love to hear from them :)

Basically it just feels interesting to me to present a game where any Praxian Adventurers who join the campaign worship exotic and different versions of the familiar gods that reflect their Praxo-centric myths. I think it will add to the story richness. And a great illustration of this would be the different names

[jajagappa]

2 hours ago, Ian A. Thomson said:

This is all stuff I think I recall from Drastic: Prax which I no longer have, but I could be mistaken

I scanned through Drastic: Prax but I do not see an alternate names noted for Orlanth, Issaries, Humakt, or Chalana Arroy.

Shargash was the Bronze Treasure, if I remember correctly.

[Ian A. Thomson]

Chan-Rolla?

Brain tells me that was the name Praxians gave to Chalana Arroy in whatever list I can remember reading 2-+ years ago

Does that ring any bells for anyone?

[Akhôrahil]

I was always a fan of Praxians thinking of Orlanth as Little Brother and Lightning Boy. Yes, perhaps technically they're just the spirit cult equivalents, but can you imagine a Praxian in general and Storm Bull cultist in particular turning down the opportunity to refer to Orlanth as "Little Brother"?

[jajagappa]

16 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

I was always a fan of Praxians thinking of Orlanth as Little Brother and Lightning Boy.

Lightning Boy is a distinct spirit cult, so I don't think Orlanth is thought of as him. Little Brother is feasible since only the Orlanth Adventurous subcult appears in Prax.

 

[Ian A. Thomson]

40 minutes ago, jajagappa said:

Lightning Boy is a distinct spirit cult, so I don't think Orlanth is thought of as him. Little Brother is feasible since only the Orlanth Adventurous subcult appears in Prax.

Where do I find details on Little Brother? :)

[Joerg]

4 minutes ago, Ian A. Thomson said:

Where do I find details on Little Brother? 🙂

Wherever sharpened sticks and lariats are handed out.

[Akhôrahil]

53 minutes ago, jajagappa said:

Lightning Boy is a distinct spirit cult, so I don't think Orlanth is thought of as him.

I like to think of him as an aspect of Orlanth worshiped as a spirit cult, but that's starting to become mere semantics. 

[nabda]

I think there was also some material that had Rain Man as a praxian spirit cult name for Orlanth

[Runeblogger]

I think Humakt might have been known as Iron Man in Prax?

[Brian Duguid]

On 8/31/2023 at 1:26 PM, Ian A. Thomson said:

Chan-Rolla?

That appears in Nick B's post here:

 

[Ian A. Thomson]

Vol. 04 is steaming along, and its time for more RQG Stats.

As I am busily writing the scenarios and articles, am wondering if anyone is up for creating a few non-complex stats, using information from the series to create some specific NPC types?

Credit in the book of course would be forthcoming, plus my gratitude for not having to divert from the other tasks.

If you have a morning off at some point soon and are up to do a whole bunch of these, then a free copy of the next (or last if you don't have it) zine could be yours too!