Jonstown Compendium: The Children of Hykim

[Brian Duguid]

I have just published this book on Jonstown Compendium.

159 pages and just over 100,000 words on the Hsunchen totem animal peoples of Glorantha. Priced at $16.99.

This book is aimed at anyone who is interested in the Hsunchen. The Hsunchen inhabit the fringes of Gloranthan geography and include some of the most peculiar and fascinating peoples in this world. Because they mostly live far away from mainstream society they are often obscure and poorly documented, and perhaps rarely encountered in many RuneQuest games.

Twenty-one Hsunchen tribes living in the western and central parts of the continent of Genertela are described across the space of 158 pages, alongside extensive information regarding their culture, myth, technology, magic and more.

The book explains how to create a Hsunchen adventurer, gives tips on using them as adventurers or as non-player characters, ideas for high-level campaigns, and even information on Hsunchen Heroquesting!

Appendices provide the author's notes, answers to Hsunchen Q&A, a spells index, Hsunchen mega-list and more.

The tribes included are (in order of appearance): skunk, black owl, mammoth, badger, raccoon, bear, bobcat, wolverine, reindeer, yellow quill porcupine, moose, mountain goat, fallow deer, giant beaver, horse*, wolf, opossum, boar, elk, lion and puma*.

(*sure, debate if you want!).

I am hugely grateful to @Diana Probst, Kristi Jones, Robert Meyer and @M Helsdon for their art, and to various others on this forum and elsewhere who provided input or simply pointed me in the right direction. And of course to the Chaosium team for creating these opportunities for community authors and artists.

If you have any comments or corrections, feel free to send me a private message via this forum.

http://tiny.cc/TCoH

[eknarfer]

I love the book. I have only started to skim through, but I really look forward to settling in to read deeply.

I did have one thing that jumped out, and that is a mention of the "Uthri" on page 130 as a possible member of the Eleven Beast Alliance, and there is no other information on them at all. Maybe there is none. But I thought it was strange as there is so much other information, sourcing and cross referencing that really provides depth and resources, such that the lone culture group name with no other information seemed odd (e.g. it is not apparent in the Hsunchen Mega-List).

Thank you for this book. It looks amazing!

[Brian Duguid]

Just now, eknarfer said:

I did have one thing that jumped out, and that is a mention of the "Uthri" on page 130 as a possible member of the Eleven Beast Alliance, and there is no other information on them at all. Maybe there is none.

Good spot! They are mentioned in a source that I think has never been officially published. I put them in, and then took them back out; I must have missed that reference, I'll remove it in v1.1.

And thanks for the kind words 🙂

[eknarfer]

8 minutes ago, Brian Duguid said:

Good spot! They are mentioned in a source that I think has never been officially published. I put them in, and then took them back out; I must have missed that reference, I'll remove it in v1.1.

And thanks for the kind words 🙂

Happy to give back just a small bit. You have created an amazing labor of love with this book!

[eknarfer]

Brian,

Still skimming and not deep reading yet, but I did note one typo. 

Page 139, second column, at the top.

It says "The Neanderthals, or course, died out, although the reasons are not clear."

But it should be "of course" 

Best,

Evan

[Brian Duguid]

Thanks for Evan. For any further typos, feel free to pop them in a DM. I've fixed a few in the v1.1 file, and I'll fix any more when v1.2 is provided.

[Brian Duguid]

To celebrate recently reaching Copper Best Seller status, I have added bonus art content, a 13-page PDF containing the text used during art commissioning, sketches from the art development, and two of the larger illustrations at larger size so you can really appreciate the glorious detail from Kristi Jones!

The bonus content is available immediately to all previous and new purchasers.

If you have already bought and enjoyed the book - please consider leaving a star-rating and/or a review, it really makes a difference and helps the title succeed.

http://tiny.cc/TCoH

[Frp]

I'm loving the book. 

Must admit it's a bit embarrassing I never thought through some of effects the great sleep in Fronela. 

[Brian Duguid]

12 hours ago, Frp said:

I'm loving the book. 

Must admit it's a bit embarrassing I never thought through some of effects the great sleep in Fronela.

Please do add a review and/or rating! 🙂

It took me some time to "wake up" to the effects of the Rathori sleep in Fronela, and it just got more interesting once I worked out how long ago most of the Rathori alive in 1625 must have been born. Some of that came from thinking about writing a "family history" section for character creation - that never made it into the book, though, too much work given how many tribes there are.

One puzzle that remains is what happens with all the other Rathorelan tribes during the same period. They don't all have totemic animals that hibernate. Did they expand into Rathori territory? I've touched on that (suggesting a reason why the White Bear became vulnerable to Harrek), but not tried to explain too much.

[Brian Duguid]

On 7/16/2022 at 8:45 PM, eknarfer said:

You have created an amazing labor of love with this book!

A review or rating would always be appreciated. Alternatively, are you happy if I quote the above on any future publicity?

[eknarfer]

On 7/25/2022 at 8:32 AM, Brian Duguid said:

A review or rating would always be appreciated. Alternatively, are you happy if I quote the above on any future publicity?

I intend to review and rate, but I have not had enough time with the book to do a good job (sorry, too many things going on), but I would be happy if any of my first impressions strike you as helpful quotes. Feel free to use them. I meant them!

[Nick Brooke]

You can leave a five-star rating now, and write the accompanying review later, you know? This book is obviously top quality, and believe me: creators live for feedback!

[Soccercalle]

A question. I will probably buy the book some day no matter the answer. But I have bought a lot on JC the last weeks and cant buy everything. How much more information is it about Hsunchen in the Dragon Pass/Prax area? (Telmori and Basmoli)?

[Nick Brooke]

The overview takes up the first thirty pages or so, and applies to any kind of Hsunchen. There are three pages on the Basmoli (lion hsunchen, found in Prax) and three pages on the Telmori (wolf hsunchen, originating in Ralios with some migrants as far away as Sartar). So that's about 36 directly relevant pages, not counting generic advice on character creation, adventure/ campaign/ heroquest suggestions and the technical appendices. Every tribe in the book gets a half-page myth, included in the above.

[Brian Duguid]

12 hours ago, Soccercalle said:

A question. I will probably buy the book some day no matter the answer. But I have bought a lot on JC the last weeks and cant buy everything. How much more information is it about Hsunchen in the Dragon Pass/Prax area? (Telmori and Basmoli)?

I think the answer depends how canonical you want your Glorantha to be. I've included the Puma People as one group who are sufficiently divorced from location specifics that they can appear anywhere. To bring others into Dragon Pass would require some willingness to depart creatively from canon. 

Some thoughts:

There's a place in Sartar (Elkenvale) where the local clan consider themselves kin to the elk. Evidently descendants of Pralori, and a possible story hook to either bring in their Pralori cousins or to trigger a trek to Pralorela.

Sartarites more generally are descended from Heortlings, who in one of the Stafford Library books included people who could take deer form. Evidently descendants of the Damali.

The Odaylans and Yinkini are fairly transparently the semi-civilised heirs of the Rathori and Rinkoni.

I can imagine any of these having their ancestral magics reawakened by either a visit to Beast Valley, or by the events of the Dragonrise, or simply by "mysterious dreams".

Some of these, and other ideas, are mentioned in the book - but yes, the Hsunchen are not an obvious presence in Dragon Pass and the Telmori (chaotic curse) and Basmoli (no lion companions) are anomalous amongst the Hsunchen.

[Brian Duguid]

My other tip would be to look on the maps for the wild places and speculate what might be there. Away from Dragon Pass, the Hsunchen mostly live in forests and often share territory with elves. Is Tarndisi's Grove too small to accommodate a tiny clan of Opossum Folk, free from their traditional elk-folk enemies? And the forests over near Muse Roost could hide all sorts. 

Even in the real world there remain an estimated 100+ tribes of uncontacted indigenous peoples. Glorantha may have far more waiting to be discovered.